CHAPTER LIX.

{VICTORIA. 1847}

Colonial Affairs..... Foreign Relations..... State of Ireland: Progress of Famine and Disease; Political Agitation; Prevalence of Crime..... Death of O’Connell..... Old Ireland and Young Ireland Parties..... General State of Affairs in Great Britain..... Naval and Military Events..... Home Incidents..... Decease of Remarkable Persons..... Parliamentary Proceedings.

COLONIAL AFFAIRS.

{A.D. 1847}

It is convenient to notice first in order the colonial and foreign relations of the country, as home events derived their character from these; parliamentary and party proceedings, more especially, turned often, in a great measure, upon the prospects and condition of our colonies, and the relations which we bore to foreign powers. This was less the case in 1846 and 1847 than in most other periods, because the failure of the harvests, the consequent overwhelming distress through out the British Isles, and the disaffection in Ireland, demanded the most earnest attention of parliament and the ministry.

_India_.—The state of India, throughout this year, was one of prosperity and peace. The Punjaub, however, created some disquietude, and there were border disturbances within the acquired territory of Scinde.

It will be recollected that in the last chapter the appointment of a council of regency at Lahore was recorded. This body excited the ranee’s jealousy, whose disposition for intrigue was once more evoked; she endeavoured to neutralise the action of the council. Representations concerning this state of things were made to the governor-general, who signified his approbation of the policy proposed by the council for her exile from the capital. She was accordingly seized, and sent under escort to a distance, where she’ was detained, and Lahore and the Punjaub were exempt from troubles throughout the year.

In Scinde the border tribes were restless, and made frequent predatory incursions upon the British territory. On one occasion, a body of seven hunded infantry and a troop of horse, headed by several chiefs, made a foray. Lieutenant Merewether, of “the Scinde Irregular Horse,” was sent, at the head of about one hundred and thirty men, to observe, and, if possible, disperse them. This gallant young officer came up with the marauders in a locality unfavourable for immediate action; they were moving in a direction which would have afforded them the protection of some sand hills and jungle. Mr. Merewether rode along their front without charging them, in order to gain their flank, and compel them to keep the open plain, in a situation more favourable for the action of cavalry. They did not understand this manouvre, and supposed it to signify that the lieutenant did not deem it prudent to assail them. Encouraged by this idea they attacked him, coming on with great exultation. This gave the skilful and intrepid young officer the advantage he desired; he wheeled to the left, formed his men in an instant, charged, and cut up the enemy fearfully. The infantry endeavoured to retreat; such of the horsemen as were left galloped away. Mr. Merewether allowed their infantry no opportunity to retire to a position where they might receive cavalry advantageously; but still acting upon their flank, and keeping them in the open plain, he again and again charged, each time cutting them down as the mower cuts the ripe hay. They were offered quarter, but with great bravery stood to their arms, until not one-fourth of their original number remained; they then laid down their weapons. Of the whole body, except the few horsemen who became fugitives after the first charge, not one escaped destruction or captivity. Lieutenant Merewether lost very few men; he himself had miraculous escapes, for he was foremost in every charge, exposing himself with the utmost audacity. This gallant little action drew upon the young soldier the attention and commendation not only of his superiors in authority, but of the army of India. The exploit was recorded in the papers at home, and was the theme of every news-room and club. The English people are always more quick to appreciate and reward valour than their government.

Sir Charles Napier, after conquering Scinde by the highest military daring and skill, ruled it with a rare political sagacity. His attempts at military reform brought upon him the ill-will of the Indian military authorities, and the directors at home. The reforms introduced by the gallant general bore the impress of his genius and his indomitable will. His prophetic predictions concerning the evils that would certainly result from the state of discipline in which he found the Sepoy armies, were, unfortunately, all fulfilled. In the memoir of this gallant general, written by his brother, Lieutenant-general Sir William Napier, the merits of the case are amply, although it must be admitted, not dispassionately discussed. The material is, however, afforded for a just judgment upon the controversy. It can hardly be doubted the gallant general was insubordinate; that he assumed authority to which he was not entitled, and ruled with a glorious and intellectual tyranny, which was not the less a tyranny because of the genius by which it was directed. The general’s faults were, however, overlooked by his country, which was served by him through an eventful life, with much honour to himself; it is sad to say that his services as well as his errors were overlooked by the government.

The public appreciation of him was just; they regarded him as a hero, and a bold and skilful governor. His brother justly described the public opinion of England when he wrote—“His fame has been accepted by the British people as belonging to the glory of the nation.”

Lord Hardinge did not long continue to govern India after Sir Charles resigned the government of Scinde. Upon his resignation Lord Dalhousie was appointed, through the especial influence of the Duke of Wellington. This appointment has been described as the only job which the illustrious duke ever perpetrated, and reasons were assigned for this unsuited to the pages of this history. Lord Dalhousie possessed many qualifications for his high office, but he was pedantic, had too jealous a sense of the dignity of his office, and often refused to listen to the advice of officers, well qualified to offer it, on military matters, which, whatever might be the noble lord’s opinions of his own parts, were rather beyond his knowledge. He entered upon his government under auspicious circumstances. The celebrated Akhbar Khan, the malignant enemy of the English during the unfortunate affair at Cabul, died this year, and made one less to the many opponents of British rule among the chiefs of India and the contiguous countries.

_The Cape of Good Hope_.—The disturbances of the previous year were not wholly quelled at the Cape. The Caffres continued to make forays within the colony, and to plunder cattle. They were pursued and punished, and considerable herds were recaptured. The feelings of all the Caffre tribes were utterly hostile, and peace was only attainable by the exercise of indisputable force.

_Our American Colonies_.—Peace and prosperity characterised the history of our American colonial possessions during this year. The failure of the potato crop caused some inconvenience and distress, but the general agricultural and commercial success compensated for this disadvantage. Security was also felt, as apprehension of a war with the United States had entirely passed away. In the legislatures of Canada and Nova Scotia there was, however, discontent with the measures of the governors of these colonies, and the imperial administration and legislature. This discontent found vent in orations, and through the columns of the press, but did not disturb colonial tranquillity nor interrupt the progress of government: those free countries were gradually laying the foundation for a future and a glorious period of wealth and greatness.

_Borneo_.—It was again necessary to chastise the Borneo pirates. On the 30th the British steam frigate _Nemesis_ engaged a fleet of Soluprahus, off Labuam The ship was crossing over to Labuan from Brune, with the rajah of Sarawak on board. When off the island of Moora the _Nemesis_ came suddenly upon a fleet of eleven pirate boats, pursuing a trading prahu. The _Nemesis_ chased the pirates to the shore, who drew up in line along the beach. The pirates first opened the combat. For about two hours the cannonade lasted; when the fire of the prahus was subdued, the marines and sailors proceeded in boats to finish the destruction of the pirate craft. Five of these war prahus were destroyed, and about eighty pirates killed, and perhaps as many wounded. The rest and their crews escaped, but the boats were much disabled. From the guns and other material captured, it was plain that a Dutch merchant ship of considerable value had fallen into the pirates’ hands. Some operations on shore speedily followed, from which the robbers suffered severely. One British seaman was killed, and seven wounded.

FOREIGN RELATIONS.

The conduct of the Chinese, ever since the peace executed by Sir Henry Pottinger, had been such as to show that the treaty was not intended to be kept by the authorities any longer than force constrained, and that with the people all intercourse with foreigners on equal terms was unpopular. During 1846 unoffending Europeans at Canton were frequently attacked, and on one occasion the factories were stormed, and only after a protracted conflict did the Europeans and Americans succeed in expelling the assailants. The government of Canton always affected to deprecate this violence on the part of the Cantonese, and as far as proclamations went there was a magnificent display of justice. Several Englishmen and other foreigners were murdered, and certain innocent Chinese were seized and executed by the mandarins, while the murderers were notoriously at large. In 1847 the merchants, who had often in vain called for protection and redress from the British government, drew up a memorial of their wrongs, which induced Sir John Davis, the governor of Hong-Kong, to interfere on their behalf. Sir Robert Peel and Lord Aberdeen seemed to adopt the policy of submitting to any indignities the Chinese government or people might offer, rather than interrupt commercial relations, or create any embarrassment at home. Possibly the state of parties and the general distress at home may have influenced the premier and the foreign minister to adopt this course, but its result was injurious to British interests and to humanity; it entailed a still greater interruption of commerce, and involved a larger sacrifice of human life.

The demands of the merchants were:—1. A distinct recognition of their rights to go such distance into the surrounding country as could be traversed, either by land or water, in one day out and home; and full protection during such period from attack or insult.—2. A space of ground of about fifty acres at Honan, or in some other convenient part of the suburbs, for the erection of warehouses and dwelling-houses.—3. A site for a church and church-yard* for British residents.

* By a “church yard” was meant a burial-ground attached to the church, for Europeans only.

—4. A burial-ground for the Parsee community, either on Dares or French Island, of forty thousand square feet.—5. A bridge to be thrown over the passage of Hog Lane, to connect the two factory gardens.—6. A cook-house for Lascars in Hog Lane.—7. The railing in of Lower China Street and the lower part of Hog Lane, and the garden walls to be kept free from Chinese buildings, excepting the military and police stations already erected.—8. Removal of the stationary boats which at present encumber the avenue to the factory gardens at the river-side.

Sir John Davis determined upon seeking redress for the various insults and outrages which had been inflicted, whatever might be the propriety of requesting the concession of such advantages as the merchants sought. In the opinion of Sir John, who knew the Chinese well, no demand would meet with attention which was not backed with military force. Orientals comprehend only that argument which Europeans regard as the _dernier resort_. The Chinese authorities were taken by surprise, or they would have prepared for resistance, and met the military demonstration of the English governor with defiance or stratagem. Major-general D’Aguilar commanded the British troops. As soon as he received the directions of the plenipotentiary, he consulted with Captain M’Dougall in command of her majesty’s ship _Vulture_. These officers agreed that the force at their disposal was inadequate to the enterprise, but that, as audacity and promptitude were the best weapons with oriental nations, it would be well to act at once with such forces as they could employ. General D’Aguilar considered it also important to impress practically upon the mind of the Chinese authorities the possibility of the garrison and the naval force at Hong-Kong being sufficient, without aid from India or England, to chastise any affronts or injuries offered to British persons, honour, or interests. It had been well if, in subsequent events, similar views had been entertained by British officers and British governments. The promptitude of the general’s action harmonised with the wisdom and boldness of his opinion. By midnight of the day on which he received his orders, the troops were embarked; and at nine o’clock the following morning the squadron arrived at the Bocca Tigris. The _Vulture_ then lowered her boats, into which the general ordered two detachments, the one under Lieutenant-colonel Brereton, the other under his own immediate orders. On landing, all the batteries were seized, the guns spiked, the ammunition destroyed, and the garrisons sent, unmolested, away. This bold measure was necessary to the safety of the general’s small force, for had he left these batteries in his rear, his return would have been endangered. At six o’clock, the squadron arrived at Whampoa. As the _Vulture_ was of too large a draught to proceed higher, the troops were placed on board the steamers _Pluto_ and _Corsair_. Sir John Davis accompanied the general in the _Pluto_. At eleven o’clock the squadron arrived before several forts, which were attacked. Lieutenant-colonel Brereton, landing, took two of them by a _coup de main_, blowing in the gates with gunpowder, and instantly seizing and spiking the guns. General D’Aguilar and his party were received by the other two forts with round and case shot, but the boats pushed in, blew open the gates, and spiked the guns, the garrison retreating by the rear. The expedition then proceeded to the French Folly Fort, a stronger place than any of those already captured, and situated on one of the narrowest bends of the river. The British swooped down upon this place as an eagle upon its prey, and their rapidity was rewarded by its immediate capture, for a few minutes delay and the guns of the work would have given our troops a reception more warm than welcome. Four other batteries were taken and spiked on their way up river by the general and commodore, and by six o’clock in the evening the troops were landed in the factories. Eight hundred and seventy-nine pieces of Chinese cannon had been spiked, to the amazement of the enemy, who had no time to recover from the panic into which so sudden an incursion threw them. The general, upon landing, placed the factories in a state of efficient defence by barricades, and such other means as were at his immediate command. The Chinese commissioner, Keying, now waited upon Sir John Davis, but refused to comply with his demands; the next day, however, the high commissioner requested another day’s delay. This was granted, and the terms demanded were ultimately agreed to by the commissioner. General D’Aguilar withdrew the troops, except a company of sappers, and the light company of the 18th royal regiment of the line. These were ordered to remain until what was promised should be fully executed. This feat of the English general’s was one of the most dashing ever executed with so small a body of men. The whole military force did not amount to one thousand men, and the naval force could only afford a few hundred sailors and marines for land operations. Audacity and rapidity carried the day—the grand secret of success in Asiatic warfare.

The Chinese, however, had no intention of observing the treaty; and when all appeared to be adjusted, six British subjects, who made a short excursion, in agreement with one of its clauses, were barbarously murdered. They were attacked by the whole population of the place which they visited. The Englishmen, when at last compelled to defend themselves, slew one and wounded several of their assailants. It required much negotiation to secure the punishment of some of the murderers, four of whom were decapitated, and a few others received minor punishments.

Whenever the French found that the British displayed vigour towards the Chinese, they made out a grievance, and sent an armed force to demand redress somewhere. Their object seemed to be to show that France also was a great nation, and could enforce respect. Two French ships of war appeared in the Bay of Touron during this year, to demand redress from the government of Cochin China, for injuries alleged to have been inflicted upon French Roman Catholic priests. Their demand not having been at once complied with, and some treachery on the part of the natives having been detected, the French ships opened fire upon the war-junks, sinking and destroying many, and slaying more than a thousand men.

The conduct of the Chinese to Europeans generally, during the year 1847, kept them, the British more especially, in a constant sense of danger. Applications were made for reinforcements, but, notwithstanding the prodigious armaments of England in India, and her resources elsewhere, it was with extreme difficulty that any additional force could be obtained. The following parliamentary papers show the perilous routine necessary on every occasion when our officers require even the most paltry reinforcement. General D’Aguilar applied to Major-general Smelt, the officer commanding at Ceylon, for two guns and a few artillerymen. In a month after, General Smelt wrote to Lord Fitzroy Somerset, the military secretary at the Horse-Guards, informing him that if he (General Smelt) _heard again_ from General D’Aguilar that the reinforcement was necessary, he would send it! but that, in doing so, he should leave Ceylon all but utterly unprotected, so far as artillery was concerned. Lord Torrington, the governor of Ceylon, at the same time communicated this “great fact”—that two guns and a few men were wanting at Hong-Kong—to Earl Grey, the colonial minister, who, at the latter end of November, sent a despatch to General D’Aguilar, telling him not to do anything against the Chinese without authority from home! The discretionary power in the hands of Sir John Davis, and the promptitude, energy, and enterprise of the general, obtained, with less bloodshed than frequently occurred in a street riot in Canton, redress of grievances, a recognition of rights, and a series of important concessions. If it had been necessary to refer these disputes to the Colonial Office at home, everything would have been frustrated. Possibly a grand expedition, at an enormous expense, would have gone out in a year or so afterwards, and an expenditure of British as well as Chinese life on a large scale have resulted. In spheres so distant, men thoroughly competent to act ought, in both civil and military matters, to be appointed, and the honour of the country should be committed to their hands. With a small force, complete in itself, at the disposal of such men, more could be effected at the moment for the honour and interests of the country than by long and roundabout despatches, passing through so many hands that one fool in authority nullifies all, as a bad link in an otherwise good chain renders the whole useless. Omitting the other portions of the correspondence, the following letter from Major-general D’Aguilar, dated Hong-Kong, August 21, 1847, to Major-general Smelt, reveals sufficiently the incompetent arrangements for British interests in China, in 1847:—

“Although I have not the pleasure of your personal acquaintance, your character and services are so well known to me, that I venture to address you without form or ceremony. I have every reason to hope that things will settle down here peaceably, but I have no positive assurance of it; and if circumstances should occur to oblige me to go to Canton again, I am but badly off for artillery. I can never hope to surprise the Chinese defences a second time; and whatever I do must be done in form, and with reference to the altered position of things.

“Under these circumstances, I write to ask if you can spare me half a company of artillery, with their proportionate number of field-guns and ammunition complete. I should only want them for six weeks, and I promise you to send them faithfully back the moment the service is over.

“Should the contingency—the possibility of which is on the cards—occur, I shall endeavour to avoid taking the field before the end of November, when the cool weather will add strength to our exertions; and I will take care to give you the earliest notice of my intention. In the meantime, perhaps, you would kindly prepare Lord Torrington for this request on my part, and afford me your interest in giving effect to it, should circumstances render it necessary.

“A couple of 9–pounders, with the half-company of artillery, would be the best; but if they are not to be had, then anything your people are supplied with.”

On receipt of the above, Major-general Smelt wrote as follows to Lieutenant-general Lord Fitzroy Somerset.

The letter was dated Colombo, Ceylon, September 22nd, 1847:—

“I have the honour to inform your lordship that I received, two days ago, a letter from Major-general D’Aguilar, commanding in China, informing me that it is likely that he would require a reinforcement of artillery in the event of operations being carried on at Canton towards the end? of this year, and requesting me, if I could spare it, and circumstances rendered it necessary, to afford him a half company of artillery, with two 9–pounder guns complete, with ammunition, &c.

“I shall therefore be prepared, should I hear again from General D’Aguilar that their services would actually be required, to send such force as, in the present strength of artillery in this command, would be in my power. But your lordship is aware that the whole amount of artillery throughout this island only consists of two weak companies, reduced in their number of Europeans in consequence of a proportion of gun-lascars; and the only ordnance that I could spare, at present equipped for service, are 4 ⅖ inch howitzer guns, having neither 9–pounder nor 6–pounder guns, excepting two of the latter, which have no carriages.

“Under these circumstances, and with the recommendation of his excellency the governor, I should be able to afford a detachment of one officer and twenty-five gunners, with a proportion of non-commissioned officers and the two howitzers above mentioned. I am informed by General D’Aguilar, who will give me the earliest notice of his plans, that he would only require this force for six weeks, and that it should be sent back to me immediately the service is over; in the meantime, as this draft would reduce my strength of European artillerymen in this island by about one-third, I shall, in order to repair the deficiency, cause a portion of the soldiers from the line regiment, equal to about five men per company, to be trained and exercised at the gun drill.

“I have to add that a draft of one hundred and twenty men of the Ceylon Rifle Regiment are under orders, and will probably sail the end of this month for Hong-Kong, to complete the six companies at present serving there to their full complement of one hundred rank and file; these companies having been sent to China so much under their establishment with a view to their being completed by recruits sent from Singapore, but the uncertain state of things there rendering it quite necessary now that trained soldiers should be sent from this place, which I trust will meet with the approbation of his grace the commander-inchief.”

The foregoing offer of assistance was finally countermanded by Earl Grey, in a despatch to Major-general D’Aguilar, dated Colonial Office, November the 24th, 1847:—

“The governor of Ceylon has communicated to me an application which you have made to the major-general commanding her majesty’s troops in that island, for a reinforcement of half a company of artillery, with two guns, and a proportionate supply of ammunition, to be held in readiness to be forwarded to Hong-Kong, should circumstances render it necessary to undertake any further military operations at Canton.

“I have desired the governor of Ceylon not to send to Hong-Kong the detachment for which you have made application; and I have further to signify to you that her majesty’s government peremptorily forbid you to undertake any further offensive operations against the Chinese without their previous sanction. Her majesty’s government are satisfied that, although the late operations in the Canton River were attended with immediate success, the risk of a second attempt of the same kind would far overbalance any advantage to be derived from such a step. If the conduct of the Chinese authorities should, unfortunately, render another appeal to arms inevitable, it will be necessary that it should be made after due preparation, and with the employment of such an amount of force as may afford just grounds for expecting that the objects which may be proposed by such a measure will be effectually accomplished without unnecessary loss.”

Lord Grey was right, that a similar expedition, if made with the same force, would probably fail. General D’Aguilar knew that rather better than Lord Grey, and did not need a pompous despatch from the Colonial Office to inform him of it. But the general did not mean to attempt the same thing with the same force, and therefore sent for aid where he might naturally have expected to derive the little he sought. There can be no doubt that if matters had been left to the general’s own discretion, and his forces been adequately strengthened, he would have performed what was proper to the occasion, and, perhaps, all that English safety and interests required, and thereby have averted future conflict, as well as the humiliations which Englishmen had to endure, and to punish at a great cost of treasure and immense sacrifice of blood.

_France_.—The Spanish marriages caused stormy debates in the French chambers, which reflected much moral discredit upon the King of the French, his minister Guizot, his ambassador M. Bresson, the queen and queen-mother of Spain, and Narvaez, the chief abettor and tool of the faction of Christina. The eloquent denunciations of M. Thiers against Guizot and his policy told upon the French mind, and led to modifications in the cabinet; but this clever invective was purely in the spirit of party: the honour of France and the love of truth were as little considered by the one leader as the other. The British government maintained an attitude of coldness to that of France, but it was not possible to act independently of it: in many of the affairs of other countries to which England stood related, and in every instance, the influence of the French king was prejudicial to the interests and moral influence of England. On the completion of the Spanish marriages M. Bresson returned to Paris, and had the impudence to demand, as his reward for his share in that transaction, the embassy to London. This was refused, on the ground that the relations of France to Great Britain were too delicate to be committed to the minister who had the chief part in producing the coldness which existed. He then demanded the embassy to St. Petersburg, but this post required higher qualifications than were conceded to M. Bresson by his government. He was nominated to the French ministry at Naples, and proceeded to his destination reluctantly, considering the appointment a slight after sustaining French affairs with the government of a superior country. Soon after he arrived at Naples, perceiving the evil consequences of the Spanish marriages, his chagrin was so increased that he put an end to his own existence.

_Spain and Portugal_.—Spain passed a year of disorder and bad government, but, excepting as regarded the affairs of Portugal, England had no especial connection with the proceedings of the Spanish government. The state of Portugal was desperate. The Miguellites and liberals continued to maintain the civil war against the queen. The former were repeatedly defeated. Their leader, M’Donnell, perceiving that all hope of inducing the party to adopt measures sufficiently bold were at an end, collected around him a chosen band, and precipitating himself upon the queen’s cavalry, fell fighting sword in hand. The radical or constitutional party made their head-quarters at Oporto, where they set at defiance the queen’s government. Meanwhile the French and Spanish governments were desirous to interfere on behalf of the queen, whose opinions and sympathies were despotic, and in harmony with those of the French king and the Spanish queen. To prevent such an interference the English government reluctantly consented to a joint interference of England and Spain only. Accordingly, the British navy co-operated with a Spanish army for the purpose of putting down all armed opposition to the queen’s government, at the same time obtaining indemnification for all in arms against her majesty, and a guarantee on the part of her majesty, by her solemn promise and the dismission of her reactionary ministry, that she would respect the constitutional rights of her people. This was effected, and Louis Philippe was balked of his desire to interfere in Portugal to promote a reactionary policy. The queen, however, did not keep faith with her allies; she did not dismiss her government until the English minister made such demands as compelled compliance. Peace was by these measures restored to Portugal; but no party within or beyond the bounds of her kingdom had any confidence in the good faith, good sense, or good feeling of the queen.

Lord Palmerston was much censured as the originator of the British policy in Portugal, but an impartial examination of the course he took will show that it was politic, and that by it he enforced upon Portugal the only plan possible to secure her independence of foreign despotic interference, and her release from internecine war. Portugal was saved for the time, and the designs of Louis Philippe were permanently baffled.

STATE OF IRELAND.—PROGRESS OF FAMINE AND DISEASE.

The year 1847 opened upon Ireland in many respects as gloomily as that which preceded. During the early months of the year the weather was very severe, and this added materially to the miseries of an already famine and disease-stricken people. The most heart-rending events connected with these disasters occurred everywhere throughout the country. The government continued its efforts for the mitigation of the prevailing evils; but the plans put forth for this object were not always wise, and the conduct of the people, high and low, baffled the projects of relief. All the mischievous proceedings of a social nature narrated in the previous chapter continued, and many of them were aggravated. The result was that great numbers perished in all parts of the country, especially in the south and west; and philanthropic men in Europe, in America, and throughout the whole world where civilised man dwelt, perused the records of Ireland’s sufferings and infatuation with horror and awe. This state of matters continued even to the harvest, and although there was then the prospect of abundant crops, that circumstance neither revived the hopes, nor assuaged the political rancour, of the people. Late in the month of June a clergyman addressed a letter to a Dublin newspaper, describing the condition of the peasantry in his locality, and it but too faithfully depicts the sufferings prevalent in most other places. It was as follows:—“The population of the district for which I would plead amounted at the last census to eight thousand seven hundred souls, but, owing to the dreadful ravages of famine and disease, it is generally considered that two thousand have perished during the past brief season of unexampled horror. Notwithstanding the relief administered through the medium of public works, and the subsequent distribution of rations, many instances have recently occurred of horses being stolen and destroyed for human food, and great distress still extensively prevails. During previous years, every available spot of land was alternately cultivated with potatoes and wheat or oats; but this year, owing to the utter destitution of the farmers, generally speaking, it is computed that one-third of the land last year under the potato crop still lies waste, while almost all the stubble ground remains untouched. If then, after the harvest of last year, when all the existing tillage was cultivated, and some proportion of the potato crop, such as it was, was available for food, such wholesale destruction of human life has taken place in this district, under circumstances of such a character that their mere recital fills the mind with horror and dismay—if, after two thousand have been swept away by the devastating power of famine and disease, four thousand eight hundred and twenty-nine of the survivors are at this moment kept from impending death by the daily distribution of rations,—what are we reasonably to anticipate for the time to come, unless prompt and energetic measures are adopted to provide means for sustaining those who may be spared?”

CONTINUED POLITICAL AGITATION.—DREADFUL PREVALENCE OF CRIME.

Unfortunately, the progress of crime and outrage kept pace with that of famine and pestilence, until the moral condition of the people seemed to be worse than their physical. Men were murdered in the open day, in the presence of numbers who made no effort to stop the deed of blood, and who would make no revelations to the officers of justice calculated to bring punishment upon the coldblooded assassins. The motives for these sanguinary outrages were various: sometimes it was purely agrarian; sometimes for the purpose of plundering food or money. Some were murdered from purely political hostility, and others on account of their prominence in religious movements distasteful to the people. Intolerance, contempt for law, a sense of wrong under the influence of the laws of landlord and tenant then in existence, and despair caused by their sufferings, constituted the incentives to atrocities which threw a hue of blood and gloom over the pages of Irish history.

The political differences which had long rent the country were exasperated, although men of all sects and parties united with equal zeal for the relief of the poor. No charities seemed to soften the heart of the Irish peasant towards those who entered strongly into political or religious combinations to which he was averse.

The new political disputes gathered strength; the different sections of repealers waged not only a wordy war with one another, as in the previous year, but the “Old Irelanders” frequently committed outrages upon the “Young Irelanders,” characterised by insolent intolerance and ferocity.

Foreign nations saw, with admiration, the magnitude of the scale upon which government extended relief. By an act of parliament a loan of eight millions sterling was contracted by government for the purpose of mitigating the wants of Ireland. On the first of March it was adjudicated; Messrs. Barings and Rothschilds having coalesced, they were declared the contractors. The loan was in 8 per cent. Consols; the bidding was 89 ½. The total amount of stock created by the transaction was £8,938,548. The annual charge for the dividend was £268,156 8s. 10d. The scrip, which opened at 2 premium, rapidly fell to discount, and gradually declined, showing the feeling of the monied interest regarding the monetary prospects of the period as affected by Ireland. The commercial distress in Ireland, partly consequent upon the famine and partly upon the general causes then operating in England, was extensive and profound. Heavy failures, in connection with houses of much reputation, shook the general credit, and aggravated the other existing influences by which suffering was originated or increased.

A new form of lawlessness appeared along the Irish coasts. Piracy had not been known there for a great length of time: the coast-guards and revenue cutters prevented that crime, as well as smuggling; but, early in the spring, formidable piratical attempts were made along an extended line of coast. Generally such attempts were frustrated when any weapons of offence were possessed by the attacked; for these enterprises, although furtive and made by considerable numbers, were seldom conducted or maintained with spirit. Thus, in April, the _Christian_, while on her passage from Liverpool to Westport, with a cargo of Indian corn, was suddenly boarded, seven or eight miles off Broadhaven, by three boats’ crews, who broke up the hatches, and carried away thirty-three bags of corn. On the following day they again approached, but the circumstance of the master presenting a gun was sufficient to deter them from any attempt to board. The men effecting these robberies seem to have been actuated by distress; they seldom committed violence, and bore all the aspect of famine and despair.

DEATH OF O’CONNELL.

The political events of the year were much influenced in every way by the absence of Mr. O’Connell from public life, and by his death. Early in the year his powers of mind and body became so much enfeebled, that his physicians insisted upon his leaving London, and upon his excluding all intelligence concerning Ireland. In obedience to these directions, he took up his abode at Hastings; but, although some intervals of apparent recovery occurred, he sank gradually until the imminency of his danger became evident to his friends and to himself. He had a wish to live, probably that he might continue the struggle for the great object of his life—the ascendancy of his religion, and the greater political power of his country. As the spring advanced, his friends were of opinion that a journey to Italy might benefit him; he, believing that his illness was fatal, wished to go to Rome, that he might die there with the blessing of the pope to sanctify the closing scene. His illness increased so rapidly that he was not able to reach Rome, and died at Genoa. A _post mortem_ examination revealed that his brain was extensively diseased, accounting for the melancholy which pervaded his illness. Old age, the failure of his hopes, prophecies, and schemes after the Emancipation Act, and deep mental anxieties about the distress of his country, the divisions in the repeal party, and the hopelessness of his agitation, caused his death. He had attained a good old age (seventy-four), and departed this life on the 15th of May. His latest anxieties were lest he should be buried alive, and he gave to his confessor, physician, and servant, constant and peculiar directions to guard against such a casualty. His heart he bequeathed to Rome! The tidings of his death reached Dublin on the 25th. Immediately placards were issued from Conciliation Hall, and were posted in town and country, announcing the event. The people gathered in crowds wherever a placard was seen, and perused it with deep sorrow, the men moving silently away, or gathering in groups to talk earnestly concerning the deceased and the prospects of their country—the women in many cases uttering loud lamentations. The bells of the Roman Catholic chapels tolled mournfully, and arrangements were made to offer public prayers for the soul of the deceased. Probably there was not a Roman Catholic in Ireland that did not privately offer such petitions upon the reception of the intelligence. The Repeal Association summoned an especial meeting to prepare an address to the people of Ireland suitable to the occasion. The corporation met and adjourned for three weeks as a mark of respect. The Roman Catholics of Ireland, and such Protestants as were considered liberal, made every manifestation of respect for the memory of the great leader. Ireland, in the midst of her starvation and sickness, felt a still deeper sorrow—the whole land appeared in mourning.

The mortal remains of the great popular chief were conveyed to Dublin, and on the 5th of August they were interred in the Glassnevin Cemetery. The day preceding the Reverend Dr. Miley preached his funeral sermon at the Metropolitan Chapel, Marlborough Street. It was an eloquent eulogy upon the character of the departed; his errors, personal and political, were passed over, and the idea pervaded the discourse that the departed was a martyr and saint.

The funeral procession was one of the most remarkable which had ever been witnessed in Ireland,—when the character of the deceased, his influence upon public affairs, the national feeling, the intense curiosity excited, and the conduct of the ceremonial, were considered. At twelve o’clock the corpse was removed from the Metropolitan Chapel. The procession was a mile and a half (Irish) in length, composed of the Trades’ Unions on foot, followed by the triumphal car which had been used to convey him from Richmond Penitentiary to his house in Merrion Square, when his acquittal of the charge upon which he had been incarcerated was pronounced by the House of Lords. The coffin was placed on a large open hearse, constructed with very little regard to taste. The hearse was covered with rich Genoa velvet. It was immediately followed by the family of the deceased, his personal and political friends, and a large assembly of the Roman Catholic bishops and clergy. All along the route to Glassnevin, multitudes were assembled in the streets and windows, and even upon the house-tops. Persons came from very great distances in the country to be present at the interment, or take some part in the ceremonial. At the cemetery the services appropriate to the Roman Catholic religion were conducted, and the coffin was consigned to a vault prepared for its reception. The site selected for the place of sepulture was the best which the cemetery afforded, and the whole scene was solemn and impressive. It was a public funeral, worthy of a great man, by a people whom he had zealously, faithfully, and disinterestedly served. It was computed that one hundred thousand persons were present. There was a deep gloom upon the people when the ceremony was over. The religious ceremonies prescribed by the Roman Catholic Church for eminent persons deceased, were continued for a considerable time.

Thus passed away a man whose name will long remain upon the pages of his country’s history, and whose influence upon the whole empire of Great Britain was greater than was publicly recognised at the time, and than historians have since recorded.

The fate of the reform bill very much depended upon the support accorded to it by Daniel O’Connell. It is probable that the bill would have been lost without the support of the Irish liberals, led by the agitator. To the repeal of the corn laws he also rendered effective aid, although his oratory in favour of that measure appeared to be less hearty than that on behalf of the reform bill. The impression prevailed very extensively among the great body of the free-traders that, while O’Connell agreed with their theory, and deemed it politic to co-operate with them, he did not regard it as immediately beneficial to Ireland, and did not feel personally cordial to the movement. On many local church questions, also, and to a very great extent, on colonial matters, the influence of the Irish leader was felt in parliament by the parties most interested, and by the governments. For a time the scale of office was held in his hand; he made and unmade ministers. He was not corrupt, or place, power, and pension might have been obtained by him and his. After his death some members of his family did receive government situations, and even before his death connexions of his obtained such advantages; but they were in all cases fit for the posts to which they were appointed, and filled them with honour—nor was the emolument much, in any case. On the whole, the Whigs did not treat the family of O’Connell with gratitude. He had more than once put them into power, and frequently, when the certainty of their losing office without his aid occurred, he gave them the requisite assistance. He was often—indeed, always—in some measure their opponent; but this rather strengthened them in Great Britain, while on great party divisions “the tail” was always to be relied upon by the Whig cabinet. Never had a public man such opportunity of raising himself to the most elevated offices, and securing emolument for himself and his family—never were these temptations more faithfully resisted. Yet O’Connell did not disdain office, and he especially valued promotion and honours in his own profession: but these things were nothing to him in comparison with what he regarded to be his mission. He was fully convinced that God had raised him up for the especial purpose of serving the Roman Catholic religion, and, in connection with that of serving his country, he pursued this object with unswerving fidelity. If he could have obtained high office, and thereby have inflicted no injury upon the cause which he espoused, he would have eagerly sought a position in the cabinet or on the bench; he would have been as much opposed to the repeal of the union as Mr. Lucas, the editor of the _Tablet_, and other English Roman Catholics, if he had believed that it would injure the Roman Catholic religion. Many supposed that he was never sincere in prosecuting repeal; while others, whose opportunities of judging were ample, believed that he was most honest in that agitation: in fact, both were right. As an Irishman, he had a desire that his country should cease to be a province, and he probably believed that her resources, moral, intellectual, and material, were sufficient to maintain the dignity and power of a nation; it was also his conviction that the repeal of the union would be a means of improving the government and social condition of Ireland, but he chiefly regarded it as an instrument for the aggrandisement of his religion. It would enable the Roman Catholic party to suppress the distribution of Protestant tracts and bibles, to silence Protestant controversialists, and to treat bible-readers and circuit-preachers as vagabonds and disturbers of the peace. O’Connell’s speeches abound with expressions of opinion, that it was the duty of the British government to do all these things in deference to the wishes of the Roman Catholics, they being a majority. He invariably held up all attempts to “proselyte the people” as a crime which ought to be punishable by law; and where the government failed “to protect the people from the bible men, saints, soupers, and fanatics” (the names which he generally applied to earnest Protestants in his abusive and bigoted polemical speeches), then the people should use all means within the law—a sort of qualification never intended to be accepted by those to whom it was addressed—“to put down” all persons obnoxious to the religious hostility of the priests. In the earlier part of his career he was accustomed, with the assistance of Brick, O’Dwyer, and others of his followers, to disturb the religious public meetings called by Protestants, especially associations for the distribution of the bible. O’Connell and his colleagues would intrude upon such meetings, often attended by a violent rabble, whose language and behaviour on these occasions were coarse and brutal. The intruders would propose amendments to the resolutions submitted to the members of these societies, and make violent speeches at the meetings, full of ridicule and abuse, which were loudly applauded by the mob, who forced their way in to support these proceedings. When the advocates of the resolutions attempted to reply, they were met by hootings, and sometimes by violence. There was always a perfect understanding between the mob who intruded below, and the gentlemen who made their way or were invited to the platform. The latter affected to protest against the tumult while it went on, but afterwards extenuated or denied it in the newspapers, or in speeches elsewhere, averring that the clergymen and laymen, who convened the meeting, were unable to answer the arguments of the Catholic champions. In many of these meetings free discussion was secured, and faithful reports of the arguments on both sides were published in newspapers and pamphlets, with the result of shaking the faith of many Roman Catholics in various parts of the country: the agitators, under O’Connell’s advice, then gave up this mode of procedure, and shunned all such meetings. O’Connell also perceived that he had created a prejudice against himself, his country, and his creed in England, by the violence he connived at, and the bigotry which he uttered.

Repeal of the union, besides enabling him to accomplish the class of religious objects thus described, would also have given him power to transfer the funds of the Irish Established Church to the Roman Catholic. He and most of his followers having loudly professed “the voluntary principle,” it may seem to readers, cognisant of that fact, and unacquainted with the modes of procedure adopted by the Irish popular party, as unlikely that those who composed it, or, at all events, he who led it, would ever desire the establishment of the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland. The truth is, that most of the men who declaimed in favour of the voluntary principle were chiefly actuated, like O’Connell himself, in their political agitation, by the desire and hope of Roman Catholic ascendancy. The great repeal leader proved at last that he was utterly insincere in these protestations of voluntarism, for afterwards, during the English agitation concerning the Maynooth grant, he turned “the voluntaries” and their principle into open ridicule. He had served his turn of them, and then held them and the principles he pretended in common with them to support, in derision. Yet O’Connell was not a dishonest politician, apart from his religious mission. He was a man to be trusted in political engagements; few public men of the day would act with such truth and honour to party, and in any purely political contest or interest. When the promotion of his Church was concerned, his conduct proved that he believed a doctrine which he often repudiated—that the end sanctified the means. He was educated a Jesuit, was one in spirit, was allied with them in the purposes and objects of his private life, and his public policy. If any considerable amount of Romish influence could have been introduced to the British cabinet, with the hope that it would become a permanent element in the government of England, O’Connell would have been the deadliest enemy of repeal: the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland would have put down repeal as injurious to it. The Young Irelanders would have still agitated for Irish independence; but they would have been mobbed, or assassinated, or otherwise soon crushed as a party. The Protestants would then have been the repealers. The argument of Mr. Lucas, that repeal would weaken the Irish Roman Catholic body, through the influence of the English government upon the colonies and foreign states, was that which prevailed with so many Romanists of respectability in Ireland, and with the English Roman Catholic party, in keeping them aloof from the repeal agitation, and inducing them even to oppose it; nor was O’Connell himself free from the effect of such a consideration. His professions of the supreme value of repeal were based upon the conviction that it was hopeless to overcome the religious hostility of the British people to any increased influence of Romanism in the government; yet he lingered on, hoping against this conviction, and feeling the difficulty, if not desperation, of the task he imposed upon himself, declaring still that he would only turn to repeal as the _dernier ressort_, and that his first cry was “Justice to Ireland.” Had everything been conceded which was claimed, “Justice to Ireland” would still have been, the cry, on the ground that, being an integral part of the United Kingdom, she was entitled to see her religion established in a fair proportion of the colonies, or placed on a par with the English Church in them all. With O’Connell and with Ireland the grievances were religious; the social evils of Ireland were abetted by many who were repealers: yet there was a sense of political injustice, and a patriotic desire on the part of O’Connell and the people for the glory of Ireland, so far as it was not necessary to merge that in the glory of Rome. Civil and religious liberty for Ireland and for the world were not desired by either the Irish Roman Catholic party or their political champion. The spirit of the speeches at Conciliation Hall, of the Irish press in that interest,—even of the Irish press in the Whig service, which was conducted by Romanists, and the tone of confidential conversation among Irish Roman Catholics at that period, all proved this allegation. Foreign despotisms, if Protestant, were abused and denounced; if Romish, they were treated with respect, and sympathy in case of any disturbance in their dominions; or if it were not for the moment politic to abet their proceedings, their misdeeds were passed over in silence. All the social wrongs and civil tyrannies practised at Rome were upheld as warmly in Ireland, and especially in Conciliation Hall, as they could have been in the conclave of cardinals. One of the favourite topics of the day among the Roman Catholics of Ireland, even amidst their sufferings, during 1847, (and subsequently still more so), was the prospect of the Roman Catholic religion becoming the established religion of the United States, through the instrumentality of the Irish and German Roman Catholics of the immigration. While they cried aloud for religious equality for themselves, they carried on in Ireland a fierce and brutal religious persecution, which was only restrained by the influence of the more enlightened and liberal laymen of their own communion, and by fear of the law; the impolicy of such a cause was not sufficient to check the raging zealotry which so extensively prevailed. All this O’Connell sanctioned and fostered, and, except when doing so would hamper his policy or political relations in England, he invited it.

Intellectually, O’Connell was a giant. His grasp of mind was comprehensive and tenacious; and he was capable of reasoning clearly whenever his religious bias allowed of his doing so dispassionately. His perception was quick, keen, and discriminating, especially where character was concerned. His knowledge of human nature was profound, although he had not been a successful student of metaphysics. His eloquence was more varied than that of any other man of his times; and he possessed the faculty of adapting himself to his audience, and to the changing feelings of an audience, to a degree which few men ever attain. In a moment he could melt a popular audience to tears or convulse it with laughter. He could be plain or ornate, coarse or courteous. The eloquence of invective and vituperation was carried by O’Connell to a very inglorious perfection. His eulogies were as dextrous and expressive as they were, nevertheless, morally repugnant to honest minds. The writer of these lines has heard him address a mob of peasants in the county of Waterford on repeal, and an assembly of Quakers, Methodists, and “other sectaries,” as he would himself call them, in the city of Cork, on an anti-slavery occasion, with equal effect. His broad-brimmed and sedate audience were as much delighted with his elegant and pathetic eloquence in favour of humanity and natural rights, as his peasant mob were while he discoursed to them upon the certainty and glory of repeal, and declared that “they were the finest peasantry in the world.” On the one occasion his action was graceful, and at times expressive even to sublimity; on the other, it was bold and broadly natural, nor less expressive of the passion he felt or simulated, and endeavoured to excite. He possessed the oratory necessary for an Irish tribune, and that which was adapted to the English senator: In his profession he held a high place. Having given up his life to politics and polemics, he could not have become a first authority in law, but he was unsurpassed as a counsel, especially in criminal cases. Most men thought that he had not the mental and moral qualities necessary for the bench, while he was pre-eminently the man of the bar. This, however, is hardly a fair estimate of him. He possessed in a remarkable degree all those qualities in an advocate which entitle him to cherish the ambition of becoming a judge. From the judgment-seat, when his bigotry did not blind him, O’Connell would have given charges as luminous and just as his speeches in court were powerful specimens of effective advocacy. His general attainments were very considerable. The writer of this history once took part in a conversation where O’Connell displayed a knowledge of Biblical criticism, and a capacity to apply what knowledge of that description which he possessed, which was very astonishing. On the same occasion he brought forth stores of ecclesiastical history, which proved that, although his studies had been confined to a particular school on that subject, his reading within the limits of that school were very extensive, and his memory altogether extraordinary. He had the faculty of attaching men strongly to him, not only as a party-leader, but as a man and a friend. Many thought him jealous of the fame of other orators of his time; but there is no just ground for this. No man approached him in reputation except Richard Lalor Shiel. O’Connell did not betray in public any jealousy of this great oratorical rival; but he often indicated, where he did not profess it, a distrust of his good faith— and the suspicions of the leader were not ill founded: Shiel was never in earnest in his arguments for the separation of the Irish from the English parliament, but preferred the policy of infusing Roman Catholic influence: he also preferred a high imperial position to that of a provincial demagogue. This, in the opinion of the Irish popular party, was treason to Ireland; and no doubt O’Connell sympathised with that feeling, and suspected that the man second only in power to himself was neither so ardent an Irishman or Roman Catholic as his countrymen desired him to be. This feeling on O’Connell’s part will account for many acts towards Shiel which were set down to personal jealousy. Dr. Michelsen is very unjust to O’Connell in the following critique upon his character:—“His greatest fault was no doubt his egotism; he could not endure a rival at his side, and would not have hesitated to annihilate any one who did not follow him with implicit obedience.” O’Connell would have hailed with delight any accession of eloquence or personal power to Conciliation Hall; but a particular policy had been arranged between O’Connell and the priests—they intrusted their cause to him, and when men started up and questioned, or attempted to modify this policy, O’Connell regarded it as rebellion, not merely against his leadership, but his party, and the church itself; hence, it was necessary for him to put down the disturber; and he was backed by clergy and people in doing so, which would not have been the case had not the understanding between him and the Roman Catholic hierarchy of Ireland been complete. Dr. Michelsen again says:—“It is a mistake to suppose that O’Connell entertained an irreconcilable hatred to England; he had never ceased to regard her as his second fatherland, as the land of his glory, of his intellectual activity. His partiality for England was only surpassed by his excessive love for his native home, and many apparent contradictions in his life can only be reconciled by this double sympathy in his character.”*

* “England since the Accession of Queen Victoria,” by Edward H. Michellen, Ph.D.

It is obvious that the writer of this paragraph has neither studied O’Connell, his country, or the party which he led. One of the grand causes of O’Connell’s failure in many things was his rancorous hatred to England. Thomas Gaspey, Esq., in his “History of England,” views this matter correctly in writing of O’Connell’s death, and the feeling in England concerning him:—“In England his departure was regarded with indifference. The hostility and scorn he frequently expressed for the Saxons, and his disparaging remarks on English women, had precluded him from gaining any of the popularity he had enjoyed in Ireland.”

The hatred of O’Connell to England was threefold—that of race, of nation, and of creed. He regarded England as the chief abettor of heresy in the world, and therefore would have rejoiced over her downfall; this was the common feeling of his party. So far as his animosity was connected with race and nationality, it was not unprovoked. The English people cherished deep prejudices against Ireland and the whole Celtic race; and the English newspapers frequently discussed the universal claims of the Anglo-Saxon to dominancy, and every social and national virtue, thereby creating a feeling of resentment in all countries where these articles were reprinted. The chief invidiousness, however, was to the Celt, and among Celts to the Irishman. This circumstance made repealers of numbers of Irishmen who were neither Celtic in race nor Roman in creed.

MR. JOHN O’CONNELL ASSUMES THE PRESIDENCY OF THE REPEAL ASSOCIATION—INFLUENCE OF THE REPEAL AGITATION UPON THE GENERAL ELECTIONS IN IRELAND.

The death of Mr. O’Connell, it was generally supposed in England, would allow agitation in Ireland to die of itself. Others supposed that it would now assume a worse form, in consequence of the absence of those restraints which the superior sagacity of the arch agitator laid upon the more fiery and imprudent ringleaders. The latter opinion was the correct one, and the people of England were astonished to find that Mr. O’Connell’s son John not only became the chairman at Conciliation Hall, but the recognised leader of the agitation. The priests gave him their confidence, and, at first, the people very generally; but he was not possessed of those qualities which enabled him to hold the reins of power. As Richard Cromwell to the deceased Oliver, so John O’Connell exhibited a contrast to his father, which soon caused the people to fall off from his leadership: his name, and the influence of the priests, were the means of retaining it for him for a time. After the death of his father, the temporary inheritor of his position indicated much energy and activity, although, even in this respect, none of the agitators approached their late chief: O’Connell’s powers of physical endurance and toil had been prodigious.

A general election, the policy of which will be noticed on another page, called out the leadership of John O’Connell, and the action of the committee at Conciliation Hall, in a manner to test whether the people were disposed to follow them. The general impression in England was, that the popular fervour had ebbed, and that the repeal members would not generally be returned: the English press made confident predictions to that effect. John O’Connell and the clique at Conciliation Hall accepted the ordeal, and were backed by priests and people in their policy. An extraordinary meeting was convened, and an address to the electors of Ireland resolved upon. It was a document which ought to be retained upon the page of history, for it discloses the spirit and temper of the repeal party, and of the Roman Catholic electors who responded practically to such an appeal. The repealers, as has been already shown, were not confined to Roman Catholics, nor were all that communion repealers; but, on the whole, the religious division of Protestant and Romanist defined the boundary between anti-repealers and repealers.

The following is copied from _Saunders’ News Letter_ of the 12th of June:—

_Address of the Loyal National Repeal Association to the Electors of Ireland._

“‘God prosper the cause!—oh! it cannot but thrive, While the pulse of one patriot heart is alive. How sainted by sorrow its martyrs have died! Far, far, from the footprint of coward or slave, The young spirit of freedom shall shelter their grave!’

“On you—fellow-countrymen—electors—at this moment devolves the good and holy task of protecting the graves of the sorrow-sainted martyrs of Ireland from the polluting tread of coward or of slave. None such will be found amongst you—none such will dare to show themselves if you be true.

“In this year of death, our country still survives! Weeping, fainting, bleeding, yet she lives; and lives to claim, aye, and to have—the services of her true children.

“Yes! although from him whose life’s devotion to Ireland was repaid by her confidence and her love, and from those without whose potent aid his labours had been vain—the beloved clergy of the people—down throughout all ranks and orders of the national organisation, Death has been busy, still enough remain of devoted, determined, patriot hearts, to carry out the good work he began, and to make it, with the blessing of a merciful God, speedily triumphant!

“Rally, then—rally, electors of Ireland—your country calls! Your dead brethren, even from their graves, invoke you. Drive from your hustings the men who shall have dared to think you cowards—who shall dare to ask you to continue slaves! And there are those who will so dare;—mark you not the exulting tone of Whig and Tory, and every other class of panderers to English passions and prejudices:—‘Repeal,’ they say, ‘is gone!’ ‘Ireland is at last subdued—she begs for bread, and is fearful to demand her rights lest we withhold our alms!’ It is false; how foully false you know, and at the elections you will prove. Deep as is the baseness of those who build their party hopes upon a nation’s misery, deeper still would be our baseness if ever, even amid all the heart-crushing calamities of the time, we shrunk in aught from our high purposes, and from our vows for Ireland’s regeneration.

“Nay, if but the hope of relief from our present distress were to animate us, even so should we cry out for that home parliament which alone can bring back wealth and abundance to the land—alone can guard her from recurring season after season of want, of pestilence, of death!

“Be ready then in time, fellow-countrymen, the elections are at hand; give us repealers—true and trusty repealers—men pledged to the safe, peaceful, constitutional principles you have been taught by him whom you followed so devotedly, and whom you mourn so affectionately and sincerely!

“On you—on each one and all of you together, and on none but you, the task now lies of helping Ireland at this fearful crisis of her fortunes. Yours, and yours alone, will be the glories of success, or the shame of not having sought it. Your distress has left the Repeal Association without funds to aid your contest, and we can do no more than to exhort and to advise. Let not the wily enemies of your freedom delude you. The duty is upon you; the means are in your hands, not in ours; if the duty be not done, poor Ireland will suffer the disastrous and ruinous consequences; but the blame of them, and the shame, will be upon you. Fellow-countrymen, this must not be—nay, this will not be. We answer for you. Unaided, undirected, as you are, you will bestir yourselves—on yourselves will depend, and you will achieve the victory. Meet in your committees; encourage the timid, cheer up the desponding; turn away with contempt from the whig or tory dependent, who would counsel you to dishonour, and vote for none but a staunch repealer—for one who will maintain the peace principles of the association, and aid it to work out and re-establish the inalienable and imperishable right of Ireland to legislate for herself.

“Had our own parliament ruled us, the landlords would not have had their tyrannies sanctioned and increased in license till the suffering people were reduced down to the lumper potato for a wretched, and, alas! a fatally precarious subsistence. Our manufactures would yet exist, giving comfort to our skilful artizans, and offering refuge to the peasant, unable to obtain a maintenance upon the land. In every village neighbourhood, the money raised by the hard toil of the labourer would be finding its way back, and briskly circulating there, by reason of the thousand sources of employment that would arise around the restored residence of the large proprietor. Irish money would thus stay at home to create and increase Irish wealth, and to support Irish poverty; and the grudging doles of an alien parliament would never more be needed in the land.

“Fellow-countrymen, for such results the association has been struggling—for such objects you are now called upon to work. By all that this wretched land has yet endured from English misrule,—by the accumulated and aggravated suffering of the last disastrous forty-seven years, with their fell climax in this year of death,—by the myriads of fresh graves, the fearful husbandry of death, that are ridging your fields and even your humble homesteads,—by the holy and most adorable name of the Deity, who chasteneth whom He loveth,—we entreat, we implore, we exhort, we adjure you to stand true to Ireland at these elections; to spurn Whig and Tory, and to prove yourselves worthy of your rights by returning none but those who will unflinchingly assert them;—and foremost amongst those rights, before all and above all, the right to make your own laws in your own parliament at home.”

The elections issued in a triumph for which the Repeal Committee itself was hardly prepared. There was a great increase in “repeal members.” This arose from a variety of causes. The Conservatives had lost heart in connection with the expenses which the famine had imposed upon their estates. The people universally attributed their distress to the government, and to their connection with heretic England. The priests made great exertions throughout the country. Fearful scenes of violence took place, “the moral-force repealers,” lay and clerical, inciting the people to these outrages by the most inflammatory appeals to their fanaticism, and by examples which were calculated to encourage them. The most awful denunciations were heaped upon the heads of “all bad Catholics who should vote against their religion and country.” These denunciations came from sacerdotal lips, and from the altar as well as the pulpit. The popular press rivalled the priests in anathemas against all who were not willing “to vote for Ireland against the Saxon.” Public placards might be seen in town and country, headed, like the address of the Repeal Committee to the electors, with inflammatory poetry: a favourite couplet on these occasions was—

“On our side is virtue and Erin, On theirs is the Saxon and guilt.”

The context of these lines was judiciously omitted from the placards, but not from the speeches of the electioneering agents and orators—

“Then onward—our green banner rearing— Go, flesh every sword to the hilt.”

If this injunction was not obeyed to the letter, it was nearly so, and at all events it was carried out in spirit.

Of green banners there was abundance, and if the sword gave place to the brickbat and the bludgeon, the consequences were pretty much the same—“Green Erin” gained a great victory over Erin of the Orange preferences, and over the Saxon in general. The spirit in which this result was received at Conciliation Hall, and its effect upon the hopes and aspirations of the people, may be gathered most readily from the address of the General Election Committee of the Repealers to the people of Ireland, when the elections had closed.

“_Fellow-countrymen_,—Even in this hour of triumph—even now, when you have so nobly vindicated at the elections the glorious cause of repeal—our congratulations must, in sad accordance with the unvarying fate of Ireland ever since Englishmen have controlled her fortunes, be mingled with considerations of mournfulness and peril! It is not merely—and, alas! that such a calamity should have to be treated as of secondary magnitude—it is not merely that the niggard state charity of England is now at once to cease and be entirely withdrawn, but we have to contemplate a still more fearful and far wider-spreading misery at the end of autumn and in the early winter.

“All-bounteous Heaven has blessed our fields with abundance; but Ireland’s poverty—the unholy doing of man—must cause the produce of her harvest to be exported away from her starving people, and sold at the rich markets of England, to meet the enormous rents of cruel absentees. Five millions of your money go annually to those absentees; and so many have lately fled from the sight of the calamities their carelessness for their country had allowed England to inflict, that more than an additional million must be drained away this year!

“What is there to save our people? The potato has not been sown in one-third of the extent of former years. The substitute crops, though promising, will be fearfully short of the deficiency caused by the loss of the potato; and those crops would be taken from us by the high prices in England, even if we had not to send them there to get money for the absentees. Food gone, and money gone, what is to become of us? The stinted relief that England gave us is out. The means voted with grudging and insult are expended and gone. Her representatives are pledged to give us no more, and not only to refuse if the government should propose a further advance, but to call upon the minister to insist strictly and speedily on repayment of that which has been given. We therefore have no hope of money from England! Have we then any money at home? Alas! it is but as the dribblings of the mountain stream when the winter floods have passed, and the summer heats are exhausting and absorbing its waters; and had we tenfold what little remains, how are the rates to be paid, when, according to even the starvation scale of the government soup-kitchens, the cost of maintaining our poor will exceed by nearly double the whole rated value of the property in Ireland! No Whig nor Tory can tell us of the means of meeting the coming disaster. The members of the ministry have not touched upon it at any of their elections. The press of England is mute, save when it gives utterance to calumnies and insults. Ireland is not in the thoughts of any of our English fellow-subjects. Their own interests, their own monetary perils, their own necessities, absorb their whole attention.

“Should we not then take counsel from ourselves? Should not our newly-elected members agree to come together here in Dublin, and consult for the safety of the country, and decide upon the matters they will urge upon the reluctant ear of the English parliament? Should they not meet, if only to concert how best to recall the absentees to their long-neglected duties at home; how best to compel all the monies of the country to be spent at home; and thus to give a chance of saving our unhappy people from being swept off the face of the earth by widely-desolating famine, or the yet more desolating and dreadful agency of a bloody, a bootless, a criminal, and all-destroying civil war?

“Again we shall address you, when the time is near that parliament is to assemble, and ask of you to announce to your representatives your opinions. We shall carefully make use of the intervening time to collect and concentrate the expression of your sentiments respecting each particular point of policy that should be pressed upon your members’ attention, as well as respecting the great leading principles of the national movement. Thus shall the ‘Council of National Distress and National Safety’ come to its labours with materials prepared and suitably digested, and thus be enabled all the readier and speedier to take, boldly and explicitly, its decisions and resolves, and maintain them firmly, undauntedly, and perseveringly in the British House of Commons. Thus shall the Irish members best show themselves to be worthy of the high trust with which they have been honoured, and of the far higher and prouder distinction of being again, and at no distant time, deputed to represent their beloved country in her restored native parliament.”

The representation that the relief England had given to the people was stinted, was a vile calumny, showing the utter want of principle of the party from which it emanated. The intimation that it was not the intention of government to do more; that the “stinted relief” which England gave was “out;” and that nothing but ruin remained, although rich England was at hand to save, if she were only charitable and just,—was well calculated to keep up disaffection in the public mind.

The success of the repealers at the elections might be supposed as tending to quiet the country, as it afforded a constitutional medium of expressing their views. But it had not that effect: the desire to procure arms which showed itself in 1846 continued through 1847, and notwithstanding the great distress so generally felt, the expenditure of money upon aggressive weapons was in some parts of the country larger than in the previous year.

BITTER DISPUTES BETWEEN “OLD IRELAND” AND “YOUNG IRELAND.”

The Young Irelanders were encouraged by the death of O’Connell to believe that they could take the lead in public affairs among the Roman Catholics, and they supposed that the Protestant population were more likely to listen to arguments in favour of an effort to achieve national independence, coming from them, than they were to hearken to the old repeal arguments from the Old Irelanders. In this they were disappointed; notwithstanding that several of the leaders were Protestants, no considerable number of that persuasion followed the new faction. The true tendency of that agitation was seen by the Protestants, who rather prepared to resist both the Old Ireland and Young Ireland parties, in the struggle which might be brought about by a coalition of these parties. Such a coalition was the policy of the Young Ireland party; but they made the doctrine of physical force a _sine qua non_ in the creed of the coalesced parties; and the Old Irelanders, still clinging to the policy of their deceased chief, refused the terms. John O’Connell and his adherents were then made the objects of unsparing ridicule by the _literati_ of the new party, and the lampoons and caricatures of which the chairman and committee of Conciliation Hall were the victims, told upon the people, and gradually insinuated a contempt for the weak and vacillating policy, as it was described, by which they were guided. The party of John O’Connell, as when under the guidance of his father, was not slow to resort to physical violence, whenever there was a chance of doing so with impunity, while they continued to proclaim the sanctity and permanent obligation of the O’Connell doctrine of moral force. The Young Irelanders endeavoured to reunite Irishmen to lift the arm of a manly and brave revolt against English connection. The Old Irelanders had no objection to kill scripture-readers, break church windows, waylay Protestants, and maltreat them at market or fair, and riotously disperse the assemblages of Young Irelanders, while they preached passive resistance as alone justifiable to the government. Of course the leaders of Old Ireland denounced all breakers of the laws; but when outrages were committed, especially on Young Irelanders or Protestants, they palliated them, or denied them in the face of evidence which was conclusive. John O’Connell found himself in a hurricane of political passion, which he could not quell, and through which he had neither power nor skill to direct his course. By the end of the year he found the reins of authority slipping through his hands; Smith O’Brien and his compeers were rampant; and Ireland, stained with blood, blackened with pestilence, exhausted by famine, raged with impotent fury against the imperial government and Great Britain: in all the folly of domestic faction, she was pitied and scorned by Great Britain when she supposed herself feared. There were no men amongst the leaders of the disaffected in Ireland to command the respect of England, in that sense which a dominant nation respects the power of a rival, or of an insurgent province. The wish became very extensive in Great Britain that all Irish grievances should be redressed, and that in every respect Ireland should be placed on a footing with the other portions of the United Kingdom, if in any a sense of injustice were experienced; but to the honest menaces of the Young Irelanders, and the hypocritical reliance on moral persuasion of Conciliation Hall, the people of Great Britain only gave their ear from curiosity, perfectly regardless of any power which any faction or union of factions might put forth. Great Britain awaited the outburst of passion which was in Ireland so rapidly coming to a crisis,’ as unmoved as the crag abides the eddies of the current which bubble and burst against it.

GENERAL STATE OF AFFAIRS IN GREAT BRITAIN.

This year was one which, in many respects, tested the power and resources of Great Britain. In her colonies she had conflicts to wage of great magnitude. Ireland was smitten with famine and disease, and turbulent. In the Highlands of Scotland the hardy peasantry suffered from the scarcity of provisions caused by the failure of the potato and other crops during 1846.

The commercial embarrassments of the year were felt from the beginning, and continued, with more or less pressure, to the close. From the operations of various causes, money was dear both on the European and American continents. Early in January, so severely was this circumstance felt in Paris, that the Bank of France applied to that of England for aid, which was granted; but the consequence, of course, was a rapid rise in the rate of interest in Great Britain and Ireland. This continued until all speculative transactions were paralysed. The timely increase in the price of accommodation by the Bank of England did much to mitigate the evils of the crisis. These were produced by recent bad harvests, and the failure of the potato crop. The great extent to which railway transactions had been carried, and the consequent drainage of capital; the wild speculations which began to prevail in France, and were so marvellously developed in England, also conduced to the monetary disturbance. Besides the operation of all these causes, there was an uneasy feeling on the continent connected with political affairs, which communicated itself to England, and made capitalists timid.

During the month of September panic pervaded the monetary and commercial world. Failures in every branch of business in London and in the provinces were numerous and disastrous. The following were among the most extensive in London:—

Liabilities.

Sanderson and Co...................... £1,725,900

J. and S. Woolley ..................... 90,500

Reid, Irving, and Co................... 1,500,000

Gower, Nephews........................ 450,000

Cockerell and Co...................... 600,000

Bensusan and Co...................... 60,000

Perkins, Schlusser, and Mullens...... 150,000

Luall, Brothers, and Co................ 400,000

Philips and Co......................... 150,000

Prime, Ward, and Co................... 100,000

Robinson and Co......................... 96,000

Castellain................................. 100,000

Giles and Co............................ 160,000

Some of these persons, and many others who incurred like misfortune, had been regarded as opulent merchants or bankers, and were men of position and influence. Mr. Robinson was, at the time of his failure, a governor of the Bank of England; Sir John Rae Reid had lately filled that office. Mr. Gomer and Mr. Settle were bank directors at the time of their stoppage.

The Bank of England not only raised its rate of interest to eight per cent., but contracted the time of accommodation to thirty days. The funds, always susceptible of the influence of an uneasy state of public affairs, and of violent changes in the money market, were at this juncture peculiarly so, falling as much as two per cent, in a single day. Consols were as low as eighty-four. Railway shares suffered more than any other kind of stock or scrip, becoming so depreciated in the market as to be unsaleable. A great outcry was raised against the monetary policy which had been initiated by Sir Robert Peel. “Peel’s bill” was the subject of unmeasured denunciation by all who were accustomed to obtain bank accommodation, but to whom that advantage was no longer open. Early in October a deputation from the city bankers waited upon the government for the purpose of inducing some relaxation upon the stringency of Sir Robert Peel’s bill. The deputation consisted of most influential men—such as Mr. Masterman, Mr. Abel Smith, Mr. Glynn, Mr. Bevan, Mr. Barnett. The chancellor of the exchequer addressed the deputation in terms which led them to expect that the object for which they were deputed would be accomplished. Their expectations were not disappointed, for the following letter was addressed to the governors of the Bank:—

“Her majesty’s government have seen with the deepest regret the pressure which has existed for some weeks upon the commercial interests of the country, and that this pressure has been aggravated by a want of that confidence which is necessary for carrying on the ordinary dealings of trade. They have been in hopes that the check given to transactions of a speculative character, the transfer of capital from other countries, the influx of bullion, and the feeling which a knowledge of these circumstances might have been expected to produce, would have removed the prevailing distrust. They were encouraged in this expectation by the speedy cessation of a similar state of feeling in the month of April last. These hopes, however, have been disappointed, and her majesty’s government have come to the conclusion that the time has arrived when they ought to attempt, by some extraordinary and temporary measure, to restore confidence to the mercantile and manufacturing community. For this purpose, they recommend to the directors of the Bank of England, in the present emergency, to enlarge the amount of their discounts and advances upon approved security; but that, in order to retain this operation within reasonable limits, a high rate of interest should be charged. In present circumstances they would suggest that the rate of interest should not be less than eight per cent. If this course should lead to any infringement of the existing law, her majesty’s government will be prepared to propose to parliament, on its meeting, a bill of indemnity. They will rely upon the discretion of the directors to reduce as soon as possible the amount of their notes, if any extraordinary issues should take place within the limits pi escribed by law. Her majesty’s government are of opinion that any extra profit derived from this measure should be carried to the account of the public, but the precise mode of doing so must be left to future arrangement. Her majesty’s government are not insensible to the evil of any departure from the law which has placed the currency of this country upon a sound basis; but they feel confident that, in the present circumstances, the measure which they have proposed may be safely adopted; and that, at the same time, the main provision of that law and the vital principle of preserving the convertibility of the bank-note may be firmly maintained.”

The Bank directors passed resolutions consequent upon this letter, which were of great importance to the trading community. These resolutions were conveyed to the government by a letter from the governor and deputy governor of the Bank:—

_Bank Resolutions_.

“Resolved,—That this Court do accede to the recommendation contained in the letter from the First Lord of the Treasury and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, dated this day, and addressed to the Governor and Deputy Governor of the Bank of England, which has been read;

“That the minimum rate of discount on bills not having more than 95 days to run be 8 per cent;

“That advances be made on Bills of Exchange, Stock, Exchequer Bills, and other approved securities, in sums of not less than £2000, and for periods to be fixed by the Governors, at the rate of 8 per cent, per annum.”

The immediate effects of this measure can be most briefly shown by the following reference made a few days afterwards by an authority in such matters:—“As soon as the correspondence between the Bank of England and the Government was made public, a rise of nearly two and a half per cent, immediately ensued. Consols on Saturday left off at 80 ¾ to ⅞, and on Monday 83 ½ ⅝. Several fluctuations, however, occurred in the course of the day; and a fall of one per cent, on the announcement by the Bank broker of the truth of the correspondence alluded to above, excited much surprise. On Tuesday, the market was very unsettled, operations being nearly confined to Consols. The opening quotation was 83 ⅝, and the highest quotation 84 ⅜, with numerous fluctuations. A tendency to reaction was visible on Wednesday; the first price was 83 ¼ for money, which declined to 82 ⅜, but afterwards rallied to 82 ½¾, at which price they closed. On Thursday, there was scarcely any fluctuation until towards the close of business. The news of a banking failure in the West of England caused a fall of nearly ½ per cent.; and, at closing, 82 ¼ for Money, to 82 ⅜ to ½ for Time, were the current quotations. Exchequer Bills have considerably fluctuated during the week; about 20s. dis. for large bills is the closing quotation. Bank Stock has rather improved, but India Bonds continue very much depressed, quoting about 30s. dis.”

The prevailing feeling among political economists was unfavourable to the measure; and there were many effects attending upon it which vindicated their judgment. In the provinces banks gave way, and mercantile houses of eminence were closed; a general apprehension among the more skilful financiers was entertained that no _ultimate_ benefit, but considerable ultimate injury, would ensue. The judgment of this class of persons may be best combed in the following review of the event:—“On this resolve being generally circulated, nothing could exceed the agitation that prevailed. Everywhere it became the engrossing subject of conversation; and, while many who were favourable to the ‘expansion’ objected to the high rate of interest, others, more experienced, remembering 1825 and 1836, with all the train of evils that resulted upon the withdrawal of the notes then issued, loudly expressed their disapprobation of this invasion of the most valuable clause in the Bank charter bill. Its mere relaxation, it was observed, robs the measure, at once and for ever, of the powerful check to over-trading that a knowledge that, under no circumstances whatever, a relaxation would be resorted to, was calculated to produce. The immediate effect in Liverpool has been to raise the value of cotton one per cent. This is a direct hindrance to manufacturing, and Manchester, Leeds, &c, consequently suffer. It is remarked at Liverpool that eight per cent., although high, is nothing in comparison with being obliged to sell. It follows, therefore, that, when sold, all the charges incident to withholding must be paid by the purchaser, and ultimately by the consumer. From Manchester, advices have been received of the failure of Messrs. Fairbridge and Mr. Robert Gardner (the latter is greatly regretted); from Leeds, of a firm it would be premature to mention. In the meantime, money in London is rather dearer than cheaper. Discount houses, and the joint-stock banks, are taking money repayable at short dates at six percent., five having hitherto been the current rate. Good bills will not be done under eight per cent., and second-rate at scarcely any price. The Directors of the Bank of England at present have not been subject to any great demands since Monday; the difficulty of offering good security being at once an obstacle to firms partially insolvent. At present, it is almost premature to judge, but doubts are entertained whether the benefits resulting, even for the present, from the ‘relaxation,’ will at all balance the baleful effects anticipated.”

The government did not expect that such opinions would be entertained by so large and influential a portion of the public, and were desirous to retrace their steps as soon as they could do so with a good grace, for before a month had passed measures were taken to that effect. The following letter was addressed by the cabinet to the governors of the Bank:—

“Her majesty’s government have watched with the deepest interest the gradual revival of confidence in the commercial classes of the country. They have the satisfaction of believing that the course adopted by the Bank of England on their recommendation, has contributed to produce this result, whilst it has led to no infringement of the law. It appears, from the accounts which you have transmitted to us, that the reserve of the Bank of England has been for some time steadily increasing, and now amounts to £5,000,000. This increase has in great measure arisen from the return of notes and coin from the country. The bullion exceeds £10,000,000, and the state of the exchange promises a further influx of the precious metals. The knowledge of these facts by the public is calculated to inspire still further confidence. In these circumstances it appears to her majesty’s government that the purpose which they had in view in the letter which we addressed to you on the 25th October has been fully answered, and that it is unnecessary to continue that letter any longer in force.”

The harvest of 1847 was such as to restore confidence in some degree, and from that and other causes, especially the cessation of all speculative undertakings, money became easier. The government, however, claimed credit for their plan, which, in the opinion of so many qualified to judge, did more harm in some directions than it did good in others. If the number and magnitude of the different commercial failures were to be taken into account, there appeared as much necessity for the government measure when it was withdrawn, as when, twenty-eight days before, it was introduced. The following were announced to the end of November:—

IN GLASGOW. Liabilities.

Campbell of May......................... £600,000

A. and J. Bournie...................... 200,000

IN LIVERPOOL.

Ashburner ............................ 30,000

Napier of Camlachie..................... 40,000

IN NEWCASTLE.

Carrand Co.............................. 70,000

IN MANCHESTER.

David Ainsworth ..................... 30,000

IN BLACKBURN.

Roget and Co............................. 76,000

IN LONDON.

Freemanand Cook.......................... 350,000

Sargeant, Garden, and Co................. 150,000

Thurbonand Co............................ 120,000

Coates and Co............................ 100,000

Leaf, Barnet, and Co..................... 100,000

Farmer and Ward......................... 55,000

Ryder, Wimbolt, and Co.................. 50,000

Pemberton and Co........................ 30,000

Abbot and Co............................ 30,000

Besides the great number of mercantile firms which failed, several banks were reduced to the same necessity: the West India, the Shrewsbury, Market Drayton, and the Honiton, were among the principal. Many foreign mercantile establishments which had connections with British houses also stopped payment, adding to the distress and alarm.

During the ensuing month large imports of bullion arrived from the continent and America, and the aspect of affairs became more hopeful.

Throughout the year the English populace experienced much distress, and bore it with patience; still there were food riots and disturbances of various sorts, which had to be put down by the strong arm of the law.

Notwithstanding the gloomy condition of all monetary and mercantile transactions, there were men of enterprise, who contemplated future undertakings of great magnitude. Among these projects was one proposing the formation of a ship canal across the Isthmus of Suez, which, however, was not carried into effect. The French government and people were very desirous to have such a work accomplished; but English politicians regarded it with jealousy, especially Lord Palmerston, then the highest authority in England on foreign affairs. By him the measure was regarded as impracticable, at all events, as a pecuniary speculation; and in its political tendency, likely to separate Egypt from Turkey, and to give France, as a great Mediterranean power, an undue preponderance. He also regarded it as endangering, and not remotely, English empire in India. At all events, Mr. Stephenson, the great English engineer, investigated the subject, and surveyed the line through which certain French speculators proposed that the canal should be cut. As the subject is technical, Mr. Stephenson’s views are given in his own words, used ten years afterwards:—

“In 1847, in conjunction with a French and Austrian engineer, he investigated the matter, feeling how important would be the establishment, if possible, of a communication between the Red Sea and Mediterranean. The levels given by a French engineer, who visited Egypt in 1801, during the French invasion, indicated a difference between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean of something like thirty-two feet. It was suggested that if the old canal of Ptolemy were opened again, a current might be established between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean, which would not impede steam navigation, and would at the same time scour the canal and enable a perfect channel to be maintained. However, after investigation, he and the other engineers found that, instead of there being thirty-two feet difference of level between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean, there was no difference at all, though the notion of that difference of level had been entertained for upwards of fifty years. While that notion existed it was believed by professional men that a canal, or a new Bosphorus, as it was called, might be maintained between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean; but the difference of level being found to be _nil_, the engineers with whom he was associated abandoned the project altogether, and he believed justly. Since that time he had walked over the district, at some considerable inconvenience, and investigated the feasibility of opening a canal between the two seas, assuming them to be on a level, and supposing the canal to be supplied with water from the higher level of the Nile, but he had come to the conclusion that the thing was, he would say, absurd, were it not that other engineers, whose opinion he respected, had been to the spot since and declared it to be practicable. He coincided in opinion with the first lord of the Treasury. Money, it was true, would overcome any difficulty, but, commercially speaking, he must frankly declare that he believed this scheme to be unfeasible. Whatever its political import might be, he believed it to be an undesirable scheme, speaking as an engineer. In his opinion, the railway now nearly completed would be more effective, as far as India and postal arrangements were concerned, than this new Bosphorus between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean.”

POLITICAL AGITATION IN ENGLAND.

The commercial distress gave an opportunity for certain political charlatans to stir up the minds of the people. The Chartists, headed by Fergus O’Connor, took advantage of the privations of the populace by appealing to their passions and their sufferings, representing them as the dupes of the upper and middle classes, especially the latter, who were described as enriching themselves at the expense of the poor. The “people’s charter” was declared to be the panacea; all social evils were to vanish before the application of that political remedy. Some of the political demands of the chartists were just; all classes of liberal politicals felt that the people were entitled to a wider distribution of the franchise, but many who thus felt were deterred from the concession by the intemperate language and impracticable schemes of Fergus O’Connor and the lesser leaders of the confederacy. Whatever might be supposed imprudent as a measure of political agitation in a rich country, and where the vast mass of the people had a strong aversion to all constitutional, or as it was the fashion to name them, “organic changes,” by sanguinary or violent means, was resorted to by Mr. O’Connor and his coadjutors. He propounded principles of political economy so absurd, that it was difficult to suppose he could have any faith in his own theories,—holding out the hope of an ultimate division of the land among the people: others propounded the doctrine of a law by which every man should be provided with “a fair day’s wages for a fair day’s work,” and the duty of supplying that “fair day’s work” for him rested, it was alleged, with the government. These men, in fact, did their utmost to bring about a social war, and the doctrines of communism were actively propagated and eagerly received among large numbers of the operatives in the metropolis and the north of England, and among the labourers elsewhere. There was, probably, no important town in England that had not its chartist association, which looked forward to a violent political revolution by which high wages could be procured by little labour. The Chartists, like the Irish repealers, were divided into sections, characterised respectively by their profession of physical force or moral force. The moral force Chartists were like the Old Irelanders, not generally very sincere in their belief of its efficacy. They professed it merely as a cover to conceal what they meditated; they were as much physical-force men as those who were so designated, but did not deem it politic to make the avowal.

After the dissolution of parliament (which will be recorded in its details upon another page), Mr. O’Connor succeeded in gaining his election. This circumstance filled his followers with revived hopes, and the agitation became more enthusiastic and demonstrative. Large public meetings were convened, which were conducted with order, and dispersed peaceably, although the speeches on these occasions were very inflammatory. The government regarded these “monster meetings” with uneasiness, and they were closely watched. The loyalty of the middle and of large sections of the poorer classes, however, gave the government a sense of security, notwithstanding the menacing attitude of the Chartists; and this loyal feeling was extended as the peaceably disposed became alarmed by the seditious and unprincipled harangues which the chartist orators addressed to such large assemblages. Many of the most active Chartists were socialists, and used the confederacy as a means of propagating their atrocious doctrines. As a specimen of the tone and method which characterised the chartist gatherings where order was maintained, the following account of one which took place after the elections will suffice:—“A meeting of Chartists, to the number of nearly ten thousand, took place at Newton Common, on Sunday. The object was to address the operatives in the manufacturing districts of Manchester, Oldham, Rochdale, Bolton, Buy, Preston, Liverpool, Wigan, &c., on the land and labour questions. Shortly after one o’clock, Mr. Fergus O’Connor, M.P., accompanied by Mr. W. H. Roberts, the miners’ attorney-general, appeared in the crowd, on their way to the platform. Both these gentlemen were received amidst the loudest demonstrations of applause. Mr. Roberts having been duly proposed and seconded, assumed the office of chairman. He addressed the meeting at much length, on the progress and prospects of Chartism, and encouraged the vast multitude then before him to take courage from the past, and work with determination and zeal for effecting the great cause of the people’s charter. A resolution, proposing that a committee, or a conference of delegates, should go to London, to escort Mr. O’Connor into Parliament on its opening, was agreed to. Mr. O’Connor then came forward and spoke at great length. He reviewed the great progress of Chartism, abused the Whigs, and browbeat the press. He next narrated the plans he had adopted, and was adopting, for the benefit of all who became Chartists. He anticipated great results from his scheme of labour palaces—denied the propriety of being placed in the election returns as a feather in the quill of Whiggery—was an earnest advocate for the amelioration of Ireland, and still willing and determined to agitate for their cause. He would go to parliament, and record his first motion for ‘The people’s charter, and no surrender.’ The meeting was conducted in a very orderly manner.”

As very considerable numbers of the working classes in Lancashire and Yorkshire had been taught in Sunday-schools, and the Sabbath day was much regarded in that part of the country, the collection of such a vast concourse of persons from great distances, on a day so sacred, created prejudices against the chartist confederacies even in their own strongholds, which, irrespective of every other difficulty, ensured their defeat. The agitation, however, did not come to a head during the year of which we write, and it is unnecessary further to trace its progress in this chapter.

This was not the only agitation which disturbed the equanimity of Great Britain throughout the year. The Protectionists, led by Lord George Bentinck, were active and acrimonious. Agricultural dinners and public meetings gave opportunities for the most violent denunciations against Sir Robert Peel, the government, and free trade. The manufacturers—the creators of wealth, and who sustained so large a portion of the public burdens—were represented as a selfish, callous set of men, eager only to acquire riches, even at the expense of all other classes of the community. They were described as disloyal and revolutionary, and bent upon the destruction of throne and constitution. It would be difficult to determine whether the orations at the protectionist groupings, or those at the chartist gatherings were most characterised by class invidiousness; nor could it be adjudged in which the less sound views of political economy were enunciated. The eloquence greatly preponderated on the side of the Chartists. Cotton was also quite as patriotic as corn. The operatives declared that “the country” was ruined by class legislation, and therefore desired that their own class should thenceforward possess the legislative power. The landowners declared that “the country” although not yet destroyed, was on the brink of destruction, and must speedily perish amidst blood and bankruptcy, unless the landed interest had again the power to make laws of which the Reform Bill had deprived it, and unless agricultural produce was “protected,” by legislatively enhancing its price for the benefit of the producers. “A fair day’s wages for a fair day’s work,” and the state to have the responsibility of securing it to the liking of those who made the demand, was as much the principle of squires as of operative cotton-spinners. Lord George Bentinck was a Fergus O’Connor for “the country party,” and Fergus was the Lord George Bentinck of the labouring town populations.

The public demonstrations of both these parties were often very unfortunate, in consequence of mismanagement by those to whom the getting up of these affairs were committed. These occurrences tended to lower both Chartists and Protectionists in public estimation, as various witty publications lampooned the prominent actors, and exposed them to overwhelming ridicule. The most signal opportunity afforded to the wits in this way was by the Chartists. On the 25th of October they announced a great public dinner to be given in London to eighteen members of parliament, whom they alleged had been returned to the House of Commons by their influence, and to represent their opinions. When the dinner-party assembled, not one of the eighteen honourable gentlemen appeared, nor did it transpire that even one had given any acceptance of the invitation! Fergus O’Connor was an exception from the application of these remarks. He was there as a matter of course, and elaborately puffed his absurd land scheme, by which so many were afterwards ruined.

The anti-slavery party were in many respects active, notwithstanding the home incidents which occupied the public mind. It was necessary to watch the conduct of government in reference to the recent enactment concerning the sugar duties, and also their general policy in regard to the sugar question, and the West India interest. The conduct of the West India party was suspicious, and required the vigilance of the anti-slavery men; and the coalition between that party and Lord George Ben thick added another motive still for watchfulness. Many of the anti-slavery people turned their attention to India, and were supported by gentlemen of influence, military and mercantile, in efforts to rouse public interest in the resources of India, and the adaptation of these resources to English requirements, rendering the importation of commodities produced by slave labour unnecessary. George Thompson, Esq., who had been returned for the Tower Hamlets, one of the largest and most influential constituencies in the kingdom, a man of surpassing eloquence, took a very active part in this movement. A correct insight as to its object and spirit may be imparted to the reader by a resolution passed at a great meeting of the inhabitants of the Tower Hamlets on the 26th of October:—“After an eloquent address, expository of the subject, G.Thompson, Esq., M.P., moved a resolution to the general effect that it had been demonstrated that India had the capacity of producing every tropical raw commodity required by England for the constant and profitable employment of her population. That England, although mistress of India, was rendered year by year more dependent upon the United States for her supply of raw cotton and tobacco; both being the produce of slave labour. That, consequently, the prosperity of this country, and the stability of a large portion of the public revenue, were made dependent upon the vicissitudes of the seasons, upon the maintenance of peace between England and America, and upon the continuance of internal peace among the Slave States. That such dependence, besides perpetuating slavery, was to a great extent, the source of existing calamities, and pregnant with future evils to the interests of England. That the free agricultural population of British India would become the natural customers of this country in the exact measure that they would if permitted to become the producers of commodities for the wants of England, but that they were rendered incapable of competing with the United States, by reason of the burdens imposed upon their soil and industry. Therefore, resolved—That it is the duty of the people of England, for the sake alike of England, of India, and of the enslaved throughout the world, to require of the legislature the immediate removal of all imposts which depress the agricultural energies of the native population; and the institution of a strict and impartial inquiry, in India, into the condition of the natives, and into the conduct and the acts arising out of the peculiar government ruling over them, which affect their well-being, and retard their prosperity. Mr. W. Howitt seconded the resolutions, which were carried unanimously, and the meeting separated.”

THE COURT.

There were few incidents of interest connected with the court during the year. In February Prince Albert was proposed to the University of Cambridge as candidate for the chancellorship. He was opposed by Earl Powis, and with such effect as to prove very mortifying to the court.. Prince Albert was elected by a majority of only one hundred and sixteen votes, and it was obvious that but for the prodigious exertion of government patronage, that result would not have been obtained. His royal highness was installed publicly at Cambridge early in July. Her majesty, having determined to accompany her husband on this occasion, a vast concourse of persons repaired to Cambridge, and the government made every effort to give _éclat_ to the event. The royal party travelled by the Eastern Counties railway, and were received by the mayor and corporation of Cambridge with much pomp. Repairing to the Hall of Trinity, they were received by the dignitaries of the university. There her majesty took her seat on a chair of state on a dais. The new chancellor, accompanied by the Duke of Wellington (Chancellor of Oxford), and other great personages, presented an address to her majesty, congratulating her on her arrival. The prince, having read the address, retired with the usual profound obeisances, which not only amused the spectators, but afforded much diversion to her majesty, whose mode of smiling indicated how much she enjoyed the burlesque of the scene.

The following day, the Installation Ode was performed in the presence of the new chancellor. Her majesty was present as a visitor. The ode was composed by Wordsworth, the poet-laureate, and set to music by Professor Walmisley. Flower-shows, public breakfasts, concerts, levees, grand university dinners, entertained the numerous visitors of rank during the stay of the royal party. Her majesty had seldom before been attended by so august and splendid a retinue, consisting of Prince Waldemar of Prussia, Prince Laurenstein, Prince Peter of Oldenburg, the Prince of Saxe-Weimar, Lieutenant-General Sir Harry Smith (the hero of Aliwal), the Bishop of Oxford, and nearly all the gentry of the eastern counties. Cambridge had probably never witnessed such a festal occasion, and never before did her majesty seem so much to enjoy herself. It was generally observed that her fondness for the prince was carried to excess, and that her enjoyment was mainly derived from the honour done to him. That this amiable character, so much calculated to ensure her own domestic happiness, and to set a good example to her people, belonged to her majesty in a degree seldom evinced by royal personages, many proofs had been given before, and many were given after, the visit to Cambridge. A work entitled “The Journal of Thomas Baikes, Esq.,” professed to make many singular revelations to that effect. Mr. Baikes, the son of a wealthy London merchant, had somehow an early introduction to _haut ton_, and continued, in London and Paris, to live in the society of men of rank and fashion, a species of Beau Brummel. The Duke of Wellington gave to Mr. Baikes the following incident, which took place at the marriage of the Princess Augusta: “When we proceeded to the signatures, the King of Hanover was very anxious to sign before Prince Albert, and when the queen approached the latter, he placed himself by her side, watching the opportunity. She knew very well what he was about; and just as the archbishop was giving her the pen, she suddenly dodged round the table, placed herself next the prince, then quickly took the pen from the archbishop, signed, and gave it to Prince Albert, who also signed next, before it could be prevented. The queen was also very anxious to give the precedence at court to King Leopold before the King of Hanover, and she consulted me about it, and how it should be arranged. I told her majesty that I supposed it should be settled as we did at the Congress of Vienna. ‘How was that,’ said she, ‘by first arrival?’—‘No, ma’am,’ said I, ‘alphabetically, and then, you know B comes before H.’ This pleased her very much, and it was done.”

This was hardly fair to the Duke of Cumberland, and shows her majesty’s strong attachment to the Cobourgs; but his grace of Cumberland and majesty of Hanover never acted as an uncle to the queen, and would have gladly made the Orange party available to mount her throne. The Duke of Wellington knew all this; and as he regarded it to be one of his especial missions to watch over her majesty, he willingly lent himself to those little artifices which tended to place the King of Hanover in an inferior position relative to that of Prince Albert, or of the King of the Belgians.

The only other event connected with the court, except such as will appear in the history of parliamentary transactions, was the visit to Scotland in August. This visit was paid in compliance with the wishes of the prince, who had on a previous occasion greatly enjoyed the opportunities of sporting which Scotland afforded. On the 11th of August, the queen, the prince, the Prince of Wales, the Princess Royal, and suite left Osborne House in the _Victoria and Albert_ yacht, with the _Fairy_ as tender, and escorted by a fleet of war-steamers. Her majesty stayed one night at the Scilly Islands, then passed through the Menai Straits, and steered for the Isle of Man. The fleet sailed close to the island, but her majesty did not land. On Monday, the 16th, the fleet anchored in Loch Ryan: their entrance to the mouth of the Clyde was very picturesque, and was observed by great numbers, in yachts and steamers, who had made excursions for the purpose. On the following day her majesty landed at Dumbarton, and inspected the old castle. The squadron anchored for the night under the castle of Rothsay, from which place the Prince of Wales derives his Scottish ducal title. On the Wednesday they proceeded up Loch Fyne; at Tarbut her majesty gazed with long and deep interest upon the glorious scenery. The royal party landed at Inverary, where the Duke of Argyll and the Campbells paid feudal homage, the clansmen assembling in their national costume.

From Inverary the court proceeded to Staffa, where they examined the cave. The prince also landed at Iona, where so many ancient kings and heroes of Scotland found sepulture. On Friday morning they arrived off Fort William, where, on Saturday morning, her majesty and suite left the squadron and proceeded by land to her Scottish autumn residence. The accounts of this expedition published in the journals of the day greatly interested the British public. A periodical not remarkable for its loyalty thus referred to the voyage:—“Never, certainly, were the habitual life and disposition of a sovereign exhibited to a nation in more favourable guise than those of Queen Victoria during her sea voyages. The history of the cruise to Scotland is like those which have preceded it. It displays the chief traveller in the most engaging light. We see her, the ruler of a maritime people, recurring for her holiday pleasures to the enjoyment of the sea; riding the waves with a fearless familiarity that yet has in it nothing unfeminine. The sovereign is pleased to gratify her people by going among them and reciprocating courtesies. Less reserved than some other predecessors, Queen Victoria, surrounded by her family, still seems attended by a thoroughly English spirit of domesticity; the manner in which the children accompany their parents, share the walks of their father on shore, and enter into the whole spirit of the voyage, is simply a model of the national manners according to their best type. And while her husband and the children are ‘stretching their legs’ on shore, the accomplished lady is seen with her pencil, exercising her talents by sketching the scenery around.”

Her majesty’s progress after the landing was such as to give her the happiest assurances of the loyalty and love of the Scottish people. The following description of the latter part of her journey is picturesque:—“The road to Ardverikie passes round the north end of Loch Laggan, crossing the Padtock Water by an ingenious boat bridge. At this point Macpherson, of Cluny Macpherson, with about thirty of his tenantry in the costume of his clan; Duncan Davidson, of Tulloch, and a few of his followers; Sir John Mackenzie, of Selvin, and others, were assembled, the Highlandmen armed with broadsword and target. About eighty, thus armed, lined one side of the road, and the same number, unarmed, lined the other; while about five hundred persons of both sexes, in holiday costume, posted themselves on the face of the hill. The Marquis of Abercorn, in full Highland costume, and wearing the order of the garter, with the Duchess of Bedford, was also present. Shortly after eleven o’clock a signal was made from Ben Nead that the royal party were approaching, and’ presently the royal carriages were seen rounding a hill half a mile distant. Cluny then put himself at the head of the Highlandmen, and behind him stood the standard-bearer, with the venerable green silk flag of the Macphersons, which was ‘out’ in the rebellions of 1715 and 1745. Cluny himself wore the shield which Prince Charles Stewart carried at Culloden. The royal carriage drew up opposite the bridge, the path to which, as well as the bridge, was carpeted. Having greeted the marquis and Cluny, her majesty shook hands with the Duchess of Bedford, and, with the prince, repeatedly acknowledged the cheering of the people. Prince Leinengen was also in the royal carriage, and shared the attentions of the people. Next to her majesty and her royal consort, the Prince of Wales was the object of interest, as, led by his royal father, and wrapped in a tartan cloak, he walked down to the bridge. The royal party then entered a carriage in waiting on the south shore, and drove slowly off to the lodge. The Duchess of Norfolk and Lady Jocelyn followed; and in a third carriage came the Duke of Norfolk, Earl Grey. General Wemyss, and Sir J. Clark, who were received with demonstrations of respect. The last carriage having passed, an anker of whiskey was brought forth, with cakes and cheese, to feast both great and small. Cluny then proposed ‘Health and happiness to her majesty,’ which was drank with nine cheers enthusiastically given; and the crowd, after discussing some forty gallons of whiskey, dispersed.

“Her majesty was not accompanied by military, and in the evening all the county police were dismissed, the force of seven London police being considered more than sufficient for the protection of her majesty and the royal party.”

Ardverikie, where her majesty sojourned during her visit to the north, was formerly a hunting park of Fergus, King of Scotland. In front is Loch Laggan, which is very extensive, being about eight miles in length, although not so picturesque as most of the Highland lochs.

On the 17th of September, her majesty left her Highland residence, and sailed from Fort William to the Isle of Man, where the prince landed. Thence the royal party steered to Fleetwood, in Morecomb Bay, Lancashire, whence they proceeded by rail to London.

The conjugal and parental love shown by her majesty, and, indeed, her affectionate interest in all her royal relatives, endeared her to her people, the more so because it was the general impression that the house of Brunswick was deficient in these virtues. In proof of that absence of family kindness which has in most instances characterised her majesty’s royal predecessors, the following was extensively circulated in the periodicals of the day, which, at the same time, held up the queen’s loving spirit to public admiration:—“Ever since the accession of the house of Guelph royalty has freed itself from one of the most universal and honourable, though somewhat expensive duties of kindred, and this, too, without observation, much less censure. The poorest of mankind mark the grave of parents, wife, and children by some humble memorial; the richer place tablets or raise tombs to their relatives. So gratifying to the heart is this duty, that rarely, if ever, is it omitted from any other cause than poverty. A foreigner visits the royal depository in St. George’s Chapel, and asks where are the royal monuments? But no son, daughter, brother, nephew, or niece of the present dynasty has erected a funeral monument of any kind to the kindred dead. Even if affection did not produce such a testimonial, it might have been expected from regard to ancient custom, and from desire to conform to the habits of civilised life. The only monuments to our kings and their descendants, with the exception of the statue to George III. in Windsor Park, by George IV., and of the beautiful mausoleum which the King of Hanover is building in memory of his consort, have been erected by the public; and in the instance only of the Princess Charlotte’s monument, which was raised by subscription, has one been placed in church or chapel. There is absolutely nothing—not even an engraved slab—to tell where the ashes of George I., II., III., and IV., and William IV., or of any one of all their numerous progeny, repose. No doubt the world knows; and the omission is only remarkable or important from its being at variance with the custom of the country, from the injury which it has caused to art, and from the idea which it creates of heartlessness in the survivors; not one of whom has expended a shilling on what would appear to be the most natural of social duties.”

HOME NAVAL AND MILITARY AFFAIRS.

The naval and military incidents of the year at home, which were of a nature to record in history, were not numerous. The most important of them was the organization of a coast defence, which was thus described in a paper of the day, having a character for accurate naval and military intelligence:—“The organization of the coast-guard for the national defence, is the plan of the Earl of Auckland, first lord of the Admiralty, under the approbation of the commissioners of customs. The carrying out of the system is vested entirely in the hands of Captain Houston Stewart, C.B., the controller-general of the coast-guard, in whose hands a sum of money has been placed for the purpose. It will be recollected that this gallant officer commanded the _Benbow_, 72, at the siege of Acre. Commander Jerningham is an additional commander appointed to the _Excellent_ gunnery-ship, and has been selected for the purpose of carrying into operation the plans and arrangements of Captain Stewart, and to superintend the system of instruction of the men at great gun exercise, which is precisely the same as that laid down in the ‘Rules for exercise and service of great guns in her majesty’s ships.’ Wherever guns have been placed for the instruction of the coast-guard, warranted gunners from the _Excellent_ have been appointed to instruct the men, under the superintendence of Commander Jerningham, who was gunnery-lieutenant of the _Wellesley_, in China. They receive four shillings a day, in addition to their present pay, and the men who are brought to the guns for instruction receive one shilling a day for six days, during which time they are excused from all other duty. It is proposed to instruct the coast-guard by means of ship platform batteries of one gun each, constructed exactly similar to the ports of a man-of-war, placed in a position in each district convenient for the drill of fifty men, and in a situation in which it may be rendered available for defence, as well as affording a range to sea for practice.”

In after years this institution proved of great value. Lord Auckland’s administration of the Admiralty will, on this account, be memorable, although certainly on no other.

The return of Sir Harry Smith from India was hailed by the public, who sought every opportunity of demonstrating their respect for a hero who had so nobly sustained the military reputation of England. Theregiment of lancers, upon which so much depended in Sir Harry’s separate command connected with the events of Loodiana and Aliwal, had also returned to England. The following exciting and singular scene occurred in the autumn at Brighton. The address delivered by the general was remarkable for the interesting incidents which it brought out, and its reference to the opinion of the Duke of Wellington:—“On Friday afternoon, Sir Harry Smith paid a visit of inspection to the 16th Lancers at Brighton. The gallant general arrived by railway at two o’clock, and was met at the terminus by Colonel M’Dowall who went out with the regiment in 1822 as a lieutenant. He accompanied the general to the cavalry barracks, situate a mile north-west of Brighton. Shortly after his arrival at the barracks, Sir Harry and Colonel M’Dowall, went into the barrack yard, where the regiment was drawn up for an undress parade. As soon as the general made his appearance the band struck up, ‘See, the conquering hero comes.’ The regiment was drawn up in squadrons by Lieutenant-colonel Smithe, who so gallantly led it into the field at Aliwal. Sir Harry inspected the troops, occasionally stooping as he proceeded down the line, addressing some of the veterans, who bore upon their breasts medals and stars, presented to them for their victories in India. Sir Harry inspected them on foot; but afterwards mounted a horse, and put the regiment through a variety of evolutions, which were performed to his great satisfaction. This done, the regiment was drawn up in close column. Sir Harry rode up to the front, and addressed the troops as follows:—‘Soldiers of the 16th Lancers, I hope you are now as happy as you made your enemies unhappy. You served in India with the highest honour. Whenever you were called on, you were ready to obey your officers, either in the field or in quarters. If I have not this day addressed each separate individual whom I know, it is not because I do not feel towards you all as I know you all feel towards me, but because I do not keep you and your officers on the ground. I have served many years, and commanded many soldiers; but never did I know a regiment of dragoons or of infantry superior, either in the field or in quarters, to my gallant comrades of the 16th Lancers. I think I now see you on the morning of Aliwal, marching in that order which would have done honour to a barrack parade—your hearts in the right place, your hands on your lances, and doing what I believe was never before done—charging twice through a dense mass of infantry. On the following morning I saw half of you, I believe, with your heads bound up, looking in the field of battle for your dead and wounded comrades. I saw you also, when the enemy had taken your baggage, with a cheerful heart and ready hand, willing to redeem what was considered to be a reverse, when I asked you to do it, and to make the enemy and the world know that you were equal to all trials. The Duke of Wellington has often talked to me about this regiment of dragoons, who have frequently distinguished themselves under his command, and also of the memorable morning of Aliwal. Soldiers of the 16th, I have on this occasion more particularly addressed you. I beg to address Colonel M’Dowall and the officers of the 16th Lancers: That you are gentlemen we all know, and none know it more than the privates of the regiment, and that they have a commander and officers who will ask nothing of them which they will not obey. I regard the 16th Lancers as the nucleus of another corps, which in future times will achieve another Aliwal. I tell you again, what I told you at Lahore, where Runjeet Singh asked if you were all gentlemen, and if her majesty had many such regiments of gentlemen; on that morning I told you I loved you. I repeat it, and the love of a comrade is known to none but to soldiers. My dear fellows, I rejoice to be amongst you again.’ Sir Harry then said (turning to Colonel M’Dowall)—’ Pray do not let them be kept any longer.’ The troops then gave a loud huzza, and marched off the ground with the band playing.”

On the 1st of June a general order was issued from the Horse-guards, to the following effect:—“Her majesty having been graciously pleased to command that a medal should be struck to record the services of her fleets and armies during the wars, commencing 1793, and ending in 1814, and that one should be conferred on every officer, non-commissioned officer, and soldier of the army who was present in any battle or siege, to commemorate which medals had been struck by command of her majesty’s royal predecessors, and had been distributed to the general or superior officers of the several armies and corps of troops engaged, in conformity with the regulations of the service at that time in force,—general and other officers, non-commissioned officers, and soldiers, who consider that they have claims to receive this mark of their sovereign’s respect, are each to apply to the secretary of the board of general officers, Whitehall, London, and to send in writing a statement of their claim, for what action, at what period of time, and the names of the persons, and the titles of the documents by which their claim can be proved.”

The occasions for which medals were granted, in pursuance of the general order of which the above is an extract, were:—

Maida, 4th July, 1806.

Bolein, 17th August, 1808.

Vimeira, 21st August, 1808.

Sahagun Benevento, December and January, 1809.

Corunna, 16th January, 1809.

Martinique, February, 1809.

Talaveia, 27th and 28th July, 1809.

Guadaloupe, January and February, 1810.

Busaco, 27th September, 1810.

Barrosa, 5th March, 1811.

Fuentes d’Onor, 5th May, 1811.

Albuera, 10th May, 1811.

Java, August and September, 1811.

Ciuclad Rodrigo, January, 1812.

Badajoz, 17th March and 10th April, 1812.

Salamanca, 22nd July, 1812.

Fort Detroit, America, August, 1812.

Vittoria, 21st June, 1813.

Chateauguay, America, 26th October, 1813.

Nivelle, 10th November, 1813.

Chrystler’s Farm, America, 11th November, 1813.

Nive, 9th to 13th December, 1813.

Orthes, 27th February, 1814.

Toulouse, 10th April, 1814.

The Admiralty issued an order similar to that of the Horse-guards. Gold medals to flag officers and captains were issued by the Admiralty for the actions undermentioned:—

Lord Howe’s victory over the French fleet, 1st June, 1794.

Lord St. Vincent’s victory over the Spanish fleet, 14th February, 1797.

Lord Duncan’s victory over the Dutch fleet, 11th October, 1797.

Captain Sir Edward Hamilton. Surprise and recapture of the _Hermione_, 15th October, 1799.

Lord Nelson. Battle of Trafalgar, 21st October, 1805.

Sir R. Strachan. French squadron taken, 4th November, 1805.

Sir J. Duckworth. Action off St. Domingo, 6th February, 1806.

Captain Bresbane, of the _Arethusa_, and three other ships, take Curaçoa.

Captain M. Seymour, of the _Thetis_, captured the _Amethyst_, 10th November, 1808.

Captain Stewart, of the _Seahorse_, captured Turkish frigate, _Badere Zaffer_, 6th July, 1809.

Captain Mounsey, of the _Bonne Citoyenne_, captured the _Furieuse_, 6th July, 1809.

Captain C. Cole, of the _Caroline_, captured the _Banda Neira_, 9th August, 1810.

Captain W. Hoste, with the _Antphion_ and three other ships, action off Lissa, 13th March, 1811.

Captain Talbot, _Victorious_, captured Rivoli, 22nd February, 1812.

Captain Broke, of the _Shannon_, captured the _Chesapeake_, 1st June, 1813.

Captain E. Palmer, of the _Helvis_, captured _L’Etoile_, 27th March, 1814.

Captain E. Hope, of the _Endymion_, defeated the _President_, 25th January, 1815.

The issue of these orders, and the grant of the medals, gave general satisfaction; but severe animadversions were offered in the London press against the want of public spirit, on the part of successive governments, in allowing such actions so long to remain without the honour thus tardily accorded. Many of the heroes who contributed to this glorious list of victories by sea and land, had passed away, their breasts unhonoured by the badge which they would have prized so much. It was no new thing for England’s braves to be neglected by their country, or rather, by those to whom the government of the country was so often unworthily committed.

GENERAL HOME INCIDENTS.

The year was remarkable for many railway accidents, resulting from the carelessness and mismanagement of the various companies, exciting public indignation, and causing uneasiness generally, in respect to personal safety in railway travelling. In the first six months of the year, according to parliamentary returns, one hundred persons were killed, and an equal number more or less injured.

In September an interesting event occurred in connection with the memory of the great national poet. In pursuance of the will of the deceased owner, the house at Stratford-upon-Avon, popularly known as the birthplace of Shakspere, was sold by public auction. When the writer of these lines visited the place, the house had nothing very remarkable in its appearance. It was old, of course, but did not look so venerable as might be expected. It was situated in the High Street of the obscure little town. It had been originally a mansion, but, at the date of its sale, part had been removed and the rest was let in small tenements. It was “knocked down,” in auctioneers’ phraseology, for the price of £3000, the purchasers being a committee appointed by an association formed for the purpose of obtaining possession of the building. The house was given to the government in trust to be preserved as a public memorial of the great man who first saw the light beneath its roof. This proceeding was very creditable to the national feeling, for though no certain proof exists that Shakspere was born there, still, as it was in possession of his father before, at, and after the birth of the great dramatist, there is probable ground for believing that it was his birthplace. It had been purchased from the descendants of the original possessor for £250, by the gentleman under whose will it was put up to auction.

During the autumn and winter, numerous disasters occurred at sea, especially on the east coasts of England and Scotland. By these wrecks many lives and much property were lost.

Few events in England excited such general interest among all classes as the arrival of Jenny Lind, the celebrated vocalist and actress. She made her first appearance at the Italian Opera House on the 4th of May, and was received with an enthusiasm never before lavished on any performer: during her stay in England this enthusiasm never abated.

Under the head of “General Home Incidents,” seems hardly the most suitable place to record the proceedings of the Hudson’s Bay Arctic Expedition. Yet, as it did not belong to the foreign or colonial affairs of the country, and as the expedition had been determined upon and ordered at home, this may be the most appropriate place in which to introduce it. From the nature of the transactions, it is necessary to give the relation in the words of the authorised report:—

“In July, 1846, the Company dispatched an expedition of thirteen persons, under the command of Doctor John Rae, from Fort Churchill, in Hudson’s Bay, for the purpose of surveying the unexplored portion of the Arctic coast, at the north-eastern point of the American continent. The expedition, which has just returned, has traced the coast all along from the Lord Mayor’s Bay, of Sir John Ross, to within a few miles of the Straits of the Fury and Hecla, proving thereby the correctness of Sir John Ross’s statement that Boothia Felix is a peninsula. From Doctor Rae’s Report to the Company the following interesting details are gathered:—Having divided his men into watches, the doctor started from Churchill on the 5th of July, 1846, and reached the most southerly opening of Wager River on the 22nd, where they were detained all day by immense quantities of heavy ice driving in with the flood and out again with the ebb tide, which ran at the rate of seven or eight miles an hour, forcing up the ice and grinding it against the rocks, causing a noise resembling thunder. On the 24th the party succeeded in making Repulse Bay, and cast anchor within eight miles of the head of the bay under shelter of a small island. Here Doctor Rae found some Esquimaux Indians, with whom he quickly established friendly relations, and from a chart drawn by one of the party he inferred that the Arctic Sea (named Akhoolee) to the west of Melville Peninsula was not more than forty miles distant, in a N.N.W. direction, and that about thirty-five miles of the distance was occupied by deep lakes; so that they would have only five miles of land to drag their boat over—a mode of proceeding he had decided upon even had the distance been much greater, in preference to going round by the Fury and Hecla Strait. Here he established a wintering party, and having unloaded the boats, and placed one of them, with the greater part of her cargo, in security, the other was hauled three miles up a rapid and narrow river which flowed from one of the lakes they were to pass through. This work occupied them the whole of the 26th, as the current was very strong, and the channel so full of large boulder stones, that the men were frequently up to the waist in ice-cold water whilst lifting or launching the boat over these impediments. Their landing-place was found to be in latitude 66° 32′ 1″ north. The rate of the chronometer had become so irregular that it could not be depended upon for finding the longitude, and during the winter it stopped altogether.

“Proceeding according to the course he had adopted, the party and their adventurous leader on the 3rd of August, at 11 o’clock a.m., rounded a high bluff cape, which they called after the lady of Sir John Henry Pelly, Bart., Governor of the Hudson’s Bay Company. It is situated in latitude 67° 28′ 00″ north; longitude, by account, 87° 40′ west.

“Having succeeded, after surmounting many difficulties, in reaching Melville Peninsula, he was ultimately obliged to retreat from the numerous obstacles that rendered his progress impossible; he therefore paid a short visit to the wintering party at Repulse Bay, to ascertain how they were getting on. Ultimately he found himself obliged to give up all hope of prosecuting the survey on that occasion. His reasons we give in his own words:—’ My reasons for arriving at this conclusion I shall here briefly mention, as such a step may seem somewhat premature. I saw, from the state of the ice, and the prevalence of northerly winds, that there was no likelihood of our completing the whole of the proposed survey this season; and although part of the coast, either towards the Strait of the Fury and Hecla or towards Dease and Simpson’s furthest, might be traced, yet to accomplish even this might detain us so long, that there would be no time to make the necessary preparations for wintering, and we should thus be under the necessity of returning to Churchill without accomplishing the object of the expedition; or, if we remained at Repulse Bay, run the risk of starving, for I could obtain no promise of supplies from the natives, and all the provisions that we carried with us amounted to not more than four months’ expenditure, which was all that our boats could carry. We should have thus to depend almost altogether on our own exertions for the means of existence, both in regard to food and fuel.’

“The party, therefore, commenced preparations for passing the winter, and on the 2nd of September their house was furnished. Its internal dimensions were 20 feet long by 14 feet broad; height in front, 7 ½ feet, sloping to 5 ½ at the back. The roof was formed of oil-cloths and morse skin coverings, the masts and oars of our boats serving as rafters. The door was made of parchment deer skins stretched over a frame of wood. It was named Fort Hope, and was situated in latitude 66° 32′ 16″ north, longitude (by a number of sets of lunar distances) 86° 55′ 51″ west. The variation of the compass on the 30th August, 1846, was 62° 50′ 30″ west; dip of the needle, 88° 14′; and the mean time of 100 vertical vibrations in the line of declination 226.

“On the 5th of April in the present year, Doctor Rae commenced his spring journeys in company with three men, the Esquimaux, Ibit-Chuck, and Oulibuck’s son, as interpreter; and, on the 15th, which was very stormy, with a temperature of 20° below zero, they arrived at the steep mud banks of a bay, called by their guide Ak-ku-li-guwiak. Its surface was marked with a number of high rocky islands, towards the highest of which (six or seven miles distant) they directed their course, and were, before sunset, comfortably housed under a snow roof. Early in the morning of the 17th, he set out in company with two of the men, for the purpose of following the coast to some point surveyed by Sir John Ross, as he felt confident that the veteran discoverer was correct in his opinion as to Boothia Felix being part of the American continent. They directed their course to the furthest visible land, which bore N.W. (true). Cape Berens (the point alluded to) is equated in latitude 69° 4′ 12″ north, and longitude 90° 35′ west. It is formed entirely of granite partially covered with moss. Thirteen miles beyond this they arrived at two narrow points in the small bay, between which they built their snow hut.

“As they were now near the latitude and longitude of Lord Mayor’s Bay of Sir John Ross, he struck across land nearly in a north direction, and at noon, when passing over a considerable lake, the latitude of 69° 26′ 1″ north was observed. Advancing three miles beyond this, he reached another lake. A walk of twenty minutes brought him to an inlet not more than a quarter of a mile wide. This he traced to the westward for three miles, when his course was again obstructed by land. Ascending some high rocks, from which a good view could be obtained, he thought he could distinguish rough ice in the desired direction. With renewed hopes, he set out at a rapid pace, plunging among deep snow, scrambling over rocks and through rough ice, until he gained some rising ground close to the beach. From the spot where he now stood, as far as the eye could see to the north-west, lay a large extent of ice-covered sea, studded with innumerable islands. Lord Mayor’s Bay was before him, and the islands were those named by Sir John Ross ‘The Sons of the Clergy of the Church of Scotland.’

“The isthmus which connects the land to the northward with Boothia Felix is only one mile broad, and, judging by the number of stone marks set up on it, it appeared to him to be a favourite resort of the natives. Its latitude is 69° 31′ north; longitude, by account, 91° 29′ 30″ west.

“After taking possession of his discoveries with the usual formalities, the Doctor returned to his quarters on the island above-mentioned, where, as they were all more or less affected with snow-blindness, and the dogs were still weak, they remained on the island, which he found to be situated in latitude 68° 53′ 44″ north; longitude, by account, 89° 56′ 00″ west. It is formed almost entirely of granite, and is upwards of seven hundred and thirty feet above the level of the sea. From the highest point of it, he obtained a fine view of the bay, and was thus saved the trouble of tracing its shores. It extends sixteen or eighteen miles to the southward, and contains a number of rocky islands, the highest of them being that on which they encamped. The bay was named Pelly Bay, after the governor of the company; and the group of islands, Harrison Islands.

“The party, on their return, traced the shores of the tracts across which they had made overland journeys when coming out. The country was low, flat, and very regular in outline. They arrived at Repulse Bay on the 5th of May, all safe and well, but as black as negroes, from the combined effects of frost-bites and oil-smoke. The Doctor subsequently traced the west shore of Melville Bay, and for that purpose started on the evening of the 13th of May.

“The nature of the service, and the hardships to be endured on such expeditions, may be understood from the few short extracts from the report in reference to this last exploring visit:—‘Our snow-house, on the 25th, was built in lat. 68° 48′ N., long. 85° 4′ W., near a small stream, frozen (like all others that we had passed) to the bottom. We had not yet obtained a drop of water of nature’s thawing, and fuel being rather a scarce article, we sometimes took small kettles of snow under the blanket with us, to thaw it with the heat of our bodies. Leaving two men to endeavour to fish and shoot, I went forward with the others, and crossed Garry Bay, passing inside a number of islets.’

“The party returned to their snow hut on the 25th, where, says the report—’ The men we had left here were well, but very thin, as they had neither caught nor shot anything eatable, except two marmots. Had we been absent twelve hours more, they were to have cooked a piece of parchment skin for supper.’ The whole party returned safe and well to York Factory on the 6th of September last.”

During the year 1847, several eminent men were called away from the sphere of their earthly honour and usefulness. Among these was Mr. Gurney, of Norwich, a man who attracted a considerable share of public attention by his talents, energies, and benevolence. As a member of the Society of Friends, he became very influential in that body, and was recognised as one of the most enlightened of their ministers. He took part with his sister, the celebrated Mrs. Fry, in prison visitations. His interviews with M. Guizot concerning negro slavery were very influential with that statesman. Mr. Gurney was an author, especially on Biblical and polemical topics. He also wrote on scientific subjects, but chiefly in their relation to theology. As a writer he was more scholarly than elegant, more learned than profound, more discursive than logical. He lived and died an eminently good man.

On the 13th of February, in the 66th year of his age, Sharon Turner, the historian of the Anglo-Saxons, departed this life. He was a distinguished archaeologist and historian.

On the 22nd April, Thomas B. Martin, Esq., M.P. for Galway, died. He was the largest landed proprietor in Ireland, and a very noted man in the political and social affairs of that country.

The 27th of April witnessed the death of a very remarkable man, Lord Cowley, in the 75th year of his age. He was the youngest son of the first Earl of Mornington, and consequently youngest brother of the Duke of Wellington. Mr. Henry Wellesley began professional life as aprecis writer in the Foreign Office. After serving for two years there, he accompanied the embassy of Lord Malmesbury to Lisle. In 1797 he accompanied his brother, the Marquis Wellesley to India, as private secretary. He was, after twelve months’ service in that capacity, appointed one of the commissioners to Mysore. In that office he showed not only talent but genius. Subsequently he was sent to Oude, on an especial mission, and conducted his diplomacy with so much tact, that he obtained the cession of territory which brought the company a revenue of nearly a million sterling. He was subsequently appointed to the government of the country thus ceded. On his return from India he entered parliament, where his mode of speaking very much resembled that of his brother Arthurshort, pointed, and to the purpose. He resumed his diplomatic engagements, and was appointed envoy to Spain. He resigned his position in the treasury, under the government of the Duke of Portland, for this office, in 1809, and continued in it until 1811, when he was directed to continue his services at that court, with the title of ambassador. In 1812 he was made a Knight of the Bath. He continued in Spain until 1822. He was then sent to Vienna, and ultimately to the court of the Tuileries, as the representative of his country. He was made a peer, and various other public honours were conferred upon him. Upon the breaking up of Sir Robert Peel’s administration, he gave place to the Marquis of Normanby, but took up his residence at Paris, and remained there until the time of his decease. He was twice married; in the first instance to Lady Charlotte Cadogan, which marriage was dissolved. His second wife was Lady Georgiana Cecil, daughter of the Marquis of Salisbury. The talent which characterised the whole of the Wellesley family was very extraordinary; every member of it distinguished himself in some way in the service of his country, and obtained honour, won by his own assiduity and genius.

Sir Robert Stopford, admiral of the red, vice-admiral of the United Kingdom, and governor of Greenwich Hospital, died on June 25, in the 88th year of his age. This distinguished sailor had entered the navy in very early youth, and was in most of the great actions that were fought during his eventful life. He was much beloved by the navy. His life was remarkably free from disputes with public men, especially in his own profession. There was one notable instance, however, to the contrary. Sir Charles Napier, who served under him off the coast of Syria, disobeyed orders, and added to the disobedience fierce attacks upon the gallant old admiral, who came out of the discussion with honour, while his disputatious antagonist suffered much in public opinion by the attacks which he made upon his superior officer.

On the 28th of July, the death of John Walter, of Bearwood, Berkshire, caused a great sensation. To that gentleman the _Times_ newspaper owes its progressive power. His inventive genius, his business habits, dispatch, punctuality, and enterprise, raised the paper to the pitch of popularity it afterwards attained, and which it has ever since preserved.

On the same day another eminent man passed away, Sir George Martin, G.C.B., admiral of the fleet, and vice-admiral of the United Kingdom. His services were innumerable. Through a long life he endured the perils and shared the glory of naval war, and died regretted by his country.

On the 7th of December, Mr. B. Liston, the celebrated surgeon, died; and during the same month many professional men, and many men of letters.

The space allotted to this history would not allow of even a brief notice of all the eminent persons who passed from life during this year in the British Isles, and subjects of Great Britain in other countries. Many distinguished men were lost to the navy and army, whose valour and renown were precious in the esteem of the nation; but so numerous are the heroes of Great Britain, in all ages, that the names of deceased warriors are only noticed with ordinary respect and regret, whose death would, in any other nation, be an event to attract the sustained attention of the people. The year made sad havoc especially in the navy list, from which the names of many of the best and bravest were removed.

PARLIAMENTARY HISTORY OF THE YEAR.

The distressed condition of the poor of the British Isles, the disarrangement of commercial affairs, the famine in Ireland, and the crime prevailing in that country, rendered it necessary to open the session of 1847 earlier than usual. Accordingly, on the 19th of January her majesty, in person, read the speech from the throne. It referred to all these subjects in a manner appropriate to the occasion. The marriage of the Infanta of Spain to the Duke of Montpensier, was simply noticed as having given rise to a correspondence between her majesty’s government and that of France. When her majesty came to the passage referring to the Montpensier marriage, the house was intensely still, and every eye watched the royal countenance to see if any indication of her private feelings would be given. This portion of the royal speech was read with a peculiar expression of displeasure by her majesty, never before witnessed in her countenance on a public occasion. In private, the royal lady did not hesitate to denounce the conduct of Louis Philippe as utterly faithless, and she was accustomed to refer to him as incapable of acting with the honour of a private gentleman, for he had given his hand to her while making a solemn promise that this marriage should not take place. This state of feeling on the part of her majesty was well known to the King of the French, who, while he regretted it, took credit to himself for having frustrated her majesty’s own intention to have the infanta married to a Cobourg. Her reference to the extinction of the free city and state of Cracow was made in terms of great severity, as a manifest violation of the treaty of Vienna, and her intention of laying before the house copies of her protests to the three states was expressed. Allusion was made to the action of the combined squadrons of France and England in the River Plate. Her majesty read the passages which described the condition of Ireland with a subdued tone, as if mingled shame and sympathy struggled within her breast.

The debates which ensued upon the address were neither remarkable for judgment nor eloquence. Lord Stanley, in the lords, was, as usual, apt, ready, and ingenious, but dealt in platitudes unworthy of his reputation. Lord Brougham was bitter against his former friends, allowing his personal spleen to interfere with his patriotism and the public welfare. He did not succeed either in embarrassing the ministry or enlightening the lords. The debates in the commons were regarded with more interest by the country than those in the lords. Mr. Disraeli’s sarcasm that the house of lords had become “the high court of registry,” had truth in it. The address gave rise to much animated discussion, envenomed by party spirit. Smith O’Brien laid the grievances of Ireland before the house in terms more patriotic and honest than wise. Lord George Bentinck taunted the government with the failure of their remedial measures for Ireland, political and material, and his taunts were keenly felt. The cabinet was not equal to the crisis.

On the 21st of January Lord John Russell moved that the house should go into committee on the corn importation acts; and he announced his intention to follow that up by a motion on the navigation laws, by which they should be suspended until the 6th of November. He accordingly first proposed the suspension of the duties on the importation of foreign corn until September. Bills were brought in, and passed both houses with the utmost rapidity, the standing orders being waived. On the 25th they received the royal assent. On that day ministers communicated their plans for the melioration of Irish suffering. So overwhelming was the wretchedness of Ireland, that the amount of relief for January was calculated by Lord John Russell at three-quarters of a million sterling. Colonel Jones, who was at the head of the board of works in Ireland, with very little advantage to his country, and no moral advantage to himself, had, in a letter dated the 19th, stated the difficulties which were admitted to stand in the way of employing labourers. The people were so reduced by famine that task-work could not be imposed upon them, and Colonel Jones was therefore of opinion that to give food was, on the whole, cheaper than to employ such labour. Lord John Russell made very effective use of this letter in support of the views which he presented to the house. He stated that the money advanced for public works should not be exacted in full, but half remitted upon the payment of each instalment. The next proposal of the premier was for a grant of £50,000 in advance, to enable proprietors to procure seed for the land. His lordship animadverted in very indignant terms upon the conduct of men of mark in Ireland, who, instead of paying their rates for the relief of the poor, invited them to make demands with which no government could comply. He instanced the union of Castlebar, in the county of Mayo, where there was room in the workhouse for six hundred persons, and only one hundred and twenty were admitted, while the Marquis of Sligo and Mr. Moore addressed a letter to the people of the district, calling upon them to meet at Castlebar and “demand their rights.” Lord John dwelt eloquently upon the want of self-reliance and co-operation displayed in Ireland, and affirmed the utter impossibility of government or any human power interposing so as to prevent the continuance of many of the painful consequences of harvest failure already experienced. His lordship’s counsels and cautions were badly received, both by the Irish members and by the people of Ireland, and notwithstanding his liberal measures of relief, his speech added to his unpopularity in that country. The Irish were very unwilling to adopt the philosophy of Mr. Disraeli, “Whether, under any circumstances, it should be the office of a government to supply the people with food is a very interesting question. When famine prevails there will always be a numerous party who will maintain the affirmative. Death and decimation are stern facts which seem to bring conviction. Yet it is the duty of a minister to consider whether, if the government were to interfere, the death might not be increased, and the rate of mortality aggravated.”

Another measure for the relief of Ireland was proposed by ministers to enable government to make advances from the treasury on the security of the rates, and excited a debate, when its committal was moved on the 8th of February. This debate was remarkable as giving an opportunity to the great agitator for his last parliamentary effort. He declared that two millions of the Irish population must perish if the parliament did not come forward with adequate relief; while he proclaimed their measures totally inadequate, and showing either ignorance of the state of the country, or want of sympathy for its sufferings. He affirmed that in the ruin which had fallen on the land, any attempt to levy rates would be abortive, and drive the people to desperation. The honourable and venerable member depicted the condition of the people with truthful eloquence, and he was no less correct in showing the shortcomings of the government schemes of relief. His speech was delivered in a faint voice, and with every symptom of physical exhaustion. He was heard with the most profound attention and respect. His predictions, unfortunately, came to pass. His dissolution was hastened by his inability to procure an assent to his views in the house, and by the consequences which he so clearly foresaw.

Lord John’s measures for the relief of Ireland having been carried, he on the 1st of March proposed a permanent measure to compel the land to support the pauper poor. On the 12th of March his lordship made an elaborate defence of his scheme, which was warmly debated, Mr. Roebuck acrimoniously attacking Irish landlords, and Mr. Smith O’Brien insisting that the blame of the condition of Ireland rested upon the government. Government, however, was not left alone to initiate measures of Irish relief. Lord George Bentinck, on the 4th of February, brought forward a motion for the reproductive employment of Irish labour by the construction of railways in Ireland. This motion his lordship advocated eloquently, and it has been agreed that his oration was the best he ever delivered. His plan was in all respects sound considered in reference to the principles of political economy, and more useful, practically, than any which the government had devised; yet the ministerial side of the house treated it with ridicule. An advance of sixteen millions sterling to promote railways in Ireland they scouted as preposterous; but no effective answer was given to the facts and figures of Lord George, who was singularly careful on this occasion in his preparation of both. The bill was brought in without any opposition from the government, but it was foreseen that the influence of the cabinet would be used for its defeat. Accordingly, on the 12th of February, on the proposal of the second reading, government opposition was offered: the debate, after an adjournment, was resumed on the 15th, and continued through that day and the next, when the bill was thrown out by an overwhelming majority.

On the 22nd of February the chancellor of the exchequer made his financial statement, and made a demand for an eight millions loan on behalf of Ireland, noticed elsewhere. He gave an appalling picture of the state of the English poor, showing that, in Manchester alone, nearly thirty thousand workmen and labourers were out of employment, while the prospect of the augmentation of the unemployed there was disheartening. The grant for Ireland was especially opposed by two members of the house, who, while they sympathised beyond most other members with the political agitators of Ireland, looked upon her material condition without an equally warm interest, and regarded her rather from an English than an imperial point of view; these members were Mr. Hume and Mr. Roebuck. Government was triumphant in those measures, so far as the support of a majority in the commons was concerned. It was, however, felt that neither the men nor the measures were adequate to the exigencies of party, any more than to the magnitude of the occasion. Lord John Russell was vacillating and time-serving, although with a show of resolution in resisting and defeating measures which afterwards met, at all events, his qualified approval. This was most singularly exemplified in connection with Lord George Bentinck’s measure for an advance of money to create railways in Ireland. On the 26th of April the house was taken by surprise when the chancellor of the exchequer proposed a loan to certain Irish railways. The proposed sum was £620,000, half a million of which was to be advanced to one particular railway—“the great South Western.” This gave great offence to many. Mr. Hume led off the opposition, Mr. Roebuck followed, of course, with fiery impetuosity; Sir Robert Peel disapproved of it, and the whole Peel party echoed his objections. Lord George Bentinck exulted in the homage paid to his counsels by the tardy, trimming, half measure, or less than half measure of her majesty’s advisers. Notwithstanding so rigorous an opposition from so many quarters, government was so well backed by the Irish members and the ministerial hacks who represented British constituencies, that they carried this and several other measures to which a similar opposition was offered. The remark that the railway scheme of Sir Charles Wood was the fag-end of Lord George Bentinck’s measure, was received with loud cheers by the house, and was repeated much “out of doors.” During these debates the grossest ignorance of Ireland, her people, resources, and financial relation to Great Britain, was evinced by English representatives. Mr. Hume and Mr. Roebuck were very conspicuous in this respect. Mr. Disraeli had the folly to say that the railway scheme of Lord George Bentinck would be beneficial to Ireland, in a political, moral, and social point of view, irrespective of material advantage, because the Roman Catholic and Protestant populations would be brought to work together as “navvies!” Mr. Disraeli did not know that not one man, probably, out of five thousand in that class of labourers in Ireland was a Protestant, and that if working together in the same employments would be sufficient to reconcile them, the reconciliation must have been long ago effected—over the whole of Ulster, at least. The differences between Irish Protestants and Roman Catholics were founded in principle, cherished deeply and warmly by them respectively, and were not, and are not, to be healed by the political or economical quackery of Mr. Disraeli, or politicians who, like him, share with neither party in the earnestness of their opinions. The Irish Protestant and the Irish Roman Catholic believe that the political ascendancy of their respective creeds is necessary to the development of their power and usefulness, and strive, therefore, with jealous eagerness and honesty for that ascendancy. Whatever concessions on this ground the Protestants might be induced to make, the spirit of Irish Romanism is ultramontane in every province and in every social grade of the people.

The Earl of Lincoln and Lord Monteagle united in bringing under the notice of the commons and lords the subject of Irish emigration, and each of these noble persons occupied the time and attention of parliament with an impracticable measure. The general want of parliamentary tact and practical sagacity evinced by the members of both houses at this juncture was discouraging to those who regarded parliament as the hope of the nation.

Parliament was much occupied with Irish and financial questions during the session; several other matters, however, occupied earnest attention. Mr. Fielden, member for Oldham, brought before the commons a measure for shortening the hours of labour of women and children, and young persons in factories. His agitation of this subject derived additional interest from the fact that he himself had been a poor factory boy, and had, to use his own expression, always “stood by his order.” His measure proposed the limitation of labour to twelve hours a clay, allowing two hours out of the twelve for meals, and he would apply this rule to all young persons between the ages of thirteen and eighteen. On Saturday, however, he would limit the hours to eight, making a total of sixty-three hours in the week until the 1st of May, 1848, after which the total hours of labour for each young person in the week should be fifty-eight. These restrictions he would apply to all females, of whatever age, engaged in factory labour. The working-classes were strongly in favour of Mr. Fielden’s motion. Mr. Cobden had said the previous year that, if the matter was postponed for twelve months, the feelings of the working-classes would change; but that eloquent and philanthropic man very often proved himself a bad prophet, and never more signally than in this instance. The desire of the working-classes for some such law had greatly increased since the time Mr. Cobden declared that it would abate. On the second reading of the bill a fierce opposition was offered, based upon principles of political economy. Sir Robert Peel, Mr. Hume, Mr. Trelawney, Sir Charles Wood, Mr. Mark Philips, and Mr. Bright, were the chief opponents of the measure. Mr. Bright very ably animadverted upon the vacillation of Lord John Russell upon this subject, and the mischief inflicted upon the interests in question by the noble lord’s indecision.

Lord John Russell avowed his support of the principle of the measure, because parliament had already given its sanction to that principle, but he objected to the details. The bill was very ably supported by Mr. Ricardo and Mr. Duncombe. Several speeches were made on its behalf, which were calculated to damage it, and to awaken the alarm of the manufacturing interest; these were made by Mr. Sharman Crawford, Mr. Ferrand, Mr. Borthwick, Sir Robert Inglis, and Mr. Newdegate. Mr. Roebuck offered an able and formidable opposition to it. Mr. Brotherton made a feeling appeal to the house, assuring it that the working-classes were borne down by the oppressive number of their hours of toil; that it was impossible for them to accomplish a better arrangement by voluntary agreement; that he himself had worked in a factory, and felt the oppressiveness of the burden, resolving, if ever he could, to contribute to the emancipation of the workmen from so great an evil, and declaring that he still retained in their original freshness the feelings he then cherished. This noble appeal was received by the house with warm demonstrations of applause. Sir James Graham endeavoured to remove the effect which it produced, setting out with the paltry sophism that Mr. Brotherton had risen by the long-hour system, ergo, he should not oppose it! The fair implication of Mr. Brotherton’s speech was that he had risen _in spite_ of the long-hour system, and if Sir James could have regarded the arguments of the honourable member for Salford with common candour, he must have drawn that inference. The bill was carried through both houses with rapid success, after undergoing certain modifications. Lord Brougham took occasion to launch his thunders against his former friends in the ministry for their varying opinions, forgetful that from him this reproach, however well founded, came with the worst possible grace.

On the 22nd of March Mr. Fox Maule moved the second reading of a bill for shortening the period of service in the army. The bill was opposed by Sir Howard Douglas, who did not on this occasion give his last mistaken opinion on military affairs. Colonel Sibthorp, the opponent of every improvement in the law, was an appropriate companion for Sir Howard Douglas in this opposition. Colonel Reid also denounced the measure. It received support from Major Layard, who exposed the injustice of the Duke of Wellington’s Horse-guards’ administration by instances of the gross political partiality displayed in the promotion of officers. Sir De Lacy Evans, the friend of the soldier, the supporter of every liberal opinion and just law, supported Mr. Maule. Mr. Sidney Herbert afforded a qualified support. The measure passed the commons, and received an eloquent and powerful advocacy in the lords from the Duke of Wellington. This mainly contributed to the success of the bill, for the lords were disposed to throw it out. The Earl of Lucan proposed a plan calculated to reconcile parties; but the Duke of Wellington was so strenuously in favour of the plan of the government, that it was carried, but by a very small majority.

GOVERNMENT PLAN OF EDUCATION.

Few subjects had engaged the attention of the country more than that of popular education. The government resolved upon an enlarged scheme, and submitted their views to parliament. The plan was essentially in the interest of the Established Church, and had the appearance of being intended not only as a means of proselytizing dissenters, but also to disparage them. No measure could be more adapted to aggravate the differences between the two great sections of English Protestants. An opposition was awakened among all the dissenting communities of the most hearty nature, and the government sowed the seeds of distrust of the whig party, which their old abettors, the dissenters, have cherished to this day, although ten years have since elapsed. It is unlikely that the Whigs, as a party, will ever regain the confidence of the Protestant dissenters of Great Britain. The whig government showed its usual inaptitude to perceive the real state of public feeling among the lower strata of the middle classes, and the unhappy faculty of making unpalatable measures, as _mal apropos_ as possible in the time and mode of their introduction.

Lord Lansdowne introduced the measure to the lords. Upon certain minutes emanating from the privy council the government based their measure. It comprised a system of educational grants, and of school inspection, which virtually consigned the education of the country to the custody of the clergy of the Established Church. In the lords the measure of the ministers passed with little question; in the commons numerous and stormy debates ensued. Mr. Macaulay, on the one hand, and Mr. Bright, on the other, threw some acrimony into these debates, but probably the former never appeared to less advantage in parliament, nor the latter to more advantage than in this discussion. Government succeeded in disarming the Roman Catholic members from opposition by a private understanding that, although by the minutes of the educational committee of the privy council then under consideration, they were debarred from any grant, separate minutes would afterwards be introduced in their especial behalf. There was also an understanding with the Wesleyan Methodists on the principle of the grants to their schools, the inspection to be exercised, and the selection of pupil teachers, which disarmed the opposition of that numerous and energetic body. The Unitarians were also conciliated by the explanations which were offered to them, and that body was so extremely anxious for the spread of education, that they were ready to accept a position of great denominational disadvantage, in order to see the extension of some plan that would conduce to the mitigation of popular ignorance. The Congregationalists and Baptists, Presbyterians and Friends, and various other bodies of Methodists who adopted the voluntary principle, were beyond conciliation. They boldly demanded equal rights for all, and perfect freedom of education. This large class of persons were much maligned by the Earl of Surrey, when he consented to have Boman Catholics excluded from the minutes, because, in his opinion, if they were placed within the circle of advantage which the government was willing to accord, all the dissenting sects would assail them with an increased and perhaps successful opposition. The objections of the “voluntary dissenters,” and more liberal sections of churchmen, were unaffected by theological considerations; they desired that their schools should be protected from government interference, and remain uncorrupted by government patronage, and they objected to the unconstitutional authority, as they deemed it, exercised by the privy council. No public man out of their own party ever had so much intercourse with those classes as Lord Brougham, who, at the same time, understood them so little. His lordship affected to “live and move and have his being” in an atmosphere of liberality and enlightenment too high for the earnestly religious men of the country to attain. From this elevation he looked down upon their conflicts with an affected compassion, which if meant to cover his disdain was very unsuccessful, and it brought out more prominently his lordship’s thorough ignorance of the tone and principles of these classes, many of whom had studied the merits of the whole question with far more undivided attention, and not less capacity, than he had.

Lord Lansdowne could not introduce a more comprehensive plan, but he admitted the impossibility of his so doing, because society was divided into two great classes, churchmen and dissenters, who loved education much, but controversy more. Never was a sentence uttered in parliament where the religious feelings and opinions of the people were concerned, even by Lord Brougham himself, more unfounded in fact. The assertion was certainly true of a great many, both churchmen and dissenters, but there was a far greater number of each who loved education very much, and who did not regard controversy with any favour—men of strong conscientious principles, and of deep and earnest piety, who were not prepared to sacrifice their opinions to any government, or to any view of expediency, whatever the end proposed.

Instead of making these classes the object of his constant sneers, Lord Brougham would have rendered more service to his country, and have been more just, had he honoured their scruples, and devoted himself to the production of some scheme which, whether successful or not in passing the legislature, would have laid the basis of an ultimate acceptance by its respect for the religious rights of all. No plan of education will ever gain acceptance in England, so long as there is freedom of discussion and religious liberty, which recognises either a sectarian or a state ascendancy in education. As the Bishop of Oxford once said, as to the feasibility of a compulsory system of education—“We are too free a people for such a scheme ever to be carried out amongst us.” Carlisle showed his philosophy and accuracy of historical knowledge when he described the Roundheads and Cavaliers as honest, earnest men,— heroes, because nobly true to the principles they had espoused, and fearless of all consequences in their avowal; but that eloquent writer showed, like Lord Brougham, his ignorance of the classes of men which, in the present age, succeed to the opinions of Roundheads and Cavaliers, when he declares that there are no such men in the England of to-day. They are now as earnest and more numerous: let the same circumstances call them forth and they will be found. A superior civilisation, a clearer understanding of the principles of civil and religious liberty, a more tolerant temper now prevail, but there is as much conscientiousness still; and now as ever, in this and in every land, men, deeply imbued with the principles of Christianity, will be found ready to bear the testimony of the advocate or the confessor, as events demand. The spirit evinced by Lord Brougham pervaded, to a less extent, a large number of the members of both houses, and produced impressions amongst the numerous classes thus contemptuously treated, which worked deeply into their hearts, and influenced for many a year the votes at elections, and the general feeling of the people towards the great historical parties by which parliament had been divided.

The government carried its measure; £100,000 was devoted to educational purposes on the plan provided by the minutes of the Committee of Education of the Privy Council. The discussions so long existing on the question of education received, however, a new impetus, and became more acrimonious than before. A very large party was gradually created favourable to a national system of secular education, leaving the religious care of the scholars to denominational supervision. A very large class of earnest men became still more devoted than ever to the voluntary system of education, and prodigious efforts were made to promote it. It was found, however, that the expense was such as to defy voluntary efforts, except as sustained through a long period, while the deficiency to be met was urgent and extensive. To carry out any government system that would at all meet the necessity, and respect the scruples of all classes would also entail an enormous burden upon the nation. In the debate on the question to which this section refers, Mr. Duncombe depicted the heavy public burdens that would be thus imposed: Mr. Macaulay exclaimed, “A penny ahead.” Mr. Duncombe’s retort, that this statement was a romance was merited. Mr. Macaulay could never have examined the financial bearing of this great question thoroughly, or his acute mind must have discovered the fallacy of the opinion he so rashly hazarded.

The discussions in and out of parliament brought to light a vast mass of statistics as to the crime and ignorance with which the worthful elements of society had to contend. The alarm felt by good men in the result of these revelations strengthened the hands of government in passing the bill. Objections were raised by many in view of the magnitude of the evil to be encountered, and a sense of responsibility in connection with some immediate and extensive action. The reverend Doctor Guthrie, on a different and subsequent occasion, eloquently expressed what was at this juncture so generally felt:—“When men die, corruption commonly begins after death, but when nations die, it always begins before it. And as in that man’s gangrened extremities, and swollen feet, and slow circulation, I see the heralds of death approaching,—in these godless masses, sunk in ignorance, lost to the profession of religion, and even to the decent habits of civilised society, I see the most alarming signs of a nation’s danger, unless remedies are promptly applied, the unmistakeable forerunners of a nation’s death. Unless early, active, adequate measures are employed to arrest the progress of our social maladies, there remains for this mighty empire no fate but the grave—that grave which has closed over all that have gone before it. Where are the Assyrian and Egyptian monarchies? Where is the Macedonian empire? Where the world-wide power of Rome? Egypt lies entombed amid the dust of her catacombs. Assyria is buried beneath the mounds of Nineveh. Rome lives only in the pages of history, survives but in the memory of her greatness, and the majestic ruins of the ‘Eternal City.’ Shall our fate resemble theirs? Shall it go to prove that Providence has extended the same law of mortality to nations that lies on men—that they also should struggle through the dangers of a precarious infancy; grow up into the beauty, and burn with the ardour, of youth; arrive at the vigour of perfect manhood; and then, slowly sinking, pass through the blindness and decay of old age, until they drop into the tomb? Under God, it depends upon ourselves whether that shall or shall not be our fate. Matters are not so far gone but it may yet be averted. A great French general, who reached the battle-field at sundown, found that the troops of his country had been worsted in the fight; unskilful arrangements had neutralised Gallic bravery, and offered the enemy advantages they were not slow to seize. He accosted the unfortunate commander; having rapidly learned how matters stood, he pulled out his watch, turned his eye on the sinking sun, and said, ‘There’s time yet to gain the victory.’ He rallied the broken ranks; he placed himself at their head, and launching them with the arm of a giant in war, upon the columns of the foe, he plucked the prize from their hands—won the day. There is no time to lose. To her case, perhaps, may be applied the words, which we would leave as a solemn warning to every worldly, careless, Christless man, ‘Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.’”

BILL FOR CREATING A NEW DIOCESS OF MANCHESTER.

The government brought in a bill for this purpose which excited much discussion in parliament, and much discontent in the locality more immediately interested. The second reading was proposed by Lord Lansdowne on the 7th of June. The bill also created a new archdeaconry of Liverpool, The bill proposed to exclude the new bishop from a seat in parliament. This evoked opposition from the high church party, but the success of the measure was secured by this proviso; for the opposition raised in Lancashire was so great that the government could hardly have proceeded with the bill had a seat in the House of Peers been associated with the new see. It was provided, however, that when a vacancy, by death or otherwise, occurred on the bench of bishops, the bishop of Manchester should succeed to a seat in that house. This introduced a new principle in the relations of the episcopal bench to the peerage; for a bishop would not in future have a seat in their lordships’ house as a matter of course, but would occupy his see without such privilege until a vacancy occurred.

DEBATE ON THE ANNEXATION OF CRACOW.

The annexation of Cracow to the Austrian empire has been already related in this chapter. Several allusions were made to this in the debates on the address, but on the 4th of March Mr. Hume brought the subject forward in a formal manner. Mr. Hume, however, so mixed up the subject with the Russo-Dutch loan, that his resolutions as far as regarded Cracow were impracticable, and he withdrew them after uselessly occupying the time of the house by a long debate.

There were few matters of interest connected with the remainder of the session. Lord Palmerston delivered a speech in which he animadverted so severely on the bad faith of the Spanish government, in reference to Spanish bonds, as to produce great indignation in Spain. It was supposed that the good effects of the speech, however, would be felt by those interested in the punctual disbursements of the Spanish government. That government had too little probity to meet the calls of honour, and too little shame to be moved by the disapprobation of honest men.

It was resolved by the government of Lord John Russell to advise her majesty to dissolve parliament, so that the elections might terminate before harvest; various bills were therefore postponed or abandoned.

Lord Lyndhurst had been accustomed to take a retrospective view of each session, in a speech which recapitulated the doings and misdoings of government, according to his lordship’s view of them. Lord Brougham, ambitious to do everything, even when he knew others could do it better, resolved to perform the task usually sustained by his brother ex-chancellor. The performance was inferior to that usually accomplished by the noble Baron Lyndhurst, although in declamatory force Lord Brougham’s oration was perfect. All the bills passed in the session he described as bad ones. Many of those lost or abandoned, if introduced by government, he represented as useless, and their introduction as a waste of time. Every epithet of contempt furnished by the English language, and by any other which his lordship knew, however imperfectly, was heaped upon the defunct bills. They were consigned to the shades below, to that “lean world” where—

“Ibant obseuri sola sub nocte per nmbram Perque domos Ditis vacuas et mania regna.”

What his lordship said of the defunct measures will be true of himself, when his great energies are still, and his eloquent tongue silent for ever—“A thousand faults and a thousand freaks died with them.” His lordship appended a condemnatory motion to his speech, which, like most of his motions, came to nothing. The house was greatly amused, and even instructed, by the noble lord’s oration, but not at all edified. The Marquis of Lansdowne replied with that calm and graceful dignity by which that venerable peer was so much distinguished; and his reply carried with it the weight of his consistent political character, for the house unanimously adopted his course.

PROROGATION AND DISSOLUTION OF PARLIAMENT.

On the 23rd of July, parliament was prorogued by her majesty. As the parliament which had been called together in 1841 had been one of the longest during the century, the prorogation, which was made by her majesty in person, excited very great public interest, and the queen’s speech was looked for with unusual public attention. The streets leading to the House of Lords presented the same animated appearance as is usual on similar occasions. Her majesty, accompanied by Prince Albert, and attended by the usual great officers of state, entered the royal carriage, and proceeded from Buckingham Palace to the House of Lords shortly before two o’clock. As the royal procession passed through St. James’s Park, and along the line of road, her majesty and her illustrious consort were loudly cheered by the spectators who had assembled to witness this splendid pageant. On the arrival of the royal _cortège_ at the House of Lords, it was announced by a discharge of cannon.

Her majesty having robed, she immediately proceeded to the house, and took her seat on the throne. Prince Albert occupied a state chair on the right of the sovereign. The entrance of her majesty to the house was announced by a nourish of trumpets. The peers and peeresses all rose as the queen entered. The new house was crowded, and presented a brilliant spectacle. All, or nearly all, the foreign ambassadors and ministers were present. The dresses of the ladies were very elegant.

Her majesty having taken her seat, the Lord Chancellor directed Sir Augustus Clifford, Usher of the Black Rod, to summon the House of Commons to hear the royal speech on the prorogation of parliament. In a short time the speaker, accompanied by a number of members, appeared at the bar, when the right honourable gentleman, as is usual, addressed her majesty in a short speech, recounting the business of the session, and concluded by praying the royal assent to several bills which had passed both houses. Her majesty then read the following most gracious speech:—

“_My Lords and Gentlemen_,—I have much satisfaction in being able to release you from the duties of a laborious and anxious session. I cannot take leave of you without expressing my grateful sense of the assiduity and zeal with which you have applied yourselves to the consideration of the public interests. Your attention has been principally directed to the measures of immediate relief which a great and unprecedented calamity rendered necessary.

“I have given my cheerful assent to those laws which, by allowing the free admission of grain, and by affording facilities for the use of sugar in breweries and distilleries, tend to increase the quantity of human food, and to promote commercial intercourse.

“I rejoice to rind that you have in no instance proposed new restrictions, or interfered with the liberty of foreign or internal trade; as a mode of relieving distress. I feel assured that such measures are generally ineffectual, and, in some cases, aggravate the evils for the alleviation of which they are adopted.

“I cordially approve of the acts of large and liberal bounty by which you have assuaged the sufferings of my Irish subjects. I have also readily given my sanction to a law to make better provision for the permanent relief of the destitute in Ireland. I have likewise given my assent to various bills calculated to promote the agriculture and develop the industry of that portion of the United Kingdom. My attention shall be directed to such further measures as may be conducive to those salutary purposes.

“My relations with foreign powers continue to inspire me with confidence in the maintenance of peace. It has afforded me great satisfaction to find that the measures which, in concert with the King of the French, the Queen of Spain, and the Queen of Portugal, I have taken for the pacification of Portugal, have been attended with success; and that the civil war which for many months had afflicted that country has, at last, been brought to a bloodless termination. I indulge the hope that future differences between political parties in that country may be settled without an appeal to arms.

“_Gentlemen of the House of Commons_,—I thank you for your willingness in granting me the necessary supplies; they shall be applied with due care and economy to the public service.

“I am happy to inform you that, notwithstanding the high price of food, the revenue has, up to the present time, been more productive than I had reason to anticipate. The increased use of articles of general consumption has chiefly contributed to this result. The revenue derived from sugar, especially, has been greatly augmented by the removal of the prohibitory duties on foreign sugar.

“The various grants which you have made for education in the United Kingdom will, I trust, be conducive to the religious and moral improvement of my people.

“_My Lords and Gentlemen_,—I think it proper to inform you that it is my intention immediately to dissolve the present parliament.

“I rely with confidence on the loyalty to the throne, and attachment to the free institutions of this country, which animate the great body of my people. I join with them in supplications to Almighty God that the dearth by which we have been afflicted may, by the Divine blessing, be converted into cheapness and plenty.”

An event occurred at this juncture not unimportant to the government, and in which the Roman Catholics of Ireland felt concern. The O’Connor Don, one of the members for Roscommon, and a lord of the Treasury, died. He was a patriotic Irishman, of superior education and intelligence, and much respected, not only by the county he represented, but in Ireland generally. In the province of Connaught he was regarded with the reverence paid to a Celtic chief.

Parliament having been dissolved, writs were at once issued for the election of members for a new one. The especial feature of this election was the want of a definite policy on the part of the great body of the candidates. The Whigs seemed to have no clear notion of what they ought to propose to themselves or to the country. Lord John Russell, as has always been his custom, referred to his past life as the standard by which the electors should judge his future policy. A suspicion existed in the electoral body in Great Britain that it was the intention of government to endow the Roman Catholic clergy, and this injured the cause of such Whig candidates as were not very explicit on this matter. The previous parliament had added to the influence of the church by increasing the number of bishops, and by their education plan; this prejudiced many of the Dissenters against Whigism in general, and the government leaders of that school as its most prominent advocates. There was a general expectation that, whatever the complexion of the new parliament, Sir Robert Peel would of necessity be in power before its dissolution. The energy of the country party was, however, mainly directed against the Peelites, and their strength was sufficient to bar, for a time at all events, the approaches to power against Sir Robert.

The elections proceeded throughout Great Britain with fairness, except that the landlords in some places exercised an influence which was unconstitutional and unjust. Tenants were evicted because they voted according to their conscience; and the tradespeople in country towns were menaced with loss of custom by the neighbouring landowners. In Ireland the landed interest also exercised an undue influence, and many cases of extreme hardship occurred. The Boman Catholic clergy used the power of their office for electioneering purposes, in a way injurious to their own moral influence, subversive of the rights of the people, and dangerous to law and order.

The elections terminated by the return of a majority, ostensibly in favour of government, but there was little earnestness of principle or purpose to give consistency or continuity to their support.

ASSEMBLING OF A NEW PARLIAMENT.

In consequence of the public distress in Great Britain, the famine in Ireland, and the disturbed state of that country, it became necessary for parliament to assemble sooner than had been customary. Accordingly, on the 18th of November, the first session of the new parliament began; Mr. Shaw Lefevre was re-elected speaker. On the 23rd, the Marquis of Lansdowne was commissioned to read her majesty’s speech. That document referred with hope to the state of commercial matters in Great Britain, and with gratitude to Providence for a bountiful harvest. Her majesty expressed her sympathy for Irish suffering, and her abhorrence of Irish crime. She expressed her pleasure at the alacrity showed by all classes to relieve the destitute in Ireland; and recommended her parliament to take measures for repressing outrage, and preserving the public peace in that country. She expressed her regret that civil war had broken out in Switzerland, and her readiness to use her influence to heal those distractions. The speech announced a treaty with the republic of the equator for the suppression of the slave-trade, and avowed confidence in maintaining the general peace of Europe. The navigation laws, the health of the metropolis, and the revenue, were also subjects to which she called the attention of her parliament.

In the debate upon the address, in the lords, Lord Stanley was unreasonable and virulent; Lord Brougham, always in opposition to somebody, refuted the conservative leader. He “praised the government for calling parliament together so soon; justified the interference with the bank charter, recorded on another page; declared that Ireland stood in a shameful and hateful pre-eminence of crime, and trusted that effectual measures would be taken to disarm the people, and protect life and property.”

The debate on the address, in the commons, was chiefly remarkable for the boldness and extent of Mr. John O’Connell’s demands upon the Treasury for the relief of Ireland. Sir Benjamin Hall made some very foolish replies to Mr. O’Connell, and added to the bitterness of the debate. Mr. Maurice O’Connell made the startling declaration that not more than one-fifth of the sum voted for Ireland had ever reached that country.

A Roman Catholic archdeacon, named Laffan, at a public meeting in Cashel, had made a very inflammatory speech, which had excited the indignation of the public, and was the subject of animadversion in parliament. Mr. Mahon, an Irish member, was chairman of that meeting, and the mode in which he palliated the atrocious speech of the archdeacon caused murmurs of disapprobation in the house. Ireland appeared to great disadvantage in this debate, and the tone of English members was not so generous as it ought to have been. The dreadful crimes perpetrated in Ireland had produced a state of feeling in England which was almost resentful, notwithstanding the compassion entertained for the sufferings of the Irish poor. There could be no doubt, as Mr. Stafford O’Brien reminded the house, that some of the best of landlords had been assassinated. There appeared to be a relentless thirst for blood among the Irish peasantry, prompted by fanaticism, famine, and despair, which was calculated to destroy the sympathy of the representatives of Great Britain.

The address in the commons was ultimately agreed to after a most acrimonious debate, protracted by the Irish members and their opponents far beyond the limits usual on such occasions.

DEBATE ON THE DISTRESS OF THE NATION.

On the 30th the chancellor of the exchequer rose, pursuant of notice, to move for “a select committee to inquire into the causes of the recent commercial distress, and how far it has been effected by the laws for regulating the issue of bank-notes payable on demand.” After an intellectual debate, except so far as some incoherent rhapsodies of Mr. Urquhart made it otherwise, the motion was acceded to. Sir Robert Peel appeared to singular advantage in this discussion; he placed the causes of public distress luminously before the house, and supported the policy of government. In the lords there was a similar debate, remarkable for the extraordinary assertion of Lord Brougham, that the public distress was chiefly to be attributed to the obstinacy of government and parliament in not taking his advice and that of the Duke of Wellington, proffered for the last ten years. His lordship seemed ambitious of identifying himself with the illustrious duke on all possible occasions, although scarcely any two men could have entertained opinions more dissonant than these two noble persons.

MEASURES FOR THE REPRESSION OF HOMICIDE AND OUTRAGE IN IRELAND.

The party of Lord John Russell had thwarted the government of Sir Robert Peel when endeavouring to enact a law for the preservation of life and property from the lawlessness of the peasantry in Ireland: it was Lord John’s fate, in this session, to invoke Sir Robert’s aid in carrying measures very similar. It became necessary to pass some enactment calculated to hold Irish outrage in check. Lord John’s influence ultimately suffered by so frequently opposing others in their more timely efforts to carry measures of which he was glad at last to avail himself.

In the six months ending October, 1847, there were ninety-six murders, while the appalling number of one hundred and fifty-six attempts at assassination had been made. During the same period, one hundred and sixteen dwelling-houses had been set on fire by incendiaries. But offences against life, property, and the civil and religious freedom of the respectable inhabitants, were innumerable. Portions of Ireland were under a reign of terror. The sympathies of whole districts were on the side of those by whom rapine and assassination were committed; and there was a general unwillingness, even among the better class of farmers, and persons in higher stations still, to bring the malefactors to justice.

Sir George Grey introduced the remedial measures of government. The proposed bill was to be applicable only to such portions of Ireland as the lord-lieutenant should proclaim to be disturbed. The reserved force of Irish constabulary was to be increased from four hundred to six hundred men—a feature of the scheme so absurdly inadequate as to expose its authors to ridicule. From this paltry reserve his excellency was to send forces into the proclaimed districts. This force would be paid out of the district it was sent to protect—a most salutary arrangement, as giving the small farmers and clergy an interest in checking insurgent proceedings. All persons, unless especially exempt from the prohibition, were to be forbidden the use of arms in proclaimed districts, but they might have such in their own houses. This provision, which appeared reasonable in itself, was practically mischievous, for the houses of many became depots of arms for their companions in disaffection more suspected than themselves. Robberies of arms were perpetrated by _unarmed_ bands, who were nevertheless not resisted. Any violation of the disarming clause of the bill would subject the culprit to three years’ imprisonment. The lord-lieutenant had power to authorise search for arms in the houses of the suspected, and all prohibited weapons were to be delivered up on proclamation to that effect, under penalties. This also was evaded, for as soon as a district was proclaimed, the arms disappeared into a neighbouring district, not so situated, from whence incursions were made into the proclaimed district, where the force was generally too feeble to protect the numerous points upon which the depredators fell. The police had power to call upon all males between sixteen and sixty, in any district where a murder was committed, to join in pursuit of the murderer; and any one who refused, was held guilty of misdemeanour. This clause alarmed the disaffected more than any other.

The bill was received with loud cheers. Mr. John O’Connell, who had declared that he would “die on the floor of the house” rather than allow a coercion bill to pass, admitted the necessity of some provision against the outrages which had prevailed, and that Sir George Grey’s bill was moderate and just; but he strangely added that he would oppose it at every stage, unless government passed such a bill regulating the law of landlord and tenant as he and his party approved. Mr. Fergus O’Connor bantered Mr. John O’Connell for his subservience to ministers, which ill accorded with his loud demonstrations of ministerial hostility in Conciliation Hall. Mr. O’Connor opposed the bill, even in its first stage. That gentleman wished the Irish repealers to join the chartist movement, and to place himself at the head of both. Mr. Horsman sensibly observed that the most appalling thing to him was that the government had allowed these murders to go on ever since, by the union, the imperial parliament had undertaken to govern Ireland. Mr. Maurice O’Connell did not oppose the bill. He also had been a man of fiery words in Ireland, and paltry deeds in the presence of the government and the legislature in England. Mr. Disraeli satirised the great outcry about suppressing outrage, if the addition of two hundred constables were sufficient. When the second reading was moved on the 6th of December, Mr. John O’Connell opposed it, and moved “that the orders of the day be read.” The honourable member had been so pressed by Conciliation Hall, and the Young Irelanders had raised such an outcry against the measure, that although he approved of the bill, and took care to let the house see that he did, yet he was obliged to oppose it, or forfeit his leadership of “Old Ireland.” His opposition, however, influenced the people of England against the O’Connells and their class. Murder and outrage stalked abroad, and whatever were the wrongs of Ireland, incendiarism and assassination were not the means of redress upon which brave men could look unmoved. That a country should fall into such a state of crime was horrible; that the political leaders of any party in it could be found to oppose measures so mild, and so little ultra-constitutional, to put down these dreadful deeds, was still more horrible. The speech of Mr. John O’Connell exposed himself and his country to just ridicule. A party numbering millions of persons, choosing as their principal leader a man so little qualified for the task, or for any great political undertaking, could not but sink in its relative importance. In spite of the opposition of a few Irish members, the bill passed the commons almost unanimously. In the lords but little opposition was offered. On the motion for going into committee on the 16th December, Lord Farnham brought under the notice of the house that Major Mahon was murdered after he had been denounced from the altar of the Roman Catholic chapel by a priest named M’Dermot, to whom Major Mahon had offered no other offence than objecting to that gentleman and his clerks constituting the relief committee of the district. The debate was rendered still more remarkable by a frank and manly speech from Lord Beaumont, a Roman Catholic peer, deprecating these altar denunciations, which had so frequently been followed by the murder of the persons denounced. Lord Beaumont expressed his astonishment that the bishops, clergy, and laity of the Roman Catholic community did not bring their moral influence to bear upon those priests who offended against the laws of God and man in so flagrant a manner. This gave rise to severe animadversions upon the whole body of Irish Roman Catholics for not having acted as Lord Beaumont pointed out. Lord Stanley especially adopted this line of remark, with the dextrous facility his lordship possessed for turning every occurrence and every admission of an opponent into an element of party attack. The measure was speedily passed through the house of lords, and became law.

Notwithstanding these weary debates upon Irish affairs, the house of commons was obliged to participate in another as acrimonious as any of the former. Mr. Fergus O’Connor moved for a committee of inquiry into the circumstances which led to the legislative union between Great Britain and Ireland, the means by which that act was attained, and its effect upon the working-classes of both countries. Mr. Henry Grattan denounced the speech of Mr. O’Connor, and his general spirit and conduct. Mr. John O’Connell and Mr. Smith O’Brien gave their support to the motion. It was all but unanimously rejected.

MOTION FOR THE REPEAL OF JEWISH DISABILITIES.

Baron Rothschild, a distinguished member of the Jewish persuasion, having been elected member for the city of London, the question of the right of Jews to sit in parliament was raised and warmly discussed, in the public press and in the country. Lord John Russell was also elected for the city of London, and was bound, therefore, by his especial duty to the citizens, to look particularly to the settlement of this matter. He moved, on the 16th of December, “that the house should resolve itself into a committee, to consider the removal of the civil and religious disabilities affecting her majesty’s Jewish subjects.” The resolution was carried by a very large majority, its principal opponent being Sir Robert Inglis, one of the members for Oxford.

ADJOURNMENT OF THE HOUSE.—CLOSE OF THE PARLIAMENTARY LABOURS OF 1847.

On the 20th of December the house adjourned for the Christmas holidays, and did not meet again until February. Thus closed the first session of the new parliament, and the legislative business of the year.

Throughout the year the sanitary deficiencies of large cities, and their moral peculiarities, were the subjects of desultory conversation in parliament, and of extensive discussion in the newspapers and at public meetings. To such a degree did the sanitary question excite public interest, that her majesty was advised to recommend its consideration to the new parliament; and during the educational debates, the moral and intellectual condition of large towns, and especially of the metropolis, was a theme of desponding comment. The reverend Dr. Guthrie, of Edinburgh, has since then eloquently shown that the providential dispensation which consigns so large a portion of our people to the close confines of cities, like all the other arrangements of Providence, however mysterious, are full of goodness and mercy:—“Somehow or other, amid their crowding and confinement, the human mind finds its fullest, freest expansion. Unlike the dwarfed and dusty plants which stand around our suburban villas, languishing like exiles for the purer air and freer sunshine that kiss their fellows far away in flowery field and green woodland, on sunny banks and breezy hills, man reaches his highest condition amid the social influences of the crowded city. His intellect receives its brightest polish where gold and silver lose theirs—tarnished by the searching smoke and foul vapours of city air. The finest flowers of genius have grown in an atmosphere where those of nature are prone to droop and difficult to bring to maturity. The mental powers acquire their full robustness where the cheek loses its ruddy hue and the limbs their elastic step, and pale thought sits on manly brows, and the watchman, as he walks his rounds, sees the student’s lamp burning far into the silent night.”