Jack could get no other opportunity of speaking to the lady that evening, and so after dinner he altered his appearance so as to make himself look less clerical, and we went off to Smock Alley Theatre together.
The coach was to set out for Kilkenny at two o’clock the next afternoon, and I had promised to call on Jack about noon. I had slept almost up to that hour, when, having hurriedly dressed myself, I rushed off to keep my appointment, I found the college gate closed and a number of the students clamouring to get out; but the Dean was standing with his back to it, flanked at either side by the college porters.
“What’s up?” said I to one of the nearest students.
“There’s an insurrection in the streets. The Ormond and the Liberty Boys and the butchers are up, and the Viceroy is frightened out of his wits; and the Lord Mayor won’t act and there’s general ructions all over the city.”
I didn’t wait to hear any more. I rushed back to my room. The window was two stories high, but it looked on the street.
To tie the bedclothes together was the work of a minute. I fastened one end of the “rope” to the leg of the bed, which was close to the window, and dropped the other over the window sill. It did not come within several feet of the ground, and under other circumstances I would have hesitated to descend it; but a yelling excited crowd was rushing along the street, and I could hear the hoarse murmur of multitudinous voices from the direction of the Green and the quays, and, spurred by the excitement, I slid down the rope, and was caught in the arms of a stalwart Ormond Boy.
There was, of course, no love lost between the Ormond Boys and the students; but my rescuer having deposited me on the ground, pushed ahead, and I heard him joining in the cry that was rising from a thousand throats: “To the Parliament House! To the Parliament! To hell with Rigby! Down with the English!”
I was almost carried off my feet by the rush of the crowd into College Green. Here all further progress was arrested. The Green was packed, and the crowd surged up the steps against the doors of the Houses of Parliament. Hackney coaches and chairs were overturned in all directions; but right in front of the entrance to the House of Commons was the Kilkenny Coach, by which Jack Langrishe’s friends were to travel.
I pushed my way by the most strenuous efforts up towards this, and just got beside it to find Jack minus his wig and clerical coat which had been torn into ribbons, handing out Mistress Dorothy Jacob and her trembling father.