The disintegration of Ireland proceeds. We noticed last week the
prominence of Mr. O'Higgins, the Free State Minister for Home Affairs. The Irregulars had evidently noticed it, too, for on Monday night they murdered his father, Dr. Thomas O'Higgins, with all that cold-blooded savagery to which they have accus- tomed their country. Meanwhile, the Free State Govern- ment had made the capture of the Irregular second-in- command, Liam Deasy, an occasion for a completely unsuccessful offer of amnesty on condition of surrender. At the same time Cardinal Logue issued his Lenten Pastoral, with an appeal to refrain from intimidation at the coming election ! Could there be a more apt comment on the helpless futility that the Roman Catholic Church of Ireland has been reduced to than that her Primate should be able only to deplore, not to condemn, the present anarchy, since he and his Church had so long condoned it when it was directed against the British ? News comes of a military offensive against the Irregulars, who are concentrated in the Arigna mountains. We can only wish, but with how little confidence, that the Free State will succeed in its task.
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