CHAPTER III.

1816---1827.

While O'CONNELL was struggling for civil and religi ous liberty through the channel of the Constitution, his progress was materially impeded by the agrarian outrages which were incessantly committed by the peasantry. The enemies of Ireland uniformly took advantage of these predial disturbances, in order to refuse the Catholic, religious equality with his Protestant fellow-subject; and to Ireland political equality with the sister country. Every fact was strained, every incident distorted, in order to prove a connection between the fair and legitimate agitation, of which O'CONNELL was the head, and the horrifying crimes which tyranny and oppression superinduced in various Counties in the south, particularly in Tipperary. In 1816, as in former and in subsequent years, that County was disorganized. Without the hazard of contradiction, the assertion may now be made, that O'CONNELL and the other Catholic Agitators neither created nor promoted the disturbances. The causes may be shortly stated. First, with reference to predial outrages generally; next, locally, with respect to Tipperary. Two social grievances had, from a remote period in Irish history, been sources of contention between the Protestant aristocracy, or portions of it, and the Catholic people. The first was, the TITHE impost,a never failing cause of bloodshed and crime for over a century, until 1838, when the law directed the incomes of the Clergy to be levied in a different manner. The second was, the social re

lations of landlord and tenant-relations sure to continue the fruitful source of misery and outrage, until the tenants' rights are more distinctly recognised by the legislature. Why the Tithe system should cause this state of things, it is not necessary now to set forth at length, as we shall have occasion, when speaking of the great Tithe struggle that commenced in 1832, to dwell upon it with some fullness. Here we may simply state, that the laws which enabled the Tithe-proctor to enforce payment, were most unjust and arbitrary. They ground down the industrious poor man, and the more industrious he was, the more they oppressed him, and incited to outrage. Cultivation, by which the poor man lived, was taxed heavily; pasture, the condition in which the rich Protetsant proprietor held his land, was suffered to escape. This was particularly the case in the most disturbed portions of Tipperary, where a vast extent of pasture lands was always held by the landlords; and where there was often not enough left for tillage to feed the people. The description of this exaction, even from the eloquent lips of GRATTAN, fell short of the reality. Tithes, then, were one unceasing cause of outrage and crime. Again, the proprietors of the soil did not possess the confidence, or the affections of the people. Tradition told the hard-worked occupier, that his ancestors were once the owners of the land on which he was but a toiling serf-that his landlord became possessed of these rich acres by wars, forfeiture, and bloodshed. Though suppressed, these thoughts were brooded over by the peasantry. On the other hand, the landlord was distrustful; he felt as if he were in an enemy's country, and that he should protect himself. He kept himself aloof, in his garrisoned residence, from his dependents or tenantry, who were aliens from him in religion and country.

He did more. He was a legislator, and both Houses of Parliament were composed of the same class. He got laws passed for his purposes, and for the easier and more effectual subjugation of a stubborn and sturdy race. The native Irish, who, from their earliest history, had learned to venerate the old Irish tenure, could never endure the feudal system of property, which the English proprietors forced upon them. Feudalism was repulsive to their notions of freedom; and they have never, to this day, cheerfully submitted to its laws. Hence it was, that, from the remotest period, there was an enduring struggle between the proprietor and the occupier; the one endeavouring to get what he could, and the other to pay as little as he could ;-the one acting from an impression that he was deceived by his tenant-the other determined, without hesitation, to deceive as much as practicable. When the Catholic people first sought with energy for their civil rights, religious rancour was added to the other causes of estrangement. The Protestant landlords then began to fear, that their religious ascendency was in danger; and the People, who, from the sweat of their brows, sustained them in affluence, and the Priesthood too, were the objects of their unceasing hatred. When the wars of NAPOLEON were over, and the prices of agricultural produce, which were sustained thereby, fell to a low rate, the Landlords became distressed; they were involved by an expenditure which they were unable to curtail. Their properties became embarrassed; and, instead of reducing their rents to a level with the reduced rates of produce, they were, to keep themselves above water, obliged to exact rack. rents" from the peasantry. It became to the latter a life of oppression, difficult to endure; still, taking the population as a whole, they did endure it. Religion, and the advice of their Clergy sustained them in their trials. But there were amongst them the violent and ill-disposed, who

It was in

had no religious principle. A few Clergymen, scattered throughout the country, could not, adequately and effectively instil the Christian principles the Catholic Priest. hood teach, into the minds of all; and there were no other means of education; for the Government in those days with held the boon, and refused in that respect to assist religion. The evil disposed perpetrated deeds of blood, and tarnished the character of a patient and enduring people. In Tipperary, contention had long prevailed. that county, the great struggles between the Anglo-Irish aud the Irish [Chieftains, and, afterwards, between the rival Chiefs of the Anglo-Irish race, were, for centuries, carried on. Many descendants of the Anglo-Irish race were amongst the peasantry; and we are told, on high authority, that it was even a more pugnacious race than the Celtic. The restless spirit, at all events, survives amongst the peasantry of the county. Then, the Landlords of one district being large graziers, who gave the people but little land to cultivate, were always at war with an increasing and a half-fed population. These lccally and generally, were the causes of the agrarian disturbances, which, for a series of years, afflicted Ireland, and which were attempted to be remedied by Insurrection Acts, Peace preservation Acts, Special Commissions, and Martial Laws; each in turn, and each without effect.

In the years 1815-16, the country districts were in this manner disturbed. In Tipperary, abominable murders had been committed, particularly the murder of a gentleman named BAKER, who was described by the Attorney General, SAURIN, as a Gentleman whose conduct and character "would do honour to any society; a Gentleman, who, "from long and intimate acquaintance, he could say,

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was an ornament to his country, for humanity, gentle"" ness and kindness; a man, charitable and benevolent, "the generous supporter of the poor, the liberal patron

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"of his tenantry, the honest Friend, the liberal Magis"trate, the affectionate Husband and most tender "Parent. He fell a martyr to his uncompromising in"tegrity; murdered by a band of fiend-like conspirators, "and by his death was completed, the overheaped measure of their hellish iniquity." His supposed murderers, being taken up, became amenable, and a Special Commission was resolved upon, to try them, and others, on similar charges. When this determination was promulgated, the Dublin Chronicle, a violent Catholic and Nationalist Paper, denounced the Commission, proclaiming the innocence of the persons incarcerated for BAKER'S murder-impugning, impliedly, the integrity of the Judges and prosecutors, and endeavouring to influence the decisions of the Juries, though in language moderate and guarded in its tone; language, which, at the present day, would not be noticed by any Government, Whig, or Tory; or, if noticed, would not be condemned by an impartial Jury. The Proprietor of the Dublin Chronicle was, at the time, ENEAS M'DONNELL -then a most active Irish agitator. He had been previously Editor of the Cork Mercantile Chronicle, and in that capacity, and as a Barrister of some note, played a conspicuous, and, in our opinion, an honest part in Catholic Politics. He was a determined anti-Vetoist; and nearly the first to censure Dr. MILNER, when he thought he had damaged the Catholic cause:-censure which, however, he afterwards withdrew, when he found himself in error. He maintained, with ability, the Franciscan Friar, Mr. HAYES, when he was so mercilessly attacked for his self-election as Secretary to a deputation to Rome, whither, as the deputation never intended to go, he, from the first, purposed to proceed alone. We mention this circumstance here, to shew the then peculiar