254 Europe, and the British Parliament. [[MARCH, 



general aspect of the affair. We cannot understand how an indivi- 

 dual charged with one of the most violent and direct offences imaginable 

 to the public peace, and the King's direct authority the attempt to 

 excite a spirit which has been pronounced by the Government the im- 

 mediate precursor of civil war, and whose results upon the public mind 

 of Ireland must be disastrous, in the extreme ; yet should find the 

 means of repeating all the mischief that he had done before, of 

 haranguing, defying, and finally coming over to England to propagate, 

 by his privilege of Parliament, every sentiment he may please to utter. 

 If his seizure were for the purpose of preventing this, its purpose has 

 failed already. His pleading guilty, if he have so pleaded, which he 

 denies, has not plucked a feather from his popularity ; and his speech, 

 after this kind of trial, is not less defying and contemptuous than 

 before. 



The truth is, that we cannot pin our faith to the statement that no 

 compromise has been entered into. Perhaps no formal compromise has 

 occurred. But if the Irish Government had acted according to the 

 usual proceeding, we should have expected to find the accused instantly 

 brought up for judgment, the sentence of the Judge directly follow^ 

 ing the verdict of the Jury, and the convict immediately undergoing 

 the result of his conviction. This was the case in the English state 

 trials, and we never heard of the culprits being let loose to harangue 

 when and where they would immediately after, suffered to approach the 

 legislature, or talk of writs of error, and the other inventions and eva- 

 sions of legal dexterity. One thing at least is certain, that the result of 

 this mismanaged affair is to make O'Connell's partizans talk more auda- 

 ciously than ever, while it has to an extraordinary degree damped the 

 reliance of the friends of order upon the activity of the law. 



The only individual who has undergone any real inconvenience on 

 the occasion is the unlucky Lord Lieutenant, who with rather unneces- 

 sary curiosity, or chivalry, or perhaps relying on the "love" which 

 his epistolary exertions might be presumed to have wrought for him 

 among the rabble, during the height of the excitement produced by the 

 appearance of the conspirators in Court and other concomitant circum- 

 stances, rode from the Castle, accompanied by one of his sons, through 

 the crowded streets to the Courts, the very centre of the confusion, 

 where his Lordship experienced not only the insults which words and 

 hootings and yells could convey, but was pelted, and forced to dismount, 

 in consequence of the pony he rode having been hit on the neck bjj a 

 stone. Having subsequently found it necessary to quicken his pace to a 

 gallop, the mob followed, uttering the most violent execrations and 

 throwing mud the Guard ran to arms, and his Excellency reached the 

 Castle in safety, but bearing ample evidence on his person of the popu- 

 lar feeling against him. 



However insolent the treatment mi.^ht be to any individual, we have 

 no very vehement sorrows for the insulted person on this occasion. The 

 Marquis wanted a lesson in politics, and he has got it. The pitiful sacri- 

 fices which he madeto win mob popularity have now found the true reward, 

 and he at last may feel that to recommend " agitation, agitation, agita- 

 tion," however it may secure a few huzzas for the time, has a natural 

 tendency to end in such favours as he received on his late ride through 

 the streets of Dublin ! 



