above the picket, as with great coats buttoned to their noses, they hurried to their guard-room from patrollingthe sentries kept snug within their boxes - and in all Castlebar but one man could have been discovered out of doors, and he, as it will appear, was a dead one.

Just then, a figure might have been observed moving hastily across my mother's chamber. Presently the bell rang; the warning peal was repeated; a loud and peremptory voice aroused the sleeping servants; and, without even waiting to bless himself, Mark Haggarty slipped on his red-plush breeches, tumbled over a turf-creel, which the housemaid, for better convenience, had judiciously laid across the passage, and as he gathered himself up, in tones which told how desperately he was alarmed, ejaculated, "Blessed Virgin! is the house coming down?”

"The mistress is ill," exclaimed my father. "Run for Doctor Donovan. Take the short way across the Mall, and be back again like lightning."

Why then, by my own soul, I wont," returned he of the red-plush breeches. "Me crass the Mall, and Kimlin swinging on a tree! Mona mondiaoul*, if I would take a hatfull of pound-notes and venture. But I'll cut round

the lane and raise the doctor in a jiffy."

Accordingly, without waiting for his other habiliments, Mark Haggarty bolted out of the door, and started at a - killing pace, upholding with his better hand the solitary garment by the waistband.

Meanwhile the whole establishment was in general commotion. Half-a-score of domestics, male and female, in that interesting and unadorned state when beauty is said to be most bewitching, careered over the house, and tilted against each other in the lobbies. The men cursed, and the women crossed themselves; lights flared, dogs barked, boys kicked them for the same, and the uproar within beat the storm without all to nothing. At this moment Mark Haggarty returned "fairly kilt wid runnin," to announce the advent of the doctor, so soon as Biddy Boyle, his favourite hand-maiden, could manage 66 to shake him

into his clothes."

Let critics say what they please, in the best biographies,

An Irish imprecation.

.

digressions will be frequent; and even at this eventful period I must leave my mother to her fate, while I put my readers in possession of certain matters, which I deem necessary to illustrate and connect these memoirs.

Every body who is aware that this history commences in 1799, will recollect that the rebellion had occurred during the preceding summer, and that although the insurrection had been suppressed, the country was still fearfully disturbed, and especially by ruffians who had been in arms with the disaffected, and who, having been excluded from mercy by their crimes, had still contrived to elude the hand of justice, and exist by terrorism and plunder. At this time martial-law was in full force; Denis Browne reigned in undisputed supremacy; his sway over the north-western division of the kingdom of Connaught was absolute, as if he had formed an integral fraction of the Holy Alliance; and his autocracy over "the finest peasantry on earth," not inferior even to that of Mr. Daniel O'Connell, whom God long preserve! With the persons and properties of his subjects Denis took occasional liberties, loosing and binding as he pleased and when example was thought preferable to precept, hanging a delinquent out of the face," for the general benefit of the body politic. True it is, that in after days, shortsighted politicians have questioned the utility of the gallows, and even mooted the authority of the defunct Denis to employ it as he did. But these important questions are not for us to decide, and we shall consign them accordingly to the future historian.

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Three days before the opening of this story, an occurrence took place which procured for the worthy citizens of Castlebar the unexpected pleasure of witnessing an execution. An outlaw named Kimlin, who had escaped the general slaughter which visited the rebel allies when the French surrendered at Ballinamuck, had infested the country for the last winter at the head of a numerous and ferocious band. He was a daring, desperate scoundrel — and, rendered confident by his previous success in evading the many attempts that had been made to arrest him, imprudently ventured within a short distance of the town, B 2

and appeared at a bridal dance which was given in a neighbouring village. As a reward of one hundred pounds had been offered for his apprehension, it is not surprising that his propinquity to the town was speedily communicated, and a few of the yeomanry, having ascertained the house where he would harbour for the night, marched hastily to the spot, and surrounded and attacked it. Although surprised, Kimlin made a desperate resistance: the leader of the party was shot through the heart, two others severely wounded, and it was not until the house was in flames and the outlaw's ammunition expended, that he could be overpowered and secured. Tied upon a car, with the dead yeoman placed beside him, Kimlin was conveyed by his captors in triumph to Castlebar. The party proceeded directly with their prisoner to the court-house, where Denis Browne was at the moment sitting in judgment upon a broken head incurred at a recent hurling match.

When the important event was communicated to the autocrat of Mayo, that the felon who had evaded pursuit so long was at last within his power, the hurlers, plaintiff and defendant, were most unceremoniously ejected from the bar of justice. Kimlin, pinioned and guarded by a yeoman with a naked bayonet at either side, was placed at the foot of the table, directly opposite to the arm-chair where Denis Browne was seated; the dead body was deposited outside in the lobby; and one of the captors desired to state briefly the particulars of the morning adventure.

While this ceremony was proceeding, Kimlin, with a dogged resolution, listened in sullen silence to his accuser. The detail ended, Denis turning upon the undaunted felon a look that would have quailed the stoutest heart, demanded to know the names and haunts of his companions. But the robber spoke not, and met the eye of his judge with a scowl of deadly hatred.

"Dost thou hear me, ruffian? Answer at once, and truly, or before the sun is at its height you shall dangle on yonder tree," and he pointed to a tall elm, whose bare and ragged boughs were visible from the court-house window.

Kimlin looked up; it was a look that united fiendish scorn with unflinching desperation.

"Not so fast, Right Honourable*," said the robber with a sneer: you'll bring me to the drum-head, I suppose, at any rate and, with all your hurry, you'll scarcely strap me up till sunset. As to my comrades, they are who they are; and for their haunts, why, look till ye find them, and then you'll not have lost the labour." The judge smiled bitterly. "Think ye, friend," he replied, "that a murderer and armed rebel, with the blood of the King's trusty soldiers on his hands, shall cumber the earth till he undergoes the forms of law intended for better regulated subjects?" He paused, and taking out his watch, examined the dial attentively, and whispered the jailor beside him, who directly left the room; then, in a voice as cold and passionlees as if he was ordering his carriage to the door, he thus continued: "Kimlin, it wants five minutes to eleven; at twelve you dangle upon yonder elm," and he pointed with his finger to the tree. "Devil may care!" replied the undaunted ruffian : will you let me have a priest ?"

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His wish was granted, and a messenger despatched for the confessor. In a few minutes, and by different doors, two functionaries entered the chamber, and placed themselves at either side of the doomed murderer.

The first of these was an old grey-haired man, whose coat of dingy black, and long coarse horse--skin boots, announced him to be a travelling friar. He crossed himself while addressing the prisoner, and muttered to him from time to time some Latin formulæ, interspersed with admonitory observations, inculcating the necessity of speedy repentance, and the making of his peace with God.

The other was a very different personage. He was a tall negro, with a face of amazing ugliness, and frame of gigantic proportions. His dress was of that peculiar and remarkable costume with which the time-beaters in military bands are generally invested. He had large rings in his ears, and a crooked sabre at his side, while his turban or cap, formed of red and yellow calico, added at least eighThe title by which Denis was universally known.

teen inches to his height. But, striking as his dress and figure were, on one thing the undivided observation of the spectators was directed. and that was a small coil of rope which he carried in his hand, having one end simply knotted, while the other was provided with an eye, spliced with a neatness that told the negro had been once a sailor.

"Sambo," said the judge, with an encouraging nod, 66 we require a cast of your craft this morning; and, like a good and provident workman, you have not forgotten your tools."

The negro's lips divided, and his grin disclosed a set of teeth firm and white as the tusks of a boar-hound.

Hegh, massa! me always ready; but rope has broke a strand ;" and, pointing out the frayed part, he directed a careless look to the convict, who had retired to a corner with the confessor "Mẹ want new rope; him there not tall, but dam heavy."

"It will do, Sambo -it will do;" said the justice, with a smile.

"But," returned the executioner, "Massa Browne, me not paid last job. Him jailor there, him dam rogue; him promise a one pound-note, besides the clothes."

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Ay, Snowball," replied the accused, " and did ye not get every rag that Conolly had on, with every thing in the pockets, and that into the bargain?".

Be

"Hegh, hegh!" and the sable functionary grinned; 66 great matter that! Him had not'ing in him pocket but thread and thimble; him clothes not worth a broken drum-stick - all tore, though himself was a tailor. side, this here a dam place. No will buy dead man's "lothes for fear him ghost come at night to claim them :" and Sambo laughed heartily, in which the judge and jailor joined.

While this conversation was carried on at the table, the felon and the churchman were busily employed in the corner of the room. Between religious exercises, the friar was endeavouring to extract a confession, which Kimlin appeared to make reluctantly, as his replies were given in hasty and querulous tones.