LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXI, Issue 1650, 4 June 1879, Page 3

LITERATURE.

a; lucky pkesbntiment. About sixty years ago a remarkable case was tried, at the criminal side, in tho county of Cork. The writer wishes to pledge himself at the outset to the literal authenticity of the narrative, which he heard from the Ups of the late eminent Quecn’e counsel, George Bennett, at that time a junior on the Munster circuit, and himself an eye-witness and attentive listener at the trial. On a fine summer evening, when the rustic hoar of supper was approaching, there arrived at the door of a comfortably thatched cabin, of large dimensions, such as tho class of persons known in Ireland as ‘strong farmers’ usually inhabit, a stranger, dressed in the then peasant costume, corduroy shorts, frieze coat, caubeen, and brogues, and with a blackthorn stick in his hand. The wayfarer entered, with the usual salutation, ‘ God save all here,’ and asked if this was not Dennis Macarthy’s house. The women who were in the cabin told him it was, and invited him civilly to sit down, ‘ and take an air of the fire;’ and with this invitation he complied, entertaining his new acquantances the while with such news as ho had collected while on his journey. The man was dark-featured, of middle statute, and of square and very powerful build.

In a little while Dennis Macarthy, returning from his fields, entered the cabindoor, and the stranger introduced himself as his cousin, Phil Eyan, from Cappaghrnore, in tho county of Limerick, and told him what had brought him to that distant part of the world. His business was to say certain prayers, according to Irish usage, over the grave of a common kinsman of both, who had died two or three weeks before and was buried in tho neighboring graveyard. Macarthy received his cousin, although he had never seen his face before, with the customary cordiality of clanship, and told him that he must sup and sleep in his house that night, and oat his breakfast there before setting out in the morning on his homeward journey. To all this tho stranger consented, and then, as he was unacquainted with the situation of the graveyard, he asked Macarthy if it was not far off, to show him the way to it, and point out tho grave of their cousin. Macarthy readily consented, and, as the potatoes were not quite boiled, it was agreed that they should set out at once, and return in time for supper. In the south of Ireland simple burialplaces, probably of immense antiquity, containing no vestige • of •-a sacred - xbuilding, rudely fenced with a loose stone wall,

lichen stained, and often partly overgrown with ivy, with perhaps two or three hawthorns, and an ancient ash-tree growing within them, are frequently to be met with. Poistbly these small and solitary enclosures were dedicated to the same funeral long before the dawn of Christianity broke upon the island. A wild and narrow track, perhaps as aocient as the place of sepulture itself, crossing, at a short distance from Macarthy’s cabin, the comparatively modern main road, leads over a little rising ground to the burial-place, which lie 5 * in the lap of a lonely hollow, seldom disturbed by the sound of human tread or voice, or the rattle of car wheels.

Macarthy and the stranger walked up tho silent by road until they reached the hollow I hare mentioned. There, under the shadow of an old twisted thorn-tree, a stile crosses the loose wall of tho burialground. 'Go on,’ said Macarthy.

‘Go you first,’ replied the stranger. 'Go first yourself,’ said the farmer, a little peremptorily, making a stand, he did not know why, upon the point of precedence.

‘ Arra, man ; go on, can’t ye, and don’t be botherin’; what are ye afraid of ?’ ins'sted Ryan. ‘ Now, I’ll tell you what it is; I don’t understand you, nor what you’re at ; but divil a foot I’ll go over that wall till yon go over it first,’ said Macarthy, doggedly. The man laughed, and looked rather angry. ‘To be sure I’ll go over it first if that'll please ye ; and what does it matter who’s first and Jwho’s laxt?’ ho answered surlily. ‘ But you’re tho biggest omadhaun I ever set eyes on ’ And, speaking to this effect, he crossed the stile, followed by Macarthy, who pointed out the grave, and forthwith the stranger kneeled beside it, according to Irish custom, and began to tell his beads f-nd say his prayers, an observance which usually lasts about a quarter of an hour.

When the prayers were ended, the farmer and Ryan, now quite good friends again, returned to the farmhouse, where the stranger had his supper with the family, and in the morning, having eaten his breakfast, he took his leave and set out on his homeward journey. Irish ideas of hospitality in tho peasant rank make it a matter of obligation upon the host to accompany his guest for a part of the way. Macarthy 7 , in compliance with this courteous custom, set oat with the stranger, and about a mile away from his house they entered a little village, where ho shook hands with his guest, and bid him farewell.

But his visitor would not part without testifying his gratitude, according to the custom, of the country, by treating his kinsman to some drink, which he insisted on doing in tho village public houso, the door of which stood open close by them. Macarthy accordingly went in with him. They sat down at the table, and the stranger, having ascertained what his cousin liked best, ordered a pot of porter, making some excuse for not partaking himself. When Macarthy raised the pewter pot to his lips, a sudden pain, which he afterwards described more particularly, in the back of his neck compelled him to set it down untasted.

The stranger urged him to drink it, and without explaining the cause of his hesitation, he a second time raised the vessel to his mouth. Precisely the same thing occurred again. Once more the stranger expostulated, and pressed Lira more vehemently to drink ; and again he tried it, but with exactly the same result.

* What ails ye ? and why don’t you drink your liquor ? Don’t you like it V the stranger demanded.

'I don’t like it,’ answered Macarthy, getting up, 1 and I don’t like you, nor your ways, and, in God’s name, I’ll have nothing more, good or bad, to say to yon.’ * To the devil I pitch you and it,’ said the stranger breaking into undisguised fury, and at tho same time, through the open door, ho flusg tho contents of the pewter pot upon the road.

Without another word, In his temper, the unknown cousin strode out of the door, and walked on his way, leaving the farmer in a state of perturbation and suspicion. Happening to look into the pewter pot, which had contained the porter just thrown out, he saw a white sediment at tho bottom of it. He and the publican put their heads together over it, hut could make nothing of this deposit. It so happened, however, that the physician was in attendance at the dispensary, only a few yards away, and to him they submitted the white powder that lay in the bottom of the measure. It proved to be arsenic.

The mud upon the road where the porter had fallen was also examined, and some of the same deposit was found upon it. Upon these facts, and the short information sworn hy Macarthy, a neighboring magistrate at once issued his warrant, with which the police pursued the miscreant, who, without apprehension of his purpose having been discovered, was pursuing his journey quite at his ease. He was arrested, and duly committed to prison. The animus and purpose of the heinorrs enterprise came afterwards to light. The pretended cousin, whose real name was Mara, had been bribed to put Macxrthy to death, hy a person interested in the termination of a lease in which Macarthy was the last Ufe.

The attempt to poison was only a resource in reserve, The primary plan, and that relied upon with good reason, was of a totally different kind. Under the pretext I have mentioned, Macarthy was to have been induced to accompany Mara to the lonely graveyard, the position of which, and the stile by which it was entered, wore familiar to him. He was to have allowed Macxi thy to cross tho stile first, and, following him closely, as ho descended on tho other side, ho was, from above, to have dealt him, with his heavy loaded stick, such a blow upon tho head as must have felled him to the ground, and, as he lay stunned in the graveyard, he would have easily despatched him, The sounds of violence in that sequestered place no ear could have heard, and no human aid oonld have interfered to prevent the consummation of his atrocious purpose. Tho women, who, in the largo bjrn-like room, were attending to the preparations for sapper at its further end, had caught nothing of the conversation of the two men who stood near the door. The effect of this might not very improbably have been that no one would have known in what direction their walk had lain, or could have conjectured where the body of Macarthy, if he had been murdered, was concealed. It might have lain under the wall of that rude cemetery undiscovered until the next funeral brought people into its solitary enclosure. At this point all turned upon the presentiment which had so mysteriously determined Macarthy, without any motive of which bo was conscious, against going over tho slile before him. Macarthy was too powerful a man to have been assailed, on fair terms, with a reasonable chance of tho intending assassin’s success.

When tho trial was over, Mr Bennett, my informant, though not in the case, and a very junior barrister at the time, had listened to the trial with deep interest, found an opportunity of speaking to the prosecutor, and asked him some questions upon tho most extraordinary point in the strange occurrence deposed 10. What passed was to the following effect:—

‘ You stated that you were prevented from drinking the porter by a pain In the back of your neck. Did that pain effect all the back of your neck ; and if not, to what part of your neck was it confined ?’ ‘ It was on one spot only, close under the skull on the backbone.’

* Was it a severe pain ?’ * The worst I ever felt.’ ‘ Had you ever had the same pain before V

1 Never any pain like it before or since.’ ‘ Can you give me any idea of what the pain was like V ‘ It covered about the size of the top of a man’s finger pressed hard against the neck, and it felt like a red-hot bullet,’

‘ Did the pain last long ?’ ‘lt came whenever I raised the porter towards my mouth, and stopped so soon as I set the vessel down again; and I could not drink or hold the vessel while it lasted.’ .Some persona.will account, upon natural, though complicated theories, for the mental

and physical impressions which they may suppose, resulted in this sensation, and in the consequent escape of the prosecutor, Maoarthy, from a deep laid scheme of murder. Others will see nearly insuperable difficulties in the way of such an explanation. It is, in any case, one of the most remarkable instances of justice satisfied and life saved by mysterious premonition that I have ever met with.

The hired assassin was convicted, and, although his intention had been defeated, his crime was then, I believe, a capital one. The wretch who employed him was, also, if I remember righly, convicted and pui ished. I relate this story m Ith a very exact recollection of the terms in which it was told to me, and with a conscientious anxiety to reproduce the narrative accurately. It is extraordinary enough, I think, to mferifc being rescued from oblivion.