I am not responsible; I did all in my power to prevent it, for I knew that, circumstanced as we then were, it would be a failure.  It has been stated in the course of those trials that Stephens was for peace.  This is a mistake.  It may be well that it should not go uncontradicted.  It is but too well known in Ireland that he sent numbers of men over here to fight, promising to be with them when the time would come.  The time did come, but not Mr. Stephens.  He remained in France to visit the Paris Exhibition.  It may be a very pleasant sight, but I would not be in his place now.  He is a lost man—­lost to honour, lost to country.  There are a few things I would wish to say relative to the evidence given against me at my trial, but I would ask your lordships to give me permission to say them after sentence.  I have a reason for asking to be allowed to say them after sentence has been passed.”

The Chief Justice—­“That is not the usual practice.  Not being tried for life, it is doubtful to me whether you have a right to speak at all.  What you are asked to say is why sentence should not be passed upon you, and whatever you have to say you must say now.”

“Then, if I must say it now I declare it before my God that what Kelly swore against me on the table is not true.  I saw him in Ennisgroven, but that I ever spoke to him on any political subject I declare to heaven I never did.  I knew him from a child in that little town, herding with the lowest and vilest.  Is it to be supposed I’d put my liberty into the hands of such a character?  I never did it.  The next witness is Corridon.  He swore that at the meeting he referred to I gave him directions to go to Kerry to find O’Connor, and put himself in communication with him.  I declare to my God every word of that is false.  Whether O’Connor was in the country or whether he had made his escape, I know just as little as your lordships; and I never heard of the Kerry rising until I saw it in the public papers.  As to my giving the American officers money that night, before my God, on the verge of my grave, where my sentence will send me, I say that also is false.  As to the writing that the policeman swore to in that book, and which is not a prayer-book, but the ‘Imitation of Christ,’ given to me by a lady to whom I served my time, what was written in that book was written by another young man in her employment.  That is his writing not mine.  It is the writing of a young man in the house, and I never wrote a line of it.”

   The Lord Chief Justice—­“It was not sworn to be in your handwriting.”

   “Yes, my lord, it was.  The policeman swore it was in my
   hand-writing.”

   The Lord Chief Justice—­“That is a mistake.  It was said to be like
   yours.”

   “The dream of my life has been that I might be fighting for Ireland. 
   The jury have doomed me to a more painful, but not less glorious
   death.  I now bid farewell to my friends and all who are dear to me.