the passions and the prejudices of this hour have passed away to appeal to your conscience, and ask of it was your charge as it ought to have been, impartial and indifferent between the subject and the Crown.  My lords, you may deem this language unbecoming in me, and perhaps it may seal my fate.  But I am here to speak the truth, whatever it may cost.  I am here to regret nothing I have ever done—­to retract nothing I have ever said.  I am here to crave with no lying-lip the life I consecrate to the liberty of my country.  Far from it:  even here—­here, where the thief, the libertine, the murderer, have left their footprints in the dust; here, on this spot, where the shadows of death surround me, and from which I see my early grave in an unanointed soil opened to receive me—­even here, encircled by these terrors, the hope which has beckoned me to the perilous sea upon which I have been wrecked, still consoles, animates, enraptures me.  No I do not despair of my poor old country, her peace her liberty, her glory.  For that country I can do no more than bid her hope.  To lift up this island—­to make her a benefactor to humanity, instead of being the meanest beggar in the world—­to restore to her her native Powers and her ancient constitution—­this has been my ambition, and this ambition has been my crime.  Judged by the law of England, I know this crime entails the Penalty of death; but the history of Ireland explains this crime, and justifies it.  Judged by that history, I am no criminal—­you (addressing Mr. MacManus) are no criminal—­you (addressing Mr O’Donohoe) are no criminal—­I deserve no punishment—­we deserve no punishment.  Judged by that history the treason of which I stand convicted loses all its guilt, is sanctified as a duty, will be ennobled as a sacrifice.  With these sentiments, my lord I await the sentence of the court.  Having done what I felt to be my duty—­having spoken what I felt to be the truth, as I have done on every other occasion of my short career, I now bid farewell to the country of my birth, my passion and my death—­the country whose misfortunes have invoked my sympathies—­whose factions I have sought to still—­whose intellect I have prompted to a lofty aim—­whose freedom has been my fatal dream.  I offer to that country, as a proof of the love I bear her, and the sincerity with which I thought, and spoke, and struggled for her freedom—­the life of a young heart, and with that life, all the hopes, the honours, the endearments, of a happy and an honourable home.  Pronounce then, my lords, the sentence which the law directs, and I will be prepared to hear it.  I trust I shall be prepared to meet its execution.  I hope to be able, with a pure heart and perfect composure, to appear before a higher Tribunal—­a tribunal where a Judge of infinite goodness, as well as of justice will preside, and where, my lords, many—­many of the judgments of this world will be reversed.”

The sentence of the court was then pronounced, as it had been previously on Mr. O’Brien.  It was in the following words:—­