negotiations. On the 28th of April; 1794, Jackson was arrested on a
charge of high treason. He was brought to speedy trial, was found
guilty, but was not sentenced, for, on the day on which the law's award
was to have been announced to him, he contrived, before entering the
court, to swallow a dose of poison, from the effects of which he expired
in the dock. Tone, with whom Jackson was known to have been in
confidential communication, was placed by those events in a very
critical position; owing, however, to some influence which had been made
with the government on his behalf, he was permitted to exile himself to
America. As he had entered into no engagement with the government
regarding his future line of conduct, he made his expatriation the means
of forwarding, in the most effective manner, the designs he had at
heart. He left Dublin for Philadelphia on the 20th of May, 1795. One of
his first acts, after arriving, was to present to the French Minister
there resident a memorial on the state of Ireland. During the remaining
months of the year letters from his old friends came pouring in on him,
describing the brightening prospects of the cause at home, and urging
him to proceed to the French capital and impress upon the Directory the
policy of despatching at once an expedition to ensure the success of the
Irish revolutionary movement.

Tone was not the man to disregard such representations. He had at the
time a fair prospect of securing a comfortable independence in America,
but with the full concurrence of his heroic wife, who had accompanied
him across the Atlantic, he sacrificed those chances and resumed the
perilous duties of an Irish patriot. On the 1st of January, 1796, he
left New York for Paris to try what he could do as a diplomatist for the
cause of Ireland. Arrived at the French capital, he had his business
communicated to the Directory through the medium of an Irish gentleman,
named Madgett, and also by memorial, representing always that the
landing of a force of 20,000 men in Ireland, with a supply of arms for
the peasantry, would ensure the separation of Ireland from England. Not
satisfied with the slow progress he was thus achieving, he went on the
24th of February direct to the Luxemburg Palace, and sought and obtained
an interview with the War Minister, the celebrated Carnot, the
"organizer of victory." The Minister received him well, listened
attentively to his statements, discussed his project with hi