was promoted to the vacant place, and proved to be a prosecutor 'of the right sort,' a fitting _pendant_ to the jury, in the state-trials which commenced immediately in the sessions-house in Green Street, hard by Newgate prison. These proceedings followed each other with the celerity which marked the chief events of '98. The rebels had thrown down their gauntlet on the 23rd of May. By the 1st of June, Kildare was quieted. It was on the 11th of June that the court was first opened for the trial of the patriots, whose chief advocate was Curran; whilst horrible reports were arriving hourly from Wexford, which were made the most of, to keep the jury up to the mark. The moment which the little lawyer had prophetically seen was come, when he of the silver tongue was to stand forth and boldly wrestle for noble human life with the demons of Treachery and Malice. The brave little man shrank not from the task, fraught as it was with personal danger to himself. He bore a charmed life. The prisoners in their beds at Newgate could hear his earnest tones in the hot night through opened windows, haranguing the jury till daylight; could detect the trotting of his pony as he returned in the morning to the Priory--no longer hospitably open as of yore, but bolted and barred, with shutters closed and loopholed, in a besieged condition, for timid Sara's sake. That which occupied the sessions-house in Green Street was the only civil tribunal which existed during this troublous time. Except in the instances of the six state-trials, there was no law in town or country but martial law, which is terrible enough even when fairly administered; how much more awful then when conducted, as it was, by excited Irishmen--rabid with religious fury, heated by rancour and revenge. Events had marched quickly. The chancellor had nothing to complain of, for, with a few trifling checks, everything went well enough. The people had been maddened into committing themselves. All classes were at sixes and sevens. The menagerie was in a chaotic condition. The wolf snarled at the hyena, the bear showed his tusks at the tiger-cat. The senate was as degraded as its bitterest foe could desire. But what an exasperating world it is! How true the trite old maxim about the slip 'twixt cup and lip! Lord Clare saw (not far off, neither) the abolition of the Irish parliament. He heard his own voice ringing along the rafters of the English House of Lords. He pictured himself high in office--why not premier some day? But all of a sudden an event occurred which had never entered into his calculations--a rap came on his knuckles, swift and agonising, which woke him from his vision to see that it was air.