--to bless the patriot's
sword! Be it in the defence, or be it in the assertion of a people's
liberty, I hail the sword as a sacred weapon; and if, my lord, it had
sometimes taken the shape of the serpent, and reddened the shroud of
the oppressor with too deep a dye, like the anointed rod of the High
Priest, it has at other times, and as often, blossomed into celestial
flowers to deck the freeman's brow.

"Abhor the sword--stigmatize the sword? No, my lord, for in the
passes of the Tyrol it cut to pieces the banner of the Bavarian, and,
through those cragged passes, struck a path to fame for the peasant
insurrectionists of Inspruck! Abhor the sword--stigmatize the sword?
No, my lord, for at its blow a giant nation started from the waters
of the Atlantic, and by its redeeming magic, and in the quivering of
its crimsoned light the crippled colony sprang into the attitude of a
proud Republic--prosperous, limitless, and invincible! Abhor the
sword--stigmatize the sword? No, my lord, for it swept the Dutch
marauders out of the fine old towns of Belgium--scourged them back to
their own phlegmatic swamps--and knocked their flag and sceptre,
their laws and bayonets, into the sluggish waters of the Scheldt.

"My lord, I learned that it was the right of a nation to govern
itself, not in this hall, but on the ramparts of Antwerp; I learned
the first article of a nation's creed upon those ramparts, where
freedom was justly estimated, and where the possession of the
precious gift was purchased by the effusion of generous blood. My
lord, I honor the Belgians for their courage and their daring, and I
will not stigmatize the means by which they obtained a citizen-king,
a chamber of Deputies."

It was all he was permitted to say. With flushed face and excited
gesture John O'Connell rose, and declared he could not sit and listen to
the expression of such sentiments. Either Mr. Meagher or he should leave
the Association; O'Brien interceded to obtain a hearing for his young
friend, and protested against Mr. O'Connell's attempts to silence him.
But the appeal was wasted, O'Brien left the hall in disgust, and with
him Meagher, Duffy, Reilly, and Mitchel quitted it for ever.

Meagher's subsequent career in Ireland is soon told. He was a regular
attendant at the meetings of the Confederation, of which he was one of
the founders, and the fame of his eloquence, his