began to loom up in the near future--inquiries instituted by the
government resulted in the discovery that the Catholics serving in the
army, and who constituted at least a third of its strength, were in full
sympathy with their countrymen on this question, and could not be
depended on to act against them--the ministry recognised the critical
condition of affairs, saw that there was danger in delay, yielded to the
popular demand--and Catholic Emancipation was won.

The details of that brilliant episode of Irish history cannot be told
within the limits of this work, but some of its consequences concern us
very nearly. The triumph of the constitutional struggle for Catholic
Emancipation confirmed O'Connell in the resolution he had previously
formed, to promote an agitation for a Repeal of the Union, and
encouraged him to lay the proposal before his countrymen. The forces
that had wrung the one measure of justice from an unwilling parliament
were competent, he declared, to obtain the other. He soon succeeded in
impressing his own belief on the minds of his countrymen, whose
confidence in his wisdom and his powers was unbounded. The whole country
responded to his call, and soon "the Liberator," as the emancipated
Irish Catholics loved to call him, found himself at the head of a
political organization which in its mode of action, its extent, and its
ardour was "unique in the history of the world." Every city and great
town in Ireland had its branch of the Repeal Association--every village
had its Repeal reading-room, all deriving hope and life, and taking
direction from the head-quarters in Dublin, where the great Tribune
himself "thundered and lightened" at the weekly meetings. All Ireland
echoed with his words. Newspapers, attaining thereby to a circulation
never before approached in Ireland, carried them from one extremity of
the land to the other--educating, cheering, and inspiring the hearts of
the long downtrodden people. Nothing like this had ever occurred before.