relation to political economy, of the lower order being raised to that decent state of intellectual and moral improvement, which there is not the smallest chance of their attaining while under the influence of a superstition which governs them by besot ting them. While however we condemn such indifference, cs.. pecially when indifference affects the character of superior wisdom, we equally condemn all corrupt and all violent methods of advancing the protestant cause. It is not by tempting the conscience of the papist with a pitiful sum of money, nor by forcibly interrupting the follies of his public worship, nor by making him, for the sake of his religion, the subject of continual derision, nor by unnecessarily excluding him from any advantage, that we could wish to see genuine Christianity aided, in its warfare against that wretched paganism, into which what was once religion is found degenerated, among all very ignorant papists in every country. We cannot but regret that both the civil and ecclesiastical rulers of Ireland should have been, for the most part, unacquainted with all apostolical methods of attempting the conversion of the catholics. And it is melancholy that the generality of the ostensible ministers of religion, at present in that country, should be so very little either disposed or qualified to promote this great work. We happen to know, that there are some brilliant exceptions to this remark; the lustre of whose character, if it cannot prevail to any distance, yet defines and exposes the obscurity which surrounds them.

Our traveller was attentive to collect any kind of useful or amusing information, respecting the several places which he visited, and respecting the country at large. He is of opinion that Ireland is of a temperature probably more mild and equal than that of any other country. Its unrivalled verdure is owing to its western position, where its hills are the first interruption to the clouds of the Atlantic, in consequence of which the proportion of rainy weather is much greater than in England. We presume this circumstance would render it, with the advantage of an equal cultivation, more richly productive of almost all the most valuable kinds of vegetables; and Arthur Young, we recollect, has given it as his opinion, that the soil of Ireland is more fertile, acre against acre, than that of this country. The agriculture is described as considerably progressive on the whole, in spite even of the singularly hapless condition of multitudes of its most valuable labourers.

One of the most curious and interesting parts of the book is the account of the interior of the Irish bogs. In digging to a great depth in one of them, there were found three prostrate woods, one below another, and separated by successive deep strata of earth. Mr. Carr refers the investigation of these facts

to more philosophic men, apparently afraid of the gravity of such inquiries; and lest even his momentary descent into the abyss of a bog-pit should have, on him, or his readers, any such effect as that of the cave of Trophonius, he inspirits himself and them with a good story of an" embalmed cobler," once found, with all his implements about him, in one of these places. Just in this manner a bog-digger takes his glass of whiskey be fore he begins.

In the narration of the hasty visit to so enchanting a place as the lakes of Killarney, we were vexed that any of the pages should be occupied about such-a-one Esq. and a second Esquire, and a third, and so on. It lessens the charm of the description, in the same manner as the crowded quarter-sessions in the town spoiled in a degree the pleasure of being in the place itself. We could also have well spared the foolish lines of Swift, called A Gentle Echo on Women. We are on the contrary delighted with the little anecdote of the huntsman, who set free a poor fawn which he had caught, because the dam followed him with tones of distress. Things like this are in harmony with the exquisite and tranquil beauty of the scene. As travellers cannot relate all the incidents they witness or hear of in each place which they visit, it would be the part of a judicious artist to select those which most harmonize with the character of the situation. Mr. Carr wants a good deal of improvement in this point. Not that we could have the conscience to require him to suppress all the humourous anecdotes which he hears, but we really wish that, if he should ever visit another place like Killarney, he will make such a choice of facts and anecdotes, out of the whole mass which comes before him, as to aid the emotions of sublimity and beauty which are peculiarly appropriate to the place, and which the actual observer would be ashamed of himself if he did not feel as the prevailing state of his mind, while he remained amidst this magnificence of nature. We must not, however, forbear to add, that Mr. C. does give a very pleasing account of this noble scene, notwithstanding the spirit and tone of the description are so unfortunately interrupted, when any jokes or ludicrous incidents, those literary wild fowl in the pursuit of which our traveller is an incomparable sportsman, happen to fly across his view.

He went to Limerick and Cork, which he describes sufficiently in detail. The shocking accounts of the house of industry at Limerick, and of the house of industry and the old jail at Cork, will sting the principal inhabitants, we hope, through very shame, to the adoption of some more humane, more decent, and more useful regulations. On reaching Kilkenny, he found quite a jubilee bustle in the streets." The

sacred flame of charity was glowing throughout all the town. It was understood that numbers of human beings were "sinking under want and misery ;" and a great company of gentle. men, and other people, were convened to make a noble effort of pure Christian munificence. And in what manner, courteous reader, should you suppose the resources were to be supplied for executing the pious design? The money was obtained by means of theatricals, which are performed during one month every year, with an incalculable mischief, beyond all doubt, to the morals of the young people. The balance, after deducting the expenses attending the performance, is reckoned at about 2001. This, as we should infer, from another item in the account, is not a fourth part of the whole sum paid for entrance into the theatre; but how much of even this smaller sum would have been contributed for the charity, if it had not been extracted by means of this vain and noxious amusement?

Mr. Carr seems to have visited Ireland in the capacity of character painter to the principal inhabitants. And as the other class of artists, portrait-painters, are said to keep a number of Venus's, Adonis's, Apollo's, &c. within sight while at their work, so we cannot be so simple as not to suspect that this moral painter has played off the same device on those who sat, and on us who are called to inspect and admire. He meets with a certain General here, at Kilkenny, whose generous patriotism may challenge the whole empire to produce an equal. In this one instance, however, Mr. C. does not attempt to put the trick upon us; and we are thankful to him for his honesty. He might have observed a discreet silence as to the particular proof of this unrivalled generosity, and then we should have supposed this patriotism displayed itself in nay, should have very deeply pondered all the forms in which it could have been displayed, and tried to ascertain which is the most generous and useful. Has he built a hospital for the lame or blind? Has he remitted his poor tenants half their rents on account of a severe season? Has he helped a great many little farmers to cultivate pieces of waste land? Or perhaps he has established large schools for the decent education of the brats of the wild Irish. No, he has done something much nobler : he has made, each year, a large volunteer subscription towards defraying the expense of carrying on the war. Cunning Mr. Painter! always perform in this manner; and we shall not be tempted to the sin of reviling you for having taken us in.

Our readers have often heard of the late Dean Kirwan, long celebrated for his charity sermons; and if eloquence be rightly defined the art of persuading, it would appear that he must have been one of the greatest orators of modern times; for the sums collected after his sermons, amounted in all, as we are

informed by Mr. Carr, to nearly sixty thousand pounds. For purposes of mischief we have often enough had occasion to see that a mere second-rate eloquence is sufficient to obtain immensely greater sums; and we have observed human nature too long to wonder at the fact; but that a sum like the one here specified should be granted to the pleadings of charity, does excite our wonder we own, and also our curiosity to know the exact nature of the eloquence which had so great an effect. Mr. Carr has given several pages of specimens, which he obtained with difficulty from a reverend admirer of the Dean, who had taken them down in short-hand. But whether it be, that the writer gave a cast of expression of his own to the sentences of the speaker, or whether there was a defect of taste in selecting them, or whether they were accompanied and enforced by unequalled graces of delivery, or whether the great law of attraction exists in less force between money and its owners in Ireland than in other countries, or whatever other cause, of which we are not aware, contributed its influence, we acknowledge that we have some difficulty to comprehend, how a kind of oratory so very dissimilar to the noblest models of eloquence could produce the splendid result. These specimens too much remind us of the worst literary qualities of French oratory. The language has an artificial pomp, which is carried on, if we may so express it, at a certain uniform height above the thought, on all occasions; like the gaudy canopy of some effeminate oriental, which is still supported over him, with invariable and tiresome ceremony, whether he proceeds or stops, sleeps or wakes, rides or condescends to step on the ground. The images seem rather to be sought than to spring in the mind spontaneously, and to be chosen rather for their splendour than their appropriateness. And the train of thinking appears to have little of that distinct succession of ideas, and that logical articulation, which are requisite to impress sound conviction on the understanding.We fear, however, that we begin to descry one capital cause of the Dean's success, in something else than the literary merits of his oratory; and our readers will hardly avoid the same surmise when they read the following passage. Expressing his reverence for the man," however he may differ in speculative opinions," who relieves the wretched, &c. &c. he proceeds, "Should such a man be ill-fated, here or hereafter, may his fate be light! Should he transgress, may his transgressions be unrecorded! Or if the page of his great, account be stained with the weaknesses of human nature, or the misfortune of error, may the tears of the widow and the orphan, the tears of the wretched he has relieved, efface the VOL. II. 3 R

too rigid and unfriendly characters, and blot out the guilt and remembrance of them for ever!" Now if an admired preacher, after a pathetic address to the passions of a numerous and wealthy auditory, many of whom had never accurately studied the doctrines of Christianity, could have the courage to proceed forward, and declare to them, in the name of Heaven, that their pecuniary liberality to the claims of distress in general, and especially to the case of distress immediately before them, would secure them, notwithstanding their past and future unrepented and unrelinquished sins, from all dan ger of divine condemnation; intimating also, that, on the extreme and improbable supposition that they should be consigned to the region of punishment, it would prove so light an affair as to be rather a little misfortune than an awful calamity, he might certainly persuade them to an ample contribution. But that an enlightened minister of a protestant church could have the courage to declare or even insinuate the pernicious sentiment, awakens our utmost astonishment. We think there can be no doubt that a certain proportion of the money collected after the address, in which such a passage as this was seriously uttered, would be paid literally as the atonement for past crimes, and as the price of an extended licence to repeat them with impunity. If the whole of the oration was powerfully persuasive, we cannot fail to attribute a large share of the success to that particular part, so soothing to apprehension, and so flattering to ignorance and corruption.

In returning towards Dublin, our author made a visit to the house of Mr. Grattan ; and he might well feel himself flattered by the welcome, and the polite attention, which he experienced there, and gratified by the mental luxuries which, we may believe, scarcely another house could have supplied. We should have been glad to receive some more particular information about this distinguished orator, than the assurance merely of his being a polite and hospitable man, an elegant scholar, and respectable in domestic relations. We should have been glad to hear something of his studies, his personal habits, his style of talking, or the manner in which he appears to meet advancing age. Yet we acknowledge it is a difficult matter for a transient visitor, who is received on terms of formal politeness, to acquire much knowledge on some of these particulars, and a matter of some delicacy to publish what he might acquire. A number of pages are occupied with passages from Mr. Grattan's speeches; some of which extracts, we believe, were supplied to Mr. Grattan from memory, and therefore are probably given imperfectly. On