no practical utility to me now, at least with respect to the judges. I know it is of no practical utility to me, because I cannot give evidence on my own behalf, but it may be of practical utility to others with whom I wish to stand well. I believe my words will carry conviction--and carry much more conviction than any words of the legal advisers of the crown can--to more than 300,000 of the Irish race in Ireland, England, and America. Well, I deny absolutely, that I ever entertained any idea of assassinating the landlords, and the letter of Mr. O'Keefe--assuming it to be his letter--is the only evidence on the subject. My acquaintance with Mr. O'Keefe was of the slightest nature. I did not even know of his existence when the _Irish People_ was started. He came, after that paper was established a few months, to the office, and offered some articles--some were rejected, some we inserted, and I call the attention of the legal advisers of the Crown to this fact, that amongst the papers which they got, those that were Mr. O'Keefe's articles had many paragraphs scored out; in fact we put in no article of his without a great deal of what is technically called 'cutting down.' Now, that letter of his to me was simply a private document. It contained the mere private views of the writer; and I pledge this to the court as a man of honour--and I believe in spite of the position in which I stand, amongst my countrymen I am believed to be a man of honour, and that if my life depended on it, I would not speak falsely about the thing--when I read that letter, and the first to whom I gave it was my wife, I remember we read it with fits of laughter at its ridiculous ideas. My wife at the moment said--'Had I not better burn the letter?' 'Oh no,' I said, looking upon it as a most ridiculous thing, and never dreaming for a moment that such a document would ever turn up against me, and produce the unpleasant consequences it has produced--mean the imputation of assassination and massacre, which has given me a great deal more trouble than anything else in this case. That disposes--as far as I can at present dispose of it--of the charge of wishing to assassinate the landlords. As to the charge of desiring to assassinate the priests, I deny it as being the most monstrous thing in the world. Why, surely, every one who read the articles in the paper would see that the plain doctrine laid down there was--to reverence the priests so long as they confined themselves to their sacerdotal functions; but when the priest descended to the arena of politics he became no more than any other man, and would just be regarded as any other man. If he was a man of ability and honesty, of course he would get the respect that such men get in politics--if he was not a man of ability there would be no more thought of him than of a shoemaker or any one else.