CHAPTER VII.

After the Union Mr. Grattan retires to Tinnehinch and gives up politics. -His mode of life.-Letter to Mr. Berwick.-Remark on Lord Clare's speech in the Imperial Parliament.-Lord Fitzwilliam urges Mr. Grattan to enter Parliament.-Mr. Grattan's letter to Signor Acerbi.-Remarks on Ireland.-Mr. Pitt and Lord Cornwallis retire from office. Their reasons.-Memorandum produced by Lord Castlereagh on the subject.-Mr. Addington's administration.-Peace with the French Republic.-Emmett's insurrection in 1803.-His words and death.-The Broken Heart, Moore's Melody.-Mr. M'Can's examination before the Privy Council.-Strange offers to him.-Mr. Grattan's letter to Mr. Wickham.--The paper regarding the United Irish Directory burned by Mr. Grattan.-Lord Fitzwilliam's letter to Mr. Grattan and Mr. Plowden.-His History and Remarks on Mr. Addington as to the Catholics.-Mr. Fox applies to Mr. Grattan on the affairs of Ireland.-His answer. His yeomanry corps.-Reconciles Orangemen and Catholics.-Mr. Grattan's important letter to Mr. Fox.-Mr. Fox to Mr. Grattan.-Hardy's Memoirs of Lord Charlemont.

AFTER the Union, Mr. Grattan retired to Tinnehinch, and gave himself up to study and to the education of his children. His love of literature and of music afforded him great and lasting resources; he returned to the study of Greek and Latin classics, and the English, Irish, and Roman histories. Horace, Virgil, Homer, Livy, Tacitus, Cicero, and Demosthenes, Shakspeare, Milton, and Pope were his favourite authors; he had them always on the table and much of them by heart. About a mile from Tinnehinch there was an ancient Roman Catholic churchyard, situated on a rising ground above the Waterfall river; the remains of the ruined walls

were overhung with ivy, and the old trees that grew around them covered the place with a grave and solemn shade, it was a lonely but an interesting spot; along its border lay a little dell through which a brook murmured gently round moss-grown stones, till a few yards farther on, it fell over a steep cascade, and there joined the river that flowed to Tinnehinch. This was the favourite retreat of Mr. Grattan; to this sequestered spot he loved to retire, and on the Sunday mornings in spring, when the wild violets and the primroses began to appear, and in summertide, he used to sit or saunter beneath the blossoming hawthorn, wrapt in thought and meditation; there, he would say, it is not within a church alone that I can offer up my prayers to Heaven; God is visible in all his works around, wondrous and infinite; I behold, I admire, and I adore. My brother and myself, who often accompanied him, used then to read or to repeat some favourite author, till the hour for breakfast aroused him to return. He could scarce speak tranquilly on the subject of the Union; at one time he would start into fits as if seized with frenzy, at another he would remain musing and melancholy, or if he ventured to speak on the subject his eyes almost filled with tears.

His habits were early, and as he was now freed from the turmoil of politics, he could regulate them with more precision. He rose at six, threw over his shoulders his House of Commons cloak, and went from the bedroom to the river and therein he precipitated himself, summer or winter, frost or snow; his health was thus restored, and his spirits in some degree recovered their former tone and elasticity. He kept to his early friends, Hardy, Berwick, Ponsonby, Arthur *The Right Hon. James Grattan, member for the county of Wicklow.

Moore, Preston (the poet), Burrowes, Fletcher, Curran, the remnant of the Irish party, with whom, as he was wont to say, he had retired from the scenes of their last labours, "with safe consciences but with breaking hearts.”

But Mr. Grattan, though sensitive in the highest degree, was a man too intellectual, too favoured in friendship and love, and too good to fall into misanthropy or stupor under any misfortunes. The following letter to one of his closet friends, though short and slight, shows that his mind was strong, as the after one from Lord Fitzwilliam is evidence of his bodily health, and of the unabated esteem with which every honest politician regarded him :—

MR. GRATTAN TO THE REV. MR. Berwick.

30th March, 1801.

MY DEAR DOCTOR,-I return you many thanks; present my acknowledgments to Mr. Davenport+ in my name, but I have got a tutor, Mr. M'Neil has agreed to come. I long to see you and talk about the times. I have not seen Hardy for some time, he is with the Bishop; as soon as my horse recovers I will ride to them. I am glad you are likely to be on friendly terms with La Touche; § he is a man of great worth, though his politics fall short a little

* An anecdote may here be related, which to some families may prove useful and instructive. When very young Mr. Grattan had been frightened by stories of ghosts and hobgoblins that nurses are too often in the habit of relating to children, so much so as to affect his nerves in the greatest degree; he could not bear being left alone, or remaining long without any person in the dark. This feeling he determined to overcome, and he adopted a bold plan. In the dead of night he used to resort to a churchyard near his father's house, and there he used to sit upon the gravestones, while the perspiration poured down his face; but by these efforts he at length succeeded and overcame his nervous sensation; this certainly was a strong proof of courage in a child. † Rev. Mr. Davenport, a Fellow of Dublin College, a very worthy

man.

Dickson, Bishop of Down, a mild, upright, honest man, who with Marley voted against the Union-the only two bishops who did so. § Right Hon. David Latouche, he had voted for the Union; one of the only seven men in the house who were not bribed.

of ours. What do you think of Lord Clare's* last speech -the mite Thaletis ingenium? He seems to me to have become a clumsy affectation of Dr. Duigenan. Remember me to the house of Castle Forbes.-Yours ever,

H. GRATTAN.

LORD FITZWILLIAM TO MR. GRATTAN.

London, June 11th, 1801.

DEAR GRATTAN,-Though no occasion has offered for my expressing to you the interest I have taken in, and the gratification I have received from, all the happy circumstances that have attended you since we last met, not one of your numerous friends has seen them with more sincere pleasure. In the midst of circumstances of a different nature, health, I am happy to hear, has returned, and with it, I hope, not only the powers, but the inclination for activity. You must not be buried in the mountains of Wicklow, nor deprive the country of talents in which it has a property. Let me then ask you if you will accept a seat in the present Parliament should a vacancy arise by a death. My friend, Mr. Dainer, who sits for Peterborough, is in a very precarious state; I trust he will recover, but there is much danger that he will not. If anything happens to him, I can venture to promise you an election, without opposition. I should not make a proposal to you to stop a gap at the fag end of a Parliament if I had it

The speech that Mr. Grattan here alludes to was delivered in the House of Lords on the 23rd of March, on the Irish Martial Law Bill; it was full of false statements, gross misrepresentations, and the most virulent abuse upon the people of Ireland.

He appears to have stated that the Catholic question was first brought forward in Ireland for the purpose of rebellion, and that ninety-nine out of every hundred Catholics did not care one jot for Catholic Emancipation; what they wanted and understood by emancipation was a partition of property! He said that every night when he retired to his chamber, he retired to an armoury; and every day when he went out of his house, his servant as regularly handed him his pistols as he did his hat!

The proof of this last falsehood was, that he resided in Ireland, which he would not have done if what he stated were true; for he possessed much more of the feminine quality than the heroic. On one occasion, as some troops were passing in the streets of Dublin to relieve a military guard, the people, in making way for them, pressed upon Lord Clare who was walking by; he conceived they were going to attack him and grew frightened, he ran into a shop and drew out a pistol to defend himself. Curran said that when he fought him he was as pale as death.

not in my power to propose to you a seat in the next without opposition; and I wish it to be understood to be under all circumstances, whether a vacancy shall now take place or not. In either case allow me to propose it to you, and to press your acceptance, as a gratification to my pride in showing the existence of mutual confidence.— Believe me, with the sincerest esteem, most truly yours, WENTWORTH FITZWILLIAM.

The reply to this could not be procured, but the offer was not accepted.

The individual to whom the following letter was addressed was an Italian, who came on a visit to Ireland and was introduced to Mr. Grattan. He was the author of a tour in Lapland, and came to write a tour in Ireland. He was a man of sense, spirit, and observation, passionately fond of music, a player and composer; this secured him a warm reception among the inmates of Tinnehinch, in honour to whom he composed some pretty pieces of music. The letter is interesting, it shows the state of the people of Ireland with rare compactness and Mr. Grattan's opinion:

MR. GRATTAN TO SIGNOR ACERBI.

Tinnehinch, December 17th, 1801. MY DEAR SIGNOR,-I was glad to hear from you and of you, in whatever quarter of the globe you are, whether the North Pole or the Torrid Zone, I shall be delighted to receive your letters. The north of Ireland contains the active citizens of Ireland; its principal wealth, industry, and spirit; a bad climate and a fine people; the south is more beautiful but worse peopled; the cause is moral and not physical. The trade of the south was forbidden, the trade of the north encouraged. The trade of the former consisting of woollen cloth, was an object of jealousy to England; the trade of the other consisting of linen, which was not. The emigration you mention is shocking; it seems we lose our people as we lose our constitution. America may rejoice, France may rejoice. I am not surprised that those of whom you speak should repent of