failure of the great Cicero of our age, to bring such an offence within the cognisance of a criminal jurisdiction: it was a subject suited to his legislative mind, worthy of his feeling heart, worthy of his immortal eloquence. I cannot, my Lord, even remotely allude to Lord Erskine, without gratifying myself by saying of him, that by the rare union of all that was learned in law with all that was lucid in eloquence; by the singular combination of all that was pure in morals with all that was profound in wisdom; he has stamped upon every action of his life the blended authority of a great mind, and an unquestionable conviction. I think, gentlemen, you will regret the failure of such a man in such an object. The merciless murderer may have manliness to plead; the highway robber may have want to palliate; yet they both are objects of criminal infliction: but the murderer of connubial bliss, who commits his crime in secrecy ;-the robber of domestic joys, whose very wealth, as in this case, may be his instrument; he is suffered to calculate on the infernal fame which a superfluous and unfelt expenditure may purchase. The law, however, is so: and we must only adopt the remedy it affords us. In your adjudication of that remedy, I do not ask too much, when I ask the full extent of your capability: how poor, even so, is the wretched remuneration for an injury which nothing can repair,-for a loss which nothing can alleviate? Do you think that a mine could recompense my client for the forfeiture of her who was dearer than life to him?

"Oh, had she been but true,

Though Heaven had made him such another world,
Of one entire and perfect chrysolite,

He'd not exchange her for it!"

I put it to any of you, what would you take to stand in his situation? What would you take to have your prospects blasted, your profession despoiled, your peace ruined, your bed profaned, your parents heart-broken, your children parentless? Believe me, gentlemen, if it were not for those children, he would not come here to-day to seek such remuneration; if it were not that, by your verdict, you may prevent those little innocent defrauded wretches from wandering beggars, as well as orphans, on the face of this earth. Oh, I know I need not ask this verdict from your mercy; I need not extort it from your compassion; I will receive it from your justice. I do conjure you, not as fathers, but as husbands;-not as husbands, but as citizens;-not as citizens, but as men ;-not as men, but as christians;-by all your obligations, public, private, moral, and religious; by the hearth profaned; by the home desolated; by the canons of the living God foully spurned;-save, oh! save your fire-sides from the contagion, your country from the crime, and perhaps thousands, yet unborn, from the shame, and sin, and sorrow of this example!

OF

MR. PHILLIPS

IN

THE CASE OF O'MULLAN v. M-KORKILL,

DELIVERED IN THE COUNTY COURT-HOUSE,

GALWAY.

My Lords and Gentlemen,

I AM instructed as of counsel for the plaintiff, to state to you the circumstances in which this action has originated. It is a source to me, I will confess it, of much personal embarrassment. Feebly, indeed, can I attempt to convey to you, the feelings with which a perusal of this brief has affected me; painful to you must be my inefficient transcript-painful to all who have the common feelings of country or of kind, must be this calamitous compendium of all that degrades our individual nature, and of all that has, for many an age of sorrow, perpetuated a curse upon our national character. It is, perhaps, the misery of this profession, that every hour our vision may be blasted by some withering crime, and our hearts wrung with some agonizing recital; there is no frightful form of vice, or no disgusting phantom of infirmity, which guilt does not array in spectral train before Horrible is the assemblage! humiliating the

us.

Joyfully

application! but, thank God, even amid those very scenes of disgrace and of debasement, occasions oft arise for the redemption of our dignity; occasions, on which the virtues breathed into us, by heavenly inspiration, walk abroad in the divinity of their exertion; before whose beam the wintry robe falls from the form of virtue, and all the midnight images of horror vanish into nothing. and piously do I recognize such an occasion; gladly do I invoke you to the generous participation; yes, gentlemen, though you must prepare to hear much that degrades our nature, much that distracts our country-though all that oppression could devise against the poor-though all that persecution could inflict upon the feeble-though all that vice could wield against the piousthough all that the venom of a venal turpitude could pour upon the patriot, must with their alternate apparition afflict, affright, and humiliate you, still do I hope, that over this charnel-house of crime-over this very sepulchre, where corruption sits enthroned upon the merit it has murdered, that voice is at length about to be heard, at which the martyred victim will arise to vindicate the ways of Providence, and prove that even in its worst adversity there is a might and immortality in virtue.

The plaintiff, gentlemen, you have heard, is the Rev. Cornelius O'Mullan; he is a clergyman of the church of Rome, and became invested with that venerable appellation, so far back as September, 1804. It is a title which you know, in this country, no rank ennobles, no treasure enriches, no establishment supports; its possessor stands undis guised by any rag of this world's decoration, resting all temporal, all eternal hope upon his toil, his talents, his attainments, and his piety-doubtless, after

יב

all, the highest honours, as well as the most imperishable treasures of the man of God. Year after year passed over my client, and each anniversary only gave him an additional title to these qualifications. His precept was but the handmaid to his practice; the sceptic heard him, and was convinced; the ignorant attended him, and were taught; he smoothed the death-bed of too heedless wealth; he rocked the cradle of the infant charity: oh, no wonder he walked in the sunshine of the public eye, no wonder he toiled through the pressure of the public benediction. This is not an idle declamation: such was the result his ministry produced, that within five years from the date of its commencement, nearly 2000l. of voluntary subscription = enlarged the temple where such precepts were taught, and such piety exemplified. Such was the situation of Mr. O'Mullan, when a dissolution of parliament took place, and an unexpected contest for the representation of Derry, threw that county into unusual commotion. One of the candidates was of the Ponsonby family-a family devoted to the interests, and dear to the heart of Ireland; he naturally thought that his parliamentary conduct entitled him to the vote of every catholic in the land; and so it did, not only of every catholic, but of every christian who preferred the diffusion of the gospel to the ascend. ancy of a sect and loved the principles of the constitution better than the pretensions of a party. Perhaps you will think with me that there is a sort of posthumous interest thrown about that event when I tell you that the candidate on that occasion was the lamented hero over whose tomb the tears not only of Ireland, but of Europe, bave been so lately shed; he who, mid the blossom of