BOOK

VI.

1782. June.

existed. The Writs of Error, by which disputed causes might be transferred by appeal from the Irish to the English courts of law, ceased to be issued. The Irish House of Peers was made the final court of appeal in Irish cases, with a result which will be apparent on the first important question which came before the jurisdiction of that tribunal. The two Catholic Relief Bills, introduced by Mr. Gardiner, were carried. Catholics might now purchase freeholds like other subjects, open schools, and edu cate their children when and how they pleased. Their stables were no longer open to inspection, or their horses above the value of five pounds liable to be seized by the Government, or taken from them by informers.1 A cheap and inonerous system of registration was adopted for the Catholic priests; and the Acts which in any shape interfered with the freedom of religious worship were repealed. The Habeas Corpus Act, so long withheld, was conceded. The tenure of the Irish judges was placed at last on the English level. Presbyterian marriages, so long and so bitterly disputed by the bishops, were made valid in law. The Perpetual Mutiny Act, fought over with so much obstinacy, became biennial, and the Irish Parliament acquired constitutional control over the Irish military establishments.

Now, at last, all obstacles to the Irish millennium were gone; every measure had been granted which the people had demanded as necessary to their happiness. The new era might now begin, and the

1 The horses of Mr. Wyse were once taken from him under the Penal Act, from a plea of some anticipated disturbance. Wyse the next day, like another Jason, drove

his carriage into Waterford with four bulls.

221 & 22 George III. c. 24. s. 62. Irish statutes.

II.

business of the year was wound up by an address of CHAP. congratulation to the Duke of Portland, drawn by Grattan himself.

'We have seen,' so the address said, 'the judges rendered independent of the Crown; the mutiny law abridged in duration; the jurisdiction of the hereditary judges of the land restored; the vicious mode of passing laws in this land reformed; the sole and exclusive right of legislation, external as well as internal, in the Irish Parliament firmly asserted on the part of Ireland and unequivocally acknowledged on the part of Great Britain. We have seen this great national arrangement established on a basis which secures the tranquillity of Ireland, and unites the affections as well as the interests of both kingdoms. The name of Bentinck will remain engraved on our hearts; and whenever your Grace shall withdraw from the administration of the affairs of this country, you will be attended, not by forced and jaded benedictions, but by the manly and dignified love of a free people.'

A last effort was made by Flood to disturb the general harmony. He moved an amendment, that England's concessions were still insufficient, for the English Parliament had still power to revoke them ; and that the people of Ireland were growing more and more of that opinion.' It was perfectly true, and the difficulty rose from the nature of the case, which nothing which Mr. Flood might do could remedy. So long as England was the stronger country, prudence and respect for her engagements could alone prevent her from asserting her superiority. The dead could not bind the living, and each generation would have its own view of its obligations. It

1782.

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BOOK
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will be seen that the Parliament of Great Britain humoured afterwards the nervous sensitiveness of Ireland so far as to paint the lily, and to confirm its acts by further words of assurance; but no additional promises could add strength to the engagements to which the honour of the existing representation was pledged already. The Irish Parliament refused for the present to allow Mr. Flood to alarm it. His amendment was rejected. His attempt to supplant Grattan in the confidence of the House of Commons by affectation of superior discernment was a decisive failure; and unable to endure the spectacle of his rival's triumph, and of the national exultation, which he had not been the instrument of producing, he left the country and went to England.

'His objects,' wrote Portland,' are to me, and I believe to everyone else, a perfect secret. Although his character is so well known, I think it my duty to apprise the Cabinet of his arrival, and to give it, as my opinion, that his ambition is so immeasurable that no dependence can be placed upon any engagements which he may be induced to form.'1

Adoring friends took charge of his reputation in his absence. Beside the Duke's disparaging comments may be placed a sketch of Flood presented to an ungrateful House of Commons by Martin, the member for James Town.

'Mr. Flood is the greatest character that has ever adorned this country; a character not to be profaned by the tongue of impious men; whose name will die only when our constitution expires, whose transcendent abilities will be handed down to posterity while the history of this planet shall be read; the

1 'Duke of Portland to Secretary Townshend, August 9.' S. P. O.

present adoration of this age, whose death will hereafter be lamented as the bitterest calamity with which an angry heaven has visited this island, whose transcendent merit is such that it keeps the merit of every other man at an awful and respectful distance, whose abilities are of such a godlike nature, that I protest, if ever I shall stand forward, the advocate of the present era, I shall do it by telling my son, if God shall ever bless me with a child, that the period in which I existed was preferable to that in which he may live, because I lived in the same era and had the honour to be born in the same country with that great man.'1

Mr. Flood had still nine years of public life before him, in which to show whether his admirers or his detractors had formed the clearer estimate of his character. Meantime a chapter of Irish history had been closed, a fresh page turned, and the floor swept clean for the opening of a new era. In July Lord Rockingham died. Fox and his immediate followers retired from the Cabinet; and Shelburne became Prime Minister, with William Pitt for Chancellor of the Exchequer. The Duke of Portland having done his work was glad to leave the scene of his eventful labours, while the halcyon days of hope were still unclouded; and Lord Temple, who had married the heiress of the Nugents, and was then the representative of a great Irish house, was chosen for the first Viceroy of the emancipated Ireland.

1 Irish Debates, 1782.

CHAP.

II.

1782.

June.

BOOK VII.

VII.

1782.

CHAPTER I.

THE CONVENTION.

SECTION I.

BOOK MR. GRATTAN had created a nation, but from the haste with which the infant had been brought to birth its limbs were half formed, and its constitution critical. The Catholics recovered their civil rights, but Ireland was still politically Protestant. The connection with England was reduced to the tie of the common sovereign. The Irish Parliament claimed an independent power of legislation, external as well as internal. Was Ireland to have a separate foreign policy,1 her own Ministers at foreign courts, her own consuls at the ports where she sold her merchandise? Was she to create a navy of her own to defend her interests on the high seas? Was she to maintain cruisers to protect her coasts from smugglers? Or if she was still to depend on the British navy, was