Page:Biographia Hibernica volume 1.djvu/363

 CURRAN. 352 according to Pope. And "brevity," says another eminent author, "is the very soul of it." It is a fine, essential spirit of the mind which is apt to evaporate in the trans- fusion of detail; and therefore nothing is more dull than your "devilish good story of a devilish good thing, said by a celebrated wit," and retailed by a smoky-headed fellow, who smothers t in the bungling stupidity of his own narration. We trust our readers will not deem the above a digres- sion; and we now commence, sans cérémonie, to record a few of the witticisms of Mr. Curran. Shortly after the establishment of our colony at Botany Bay, when the population was fast increasing, Mr. Curran in one of his speeches upon a criminal trial observed,- " That should the colony thrive, and become a regular civil government, what a pleasant thing it would be to have the laws administered by judges reprieved at the gallows; by justices who had picked pockets; by coun- sellors who had pleaded at the bar for their lives; by lawyers who had set the law at defiance; to see house- breakers appointed to protect the public property; high- waymen entrusted with the public money; rioters invested " with commissions of the peace, and shoplifters to regulate the markets. Such, however, said he, were the original people of Rome; and such the foundation of the states of America." He was addressing a jury on one of the state trials in 1803 with his usual animation. The judge, whose poli tical bias, if any a judge can have, was certainly supposed not to be favourable to the prisoner, shook his head in doubt or denial of one of the advocate's arguments: " I see, gentlemen," said Mr. Curran, "I see the motion of his lordship's head; common observers might imagine that implied a difference of opinion, but they would be mistaken--it is merely accidental-believe me, gentlemen, if you remain here many days, you will yourselves per- ceive, that when his lordship shakes his head there's nothing in it!"