Ultimately, there came the period of the "Kilmainham Treaty," and most of the political prisoners were released. The issue of "United Ireland" for March 11th did not appear as on previous occasions. I produced an issue, which I sent in charge of my son to Dublin, putting it at the disposal of Mr. O'Brien. It was not, however, published, though I received a long and interesting letter from Mr. William O'Brien—still in Kilmainham jail—expressing the appreciation of the Irish leaders for the work I had done in these words:—
We are all deeply sensible of your extraordinary energy and courage in this matter.
I am prevented from giving this letter, which explains the reasons for the stoppage of the paper, as Mr. O'Brien has endorsed it "Private and Confidential."
A few weeks later "United Ireland" appeared in its old publishing office in Abbey Street. Mr. O'Brien was set free on April 15th, Messrs. Parnell, Dillon and O'Kelly were released on May 2nd, and Michael Davitt and others soon afterwards.
CHAPTER XVIII.
PATRICK EGAN.
It will be seen that when "United Ireland" was "on the shaughraun" during the time that William O'Brien was in prison, though he was able to send communications out regularly, the direction very largely devolved upon Patrick Egan, who had taken up his quarters in Paris for that and other purposes of the Land League. I may say that I have been in frequent communication with Mr. Egan ever since, and it is but recently that I got a letter from him touching upon this matter. In making some valuable suggestions as to the contents of this book, he says, "There just occurs to me as I write, a point that you might introduce as an added feature, namely—all the leading articles that appeared in 'U.I.' during those fateful months (or almost all of them) were written by William O'Brien in Kilmainham Prison, smuggled out by the underground railroad, which ran upon regular scheduled time, and were despatched by trusty messengers to me in Paris, which messengers brought back on their return journey the matrices to which you refer for the next issue of 'United Ireland.'
"There were four messengers, in order to avoid attracting attention—two of them the Misses Stritch, whose father had been a resident magistrate in Ireland. They were fine patriotic girls, and active members of Miss Anna Parnell's Ladies' Land League. Both are now dead."