The Sun.
London, England, 1827-02-10 00:00:00

PROSECUTION OF MR. SHELL.

Mr. StifilL said, in siting to address you upon a subject by
which the national sympathy has been in a great degree awakened,
(for the great body of the Irish people are determined not to desert
me)—(loud cheering)-1 do not intend to express myself with a
vindictive virulence in regard to Mr. Plunkett. Yet I cannot
avoid expressing a wish that his conduct had been a little more
consistent with cur ordinary notions of justice, of truth, and of
honour; for while
,I acquit him, as far as I ant myself concerned,
I pronounce his proceedings against the proprietor of the Register,
as not only wantonly oppressive, but as amounting to a breach of
contract, which should have been the more binding upon an ho-
nourable mind, from its being less direct than implied. I accuse
Mr., Plunkett before the tribunal of public opinion (and in doing
so I appeal both to Catholics and Protestants) of having acted a
part utterly at variance with all customary conceptions of official
propriety. The facts stand thus :—On the 2d of February the
Crown wrote to Mr. Staunton; that unless he gave up the author
of the Wolfe Tone speech, he should be prosecuted. Having fur-
nished a report of the speech myself, I did not for an instant hesi-
tate in avowing it.--(Loud cheers.)—Now mark the duplicity,
the disingenuousness, an !, let me add, the absolute mean-
ness, with which the prosecutors have acted. Upon as-
certaining the publisher of a speech printed on the 22d
of January, they call for the publisher of another
speech, purporting to he delivered by n 'self several days
after, and printed in the Register on the Slat of January. Re-
member that it wag on the 2d of February that they required the
publisher of the first speech to he delivered to them. They had
then the speech of the 31st of January, purporting to be spoken
by the same person before them. They do not call for the pub-
lisher of both at once ; but after they obtain an avowal of the
first, they demand evidence of the publisher of the second. I
put it to every honourable Protestant, whether this be fair deal-
ing.—(Cheers.)—Why not ask for the publisher of both speeches
at the same time ? Why, after entangling the speaker by the
admission of one speech, and obtaining, such advantage-ground,
call for an admission of the second I—(Cheers.)—To get evidence
drop by drop, to win out of a newspaper-office these piece-meal
acknowledgments—to gather up these drippings of admission, (the
image is a vile one, but it befits the object of its application) was
to say the least, an exceedingly shabby proceeding.—(Cheers.)—
Taking then, the whole of Mr. Plunkett's conduct in this busi-
ness together—looking at the spirit by which he has been ani-
mated—considering the traps and pit-falls which he has laid,
when we find him making a specific demand, and then advancing
upon concession, demanding an ell where he first only required an
inch, and prosecuting a popular journal for an alleged libel, which
first appeared in a Government paper, we must—what should we
say of him ? Nothing, but oh, fie ! lie is, I understand, about
to proceed to England before this double prosecution shall take
place. What ! run from the Grand Jury, and try to shift upon
his colleague in office, but not in 'sentiment, the Solicitor-Gene-
ral, the burthen of responsibility. I trust he will not shew him-
self such a craven, and shrink from the performance of his public
duty. Let us not be told that he must proceed to England, in
order to vote for Ministers ion the Corn Laws. lie
throws all Ireland into tumnit by his preposterous prosecu-
tions. Let him not, while the flame which he has excited is
raging, and the whole country is involved in it, desert his post,
and leave to others the task of extinguishing the fire. When
the chief director of the great insurance-office of the State
sets fire to the edifice, he should, at all events, remain to
work the engine by which it is to be put out. I confess that, I
although such poor abilities as I possess, must, in comparison with
the gigantic talents of Mr. Plunkett, sink into dwarfish diminu-
tion, yet I do not fear to confront him upon the subject matter of
this prosecution.—(Cheers.)—l cannot but enjoy an advantage
over him in the justice and the nobleness of the cause which I
shall have to maintain, and I know that the consciousness of a
moral superiority will do more than place us on a level. I can
turn his own weapons against himself; I can cut down this Go-
Halm with his own sword—(cheers)—l can ask him to his face
with what front Le dares to accuse me of sedition, when his own ,
speeches are fraught with faction, and teens with the same in- I
flammatory matter? I can remind him of the time when he
went far beyond the limits which I have prescribed to myself,
and uttering a sentiment in which I do not participate.
he spoke of "Ringing British connexion to time winds."
I want his presence for these purposes, for I know that
he must quail, in that appeal to himself. When 11Iaster
Ellis abandoned his office, and went to Parliament in search
of political renown, Mr. Plunkett determined to abridge
him of his Parliamentary honours, and to withhold from him "the
applause of listening Senates," which the worthy Master is so
eminently qualified to command.—(Cheers.)—Mr. Plunkett in-
sisted that it was fitter for him to ascertain and report the Popish
Mortgagees and Judgment Creditors, upon the Cromwellian
Estates, which were brought to the hammer snider my Lord Mau-
ners's decrees. Surely, when the whole national mind has been
raised into an unusual commotion by Mr. Plunkett's prosecution,
it is unbecoming of him to run from the sceue of contention,
which he has himself produced, and to throw the whole onus of
his proceedings upon the " Atlantean shoulders" of Mr. Joy. I
would therefore catch the official robe of Mr. Plunkett, like the
bramble that caught the gown of Demosthenes in the field of Chro-
nea, and prevent him from running away—(Loud cheers.)—Bnt
it is not to his inflammatory orations Orme that I can ap-
peal. A pamphlet, written by Mr. Spring Rice, has
just come out, which contains not only as strong matter
as my speech, but exactly the same matter,, conveyed in a
still more ardent expression than my own.—(Loud cheers.)—
Gracious God ! (exclaimed Mr. Shell, after reading the passage)
gracjous God ! is the writer of this to escape ; nay more, is he
to ke lauded in the language of Parliamentary cant, as. " his elo-
quent and honourable friend," by the Attorney-General; and am
I ?—Oh, shame on Mr. Plunkett to act such a part as this !--
(load cheers,)—to let the wealthy, time useful, the convenient, the
high, the Parliamentary, go by not only with impunity but with
honour, and to fasten upon me, who am guilty of no other offence
than speaking with ardour what I feel with intensity, in order that
he may throw sue with a feeble frame into Ipri;oz, and depriving me
of my livelihood, by locking me up from my profession, leave me
" to live upon the vapour of a dungeon." But " on that va-
pour" I had rather live, than act such a part as Mr. Plunkett
is performing. What an example does he afford of the
union of great talents and fagrant indiscretion !—What a
noble vessel, how finely rigged, how lofty its PAIN,
and how ample are its sails, and how majestically it makes
its way ; but unfortunately it is without rudder, and
drives upon the breakers with all its vest
and expanded can-
, vacs. Never did a man commit a like series of imprudences.
He commits the Orangemen for High Treason, and he is igno-
miniously beaten. " Death in a Bottle" would make a good title
for a new farce. He next tries his hand at en ex-officio, and
never reward* the man who supplied him with the facts to which
he owed his safety. What proof of his gratitude did he ever give
to Arr. Foley ? He assails the Evening Mail for comparing
Lord Wellesley to one el" his predecessors, and is foiled again.
He prosecutes Mr. O'Connell for a phrase, and is flung out of
Court. He grapples with Sir Harcous-t Lees, who gives him a
tremendous fall in the mud ; and now, in order to prove his com-
plete confideuce for his office, and that be may go before Parlia-
ment with a conviction to boast of, he aims a deadly blow at my exist-
ence, and seeks to take my life, by taking " the means whereby I
live." And, after all, am I worth the crushing ! Let them cast
me into the lowest and dampest vault of Newgate, with the
stone for my bed, and a spider for my companion, what will it

avail them ! They have a nobler quarry, and they feel it.—(Load
cheers.)—They have already made their election between the two
victims offered to them, by Mr. Plunkett, in his own person and
myself.—(Cheers.)—Sir Harcourt Lees is already preparing a
cougratulory proclamation to his army in the North ; Mr. Rom-
ney Robinson is engaged in the composition of a triumphal ode ;
David M'Cleary, the Legislative Tailor, has taken Mr. Saurin's
measure for a new gown ; and the Rev. Tighe Gregory has un-
dertaken to preach a funeral oration on Mr. Plunkett, from his
father's pulpit, in the Socinian Chapel, in Strand-street.—(Loud
cheers.)—For Mr. Plunkett had doubts on the Trinity, until some
time in the year 1805, when all his father's difficulties on the
Athanasian Creed were dispersed by the Grace of God and of the
King, and yielding td what has always had an irresistible influence
upon his acute and logical mind, he became an ardent, and official
member of the Established Church.—(Mr. Shell sat down amidst
loud and long continued cheers.)