*

impunity, greatly inflamed the irritation of the opposite party, which throughout the nation was by far the more numerous. I forbear to retail the particular outrages, lest malice should misrepresent their statement, as a justification of rebellion. In the autumn of this year government greatly encouraged the formation of different armed corps, particularly of yeomanry, in imitation of those in England The dread of a French invasion was the ostensible reason for embodying these corps. Nothing however gave more sanction and favour to them with the public, than the formation of the lawyer's corps. A general meeting of the bar was holden on the 14th of September, 1796, at which it was resolved, that they held it expedient, with the permission of government, to form an armed association for the defence of the kingdom. Great exertions were at this time made to fester the soreness of the Catholics, and to inflame the differences between the Protestants and them. Complaints were

These corps, which afterwards proved highly serviceable to the state, were at first strongly disrelished and opposed by numbers: all those of course were against them, who entertained any real evil designs against the govern ment: those who had bona fide united for the purposes of attaining reform and emancipation conceived, that they were to be dragooned out of their purposes: and the Catholics not being generally admitted into these corps, resented their invention as an invidious distinction, tending to question their loyalty and sincerity in their country's cause. They accordingly waited on Mr. Pelham for leave to raise a Catholic corps, but were told, that if they chose they might join the corps then raising by their Protestant fellow subjects. Some few in fact did; but the shyness and reluctance, with which Catholics were. admitted into the Protestant corps of yeomanry, kept most from joining them. Certain it is also, that the anti-ministerial party discouraged them at the time, as appears from party publications of those days. One of them spoke thus: "The manner in which administration are about to prepare a force in this kingdom is exceeding suspicious. Were the liberties of the nation to be destroyed, its independence, or imperial existence to be voted away, the plan to be acted upon could be no other than that which developes itself."In the metropolis the canaille de la cour only are to be armed; we are to "have armed pensioners, armed excisemen, armed revenue officers, from "the commissioner to the gauger; armed contractors, armed clerks from all "the public offices: every person in the court, about the court, or deriving "from the court, is to be armed. In the country our little great men, known "at court, and none others, are to be armed; their parasites and retainers are to be armed, their domestics are to be armed, their devoted tenants are "to be armed, and this pye-bald mass of incongruous particles, this disjoint"ed pce of patchwork, a just emblem of folly, weakness, and ridicule, is "to be called yeomanry.

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"See, then, in what situation we will eventually find ourselves. All the "partizans of corrupt influence, all those whose interest it is to continue and "multiply the abuses of our political system, will have arms in their hands. "All those who rely upon their own independent properties, or upon their " own industry, the people whom it has become of late the fashion to asperse, "will be naked. Thus naked, the people will stand, like a fool in the mid"dle, surrounded by a treble army, an army of placemen and pensioners, a "mercenary standing army, and an army of militia, officered by the court."

made in the popular prints* of those in the pay of government for their open endeavours to blow up these nearly smothered embers into a fresh flame of rancour, animosity and perpetual discord. The unchecked and unpunished persecutions of the Catholics in the county of Armagh, was the never-ceasing theme of popular declamation: ministers both in and out of parliament rebutted the charge of connivance, approbation and encouragement, by flat and solemn denials. It was objected to the administration, that whilst they proclaimed the houghing of a bullock in the south, they smothered in silence the murder and proscription of hundreds of human beings in the north: that they were vigilant to make every forcible possession out of the county of Armagh the subject of a proclamation, whilst within that county they winked at the perpetration of the most atrocious crimes. The popular party, which sought nothing so eagerly as to disgust and inflame

The Dublin Evening Post of the 24th of September, 1796, contained the following observations, which I copy, not to prove the truth or justness, but to shew the state and disposition of the public mind at that period. The "most severe stroke made against the character and conduct of the viceroy, "as a moral man and first magistrate of a free people, who ought not to hold "the sword in vain,' nor to exercise it partially, has been in Faulkner's jour "nal of this day. That hireling print is undeniably in the pay of his lordship's "administration; and what administration permits, it is supposed to prompt "or patronize. In that print, the blind fury of the banditti, which usurps " and disgraces the name of Orange in the north, is applauded, and all their "bloody excesses justified. Murder in all its horrid forms, assassinations in "cold blood, the mutilation of members without respect to age or sex, the ❝ firing of whole hamlets, so that when the inhabitants have been looked after "nothing but their ashes were to be found; the atrocious excursions of furi“ous hordes, armed with sword, fire, and faggot, to exterminate a people, "for presuming to obey the divine command, written by the finger of God "himself, Honour thy father and thy mother,' and walking in the religion "which seemed good in their eyes. These are the flagitious enormities, "which attract the mercenary applause of Faulkner's journal, the literary "prop of the Camden administration; these are favourite themes, upon, "which it dilates with the copiousness of a full heart.....O shame! where is "thy blush?

"The same print, by insinuation, would visit the disturbances, which have "taken place in Louth, Meath, Monaghan, Cavan, Westmeath, Roscom"mon, Longford, Leitrim, Sligo, Limerick, Wexford, and Dublin, upon "the magistrates of those counties. The suppression of nocturnal insur"rections in these districts is a full vindication of these magistrates. The "violence of the other insurrection, and the impunity with which it rages in "the north, leave the magistrates in that quarter without excuse. Recent "decisions in our courts prove, that they deserve punishment, and are them"selves accomplices in the crimes, which it is their duty as magistrates, as "men, and as Christians, to prevent. It is silly and impudent to say, that "Defenders have advocates in this paper. Every rational man must abhor the "practices of those unfortunate misguided people. But there are shades in "guilt; and guilt of a deeper and fouler stain, baseness more black and bloody "never appalled the eye of man, than that which stalks in the counties of "Armagh and Down, however it may be hailed as the good genius of the country, by that literar dæmon of the court Faulkner's Journal.”

the public mind against the castle, justified these charges by asserting, what was certainly true, though perhaps otherwise intended by government, that no statute, no proclamation, no resolutions of public bodies, had specified or punished the particular crimes of the Orangemen in Armagh, that no perpetrators of them had been punished, that not a single magistrate had been stricken off the commission, though many were generally believed to have connived at and encouraged those outrages: that several were rewarded by commands in the yeomanry corps, and otherwise favoured by government. Whatever the real conduct of government were with reference to the disturbances in Armagh, the partiality of that county for Mr. Pelham the secretary, and the then well known intention of returning that gentleman with Dr. Duigenan for the borough of Armagh in the ensuing parliament, coupled with other reports, riveted in the minds of the great mass of the people the firmest conviction, that the impunity of those fanatic exterminators of Armagh, found countenance and support from the seat of civil and ecclesiastical power. Already had the reports of a general election brought forth many candidates for the counties, and the few open boroughs that admitted of election, to address their constituents. A more unequivocal test of the prevailing principles in those particular districts cannot be resorted to, than the addresses, in which the candidates assume merit in the eyes of what they conceive and wish to be the majority. Thus the congenial opposition given by Mr. Pelham and Dr. Duigenan to the question of Catholic emancipation, recommended them to the borough of Armagh: thus a contrary spirit of equal toleration endeared colonel (now lord) Hutchinson to the city of Cork. The early meeting of the par

In his address to the electors of Cork on the 6th of October, 1796, amongst other matters, this gentleman, whose gallant conduct his sovereign has since rewarded with a peerage, thus accosted his constituents after the usual introductory compliments. "It would be ridiculous in me to make you a vain dis"play, and an idle pageantry of my loyalty, which no man has ever presumed "to doubt or deny. Brought up in the army almost from my infancy, and now "a general officer in the king's service, I must be loyal from duty, interest, "affection, habit, and feeling; it would be too late for me to desert that cause, "for which I have fought, and for which I am ready to die.

"I too love and revere our glorious constitution; I have studied and endea. "voured to comprehend its principles, and have yet to learn that they tend to "exclusion or intolerance. Sure I am, that the representation of all freehold "property is the basis upon which it is erected; and that every departure "from this its vital principle, is a violation of that constitution, which will "be most applauded by those who understand it best. To unite all sects in "one common comprehension, to consolidate the nation in order to give secu Irity to the people, strength to the empire, and dignity to the crown, has ever “been the first object of my political life. These were my sentiments open "and avowed long before I had the honour of representing you in parliament. "Your own experience has proved, that they were not founded in error; you "must have uniformly observed, that the prosperity of the country has increas

liament, the uncertainty of its duration, the importance of the expected debates, the progress of organization with the United Irishmen, their hopes of French succours, others dread of French invasion, the increased vigilance of government, and their new exertions to tranquillize Armagh, all tended in different ways to abate for the moment the heat of the public fever.

The parliament met on the 13th of October, 1796, when the lord lieutenant in his speech from the throne informed them, that his majesty had required their attendance thus early in parlia ment in consequence of the enemy's threatning a descent upon that kingdom and Great Britain: he appealed to and confided in the spirit, loyalty, and zeal of his faithful people of Ireland to repel such an attack: he apprised them of his majesty's intention to send a person to Paris to treat for a peace: informed them of the hostile disposition of Spain, and congratulated with them upon our successes in the West Indies, and the steady and dignified conduct of the emperor, and the intrepidity and spirit of the Austrian forces under the archduke Charles, which inspired a well grounded confidence of obtaining a peace. He trusted to the liberality of the commons for the supplies. He then adverted to the expediency of the vigorous measures of the last parliament, which appeared by the subsiding in great measure of those outrages, which they were intended to suppress. His excellency now for the first time took tender and oblique notice of the disturbances of Armagh. "I have however to lament, that in "one part of the country good order has not yet been entirely "restored; and that in other districts a treasonable system of "secret confederation, by the administering of illegal oaths, still “continues, although no means within the reach of government "have been left untried to counteract it."

†Mr. Grattan objected to the speech. It contained no reconciling matter, no expectation of commercial benefits, and did in a great measure bespeak a false confidence in our resources both in commerce and revenue.

He lamented extremely, that the outrages against the Catholics in the north had been so slightly dwelt on. He could not conceive that government, with all the powers it now possessed, should not have been able to quiet that part of Ireland; that he feared the mob had a confidence in the lenity of government, founded on the sympathy of religion between the castle and the Orange Boys, and that the latter had therefore, under the pre

"ed in direct proportion with the relaxation of the penal code; and you must "be convinced, that the circumstances of the times, and the situation of sur"rounding Europe, imperiously require the union of all the inhabitants of this "island." 17 Par. Deb. p. 3.

17 Journ. Com. p. 9.

sumption of connivance, continued to commit the most daring outrages. That to suppose that government was inadequate to suppress this insurrection, when it has shewn itself not adequate only, but unrestrained in putting an end to other insurrections, was to allow government more indulgence than it deserved. That he did not approve of that expression in the speech, which represented these raging atrocities in the north as a disturbance not entirely suppressed; such tenderness of language to such enormous practices against the poor and industrious, betrayed an indifference in the government to the protection of the lower or ders of his majesty's Roman Catholic subjects; that he was an enemy to equality of property, but a friend to equality of protection; and that in his opinion the best method of preventing equality of property was to afford equality of protection. Mr. Grattan then proceeded to consider the war in general: he represented in the highest glow of colouring the different situations of the several powers of Europe, and when he came to his own country, he exclaimed, "There was also Ireland; poor, plun"dered, ill used, insulted, and forgiving Ireland; and though "represented by the minions, easily raised and easily put down, 66 pouring into the fleets and armies until she was forced to leave "herself without a soldier, for her minister's ill fated, and wide "wasting West India expedition, where those ministers by their "plan and their delay supplied the place of plague, pestilence, "and famine: loans granted more in one year, than she granted to any one minister in the course of any former war. They "have had every thing from the two islands which an old country, that was relaxed, and a young one, that was ill adminis"tered, could afford: every thing in England but enthusiasm, "and in Ireland every thing but the good opinion of the people, "and all to send an ambassador to ask peace of the French republic." He concluded* a very long, eloquent, and severe

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17 Par. Deb. p. 13. The conclusion of his speech was to this effect. "Rely on it, ministers must reconcile: they must capitulate: it is not to them a new thing; they capitulate in 1793 to the Catholic claim. What measure "has been carried for this country but by their capitulation? The declaration "of rights, &c. &c. &c. nor can the English cabinet have any qualm on this "occasion: the English cabinet have been of late years in the course of capi"tulation: they capitulated to America: they now capitulate to the French "Republic and why not capitulate to Ireland? This country can only be "saved by her own force, and her own force can only be procured by adopting "the Catholics; and they can only be adopted by a total and entire change of "maxims, measures, and manners, accompanied with a free and full partici"pation of whatever privileges the constitution can boast, and what is infinitely "more essential, whatever privileges the constitution intended. This is the "force, the power, the charm, the staff of your saint, that will banish from your isle all noxious animals; the wand that opens the sea to the English, "and will wall it up against the French. Quick, very quick! you have not a "moment to lose; you have given your fellow subjects a share of your taxes.