quite realise the expectations I had formed from his fame as an orator. The subject, indeed, was not very inspiring; being, if I remember rightly, some portion of the law of landlord and tenant. His discourse was a plain, easy, argumentative address, of no great length.

Thenceforth, I saw nothing of O'Connell for some years. I rejoiced in his great triumph in 1829; but there was another question in which I had at all times felt a much more vivid interest than in Emancipation. That was the Repeal of the Union. It was, therefore, with the highest delight that I read O'Connell's series of powerful letters, addressed to the people of Ireland, in 1830, inviting the nation to combine in an effort to recover the domestic legislature of which they had been defrauded.

To the settlement of the Catholic question succeeded times of stirring agitation. One great injustice was removed; but the tithe system still oppressed the Irish people; and the country was withering from the baneful influences of the Union.

O'Connell's letters, in 1830, were, in the highest degree, spirited and exciting. In point of argument they were masterly. If the advocate of Catholic privileges had awakened my curiosity, the champion of Repeal excited my enthusiasm.

I had, from an early period, been an ardent Repealer. One of the first impressions of which I have any recollection, is the indignant resentment with which I listened to the history of the Union from my elder relatives. To know that we had possessed, for nearly six hundred years, a resident legislature to know that we were despoiled of that possession by violence and fraud-this knowledge was, in itself, enough to make me a partisan of the Repeal.

Cherishing such sentiments, I hailed, with delight, the new agitation set on foot by O'Connell. He uttered not a word to which the feelings of the nation did not instantly respond. It is a great mistake to suppose that he originated the national desire for Repeal. He did no more than organise the people in a national confederacy, and give public utterance to the sentiments which millions had already entertained. The Irish were Repealers, and would have been such had O'Connell never existed.

In 1831 and 1832 the oppressive exactions of the tithe system had awakened a general resistance throughout the kingdom. O'Connell, of course, took a prominent part in the anti-tithe agitation. He recommended that at every parliamentary election, the tests of "Repeal and No tithes" should be

required from the candidates. The people prepared to act on this recommendation. The county, city, and boroughs of Cork were on the alert. I name them particularly, because I had personal experience of the southern agitation. Feargus O'Connor (now M.P. for Nottingham), incessantly traversed the county of Cork from end to end during the summer and autumn of 1832, addressing public meetings on national grievances, working up the registration of the county electors, and inflaming the masses with a strong desire to rescue the county from both Whigs and Tories. The city and boroughs took care of their own interests; and at the general election in 1832, out of eight members there were six Repealers, one Whig, and one Tory returned.*

The elections over, O'Connell invited the Irish representatives to assemble in a "National Council" in Dublin. Many of their number obeyed the invitation. I must own that I did so, in the confident expectation that the leader would lay before us a plan for the agitation of Repeal in Parliament during the ensuing session. But O'Connell did not

* I was elected for Mallow. It has often been publicly alleged that O'Connell influenced my election. He had nothing whatever to do with it, not having been even consulted. Equally untrue is the assertion of the Daily News that O'Connell "thrust Feargus O'Connor on the county Cork Electors." To Feargus alone is his election of 1832 attributable.

think the question had yet acquired sufficient popular strength to render prudent a Repeal campaign in the English House of Commons. Much disappointment was the result of this opinion. Still greater disappointment arose from the total silence observed in the "National Council" on Repeal; this silence was excused on the ground that some of the persons who composed it were anti-repealers, and were induced to attend it on the faith of our carefully avoiding the forbidden topic. But copious materials for arriving at Repeal conclusions were submitted to the council by Michael Staunton, now Lord Mayor of Dublin. He was introduced by O'Connell on our first day of meeting, and presented us with financial details illustrative of the mismanagement of Irish resources by the English Parlia

ment.

Rumours at this time were rife that ministers intended to introduce a Coercion Bill for Ireland at an early period of the approaching session. O'Connell defied them. He thought it quite impossible that they could have very large English support. The Reform Bill-a new charter of liberty for England-had just been carried by an Irish majority in the House of Commons; and he judged it quite chimerical to suppose that the first Reformed Parliament-indebted for its reformation to Irish

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assistance-would disgrace itself by requiting that assistance with an attack upon the liberties of Ireland.

Feargus O'Connor's recent victory over Whiggism and Toryism in the county Cork elicited O'Connell's admiration. Speaking to me of Feargus one day at that period, he emphatically said, "He is a MAN." At a subsequent period he criticised Feargus's declamatory powers; remarking that his harangues were exciting, "but that there was too much bragging about conquering and trampling under foot in them. He also talks in a tone of leadership: now," continued O'Connell, “I never did so on the contrary, I have always professed myself quite ready to follow the lead of any body who should work harder or better than I did; and my command is only the more readily obeyed on that account."

The commencement of the session found the Irish members in London. There I occasionally met O'Connell, and we sometimes conversed on Repeal, respecting which measure I was anxious to elicit his policy and purposes. He was quite decided upon one point; namely, the imprudence of introducing the question prematurely into Parliament, "But," said I, "you will watch the earliest opportunity for