For the feast of the vulture in Taanach is spread, And the kings of Canäan are strewed with the dead! The mother of Sisera looks out on high, From the halls of her palace, for evening is nigh: And the wine-cup is brimmed-and the bright torches burn- VIII. She cries to her maidens-"Why comes not my son? IX. She saith in her heart-yea, her wise maidens say— X. But Sisera's mother shall view him no more; XI. And the owl, and the raven, are flapping their wings- O'er Sisera's palace, and Jabin's proud towers! CONLA. The mother of Sisera looked out at a window, and cried through the lattice, "Why is his chariot so long coming? Why tarry the wheels of his chariots ?" Her wise ladies answered her, yea, she returned answer to herself, "Have they not sped? Have they not divided the prey; to every man a damsel or two, to Sisera a prey of divers colours, a prey of divers colours of needle-work meet for the necks of them that take the spoil."-1. JUDGES, chap. v. verses 28 29. VOL. I. NO. I. THE SPIRIT OF ANGLO-IRISH LEGISLATION. It may easily be observed, that though free governments have been commonly the most happy for those who partake of their freedom, yet are the most ruinous and oppressive to their provinces.-HUME, FROM Henry the Second to Henry the Eighth, the sovereigns of Britain were styled Kings of England and Lords of Ireland. The last of the Henrys laid aside the distinction, and created a union of the kingdoms, which, like the amalgamation of the legislatures in 1800, was confined to the blending of the names alone. His predecessors were well aware that there was a wide difference between the terms of their rule in both countries. The King of England was then controuled by a charter, and a warlike population; but the Lord of Ireland was a title expressive of a much more absolute power. In that wretched land he had no enfranchised people to keep his authority in check: his code was contained in the articles of war, and his administration a perpetual campaign. Henry the Third extended the Magna Charta to Ireland, but its benefits were limited to the English pale, and therefore confined to his English adventurers. It would have been far more candid on the part of the English monarch, if he had still retained his title as Lord of Ireland, for his successors have continued to Lord it over her, with increasing rigour, to the present hour. From the iron-clad Strongbow down to the present Lord of Ireland, the flippant Mr. Stanley, the spirit of Anglo-Irish legislation illustrates the position of England's greatest historian, which we have placed at the head of this article. In whatever shape that spirit has been displayed, either in acts of fraud or force, the same immutable feature predominates-the same taste for tyranny is manifested by a free people against those who are subjected to their protection. Revolutions favourable to liberty took place in England, but Ireland was always excluded from any participation in the benefit the sister country derived from them; and thus we find the same unvaried spirit in the Anglo-Irish legislation of England in the feudal times-of England after the Revolution of 1688-and of Great Britain after the Union of 1800! All the enactments passed for the people of Ireland, betray that spirit which "cries out, down with them even to the dust.' An assembly of successful military adventurers, whose fortunes depended upon the prostration and subjugation of the entire island, met within the English pale, and styled its promulgations the acts of the Irish Parliament. Conscious of their own weak tenure, the members of this divan regarded the dispossessed inheritors of their usurped domains, with feelings of animosity and apprehension, and persuading themselves that their only security consisted in the humility of the natives, they put in force that old problem of tyranny which proposes to beggar its subjects into submission, and eagerly assented to every law which could divide, reduce, and destroy the native energy and resources of the people of Ireland. Edicts which were a disgrace to humanity, issued from the representatives of England's adventurersnature proceeded in her ordinary course, and fierce discontent increased with misery-resistance became indispensable, and selfdefence was branded as rebellion. Confiscations, and all the different plans of plunder by which the invader establishes his greedy followers, in the unhappy land of their desires, were eagerly "shouted into law;" and after some centuries of uninterrupted rapine, the heirs of the primitive invaders- the descendants of the soldiers of the ruthless Elizabeth-of the enriched exterminators of Cromwell's legionsand of the patentees of William the Third, were firmly established and acknowledged as the nobility and gentry of Ireland! Such were the men to whose sense of justice the people of Ireland were to appeal; and, worthy of the feelings which animated their progenitors, they proved, in the long course of their legislation, that the spirit of their sires had not diminished in its descent, by the ready acquiescence they gave to every Draconian law the English minister proposed for their adoption. If left to itself, time would have produced a change, and, like a stream which becomes more purified in its course, the Irish Parliament, as it grew older, at length gave some symptoms of self-regeneration in 1782, which were found by the English minister both expensive and troublesome to counteract, and, accordingly, the entire power of the latter was exerted to destroy the institution--which object was at length accomplished by the UNION. Thirty-two years of experience have passed away since that event, in which we have also to trace the progress of the spirit of Anglo-Irish legislation. This blending of Ireland's representatives into an alien assembly, where their numbers were less than one to five, gave a predominance to Anglo-Irish policy, in addition to the advantage it possessed in numerical strength, for the majority of Ireland's members were returned by those who were embued with the old Anglo-Irish spirit. The English minister found, therefore, but little difficulty in passing such acts as his ingenuity suggested for their adoption. The votes and voices of the Irish members were too few and too feeble to give him much opposition; and the independent English members were generally too much occupied with their own concerns to pay more than a very limited attention to Irish business; or if they were inclined to enter into its details, they were not equal to the task, from their ignorance of local transactions. An examination of the Acts of the Imperial Parliament which relate to Ireland, will prove that the old spirit is still preserved in all its ancient rancour. A change however has latterly taken place in the spirit of AngloIrish legislation; not in the mitigation of its hostility to Ireland, but only in the circumstances by which it was formerly upheld. It has discarded its old auxiliaries, the Anglo-Irish settlers, and now trusts to the energies of the English power alone. By this abandonment of her own offspring, England is pursuing a parallel course with Ireland to that which she followed at the commencement of the breach with her American colonies, and exhibits the same insulting disregard of the wishes of another people, and the same obstinate adherence to . have the remedy applied according to her own notions. Although they proceeded from different causes, the subjects which aroused this severity towards America in 1773, and towards Ireland in 1832, very nearly resemble each other. England eyed with feelings of impatience the exuberance of freedom which emanated from active industry and unassuming equality in America, and the least contravention of her mandates was followed by some coercive law, passed in all the heat of disappointed arrogance at finding them opposed. Although Ireland was never allowed to arrive at the same state of competence by the exercise of her activity and industry, yet an equal desire for liberty has been produced by the actual privations which her state of subjection has inflicted upon her people; and they are now as determined to persevere towards the acquisition of freedom, as the colonists were in the glorious morning of their independence. The present widely-extended organization against the collection of Tithes in Ireland, operates just as the resistance to the payment of British imposts did in America; and the latter drew forth the same kind of severe and coercive enactments which are now in progress against the former. The arguments used against the coercive policy which England pursued towards America, bear an extraordinary application to the cause she is pursuing towards Ireland at this moment. All the warnings which were uttered by the advocates of freedom and humanity at that time, and disregarded by those to whom they were addressed, were corroborated by the events that followed; and it only remains to be seen now, whether the forebodings of some in our own times may not be attended with a similar consummation. When a people are once morally organised against the continuance of a well-defined grievance, all new experiments on the part of the Government to uphold it must be unsuccessful; and that which is meant as a punishment for sedition and violence, serves only to raise a more general spirit of resentment and opposition. The temper and character which now prevail in Ireland are of long growth, and are unalterable by any human art: neither the natural or moral causes can be changed by the artificial means of legislative applications. When the presence of this spirit is once ascertained, there are, as Mr. Burke laid down, three ways of proceeding to allay it-namely, to change it by removing the causes; to prosecute it as criminal; or to comply with it as necessary. To prosecute this spirit in its overt acts as criminal, he knew, he said, of no method of drawing up an indictment against a whole people; and in a quarrel amongst the component parts of a great political union of communities, nothing could be more completely imprudent than to put the whole under the ban of power. "If then (said this great politician) the removal of the causes of this spirit be for the greater part, or rather entirely, of American liberty, impracticable-if the ideas of criminal process be inapplicable, or, if applicable, are in the highest degree inexpedient-what way yet remains? No way is open but the third and last, to comply with the American spirit as necessary, or, if you please, to submit to it as a necessary evil. It is not what a lawyer tells me I may do, but what humanity, reason, and justice, tells me I ought to do. Of what avail are titles and arms, when the reason of the thing tells me, that the assertion of my title is the loss of my suit; and that I could do nothing but wound myself with my own weapons. The general character and situation of a -people must determine what sort of Government is fitted for them." Although the foregoing strain of reasoning was lost upon the legislators of that day, the results of its neglect were not forgotten by their successors. In the year 1828 the people of Ireland presented the same formidable organization upon the Catholic Question, and the legislature not venturing to prosecute that spirit as criminal, complied with it as necessary: and thus admitted the triumph of that principle which in both cases was successful-in America opposed to force, and in Ireland yielded to for expediency. The blind policy which has actuated the British Minister to persevere in opposing force to opinion, by which he persuades himself that his Tithe Bill will suppress the present opposition to that species of impost, brings us back to the days of Lord North again. We recognise in the circumstances under which this Act was passed through the Commons, a repetition of the same determined obstinacy, that distinguished those under which the Boston Port Bill was hurried through the House; but, in comparing both, perhaps even the latter was attended with less insulting additions. The American people were not mocked with having representatives, whose earnest entreaties were denied, and whose indignant remonstrances were contemptuously disregarded. No committee had been nominated to inquire into American grievances, composed of persons hostile to their interests, and whose verdict was received when a sufficient quantum of partial evidence had been collected, so as to give an excuse to frame it according to their own views. The Boston Bill was passed without a division; but even this dubious indication of unanimity was less galling, than the miserable paucity of the minorities formed by the friends of Ireland on the different stages of Mr. Stanley's Tithe Act. All that insult can add to the deep sense of injustice, this last step of Anglo-Irish legislation contains; and we know not the Irish character, or the feelings of human nature, if its results will not be pregnant with the most awful and important consequences to these kingdoms. There are critical moments in the fortunes of all states, when they who are too weak to contribute to our prosperity, may be strong enough to complete our ruin; and, although wretched and reduced Ireland may be regarded by her purse-proud step-mother, as too long steeped in poverty to afford her much assistance, yet the very desperation which at length grows out of that state, may endow her with sufficient strength to requite all her previous wrongs. Meantime the Reform Bill progresses; and if that measure be successful, what better treatment has Ireland to expect? We answerNONE. If the same House of Commons which has thus regenerated its own constitution, and virtually reformed itself by such an act of contrition and repentance-if that very body of men the next night "shout the Tithe Bill into law," what are we to expect from any change they may contemplate?-or from any system which may be the work of their hands? We have already a foretaste of the Irish Reform Bill, and may form a very tolerable estimate of what a re |