The bequest of Higgins to O'Leary is noticed as strange by the priest's biographer. Was it meant by way of restitution, seeing that the compact to pay O'Leary had been broken? As in the case of the betrayal of Lord Edward Fitzgerald by Magan, 'Shamado' no doubt pocketed the lion's share. The will of Francis Higgins goes on to say: 'To Andrew D. O'Kelly, of Piccadilly, London, I leave 300_l._: declaring that if I did not know that he, my friend, was in great affluence, I would have freely bequeathed him any property I might be possessed of.' This was the man sometimes known as Count O'Kelly, but more generally as Colonel O'Kelly. An Irish judge who once acted as advising counsel for the legatees of O'Kelly, informs me that the latter was originally a jockey, afterwards a successful blackleg, and was made colonel of a regiment that never existed, simply by the Prince Regent addressing him under that title. This explains a remark made by the 'St. James's Gazette,' that 'his military rank, whatever right he may have had to it, as well as to his Countship, could never obtain for him an entrance to the clubs of his fellow sportsmen.'[637] He owned the racehorse 'Eclipse,' and by its aid netted 124,000_l._ There has been much discussion by O'Leary's biographers upon Plowden's statement as to the stoppage of the pension, and they vainly try to account for so harsh a step. 'What the reason for this withholding was, it is not easy to ascertain,' writes Father Buckley; but, from an observation in the 'Life of Grattan,' by his son, we surmise that it must have been because O'Leary refused to comply with a request made by the minister, that he _would write in the support of the Union_.[638] Plowden takes care to say that the pension was 'hush money.' Buckley's argument demands, however, a fuller reply. The agitation against the Union took place chiefly in 1799. O'Leary died in January 1802, soon after the Union became law. Plowden, through whom he got the arrears paid, says that it was 'after a _lapse of many years_, by importunity and solicitation, and _repeated proofs_ of his having complied with the _secret conditions_, he received a large arrear.' Therefore there could not have been time for all this in the interval between the Union and O'Leary's death. But, in point of fact, O'Leary _did_ express himself publicly in favour of the Union. His 'Address to the Lords Spiritual and Temporal,' dated from O'Kelly's house, and published in June 1800, mentions that he is 'a great friend to the Union, and reconciled many to it;' and then follows much clever argument in support of the measure. This rather spoils the statement in Grattan's 'Life,' quoted by the biographer of O'Leary as proof that he spurned Pitt's proposal to support the Union.