She was soon busy in her nursery. In 1761, her first-born son, Christopher Temple Emmet, made his entry into it. The boy was destined, like Cuchullin, to “a great name and a short life.” He was only twenty-eight when he died, but he had already impressed his contemporaries as one of the most brilliant men of his time. Grattan, who disliked the Emmets intensely (because they had the courage of their convictions, and he, in spite of his fiery rhetoric, was all for compromise and security), has left on record his opinion of Temple Emmet, and it is worth quoting at length:— “Temple Emmet, before he came to the Bar, knew more law than any of the judges on the bench; and if he had been placed on one side, and the whole bench opposed to him, he could have been examined against them, and would have surpassed them all; he would have answered better both in law and divinity than any judge or any bishop in the land. He had a wonderful memory—he recollected everything—it stuck to him with singular tenacity. He showed this in his early youth, and on one occasion he gave a strong instance of it. There existed at that time in Dublin College, an institution called the Historical Society; there were subjects selected for discussion, and prior to the debate there was an examination in history. On one occasion the books happened to be mislaid, and it was thought no examination could have taken place; but Emmet, whose turn it was to be in the chair, and who had read the course, recollected the entire, and examined in every part of it, and with surprising ability.”[10] Footnote 10: Grattan’s “Life and Times.” By Henry Grattan, the younger. IV. 356. In reading the records of eighteenth-century families, we are equally astonished at the size of them, and the small proportion of their members to survive infancy. Dr. and Mrs. Emmet had seventeen children in seventeen years, and of these there only grew to manhood and womanhood three sons, Christopher Temple, Thomas Addis (born 1764), Robert (born 1778), and one daughter, Mary Anne (born 1773). Of the other thirteen, there remained only their names in Aunt Grace’s family bible, followed by the pitiable record, “died young.” One circumstance moves us strangely: four little Robert Emmets (the first born in 1771, the others in 1774, 1776, 1777) came, and finding the burden of life too heavy, laid it quickly down, until _he_ came, the fifth, the destined one, who was to take it up and carry it, until his hero-fate bade him lay it down—for Ireland.