MR MORLEY’S APOLOGY (1893)

  We statesmen of Erin, Archbishops, M.P.’s,
      and Leaders of National Thought,
  Pray explain to your friends that I’m anxious
      to please, if I do not succeed as I ought! 
  When I sympathize quite with their notions of right,
      it is hard, as I’m sure you’ll agree,
  That an agent should come with a dynamite bomb,
      which perhaps was intended for me!

  My views on the tenants evicted for debt
      are identical wholly with yours,
  And the fact that they’re not in possession
      as yet no statesman more deeply deplores: 
  I approve of explosives—­they’re often a link
      which our union may serve to complete—­
  But they’re dangerous too, as I venture to think,
      when employed in a populous street.

  I planned the Commission; I packed it with men
     opposed to the payment of rent;
  No landlord had ever evicted again if they
      only had done what I meant: 
  It “adjourned,” as I know, in a fortnight or so,
      and it did not do much while it sat,
  But I was not to blame if we failed in our aim—­
      for I could not anticipate that.

  ’Tis a shame, I agree, that I cannot set free
      all persons who kill the police;
  That patriots leal who in dynamite deal
      I can only in sections release: 
  But I think you must see that a statesman like me
      has a character moral at stake,
  And must simulate doubt as to letting them out,
      for my Saxon constituents’ sake.

  For their sentiments move in the narrowest groove—­
      be thankful you are not like them! 
  Mere murder’s an act which they seldom approve,
      and are even inclined to condemn: 
  When the patriot blows up his friends or his foes,
      those prejudiced Saxons among,
  It is reckoned a flaw in his notion of law,
      and he is not unfrequently hung.

  Then explain to your friends that their means and their ends
      I wholly and fully approve,
  Though at times what I feel I am forced to conceal,
      and to partly dissemble my love,
  And the Saxon, I hope, may develop the scope
      of his narrow and obsolete view—­
  He will alter in time his conception of crime,
      on a longer acquaintance with You.

HONESTY REWARDED (1892).

  I have always regarded with wonder and awe
  The conception of Justice embodied in Law: 
  For it dealt in a highly remarkable way
  With Cornelius Molloy and with Peter O’Shea.

  Now, Peter O’Shea was by nature a serf,
  And he paid (when he could) for his land and his turf: 
  But Cornelius, his friend, was a broth of a boy—­
  The Sassenach’s scourge was Cornelius Molloy.

  Cornelius adopted the Plan of Campaign,
  And he tried to tempt Peter, but tempted in vain. 
  “’Twas the masther, not thim, I conthracted to pay: 
  ’Tis a quare kind of business,” said Peter O’Shea.