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the money for a passage to America. A new
partner, and a lucky stroke of business
tempted him to forfeit his passage-money, and
remain in Ireland. A run of success followed;
after which, he was proceeding to Belfast to
take ship for France, when he heard of a fair
at Clough, six miles on one side of his route,
which he resolved to attend, and at which he
resolved to exercise his calling for the last
time upon British soil. There he was seized
by a pig-drover for a theft which had been
committed on the spot, but could not be
proved. The pig-drover dragged him before
a justice at Downpatrick, where his
personal resemblance to an old Irish offender
secured his condemnation. Returned to jail,
he happened to pass within sight of the
magistrate at Drummore, and was recognised
as the man who had escaped from the court-
house. He was carried to Kilmainham jail,
and detected in an attempt to break that
prison. The account he gave of himself was
unsatisfactory. John Richardson was in
Ireland, seeking Haggart: he was summoned to
Kilmainham, and knew his man. Heavily
fettered, Haggart was carried back to
Dumfries; and, arriving there at dark, was met by a
thousand of curious spectators, who came out
with torches to see the murderer. Haggart
went up the stairs on which Morrin had
received his death-blow. He was twenty
years old, and already at the end of his
career. Soon afterwards condemned to
death, he received his sentence with a
careless air, and answered the judge with a
flippant comment. But he writes that while
being sentenced, two thoughts were strong in
him. A recollection that his mother was
dead of a broken heart, and an impulse to
leap over the dock upon the heads of the
people, and make one desperate effort more
for life. He did not repent until repentance
was the last trick left to him to play. He
wrote verses in prison. Had he not struck
for liberty, and was it not as a martyr for
liberty that he was doomed to fall? Here
are some of his lines:

"My life by perjury was sworn away,
I'll say that to my dying day.
Oh, treacherous Smith, you did me betray,
For all I wanted was liberty.
No malice in my heart is found
To any man above the ground.
Now, all good people that speak of me,
You may say I died for my liberty."

Great was the satisfaction of the chaplain
over this young Christian, who listened to
his prayers, wept at his eloquence, remained on
his knees as long as the reverend gentleman
pleased, and only asked in return that the clergy
would make much of him. We are told that
"his conduct on the scaffold was in the highest
degree becoming," that the "beneficial
influence of religion was apparent in his whole
demeanour," and that "he met his fate with
the same intrepidity which distinguished all
the actions of his short, but guilty and eventful
life."

In his last days, David was visited by a
distinguished phrenologist; who, on going
over his head, found that he had a greater
development of the organs of benevolence and
justice than had been supposed. Phrenology
proceeded to depict this good youth as having
been in his early boyhood obstinately brave,
but free from hatred or the spirit of revenge,
self-willed at home in the resolve to take no
course dictated to him against his own
consent by other persons; as a youth cunning
and dexterous, conscious of superiority to his
associates in intellectual power and discrimination.
He was a child who would grow
with years firmer in resolve, having power to
keep his own counsel, labouring in the "sporting
life," for love of cleverness, and love of
liberty and ease, not for the love of money or
the desire of applause from associates. He
would probably see that other men, called
honest, lived practically as he did; he would
never be cruel or brutal; he would never
inflict serious suffering on any individual
without bitterly regretting it. He would not
be the slave to animal passions. His sense of
justice was not remarkably defective; his
sentiment of benevolence was great, and so
were his intellectual powers.

So, we are dutifully to believe that the
good and the wise honoured David in his
very interesting end. Being neither good
nor wise in such matters, we believe about
one-third of what he relates in his exemplary
work, and make bold to consider him an
unmitigated rascal.

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