they deserved. Were such a person to be looked on as a mere private individual, charity and good nature might sug gest not a little in his excuse. An inexperienced man, new to the world, and in the honeymoon of preferment, would run no small risk of having his head turned in Ireland. The people of our island are by nature penetrating, sagacious, artful, and comic-" natio comeda est." In no country under heaven would an ass be more likely to be hoodwinked, by having his ears drawn over his eyes, and to acquire that fantastical alacrity that makes dulness disposable to the purposes of humorous malice, or interested imposture. In Ireland, a new great man could get the freedom of a science as easily as of a corporation, and become a doctor, by construction, of the whole Encyclopædia; and great allowance might be made under such circumstances for indiscretions and mistakes, as long as they related only to himself; but the moment they become public mischiefs, they lose all pretensions to excuse the very ambition of incapacity is a crime not to be forgiven; and however painful it may be to inflict, it must be remembered that mercy to the delinquent would be treason to the public.

I can the more easily understand the painfulness of the conflict between charity and duty, because at this moment I am labouring under it myself; and I feel it the more acutely, because I am confident, that the paroxysms of passion that have produced these public discussions have been bitterly repented of. I think, also, that I should not act fairly if I did not acquit my learned opponents of all share whatsoever in this prosecution-they have too much good sense to have advised it; on the contrary, I can easily suppose Mr. Attorney-General sent for to give counsel and comfort to his patient; and after hearing no very concise detail of his griefs, his resentments, and his misgivings, methinks I hear the answer that he gives, after a pause of sympathy and reflection: "No, Sir, don't proceed in such a business; you will only expose yourself to scorn in one country, and to detestation in

the other. You know you durst not try him here, where the whole kingdom would be his witness. If you should attempt to try him there, where he can have no witnesses, you will have both countries upon your back. An English jury would never find him guilty. You will only confirm the charge against yourself: and be the victim of impotent, abortive malice. If you should have any ulterior project against him, you will defeat that also; for those that might otherwise concur in the design will be shocked and ashamed of the violence and folly of such a tyrannical proceeding, and will make a merit of protecting him, and of leaving you in the lurch. What you say of your own feelings I can easily conceive. You think you have been much exposed by those letters; but then remember, my dear sir, that a man may claim the privilege of being made ridiculous or hateful by no publications but his own. Vindictive critics have their rights as well as bad authors. The thing is bad enough at best; but, if you go on, you will make it worse-it will be considered an attempt to degrade the Irish bench and the Irish bar-you' are not aware what a nest of hornets you are disturbing. One inevitable consequence you don't foresee-you will certainly create the very thing in Ireland, that you are so afraid of, a newspaper; think of that, and keep yourself quiet. And in the mean time, console yourself with reflecting, that no man is laughed at for a long time; every day will probably produce some new ridicule that must supersede him." Such, I am satisfied, was the counsel given; but I have no apprehension for my client, because it was not taken. Even if it should be his fate to be surrendered to his keepers-to be torn from his family-to have his obsequies performed by torch-light--to be carried to a foreign land, and to a strange tribunal where no witness can attest his innocence, where no voice that he ever heard can be raised in his defence, where he must stand mute, not of his own malice, but the malice of his enemies—yes, even so, I see nothing for him to fear that all-gracious Being that shields the feeble from the op

pressor, will fill his heart with hope, and confidence, and courage: his sufferings will be his armour, and his weakness will be his strength; he will find himself in the hands of a brave, a just, and a generous nation-he will find that the bright examples of her Russels and her Sydneys have not been lost to her children; they will behold him with sympathy and respect, and his persecutors with shame and abhorrence; they will feel, too, that what is then his situation, may to-morrow be their own-but their first tear will be shed for him, and the second only for themselves-their hearts will melt in his acquittal; they will convey him kindly and fondly to their shore; and he will return in triumph to his country; to the threshold of his sacred home, and to the weeping welcome of his delighted family; he will find that the darkness of a dreary and a lingering night hath at length passed away, and that joy cometh in the morning. No, my lords, I have no fear for the ultimate safety of my client, Even in these very acts of brutal violence that have been committed against him, do I hail the flattering hope of final advantage to him-and not only of final advantage to him, but of better days and more prosperous fortune for this afflicted country-that country of which I have so often abandoned all hope, and which I have been so often determined to quit for ever.

Sæpe vale dicto multa sum deindo locutus,
Et quasi discedens oscula summa dabam,
Indulgens animo, pes tardus erat.

But I am reclaimed from that infidel despair-I am satisfied that while a man is suffered to live, it is an intimation from Providence that he has some duty to discharge which it is mean and criminal to decline; had I been guilty of that ignominious flight, and gone to pine in the obscurity of some distant retreat, even in that grave I should have been haunted by those passions by which my life had been agitated

Que cura vivos eadem sequitur tellure repostos.

And, if the transactions of this day had reached me, I feel how my heart would have been agonized by the shame of the desertion; nor would my sufferings have been mitigated by a sense of the feebleness of that aid, or the smallness of that service, which I could render or withdraw. They would have been aggravated by the consciousness that, however feeble or worthless they were, I should not have dared to thieve them from my country. I have repented-I have staid-and I am at once rebuked and rewarded by the happier hopes that I now entertain. In the anxious sympathy of the public -in the anxious sympathy of my learned brethren, do I catch the happy presage of a brighter fate for Ireland. They see that within these sacred walls, the cause of liberty and of man may be pleaded with boldness, and heard with favour. I am satisfied they will never forget the great trust, of which they alone are now the remaining depositaries. While they continue to cultivate a sound and literate philosophy-a mild and tolerating christianity-and to make both the sources of a just and liberal, and constitutional jurisprudence, I see every thing for us to hope; into their hands, therefore, with the most affectionate confidence in their virtue, do I commit these precious hopes. Even I may live long enough yet to see the approaching completion, if not the perfect accomplishment, of them. Pleased shall I then resign the scene to fitter actors -pleased shall I lay down my wearied head to rest, and say, "Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation.”

5

SPEECH

OF MR. CURRAN IN DEFENCE OF LADY PAMELA FITZGERALD, AND HER INFANT CHILDREN, AT THE BAR OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS IN IRELAND.

LORD EDWARD FITZGERALD having died in prison, before trial, of the wound he received in resisting the person who apprehended him; a bill was brought into parliament to attaint him after his death. Mr. Curran was heard at the bar of the house of commons, against the bill, as counsel for the widow and infant children of that nobleman, (the eldest of whom was only four years old,) on which occasion Mr. Curran delivered the following speech.

Mr. CURRAN said, he rose in support of a petition pre sented on behalf of Lord Henry Fitzgerald, brother of the deceased Lord Edward Fitzgerald, of Pamela his widow, Edward his only son and heir, an infant of the age of four years, Pamela his eldest daughter, of the age of two years, and Lucy his youngest child, of the age of three months; against the bill of attainder then before the committee. The bill of attainder, he said, had formed the division of the subject into two parts. It asserted the fact of the late Lord Edward's treason; and, secondly, it purported to attaint him, and to vest his property in the crown. He would follow the same order. As to the first bill, he could not but remark upon the strange looseness of the allegation; the bill stated that he had, during his life, and since the first of November last, committed several acts of high treason, without stating what, or when,