the reform of the Dublin Corporation which had been long resisted by the House of Lords, but was at length accomplished. The payment of my official labours was on a scale that seemed munificent to a young man who had never earned a guinea before, and it afforded me the exquisite enjoyment of making a considerable gift to the mother who had made so many to me.
Another unexpected enterprise was a mission to conduct the funeral of a tithe martyr from Dublin to Queen's County. The resistance to tithe was at that time nearly universal, and as the recovery of the imposts by seizure and sale of property had become very dangerous, defaulters were generally proceeded against by "writ of rebellion" (a device disinterred from the middle ages) and sent to prison. The prosecutions were often for sums incredibly small, sometimes less than a shilling, and the popular exasperation grew intense. One man who died in prison had expressed a desire to be buried with his family, and Peter Purcell, who was then a man of decisive importance in O'Connell's organisation, the Precursor Society, determined that his wishes should be gratified. A public funeral was ordered, and Mr. Purcell selected James Coffey, who always stood high in his favour, and myself to accompany it on behalf of the Press and the Precursor Society. The incidents of that journey, our reception by the local leaders in the towns along the line of route, and the speeches of the young missionaries, neither of whom had passed his twenty-second year, have not altogether faded from my memory, but the interest has passed away, and I leave them to sleep in peace. It was my first personal share in popular agitation, and it made my heart beat fast with enthusiasm.[1]
- ↑ I made a week's visit to London at this time on personal business and got a hurried glance at parks and theatres, and the streets and squares, which books had made most familiar to my imagination. My first great disappointment was in Paternoster Row, associated with so many handsome and brilliant books, and which, to my amazement, I found narrow and dingy, and overcrowded with insignificant shops. T. B. MacManus recommended me an hotel frequented by commercial travellers and shop assistants, and my residence there furnished an insight into social life which I have never forgotten. Among this class, so smooth and deferential behind the counter, I heard more chansons graveleuses, not at all deficient in point or humour, during my week's stay than in all my life before, and in all my life since.
