d, everything which had transpired
on that day, regarding the questions in dispute, should be laid aside,
binding neither party to any course of action, and reserving any
measures to be adopted, so as to apply to what might occur at the
meeting of next day. John O'Connell replied that, in his opinion the
Association was in the greatest peril, and it would be therefore
necessary to have "Yea" or "Nay" to the Peace Resolutions.

At the adjourned meeting next day, the Secretary read a letter from Mr.
Charles Gavan Duffy, the proprietor of the _Nation_ newspaper. That
journal had been charged by several members of the Association with
inciting the people to overthrow English rule in Ireland by armed force.
Mr. Duffy's letter was written to explain and defend the articles of the
_Nation_, which were said to have such a tendency. It must be admitted
that, in his earlier days of agitation, O'Connell did not seem to hold
the single-drop-of-blood theory; on the contrary, he often threatened
England, at least indirectly, with the physical strength of the Irish
millions. The Young Ireland party, in defending themselves, referred to
this, but Mr. John O'Connell explained in his speech of the previous
day, that all those allusions to physical force pointed but to a single
case in which it could be used--"the resistance of aggression, and
defence of right." The Liberator himself, in the letter quoted above,
also fully admits this one case, when he says it is to be borne in mind
that those peaceable doctrines leave untouched the right of defence
against illegal attack, or unconstitutional violence. Referring to this
admission, Mr. Duffy, in a postscript to his letter, writes--"Mr.
O'Connell says his threatening language pointed only to defensive
measures. I have not said anything else. I am not aware of any great
popular struggle for liberty that was not defensive."

Mr. John O'Connell again spoke at great length on the second day; his
speech mainly consisting in a bill of indictment against the _Nation_.
He quoted many passages from it to show that its conductors wrote up
physical force. Mr. John Mitchell, in an able speech, interrupted by
cheers, hisses, and confusion, undertook to show that O'Connell was, to
all appearance, formerly for physical force. He was accustomed, he said,
to remind his hearers that they were taller and stronger than
Englishmen, and had hinted, at successive meetings, that he had then
and there at his dispo