disastrous to the Mexican Emperor Maximilian. His adventurous
temperament led him again to join the French service during the
Franco-Prussian war. He was employed on the confidential mission of
raising a force of Irishmen for the war. I have described the formation
of the company under Kirwan, which was the outcome of the Ambulance
Corps. It will be seen, too, that there were a considerable number of
Irishmen in the Foreign Legion. But, after all, these did not amount to
a number sufficient to have much appreciable result on the ultimate
fortunes of the war. The French military authorities, knowing what
splendid fighting materials Irishmen would make, commissioned O'Kelly to
raise a large force. For this purpose he made Liverpool his
headquarters, and I was pleased to see him again when he called upon me
at the office of the "Catholic Times" My sympathies were strongly with
France, and I gave him what assistance I could in furthering the object
of his mission. At my suggestion, therefore, he took up his abode at the
hotel opposite our office, at the corner of Moorfields and Dale Street.
A large number of volunteers were got from among the advanced element in
Liverpool and surrounding towns, who wanted to learn the use of arms in
real warfare--their ultimate object I need not mention. From other
quarters in Ireland as well as England there were volunteers for the
French army. I had arranged through an emigration agent, Mr. Michael
Francis Duffy, a much respected and patriotic Irishman of singular
culture, for the charter of two steamers to take the men to Havre; but
just then Paris fell, after a long siege; the war ended, and the Irish
Legion project collapsed.

In 1872 James O'Kelly turned his attention to journalism as a
profession. He got his first opening on the "New York Herald," partly
through his thorough knowledge of the military profession, but still
more by that singular tact that never failed him under the most trying