anchester Martyrs, they were already called--belonged to the Fenian
organization; a conspiracy which the wisest and truest patriots of
Ireland had condemned and resisted; yet men who had been prominent in
withstanding, on national grounds, that hopeless and disastrous
scheme--priests and laymen--were now amongst the foremost and the
boldest in denouncing at every peril the savage act of vengeance
perpetrated at Manchester. The Catholic clergy were the first to give
articulate expression to the national emotion. The executions took place
on Saturday; before night the telegraph had spread the news through the
island; and on the next morning, being Sunday, from a thousand altars
the sad event was announced to the assembled worshippers, and prayers
were publicly offered for the souls of the victims. When the news was
announced, a moan of sorrowful surprise burst from the congregation,
followed by the wailing and sobbing of women; and when the priest, his
own voice broken with emotion, asked all to join with him in praying the
Merciful God to grant those young victims a place beside His throne, the
assemblage with one voice responded, praying and weeping aloud!

The manner in which the national feeling was demonstrated on this
occasion was one peculiarly characteristic of a nation in which the
sentiments of religion and patriotism are so closely blended. No stormy
"indignation meetings" were held; no tumult, no violence, no cries for
vengeance arose. In all probability--nay, to a certainty--all this would
have happened, and these ebullitions of popular passion would have been
heard, had the victims not passed into eternity. But now, they were gone
where prayer alone could follow; and in the presence of this solemn fact
the religious sentiment overbore all others with the Irish people. Cries
of anger, imprecations, and threats of vengeance, could not avail the
dead; but happily religion gave a vent to the pent-up feelings of the
living. By prayer and mourning they could at once, most fitly and most
successfully, demonstrate their horror of the guilty deed, and their
sympathy with the innocent victims.

Requiem Masses forthwith were announced and celebrated in several
churches; and were attended by crowds everywhere too vast for the sacred
edifices to contain. The churches in several instances were draped with
black, and the ceremonies conducted with more than ordinary solemnity.
In every case, however, the authorities of the