In the course of Tuesday's debate, Mr. Trevelyan made a
quotation from a speech of Mr. Parnell's at Cincinnati in 1880, declaring it to be his object to break "the last link" between Ireland and England, the authenticity of which Mr. Parnell positively denied. On Thursday, Mr. Bagenal quoted, in a letter to the Times, the report given in the Irish World of March 6th, 1880, of Mr. Parnell's Cincinnati speech, which contained these words :—" None of us, whether we be in America, or Ireland, or wherever we may be, will be satisfied till we have destroyed the last link which keeps Ireland bound to England." The report was signed "J. W. F.," initials which Mr. Bagenal suggests to be those of Mr. J. W. Fitzgerald, the first name on the Cincinnati Committee of Reception, and the date, February 23rd, 1880, is given to "J. W. F.'s" report of the speech. Mr. Bagenal also shows that Mr. Parnell telegraphed his farewell message to Mr. Patrick Ford, the Editor of the Irish World, showing that he then regarded the Editor of that paper as one of the closest of the American friends of his movement. Does not this dispose of Mr. Parnell's challenge ?
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