Major Le Caron, the spy who reported the Fenian plots
for invading Canada, and who made so dramatic an appear- ance in the witness-box during the Parnell Commission, died on Sunday of a painful internal complaint. It is stated that during the last few years he has been living in South Ken- sington, and that he was watched day and night by four detectives. That he was in imminent danger of assassination cannot be doubted, and there must have been thousands of men in America and in Ireland who would have thought it a sacred duty to kill him. Especially must this have been the case after the publication of the Memoirs in which the ex- member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood poured ridicule and contempt upon his dupes. That Major Le Caron's motives were patriotic, we do not doubt, and we are inclined to believe that he did nothing worse, from the point of view of morals, than is done by every ordinary detective. Had he acted in any way the part of an agent provocateur, the spy and those who employed him would have deserved the condemnation of all good men ; but the evidence all goes to show that he never used incitement or laid traps for innocent men. Could any- thing of the kind have been proved against Le Caron, Sir Charles Russell would have brought it home to him. As a matter of fact, however, Sir Charles's cross-examination did not shake Le Caron's credit in the very least.
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