“Connor O’Donovan!” he exclaimed, “he might well bear to die; he was innocent; it was I that burned Bodagh Buie’s haggard; he had neither act nor part in it no more than the child unborn.  I swore away his life out of revinge to his father an’ jealousy of himself about Una O’Brien.  Oh, if I had as little to answer for now as he, I could die—­die!  Sweet Jasus, an’ must I die to-morrow—­be in the flames o’ hell afore twelve o’clock? tarrible! terrible!”

It was absolutely, to use his own word, “terrible,” to witness the almost superhuman energy of his weakness.  On making this last disclosure to the sheriff, the latter stepped back from a feeling of involuntary surprise and aversion, exclaiming as he did it,—­

“Oh, God forgive you, unhappy and guilty man! you have much, indeed, to answer for; and, as I said before, I advise you to make the most of the short time that is allotted to you, in repenting and seeking pardon from God.”

The culprit heard him not, however, for his whole soul was fearfully absorbed in the contemplation of eternity and punishment, and death.

“Sir,” said the turnkey, “that’s the way he’s runnin’ about the room almost since his thrial; not, to be sure, altogether so bad as now, but clappin’ his hands, an’ scramm’ an’ groanin’, that it’s frightful to listen to him.  An’ his dhrames, sir, is worse.  God, sir, if you’d hear him asleep, the hair would stand on your head; indeed, one of us is ordered to be still with him.”

“It is right,” replied the sheriff, who, after recommending him to get a clergyman, left him, and, with his usual promptness and decision, immediately wrote to the Secretary of State, acquainting him with Flanagan’s confession of his own guilt, and of Connor O’Donovan’s innocence of the burning of O’Brien’s haggard; hoping, at the same time, that government would take instant steps to restore O’Donovan to his country and his friends.

Soon after the sheriff left him, a Roman Catholic clergyman arrived, for it appeared that against the priest who was chaplain of the jail he had taken an insurmountable prejudice, in consequence of some fancied resemblance he supposed him to bear to the miser’s son.  The former gentleman spent that night with him, and, after a vast deal of exertion and difficulty, got him so far composed, as that he attempted to confess to him, which, however, he did only in a hurried and distracted manner.

But how shall we describe the scene, and we have it from more than one or two witnesses, which presented itself, when the hour of his execution drew nigh.  His cries and shrieks were distinctly heard from a considerable distance along the dense multitudes which were assembled to witness his death; thus giving to that dreadful event a character of horror so deep and gloomy, that many persons, finding themselves unable to bear it, withdrew from the crowd, and actually fainted on hearing the almost supernatural tones of his yells and howlings within.