However, Dr. Singer had promised that I “should get, at all events, a hearing.” And this was performed with a vengeance. _Three_ months was the time devoted to the examination of all the former Essays. It remained, therefore, only publicly to announce what was privately resolved upon. But as my Essay, the _only new one_, was at all taken in, it was indispensable but that they must read it, and _six_ long months did they appropriate thereto. At the end of this period they saw that the position assumed was right, and that I was entitled to the premium. But they had already pledged themselves to give it to their friend, whose theory was the direct opposite of mine; and, consequently, every sentence in it, or in mine, must be wrong--a discrepancy, however, which they thought to reconcile by leaving the original prize undisturbed, and voting me a separate one. Had they had the candour to avow that this was their dilemma, I should never have murmured, but quietly submitted to the issue; instead of which, however, they worded their resolution in such a form as led the public to think that there were _two_ premiums all along intended, and that the first of these was given to the _best_ composition, and the second to that which approached it in quality. It was as follows:-- “ROYAL IRISH ACADEMY HOUSE. “On Monday, December 17, a meeting of the Council of the Royal Irish Academy was held, for the purpose of deciding on the merits of essays received, pursuant to advertisement, on _The Origin and Use of the Round Towers of Ireland_, when the following premiums were adjudged, viz.:-- “Fifty pounds and the gold medal to George Petrie. “Twenty pounds to Henry O’Brien, Esq.” Now, be it observed that it was not only of the gold medal and fifty pounds that I was deprived by this manœuvre, but of the one hundred additional pounds which Lord Cloncurry had offered upon the same subject. Of this the Academy were also the dispensers, on the understanding that whoever should get their gold medal and fifty pounds--the only premium which they had offered--should also get his lordship’s hundred; so that by this stratagem they assigned to their friend not only their own, but his lordship’s patronage! I was in London at the time, and signified my dissatisfaction by letter. Several were interchanged, in one of which I gave them to understand that I would submit to the injustice if they would but publish my work in their _Transactions simultaneously_ with Mr. Petrie’s. This they declined, assuring me that they would publish it, but _not simultaneously_, and not _until_ after. No comment is necessary for this.