Page:My Life in Two Hemispheres, volume 1.djvu/282

 only limited success. The most conspicuous of them stated his objections in terms which implied his rooted suspicion of a generous people who are among the most placable of mankind. "Duffy," he said to his correspondent, "is no bigot, but he must know well that he could not find ten men of his own creed in Ireland who would be as tolerant as himself. He may be enthusiast enough to believe it possible that he and his handful of allies could protect religious liberty in a Parliament of priest-selected members; but it is the dream of an enthusiast. He and his friend would be the first victims."

In my old age, when I have seen much of men, and have learned to measure probabilities with caution, I am persuaded the Protestant and propertied classes in Ireland would have made the best bargain that ever was open to them if they had frankly joined hands with the Catholic people in 1848. Though the leaders did not join us, a considerable impression was made on the middle class. A deputation from Ferguson's society was well received in Belfast and other Northern towns. In Lurgan the Tenant Protection Society adopted a petition for an Irish Parliament, and in Antrim nine-and-twenty Orangemen were expelled from their lodges for disobeying an order forbidding them to consort with Repealers, Popish or Protestant. In Dublin the Protestant operatives, led by the Rev. Thresham Gregg, only rejected by a small majority a resolution in favour of the new organisation; and from Belfast my friend Dr. M' Knight assured me that the Presbyterian Tenant-Righters of Ulster would give the Government no assistance against the Nationalists.

Lord Clarendon, the Lord- Lieutenant at this time, was a man who had spent his life in subordinate employments in Spain and Ireland, till his brother's death opened the way to a peerage. His subsequent experience lay altogether among the cautious movements of diplomacy, where men are trained to understate and minimise their intentions, and he was persuaded Mitchel would not have employed the language of menace and exasperation he used week after week unless an insurrection was ready to break out. He assumed, indeed,