A few whose self-interest constrained their subserviency, shrugged wisely and said nothing, while several provincial journals stoutly maintained the undoubted and enduring supremacy of the great national aim over every weak expedient.
Whatever hopes may be entertained by Mr.O'Connell, his suggestions met with no sustainment and no response, save the empty echoes of an adulating press.

Among the great party to whom he appealed, not one voice was heard to suggest a practical step in the direction intimated.
The project fell, if indeed it were ever seriously entertained, leaving no memory and no regret.

The first place Mr.O'Connell afterwards appeared in a public capacity, was at the Limerick banquet, given on' the 20th of November.

His speech on that occasion contained scarcely a reference to Federalism, and both his sentiments and those of the other speakers, including John, Archbishop of Tuam, as well as the Toasts and Mottoes, were distinguished for loftiness of tone, unflinching purpose and highest enthusiasm.

But other elements were at work furtively sapping that purpose and dimming that enthusiasm.
Prominent among these was the spirit of religious dissension already under discussion, to which it is now time to recur.
At and after the period when the Roman Catholic prelates accepted the functions of administering a law insulting and obnoxious to the Catholics generally, much angry controversy prevailed.