"I saw O'Connell in Galway one time, and I couldn't get anear him. All
the nations of the world were gathered there to see him. There were a
great many he hung and a great many he got off from death, the dear man.
He went into a town one time, and into a hotel, and he asked for his
dinner. And he had a frieze dress, for he was very simple, and always a
clerk along with him. And when the dinner was served to him, 'Is there
no one here,' says he, 'to sit along with me; for it is seldom I ever
dined without company.' 'If you think myself good enough to sit with
you,' says the man of the hotel, 'I will do it.' So the two of them sat
to the dinner together, and O'Connell asked was there any news in the
town. 'There is,' says the hotel man, 'there is a man to be hung
to-morrow.' 'Oh, my!' says O'Connell, 'what was it he did to deserve
that?' 'Himself and another that had been out fowling,' says he, 'and
they came in here and they began to dispute, and the one of them killed
the other, and he will be hung to-morrow.' 'He will not,' says
O'Connell. 'I tell you he will,' says the other, 'for the Judge is come
to give the sentence.' Well, O'Connell kept to it that he would not, and
they made a bet, and the hotel man bet all he had on the man being hung.
In the morning O'Connell was in no hurry out of bed, and when the two of
them walked into the Court, the Judge was after giving the sentence, and
the man was to be hung. '_Maisead_,' says the judge when he saw
O'Connell, 'I wish you had been here a half an hour ago, where there is
a man going to be hung.' 'He is not,' says O'Connell. 'He is,' says the
judge. 'If he is,' says O'Connell, 'that one will never let anyone go
living out of his hotel, and he making money out of the hanging.' 'What
do you mean saying that?' says the judge. Then O'Connell took the
instrument out of his pocket where it was written down all the
hotel-keeper had put on the hanging. And when the judge saw that, he set
the man free, and he was not hanged."