Twenty Years' Recollections of an Irish Police Magistrate. Frank Thorpe Porter
he afforded, or to his supposed suggestions. His successor was judged by the contrast, and his faults were considered as venial mistakes, whilst the Major's acts were only remembered to be stigmatized as wilful misdeeds. His courage has been doubted, but the imputation of cowardice is not fairly sustained. It arises from the prejudice which satisfied itself that he could not possess any good quality. His conduct at the apprehension of Lord Edward Fitzgerald did not evince either courage or cowardice. He entered the room after the conflict had commenced, and fired the fatal shot, in all probability, to save the life of his associate. He frequently, and without any necessity, risked his personal safety, and there is no sound reason for believing that he was of a pusillanimous nature.
In 1798 Sirr received information that a young man of most respectable family, who had involved himself in the insurrectionary movement of the period, had arrived in Dublin, and was concealed in the upper room of a house in Bull Alley. The Major proceeded, attended by several of his myrmidons, to the place, and entered a house on the right hand side from Bride Street, the lower part of the premises being a butcher's shop. He went up to the front two-pair room, and there surprised the accused party lying on a bed, and partly undressed. He held a pistol to the young man's head, and commanded him to arise and surrender. The mandate was complied with, and the captive apparently submitted to his fate. He arose and asked permission to wash his face and hands, which was accorded, and he then put on his coat, which the Major had previously ascertained to have no weapons in the pockets. Suddenly the prisoner made a spring, throwing himself bodily against the window, which yielded to his force, and out he went. Sirr shouted and dashed down stairs, greatly impeded by his own assistants who were hurrying up on the alarm. The poor fellow who had adopted so desperate an expedient, met, in his fall, a clothes pole, and then came on some wooden shed-work which projected over the front of the shop; the latter was rather crazy and gave away. He sprang to his feet unhurt, darted down the alley and escaped by one of the numerous passages with which it communicated. Sirr hastened down to the Coombe, turned out the Poddle guard, and searched the neighbourhood, but without success. When the British government, after the campaign of Waterloo, formed some regiments of lancers, they procured two Austrian officers, of ascertained capability, to impart a knowledge of the lance exercise to those regiments. One of the officers was the Bull Alley jumper. He took an opportunity of renew his acquaintance with Sirr, and jocosely apologised for having terminated their previous interview so suddenly and unceremoniously.
Sirr was once tricked into making himself instrumental in carrying out the punishment desired by an outraged father against a profligate son, and it occurred also in the unhappy year of 1798. There was a wealthy bookseller residing on Lower Ormond Quay, who had a son, his only child, bearing the same Christian name. Mr. Patrick W——, the father, was very indulgent. Mr. Patrick W——, the son, was extremely vicious. His time was chiefly spent in society of the most objectionable description, and he was not particular as to the means whereby he made his father's money available for his licentious pleasures. He had been absent from the paternal roof for some weeks. His father had vainly sought to discover him, when he unexpectedly met him in the street, and directed a storm of well-merited reproaches on the young reprobate.
Young Pat stood submissively attentive to his parent, and allowed him to vent the first burst of his wrath, and when old Pat closed his impassioned complaints by peremptorily ordering him to go home, he mildly replied, "I was going there, sir, to try if you would admit me; I own it is more than I deserve, but give me one trial more before you cast me off: give me one more trial, and you shall not regret it."
"You young villain! where have you spent the last month?"
"I spent it as badly as I could, except the last week, and during that time I have been with Mr. Luke White, at Woodlands."
"At Woodlands!" exclaimed the astonished old man, "Is it with Luke White, my oldest, my most valued friend, you have been?"
"Yes sir. This day week I was walking in Stephen's Green, and Mr. White met me. I sought to avoid him, I own that, but he called after me, took me aside and expostulated with me about my habits and associates. He told me that I was breaking your heart, and that I must reform my life. He said that he grieved, as did all your friends, over the coming ruin of your hopes, and that he was determined, if possible, to avert it; that you were his esteemed, respected, and highly valued friend. He then proposed that I should go out to him that evening to Woodlands for a week, and that in the peaceful retirement of that residence, he would try to bring me to a proper sense of duty to a worthy father. I yielded to his remonstrances, and accepted his invitation; and having spent the week with that excellent gentleman, I was going, by his direction, to throw myself upon my knees before you, and implore your forgiveness."
"Oh!" exclaimed old Pat, "may heaven's choicest blessings be showered on him, my real, true friend, who felt for my misery, and has relieved it. Come, Pat, my darling boy, all is forgiven and forgotten. Happiness is in store for us both. You will be my pride and comfort. I can die contented if my eyes are closed by a son whom I leave respectable in conduct and character."
Father and son proceeded home; and old Pat immediately sought all means to convince young Pat of his faults having been condoned. He was informed of the business transactions then pending; and his father handed him a cheque for a considerable amount, and directed him to proceed to the bank, and pay some bills which were due that day.
Young Pat departed. He did not return; and the notary's messengers called in the evening with the unpaid bills. The miserable parent was only able to discover that his son had been seen, during the afternoon, in most disreputable society. Next morning old Pat waited on Mr. White, and thanked him most warmly for his exertions to reclaim the young reprobate by his advice and expostulations. "If anything could have produced a good effect on him," exclaimed the agonized father, "it would have been your advice, your example, and the contemplation of the sweet scene and happy family to which your invitation last week——"
"My dear sir," interrupted Mr. White, "there is a great delusion on your mind. I have not seen your son, nor have I had any communication whatever with him for more than twelve months."
The old gentleman staggered to a seat. A terrible convulsion shook his frame. Then supervened that which is fearful to witness in woman, but doubly horrible in man, hysterical tears and sardonic laughter. At length the fit terminated. Old Pat arose and took his leave. He walked away with surprising energy, and his countenance assumed a calmness beneath which was concealed nothing less
"Than the stern, single, deep, and wordless ire
Of a strong human heart, and in a sire."
Old Pat sought a private interview with Major Sirr, and confided to him strong suspicions that young Pat was compromised with the United Irishmen, and that if closely and properly interrogated, he could disclose a great deal, especially as to some depôts of pikes and other weapons intended for insurrectionary purposes. He affected to stipulate for the utmost secrecy as to the Major's informant, protested that he regarded the rebels with the utmost horror and detestation, and that he had no idea of favoring a change in public affairs detrimental to those who, by unremitting industry, had realized property. He suggested that his son, when arrested, should be brought to the Custom House, which, at that time, was in Essex Street, and directly opposite to his own residence on Ormond Quay. Sirr entered into his views, complimented him on his prudence and loyalty, and took immediate measures for the arrest of young Pat, who, when captured, was delivered to some of "Beresford's Troop," to exercise their inquisitorial talents in eliciting all he knew about men whom he had never seen, and as to designs of which, in all probability, he had never heard. The young man was perfectly free from all political or religious influences. Beau Brummell might as justly have been accused of complicity in the designs of revolutionary sans culottes, as young Pat of any sympathy with other pursuits than the midnight orgies and debasing revels of the worst of both sexes.
In the Custom House yard he was interrogated, and his denials only produced louder and sterner demands. Truth, strict truth, issued from lips to which it had been hitherto a stranger. The triangles stood before him, and all his protestations of innocence were uttered to ears worse than deaf. He was stripped, tied up, and lashed until he swooned; then taken down, and recalled to a sense of existence by restoratives, only to be put up