'Well, that won't make him a judge of an Irish gentleman.'

In the last chapter I mentioned that the preacher I most admired was
Archbishop Magee. I had the privilege of frequently hearing him in Cork,
where he drew crowded congregations to a temporary church--the cathedral
being under repair.

I never heard any one who so magnetised me from the pulpit, and I am by
no means prone to admire sermons. There was a sort of mesmerism in the
very eloquence of Magee which kept my eyes riveted on his lips--rather
big, bulgy lips in an expressive, sensitive face. An hour beneath him
sped marvellously fast, and more than once in Cork I have heard him
preach for that length. The impression he made on me has never been
effaced, and it was with no surprise I learnt in due course that he
became Archbishop of York.

The late Lord Derby said that the most eloquent speech he ever heard in
or out of the House of Lords was Magee's speech on the Church Act, the
peroration of which--quoting from memory after many years--ran:--'My
Lords, I will not, I cannot, and I dare not vote for that most
unhallowed bill which lies on your Lordships' table.'

Have all Magee stories been told?

I am afraid so. Yet in the hope that a few may be new to some, though
old to others--who are invited to skip them--here are just a small
batch.

When he was a dean, he one day attended a debate on tithes in the House
of Commons, and was subsequently putting on his overcoat, when a Radical