“My lords, I never was for one minute in Warner’s company.  What Warner swore about me was totally untrue.  I never was at a meeting at Geary’s house.  The existence of the Fenian organization has been proved sufficiently to your lordships.  I was a centre in that organization; but it does not follow that I had to take the chair at any meeting, as it was a military organization.  I do not want to conceal anything.  Warner had no connexion with me whatever.  With respect to the observation of the Attorney-General, which pained me very much, that it was intended to seize property, it does not follow because of my social station that I intended to seize the property of others.  My belief in the ultimate independence of Ireland is as fixed as my religious belief—­”

At this point he was interrupted by Judge Keogh, who declared he could not listen to words that were, in fact, a repetition of the prisoner’s offence.  But it was only words of this kind that Bryan Dillon cared to say at the time; and as the privilege of offering some remarks in defence of his political opinions—­a privilege accorded to all prisoners in trials for treason and treason-felony up to that time—­had been denied to him, he chose to say no more.  And then the judge pronounced the penalty of his offending, which was, penal servitude for a term of ten years.

John Lynch’s turn to speak came next.  Interrogated in the usual form, he stood forward, raised his feeble frame to its full height, and with a proud, grave smile upon his pallid features, he thus addressed the court:—­

“I will say a very few words, my lords.  I know it would be only a waste of public time if I entered into any explanations of my political opinions—­opinions which I know are shared by the vast majority of my fellow-countrymen.  Standing here as I do will be to them the surest proof of my sincerity and honesty.  With reference to the statement of Warner, all I have to say is, and I say it honestly and solemnly, that I never attended a meeting at Geary’s, that I never exercised with a rifle there, that I never learned the use of the rifle, nor did any of the other things he swore to.  With respect to my opinions on British rule in this country—­”

   Mr. Justice Keogh—­“We can’t hear that.”

The Prisoner—­“All I have to say is, that I was not at Geary’s house for four or five months before my arrest, so that Warner’s statement is untrue.  If, having served my country honestly and sincerely be treason, I am not ashamed of it.  I am now prepared to receive any punishment British law can inflict on me.”

The punishment decreed to this pure-minded and brave-spirited patriot was ten years of penal servitude.  But to him it was practically a sentence of death.  The rigours and horrors of prison life were more than his failing constitution could long endure; and but a few months from the date of his conviction elapsed when his countrymen were pained by the intelligence that the faithful-hearted John Lynch filled a nameless grave in an English prison-yard.  He died in the hospital of Woking prison on the 2nd day of June, 1866.