The Sun.
London, England, 1867-12-23 00:00:00

FENIANISIII.

The Fenian outrage at Clerkenwell, although
fortunate in strengthening order and weakening the
power of the conspiracy, will have an injurious
effect on the relations between this country and the
United States. No person who mixes in English
society can deny that there exists a prejudice against
Americans. Among a large portion of Irishmen,

this prejudice, strong with the English, almost
amounts to a passion. Facts are mis-stated at
Fenian meetings iu New York, where a united
Ireland with a heart throbbing with patriotic pulses,
is represented as burning to throw off the hated
yoke of the Saxon. Yet the Emerald Isle is so
equally divided for and against the English con-
nection, that th)ugh difficult to predict what would
be the result of a ballot, there is no difficulty in pre-
dicting what would be the result of a fight, if all
men born in Ireland, and they only, were engaged
and left free to choose their sides. There are
some who ignorantly attribute the Fenian con-
spiracy to American hatred of England. They be-
lieve these outrages to be the acts of foreigners;
and they are supported in this opinion by the wide
publication given to such resolutions as those intro -
duced in Congress by Mr. ROBINSON, Mr. CHANDLER,
and others. The action and re-action of this feeling
keeps alive what we believe to be the most baneful
of influences. It has gone on producing its evil fruits,
and may yet end in a hideous calamity. England
thought that American syMpathy was with Russia
when the Western Powers were engaged in that
great conflict. America believed that English aid
and sympathy were given to the Southern States
during the frightful Civil War. England is
convinced that the revolt in Canada was
wholly the work of America ; and she equally
holds that the Fenian conspiracy was born and
fostered on the soil of the United States. The
people of this island regard that plot as one
against life and property—a mere band of Secret
Assassins—actuated by the vilest motives. The
conviction that even in some degree they owe to
America this organisation tends to intensify a
feeling which it is of the highest moment to
uproot, and it is deplorable that members of
Congress should give a colouring of truth to
accusations which are, in reality, devoid of foun-
dation. The native American retains little, if
any, of that prejudice we attribute to the Eng-
lish. England is regarded with esteem and even

affection. Those who consider Ireland to be au
oppressed country hold that the Irish would be jus-
tified in a revolt—that is, an open, manly appeal

to arms, when failing in obtaining redress by
political agitation. In no other part of the world
outside these islands, would such a deed as that

done in Clerkenwell be more indignantly condemned
as in America. In Mr. JOHNSON'S words, the
American people are distinguished, above all others,
for their love of liberty and of law. It is not the

lovers of law who justify an organisation like
Fenianisin, and there is an innate sense of right
implanted in American minds which leads them
to censure more quickly and strongly than other
people what they clearly see to be a wrong. Hitherto
their sympathies have been accorded to the Irish as
sufferers from English oppression ; but once con-
vinced that the English are the sufferers from a

reckless gang who falsely claim to represent Irish
wrongs, and a change will be at once effected.
gone can better appreciate such deeds than they,

for they have suffered from them themselves. The
secret combinations of the li.wless men the United
Kingdom has sent to their shores have led to count-
tess murders in New York and Pennsylvania, to a
terrorism in California, to riots between Irishmen

and Negroes, between Irishmen and Germ Ins
Irishmen and Chinese, and to that Fenian organisa-
tion destined hereafter, we fear, to prove even
more disastrous to the United States than to the
United Kingdom. It may be asked—Why should
America tolerate such an imperinin in imperil)? We
reply—lt is here working actively against society,
shy do the English tolerate it ?—And the answer is
very simple—Because they cannot help themselves.
It is, in truth, one of the charges America. brings
4gainst them. You- have misgoverned, they say,
a country so as to turn a large portion of its in-
habitants into conspirators. You ship them off in
tens of thousands to our shores, when we become
the victims of the secret machinations to which you
have constrained them to resort. Our institutions