Was descended from a family which came over from Ayrshire, in Scotland, in the beginning of the seventeenth century, he was settled at Ross Bay, afterwards called Castle Caldwell, in Fermanagh. He was created a baronet, June 23, 1683. At the Revolution his services were of the highest importance, as appears by the following case enclosed in a petition to King William.

The State of the Case of Sir James Caldwell, Bart.

That he staid in Ireland in all the late troubles at and near Enniskillin, till the end of the year 1689, and raised and maintained a regiment of foot and two troops of horse, at his own charge, and kept the same at the great passes at Belleck and Donegal, between Conaught and the province of Ulster, which was of such consequence, that it hindered communication between the enemies in the said province of Conaught (which were very numerous) from joining or recruiting those besieging Londonderry. —

That the said Sir James Caldwell was besieged with a detached party from Colonel Sarsfield, of about the number of two thousand foot, and three troops of dragoons, about the 3rd of May, 1689, and was forced to send to Enniskillin, Castle Hume, and other neighbouring garrisons, for relief, which came on the Sth of May, and joined the forces, which Sir James Caldwell had, who then fought the enemy near Sir James’s house, and routed them, killing about a hundred and twenty, took seventy prisoners, two cannon, many small arms, and about forty horses, from the enemy,

{365}

That the said Sir James Caldwell also placed his son Hugh Caldwell in the garrison of Donegal, over three companies of foot, and a troop of horse, being the next garrison to Londonderry the protestants were possessed of, which was of such consequence, that if the enemy had been masters of it, the whole country about Enniskillin must have submitted to them.

That the said Hugh Caldwell had several offers of money and preferment from the Duke of Berwick to surrender the place, but always told him he would defend it to the last; as appears afterwards by the defence he made against the Duke, who attacked him with fifteen hundred men, burnt some part of the town, but was beaten off with considerable loss, which Colonel Luttrel can give an account of; as also of the said Sir James’s vigilant and faithful behaviour in the defence of that country,

That the said Sir James Caldwell went in an open boat from Donegal to Major-General Kirk by sea, forty leagues, on the most dangerous coast on that kingdom, not having any other way to have communication with him, to acquaint him with the condition of that country, to which he was then a stranger, and to get arms and ammunition from him, which were greatly wanting to arm the naked men in the country. Some time after, the said Sir James Caldwell was sent back with Colonel Wolsely, Colonel Tiffany, Colonel Wynne, and some ammunition, by the said major-general, who then gave the said Sir James a commission to be colonel of foot, and a troop of horse independent, as by the said commissions will appear; that within four or five days after they landed their men were forced to fight Lieutenant-General Macarty, and obtained a great victory against him, as has been heard.

That the said Sir James met Duke Schomberg when he landed at Carickfergus, and staid the siege of that place; and afterwards went to Dundalk with the Duke, and staid that campaign with him, till about a week before he decamped, which the now Duke Schomberg will certify.

That the said Sir James Caldwell expended in money, arms, provisions, and other necessaries, to support those troops, which were raised for the king’s service, and what he lost by the destruction of his town, houses, iron mills, stud of horses, and stock of black cattle, and other essential losses, amounted to about ten thousand pounds.

That the said Sir James’s second son also suffered very much, by cattle and provisions taken from him by our own army at Bally Shannon, for the maintenance of that garrison, without which they could not have sustained,

That the said James Caldwell had, after the campaign at Dundalk, a regiment of dragoons, and a regiment of foot quartered in his house and town of Belleek, which did him much damage, and destroyed many things, which he, with so much difficulty, saved from the enemy.

That also the said Sir James Caldwell’s daughter, Elizabeth, conveyed several quantities of powder from Dublin, by his commands, to Enniskillin, and other garrisons thereabout, to the hazard of her life, as may appear by my Lord Capel’s report, upon a reference to him.

The truth of the above statement was supported by {366} various documents from the lord-lieutenant and other officers of the king. His majesty, in recompence of his services, bestowed upon him in custodiam, for seven years, the whole of the forfeited Bagnal estate, then let for £8,000 per annum; at the end of which time it was to be restored to the Bagnal family, and Sir James was to be otherwise provided for. He died in 1717.

Who in the compass of a very short life, obtained more military glory than has fallen to the lot of most individuals who have embraced the profession of arms, was the third son of Sir John Caldwell, of Castle Caldwell, and great grandson of the subject of the preceding article. Possessed of all those warm and generous feelings so peculiar to the Irish, blended with a share of that uncalculating ardour of mind, more honourable than profitable, which has also been considered their characteristic, he rose deservedly and rapidly to high military honours.

He was born in the year 1735, and being intended for the university, was instructed in the Latin and Greek languages, under a private tutor, till he was about fourteen years of age, at which time he had made considerable progress in both.

His brother, Sir James, having distinguished himself in the army of the Empress Queen, to whose notice he had thus recommended himself, she made him an offer of taking one of his brothers into her service, which he accepted in favour of Hume, who was therefore placed in a French academy at Dublin, to learn the modern languages and mathematics. Here, being, though so young, troubled with some symptoms of the gout, he gave a specimen of that firmness and self-denial which were his characteristics, by abstaining, at the recommendation of his master, from animal food and fermented liquors, and during a year that he remained there, was never known to depart once from this rule. {367}

In the year 1750, on the conclusion of the peace, his brother quitted the imperial service, and returned to London, whither Hume repaired, and was furnished by him with letters of recommendation to Marshal Konigsegg, a letter of credit on Baron Aguilar for a £1,000 and £300 in money, with which, and a valet acquainted with the language, he set out on his journey to Vienna.

They were to go in the stage coach to Harwich, and the baggage having been sent to theinn the night before, they were to meet it the next morning. By some negligence or other, however, they did not arrive till the coach had been gone at least half anhour. The servant proposed taking post horses, but Hume refused, saying, he was resolved that no new expense should accrue from his want of diligence or punctuality, and insisted on their trying to overtake the coach on foot. They accordingly set out running until they were out of breath, and walking till they were able to run again; but with all their exertions they could not reach the coach till they came to the place where it stopped for the passengers to breakfast. They now calculated on a comfortable journey the rest of their way, but unfortunately, the places which had been taken for. them, were filled by two women. Hume's gallantry would not permit him to assert his right; he therefore complimented the females with the ss ah and went the rest of the journey with his attendant on the outside.

On his arrival at Vienna, he was received by Marshal Konigsegg and his lady, with marks of an almost parental affection, and they being persons of high distinction, he imagined that he also ought to support that character. For this purpose he took expensive lodgings, kept a chariot, a running footman, and a hussar, and was admitted into the highest circles; but at the close of about five weeks, finding his stock of cash much diminished, and having formed a resolution not to have recourse to the letter of credit which he possessed, he determined to repair immediately to the corps in which he was to serve; he {368} therefore expressed to the marshal a wish to obtain an audience of the Empress Queen. The marshal highly approved of this undertaking, and immediately procured him that honour, her majesty being always easy of ACCESS.

When introduced to her majesty, he expressed, in a very animated speech in the French language, his resolution to devote himself entirely and for ever to her service, and his determination either to rise to a distinguished command in her armies, or to die in the attempt.

The empress was so much pleased with this spirited, yet modest address, that she told him she did not at all doubt of his efforts in her service, and said some obliging things of the Irish; inquired very graciously after his brother, and concluded by saying, that she had recommended him to Marshal Konigsegg for preferment, who was himself very much inclined to serve him.

After quitting the empress, he repaired to the marshal, and begged to be sent to his regiment, where he said her would serve and improve himself in learning the language and his duty, till his excellency should think proper to honour him with a commission. The marshal gave him a letter of recommendation in the strongest terms to the colonel of the regiment who was then at the head-quarters, at Coningsgratz.

Hume immediately went to his lodgings, discharged his servants, and paid all his debts after which, to his surprise, he found he had but two gold ducats left. This was a blow that completely disconcerted all his measures, as it disabled him from appearing as a volunteer in the army, a station very incompatible with his present circumstances, as he continued firm in his resolution not to touch his letter of credit. Still, however, determined upon learning the language and military discipline of the country, without losing time in fruitless regret, he packed up his clothes and other ornaments, and deposited them all at iis banker’s except the worst suit, which he wore; even {369} this, however, was too good for his present purpose; he, therefore, exchanged it for worse with a Jew dealer in second-hand clothes.

He destroyed the marshal’s letter, which could now be of no service to him, and thus equipped, the companion of princes, the friend of Count Konigsegg, the possessor of a splendid hotel, and a gilt chariot, who had kept a hussar, and an opera girl, figured at court, and had an audience from the empress, and was possessed of a letter of credit for a £1,000 (animated by the same spirit which had, when he suffered the stage-coach to leave him behind, urged him rather to overtake it on foot than incur the expense of hiring horses by his delay) set out from Vienna alone, on foot, in a mean habit, and with an empty pocket, for that army, in which he was to rise by his merit, to a distinguished command. Having arrived at a village near Prague, where a party of Konigsegg’s regiment was quartered, he enlisted by a feigned name as a private soldier. In this humble station he made so great a progress in the language, and behaved with so much diligence, as to be particularly noticed by the lieutenant who commanded the party.

In about two months time, Konigsegg wrote to the colonel, inquiring after Hume Caldwell, and, at the same time, sent an ensign’s commission for him. The colonel, in great astonishment, wrote, in answer to the marshal, that he knew no such person, nor had he ever received any recommendation of him, neither had any such person joined the regiment. The marshal in his reply, expressed great regard for the young gentleman, and directed inquiry to be made after him. Inquiry was immediately made, but no tidings could be heard; at last, somebody informed the colonel, that there was an Irish soldier at certain quarters, who might possibly know something of him. He was immediately sent for, and the colonel, asking him if he knew of any such person, mentioning, at the same time, that there was a commission sent down for him, was surprised to hear him answer, that he was the man. {370}

The lieutenant under whom he had enlisted, having commended him in the highest terms, these circumstances were communicated by the colonel to the marshal, and by the latter to the empress, who soon after gave him a lieutenancy. He continued to apply himself very diligently to the study of his profession, but an accident happened to him which was near putting an end to his life and prospects at once. Reading one night in bed, he fell asleep, and the candle falling from his hand, set fire to the curtains; he was, however, fortunate enough to escape in time to save the house from destruction, but the greater part of the furniture in the room was consumed; on account of which the people of the house obtained the sequestration of half his pay, till the damage was made good. This involved him in great distress, but he acquiesced without complaint. The circumstance, however, soon became known, and coming to the knowledge of a large convent of Irish franciscans established at Prague, one of the fathers of which, happening to have known Sir John Caldwell, our young hero’s father, in Ireland, gave this account of him to the fraternity: “Sir John,” said he, “though a staunch protestant, always treated the Roman catholics with humanity and tenderness: in particular, one stormy day, when it rained very hard, he discovered a priest with his congregation, at mass under a hedge: and instead of taking that opportunity of blaming them for meeting so near his house, he ordered his cows to be driven out of a neighbouring cow-house, and signified to the priest and people that they might take shelter from the weather, and finish their devotion in peace. It ill becomes us, therefore, brethren,” said he, “to see the son of Sir John Caldwell distressed in a strange country, remote from all his friends, without affording him assistance.”

The fraternity, having heard this account, contrived, by mutual consent, to have the debt paid, unknown to young Caldwell, who, shortly afterwards, being advanced to a company, presented them with treble the sum, and returned his brother’s letter of credit. From this. time he was {371} actively engaged in the duties of his profession, in which he rose gradually but rapidly. Ele was of great service in cutting off. the convoys, and annoying the reinforcements which were sent to the assistance of the King of Prussia, during the siege of Olmutz, particularly in the defeat and destruction of the great convoy, the loss of which compelled Frederic to raise the siege. In this action he so highly distinguished himself, as to be made.a major on the field of battle, by General Laudohn; and in the course of the ensuing winter, he was created a knight of the military order.

In the campaign of 1760, he was appointed to the command of two battalions, four hundred croats, and two squadrons of hussars, which formed the advanced guard before the battle of Landshut, in which memorable battle he forced the enemy, sword in hand, from three formidable entrenchments, made himself master of the hill, and contributed much to the taking of General Fouquet, who commanded the Prussian army. All the other field-officers of his regiment being wounded in this action, he commanded it during the remainder of the campaign, and being sent to Glatz, contributed much to the taking of that important fortress. The army of General Laudohn being entirely routed by the King of Prussia at Lignitz, Caldwell, observing a favourable opportunity for the horse to charge, by a wonderful exertion. of spirit and presence of mind, gave the commanding officers orders in the general’s name to advance, and placing himself at their head, succeeded in putting a stop to the progress of the Prussians, by which means he secured the retreat of almost half of the ~ army, which was dispersed and in the utmost confusion. For this important service he was immediately advanced to the rank of lieutenant-colonel, and in the succeeding campaign always commanded the advanced or rear-guard of Laudohn’s army, when on a march.

At the storming of Schweidnitz, he acted as that general’s immediate instrument, being put at the head of a considerable corps; and the assault being entirely left to him, {372} which, although he had never before been in that fortress, he conducted with consummate skill, himself leading one of the most difficult and dangerous attacks. He succeeded at the first onset, and being the first field-officer that entered the town, was sent to Dresden and to Marshal Daun with an account of the success, and was immediately made a colonel. To follow him through all the battles and sieges in which he was engaged during these campaigns, would be giving a history of Laudohn’s army; suffice it to say, that he was in every action of consequence in which that army was engaged, and was honoured by so much of the general’s confidence as to be very frequently employed above his rank, in preference to many older officers.

He had received two severe wounds in cutting off the king of Prussia’s convoy at Olmutz, in consequence of which he had been left for dead, and a slight one at the escalade of Schweidnitz. In July 1762, a short time before the last siege of that fortress, he was ordered thither by Daun to assist in its defence. On the 8th of August the trenches were opened, and on’the 9th he commanded a well-conducted sally. On the 13th, at night, he conducted a second, in which he was struck by an iron cartridge ball, on the outside of the upper part of his left arm, which broke the articulation of his shoulder, and driving the limb with great foree against his side, caused a violent and extensive contusion, which was pronounced by the surgeon to be much more. dangerous than the fracture. He appeared so greatly better in the course of a few days, as to give hopes of his recovery, but on the 18th such an alteration for the worse had taken, place, as gave a certain presage of his death. About seven o’clock that evening he sent for a particular friend, Captain Sullivan, who commanded a company of grenadiers in Konigsegg’s regiment; but as he was upon duty, he could not leave his post till he was relieved, which was about nine. “As soon as he came into the room, the colonel said to him, “My dear Sullivan, as you have known me intimately several {373} years, you know that I hever feared the hour that is now come: I find so strange an alteration in myself since yesterday, and have sensations so different from all I ever felt before; that I think it impossible I should live through this night: the only favour 1 have to beg of you is, that you would*acquaint my mother and brothers that I die like an honest man, who Always had: his duty in view; tell them, that I always had my family and country at heart, and that it was the constant study of my life to do them honours As God is now calling me, from this world, I desire to be thankful to him for all his goodness to me in it, which has been very extraordinary, for all my undertakings have been crowned with success; I am still more thankful that I have now nothing to reproach myself with, and that I can die not only with resignation, but comfort.”

After this, Mr. Sullivan remained with him the whole night, he settled his affairs, told him what he owed, and what he possessed; a person was sent for to make his will, by which he directed his debts to be paid, and gave pecuniary rewards to all his servants, appointing Captain Sullivan his executor: the rest of the night he spent with a minister of the Lutheran; church, and in talking of his mother, his brothers, and family.

At eight Captain Sullivan left him, but returned again at ten, when he found him delirious. He staid till twelve, when the last agony coming on, he could no longer sustain the pain it gave him to be present at such a scene, and therefore retired About two o’clock in the afternoon of the 19th of August, 1762, the colonel died, in the twenty-seventh year of his age, and was buried the next day, in a kind of a chapel or grotto, in the Lutheran church-yard, which is reserved for persons of distinction.

Thus died in the post of honour, at the age of twenty-seven, Colonel Hume Caldwell, sincerely and deservedly lamented by the empress, the general, and the whole army. To what high rank and honours such-an ardent spirit and such high professional skill might have elevated him, had he lived, may be conjectured from this faint sketch of a {374} life, short but brilliant. Indeed, had he survived this fatal siege, he would have been immediately appointed a general, and also chamberlain to their imperial majesties, as appears by letters since received by his brother, Sir James. The regret felt by such a man as General Laudohn, for his death, is the best proof of his worth; we shall therefore conclude this article by the following translation of a letter from that general to Colonel Lockhart, on the subject.

“Notwithstanding the frequent sallies that have been made since the beginning of the siege, our loss has not been very considerable; the greatest that we have suffered is by the death of Colonel Chevalier de Caldwell, who, in one of the sallies, which was conducted by him, as well as many others, had the misfortune to be winded; of which he died in three days after.

“T have no occasion to represent to you the very great and just affliction I have suffered on account of his death. You know very well how much I[ honoured and esteemed that worthy officer, who, by his intrepidity and courage, which was so natural to him, as well as by his amiable qualities, had gained the friendship of all the generals of the army, as well as\the universal esteem of the public. His memory shall be for ever dear to me; indeed he is universally lamented.

“As I know the friendship which subsisted between you, I am persuaded this account will give you the greatest affliction. J entreat that you would acquaint his family, and in particular his brother the count, with this melancholy event; it gives me the greatest pain to. be obliged to acquaint them with it, and myself, on this occasion, am very much to be pitied.”

“Dated at Shiobe, the 27th of August, 1762.”

Great grandson of Sir James, and brother of Hume Caldwell, served as captain of the 36th regiment of foot, {375} with the rank of major in the army, under the command of the great General Wolfe. He distinguished himself both at the capture of Louisburg and of Quebec. He so far recommended himself to the favour and kindness of the general, that he made him live with him in his own family, and expressed his esteem and regard for him by leaving him a legacy in his will. After the conquest of Canada, he was made a privy counsellor of the province, and was appointed lieutenant-colonel-commandant of the British militia for the defence of Quebec, when it was invested by the Americans under General Montgomery. He distinguished himself, by his gallantry and skill, in defence of the fortress, on which account General Carleton sent him home with the important news of the entire defeat of the enemy, and the raising of the siege; on which, occasion he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant-colonel on the day of his arrival.

A LITERARY character, was the eldest son of Charles Caldwell, Esq. an eminent solicitor, and was born in Dublin, in the year 1732. He received part of his education © in one of the Scotch universities, from whence he removed to London, and after having resided for about five years in the Temple, returned to Dublin, where he was admitted to the bar in 1760. But his father being possessed of a good estate, fully adequate to his son’s wishes, he did not prosecute with “unremitting ardour” the dull and tedious study of the law, and for several years before his death, had quitted it altogether. His literary and studious disposition, conjoined with his taste for the fine arts, always occupied every leisure hour, as he patronised liberally all those who excelled in any of the various branches of art.

He had made architecture the chief objeet of his study, and about the year 1770, published anonymously, some very judicious. “Observations on the Public Buildings of Dublin,” and on some edifices which at that period were about to be erected in that city, at the expense of the state. The only other known production of his pen that has been published, is a very curious.” Account of the extraordinary Escape of James Stewart, Esq. (commonly called ATHENIAN Stewart) by being put to death by some Turks, in whose company he happened to be travelling;” the substance of which had been communicated to Mr. Caldwell by the late Dr. Percy, Bishop of Dromore, as related to his lordship by Stewart himself. . Of this narrative, of which only a. small number was printed at London in 1804, for the use of the author’s friends, it.is believed not more than a dozen copies were distributed in; this country.

Mr. Caldwell’s literary taste naturally led him to collect a large library, which contained many rare volumes, and was particularly rich in botany and natural history.

He died at the house of his nephew, Major-General {377} Cockburn, near Bray, in the county of Wicklow, on the 2nd of July, 1808, in the seventy-sixth year of his age, after an illness of nearly three months duration.

His manners were gentle and pleasing, and as his benevolence and other virtues caused him to be generally respected through life, so his urbanity, variety of knowledge, and cultivated taste, endeared him to the circle in which he moved.

ANDREW CANTWELL

LORD DORCHESTER was descended from an ancient family, which resided many years at Carleton, in Cumberland, from whence they removed to Ireland. He was the third son of Christopher Carleton, Esq. of Newry, in the county of Down, who died in Ireland about 1738, leaving a widow, who became the third wife of the Reverend Thomas Skelton, and died in 1757. Three brothers of this illustrious family lost their lives at the battle of Marston Moor, in the seventeenth century, having espoused the loyal cause.

Sir Guy, the subject of the present memoir, was born at Strabane, in the county of Tyrone, on the 3rd of September, 1724, and agreeable to the wishes of his parents, was early initiated into the rudiments of the military sciences, being {378} destined for the army, in which capacity it was augured, (from his great personal activity, and the early proofs he gave of courage) that he would make a conspicuous figure; and how well the event realised their most sanguine expectations, will speedily be seen.

While very young he entered into the guards, in which corps he continued until the year 1748, when he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant-colonel of the 72nd regiment, At this period, he had met with no opportunity of giving an example of his merit, but upon the breaking out of the seven years war, his abilities were put to an honourable test. In 1758 he embarked with General Amherst for the siege of Louisburg, and in this his first campaign, he gave such eminent proofs of his skill and bravery, as entitled him to the notice of the commander-in-chief. The following year he gave still greater proofs of his courage, and good conduct, at the siege of Quebec, under the immortal General Wolfe. He rendered the cause some effectual services during this siege, and his abilities were now so conspicuous, that he was entrusted with the achievement of a post on the western point of the Isle de Orleans, in which he was eminently successful. He now began to be considered as an able officer, and was shortly after dispatched to dislodge the French from Point-au-Trompe, a distance of twenty miles from Quebec, where the enemy were strongly entrenched; in this expedition he also succeeded, and forced the enemy to make a precipitate retreat. He took a considerable. part in this difficult and important siege, and at the celebrated battle fought in the heights of Abraham, when the gallant Wolfe fell in the moment of victory, Carleton displayed a wonderful activity, prudence, and presence of mind in every part, of. the arduous duty with which he was entrusted. The next opportunity he had for displaying his valour, was at the siege of Belleisle, where he commanded as brigadier-general, with which rank he had been invested on the spot, and it was on this occasion he received his first wound, haying exposed himself to great personal danger during the whole {379} siege. In February 1762, he was promoted to the rank of colonel, in which capacity he embarked with the Earl of Albemarle for the siege of the Havannah, where: he was likewise distinguished for his bravery, and. was dared in investing the Mora Castle.

Soon after the termination of this campaign, a peace for some time interrupted the military achievements of our colonel. He was not, however, altogether idle; for when General Murray was recalled from Quebec, he was appointed lieutenant-governor of that important place, and at length promoted to the government thereof. In this station he continued some years, and gave entire satisfaction, both to the power who appointed him, and to the provincials over whom he presided. In April. 1772, he was promoted to the rank of major-general, and appointed colonel of the forty-seventh regiment of foot. In the course of this year he married Lady Mary Howard, sister to the Earl of Effingham.

In 1775 when the American war recommenced, General Carleton had an ample field for the display of his military talents. The American congress having resolved to resort to arms, began soon to turn their eyes to Canada, where they knew the late acts were very unpopular, not only among the British settlers, but the French Canadians themselves, who having experienced the difference between a French and a British constitution, gave the preference to the latter. To co-operate with the disaffected in Canada, and to anticipate the probable and suspected designs of General Carleton, the congress formed the bold and hazardous project of invading that province. The success of the scheme depended chiefly on the celerity of movement, while the British troops were cooped up in Boston, and before reinforcements could arrive from England. In August 1775, Schuyler and Montgomery marched to Lake Champlain, which they crossed in flat-bottomed boats to St. John’s; but Schuyler, the American general, being taken ill, the command devolved upon Montgomery, {380} who, being an officer of great skill and ability, detached the Indians from the service of General Carleton; and having received some reinforcements of artillery, he compelled the fort of St. John’s to surrender at discretion on the 2nd of November. Hence crossing the St, Lawrence, he proceeded.to Montreal, which being incapable of defence, General Carleton wisely evacuated, and retired to Quebec. Having possessed himself of Montreal, Montgomery made dispositions for advancing to besiege the capital of Canada, and there were several circumstances favourable to his hopes of success. The works of the town had been neglected for a long time of peace; the garrison did not exceed eleven hundred men, of which few were regulars, and the majority of the inhabitants were disaffected to the framers of their new constitution, and particularly to General Carleton, who was supposed to have been a steady supporter of that measure. While he was endeavouring to defend Quebec, amidst all these disadvantages, the American. generals, Montgomery and Arnold, summoned him to surrender, which he treated with contempt, and refused to hold any correspondence with rebels. The inhabitants too, displeased as they were with their new constitution, joined the British troops with cordial unanimity, and the American commander unprepared for a regular siege, endeavoured to take the place by storm. In this attempt Montgomery fell bravely at the head of his troops, whom the garrison, after an obstinate resistance, drove from the town with great loss. After this success, General Carleton shewed that his humanity was equal to his valour, for he treated all the prisoners that fell into his hands with mildness, and softened the rigours of their captivity. Understanding that a number of sick and wounded provincials were scattered about the woods and villages, he issued a proclamation, and appointed proper persons to discover those miserable people, afford them relief and assistance at the public expense, and assure them that on their recovery they should have leave to return to their respective, {381} homes, and that he would not take the advantage of their deserted and distressed situation to make them prisoners of war.

Arnold encamped on the heights of Abraham, where he fortified himself, and continued the siege of Quebec in the following year (1776) but retired from thence on the arrival of an English squadron.

General Carleton being now reinforced by troops, which, added to what he had, formed a body of thirteen thousand men, prepared for offensive operations, and the Americans evacuated their conquests, stationing themselves at Crown Point, whither the British commander did not follow them for the present. An armament was now prepared for crossing Lake Champlain, in order to besiege Crown Point, and Ticonderago. The Americans had a considerable fleet on Lake Champlain, whereas the British had not a single vessel. The general therefore used every effort to procure the requisite naval force, but October had commenced before he was ready to oppose them. On the 11th October, the British fleet commanded by Captain Pringle, and under the direction of General Carleton, discovered the armament of the enemy posted to defend the passage between the island of Valicour and the Western Main. An engagement commenced, and continued on both sides for several hours with great intrepidity, but a contrary wind preventing the chief British ships from taking a part, and night coming on, it was thought prudent to discontinue the action, and Arnold took advantage of the night to retreat.

The British pursued them the next day, and the day following, and the wind being favourable for bringing all the ships into action, overtook them a few leagues from Crown Point. The American commander unable to avoid an engagement, made the best disposition which his force permitted. About noon the battle began and continued with great fury for two hours, but at length the superior force and skill of the British prevailed. General Carleton remained at Crown Point till 3rd November, and {382} as the winter was commencing, he did not think it advisable to besiege Ticonderago. He returned therefore to St. John’s, whence he distributed his army into winter quarters.

In the following year, 1777, an expedition being planned from, Canada, to effect a co-operation with the principal British force, the command of the armament was conferred on General Burgoyne. Sir Guy Carleton, (for he had been created a knight of the bath in July 1776) from his official situation in Canada, his conduct, and especially his defence of Quebec, might have reasonably expected this appointment; he was an older general, of more military experience, and from his official situation in Canada, had. acquired a superior knowledge of the country, its inhabitants and resources. His character commanded greater authority than Burgoyne’s had hitherto established; and as no military grounds could be alleged for superseding Carleton to make room for Burgoyne, his promotion was imputed to parliamentary influence, more than to his official talents. Carleton disgusted with a preference by no means merited, as soon as he heard of the appointment, resigned his government, in which he was succeeded by General Haldinard; but before he departed, exerted himself to the utmost to enable Burgoyne to take the field with advantage.

On his arrival in England, he received the pe tions of all the friends of his country for his very able and successful defence of Quebec, and was honoured by his majesty with a red ribbon, as a mark of his gracious approbation of his conduct and services.

In August 1777, Sir Guy was made a lieutenant-general in the army, and in 1781, was appointed to succeed Sir Henry Clinton as commander-in-chief in America, where he remained until the termination of the contest, when, after an interview with General Washington, in which these two veterans congratulated each other on arriving at the close of a disastrous war, he evacuated New York, and returned to England. {383}

In April 1786 he was once more appointed governor of Quebec, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick, and as a reward for his long services, was in the following August raised to the peerage by the title of Lord Dorchester of Dorchester, in the county of Oxford. His lordship remained in this extensive government, for many years; and returned at length to England, where he passed his old age in the bosom of his family, first at Kempshot, near Basingstoke, in Hampshire, and afterwards at his seat near Maidenhead. He died the 10th November, 1808, at the advanced age of eighty-five, at which time he was colonel of the fourth regiment of dragoons, and a general in the army.

He left a numerous issue, and was succeeded in title, and estate, by his grandson, Arthur Henry Carleton, a minor.

Blind and untaught, may be considered as a musical phenomenon. This minstrel bard, sweet as impressive, will long claim remembrance, and float down the stream of time, whilst harmony has power to charm. He was born in the year 1670, in the village of Nodder, in the county of Westmeath, on the lands of Carolans town, which were wrested from his ancestors by the family of the Nugents, on their arrival in this kingdom, with King Henry II. His father was a poor farmer, the humble proprietor of a few acres, which afforded him a scanty subsistence. Of his mother little is known, probably the daughter of a neighbouring peasant, in the choice of whom, his father was guided rather by nature, than prudence. It was in his infancy that Carolan was deprived of his sight by the small-pox. This deprivation he supported with cheerfulness, and would merrily say, “my eyes are transplanted into my ears.” His musical genius was soon discovered, and procured him many friends, who {384} determined to aid its cultivation, and at the age of twelve a proper master was engaged, to instruct him on the harp; but his diligence in the regular modes of instruction was not great, yet his harp was rarely unstrung, for his intuitive genius assisted him in composition, whilst his fingers wandered amongst the strings, in quest of the sweets of melody. In a few years this “;child of song” became enamoured of Miss Bridget Cruise. His harp, now inspired by love, would only echo to the sound; though this lady did not give him her hand, it is imagined she did not deny him her heart, but like Apollo, when he caught at the nymph “he filled his arms with bays,” and the song which bears her name, is considered his chef-d’œuvre, it came warm from his heart, while his genius was in its full vigour.

Our bard, however, after a time, solaced himself for the loss of Miss Cruise, in the arms of Miss Mary Maguire, a young lady of good family in the county of Fermanagh. She was gifted in a small degree with both pride and extravagance, but she was the wife of his choice, he loved her tenderly, and lived harmoniously with her. On his entering into the connubial state, he fixed his residence on a small farm near Moshill, in the county of Leitrim; here he built a neat little house, in which he practised hospitality on a scale more suited to his mind than to his means, his profusion speedily consumed the produce of his little farm, and he was soon left to lament the want of prudence, without which the rich cannot taste of pleasure long, or the poor of happiness.

At length Carolan commenced the profession of an itinerant musician, Wherever he went, the gates of the nobility and others. were thrown open to him; he was received with respect, and a distinguished place assigned him at the table: “Carolan,” says Mr. Ritson, “seems from the description we have of him to be a genuine representative of the ancient bard.”

It was during his peregrinations that Carolan composed {385} all those airs which are still the delight of his countrymen, and which a modern bard possessed of a congenial soul hath so elegantly adorned.

He thought the tribute of a song due to every house in which he was entertained, and he seldom failed to pay it, choosing for his subject, either the head of the family, or the loveliest of its branches.

Several anecdotes bordering on the miraculous, are recorded of Carolan, and amongst others the following which we are told, was “a fact well ascertained.”

“The fame of Carolan having reached the ears of an eminent Italian music-master in Dublin, he put his abilities toa severe test, and the issue of the trial confirmed him, how well founded every thing had been, which was advanced in favour of our Irish bard. The method he made use of was as follows: he singled out an excellent piece of music, and highly in the style of the country which gave him birth; here and there he either altered or mutilated the piece, but in such a manner, as that no one but a real judge could make a discovery. Carolan bestowed the deepest attention upon the performer while he played it; not knowing, however, that it was intended as a trial of his skill; and that the critical moment was at hand, which was to determine his reputation for ever. He declared it, was an admirable piece of music, but, to the astonishment of all present, said, very humorously, in his own language, “ta se air chois air bacaighe;” that is, here and there it limps and stumbles. He was prayed to rectify the errors, which he accordingly did. In this state the piece was sent from Connaught to Dublin; and the Italian no sooner saw the amendments than he pronounced Carolan to be a true musical genius.”

The period now approached at which Carolan’s feelings were to receive a violent shock. In the year 1733, the wife of his bosom was torn from him by the hand of death, and as soon as the transport of his grief was a little subsided, he composed a monody teeming with harmony and poetic beauties. Carolan did not continue long in this {386} vale of sorrow after the decease of his wife. While on a visit at the house of Mrs. M’Dermot, of Alderford, in the county of Roscommon, he expired in the month of March, 1738, in the sixty-eighth year of his age, and was interred in the parish-church of Killronan, in the diocese of Avedagh, but “not a stone tells where he lies.”

The manner of his death has been variously related; but that his excessive partiality for a more sparkling stream than flows at Helicon, was the cause of his decease, is a point that all his biographers have agreed on. Goldsmith says “his death was not more remarkable than his life. Homer was never more fond of a glass than he. He would drink whole pints of usquebaugh, and, as he used to think, without any ill consequence. His intemperance, however, in this respect, at length brought on an incurable disorder, and when just at the point of death, he called for a cup of his beloved liquor. Those who were standing round him, surprised at the demand, endeavoured to persuade him to the contrary, but he persisted; and when the bowl was brought him, attempted to drink but could not, wherefore giving away the bowl, he observed with a smile, that it would be hard if two such friends as he and the cup should part, at least without kissing, and then expired.”

Walker, in his account of the Irish Bards, inserts a letter which states that “Carolan, at an early period of his life, contracted a fondness for spirituous liquors, which he retained even to the last stage of it. But inordinate gratifications carry their punishments along with them; nor was Carolan exempt from this general imposition. His physicians assured him, that, unless he corrected this vicious habit, a scurvy, which was the consequence of his intemperance, would soon put an end to his mortal career. He obeyed with reluctance; and seriously resolved upon never tasting that forbidden, though (to him) delicious cup. The town of Boyle, in the county of Roscommon, was at that time his principal place of residence; there, while under so severe a regimen, he walked, or rather wandered about like a rêveur. His usual gaiety forsook {387} him; no sallies of a lively imagination escaped him; every moment was marked with a dejection of spirits, approaching to the deepest melancholy; and his harp, his favourite harp, lay in some obscure corner of his. habitation, neglected and unstrung. Passing one day by a grocer’s shop in the town (where a Mr. Currifteene at present resides), .our Irish Orpheus, after a six week’s quarantine, was tempted to step in; undetermined whether he should abide by his late resolution, or whether he should. yield to the impulse which he felt at the moment. “Well, my dear friend,” cried he to the young man who stood behind the compter, “you see am a man of constancy; for six long weeks I have refrained from whiskey. Was there ever so great an instance of self-denial? But a thought strikes me, and surely you will not be cruel enough to refuse one gratification which I shall earnestly solicit. Bring hither a measure of my favourite liquor, which I shall smell to, but indeed shall not taste.” The lad indulged him on that condition; and no sooner did the fumes ascend to his brain, than every latent spark within him was rekindled, his countenance glowed with an unusual brightness, and the soliloquy. which he repeated over the cup, was the effusions of a heart newly animated, and the ramblings of a genius which a Sterne would have pursued with raptures of delight. At length, to the great peril of his health, and contrary to the advice of his medical friends, he once more quaffed the forbidden draught, and renewed the brimmer, until his spirits were sufficiently exhilarated, and until his mind had fully resumed its former tone. He immediately set about composing that much-admired song which goes by the name of Carolan’s (and sometimes Stafford’s) Receipt. For sprightliness of sentiment, and harmony of numbers, it stands unrivalled in the list of our best modern drinking songs, as our nicest critics will readily allow. He commenced the words, and began to modulate the air, in the evening at Boyle; and, before the following morning, he sung and played this noble off-{388}spring of his imagination in Mr. Stafford’s parlour, at Elfin.”

“Carolan’s inordinate fondness,” says Walker, “for Irish Wine (as Pierre le Grand used to call whiskey) will not admit of an excuse; it was a vice of habit, and might therefore have been corrected. But let me say something in extenuation. He seldom drank to excess; besides, he seemed to think—nay, was convinced from experience, that the spirit of whiskey was grateful to his muse, and for that reason generally offered it when he intended to invoke her.” “They tell me,” says Dr. Campbell in his Survey of the South of Ireland, “that in his (Carolan’s) latter days, he never composed without the inspiration of whiskey, of which, at that critical hour, he always took care to have a bottle beside him.” “Nor was. Carolan,” continues Walker, “the only bard who. drew inspiration from the bottle; there have been several planets in the poetical hemisphere, that seldom shone, but when illuminated by the rays of rosy wine.” He then proceeds to infer the advantages of a state of demi-drunkenness, as far as regards poetic composition, and instances Cunningham, Addison, and Homer, as three authors whose works bear ample testimony to the efficacy of so pleasing a method of procuring inspiration. That Carolan was not. indifferent to advice of this description, has been sufficiently proved, and in all probability, both he and Mr. Walker. thought true talent similar to those richly painted vases in the east, the most brilliant tints of which could not be discovered unless wine were poured into them *. {389}

* Vide Moore’s Lalla Rookh.

THIS individual, celebrated both for learning and piety, was descended from an ancient family near Athlone, in the county of Westmeath; at which place he was born about the year 1605. He embraced the Franciscan order in the {389} convent of Athlone. when he was. only sixteen years of age; and afterwards studied philosophy in a monastery of his own order at Drogheda, under the tuition of Dr. Alexander Flemming. Several years after, when many of the convents were seized by the iron hand of government, he quitted: Ireland, and retired to Saltsburgh in Germany; where, uniting intense application to great learning, he devoted the whole of his time to the-study of divinity, in a Franciscan monastery; and finished his studies at Louvain, in Flanders, under the instruction and direction of Malachy Fallow and Bonaventure Delahoide, two eminent Irish professors in divinity. In a short time after this period he possessed the chair himself, and acquired the reputation of an able and learned theologist. Some years after he was sent to his native country in quality of commissary-general of the Recollets, all over Ireland; where he found every thing in a state of great confusion. Being at Kilkenny when the differences and disputes ran high between the loyal catholics and the party of Owen O'Neill, he sided with the former; and, in an attempt to remove from that city one Brenan and some other seditious friars, he was in great danger of losing his life; and to a certainty had lost it in the tumult raised by these friars, had not the Earl of Castlehaven providentially arrived, with some friends, in the very instant of ums to. save him.

When the forces, sent by parliament to reduce Ireland, had landed, and were proceeding to their work of murder, flame, and desolation, Caron left his country, and continued abroad until the Restoration; at which period he returned to England, where he resided till within a few months of his death. Prior to which, feeling the hand of that despotic monarch upon him, he returned once more unto the land of his birth; and died in Dublin, some time in May 1666; and was fees in St. James s church-yard in that city.

He was esteemed a man of exemplary piety and extraordinary learning, and of upright and loyal principles, {390} which raised him many enemies among his brethren, who, by their connivances, caused the censures of their church to fall upon him. He was remarkably zealous in promoting the affair of the Irish remonstrance of their loyalty; and wrote, at some length, in defence of it. A complete list of his writings is to be found in Ware’s Account of the Writers of Ireland.

AN eminent musical and vocal performer, was a native of Ireland, but left that country at a very early age, and was patronised by the Earl of Inchiquin. After visiting various countries for the better perfecting himself in the intricacies of his art, he arrived at Naples, where he was much noticed by Sir William and Lady Hamilton. Here he became celebrated for the great effect with which he sung the beautiful little ballad of “Sally in our Alley.” He was also celebrated for a capriccio, commencing with the words “Fairest Dorinda,” in which he united all the elegancies of musical science, with the most humorous comic expression. In Italy he finished his musical studies, but where he proceeded to next we are not informed. He visited “the clime of the east,” and passed some time in India, where he conducted the musical department in the theatre at Bengal; but the intense heat of the climate so greatly affected the health “of this child of song,” that he was obliged to bid adieu to a clime, “where every voice is melody, and every breath perfume,” and fly to Albion’s genial skies, to endeavour to regain that health he had lost in delighting others.

In 1793 he married one of the daughters of the Rev. Mr. Wells, of Cookham, in Berkshire, by whom he had two children, but did not live long to enjoy the pleasures of a domestic life, or contribute to the happiness of the circle that surrounded him, as he died of that unrelenting disease, a liver complaint, (which he is supposed to have {391} imbibed on India’s sultry shore) on the 8th of November, 1800, being then in the thirty-second year of his age.

He was a distinguished member of most of the musical societies in this metropolis, and was justly considered by them, “as the choicest feather of their wing.”

SECOND VISCOUNTCHARLEMONT, was a brave and experienced soldier, who patriotically touk up arms in defence of his religion and country, against the attacks made on both by King James II and during the contest between that monarch and King William, he not only engaged himself, but his brothers, in the service of the latter, whereupon he was attainted, and his estate of £500 a-year, sequestrated on the 7th of May, 1689, by King James’s parliament. But after the reduction of the kingdom, King William gave him a regiment of foot, made him governor and Custos Rotulorum of the counties of Tyrone and Armagh, and governor of the fort of Charlemont.

On the 5th of October, 1692, he took his seat in the house of peers, and in 1697, the peace being concluded, his regiment was disbanded, but on the 28th of June, 1701, he was again made colonel of a regiment of foot.

In 1705 he was called upon to serve her majesty in Spain, under Charles, Earl of Peterborough, commander-in-chief of her majesty’s forces. King Charles III being besieged by the French in his city of Barcelona, all efforts and expedition were made use of to relieve him, and at the attack of the breach of the town on the 24th of April, Lord Charlemont commanded the first brigade, and forced an entrance, and it being determined on the 26th of August, to attack the citadel of Monjuich, which appeared the only means whereby that city (in a short space) might be brought to surrender, Lord Peterborough, accompanied by the Prince of Hesse Darmstadt and Lord Charlemont, presented himself with a detachment, before it on the 14th of September, and commenced the assault, during {392} which Lord Charlemont behaved with distinguished bravery, and at the attack of the fort, fearlessly marched into the works at the head of his men. He was near the Prince of Hesse when he fell, and continued, during the heat of the action, to perform his duty with great coolness and intrepidity. When the affair was ended, the Earl of Peterborough presented his lordship and Colonel Southwell to the King of Spain, as two officers who had rendered his majesty signal services, for which they received his thankful acknowledgments.

The taking of this place occasioned. the ieee i Barcelona on the 9th of October, 1705, and the share his lordship had in this memorable action, induced her majesty, on the 25th of August, to. promote kim to the rank of a brigadier-general of her armies; and on the 22nd of April, 1708, to advance him to that of a major-general, calling him into her privy council, and appointing him euskal! of the counties of Tyrone and Armagh, .

In 1706 he was removed from his regiment by the Earl of Peterborough. In May 1726, he was sworn of the privy council to King George I and having enjoyed the peerage upwards of fifty-five years, was considered the oldest nobleman in his majesty’s kingdoms.

He died on the 21st of July, 1726, eh was buried in the vault with his father and grandfather, under a fine monument, which he had erected to their memories, at Armagh.

He was married on the 11th of July, 1678, to Anne, only daughter of Doctor James Mengetson, Archbishop of Armagh, and by her (who died in 1729) had five daughters and seven sons, the second of whom is the subject of the following memoir.

Earl or Charlemont. This nobleman, one of the most accomplished persons of his time, and as amiable, patriotic, and truly honest man, as perhaps ever adorned any age or country, was born at Dublin on the 18th of {393} August, 1738. Owing to the delicacy of his constitution, and the solicitude of his father for the early formation of his principles, he was never sent to any public school, but was placed under three preceptors: the first of whom was a respectable clergyman, named Skelton: another was a Reverend Mr. Barton, eminent for moral and scholastic character; and the last (a man of eminent worth and learning) was a Mr. Murphy, an editor of Lucian, whose character and abilities were so congenial to the views of Lord Caulfield, that he was employed to undertake the education of the young lord. Under his instructions, his pupil redoubled his own industry, and advanced rapidly in his studies; and such was his esteem and attachment to his preceptor, that he afterwards took him as companion on his travels, and treated him through life with generosity and kindness.

In the year 1746, the young lord baving finished his classical studies, set out on his first tour to the continent of Europe; then deemed indispensable to finish the education of gentlemen of rank. He first visited Holland, and was present during the revolutionary tumult which ended inthe establishment of the Prince of Orange as Stadtholder. Then he proceeded to the British camp in Germany, where he was politely received by William, Duke of Cumberland, commander-in-chief, who, not only during his stay, but afterwards, during His Royal Highness’s life, gave him signal marks of esteem. From the British camp he proceeded to Turin, where he entered the academy, and resided a year, making occasional excursions. to other parts of Italy. At the academy he became intimate with his illustrious fellow-student, the young Victor Amadeus, Prince Royal of Sardinia, from whom, as well as from his illustrious family, he received the most gracious attentions, and enjoyed the opportunity of intercourse with many of the most eminent literary and political characters of Europe, who were then at Turin; and, amongst others, the Marquis de St. Germain, embassador [sic] to France, the Comte Perron, and David Hume, the British historian, at that time secre{394}tary to Sir John Sinclair, the British plenipotentiary at the Sardinian court. From Turin he proceeded on the 27th of October, 1748, (vid Bologna) on his way to Rome, and spent the winter between that capital and Naples. In the following April, he sailed from Leghorn with his preceptor Mr. Murphy, Mr. Dalton his draftsman, and two other Irish gentlemen, on a voyage to Constantinople. On the 6th of May, 1749, having passed the poetic dangers of Scylla and Charybdis, as they approached the entrance of the beautiful bay of Messina, their vessel was visited by the officers of health, who-warned them not to approach the city without due examination, for that populous and beautiful capital, the pride of Sicily, had been recently wasted with a dreadful plague, which destroyed the greater part of its inhabitants. The infection had been brought thither by a Genvese Tartan, laden with wool, bale goods, and corn, and she had entered the port under Neapolitan colours, but had come direct from the Morea, where the plague had been raging for some time. Her captain pretended he had come from Brindisi, and produced counterfeit bills of health as from that port. But his own death in the Lazaretto, gave the first alarm of that pestilence which afterwards produced such horrors. Lord Charlemont and his party were, however, permitted to land at some distance on the beach, and after a tedious ordeal of precautionary measures, they were allowed to enter the city, lately one of the finest in the world, and a scene of grandeur and gaiety; but now reduced to the most lamentable contrast of its former state. The streets nearly depopulated, the few straggling passengers now visible were squalid from disease, famine, and despair; the shops every where closed; the pavements overgrown with grass, and a deathlike silence reigned throughout, interrupted only at intervals by the plaints of wretchedness. Such were the consequences of a pestilence, equal perhaps in its horrors to that at Athens, described by Thucydides, or that of Florence, related by Boccacio.

From Messina the travellers sailed to Malta, where they {395} arrived on the 20th of June following; and after a short stay, proceeded to Constantinople, visiting in their way, Smyrna, Tenedos, the Dardanelles, and the Troade, in all of which they inspected every thing interesting to classical curiosity. During his stay at Constantinople, Lord Charlemont attained his twenty-first year, which he commemorated by the composition of an elegant Latin ode, in imitation of Horace’s “Ad Posthume.” Lib ii. xiv.

“Eheu! fugaces, Posthume, Posthume,
Labuntur Anni.”

It was addressed to his friend, Mr. Richard Marlay, afterwards Lord Bishop of Waterford, the learned and admired friend and companion of Burke, Reynolds, Johnson, and Malone, and the maternal uncle of the Right -Honourable Henry Grattan.

In his observations on every thing curious in Constantinople, he was zealously aided by Doctor Mackenzie, many years the resident physician to the English embassador and British factory there, and highly esteemed by the Turks for his medical skill.

From Constantinople, after a stay of little more than a month, the travellers proceeded to Egypt, visiting, in the course of their voyage, the Classic Isles of Lesbos, Chios, Micone, Delos, and Paros, from the last of which they sailed to Alexandria, and travelled thence to view every relique of antiquity worthy of curiosity in Egypt. On the 22nd of October, 1749, they sailed from Alexandria, intending to visit Cyprus, in sight of which they arrived, but were forced by contrary winds, after a voyage of seven days, to anchor at Rhodes. Whence they sailed for Athens, but were again driven by unfavourable gales, upon the rocky coast of Caria, now called Carimania; and on the morning of the 9th of November, they passed the promontory of Doris, on the south-east side of the Sinus Ceramicus, now Gulph of Stanco: here they landed and visited the splendid ruins of the ancient theatre near it, then in high preservation; all of white marble, 190 feet broad by 150 in depth; and above the theatre stood the {396} remains of the magnificent temple of the Cnidian Venus, built in the Corinthian order, of the purest Parian marble, and which Praxiteles had enriched with the famous statue of the goddess, the most perfect production of his skill. These precious monuments of classic architecture. afforded a delightful treat to the travellers, and more especially to Lord Charlemont, whose cultivated taste taught, him to contemplate them with ecstacy. They next visited the Isle of Cos, and thence Bodromi, and the splendid ruins of the once famous Halicarnassus, the capital of Caria; proceeding thence to Cynthus, now Thermia. On the 23rd of November they passed Egina, and entered the Piraeus, and the following morning, with the permission of the governor of Attica, proceeded to the renowned city of Athens. On their approach to this celebrated capital, the first grand object of their attention was the temple of Theseus, which alone, in the opinion of Lord Charlemont, was worth the whole voyage. From this place they proceeded to the Morea, Thebes, Corinth, and the ancient Euboea; and returned to Athens on the 14th of December, 1749.

From the harbour of Aulis, immortalised by the genius of Homer and the muse of Euripides, they sailed on the 20th of January, 1750. On their voyage to Rhodes and Malta, they encountered a tremendous storm, and very narrowly escaped being lost. They at length arrived at Malta, and after a short quarantine of twenty-three days, were allowed to land, and honoured by, the grand master, Don Emanuel Pinto, a Portuguese nobleman, and all the knights, with the most courteous and hospitable urbanity.

From Malta Lord C. and his friends returned to Italy, where he resumed his exertions to become perfect in that language, which he had cultivated with assiduity, and his consummate accuracy in which, aided by the polished elegance of his mind and manners, rendered his intercourse highly acceptable to persons of the first rank and accomplishments. At Turin he renewed his intimacy with his former fellow-student, the Prince Royal of Sardinia, then about to be married to a princess of Spain, and the pre{397}sence of our noble traveller at the nuptials was particularly requested by the prince; who afterwards took every occasion to evince his unaltered esteem for Lord Charlemont.

His lordship next visited Lucca, Sienna, and other places of celebrity, in company with Lord Aylesbury, whom he met on his travels, and with whom he afterwards maintained an intimate friendship through life. At Verona he experienced a marked attention from the Marchese Scipione Maffei, so honourably mentioned by Lady M. W. Montague, and he cultivated intimacy with the literary society who used to assemble at Maffei’s palace, and with almost every other erudite society in the principal towns of Italy. At Rome he continued two years, and was one of the earliest of the British subjects, who kept a house and establishment there for the reception of his friends: and here, preceptor Murphy, the Fidus Achates of his travels, acted as his major domo in the domestic arrangements of his establishment. The noble young traveller did not confine his attentions or expenditures to his own amusements and pursuits, but was a kind benefactor to several young artists then pursuing their studies at Rome; and especially Mr. William Chambers, whose finances and connections were much limited. His lordship’s kindnesses to him at that period were gratefully remembered through life by that eminent man. With the most distinguished of the Roman and Neapolitan nobles then at Rome, and all the English of worth and eminence there, Lord Charlemont cultivated intimacy and friendship, and afterwards corresponded with many of them. Amongst the British whom he met there were the Lords Cavendish, and the Marquis of Rockingham, with whom he contracted the most cordial and indissoluble friendships, and the same might be! said of his friendship with the Duc de Nivernois, and the venerable Pontiff, Benedict XIV. From Rome his lordship returned to Turin, and spent his time between that-city and Florence till the end of July 1754, when he proceeded to Spain and France, and amongst {398} other eminent persons in the latter country, he visited the celebrated Baron Montesquieu, at his residence near Bourdeaux, by whom he was received with the utmost urbanity, and in whom his lordship was not a little astonished to find blended the learning, talents, and profound philosophy of the author of L’Esprit du Loi, with all the agreeable levity, vivacity, and inexhaustible chit-chat of a refined petit-maître of the Parisian circles, although then at the age of seventy. His lordship also renewed his intimacy with Monsieur de Nivernois, St. Palaye, Helvétius, the Marquis Mirabeau. At the Count D’Argenson’s, and the Duke de Biron’s, he met many eminent characters both French and English.—In 1755, after an absence of nine years, he returned to his native country, for which, all the attractions of foreign travel and extensive intercourse with the arts, courts, the literature, and manners of the most polished nations of Europe, never abated his affections; nor was his country, during his absence, unmindful of him in whom she contemplated one of her future and best friends and ornaments. His return, therefore, was gladly hailed by all ranks; and the Lord Chancellor Jocelyn, eminent for his discernment, spoke of him as a young nobleman of whom his country had reason to form the highest expectations.

‘The state of society at that day in Ireland had but few inducements to secure the constant residence of a young nobleman just returned from a nine years intercourse with the most polished nations, splendid courts, and eminent characters of Europe, amongst which he had moved. Much of his time, therefore, was spent amongst his friends in England. His zeal, however, to promote the freedom and prosperity of Ireland, never slept, and in the course of some years, his love of the natale solum superseded all foreign attachments, and induced him to make the land of his birth that of his constant residence; although at the time of his return, and long afterwards, it was the prevailing fashion with the Irish nobility and principal gentry, to reside in France or England: for, it must be admitted, {399} that Ireland, in those days, had but few inducements for the votaries of refined taste, elegant amusement, or social tranquillity. The history of the men and measures of those days, are so intimately blended with the life of Lord Charlemont, that it will be impossible to detach them from the thread of this memoir; but the brevity to which our sketch is necessarily restrained, will oblige us to exclude all collateral details, not indispensable to our purpose.

The first occasion we find to notice Lord Charlemont as a prominent figure in the political canvass in Ireland, was during the viceroyalty of the Marquis of Hartington, son of the then Duke of Devonshire; a nobleman selected for the suavity of his manners, and the excellence of his character, as a minister well calculated to calm the turbulence which then prevailed between the leading partisans of the Irish and British interests. The Lord Primate Stone, on the one hand, and Mr. Boyle (afterwards Lord Shannon) on the other, were the conflicting candidates for superiority. Both were sustained by vigorous partisans, and Lord Hartington saw, that unless conciliation could be effected, the purposes of his mission would be fruitless.

Lord Charlemont, then, almost a stranger in his own country, and wholly unexperienced in the manoeuvres of old intriguing statesmen, was induced, at the request of the viceroy, to undertake the mediation; and notwithstanding his youth, he carried the point by the influence of his candour and conciliating manners. His own principal object was, to restore tranquillity to his country, and to effect a junction of both chiefs, in aid of the viceroy, whose sole purpose was public utility, and the establishment of harmony at the castle, But the noble young mediator never suspected an underplot which was proceeding at the same time, to establish as a secret article in the treaty, that Mr. Boyle should have an earldom with a pension of £3,000 a-year, for thirty-one years; and that the Primate Stone, after a little time, should enjoy his {400} due share of power. But this was only one of many hundred instances, which proved to Lord Charlemont’s subsequent experience, that the mask of patriotism and the zealous display of violent opposition, are too often the mere disguise of self-interest and ambition. But whatever claims to the favour of the viceroy this acceptable service might have found for Lord Charlemont, with him they lay dormant; for he sought no favour; and the only stipendiary one conferred upon his family or connections, was the unsolicited compliment of a cornetcy of cavalry to his brother, who had chosen a military life.

In the subsequent viceroyalty of the Duke of Bedford, during the then existing war with France, occurred the descent of the French expedition under Thurot and General Flobert, with twelve thousand. men, upon. Carrickfergus, in the North of Ireland. Lord Charlemont was then governor of the county of Armagh; and on the first news of the attack, he waited on the viceroy to receive his commands. He learned that Lord Rothes, the commander-in-chief, had marched with competent force for the scene of attack; and that the viceroy had determined to follow. Lord Charlemont proceeded forthwith to Belfast, where he found, that the peasantry and yeomanry of the county, mostly his own tenantry, had thronged from the surrounding country to meet the enemy, with such arms as they could procure. They were drawn up in regular bodies; some with old firelocks, but much the greater number with lochaber axes, of which they, were ready to make a desperate use. But when his lordship had advanced to Carrickfergus, he found the enemy, having made but a very short stay in the town which they possessed, after a smart action with the small force there, had fled: for, observing the determined spirit of the country, they had reimbarked their troops, and only waited a fair wind for their escape; having left numbers of killed and wounded on the field, and amongst the latter, Monsieur Flobert, their general, and many of his officers, who, by the active humanity and influence of Lord Charlemont, were saved {401} from the fury. of the people, and afterwards treated with protection and generosity. This skirmish, though not very important ina military point of view, gave to Lord Charlemont the strongest proof of the spirit, promptitude, and bravery of his countrymen in the defence of their . native soil... The conduct of his lordship on this occasion, and the spirit displayed by his countrymen, were highly commended in the viceroy’s dispatches to his government in England, and as graciously approved by the reigning monarch, Geo. Il. And his Grace of Bedford, at a subsequent time, upon the appointment of his successor, the Duke of Northumberland, to the viceroyalty, marked. his esteem for Lord Charlemont, by strongly recommending, that. an earldom should be offered to his lordship. This was the more generous, as Lord Charlemont had warmly opposed many of the Duke of Bedford’s measures in parliament.

On the succession of his present majesty to the throne, Lord Halifax was appointed to the viceroyalty of Ireland, and Lord Charlemont being then in London, an event occurred, in which he conceived the honour of his country, and the privileges of its nobility, were materially affected.

The nuptials of the young king with her late majesty, Queen Charlotte, were shortly to be celebrated, and a number of Irish peeresses were then in town, and expected, as a matter of course, to have the honour of walking in the procession, according to their respective ranks, at the august solemnities. But before even the queen had landed, the Duchess of Bedford had received orders to acquaint these ladies, “that they were not to walk, or form any part in the ceremonial.”

Extremely mortified at this unexpected veto, exposing themselves to ridicule, and their country to contempt, they applied to Lord Charlemont for his interference, to vindicate the-honour and privileges of the peerage of Ireland; and his lordship, ever the devoted champion of chivalry, and the honour of his fair countrywomen, used {402} his exertions with such effect, that, by the zealous aid of Lord Middleton, Lord Halifax, and Lord Egmont, and (notwithstanding the warm opposition which the object met in the privy-council, called on purpose to adjust the matter, yet who came to no decision) he ultimately succeeded. And his majesty was graciously pleased to forego, the indecision of his council, and to issue his orders for the nobility of Ireland to take their places in the ceremonial, immediately after those of England, respectively according to rank.

About this period the internal state of Ireland was frequently disturbed by the insurrections and tumults of the peasantry; not from any motive connected. with sedition against the government, but merely from the extreme distresses and oppressions under which the common people laboured, from a variety of causes. Amongst others, the severe pressure of the penal laws against catholics operating on four-fifths of the whole population; the exaction of rack-rents from the miserable occupants of the soil; the severe exactions of tythes for the maintenance of the high church clergy, pressing on dissenters as well as catholics, to maintain a priesthood, from whom they derived no instruction or advantage, besides being obliged to maintain their own clergy; the heavy taxes imposed by grand juries for roads, and other county and baronial rates, which, added to the wretched state of agriculture and manufactures, the almost total depression of home trade, and the utter preclusion from foreign commerce, formed a constant and prolific source of irritation, to which the only legislative remedies applied were, severe laws and sanguinary punishments,

In 1763, one of those insurrectionary tumults broke out in the north of Ireland, where the population was chiefly composed of dissenters. The insurgents assumed the appellation of oak-boys, wore oak-boughs in their hats, threatening destruction to all abettors of the tithe system, the rack-rent landlords, and promoters of road assessments. This spirit pervaded, not only the county of {403} Armagh where Lord Charlemont was governor, and an extensive land-owner, but also Fermanagh, Derry, and Tyrone. The gentry of the province were greatly alarmed and called on government for military aid; and proclamations were issued, and military execution threatened. But Lord Charlemont, at the request of the government, repaired to the disturbed quarters, and by the influence of his character, and conciliatory persuasions, aided by the moderate gentry of those counties, in a short time, was the principal means of restoring tranquillity without the loss of a single life. On his lordship’s return to the metropolis, he received the warmest acknowledgments from the Duke of Northumberland for his eminent services in this affair, and was informed by his grace, that his majesty was so highly sensible of those services, as to desire him as his lieutenant, to acquaint his lordship, that an earldom awaited his acceptance. To this honour, his lordship, after a few days consideration, bowed assent; but on the express stipulation that the advancement of his rank was inno way to influence his parliamentary conduct. The duke assured his lordship that nothing of the sort was ever in contemplation’; and upon this condition, the earldom was accepted. . His grace only added a wish to be permitted, as an old friend, to testify his pure personal respect for him, in any ~ mode he should be pleased to point out. But Lord Charlemont merely requested the appointment of a member of the linen board, as his estates lay in the linen counties. The appointment had no emolument attached, and it was cheerfully promised him on the first vacancy. His lordship proved his sincerity in the condition, on which he accepted the earldom; for while his patent was passing through the offices, he voted against the address of thanks for the treaty of peace then recently concluded, and afterwards entered his protest against it in the lords journals. But from this moment, there was an end of court favour and distinction to him, nor was he ever nominated to the seat at the linen board; and although the then Lord Chancellor, Bowes, decidedly objected to an {404} entry on his patent of peerage, stating, “that it was. wholly. unsolicited, and the spontaneous grant of his majesty,” as informal; his lordship had afterwards added to his patent, an engrossed testimonial, specifying the manner in which it was granted, lest the honour of his earldom should ever be stained with the imputation of motives similar to those which afterwards led. to the profuse creations of new nobility.

In 1764, Lord Charlemont revisited London: and. was nominated by the Dilletanti Society for the promotion of literature and the arts, to the honour of their chair, for which he was eminently qualified by his taste, knowledge, and zeal for their success; and he was chiefly instrumental to the subsequent mission of Dr. Chandler, the celebrated Athenian Stewart, Mr. Revett the architect, and Mr. Pars the draftsman, to Greece, and some parts of the East, to collect information on the ancient state of those countries, and the remaining monuments of antiquity. The society, in the first instance, devoted a fund of £2,000 and for this undertaking the world is indebted for. those subsequent publications at the expense of the society, which have thrown so much light on the subject of classic antiquity.:

The next period in which we find his lordship assume a prominent public part in Ireland, was in the viceroyalty of Lord Townshend; a:nobleman selected for the conviviality of his disposition, and frankness of his manner, as well adapted to conciliate supporters to his government in Ireland. But his parliamentary measures met strenuous opposition. In those contests, it was Lord Charlemont’s fortune to act with the minority. But the government of Lord Townshend will be remembered as the epoch which first unlocked the energies of that country, by the passing of the octennial bill for limiting the duration of parliaments, which, heretofore, was co-extensive with the lives of the members, and only limited otherwise by the chance of dissolution, or the demise of the crown. This measure had been long earnestly called for by the voice of the {405} country; and though heads of a bill for the purpose had twice passed the houses of parliament, even with the simulated support of those who were, at bottom, the most decided enemies of the measure, because they were confident it would be stifled in the privy council, through which it must pass, before it could be transmitted to England; the British cabinet, at length vexed by this duplicity, through which the whole odium of rejecting so popular a measure was thrown upon the government, sanctioned the bill, and returned it confirmed, with orders to dissolve the parliament at the close of the session. But it was considered at the time, perhaps truly, to have: been adopted by the British cabinet, as a measure of experiment to break down the phalanx of Irish aristocracy, who controlled: the parliamentary influence of the crown, at their own discretion. The first public writer in suggesting this measure; was Doctor Charles Lucas, the friend and physician of Lord Charlemont; whose able advocacy excited the exertions of other spirited writers, and finally the voice of the whole country, whose object was ultimately successful: an instance (as Lord Charlemont was wont to observe) that should stimulate the exertions of every true patriot, and teach him to cherish, as an infallible maxim, that every measure, intrinsically just and good, will finally be carried by virtuous and steady perseverance.”—A maxim, which he solemnly recommended to his children after him, adding, that “although the first advocate of a good measure might not live to witness its success, yet he may lay the foundation of that success for his survivors: and that the man who lays the first stone of the temple of liberty, deserves as much, and perhaps more, credit with posterity, than he who lives to complete the edifice.”

In the year 1768, Lord Charlemont married Miss Hickman, daughter of Robert Hickman, Esq. of the county of Clare; a lady, whose mind and accomplishments were perfectly congenial with his own, and eminently contributed to his subsequent happiness through life.

The dissolution of the old parliament, in consequence of {406} the octennial bill, created a marked change in the energies of the country, and introduced a succession of new and splendid characters on the senatorial stage; and the administration of Lord Townshend became in consequence, a perpetual scene of arduous contest. At no one period of Irish history, did there appear so numerous a host of able men, or a more brilliant display of talents and eloquence in the parliament. The country began to rouse, as it were, from a political lethargy. The limitation of eight years to existence of parliament on the one hand, taught the representative! body to feel, a little, their dependence on popular sentiment; and the people, on the other, to hope that the talents of their honest gentry would have a fair chance of being more generally exerted in their cause; while the great borough-owners looked to the lucrative expedient which would recur to them on the demise of every parliament, of turning their influence with advantage to their political or pecuniary account. This measure also sowed the first germ of a future system, little, if at all, contemplated at the moment; namely, the extension of the elective franchise to the catholics, who, for a series of years before and after, were wholly excluded that privilege, their subsequent attainment of which, was at least as much owing to the electioneering views, as-to the liberality of parliamentary leaders.

Amongst the leading characters eminent in the political contests of the day, were, in the upper house, Simon, Earl of Carhampton, and Charles Coote, Earl of Bellamont; John Scott, a barrister, afterwards Earl of Clonmell and chief justice; Walter Hussey Burgh, afterwards chief baron of the exchequer; Sir William Osborne; the celebrated Henry Flood; John Hely Hutchinson, afterwards secretary of state, and provost of Trinity College; and Dennis Daly, member for Galway.

Lord Charlemont thought it his duty to his country uniformly to act with the opposition, although he frequently viewed with regret the revolt of some of his ablest friends, whose patriotic fortitude could not withstand the {407} temptation of office and emolument. The octennial bill was the only measure as yet conceded by the British cabinet to the wishes of the Irish nation; but the complaints of the country were now directed to other grievances, which, so long as they continued, were considered as insurmountable impediments to the honour, independence, and prosperity of the nation. These grievances were, - 1st, the claims of the British parliament to the right of passing laws to bind Ireland; thus superseding the authority of her own legislature. 2dly, The ruinous restraints upon her commerce, which debarred her from all direct trade with the British colonies, and all share in the privileges of British subjects under the navigation act, and reduced her population to misery. And, Sadly, the necessity of transmitting all bills passed by the two houses of the Irish parliament through the medium of the lord-lieutenant and privy council, in whom was vested the power of cushioning such bills (as the phrase was) i. e. stifling them in transitu; and, if they survived that ordeal, they were afterwards subject to mutilation, and even death, in the privy council of England. It was utterly. in vain for Ireland to hope for any measure of amelioration, political or commercial, under such control, which was supposed in any degree to interfere with British interests.

These were the prominent features of political evils, which the patriots of that day considered as the sole source of degradation and debasement to their country. The removal of which might lead to the future mitigation of minor mischiefs; but, practically, those very minor mischiefs were the heaviest grievances under which the country internally suffered; namely, the divisions of the people into sectarious classes, cherishing mutual rancour and hostility to each other; and the intolerable yoke of the penal laws against catholics, which weighed down four-fifths of the population to a state of debasement and vassalage little better than that of the boors of Russia, or of other despotic governments of the north. This system, {408} originating in the prejudice and hostility of the English settlers in that country under successive reigns, who possessed the confiscated estates of the old rebellious chiefs, (many of them of English descent,) who resisted English: domination; and more especially the followers of Cromwell and William III, who, having obtained the ruling power, seemed determined to wreak interminable vengeance on the devoted Irish, for their, perhaps, mistaken, but certainly most unfortunate loyalty to their British monarchs, Charles I and his son James II. The victorious party thought they had no security for their new possessions in Ireland, even under the protection of British power, so long as a vestige of liberty, of property, or of influence remained with the catholics, who formed four-fifths of the population; and hence they formed a system of laws against that sect, calculated not merely to subjugate, but to brutalise them, - a system which a protestant legislator and eminent lawyer and statesman, shortly before this period, in his.endeavours to mitigate those laws, said, - “They were a disgrace to the statute books of an enlightened nation; and so odious in their principles, that one might think they were passed in hell, and that demons were the legislators.” And, in fact, if the catholics of Ireland did not become the most ignorant, stupid, and ferocious savages, it is by no means attributable to the spirit and letter of those statutes, so eminently calculated to render them such.

The octennial -bill, which was balm to the political wounds of the privileged sect, was a new source of bitter oppression to the degraded one. Every new election gave rise to new contests in every county; and every candidate sought to increase the numbers of his elective force. “A freehold, or profit rent, of forty shillings a year for thirty-one years, constituted every protestant an elector; and the result was, that every eighth year, the catholic, whose farm had been cultivated for thirty preceding years by the labours of himself and his children, was turned out of possession, with his family, to beg, if they chose, in order {409} to make room for a manufacture of as many protestant freeholds as his land could admit. Not. only the candidates, but: their friends and relatives had recourse to: the same expedient; and the system, in progress, was further. improved by shortening the term of thirty-one years leases to the catholic down to twelve or eight, so as) to terminate about the eve of a general election, - a ceremony in which the catholic had no share, except: the honour of bearing a part with his cudgel, to support the cause of his landlord, or his friends, who happened to be candidates or partisans, in those ferocious conflicts uniformly prevalent in contests for representation.

The dissenters, principally inhabiting the north, although exempt from the severities sustained by the catholics, were not without some share of legal disability. For, although the kirk was viewed as a half-sister of the high church, still her children were not regarded without some share of jealousy. Their Scottish descent rendered them in view of some orthodox zealots, as hereditary friends to the house of Stewart, while by others they were. suspected, partly as. descendants of the Cromwellian: school, and tinctured with the principles of the puritans in the days of the first Charles, and partly as secret adherents of the house of Stewart: and, all together, a sort of mules between Republicans and Jacobites. They were, however, by. no means cordial to the ascendancy: of the dominating sect, for, in common with the catholics, they were heavily assessed by tythes for the support of the high church, from whose ministry they derived no advantage; while they had a ministry of their own to support: and although they were eligible to affairs under; the state, their admission was barred by sect oaths, and religious compliances with high church discipline; that the boon was a bitter pill to the presbyters of the old school: but then they cordially hated the pope and the papists, and to this saving principle they ultimately owed the indulgence of a bill,, passed from year to year, dispensing with those compliances, and allowing further time to, qualify. Thus they enjoyed, as {410} yearly tenants, privileges which served to keep them in good humour, but which might be abrogated at the discretion of parliament, so that proscription was still suspended over their heads, like the sword of Dionysius, quamdiu se bene gesserint, i.e., during good behaviour. But the mutual religious antipathy between them and the catholics, who viewed them as enemies of a deeper blue than the high church, was a clencher for the system of divide et impera.

To the system of the penal laws, although many liberal and enlightened men in and out of parliament were long hostile, yet the great majority of the protestants retained the prejudices absorbed with their mother’s milk. Lord Charlemont himself, even with all his education, liberality, and travelled experience in other countries, was never friendly to a total, and certainly not to a rapid, abrogation of the system, although his most intimate and confidential friends were the strenuous advocates for the total abolition. But even the catholics, from the knowledge of his character, respected his prejudices, and considered him a zealous and conscientious friend to his country. But though he resisted every motion of influence or aggrandisement to the wealthier catholic, he was desirous to alleviate the sufferings of the peasantry; and, in 1768, he had brought a bill into the house of lords, to enable the poor labourer to take a lease for ninety years of so much ground as might serve him for a cottage and potatoe garden: which, however, was then rejected. This measure was frequently moved in the commons, and as often failed. In 1772 he tried it again in the lords, and during some thin attendances, succeeded as far as the second reading and committal: but, to use his lordship’s own language, “the trumpet of bigotry had sounded the alarm; to give the wretched cottager a permanent interest in his miserable habitation was said to be.an infringement on the penal code, which. threatened the destruction of church and state! A cry was raised that the protestant interest was in danger. The lords were summoned, the house was crouded {411} with the zealous supporters of orthodoxy and oppression, and I was voted out of the chair, not wholly unsuspected of being little better than a papist.”

The war in which England was engaged with her American colonies ultimately involved her in a war with France, and Spain, who, at first covertly, and at last openly espoused the cause of the colonists; and while England and Ireland. were drained of their troops to carry on the ineffectual struggle with the colonies, the European seas swarmed with American and French privateers, and the squadrons of France not only swept the British seas, but hovered on our coasts, and menaced our fleets in the yery mouths of their own harbours. The invasion of Ireland was deemed by France a favourable diversion in support of America, to distract the attention of England, and oblige her to keep her trocps at home for the defence of her domestic territories; and the project was actually set on foot for the invasion of Ireland, where the whole force of the line, left there, after drafts and selections for American service, consisted of about five hundred men. The people of Belfast, mindful of the danger their town had risked) eighteen years before, in the former reign, from the descent of Thurot, and conceiving the present a much more formidable and alarming crisis, applied to the government for a force for their protection and that of their province. But their application was plainly and candidly answered by Sir Richard Heron, secretary to the then lord-lieutenant, Lord Buckinghamshire, that government could afford them none.”

This answer raised alarm throughout the whole country, and, by degrees, roused the whole nation to a sense of the pressing necessity of arming for self-defence against the common danger; and this was the first germ of that volunteer army which occupies so prominent a place in the modern history of Ireland. It is not our purpose to detail minutely its growth and progress to maturity. Government had plainly abdicated the national defence. The people volunteered, and armed, and arrayed, at their {412} own expense, for their own security. They chose their own officers, were self-clothed, armed, disciplined, and . sustained; and in the course of a year or two amounted to a force'of eighty thousand.

Of the regiment formed by the town of Armagh, Lord Charlemont was chosen to the command, as were the principal noblemen and gentlemen in other districts to the local corps. The jealousy against the catholics, who by law were debarred the use of arms, precluded their admission to join these corps for some time; but a patriotic ardour for the common safety of the country, consumed for a time all sectarious prejudices, and fixed the whole national mind into one compound, like Corinthian brass. The government did not view, without astonishment and regret, this unexpected combination and formidable array, the effects of its own work, and more remotely, of its predecessors and of England; by whose policy there had been but too many dragon’s teeth planted in the soil for a century, which there was some reason to apprehend would, on the first favourable occasion, spring up to armed men. If it were now even possible, they felt it would be highly rash and impolitic to attempt the disarray of the volunteers; and the humiliations which the British arms had felt from their ineffectual conflicts in America, taught the government rather to dissemble their antipathies, and learn to cherish the only force which could protect the country at such a crisis. Therefore the supporters as well as the opponents of administration joined their ranks, and in little more than a year their numbers amounted to four thousand two hundred more. 3 Men of all sects and orders met in the same ranks, shared in the same fare, and the same services, forgot their divisions, conversed with each other, not as formerly, like enemies or rivals, but as countrymen and friends. It became every day more clear to the liberal and unbiassed friends of the country, that something should be done for the relief of the catholics, who were in effect “strangers at home.” The people of Ireland had long {413} looked forward to the result of the American contest as the criterion of their own fate; and many of the most leading landed proprietors foresaw, that, if America should be successful in shaking off the government of England, her next project would be to encourage emigration from Europe, to people her boundless but fertile solitudes; and, with such an opportunity, it was natural to expect that the catholic population, of Ireland would: prefer: expatriation and liberty in America, to slavery, debasement, and oppression at home; and that population was of some value to the land-owner, if not to the government. Some efforts were made in England, by Sir George Saville and other leading men, for the relief of the sails there; and Lord North, then at the head of the British ministry, was highly favourable to relaxation in Ireland, but thought that any measure for that purpose should originate in the Irish parliament. Accordingly Mr. Luke Gardiner, afterwards Lord Mountjoy, a man of large possessions in the country, in 1778, brought ina bill, the chief -objects of which were to empower catholics, subscribing the oaths of allegiance, to take leases of lands for nine hundred and ninety-nine years; and to render such. property devisable and descendible, as that enjoyed by protestants; and, also, to abrogate that infamous law for enabling, and consequently encouraging, the son of a catholic gentleman to make his father, tenant for life, and. possess himself of the inheritance, by proving his, father a catholic, and conforming himself to the established church. This bill was resisted in every stage; but finally carried in the house of commons; and. in. the lords. it passed by a majority, thirty-six to twelve. Such was the change, excited by the rapid alteration .of circumstances, in parliamentary sentiment within the short space of. six years; and thus was the long proscribed catholic restored once more to the privilege of obtaining a permanent inheritance in his native country. The last-mentioned clause of this bill, Lord Charlemont supported, but opposed it on other points. The bill was gratefully accepted as an {414} important boon, and produced effects in the agriculture and industry of the country within ten years, unparalleled in the history of any nation in Europe within the like period. Still the distresses of the country were great, and her revenues reduced to a state of insolvency, from the trammelled state of her external commerce; and the nation now felt itself ina situation to remonstrate with England, in firm but moderate language, for the removal of her grievances, and a fair participation in the rights of British subjects, as a country annexed to the British crown, though under.a distinct parliament. It remained then to establish the independent privileges of that parliament, free from the control of an external senate; and the constitutional rights of Ireland, as a distinct country, to be governed by her own king, lords, and commons, under laws of their own enactment.

Now commenced the most active period of Lord Charlemont’s life. The volunteer army daily increased in strength and respectability. It was not composed of ignorant mercenaries enlisted from the lowest orders of* the community, and reduced to discipline by rigour, kept in order by severity, with little understanding or warm feeling for the interests of their country; animal machines —thoughtful of nothing but their pay, and implicit obedience to the commands of their officers. The volunteers, on the contrary, were composed universally of educated men, who read, thought, understood, and felt, for the cause in which they were engaged; for a country where they possessed rights and interests, which they had shewn themselves prompt to defend from a foreign enemy, and which they now wished to render worthy the name of a sister nation to England. Lord Charlemont was chosen to the chief command of the Leinster army, which gave him a just celebrity or distinction, which he acknowledged as the principal and dearest honour of his life; and happy it was for the country and the empire, that he, and men of his character for wisdom and moderation, were selected by the whole body to hold the chief sway {415} in their direction. For it was by the influence of their wisdom, the veneration paid to it by their country, that every thing like intemperate ebullition was. restrained, whenever such a disposition partially appeared; and the spirit of the whole was directed by loyalty to their king, but a manly and firm devotion to the rights and just claims of their country. So far as depended on Lord Charlemont, he devoted his whole time and mind to the duties he had assumed. At this time the distress of the manufacturers was great beyond conception, and tens of thousands were supported by charity, and the value of cattle and corn was so reduced by embargoes, and the consequent cessation of external demand, that the tenantry could not pay their rents. The British government, and many eminent men in parliament, were willing to yield some measures of relief, by removing the restrictions upon Irish external commerce; but the jealous clamours of the British manufacturers prevented them. Lord Charlemont corresponded with the Marquis of Rockingham, and other enlightened friends to Ireland in the British senate; but the influence of a few manufacturing towns in England prevailed against the interests of all Ireland. At length the whole country, as one man, determined on an experiment to relieve themselves—and entered into non-importation and non-consumption agreements against all English commodities whatever. This was the expedient which Dean Swift had in .ain advised, half a century before. And it suddenly produced signal effects: despondency amongst the working orders was changed to joy and gratitude. Those of the higher orders who had been most supine, were now stimulated to a sense of their duty, and the British manufacturers were quickly taught to feel, that some of their best interests were most vulnerable in that country, whose claims they resisted with such selfish hostility. Matters were now approaching to a crisis. Lord Charlemont had the honour, as well as the high satisfaction to introduce into the house of commons, as representative for his borough of Charlemont, that justly celebrated {416} orator and patriot, Henry Grattan, then a young barrister; but whose talents afterwards shed so much lustre upon his country. Towards the close of the session of parliament in 1778, an address was moved by Mr. Dennis, Daly, the object of which was, to open the trade of Ireland— but it was negatived. That gentleman and his friends (of whom Lord Charlemont was a principal one) determined to renew it in the next session: and an address was accordingly framed, and moved by Mr. Grattan in answer to the lord-lieutenant’s speech from the throne. It stated the necessity and justice of the claims of Ireland; and Mr. Burgh, then prime-serjeant, on the suggestion of Mr. Flood, moved an. amendment to the preamble, “that nothing but a free trade could save the country from ruin,” and the amendment was carried unanimously. When the house went up with the address to the castle, the Dublin Volunteers, under the command of the Duke of Leinster, lined the streets through which, they. passed, in grateful approbation, and the house, immediately at. the next meeting, voted their unanimous thanks to them. And shortly afterwards they passed, a money bil for six months, and no longer. These proceedings excited the attention of the British ministry; and some commercial, resolutions in favour of Ireland, were ably introduced by Lord North, in the British house of commons. These resolutions re-opened the woollen trade of Ireland, and gave a freedom of commerce with the British colonies, which were received in Ireland with marked demonstrations of public joy and gratitude. Mr. Grattan, some short time afterwards, acting in concert with his noble friend, Lord Charlemont, moved in parliament a declaration of rights in favour of Ireland, prefaced by a most animated and splendid oration. It was, however, resisted by the court members, and failed. The popular indignation roused by this circumstance, vented itself in angry but justifiable resolutions, and addresses. Parliament did not rise till September 1780, and Lord Buckinghamshire was recalled from the government the Christmas following. {417}

He was succeeded by the Earl of Carlisle, accompanied by Mr. Eden, (afterwards Lord Auckland,) as his secretary. The nation called out for independence; for without a free constitution, they regarded a free trade as insecure. Lord Carlisle did not meet parliament till the October after his arrival; and the plan of a national bank was proposed as a measure of popularity to his administration, and adopted.

In the year 1781, an event took place. peculiarly illustrative of the ardent loyalty, which. prevailed in the northern volunteer army, different in no respect from what would have been shewn in any other part of the kingdom, had occasion required it. A rumour was prevalent, that the French had determined on the invasion of Ireland; Lord Charlemont, in consequence, waited on the lord-lieutenant, who acquainted him there was strong reason to believe the rumour authentic, and that a letter from Lord Stormont, then secretary of state, gave many particulars of the proposed expedition, and stated that Cork was the meditated point of attack. Lord Charlemont proposed, that, with his excellency’s permission, he should proceed to the north, with “the fullest reliance of obtaining” a volunteer auxiliary force there, ready to march to the southward, and baffle every attempt of the enemy. The viceroy warmly approved his proposal, and his lordship set out next morning, and reached Armagh that night. The officers of his own corps (which consisted of one thousand infantry, with two troops of horse and two companies of artillery) were at that time in the town, attending the assizes; and no sooner had his lordship stated to them his object, and asked what they would authorise him to say to the viceroy, than the lieutenant-colonel, authorised by the rest of the officers, expressed that “his regiment were extremely hurt that his lordship, whom they had unanimously chosen as their colonel, should feel it necessary to make an application so hurtful to, their feelings, for with the reliance which they hoped he had on their spirit and obedience, he should in the first instance have assured thee. {418} lord-lieutenant that his regiment were ready, at a moment’s warning, to march and join the king’s troops at Cork, and he had then but to send down his orders, and they would have instantly obeyed, and marched to meet the enemy.” They would hearken to no declaratory resolutions; it was only requisite to inform his excellency they should be at Cork as soon as any other troops in the king’s service, and they entreated he would never again use them so ill as to make a similar application, but answer for them in his own name, and command them any where, at any time. The whole northern army followed this gallant example, and fifteen thousand men declared themselves ready to march, at a moment’s notice, for the south, and place themselves under the command of his majesty’s generals, leaving a sufficient force behind for the defence of the northern counties. This promptitude gave the highest pleasure to his lordship, because it enabled him to shew to his excellency the disposition of his countrymen. His excellency, at his lordship’s request, ordered camp equipages to be furnished to such corps as were unprovided; and it may be fairly presumed, that the same spirit, manifested throughout the country, induced the enemy to abandon his project.

In such intervals of leisure as his military duties afforded, the peaceful retreat of his elegant villa at Marino, bordering on Dublin bay, or his town residence in Rutland square, afforded the opportunities of literary amusement, and intercourse with his friends in the metropolis. Both structures were simple, but tasteful specimens of architecture, in the Grecian style, and furnished with excellent libraries, and works of statuary and paintings, by the first artists.

The parliament at length assembled, and Lord Charlemont, on the first day of its session, moved the thanks of the house of lords to the volunteers, which passed unanimously, as did.a similar motion on the same day in the house of commons. The viceroy, Lord Carlisle, most strongly recommended to the English cabinet, a dereliction {419} of all claims of the British parliament to bind Ireland by any laws made at Westminster, as theretofore; and Lord Charlemont looked with confidence to the conduct of parliament itself, from which he augured the speedy accomplishment of the great objects so anxiously desired by the country. At length took place the memorable convention at Dungannon, the proposal for which originated from the southern battalion of the first Ulster regiment, commanded by Lord Charlemont. The officers and delegates of that battalion met on the 28th of December, 1781, and resolved to publish a declaration “that they beheld with the utmost concern the little attention paid to the constitutional rights of Ireland, by the majority of those whose duty it was to establish and preserve them,” and they invited every volunteer association throughout their province to send delegates to deliberate on the alarming situation of public affairs; and fixed on Friday, the 15th of February, 1782, for such an assembly, at Dungannon. On that day the representatives of one hundred and forty-three corps of volunteers of Ulster assembled accordingly; Colonel William Irvine took the chair; and the assembly was composed of gentlemen of the most considerable fortune, their loyalty and patriotism were well known and acknowledged, and they formed twenty resolutions, declaratory of the rights and grievances of their country, and at the same time expressive of their exultation in the late relaxation of the penal laws against their Roman catholic countrymen; and they concluded by voting the following short, spirited, and impressive address to the minority in both houses of parliament: -

“My lords and gentlemen;

“We thank you for your noble and spirited, though hitherto ineffectual efforts in defence of the great constitutional rights of your country: go on! the almost unanimous voice of the people is with you, and, in a free country, the voice of the people must prevail.
 “We know our duty to our sovereign, and are loyal. We know our duty to ourselves, and are resolved to be {420} free. We seek for our rights, and no more than our rights: and in so just a pursuit, we should wha the being of a Providence, if we doubted of success.”

The moderate temper but manly firmness of this address greatly disappointed the hopes of the enemies of the country; and the proceedings of the convention seemed to attach the applause even of foes, as well as friends. In little more than a month the British ministry gave way; and Lord Carlisle having sent in his resignation to London, through his secretary, Mr. Eden, - his lordship was succeeded in the viceroyalty by the Duke of Portland, attended by Colonel Fitzpatrick, (brother to Lord Ossory,) as his secretary. His grace, on his arrival, was hailed by all ranks as the harbinger of liberty, conciliation, and peace. A whig ministry in England, at the head of which was the Marquis of Rockingham, and a whig viceroy in Ireland, who had zealously co-operated with that ministry, were omens highly auspicious to the hopes of Lord Charlemont, for the completion of those objects for which he had laboured throughout his political life, and so highly were his character, his integrity, and his weight in the political scale of his country estimated, that the change of men and measures were announced to him by a most cordial and congratulatory letter from his old friend, the Marquis of Buckingham; and his confidence and support earnestly solicited by the new viceroy and his secretary immediately on their arrival. He received at the same time, another letter from Mr. Fox, couched in a similar spirit of confidence, and giving the strongest assurances of the cordial. wishes of the new administration to promote in every way the prosperity, the freedom, and the attachment of Ireland; to which suitable answers were returned by his lordship.

In the proceedings of the 16th April, 1782, the resolutions moved by Mr, Grattan, in the house of commons, and carried, were objected to at the castle, not so much for their substance (for the British ministry meant fairly) as because they were thought to require some modifications, which, in the opinion of Lord Charlemont and his friends, {421} would have diminished their weight and efficacy. Perhaps, the Duke of Portland might think they would not meet the concurrence of the British cabinet without some alteration. Lord Charlemont had some interviews with his grace on the subject, and declared the intention of himself and his friends, to move the resolutions again in both houses without any alteration; and that ministers might take what course they thought fit. In this state of uncertainty, when the house met, it was wholly unknown to Lord Charlemont and his friends, whether the resolutions and address, which Mr. Grattan was to move, would, be opposed by government, or not. Mr. Grattan, however, persevered; and, though much indisposed, he prefaced his declaration of rights by a most splendid oration.. He stated the three great causes of complaint on the part of Ireland; namely, the declaratory statute of George I enabling the British parliament to make laws to bind Ireland; the perpetual meeting bill, which rendered the standing army of Ireland independent of the control of parliament; and the unconstitutional powers of the Irish privy council, to mutilate, or suppress, bills of the Irish parliament on their way to England for the royal assent. The repeal of these obnoxious statutes, and the-abolition of that most improper sway of the Irish privy council, were, he said, the terms on which alone he could be induced to support the government. The address to his majesty, stating the grievances of Ireland, and the declaration of rights, were then moved by him in answer to the king’s message. The sense of the house, in favour of the address, was unequivocally manifest. All opposition, if any were intended, was relinquished; and the address passed unanimously; as did a similar one in the house of lords. The British ministry acted with candour and magnanimity. Mr. Fox moved the repeal of the obnoxious statute of George I in the British house of commons with his usual ability. Lord Shelburne moved a similar resolution in the lords; and the repeal was immediately adopted. If any thing could surpass the patriotic zeal {422} and temperate firmness which marked the conduct of the Irish parliament and people in pursuit of their constitutional rights, it was the unbounded joy and generous gratitude they manifested on this first pledge of political sincerity on the part of the British government toward Ireland. The parliament Voted twenty thousand seamen for his majesty’s navy; and the whole volunteer body cheerfully engaged to contribute their aid and influence in raising the men. A sum of £50,000 was unanimously voted to Mr. Grattan, as a tribute from his grateful country, for those exertions of his eloquence which so mainly contributed to the restoration of her rights; and a day of public thanksgiving was appointed to the Almighty for that union, harmony, and cordial affection so happily effected between the two kingdoms.

But, notwithstanding the unanimity which seemed to have prevailed in parliament, that the simple repeal of the statute of George I was an ample renouncement of all right, on the part of the English parliament, to legislate for Ireland, a few members, at the head of whom was Mr. Flood, now came forward to start. objections, and to declare that nothing was done, and that nothing short of entire and formal renunciation on the part of England, of all right to bind Ireland by British laws, could be valid or efficient. But all the powers of Mr. Flood’s eloquence could not persuade the parliament to adopt this notion; and they declared themselves almost unanimously satisfied with the simple repeal, as fully binding upon the honour of England: “The nation,” said Mr. Grattan, “that insists on the humiliation of another, is a foolish nation.” But notwithstanding the satisfaction expressed by parliament, a very opposite feeling prevailed out of doors—discontent gained ground - the arguments of Mr. Flood had a very general influence.

On the 31st of July, the volunteers of Belfast declared, by a majority of two, “that the nation ought not to be satisfied with what had been done.” Many other corps followed their example: and Mr. Grattan, for whose patriotic conduct and eloquent exertions, the whole nation {423} seemed of late to be so unanimously grateful, was reviled, both in and out of parliament, by the partisans of Mr. Flood’s doctrines against the efficacy of simple repeal, But that which seemed to heap new combustibles on this newly kindled flame, was the attempt of Lord Abingdon to introduce a bill in the British house of lords, asserting the right of Great Britain to legislate externally for Ireland; and the basis of this bill was a preamble, stating, that whereas the kings of England having been acknowledged sovereigns of the English seas for eighteen centuries, the British parliament had the sole right to make laws to regulate the external commerce of Great Britain, and all such kingdoms as are under its sovereignty. There was also a clause in the bill, stating, that whereas Queen Elizabeth having formerly forbad the kings of France to build more ships than they then had, without her leave first obtained, it enacted that no kingdom, as above stated, Ireland, as well as others, should presume to build a navy, or any ship or ships of war without leave from the lord high admiral of England.” The very announcement of this bill excited a strong and general ferment in Ireland, and raised such distrust and indignation among the volunteer corps who had pledged their exertions for raising the twenty thousand seamen, that they desisted from their laudable endeavours: and a numerous and respectable corps in the metropolis, then under the immediate command of Lord Charlemont, entered into very warm resolutions against enrolling any seamen, and sent their resolutions to his lordship, then in the north, with the warmest expressions of personal respect and kindness. To this his lordship returned a polite and moderate answer, in which he shewed them the rashness of suffering themselves to be alarmed by the measure in question, which was “the production of an individual nobleman, actuated by his own private whim and prejudice, and not adopted, nor even suffered to proceed to discussion in the English parliament. The speech of Lord Abingdon in his attempt to introduce {494} this bill, was ably and explicitly replied to, and. the bill was not even suffered to lie on the table. Were the volunteers of Ireland, therefore, upon every breath of rumour, to agitate their own minds, to forfeit the steadiness of their character, or to desist from proceeding in a measure to which “the nation was bound in honour, and so essentially necessary to the security of their country, as well as England, by manning the Channel fleet for common defence against the common enemy?” This persuasive remonstrance had the desired effect, and all apprehension vanished. A most respectable meeting was called in Dublin, and Lord Charlemont was requested to take the chair, and, pursuant to the desire of the meeting, wrote to every sheriff in Ireland, strongly recommending to their zealous support this important service; and from all quarters received the most satisfactory assurances of their compliance. The act for repealing the statute of George I having received the royal assent, a correspondence followed between Lord Charlemont, and the Marquis of Rockingham, and Mr. Burke. The marquis, in terms of the most cordial esteem, congratulated his lordship on the happy change of circumstances for his country, as did Mr. Burke; and both earnestly recommended the speediest possible completion of the generous and well-timed offer of Ireland, to raise the twenty thousand seamen: acquainting him that Lord Keppel had sent one of the best and most alert officers in the navy, Captain M’Bride, to receive the men; which would enable him in three weeks to man fourteen additional ships of the line, for Lord Howe’s command, which would enable the British fleet to cope with the enemy, though superior in number of their line of battle ships; and nothing but the friendly efforts of Ireland could rapidly furnish men for the purpose.

To this letter Lord Charlemont answered, by expressing his confidence in the success of the measure, in spite of a discontented party, and promising his own best-efforts to promote it. The men were accordingly raised, Lord {425} Howe’s fleet of fourteen sail of the line were manned, and the world has heard of the result, that the enemy’s fleet — was utterly defeated.

In the summer of 1782 a plan was proposed by. government to supply the deficiency of the troops of the line, which, from the number of twelve thousand men, settled in Lord Townshend’s administration, as the standing force of the country, was now reduced by drafts for foreign service to three thousand men, not sufficient. for garrison duty: and the plan proposed was to raise four provincial regiments of one thousand men each, under the name of fencibles; to be enrolled, for three years, or for the war, and officered by Irish gentlemen, with rank according to the numbers they should respectively raise, and not be sent out of Ireland. The plan was submitted to Lord Charlemont, with an offer of commanding the whole or part, with the rank. of major-general.. The latter offer he declined on the first instant, and afterwards stated to the viceroy his objections to the entire plan. From his peculiar situation, he knew it would be highly unpopular. If, however, on full consideration, it should appear eligible, its mere unpopularity would not sway him as an honest man. The volunteers would certainly consider it as a direct attempt to undermine them, who had manifested such alacrity for the defence of. their country. In the result, however, Lord Charlemont’s predictions of the unpopularity of the measure were fully verified, and although there were above one hundred and fifty applications for commissions in the proposed regiments, and many of those from the most outrageously abusive enemies of the fencible scheme, the plan was abandoned; and the lord-lieutenant expressed to Lord. Charlemont his regret that his lordship had proved so true a prophet.

When the volunteer regiments of Leinster were reviewed by Lord Charlemont in the Phoenix Park, the Duke of Portland was present; and on being thanked by the noble general at the next levée, for the honour his grace had done the volunteer troops by his presence; his grace {426} replied, “‘ Surely my lord, a body of troops formed on such principles, could not be so near one without a desire on my part to see their exertions in the field.” The like attention was shewn every where by the officers of government; and whenever the king’s troops, then under the chief command of General Burgoyne, met with the volunteers, military honours were reciprocated. To Lord Charlemont himself, as a commandant, every degree of military respect was paid by the king’s troops wherever he passed. And on his road to Limerick, passing through the town of Nenagh, a party of the 18th light dragoons insisted on mounting guard for him at his inn, whilst he staid, and a party of the same regiment escorted him on his journey, as far as he would permit.

Earl Temple (afterwards Marquis of Buckingham) succeeded the Duke of Portland in the viceroyalty in 1782 and, previous to his arrival, wrote to Lord Charlemont announcing his appointment, and soliciting, as his predecessor had done, his lordship’s support to his administration. Lord Charlemont replied, by expressing his regret for the departure of the Duke of Portland, whose principles and conduct had been the sole motive of his attachment and support; and assuring the new viceroy of his support upon the same grounds only. 7

About this time, his majesty was pleased to found an order of knighthood in Ireland, by the appellation of The Knights of St. Patrick; and Earl Temple, who had his majesty’s commands to select such a list of Irish names, as might best promote his majesty’s intentions of placing this order on the most honourable footing—addressed, with his own hand, a letter to Lord Charlemont, stating, that he could not better promote his majesty’s wishes, than by addressing himself to a nobleman, whose birth, rank, fortune, and character, as well as his eminent public services, entitled him to the veneration and gratitude of his country; and requesting permission to place his name on the list of new knights. This honour his lordship accepted with suitable expressions of his feelings for the distinction {427} - but on the same conditions of perfect parliamentary independence, as he had many years before accepted the dignity of his earldom; and both were the more honourable, because the spontaneous offers of the crown, wholly unsolicited on his partp.

Notwithstanding the conciliatory measures then accomplished, there were still some embers of former discontent on the subject of simple repeal, not extinguished, and nothing short of an explicit and total renunciation of the British parliament to legislate for Ireland, could appease the malcontents. Lord Charlemont and his friends still thought such a demand indelicate, because indicative of suspicion towards the honour and sincerity of England. But his lordship, who had daily intelligence of what was passing, saw clearly the enemies of tranquillity in Ireland would never be quiet until this point was conceded: and he therefore judged, that to relinquish that point, would afford the last chance of exploding all pretences for irritation. But anew flame was kindled by the circumstance of a writ of error from the Irish courts to the court of king’s bench in England, transmitted previous to the new order of things, being entertained and acted upon by Lord Mansfield. This circumstance was regarded as an instance of punic faith on the part of England: and the uproar against the simple repealists, was louder than ever. In vain did Lord Charlemont strive to allay the gathering storm; although he considered the occurrence fortunate, as it would prevent such a circumstance being repeated in future. But it led to the adoption of a measure which silenced all apprehensions, for the draught of a reconciliatory bill was transmitted by Lord Temple to Westminster, which was introduced into the British parliament with some modification; passed both houses without opposition; and finally received the royal assent. Lord Temple continued in office until the coalition between Mr. Fox, and Lord North, took place; when his lordship was succeeded by Lord Northington. The friendship between them and Lord Charlemont continued undiminished, and {428} the volunteers of Dublin co-operating with their venerated commander, escorted Earl Temple to the water-side on his return to England, as a testimonial of their gratitude and respect. Lord Northington, who was appointed under the influence of Mr. Fox, paid the same respect and confidence to Lord Charlemont, his predecessors had done; and by him his lordship was called to the privy council; an honour which he accepted on the condition that his friend Mr. Grattan should be called to a seat in the same assembly; an arrangement which shortly afterwards took place.

The friends of conciliation and tranquillity were now congratulating each other upon the happy termination of all political disputes between the sister countries, when a new and unforeseen theme of contention arose, which, in its progress, more seriously threatened the public tranquillity than any topic which had heretofore heated the public mind; it was the question of parliamentary reform. The fatal issue of the American war had completely chagrined the advocates of that measure; and the galling weight of taxation incurred by that contest, exasperated the people of England—quite weary of so hopeless a pursuit, in which the great majority of them had been so ardent in the outset. The corrupt state of parliamentary representation was now considered as the source of all their calamities; and Mr. Pitt, then just of age, and first advancing into public notice, became the avowed champion of parliamentary reform in England. The people of Ireland had at least as much reason as those of England to complain of the state of their representation; and the voice of reform in England was immediately re-echoed in Ireland; not simply by assemblies of the people, but by the volunteer army, - issuing indeed from the people, but still a military body, numerous and formidable; and however well intentioned that army in general was, there was much reason to apprehend that amongst them some of great popular influence were desirous of carrying matters much beyond the line of modification and improvement. The whole {429} kingdom was much agitated on the subject. A provincial meeting, assembled at Cork, on the 1st of March, 1783, published many strong resolutions in favour of reform; and in the north, another meeting of delegates from fortyfive volunteer corps, assembled at Lisburne, on the Ist of July following, and afterwards at Belfast, on the 19th of the same month (which afterwards corresponded with Mr. Pitt, the Duke of Richmond, and other British advocates for reform) and they addressed a letter to Lord Charlemont, then on a visit to his friend Mr. Brownlow, at Laydon, soliciting, not only his lordship’s support in favour of a reform for which he had already avowed the warmest approbation, but entreating the communication of his lordship’s sentiments at large on the subject, pointing out such a specific mode of reform, and the most eligible steps leading to it, as came up to his lordship’s ideas; and naming several specific points, requesting his lordship’s opinion, whether they were subjects upon. which the volunteers of Ireland ought to interfexe: his lordship’s opinion to be communicated to the chairman of their meeting at Dungannon, appointed for the 8th of September following; together with a sketch of such resolutions as he should sick proper to be proposed at that meeting.

In his lordship’s answer to this letter, after acknowledging the honour of their high opinion, he declined giving any opinion beyond the reform itself, upon the specific detail of subordinate points, which involved questions for the most able and minute discussion; and suggested that at the meeting, the measure alone should be recommended, without specifying any mode, leaving that entirely to the consideration of parliament.

The meeting, however, was held at Dungannon, on the appointed day; and consisted of delegates from two hundred and sixty-nine volunteer corps. Mr. Stewart, member for Tyrone, in the chair. Lord Bristol, then bishop of Derry, was also present. Many resolutions were passed; and a grand national convention was suggested to be held {430} at Dublin, on the 10th of November following; to consist of five persons from each county, to be chosen by ballot, to digest a plan of parliamentary reform, and adopt such measures as appeared most likely to effect it. An address to the volunteers of Munster, Leinster, and Connaught, accompanied this resolution, Other resolutions were adopted; and particularly one for extending the elective franchise to the Roman catholics.

The convention at Dublin at length took place. The government was by no means at ease; but many of the delegates chosen were of a character and description which greatly soothed their fears; and, amongst others, Lord Charlemont and Mr. Brownley, who were chosen for Armagh; Mr. Stewart, for Tyrone; and many noblemen and gentlemen of large property and known moderation, chosen by other counties, whose hatred to anarchy had been always manifest.

This convention elected Lord Charlemont to their president’s chair; an honour which his lordship accepted, as he had done the delegation for Armagh, solely with a view to co-operate with many other delegates, the friends of order and moderation, to prevent violence. And another motive was to hinder the Bishop of Derry from being called to the chair, for which that prelate, a very eccentric and violent man, was extremely solicitous, and to which he would have been chosen, had Lord Charlemont declined. The delegates adjourned their sittings, for more room, to the rotunda in Rutland square. Their noble president led the way, escorted by a squadron of volunteer cavalry.

The assembly was extremely numerous, and in general highly respectable; but, in consequence of a mixture of some characters too ardent in natural temper and political feelings to be easily controlled by the friends of moderation, debates ran high, from day to day; and innumerable projects of reform poured in upon the committees appointed to receive them, and prepare a specific plan to be reported to the convention. At length, upon the motion of the Bishop of Derry, Mr. Flood was chosen a {431} member of the superior committee, and soon attained by his imposing talents a marked ascendency. The Bishop of Derry strenuously supported the resolution for extending the elective franchise to the catholics; but Mr. Flood as strenuously, but more successfully, opposed it. Lord Charlemont and his friends, thinking the measure at that time premature, opposed it also, and it was finally rejected. Various other plans for the reform itself met a similar fate; and, finally, Mr. Flood produced one of his own, which, upon full discussion, was not deemed better than others which had been rejected.

We shall not here attempt to detail the proceedings of the convention more at length. The assembly, however, at length tired out by the multiplicity of visionary projects, all turned towards Lord Charlemont for his opinion. Averse alike to ostentation and public speaking, he had hitherto remained silent; but now declared his readiness to sacrifice the only borough he possessed to the wishes of that country, in trust for which he had always held it. In a conversation, which his lordship held apart with the Bishop of Derry, that noble and reverend prelate, in allusion to the catholic question, took the liberty of telling his lordship “that his conduct was by no means generally approved, and that he was considered as rather lukewarm in the cause of reform.” An unpleasant conversation followed, which closed with the following declaration of his lordship:

“The difference I make between the former and present objects of our exertions is this, - Whilst Ireland was in effect subject to a foreign legislature, there were no lengths to which I would not have gone to rescue her from a state which I considered as positive slavery. To that point I had pledged my life and fortune; and towards the attainment of it I would willingly and cheerfully have hazarded not only them, but what was still more dear to me, and far more important, the peace of my country. Our present object I esteem great, and of high importance; and to attain it, will do every thing not inconsistent with {432} the public peace, but I will go no farther. Make what use of this you please.”

The convention had now sat three weeks, and a new parliament having met at the end of October, was sitting the while. Lord Charlemont, who sedulously attended in the duties of his presidency, had suffered much from close confinement. Mr. Flood, having carried the resolution for adopting his plan of reform, to the astonishment of Lord Charlemont and the other friends of moderation, he rose in the assembly on the afternoon of Saturday, November 29th, and proposed that he himself, accompanied by such members of parliament as were then present, should go down to the house of commons, and move leave for a bill for parliamentary reform, precisely corresponding with the plan he had submitted—”and that the convention should not adjourn till the fate of his motion was ascertained.” Here was a complete avowal of a deliberative assembly, co-existing with the parliament, and almost assuming co-extensive authority. The motion, however, was carried: Lord Charlemont and his friends saw the rashness and impropriety of such a step; but Mr. Flood’s ascendency at that time bore down all opposition. He hurried to the house of commons, and proposed his motion for adopting his plan. The aspect of the house was truly awful. Several of the minority, and all the delegates who came with Mr. Flood from the convention, were in military uniform.—A most tumultuous debate ensued, which before morning became almost a tempest; but Mr. Flood’s motion was lost upon the division, one hundred and fifty-nine against one hundred and seventy-seven, and this was followed by a declaratory determination of the house to maintain its just rights and privileges against any encroachment whatever. A vote for an address to the throne was afterwards carried, as the joint address of both houses, expressive of perfect satisfaction in his majesty’s government, and a determination to support it with their lives and fortunes,

In the mean time, the convention having sat above two {433} hours without any intelligence from Mr. Flood, Lord Charlemont, suspecting what would be the fate of that gentleman’s motion, and anxious to prevent any new error, prevailed on them to adjourn till the following Monday. There was a numerous meeting on the intermediate Sunday, at Charlemont House, whereat it was agreed, that the public peace should be the first object of attention; his lordship received numerous messages from delegates of whom he had scarce any personal knowledge, that they were ready to follow him in any measure he should propose. On the Monday morning he took the chair at an early hour. A delegate rose and began to inveigh against the house of commons. His lordship instantly called the delegate to order, observing, that one of the wisest rules of parliamentary proceedings was never to take notice in one house of what was said in another. This had the desired effect, and promoted order and harmony through the day.

Lord Charlemont’s own plan at the original meeting of the convention, was to prevent all intercourse between parliament and that assembly; and that the delegates having once agreed to a plan of reform, the convention should be dissolved, and that the delegates should then lay before their respective county meetings, regularly convened, the plan agreed on, in order that: the subject should be submitted through their representatives in dutiful petitions to parliament. This was certainly the most unexceptionable mode of proceeding, but Mr. Flood’s genius prevailed against it. It was thought advisable, however, that the delegates should not separate without some plan of parliamentary reform still to be kept in view. Two resolutions were therefore passed unanimously, declaring the sense of the convention, that the delegates of counties, cities, and towns, in conjunction with the other freeholders, should forward the plan of reform agreed to by the assembly, by convening county meetings and instructing their representatives in parliament to support it; and {434,} exhorting the nation to use every constitutional effort to effect that reform so manifestly necessary.

An address to his majesty was then voted, declaring their loyalty to their sovereign, and their attachment to Great Britain was thought the most dignified reply to asperities cast on the assembly by some members in parliament. The address was couched in the most dutiful terms, and concluded with imploring his majesty that their humble wish to have certain manifest perversions of parliamentary representation in the kingdom, remedied by the legislature in some reasonable degree, might not be imputed to any spirit of innovation in them; but to a sober and laudable desire to uphold the constitution, to confirm the satisfaction of their fellow-subjects, and to perpetuate the cordial union of both kingdoms.

Lord Charlemont, fully aware of the evil consequence to which the longer continuance of such an assembly in the metropolis, might be liable, wisely insisted that no other business should be proceeded on, and the convention finally adjourned.

Thus terminated this memorable meeting; and happy was it for Ireland, and the empire, that Lord Charlemont and other noblemen and gentlemen of his wise and moderate principles, had sway enough to prevent the seeds of anarchy so plentifully sown by indiscreet and impetuous partisans, from coming to maturity. The dissolution of the convention excited little or no public sensation. To above three-fourths of the population, namely, the catholic body, their proceedings were viewed with jealousy, if not with disappointment and disgust; for while their plan of reform talked of extending the right of suffrage to the possession of property in every shape, and at the same “time, to perpetuate exclusion from that: suffrage to their catholic countrymen, was a strange contradiction: and thus, while they professed to erect a temple of general freedom for the people, three-fourths of that people were to be precluded from entering even the vestibule. The {435} cordiality which had for some time subsisted between Lord Charlemont and Lord Northington, had considerably cooled. The introduction of John Scott (afterwards Earl of Clonmell), and John Fitzgibbon (afterwards Earl of Clare) to: power, had: alienated his lordship from the viceroy, whom, on the other hand, the convention had alienated from Lord Charlemont, who had continued his attendances at the viceroy’s levee; after the convention was dissolved; but his visits were received with such cold civility, that he now declined them: entirely. He had done the state important services in that very convention, and gratitude, rather than frowns and: coldness, was the due meed of himself and many of his friends, who acted with him, and now shared in the same wore treatment.

The coalition ministry of Mr. Fox and Lord North were soon removed from their places, and Lord Northington of course from the government of Ireland, and was succeeded by the Duke of Rutland.

Early in 1786, Lord Charlemont was elected president of the Royal Irish Academy, incorporated under the auspices of his majesty, and to which such a president was both an honour and an ornament, as well as an able and active promoter of its laudable purposes, which embraced the three compartments} of science, polite literature, and antiquities. The volunteer army—the great objects of its formation being now accomplished, began rapidly to diminish in its numbers. This circumstance was observed by Lord. Charlemont; but his solicitude and attention to them, suffered no abatement; and in this and the following year their reviews were continued, for he was aware that if he relinquished the command of those bands, there were not wanting some who might seize on that command, for purposes not so patriotic as his own; besides that, it was more wise to suffer those corps to fade away tacitly under his calm and auspicious rule, than that they should receive an-angry and ill-timed mandate from the castle, for dispersion; which, instead of obedience, might have produced {436} a recal of their old companions to join their ranks. His lordship’s military attentions were now divided between the volunteers of the metropolis, and those of the north - and the rest of his time was filled up by literary or personal intercourse with his friends. The country, with some few slight exceptions, was now quiet, and began to manifest the happy effects of its new-born liberties by rapid advances in agriculture and commerce. After the close of the session of 1787, the Duke of Rutland died, universally lamented, and his remains were attended to the sea-side, on their way to England, with the most honourable marks of sorrow and funereal respect. The Marquis of Buckingham; formerly Earl Temple, returned once more to Ireland as viceroy, and his administration for some time moved with unusual tranquillity. On the 16th July, Lord Charlemont once more reviewed the volunteers near Belfast: and at this period the flames of discord broke out in the county of Armagh, of which his lordship was governor. This feud originated in a petty quarrel between two presbyterians, in which a Roman catholic espoused one of the parties. This affray lighted up a religious war through the whole county. The protestant and presbyterian parties assumed the appellation of “Peep-o’-day Boys,”—and the catholics that of “Defenders;” and much blood was spilled. But by the benign influence of Lord Charlemont, at least a temporary peace was restored—but unfortunately, that peace was delusive; and the seeds of mutual hostility sown by this quarrel, afterwards sprung forth with mischievous luxuriance.

In the ensuing session, the most prominent topic which occupied the discussions of parliament, was the question of regency, arising from the unhappy illness of his majesty. The arduous debates which took place on this occasion in both parliaments, are now matter of history, and not necessary for detail here. It will be sufficient to notice, that the two parliaments materially differed from each other. That of England—declared its own power to provide for the temporary incompetency of the reigning {437} monarch, and to appoint any regent they thought fit, with+ out being limited by any considerations of the hereditary rights of the heir apparent; but, as matter of discretion, they voted the office to his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, with restricted authority; while the parliament of Ireland asserted its own independence, and distinct. power. of appointing a regent) for Ireland, uncontrolled by the example, or the decisions of the British parliament; they considered the right of the heir apparent. to represent his royal father during his incompetency, as paramount to all other considerations; and they voted the regency of Ireland to the Prince of Wales, with the full powers of the crown to which he was the rightful heir. Lord Charlemont and all his parliamentary friends joined in supporting the independence of the parliament of Ireland—and in voting the regency unrestricted to his royal highness. Their object was strongly opposed by the whole influence of the viceroy. An address was moved to his royal highness, in: the house of commons, by Mr. Grattan, and in the house of lords by Lord Charlemont—requesting him to assume the government of Ireland, with the style and title of Prince Regent, and in the name and behalf of his majesty, to exercise all regal powers during his majesty’s indisposition, and no longer; and it was carried. With this address both houses waited on the lord-lieutenant, to request its transmission to England. But his excellency refused the transmission, as inconsistent with his official oath. A, vote of censure upon this conduct of the viceroy, passed both houses; and the lords delegated two of their members, the Duke of Leinster, and Lord Charlemont; and the commons, four, Mr. John O’Neal, Mr. Connoly, Mr. William Ponsonby, and Mr. James Stewart, to wait on his royal highness with the address; and they proceeded forthwith to London. But the happy restoration of his majesty’s health, terminated all further proceedings respecting the regency in both kingdoms. The delegates, however, were received by his royal highness with the most. courteous expressions of the high sense he felt of the {438} flattering marks of attachment shewn him by the parliament of Ireland. But this first attempt of the Irish parliament to exercise its new-born independence, by differing from that of England, on a point of so much importance, planted the first germ of that jealousy in the British cabinet, which determined them to watch for the first convenient opportunity of punishing the presumption of the parliament of Ireland, by extinction: and accordingly it afforded the great principle of argument on which the subsequent measure of legislative union was founded.

Lord Buckingham’s resignation was a consequence naturally resulting from the vote of censure on his conduct passed by both houses of parliament, and he was succeeded in the viceroyalty by the Earl of Westmoreland, with Lord Hobart for his secretary. Lord Lifford, the chancellor, died about the same period, and made way for the promotion of Mr. John Fitzgibbon, attorney-general, — to the seals. Some of the opponents of Lord Buckingham, upon the regency question, fell back quietly into their old situations; but several of the more prominent and formidable were dismissed from their situations, and from those with their adherents was gradually formed an opposition, one of the most formidable in point of numbers, respectability, and talents, that had encountered the administration of Ireland for many years. They formed themselves into a Whig Club, adopted the blue and buff uniform, as well as the principles of the Whig Club in England. In the formation of this club, Lord Charlemont was prominently active, and also in the formation of a similar club at Belfast, where his esteemed friend: Dr. Halliday, a whig of the old constitutional school, warmly co-operated in his views. But this was a measure by no means satisfactory to the ministerial party, some of whom scrupled not to impute to both, principles of anarchy. But such imputations were disregarded as the ebullitions of political rancour, which had been sustained from time immemorial by similar associations of talent and patriotism, acting chiefly, if not solely, to protect the purity of the {439} constitution from ministerial encroachment. By the members of the new Whig Club were proposed, and maintained with firmness and eloquence, a place bill, a pension bill, a responsibility bill, a bill to prevent revenue officers from voting at elections; similar to those bills which had long been the law of England. Session after session were those bills resisted with effect by the administration and its adherents, but perseverance at length procured their adoption. Lord Charlemont attended all the arduous debates of that day, and spent more of his time in the commons than in the lords, where Lord Fitzgibbon began to rule with almost unlimited sway. A principal ground of attack on ministers in the house of commons, was the creation of fourteen new places for members of parliament, for the purpose of increasing an unconstitutional influence in that house, and conferring the honours of the peerage for money, which was expended in the purchase of seats in the lower house, for the like unconstitutional purpose. This most criminating charge was but feebly resisted by the ministerial party, who were content to vindicate themselves by recrimination on their opponents, that similar practices had taken place during Lord Northington’s administration, which some of the leading members of the present opposition had advised and supported. The fact, however, serves to shew the system of expedients by which the ministers of the day were constrained to support their influence in parliament; but while the honours of the peerage were thus carried to market, and sold to the best bidder, who would only pledge his support to ministers, it was deemed necessary to wound the feelings of a nobleman who had always proudly maintained the dignity of his own hereditary rank, the independence of his principles, and the attachment of his country. Lord Charlemont, whose ancestors, for more than a century, had held the lieutenancy of the county of Armagh, had now joined with him in that office, Lord Gosfort, and this without any previous intimation, or any motive assigned: for the first intimation {440} to his lordship of the circumstance, was from a friend who had accidentally read the appointment in the Dublin Gazette. His lordship wrote immediately to the secretary of the viceroy, and gave in his resignation. This measure served to mark the feeling entertained at the castle of Lord Charlemont’s political conduct; but with his country it served to exalt still higher, the man whom ministers meant to degrade. A meeting of the freeholders of Armagh assembled, who voted to his lordship a most affectionate address, in which they marked the indignation which they felt for the indignity offered him, and this address was signed by one thousand three hundred and seventy-three of the most respectable names.

The alarming progress of the French revolution, vail; after overturning the monarchy in France, menaced the political systems of all Europe, had also its influence upon the state of Ireland, and the policy of the British government, in relation thereto. The French revolution at its outset had the approbation and good wishes of many of the most loyal men in both countries, and the proceedings of the revolutionists, and the discussions which took place in France, were read with avidity by all classes of people in Great Britain and Ireland. His majesty’s ministers foresaw that from the state of things between the revolutionists of France and the continental powers, England might ultimately be involved in a war, if not on her own account, yet in support of some of her allies: and therefore the good policy of conciliating all feelings of popular discontent at home must be obvious,on the approach of a crisis when the whole physical force of the empire might become necessary to her own security. To secure the affections of the catholic population in Ireland, forming four-fifths of the whole, was a leading object. The first germ of this policy began with a bill introduced in the British parliament by Sir John Mitford, afterwards Lord Redesdale; and another was introduced into the Irish house of commons, by Sir Hercules Langrishe, a commis{441}sioner of revenue, and seconded by Mr. Hobart, secretary to the viceroy, which proposed admitting the catholics to the profession of the law; permitting their intermarriage with protestants; removing the restrictions on their education, and the limitations on the number of their apprentices in arts and manufactures. . On the eligibility of this measure, the members of the opposition were much divided. Lord: Charlemont had all along strong prejudices against any sudden relaxation of the penal statutes; such was the force of early habits. The bill, however, beside the support of that side of the house where it originated, had also that of many distinguished members of the opposition, and it finally passed into a law.

On the 18th February, 1792, a petition was presented from the catholics by Mr. Egan, an opposition. member, praying their restoration to the elective franchise, and it was ordered to lie on the table; but on the Monday, Mr. Latouche, an eminent banker, and a man of considerable influence and character, moved that this petition be rejected. This motion was without any previous notice to the house, but it produced a long and most interesting debate, embracing the whole subject of the catholic cause, and though this motion was carried by a majority of two hundred and eight to twenty-three, and seemingly extinguished for ever all hopes of the catholics on this ground, yet this discussion procured to them many new friends, who were before their opponents. They persevered, calmly but firmly, in their objects. They took measures to vindicate their character as a religious: sect, by solemnly abjuring the obnoxious tenets attributed to them by their enemies; and refuting the imputations cast on their religious and political principles.. And so rapid was the march of relaxation in their favour, that the very next, session of parliament was opened by the lord-lieutenant with a speech from the throne, recommending to the consideration of both houses the situation of the catholics; and a bill, granting to them the elective franchise, and many other indulgences more than they asked or expected, {440} finally passed into law, much to the chagrin of many of those former opponents who had been arrayed against it under the ministerial standard, and were now obliged to support it under the like authority. Even in the house of lords, Chancellor Clare, who had been always. the opponent of concession, and though on this occasion be vehemently marked his own hostility to the measure, yet he deprecated discussion, and voted in its support. Lord Charlemont, whose prejudices were unshaken, not only voted, but entered his protest against it. The fact was, the British government felt that the conciliation of so numerous a portion of the Irish people was of more pressing importance at such a crisis, than to indulge and sanction any longer, the antipathies and prejudices of the ruling sect. And the catholics retired from the doors of parliament, under a full conviction, that they owed gratitude for this boon, more to the kindness of his majesty and the British government, than to the liberality of that parliament, who, but the year before, had rejected their humble petition with contumely and reproach.

In the following year, 1794, Lord Charlemont sustained a domestic calamity in the loss of his second son, James Caulfield, a promising youth of seventeen.

In the parliament this year, almost the only circumstance worth notice that occurred, was the introduction of a bill, by Mr. W. B. Ponsonby, on the 4th of March, to improve the representation of the people in parliament, the second reading of which he moved for the next day. This was warmly opposed by ministers, who moved an amendment for postponing the second reading to the 2nd of August. The question, however, was debated with great ability; parliamentary reform had long been the cry of the north of Ireland; Lord Charlemont himself was a warm friend to moderate reform, but he was extremely averse to the principles of reform for which the political societies of Belfast, echoed by those of Dublin, now began to clamour, namely, universal suffrage and annual parliaments. The bill introduced by Mr. Ponsonby was to effect that mea{448}sure of moderate reform which the impartial of all parties admitted to be necessary. But the government, on this occasion, opposed the measure, on the ground: that it would look like a concession to the seditious clamours then prevalent, and Mr. Grattan, who supported this bill, deprecated, with great eloquence, the system of reform proposed by the United Irishmen of Belfast and Dublin, as leading to the subversion of all liberty, property, and government. But Mr. Ponsonby’s motion was superseded by the amendment, and some of the ministerialists, and their partisans out of doors, did not scruple to blend Lord Charlemont and his friends in common estimation with the United Irishmen, and to impute to their parliamentary speeches part of the growing sedition of the country, for no other reason than that they opposed the obnoxious measures of the government; while, on the other hand, the United Irishmen publicly declared, that the speeches and debates of the opposition, and all whom they could influence, were regarded by them with indifference: they, in fact, regarded Mr. Ponsonby’s bill merely as a temporary half-measure to privilege their own plans; and therefore they rejoiced in its failure. Happy, perhaps, would it have been for the tranquillity of Ireland, had this bill succeeded; because it would have amply satisfied all the moderate reformists, and if they did not go far enough to meet the views of others, it would at least have shewn that the government and. parliament were not decidedly opposed to’reform in all shapes, but would have given an earnest of disposition to gratify the reasonable wishes of the country, which might be farther extended in a future session, and thus even the most clamorous for total reform would have been, at least, divided but the rejection of this moderate measure strengthened: the cause of the United Irishmen, and furnished their leaders with an irrefragible argument, that they must never hence look to the government or the parliament for any further redress of political grievances, but seek it from their own numbers and revolutionary movements: An awful crisis {444} was fast approaching, which was greatly accelerated by the traitorous obstinacy of government in resisting all measures of conciliation towards popular feelings. The old system of sectarious division had. long subsided, and the two great bodies of dissenters, the presbyterians and catholics, long hostile to each other from religious prejudices, were now become firm allies in political interest. The former, in the north, avowed themselves the devoted friends of total emancipation to the catholics; and the latter, in the south, east, and west, pledged themselves to unite with the former in their efforts for parliamentary reform; and never to lose sight of those two great objects so indispensable to their mutual views for the freedom and prosperity of the country. Indeed every symptom of religious antipathy had been rapidly subsiding in the country from 1782; which circumstance was viewed with alarm by the old partisans of division; and an attempt made in the north to revive the system. An opportunity was offered by the revival of an old religious quarrel, which has been before-mentioned, and which was then calmed by the influence of Charlemont. It-recommenced in a desperate cudgel fight, between some catholic peasants and weavers and some protestants and dissenters of the same class, at a funeral; and so far from being put down by the interference and authority of the magistrates, there was strong grounds to believe it was rather fomented by many of them. Numerous and desperate pitched battles were fought. The protestant party, under the assumed appellation of Peep-o’-day Boys, attacked the houses of the catholics at night, broke open their doors, destroyed their looms and little furniture, and abused their wives and daughters. The catholics armed for their defence under the name of Defenders; and, the former party being ultimately victorious, commenced this short system of expulsion to their antagonists. A placard was affixed in the night on the door of the catholic, in these words, - “To hell, or Connaught, in three days.” And, if he failed to obey this manifesto, his house was pulled down, his pro{445}perty destroyed, his looms and furniture burnt, and his family fled by the light of the flames to seek some other asylum until they could escape from the province. The unfortunate fugitives, with their half-naked wives and children, explored their way to Connaught and Munster, the catholic provinces; and, as they begged their sustenance on the journey, told their tales of woe, exciting the sympathy and resentment of their catholic brethren. This migration to the west and south, received a new construction from the protestant magistrates and gentry of those provinces, namely that the popish defenders of the north were marching to cut their throats; and immediately the houses of the catholic peasantry were searched for arms, and their pitchforks; scythes, reaping hooks, and other manual instruments of husbandry taken away, as weapons of massacre. Such a severity, wholly unprovoked by any symptom of disloyalty or tumult; and from their protestant landlords, magistrates, and neighbours, naturally produced alarm amongst those poor ignorant persons, and roused them to a fellow-feeling with the northern defenders, hundreds of whom daily attested to them the cruelties they had experienced previous to their expulsion from their native homes; and hence the source of defenderism, nightly meetings, secret oaths, plunder for arms, and seditious conspiracies, which, in succession, every where began to infest the whole country; and which were met on the other side by severe laws, domiciliary visits, military executions, and arbitrary transportations, without the semblance of law, or form: of trial, carried on at midnight, by the magistrates of ue country, aided by parties of horse and foot.

These transactions were detailed with the most aggravating comments.

The combustibles already collected in the country from the details of the French revolution and French victories; from the proceedings of the corresponding society in England; and from the wide and gratuitous distribution of Tom Paine’s Rights of Man, to the number of some {446} hundred thousands, caught fire from new, inflammatory sources. The old volunteer army had long fallen to decay. In the north, Lord Charlemont, whose voice had so long operated as a pacific charm, had now lost all influence. In the metropolis, and various parts of the country, a few detached armed companies associated under the appellation of volunteers, under the direction of some of the most democratical leaders of the old corps, and especially James Napper Tandy; who then occupied. his Sundays in manoeuvering those brigades in the fields round. the metropolis. They wore uniforms quite different from those of the king’s troops; and some of the corps adopted mottoes and emblems but too significant of the political principles of the wearers. A militia law had passed in the country; but still the petty volunteer-corps increased to such a degree that they were at length suppressed by a proclamation from the castle, and a new corps were organised under the auspices of government, under the appellation of yeomanry; furnished indeed with arms and accoutrements by the government, but clothed at their own expense; and to be paid when called on actual service. In this state of affairs, the United Irishmen continued to extend their influence, to increase their numbers, and administer their oath; while an opposite party of politicians, professing the most ardent attachment to the constitution in church and state, assembled in various parts of the country, under the denomination of Orange Lodges, bound to each other by solemn and mysterious oaths. And the mutual antipathy of both daily increased.

During this state of things, an important increase was given to the British cabinet, from, whose consultations it was determined that some immediate measures should be taken to calm the perturbed spirits of Ireland; and it was finally resolved to send Earl Fitzwilliam as the harbinger of amity and peace. The arrival of that nobleman was hailed with general joy, as that of a minister from heaven. Mr. Grattan and Mr. Ponsonby were called to. his councils: both had been previously summoned to England, in {447} order for consultation with them as to the measures which would be most likely to satisfy the wishes of their country; and on their return, and previously to the arrival of Earl Fitzwilliam, it was confidently signified, that the fatal abrogation of the remaining penal laws against the catholics, and a moderate reform in parliament, should be adopted; measures which would at once have silenced all clamour and calmed every discontent. Upon the first meeting, of parliament, Mr. Grattan, in his place, announced the objects of Lord Fitzwilliam’s mission; and shortly afterwards moved an address to the lord-lieutenant, and obtained from parliament, as a proof of national gratitude, a vote of three millions in support of the war against France. Several members, and especially Sir Lawrence Parsons, decidedly rejected to the precipitancy with which the house was about to pass this measure, and advised them to defer the gift until they were sure of the boon for which it was given; but his objections were treated as illiberally suspicious, and were borne down by the popularity of the new chief governor, and the implicit reliance placed in the sincerity of the British cabinet. The vote therefore passed; but before it had finally proceeded through both houses, a rumour prevailed that Earl Fitzwilliam was to be recalled, for that he had greatly exceeded his instructions in the pledges held out to the Irish parliament; and this rumour was very speedily verified by the publication of a correspondence on the subject between Ear] Fitzwilliam and Lord Carlisle; and he was actually recalled. The joy of the country was suddenly changed to astonishment and despondency. The day of his departure was a day of sorrow in the metropolis; and his progress to the water side had all the appearance of a funereal procession. Lord Camden came as his successor, with Mr. Pelham as secretary, to perform the ungracious office of refusing all the measures held out for his predecessor. He was greeted by the populace with marked indignation. Mr, Grattan now, with his friends, returned to the ranks {448} of opposition, brought forward his bill for the total emancipation of the catholics. It was indignantly and decidedly resisted by Mr. Pelham, who declared. that. concession to the catholics, which had already gone to. the utmost length, consistent with safety to a protestant state, must stop somewhere; and here he would plant his foot, and resist its further progress. An arduous debate ensued, which was continued till six o’clock in the morning, and ended in the loss of the bill.

This event was a decisive specimen of total departure from the conciliatory system of which Lord Fitzwilliam came as the harbinger; it confirmed, at once, the influence of the United Irishmen over the great mass of the population; it gave new force to the machinations of the seditious; and accelerated the revolutionary burst, long apprehended from the combustibles for years in preparation. From that day forth, all the machinery of sedition was set in motion on the one hand; opposed on the other, by severe laws and arbitrary measures of coercion, which, instead of suppressing, served but to feed the flame. The government could not be blind to the volcanic symptoms perceivable on all sides; but could never come toa full discovery of the whole plot, until, by mere, accident, on .the very eve of explosion, a chief conspirator was induced to betray his associates. In consequence of which they were seized in full council, in the very heart of the metropolis, within a day or two of the intended general insurrection throughout the whole country; but although this seizure of the chiefs defeated the plan of. an immediate and general explosion, it accelerated a partial rebellion, which instantly broke out, and raged for nearly three months with incessant and sanguinary fury. A few of the chief conspirators in custody were executed; and the rest, seeing their grand scheme utterly defeated, waisted their lives by a full discovery of their whole plan, force, and preparations, to a secret committee of parliament, which, Jn point of extent, surpassed all. previous conception, and astonished. both the government and senate. The rebellion {449} was still going on in various counties. Mr. Pelham retired to England, leaving Lord Castlereagh at first as his temporary substitute; but shortly after that young nobleman avowed himself as his successor in the secretaryship to his maternal uncle, Lord Camden. The flames of civil war raged every where unabated; and, finally, Lord Camden was recalled, and a military chief governor, Lord Cornwallis, sent in his stead.. The rebel armies being at last disconcerted, Lord Cornwallis, as the best mode to stem the further effusion of blood, loyal as well as rebellious, proclaimed an amnesty and full pardon to all the rebels ~ who should within a month lay down their arms, swear allegiance, and return to their homes: This had the immediate effect of terminating the conflict; but not the private vengeance of the victorious loyalists, still smarting under their calamities and the slaughter of their friends. But Lord Cornwallis, the chief object of whose mission was the restoration of peace, and the re-establishment of law and justice, announced his determination of punishing with equal severity the aggressions of parties on all sides; and strictly denounced all emblems and ensigns of party principles, as calculated only to excite new hostilities and “perpetuate mutual vengeance.”

The French government, desirous of aiding the insurgents, had dispatched an expedition, consisting of a ship of the line and seven frigates, with a body of troops officered ina great degree by Irishmen, to effect a landing in Ireland. Of this number only seven hundred men, un~ der the command of General Humbert, landed at Killala, where, by arraying in French uniforms and arms great numbers of the rebellious peasantry, and propagating exaggerated statements of their real force, they threw the country into much alarm for about three weeks. Lord Cornwallis, however, marched against them, collecting in his way such troops as could be spared from garrisons, to the amount of fifteen thousand men; and general Humbert, and his whole force, after a short action, surrendered prisoners of war. On another part of the coast, namely, {450} Rutland, in the county of Sligo, the noted James Napper Tandy, as a French general of division, landed with a few partisans, to ascertain the probabilities of support from the population of that part of the country; but quickly re-embarked to join some of his dispersed squadrons, and was afterwards seized in neutral territory and sent prisoner to Ireland. Mr. Theobald Wolfe Tone, an Irish barrister, was found as a French officer on board another ship of the squadron taken by some of the British fleet, and sentenced to death by a court-martial in Dublin, but-destroyed himself,.

During the whole rebellion the parliament continued sitting; and, on its prorogation, received the thanks of General Cornwallis in his speech from the throne.

Internal peace being now restored, the country, though smarting under the wounds of civil war, was permitted to take some repose; from which, however, it was soon roused by the alarming rumour of an intended proposition for a legislative union with England. This rumour was soon verified by the avowal of government. This excited new irritation, even amongst the warmest friends of the castle; and was attacked in limine, as a measure of the grossest ingratitude and treachery, on the part of the British cabinet. The question was discussed by anticipation in a war of pamphlets and newspapers, popular meetings, speeches, and resolutions. Lord Cornwallis actually made a summer circuit to the southward, to collect the sentiments of the country upon the subject, and stimulate the local influence of the friends of government in support of the measure. It would exceed our limits to detail the variety of pretences artfully insinuated to render the attempt palateable to the different quarters, parties, and classes in the country. The incompetence of an Irish parliament to maintain peace and contentment in the country, and the great advantage to Ireland of a perfect identification with England in all the blessings of commerce, constitution, power, and prosperity, formed the vanguard of the proposal. The consequent prosperity of {451} agriculture, manufactures, and commerce, came next; and while the metropolis was to be the emporium of British intercourse, every other outport was flattered with the prospect of flourishing on the decay of maritime commerce in the metropolis. The catholic body were told. that their complete emancipation, and admission to the representative franchise, which they must never hope to attain from an Irish parliament, would immediately follow the establishment of an union; while, on the other hand, the enemies of the catholics were told that an union was the only measure by which the catholics could be prevented from forcing their way into parliament, and effecting the subversion of church and state. The timid were told that union was the only resource left to terminate the struggles of hostile parties, and prevent the recurrence of civil war; and the bold and adventurous, who stickled for their independent parliament: in Ireland, as the great lottery for promotions to place, power, and influence, were told that union was the rapid road to those advantages, as it would throw open to them and their families a participation in all the blessings of patronage, over the extensive range of imperial dominion, British manufacturers with enormous capitals, tempted by the security of consolidated governments, were to,croud into Ireland, enrich the country, give employment and civilization to her increasing popu: lation, and rival their native England in commerce with the world.

Parliament at length met. The subject was mentioned in the viceroy’s speech; and, notwithstanding the general irritation excited out of doors, and the vengeful clamour of some partisans in the senate, the then youthful statesman, Lord Castlereagh, brought forward the proposition for consideration in the house of commons. His lordship, in the course-of his speech, did not confine himself to a statement of the advantages. political, commercial, and social, likely to follow to his country from an identification with England, but proceeded to argue that the fond dreams of a distinct and independent parliament, and {452} kingdom, so long cherished by the patriots of 1782, as the proud triumph of their struggles, and the peaceful achievement of their volunteer army, was in fact but a mere airy delusion, a perfect anomaly in the imperial government of two distinct islands conjoined under the same crown, and containing in its own womb the embryo of perpetual conflict and ultimate separation, as was clearly proved by the result of the regency question some few years before, when the parliament of Ireland were totally at variance upon a vital question with that of England; and might on the recurrence of a similar occasion, assert its independent right of differing in the choice of the person, as well as the power to be given, to a regent representative of the crown.

The debate was arduous, and continued till ten next morning; but, upon the division which took place, the numbers were so nearly equal that the proposition was carried only by the majority of a single vote. The debate was renewed on the report of the address the next evening, and the minister was left in a minority, - one hundred and six to one hundred. Upon the first debate in the house of lords, forty-six voted for entertaining the measure, and only nineteen against it. The country triumphed in this defeat as a complete and final victory; but the triumph was but temporary. Before the next session the treasury wrought miracles, and the measure was carried. )

But, as to the accomplishment of those splendid predictions of national happiness and prosperity so speciously held out as the certain consequences of the union, the experience of the first twenty years has proved it commensurate to the popularity of the noble viscount, who had the proud honour of proposing the measure, and conducting it to success. The people of Ireland have to contemplate a strange coincidence in their national fortunes under the auspicious influence of the Stewarts. For their loyalty to the last British monarch of that name, three-fourths of them suffered near a century of confiscation, {453} proscription, disfranchisement, degradation, and vassalage; while the other fourth secured to themselves the extensive monopoly of parliamentary power, office, and emolument in church and state, for their valorous attachment to the house of Brunswick. By the instrumentality of another scion of the noble, though not royal house of Stewart, after the lapse of a century, the Irish parliament itself was extinguished, for its presumptuous loyalty and attachment to an illustrious descendant of the same house of Brunswick, heir-apparent to these realms; and its memory only preserved by a remnant of one third of its number transported, like a condemned regiment, to represent the representation of Ireland in Kadina country.

We now return to Lord Charlemont, whose mind was Jong tortured with sorrow for the unhappy conflicts of his country, and whose years and ill health obliged him to continue little more than a silent spectator of the mischief he had so long and so zealously struggled to avert. Lord O Neill, Lord Mountjoy, and many of his most valued friends, had fallen in the defence of the government and constitution of their country. Parliament had been publicly thanked by the viceroy for its vigilant and successful aid in putting down the rebellion; and, what was now to be the remuneration to that parliament, and of the brave loyalists, who had shed-their blood and suffered so many calamities in defence of the state ?—why, extinction to the one; and to the other, abrogation of their rights, privileges, and independence.

On the first rumour of this measure, his lordship waited on Lord Cornwallis, and feeling it his duty, as an hereditary counsellor of the crown, stated his reasons at length for deprecating most earnestly a project, which, so far from consolidating the strength, affections, resources, and interests of both kingdoms, would directly contribute more than any other to a separation of two countries, the perpetual connection of which was one of the most ardent wishes of his heart. The viceroy politely received his counsel, and expressed his confidence that it {454}was founded on the best motives, but declined at that time any explication on the project, which soon became unequivocal. Lord Charlemont exulted in the first victory over the ministers in the first session, although he did not rely on it as quite decisive; but henceforward his health more rapidly declined. He was the continued victim of disease; and his valuable life, though obviously verging to its close, was occupied to the last in efforts for his country. Not quite eighteen years had now elapsed since he had triumphed in establishing the constitutional independence of his country. That independence which he had cherished in its cradle, he now feared he must shortly follow to its grave, for its existence hung, like his own, by a feeble thread. His vital powers hourly decayed. His appetite ceased; his limbs swelled; and it was evident to his friends, whose visits he received as long as his disorder would permit, that his dissolution was fast approaching. He did not live to see the completion of the measure he so much deprecated; the hand of death prevented him that anguish. On the 4th of August, 1799, he expired, at Charlemont House, Dublin, in the seventieth year of his age; and his remains were conveyed to his family vault, in the ancient cathedral of Armagh.

Thus terminated the existence of one of the best men and truest patriots that ever adorned any country; bequeathing to his posterity an illustrious example for their imitation, and to his native land the memory of his virtues" as an imperishable monument.

A dramatic writer of great and deserved celebrity, is asserted by some of her biographers to have been born in Lincolnshire; but it being infinitely more probable, fronm the following circumstances, that she drew her first breath “in the Isle of Erin,” we have taken the liberty of admitting her into this work.

She was the daughter of a Mr. Freeman, a gentleman {455} of Holbeach, in Lincolnshire. Her father had been possessed of an estate of no inconsiderable value, but, being a dissenter, and having discovered a zealous attachment to the cause of the Parliament, was, at the Restoration, obliged to seek refuge in Ireland, and his estate was consequently confiscated. The mother of our poetess was daughter of Mr. Markham, a gentleman of fortune at Lyme Regis, in Norfolk, who is represented as having encountered similar misfortunes with those of Mr. Freeman, in consequence of his political principles, which were the same with those of that gentleman; and he also was obliged to quit his: native country, and seek shelter in the western isle. She is supposed to have been born between the years 1667 and 1680; and, from the above statement, there can be but little doubt that Ireland was the spot of her, birth. It is true, Walter Harris, in his edition of Ware, does not claim her as an Irish writer, but, that she is fully entitled to be considered as such, is as clear, as that Congreve, who is claimed by Harris, is not.

She discovered, at an early period, a propensity to poetry, and is said to have written a song before she had attained her seventh year. She was left an orphan at an early age, having had the misfortune to lose her father before she was three years old, and her mother before she had completed her twelfth year.

Having been treated with a degree of harshness, by those to whose care she was committed, after the death of her mother, she resolved, whilst very young, to quit the country, and proceed to London, to seek her fortune. The circumstances of her life, at this period, are involved in much obscurity, and the particulars which are recorded seem somewhat romantic. It is said, that she attempted her journey to the capital alone, and on foot, and, on her way thither, was met by Anthony Hammond, Esq. father of the author of the Love Elegies. This gentleman, who was then a member of the University of Cambridge, was struck with her youth and beauty, and offered to take her under his protection. Either her distress, inclination, or {456} inexperience, induced her to comply with his proposal, and she accompanied him to Cambridge, where, having equipped her in boy’s clothes, he introduced her to his college intimates as a relation who was come down to see the university, and to pass some time with him. Under this disguise, an amorous intercourse was carried on between them for some months, but, at length, being probably apprehensive that the affair would become known in the university, he persuaded her to go to London, which she agreed to, and he generously presented her with a considerable sum of money, and recommended her, by letter, to a lady in town with whom he was well acquainted, assuring her, at the same time, that he would speedily follow her; this promise appears, however, not to have been performed, yet, notwithstanding her unfavourable introduction into life, she was married, in her sixteenth year, to a nephew of Sir Stephen Fox, who did not live more than a twelve-month after their marriage; but, she possessing both wit and personal attractions, soon obtained the consolation of another husband, whose name was Carrol. He was an officer in the army, and was unfortunately killed in a duel, about a year and a half after their marriage, and she became a second time a widow. She is represented as having had a sincere attachment for Mr. Carrol, and, consequently, as having felt his loss as a severe affliction.

It was at this period of her life that she presented herself before the public as a dramatic authoress, to which she was, probably, in some degree induced by the narrowness of her circumstances. Some of her earlier pieces were published under the name of Carrol. Her first attempt was a tragedy, entitled “The Perjured Husband,” which was performed at Drury Lane theatre, in 1700, and published in 4to. the same year. In 1703, she produced a comedy, called “The Beau’s Duel; or, a Soldier for the Ladies;” and “Love’s Contrivance,” which is chiefly a translation from. Molière, and the following year another comedy, entitled “The Stolen Heiress; or, the Salamanca {457} Doctor outwitted”. In 1705, her comedy of “The Gamester” was acted at Lincoln’s Inn Fields, which met with considerable success, and was afterwards revived at Drury: Lane. The plot of this piece is chiefly borrowed from: a French comedy, called “Le Dissipateur.” The prologue was written by Nicholas Rowe.

Her attachment to dramatic amusements was so great, that she not only distinguished herself as a writer for the theatre, but also became a performer in it, though it is far from probable that she attained any great celebrity as an actress, as she appears never to have played at the theatres of the metropolis But in 1706, we are told she acted the part of Alexander the Great, in Lee’s tragedy of the Rival Queens, at Windsor, where the court then was, and, in this heroic character, she made so powerful an impression upon the heart of Mr. Joseph Centlivre (yeoman of the mouth) or principal cook to Queen Anne, that he soon after married her, and with him she lived happily until her decease; That this marriage was the happiest of the three, can easily be accounted for - the precarious subsistence dependant on dramatic authorship is proverbial.

The same year in which she entered into the matrimonial state with. Mr.-Centlivre, she produced the comedies of The Basset Table,” and “Love at a Venture;” the latter was acted by the Duke of Grafton’s servants, at the new theatre at Bath; and in 1708, her most celebrated performance, “The Busy Body,” was performed at Drury Lane theatre.. It met at first with so unfavourable a reception from the players, that, for a time, they even refused to act in it, and were not prevailed upon to comply, until towards the close of the season; and even then the celebrated Wilks shewed so utter a contempt for the part of Sir George Airy, as to. throw it down on the stage at the rehearsal, with a declaration, “that no audience would endure such stuff:” but the piece was received with the greatest applause by the audience, and still keeps possession of the stage... In 1711, she produced, at Drury Lane theatre, “Marplot; or, the Second: Part of the Busy {458} Body.” This play, though greatly inferior to the former, met with a favourable reception, and the Duke of Portland, to whom it was dedicated, made the authoress a present of forty guineas. In 1717, her admirable comedy of “A Bold Stroke for a Wife,” was performed at Lincoln’s Ing Fields. In this play she was assisted by, Mr. Mottley, who wrote a scene or two entirely. It was extremely well received, although Mr. Wilks very cavalierly declared, that “not only Mrs. Centlivre’s play would be damned, but she herself would be damned for writing it.”

The above opinions of Mr. Wilks ought to be registered in theatrical annals, as hints to those ladies and gentlemen of the sock and buskin, who decide on the merit of an author by the first ten lines they may casually glance upon, and whose judgments are formed from the opinions of the property-man or prompter at the rehearsal*.

In 1714, her excellent play of “The Wonder, a Woman keeps a Secret!” was acted at Drury Lane theatre; it was very successful, and Garrick threw a new lustre on it, by reviving it with some judicious alterations, and by his inimitable performance of Don Felix. It has been successively rendered popular by the admirable performances of Mrs. Jordan, in Violante, and Elliston, in Don Felix; and still keeps possession of the stage.

Besides the dramatic effusions which have been already mentioned, she produced several others, the titles of which are to be found in the Biographia Dramatica.

She died in Spring gardens, Charing cross, on the Ist of December, 1723, and was buried at St. Martin’s in the Fields. She possessed a considerable share of beauty, was

* Since so much has been lately said relative to theatrical management, we cannot forbear hinting, that we conceive the theatres must have been infinitely better managed in those days than at present, as almost every piece produced was successful; whereas, in the records of both houses of the present day, it would be difficult to find any thing (with the exception of pantomimes) that has kept possession of the stage; and truly has their theatric course been characterised by a parodist, who said, “The failure of to-morrow, succeeds unto the condemnation of to-night.”

{459} of a friendly and benevolent disposition, and in conversation was sprightly and entertaining. Her literary acquisitions appear to have been merely the result of her own application, and she is supposed to have understood the French, Dutch, and Spanish languages, and to have had some knowledge of the Latin. Mrs. Centlivre enjoyed, for many years, the intimacy and esteem of many of the most eminent wits of the time, particularly Sir Richard Steele, Farquhar, Rowe, Dr. Sewell, and Eustace Budgell. But she had the misfortune to incur the displeasure of Mr. Pope, who introduced her into the Dunciad, for having written a ballad against his Homer. In the third book are the following lines:

“Lo, next two slip-shod muses traipse along,
In lofty madness, meditating song,
With tresses staring, from poetic dreams,
And never wash’d but in Castalia’s streams:
Haywood, Centlivre, glories of their race,” &c. &c.

An extensive, acquaintance with men and manners is exhibited in her dramatic writings, and they are sometimes justly censurable for their licentiousness; but she unfortunately flourished in a period. when it was the fashion to admire vicein any shape, alluring or not. Her greatest merit is the incessant interest and bustle she has contrived to keep up throughout the whole five acts of her most popular plays: the language is spiritless, and at times ridiculous: neither is there a superabundance of wit to be found in any of her productions; but there is such a happiness of thought, in regard to plot, and so thorough a knowledge of stage effect displayed throughout the Wonder, Bold Stroke for a Wife, and Busy Body, that (with the exception of the Beaux Stratagem) it would be difficult to find an equal to either of them. Yet neither Farquhar, Centlivre, Vanbrugh, or Congreve, were the advocates of virtue; they have been characterised as writers, who, though—

       —Heaven endow’d
To scourge bold Vice with Wit’s resistless rod,
Embrac’d her chains, stood forth her priests avow’d,
And scatter’d flow’rs in every path she trod. {460}
Inglorious praise, though Judgment’s self admir’d,.
Those wanton strains which Virtue blush’d to hear;
While pamper’d passion from the scene retir’d,
With wilder rage to urge his fierce career.”

In 1761, her dramatic works were collected together, and printed in three volumes 12mo. and is at present.a scarce book. She was also authoress of several copies, of verses on divers subjects and occasions, and many ingenious letters, entitled, “Letters of Wit, Politics, and Morality,” which were collected and published by Mr. Boyer.

The first character our hero exhibited himself before his new audience in, was Colonel Feignwell, in Mrs. Centlivre’s comedy of “A Bold Stroke for a Wife,” somewhat an arduous undertaking for a boy of seventeen, as it is but rare that even the veterans of the stage are possessed of a variety of talent sufficient to represent this difficult character. The applause, however, was great, and the manager of this sharing company, after passing many encomiums on his exertions, presented him with 10½d. as his dividend of the profits on that night’s performance.

Young Cherry afterwards launched into a most extensive range of character, for being blest “with a peculiar facility of study,” (and a good memory,) in the space of ten months, he performed almost all the principal characters in tragedy, comedy, and farce; and during the same periods underwent all the vicissitude and distress, that usually attend those hapless individuals, who are dependant on so precarious a mode of existence. The friends of Cherry have heard him declare, that although constantly employed in the laborious study, that his range of character must necessarily bring upon him, he never was in possession of a single guinea, during the whole ten months. He was frequently without the means of common sustenance, and sometimes even unable to buy the very candles by which he should study the characters that were so numerously allotted to him—circumstances the whole of which are highly probable.

In the town of Athlone, we are told, a circumstance of particular distress attended our hero; but which he bore with all the magnanimity that dramatic ardour could inspire. The business of the theatre was suspended for a short time, in consequence of the benefits having turned out badly: the manager was resolved not to waste any more bills, but wait for the races, which were to commence in a few days. Our hero being of a timid and bashful turn, and assisted by a portion of youthful pride, was incapable {464} of making those advances, and playing off that train of theatrical tricks, by which means benefits are frequently obtained in the country, and therefore he had been less successful than many of his brethren. His landlady, perceiving there was no prospect of payment, satisfied herself for the trifle already due, by seizing on the remnant, of our hero’s wardrobe; and knowing she could dispose-of her lodgings to more advantage during the races, turned him out to the mercy of the winter’s ial which. he .endured with all his former philosophy. He rambled carelessly about the streets, sometimes quoting passages to himself, both comic and serious, that were analogous .to his situation, but without forming one determined idea of where he was to rest his houseless head. Towards the close of the evening he strolled by accident into the low yer part of the theatre, which had formerly been an inn, and was then occupied by a person whose husband had been a serjeant of dragoons, for the purpose of retailing refreshments, &c. to those who visited the theatre. After chatting until it grew late, the woman hinted to our hero that she wished to go to bed, and begged he might retire; upon which he replied, in the words of Don John, “I was just thinking of going home, but that I have no lodging. ” The good woman, taking the words literally, inquired into the cause, with which he acquainted her without disguise. Being the mother of a family, she felt severely for his distressed situation: at that time he did not possess a single halfpenny in the world, nor the means of obtaining one. The poor creature shed tears of regret that she could not effectually alleviate his misfortune. He endeavoured to assume a careless gaiety; but the woman’s unaffected sorrow brought the reflection of his own disobedience to his mind, and he dropped tears in plenteous libation: in his grief he saw the sorrow of his parents, whom he had deserted, to follow what he began to perceive a mad career, in despite of the many unanswered remonstrances he had received, with a fair promise of forgiveness and affection, should he return to his business. This philan{465}thropic female lamented that she could not furnish him with a bed, but offered to lend him her husband’s cloke, and to procure a bundle of dry hay, that he might sleep in an empty room in her house. His heart was too full to pay his gratitude in words; his eyes thanked her; he wept bitterly, accepted her kind offer, and retired to rest. The intruding any further on her kindness was painful to him, as she was struggling to maintain a numerous offspring. He therefore carefully avoided the house at meal-times, and wandered through the fields or streets, until he supposed their repasts were finished: at last, so overcome by fasting and fatigue, that he could not rest, he rose from his trooper’s cloke [sic] in the dead of the night, and explored the kitchen, searching the dresser and all its shelves and drawers, in hopes of finding something that might satisfy the cravings of his appetite, but in vain. On his return to his hay-truss, he accidentally struck against the kitchen table, the noise of which he feared might alarm the family; and, uncertain of the real cause of his leaving his apartment at that hour, they might naturally suppose that his purpose was to rob the house, as a reward for their hospitality: the idea added to the misery he then suffered; he trembled, he listened, but all was quiet; and then renewed his search (for his hunger overcame his fears), and to his gratification he found a large crust of stale bread, which he was afterwards informed had been used for rubbing out some spots of white paint from the very cloke that composed his bedding; he, however, ate it with avidity, as he was entering on the fourth day without the least refreshment, and returned heartfelt thanks to Providence, whose omnipotent hand was stretched in the very critical moment, to save him from the most direful of all possible deaths, - starving!

At length, after enduring, in all probability, not more than the usual and every-day hardships attendant on the life of a strolling player, he quitted the stage, and even now “returned to reason and the shop,” remaining at home for upwards of three years. The “strutting and {466} fretting” profession, was, however, too firmly seated: in his mind and heart, to beso suddenly got rid of. He forgot entirely the misery he had so lately suffered, quitted his home, and after making some excursions of little moment, enlisted himself under the banners of a Mr. R. W. Knipe, a well-known dramatic veteran, “a scholar and a gentleman.” In his company (we are told) Cherry enjoyed much comfort and satisfaction, and remained attached to it till Mr. Knipe’s decease. He then joined the principal provincial company of Ireland under the management of Mr. Atkins, where he performed a most extensive round of characters, and was for many years the popular. favorite of the north of Ireland, during which period he married the daughter of his old friend and seh inc ne, Knipe, by whom he had a large family.

In, 1787, Mr. Ryder having been engaged at Garden theatre, Cherry whose provincial repute had reached the capital, quitted the audiences of Belfast, to supply his place at the theatre in Smock alley, Dublin, where, for six years, he stood at the top of his ariaiactons in the comic line.

Having long entertained a desire of visiting the sister country, he engaged Mrs..Cherry and himself to the celebrated Tate Wilkinson, at the period when Mr. Fawcett entered into articles with the managers of Covent Garden, whose situation he filled at the theatres of York, Hull, &c. for three years, when he again returned to his native country, 1

He continued two seasons in Ireland; after which the irregular payments of the manager, and other disgusting circumstances, induced him to return to England, and he accepted an engagement with Messrs. Ward and Banks, managers of the Manchester theatres where, with his wife, he successfully performed two years. From thence he went to Bath, where for four seasons he enjoyed an ample share, of public favour.

On the abdication of the late Mr. King, Mr. Cherry was engaged at Drury Lane theatre, where he made his {467} appearance on the 25th of September, 1802, in the characters of Sir Benjamin Dove” in the “Brothers,” and “Lazarillo,” im “Two Strings to your Bow,” and. was received with great applause. He afterwards became manager of the Swansea and Monmouth theatres, and died at the latter place, of dropsy on the brain, on the 12th of February; 1812.

Such was Andrew Cherry, a man who underwent every variety of disappointment and misery, for the pleasure of being conspicuous: his life, though little else but a record of folly, however, will not be utterly useless to mankind, if but ove of those countless individuals, - the would-be Richard’s and Hamlet’s,. pause ere they sacrifice the sunniest hours of their lives, making a compact with the “juggling fiend, that keeps the word of promise to their ear, and breaks it to their hope.”

As an author, Cherry is fully deserving of the epithet, ingenious, as he contrived to produce a comedy (The Soldier’s Daughter) which ran for thirty-seven nights, at a time when the public taste was not very degraded.

He wrote altogether ten-dramatic pieces, the titles of which are to be found in the Biographia Dramatica.

EARL of DONEGAL, was the eldest son of Edward, Viscount; Chichester, and: was born. on the 16th January, 1606. In 1627 he succeeded Lord Valentia in his troop of horse, and after the decease of his father, was appointed governor of Carrickfergus for life. At this place he resided when the first tidings of the rebellion were brought to him, on: Saturday, 23rd October, 1641, about ten o’clock at night. He immediately by fires and alarm-drums raised the country, and distributing the arms and ammunition among those who came to Carrickfergus, he left the castle under the care of Captain Roger Lyndon, and marched with about three hundred horse and foot to Belfast, where he received a reinforcement. On the 27th he joined the {468}

Lord Montgomery, at Lisburne, and. soon after he was appointed, in commission with Sir Arthur Tyringham, to the chief command of the county of Antrim. He immediately endeavoured to put the towns in a state of defence, and to take the best methods in his power for the suppression of the rebellion, in which he was farther assisted by a. commission from the king, and a grant for the fortifications of Belfast. But when, by the defection of the army in the north, he could no longer maintain his command, he retired to Dublin, where he was sworn a member of the privy council, and, in January 1645, entered into a resolution, with the rest of the officers of the Marquis of Ormond’s regiment, not to take the covenant imposed upon them by the English parliament, but to preserve their allegiance to his majesty, and obey the orders of the lord-lieutenant. His fidelity to his prince, affection to his country, and activity against the rebels, were indeed so conspicuous, that the lord lieutenant, in a letter to the king, dated 19th January, 1645, writes thus:

You have been graciously pleased of late to reward some, that have either served your majesty actually, or suffered for you eminently in their persons or fortunes, with new creations, or with additions of honour in this kingdom, That Colonel Arthur Chichester hath missed such a mark of your majesty’s favour, I conceive to have been through his own modesty, and my not representing his personal merit. If he outlives his father, he will be in among the foremost of the viscounts of this kingdom in place, and (I am sure) beyond. them all, except one, sn fortune, though he be for the present deprived of the latter for his faithfulness to your majesty’s crown, the same means whereby his uncle got both it and his honour. He hath served your majesty against the Irish rebellion since the beginning of it; and when, through an almost general defection of the northern army, he was no longer able to serve your majesty there, he came with much hazard to take his share in the sufferings of your servants here, and with them to. attend for that happy time, that {469} (we trust) will put us in a condition to contribute more to your service than our prayers. If your majesty shall think fit to advance this gentleman to an earldom, I conceive that of Dannegall, a county in the province of Ulster, wherein he should have a good inheritance, is fittest, which I humbly offer to your majesty’s consideration, as a part of the duty of

Your majesty’s, &c.    
Ormond

 

In consequence of this representation, he was created, in 1646, Earl of Donegal; and in the following year he was one of the four hostages sent by the Marquis of Ormond to the English parliament, as surety for his performance of the articles between them, for the surrender of Dublin, and the other garrisons, to their commissioners. Soon after the Restoration he was appointed custos rotulorum of the counties of Antrim and Donegal, and also restored to the government of Carrickfergus. In 1668, he founded a lectureship on mathematics in the university of Dublin. He died at Belfast, on the 18th March, 1674, and was buried at Carrickfergus.

THIS gentleman was the son of a military man, of an ancient and once powerful family in the county of Clare; and appears to have been born towards the latter end of the seventeenth, or the commencement of the eighteenth century. When he had attained his eighth year he was placed at one of the first colleges in France, where he remained until the famous James, Duke of Ormonde, fled from England and went to St. Germains. On that occasion, he, with two of his companions, seizing an opportunity, quitted the college, for the purpose of seeing an individual who had rendered himself celebrated all over Europe; which having accomplished, he was, either through fear or shame, deterred from returning to his pre{470}ceptor. He accordingly resolved on proceeding to his native country; for which purpose he took a place in the boat for Harfleur in Normandy, and shortly after arriving at Havre de Grace, obtained a passage to Dublin.

Being perfectly ignorant of who is relations were, or at what place they resided, but remembering to have heard that he sprung from a family on the borders of the county of Clare, he resolutely determined to proceed into that part of the kingdom; accordingly he commenced his excursion, making the best of his way through Kilkenny, where he luckily met with a “good Samaritan,” who took compassion on his helpless state, and feeling an inclination to pay back to the son some obligations conferred on him by the father, eagerly embraced the opportunity that now presented itself, and supported him, and placed him in a free school belonging to that town. Here he continued for three years, when the misfortunes of his benefactor deprived him of the assistance he had derived from that quarter; fortunately for him, however, it was his destiny in losing one benefactor to procure another, as, about this period, an unforeseen event brought him to the knowledge of his relations, by whom he was sent to Trinity College, Dublin, and became a pupil of Dr. James King.

At the university he remained nearly four years, at the end of which period, perceiving no prospect of advancement, and being of a “lively disposition,” and feeling an inclination to “see a little of the world,” he once more left his native country for France, setting sail on board a ship bound for Rochelle, on the 25th of July, 1724. In three days time the vessel gained sight of L’Isle Dieu on the coast of Britanny; but, on the fourth, a violent storm arose, which. drove it towards the coast of Spain, where it was stranded on the shore about a mile’s distance from the town of St. Sebastian, in Biscay. From this place he obtained a passage to Rochelle, and from thence to Bordeaux, where he intended to commence the study of physic. .He afterwards. obtained the degree of doctor at Rheims. At what time he returned to Ireland is unknown, {471}

But he was there in 1737, when he was deprived of his sight by an accidental cold. This deprivation rendering him incapable of his profession, he amused himself with writing his comedy, called “The Sharper,” which was acted five times at Smock alley, and obtained him the notice of Dean Swift.

From this period his life partook of all the inconveniences that usually result from confined circumstances, and an inability to procure the means of subsistence by a profession. He, however, obtained from the late king a pension of forty pounds a year during his life; and, in the year 1746, procured a sum of money by performing a part he was so well qualified for by nature, namely, Tiresias the blind prophet, in “Oedipus.” This performance was for his own benefit at Drury Lane theatre. He afterwards was settled at the Latin school at Kilkenny. The time of his death we are wholly unacquainted with. He is the author of a Latin Poem, called “Templum Veneris, sive Amorum Rhapsodiæ;” and of three dramatic pieces, whose titles are, 1. “Tamar, Prince of Nubia,” T. 1739; 2. “Hermon, Prince of Chorwa,” T. 1740; 3. “The Sharper,” c. 1750:

AN eminent scholar, and a prelate of the church of Ires Jand, was born at Dublin, in 1695. His father, Dr. Clayton, was minister of St, Michael’s, Dublin, and dean of {472} Kildare. The family was descended from the Claytons; of Fulwood, in Lancashire, whose estate came to Dr, Clayton by inheritance. The son was, at an-early age, put to Westminster school, under the tuition of Zachary Pearce, afterwards Bishop of Rochester. The kindness and fidelity of the teacher, and the gratitude and application of the pupil, cemented between them a warm and lasting friendship. From Westminster he was removed to Trinity College, where he made honourable progress, and, in due time, was elected fellow; and afterwards made the tour of France and Italy. In 1729, he was D. D. and besides this literary title, he became F.S.A. and F.R S, of London. In 1728, he came into possession of .an affluent estate, in consequence of his father’s death, when he laid down his fellowship without any beneficiary commutation, and married Catharine, daughter of Lord Chief Baron Donellan, and had the generosity and indepen dence to give her fortune, which was but inconsiderable, to her sister. He shewed an equal degree of noble kindness to his own three sisters, and gave each double what had been bequeathed them by his father’s will.

Soon after his marriage, he went with his lady to London, where a person in distressed circumstances applied to him for assistance, with a testimony of Dr. Samuel Clarke, for a recommendation; upon which, instead of a small donation, as usual upon such donations, he gave no less than £300 which was the whole sum which the unfortunate man said was necessary to make him easy in the world. This circumstance made him acquainted with Dr. Clarke, and the result of their intercourse was, that Dr. Clayton was led to embrace Arian principles, to which he adhered through life. Dr. Clarke having informed Queen Caroline of the remarkable beneficence of Dr. Clayton, it made a strong impression on her Majesty’s mind in his favour; which impression was strongly enforced by Mrs. Clayton, afterwards Lady Sandon, then in attendance in her Majesty’s service, as: bed-chamber woman. Such powerful interest procured a recommendation to Lord {473} Carteret, then lord-lieutenant of Ireland, for the very first bishopric which should become vacant, and he was accordingly appointed bishop of Killala, January 1729-30. Over this see he presided till 1735, when he became bishop of Cork, which office he held till his translation to the see of Clogher, in 1745. This was his last and greatest ecclesiastical preferment. Dr. Clayton filled his important rank in society in a dignified and respectable manner, but was not known to the world as a literary character, till he published an”Introduction to the History of the Jews,” which was at first attributed to another pen. Soon after appeared an elaborate work, which excited the attention of the learned, “The Chronology of the Hebrew Bible vindicated; the Facts compared with other ancient Histories, and the Difficulties explained, from the Flood to the Death of Moses; together with some Conjectures in relation to Egypt, during that Period of Time; also two Maps, in which: are attempted to be: settled the Journey of the Children of Israel,” 1747, 4to. Continuing his Biblical studies, his lordship published, in 1749, a “Dissertation on Prophecy,” in which he endeavoured to shew, from a joint comparison of the prophecies of Daniel and the revelations of St. John, that the final end of the dispersion of the Jews will be coincident with the ruin of Popedom, and take place about 2000, A.D. After this followed “An impartial Enquiry into the Time of the Coming of the Messiah,” in two letters to an eminent Jew, printed first separately and then together, in 1751.

It has already been stated, that his lordship had imbibed the Arian doctrines, in opposition to the standards of the Church, and, in furtherance of the views he had adopted, he now gave to the world a work which excited considerable controversy. It was entitled, an “Essay on the Spirit;” and the object of it was to prove the inferiority of the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and to prepare the way for an alteration of the Liturgy of the Church. To this work he prefixed a dedication, with his name, to the primate of Ireland; and it had the effect of fixing on him {474} the stain of heresy, and preventing his rising farther in the church, After all, the work was not written by the bishop himself, but. by a young clergyman of his diocese, who shewed the manuscript to his lordship, but had. Not the courage to print it. The bishop conveyed it to the press, and so managed the affair, that he alone sustained the whole brunt of. the opponents. There was a considerable degree of romantic generosity in this conduct, but little of worldly prudence. In 1752, he was recommended by the Duke of Dorset, the viceroy of Ireland, to the vacant. archbishopric of Tuam, but was refused the promotion. simply from his being reputed the author of this essay*. The next work the bishop: sent to the press was undoubtedly his own composition, “A Vindication of the Histories of the Old and New Testament; in Answer to. the Objections: of the late Lord Bolingbroke;” in two letters to. a young nobleman, 1752, 8vo. It is a work of great learning and ability, which discovers great acuteness of criticism and industry in his lordship, and in it the objections of Bolingbroke are ably exposed and confuted. There are, however, in it some physical principles laid down, which are more fanciful than solid. This is more particularly the case with the second part, which {175} appeared in 1754, in which he attempts to give an account of the formation of the earth, and of the deluge.

* The controversy to which the “Essay on Spirit” gave rise, continued but a short time, The best answers to the work were, “A Full Answer, &c.” 1753, 8vo. by the late Rev. William Jones, the friend and biographer of Bishop Horne; and “A Vindication of the Doctrine of the Trinity,” in three parts, with an Appendix, by the Rev. Dr. Randolph, father to the late Bishop of London. Dr. Keppis expresses his opinion that the “Essay on Spirit,” and the tracts in defence of it, were the means of diffusing the Arian sentiments, which, however, he adds, “are at present upon the decline, the Unitarians tending fast to the doctrines of Socinus.” On the “Essay on Spirit," Dr. Warburton says, in a letter to Dr. Hurd, “The Bishop of Clogher, or some such heathenish name, in Ireland, has just published a book. It is made up out of the rubbish of the heresies; of a much ranker cast than common Arianism. Jesus Christ is Michael, and the Holy Ghost, Gabriel, &c. This might be heresy in an English bishop, but in an Irish, ’tis only a blunder. But thank God, our bishops are far from making or vending heresies; though for the good of the church, they have excellent eyes at spying it out wherever it skulks or lies hid.” {175}

In 1753, he published “A Journal from Grand Cairo to Mount Sinai, and back again. Translated from a Manuscript, written by the Prefetto of Egypt; in company with the Missionaries de Propaganda Fide, at Grand Cairo. “To which are added, some Remarks on the Origin of Hieroglyphics, and the Mythology of the ancient Heathens,” London, 4to. and 8vo. This work was dedicated to the Society of Antiquaries. The bishop having become possessed of the original journal from Grand Cairo to Mount Sinai, and which had been mentioned by Dr. Pococke in his Travels through the East, offered this translation of it to the antiquaries, with a view of exciting their attention to characters cut out in the rocks in the wilderness of Sinai, at a place well known by the name of Gebel el Mokatah,or the Written Mountains. The bishop was in great hopes, that, if they could-have been copied and transmitted to England, the meaning of them might perhaps have been by some means or other got at; and, as it was supposed they were cut-out by the Israelites during the long leisure of their encampment in the Wilderness, it was supposed that much curious: and. interesting information might have been obtained, and confirming the truth of the Mosaic history. The prefetto of Egypt had with him persons acquainted with Arabic, Greek, Hebrew, Syriac, Coptic, Latin, Armenian, Turkish, English, Illyrian, German, and Bohemian languages; yet none of them had any knowledge of the characters, which were cut in the rock twelve or fourteen feet high with great industry. The bishop was anxious a person might be sent out qualified to copy them, and offered himself to contribute £100 per annum for five years, to. assist in defraying the expense. It does not appear that any steps were taken by the Society of Antiquaries in consequence; and probably the result would have been less satisfactory than supposed. The celebrated Mr. Edward Wortley Montagu, who went from Cairo to the desert of Sinai, for the express {476} purpose of seeing and describing the objects proposed by the bishop, was greatly disappointed, and convinced that the characters were not made by the Israelites. Other travellers, who have been at the same place since, have not been more successful.

The bishop’s next publication was in 1755; and consisted merely of some letters which had passed between his lordship, when Bishop of Cork, and Mr. William Penn; on the subject of baptism. In which he contended, that the true christian baptism is to continue to the end of the world; whereas the baptism of the Holy Ghost ceased with the working of miracles.

The zeal with which his lordship had entered into the Arian controversy, by fathering a work not his own, did not cease to influence his mind; and he attempted to further the propagation of the same tenets in his legislative capacity, by a speech in the house of lords, at Dublin, 2nd of February, 1756, when he moved that the Nicene and Athanasian creeds should for the future be omitted in the Liturgy of the church of Ireland. The speech he delivered on that occasion was taken down in short-hand; and, being published, went through several editions. This so avowed and declared an attack on the articles of the church, made his lordship be viewed in a very unfavourable light by his brethren, and this feeling towards him was aggravated still more by his posterior conduct. In 1757 he published the third part of his “Vindication of the Histories of the Old and New Testament,” in which he wandered so far into heterodoxy, that it was considered by the governors of the church as highly improper that such conduct should be allowed in one whose situation required him to appear in her defence. Accordingly orders were sent by his Majesty to the Duke of Bedford, then lord lieutenant, to take the proper steps towards a legal prosecution. A day was appointed for a general meeting of. the Irish prelates at the primate; to which Bishop Clayton was summoned, that he might receive from them the notification of their intentions. A censure was certain; {477} and it was apprehended he would be deprived of his benefice. His lordship however, and the other bishops and ministers, were relieved from all further trouble in so unpleasant, an affair by the hand of death, Feb. 26, 1758. The disease was nervous fever, and the agitation of mind under which he was thrown when a prosecution commenced against him, proved the cause of his death. When informed of the prosecution, he consulted an eminent lawyer on the subject, and asked him if he supposed he should lose his bishopric. The answer was, “My lord, I believe you will.” “Sir,” he replied, “you have given me a stroke I shall never get the better of.” It has been asserted, that, after the bishop had delivered his speech in the house of lords, he said “That his mind was eased of a load which had long been upon it, and that he now enjoyed a heartfelt pleasure, to which he had been a stranger for above twenty years before.” This story, if true, and his lordship’s future conduct, are decidedly inconsistent; and, indeed, it is, impossible to view in a favourable light the behaviour of the bishop and his precedent conduct. If he had been truly conscientious in the zeal he had shewn for the tenets which he had embraced, it ill became him to shrink from the consequences of avowing them.. The pecuniary loss of the revenues of his bishopric for the few remaining years in which he hadany probability of living, ought not to have weighed much in any circumstances; and surely none at all with one who was possessed of so ample a private fortune. And to suffer for conscience sake, t oa man thoroughly sincere in the principles he professes, ought to be viewed as his glory and his crown. Without, therefore, entering at all into the merits of the doctrines he advanced, we shall only remark, that the man who launches out into the storms of religious controversy, ought to be prepared to meet the buffettings, of the waves; he must expect the warm attacks of his opponents, and particularly so, if the tenets he advances be in opposition to those to which he has sworn his belief; and miserable must. be his feelings if he is not {478} prepared to withstand such hostility, and to derive: consolation from the approbation of his friends, and the still more important judgment of his own conscience.

We turn with pleasure to the amiable qualities manifested by the bishop in private life. The objects of his charity were numerous, and he bestowed his benefactions with such privacy, that it might be truly said his “left hand knew not what his right hand gave.” Being a member of the linen board, he availed himself of the means of doing good presented to him, and by getting wheels and reels for the poor about Clogher, he put it into their power to maintain themselves by the exertion of honourable labour.

The bishop left behind his many manuscripts, the fruits of his literary industry, but not in a state fit for the press. As a member of the learned societies to which he belonged, he maintained a correspondence with men of the first eminence for literature and science. To the learned printer, Mr. Bowyer, he made a present of the copyright of all his works published in England. His Lancashire estate he bequeathed to his nearest relation, Richard Clayton, Esq. chief justice of the common pleas in Ireland; but the principal part of his fortune fell to Dr. Barnard, who had married his niece.

WIFE of the Archbishop of Dublin, born at —— in Ireland, and descended from one of its ancient and most honourable families. This lady stands so high in the records of excellence, that it may truly be said, “When the eye saw her, it blessed her;” when the ear heard of her, it was in the chorus of praise and admiration: in her was united all the warmth and liberality of the Irish, with the solidity, energy, and fortitude of the English character. Munificent in her donations, yet her benevolence was as extensive as her generosity was unbounded; unostentatious in her charities, as in all her actions, she concealed {479} them as much as possible from the public eye. She seemed indeed to live but for the welfare of -others; her every pursuit was subservient to that exalted sense of duty which was the ruling principle of her mind and the great stimulus of all her actions. The benevolence and virtues of her heart appeared in her countenance, and gave an inexpressible charm to her manners and conversation. No one retired from her society without having been pleased; and very few without improvement. With an intuitive perception of all that was. elegant or graceful in language, and dignified in conduct, she united intellectual endowments which would have rendered her conspicuous in any sphere of life, had she pursued the paths of literature; but the duties of daughter, mother, the wife, and the friend, engrossed her attention. She was always actively engaged to promote happiness at home, and diffusing it in the wide circle of her connections. She poured consolation: into the bosom of distress, bound up the broken heart;”visited the fatherless and widow in their affliction;” “gave to the poor bread;” to the sick medicine; and to the ignorant instruction. Such was the being whose decease we have to record and lament, on the 1st of May, 1815. She had retired to rest the preceding evening, and not having risen at her usual time in the morning, the family became alarmed, and on entering her chamber, found her dead, apparently as if recently engaged in prayer.

This historian and antiquary was a native of the province of Ulster, a friar of the Franciscan order; and being well skilled in the language and antiquities of his country, was one of the envoys sent into Ireland from Louvain, by Hugh Ward, to collect the materials for his work relative to the Irish Saints. This task he performed with indefatigable industry for about fifteen years, and collected together. a mass of information, both genealogical and biographical, and which proved invaluable (as has been {480} recorded) to John Colgan, the author of the “Acta Sanctorum Hiberniæ.”

The task assigned him by Hugh Ward, afforded him an opportunity of procuring many other materials, regarding both the civil and ecclesiastical history of his country, which he digested into method and order; and with the aid of several skilful antiquarians, whom he employed to assist him, he not only compiled, but enlarged three historical treatises, the titles of which are to be found in Ware. By the assistance likewise of the aforesaid antiquaries (who were Ferfessius O’Melchonaire, or Coury, Peregrine O’Clery, and Peregrine O’Dubgennan) and receiving occasionally the assistance of others, he compiled and composed a treatise in a convent in Donegal, entitled, “The Annals of Donegal.” A work which O’Flaherty, in his Ogygia, taxes with great defects in point of chronology; yet (adds Ware) it is chiefly depended on, and closely followed by John Lynch and John Colgan.

Cleri also arranged and published a dictionary and glossary of the most difficult and obsolete words in the Irish language, under the title of “Senasan Nuadh, Louvain, 1643,” and died in the course of the same year.

Was born in Dublin, on the 28th December, 1673, and was admitted a fellow commoner of Trinity college in 1687; here. he took his degree of doctor of civil law, and was chosen one of its representatives in parliament, which mark of respect and esteem his constituents conferred on him till the time of his decease. After filling several important offices, he was appointed chancellor of the Irish exchequer, in 1735, which situation he3 held with great repute during the rest of his life. He-died of that fatal disorder, the gout in the stomach, in 1738, and was interred in St. Andrew’s church-yard. In public life he was a man of unwearied diligence and clear judgment, an equally, upright counsellor of the crown, and independent representative of the people. As one of the first commissioners of the board of first fruits, he may be said to have organised that body, and to have been the prime cause of all the benefits which arise to the established church in Ireland from his exertions. In private life he was univers{482}sally beloved for his benevolence, affability, and sweetness. of temper. His sister, Mary Coghill, erected the church of Drumcondra, near Dublin, as a monument of respect and affection to his memory, and ornamented it with a tomb, sculptured by Scheemaker.

Was descended from the ancient family of the Coles of Devonshire, and was the second son of Sir William Cole, who was the first of the family settled in Ireland.

The year of Sir John’s birth has not been recorded. During the unhappy dissensions, he was very active under his father, particularly in the relief of Enniskillen, which having been besieged nine weeks by fifteen hundred men, under Philip M’Hugh O’Reily, they were surprised in a sally by Walter Johnson, an officer under Sir William, who being seconded by Sir John, with his foot-company, and some volunteers, they raised the siege, and led the pursuit of the enemy for seven miles, as far as Maguire’s bridge.

After the reduction of Ireland by the parliament, he was appointed, with others, on the 21st November, 1653, commissioners for the precinct of Belturbet, to consider how the titles of the Irish and others to an estate in Ireland, and also their delinquency according to their respective qualifications, might be put into the most speedy and exact way of adjustment.

On the 27th of February following, he had the pay of £18. 4s. allowed him by the month, as governor of Enniskillin, and being very instrumental in promoting the restoration of King Charles Il. his majesty by privy seal, dated at Whitehall, 4th August, and by patent, 23rd January, 1660, created him a baronet, in consideration of his very many good services performed to him; and on the 13th of December gave him a colonel’s commission in a regiment of foot, to which he was appointed on the 22nd of March following; having on the 19th been constituted {483} one of the commissioners for the settlement of the kingdom, for which purpose he had a grant of lands.

He was member of parliament for the county of Fermanagh, of which county he was appointed custos rotulorum on the 2nd of April, 1661. He married Elizabeth, daughter of John Chichester, Esq. of Dungannon, by whom he had four sons and seven daughters, and died in or about the year 1693.

A native of the county of Donegal, and celebrated; both as an author and a scholar; was a strict Franciscan friar in the Irish convent of St. Anthony of Padua, in Louvain, in which he was professor of divinity. He was thoroughly acquainted with the Irish language, and like wise possessed a great knowledge of the antiquities and church history of his country, by the acquirement of which learning, he was admirably qualified for the praiseworthy and laborious work in which he had engaged, namely, the collecting and writing the lives of the Irish saints; a work in which he was greatly aided by the collections made for the same purpose by Hugh Ward*, who was unfortunately prevented from carrying his intentions into effect by sudden death. He (Colgan) gave up the greater part of his time and talents to this work, and has published two large folio volumes, illustrated with many notes, both useful and learned, especially in what regards {484}

* Hugh Ward was likewise a native of the county of Donegal, but received part of his education at Salamanca and part in Paris; and afterwards was made lecturer, and then guardian of the Irish college at: Louvain. Prior to which he was admitted into the order of Franciscan friars at Salamanca, in the year 1616. He was a man deeply read in Hibernian antiquities, and undertook the writing a complete History of the Lives of the Saints of Ireland. For which purpose he employed one Michael O’Clery,. who was likewise a friar of the same order, and sent him from Louvain to: Ireland to search for manuscripts and to collect materials for the work. The finishing of which was prevented by the author’s sudden decease, on the 5th November, 1635; and the whole of his papers came into the possession of John Colgan, and were singularly useful to him. {484}

the ancient topography of Ireland, and has annexed to them large and complete tables. The last of these volumes in order was the first printed and entitled “Acta Sanctorum Veteris et Majoris Scotizæ seu Hiberniæ, &c. &c.” Lov. 1645. Folio. His intention (says Ware) was, first to publish one general Treatise, or Synopsis of the Ecclesiastical Antiquities of Ireland. Secondly, The Acts of St. Patrick, St. Columb, and St. Bridgit. And, thirdly, to write the Lives and Acts of the other Saints of Ireland, according to the order of the months and days, which would occupy many volumes. But the first part of this last work being earliest ready for the press, he presented it to the public eye, and called it the first volume, though, the third of what he intended for his Ecclesiastical Antiquities. Into this volume he brought all the saints of Ireland who died during the first three months of the year, and it is suspected some Scots and English, such as he could lay the least claim to; yet is far short (continueth, the same author) of making sufficient reprisals on Mr. Dempster who with so bare a face hath plundered the Irish calendar, and from thence got the nick-name of [Greek], or the Saint-stealer. Peter Talbot, a man of “good parts and learning,” gives our author the title and character of Incitorum Corrosor, or a raker together of uncertain and unknown lives. The second volume of this work was printed at Louvain in 1647. In this volume he hath given seven different lives of St. Patrick, five of St. Columb, and six of St. Bridgit, to which he has annexed appendixes, notes, and indexes.

He died at Louvain in 1658, and his death frustrated his intention of giving to the public the lives of the Irish Saints for the other nine months of the year.

Several manuscript volumes of his writings are yet remaining at Louvain, the titles of which are to be found in Harris’s Edition of Ware. {485}

Was one of the greatest patriarchs of the monastic order in Ireland, and the apostle of the Picts. To distinguish him from other saints of the same name, he was surnamed Columkille, from the great: number of monastic cells; called by the Irish, killes, of which he was. the founder. He was of the noble extraction of Neil, and was born at Gartan, in the county of Tyrconnel, in 521, and early learned the divine Scriptures, and the lessons of an ascetic life under the celebrated bishop of St. Ferrian, in his great school of Cluain-iraird, and esteemed nothing worthy his pursuit that did not assist him in the disengagement of his mind from the world, and the advance of religion and holiness in his heart. Being advanced to the order of priesthood. in 546, he gave admirable lessons of piety, and sacred learning, and was soon attended by many disciples. He founded, about the year 550, the great monastery of Dair-magh, now called Durrogh, and Sit James Ware mentions a MS copy of the four gospels of St. Jerome’s translation, adorned with silver plates, as then extant, preserved in this abbey. He likewise founded many other monasteries of less note; and the same antiquarian observes, that a rule composed by St. Columba, then existed in the old Irish. This rule he settled in the hundred: monasteries, which he founded in Ireland and Scotland. King Dermot (like great men of more modern times) being offended at the zeal which reproved public vices, St. Columba determined on: leaving his native country; and with his twelve disciples passed into Scotland, and was successful in converting the king of the northern Picts, together with his subjects. These Picts, having embraced the faith, gave St. Columba the little island of Hy, or Iona, called from him Y-colin-kille, twelves miles from the land, in which he built the great monastery, which was for several ages the chief seminary of North Britain, and continued long the burying-place of {486} the kings, and other superior personages. Lewis, in his ancient History of Great Britain, mentions the remains of the tombs in the church-yard, of forty-eight kings of Scotland, four kings of Ireland, and eight kings of Norway.

St. Columba’s manner of living was most austere; his. fasting extraordinary, the bare floor his bed, and a stone his pillow; yet he was mild and cheerful, and his general. benificence [sic] won him the hearts of all; he considered time of so much value, that. he suffered no minutes to pass without employment, and that employment of the best kind, promoting religion and virtue in his own person, and communicating the same by example and precept to all, around him, - a rare example to the priesthood of all denominations. In the MS. life of St. Columba: by O’Donnell, it is asserted that in the year 544, being a prince of the royal family, he was offered: the crown of Ireland, and that. Dermod M’Cerball, his competitor, succeeded only because our holy abbot preferred the cowl to the diadem, an evident proof of the sincerity of his devotion, and the humility of his mind.

He died in the seventy-seventh year of his age, and was buried in the island, but was some ages. after removed to Down, in Ulster, and laid in one vet with the remains of St. Patrick and St. Brigit.

It is justly observed by Butler, that formerly, christians hid themselves in solitudes, that they might more immediately devote themselves to the service of Gods but now, after a christian education, too many pass their whole lives in dissipation and vanity, without being able to find leisure for serious meditation or reading, as if they made it their study to unlearn the chief thing which it concerns them to know, and to love the only thing: for which they exist religion, or the worship of God.