16 FEBRUARY 1889, Page 2

The same correspondent sends us Father MacFadden's own account of

his arrest, from which it would seem that he was for some time unaware of the existence of any mob or of any violent conduct on the part of his people, and that Inspector Martin invited the violence of the peasantry by ostentatiously waving a drawn sword before any attack upon him had been made. According to this letter of Father MacFadden's, pub- lished in the Freeman's Journal of last Monday (February 11th), the crowd, so far as Father MacFadden saw it,—but he saw very few,—consisted, for some time at all events, chiefly of women. And he declares that he shouted to the

people to keep back, and waved them back with his biretta as earnestly as possible. But would he have done so if only a handful of persons, "chiefly women," had presented them- selves to his eyes ? Father MacFadden's account is in curious contrast to that given by a correspondent in another column. We cannot say that we consider Father MacFadden's account of what happened consistent even with itself. But Father MacFadden expresses with evident sincerity his horror of the murder.