The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1911-09-09
O'CONNELL IN PEN PICTURE
FINE SKETCH OF THE IRISH CATHOLIC LEADER
WHO WON EMANCIPATION


The following pen picture of O'Con-
nell from Richard Lalor Shells brill
liant sketches of the Irish Bar
makes good reading for those who
want to familiarize themselves with
the character of the Great Liberator
If any one being a stranger in
Dublin should chance, as you return
upon a winters morning from one of
the Small and early" parties Of that
raking metropolis-that is to say, be-
tween the hours of 5 and o'clock-to
pass along the south side of Merton
Square, you will not fail to observe
that among those splendid mansions
there is one evidently tenanted by
person whose habits differ materially
from those of his fashionable neigh
bors. The half-open shutter and the
light within announce that some one
dWells there whose time is too pre-
cious to permit him to regulate his
rising with the sun. Should your
curiosity tempt you to ascend the
steps and under cover of the dark to
reconnoiter the interior, you will see
a tall able-bodied man standing at a
desk and immersed in solitary occu-
patton. Upon the wall in front of
him there hangs crucifix. From
tho no1 I'm attitude IF th
person within, and from a certain
monastic rotundity about the neck
and shoulders, your first impression
will be that he must be some pious
dignitary of the church of Rome alb
sorbed in his matin devotions.
But this conjecture will be reject
ed almost as soon as formed. No
sooner can the eye take in the other
furniture of the apartment-the book
cases clogged with tones in plain calf
skin binding, the blue covered octa-
vos that lie about on the tables and
the floor, the reams of manuscript in
oblong folds and begirt with crimson
tape than it becomes evident that
the party meditating amid such OBJ
jects must be thinking far more Of
the law than of the prophets. He is
unequivocally a barrister, but appar-
emily of that homely, cham ber-keep-
ing plodding cast who labor hard to
make up in assiduity what they want
in wit, who are up and stirring be-
fore the bird of the morning has
sounded the retreat to the wandering
specter, and are already brain deep
in the dizzy vortex Of mortgages and
cross reminders and mergers and re-
mitters, while his clients, still Tapped
in sweet oblivion of the laws delay
are fondly dreaming that their cause
is peremptorily set down for a final
hearing. Having come to this con-
clusion, you push on for home, bless
ing your stars on the way that you
are not lawyer, and sincerely COM
passionating the sedentary drudge
whom you have just detected in the
performance of his oheerless toll.
But should you aappen in the
course of the same day to stroll down
to the Four Courts, you will not be
whit surprised to find the object Of
your pity miraculously transferred
from the severe reclue of the morn
ing into one Of the most bustling, i'm
portant and joyous personages in that
busy scene.
There you will be sure TO see him.
his countenance braced up and glis-
tening with health and spirits, with
huge, plethoric bag, which his ro-
bust arm can scarcely sustain, clasped
with paternal fondness to his breast,
and environed by living palisade of
clients and attorneys with out
stretched necks, and mouths and ears
agape to catch up any chance opinion
that may be coaxed out Of him in a
colloQulal way. or listening to what
the client relishes still better (for in
no event can they be sided into a
bill of costs,). the counselors bursts
of jovial and familiar humor, or
when he touches on sadder strain
his prophetic assurance that the hour
of Ireland's redemption is at hand.
You perceive at once that you have
lighted upon a great popular advo-
cate; and if you take the trouble to
follow his movements for couple of
hours through the several courts, you
will not fail to discover the qualities
that have made him-his legal COM
potency, his business-like habits, his
sanguine temperament, which render
him not merely the advocate, but the
partisan Of his client, his acuteness,
his fluency Of thought and language,
4 his uncomfortable good humor, and,
above all, his versatility.
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