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X.

1822.

content with sending immediate succour, in men and arms, to the menaced districts, he prepared and laid before Government several memorials on the measures requisite Lord Wel- to restore order in the country, in which, as the first step, lesley's able conduct and a great increase in the police establishment of the country impartiali- was suggested.* At the same time the greatest exertions

ty.

120.

were made to reconcile parties, and efface party distinctions at the Castle of Dublin. Persons of respectability of all parties shared in the splendid hospitality of the Lord-lieutenant; Orange processions and commemorations were discouraged; the dressing of King William's statue in Dublin, a party demonstration, was prohibited; and every effort made to show that Government was in earnest in its endeavours to appease religious dissensions, and heal the frightful discord which had so long desolated the country. But the transition from a wrong to a right system is often more perilous than the following out of a wrong one. You alienate one party without conciliating the other; so much more deep is recollection of injury, than gratitude for benefits in the human breast. Marquis Wellesley's administration, so different from any55; Pearce's thing they had ever experienced, gave the utmost offence Life of Wel- to the Orange party, hitherto in possession of the whole situations of influence and power in the country. To such a length did the discontent arise, that the Lordtary Peel, lieutenant was publicly insulted at the theatre of Dublin, and the riot was of so serious a kind as to give rise to a trial at the next assizes.1

1 Ann. Reg.

1822,14,16,

lesley, iii.

348, 351;

Lord Wellesley to

Mr Secre

Jan. 29, 1823.

One authentic document may convey an idea of the general state of Ireland, with the exception of the Protestant province of Ulster, at this period. "The progress of this diabolical system of outrage, during the last month, has been most alarming; and we regret to say that we have been obliged, from want of adequate force, to remain almost passive spectators of its daring advances, until at length many have been obliged to convert their houses into garrisons, and others have sought refuge in the towns. We cannot expect individuals to leave their houses and families exposed, while they go out with patrolling parties; and to continue in such duty for any length of time, is beyond their physical strength, and inconsistent with their other duties." (Memorial of twenty-eight Magistrates of County Cork.) Annual Register, 1823, p. 9.

Dreadful but necessary examples were made, in many CHAP.

X.

examples in

ed districts.

of the disturbed districts, of the most depraved and 1822. hardy of the depredators. So numerous had been the 121. outrages, that although the great majority of them had Dreadful been perpetrated with impunity, yet great numbers of the disturbprisoners had been made-prisoners against whom the evidence was so clear that their conviction followed of course. In Cork, no less than 366 persons awaited the special commission sent down in February to clear the jail, of whom thirty-five received sentence of death. Several of these were left for immediate execution. Similar examples were made in Limerick, Tipperary, and Kilkenny, where the assizes were uncommonly heavy; and by these dreadful but necessary examples the spirit of insubordination was, by the sheer force of terror, for the time subdued. One curious and instructive fact appeared from the evidence adduced at these melancholy trials, and that was, that the principal leaders and most daring actors in their horrid system of nocturnal outrage and murder, were the persons who had been cast down from the rank of substantial yeomen, and reduced to a state of desperation Ann. Reg. by the long-continued depression in the price of agricul- 31. tural produce.1

1 *

1822, 30,

famine in

But ere long a more dreadful evil than even these 122. agrarian outrages broke out in this unhappy land; and Dreadful the south and west of Ireland was punished by a cala- the south mity the natural consequence, in some degree, of its sins, Ireland. but aggravated to a most frightful extent by a visita- April 1823. tion of Providence. The disturbed state of the coun

* "The authors of the outrages consisted of three classes: 1. Many farmers had advanced their whole capital in improvements upon the land. These men, by the depression of farming produce, had been reduced from the rank of substantial yeomen to complete indigence, and they readily entered into any project likely to embroil the country, and, by the share of education which they possessed, unaccompanied by any religious sentiments, became at once the ablest and least restrained promoters of mischief. 2. The second consisted of those who had been engaged in the Rebellion of 1798 and their disciples. 3. The third consisted of the formidable mass of ignorance and bigotry which was diffused through the whole south of Ireland.”—Annual Register, 1822, pp. 30, 31.

VOL. II.

21

and west of

X.

1822.

CHAP. try during the whole of 1822 had caused the cultivation of potatoes to be very generally neglected in the south and west, partly from the numbers engaged in agrarian outrages, partly from the terror inspired in those who were more peaceably disposed. In addition to this, the potato crops in the autumn of 1822 failed, to a very great degree, over the same districts; and though the grain harvest was not only good, but abundant, yet this had no effect in alleviating the distresses of the peasantry, because the price of agricultural produce was so low, and they had been so thoroughly impoverished by its long continuance, that they had not the means of purchasing it. Literally speaking, they were starving in the midst of plenty. The consequence was, that in Connaught and Munster, in the spring of 1823, multitudes of human beings were almost destitute of food; and the nocturnal disturbances ceased, not so much from the terrors of the law, as from the physical exhaustion of those engaged in them. What was still worse, the sufferings of the present had extinguished the hopes of the future; and the absorption of three-fourths of the seed-potatoes, in many places, in present food, seemed to presage a still worse famine in the succeeding year. In these melancholy and alarming circumstances, the conduct of Government was most praiseworthy, and was as much distinguished by active and welljudged benevolence as it had previously been by impartial administration, and the energetic repression of crime. Five hundred thousand pounds were placed at the disposal of the Irish government by the English cabinet ; 1 Pearce's and roads, bridges, harbours, and such objects of public Wellesley, utility, were set on foot wherever they seemed practicable. But this melancholy calamity called forth a still more Ann. Reg. striking proof of British kindness and generosity, and 37; Sir D. afforded proof how thoroughly Christian charity can obH. Taylor, literate the fiercest divisions, and bury in oblivion the 1822. worst delinquencies of this world. England forgot the sins of Ireland; she saw only her suffering.1 Subscrip

Memoirs of

iii. 123,

342, 344;

1822, 33,

Baird to Sir

June 24,

X.

1822.

tions were opened in every church and chapel of Great CHAP. Britain; and no less than £350,000 was subscribed in a few weeks, and remitted to Dublin, to aid the efforts of the local committees, by whom £150,000 had been raised for the same benevolent purpose. By these means the famine was stayed, and the famishing multitude was supported, till a favourable crop, in the succeeding year, restored the usual means of subsistence.*

123.

of the Ha

Those awful scenes, in which the visitations of Providence were mingled with the crimes and punishment of Suspension man-and both were met, and could be softened only, by beas Corpus the unwearied energy of Christian benevolence-excited, Act, and as well they might, the anxious attention of Government tion Act. and the British Parliament. Whatever the remote causes of so disastrous a state of things might be, it was evident that nothing but vigorous measures of repression could be relied on in the mean time. Justice must do its work before wisdom commenced its reform. Unfortunately only the first was energetically and promptly done; the last, from political blindness and party ambition, was indefinitely postponed. Lord Londonderry (Lord Castlereagh) introduced into the Lower House two bills, one for the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act until the 1st August following. This was strongly resisted by the Opposition, but agreed to by a large majority, the numbers being 195 to 68. The Insurrection Act, which authorised the Lord-lieutenant, upon application of a

"The distress for food, arising principally from the want of means to purchase it, continues to prevail in various districts; and the late accounts from the south and west are of the most afflicting character. Colonel Patrickson, whose regiment (the 43d) has recently relieved the 57th in Galway, reports the scenes which that town presents to be truly distressing. Hundreds of half-famished wretches arrive almost daily from a distance of fifty miles, many of them so exhausted by want of food that the means taken to restore them fail of effect from the weakness of the digestive organs, occasioned by long fasting." -Sir D. BAIRD to Sir H. TAYLOR, 24th June 1822; Memoirs of Lord Wellesley, iii. 343, 344.

In June 1822 there were in Clare alone 99,639 persons subsisting on daily charity; in Cork, 122,000; in Limerick, 20,000, out of a population not at that period exceeding 67,000.-Ann. Reg., 1822, p. 40.

1822.

CHAP. certain proportion of the magistrates of a district, to deX. clare it by proclamation in a state of insurrection-and in that event gave extraordinary powers of arrest to the magistrates of all persons found out of their houses between sunset and sunrise, and subjected the persons seized, in certain events, to transportation-was next brought forward, and passed by a large majority, the numbers being 59 to 15. Two other bills were also passed, the one indemnifying persons who had seized gunpowder without legal authority since 1st November, and the other imposing severe restrictions on the importation of arms and ammunition. The lawless state of the country, and the constant demand of the nocturnal robbers for arms, rendered these measures absolutely necessary in this as they have been in every other disturbed period of Irish history, and the powers thus conferred were immediately acted upon by the Lord-lieutenant. A still more efficient measure of repression was adopted by a great increase of the police, who were brought to that state of vigour and efficiency which they have ever since maintained.1

1 Hughes,

vi. 481;

Ann. Reg.

1822, 26,

34.

124.

The Catholic claims were in this session of Parliament Divisions on again brought forward by Mr Canning, in the form of a the Catholic motion to give them seats in the House of Peers, and April 30. enforced with all the eloquence of which he was so consummate a master.*

claims.

They were as strongly opposed by

* On this occasion Mr Canning made a very happy use of the late imposing ceremony of the coronation, the splendour of which was still fresh in the minds of his auditors. "Do you imagine," said he, " it never occurred to the representatives of Europe that, contemplating this imposing spectacle, it never occurred to the ambassadors of Catholic Austria, of Catholic France, or of states more bigoted, if any such there be, to the Catholic religion, to reflect that the moment this solemn ceremony was over, the Duke of Norfolk would become deprived of the exercise of his privileges among his fellow-peersstripped of his robes of office, which were to be laid aside, and hung up until the distant (be it a very distant!) day, when the coronation of a successor to his present and gracious sovereign should again call him forth to assist at a similar solemnisation? Thus, after being exhibited to the peers and people of England, to the representatives of princes and nations of the world, the Duke

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