Neilson considered that the Government’s breach of faith towards him absolved him from his engagement to them—and from this time forth he threw himself, with a feverish energy his debilitated frame could ill support, into the service of the Union. According to his own statement, “he was very active in procuring that the vacancies caused by the arrest at Bond’s should be filled up, attended several committees belonging to the union, delivered some messages from Lord Edward Fitzgerald, and together with his Lordship, was stopped by a patrol near Palmerstown, and liberated after being a short time in custody, owing to the ignorance of the officer respecting our persons.” A Northern delegate reported at a provincial meeting in Belfast that Neilson “was riding almost night and day, organising the people; and scarcely any person knew where he slept.” During the time between March the 12th and Lord Edward’s arrest on May the 19th, Neilson constantly visited his Lordship at his various places of concealment. Miss Moore long afterwards told Dr. Madden that “no matter how depressed Lord Edward was, the appearance of Neilson always brightened him up.” On the day Lord Edward was arrested at Murphy’s, Neilson visited him and told him that he had seen a party of soldiers pass up the street. He dined with Lord Edward and, according to Murphy, as soon as the dinner was over hurried away, as if a sudden recollection had occurred to him, leaving the door open behind him. Through this door an hour later entered Major Sirr and his party. “Lord Edward’s arrest following so immediately Neilson’s exit, his restlessness during dinner, his ‘fidgety’ demeanour at the moment of leaving the house, and the strange circumstance of the door being found open by Major Sirr, were circumstances that caused Neilson’s conduct to be freely canvassed; and those who were in the secret of the treachery which really led to the capture of the prisoner took care to let suspicion light and rest on those whom it was thought desirable to bring into odium with their own party. Neilson and Murphy were made the scape-goats of the infamy of the memorable F. H. whose initials have finally been identified with the name of Francis Higgins, one of the worst men of the worst period of our history.” It makes our heart bleed for poor Anne Neilson and her children when we think of this terrible imputation being cast on him whose only fault was that he loved his country before all else!