trooped by—­thousand after thousand—­there was not a drunken man to be seen—­all were calm and orderly, and if they were, as many of them were—­soaked through—­wet to the skin—­they endured the discomfiture resolutely.  The numbers in the procession have been variously estimated, but in my opinion there could not have been less than 50,000.  But the demonstration was not confined to the processionists alone; they walked through living walls, for along the entire route a mass of people lined the way, the great majority of whom wore some emblem of mourning, and every window of every house was thronged with ladies and children, nearly all of whom were decorated.  All semblance of authority was withdrawn from sight, but every preparation had been made under the personal direction of Lord Strathnairn, the commander-in-chief, for the instant intervention of the military, had any disturbances taken place.  The troops were confined to barracks since Saturday evening; they were kept in readiness to march at a moment’s notice; the horses of the cavalry were saddled all day long, and those of the artillery were in harness.  A battery of guns was in the rere yard of the Four Courts, and mounted orderlies were stationed at arranged points so as to convey orders to the different barracks as speedily as possible.  But, thanks to Providence, all passed off quietly; the people seemed to feel the responsibility of their position, and accordingly not even an angry word was to be heard throughout the vast assemblage that for hours surged through the highways of the city.

The Ulster Observer, in the course of a beautiful and sympathetic article, touched on the great theme as follows:—­

The main incidents of the singular and impressive event are worthy of reflection.  On a cold December morning, wet and dreary as any morning in December might be, vast crowds assembled in the heart of Dublin to follow to consecrated ground the empty hearses which bore the names of the Irishmen whom England doomed to the gallows as murderers.  The air was piercingly chill, the rain poured down in torrents, the streets were almost impassable from the accumulated pools of mingled water and mud, yet 80,000 people braved the inclemency of the weather, and unfalteringly carried out the programme so fervently adopted.  Amongst the vast multitude there were not only stalwart men, capable of facing the difficulties of the day, but old men, who struggled through and defied them; and, strangest of all, ’young ladies, clothed in silk and velvet,’ and women with tender children by their sides, all of whom continued to the last to form a part of the cortege, although the distance over which it passed must have taxed the strongest physical energy.  What a unanimity of feeling, or rather what a naturalness of sentiment does not this wonderful demonstration exhibit?  It seems as if the ‘God save Ireland’ of the humble successors of Emmet awoke in even