impose,
postponed the passing of sentence on you until this morning." Then,
having stated the various considerations which induced him to believe
that the punishment should be lenient, and the equally various
considerations which induced him to believe the contrary, Lefroy
concluded as follows: "We had to consider all this--to look at the
magnitude of the crime, and to look also at the consideration, that if
this were not the first case brought under the Act, our duty might have
obliged us to carry out the penalty it awards to the utmost extent; but,
taking into consideration, that this is the first conviction under the
Act--though the offence has been as clearly proved as any offence under
the Act could be--the sentence of the court is, that you be transported
beyond the seas for the term of fourteen years."

The listeners to the hypocritical sentence which concluded Lefroy's
speech, heard the sentence with astonishment and indignation. Mr.
Mitchel merely asked, apparently without any astonishment, if he might
now address some remarks to the court. The leave asked was granted, and
a silence still as death awaited the prisoner.

"The law," he said, in his usual manly tone, and unexcited manner, "the
law has now done its part, and the Queen of England, her crown and
government in Ireland are now secure--'pursuant to Act of Parliament.' I
have done my part, also. Three months ago I promised Lord Clarendon and
his government in this country, that I would provoke him into his
'courts of justice,' as places of this kind are called, and that I would
force him publicly and notoriously to pack a jury against me to convict
me, or else that I would walk out a free man from this dock to meet him
in another field.

"My lord, I knew I was setting my life on that cast; but I warned him
that, in either case, the victory would be with me; and the victory is
with me. Neither the jury, nor the judges, nor any other man in this
court, presumes to imagine that it is a criminal who stands in this
dock."

He was interrupted with the plaudits of the auditory; and again
continued:--

"I have kept my word. I have shown what the law is made of in Ireland. I
have shown that her majesty's government sustains itself in Ireland by
packed juries, by partisan judges, by perjured sheriffs--"

Here he was interrupted by Lefroy, who said, "the court could not sit
there to hear him arraign the jurors of the country, the sheriffs of the
country, t