President joins the company of Pope and Parnell

Parnell, Pope John Paul II, Maud Gonne, Michael Davitt, de Valera and JFK. If he had time to glance through the list before him, William Jefferson Clinton would have noticed that he is in good company as the latest freeman of Limerick city. Good celibate company, mostly. Almost half of those honoured, since Isaac Butt MP in 1877, have held senior positions within the Catholic Church.

Even Frank McCourt hasn't been given free parking . . . but then, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Angela's Ashes isn't exactly the man of the moment, to judge from the cool response by an estimated 40,000-strong crowd. Alluded to by the Taoiseach in his opening address in Limerick's O'Connell Street on Saturday morning, McCourt became the subject of one of the smarter soundbites in the President's speech.

Why, Mr Clinton said, he would have to go home and tell him "you know, Frank, you made a lot of money writing about the old Limerick, but I like the new one better!" It was enough to rouse the cheers, to have the Stars and Stripes raised again.

So heavy was the demand for plastic US flags in the days before the President's visit that additional supplies had to be dispatched from Dublin.

For some, flag-waving was the only way to keep warm, as torrential rain prefaced the President's visit. As official MC, broadcaster Des Cahill did his best to keep the mood up, while musicians and singers Brian Kennedy, Micheal O Suilleabhain and Noirin Ni Riain performed on stage.

When the heavens opened at around 10.35 p.m, the guest of honour was already running late. VIPs seated near the podium retreated into a fast-food restaurant. Journalists and Garda detectives retreated under a makeshift platform.

A mini-monsoon even by west of Ireland standards, it wasn't quite enough to dampen spirits - but it was close. Having queued patiently at security scanners, some groups found themselves separated by cordons. The location for the President's podium, on the corner of Bedford Row, O'Connell and Thomas Streets, was chosen to ensure a quick exit in case of trouble.

Of trouble, there was little evidence - and, of course, the sun shone just in time for the late arrival. Even the robeless flower-selling socialist mayor, Cllr Joe Harrington, who holds a Guinness world record for political handshakes, didn't make his promised criticism of the recent US attacks on Sudan and Afghanistan in his speech.

"On the national and the international stage, the bomb and the bullet too often appear to be the instruments of first resort," the mayor said simply.

"Like you, Mr President, I recently visited the town of Omagh to express solidarity with the relatives of the dead and injured. There I saw the devastation caused by one bomb and was truly shocked - as we were by the embassy bombings in Africa. "Mr President, we all share in the grief of your people who lost loved ones in these terrible acts, and we extend our sympathy to the victims of the host nations also, as we do to the relatives of those who were later killed in the Middle East." The North was the dominant theme of the President's address, greeted warmly but without the wild abandon of Dublin in 1995. Mr Clinton paid tribute to an "extraordinary Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern" and to all those who had made the peace process possible, but "the major credit" belonged to the Irish, he said. There was contained applause - as if, after Omagh, few could really take great comfort in that.

He referred to John F. Kennedy, who had visited 35 years before, and who had promised he would return in the springtime. "He was not able to fulfil that promise," President Clinton said. "But I appreciate that opportunity to renew it, and to thank you for the springtime of hope the Irish people have given the entire world in 1998."

And again, he returned to the peace initiative in which there is such desperate hope. Again, the response from the crowd was embarrassed, and his words a little hollow. "Because of what you have done in Ireland in 1998, you have made it possible for me, on behalf of the United States and the cause of the peace in the world, to tell every warring, feuding, hating group of people trapped in the prison of their past conflicts to look at Ireland and know that there can be a better way."

Free of "demons" of the past, "you can look to the future", he said, warning against those enemies of peace who would "break your will".

"Don't do it, don't do it. Remember what it was like when you were here on this day, in this street."

George Bernard Shaw had always said he hoped to be in Ireland when the world ended, because the Irish were always 50 years behind, he continued, paying tribute to the State's, and the region's, economic success. "Well, Ireland has turned the tables on poor old Mr Shaw," he quipped, following this with a special reference to that morning's jobs announcement by Dell Computers.

As his wife, Hillary, sat nodding behind her own personal security barrier - a large pair of sunglasses - there was only one veiled reference by Mr Clinton to his own uncertain future.

It came early in his 20-minute speech. "I told the mayor that I was relieved to have the freedom of the city here. It means when I'm no longer president and I come back to Ireland, I won't have to stay in Dublin at all, I can come to Limerick!" An elderly woman in the crowd dug the ribs of her friend. "Best put the kettle on for him, so, "she said.