of secrecy. After the House had determined that he should be compelled to answer, the inquiry was urged in every possible shape: he was told by Mr. Brougham that his oath was an absurdity, and of no force, and admonished by the chairman that his refusal might drive the committee to a painful course. But neither casuistry nor menaces, nor persuasion availed: sir A. B. King firmly persisted in respecting the pretended sanction of his oath; nor would he communicate more than that the pass-words were to be found in the Old Testament. The attor ney-general (sir Robert Gifford) thought that, before compelling the disclosure of these words by measures of severity, it might be worth inquiring whether the answer was likely to bear upon the subject before the committee. Mr. Canning too recommended not to press this line of examination. Sir John Newport, Mr. Grattan, Mr. Scarlett, and Mr. J. Smith urged the necessity of committing the witness; but Mr. Brougham and Mr. Plunkett thought it better to give him another opportunity of answering. Being recalled, sir Abraham King again explained, that the only words, which he hesitated to divulge, were the signs and symbols by which Orangemen are enabled to distinguish each other; and these had no reference whatever to any maxim or rule of conduct. Mr. Peel declared, that, after this answer, he could not press the inquiry. Mr. Brougham com plained, that the witness had triumphed over the committee. Mr. Calcraft, on the other hand, thought the last answer perfectly satisfactory.

On the 26th of May, the in

quiry proceeded; and again an effort was made to extort from sir A. B. King, the sign and passwords of the Orangemen.Mr. Brougham said, it had been proved that sheriff Thorpe had boasted of having an Orange panel in his pocket, and that some of the grand jurors were in fact Orangemen; and therefore, the committee was bound to probe the Orange system to the bottom. Mr. Peel, Mr. Dawson, Mr. Goulburn, and colonel Barry urged, that the moral tenor fo the system might be thoroughly known without extorting its formal and insignificant symbols.-Sir A. B. King assured the House, that the so earnestly-pursued symbols had no hostile allusion whatever to any class of his majesty's subjects; and that they hinted nothing of extermination. Mr. Brougham, on pressing the proposition of a specific examination to a división, was defeated by a majority of 117 to 87. Mr. Hume then proposed to ask the witness the purport of the passages from which the Orange symbols were taken. On a division, the motion was rejected by a majority of 131 to 77. Mr. Plunkett voted both times in opposition to ministers.

The inquiry terminated on the following day, by the examination of Mr. Plunkett himself; the members who advocated the cause of the sheriff and jury, conceiving that they had already sufficiently made out their case. The effect of it certainly was, to disprove the inculpatory allegations of the attorney-general: but it had another more important use; for it showed how familiar corruption, in the administration of justice, was to the minds of the Irish people.

The tendency of these proceed

ings, relative to the riot in the theatre, to excite strong party feeling in the capital could not be doubted; and when a spirit of faction is called into activity in a metropolis, the remoter districts seldom escape the contagion. The violence of religious animosity disturbed the tranquillity even of those districts where property was in general secure. For instance,

the counties of Antrim and Armagh exhibited frequent scenes of violence, though few or none of plunder. Wherever the Ribandmen and Orangemen met, or came within reach of reciprocal insult or provocation, riot seldom failed to ensue. At Carrickfergus, a prosecution for riot took place before baron M'Clelland, where the parties indicted were Catholics; but, after the examination of several witnesses, whose evidence just went far enough to prove the impossibility of discovering which faction was the aggressor, the judge stopped the further progress of the trial, and dismissed both Orangemen and Ribandists, with a just reproof of that unnatural spirit by which the banners of two communities, calling themselves Chris tian, were made the incitements to devastation and civil bloodshed. On the 12th of June, the Orangemen, and Ribandmen, met at the fair of Maghera, in the county of Derry. A quarrel ensued; when the Orangemen, being driven to the barracks, there provided themselves with arms and ammunition, and fired repeated volleys upon the country people, of whom some were killed, and from 16 to 30 were wounded. The Orange triumph was afterwards celebrated by an attack on the houses and windows of Roman Catholics. The following circum

stance is an illustration of the mode in which party spirit was constantly interfering with the administration of justice. At the Lent assizes of Mullingar, a prisoner was put on his trial for murder, and the clearest evidence of his guilt was produced. The accused was a Catholic, and a single Catholic was on the jury. Eleven of the jurors were agreed to convict the accused of murder, but the twelfth stood out. No argument, no appeal to justice, or to conscience, could influence him. The jury, after being locked up until the judge left the town, were dismissed without a verdict, and the murderer escaped.

The disturbances in the southern counties and the adjacent districts, had never been entirely suspended; but in the beginning of the year, the outrages were less numerous than they had previously been, and hopes were entertained of a gradual return to tranquillity and peace. This expectation was quickly disappointed: for, during the month of March, the system of outrage was pursued in parts of the province of Munster with increased activity and vigour, and reached other parts of the country which had been nearly exempt from disturbance. During the first week in March, five malicious conflagrations and twelve outrages of different descriptions took place within the county of Cork; and for some subsequent weeks, scarcely a night elapsed, in which, within those districts, some house or property was not destroyed by fire, or in which attempts were not made by the insurgents to enforce the penalties previously denounced against all those who resisted the authority of these desperate offenders. Notwithstanding the

most unremitting exertions on the part of the military and the police to intercept the perpetrators of such crimes, few persons were apprehended. Conflagrations were so easily effected, even by one skilful offender, and the system of terror had been so firmly established in the minds of the inhabitants, that the detection of the crime became a matter of extreme difficulty, in consequence of the extent of the

evil.

Lord Combermere, early in the month of March, visited the principal military stations in Munster, and also conferred with the magistrates in the vicinity of Doneraile, and in the disturbed districts in that part of the county of Cork. At his lordship's suggestion, and at the desire of the magistrates, a large additional force of police was stationed in that neighbourhood, and the military force was distributed in the manner best calculated to aid the restoration of order.

In Limerick, which in January had been restored to tranquillity, instances of similar crimes appeared during the spring; and parts of the county of Clare were so much agitated as to require the application of the Insurrection act to two of the baronies which adjoined to the county of Limerick. An increased spirit of outrage was at the same time manifested in parts of the county of Westmeath, and Queen's County. In April, the Irish newspapers were every day filled with the particulars of many ferocious outrages in Cork, Limerick, Clare, Galway, Meath, and Dublin. The two grand juries of the county and city of Cork addressed the lord-lieutenant upon the state of the country. They affirmed in these addresses, that the spirit

of insurrection was rapidly extending-that there had come before the county grand jury, nearly a hundred petitions for compensation for damage sustained by fire, destruction of cattle by stabbing and houghing, breaking machinery, &c.; and that, after a patient inquiry, there were not more than four or five cases which did not appear fit subjects for relief from the county-that many had

been turned naked out of their dwellings, to behold them, a few moments afterwards, in ashes— that others had been intimidated into an abandonment of their lands-that all who had given evidence against insurgents, had done so at the risk of their lives, and some, who had only made statements respecting property de stroyed, had been speedily punished by the destruction of their own houses. In the county of Cork, two soldiers and a policeman were attacked on the road while returning home from duty. One of the soldiers died next day from the brutal treatment he suffered, and the policeman had his ears and one of his cheeks cut off! The spirit of depredation approached even within two miles of Dublin. A Mr. Loughnan, of Prospectplace, was forced to deliver up a large quantity of arms, which the ruffians demanded from him as loan." Several cabins were attacked and levelled with the ground in the same county, and the inhabitants barbarously ill-treated. In June, it was found necessary to place the neighbouring district of Kildare under the Insurrection act.

Under these circumstances, lord Wellesley called for, and the ministers here proposed, the continuance of the Insurrection act. That

measure was carried without much discussion. The opponents of it argued, not so much against the specific provisions of that law, as in favour of a general inquiry into the state of Ireland, with a view to find and apply a permanent remedy to her evils.

The collection of tithes had always been, either in reality or in pretext, one of the principal causes of disturbance in Ireland. To alleviate this source of mischief, a bill was introduced by Mr. Goulburn, the object of which was, to authorise compositions for tithes. It was much discussed in its progress through parliament. In the form in which it received the royal assent,* the following were the most important of its provisions:

In order to bring the act into operation in any parish, it was necessary that an application should be made to the lord-lieutenant, either by the incumbent, or some five owners or occupiers of land in the parish to the annual value of 201.; upon which application the lord-lieutenant was to have it in his power to direct the assembly of a special vestry, the business of which was, in the first instance, to discuss with the incumbent the propriety of compounding, for 21 years, for the tithes of the whole parish. If the lord-lieutenant directed the vestry to assemble, it was the duty of the incumbent, or of the five owners or occupiers of land (according as the application for the vestry had been made by the one or by the other), to require the high constable, or other collector of grandjury rates or county cess within the parish, to deliver lists of

• 4 Geo. IV. c. 99.

vestrymen; that is, of persons who in the preceding year were assessed to an amount exceeding 20 shillings, in respect of lands within the parish not tithe free.

If the incumbent and the vestry did not agree in the propriety of making a composition, no further proceeding could then be had upon the subject; and it only remained for the incumbent to certify such result to the office of the chief secretary. But if the vestry and incumbent agreed that a composition was desirable, it was necessary that a memorandum of that agreement should be made at the time, and signed by both parties; upon which the incumbent on his own behalf, and the vestry on behalf of the parish, were each to proceed to nominate a commissioner (qualified as required in the 14th section), to fix the amount of the annual composition. Then the incumbent was required, within seven days after the appointment by him of a commissioner, to give notice to the bishop of the diocess, to the churchwardens of the parish, and to the office of the chief secretary, of the name, and place of abode, of the person so appointed by him; and, in case any other persons besides himself were entitled to any portion of tithe within the parish, it was necessary that a similar notice should also be transmitted by him to each of those persons.*

The duty of the commissioners, when appointed, was, to ascertain and fix the amount of annual compensation, in the manner and according to the rules laid down in the 16th section.

This might, under particular circumstances, be an operation of some difficulty and delay; a pro

* Section 13.

vision for sanctioning a previous agreement between the incumbent and his parishioners was there fore introduced in the 27th section; which enacted, that, if the incumbent should have been able to make an agreement with the vestry, for the payment of a specific sum, and such agreement should have been sanctioned by the bishop of the diocess, and the patron of the living, the duty of the commissioners, should, in that case, be limited to an approval of the agreement so made, provided they were satisfied that the sum agreed on was not less than the average annual receipt on account of the tithes during seven years preceding 1821.

The commissioners, within four calendar months from the 1st of -November next, after they had signed their certificate of the amount of the composition, were to assess or applot that amount upon all lands within the parish, not being tithe-free, according to their true annual value. If no such applotment was made, the incumbent might require from the collector of the parish-cess a copy of the last applotment, according to which the composition was then to be levied.*

If the commissioners could not agree in fixing the amount of the composition, they were to appoint an umpire.

"Such were the provisions of the law that was passed: but the bill, as introduced by Mr. Goulburn, was very different both in its details and in its general principle. In particular, it originally contained a clause, by which the incumbent might be compelled to accept of a composition even against his

• Sec. 34 and 40.

will. This proposed enactment was so keenly opposed, at different stages of the measure, as a violation of the rights of church property, that it was at length abandoned. When this stumblingblock was removed out of the way, the other clauses, to which objec tions of less importance were made, were modified so as to meet, as far as possible, the views of all parties: and, at last, the bill was transmitted to the House of Lords.

There an attempt was made to restore it in some degree to its primitive form for, in going into a committee on the measure, Lord Clifden moved, that it be an instruction to the committee, to introduce a clause to empower the lord-lieutenant to appoint a commission for the purpose of settling the amount of composition for tithes, such amount to be determined with reference to the sums paid for tithes for a specified number of years previously to the valuation being made.

The Earl of Liverpool, although he believed that ultimately it would be necessary to add a compulsory clause to the bill, was of opinion, that more advantage would result from trying it as a voluntary measure in the first instance. The plan now proposed, he admitted, was an imperfect one; but it would at least alleviate the evil, and would, by its operation, cause the true nature and extent of the difficulties, that were to be struggled with, to be better understood. The motion was rejected by a majority of 34 to 11; and the measure was passed in the form which it had received in the House of Commons.

There had long been a practice in Ireland, by which parcels of land, from ten to five hundred