rumour was widely spread, and that everybody, including the authorities,
looked upon it as a joke.

The other singularity of the rising is the amazing silence in which it
was fought. Nothing spoke but the guns; and the Volunteers on the one
side and the soldiers on the other potted each other and died in
whispers; it might have been said that both sides feared the Germans
would hear them and take advantage of their preoccupation.

There is a third reason given for the rebellion, and it also is divorced
from foreign plots. It is said, and the belief in Dublin was widespread,
that the Government intended to raid the Volunteers and seize their
arms. One remembers to-day the paper which Alderman Kelly read to the
Dublin Corporation, and which purported to be State Instructions that
the Military and Police should raid the Volunteers, and seize their arms
and leaders. The Volunteers had sworn they would not permit their arms
to be taken from them. A list of the places to be raided was given, and
the news created something of a sensation in Ireland when it was
published that evening. The Press, by instruction apparently, repudiated
this document, but the Volunteers, with most of the public, believed it
to be true, and it is more than likely that the rebellion took place in
order to forestall the Government.

This is also an explanation of the rebellion, and is just as good a one
as any other. It is the explanation which I believe to be the true one.

All the talk of German invasion and the landing of German troops in
Ireland is so much nonsense in view of the fact that England is master
of the seas, and that from a week before the war down to this date she
has been the undisputed monarch of those ridges. During this war there