SUCH Irish soldiers as had remained in England after the flight of James were mobbed, insulted, and even murdered by the unthinking multitude, so easily excited to deeds of cruelty. These men had done the English people no wrong—they had shed no English blood, and they even wore the English uniform. Many fell in savage combats with the furious mobs, but the majority fought their way to the seaports, where they, by some means, obtained shipment to Ireland, carrying with them many a bitter memory of England and her people. Many of these persecuted troops were well-trained cavalry, who afterward manifested splendid prowess at the Boyne and in other engagements. Their colonels were all members of the ancient Irish nobility, Celtic or Norman, and they were quite incapable of the crimes the credulous English mobs were taught to believe they were ready to commit at the earliest opportunity. Although the English people, in their normal condition, are a steady and courageous race, they are, when unduly excited, capable of entertaining sentiments and performing acts discreditable to them as a nation. A people so ready to resent any imposition, real or fancied, on themselves, should be a little less quick to punish others for following their example. It is not too much to say that the English, as a majority, have been made the victims of more religious and political hoaxes—imposed upon them by evil-minded knaves—than any other civilized nation. It was of the English, rather than ourselves, the great American showman, Barnum, should have said: “These people love to be humbugged!”