68

FATE OF THE LEADERS.

[BOOK I. were down upon the insurgents, who were dispersed without a struggle. Lord Kilwarden still breathed; and he lived half an hour longer. Mr. Wolfe lay dead, some yards from the spot where the carriage was stopped. Some one said, within the hearing of the dying man, that the assassins should be executed the next day; on which, the upright Judge exerted himself to speak once more. "Murder must be punished," he said; "but let no man suffer for my death but on a fair trial, and by the laws of his country."

Results.

The number of lives lost otherwise than by murder does not appear to have been ascertained: 1 nearly twenty, it is said, of soldiers and volunteers, and probably about fifty of the insurgents. An escaped prisoner of the rebels, who had been shut up in the depot after the explosion, showed the way; and the lane leading to it was found strewed with pikes. Within, were stores of ball cartridges, hand-grenades, powder, some uniforms, and a batch of printed sheets, wet from the press, which bore the proclamation of the Provisional Government; of those lost men who were now pressing on towards the Wicklow mountains, to hide themselves from pursuit. These ill-judging leaders pretended in their wandering to be French officers; and the consequence was that the Catholic peasantry, who hated the French for the Pope's sake, would have nothing to say to them. Poor Emmett might have escaped by sea, but he could not go till he had once more seen Sarah Curran. He stole back into Dublin, and was apprehended near her residence. It was not till now that her afflicted father knew of the attachment.2 In letters, written immediately before his execution, Emmett acknowledged his misconduct in regard to the Currans. He met his death with composure. His epitaph is known to all as Moore's mournful "O! breathe not his name." Sarah Curran died of lingersong, 66 ing heart-break. Most of the leaders of the enterprise were apprehended, and some hanged. Russel was executed. Quigley was exiled, after making a full confession.

This rebellion is sometimes called insignificant; or it is said to be rendered important only by the murder of Lord Kilwarden. But the truest and most intelligent friends of Ireland saw the matter very differently; and the survivors of them hold their opinion to this day. This outbreak disclosed (by means of the documents that were seized in consequence) an amount and extent of Irish discontent of which the most clear-sighted had before been unaware. The outbreak rudely checked the course of improvement which had obviously made a fair start after the Union ; and the event and the documents together brought on a new 1 Annual Register, 1803, p. 308. 2 Life of Curran, ii. pp. 235, 238.

CHAP. III.]

RESULTS OF THE REBELLION.

69

series of Coercion Acts, under which few of the objects of the Union could go forward at all.

On the 28th of July at the earliest moment, in those days of a slow post the King sent down a message to par- Coercion. liament,1 notifying that insurrection had again appeared

3

in Ireland, and expressing his reliance that parliament would take measures for protecting the innocent, and restoring tranquillity. Two bills were immediately brought into the Commons; one for the suspension of the Habeas Corpus in Ireland, and the other for enabling the Viceroy to try the prisoners by martial law. Both bills were passed through all their stages in the Commons before ten o'clock the same night; and in the Lords before eleven; the standing orders, which would have caused delay, being suspended in consideration of the emergency. When parliament reassembled on the 22d of November, the royal Speech announced that the Irish conspirators 2 had been brought to justice; and one of the earliest acts of the session was to renew the term of operation of the coercion bills of July. Year after year was the coercion continued; and mournful was the state of the unhappy country where all was to have gone on well after the Union. In 1803, Lord Redesdale, the Chancellor, wrote letters to Lord Fingall, about the Catholics, which by some means became public in January, 1804. In these letters were contained insults to the Catholic body, doubts of the Catholics loyalty of the most eminent Catholic gentlemen, and stirred up. prejudices on the whole subject so injurious as to cause shame among friends of the government that the second functionary in Ireland should so feel and so speak about the great majority of the population of the island; and at a moment, too, when, in consideration of the anxieties of the State, the leading Catholics had declined to urge their claims at present. The popular exasperation was naturally strong. The Catholic question, before in abeyance, was revived in full force; and it required all the popularity of Lord Hardwicke, and all the efforts of the Catholic leaders, to secure the quietness of the public meetings held throughout 1804. Then ensued grievous distress to all classes Currency from the disappearance of the metallic currency. The troubles. Bank Restriction Act of 1797 had extended to Ireland; but there was not, as in England, any supervision of the issues of the Bank, or any check to private banking. The insecure state of the country caused a hoarding of the metals, at the very time that the island was flooded with paper money. Country banks gave out notes down to the value of half-a-crown; a spurious coinage of flat morsels of silver was current for a time; but it 2 Hansard, i. p. 2.

1 Annual Register, 1803. Chron. p. 414.

3

8 Ibid. ii. p. 151.

70

THE NEW VICEROY.

[BOOK L was suddenly refused at the post-office, and other government offices; and then tradesmen would not take it. The perplexity and distress of the people were extreme; and military guards were set on the bakers' shops, and other places of trade.1 Before the public peace was fatally broken, government provided a costly supply of dollars and halfpence in rolls,2 and authorized silversmiths to issue silver tokens, and opened an office for the reception of depreciated money. At the same time, employers paid their workmen by orders on the baker or other tradesmen. Riot was thus obviated, though very barely; but the manufacturing and commercial, and other social progress hoped for from the Union, was grievously retarded.

3

In 1805, the continued suspension of the Habeas Corpus in Ireland was resolved on by large majorities in parliament, though the tranquillity of the country was declared to be still on the increase under Lord Hardwicke.

Duke of Bedford Viceroy.

4

In 1806, when parliament had again rejected the petitions of the Catholics, and France was threatening, and all was going ill on the Continent, there was serious fear that Ireland would make common cause with France. But she had obtained a ruler as mild as Lord Hardwicke, and yet more favoring to the mortified classes of the Irish people, in the Duke of Bedford, who, by a change of ministry, became Lord Lieutenant. When a wild outlaw force committed ravage in the north, at the end of 1806, under the name of Threshers, the Viceroy repelled all solicitations to obtain and use Insurrection Acts. He declared his belief that the existing law, properly administered, would suffice for the protection of society; and he proved that, in that case, it was so. He did what one man could do; but Mr. Pitt had died without seeing the Catholics righted. He left them sullen and discouraged; more ready to ask than he to answer how far his expectations of salvation to Ireland from the Union had been accomplished. No one could say that Ireland would not have been more wretched without the Union; but neither could it be pretended that it had proved a cure for her

woes.

1 Annual Register, 1804, p. 150. 3 lbid. iii. pp. 336, 534.

2 Hansard, iv. p. 599.

4 Annual Register, 1806, p. 263.

CHAP. IV.] DOUBTS CONCERNING PEACE.

71

CHAPTER IV.

IT has already appeared that the first wild rejoicings at the promise of Peace gave way to misgivings before the treaty was actually concluded. Men in high places never had Precariousmuch hope of a lasting peace with Napoleon; and ness of the when their doubts were necessarily manifested by their peace. public acts, men in low places were at first exasperated, and then alarmed. Soldiers had expected to be sent to their homes, and never to leave them more; sailors in all distant ports had watched for the signal to weigh for England; merchants and tradesmen had calculated on the remission of war taxes; and the laboring classes hoped they had heard the last of press-gangs, and recruiting parties, and balloting for the militia: and when disappointment followed immediately on the announcement of peace, there was so much anger and fear, that it did not appear as if the national happiness had as yet gained much. The people were told to wait till the Definitive Treaty was signed; and then, month after month passed on, and no news came of the conclusion of the business, while reports arose, almost every week, of impediments and misunderstandings abroad, and want of cordiality among statesmen at home, which made the future as doubtful as ever. On the 16th of November, 1801, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Vansittart, announced to Parliament that it was thought necessary to continue, for three months longer, the military and naval establishments of the preceding year; for which purpose upwards of eight millions would be required. The amount was to be raised by means of the land and malt taxes, and a fresh issue of Exchequer bills. The militia force was to remain at 36,000, till the Treaty was signed. In expectation of this event, parliament adjourned from week to week, till the winter holidays were over; and this method increased the suspense. News arrived that a considerable French fleet had collected, and had shipped 25,000 troops. It was declared that this fleet was only going to bring to order the island of St. Domingo; but prudence required that such a force should be watched; and a British fleet collected in Bantry Bay for the purpose, was ordered off to the West Indies, to the blank dismay

72

Mutiny.

THE TREATY SIGNED.

[BOOK I of the sailors. They asked what the peace was for, if not to send Bantry Bay soldiers and sailors home; and they refused to go anywhere but to England. A great impression was made on the minds of the poor fellows by their admiral's (Admiral Mitchell's) reply when the noise of the mutiny brought him on deck of the Temeraire, to know what was the matter. The Captain told him that the men wanted to know where the ship was going; when he replied, "To hell, if she is ordered; and we must go with her." The mutineers were tried at Portsmouth; and when their doom was pronounced, one of them humbly and sorrowfully acknowledged the justice of his sentence; and the others solemnly exclaimed, "Amen!" Twenty of the mutineers were found guilty, and eleven were hanged, in the midst of the preparations for departure to the West Indies.

When expectation was almost worn out, in April, the news Signature of came at last; and the illuminations and other rejoicthe Treaty. ings were renewed. The popular jealousy of France seems to have been as strong as ever, judging by what took place before the house of the French Minister, M. Otto, on the night of the illuminations.2 The word CONCORD was exhibited in colored lamps over the door; and the mob, reading this "Conquered," began to riot, in resentment for any Frenchman saying that Britons were conquered. Moreover, the G. R. was not surmounted by a crown, as usual; and England was not to be supposed republican: so M. Otto bestirred himself to give orders; and presently, the crown appeared, and the word AMITY was substituted for CONCORD. The income tax was relinquished The last stroke was put to

by the minister in the same month. the convention with the Northern Powers; and the people had by this time been told that the expense of the armistice had been 1,000,000l. per week. The disbanding of the militia and fencible troops took place, and that of the regulars was soon to follow; the Secretary at War declared the peace establishment to consist of 121,400 soldiers, which was presently announced to be reduced to little more than 70,000; and in June, it was made known that the French government had at length chosen an ambassador to be sent to London, to begin the new era of peace. The ambassador, M. Andréossi, did not, however, arrive till November, nearly thirteen months after the signing of the preliminaries; and meantime, affairs had assumed an aspect which made the public regard this arrival as nothing better than a symptom of hope that peace might possibly be preserved. One of the most important effects of the peace was that it

Foreign travel.

opened opportunities of foreign travel to Englishmen, and permitted an influx of new ideas, and an enlarge2 Annual Register, 1802, p. 181.

1 Annual Register, 1802. App. 554.