But there was one heart, whose anguish it would be impossible to describe. In happier days and fairer fortunes, he had won the affections of a beautiful and interesting girl, the daughter of a late celebrated Irish barrister. She loved him with the disinterested fervour of a woman's first and early love. When every worldly maxim arrayed itself against him; when blasted in fortune, and disgrace and danger darkened around his name, she loved him the more ardently for his very sufferings. If,

sion to vindicate myself from some of the charges advanced against

ine.

I am charged with being an emissary of France-'tis false! I am no emissary-1 did not wish to deliver up my country to a foreign power, und least of all, to France. No! never did I entertain the idea of establishing French power in Ireland-God forbid. On the contrary, it is evident from the introductory paragraph of the address of the Provisional Government, that every hazard attending an independent effort was deemed preferable to the more fatal risk of introducing a French army into the country. Small would be our claims to patriotism and to sense, and palpable our affectation of the love of liberty, if we were to encourage the profanation of our shores by a people who are slaves themselves, and the unprincipled and aban doned instruments of imposing slavery on others.

'If such an inference be drawn from any part of the proclamation of the Provisional Government, it calumniates their views, and is not warranted by the fact. How could they speak of freedom to their countrymen? How assume such an exalted motive, and meditate the introduction of a power which has been the enemy of treedom in every part of the globe? Reviewing the conduct of France to other countries, could we expect better towards us? No! Let hot, then, any man attaint my memory by believing that I could have hoped for freedom through the aid of France, and betrayed the sacred cause of liberty by committing it to the power of her most determined foe: had I done so, I had not deserved to live; and dying with such a weight upon my character, 1 had merited the hobest execrations of that country which gave me birth, and to which I would have given freedom.

'Had I been in Switzerland, I would have fought against the French-in the dignity of freedom, I would have expired on the threshold of that country, and they should have entered it only by passing over my lifeless corpse. Is it then to be supposed that I would be slow to make the same sacrifice to my native land? Am I, who lived but to be of service to my country, and who would subject myself to the bondage of the grave to give her independence -am I to be loaded with the foul and grievous calumny of being an emissary of France?

'My lords, it may be part of the system of angry justice, to bow a man's mind, by humiliation to meet the ignominy of the scaffold; but worse to me than the scaffold's shame, or the scaffold's terrors, would be the imputation of having been the agent of French despotism and ambition; and while I have breath, I will call upon my

then, his fate could awaken the sympathy even of his foes, what must have been the agony of her, whose whole soul was occupied by his image! Let those tell who have had the portals of the tomb suddenly closed between them and the being they most loved on earth-who have sat at its threshold, as one shut out in a cold and lonely world, from whence all that was most lovely and loving had departed.

But then the horrors of such a grave! so frightful, so

countrymen not to believe me guilty of so foul a crime against their iiberties and their happiness.

Though you, my lord, sit there a judge, and I stand here a culprit, yet you are but a man and I am another. I have a right therefore to vindicate my character and motives from the aspersions of calumny; and, as a man, to whom fame is dearer than life, I will make the last use of that life in rescuing my name and my niemory from the afflicting imputation of having been an emissary of France, or seeking her interference in the internal regulation of our affairs. 'Did I live to see a French army approach this country, I would meet it on the shore, with a torch in one hand and a sword in the other; I would receive them with all the destruction of war! I would animate my countrymen to immolate them in their very boats; and before our native soil should be polluted by a foreign foe, if they succeeded in landing, I would burn every blade of grass before them, raze every house, contend to the last for every inch of ground; and the last spot on which the hope of freedom should desert me, that spot I would make my grave! What I cannot do, I leave a legacy to my country because I feel conscious that my death were unprofitabic, and all hopes of liberty extinct, the moment a French army obtained a footing in this land. God forbid that I should see my country under the hands of a foreign power. If the French should come as a foreign enemy, Oh! my countrymen! meet them on the shore with a torch in one hand and a sword in the other receive them with all the destruction of war; immolate them in their boats, before our native soil shall be polluted by a foreign foe! If they succeed in landing, fight them on the strand, buru every blade of grass before them as they advance-raze every house; and if you are driven to the centre of your country, collect your provisions, your property, your wives and your daughters; form a circle around them-fight while but two men are left; and when but one remains, let that man set tire to the pile, and release himself, and the families of his fallen countrymen, from the tyranny of France.

My lamp of life is nearly expired-my race is finished: the grave opens to receive me, and I sink into its bosom All I request then, at parting from the world, is the charity of its silence. Let no man write my epitaph, for as no man, who knows my motives, dare vindicate them let not prejudice or ignorance asperse them : let them and me repose in obscurity and peace, and my tomb remain uninscribed, till other times and other men can do justice to my character."

dishonoured! There was nothing for memory to dwell on that could sooth the pang of separation-none of those tender, though melancholy circumstances, that endear the parting scene-nothing to melt sorrow into those blessed tears, sent, like the dews of heaven, to revive the heart in the parting hour of anguish.

To render her widowed situation more desolate, she had incurred her father's displeasure by her unfortunate attachment, and was an exile from the paternal roof. But could the sympathy and kind offices of friends have reached a spirit so shocked and driven in by horror, she would have experienced no want of consolation, for the Irish are a people of quick and generous sensibilities. The most delicate and cherishing attentions were paid her by families of wealth and distinction. She was led into society, and they tried by all kinds of occupation and amusement to dissipate her grief, and wean her from the tragical story of her loves. But it was all in vain. There are some strokes of calamity that scathe and scorch the soul-that penetrate to the vital seat of happinessand blast it, never again to put forth bud or blossom. She never objected to frequent the haunts of pleasure, but she was as much alone there as in the depths of solitude. She walked about in a sad reverie, apparently unconscious of the world around her, She carried with her an inward woe that mocked at all the blandishments of friendship, and "heeded not the song of the charmer, charm he never so wisely."

The person who told me her story had seen her at a masquerade. There can be no exhibition of far-gone wretchedness more striking and painful than to meet in such a scene. To find it wandering like a spectre, lonely and joyless, where all around is gay-to see it dressed out in the trappings of mirth, and looking so wan and woe-begone, as if it had tried in vain to cheat the poor heart into a momentary forgetfulness of sorrow. After strolling through the splendid rooms and giddy crowd with an air of utter abstraction, she sat herself down on the steps of an orchestra, and looking about for some time with a vacant air, that showed her insensibility to the garish scene, she began, with the capriciousness of a sickly heart, to warble a little plaintive air. She had an exquisite voice; but on this occasion it was so simple, so touching, it breathed forth such a soul of

wretchedness, that she drew a crowd mute and silent around her, and melted every one into tears,

The story of one so true and so tender could not but excite great interest in a country remarkable for enthusiasm. It completely won the heart of a brave officer, who paid his addresses to her, and thought that one so true to the dead could not but prove affectionate to the living. She declined his attentions, for her thoughts were irrevocably engrossed by the memory of her former lover. He, however, persisted in his suit. He solicited not her tenderness, but her esteem. He was assisted by her conviction of his worth, and her sense of her own destitute and dependent situation, for she was existing on the kindness of friends. In a word, he at length succeeded in gaining her hand, though with the solemn assurance, that her heart was unalterably another's.

He took her with him to Sicily, hoping that a change of scene might wear out the remembrance of early woes. She was an amiable and exemplary wife, and made an effort to be a happy one; but nothing could cure the silent and devouring melancholy that had entered into her very soul. She wasted away in a slow, but hopeless decline, and at length sunk into the grave, the victim of a broken heart. *

*It was on her, says our Author, that Moore, the distinguished Irish Poet, composed the following lines:

She is far from the land where her young hero sleeps,
And lovers around her are sighing;

But coldly she turns from their gaze and weeps,
For her heart in his grave is lying.

She sings the wild songs of her dear native plains,
Every note which he lov'd awaking-
Ah! little they think, who delight in her strains,
How the heart of the minstrel is breaking!

He had lived for his love-for his country he died,
They were all that to life had entwined him-
Nor soon shail the tears of his country be dried,
Nor long will his love stay behind him!

Oh! make her a grave where the sun-beams rest,
When they promise a glorious morrow;

They'll shine o'er her sleep like a smile from the west,
From her own lov'd island of sorrow!

A WRECK AT SEA.

WE one day descried some shapeless object drifting at a distance. At sea, every thing that breaks the monotony of the surrounding expanse attracts attention. It proved to be the mast of a ship that must have been completely wrecked; for there were the remains of handkerchiefs, by which some of the crew had fastened themselves to this spar, to prevent their being washed off by the waves. There was no trace by which the name of the ship could be ascertained. The wreck had evidently drifted about for many months; clusters of shell fish had fastened about it, and long sea weeds flaunted at its sides. But where, thought I, is the crew? Their struggle has long been over-they have gone down amidst the roar of the tempest-their bones lie whitening among the caverns of the deep. Silence, oblivion, like the waves, have closed over them, and no one can tell the story of their end. What sighs have been wafted after that ship! what prayers offered up at the deserted fireside of home! How often has the mistress, the wife, the mother, pored over the daily news, to catch some casual intelligence of this rover of the deep! How has expectation darkened into anxietyanxiety into dread-and dread into despair! Alas! not one memento shall ever return for love to cherish. All that shall ever be known, is, that she sailed from her port, "and was never heard of more!"

The sight of this wreck, as usual, gave rise to many dismal anecdotes. This was particularly the case in the evening, when the weather which had hitherto been fair, began to look wild and threatening, and gave indications of one of those sudden storms that will sometimes break in upon the serenity of a summer voyage. As we sat round the dull light of a lamp in the cabin, that made the gloom more ghastly, every one had his tale of shipwreck and disaster. I was particularly struck with a short one re lated by the captain.

"As I was sailing," said he, "in a fine stout ship, across the banks of Newfoundland, one of those heavy fogs that prevail in those parts rendered it impossible for us to see far ahead even in the day-time; but at night the weather was so thick that we could not distinguish any object at twice the length of the ship. I kept lights at the mast head, and a constant watch forward to look.