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 vigorous support of the French war. Many were daily falling away from the opposition. In 1796 he was exposed to fierce attacks on the Roman catholic question from his inveterate foe Dr. Duigenan. But he clung to a broken cause. In May 1795, by way of protest, for he had no chance of success, he moved, in a long speech, for an address to the crown on the Irish distress. The government met him with a motion for adjournment and carried it. In October 1796 he supported Grattan's motion, in face of the projected invasion of Hoche, that union could best be secured by legislation to guarantee ‘the blessings and privileges of the constitution without distinction of religion.’ On 24 Feb. 1797 he supported an address for an increase in the domestic Irish troops, especially the yeomanry. On 20 March he spoke on the disarming of Ulster, and last of all on 15 May he supported Ponsonby's plan for parliamentary reform and catholic emancipation. It was the last effort of the constitutional opposition to obtain a conciliatory policy from the government on domestic grievances. After it had been rejected they withdrew from the commons and ceased to attend its debates until the parliament adjourned on 3 July. This left matters wholly in the hands of the revolutionary party. The insurrection of 1798 was now being prepared, and on the information of Thomas Reynolds of Kilkea Castle, who had been in 1797 treasurer of the United Irishmen for Kildare, Major Swan, on 12 March 1798, arrested, in Bond's house, 12 Bridge Street, Dublin, the general committee of the conspiracy. Whether Curran was connected with them it is hard to say. The government was told by another informer, a member of the general committee, that Curran was to have been proposed for the committee of one hundred, and would have been arrested had Major Swan arrived two hours earlier (, English in Ireland, iii. 330). He was certainly acquainted with Wolfe Tone's designs, and when in 1798 the Hon. Valentine Lawless, afterwards Lord Cloncurry, was arrested in London on suspicion of treason, a letter of his having been found among the papers of Broughall, the secretary of the Irish Catholic Association, Curran chanced to be with him, and was arrested too, but was at once set at liberty. On the appointed day, 23 May 1798, the rising took place, though deprived of its leaders, and after much bloodshed Lord Castlereagh announced on 17 July that it was suppressed. The government proclaimed an amnesty for all but the leaders, and entered on a terrible series of prosecutions. Curran defended the prisoners in nearly every case, and this he did although his own position was insecure. He was threatened with deprivation of his rank as king's counsel; soldiers were vexatiously billeted on him, anonymous letters were sent to him, and, but for the protection of Lord Kilwarden, he would probably have been arrested. The first case was that of the brothers Sheares, who were arrested on 21 May. They were two barristers, sons of a banker in Cork, who, as a member of the Irish parliament, had promoted the act of 5 George III, under which a copy of the indictment was to be furnished to a prisoner and counsel to be assigned him. Under that act Curran, McNally, and Plunket were assigned to defend his sons. The case (after an adjournment) came on on 12 July. After a sixteen hours' sitting, with but twenty minutes' interval, Curran rose to address the court at midnight. Lord Carleton refused to adjourn the court. After an extraordinary display of eloquence, and a prolongation of the trial for eight hours more, the prisoners were convicted and sentenced to be hanged and beheaded. The other cases followed rapidly. McCann was tried on 17 July, and Byrne on the 20th; both were convicted and executed. Curran's speeches were suppressed. On the 23rd Oliver Bond was tried. The principal witness was again Thomas Reynolds of Kilkea. The court was full of soldiers, and Curran, who was in ill-health, was thrice silenced by interruption. ‘You may assassinate me,’ he cried, ‘but you shall not intimidate me.’ Bond was found guilty, but died in prison of apoplexy. On 20 Aug. Curran was heard at bar against the bill of attainder upon the late Lord Edward Fitzgerald on behalf of Lord Henry, his brother, Pamela, his widow, and her children. He was unsuccessful, and this act passed, by which a dead man was declared a traitor, and his estate taken from his heirs. On 10 Nov. Wolfe Tone was tried and sentenced by a court-martial, in spite of his pleading his French commission and rights as a prisoner of war. Curran and Peter Burrowes [q. v.], though uninstructed, applied to the king's bench for a habeas corpus instantly, Tone being that day marked for execution. The court granted it on the ground that Tone not having held the king's commission was not amenable to a court-martial, when word was brought that Tone had attempted suicide and was only barely alive. In spite of the writ he was not removed from military custody, and died of his wound on 19 Nov. The last of Curran's efforts in connection with the rising of 1798 was on 19 May 1800, when he appeared for Napper Tandy, who was charged with not surrendering before 1 Dec. 1798, pursuant to the Attainder Act of that year, on pain of