this I speak with confidence, of intimate knowledge, and with the
consolation that appertains to that confidence. Think not, my lords,
I say this for the petty gratification of giving you a transitory
uneasiness. A man who never yet raised his voice to assert a lie,
will not hazard his character with posterity, by asserting a
falsehood on a subject so important to his country, and on an
occasion like this. Yes, my lords, a man who does not wish to have
his epitaph written until his country is liberated, will not leave a
weapon in the power of envy, or a pretence to impeach the probity
which he means to preserve, even in the grave, to which tyranny
consigns him."

[Here he was again interrupted by the court]

"Again I say, that what I have spoken was not intended for your
lordship, whose situation I commisserate rather than envy--my
expressions were for my countrymen. If there is a true Irishman
present, let my last words cheer him in the hour of his affliction."

[Here he was again interrupted. Lord Norbury said he did not sit
there to hear treason.]

"I have always understood it to be the duty of a judge, when a
prisoner has been convicted, to pronounce the sentence of the law. I
have also understood that judges sometimes think it their duty to
hear with patience, and to speak with humanity; to exhort the victim
of the laws, and to offer, with tender benignity, their opinions of
the motives by which he was actuated in the crime of which he was
adjudged guilty. That a judge has thought it his duty so to have
done, I have no doubt; but where is the boasted freedom of your