58

DISTRUST.

[Book I. and who had most joyfully hailed it, felt nothing of the confidence and repose which it had promised; and few but the Minister remained smiling and complacent. In him, little change of mood was visible, for it took much to extinguish the smiles and complacency of Mr. Addington.

CHAP. III.]

CATHOLIC DISCONTENT.

59

CHAPTER III.

The Union.

NEXT to the settling of our affairs with foreign Powers, the greatest subject of anxiety to the government was the effect of the Union upon Ireland. When, on the first day of the century, the bells of the churches rang, and the Park and Tower guns were fired as the new Imperial flag was hoisted, there were other feelings than of joy in the minds of the men about the throne, though a great object appeared to have been accomplished. On that day, the King met the Chancellor to receive from him the great seal, and see it defaced, and the new Imperial seal substituted. The Privy Council were sworn in anew; and proclamation was made of the alteration in the style and title of the sovereign. The word Union was in every mouth; but that state of the Catholic question which has been already described impaired the confidence of all who knew the circumstances. No one doubted that the intimidation of the vice-regal government by the great dominant families was over; and with it, much jobbing at Dublin, and much tyranny on their own estates. No one doubted that vast internal improve- Discontent ments would take place, by which peace and prosper- of the Cathity among the people would be promoted. But the great religious quarrel was becoming more formidable than ever. By some means never explained, a paper was circulated among the Irish Catholics in the name of Mr. Pitt, in the issue of which he had no share whatever.1 It appears to have been made up of parts of that " Letter of Lord C- " which has been re

The "Lord C

olics.

was

ferred to, and of statements drawn up by Mr. Dundas and others, never intended for publication. Castlereagh, but understood to be Cornwallis, the Viceroy; and the rest was attributed to Mr. Pitt. This paper set forth the views and wishes and probable conduct of the Catholics in that style of freedom which might be expected in written communications among public men of the same way of thinking; and it was wholly improper for general circulation at a time so critical. The Catholics believed their cause secure, thus advocated (as they thought) by the Prime Minister and the Viceroy; while at

1 Lord Malmesbury's Diaries, iv. p. 30.

60

IRISH PEASANTRY.

[BOOK I the same moment the Sovereign was stiffening himself immovably against all concession whatever. The danger from the wrath of the deceived Catholics must be great: and the Union opened under the gloom of this misunderstanding.

This was not, however, the greatest danger, threatening as it Of the Re- was. The worst discontent of Ireland at this time was publicans. not immediately connected with religious feuds. The insufferable oppressions which had caused and followed the rebellion of 1798 were resented as vehemently as ever; and those who had desired a republic before and an alliance with France, did not desire these things the less, but the more, for what had happened. The government was blind to this danger for nearly two years after the Union; and the reason of this blindness was that the priests, who were always supposed to be all-powerful with the people, were as fiercely opposed to France under Napoleon as the Protestant clergy could have been. Napoleon had humbled the pride and restricted the power of Rome, and the Irish priesthood resented this in a style which misled the government into taking for granted the loyalty of the Irish people. Because no Catholic rebellion was brewing, statesmen supposed that all was well. It is curious now to read the correspondence which passed between the governments in London and Dublin in 1801 and 1802, and compare it with the state of the country and the needs of the people.

Of the

The fertile parts of Limerick, Cork, and Kerry, and elsewhere, were separated by vast wildernesses, where no roads peasantry existed, and scarcely here and there a path. Swarms of people lived in these wilds, like rabbits in a warren. Not a plough or a cart was to be seen for many miles together; and the weed-grown mud hovels of the inhabitants could scarcely have been discerned by the stranger, though a hundred might be within reach of his eye. But few strangers ventured there. The soldiery and police could make no way; and they knew that every man's mind and hand were against them. Such districts were always the hiding-places of smugglers, thieves, and men in danger from society; and now, those who had outlawed themselves by their share in the rebellion of 1798 were harbored among the wilds. There was little commerce between the towns and the rural districts, to bind them together, and create mutual interests. The only produce of county Kerry was butter; and that was carried to Cork on horseback. The proportion of inhabitants employed upon the land was more than double that so employed in England; while the isolation of the class from the rest of the world was much greater: so that wrong ideas, once introduced among the rural multitude, were irremovable; and the temptation to rule them as slaves or banditti was as strong to the

CHAP. III.]

GOVERNMENT IN IRELAND.

61

land-owners and the government, as it was to hot-blooded and sanguine patriots to make them tools. Nothing had been done to remove from the minds of this portion of the population the discontents which had exploded in rebellion two years before; and they did not know that they had anything to do with England but to hate her. The Shannon was flowing through the midst of the island, ready to open, with a little pains, to the custom of the world, 2,000,000 of acres of fertile land; and nobody stirred to do it. The local authorities had decided and represented, in 1794, that the thing ought to be done; but nobody was stirring to do it.1 All that the rural inhabitants knew about England, or about society, was that it hunted down smugglers and the friends of the peasantry, and hanged or shot patriots, and set up churches here and there which the people had to pay for, but could not enter. The small manufacturing and commercial classes of that day were troubled in their own way. They had their political and religious grievances and prejudices, and their Irish temperament and rearing, - all unfavorable to England. And correspondence with the Irish exiles in France, and solicitations from the tempters sent (as seems really to have been the case) by Napoleon to stir up rebellion, in order to occupy England with a civil war, kept up a constant restlessness, excitement, and inability to acquiesce in any kind of settlement, which were, unfortunately, little understood or apprehended by the government.

Temptations.

Lord Hardwicke was the first Viceroy after the Union; and Mr. Abbott, afterwards Lord Colchester, was Chief The governSecretary. Lord Hardwicke arrived in Dublin in ment. May; and for a considerable time was certainly well satisfied with the results of his government. He endeavored to moderate violence, and keep down tyranny wherever he saw it, and to do justice impartially; and as he found the Protestants highly political, and the Catholics, for the most part, a quiet, money-getting sort of people, like the Jews or any other class under permanent political disqualification, he was naturally popular among the Catholics, and less liked by the noisy Protestants, who found themselves no longer what they were. He and the Secretary thought that while this was the case, all was well; and they were always writing home that it was so. It is surprising to read their letters now; and to observe how they endeavor to vary the expression of their assurance that all was quiet, the people satisfied and happy in the new settlement, and everything sure to come right in the shortest possible time, while insurrection was preparing in the towns, and the rural population

1 Porter's Progress of the Nation, i. p. 26.

62

WRONG IDEA FROM IRISH QUIETUDE. [Book L

was too barbaric to enter into the question at all.1 The The government believed itself at leisure to occupy itself with military finances, and a system of checks upon military expenditure, and a discrimination between the offices of Lord-Lieutenant and Commander of the Forces; and a distribution of forces, in case of a possible invasion by and by: and again, with a plan for enabling the University of Dublin to print Bibles and Prayer Books; and again, with plans of greater weight, - for working the mines of Ireland, and improving its inland navigation. Next, the patronage question occasioned so much disagreement, that Lord Hardwicke was on the point of resigning. Amidst the controversies and discussions on the arrangement of the executive powers and legislative business of Ireland, these rulers went on saying that all was well, and that nothing could be more rapid than the process by which the Union was producing its fruits. During this period, however, the coercion laws under which Ireland had smarted from the time of the rebellion were perpetuated: not only was the Act for the suppression of rebellion renewed in the spring of 1801, but that for the continuance of martial law. When English members of the House of Commons suggested that no country could attain a safe and wholesome condition which was under a perpetuated martial law, Irish members assured them that they did not understand Ireland: and this, again, could not tend to make the Irish in love with the English connection By the autumn, when peace was agreed on, the Premier was himself disposed to disuse martial law in Ireland, and to promise its removal on the signature of the Definitive treaty.

Opinions of

ment.

2

In

In 1802, it was not to be described (the ministers said) how well everything was going on. Not one member of the govern- parliament lost his seat in consequence of having advocated the Union; and therefore all Ireland must be satisfied with it. The effect of the presence of good soldiery from England was evident and remarkable; their discipline was admired by the people; and they seemed to spread quietness wherever they were stationed. This was probably true. August, 1802, however, Lord Redesdale, the Irish Chancellor,8 wrote a letter to the Premier, which indicates that the security and complacency of the vice-regal government were shaken at last. "When I first came to this country," says Lord Redesdale, "I was induced to form an opinion which I communicated to you, that it was approaching rapidly to a state of quiet. I am extremely sorry to say that I fear I have led you into an error in that respect." The letter goes on to intimate that, amidst the 3 lbid. ii. p. 96.

1 Life of Lord Sidmouth, i. p. 433. 2 Ibid. p. 483.