1831.] [ 639 ] 



THE GHOST OF KILSHEELAN. 



Now hear me relate 



My story, which perhaps thou liast not heard. 



MltTON. 



IT is not more than three years since, when I was present at one of 

 those assizes for Tipperary, so little distinguished in the annals of that 

 country, and so infamous in the records of Ireland for the horrible but 

 accustomed detail of atrocity, assassination, and recklessness of human 

 life. I had been listening for some days, with horror and disgust, to 

 the crimes of the murderers who were brought to the bar of justice, and 

 to the shameless and bare-faced perjuries of those who sought to shelter 

 them from the consequences of their guilt ; I had listened until my 

 senses recoiled with affright at the villanies that were detailed to me ; 

 and I had marked, with equal abhorrence and contempt, the stolid 

 countenances of the alibi witnesses for the prisoners, while their native 

 perjuries were translating into the English language, with which they 

 pretended to be unacquainted. From the midst of this scene of misery, 

 vice, and sin, I gladly received an order to return immediately to 

 Dublin. 



Upon inquiring at the coach-office, I was informed that all the inside 

 places to the metropolis were engaged for a " particular company ;" 

 but the clerk could not tell me who or what they were, nor even satisfy 

 my inquiries so far as to inform me to which sex the " particular com- 

 pany" belonged. My curiosity was, I confess, excited by the circum- 

 stance ; and it was with little of the listlessness of a stage-coach passen- 

 ger that I took my place beside the driver the next morning. Before I 

 mounted the box, I took care to look into the coach : it was empty. 

 There were not upon the roof any one of those innumerable and name- 

 less depositories of stowage, that indicate the profusion or attention to 

 personal comfort of a female traveller. The coach had no outside pas- 

 senger but myself; and the blank countenance of the hostler, as he 

 pocketed his solitary shilling, sufficiently manifested that there was for 

 his advantage but one departure that morning from Clonmel. 



We had travelled for about two miles when we came to a place where 

 the road turns in directly upon the river's bank. Here about ten or 

 twelve persons could be observed collected together. The low whistle 

 of a mounted policeman, whom we had once or twice encountered on 

 the road, was responded to by them. I could distinguish the military 

 step and bearing of some amongst the group ; and the protrusions in the 

 dark frieze coats with which they were enveloped, shewed that they 

 carried the short muskets with which every one of the Irish police are 

 armed. The coachman Was directed to pull up in a few seconds after- 

 wards a movement took place in the distant body, and five persons 

 walked towards us. Two of them were dressed like the peasants of 

 Tippsrary, in their best apparel, or as they themselves term it, "their 

 Sunday clothes." There were two immediately behind, and as if watch- 

 ing with a practised glance every attitude of the countrymen these I 

 at once recognised as two of the Dublin peace-officers, while, in front of 

 the four walked a gentleman, who, either for the purpose of conceal- 

 ment or more probably to protect himself from the cold, had his face 

 covered up nearly to the eyes with a silk handkerchief, while his person 

 was enveloped with a rug coat, oyer which was thrown a large camlet 



