believed, and believed generally, that their lives were sacrificed to
expediency, and not to satisfy justice. The spot where Robert Emmet
closed his young life on a bloody scaffold was yesterday regarded by
thousands upon thousands of his countrymen and women as a holy place,
and all looked upon his fate as similar to that of the three men
whose memory they had assembled to honour, and whose death they
pronounced to be unjust. It would be hard to give a just conception
of the scene here, as the procession advanced and divided, as it
were, into two great channels, owing to the breaking up of the
streetway. On the advance of the _cortege_ reaching the top of
Bridgefoot-street every head was uncovered, and nothing was to be
heard but the measured tread of the vast mass, but as if by some
secret and uncontrollable impulse a mighty, ringing, and enthusiastic
cheer, broke from the moving throng as the angle of the footway at
the eastern end of St. Catherine's church, where the scaffold on
which Emmet was executed stood, was passed. In that cheer there
appeared to be no fiction, as it evidently came straight from the
hearts of thousands, who waved their hats and handkerchiefs, as did
also the groups that clustered in the windows of the houses in the
neighbourhood. As the procession moved on from every part of it the
cheers rose again and again, men holding up their children, and
pointing out the place where one who loved Ireland, "not wisely but
too well," rendered up his life. When the hearse with white plumes
came up bearing on the side draperies the words "William P. Allen,"
all the enthusiasm and excitement ceased, and along the lines of
spectators prayers for the repose of the soul of the departed man
passed from mouth to mouth; and a sense of deep sadness seemed to
settle down on the swaying multitude as the procession rolled along
on its way. After this hearse came large numbers of females walking
on bravely, apparently heedless of the muddy streets and the