"Would that I had you here, to show you 'their august abode' in its most awful beauty. I could show you at noontide-when the stern south-wester had blown long and rudely-the mountain waves coming in from the illimitable ocean in majestic succession, expending their gigantic force, and throwing up stupendous masses of foam, against the more gigantic and more stupendous mountain cliffs that fence not only this my native spot, but form that eternal barrier which prevents the wild Atlantic from submerging the cultivated plains and high steepled villages of proud Britain herself. Or, were you with me amidst the Alpine scenery that surrounds my humble abode, listening to the eternal roar of the mountain torrent, as it bounds through the rocky defiles of my native glens, I would venture to tell you how I was born within the sound of the everlasting wave, and how my dreamy boyhood dwelt upon imaginary intercourse with those who are dead of yore, and fed its fond fancies upon the ancient and long-faded glories of that land which preserved literature and Christianity when the rest of now civilised Europe was shrouded in the darkness of godless ignorance. Yes! my expanding spirit, delighted in these day dreams, till catching from them an enthusiasm which no disappointment can embitter, nor accumulating years

diminish, I formed the high resolve to leave my native land better after my death than I found her at my birth; and, if possible, to make her what she ought to be

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'Great, glorious, and free,

First flower of the earth, and first gem of the sea.

"Perhaps, if I could show you the calm and exquisite beauty of these capacious bays and mountain promontories, softened in the pale moonlight which shines this lovely evening, till all which during the day was grand and terrific has become calm and serene in the silent tranquillity of the clear night— perhaps you would readily admit that the man who has been so often called a ferocious demagogue, is, in truth, a gentle lover of Nature, an enthusiast of all her beauties—

"Fond of each gentle and each dreary scene,

and catching, from the loveliness as well as the dreariness of the ocean, and Alpine scenes with which he is surrounded, a greater ardour to promote the good of man, in his overwhelming admiration. of the mighty works of God."

One trait in his social character was a remarkable attention to all that was passing, even the most trivial things. Often, when he has apparently been wholly engrossed among newspapers or letters, he

has surprised me by suddenly throwing in an observation or reply to some remark made sotto voce at the further end of a long room. His alertness of mind as well as quickness of hearing, made him thus quite alive to whatever passed, even when one least would suspect it.

One day I witnessed the surprise of a rough northern lawyer at this faculty of bestowing attention upon different subjects at once. The lawyer consulted him about an Act of Parliament, and was reading aloud the disputable parts of the Act, when he suddenly stopped short, exclaiming, "Oh, Mr. O'Connell, I see you are reading something else; I'll wait till you have done." "Go on! go on, man!" said O'Connell, without raising his eyes from the document with which he was engaged, "I hear you quite distinctly. If you had as much to do as I have, you would long ago have been trained into the knack of devoting the one moment to two occupations." The other obeyed, and when he had concluded his queries, O'Connell put aside the second subject of his thoughts, and delivered a detailed reply to all the questions of his visitor.

Whilst Mr. O'Connell remained at Darrynane, he often devoted an hour or two to hearing and adjusting the disputes of the neighbouring peasantry. He officiated as " Judge and Jury" upon these occa

sions, and prevented by his interposition a vast deal of ill-will and litigation.

His acquirements did not include any knowledge of arboriculture. We were speaking of some young ash that did not seem healthy. I advised him to cut them over at the root, in order that new leaders might grow up from the stool. He demurred. I assured him it was an old practice with foresters, and that I had frequently tried it myself with perfect success. He laughed, and said, "Of all the preposterous schemes I ever heard, the notion of cutting a tree down to make it grow up, seems the most comical."

O'Connell's etymology of Darrynane was derived from the two Irish words Darragh, an oak, and Inane, ivy-" The Ivied Oaks."

CHAPTER XVIII.

O'Connell at Home-Forensic Recollections-A candid Physician-Crosbie Morgan-Hunting-Recollections of the Penal Laws-"Discoverers."

O'CONNELL never appeared to greater advantage than when presiding at his own table. Of him it may be said-as Lockhart has observed of Scottthat his notions of hospitality included the necessity of making his intellectual stores available to the amusement of his guests. His conversation was replete with anecdote; and the narratives which possessed for me by far the greatest interest, were those in which the narrator was personally concerned. His memory was prodigious; and not the smallest trait of character or manner in the numberless persons with whom, in the course of his bustling career, he had come in contact, escaped the grasp of his

retentive recollection.