During the American Revolution a band of Irishmen were embodied to avenge, in the country of their adoption, the injuries of the country of their birth. They formed a major part of the Pennsylvania Line. They fought and bled for the United States. Many of them sealed their attachment with their lives. Their afopted country was shamefully ungrateful. The wealthy, the indolent, and the luxurious, for which they fought, were rioting in all the comfort and superfluities of life. Their defenders were literally half starved and half naked. Their shoeless feet marked with blood their tracks on the highway. They bore their grievances patiently. They at length murmured. They remonstrated. They implored a supply of the necessities of life, but in vain. A deaf ear was turned to their complaints.

They felt indignant of the cold neglect, at the ingratitude of that country for which so many of their companions in arms had expired on the crimsoned field of battle. They held arms in their hands. They had reached the boundary line beyond which forbearance and submission became meanness and pusillanimity. As appeals to the gratitude, the justice and generosity of the country had proved unavailing, they determined to try another course.

The appealed to its fears. They mutinied. They demanded with energy that redress for which they had before supplicated. It was a noble deed; I hope in all similar cases similar measures will be pursued.