plane. It is sometimes happily called a "star
feat," and the professor himself "a daring
equilibrist." But Diarmid was before him by at
least fifteen hundred centuries, and went up a
hill and down again, on a large tun of wine, to
the amazement of a sort of open-air circus. A
conceited young man, who thought he could do
the same feat, and was invited into the ring to
do it, was crushed under the barrel.

They seem to have been sumptuously
appointed, and to have lived magnificently — feasting,
drinking, and fighting. "Tell me," said
Conan, an Irish gentleman, at whose house Fion
was on a visit, "what are the sweetest strains
you ever enjoyed?" Fion answered him in a
song that breathes the spirit of poetry:

"When the seven battalions of Fenians
assemble on our plain, and raise their standards
over their heads; when the howling whistling
blast of the dry cold wind rushes through them
and over, that is very sweet to me. When the
drinking hall is set out in Almin, and the
cupbearers hand the bright cups of chaste
workmanship to the chiefs of the Fenians, the ring
of the cups on the tables, when drained to the
last drop, that is very sweet to me. Sweet to
me is the scream of the seagull and of the heron,
the roar of the waves on Tralee, the song of the
three sons of Meardha, the whistle of Macluagh,
and the voice of the cuckoo in the first months
of summer." A couple of centuries later, we find
the Fenians in possession of a code of laws more
minute than, and quite as philosophical as, those
of Justinian, illustrated by commentaries,
glossary, and interpretations, divided into elaborate
systems of the law of distraint, and debtor and
creditor, of "fosterage," &c.*

* See the curious portion of the Brehon Laws,
just published by the government, and ably and
carefully edited by Doctor Hancock. One of the
remedies of a creditor against his debtor was "fasting"
at his gate until he paid.

Of a very, very diiferent pattern are the
modern gentry who take to themselves the name
of those Ossianic heroes. I wander through
the city where the Fenian "centres" are
supposed to exist in great force. I see the walls
covered with great placards, headed ominously:

[crown symbol]

A PROCLAMATION!

WOODHOUSE.

Whereas, &c. (to an unlimited extent of what
lawyers call "recitals").

And whereas (more "reciting") .

Now we, the Lord-Lieutenant-General and
General Governor of Ireland, do hereby, &c.

Given at our Council Chamber, Dublin
Castle.

Round these awful documents little crowds
are gathered, who read and pass on: some with
that curious and significant gesture of lifting
the "caubeen" a little to one side from the
back, to allow of a kind of puzzled scratch of
the head, and leaving the caubeen in that
position. Some go their way with a muttered
"Bedad!" Down Parliament-street, not a hundred
yards from "The Castle," there is a gaudy office,
ostentatiously painted a bright green, but its
shutters are up, and a policeman, like a
gendarme, standing at the door. This is the "IRISH
PEOPLE" office, sacked and rummaged only the
other night. There is a great deal of newspaper
reading, and "sensation" advertisements, and
a little dramatic incident or two. Here is a
specimen. For as I enter a large house of
business, employing some five or six hundred
clerks and workmen of all grades, two very
gigantic gentlemen, with heavy walking-sticks,
bearded and moustachioed, and looking so
uncomfortable in their costume — intended to
represent easy affluence in the shopkeeping
class — that they seem to be theatrical, and to
be coming on in a pantomime. I here request
a private interview with the head of the house,
and I have no difficulty in identifying them as
members of the B division, who are the detectives
of the force, and who, for some mysterious
sort of detection, must be over six feet high.
As I go out, I see another gentleman in a new
frieze coat, and a heavy oak walking-stick,
dressed evidently as his ideal of an opulent
country shopkeeper, walking carelessly up and
down, looking at the clouds and chimney-pots
with an abstracted air; and on the opposite
side of the street are two police flâneurs in their
real dress, crossing each other, and with an overdone
air of lounging, and a blasé manner, as
though the force was getting a bore. Putting
"this and that together," it is evident that there
is a Fenian inside, who is about to be "drawn."

My friend, Mr. Malachy, whose exertion in
the reformation of the drama has been described
not very far back,* has, I see, seized on the
popular thought, and, with an aptitude which is
his characteristic, has embodied it in a grand
national drama. One would have thought that
Harry Munro, whom he happily described as
"that Renowned Son of Momus," and as "the
King of Comedians," would alone have been a
sufficient attraction. But Malachy is never
contented by the meagre and exact measure of duty.
He goes beyond it, and has announced a real
national drama on the grand stirring subject
of "ROBERT EMMETT," with such characters
as the ill-fated LORD EDWARD FITZGERALD,
the CHIEF JUSTICE, and a savage SERJEANT,
and various other important characters of
that exciting period. It is remarkable,
however, that this drama should have been
suddenly withdrawn, owing, no doubt, to that
reign of terror which now obtains in the
unhappy city. But Mr. Malachy, with that
readiness of resource which, I must again remark,
those that share in his private friendship have
noticed as a special feature in his character, has
compassed the same end by substituting the
story of the unhappy "WALLACE, THE HERO OF
SCOTLAND," whose sentiments and misfortunes
a quick-witted audience would know how to
apply.

* See No. 337.