to or by the multitude. "The rights of landlords" he would begin by attacking. "They consist principally (according to him) in masses of statute law, being statutes passed by the landlord class, for their own benefit." This is the usual language of the Jack Cade class of politicians; and O'Connell's scheme for reducing the landed gentry of the country to mere dependents on their tenantry, shows that his principles are well represented by the tone of his declarations.

The Repealers are to "enact a law," which is to repeal "much of the existing statute law in favour of landlords;" but then those landlords are to have "perfect remedies for recovering a rent adequate to the real value of the land, after allowing for the tenants' rightful and natural share of the growing produce.' There is an agrarian insolence, in this which betrays the cloven feet of those who are sighing and groaning to ride roughshod though the halls of the Irish landlords, and, if possible, through the palaces of the Queen herself. Leases are to be imperative -the real value of the land is to be fixed upon, of course, by him who is to cultivate it;-what is the "tenants' rightful and natural share of the growing produce," is to be decided by the tenant himself; and then the tenant is to have a lien on the land for valuable and lasting improvements! Mr. Sharman Crawford is to be the umpire: his bill the model;—and then Ireland is to be tranquillized when the Papists have plundered the Church, and when the tenants shall have defrauded the landlords! What a perfect specimen of just, equal, reasonable, and tranquillizing pacification!!

The rest of the "Address of the Repeal Association" to the people of Ireland can be disposed of in a few sentences. It contains, in a most inflated and bombastic style, false promises, unjust assertions, statements of imaginary wrongs, and exhortations to energetic union, and a display of force. "The commercial relations" of Ireland are to be vastly improved; Ireland is to have her own manufactures; the elective franchise is to be vastly extended; corporate reform is to be con lete; "foreign minions" are no longer " to insult the people of reland;" "the right of petitioning" is no longer to remain in eopardy; "the absentee drain" is to be got rid of; the "English debt" is not to be paid by Ireland; and that land of lands is to equal “glorious" Belgium, or proud and splendid "Norway," both put forward by the agitator as the models of independence, virtue, happiness, and prosperity!!

This is the "Address." It concludes with a panegyric on the Belgium revolution!

What does this mean? Does it mean to convey a threat, an

insult, and a direction? To be sure it does. It is intended by it to say to the Government-" Take care that we do not make a revolution, and a revolution too to overthrow the dynasty!" It is intended to insult the people of England, by representing them as easily got rid of, as the Belgians separated themselves from the Dutch. It is intended as a direction to the Repeal wardens all over Ireland, to prepare for a general rising, and for physical resistance! Couple this language with that before quoted in the earlier pages of these remarks, in which the dastardly exhortation to the Irish Papists in London to burn down English manufactories and property should the Irish Repealers be attacked, and we have the measure of the infamous schemes which O'Connell projects for carrying into effect his plans of repeal and of anarchy. True, indeed, to cover his retreat, and hide for awhile his shame and his rebellion, he protests that he does not desire, but "repudiates," a total separation, "such as Belgium," and only looks for and seeks a local Parliament " like Norway." But who that is acquainted with the history of all revolutions, and of all demagogues and democrats, in all times, and in all countries, does not know that they commence as they did in Belgium, and as they are now doing in Ireland, with "sweet speeches, fair promises, and loyal assurances," to end their career in perjury, disloyalty, bloodshed, and treason?

We have entitled this article "IRISH PROSPECTS, AND GOVERNMENT DIFFICULTIES," and we have done so advisedly. And is not the first and foremost difficulty "What is to be DONE WITH IRELAND?" The Government has presented a bill to disarm the disaffected; and it has well done in so acting. The opposition to that measure in the House of Commons is factious and unprincipled. The Government has sent troops and vessels to Ireland and to the Irish coast; and it has well done in adopting measures to preserve physical peace, or at least, if possible to prevent collision. The Irish have little confidence in O'Connell's sharp-shooters, when they have marshalled against them English battalions. The Government has dismissed from the commission of the peace the magistrates who attended at, or encouraged, Repeal meetings, and has accepted immediately the resignations of those who have rejoiced either to display their spite, or to insult the Irish authorities. All this is well done on the part of the Government, but it is only a tithe of that which they must yet perform. Is the Legislative Union to be maintained? Yes, or no! We do not mean maintained, like the Protestant ascendancy, to be defended in 1828 and abandoned in 1829. We do not mean maintained, like the old and admirable constitution of the House of

Commons, to be pronounced a perfect model in 1829, and sacrificed to the "pressure from without" in 1830. But we mean to ask this question of our Government-"Is the Legislative Union to be maintained, even if so great and vast a calamity should follow as a civil war? Coute qui coute, is the Legislative Union to be maintained?" We say "Yes!" Do our governors say the same; and are they prepared to accomplish the same? If they are, then something like the following plan must be adopted.

First, the Irish Poor Law must be greatly altered, for it has added vastly to the ill blood and bad feeling existing previously. The Irish complaints on this head are just and wellfounded, and we hold it to be the bounden duty of the Government, and of the Parliament, to listen to and redress them.

Secondly, the Repeal Association must be declared illegal by law, and all other associations, or plans, which shall have for their object, directly or indirectly, to agitate the public mind on the question of Repeal. There must be no loop-hole left by which O'Connell and his faction may escape. The folly of talking of legality-i. e., of the legality of seeking to overthrow all the institutions of a country, under the pretext of holding public meetings to repeal an Act by another Act, is too contemptible and childish to be treated with seriousness. If the shallow excuse of meeting to repeal the Act of Union can justify rebellion, because this Act is, forsooth! to be repealed by another Act, then why not seek to repeal the Magna Charta by calling "the people" together to make another Charta? In all these large and popular movements the real question is this -What is the object sought for? Now, in this case, who can doubt for a moment that the object is to overthrow all the institutions of the empire, and to disturb that union which is essential to the well-being and happiness of all its parts? This is not merely illegal, but it is revolutionary and anarchical, and should be treated as such.

Thirdly, all public meetings held in the open air, and so held for the manifest purpose of exciting masses of poor and ignorant people to moral, if not to physical insubordination, should be treated as seditious meetings, and prevented by cautions and proclamations, or dispersed by force and severity.

Fourthly, the active and interested leaders should be arrested, imprisoned, and tried; and in the event of it being clear to the Government that fair and impartial trials could not take place in the counties in which the offences were committed, the

Attorney-General should have the power of preferring the indictments, or of removing them to less disturbed and agitated districts. Fifthly, all subscriptions, collections, or contributions of any sort, and in any form or disguise, with the view of aiding the Repeal movement, should be prohibited by statute; and persons either subscribing, or receiving subscriptions, for such a purpose, should be held to be guilty of a misdemeanor. Besides this, the press should be interdicted from publishing any lists of such subscriptions or subscribers, or from making any allusion thereto. A similar bill has been passed in France during the reign of Louis Philippe; and since then subscriptions for revolutionary purposes have been unknown. Of course such a proposal will be met by the cry of, "This would be gagging the press." The answer would be, "This is not gagging the press, but preserving Ireland from abortive attempts at revolution."

Sixthly, the garrisons of Ireland must be well filled with English and Scotch soldiers. The magistracy of Ireland must be composed of men of devotedness to the Union. The public officers of Ireland must be persons of no doubtful calibre; and all who have taken any part in the Repeal agitation must be removed from spheres where their presence could be injurious, and their example baneful.

But, seventhly, public works in Ireland must be encouraged; emigration from Ireland to our colonies must be promoted; patronage in Ireland must be carefully and kindly exerted and bestowed; local interests must be watched over and defended; and all that can possibly be done must be done, and ought to be done, to make the Irish feel less and less that they are a conquered and a dependent people, by placing them on as near an equality as possible with us, in all our civil, ecclesiastical, municipal, political, and social relations. Not only do we ask for "justice for Ireland," but for kindness, sympathy, and Christian brotherhood.

If the Government is prepared to adopt this line of conduct, it is not only possible to maintain the Legislative Union, and to put down the cry for "Repeal," but to render Ireland a source of prosperity and of advantage to Great Britain, at the same time that the latter will become a nursing-mother to the former country. This is the only means of meeting the FIRST and the greatest difficulty, which the Government has to encounter. We will not venture to predict the course that will be pursued; for ease is always preferred to effort, and Governments, like individuals, leave too much to time, to accident, and to circumstances; but we are at least sure of this, that the present Repeal

agitation in Ireland is not to be put down by compliment, civilities, and persuasion.

The SCOTCH CHURCH QUESTION is the next difficulty which the Government has to meet. Not what is to be done about the Veto Act, or the Strathbogie ministers, or the quoad sacra clergy for these are resolved by the proceedings of the General Assembly of the Kirk, and by the measures of the Government. But what is to be done to pacify the Scotch Conservatives, who are so indignant that five hundred of their ministers have been allowed to withdraw and form themselves into a "Free Church," because they could not obtain from the Government the concessions they demanded, or the terms they dictated. We regret to state that the course the Government has pursued (and yet which was the only course it could adopt) has so offended its Conservative friends as to render their support next to impossible at the next general election. On this subject, however, we shall say no more, as it will be treated of in the "Ecclesiastical Report."

In like manner we shall say little of the THIRD difficulty-we mean the EDUCATIONAL CLAUSES of the Factory Bill. The Government has neither satisfied the Church, conciliated the Dissenters, or enlisted any party on its side with respect to this bill. The Wesleyans make common cause with Papists and Socinians, Independents, Presbyterians, and Baptists, and all the followers of Joanna Southcote, Emanuel Swedenborg, and Edward Irving; and that powerful body of sectarians, the followers of John Wesley, are now in a state of open hostility to the Church.

The melancholy divisions in the CHURCH OF ENGLAND-the schism at Oxford-and the necessity for taking strong moral measures to close the breaches and heal the disorders in the Church, present the FOURTH capital difficulty for the Government to meet and to overcome. This is another subject which here we simply allude to, since it is debated fully elsewhere in our pages.

CHURCH EXTENSION, and the necessity for doing something effectual for the amelioration of the condition of the poor, form the FIFTH difficulty; and the former Sir Robert Peel has sought rather to elude, than to meet, by a measure of a very limited character; whilst the latter evil he has proposed partly to cope with by a measure simply applicable to a very small portion of the community, and to which objections are, however, made in limine. The SIXTH difficulty consists of two questions which we will place under one head-the proposed union of the dioceses of St. Asaph and Bangor, and the Ecclesiastical Courts Bill. The