The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1866-03-07
WEDNESDAY, MARCH Z, 1865.
The Feninn nIeetina.

The Fenian Meeting.
THE Fenian Brotherhood had a grand meeting
in front of the State House last evening. There
was great deal Of enthusiasm, of course, as
there always is in q pronis.uouS crowd of
people who are excited by music and torches
and banners, and noisy declarations about
liberty, and all that O'MAuoNY was on
hand, and made speech full Of warm invoca-
tion to the Irish in America 20 come forward
with their money in defense of Irish ma
tionality; and by way Of enforcing his appeal,
he declared that there were three hundred
thousand Irishmen in Ireland fully organized
armed and equipped for the fray. Some other
speaker, however, put the number much
lower; and in view of these contradictory
statements it is hard to ascertain what the
truth is.
The first orator on the occasion, however,
who took precedence even of O'MAHoNY, was
Mr.. GEORGE FRANCIS TRAIN, whose utter
ances are always full of sound and fury.
GEORGE was, as usual, very much down on
Great Britain, and pitched into her Govern
ment and people. GEORGE FRANCIS, in one
of his widest flights of fancy, exclaimed,
"England is dying-let her del" and a
little while after, he expressed his belief that
the bonds of the Irish Republic were worth
more to-day than the bonds of England
This sort of romancing is not, we should
think, fitted to inspire much con6dsnce
and sympathy among rational persons in the
Fenian enterprise, though the employment
Of GEORGE FRANCIS TRAIN was en-
tirely in harmony with the gross want
of discretion with which the Fenian
engineers of the movement in this country
have generally acted. If Irlshmen here
choose, with their eyes open, to give their
money into The keeping of the O'MAHoNYs
and RoBERTsEs and SwEENEYs, and take in
exchange for it the bonds of republic
which has no existence save in the heated i'm
agination of enthusiasts, and which is not
likely to have any other, they have right to
so dispose it; yet no sincere friend of the
Irish citizens can witness without sorrow 80
worse than wasteful disposition Of treasure
that might il wisely directed and applied. be
made instrumental in doing so much for the
real prosperity, happiness, ,and independence of
We have said that, in our judgment at
least, the present effort to emancipate Ireland
cannot possibly succeed under such auspices
as now inspire and control it, And those
who, secretly knowing the desperate char
acter of the enterprise, deliberately tell the
Irish people in America that the cause is GER
tain of success, and only requires Irish money
and Irish soldiers, are guilty of great wrong,
and are, indeed, the foes and not the true
friends of the Irish race. Mr.. TRAIN
must have been well aware that he
was merely asserting huge hyperbole when
he said last night that President JOHNSON
was Head Centre OF the Fenians, and that
LOUIS NAPOLEON was another. This may
have been very rhetorical and impressive, but
it was very foolish, as was the other sugges-
ton of the same brain, to wit, that the
American people should foster the cause OF
Mr.. O'MAHoNY, STEVENS & Com
pany, by refusing to send any man to Con-
gress "who is not pledgedto Irish nationality"
In short, we are Of the opinion that the
meeting last evening was altogether an ex-
ceedingly illmanaged and, in some respects,
ridiculous affair, and that it is fitted to hurt
much more than benefit the Fenian movement.
AN ERRONEOUS STATEMENT.-Some days
ago paragraph appeared in THE EVENING
TELEGRAPH in reference to the visit of
Major-General j. A. HARDIE, Inspector
General and A. A. G., Major General d. 81.
RUCKEB, and Colonel A. I. PERRY, intimat-
ing that the object of their coming was to in
vestigate the affairs of this Department. We
are now in possession of facts unknown to us
then, that these gentlemen are here solely
upon official business, and are not charged
with any secret service. Their business is
simply to inspect the present frame buildings
at the Gray's Ferry Arsenal, and report
whether or not it would be advisable to SUBJ
stitute brick ones. AS the former statement
may have done injustice to certain gentlemen
lately connected with this military depart
ment, it gives us great pleasure to make d
proper staie ement of the facts Of the case.
AID FROM ENGLAND.-The scriptural in
junction to "cast bread upon the waters, and
il will return after many days,n is proved true