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made proselytes to them; and thus it becomes evident that the allegations of the parliamentary committee, which Mr. M'Nevin stigmatises as falsehood, were well-grounded and truc. Mr. M'Nevin has another argument at hand. Tone continued to be, for some time, the confidential friend of the Roman Catholic party-an honour which he would have forfeited had he dared to attempt the propagation of his treasonable opinions. This does not appear to have been the persuasion of Tone himself. He seems to have relied on the disaffection of the Roman Catholics to the British government and nation, rather than to have dreaded their loyalty.

"To the Catholics," he writes, "I thought it unnecessary to address myself, because that, as no change could make their political situation worse, I reckoned upon their support to a certainty; besides, they had already begun to manifest a strong sense of their wrongs and oppressions; and finally, I well knew that, however it might be disguised or suppressed, there existed in the breast of every Irish Catholic an inextinguishable abhorrence of the English name and power.'

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This, it may be said, was no more than Tone's impression. It was an impression, however, on which he acted, and which was confirmed by his experience. An extract or two from his journal (space will not allow us to afford more) will suffice to show how little reason he had to be apprehensive of ultra loyalty among his Roman Catholic friends, or to fear that an open avowal of his own opinions would estrange them from him :

"1792-Nov. 18. Mr. Jerome again. Dinner with J. Plunkett of Roscommon, and J. Jos. M'Donnell of Mayo. Conversation right good. The country Catholics, I think, will stand fire. All

seem stout.

"20th Nov. Mr. O'Beirne, of county Leitrim, a sensible man. Gogt takes great pains to put him up to Catholic affairs, and does it extremely well. Gog lucky to-day; never lets an opportunity pass to convert a country delegate

Life, vol. i. p. 52.

which answers two ends: it informs them, and gives him an influence over the country gentlemen. O'Beirne says the common people are up in high spirits. Bravo! Better have the peasantry of one county than twenty members of parliament. Gog seems to-day disposed for all manner of treason and mischief-separation of the countries, &c.-a republic, &c.-is of opinion this will not end without blows; and says he, for one, is ready," &c. &c.

Our

Such was Tone's experience of the party leaders, whose confidence he enjoyed in the various parts of Ireland, and among the professors of various religious creeds. It was not in such society he was likely to be discouraged from the expression or the propagation of his extreme opinions. extracts to prove this fact, and to vindicate the truth of the parliamentary report, have been numerous, perhaps even to tediousness; but the matter to be proved seemed to us of no little importance-namely, that the leading conspirators of the last century, under the pretence of seeking constitutional reforms, contemplated the overthrow of the Constitution. It was after Tone had not only planned, but declared, his real purposes, that he was invited to assist in framing the United Society in Belfast, assisted in the formation of a similar society in Dublin, and became the confidential and the paid agent of the Roman Catholic party. Had the parliamentary committee no other ground of suspicion than this, their allegation would have been reasonable; but when the results of Tone's experience among his patrons, and clients, and co-conspirators, are taken into account, it seems impossible for an unprejudiced and reasonable man to deny that what Mr. M'Nevin pronounces a falsehood was an indisputable truth. We shall offer but one more extract in confirmation. It is Tone's account of the views and spirit of his associates in Belfast:

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↑ A name given in the diary to Mr. John Keogh, the acknowledged and leader of the Roman Catholic party.

very able

doctrine of the union of Irishmen through the whole North of Ireland; and they had the satisfaction to see their proselytes rapidly extending in all directions. In order more effectually to spread their principles, twelve of the most active and intelligent among them subscribed £250 each, in order to set on foot a paper, whose object should be to give a fair statement of all that passed in France, whither every one turned their eyes; to inculcate the necessity of union amongst Irishmen of all religious persuasions; to support the emancipation of the Catholics; and, finally, as the necessary, though not avowed, consequence of all this, to erect Ireland into a republic, independent of England. This paper,

which they styled very appositely, The Northern Star, was conducted by my friend Samuel Neilson, who was unanimously chosen editor-and it could not be delivered into abler hands. It is, in truth, a most incomparable paper, and it rose instantly on its appearance, with a most rapid and extensive sale. The Catholics everywhere through Ireland (I mean the leading Catholics) were, of course, subscribers, and the Northern Star was one great means of effectually accomplishing the union of the two great sects, by the simple process of making their mutual sentiments better known to each other."*

Dr. Madden, in his Lives of the United Irishmen, argues that Wolfe Tone's republicanism had the effect of depriving him of influence in the United Irish Society of Dublin.

"Tone's influence in the Belfast Society suffered no diminution during his stay in Ireland; but in Dublin, his republican opinions had a very different effect. With few exceptions, the leaders of the society which Tone had formed were apprehensive of being committed by his opinions. He says, "The club was scarcely formed before I lost all pretensions to any thing like influence in their measures.' "t

This extract is correct, as a fragment; but it does not convey the sense of the passage from which it has been abstracted. The loss of influence was real; but the reason for it, assigned, or insinuated rather, by Tone, is the reverse of that which

*Life, vol. i. p. 67.

Dr. M'Nevin has substituted. The passage is as follows:

"The club was scarcely formed before I lost all pretensions to any thing like influence in their measures, a circumstance which at first mortified me not a little, and perhaps, had I retained more weight in their councils, I might have prevented, as on some occasions I laboured unsuccessfully to prevent, their running into indiscretions, which gave their enemies but too great advantage over them."

Here it seems very clearly intimated that not his displays of republicanism, but his desire to prevent incautious display, deprived this daring man of influence. Such would be the natural inference, were we left without an explanation, when we called to mind that the secretary of the society was the "sincere republican," as Tone calls him, James Napper Tandy; but we are not left dependent on inferenceMr. Tone the younger, clearly declaring, in his supplemental biography,

what his father had contented himself with intimating.

"At other times, on the contrary, their enthusiasm, roused by the energetical efforts and dazzling exploits of the French Republicans, and their indignation kindled by the oppression of the government, burst out into imprudent and improvident excesses. My father endeavoured to restrain them; but the only consequence of his efforts was, that he lost all influence in the United Irish Clubs, his own creation, but who had now assumed a new spirit and organization."‡

Such was the progress made in the space of about one year by the United Irish Society. It had become impatient of disguise, and suffered its real purposes to show themselves through the thin covering of constitutional professions.

It is of much importance to bear in mind the truth which has been here established. The United Irish Society, instituted in the year 1791, was designed, even so early, to be an instrument for separating Ireland from

+ Lives of the United Irish-Second Series. Vol. I., p. 93. Life, &c., vol. i. p. 110.

Great Britain; and whatever its avowed principles and its public agencies may have been, its real purposes and designs were treasonable. Here were then two parties at issue. Government with its official functionaries and the loyal portion of the people, arrayed for the defence of the throne and the constitution: a formidable conspiracy, propagating by every artifice and effort it could employ, treasonable principles-menacing the throne -corrupting the people. The wisdom of this criminal party would naturally be to obtain a judgment on its professions; the policy of its advocates at this day is to represent these professions as its real principles. It was the part of the government which would put traitorous conspiracy down, to penetrate its specious disguises, and detect the foul purposes they covered; it is the part of those who would do justice to the memory of the parties thus fearfully at issue, and would draw wisdom from the history of their struggle, to view the defensive measures of government, not as they might act against pretences, by which treason sought to baffle them, but against purposes of deadly enmity, which they defeated and crushed.

The Roman Emperor, arming himself, in a malignity which he called mirth, with a ponderous club and sharp sword, against a band of decrepid and blind old men, who carried sponges for rocks, and wands of cork for spears, represented cruelty in one of its most intolerable and revolting aspects. The folly or pusillanimity of the government that could reverse the conditions of this malignant game, taking to itself blindness and anility-the cork and the sponge-and leaving its enemies at large, to arm themselves with deadly weapons, and to wait unmolested for the moment when they could wield them with fatal success, would be, considering all its responsibilities, no less criminal, and scarcely less odious, than that imperial monster. The Irish government was not guilty of this utter abandonment of duty towards the sovereign and his faithful subjects. Whether and how far it may have erred towards a contrary extreme, can be judged by a patient and unprejudiced reader of the state trials, who remembers, as he reads, the history of

the perils and difficulties through which they were conducted.

The trials in the volume now before us, which is brought down to the summer of July, 1797, are, for the greater part, those of United Irishmen and Defenders. The first is that of Mr. Hamilton Rowan, for a seditious libel. The circumstances of this remarkable trial are too well known and remembered to require of us a formal statement of them. Every reader is acquainted with the chivalrous character of the culprit. Into whose heart as well as memory have there not passed some splendours of that magic eloquence which illuminated his great advocate's defence? It may be said, briefly, that after the United Irish Society had been for some time acting, or aping, fraternization with France-adopting the phrases and titles in use among the revolutionary masses-assuming emblems, dresses, and decorations, which indicated disaffection towards Great Britain-meeting, and preparing to meet, in large numbers and in arms-the government felt that the time was fully come for its tardy interference. A formidable meeting was to take place on a Sunday in December, 1792. It was prevented by a proclamation issued on the preceding Saturday. The meeting thus prevented, or one of the same description, was held some few days after, and a proclamation was issued, in the distribution of which Mr. Rowan took part, calling upon the citizen-soldiers to take arms, and lavishly pouring forth those strains of eulogy, and invective, and exhortation, which use had not then deprived of much of their power to harm. Mr. Rowan was convictedwas sentenced to suffer imprisonment— conspired, even in his prison, with an embassy from France-was betrayed to the government-received warning from the informer who had divulged his secret and through the indulgence of his gaoler, escaped from prison. For our parts, we are strongly persuaded that the government connived at his escape, believing him, with all his faults, a man whose life would not have its fitting close on a scaffold. We think a passage of Mr. Rowan's own writing more creditable to him than any observations of the editor of his trial, and we shall therefore close our account with them. In the introduc

tory letter to his children, prefixed to his autobiography, he writes

"It was not my intention, nor is it now my intention, to vindicate the act which occasioned my then exiled situation; though I felt a strong self-justification, in the consciousness that if I had erred, it had been in common with some of the most virtuous and patriotic characters then in Ireland. Yet I was sensible that I had been concerned in a transaction for which the laws of my country would have not only seized on my property but taken my life; and I felt no small degree of gratitude to the existing government of the country from which I had fled, for its conduct to a beloved wife and eight children, whom I had left behind."

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The second trial is that of the Rev. William Jackson-a trial rendered fearfully memorable by its dreadful termination. Mr. Jackson's story admits of being briefly told. He appears to have mistaken his vocation in entering into holy orders, and to have paid the penalty in an unhappy life and miserable end. He is said to have been a person of engaging manners and of respectable abilities-was at one time chaplain to the Earl of Bristol-at another time secretary or literary agent for the Duchess of Kingston, in her epistolary warfare with Footeafterwards a writer of political articles, as an adventurer in London—and finally, a traitorous instrument for France, in the intrigue to which he gave his life. One generous act is recorded of him. It is said that, owing to the indulgence of his gaoler he could have escaped, and that he refused to avail himself of the opportunity, and returned to his cell and to certain death, rather than wrong the man who trusted in him. The report of the proceedings at his trial, in Mr. M'Nevin's volume, concludes thus

"A paper, of which the following is a copy, was found in the pocket of the deceased, in his own handwriting:

"Turn thee unto me and have mercy on me; for I am desolate and afflicted.

"The troubles of my heart are enlarged; O bring thou me out of my distresses!

"Look upon my affliction and my pain; and forgive all my sins!

"Consider mine enemies for they are many; and they hate me with a cruel violence!

"O keep my soul and deliver me Let me not be ashamed, for I put my trust in thee!'"

It is among these inconsistencies of the human spirit which baffle ordinary calculation or conjecture, that prayer, even of the description intimated in this extract, shall be compatible with a purpose so dreadful as that which unhappy Jackson entertained. The reader is probably acquainted with the graphic and affecting account of his death, as given by Mr. Curran ; but it is scarcely possible that the harrowing effect of the passionless, routine notices of the circumstances of this mournful event, as given in the report of the trial, could be exceeded by any powers of eloquence.

"Thursday, April 30th, 1795.

"This day Mr Jackson was brought up for judgment.

"CLERK OF THE CROWN.-Gaoler, set the Rev. Mr. Jackson to the bar "Hold up your right hand.

"Mr. Jackson accordingly held up his right hand."*

The appearance of the prisoner must have been such, even thus early in the proceedings of the day, as to indicate extreme weakness. It attracted the notice of the bench.

"LORD CLONMEL.-From the prisoner's apparent ill state of health, if any advantage is to be taken from reading the indictment, I should be glad it may be read through. But seeing his ill state of health, I would not wish to increase his labour by waiting. But do as you please."

Mr. McNally proceeds. Mr. Curran enters the court, and a discussion commences on the subject of moving an arrest of judgment, in which the conduct of the bench appears to afford perfect satisfaction to the prisoner's counsel. At length the attorneygeneral comes into court, and apologises for his unavoidable absence. The report then proceeds—

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sent in court, was desired to go into the dock to him. He, after some examination, informed the court that there was every apprehension he would go off immediately. Mr. Thomas Kinsley, who was in the jury-box, said he would go down to him; he accordingly went into the dock, and in a short time informed the court that the prisoner was dying. "The court ordered Mr. Kinsley to be sworn.

"He was sworn accordingly. "LORD CLONMEL.- Are you in any profession?

"MR. KINSLEY.-I am an apothecary and druggist.

"LORD CLONMEL.-Can you say you understand your profession sufficiently so as to speak of the state of the pri soner?

"MR. KINSLEY.-I can. I think him verging to eternity; he has every symptom of death about him.

"LORD CLONMEL.-Do you conceive him insensible, or in that state as to be able to hear the judgment, or what may be said for or against him?

MR. KINSLEY.-Quite the contrary. I do not think he can hear his judgment.

"LORD CLONMEL.-Then he must be taken away. Take care in sending him away, you do not any mischief. Let him be remanded until further orders; and I believe it much for his advantage, as for all of yours, to adjourn.

"The sheriff informed the court that he was dead.

"LORD CLONMEL.-Let an inquisition, and a respectable one be held on the body. You should carefully inquire when and by what means he died."

It is unnecessary to pursue the harrowing details of this dreadful event further. The Coroner's jury found

"That the deceased, William Jackson, died on the 30th of April, in consequence of some acrid and mortal matter taken into his stomach; but how or by whom administered is to the jury unknown."

According to Mr. Curran's account, there had been a suspicion prevalent that Mr. Jackson meant to destroy himself, and implements of destruction were kept from him in the prison. How he eluded the vigilance of his keepers we are unwilling to conjecture.

Mr. Curran's account of the closing act of this unhappy life is painfully striking:

"He beckoned to his counsel to approach him, and making an effort to

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