bayonet, which was screwed to the top of his musket. She stooped and escaped, but the bayonet cut her across the shoulders. There were some good shots on the qui vive. The occurrence just took place on the site of Roe's distillery, and a shot was forthwith fired from a house at the corner of Crane Lane, which closed the loyal career of the soldier who wounded my mother. He was shot dead. The official report in the newspapers next day stated that they were so near capturing the Committee or Directory of the United Irishmen that in their flight they left the taper lighting, and the wax was soft with which they had been sealing their letters and documents. I should have mentioned that Magan went up the next morning to know had 'anything happened, as he was quite uneasy at not seeing Lord Edward and Mrs Moore, and that he had stopped up until midnight expecting them. While on this point I may as well finish it. When Dr Madden was getting in

formation from my mother, he asked who she thought had betrayed Lord Edward. Whether she said this to him or not I cannot say; but just as he left, she said to me, ‘Dr Madden asked me who I thought betrayed Lord Edward, and only fearing I should sin against charity, I would have said it was Magan, for no one but my mother and he knew that Lord Edward was to go down to his (Magan's) house on Usher's Island the night his lordship was stopped by Major Sirr. Poor Lord Edward himself did not know we were going to Magan's house till we set out for it. We told Magan next day what a narrow escape we had that night, and how Lord Edward had to take refuge in Murphy's. Lord Edward was arrested on the following day in Murphy's house.'*

"Gallagher, of whom I have already spoken, was brought out for execution; but he put on a freemason's apron, having received an intimation that the captain of the guard was a member of the craft. By some rule of their faith, one brother cannot see another hanged. Be this as it

It is more than probable that Mrs Macready did not avow during that interview her suspicion of Magan. It took place, as we learn from the Lives of the United Irishmen, (vol. ii., p. 406,) in the year 1842. Magan was then alive. Reminiscences contributed by Mrs Macready appear, but Magan's name does not occur in them.

may, the captain ordered his men away, and Gallagher was taken back to the Provost Prison until some non-masonic hangman could be got. After, or about this time, the executions at the corner of Bridgefoot Street, in Thomas Street, were going on, and the blood flowing from the block whereon the poor rebels were quartered clogged up the sewers, and some dogs were licking it up. The Lady Lieutenant was driving past, and got such a fright from this horrible scene that she fainted in the carriage. Having arrived home, she wrote to her brother, who was high in the then Government, for God's sake to stop this wholesale massacre of the defenceless. Her humane appeal had the desired effect; an order came to stem all further executions; enough blood had been shed. The rest of the prisoners were ordered to be transported, and vessels for that purpose were sent over. In one of these poor Gallagher was placed, heavily ironed. The night before the transport sailed, his young wife was permitted to see him, when his manacles, for that occasion, were taken off. His wife brought a coil of sash cord under her dress; night came on before she left, and Gallagher held one end while she took the other ashore. The captain, as soon as he thought the wife was out of sight of the ship, ordered the prisoner to be put in irons again. When they went to him for that purpose he said, 'Can you not wait one minute?' They paused, and he leaped overboard, and was towed by the rope safely ashore, before the sailors (who told the captain the man had leaped in) had time to overtake him in a boat. He was put aboard a smuggling lugger that conveyed salt to France, and in years afterwards James Moore, his former master, met him in London. He told him he was a wealthy hotel-keeper in Bordeaux, and the handsome landlady, of course, was the person who pulled the cord with him aboard the transport ship.

66

My mother took £500 to the doctor who attended the prisoners in Birmingham Tower, Dublin Castle, where my grandfather was detained, and he certified my grandfather was mad! Whether he arrived at this conclusion from his professional skill or my mother's persuasive powers, de"ponent further knoweth not; but I even heard, in the event of my grandfather's escape, he was to be further

convinced that my grandsire was mad. Major Sirr had not implicit faith in the doctor's word, for he went to the Tower to judge for himself. The prisoner must have acted the maniac to life, for he made Major Sirr run for his life after severely biting him. He then passed out of the Tower and escaped up Castle Street. The Government

never re-arrested him, believing him insane.

"Major Sirr and Jemmy O'Brien, the informer, were looking for pikes at the rear of my grandfather's stores in a field that is now occupied by Messrs Fitzimmons, timbermerchants, Bridgeford Street. A croppy, named Clayton, saw them, and had them covered with his carbine; but, as he could only hit one, he feared the other might escape, and that he himself would be captured. He told this to Casey, who said each of them were fully worth a charge of powder. This, perhaps, was the narrowest escape Major Sirr had, for he it was that was covered, and covered moreover by a man of unerring aim-the same who hit the soldier at Costigan's Gate."

JEMMY O'BRIEN.

O'Brien, to whom Mr Macready refers, had obtained an unenviable notoriety for murder, burglary, and general chicane, when Major Sirr enlisted him in his service as a "bloodhound," who, to quote the words of Curran, "with more than instinctive keenness pursued victim after victim." "I have heard," he added, "of assassinations by sword, by pistol, and by dagger, but here is a wretch who would dip the Evangelists in blood. If he thinks he has not sworn his victim to death, he is ready to swear without mercy and without end. But, oh! do not, I conjure you, suffer him to take an oath; the hand of the murderer should not pollute the purity of the gospel, or, if he will swear, let it be by the knife, the proper symbol of his profession." To trace O'Brien through the bloody track of his progress during "the reign of terror," would prove a repulsive task. The following account of the circumstances which led to his end were given to us in 1854 by a gentleman connected

with the Irish Executive. In the year 1800, O'Brien was deputed to scrutinise some persons who had assembled for the purpose of playing foot-ball near Stevens' Lane. In scrambling over a fence which enclosed the field, assisted by an old man named Hoey, who happened to be on the

spot, the cry of "O'Brien the informer" was immediately raised, the people fled, and O'Brien in his chagrin turned round and illogically wreaked his vengeance by stabbing Hoey to death. He was tried for the crime, and sentenced to execution by Judge Day, who was a just judge in bad times, and disregarded the eulogiums with which Major Sirr belauded O'Brien during the trial. The delight of the populace was unbounded. A vast ocean of people surged round the prison and under the gallows. A delay occurred; the populace became impatient, and finally uneasy, lest the Government should have yielded to the memorial which was known to have been presented in his favour. A multitudinous murmur gradually gave place to a loud boom of popular indignation. The delay was caused by the cowardice of O'Brien, who shrank from his approaching doom. Prostrate on his knees, he begged intervals of indulgence according as the turnkey reminded him "that his hour had come.' At length Tom Galvin, the hangman, a person of barbarous humour, accosted him, saying, "Ah, Misther O'Brien, long life to you, sir, come out on the balcony, an' don't keep the people in suspense; they are mighty onasy entirely under the swing-swong."

GENERAL LAWLESS.
(P. 116, ante.)

Having some reason to doubt the accuracy of the account given on hearsay by the late Lord Cloncurry, and quoted by Dr Madden, which represented Lawless effecting his escape in the guise of a butcher, carrying a side of beef on his shoulder, we instituted inquiries as to the real facts, and the parties exclusively competent to state them; and with this object we had an interview, in 1854, with the late Mrs Ryan of Upper Gardiner Street, then in her eighty-second year.

After the break-up of the Executive Directory by the arrests at Oliver Bond's, a new one, composed of John and Henry Shears, William Lawless, and others, started into existence, determined to carry out the plans of the original founders. Proclamations appeared, and several arrests were made; but Lawless, owing to his own tact, and the presence of mind of his friends, escaped. Lawless was proceeding to his mother's house in French Street at a rapid pace, through Digges Street, when his sister, perceiving his approach, appeared at the drawing-room window, and motioned him to retire. The house was at that moment undergoing a search by Major Sirr and his myrmidons, and had Lawless come up, his life would, doubtless, have paid the forfeit. It is a significant fact that, on the following day, Henry Sheares was arrested in the act of knocking at Lawless's door. The family of Mr Byrne, of Byrne's Hill, in the Liberty, was then staying at their country residence, near Kimmage, where Mr Byrne and his daughters, of whom our informant, Mrs Ryan, was one, provided Lawless with an asylum. He was concealed in a garret-bedroom, communicating with a small clothes closet, into which he retired at every approach, even of the servants, who were quite unconscious of his presence. Days rolled over, and the search, but without avail, continued. Military and yeomanry scoured the country round. Major Sirr was so active, that some swore he possessed the alleged ornithological property of being in two places at once.

The Lawyers' corps having been on duty near Kimmage, it was suggested that Mr Byrne's house should be searched; but a gallant nephew of Lord Avonmore, who commanded, refused to sanction this proceeding, in consequence of Mr Byrne's absence, and the presence of several ladies in the house. Lawless thanked his stars; but the fears of the family were greatly excited by the proximity of his pursuers, and they resolved at all hazards to remove him to Dublin previous to making one desperate effort to reach France. Word was sent to Philip Lawless, an eminent brewer, residing at Warrenmount, the elder brother of William, to send his carriage to Mr Byrne's to convey him to town, Mrs Ryan, then Miss Byrne, dressed Lawless in a loose