seditious invective against the servile profligacy and liquorish venality of the board of aldermen-this he does by beans*; having this previously inflamed the passions of his fellows, and somewhat exhausted his own, his judgement collects the reins that floated on the neck of his imagination, and he becomes grave, compressed, sententious, and didactic; he lays down the law of personal disability, and corporate criminality, and corporate forfeiture, with great precision, with sound emphasis and good discretion, to the great delight and edification of the assembly—and this he does by beans. He then proceeds, my lords, to state the specific charge against the unfortunate candidate for approbation, with all the artifice and malignity of accusation, scalding the culprit in tears of affected pity, bringing forward the blackness of imputed guilt through the varnish of simulated commiseration; bewailing the horror of his crime, that he may leave it without excuse; and invoking the sympathy of his judges, that he may steel them against compassion-and this, my lords, the unshaved demagogue doth by beans. The accused doth not appear in person, for he cannot leave his companions, nor by attorney, for his attorney could not be admitted, but he appears and defends by beans. At first, humble and depręcatory, he conciliates the attention of his judges to his defence, by giving them to hope that it may be without effect; he does not alarm them by any indiscreet assertion that the charge is false, but he slides upon them arguments to shew it improbable; by degrees, however, he gains upon the assembly, and denies and refutes, and recriminates and retorts

all by beans-until at last he challenges his accuser to a trial, which is accordingly had; in the course of which the depositions are taken, the facts tried, the legal doubts proposed and explained-by beans; and in the same manner the law is settled, with an exactness and authority that remains a * A common mode of election in Ireland.

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record of jurisprudence for the information of future ages; while at the same time, the harmony' of the metropolis is attuned by the marvellous temperament of jarring discord; and thegood will' of the citizens is secured by the indissoluble bond of mutual crimination and reciprocal abhorrence.

By this happy mode of decision, one hundred and fortysix causes of rejection (for of so many do the commons consist, each of whom must be entitled to allege a distinct cause,) are tried in the course of a single day, with satisfaction to all parties.

"With what surprise and delight must the heart of the fortunate inventor have glowed, when he discovered those wonderful instruments of wisdom and of eloquence, which, without being obliged to commit the precious extracts of science or persuasion to the faithless and fragile vehicles of words or phrases, can serve every process of composition or abstraction of ideas, and every exigency of discourse or argumentation, by the resistless strength and infinite variety of beans, white or black, or boiled, or raw; displaying all the magic of their powers in the mysterious exertions of dumb investigation and mute discussion, of speechless objection and tongue-tied refutation!

"Nor should it be forgotten, my lords, that this notable discovery does no little honour to the sagacity of the present age, by explaining a doubt that has for so many centuries perplexed the labour of philosophic inquiry, and furnishing the true reason why the pupils of Pythagoras were prohibited the use of beans; it cannot, I think, my lords, be doubted, that the great author of the metempsychosis found out, that those mystic powers of persuasion which vulgar naturalists supposed to remain lodged in minerals or fossils,

had really transmigrated into beans; and he could not, therefore, but see that it would have been fruitless to preclude his disciples from mere oral babbling, unless he had also debarred them from the indulgence of vegetable loquacity."

Such was the effect of Mr. Curran's pleasantry, that even on ordinary occasions, servants in attending at table often became suspended, like the bucket in the well, and frequently started as if from a reverie, when called upon for the ordinary attendance. Sometimes a wine glass could not be had, or if asked for, a knife or fork was presented in its place; their faces turned awry, you heard nothing but the breaks of a suppressed laughter!

He had a favourite black servant who lived with him for many years, and to whom, for his great fidelity, Mr. Curran was very much attached. This poor fellow was observed for a few days before his departure, to have been oppressed with gloom and sadness, the cause of which was not directly enquired into. One morning, whilst in this state, he came up anxiously to his master, and with apparent regret and an air of much dejection requested to be discharged. Mr. Curran told him he was very much concerned to lose the services of so faithful a person, that he had a strong regard for him; and on enquiring into the reason of his desire to leave him, the black replied, "it is impossible for me to remain longer with

you, massa.

Why, my good fellow, we will see all care taken of you." "No massa, I cannot live longer with you, I am losing my health with you, you make a me laugh too much."

A brother barrister of his, remarkable for having a perpetuity in dirty shirts, was drily asked in the presence of Mr. Curran, "Pray, my dear Bob, how do you get so many dirty shirts?" Mr. Curran replied for him, "I can easily account for it; his laundress lives at Holyhead, and there are nine packets always due." This gentleman wishing to travel to Cork during the rebellion, but apprehensive he should be known by the rebels, was advised to proceed incog. which he said was easily effected, for by disguising himself in a clean shirt, no one would know him.

Of the same gentleman, who was a sordid miser, it was told Mr. Curran, that he had set out from Cork to Dublin, with one shirt, and one guinea. "Yes," said Mr. Curran," and I will answer for it, he will change neither of them till he returns.”

On travelling into London once, he was told of a builder, who had erected a row of houses, on so cheap a principle, that one of the evils likely to arise out of his oeconomy was, that if one was touched or altered, the remainder, like card houses, would immediately fall. A tenant to one of the

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houses, getting tired of his bargain, and wishing to put a little money into his pocket, ordered masons and other tradesmen to be ready to pull down part of the house inhabited by him. The landlord ran impatiently to remonstrate with, and to obstruct him if possible, and it ended in a money settlement, as the tenant calculated. " What a scoundrel!" exclaimed some fellow traveller. "No, Sir, by no means," said Mr. Curran," he took the money by the oldest title known to your country, he took by the law of descent, and he brings to my recollection what I once heard of a cobler, who rented out the leg of a stool."

On letting his beautiful and tasty residence in the county of Cork, which was distant from the Lakes of Killarney but one short day's journey, he became the purchaser of a country-seat near Rathfarnham, on the slope of those delightful hills hanging over the Marquis of Ely's demesne. The scenery before the windows is of interminable expanse, and commanding one of the richest and best dressed landscapes in Ireland, including the Bay of Dublin, the ships, the opposite hill of Howth, the pier, and light-house, and a long stretch of the county of Dublin; on the eastern side May-puss Craggs and obelisks, and a long range of hills. The house is plain, but substantial, and the grounds peculiarly well laid out, and neatly kept; sheltered to the south by a ridge of