Speech, in the Hibernian Magazine of 1803, is far more simple, and equally correct, as far as it goes; but there are likewise many omissions. It was only by submitting the various versions of the speech to the revision of persons who were pre

In the manuscript, as originally struck yourself, the allusion to aid from France is more decided than in the published speech. Emmet certainly intended saying that there was at that moment in Paris a member of the Irish Provisional Government empowered to negotiate for an invading expedition, but with orders not to allow it to sail until the French Government had given Ireland a guarantee for her liberties similar to that obtained by Franklin for America. This is much more than I can find in any report of the speech. Emmet may not have spoken these words, but it is just as probable that he did. The report of the trial was published under the editorship of the then Under-Secretary of the Castle, Mr. Marsden, who is known to have greatly garbled the account.

I have always been doubtful whether Robert Emmet, who was fastidious in his language, ever designated Plunket as a viper whom his father had nurtured to sting his child. There is no trace of such words in the manuscript, but, indeed, they could only have been suggested, if ever uttered, by the line taken by Plunket on the trial, a course of procedure which evidently had but one motive, and upon which there could scarcely be a second opinion.

The kindness of Mr. Marshal has given me not only the inspection, but the possession of Emmet's manuscript. I vainly essayed to make him accept some price for it, knowing that his circumstances cannot be good, but he declined so decidedly that I did not venture to insist. I have sent him, as a small acknowledgment, the late edition of my verses, and beg that when you again see him you will say how much I am his debtor.

As you are curious, with pertinacity in your curiosity, about Robert Emmet, I have only to add, that I shall return to Sloperton in a few days; and should the facilities of railroad travelling tempt you to give me a few days visit, you may then make a copy of the Speech-which I should gladly do for you, but the mere work of writing greatly fatigues me now, and, indeed, I have taken several days to this letter. Pardon its great length, and believe me,

Your obliged and faithful servant,

To Dr. Shelton Mackenzie.

THOMAS MOORE.

It was not in my power to visit Moore, in his cottage in Wiltshire, and thus I lost the opportunity of obtaining a copy of the speech. The original remains, most probably, among Moore's papers.

R. S. M.

The Publisher made every effort to obtain a copy of the above mentioned version of the speech, but in vain. It has probably met the same fate as every allusion to Irish politics in the latter part of "Moore's Journal," under the hands of its editor Lord John Russell.

sent at the trial, and had a strong recollection of the discourse pronounced by Emmet, and comparing different passages, that a copy could be obtained, wherein the omitted matter was supplied, and the additions were struck out, which certainly were not improvements of Watty Cox and others. Mr. Buchanan, the late Consul of New York, Dr. Macabe, the Rev. Dr. Haydon, the Rev. Dr. Macartney, and others whose names I am not at liberty to disclose, and amongst them one whose retentive memory has preserved every striking passage, an Englishman, now filling the situation of Usher of one of the principal police offices in London, were present at the trial of Emmet, and one and all speak of his address, as surpassing in thrilling eloquence in that speech any thing they had ever witnessed in oratory. Emmet pronounced the speech in so loud a voice as to be distinctly heard at the outer doors of the Court House; and yet, though he spoke in a loud tone, there was nothing boisterous in his manner, his accents and cadence of voice, on the contrary, were exquisitely modulated. His action was very remarkable, its greater or lesser vehemence corresponded with the rise and fall of his voice. He is described as moving about the dock, as he warmed in his address, with rapid, but not ungraceful motions, now in front of the railing before the bench, then retiring, as if his body, as well as his mind, were swelling beyond the measure of their chains. His action was not confined to his hands, he seemed to have acquired a swaying motion of the body when he spoke in public, which was peculiar to him, but there was no affecta tion in it. It was said of Tone, on his trial, by a bye stander, that he never saw any one cast affectation so far behind him. The remark with equal truth might have been applied to Emmet. His trial commenced on the morning of the 18th of September, 1803, and terminated the same evening at ten o'clock, and a few hours were all that were given to him to prepare for eternity. Tuesday was fixed for his execution; he had prayed, through his counsel, of the Attorney-General, not to be brought up for judgment till the Wednesday, his application was refused; the ministers of justice were impatient for

Nothing could exceed the public anxiety to hear the trial; however, the audience was exclusively military-there was not a person in colored clothes in the Court House.—Phillips' Recollections.

the sacrifice; the ministers of mercy and of humanity were abroad, or had resigned their places, or were driven from the Castle, or were drowned in their own tears. Poor Emmet, at ten o'clock at night, was removed from the court-house in Green-street to Newgate, there he was heavily ironed by Gregg the jailer, and placed, it is supposed by the Time's Correspondent, in one of the condemned cells. The government appear to have become alarmed least any attempt should be made at a rescue; there is some reason to think that, some project of this kind was in contemplation, and that Robert Emmet had been made acquainted with it. After midnight, when the few brief hours the prisoner had to live ought to have been sacred from disturbance, an order came from the Secretary at the Castle forthwith to have the prisoner conveyed to Kilmainham jail, a distance of about two miles and a half. And the fears of the government were made to appear in the anxious desire of the Secretary to consult the comfort of the condemned man. If this was the case why did he wait till after midnight, to issue his orders.

Poor Emmet once more entered Kilmainham jail! It is said that George Dunn, at seeing him enter, heavily fettered, and the marks of blood on his stockings, was moved even to tears; and that he was provided with refreshments, which he was much in need of, having been on his legs nearly eleven hours in court, and never having tasted food since he had left the jail. I have omitted to state, that the trial commenced at ten o'clock in the morning, and terminated at ten at night. The court was crowded to excess. He was dressed in black, wore a black velvet stock and Hessian boots. The speech of Mr. Plunket on Emmet's trial has been the subject of much controversy, which it is impossible, in the memoir of Robert Emmet, to leave unnoticed or affect to be ignorant of. I feel anything but a desire to enter on this subject; however, having to treat of it, I shall confine myself to the task of placing before the reader all the authentic information there is on the subject, and leave him to draw his own conclusions— premising simply, that much falsehood has crept into the details respecting the intimacy of Lord-then Mr. Plunket with the father of Thomas Addis Emmet.

Having required a search to be made in the Court of King's Bench for an affidavit of Lord Plunket, in the case of the

King at the suit of the Right Honorable W. C. Plunket against Gilbert and Hodges, I found that an affidavit had been filed in that case in the latter part of 1811, and that two orders had been pronounced on it in Hilary term, 1812.

"" THE KING re GILBERT AND HODGES.

"The Right Honourable William C. Plunket, of Stephen's green, in the city of Dublin, maketh oath and saith, that he hath read in a book entitled-'Sketches of History, Politics, and Manners, taken in Dublin and the North of Ireland, in 1810,' the following passage :-' Mr. Plunket, the late Attorney-general of Ireland, is an admirable public speaker, either at the Bar or in Parliament. This gentlemen, however, was much reprobated for his conduct on the trial of Mr. Emmet for high treason, about seven years ago. Mr. Plunket, who was then only King's Counsel, conducted the prosecution against this unfortunate young man with a rancour and virulence which shocked and surprised every person acquainted with his obligations to his father and family. Mr. Plunket's reason for this conduct has never been made known, though it injured him very much in public estimation. Crown lawyers have at all times been of the blood-hound tribe; they seldom lose scent of their prey, either from considerations of gratitude or humanity. We have an instance of this in the prosecution of Lord Essex, on whom the celebrated Bacon, then Attorney-general, exhausted every opprobrious term in the English language, though this amiable nobleman had been his greatest benefactor and constant and unalterable friend.' This deponeth saith, he believes himself to be the person designated in the foregoing passage by the name of Mr. Plunket, and that the object of the said passage is to represent this deponent as having conducted a prosecution for high treason against the late Robert Emmet with rancour and virulence, so gross as to shock and surprise the public mind, and that the passage is further intended to represent this deponent as having violated the dictates of gratitude and honour, by exciting such virulence and rancour against a person from whose father and family this deponent had received considerable obligations. This deponent saith, that the entire of the charges and insinuations against this deponent contained in these passages are untrue. This deponent saith, that he was personally an utter stranger

:

to the said Robert Emmet, never having, to the knowledge of this deponent, seen him until he was arraigned, and on the trial in the Dublin Court, and never having had any intercourse with him of any kind, directly or indirectly and this deponent saith that he never received the slightest or remotest obligation from the said Robert Emmet, or from the father, or from any one individual of the family of the said Robert Emmet. And this deponent saith that the father of the said Robert Emmet was a physician, residing in the city of Dublin : this deponent was not even on such terms of acquaintance with the said Dr. Emmet as to bow to him in the streets; and this deponent never was, to his recollection or belief, in a private company with the said Dr. Emmet, or in a room, in his life, save once, and that, as this deponent believes, upwards of twenty years ago, at the house of the said Dr. Emmet, on the invitation of his son, Thomas Addis Emmet, with whom the deponent had been intimate when in the University of Dublin, and when a student at the Inns of Court in England; but this deponent saith that, within a very short time after the said Thomas Addis Emmet had been called to the Irish Bar, which was, as the deponent saith, some time in May, 1790, all intimacy between him and this deponent had ceased-principally in consequence, as this deponent saith, of a total opposition between the opinions of Thomas Addis Emmet and this deponent on the political affairs of this country, which about that period assumed a form so very important as deeply to affect the private sentiments and character of reflecting persons, in so much so that, for some years before the arrest and imprisonment of the said Thomas Addis Emmet in the year 1798, there subsisted no sort of intercourse between this deponent and the said Thomas Addis Emmet, save unless what arose from occasionally meeting in the streets or in the Four Courts, although this deponent was not then fully apprized of the danger in which the said Thomas Addis Emmet was implicated with the party who were engaged in the political pursuits in this country which ended in so much public disaster. This deponent further saith, that he did not conduct the trial for high treason against the said Robert Emmet, the same being then conducted by the then Attorney-general, the present Chief Baron of the Exchequer in England. But this deponent admits that he was one of the Counsel employed and consulted in the con