I came in
afterwards. Both of these assertions have been made and submitted to
the men in whose hands my life rested, as evidence made on oath by
these men--made solely and purely for the purpose of giving my body
to an untimely grave. There are many points, my lords, that have been
sworn to here to prove my complicity in a great many acts it has been
alleged I took part in. It is not my desire now, my lords, to give
utterance to one word against the verdict which has been pronounced
upon me. But fully conscious of my honour as a man, which has never
been impugned, fully conscious that I can go into my grave with a
name and character unsullied, I can only say that these parties,
actuated by a desire either of their own aggrandisement, or to save
their paltry miserable lives, have pandered to the appetite, if I may
so speak, of justice, and my life shall pay the forfeit. Fully
convinced and satisfied of the righteousness of my every act in
connection with the late revolutionary movement in Ireland, I have
nothing to recall--nothing that I would not do again, nothing for
which I should feel the blush of shame mantling my brow; my conduct
and career, both here as a private citizen, and in America--if you
like--as a soldier, are before you; and even in this, my hour of
trial, I feel the consciousness of having lived an honest man, and I
will die proudly, believing that if I have given my life to give
freedom and liberty to the land of my birth, I have done only that
which every Irishman and every man whose soul throbs with a feeling
of liberty should do. I, my lords, shall scarcely--I feel I should
not at all--mention the name of Massey. I feel I should not pollute
my lips with the name of that traitor, whose illegitimacy has been
proved here--a man whose name even is not known, and who, I deny
point blank, ever wore the star of a colonel in the Confederate army.
Him I shall let rest. I shall pass him, wishing him, in the words of
the poet:--

"'May the grass wither from his feet;
The woods deny him shelter; earth a home;
The dust a grave; the sun his light:
And heaven its God!'

"Let Massey remember from this day forth that he carries with him, as
my able and eloquent counsel (Mr. Dowse) has stated, a serpent that
will gnaw his conscience, will carry about him in his breast a living
hell from which he can n