The Sun.
London, England, 1865-10-13 00:00:00

AMERICA.

rom the Times Correspondent.)
PHILADELPHIA, Sept. 29.

Had there not been an excitement in England
about the Fenians, which reflected to this side of
the Atlantic, there would not have been developed
in any part of America the least active sympathy
on the part of the 200,000 Irishmen said to be in
the American branch of the order with the move-
ments in Ireland. Heretofore the order has been
passive, limiting its revolutionary tendencies to a
few meetings, at which Irish oratory reigned in all
its florid rhetoric, or a funeral of gaudy equipages
when some " Mac" or "0" happened to die. The ex-
citement in England has caused an excitement here,
but nothing is to be at all feared by any English
garrison in Ireland. One fierce meeting in New
York, at which crowds attended, cheered, hissed,
and howled with all the fervour of the Emerald Isle,
but at which no American of any prominence ventured
to be present, and nothing wasdone that could in any
way help Ireland, is the sum total of all the Fenian
movements in America, since it was announced that
the English Government seriously feared an out-
break in Ireland. It has now been three weeks
since the news of arrests and martial law in various
parts of Ireland reached us, and every steamer has
been adding fuel to the flame one would suppose
ought to consume the hearts and enrage the minds
of an excitable people like the Fenians. But they
have done nothing, either openly or secretly. Be-
yond the meeting at New York, which resulted
merely in an expression of barren sympathy, not in
a resolve to give active aid, there has not been a
declaration of feeling from a single Fenian in the
land. The whole thing seems to have fizzled out as
soon as the first call for active operations was made.
The order is said to be preparing to help Ireland,
and to have opened a recruiting office in New York
and another office where bonds of the loan of " The
Republic of Ireland" are printed and sold ; but the
most diligent search can find neither place, and if it
could, I am sure, from the feeling of the American
Government, it would result in the suppression by
military force of every movement calculated to em-
broil America in a foreign war. If there are 200,000
Fenians in America willing and anxious to invade
and capture Ireland, they keep very quiet about it,
much more quiet than Irishmen are wont to do when
bent on matters of less moment, and the excessive
quietness of the whole order leads me to think that
nothing is contemplated by either leaders or followers
beyond the abuse of England or the expression of a
little harmless sympathy for the revolutionistsin Ire-
land. England need not fear the American
Fenians, for abuse sent 2,000 miles across the At-
lantic cannot have much venom in it.
The truth is that Fenianism meets with no sym-
pathy in America outside the pure Irish population.
The Americans do not like the Irish, for the hun-
dreds of thousands who have come to us are all of
lower classes— at the best of times very bad
specimens of the Celtic race. If the Americans did
nothing to help Juarez to drive Maximilian from
Mexico they can do no more to help the Fenians to
conquer Ireland. Of themselves the Irish compos-
ing the Fenian order in America are perfectly harm-
less. Nearly all are very poor, many came to Ame-
rica by the charity of friends, and not one in a
hundred could be induced even by patriotism to
return again to Ireland. They get no sympathy
from us, for our people are sick and tired of endless
proposals to revolutionise Ireland. The Catholic
Church is opposed to them, and thepronunciamentos
of its bishops and clergy forbidding all good Catho-
lics from joining the order have almost paralyzed it.
The Government watches the Fenians closely, and
the first attempt at violating international law will
be suppressed with a strong hand. The head centres
may talk as loud as they please, and belabour Eng-
land to their hearts' content, but they must go no
further ; and so well do the Fenians know this that
I do not believe any of the circles are even cal-
culating the amount of military preparation neces-
sary before an invasion of Ireland would be at all
practicable. If sympathy from American Fenians
will do the Irish any good they can have any amount
of it, but they need look for nothing else. 'They will
have to fight their own battles if they do fight,
for their sympathisers have very little money, and
still less of anything else calculated to fit out an
expedition to send across the seas. The Irish in.
America are by no means' united in their support of
the order, for many of them distrust it, others do
not wish to break the peace, and a vast multitude
who have been members of Fenian circles, finding
that year after year there was an endless drain on
their pockets with no tangible result, have withdrawn
from the order, and refuse any longer to take part
in Fenianism. A few master spirits make all the
noise that is heard from America ; the great majo-
rity of the 200,000—if there be that many Fenians
in the United States—are merely silent and passive
spectators of the antics of the few. It is the settled
opinion in America that the branch of the Fenians
here will do little or nothing to aid the branch in
Ireland, and that if the revolutionists place any de-
pendence on the promises of the Irish Americans
they will be most wofully deceived. There are even
grave doubts if the Fenians do possess the strength
of 200,000 men they boast of, for their circles are
all small, and if they have a very large membership
the rank and file do not attend very closely to the
duties of the order. An estimate generally thought
reliable places the number of active Fenians in Ame-
rica at 10,300, divided thus :—Chicago, 500 ; St.
Louis, 500 ; New York, 2,590 ; Cincinnati, 500 ;
Baltimore, 500 ; Cleveland, 400 ; Detroit, 400 ;
Boston, 300 ; Hartford, 250 ; Newhaven, 250 ;
Springfield,loo ; Albany, 200 ; Philadelphia, 1,000;
Pittsburg, 400 ; other places, 2,000. This is a very
small estimate, but, so far as any evidence is given
of activity in America, it must include all who can
be relied upon to take part in any revolutionary de-
signs, for 10,300 Irishmen bent on any other object
certainly would do more to attract attention than
the Fenians do. An invasion of Ireland by so small
a body certainly cannot be feared in England.
The Americans place no more dependence on the
prospects of the Fenians than they do upon the
hopes of tJuarez and his Liberal Government in
Mexico. We would rather ten times over have
Juarez possess Mexico than have the Fenians con-
quer Ireland ; but both are hopeless. If any one
has any doubt that the Liberal Government in
Mexico is gone beyond the power of redemption,
events should by this time convince him that Maxi-
milian's Empire is a success. Of late the friends of
Juarez have been sending us rose-coloured accounts
of his fortunes, but each mail as it came from Mexico
dissipated them. Even the letters written by Juarez
and Senor Romero, prophesying ultimate success,
were falsehoods. Advices which cannot be ques-
tioned represent Juarez's influence in Mexico as 9f
no moment whatever, and say the only spot he can
claim for his dominions is El Paso del Norte, on the
Rio Grande. The mercantile population of Mexico
were always in favour of Maximilian, because the
establishment of his government promised peace and
security, and the restoration of commerce to a firmer
basis than it had known for years. Senor Ortega
has been in Washington recently, casting about to
learn the prospects for having a loan taken to sus-
tain the dying Liberal cause ; but so badly was the
proposition received that he now denies that he ever
thought of proposing such a loan to the American
people. President Johnson has lately shown unmis-
takable signs of withdrawing all countenance from
Juarez. Ile has always maintained a strict neu-
trality, but now he gives evidence that if it is found
that the majority of the Mexican acquiesce in
Maximilian's government his Ambassador will be
received and his government recognised. The Libe-
rals can hope for no aid from the United States. It
was generally believed at Vera Cruz and Matamoras
at the date of our last advices from there that an
expedition to assist the Liberals was being fitted out,
at New York under the auspices of General Ortega,
but there are no more signs of a Liberal expedition
:fitting out at New York than there are of a Fenian
(foray preparing there to invade Ireland. The
agents both of Maximilian and Juarez in New York
den y that anything of the kind is contemplated.
'1 'hat the various guerilla bands into which the
Libe rats have broken up their armies will annoy
Maxi. milian for some time to come cannot be de-
nied, :for the guerilla war that has cursed Mexico
re will not cease
for yeauntil the character of the