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dragged out of their beds and ducked; or delivered over to Captain Carder, to have their backs carded, (that is, flayed with a steel inftru. ment used in dreffing flax.)

But all this was done with jollity,

Midnight fhouts and revelry.

And these political maskers were all in fancy dreffes; white caps on their heads, and white shirts over their clothes; fome over uniforms, it is faid;-but no harm was done. Befides, their caufe was fo popular, that most of the middling farmers favoured them, and many of the thinking men approved of the end, and objected only to the means. Now, however, the whole affair is fettled by fpecial commiffion; the poor wretches, who have been tried and condemned, have suffered, and are a fufficient warning to the reft; though they have been generally pitied, because it was obvious that they were merely tools in the hands of others, and actually did not know what they were about. At all events, the country is now perfectly quiet; and we may all fleep in peace.

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Yes!-sleep in peace, like the rash fools who sleep at the foot of Mount Vesuvius-secure, because, say they, there has been lately an eruption of the mountain, and, may be, there will not be another in our times.

It is in vain to palter and palliate. Ireland never will be perfectly safe, till the causes of discontent among the great body of the people are removed. Complete Catholic emancipation, as it is called, should be granted to them; nothing less will do. As to the right, the arguments in favour of the abolition of the slavetrade are not more clear, than those in favour of the Catholic emancipation. But as to the expediency, it is alleged, if we grant the Catholics this, they will ask more. Then it will be time to refuse; but the surmise that people will encroach, is no argument against granting them their rights. Expediency can. never permanently stand against justice. And after all this, expediency exists merely in imagination. Popery is a mere bugbear. The fear of a Catholic interest in a British parliament is absurd. The Catholic gentry in Ireland, of property sufficient to become members of the senate, are few, compared with the Protestants; and, what is of more consequence, their interests are the same as those of the Protestants. Their property is subject to the same danger from invasion or insurrection. The old claims to forfeited Irish estates could never be substantiated, without despoiling the present opulent Catholics. Property against numbers, is a contest decidedly in favour of property, as long as the possessors of property manage their advantages with

prudence: but oppression makes the danger which it fears.

The Irish Catholics, upon their taking the oaths of allegiance and. fupremacy, thould, in their political rights, be put exactly on a

footing

footing with all the other fubjects of the empire; and fhould be relieved from the burthen of tithes paid to minifters from whom they receive no inftruction. Might not their priests, too, be paid by government? They would then be properly dependent. The late grant to the College of Maynooth, for the education of Catholics, is liberal and prudent. It is to be hoped, however, that that college is fubject to frequent vifitations. We fhould know what books are put into the hands of the ftudents; not with a view of interfering in the least with religious tenets, but to secure some pledge that the youth are properly educated. In all other colleges the courfe is univerfally known. With thefe precautions, and with this juft toleration, all the lower claffes of the Catholic religion in Ireland would be fafe, and good fubjects; not only when English troops are in the country, but in all circumftances. In cafe of an invafion, it would not be their intereft to join the enemy. It is a common Irish proverb, that those who are upon the ground can go no lower.' Raife them, and their fear of falling begins to operate. In moft countries, the lowest class of the people is in the fituation of the afs in the fable, caring not who is master, fince he muft always carry his paniers; but the afs ceafes to be in this, his usual state of neutrality, if his paniers be too heavily laden, and if he have hopes that his new mafter will lighten his burthen.

Independently of all that can be done by the Legislature, much may be effected towards making the different claffes of people in Ireland coalefce, by the good fenfe of individuals, in their daily converfation and intercourfe with each other. All figns of party hatred should be fuppreffed; all party words forborn. The appellations of orangemen and croppies fhould never be heard: Protef tant afcendancy thould never be talked of; nor fhould the term an honeft man be used exclufively to defignate a Proteftant. If this liberal policy were univerfally adopted, Ireland would indeed be perfectly quiet and fecure. And it would become, not only a fecure, but a flourishing part of the British empire, if commercial as well as religious jealoufies could ceafe. This is another subject, which a writer, publishing a quarto on Ireland, should have difcuffed. The difcuffion would lead us far beyond our limits, which we have already tranfgreffed: but we cannot avoid observing, in general, that it is a farce to talk of an incorporating union having taken place between two countries, whilst the frontiers of each are guarded by a host of customhouse officers; whilst the inhabitants cannot pass or repass from either country, without undergoing a fearch as rigorous as if they were in an enemy's territory; whilft the duties and drawbacks of excife operate as checks upon the transfer of property, and even upon locomotion.

Though

Though Mr Carr, from prudential motives perhaps, has avoided fome fubjects peculiarly interefting to Ireland, yet it is but justice to acknowledge that he has taken great pains to represent the Irish in their true colours, wherever he adverts to the prejudices of their neighbours. We fhall conclude our fpecimens of this work with his character of the Irifh, which we believe to be a faithful representation of that people, and which, we hope, will ftrengthen the public interest in their favour.

• With few materials for ingenuity to work with, the peasantry of Ireland are moft ingenious, and, with adequate inducements, laboriously indefatigable. They poffefs, in general, perfonal beauty and vigour of frame; they abound with wit and fenfibility, although all the avenues to ufeful knowledge are closed against them; they are capable of forgiving injuries, and generous even to their oppreffors; they are fenfible of fuperior merit, and fubmiffive to it; they display natural urbanity in rags and poverty; are cordially hofpitable, ardent for information, focial in their habits, kind in their difpofition; in gaiety of heart and genuine humour unrivalled; even in their fuperftition prefenting an union of pleasantry and tenderness. They are warm and conftant in their attachments; faithful and incorruptible in their engagements; innocent, with the power of fenfual enjoyments perpetually within their reach; obfervable of fexual modefty though crowded in the narrow limits of a cabin; ftrangers to a crime which reddens the cheek of manhood with horror; tenacious of refpect; acutely fenfible of, and cafily won by, kindneffes. Such is the peafantry of Ireland. I appeal, not to the affections or to the humanity, but to the juftice of every one, to whom chance may direct these pages, whether men fo conftituted, prefent no character which a wife government can mould to the great purpose of augmenting the profperity of the country, and the happinefs of fociety.'

Upon the whole, we have bestowed more time upon this book than we should have done, had not the author appeared before as a refpectable tourist, and had we not thought it our duty to endeavour to prevent him from degenerating into a mere collector of ftale jefts, and worn out anecdotes; in fhort, into a mere bookmaker. We now leave Mr Carr's merits to the judgment of more competent, and more confequential reviewers. The Irish have given him, from their favourite vehicle, the agnomen of JauntingCar, and the lord-lieutenant has created him a knight. *

ART.

* See a curious note (p. 31) in the aforefaid Epifle to Gorges Edmond Howard, relative to the offer of knighting George Falkener in the field, by the Earl of Chesterfield, in Dublin Cafle.'

ART. IV. A Tour to Shiraz, by the Route of Cazrum and Firuzabad, with various Remarks on the Manners, Customs, Laws, Language, and Literature of the Persians: To which is added, a History of Persia, from the Death of Kerim Khan, to the Subversion of the Zend dynasty. By Edward Scott Waring, Esq. of the Bengal Civil Establishment.

To travel in a country imperfectly known, and to publish a journey which shall neither prove amusing nor instructive, though not quite unprecedented in the history of literature, must still be allowed to require some address and management. As the ambition of authors is not limited to one mode of excellence, we venture to furnish a few canons for the benefit of those who may be desirous of excelling in this line; premising, that although we have derived some useful hints from the publication before us, our obligations are by no means limited to the lucubrations of Mr Waring. 1st, To avoid the relation of characteristic anecdotes as much as possible. Man is naturally a very inquisitive animal, and too apt to indulge an impertinent curiosity respecting matters which nowise concern him. The manners of foreign nations most evidently fall under this description; and it is extremely commendable in a traveller to disappoint him of this silly amusement. It is to the injudicious neglect of this canon, that we are to attribute the foolish interest which some authors have excited for persons who should be no more to us than we to Hecuba; thence it is that, at the courts of Gondar, of Amerapura, of Tasisudon, and even of Pekin, we had formed a little circle of acquaintances, in whose welfare we took a ridiculous interest, and have caught ourselves trembling at the danger which future revolutions might occasion to the tottering authority of the Abyssinian monarch, or the spiritual dignity of the infant Lama. There is also another reason for avoiding anecdotes illustrative of manners, and substituting short but comprehensive sentences in their stead. Veracity is an article in pretty general circulation; and those anecdotes are generally believed, either to be true, or to be supposed so, by the persons who report them. Judgment, on the other hand, is a much rarer commodity; the talent of generalizing the mass of facts, in order to deduce accurate conclusions on national character and manners, is not very generally possessed, and demands, for its exercise, a long period of observation, and an extensive range of communication amongst different ranks. The adoption of our plan, therefore, seems to be the surest method of excluding both amusement and instruc tion, since the reader is sure to be sceptical as to the author's

ability

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ability to form a correct judgment, particularly if his decisions are given in a very decided tone, although he may have resided. in the country during a period of almost three months. Besides, we really believe that most people coincide with us in adopting the Norman adage, Qu'il y a des bonnes gens partout; ' and when we find that these have been more careful than usual to keep out of the way of a particular traveller, we are not apt to appreciate highly his powers of impartial observation. 2d, The next canon we would recommend to a travelling tyro, is copiousness of reflections: the more trite the subjects, the better are they adapted to the end in view: for this purpose, we suggest despotism, insecurity of person and property, murder, assassination, and perfidy. As the same reflections must arise in every human breast on these topics, any given individual may be sure of not deviating into usefulness, by publishing his own. 3d, As every object in the physical and moral world may be contemplated in a point of view more or less favourable, he must be sure to seize the most unfavourable. This is an important canon; for a series of disgusting pictures, unavoidably creates some disgust at the book, besides an aversion to the subject, and all information connected with it. 4th, If recent events have raised the country through which he travels to a high degree of political importance, he should be cautious of affording information on the points which are most anxiously studied at the moment. But if he cannot altogether suppress these topics, he might at least contrive to treat them in a style so manifestly loose and inaccurate, as to destroy all hopes of obtaining correct and precise notions. We flatter ourselves, that these rules may not prove altogether useless to future travellers, and have again to disclaim exclusive obligations to Mr Waring, who has by no means sufficiently attended to them, on various occasions.

Mr Waring possessed one great requisite in a traveller, a perfect knowledge of the language of the country he was to visit. He embarked on the 10th of April 1802, (ask not from whence?) and arrived at Bushir on the 22d May. His route lay through the populous village of Birasgun, the ruins of Dires, and the city of Cazrun, now in a state of decline. On the 19th of June he entered Shiraz, where he remained till the 31st of July, about six weeks, and then returned by the route of Firuzabad to Bushir, where he staid till the 7th of September. The whole period of Mr Waring's stay in Persia, from the 22d of May till the 7th of September, comprizes a period of about three months and a half. But to collect information on all the topics we find mentioned in the titles of his thirty-five chapters, would, to an uninspired traveller, require years; to discover persons on whose statements

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