EWMET, ROBERT (1778-1803). An Irish pa triot and orator. The third and youngest son of Dr. Robert Emmet, an Irish State physician, he was born in Dublin. After education at private schools, he became a distinguished prize-winner at Trinity College, Dublin, and an eloquent mem ber of the Historical Society. Summoned before the faculty and governmental visitors in 1798 as a United Irishman, he resigned from college, and traveled on the Continent, where lie had in terviews with Napoleon and Talleyrand in 1802. Napoleon promised to aid Irish independence, and Emmet returned secretly to Ireland. with the idea of planning a general revolution. On July 23, 1803, an immature rising took place. Emmet, dressed in fancy attire, and attended by a hundred conspirators armed with mu*kets and pikes, marched to seize Dublin Castle. On their way the men with pikes murdered the aged Lord Kilward•n, whom they met in his carriage, and assassinated Colonel Brown of the I.'mirth
Regiment, \rho was walking on the Coombe. Emmet was in despair at these excesses, and after the ordinary guard with their first volley had dispersed the rioters, lie lied to the Wicklow mountains, intending to escape to the Continent. Ills affection for Curran's 'laughter led to his arrest when seeking a final interview with her. lie was tried for treason, condemned to death, and hanged the following day. His speeches de livered before receiving sentence and on the scaf fold are held to be models of patriotic eloquence. "0 Breathe Not His Name," and She is Far from the Land where Iler Young Hero Sleeps," two of the most pathetic poems of his college friend, Moore, commemorate the sad fates of Emmet and Miss Curran. Consnit: Madden, Life of Robert Emmet (New York, 1856) ; and Robert Emmet : Cause of II is Rebellion (Lon don, 1871).