The Irish standard., 1914-03-07
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peasants ear; but those intelligent
Irishmen who sought from him inter-
view and aid left him with pie-crust
promises and hollow hopes. A short
time before he had massed a grand
army right over against the English
coast, and then sailed away to Egypt,
although at the signal every pike-head
in Ireland was spelling for the fray.
Long years afterwards on his Island
rock he bitterly regretted that his
sails had not sought the Bay of Bantry
or the Shannon's mouth. Anyhow
Emmet's interviews with him reflect
more credit on the young Irish en-
thusiast than on the ambitious Euro
pean conqueror, and they display quail
tiles with which few accredit him,
namely discernment as we'll as devo-
ton. Earlier Irish emissaries had
gone down on their knees before the
French Directory. Emmett stood up
like man and asked for French as
sistance more like an American deputy
from Philadelphia than an Irish dele
gate from Dublin.
To devotion and discernment espe-
cially of the selfish aims of France
aims which he distinctly repudiated in
his dying speech-was added during
his sojourn abroad students indus
try. must pass lightly over this
period of his career for l have some
regard for your patience. I will re-
mind you that the College boy was
developing unto a military leader.
Though Napoleon hedged there was
at that time movement on foot in
France to which history has given
little regard, movement which in a
short time eliminated in General
Humbert's sailing, ostensibly for the
settlement of louisiana but in reality
for descent on Ireland. While this
plan was ripening Emmett sailed for
home with but one object in view
France or no France-to strike blow
for his country.
1t was a serious project for any
man at any time. In the abstract re-
bellion is foul, dishonoring word,
and no man should attempt the over
throw of an existing order without the
gravest causes and reasonable chances
of success. Had Emmett grave cause?
Listen to his own words on the Brit
ish government of his day: "a govern
ment which upholds its dominion by
iniquity against the Most High; which
treats a hapless people like beasts of
the field; which sets man at his
brothers throat in religions name;
which reigns amid the cries of the
widows and orphans it has made"
IF anything" remarks an English
writer who had little love for an Irish
rebel, could extend show of reason
or the color of an excuse to the in
surrectionary movement of Emmett, it
was the subsequent barbarity of the
government to every person suspected
of sympathy with his designs or the
will to aid them"
Had Emmett reasonable chances of
success? The temporary peace be-
tween England and France, known as
the treaty of Amiens, had been dis
rupted; Napoleon was on the watch
to pounce on British interests if not
on British soil; there was the collater-
al louisiana plot. But what of the
people at home? Well, Miles Brynes
was still in Wexford; Micheal Quigley
was administering the old United oath
to the men of Kildare; and Micheal
Dwyer was still untamed among the
hills of Wicklow. In Dublin
Emmet's chosen arena-the Union
had not yet time to play havoc with
Irish industries, and a large artisan
population would be sure to furnish
fuel to his hand. Very few of the
gentry-unlike '98-would be willing
to join, but there was number of
humber men, like those I have men,
toned, whose influence over the low
er classes was as subtle as it was
enormous. He could appeal-he
thought and wrote on the very eve of
his attempt-"to the men of the North
where the fame of liberty once
glowed; to the men of Leinster who
six years before lost cause because
their courage was not rightly directed
by discipline; to the men of Munster
and Connaught anxious six months
before to act alone and now await
ing an opportunity"
His actual plot was to be daring and
decisive. He would not try the gauge
of battle on country hillsides like
Oulart or hedge-lined roads like Tub
berneering, but in the capital city
itself where, to use his own words,
each street becomes de6le and each
house battery,"-on Dublin Castle
the fount and origin of the ills of his
country-con6dent that with its seiz-
ure the flames of instruction would
spread and wrap the whole island in a
blaze wherein would be sure to appear
as in another burning bush, the God
like spirit of insurgent liberty.