The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1866-12-19

Alarm in Ireland.
No wonder there is Alarm" But it is
the British Government, as usual, which is
making the alarm. Not 4 single revou-
tionary or insurrectionary movement has
been yet attempted in that island yet
hundreds of quiet people have been ar
rested "on suspicion" and the gaols are
overflowing once more. No wonder there
is alarm, when any farmer or tradesman in
the country cannot go to bed at night with
out experimenting that before morning he
may be dragged from his family and thrust
into dungeon, either on account of the
cut of his beard, the shape of his panta-
looms, or the toes of his boots-beard, boots,
and breeches being the indications Of q
suspected person. And this month it is
precisely the same story as in the Deem
Der Of last year. Then, also, the British
Government, taking feigned alarm, pro-
ceeded to propagate genuine alarm, and
dred persons were crammed into gaol
without any charge against them whatever.
Paragraphs, it seems, Of menacing cha
racter had appeared in certain New York
papers Ia most uneXceptiOnable authority
last year, as well as this year, and certain
" organizers in excited public meetings
had said last December, as they are saying
now, that an Irish army would be fighting
her Majesty's troops on given day. But
the "alarm" on the part of the British
Government is Fictitious and feigned
one; on the part of the poor people of that
country; which has the misfortune to be
under their dominion, it is but too sincere.
And the means by which this uneasy feel
ing is propagated and intensified are as
| ingenious as they are base. For example,
last December the Viceregal Government
pretended, one Sunday morning, to have
received information that certain Fenian
conspirators had deposited barrels Of gun
powder under the payements Of the Pro-
tcstant church of upper Mount street, in
Dublin, the most fashionable church in the
city, which is every Sunday crowded with
the Irish aristocracy. Just before church
hour, anxious police officers took posses
sion Of the church, and turned back the
approaching Christians. Then there was a
delving and digging up of pavementS; and
nothing was found of course. The people
who had had such narrow escape from
being blown up were duly excited against
the bloodthirsty Feuians and there was
"alarm," and more regiments were ordered
over from England. This is only one
instance of the methods by which these
alarms are artiically excited, the motive
being to make the Protestants and higher
classes of Ireland believe that Fenianism
is a species of gunpowder plot, intended to
destroy them. BY such methods the British
Government keeps up party in Ireland
One begins to tire of these continual
"scares" in Ireland, while the country is
all the time in the most profound tranquil
lity. One uniform is found in box
| quick, another cavalry regiment from Eng
land. Two dozen rifles in package, con
signed to q gunmaker in the course OF
| trade-here is the crisis that calls for the
Coldstream guards If the English tele-
graph operators intend to goon to brighten
all the ends of the earth with these terri
BILE Irish troubles, let them at least begin
to tell us what the Irish are doing, not
what chief organizer is threatening far
away. II is tiresome to hear Of "Irish in
surrections," while nobody is hurt except
the Irish of continual alarms in that
island, while nobody is really alarmed ex-
cept the peaceful inhabitants.
And after all, the explanation of all this
tremendous alarm is easy enough. 1t is
an explanation which (being true and SIM
ple) does not suit our sensational friends
of New York and the explanation is this
The English Government, though it has no
fear at all of an insurrection, under pre-
sent circumstances. in Ireland, is really
apprehensive of such lodgment in Canada
as would constitute the Irish beNgerents,
under the precedents set by England her.
self-and once they are belligerents the
sea is covered with cruizers under their
flag. Now, to avoid this mortal risk the
British Government is going not only to
pay the whole of the Alabama claims, but
to invite the American Government to a
revision of the whole question of the neu-
trality laws. with view of modifying then,
so as to checkmate Fenianism. But to
gain the assent of Parliament and the pub
lie to such q manifest trucking to Anne
RIGA, it Is necessary to create and stimulate
an "alarm" in the moneyed classes.
Hence the military demonstrations, the
rumbling of artillery trains, and garrisons
under arms day and night.
As to the Irish people, its wrongs, its
homes and It's aspirations, the American