* * *
I have only seen two people in my life whom I knew to be One was a wretched little Tunisian, twitching uneasy fingers yellow leather gloves. The other was an Englishman who fallen on very evil days, and who had adopted his profession much from a love of adventure as from the need of gain. I dc think that either of them can have been a very good spy, s, the infidelity which was stamped upon their faces was such as we have roused suspicion even if one had met them in the tube. have been reading this week an excellent and scholarly book w deals with the secret agents employed by Mr. Pitt and Du Castle to inform against the Irish patriots. There was . Cockayne, a slimy London solicitor, who brought Pastor Jack to his death, and who tricked my own forebear, Hamilton Ron into an indiscretion which led to his being attainted for teen and passing nine bitter years in exile. There was Thomas Co'J who posed as a United Irishman, and who sent through Giffard detailed reports of all their meetings. Mr. Collins, I glad to learn, became so uneasy when Hamilton Rowan esca that he applied to the British Government for a post in the Indies. There was Francis Magan, who betrayed Lord Edo Fitzgerald by communicating his whereabouts to Francis Higa the "sham squire." There was Samuel Turner, who wormed way into the confidence of Lord Edward's wife, Pamela, and full reports to Downing Street of the negotiations between the exiles established in Hamburg and the French Directorate. there was that amazing figure, Leonard M'Nally, the Mfirr friend of Curran, the man who wept on Robert Emmet's brc the man who all the time was receiving £3oo a year from secret service funds of Dublin Castle. Of all these inform M'Nally is the most sinister. It was he who, with passio oratory, defended those who had been attainted of treason ; it he who received the last words of Pastor Jackson ; it was he was the last to say good-bye to Curran on his final journey England ; and yet it was he who supplied Lord Clare with ado copies of the briefs with which he had been entrusted, and was instrumental in bringing many of his clients to the soli Never has corruption proved so infectious, as in Ireland he the Union.
* * *
Previous page
