ROBERT EMMET. T would be an exceedingly difficult task to find a name dearer to the hearts of Irishmen than that of Robert Emmet. Hosts of Irishmen have given up their lives in the cause of their country's freedom. But one martyr's memory is specially enshrined in Ireland's heart; one martyr's name has a spell to awaken feelings of glory and pride. The name and the memory are those of Robert Emmet, whose birth took place the 4th of March, 1778, whose light of life was rudely extinguished by the executioner after burning for only five-and-twenty years, and whose name and fame have grown dearer and dearer to Ireland with almost every year of the three-quarters of a century which have passed away since the September afternoon when his head was severed from his body in front of St. Catherine's Church. But there is an episode in Robert Emmet's brief career which sheds a tender light over his memory, and surrounds it, as it were, with the glamor of romance. Mixed up with his ardent dreams of a great and free future for his land, to be bought at the bloody price the oppressed have oftenest had to pay for liberty, there were softer dreams of his own; dreams of a time when-the dread day of conflict over, the glad hour of his country's new birth arrived he could turn into the quiet paths of domestic life, there to be blessed by a union with one whom he loved with all the high, pure ardor of his soul, one who returned his love as such love ought to be returned, one in every way fitted to be the mate and other self of such a man as he. The time never came; the romance is at once touching and sad. It was on Monday, the 19th of September, that Robert Emmet stood in that too famous spot, to plead to the charge laid against him. Norbury, "the hanging judge," the coldly cruel and unfeeling wretch who made a point of jesting while he sentenced some poor unfortunate to the law's extreme penalty, presided at the trial. Standish O'Grady, attorneygeneral, led the prosecution. Witnesses were called, whose evidence was enough to establish the indictment, even for a not too willing jury. Emmet declined to go into any defense, and, according to the custom in such cases, the judge's charge should have followed. But Mr. Plunket, for the crown, rose, breaking through usage, and, in a speech of extraordinary bitterness, attacked the prisoner and his principles. When Plunket's speech had come to an end, Norbury charged the jury, who, without quitting the box, brought in the verdict -Guilty. When asked, according to the forms of law, if he had any thing to say why sentence should not be passed against him, he made the following speech of vindication, which will hold its place amongst the classics of liberty while the world endures: MY LORDS: What have I to say why sentence of death should not be pronounced on me, according to law?—I have nothing to say that can alter your predetermination, nor that it will become me to say with any view to the migitation of that sentence which you are here to pronounce, and I must abide by. But I have that to say which interests me more than life, and which you have labored to destroy. I have much to say why my reputation should be rescued from the load of false accusation and calumny which has been heaped upon me. Were I only to suffer death, after being adjudged guilty by your tribunal, I should bow in silence, and meet the fate that awaits me without a murmur; but the sentence of law which delivers my body to the executioner will, through the ministry of that law, labor, in its own vindication, to consign my character to obloquy: for there must be guilt somewhere,—whether in the sentence of the court, or in the catastrophe, posterity must determine. The man dies, but his memory lives. That mine may not perish,-that it may live in the respect of my countrymen,-I seize upon this opportunity to vindicate myself from some of the charges alleged against me. When my spirit shall be wafted to a more friendly port; when my shade shall have joined the bands of those martyred heroes who have shed their blood on the scaffold and in the field, in defense of their country and virtue; this is my hope,-I wish that my memory and name may animate those who survive me, while I look down with complacency on the destruction of that perfidious government which upholds its domination by blasphemy of the Most High, which displays its power over man as over the beasts of the forest, which sets man upon his brother, and lifts his hand, in the name of God, against the throat of his fellow, who believes or doubts a little more or less than the government standard, a government which is steeled to barbarity by the cries of the orphans and the tears of the widows which its cruelty has made. I swear, by the throne of heaven, before which I must shortly appear, by the blood of the murdered patriots who have gone before me, that my conduct has been, through all this peril, and all my purposes, governed only by the convictions which I have uttered, and no other view than that of the emancipation of my country from the superinhuman oppression under which she has so long, and too patiently, travailed; and that I confidently and assuredly hope (wild and chimerical as it may appear) that there is still union and strength in Ireland to accomplish this noble enterprise. Let no man dare, when I am dead, to charge me with dishonor; let no man attaint my memory by believing that I could have engaged in any cause but that of my country's liberty and independence; or that I could have become the pliant minion of power, in the oppression or the miseries of my countrymen. I would not have submitted to a foreign oppressor, for the same reason that I would resist the domestic tyrant; in the dignity of freedom, I would have fought upon the threshold of my country, and her enemies should enter only by pass ing over my lifeless corpse. Am I, who lived but for my country, and who have subjected myself to the vengeance of the jealous and wrathful oppressor, and to the bondage of the grave, only to give my countrymen their rights,--am I to be loaded with calumny and not to be suffered to resent or to repel it? No! God forbid! If the spirits of the illustrious dead participate in the concerns and cares of those who are dear to them in this transitory life,—O ever dear and venerated shade of my departed father, look down with scrutiny on the conduct of your suffering son; and see if I have even for a moment deviated from those principles of morality and patriotism which it was your care to instill into my youthful mind, and for an adherence to which I am now to offer up my life! My lords, you are all impatient for the sacrifice. The blood which you seek is not congealed by the artificial terrors which surround your victim; it circulates warmly and unruffled, through the channels which God created for noble purposes, but which you are bent to destroy, for purposes so grievous that they cry to heaven! Be yet patient. I have but a few more words to say! I am going to my silent grave; my lamp of life is nearly extinguished; my race is run; the grave opens to receive me, and I sink into its bosom. I have but one request to ask at my departure from this world, it is the charity of its silence. Let no man write my epitaph; for, as no one who knows my motives dare now vindicate them, let not prejudice or ignorance asperse them. Let them and me repose in obscurity and peace, and my tomb remain uninscribed, until other times, and other men, can do justice to my character. When my country shall take her place among the nations of the earth, then, and not till then, let my epitaph be written! I have done. As Emmet was conducted to his cell, he passed that of a colleague of his, and through the grating he whispered loudly: "I shall be hanged to-morrow." He must have rested but a short time, for early morning found him writing busily. The two objects dearest to his heart still occupied his thoughts-his country and his love. One is moved almost to tears on reading some of these last writings of Emmet, and especially on noting the self-forgetting tact and delicacy with which he sought to turn aside Curran's anger from the devoted Sarah's head. On this last morning of Emmet's life, too, he was informed of the death of his aged mother on the previous day. This was the greatest shock his firmness had yet got, and it required an evident struggle to enable him to master his feelings. When his composure had returned, he simply said, "It is better so." |