MY EMMET'S NO MORE.

Despair in her wild eye, a daughter of Erin,
Appeared on the cliff of a bleak rocky shore,
Loose in the winds flowed her dark streaming ringlets
And heedless she gazed on the dread surge's roar.
Loud rang her harp in wild tones of despairing,

The time passed away with the present compairing, And in soul-thrilling strains deeper sorrow declaring, She sang Erin's woes, and her Emmet's no more!

"Oh, Erin! my country, your glory's departed,

For tyrants and traitors have stabbed thy heart's core, Thy daughters have laved in the streams of affliction. Thy patriots have flet, or are stretched in their gore. Ruthless ruffians now prowl through thy hamlets forsaken From pale hungry orphans their last morsels have taken;

The screams of thy females no pity awaken;

Alas! my poor country, your Emmet's no more!

"Brave was his spirit, yet mild as the Brahmin,
His heart bled in anguish at the wrongs of the poor;
To relieve their hard sufferings he braved every danger,
The vengence of tyrants undauntedly bore.
E'en before him the proud titled villains in power,
Were seen, though in ermine, in terror to cower,
But, alas! he is gone-he has fallen a young flower,
They have murdered my Emmet-my Emmet's no
more!"

THE TRIAL

OF

ROBERT EMMET,

UPON AN

INDICTMENT FOR HIGH TREASON,

Held, under a Special Commission, at the Sessions House, Green Street, on Monday, 19th of September, 1803.

JUDGES PRESENT.-LORD NORBURY, MR. BARON GEORGE, AND MR. BARON DALY.

MR. STANDISH O'GRADY, ATTORNEY GENERAL.

To the indictment, charging him with compassing the disposition and death of the king, and conspiring to levy war against the king within the realin, Mr. Emmet pleaded not guilty He was then given in charge.

The indictment was then opened, in substance, to the following effect, by

THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL,

My Lord, and Gentlemen of the Jury:

It is my duty to state, as concisely as I can, the nature of the charge which has been pre

ferred against the prisoner at the bar, and also the nature of the evidence which will be produced to substantiate the charge. It will require on your part the most deliberate consideration; because it is not only the highest crime of which at all times the subject can be guilty, but it receives, if possible, additional aggravation when we consider the state of Europe, and the lamentable consequences which revolution has already brought upon it.

Perhaps at former periods some allowance might be made for the heated imagination of enthusiasts; perhaps an extravagant love of liberty, might for a moment supersede a rational understanding, and might be induced, for want of sufficient experience or capacity, to look for that liberty in revolution. But it is not the road to liberty. It throws the mass of the people into agitation, only to bring the worst and the most profligate to the surface. It originates in anarchy, proceeds in bloodshed, and ends in cruel and unrelenting despotism.

Therefore, Gentlemen, the crime of which the prisoner stands charged, demands the most serious and deep investigation, because it is in its nature a crime of the blackest die, and which, under all existing circumstances, does not admit of a momentary explanation.

Gentlemen, the prisoner stands indicted under a very ancient statute-the 25th of Edward III.-and the indictment is grounded on three clauses. The first relates to compassing and imagining the death of the king-the second in adhering to his enemies-and the third

in compassing to levy war against him. The two latter, namely, that of adhering to the king's enemies, and that of compassing to levy war, are so intelligible in themselves that they do not require any observation upon them. But the first admits of some technical considerations, and may require on my part a short explanation.

In the language of the law, compassing the death of the king, does not mean or imply necessarily, any immediate attack upon his person. But any conspiracy, which has for its object an alteration of the laws, constitution, and government of the country by force, uniformly leads to anarchy and general destruction, and finally tends to endanger the life of the king. And, therefore, where that design is substantiated, and manifested by overt acts, whenever the party entertaining the design, uses any means to carry his traitorous intentions into execution, the crime of compassing and imagining the death of the king is complete.

Accordingly, gentlemen, this indictment particularly states overt acts, by which the prisoner disclosed the traitorous imagination of his heart-and, if it shall be necessary, those particular overt acts, and the applicability of the evidence which will be produced to support them, will be stated at large to you by the the court, and therefore it will not be necessary for me now to trespass upon the public time, by a minute examination of them.

Gentlemen, having heard the charge against the prisoner, you will naturally feel that your

duty will require an investigation into two distinct points: first, whether there has, or has not existed a traitorous conspiracy and rebellion for the purpose of altering the law, the constitution, and the government of the country by force ?-And, secondly, whether the prisoner has in any, and in what degree, participated in that conspiracy and rebellion?

Gentlemen, I do not wish to undertake to speak in the prophetic: but when I consider the vigilance and firmness of his majesty's government, the spirit and discipline of his majesty's troops, and that armed valour and loyalty which, from one end of the country to the other, has raised itself for the purpose of crushing domestic treason, and, if necessary, of meeting and repelling a foreign foe, I do not think it unreasonable to indulge a sanguinary hope, that a continuance of the same conduct upon the part of government, and of the same exertions upon the part of the people, will long preserve the nation free, happy and independent.

Gentlemen, upon former occasions, persons were brought to the bar of this court, implicated in the rebellion, in various, though inferior degrees. But if I am rightly instructed, we have now brought to the bar of justice, not a person who has been seduced by others, but a gentleman to whom the rebellion may be traced as the origin, the life, and soul of it. If I mistake not, it will appear that some time before Christmas last, the prisoner, who had visited foreign countries, and who for several months