In immense numbers these “exiles” united in more or less secret and criminal associations for the “freeing of Ireland.” At first their schemes were comparatively peaceful and their meetings open; but as time passed on, and little visible progress was made in the task of abrogating English supremacy in Ireland, the plots of the wilder zealots grew in acceptance, and the machinations of the plotters took on deadlier aspects. Not only did nine tenths of the later immigrants hasten into these various societies, but fully as great a proportion of the American-born sons of Irish refugees went with them. Whatever may have been their original intentions, such societies as the “Ancient Order of Hibernians,” the “Clan-na-Gael,” the “Emmet Clubs,” the “National Leagues,” and the like became in the end a series of widely ramifying conspiracies. In their meetings the wildest schemes of vengeance against England were planned, and bloody plots deliberately woven, not only for the commission of the most fiendish and inhuman crimes against English men and English women and children, but also aiming at the embroilment of the United States in actual war with the other great Anglo-Saxon Power. A large proportion of the most brutal crimes committed in England and Ireland during the long agitation were planned in the United States by these organizations. By far the larger part of the money with which the agitation was fomented and the crimes paid for came from contributions made in the United States, openly and without any attempt to conceal the purposes for which they were made. At the head of one of the worst of these Irish organizations was an agitator who had been driven out of Ireland on account of his persistent attempts against the Government, named Patrick O’Halloran, but more commonly known as “Patsy.” It was by this assumed addition to his name that he was best known. The gang of which he was the acknowledged leader conceived the idea of using dynamite, either in its crude form or made up into “infernal machines,” for the destruction of property and life in England. It was the natural weapon of cowards, who fancied they saw in it a means to inflict serious injury on their enemy without his being able to strike back. It was eagerly adopted by numerous Irish “patriots,” and a school of murderers and destroyers arose, calling themselves “dynamiters.” These American societies collected the necessary funds and sent emissaries to England to purchase or carry with them dynamite for use in blowing up public buildings.