"I go like an Arab of the desert," he wrote to Skelton a little later: "my hand will be against every man, and therefore every man's hand will be against me."* A belief in Ireland's wrongs was part of the American creed, like the faithlessness of Charles II.

and the tyranny of George III.

Irish Americans had enormous influence at elections, in Congress, and in the newspapers.

Released Fenians, O'Donovan Rossa among them, had been spreading what they called the light, and their own countrymen at all events believed what they said.

The American people as a whole were not unfriendly to England.