I hope this is another rumour, for, so far as my knowledge of him goes,
he was not with the Volunteers, and it is said that he was antagonistic
to the forcible methods for which the Volunteers stood. But the tale of
his death is so persistent that one is inclined to believe it.

He was the most absurdly courageous man I have ever met with or heard
of. He has been in every trouble that has touched Ireland these ten
years back, and he has always been in on the generous side, therefore,
and naturally, on the side that was unpopular and weak. It would seem
indeed that a cause had only to be weak to gain his sympathy, and his
sympathy never stayed at home. There are so many good people who
"sympathise" with this or that cause, and, having given that measure of
their emotion, they give no more of it or of anything else. But he
rushed instantly to the street. A large stone, the lift of a footpath,
the base of a statue, any place and every place was for him a pulpit;
and, in the teeth of whatever oppression or disaster or power, he said
his say.

There are multitudes of men in Dublin of all classes and creeds who can
boast that they kicked Sheehy Skeffington, or that they struck him on
the head with walking sticks and umbrellas, or that they smashed their
fists into his face, and jumped on him when he fell. It is by no means
an exaggeration to say that these things were done to him, and it is
true that he bore ill-will to no man, and that he accepted blows, and
indignities and ridicule with the pathetic candour of a child who is
disguised as a man, and whose disguise cannot come off. His tongue, his
pen, his body, all that he had and hoped for were at the immediate
service of whoever was bewildered or oppressed. He has been shot. Other
men have been shot, but they faced the guns knowing that they faced
justice, however stern and oppressive; and that what they had engaged to