BOOK II
CHAPTER I
THE SECOND YOUNG IRELAND PARTY
The death of Davis followed by the maladies of Dillon and MacNevin, and absence of John O'Hagan—The original Young Ireland Party being disbanded by death and disease, I recruited a new one—M'Gee, Meagher, Mitchel and Reilly—Position of Smith O'Brien—Peel declares for Free Trade, but fails to form a Government—Lord John Russell sent for, and O'Connell promises him the help of the Irish members—Secret compact witn the Whigs—Slanders of the Pilot against the party and against Archbishop Crolly—Opinion of Frederick Lucas on the Pilot—M'Gee becomes a regular contributor to the Nation—I retire to the country to write the Great Popish Rebellion—Interrupted by visits from Frederick Lucas and Thomas Carlyle, and finally by a Government prosecution—O'Connell points out the Nation as guilty of sedition, and forbids any sympathy to be expressed with it in Conciliation Hall—John O'Hagan on the management of the Nation in my absence—"The Railway Article"—My justification of it—Letter from Samuel Ferguson (note)—Speeches of O'Brien and Grattan—I am called to the Bar.
Troubles, says the German proverb, come not singly but in flocks, and when I returned from the graves of my wife and my friend to the editor's room I found a formidable flock on the wing. Up to the day of Davis's death he had been assailed in the journals which Mr. John O'Connell could inspire, and in the gossip of malicious enemies, and not infrequently of honest simpletons, who believed whatever they were told. I could not, from the warnings that reached me, doubt that an attempt would be made to silence the Young Irelanders, and if that proved impracticable to destroy the Nation. I found friends full of sympathy, some of them ready to attempt a little amateur journalism to secure me a few tranquil hours, but the men who had made the Nation a great power and a trusted coun-
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