by the action of her representatives, who have fought so bitterly in this House and in the country, has created a new claim for herself upon the affection, the gratitude, the respect of the people of the Empire by the great and proud part that she has played in this great struggle.”

That was the position to which Redmond’s policy, backed by the Irishmen who supported it with their lives, of whom his brother was the outstanding representative, had brought this great issue.  The next thing which brought the name of Ireland prominently before the world was the story of action taken by other Irishmen, also at the risk of their lives, to reverse the strong current which was then carrying us forward with so hopeful augury.

FOOTNOTES: 

[Footnote 5:  Lieutenant-Colonel Maurice Moore, C.B., an officer who had served with distinction in South Africa, and whose father, George Henry Moore, had been a famous advocate in Parliament of Tenant Right and Repeal.]

[Footnote 6:  Rifles were really not available, nor competent instructors.  But the essential was recognition.  A grant towards equipment should have been given, and possibly other assistance.  We secured several thousand rifles in Belgium about this time.  For instructors, any old crippled veterans paid by Government would have conveyed the sense of recognition.]

CHAPTER VII

THE REBELLION AND ITS SEQUEL

I

The facts of the Irish rebellion are too generally familiar to need more than the briefest restatement—­and perhaps too little known for an attempt at detailed analysis.  Broadly, a general parade of the Irish Volunteers all over the country was ordered for Easter Sunday.  On the night before Good Friday a German ship with a cargo of rifles was off the Irish coast.  This ship, the Aud, was a few hours later captured and taken in convoy by a British sloop, so that the arms were never landed.  Emissaries from the Volunteers who had gone to Kerry by motor-car to receive and arrange for distributing the arms were killed in a motor accident while hurrying back to get in touch with their headquarters.  On Saturday the general parade was cancelled by order of Professor MacNeill, chief of the Volunteer organization.  On Monday, against his wish, a portion of the Volunteer force in Dublin, including the battalion specially under command of Pearse and MacDonagh, with the Citizen Army under James Connolly, paraded, scattered through the city and seized certain previously selected points, of which the most important was the Post Office.  From it as headquarters they proclaimed an Irish Republic.  Slight attempts at rising took place in county Wexford, where the town of Enniscorthy was seized, in county Galway, and in county Louth.  At Galway, at Wexford and at Drogheda the National Volunteers turned out