to this article, he writes: "The statement that Mr. Barry's coffin was borne to the grave by six Protestants, can hardly be correct, as nothing was known of the pension he received till some time after his death. He was buried in the same respectful way in which Catholic clergymen are usually buried”.

Conspirators and informers will coëxist until the crack of doom. Some of the seemingly staunchest hearts in Smith O'Brien's movement of '48 were false to their chief and colleagues; and when the crisis came suggested to the police magistrates, that in order to preserve consistency and keep up the delusion, they ought to be arrested and imprisoned.* Even while we write, the ranks of the Fenians, although knotted as it seemed by the most binding oaths of secrecy, are broken and betrayed by internal spies. Nor are the informers confined to Ireland. One of the American correspondents of the Times, in a letter dated Philadelphia, October 24th, 1865, writes: "The Fenian Congress continues its sessions, and has so much business to attend to that they are protracted far into the night. The green-uniformed sentinels still guard its doors closely, and hope to keep the secret of the deliberations within. They have changed their weapons to loaded muskets, in order to terrify attempting intruders, but their watchfulness is of little avail, for not only are there informers inside in the interest of your Government, but I learn that others assist in the deliberations who are in the interest of our own, who send daily reports of the proceedings to Washington, that the Government may know in time the adoption of any measures tending to violate the peace between England and America".

In concluding a book which deals largely with Irish Informers, we have no desire to convey the inference that treachery or duplicity, for what Shakspeare calls "saint seducing gold", is a speciality of the Celtic cha* Communicated by F. T. P., Esq., ex police magistrate.

racter. The records of every age and nation furnish ample illustrations of both, even in the most aggravated form. Philip of Macedon said that he would "never despair of taking any fortress to which an ass might enter laden with gold". The physician of Pyrrhus informed the Roman general Fabricius, that he was ready to poison his royal master for pay. King Charles the Second received large douceurs from the French monarch, and shaped his foreign policy accordingly. Sydney was secretly subsidized by France, and Dalrymple's memoirs disclose many similar cases. The publication of the French Official Records shows to what a great extent the members of the English legislature were in the pay of Louis XIV. To come down to a later period, we learn from Napier's narrative of the Peninsular war, that Wellington had paid informers on Soult's staff, and Soult had similar channels of information through officers on Wellington's staff. Again, we are assured by Barry O'Meara, the Boswell of Napoleon at St. Helena, that the wife of an English statesman was subsidized by the Emperor, to the extent of £2,000 a month, for revealing to him the secrets of the British cabinet.

* The Duke, in one of his conversations with Rogers, describes an informer, called Don Uran de la Rosa, and sometimes Ozèlle, who, during the progress of the Peninsular war, was wont to dine with the English and the French alternately. "When I was ambassador at Paris", added Wellington, “he came and begged me to make interest with Soult for the settlement of his accounts. 'How can I?' I said, laughing, 'when we made such use of you as we did?' They were settled, however, if we could believe him. After his death, a Frenchman came to me in London, and when he had vapoured away for some time, declaring that Ozèlle had won every battle and saved Europe, he said, Here are his memoirs; shall we publish them or not?' I saw his drift, and said, 'Do as you please; he was neither more nor less than a spy'. I heard no more of them or of him". For full details, see Recollections by Samuel Rogers, pp. 198-201.

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CORRIGENDA.

At page 119, for "Dolphin's Barn" read "Portobello".

At page 160, beginning with line 15, a misprint occurs, which may be thus corrected:

"movement, it possessed no more staunch partizan. But flesh is weak; and we find Cox, during thirty-five years that he personated the character of an indomitable patriot, in the receipt of a secret stipend".

At page 271, it was intended to have inserted the following note as an additional illustration:

"In the interval which elapsed between the French expedition to Bantry Bay and their arrival at Killala, the Mayor of Drogheda hired a staff of spies, whom he dressed up in French uniforms, and despatched through the country to entrap the unwary peasantry".

J. F. FOWLER, Printer, 3 Crow Street, Dame Street, Dublin.