The measure of abridging the duration of parliaments having been ineffectually and insincerely entertained, first, in 1761, was now, in 1767, under the administration of lord Townshend, taken up with more earnestness. The commons had been sorely pressed with the reproaches of the people; and, galled by numerous writings and public discussions, calculated to render them unpopular, they now once more took up the question, and transmitted the heads of a bill for the limitation of parliament to seven years. The privy council, actuated by what motives the reader may infer, changed it to eight years, and returned it so changed to Ireland. Contrary to the general expectation, and to the consternation of many, it passed. It was still hoped that it would be cashiered in the Irish privy council; and it is apparent that some such design was entertained. The bill was detained for two sessions; but the facts had transpired, and were become known to the public, and the clamour was long, loud, and irresistible. The rest may be conveyed in a story told by lord Charlemont. "He happened," writes Mr Hardy, " to dine with one of the great parliamentary leaders; a large company, and, as Bubb Doddington says of some of his dinners with the Pelhams, ‘much drink and much good humour.' In the midst of this festivity the papers and letters of the last English packet, which had just come in, were brought into the room, and given to the master of the house. Scarcely had he read one or two of them when it appeared that he was extremely agitated. The company was alarmed. "What's the matter? Nothing, we hope, has happened that " "Happened!" exclaimed their kind host, swearing most piteously. Happened! the septennial bill is returned." A burst of joy from lord Charlemont and the very few real friends of the bill who happened to be present. The majority of the company, confused, and, indeed, almost astounded, began, after the first involuntary dejection of their features, to recollect that they had openly, session after session, voted for this bill, with many an internal curse, Heaven knows! But still they had uniformly been its loudest advocates; and that, therefore, it would be somewhat decorous not to appear too much cast down at their own unexpected triumphs. In consequence of these politic reflections, they endeavoured to adjust their looks to the joyous occasion as well as they could. But they were soon spared the labour of assumed felicity. "The bill is not only returned," continued their chieftain, "but the parliament is dissolved." "Dissolved, dissolved! why dissolved?" My good friends, I can't tell you why or wherefore; but dissolved it is, or will be directly."Hypocrisy," says Mr H., " could lend its aid no further," and a sullen taciturnity fell upon the board. Taking advantage of this blank moment, lord Charlemont withdrew from the group, "than which, a more ridiculous, rueful set of personages, in his life, he said, he never beheld." 66 66 66 The English government must have strongly felt the necessity of shaking off the grasping and encumbering influence of this class of persons, so well described in the foregoing extract, and their patrons the boroughmongers, by whose means they had hitherto ruled the country. to be kept in order, at a mighty cost, and impossible to satisfy, it was now for some time beginning to be felt that they were becoming yearly Hard less efficient in the work for which they were courted, flattered, and paid. A national spirit had been springing up around them, and they had not only been compelled to give way, but it was also felt that the disgrace and unpopularity of their characters, their tyranny and unconstitutional conduct, were reflected upon the administration which had recourse to such an unworthy instrumentality. From time to time, men of ability and spirit stood up to expose the system and its effects, with so much force and fulness as no underhand game of venality and deception could long continue to endure; and, if Ireland were for a few years longer to submit, yet such resources were not fit to be sported in the light of full and public exposure. The clouds and shadows of dawn were melting away during the advance of morn, and the night-haunting crew, with their deeds of darkness, could not much longer affront the daylight with impunity. The English government had no desire for the independence of parliament; but, far more anxious to unfetter themselves from the loathsome arms of that prostitute influence by which they were at the same time upheld, controlled, impoverished, and debased, they made their election, and secured for Ireland the first great step of political revival. To trace out the few events which intervened between this and the great events of 1777, will not occupy many paragraphs. But we may observe here, that the vast expansion of the popular spirit in Ireland was fully shown by the reception of the octennial bill. It awakened a frenzy of delight; and the lord-lieutenant's carriage was drawn by the citizens, when he returned from the house, after giving the royal assent to it. The parliament was dissolved, but a new parliament was not to meet for sixteen months, which time was considered necessary, to enable lord Townshend to complete his arrangements, by detaching the new members from their patrons. This important undertaking, of which the result was to be eventually of far different importance than was anticipated by any one, was to be effected by the most enormous corruption. The great boroughmongers could be secured by the various resources within the ordinary disposal of every administration. The subalterns were to be purchased at a ready-money sacrifice. The success was very considerable, but not entire, when the parliament was next assembled, in 1769. They had included in their drag-net some intractable and dangerous fishes. A money bill, not originating in the commons, was thrown out unceremoniously. This defeat caused sensible mortification, and the more, as the popular party was joined by many of the castle retainers, who had in their bargain reserved to themselves some latitude. This resistance of the house of commons is the more remarkable, as it is the first instance, for nearly eighty years previous, on which they had manifested any determined spirit on the subject of money bills. An English journal, of a popular character, animadverted upon it in terms which strongly manifest the surprise it must have given, and the low idea of Ireland then entertained in England by any party. "The refusal of the late bill, because it was not brought in contrary to the practice of ages, in violation of the constitution, and to the certain ruin of the dependence of Ireland upon Great Britain, is a behaviour more suiting an army of Whiteboys, than the grave representatives of a nation. This is the 'most daring insult yet offered to government," &c. In consequence of this act of resistance in the commons, lord Townshend prorogued the parliament, and in his speech pronounced a severe rebuke, in which he expounded to them the laws by which they were bound. The commons forbade their clerk from entering his speech upon their journals, and he entered his protest in the house of lords. Against this irregular proceeding five lords protested-viz., Lowth, Charlemont, Mountmorris, Powerscourt, and Longford. In any proceeding of the period, it would be vain to reason strictly upon right. Every act was more or less anomalous, and acts grounded on expediency were protected by a virtual irresponsibility. A crime in England liable to impeachment would have here been little more than a mistake. But assuredly, if the question thus opened were to be strictly looked into, the commons had right on their side. That the law of Poynings was clearly against them, may be admitted, on a plain construction of its whole sense. If there is any ambiguity to be allowed, it was strictly explained by subsequent statutes of Philip and Mary. But it was an established custom by which, under the form of "heads of bills," the commons had been allowed to originate such bills as they thought fit. Under the sanction of this form, they had uniformly been allowed the privilege of originating the money bills. They had acquired a prescriptive right, which may be considered as standing on the same ground as the similar constitutional privilege of the English commons, which is merely custom from time immemorial. The objection would, it is true, in the case of Ireland, arise from the terms of distinct enactments. The Irish privilege was opposed to the letter of the statute, and might be viewed as an usurpation; but it was an old one, and in strict conformity with the most recognised constitutional maxims. The whole system arising out of the laws of Henry VII., and of Philip and Mary, &c., was a gross anomaly an exception in the statutes. The actual customs amounted to an admission of this truth; and the violation, in the present instance, of those customs, was an express declaration of a despotic power. It was made more glaring by other violations of a similar tendency, which were as directly against express law as against established right;-we mean those declarations of the British parliament, which had been occasionally made. The incident on which we have been remarking, itself led to some very strong language," Always considering that it is one of our most essential duties to maintain inviolate the supreme authority of the legislature of Great Britain over every part of the dominions of your majesty's crown." This language, directly applied to the conduct of America, was understood to be intended to glance at that of the Irish parliament, and greatly helped the growing ferment there. There was also another incidental circumstance which produced a strong sensation in the commons. One of the members of the Irish administration let fall a hint that the money bill was in the nature of a fine for the renewal of the parliament. The main ground taken by. the opposition in the parliament was constitutional, and seems to be more strong in itself than strictly applicable to a question of settled usage: the people, they affirmed, had no right to pay taxes laid on by the Irish privy council. But the reply must be so obvious, that we need not state it: it is answered by the fact of their rejection of the bill. The great aristocratic families, now beginning to feel themselves in some measure unseated from their place of influence, and seeing the further danger to which such proceedings on both sides would expose them, must at this time have felt no small embarrassment. They could not, without much reserve, act with either the government, which aimed itself to supersede their influence, or with the opposition, which was more directly opposed to that influence. They were by habits and prejudices bound to the general policy of administration; and thus while they lent themselves in parliament to the measures of the council, they were at the same time loud in their appeals to the people, against the course by which their authority in the elections had been tampered with and diminished. After the prorogation, an interval of fourteen months elapsed, during which the liberality of lord Townshend's gratuities had full time to work; and on the next meeting, in February, 1771, a new spirit of compliance manifested itself in an address, which caused the speaker, Mr John Ponsonby, through whom it should have been presented, to resign. In the conclusion, they thanked his majesty "for continuing his excellency, lord Townshend, in the government of this kingdom." On this, Mr Ponsonby observed that this lord had," on the last day of last session, accused them of a great crime," and that the thanks appeared to him "to convey a censure of the proceedings, and a relinquishment of the privileges of the commons." Mr Edmond Sexton Pery was, in consequence, chosen speaker, in the room of one worthy to preside over a more dignified assembly. The earl of Charlemont had made great but vain efforts to induce Ponsonby to keep the chair, and had thought himself successful; but after a night spent in reasonings to which the speaker assented, he was the next day surprised by the event. Though silent in the house, lord Charlemont was effectively the leader of the opposition through the whole proceedings of which we have here endeavoured to give an abridged view. earnest zeal, and persevering alacrity-his constant good sense, and engaging manner, gave him universal weight among the better classes. His To keep our narrative unbroken, we omitted to mention that, in 1768, his lordship had married Miss Hickman, daughter of Mr Robert Hickman, of the county of Clare. It was, perhaps, something about the same time, or immediately after, that he built his house in Rutland Square, and also that at Marino. He was, it appears from a letter of his published in Mr Hardy's memoir, deterred from residing on his estates in the north of Ireland by the delicacy of his constitution, which required the vicinity of the sea, and ready access to the best medical advice. It is also, we conceive, an evident inference from his whole life and character, that he felt a strong parental feeling for the yet infant liberties of his country too strongly to quit the scene of political life. To him, indeed, with more than its mere figurative power, belongs the application of that expression which Mr Grattan applies somewhere to himself on another occasion, of having "watched her cradle." This part, at least, of that rhetorical antithesis was just and true for lord Charlemont. The success of lord Townshend's administration now began more distinctly to be seen. The spirited resolutions, and the determined resistance of the opposition, were completely borne down by the government party, which appeared re-enforced by several clever young men brought in by lord Townshend, and by several additions to the peerage, which counterbalanced the growing opposition in the upper house. In consequence, every proposal for the good of the country was thrown overboard with a high hand. The burthen of misapplied taxation, the commercial and agricultural disadvantages, and other prominent defects which we shall presently have to detail, were vainly pressed by the party of lord Charlemont. At the same time, however, the attention of the opposition party in the British house of commons was forcibly awakened by the recent discussions on the rejected money bill, and some spirited proceedings took place, which showed that a just sense of the claims of Ireland was beginning to take root. But of this more decided manifestations were ere long to show themselves. Lord Townshend was recalled in 1772. He had been successful in a high degree in effectuating the plan of policy for which he had been sent. But, on the whole, we see reason to suspect that the British government was disappointed in the result. In the mean time, a clearer insight had been obtained on the real interests and just claims of Ireland; and though the Irish privy council had been enabled to assert a strong control, it was becoming equally manifest that the opposition was also advanced in weight, intelligence, and general concert with the sense of the nation. If great power had been obtained, its limitations were become more apparent, and its exercise more unpopular. It is mentioned by some writers that lord Townshend was censured by the British cabinet, for not maintaining the dignity of the Irish court. He was a wit of the first water; and the house was told, by one of its members, that his lordship said more good things in one night than the whole house in a year. He won many friends by the charms of good fellowship, and the grace of free and liberal hospitality, so attractive to the Irish of the last century. He He had The address of His He was succeeded by lord Harcourt, a most amiable man. was, however, less active and determined, and to some extent addicted to retirement and study, and of a temper too fastidious for the coarse jocularity which then pervaded the manners of this country. not, however, any formidable difficulty to encounter. his predecessor had secured for him a tame parliament; and, so long as it lasted, no very formidable difficulty could be encountered. secretary, De Blaquiere, on whom the burthen of public affairs fell, was qualified to make amends for the deficiency of the viceroy. He kept the best wine, and a first-rate French cook: he caught the manners, and cultivated the tastes of his supporters, with rapid tact. It was alleged in his praise, that he was the first secretary who ever bestowed a thought on the consideration of Irish interests—a strange, and yet highly probable affirmation. We have omitted to mention somewhat earlier an event in the previous administration, of which the result belongs rather to a subsequent time, to which we shall now hurry on. A nobleman's agent in the north endeavoured to increase his employer's income by a most oppres |