ordinary British politician, to realise what the prevailing colonial sentiment is on the so-called Irish Question. Roughly speaking, it may be declared that by origin the Australians are three-fourths British and one-fourth Irish. Among that fourth, however strong may be the sympathy with the Constitutional agitation in favour of Irish Home Rule, it is absolutely true that no trace exists of a section analogous to the Irish-American dynamite party, Australia has never nurtured a bloodthirsty braggart such as O'Donovan Rossa, or a journalistic firebrand like Patrick Ford, nor from her shores have ever emerged any of those subsidised assassins and murderers who have from time to time crossed the Atlantic on their barbaric crusade. Generally speaking, the Irish element in Australia, though many of its members may support the Land League and secretly sympathise with boycotting—13,000 miles away—is avowedly faithful to the British Crown and connection. In a sketch, by a Roman Catholic writer, of the late Sir John O'Shanassy (Melbourne Review July 1883), admittedly the greatest of Irish-Australian politicians, appears the following suggestive statement:—
"While he (O'Shanassy) was ill, he was waited
