overcome by the thoughts of their day's work. Burke and Casey are still safe in confinement. Nothing that their friends can do is now likely to deliver them from the necessity of answering for their actions at the bar of justice. The conspirators have to no purpose committed a crime which will bring down on themselves and their scheme the execration of the world. If one of them escapes, all that he will have to look back upon is the slaughter of a number of innocent people, the burning and mangling of women and helpless infants, the destruction of poor men's homes and poor men's property. Some 40 persons are dead or wounded. We know not what number will have perished by the time these lines are read; but four or five were said to be dead last night, and others were in a most precarious state. It is, indeed, heart-rending to hear of little children four and five years old torn and mangled, to find youth and age involved in a cominon destruction. It is terrible to think that there are, no doubt, still among us others planning outrages equally dastardly and deadly, and that any day may bring some disastrous news. Our first thoughts, however, must be given to those who have been the victims of this plot. The chief sufferers are in the hospitals, and of course will receive all the care that their cases require. But the destruction of property has been large, and it is probable that several families have not only to mourn the loss or disablement of a member, but will be plunged into deep distress. They have a claim on the public, for they may be said to have suffered in a public cause. They are the victims of a conspiracy which, under the names of patriotism and liberty, has declared war on the government and society of these islands. In the Irish outbreak of last March, in the attack on the prison vau at Manchester, in this traitorous enterprise at Clerkenwell, the Fenians have shown that they shrink not from bloodshed, even for a most inadequate end. Their object is now apparently to create a terror throughout the United Kingdom, and such is their unscrupulous ferocity that with a large class of the community they may so far succeed. If the country, however, can do nothing else, it can take care that those who actually suffer at the hands of these public enemies shall not want care in their sufferings and compensation for their losses. As to the Fenian conspiracy itself, it must be evident that the time is past for clemency and forbearance. With traitors and assassins such as these there can be but one course. We desire to say nothing which may aggravate the bitterness of English feeling, or increase the indignation which will burst forth to-day in every part of the land. We feel that the Fenians have filled to the full the cup of wrath, and that in dealing with them public opinion will need rather to be restrained than instigated. We would impress on our readers the duty of looking at these events with as much calmness as is consistent with human nature, of remembering that not every Irishman-nay, not even every processionist and every listener to seditious speeches-is a Fenian. The conspiracy to which these Clerkenwell assassins belong is probably directed by a few, and its active co-operators may be only some thousands in the whole kingdom. This leaven might, indeed, if left to itself, soon leaven the whole lump; and it is therefore necessary to remove it at once. But, while doing strict and stern justice on the guilty, we may separate them in our minds from the excitable and deluded. Ireland has suffered much at the hands of her self-constituted representatives, and never more than when she is made to appear before the world as the mother of assassins. It may be that this great crime will cure many who have taken the infection of Fenianism. At least let England show that, whatever may have to be done, she will allow neither fear nor anger to sway the balance of justice. ATROCIOUS FENIAN OUTRAGE. Yesterday afternoon an attempt was made to obtain the release of the Fenian prisoners Burke and Casey by blowing up with gunpowder the outer wall of the house of detention at Clerkenwell, in which they are at present confined while under remand, and it succeeded so far as to effect an enormous breach in the wall, about 60 feet wide at the top and lessening towards the ground. Unhappily, that was not the whole result. Upwards of 40 innocent people, men, women, and children of all ages, some of whom happened to be passing at the time, were injured more or less severely by this modern gunpowder plot, of whom one was killed on the spot, two have since died, and a fourth is not expected to survive the night. Thirty-six of the sufferers were removed to St. Bartholomew's Hospital, where three died in the course of the evening, and six to the Royal Free Hospital in Gray's-inn road. Three and four of the wounded were members of the same family, some were mere infants, and the husband of a woman who has since died of injuries she sustained lies in St. Bartholomew's, shockingly bruised and prostrated. Others are missing. The living, on being taken to the hospital, received the prompt and humane attentions of Mr. Holden, one of the senior surgeons, Mr. Edward McClean, the house surgeon, and, indeed, of the whole medical staff. The treasurer (Mr. Foster White) was also conspicuous for the aid he rendered in promoting the comfort of the poor sufferers. ́ The explosion, which sounded like a discharge of artillery, occurred at exactly a quarter to 4 o'clock in the afternoon, when there is still daylight in even these short days, and was heard for miles round. In the immediate neighborhood it produced the greatest consternation, for it blew down houses and shattered the windows of others in all directions. The windows of the prison itself, of coarse glass more than a quarter of an inch thick, were to a large extent broken, and the side of the building immediately facing the outer wall in which the breach was made, and about 150 feet from it, bears the marks of the bricks which were hurled against it by the explosion. The wall surrounding the prison is about 25 feet high, 2 feet 3 inches thick at the bottom, and about 14 inches thick at the top. The scene of the explosion is Corporation Row, which runs parallel with the prison wall on its northern side, and consisted of houses three stories high, some of them let out in tenements, and others used for various manufacturing purposes. A very circumstantial account of the transaction is given by an intelligent little boy named John Abbott, 13 years of age, who happened to be an eye-witness, and who now lies at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, but happily not much injured. The boy lived with his parents at 5 Corporation lane, and we cannot, perhaps, do better than give his statement in his own words: About a quarter to 4 o'clock, he says, he was standing at Mr. Young's door, No. 5, when he saw a large barrel close to the wall of the prison, and a man leave the barrel and cross the road. Shortly afterwards the man returned with a long squib in each hand. One of these he gave to some boys who were playing in the street, and the other he thrust into the barrel. One of the boys was smoking, and he handed the man a light, which the man applied to the squib. The man staid a short time, until he saw the squib begin to burn, and then he ran away. A policeman ran after him, and when the policeman arrived opposite No. 5 "the thing went off." The boy saw no more after that, as he himself was covered with bricks and mortar. The man, he says, was dressed something like a gentleman. He had on a brown overcoat and black hat, and had light hair and whiskers. He should know him again if he saw him. There was a white cloth over the barrel, which was black, and when the man returned with the squib he partly uncovered the barrel, but did not wholly remove the cloth. There were several men and women in the street at the time, and children playing. Three little boys were standing near the barrel all the time. Some of the people ran after the man who lighted the squib. Mrs. Holder, a widow, living at 4 Corporation lane, and now in St. Bartholomew's, says, about half past 3 a man knocked at her door, and, upon her son answering, the man asked to be allowed to go to the top story of the house to be enabled to see his cousin and speak to him when exercising in the yard of the house of detention. His application was refused, and he went away. About 10 minutes afterwards the explosion occurred. It is understood that her son will be able to identify the man. Two men and a woman are now in custody charged with being implicated in the crime. One of the men gives the name of Timothy Desmond, and describes himself as 46 years of age, and a tailor by trade; the other, Jeremiah Allen, is 36, and a bootmaker. The woman, whose name is Ann Justice, is about 30 years of age. Late last night she made a determined attempt to strangle herself in a cell in which she was confined in the house of detention, but it was frustrated. She has been in the frequent habit of visiting the prisoner Casey while he has been confined there. It is understood that on Thursday evening Mr. Henry Pownall, the chairman of the county magistrates, in consequence of information he had received paid a visit to the prison, and directed the governor, Captain Codd, not to exercise the prisoners in the ordinary way yesterday either as to time or place. The wall which has been blown down inclosed a large open space in which the prisoners were accustomed to take exercise. The governor, therefore, had them exercised between 9 and 10 yesterday morning, instead of the usual time, which was between 3 and half-past 4 in the afternoon, and to this precaution it is probably owing that the diabolical attempt of yesterday was unsuccessful. The governor is also understood to have put himself in communication with the public authorities, and they had undertaken to keep a large body of the force outside the walls, perambulating the immediate neighborhood of the prison. That, we believe, was not a special precaution, for it is said to have been observed during the time the man Groves was under remand on suspicion of being concerned in the murder of the bandsman. Six warders from the house of correction were sent to the prison on Thursday to act as a night guard, but the governor, not thinking they were necessary, dispensed with their services, and called in the aid of six or eight of his own warders as an additional force during the night. Shortly before the explosion the prisoner Burke appeared very excited, and went often to the window of his cell. Three men and a woman are said to have been concerned in the explosion. A policeman, who was on special duty in plain clothes at the time, rushed forward and tried to seize one of them, but was stunned for the moment by the force of the explosion and lost his feet. On rising he secured one of the men, and the woman was apprehended shortly afterwards. One of the three men who made his escape is supposed to have been the one who fired the train; but all these are matters to be elicited and explained in evidence. In the course of yesterday a policeman on duty outside the prison had his suspicions so strongly aroused by seeing the woman Justice and a man frequently conversing together, that he communicated with one of the prison authorities, who in consequence made arrangements for giving an alarm if it should become necessary. During the day a warder on duty inside had his attention directed to a man at a window in the upper part of a house in Woodbridge street overlooking the prison yard. He went to bring another warder, and on their return the man had vanished, but was shortly afterwards seen talking to the woman Justice near the entrance to the prison, and to the man who had been seen loitering with her. The latter man wore a white apron, and had the appearance of a shoemaker; and that description applies exactly to one of the two now in custody. Later in the day the warder had his attention called to the same window in the opposite house in Woodbridge street, overlooking the prison yard, and there he saw a woman leaning out, and several men inside the room. He distinctly counted five men, but there seemed to him to be more, and they were all looking anxiously in the direction of the place where the explosion occurred almost immediately afterwards. All the houses in Corporation lane overlooking the prison yard are more or less damaged by the concussion, and two or three of them so seriously in front of the part of the wall where the breach was made that members of the fire brigade, under the direction of Captain Shaw, were pulling them down last night in anticipation of their falling by their own weight. About 500 of the metropolitan police were on duty keeping off the crowd and preserving order, and 100 of the Fusileer Guards, under the command of Colonel Moncrief, Captain Gosling, Lieutenant Moray, and Lieutenant Inigo Jones, were posted as a guard inside the prison throughout the night. Many of the county magistrates were also in attendance, including Mr. Pownall the chairman; Lord Ranelagh, Mr. Northall Laurie, Mr. Henry White, Mr. Bodkin, Mr. Fish Pownall, and Mr. Frederick Pownall, the county surveyor. The police on duty were under the command of Captain Labalmondiere, from their headquarters in Scotland yard, Throughout the whole evening great excitement prevailed in the neighborhood. The two men and the woman who have been apprehended were, until late last night, kept in the house of detention, as being the nearest to the place where they were arrested, but not being in the legal custody of the governor preparations were being made for their removal to another prison. The occasion served to bring into strong light the incalculable value of such an institution as St. Bartholomew's Hospital on a great public calamity. The poor sufferers, many of them rendered homeless for the time, were conveyed thither with as little delay as possible, and many anxious relatives crowded its doors during the evening to hear some tidings respecting them. According to Mr. Holden, the senior surgeon on duty, the effect of the concussion in most cases had been to produce a severe shock to the nervous system and great prostration. The chief injuries were about the head, including severe wounds, with fractured bones of the face in several instances. The hands of a boy about 11 years old were so frightfully wounded that all his fingers except two, and both his thumbs, had to be removed. A woman, who had sustained a severe fracture, was to all appearance on the point of death on her admission, but she rallied a little afterwards, and later in the evening her condition inspired hope. A girl named Anne Cross, eight years old, had her left knee fearfully lacerated. She was on her way home with a jug of milk for which her mother had sent her when she was injured by the explosion. In the course of the evening Mr. Foster White, the treasurer of St. Bartholomew's, forwarded a telegram to the Prince of Wales, the president of the hospital, informing his royal highness of the preparations which had been made there for the reception and treatment of the sufferers. The dead at St. Bartholomew's hospital are William Clutton, a woman named Hutchinson, (whose husband, 38, is in a very precarious state,) and a female child named Abbott, about eight years old. Her mother, Maria Abbott, is also a patient. The following are the in-patients: John Abbott, 13, No. 5 Corporation lane; two children, Charles and Martha Perry, 4 and 5 years respectively; Caleb Beckett, 23; John Harvey, 48; William Abbott, 11; William Kitchener, 55; John Walker and Thomas Wheeler; Thomas Hutchinson, 38; Ann Cross, 8; Maria Giles, 39; Margaret Mosely; Sarah Hartley, 41; Thomas Hartley, 8; and two other boys name Hartley, all of the same family; Harriet Thompson; a baby, (unclaimed';) Elizabeth Williams; Elizabeth Holder, 56; Elizabeth Hodgkinson, Maria Abbott, and a child not known; Elizabeth Thompson, Mary Ann Chittlebird, Anna Maria Abbott, another Elizabeth Thompson, 48; Mary Ann Miles, (old;) Martha Evans, 67; Ann Bennett, 67; and Mary Ann Young. At the Free Hospital, Gray's-inn lane, are Anna Maria Thompson, 4; Anna Roberts, 30; Arthur Abbott, 4, and Minnie Abbott, 4; Humphrey Evans, 66; and a boy two years and a half old, calling himself Tommy. One of the six was not expected to live. No. 2108.] Mr. Seward to Mr. Adams. Washington, December 14, 1867. SIR: Your dispatch of the 29th of November, No. 1485, has been received, I thank you for your attention in furnishing me copies of the British statutes on treason-felony. When I shall have received expected copies of the indictments of citizens of the United States who have been tried and are to be tried under these statutes, I shall have occasion to give you at large the President's views concerning the conflict which exists between the United States and Great Britain in regard to the just rights of naturalized citizens under prosecution for offenses committed in Great Britain. I have read the letter which Colonel Nagle addressed to you on the 22d November, and which you have transmitted at his request. I have been advised by the consul at Dublin that Colonel Nagle, subsequently to writing that letter, applied to the court, in the customary form of law, for an immediate trial or for his discharge from imprisonment; that the court denied the application, and that the trial stands postponed, to take place at Sligo in March next. You will take care that he be defended by proper counsel, at the expense of the United States. Her Majesty's government determines for itself upon the policy of rigorous criminal prosecution in these frequent cases, which I have had more than one occasion to say are popularly regarded in the United States as incidents of popular movements for political reform. It would be unbecoming on my part to speculate upon the effects which this policy secures in Great Britain. Charged, however, as I am with the duty of extending legal protection, under treaties and the law of nations to the citizens of the United States sojourning abroad, and with the duty also of preserving good and favorable relations between the United States and foreign countries, I have constantly thought it right to let her Majesty's government know, in every proper way, that the practice of exceptionable severity in these cases produces in the United States consequences very unfavorable to the interests of Great Britain. It was with a very clear foresight of these results that, under the President's direction, I so earnestly and so frequently urged the discharge of Colonels Nagle and Warren before their prosecution, upon a full understanding with the lamented Sir Frederick Bruce of his approval and concurrence in that proceeding. Similar motives induced the President to recommend clemency to the United States citizens recently convicted at Manchester. If I may judge from the tone of popular and legislative sentiments in the United States, the policy of these recommendations has been fully vindicated. It is my deliberate conviction that, so far as our own country is concerned, it would be an act of wisdom on the part of the British government to dismiss its prosecution against Colonel Nagle, and to discharge Colonel Warren and the prisoner Costello from penal imprisonment. You will please communicate the substance of this dispatch to Lord Stanley, and give him a copy thereof if he shall request it. I am, sir, your obedient servant, WILLIAM H. SEWARD. CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS, Esq., &c., &c., &c. No. 1499.] Mr. Adams to Mr. Seward. LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES, SIR It will doubtless be remembered by you that at the commencement of the present administration I solicited, wholly for private rea sons, to be relieved from longer service at this post. It being, however, thought at that time by the President that my continuance here for a further period was advisable on public grounds, I very cheerfully acquiesced in what could not but be construed by me to be as flattering as it was an imperative necessity. Nearly three years have since passed away, and matters have become so far simplified in the interval that I am led to the hope that the public considerations which then prevailed to prompt my stay have, in a good measure, lost their force, whilst, on the other hand, the private reasons weighing upon myself have much increased in strength. I am, therefore, encouraged once more to ask of you the favor on my behalf most respectfully to tender to the President this resignation of my place, to take effect, if consistent with his convenience, on or about the first of April next. For the uniform and steady confidence and support accorded to me during the term of my mission-among the longest in duration of those heretofore sent to this kingdom-I shall ever entertain the most grateful sentiments, as well in regard to the present as to the late President. To yourself, who have been more directly their organ of communication with me, I shall equally retain the strongest sense of my obligations for the unvarying friendliness of spirit in which my efforts to execute the duties imposed upon me have been ever both received and accepted. I have the honor, to be, sir, your obedient servant, Hon. WILLIAM H. SEWARD, CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS. Secretary of State, Washington, D. C. Mr. Adams to Mr. Seward. No. 1500.] LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES, SIR: In connection with your dispatch No. 2105, of the 2d instant, I have the honor to report the receipt from Mr. West of an official copy of the report of Colonel Warren's trial, obtained by him, under my directions, from the authorities in Ireland. I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant, Hon. WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State, Washington, D. C. Note by the Department of State. The following report having been published in pamphlet form, and it being advisable for future reference to preserve intact the paging of the same, the words "Page of report No. 1," "Page of report No. 2," &c., |