O'RUARC, AN IRISH TALE. Dnblin, 1832: MILLIKEN and SON. OUR attention has been directed a second time to this interesting little work, in which, a more careful perusal has revealed to us new claims to public esteem. It seems to be written with a higher design, than the exhibition of clever talent. It embodies sound information, and striking views of the condition of this country, particularly in its description of the means by which the Legislative Union was effected, and the consequences of that ruinous measure to our national interests and resources. Combined with these merits, and the ardent feeling of patriotism that pervades it, we find in the incidents of the story, as much of bold action, and touching sorrow admirably depicted, as must render it equally a favourite with the novel-reader, as with the politician. Its principal facts are drawn from history, and in them, the romance of real life is proved to be infinitely more extraordinary and affecting, than that supplied by the imagination of the poet. FINE ARTS. VIEW OF DARRYNANE ABBEY. SKETCHED BY CHRISTOPHER FITZSIMON, ESQ., M. P., AND DRAWN ON STONE BY T. MULVANY, ESQ., R. H. A. Dublin, 1832. INDEPENDENT of the interest this view creates, from the associations connected with it, it must excite the attention of the coldest observer, for its own peculiar merits. It represents a place combining many of the boldest and finest features of landscape,-majestic mountains, lofty and picturesque rocks, wild dell, smooth and verdant valley, wood and habitation, and the wide expanse of ocean. Such attrac tions are rarely found united together in one view; but this places them all before us with the vivid impression of actual existence. It is manifest that the amiable and accomplished gentleman who has sketched the scene, has improved the production of a clever and faithful pencil, with the warm and eloquent expression of the heart. There is that vigorous freshness, and intense reality stamped on it, which only the affections of the artist could convey; and the original idea seems to have lost nothing in the labour of the copyist; indeed as a specimen of art, the view of Darrynane is highly creditable to the lithographer; and we earnestly recommend it to the attention of all who feel national pride and pleasure in the success of Irish talent. It is not, however, the singular beauty of this wild spot, producing, as it does, much of its influence over our minds by its very remoteness and isolation-resembling the fabled Oasis surrounded by sterility that alone invests it with interest, but the importance it derives from being the favourite home of— "One who, Fame declares aloud, has wrought and who himself "Oped this little Eden in the wild,And gave to scenes by nature sternly grand, The grace and comfort now so striking there."* Hereafter, when the fame and days of this extraordinary man shall be full, and Ireland a happy nation, Derrynane Abbey will become a place of pilgrimage to all who revere liberty or admire talent; and every memorial of it will be treasured in gratitude and respect for the LIBERATOR of his country. It is this feeling that enhances the value of the sketch before us, and demands our thanks. We quote these passages, as our readers will observe, from the poem "Darrynane Abbey in 1832," which appeared in our number for December. It is not, perhaps, the least merit of that charming production that it illustrates admirably the sketch before us. ALBERIC, THE TROUBADOUR. [FROM THE FRENCH.] I. On Clermont's towers the banner'd cross way'd glittering to the skies, II. "Welcome, oh! Sion's disfant land, where hallow'd Jordan flows, II. To love the Troubadour once tuned his harp's melodious strings, * Pope Urban II., by whom the first Crusade was preached at the Council of Clermont, THE late Elections afford much useful instruction to the aristocracy and to the rulers of the nation. From a few isolated facts it is impossible to arrive, salva consequentia, at a general conclusion. But, in the Elections we have an accumulation of facts, all bearing with a united effect upon the state of Ireland, and, therefore, furnishing sure data, from which it is easy to deduce truths the most important, not merely respecting the present, but also regarding the future. The first thing of which the Elections are a striking proof, is the popular power. In one scale were the people in the opposite one were the interest and patronage of the Government, the weight of the Conservative money, the wealth and influence of the aristocracy, the menaces of despotic landlords, and many other make-weights. But Government, Conservatives and all, kicked the beam; nor could the people be at all sensible of being balanced against any thing, if it were not for the ludicrous spectacle made by the others when jerked up into the air. When shall we see such a sight again? Another truth illustrated by the Elections is the ardent love of liberty prevailing through the land. It is not uncommon to hear highsounding professions of patriotism; but words are cheap, and the value of professions is best estimated by actions. Nor is it in the battlefield alone that we can prove with what sincerity we love our country. A devoted attachment to its interests is often shown upon the peaceful hustings; and, the man who would sooner be cloven down by the armed foe than surrender his honour or his country, has sometimes suffered himself to be cheated of both by wily arts, or gilded persuasion. But the Irish Electors have proved themselves patriots in more than mere words-pure and disinterested patriots. They have nobly done their duty indeed. Despising every consideration of self-interest as paltry, compared with the public good, they have, many of them, voted in the teeth of tyrannical landlords; and not a few of them, after receiving notice to quit, should they, thus warned, dare, by voting honestly, to contemn the behests of these genteel Rockites. Strong temptations were held out the people's VOL. I. NO. X. 4 K 6 virtue was stronger. The gold of the corrupter glittered in vain : it seduced not. The poor man, down whose brow the big drops of sweat trickle from dawn to dark, shrunk with a virtuous abhorrence from ts unholy touch-a reproach upon the memory of those who sold our national independence, he held his country too dear to estimate its value in gold. Every one nobly did his duty, and none required other guerdon for his service than the consciousness of having done well. If you commended any for his virtue, he would reply in the language of the illustrious Wallace to King Baliol—“ Make not that a subject of praise, which, if I had left undone, would have stampt me a traitor." Is it not a proud reflection, and one big with hope for Ireland, that men of humble rank are capable of disinterestedness heroic enough to ennoble birth the most exalted? And does not the fact proclaim, trumpet-tongued,' the impolicy, nay the imposibility, of resisting the just wishes of such men? Yet these men are sometimes called a "mob." What! call them a "mob"? And who presumes so to designate them? Their superiors or their equals in sterling virtue-is it? No but persons calling themselves gentlemen, whose character is a perfect vacuum with regard to every excellence-or, rather, all about them is emptiness, while they themselves, like a flaccid bladder placed under the exhausted receiver of an air-pump, are inflated almost to bursting with their little breath of arrogance. Let such persons be filled with their aristocratic inanity. It is a commodity of which no one grudges them to be the monopolists. But, let them not presume to call the honest people a "mob." Is it not enough that they are strangers to acts of exalted virtue in themselves, and that they cannot, therefore, appreciate them in others? Is it not enough that, as Sir Andrew Ague-Cheek says in the play, they are "great eaters of beef," which does harm to their wit?" Let them not add insolence to worthlessness. If the Irish Electors evinced an ardent love of country, they also evinced equal discrimination; which correspondence clearly refutes the enemies of popular privilege, and supplies an irrefragable proof that the people are worthy of freedom. For, in the choice of their Representatives, did they not show an accurate discernment of true merit? Did they not scout the folly of concluding one's fitness for the serious duties of Parliament from his fitness for the fashionable frivolities of the drawing-room? Did they not refuse to station the honour which is due only to virtue? And did they not place in the fore-ground of the Candidates' recommendations the will and the ability to represent their wishes? The discernment of the people was, therefore, equal to their pure and incorruptible patriotism. If these two things combined do not render men worthy of freedom, I know not what does, and should be glad to learn from any one standing for the negative, upon what principle of reason or politics he accounts himself worthy of freedom. The Elections also furnish a clear comment upon the anomalous state of society in Ireland. Wherever we turn our eyes, we find the lords of the soil arrayed against the mass of the people, as though they had been born in different nations, had opposite interests, and were swayed by conflicting feelings, instead of owning a common country, possessing common interests and cherishing common feelings. This strange state of things is at open variance with the fundamental principle of society under whatever form of political regime. For, what but a community of interests and feelings first led men to enter into the social compact, and has induced them, in every succeeding age, to form the endless diversity of societies spread over the face of the world? What but the same community of interests and feelings has prompted the bulk of mankind to forego a portion of their natural liberty, and to invest a few persons with authority to make and to execute laws affecting all? What else has induced us to uphold the inequality of condition resulting from this surrender of natural right? And what principle of cohesion is there to hold together the component parts of the social body, once formed, if it be not a community of interests and feelings? Therefore, in every well-constituted society there must needs be in the members composing it, a concert of wishes and views tending to the general welfare. That no such identity of interest or feeling subsists between our landed gentry and the people, is notorious from the Elections, though every body acquainted with Ireland had been already aware of the fact. On the contrary, it is as if the good of the one were the evil of the other, as if the prosperity of one must be in the descending, when that of the other is in the ascending, scale. Whichsoever party is in the wrong, as either party must be, one thing is unquestionable-that we live in a most anomalous state of society. Neither is it a problem of difficult solution to tell where lies the blame. Where, then, does it lie? With the people or with the gentry? With the people it does not : with the gentry, I am sure, it does. They treat the people as Helots, living upon the sweat of their brow, and giving nothing in return but thanklessness and contempt: they regard the people's depression as the exact measure of their own elevation: by exorbitant rents, cruel ejectments, tyrannical persecutions, and their consequent evils, distress and poverty, they goad the people unto madness, and, after doing the deed, clamour to the government for Insurrection Acts, Special Commissions, increase of Police, or any other agent of terror, to put a stop to the evils of which, before God, they are themselves the authors. This system of galling oppression they strain every nerve to maintain against the efforts of a long-suffering geople. Thus it is a struggle between the oppressors and the oppressed; and, therefore, upon the gentry, not the people, is the present unnatural disunion between them to be charged. They are a heartless gentry. They recognise a relation with their tenants only inasmuch as it tends to their own good. Reciprocation of kind offices there is none. It is gain upon one side, loss on the other; for, the tenant is contemned when he deserves gratitude, oppressed when he ought to be cherished. Indeed, so reckless are the gentry of the interests of those from whom they draw their subsistence, that they would seem to have adopted in practice (at least with respect to the majority of their kind,) the eccentric opinion of Rousseau, according to whom mau was not born for society, and to have tacked to it the equally eccentric and more mischievous tenet of Hobbes, that there is in the human breast an innate hostility prompting us to injure our fellow-man. But the gentry |