8 APRIL 1922, Page 2

The ugly temper of Mr. De Valera's followers has been

illus- strated -by further outrages. Early oa Thursday, March 30th, a Republican gang seized the Freeman's Journal office in Dublin, smashed the machines and set fire to the building, because the paper had denounced the anti-Free State section of the Republi- can Army. The freedom • of the Press is anathema, to Me: re Valera, as it is to Lenin. So, too, is freedom of speech. When 'Mr. Collins himself went to speak at Castlebar on Sunday, the Republicans blocked the reads and railways to' prevent him from getting an audience and finally ordered him off the plat- form, as the meeting was " proclaimed." Last week the Queens. town -Republicans 'went so far as to commit an act of piracy on the high. seas. They stole a tug and chased• and captured an Admiralty vessel carrying a cargo of rifles, machine-guns and munitions to Devonport. They took the vessel back into port, unloaded the arms into stolen motor-lorries and got clear away. Mr. Churchill, in giving the details to the Rouse on Monday, described the affair as a gross and dishonourable breach of the truce, which showed that the Provisional Government. had no. control over Cork.