The Express.
London, England, 1867-11-25 00:00:00

TIM FENIAN EXECUTIONS.

The Times devotes two articles to the above
executions and the exhibition of feeling which they have in
some quarters occasioned. To one of the writers it is •
comfort to think that these poor creatures were honestly
under the delusion that murder ceases to be murder when
it can be invested with • political colour, and that they
did but carry, as they thought, to • higher tribunal the
rights of a nation and the wrongs of seven centuries. One
would rather they died heroes, though only under
the falsest estimate and the most foolish pleas.
The author of the second article observes that resist-
ance to the course of justice is the most
heinous offence of which anyone can be guilty. It
is not like the wilful murder of one man, primarily •wrong
done to a single person, and consequentially a crime against
society ; the murder of Brett was in its very fount and
essence a crime against society, and the punishment et it,
however unwelcome to us, could not be omitted. With regard
to the demonstration yesterday in Hyde•park, the meaning

appearing with more or lees distinctness throughout it
was that of sympathy with an armed attack on the order
of our national life, and if ibis once becomes well appa-
rent It cannot be surprising if those who prefer to main-
tain our institutions es they are should take some measures
for the repression of incentives to violence against them.
The Daily Nees draws a distinction between political
crimes and crimes committed in a political cause, and from
a political motive. It is this difference which, in spite of
the repugnance of natural sentiment and sympathy, made
the execution of Allen, at least, not just only, but cape.
dient. The previous conduct of the English government
and people has shown that they were not afraid to be
merciful. The executions of Saturday prove that, when
the occasion demands it, they do not her to exact the
extreme penalty of the law. The people of Manchester
appear to have acted with great wisdom and good feeling,
and the deme►nour of the men themselves was free from
bravado, and, though not free in one ease from natural
shrinking from the impending death, religious. If there
is no reason to think that they repented, or saw the guilt
of the crime for which they died, this insensibility seems
to have sprung, not from general hardness, but from per-
verted social and political feeling.
The Post thanks the government for the determine=
they have shown to uphold the law. Nothing can be more
monstrous than the proposition that the three men who
were banged were political offenders. Still, it is clearly
held by a number of our working men. Such talk as was
heard yesterday in London shows, as the Sheffield trades•
union revelations showed, that at least a certain propor-
tion of them, when once they have formed a view, either
political or economical, consider it justifiable to use any
means, however atrocious, in order to overcome opposition
to it. Such a disposition cannot bat be fraught with the
greatest danger to society at large, and the most significant
and alarming feature of the matter is that it appears to be
gaining fresh ground every day.
In the opinion of the Standard it would have been the
merest weakness and the shallowest sentimentality to have
shrunk from executing justice on the ordinary principles
of our jurisprudence, because the phantom had been raised
of a " political scaffold."

If the Fenian leaders, the Herald says, will but learn
and utilise this lesson, it may fail to convert them into
peaceful citizens, but at least it will spare the Ministers of
the crown one of the most painful and revolting tasks
which their duty imposes upon them.
The execution at Manchester, the Telegraph declares,
wee not political. Allen, Larkin, and Gould were not
political offenders ; they were murderers ; and they have
perished because the law says that murderers shall die.
The Star, on the other band, is of opinion that Fenianism
won a great point last Saturday when it provoked us into
baptising it in blood. We must be prompt, earnest, and
generous if we would not be driven by Fenianism to the
choice of reconquering Ireland or renouncing her.

EXPEDITION.

The Times condenses from a document by Sir Henry
Durand several important observations respecting the
above expedition. Difficult, Sir Henry says, uan advance
into the country may be, it is probably the easiest part of
the business. The temporary occupation and the ultimate
withdrawal to the coast will prove the more serious part
of the enterprise. Much will depend on conciliation, much