Closely following upon the recent debate in the House of Commons on the Fenian prisoners, still held most justly in durance, come particulars from Western Australia of the escape of the half dozen jail-birds who, while they were in captivity, excited so much sympathy among Irish rebels and their abettors. Every Englishman knew that this sympathy was misplaced, and, as a matter of fact, it turns out that it was the very mildness of the captivity of the Hibernians in an Australian penal settlement which made their escape so easy.
[After telling how the rescue was effected, the "Telegraph" continued:]
So the English cruiser had to return to Freemantle as empty as it left, and the skipper of the Catalpa, who was evidently, like most Yankee mariners, an accomplished sea lawyer, sailed off in triumph, laughing at our scrupulous obedience to international law. This is a humiliating result, and it is not easy to see who most deserves blame,—the sleepy warder who allowed all the men to give him the slip and sounded no alarm in time to overtake them on their long carriage drive, or the authorities at Rockingham, who permitted the Catalpa to get outside the territorial limit before stopping her. Nor is it clear what is the next step to be taken. If the American vessel took on board the convicts in Australia, that is in British waters, we presume that we can insist on their rendition and on redress in some shape for a violation of our sovereignty. We can readily conceive what would have happened if an English vessel in the harbor of say Norfolk, Va., had received Confederate prisoners on board, and had sailed off, daring pursuit or arrest. Thus our government may be excused for being firm and peremptory in calling attention to whatever violation of law the Yankee whaler may have committed. On the other hand, there is the consideration that the enterprising skipper of the Catalpa has, without meaning it, done us a good turn; he has rid us of an expensive nuisance. The United States are welcome to any number of disloyal, turbulent, plotting conspirators, to all their silly machinations. If these are transferred to British soil, we shall know how to deal with them,—as we have shown already.
[Melbourne Argus.]
The news from Western Australia confirms the suspicion that a grave international outrage was committed in the escape of the Fenian prisoners from Freemantle. They were actually taken away while wearing the convict garb by the master of an American ship, who dispatched a boat ashore for that purpose. It is impossible to suppose that a man did not know very well what he was doing, and his proceedings are precisely as if a French boat were to run to the hill of Portland and take away as many convicts from there as could crowd into her. The imperial authorities are bound to take cognizance of the episode, and to demand a substantial redress. We shall be told, no doubt, that the escaped convicts are political refugees, and attention may be called to the fact that Communist convicts frequently arrive in Australia without the permission of their gaolers. But the attempt at a parallel will deceive no one. The Communists arrive here without any aid on our part. They build boats and take their chance, and if the Fenians had found their way to America, their case would be very different from what it is. Rochefort and his companions came over, it is true, in a British bark; but, though the complicity of the captain was suspected, it was never proved. But with the Catalpa there is evidence of a plot; there is testimony that the American master took his boat to an unsuspected spot, and that he made special exertions to ship the men. The ship was on the high seas, it is true, and outside of British jurisdiction, but the master and his boat went to the shore, and for a felonious purpose, and that constitutes the breach of the law of nations. The offense is too serious, too glaring, to be overlooked, and we presume that important communications will speedily pass between the governments of Westminster and Washington.
[Melbourne Advocate.]
The correspondence will be voluminous, but very courteous on both sides, and, after being long drawn out, it will terminate in friendly assurances; for it would never do that first cousins, bound together by common interests, and in whose hands the great destinies of the English-speaking race rest, should seriously quarrel over the fate of a half dozen unfortunate Irishmen. The Slidell and Mason business was a little more serious, and there was no quarrel over it. The cabinet of Westminster will have a strong case for Washington in this Fenian business, but Washington is not without a case against Westminster; for its demand for the unconditional extradition of an American criminal has been refused by the English government. Washington, besides, will be apt to say that these escaped Fenians were political prisoners, and though Great Britain may maintain the contrary, European opinion will be decidedly against her view of the case. Something will also be said about Communist convicts being sheltered on British soil, and after all that can be urged on each side has been said, the whole affair will taper down to an indivisible and invisible point, or, to use a more homely phrase, it will end in smoke.
THE RESCUED PRISONERS
On the 12th inst., William Foley, one of the Irish political prisoners recently confined in Western Australia, arrived in New York from Queenstown, on the steamship Wisconsin. When the news of the escape of the prisoners came last week, it was thought that Foley was among the number, but it now appears that his sentence expired last January, and he sailed from Perth, Western Australia, on the 16th of that month for London. From London he proceeded to Dublin, and after spending a fortnight there went to his home in Tipperary, but finding none of his friends there except one uncle, a very old man, he went to Cork, where he remained about ten days, when he started for New York. The following is the substance of Foley's story, given to a "New York Herald" reporter by the gentleman who received it:—