kill a calf. He had a huge knife in his handit was as sharp as a razor. The calf was standing beside him—he drew the knife to plunge it into the animal. Just as he was in the act of doing so, a little boy about four years old-his only son -the loveliest little baby I ever saw, ran suddenly across his path, and he killed-oh, my God! he killed-" "The child! the child! the child!" vociferated Lord Avonmore. "No, my Lord, the calf," continued Curran, very coolly; "he killed the calf, but-your Lordship is in the habit of anticipating."

HIS FIRST CLIENT.

When Curran was called to the bar, he was without friends, without connections, without fortune, conscious of talents far above the mob by which he was elbowed, and cursed with sensibility, which rendered him painfully alive to the mortifications he was fated to experience. Those who have risen to professional eminence, and recollect the impediments of such a commencement-the neglect abroad-the poverty, perhaps, at homethe frowns of rivalry—the fears of friendship—the sneer at the first essay-the prophecy that it will

be the last-discouragement as to the present——— forebodings as to the future--some who are established endeavoring to crush the chance of competition, and some who have failed anxious for the wretched consolation of companionship-those who recollect the comforts of such an apprenticeship may duly appreciate poor Curran's situation. After toiling for a very inadequate recompense at the Sessions of Cork, and wearing, as he said himself, his teeth almost to their stumps, he proceeded to the metropolis, taking for his wife and young children a miserable lodging on Hoghill. Term after term, without either profit or professional reputation, he paced the hall of the Four Courts. Yet even thus he was not altogether undistinguished. If his pocket was not heavy, his heart was light-he was young and ardent, buoyed up not less by the consciousness of what he felt within, than by the encouraging comparison with those who were successful around him, and his station among the crowd of idlers, whom he amused with his wit or amused by his eloquence. Many even who had emerged from that crowd, did not disdain occasionally to glean from his conversation the rich and varied treasures which he

did not fail to squander with the most unsparing prodigality; and some there were who observed the brightness of the infant luminary struggling through the obscurity that clouded its commencement. Among those who had the discrimination to appreciate, and the heart to feel for him, luckily for Curran, was Mr. Arthur Wolfe, afterwards the unfortunate, but respected Lord Kilwarden. The first fee of any consequence that he received was through his recommendation; and his recital of the incident cannot be without its interest to the young professional aspirant whom a temporary neglect may have sunk into dejection. "I then lived," said he, "upon Hog-hill; my wife and children were the chief furniture of my apartments; and as to my rent, it stood much the same chance of its liquidation with the national debt. Mrs. Curran, however, was a barrister's lady, and what was wanting in wealth, she was well determined should be supplied by dignity. The landlady, on the other hand, had no idea of any other gradation except that of pounds, shillings, and pence. I walked out one morning in order to avoid the perpetual altercations on the subject, with my mind, you may imagine, in no very enviable tem

perament. I fell into gloom, to which from my infancy I had been occasionally subject. I had a family for whom I had no dinner, and a landlady for whom I had no rent. I had gone abroad in despondence—I returned home almost in desperation. When I opened the door of my study, where Lavater alone could have found a library, the first object that presented itself was an immense folio of a brief, twenty golden guineas wrapped up beside it, and the name of Old Bob Lyons marked on the back of it. I paid my landlady-bought a good dinner-gave Bob Lyons a share of it; and that dinner was the date of my prosperity!"

CURRAN AND THE INFORMER.

The following is an extract from Curran's speech delivered before a committee of the house of Lords, against the Bill of attainder on Lord Edward's property

"I have been asked," said he, "by the committee, whether I have any defensive evidence? I am confounded by such a question. Where is there a possibility of obtaining defensive evidence? Where am I to seek it? I have often, of late, gone

to the dungeon of the captive, but never have I gone to the grave of the dead, to receive instructions for his defence; nor, in truth, have I ever before been at the trial of a dead man! I offer, therefore, no evidence upon this inquiry, against the perilous example of which I do protest on behalf of the public, and against the cruelty and inhumanity and injustice of which I do protest in the name of the dead father, whose memory is sought to be dishonored, and of his infant orphans, whose bread is sought to be taken away. Some observations, and but a few, upon the evidence of the informer I will make. I do believe all he

has admitted respecting himself. I do verily believe him in that instance, even though I heard him assert it upon his oath-by his own confession an informer, and a bribed informer-a man whom respectable witnesses had sworn in a court of justice, upon their oaths, not to be credible on his oath-a man upon whose single testimony no jury ever did, or ever ought to pronounce a verdict of guilty—a kind of man to whom the law resorts with abhorrence, and from necessity, in order to set the criminal against the crime, but who is made use of for the same reason that the most