enthusiastic young Irishman saw no rocks ahead, felt no mistrust, and rushed into the fray. “I grappled with the question,” he assures us, “with all the ardour of my nature; and, _heaven_ and _earth_, _night_ and _day_, _in difficulties and in sorrow_, I laboured until I finished my ‘essay’ against the appointed hour, when--a brain blow to their (_sc._ the Academy’s) expectation--I sent it in--fully satisfied, from the consciousness of its imperturbable axioms, that all the powers of error and wickedness combined could not withhold from it the suffrage of the advertised medal.”[8] The meaning of this passionate reference to malign influences in the background will appear later on; as yet, he had no cause for misgiving on the subject of fair play, and his overweening self-confidence precluded any anticipation of failure. Bad omens seem to have attended his venture from the very outset. The Academy had requested that each essay should be inscribed with some motto; and it would appear that the motto appended to O’Brien’s was “Φωνη εν τη ερεμω” (_sic_[9])--a sorry introduction to the notice of learned Academicians. The heartburnings of suspense, with which most young authors are familiar, soon began. Four days after his essay had been sent in, the Academy issued a _third_ advertisement, requiring all the essays to be taken back, and extending the period of preparation by an additional month, “so as to admit of the receiving of other essays on said subject, and for allowing the authors of essays already given in to improve and enlarge them.” O’Brien afterwards saw fit to attribute this fresh delay to a cause very different from that alleged; but just then, being persuaded that his triumph was merely postponed, he reconciled himself as best he could to the infliction, and calmly waited for apotheosis. Six months more passed by--wearily enough, we may be sure; and then, one direful morning, just at the close of 1832, came news that the premiums had been adjudged as follows:--“£50 and the gold medal to George Petrie, and £20 to Henry O’Brien, Esq.”