325

Repeal of the Union—

{Nov. 9}

Personalities.

326 william's estate, under notice to quit on the language would permit him to use. There 1st of May. [Cries of "No, no."] He never was anything asserted—he would said that a farm of 800 acres was to go not say by the hon. Gentleman, but-by into lease on the 1st of May next: there the lowest person in the most degraded were sixty families upon it, consisting of rank of society, more groundless and unabout 300 persons; these had all got true. His constituents were nine-tenths notice to quit, as Mr. Challoner had dis- of them equal to the ex-member for posed of the farm to a person of the name Londonderry in rank, and all vastly of Singe. He had now disposed of 300 superior to him in intellect. He would persons out of the 800. He had got de- not demean himself by entering into a tails from two clergymen as to the remain-comparison of his own merits with those ing cases, into which he should not enter of the ex-member for Londonderry. He at present. He begged leave also to re- (Mr. O'Connell) had had the honour of mind the House, that he was not imputing receiving an offer to return him to Parliablame to Earl Fitzwilliam or his agent, when ment from three counties in Ireland-an he mentioned these cases, [Cries of "oh!"] offer made, too, by persons who could but was speaking of the consequences of the have performed it, as they proved by Subletting Act. Did hon. Gentlemen think returning Members who had pledged themto put him down by assailing him with selves to act upon his principles. He (Mr. broad and unmannerly contradictions? If O'Connell) had given up the representathey did, they were utterly mistaken in tion of a fourth county; and a fifth county, their man. The sitting member for Lon- as they all knew, had sent him to Parliadonderry had told the House, that his con- ment. No man in the House could pair with stituents were almost to a man opposed to him in that respect, certainly not the exthe repeal of the Union. He (Mr. O'Con- member for Londonderry, for he had been nell) had never said, that that question was turned out of his county. The ex-member popular in the north of Ireland. He knew, for Londonderry had taunted him with however, that the people of three provinces representing an Irish mob, but the ex-memhad declared themselves decidedly in its ber himself represented nothing Irish; favour. He knew also that it was gaining and he (Mr. O'Connell) was glad of it. ground in the north of Ireland, for a news- He (Mr. O'Connell) could have come in paper at Newry, which had originally been for five counties. The ex-member for opposed to the repeal of the Union, had Londonderry was turned out of his own recently changed its opinions, in deference county; he tried to take refuge in another to the popular sentiments prevailing in and failed-tried again at Merchants'-hall, the neighbourhood. He was not ac- failed there too-and then left his country, quainted with the hon. Member's con- and took refuge in an English rotten stituents, but he understood that they borough. And yet that man-that clerk were a pugnacious race, who built in a public office, with an extravagantly large salary for doing nothing-came forward to calumniate him-him, disinterestedly and independently chosen by the people of Waterford; for who could expect to receive favours or patronage at his hand? The freeholders of Waterford selected him because they knew that he was an object of hostility to all who enter

-Their faith upon

The holy text of pike and gun." He understood, that after some Roman Catholics had surrendered to them, and given up their arms on the express condition that their lives should be saved, they had done what? given the Catholics protection? No; they had done this [The hon. Member drew his hand sig-tained views hostile to Ireland; because nificantly across his throat]. But he would not pursue that feud further; he wished it to be forgotten. He had heard four or five Gentlemen speak that evening in defence of the Union; but, strange to say, not one of them had pointed out a single good which it had done. The exmember for Londonderry had called the electors of Waterford a mob. He denied the truth of that assertion in the strongest terms that the decorum of parliamentary

they knew that he was marked out for the rancour of every little mean and contemptible mind. He would take care not to disgrace their choice. He would never tire in doing his duty to his country. Ireland deserved well of all her sons. The curse had been on her long. In the words of the Chief Justice of the Irish Common Pleas, he would say that Ireland had never wrung any boon from the grasp of England, which England had not parted with as re

luctantly as if it had been her heart's blood. He would imitate the glorious example of the Brownlow of 1782-of that man, on whose tomb was inscribed the proud epitaph, that he had found his country enslaved, and had left her free, of that man, whose name could not receive greater lustre, unless the Brownlow of 1830 should join with him and procure the repeal of the Union. He had that evening been assailed by language that was as low, mean, and creeping, as the source from which it came. He hailed it as his richest reward-as his highest encomium. "Ye placeholders, who revel on the hard earnings of the people," said Mr. O'Connell, addressing the Ministerial benches; "ye pensioners, who subsist on the public money; ye tax-consumers and tax-devourers, assault me as you please. I am not to be intimidated by you. I shall continue to stand by Ireland; for I represent her wants, her wishes, and her grievances." The hon. Member concluded by expressing his hopes that, as he was born in an independent country, he should not die, until he had left her in possession of an independent Legislature.

Lord Althorp said, that the hon. and learned member for Waterford had made a statement regarding the conduct of Earl Fitzwilliam, which rendered it necessary for him to say a few words in contradiction of it. In order to give full effect to that contradiction, he felt himself called upon to lay certain details before the House, not merely by the respect which every man of proper feeling must entertain for so venerable a character as ! Earl Fitzwilliam, but also by the special request of his noble friend, Lord Milton, who was prevented by a severe domestic calamity from attending in his place. He would state to the House all that Earl Fitzwilliam and Lord Milton knew and believed upon the subject, derived as their knowledge and belief were from agents whom they had sent to acquire information concerning it. That information enabled him to contradict the hon. and learned Member's assertion, that 800 persons had been ejected from Earl Fitzwilliam's estate, as completely as Mr. Challoner had already contradicted his assertion about 800 families. [Immense cheering followed this declaration). His noble friend, Lord Milton, had sent him up word that he had received information from his father's agent, Mr. Challoner,

that there were only four families under notice to quit upon the whole of Earl Fitzwilliam's estates in Ireland. Three of them held about thirty acres together in common-in conacre, he believed, was the phrase in Ireland. The other man's family was in a different township from that mentioned by the hon. and learned member for Waterford. They were not under notice to quit owing to any wish on the part of Earl Fitzwilliam to enforce severely the provisions of the Subletting Act, but because they had lately been much in arrear for rent, some of them owing as much as four years' rent. Such were the results of an inquiry which Earl Fitzwilliam and Lord Milton had expressly ordered to be made in Ireland, in consequence of the unqualified assertions of the hon. and learned member for Waterford. He had received this information from his noble friend, Lord Milton, on Saturday last. He knew that Mr. Challoner was at present with his Lordship, and every man who knew anything of that Gentleman's character, must be convinced that he would have corrected any errors, had there been any errors to correct, in the information his noble friend had derived from the agents he had purposely sent to Ireland. In conclusion he observed, that he had no doubt that, if the hon. and learned member for Waterford would make further inquiries into this matter, he would find that he had been misinformed as to the circumstance of 800 persons having been ejected from the estates of Earl Fitzwilliam.

Mr. O'Connell said, that the documents with which he had been furnished, made a very different impression upon his mind from that which had been made upon the mind of the noble Lord by the information furnished to him by Earl Fitzwilliam. He could not lay the documents which had been sent to him on the Table of the House; but he was ready to submit them at any moment to the inspection of the noble Lord. In conclusion, he repeated, that he had not, when he mentioned the fact, made any imputation against either Earl Fitzwilliam, Lord Milton, or their agent, Mr. Challoner.

Mr. G. Dawson said, that he did not intend to indulge the House, upon this occasion, by entering upon that kind of personal altercation which the hon. and learned member for Waterford had introduced into this discussion. Whatever

Mr. Grattan was understood to bear his testimony to the kind and paternal feelings of Earl Fitzwilliam to his tenantry in Ireland, and to the exemplary manner in which Mr. Challoner, as his Lordship's agent, watched over and promoted their local interests. He believed that, in consequence of a provision in the Subletting Act,-which he should be most glad to see entirely repealed,-it was necessary to give notices to quit to all persons on a farm, when a new lease of it was granted. Thus it might happen that notices to quit might be served on many families residing on Mr. Singe's farm, whom there was no intention of removing from their tenements. He had passed some days at that gentleman's house, and he must say that he never saw a more happy and contented peasantry than the 300 persons who were said to have been ejected from his farm.

that hon. and learned Gentleman might | allowed his mind to receive any prejudice please to say regarding the public cha- against the Union. racter and public services of so humble an individual as himself, he was at full liberty to say it, both in that House and elsewhere, and he certainly should never complain of his observations. "I therefore did not hear with any indignation (said the hon. Member) the observations which he made on my being a clerk in a public office, with a large salary, because I knew, that to be the object of such observations is the fate of every man who holds public office, and because I feel that it is language which he is liable to hear at any time from a man of vulgar mind and mean ideas. But when the hon. and learned Member indulges in aspersions on my private character-when he states as a reflection upon me that I am no longer the Representative of Derry, though he knows that I lost my seat for conscientiously supporting his claims as a Roman Catholic to emancipation, and for assisting to give Sir H. Hardinge said, that he, too, had him privileges which he now uses to pro- been desired to offer a few words to the mote agitation in Ireland-when he pre-House in contradiction of another statesumes (and I use that word advisedly) to touch upon my private conduct, I have a right to say thus much at least to him, that I have had the misfortune in my time to receive his praises and encomiums, and that I have now, thank God, the good fortune to be made the object of his calumnies and his slanders. He knows well that he dared not have uttered a tenth part of the calumnious falsehoods which he has vomited against me, if he had not determined to cover himself with the mantle of a most disgraceful indemnity. [Loud cheering, and cries of "Order," from the Chair]. Well, I will pursue that subject no further. I will only say, that I despise anything that the hon. and learned Member can say of me as much as it is possible for one man to despise the opinion of another." Before sitting down, he wished to notice one of the observations which had fallen from the hon. member for Limerick, respecting the number of Englishmen holding situations in the Taxoffice in Ireland. If that complaint were made in Ireland, he could assure the hon. Gentleman that a very different complaint was made in England, and that was, that in the Customs and Excise too many situations were given away to Irishmen. He hoped that the hon. member for Limerick would weigh one of these complaints against the other, before he

ment of the hon. and learned member for Waterford. Archdeacon Trench had commissioned him to inform the House, that the hon. and learned Member had been guilty of a most gross exaggeration when he stated that Lord Rathdrum had served notices to quit upon 400 or 500 individuals on his estates. Instead of 400 or 500 notices, he had only served four, or at most five, notices upon his tenants; and during the last three years only ten persons had been discharged from his property.

Mr. O'Connell said, that with regard to Lord Rathdrum, he had never mentioned the number of notices which he had served upon his tenantry. He had not specified any number. He was informed, however, that those persons were ejected because they were not of the same religious persuasion with their landlord.

Sir H. Hardinge:-Archdeacon Trench has authorised me to contradict that statement likewise.

Mr. O'Connell:-It can, however, be proved.

SLAVE EVIDENCE.] Mr. Brougham rose to complain of the extraordinary waste of time which had been consumed in these irrelevant discussions. He was sorry to say that, during the present Session, he had heard language used every day in that House which he was sure would not be tolerated in any other house in the

metropolis. He seldom came into the House without hearing the lie bandied, more or less directly, from one side of it to the other. Now if it were of importance for them to preserve the dignity of their proceedings, they ought to put a stop to such conduct. Conceiving the present discussion to be closed, he would now take the liberty of asking the hon. Secretary for the Colonies whether he would have any objection to postpone the introduction of his bill, to render slave evidence admissible in the colonies until after he (Mr. Brougham) had brought forward his Motion on WestIndia slavery?

Mr. O'Connel rose to reply-but the Speaker decided that he had no right to reply.

Mr. O'Connell said, that he would speak, then, in explanation.

The Speaker:-The hon. Member will be good enough to confine himself strictly to explanation.

Mr. O'Connell :-All he had to say was this,--namely, that the personalities had been commenced against him, and not by him. He appealed to those around him if this were not the fact.

leave Ireland out of the bill?" To this observation and to this question from the hon. and learned Member, he (Mr. Littleton) carelessly replied, but in words which he perfectly recollected, "Well, I do not care about Ireland." By this expression he meant, as he was sure every Gentleman he was addressing must see, that be did not think it essential that Ireland should be included in the measure, and that he was, therefore, willing to accede to the request of the hon. and learned Member. It appeared almost impossible that any one could have misconstrued his meaning. The hon. and learned Member, however, received his observations with a smile, which excited in his mind, and in the minds of many of his hon. friends who were then sitting around him, a suspicion that his words would be misrepresented. He was particularly careful, therefore, on that very evening, to explain to the hon. and learned Member what he had meant by the expression which he had thus carelessly used. Thus, he had supposed that all misconstruction of his meaning, and that the misrepresentation he had suspected, would have been avoided. But let the House see how he had been treated in this matter by the hon. and learned Member. At a parish meeting in Dublin, the proceedings of which were reported in the Dublin Evening Post of the 23rd of OctoSYSTEM-MISREPRESENTA- ber, the hon. and learned Member, after TION.] Mr. Littleton rose, for the pur-speaking of the manner in which English pose of presenting a Petition against the Members performed their duty with reTruck-system. He trusted that the House gard to Ireland, said, "One of them, Mr. would allow him to take this opportunity Littleton, the member for Staffordshire, of noticing a passage in a speech which brought in a bill respecting the truck-syshad been made at a parish meeting in Ire-tem" the hon. and learned Member land, by the hon. and learned member for then made some observations respecting Waterford. He need hardly say that this that system, which it was unnecessary that passage contained a reflection on himself; he (Mr. Littleton) should trouble the and, although he did not think that any House with reading, and the hon. and disapprobation, coming from the hon. and learned Member continued thus:-" learned member for Waterford, was likely expostulated with him on the subject, and to injure his character, yet, as a public told him that I would not stand between man, he felt it necessary to notice it, and the operatives of England and their emto expose the misrepresentation. On one ployers; but I requested that Ireland evening towards the close of the last Ses- might not be included in the bill, for that, sion of Parliament, when a bill which he in Ireland, the evils complained of in had introduced respecting the truck-system England had not been experienced from stood for committee, the hon. and learned the system. What reply did he make me? Member came across the House to him It was this What do I care about Ireand said, "Your bill stands for to-night; land? Good Gentleman, said I, I shall I shall vote against it, because it is against take care to tell the people of Ireland how uy principles; but I should not have little English Members care about Ireland." spoken against it if you had not included Now was this consistent with fair dealing? Ireland in it: have you any objection to Was it necessary that he, after eighteen

Sir G. Murray (in reply to Mr. Brougham) consented to postpone his Motion, of which he had given notice, with regard to slave-evidence in the colonies.

TRUCK

years' service in Parliament,-after having | land with contempt; and he was very been the first to introduce into that House sorry if he had misunderstood the hon. a measure with regard to the elective Member. franchise of the Catholics, after having, upon every occasion, though at much risk PUBLIC RELIEF FOR THE POOR.] Mr. and inconvenience, done all he could to Portman begged to ask a question of the advance the interests of the Catholics, right hon. Secretary opposite, which appearwas it necessary that he, after such con- ed to him to be very material in the present duct, and after the manner in which he state of the realm. It was well known had always carried himself upon questions that this metropolis, and a portion of the relating to Ireland,-was it necessary, he country, were in a state of great exciteasked, that he should rise up in that ment. Many attempts had been made in House and vindicate himself against the that House to ameliorate the condition of charge of caring nothing about Ireland, the poor, and, under existing circumof being altogether insensible to the inter- stances, he could refrain no longer from ests of the Irish people? He did not asking his Majesty's Ministers whether believe that any hon. Member, with the they had any measures to propose, and at single exception of the hon. and learned what time they meant to propose them, member for Waterford, and even of that with the view of relieving the extreme hon. Member he would not have believed pressure of the lower, and also of the midit unless he had seen it in print, could have dling classes, who, in consequence of that given utterance to a charge so unjust, so pressure, were unable to employ as many utterly unfounded, and so injurious to his of the labouring poor as they wished to character. He begged pardon for having employ. If Ministers had no such meatrespassed thus long, he hoped not un-sures in contemplation, then individuals, necessarily, upon the attention of the House.

--

Mr. O'Connell said, that he had been a good deal astonished at the warmth of the hon. Member; for, as it appeared to him, by the hon. Member's own showing, he had merely repeated the expression which the hon. Member acknowledged he had used ["No, no".] Was he, then, still labouring under some extraordinary misconception? The hon Member's expression to him was, "What do I care about Ireland" ["No, no"]. Well, then, would the hon. Member be good enough to state once more what the expression was which he had used upon the occasion referred to? Mr. Littleton said, that the expression he had used was, "Well, I do not care about Ireland;" and he had already explained, he hoped satisfactorily to the House, the manner in which he had used it.

Mr. O'Connell said, was this, then, the distinction intended to be drawn,-the distinction between the expression" What do I care about Ireland ?" and the expression, "I do not care about Ireland." The words of the hon. Member were still ringing in his ears. By those words the hon. Member appeared to him to throw off Ireland altogether, his mind being entirely taken up with his English constituents. He thought that the hon. Member, in using those words, meant to cast off Ire

however humble, must call upon Parliament to assist them, and to support them in their endeavours to effect this object.

Sir R. Peel said, he must protest against this course of asking, day after day, questions with regard to the measures contemplated by the Government. It must be evident to every hon. Member, that scarcely any measure could be proposed which would not, directly or indirectly, affect the condition of the labouring poor. Was it possible, then, that he could enter into the details which an answer to the question of the hon. Member must necessarily lead him into. The hon. Member had mentioned the metropolis; did the hon. Member mean to inquire whether the Ministers had in contemplation any partial measure; or, did the hon Member. refer to general measures?

Mr. Portman:-To general measures. Sir R. Peel said, that an answer to such a question would include details which the House, he was sure, would not expect him to be prepared to enter into. He was ready to give a specific answer to any specific question; but, with all the respect he entertained for the hon. Member, he must refuse to attempt to satisfy the hon. Member on a subject so general as that to which the hon. Member's question referred.

Lord Althorp said, that the right hon. Gentleman seemed to have misunderstood