high to be affected in the smallest degree by the fate of so insignificant an individual. Turn to the miserable prisoner himself -tainted and blemished as he possibly may be, even him you may retrieve to his country and his duty, by a salutary effort of seasonable magnanimity. You will inspire him with reverence for that institution which knows when to spare, as well as when to inflict; and which, instead of sacrificing him to a strong suspicion of his criminality, is determined, not by the belief, but by the possibility of his innocence, and dismisses him with indignation and contemptuous mercy.

A feeble attempt was made to prove that Kirwan slept at home on the 23rd; and witnesses were also examined to prove his general loyalty. Baron George then charged, and in five minutes after, the jury found a verdict of GUILTY. He was sentenced on the 2nd of September, and hanged in Thomas-street, on the 3rd.

AGAINST ENSIGN JOHN COSTLEY.

[CONSPIRACY TO MURDER.]

SESSIONS-HOUSE, GREEN-STREET.

February 23rd, 1804.

THE following speech is chiefly valuable, as illustrating the placid and just manner in which so vehement an advocate as Curran could discharge his duty as prosecutor.

Costley was an ensign in the Roscommon Militia.

He was arraigned before Baron George and Mr. Justice Day at Green-st., Dublin, on the 21st of February, 1804, on an indictment, charging him and Charles Frazer Frizell with having conspired to murder the Rev. William Ledwich, parish priest of Rathfarnham, in the county Dublin. Other indictments charged burglary in the house of Catherine Byrne, with intent to murder. There was one count for a common assault.

On Thursday, the 23rd, the trial came on, and after Mr. O'Grady, jun., had opened the pleadings, Curran stated the case for the crown as follows:

My Lords, and Gentlemen of the Jury, I am concerned in this cause as counsel for the crown - that is, as counsel for the law and for the public peace, by putting the charge, that has

been found by the indictment, into a course of sober, humane, firm, and dispassionate inquiry, before you, Gentlemen of the Jury, to enable you to fulfil, to the public the awful, heavy, and severe duty of finding the prisoner at the bar guilty, if he be guilty, and that awful, solemn, and equally bounden duty you owe to the prisoner himself, to acquit him, if he shall appear to be innocent of the charges brought against him.

It becomes my duty at present, and painful is that duty, and painful must it be to every man who acts as counsel for the crown against the life of a fellow-subject, painful must it be in proportion to the sad conviction that he feels in his mind that the prosecution must be successful.

It is my duty, gentlemen of the jury, to apprize you of the nature of the charge, as well as to apprize you of the circumstances that will be given in evidence to support that charge, that you may understand, in some previous degree, the law by which you are to be directed, and that you should have some previous knowledge of the nature of the evidence that shall be adduced for the purpose of substantiating that charge.

The prisoner has been given in charge to the jury on an indictment stating, that he, with others, did conspire to kill and murder William Ledwich, who is prosecutor in this cause. That offence is made capital by the statute laws of the country; and, gentlemen, I would be glad to guard you against a mistake, that in common parlance arises on this subject. A conspiracy to kill and murder does not owe its criminality to the length of time it may occupy in its progress, from its first conception to its ultimate adoption-a conspiracy may be formed the very instant before the step is taken to put it into effect. If a number of people meet accidentally in the street, and conspire together to kill and murder at the moment, it is as essentially the crime of conspiracy as if it had been intended for a year before, and hatched for that year to the moment of its accomplishment.

On the charge of burglary alleged against the prisoner at the bar, it becomes requisite to be equally clear and explicit, that you may comprehend how essential it is, that two circumstances shall go to compose this species of crime, which is also made capital, and consequently liable to the punishment of death. It becomes necessary before you can decide on a verdict of guilt on

this indictment, that two circumstances shall be proved to your satisfaction. The first of these is, the breaking open of the dwelling or habitation of any of his Majesty's subjects any time after night-fall; and the next essential ingredient is, that such breaking must have been effected with design or intent to commit a felony. These distinct and separate facts you must combine in proof before the charge of burglary can be sustained; so far, that should you be satisfied that a breaking into a dwelling or habitation at a late hour of the night was accomplished, it becomes necessary, in addition, that you should have as strong and forcible a conviction on your minds, that such breaking into the house or dwelling was designed and perpetrated with the intent to commit a felony, before you can venture to bring in a verdict of guilty. As to the burglary charged against the prisoner at the bar, you will perceive that the indictment lays the breaking into the habitation of the prosecutor, with intent to kill and murder him; an act, which, if perpetrated, would constitute a capital felony in itself, and the intention of which, connected with the fact of breaking into the house, forms an indictment on grounds sufficiently firm to form the capital crime of burglary.

It may be equally necessary to hint to you, gentlemen of the jury, that the statute which makes burglary a capital offence, does not lay down a distinct species of felony, the commission of which must previously occupy the intention-it does not discriminate between the intention of committing a murder and committing a robbery; so that, on this principle, if you shall reconcile it to your minds in the course of the evidence which shall be adduced, that the prisoner at the bar broke into the habitation alluded to, with intent to murder, the crime of burglary is effectually constituted; and you are bound, by the sacred oath you have taken, to bring in a sentence of conviction. But if the evidence shall not appear to you sufficiently strong to reconcile your consciences to the belief, that the prisoner at the bar, let the fact of his breaking open the house be ever so incontrovertible, did form the design or intention to commit the murder alleged, then, gentlemen of the jury, your understandings will suggest to you, that it becomes an imperious duty on you to bring in a verdict of acquittal.

I feel it is my duty to make these preliminary observations by

which you might at least be directed to that more minute and precise exposition of the law, which you will have the satisfaction of hearing from the court. I also feel, that the man who stands up in a court of justice, owes to the jury whom he addresses, the duty of elucidating any matter of law suggested by the nature of the case in which he becomes an advocate, and a studied anxiety not to aggravate or strain its circumstances beyond a fair and liberal construction of that law. I repeat, gentlemen, that I feel it becomes a duty equally awful and imperious on his conscience, to view the object of explanation in all its points and bearings, with uniform and impartial investigation. The more momentous and important the object of inquiry becomes, the more ardent must his anxiety be not to mislead; and that delicacy, which the advocate must feel in a predicament of this nature, becomes a principle to govern the consciences and the oaths of persons delegated to expound the law in more exalted situations.

I have hitherto stated two material charges against the prisoner at the bar, in which your judgments will be exercised. Those of a less important or inferior nature, I do not think it equally necessary to dilate upon; and will therefore proceed to state the particular circumstances that attended this extraordinary and unfortunate transaction.

I understand, gentlemen of the jury, it will appear in evidence before you, that on the night of the 3rd of the present month of February, about the hour of ten o'clock, this attempt was made on the Rev. William Ledwich, a Roman Catholic clergyman of the parish of Rathfarnham, where he has resided for more than twenty-five years, an edifying and respected pattern of innocence of heart, mildness of manners, of exemplary piety, and conduct the most inoffensive and irreproachable.

As this venerated and innocent man was preparing to seek that undisturbed and calm repose, which he should look for, after a conscientious and precise discharge of the functions and duties of the preceding day, he heard a tumultuous noise under the window of the chamber in which he was about to sleep. He naturally went to the window, which he raised, to see what created the unusual disturbance with which he was annoyed from below, when he recollected a voice, and immediately asked, Is not that Mr. Frizell? He also knew the prisoner by his voice, and

asked, "Is not that Ensign Costley?" They answered to their names, and ordered him to come down. Astonished at this kind of proceeding, he asked for what he should come down? The reply was, that he must go to the guard-house. Mr. Ledwich began to expostulate. "You know, Mr. Frizell, that I am an infirm man, and that I am to be at all times found on any occasion for me. I entreat of you not to disturb me this night, and you shall find me punctual in attendance at your guard-house on to-morrow." The party below were still vociferous, urging that he must come to the guard-house. This infirm gentleman then put his head out of the window, to try the effect of further entreaty, on which a stroke of a drawn sword was made at him, which fortunately missed his head, but made a deep cut in the window-frame from which he looked out. On this he retired to his room, unconscious how to act, but at length yielded to the half advice, and half persuasions of a fellow-lodger, who was roused by the tumult in the street, and in suspense what opinion to give, as to the most effectual mode for Mr. Ledwich to adopt, in order to save his life. At length he made his way through a back door, and secured a retreat over Lord Ely's park wall, glassed at the top, the sense of peril giving to his feeble bodily powers that concentrated effort which a hard struggle for life will often produce. Having clambered to the top of this wall, he precipitated himself at the other side to a dangerous and most extraordinary depth. Here, it becomes requisite, gentlemen of the jury, to animadvert, but to do it with candour, and not with a view to stimulate your indignation, on a military officer, wearing his Majesty's garb, entrusted with an armed force, for the important purpose of defending his fellow-subjects, and preserving the public peace, degrading that commission, and disgracing the honour of those forces under his command, by converting the arms given to them for protection into vile. instruments of annoyance, seeking by their means to take away a life it was his duty to preserve. Nor is the aggravation of this horrible outrage small, when offered against a man advanced in years, infirm in health, a priest in orders, preaching the same faith with others, upon the same authorized system of social duty on this side of the grave, in order to realize those hopes in the next world, given to Christians to entertain by that wise Redeemer,