An earnest advocate of Federation, he did not see that the best way of retaining colonial loyalty was to preserve colonial independence intact.

Nevertheless Froude was a pioneer of the modern movement, still in progress, for a closer union with the scattered parts of the British Empire.

He feared that the Colonies would go if some effort were not made to retain them, and he turned over in his mind the various means of building up a federal system.

Although Canadian Federation was emphatically Canadian in its origin, and had been adopted in principle by Cardwell during the Government of Lord Russell, it was Lord Carnarvon who carried it out, and he had no warmer supporter than Froude.
Of Froude's favourite recreations at this time the best account is to be found in his two Short Studies on A Fortnight in Kerry.

From 1868 to 1870 he rented from Lord Lansdowne a place called Derreen, thirty-six miles from Killarney, and seventeen from Kenmare, where he spent the best part of the summer and autumn.