With claims of this necessity, faction has nothing to do. The men, by whom they were upheld, were the most unblemished friends to the constitution of England, and to the connection of both countries. But they felt, truly, that there can be no solid connection between the free and the slave, and they raised Ireland into liberty, that the alliance might be sincere, pure, and indissoluble.

In this general triumph, Grattan took the undisputed lead, and his speech in the address of thanks to the viceroy has the solemn beauty of a pæan.

"I am now to address a FREE PEOPLE!

"Ages have passed away, and this is the first moment in which you could be distinguished by that appellation."

The orator suddenly rises into a strain of magnificent self-applause.

"I found Ireland on her knees.-I watched over her with an eternal solicitude. I have traced her progress from injuries to arms, and from arms to liberty. Spirit of Swift! Spirit of Molyneux! your genius has prevailed. Ireland is now a nation.-In that new character I hail her, and bowing to her august presence, I say, Esto perpetua !"

This language, which would have been ostentation in the lips of any other man, was, in his, simplicity and justice. He then throws a flash upon the Cimmerian darkness of the past.

"She is no longer a wretched colony, returning thanks to her governor for his rapine, and to her king for his oppression. Nor is she now a squabbling, fretful sectary, perplexing her little wits, and firing her furious statutes with bigotry, sophistry, disabilities, and death, to transmit to posterity insignificance and war."

He then rushes out into splendid amplification.

"You, with difficulties innumerable, with dangers not a few, have done what your ancestors wished, but could not accomplish; and what your posterity may preserve, but will never equal. You have moulded the jarring elements of your country into a nation; and have rivalled those great and ancient commonwealths, whom you were taught to admire, and among whom you are now to be recorded. In this proceeding you had not the advantages which were common to other great countries; no monuments, no trophies, none of those outward and visible signs of greatness, such as inspire mankind, and connect the ambition of the age which is coming on, with the example of that going off, and forms the descent and concatenation of glory! No, you have not had any great act recorded among all your misfortunes; nor have you one public tomb to assemble the crowd, and speak to the living the language of integri ty and freedom."

"I congratulate my country, who, going forth, as it were, with nothing but a stone and a sling, and what oppression could not take away, the favour of heaven, accomplished her own redemption, and left you nothing to add, and every thing to admire. You want no trophy now; the records of parliament are the evidence of your glory."

We have not now space to examine the often discussed topic of Irish eloquence. Its palpable characteristics are vigour and richness-great variety of passion--and great imaginative power-sometimes extravagant in its flights, but always showing

APRIL. 1823.-No. 252.

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native strength of wing. It is the very antipodes of meagreness, aridity, and common-place. We speak of it, of course, in it highest examples. It has been degraded, like all the other eminent and enviable things of the earth. Imitation naturally fastens on the costliest and most proper products, and the eloquence of the sister country has had its parasite plants, loading the noble tree with weedy fertility and colours not its own. But Ireland protests against having her claims to precedence in this master art of mind, decided by any living model. Her last orator is scarcely cold; and long distress and wild convulsions may shake the land, before the grave of eloquence is broken, and issues again in the shape of living man. It is at the foot of the statues of Burke and Sheridan, of Curran and Grattan, that Ireland takes her stand, and, in pride and sorrow, provokes the contest with the world.

We are not insensible to the faults of Grattan's style. His favourite figure was antithesis, a form of speech natural to a penetrating mind, and of all forms the most impressive on a public assembly. Maxims are arguments-the force of logic without the tardiness of induction. But their use may obviously be indulged too far; and they encumbered the excellence of his old age. Those were rarely visible in his earlier speeches, or, when they obtruded themselves, the fault was consumed in the surrounding glow of passion and genius, and, like spots on the sun, became a part of the intenser glory.

Another and more painful peculiarity was his strong and frequent appeal to the name and the ways of the Deity. This, which was sometimes stately, was sometimes forced, and is certainly among the hazardous violences of oratory. But those faults are too palpable to seduce the student. It is our higher gratification, as it is over better service, to commemorate rather the excellencies than the defects of distinguished ability; and in this spirit we have desired to direct the reader's attention to the more unquestioned merits of the great orator.

We have yet gone over but a few years of the forty that this eminent person filled up with active patriotism. We may return to the subject;-for the present recommending these volumes to the most diligent study of the parliamentary speaker. All imitation is false and unwise. But to dive into the secret of the renowned poet or orator; to see the hidden springs of that unfailing freshness and flow which won him homage; to purify and replenish our earthly nature, till it becomes the source of perennial purity and beauty like his own,-is not to imitate, but to rival; to make the true use of departed eminence; to follow the will of Providence in sending mighty minds, from time to time, to elevate the scale of human power. The student has in Grattan a great example. His clearness of reasoning; his diction, simple, strong, and original; his imagination, embodying ideas with a living vi

gour, and presenting a perpetual grouping of grand and impressive conceptions, a continual freeze of mental sculptures; and those fine qualities, inspirited by a lofty heart devoted to a cause well worthy of the life or death of man, place him rather among the immortal orators of antiquity, than among the leaders of our feebler time. His feelings, his style, and his time, were Demosthenaic. He was raised to raise his country with himself; and it is his supreme renown, that he succeeded;—that, during a long life of popular vicissitude, he was the highest mark both with the friends and the enemies of Ireland; that, with the strongest temptations to betray, he was found faithful to the last; and that, let the time of Ireland's grandeur come when it will, her patriot must first draw his inspiration from the sepulchre of GRATTAN.

THE NOCTURNAL SEPARATION.

(From Blackwood's Magazine.)

ONE summer, while at Baltimore on a pleasure excursion, peculiar circumstances suddenly rendered it necessary that I should set sail for St. Thomas's. I immediately proceeded to make inquiry about a vessel to convey me there, and found that there were none bound for that quarter, except a small schooner, which had very inferior accommodations, and was commanded by a person of rude manners and a disobliging temper. However, as my business admitted of no delay, I engaged a passage in her, and put my luggage on board, and desired the captain to send me notice whenever he was ready to sail, that I might immediately join him. I passed two days in that anxious and unsetled state of mind which the prospect of going to sea generally induces, and went despondingly to bed the second night, after having ascertained that the wind was unfavourable to the prosecution of my intended voyage. A loud knocking at my chamber door awakened me from a profound sleep, about an hour before dawn. I was on the point of demanding who occasioned the disturbance, when a voice called out, "The schooner is ready to sail They are heaving up the anchor-Captain Burder sent me to warn you to come on board without a moments delay." I started from bed, and having dressed myself as quickly as possible, accompanied the messenger to the wharf, and embarked in a boat which waited there for us, and soon reached the schooner. Her captain was so busily engaged in giving orders to the seamen, that he seemed scarcely to notice my arrival. However, I addressed him, and made some remark about the suddenness of his departure. "That doesn't concern you," replied he abruptly, "I suppose your berth is ready below." But instead of taking his hint, and going down to the cabbin, I remained upon deck until

we cleared the mouth of the harbour, which we at last accomplished with much difficulty, for the wind was as directly ahead as it could blow. I felt at a loss to conceive the cause of our putting to sea in such unfavourable weather; but judged, from the specimen of the captain's manner which I had already had, that it would be useless to address to him any inquiries upon the subject. I therefore went to bed, and did not get up next morning till called to breakfast. On entering the cabbin, I was astonished to find a lady and a gentleman there, whom I had not previously known to be on board. They were introduced to me as fellow-passengers; and after expressing my gratification at the prospect of enjoying their society during the voyage, I began to converse with them, and soon found that their presence would in a great measure counterbalance the disagreeables arising from captain Burder's surly and untractable temper. They were named Mr. and Mrs. Monti, and were both young, and had recently been married. She was a pretty, lively, interesting creature; and having fortunately been at sea before, she did not suffer from sickness, or feel at all incommoded or depressed by the comparative uncomfortableness of her situation; and therefore the sociality of our little circle was never interrupted by her absence, or her incapacity to join it. But the charm of her manners seemed to exert no influence upon the stubborn nature of captain Burder, who always maintained a cold reserve, and rarely took any part in our conversation. His appearance and deportment were singularly unprepossessing. A short muscular figure, a stern countenance, burnt almost to a copper-colour by an exposure to tropical climates, black bushy hair, and small scintillating eyes, formed the exterior of our commander; and his actions and external behaviour proved that the traits of his mind were as revolting as those of his person. He treated his crew in a capricious and tyrannical manner; but at the same time, behaved towards them with an air of familiarity very unusual for shipmasters to assume when among common seamen. But a negro man, who attended the cabin, daily experienced the most inhuman usage from his hands, and afforded such a spectacle of degradation and misery as was painful to look upon. Almost every night after dark captain Burder had a long conversation with his mate, during which both seemed particularly anxious to avoid being overheard, and I once or twice observed them studying charts of parts of the ocean that lay quite out of our due and proper course. Their whole conduct was equally suspicious and inexplicable, and I often felt uneasy and apprehensive, though there wss no defined evil to fear, nor any danger to anticipate. Our personal comfort was but little attended to on board the schooner; and our table, which had never been a well furnished one, soon became so mean and uninviting, that Mr. Monti complained to captain Burder about it; however, without avail, for

the latter told him that he must just take things as he found them. On comparing the quantity of stores we had respectively brought on board, we thought we could manage to live independent of our commander, and Mrs. Monti's woman servant was, therefore, desired to prepare our meals, and spread a table for us every day. Captain Burder grew furious with passion when he learned this arrangement, and muttered some threats which we did not understand. However, next day, his rage against us was farther increased, in consequence of Mr. Monti having taxed him with cruelty and injustice while in the act of beating the negro man already mentioned. This offence was not to be forgiven, and he accordingly broke off all intercourse with the individuals of our party. Delightful weather attended us during the first week of the voyage, and we usually spent the evenings upon deck, under an awning. While thus seated, one calm and beautiful moonlight night, Mrs. Monti said, "if the weather and ocean were ever in this placid state, I believe I would prefer a sea-life to any other. The most susceptible mind could not discover any cause for terror or anxiety in the scene around us-I would rather meet a speedy death among those little billows than linger life away upon a sick bed, racked with pain, and surrounded with weeping friends."-"I have less objection, Harriet," said her husband, " to your mode of dying than to your mode of living. I should not care to spend much time at sea, for I am sure it would pass very heavily. I love variety, and nothing of that is to be met with on board a ship."-"I agree with you," said Mrs. Monti; " but variety is not necessary to happiness-a regular, well-planned, uninterrupted routine, would suit my disposition exactly, and would be more easily attainable at sea than any where else. A life of change entails many miseries. It makes us the slaves of accidents of every kind, and when we are happy, we never can feel secure that our happiness will continue. Now, were I mistress of a large ship, and had the power of sailing continually upon a calm and safe ocean, I would collect my dearest friends on board of her, and get out of sight of land as fast as possible, carrying with me of course various means of amusement and recreation. We would regulate our time and our pleasures as we chose no disagreeable person could intrude on us-no spectacles of misery would meet our eyes, and no lamentations assail our ears; and we would enjoy each other's society without the fear of ever being separated or disunited except by death; and when any one was removed, the remaining persons would console themselves with the reflection, that a link had been withdrawn from the chain which bound their hearts to this delusive and transitory world; and that, in proportion as their friends dropped away, they would feel more ready and willing to die than they had done while the former were in existence."

This seems a very plausible scheme of yours my love;” replied