Arthur Griffith to Eamon de Valera (Dublin)

A Chara,
The enclosures describe all that has happened.¹ Matters are now getting more lively.

Ulster will be a hard fight. Trade and Defence hard, though not quite so hard. Finance begins tomorrow.

The difficulties this British Cabinet has are real. They greatly exaggerate them to us for negotiating purposes, but it would be a mistake for the people at home to think there are none. The Morning Post party at home is not without power, and it is obvious that both Ll.G. and Chamberlain are a trifle afraid, not of its present power, but of its potentialities.

I received a resolution from the Mayo Co. Council to the effect that we should break off negotiations unless the prisoners were released. So the whole national fight of the past few years is sought now to be put on the basis of an amnesty movement. I suppose there is nothing more behind these resolutions but stupidity and mawkishness, but it is bad to see any section of our people getting back to resolution-mongering and seeking unwittingly to regard us as a political party, whose policy they control rather than an established Government whose policy they uphold.

P.S. I'll do what I can about D.[iarmuid] O'H[egarty]'s return.