general agreeableness that enabled him to attract the old caretaker
at the drill-shed as he had attracted the schoolboy in the train?
As we walked back to the station, my desire to know what my friend
really was increased momentarily, but I no more dared to ask him
than I should have dared to shake hands with Queen Victoria; for,
to say the truth, Mr. Aulif, while he fascinated, awed me. He told
me that he was just going abroad, and we parted at the station
with mutual regrets.

* * * * *

The year 1867 was conspicuously a year of Fenian activity. The
termination of the Civil War in America had thrown out of employment
a great many seasoned soldiers of various nationalities, who had
served for five years in the American armies. Among these were
General Cluseret, educated at Saint-Cyr, trained by Garibaldi,
and by some good critics esteemed "the most consummate soldier of
the day." The Fenians now began to dream not merely of isolated
outrages, but of an armed rising in Ireland; and, after consultation
with the Fenian leaders in New York, Cluseret came to England with
a view to organizing the insurrection. What then befell can be
read in Lathair, where Cluseret is thinly disguised as "Captain
Bruges," and also in his own narrative, published in _Fraser's
Magazine_ for 1872. He arrived in London in January, 1867, and
startling events began to happen in quick succession. On the 11th
of February an armed party of Fenians attacked Chester Castle,
and were not repulsed without some difficulty. There was an armed
rising at Killarney. The police-barracks at Tallaght were besieged,
and at Glencullen the insurgents captured the police-force and
their weapons. At Kilmallock there was an encounter between the