DAVIS-(Spirit of the Nation.)

"When Grattan rose, none dare oppose
The claim he made for freedom;

They knew our swords, to back his words,
Were ready, did he need them."

DUBLIN:

PUBLISHED BY JAMES DUFFY,

23, ANGLESEA-STREET.

1845.

Stereotyped and Printed by

T. COLDWELL, 50, CAPEL-STREET.

то

WILLIAM SMITH O'BRIEN, Esq., M.P.

MY DEAR SIR,

your name.

I beg to inscribe the following work with

I know of few living men more fit than you

to have played an honourable part in the great Revolution of which this book treats, or to direct the struggles of the present generation to revive its glory and to reacquire its benefits.

With these feelings, and with others of sin

cere friendship, I dedicate the following pages to you,

and beg to subscribe myself

Your humble Servant,

THOMAS MAC NEVIN.

26, Summer-hill.

PREFACE.

THE following narrative of the celebrated army of the Volunteers is intended for the people of Ireland, and makes the first of a series of cheap publications on the history of their country, and the biographies of their most celebrated fellowcountrymen, which it is the intention of the publisher of this volume to offer for their use.

On his behalf, I must be permitted to express my earnest hope that the people will, by their patronage of these works, display a just appreciation of an exertion made to supply them with wholesome literature, as a substitute for the flood of absurd and corrupting trash with which they have been heretofore deluged. The publisher, in common with a number of men who have the happiness, and enlightenment of the country sincerely at heart, was struck with regret at observing the kind of works which the people sought, and devoured with avidity. The memoirs of robbers tales of clumsy fiction and fairy stories without grace or fancy-these were the garbage on which the people's minds were cultivated into