Stick Man...

There's a weird way that every statue in Dublin gets a nickname. So, there's "the Tart with the Cart" (Molly Malone) displaying her wares on Grafton Street and "the Hags with the Bags" waiting for a bus at Liffey Street. I've already done Patrick Kavanagh - "the Crank on the Bank" - and this is "Tonehenge"!

Theobald Wolfe Tone (1763-1798), leader of the United Irishmen, and father of Republicanism

It's often overlooked that Irish Republicanism owes its start to disaffected Protestants such as Tone and not the oppressed Catholic masses. Tone sought to unite Catholics and the Scots dissenters against the Anglican establishment. Where as his contemporaries such as Grattan, Flood and Lord Charlemont sought to remedy the worst excesses of English rule, Tone - influenced by Paine, Danton and the Jacobins - sought the complete overthrow of the monarchy and the establishment of a republic, such as those in France and America.

Thanks to informants in the organization, the government implemented martial law in early 1798 and arrested many leaders of the United Irishmen.The remaining members staged guerilla attacks and some pitched battles across the country, but the rebellion had been quelled by August when a French Army landed in Mayo. Tone had travelled to Paris in 1796 to obtain military support, and was captured leading a second French fleet in Lough Swilly in October.

Tried by court martial and sentenced to death, he was refused a firing squad and slit his throat in prison to cheat the hangman.

Here endeth the lesson!