April 9th, 1829
Met O’Connell at dinner yesterday at William Ponsonby’s. The only Irish (agitators) were he and O’Gorman Mahon; ——, he said, was too great a blackguard, and he would not invite him. O’Connell arrived from Ireland that day; O’CONNELL AT DINNER. there is nothing remarkable in his manner, appearance, or conversation, but he seems lively, well bred, and at his ease. I asked him after dinner ‘whether Catholics had not taken the oath of supremacy till it was coupled with the declaration;’ he said, ‘in many instances in the reigns of Elizabeth, James, and Charles, because at that time it was considered to apply to the civil supremacy of the Pope only, and that the Government admitted of that interpretation of it, but that no Catholic could take it now, because that construction is never given to the oath.’ Duncannon told me that O’Connell has no wish to be in Parliament, that he makes so much money by his profession that it is a great loss to him to attend Parliament at all. What they want is a compromise with Vesey Fitzgerald, by which he may be admitted to take his seat in this Parliament on an understanding that he will not oppose Vesey in the next; not that I see how that is to be done, except by an Act of Parliament (which would never pass) in his favour. Besides, the Duke detests him, and Vesey likewise. They cannot forgive him for all he has done and all he has made them do. O’Gorman, the secretary of the Catholic Association, appears a heavy, civil, vulgar man. I sat next to Stanley, who told me a story which amused me. Macintosh, in the course of the recent debates, went one day to the House of Commons at eleven in the morning to take a place. They were all taken on the benches below the gangway, and on asking the doorkeeper how they happened to be all taken so early, he said, ‘Oh, sir, there is no chance of getting a place, for Colonel Sibthorpe sleeps at a tavern close by, and comes here every morning by eight o’clock and takes places for all the saints.’