schools, which seemed so many bee-hives in swarming time; I was only in the Catholic part of Ireland, and have not quite information enough to conclude what I rather presume to be true, that it is to the zeal inspired by religious persecution that this singular effect is to be ascribed. The instance would for the present appear to be one on their side of the argument, who deny the advantages of education; but the good fruits, I am convinced, will be reaped in due season. It was during the persecution of the Presbyterians in Scotland, that their system of parish education was founded and organized, and the lower orders of that country remained for many years after the union in a state of wretched beggary, idleness, and insubordination. Fletcher of Salton's description of them would pass for too high colouring in describing the present Irish. They are, generally speaking, unemployed and lawless; and the greatest political evil of Ireland is their excessive number. Nothing seems likely to remedy this but that change in the occupation of landed property by the breaking down of vast territories held by Absentees into smaller estates, and the reverse process of converting the present fractions of leasehold into large farms, which will take place in the natural progress of wealth. It is a revolution which will cause some violent struggles, on the part of the displaced tenantry; and there have been already some proofs of the change having commenced, and of the struggles which attend it. This progress of agriculture in Ireland will be accelerated, I expect, by two circumstances, which may be regarded as accidental. The peculiar circumstances of England in respect of population and wealth give Ireland a near and vast market for grain; and Sir John Newport's Act has rendered the trade quite free. The other circum stance is, that the rebellion of 1798 has led both government and the country gentlemen of Ireland to pay an extraordinary attention to the improvement of their roads, which are better in that country and more numerous, than in almost any other. The late unexpected turn of things here will probably bring your Grace sooner to town than you intended. I have not heard how the King is to-day, but I have good reason to believe that he was worse yesterday than was publicly given out. The pains taken at Windsor to conceal the real extent of his illness, only make one believe it to be much more severe and serious. Believe me, my dear Lord, Most faithfully yours, FRA. HORNER. LETTER CLXI. TO DUGALD STEWART, ESQ. My dear Sir, Lincoln's Inn, 16th November, 1810. I was much chagrined, upon my coming to London, to find that no copy of the Bullion Report had been sent to you from the Vote Office, though I wrote from the circuit expressly to desire it, and I had taken for granted that it had been sent. It is now out of print; but there is a copy which I have lent to a gentleman who is now in Yorkshire, and which, as soon as I can recover it, I will send to you; if I should not be fortunate enough to procure another sooner. I hope you have got Huskisson's tract, and pray let me know if you have Mr. Blake's which is very good; the subject has produced much discussion in England, and I have no doubt will, within a year or two, be practically settled agreeably to our views. Every day, I hear of converts. You could not do me a greater favour, than by commu nicating to me what particular points there are in the doctrine stated by the committee, on which you either entertain a different opinion, or feel difficulties; for myself I will own, that there are a few instances, in which I think the argument has not yet been placed accurately upon the right grounds, as there are some in which I contented myself (in drawing my part of the Report) with assuming what might have been deduced from principles, but not without an air of more theory and general speculation than I thought it prudent (on account of my own situation) that the Report should bear. I suppose it is with respect to the wages of labour, and the pay of the army and navy, that you wish we had spoken out more fully, and followed out the consequences of our reasoning. I think the time will come. when all those consequences ought to be explained without reserve; but in first breaking the subject, against the prejudices of a large portion of the English public, and against the arts of misrepresentation, which Government and the Bank were sure to put in practice, it seemed more advisable to rest the argument upon those grounds with which it was most difficult to mix any topics of declamation; and the more so, as a single hint, with respect to those other momentous consequences of a depreciated currency, is more than sufficient for all who are already acquainted with the principles of such subjects. I was in the minority last night against the renewed adjournment. The difference among us upon that motion, though it may be represented as party disunion, will have no bad consequences; I rather think the contrary. The constitutional principle is saved by so strong * An adjournment of the House for a fortnight was proposed by the Government, on account of the King's illness. ED. a protest; and the conduct of the rest of the Opposition secures the party from any charge of indelicacy towards the King, or undue eagerness to make the most of the present crisis. The account of the King is, that he had some fever again yesterday, that he has had some sleep in the night, and that his fever is again a little abated. I beg to be most kindly remembered to Mrs. Stewart, And am, my dear Sir, FRA. HORNER. LETTER CLXII. TO J. A. MURRAY, ESQ. My dear Murray, Lincoln's Inn, 29th Nov. 1810. It was very negligent in me not to satisfy you about my health, which is now perfectly good. Huskisson's pamphlet is excellent. There are still some points in the theory of this subject not quite cleared up; and I can put my finger now on one or two parts of the Bullion Report, from which I dissent. There is one especially, from which indeed I dissented at the time I drew up the Report, but adopted it as the sense of the majority of the committee, and particularly Huskisson, Thornton, and Baring; which is this, that the whole depression of the exchange was originally occasioned by the state of trade, and that the operation of the excessive and depreciated currency was to prevent its restoration. This way of stating it gives a confusion to the reasoning, and involves, I am satisfied, an error in principle; inconsistent, indeed, with the very foundation of the argument. Depreciation must produce, under all circumstances, its appropriate and proportionate effect upon the foreign exchanges; and produces that effect independently, though it may be combined in the result with the effect produced upon the balance of payments by political or commercial circumstances. It may, in some instances, require a good deal of address to separate, in a particular instance of the exchange with a foreign country, those other circumstances, the effect of which is mixed with that of depreciation; and in some instances, from our imperfect knowledge of the state of the currency of the other country, with which our exchange is stated, the case may stand for a while unsolved, and apparently as an objection, which it is not in reality, to the general conclusion. I have not read the whole of Blake's pamphlet; it seemed to me very perspicuous and satisfactory: I shall read it in a day or two. I had dismissed the subject from my mind as soon as the Report was presented, but am now deep in it again. The discussion, which is in great activity in London, will do much good; and enable us to set a good many questions at rest. You cannot do me a greater favour, than by stating to me any doubts or difficulties that you feel upon any part of the question. Bosanquet's dexterous but somewhat unfair pamphlet has given me a good deal of exercise in this way he leaves the main argument quite untouched, when his misapprehensions of the facts are explained. The recommendation in p. 33 of the Report, that the Bank of England should be permitted to issue notes under 51. for some little time after the resumption of payments in specie, is founded upon this principle, that the former policy of the legislature ought to be resorted to, by prohibiting their issue of notes under 51. The reason upon which that rests is, that it is important to have a certain proportion of specie in actual circulation, in order to prevent those sudden panics respecting the |