“So was I, my lord,” returned I, unbendingly.
He fidgeted again, and looked haughty and sour. I thought he would break out, but he only said, “Go on, sir—go on, sir!” I proceeded; and, whilst I was speaking, he wrote a note, which was handed to me by the officer. I kept it, as affording a curious trait of human character. It ran thus:—
“Barrington,
“You are the most impudent fellow I ever met! Come and dine with me this day at six. You will meet some strangers; so I hope you will behave yourself, though I have no reason to expect it!——
K.”
To conclude this sketch:—Lord Kilwarden was, in grain, one of the best men I ever met through life: but, to be liked, it was necessary he should be known; and the more intimately known, the more apparent were his good qualities. He had not an error, to counterbalance which some merit did not exhibit itself. He had no wit, though he thought he said good things: as a specimen of his punning, he used to call Curran “Gooseberry!”
The instability of human affairs was lamentably exemplified in his lordship’s catastrophe:—his life was prosperous, and deservedly so; his death cruel and unmerited. There scarcely exists in record a murder more inhuman or more wanton than that of the chief justice.
In 1803, on the evening when the partial but sanguinary insurrection broke out in Dublin (organised by Mr. Emmet), Lord Kilwarden had retired to his country-house near the metropolis, and was tranquilly enjoying the society of his family, when he received an order from government to repair to town on particular business: in fact, the police, the secretaries, and all attached to the executive, had continued incredulous and supine, and never believed the probability of a rising until it was at the very point.
Lord Kilwarden immediately ordered his carriage, and, attended only by his nephew (a clergyman) and one of his daughters, proceeded to Dublin, without the least suspicion of violence or interruption. His road, however, lay through Thomas Street—wide and long—wherein the rebels had first assembled; and previously to Lord Kilwarden’s arrival had commenced operations. Before his lordship could conceive, or had time to ask, the cause of this assemblage, he was in the midst of their ranks: hemmed in on every side by masses of armed ruffians, there was no possibility of retreat; and without being conscious of a crime, he heard the yells of murder and revenge on every side around him, and perceived that he was lost beyond the power of redemption.
A general shout ran among the insurgents of “The chief justice!—the chief justice!” Their crime would have been the same in either case; but it was alleged that they were mistaken as to the person, conceiving it to be Lord Carleton, who, as justice of the Common Pleas, had some years before rendered himself beyond description obnoxious to the disaffected of Ireland, in consequence of having been the judge who tried and condemned the two Counsellors Sheers, who were executed for treason, and to whom that nobleman had been testamentary guardian by the will of their father. The mob thought only of him; and Lord Kilwarden fell a victim to their revenge against Lord Carleton.