were most unremitting exertions on the part of the military and the police to intercept the perpetrators of such crimes, few persons 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 ashesthat 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 destroyed, 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 a 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. σε Under these circumstances, lord Wellesley called for, and the ministers here proposed, the continuance of the Insurrection act. Thas 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 incum bent 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.*192 "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 vio lation 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 objections 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 holder. This electioneering influence was the bribe, which perpetuated so pernicious a mode of letting. To discourage, therefore, a practice productive of so much evil, an act was passed, providing that it should not be lawful for any person to register, or to vote at an election in respect of, any freehold under the yearly value of acres in extent, were let to several individuals, from two to one hundred, jointly. Every one of these tenants was responsible for the rent of all the rest, as well as for his own. They made a new division of the arable every year or two; but the pasture remained always undivided. They generally paid a rack-rent; and after they had built their huts without mor-201. held under a lease executed to tar, chimney, or window, all swore any persons jointly, in common, or on registering their freeholds, to in partnership, after the 1st of 40s. profit arising from a joint July, 1823. lease for one or more lives. The uniform results of this system were, squalid beggary and extreme indolence; the necessary consequences of the industrious being liable to pay for the idle and profligate. Being all bound for each other, to the whole extent of the reserved rent, the landlord could at any moment ruin any one though worth far more than his own proportion of rent, by distraining him for the rent of his co-lessees. Even where joint-tenants were in the best circumstances, much of their time was lost in watching the proper application of their common funds. They all attended, whenever money was to be received or paid for the general account. This system contributed also in another way, to the multiplication of a beggarly population; for as persons never value a common right like an individual one, joint-tenants readily admitted into their partnership all their sons and frequently their sons-in-law. These joint-tenancies were equally injurious to the interests of the landlord: but they afforded him an easy means of increasing the number of voters under his absolute control; since he could, without difficulty, have every male living on his estate registered as a free VOL. LXV. On the 25th of June, Mr. Brougham presented a petition, signed by two thousand Roman Catholics of Ireland, complaining of the unequal administration of justice in that part of the empire. On the following day, after having moved that the petition should be entered as read, he proceeded to the consideration of the complaint contained in it. The topics upon which he insisted were the composition of the magistracy A the selection of juries-and the conduct of Sheriffs and their deputies. On the latter subject, he reminded the House of a circumstance, which had occurred during the current session. gentleman of the name of Dillon M'Namara, an attorney of many years' standing, had been summoned upon the late inquiry into the conduct of the sheriff, and grand jury of Dublin; and, by way of discrediting his evidence, the following questions had been put to him, "Did you not some years ago offer a bribe to a subsheriff of Dublin, if he would pack a jury to get off a client of yours, who was going to be tried for forgery?"Answer, "Yes, I did.' "Did you pack the jury?"-Answer, No, I could not, because the panel was up at the castle. [F] Did not the sub-sheriff, it would be asked, perhaps, indignantly reject the bribe? Did he not treat the offer, as every sub-sheriff in every county in England would treat it? Mr. M'Namara's answer as to that point made no mention of indignation. The questions went on-"Did not the sub-sheriff reject the bribe ?" Answer. “He did not get the bribe." Mr. M'Namara would not say he I rejected it. Question, Why did he not get the bribe?"-Answer, "Because he did not do what I wanted him to do." This was not, Mr. Brougham submitted, exactly the kind of dialogue, which would have taken place between an attorney and a sub-sheriff in England, upon the subject of packing a jury. He would not say, that the man, who would pack one jury to acquit a prisoner of felony, would as readily pack another to convict man of high treason, or of libel; but it would not be too much to suggest, that there was a point in money matters, to which, if the briber could manage to go, he might possibly find access to the ear of the sub-sheriff, even although he should wish to secure a conviction for an offence of that character. What would the House say to another practice, which he could prove by competent witnesses to exist in Dublin universally, of the sub-sheriff, whose duty it was to summon the juries, being in the habit of receiving from persons liable to serve, a fee of a guinea a-year, to refrain from calling on them to perform that duty? So that those men, to whom it was convenient to pay a guinea a-year, did not serve on juries at all; while those, who could not afford to pay the guinea, were compelled to do double duty, and those, who wished to serve, might, by not paying the guinea, serve more frequently than came to their turn. And this precious practice was not peculiar to Dublin; the provinces had the benefit of it as well as the capital, though the fee in country places was only half a guinea a year. Thus the superior classes, who were best calculated to act as jurymen, gave up, unless where they chose to act, the duty altogether; and it fell into the hands of persons who were less competent to the discharge of it, and more open to undue influence. Mr. Another evil was, that the process of the law did not reach equally to all classes of persons. Where a man had money, he regularly bribed the sub-sheriff, as soon as that officer came into place, and agreed to pay him all fees upon writs out against him for debt, as if such writs were formally served, provided timely notice of the issuing of such writs were given him. To the poor man, of course, this indulgence did not extend: he was taken with all the rigour of the law, and full justice was executed upon him. Brougham said, that he could prove this at the bar; but, in fact, i had been proved within the last three days, before a committee above stairs. He would read a note to the House of the evidence upon the subject. It was an attorney of respectability who now spoke, giving his evidence on the 23rd of the present month. Question. "Do you regard the difficulty of obtaining money in Ireland after judgment, as one of the obstacles to English capital being carried to that country?" Answer. " Certainly I do; and it is one of the greatest evils we have to contend with." Question. "How |