Marquis of Rockingham, had the effect of procuring speedy success for the measure. The royal assent was given to it, and for a time all went on favourably for Ireland: but the death of the Marquis of Rockingham, the subsequent alteration of ministry, and above all the security afforded to England by the conclusion of a general peace, enabled our court to impose a limit on farther concessions. Inducements were offered to the volunteer-officers to accept commands in fencible regiments, and place themselves under the controul of government : but the accession of Roman Catholics supplying the chasms in the volunteer-ranks, recourse was had to a variety of other expedients, in order to restrain the farther progress of Irish ardour: In some instances, national pride was gratified: in a variety of others, either the pride, the ambition, or the avarice of individuals. Institutions, pregnant in several cases with much public benefit, and more or less calculated to extend the patronage of government, were successively devised or supported; and a spirit of industry and enterprise was liberally encouraged. The order of St. Patrick was instituted, in 1783, with much pomp and ceremony. The national bank of Ireland was opened, in the same year, with a capital of one million and a half. The general post-office was established in the following year. New places were created. The pension-list was swelled. Many were gratified by titles. The Duke of Rutland's conviviality and conciliatory manners were productive of no inconsi derable effect in diverting the higher orders from political speculations. Dublin was improved and embellished: several magnificent public structures being undertaken, or carried on with increased spirit. The custom-house, the building whereof was begun in 1781, and which was opened in 1791, had cost no less than 262,3811.19s. 71d. in 13 years ended in 1794. The fisheries were promoted by liberal aid and bounties. The premiums on fishing busses granted in 6 years, ended in 1786, amounted to 116,289l. 3s. 4d. Inland navigation, that eminently valuable national improvement, was prosecuted with unusual ardour and skill, private interests being prudently com. bined much more closely with public interest than before. The bounties on manufactures from the year 1783 to 1789 inclusive, amounted to 115,000l. The sums granted in aid of manufactures, charities, and public works, in four years ended in 1788, amounted to 290,0571., besides the annual grants to the trustees of the linen manufacture, which were greater than before, and to the Dublin society, &c. In three years, ended in 1786, there passed 185 acts; which was 4 more than had passed in 22 years ended in 1725. The money profusely granted, at this period, was certainly not then misapplied and jobbed away in so scandalous a manner as was the case about 1755, but there was, in most instances of expenditure, a shameful want of due economy in many, an evident want of honesty. Incapable persons appear to have been frequently employed, through the influence of those whom government felt a disposition to gratify. And the practices of defaulters and peculators seem to have Bb 2 been, been, for the most part, designedly overlooked. That Ireland is again suffered to be as notorious as ever for infamous and outrageous jobbing, the writer apprehends there would be found ample ground for believing, if the expenditure of public money, in every department were narrowly investigated.' Of the different acts passed in the Session of 1783-4, that which led to the most remarkable consequences was the grant of bounties on the exportation of corn from Ireland. The food of the common people consisting greatly in potatoes, and Ireland being so much indented by the sea as to possess almost unparalleled facilities for export, the operation of the act was speedy and extensive. The payment of 60,000l., a year to cornmerchants, in the shape of bounties, produced forthwith an annual export to the value of 400,000l., a sum which strikes the ima gination of many politicians, and among others of Mr. Newenham, as so much clear gain to Ireland. He has written an elaborate chapter in opposition to Dr. Smith's reasoning on the subject of bounties; and though we can by no mean concur in applauding the policy of this measure, we deem it intitled to serious attention, on account of the magnitude of its consequences. It has given a rapid extension to the tillage of Ireland, and has greatly enhanced the rate of labour as well as the rent of land. In adverting to Mr. Foster's habitual opposition to Catholic claims, Mr.Newenham declares (p. 238.) that Mr. F. could in no other way have served that body so effectually as by this act, of which, it seems, he was the author. The oppression of former ages, having driven the Catholics from the towns, made them bear an extraordináry proportion in the rural popu lation. Throughout many parishes, in the greatest tillage-counties of Ireland, scarcely a Protestant is to be found;, and although the augmentation of linen-exports has gone on during the last thirty years with great rapidity, the effect of extended agriculture in augmenting population leads to a conclusion, supported by other considerations, that the ratio of increase in that respect is greater on the side of the Catholics. [To be concluded in our next Number.] ART. III. Weber's Edition of Ford's Dramatic Works. THE [Article concluded from p. 254.] HE instances of obvious corrections which have been overlooked by Mr. Weber, and of passages most imperiously calling for revisal which he has left unquestioned, are too numerous to be pointed out in a Review. We shall remark only a few which we corrected for ourselves en passant. Lover's Lover's Melancholy-concluding couplet, Act the second, ! "Ameth: Sweet maid, forget me not! We now must part. Cleoph: Still you shall have my prayer. Ameth; Still you my truth." As every other Act concludes with a rhyme, it may very safely be asserted that truth should be heart. The Broken Heart, Act 4. sc. 3. "But must Calantha quail to that young Grape?" Mr. Weber, while he very kindly informs us, what every body knows, that to quail means to sink, to faint, &c. overlooks altogether the exquisite nonsense of the line in which this word occurs, and which, by the mere addition of a letter and a comma, becomes perfectly intelligible: "But must Calantha quail too, that young Grape ?" alluding to the Oracle by which Calantha is typified under the symbol of a grape. The Lady's Trial, Act 2. sc. I. "Fut; As soon as said; in all the clothes thou hast, More than that walking wardrobe on thy back." This nonsense is easily corrected by substituting is, for in, and a note of interrogation for the period. Is for are is a very common and probable inaccuracy. Same play, Act 5. sc. 1. "A soldier is in peace a mockery, a very town-bull for laughter; unthrifts, and landed babies, are prey-curmudgeons, lay their baits for." That is, says Mr. Weber, who lay their baits for them, (the soldiers.) This,' he adds, is the only sense I can extract from this passage, which is very inaccurately worded.' It is much more difficult, however, to extract sense from a commentator's brains than from such a passage as this, which requires nothing more than the simple process of a new punctuation to render it perfectly intelligible. soldier is in peace a mockery, a very town-bull for laughter. Unthrifts and landed babies are prey, curmudgeons lay their baits for:" that is, extravagant and foolish young people of property are the prey which avaricious usurers seek to ensnare. In the next scene, we have the following piece of nonsense, which requires nothing but the same operation to reduce it into order : "Sure state and ceremony ! In habit here like strangers, we shall wait, Bb3 for for which, read "Sure, state and ceremony Inhabit here like strangers. We shall wait (perhaps, waive) Formality of entertainment." Mr. Weber's illustrations, scanty as they are, have been almost entirely borrowed from the notes to the admirable Variorum Edition of Shakspeare. His own historical and antiquarian researches appear to have been nearly confined to that source; and it is not easy to conceive a more unfair as well as more unsatisfactory mode of editing an antient author; though it holds out one great recommendation to the editor; viz. that it is both cheap and easy. We should not have dwelt so long on Mr. Weber's incapacity for the office which he has assumed, if the mischief of it were likely to be confined to the present publication. In that case, our satisfaction in receiving, on any terms, an entire collection of the works of Ford would, to a certain extent, have overcome our inclination to chastise the ignorance and idleness of his editor; we should probably have contented ourselves with remarking that our obligation to Mr. Weber would have been considerably greater, had he confined himself to a simple republication of the originals, cleared only of such faults as were obvious and indisputable blunders of the printer; and we should have waited patiently till some abler editor should arise, to supply all that might be wanting in the way of explanation and liberal criticism. Mr. Weber, however, threatens a new edition of the works of Beaumont and Fletcher; which, if executed with any resemblance, in taste and spirit, to the present performance, will (we conceive) be so serious an injury to this branch of our national literature, that we should not perform our duty to the public without pointing out, as we have done, the reasons with which Mr. W. himself has now furnished us for intreating that he will lay aside the design. The text of Beaumont and Fletcher is already accessible to every body, in many different shapes and sizes. It may require even now considerable purgation: but Mr. W. is not the person best qualified to mend it, and in other respects he is still less capable of supplying the defects and follies of former editors. He may go on collecting Ballads and Romances as fast as he pleases; or if he be irresistibly impelled towards the antient Drama, there are still lying, neglected and forgotten, the works of Webster, Marston, Deckar, and many others of James's and Charles's days, of more or less merit, but all worthy of preservation; and though we had rather commit the task of reviving them to more skilful hands, yet, for the sake of having them before us in any convenient and readable shape, we would not discourage Mr. Weber from the labour of collecting them. We must, however, pray for a perpetual injunction from the court. of Parnassus to restrain him from interfering with the works of any antient author who has ever met with an editor, whether that editor be Steevens or Monck Mason. We have left ourselves much less space than we originally intended, for any observations on the author of these plays, and on the poetical merit of his works: but few readers will require any recommendation from us, to induce them to become acquainted with a poet who, in the young and vigorous age of the English drama, was deemed equal to any and superior to most of his contemporaries; and the beauties of whose compositions, wherever they occur, (and they are by no means rare,) can scarcely, even in these days of strict criticism, be estimated too highly, except when they meet with a panegyrist so indiscreet as to make a comparison between them and those of Shakspeare. Ford was born of respectable parents, and was baptized at Ilsington * in Devonshire, on the 17th of April 1586. In 1602, he *The following passage in Risdon's Survey of Devon has not been noticed by Mr. Weber: "The barton of Bagtor (in the parish of Ilsington) was anciently owned by Augerius: afterwards it became the inheritance of the name of Bere; at length, it was purchased by John Ford, who left it for a seat unto his posterity." p. 135. Edn. 1811. Risdon was contemporary with this dramatic author. The John Ford here mentioned was therefore in all probability one of his ancestors; and, when Risdon wrote, this seat of Bagtor still continued in his family. The editors of Risdon have given us no intimation of the subsequent changes in the possession of the estate. Prince, in his Worthies of Devon, throws somewhat more light on this subject. In his article of "Sir Henry Ford, knight, twice principal Secretary of State to King Charles II. in the kingdom of Ireland, he says that the family was of great antiquity in that county, and spread into several branches; and he supposes the subject of his memoir to have been " descended from a younger branch" of a family of this name seated at Moreton Hamstead from the time of Henry the Second," which (says he) sprang out of it many generations back, and settled first at Chagford, then at Ashburton, and then at Ilsington, all in this county." He then proceeds to give the pedigree of this branch, beginning from John Ford of Chagford, from whom another John Ford of Ashburton was fourth in descent. The John Ford last mentioned was four times married. By his third wife he had George Ford of Ilsington; and, by his fourth wife, a younger son named John. George Ford of Ilsington had issue Thomas and others; Thomas was the father of another John Ford of Bagtor; and the last mentioned John Ford, by marriage with the heiress of Drake of Spratshags, had issue Sir Henry, the subject of the article. Now, though it seems impossible to point out with exactness the situation Bb 4 of |