Reinhard tells De la Croix, on July 12, 1797, that while 'Lord Edward Fitzgerald and Macnevin[188] were of the moderate party, Turner was for a speedy explosion.'[189] Turner was co-operating in a very base policy, one which unscrupulous statesmen are said to have planned. During the examination of Macnevin before the Secret Committee, Lord Castlereagh confessed that 'means were taken to make the United Irish system explode.' The policy of exciting a premature explosion before Ireland had been organised peeps forth in the Report of the Secret Committee of the Irish Parliament: 'The rebellion [we are told] would not have broken out so soon as it did, had it not been for the well-timed measures adopted by Government.' Turner's policy changed according as the policy of his employers changed. In March 1798 the rebel Directory at Dublin were seized as they sat in council at Oliver Bond's. Soon after, three out of thirty-two counties rose; and to crush that partial revolt cost England twenty-two millions of pounds and twenty thousand men. FOOTNOTES: [140] _Castlereagh_, i. 282-292. [141] _Ibid._, General Index, iv. 504. [142] Further on will be seen Portland's caution to Castlereagh as to the means to be taken by the Secret Committee of the Irish Parliament in order to divert suspicion from their spy. [143] The letter, of which this is an extract, appears in the _Castlereagh Papers_ (i. 275-6). It was the interest of the spy that this letter should not be seen at the Foreign Office, Paris. It could do him no harm in the eyes of Pitt. A second intercepted letter from Reinhard states that consistently with his duties he sent Samuel Turner [of Hamburg] to General Hoche (see _Castlereagh_, i. 285). Tone mentions in his diary that Hoche one day 'seemed struck when I mentioned Hamburg, and asked me again was I going hither. "Well then," said he, "perhaps we may find something for you to do there. There is a person there whom perhaps you may see."' Tone muses, 'Who is my lover that I am to see at Hamburg, in God's name?' (_Diary_, ii. 341.) His diary is relinquished, however, just as he gets there, and his death in an Irish prison occurred soon after. [144] _English in Ireland_, iii. 278. [145] _Ibid._ iii. 284. [146] Irish Record Office. [147] Judgment Registry, Four Courts, Dublin, No. 302. [148] Tone's _Life_ (i. 128) describes how, before leaving for America in 1795, he swore to his friends who surrounded him on Cave Hill never to desist from his efforts until Ireland was free. [149] This is quite Turner's style. [150] Froude, iii. 176. The original objects of the Society of United Irishmen were parliamentary reform and Roman Catholic emancipation. [151] _Ante_, p. 25. [152] The Rev. Arthur McCartney, vicar of Belfast, stated that he had never heard of a Committee of Assassination existing in Belfast with the cognizance or sanction of the leaders of the United Irishmen. [153] Froude's _English in Ireland_, iii. 175.