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sides of this river; ALL WHICH TIME THERE WAS NEVER ANY

SHOW OF RESISTANCE.

"And it is conceived by such as know the enemy's part of Tividale, that there are razed, overthrown, and burnt, in this journey, ABOVE FIFTY STRONG CASTLES AND PILES, AND ABOVE THREE HUNDRED VILLAGES."238

It may be fairly questioned, whether a band of demons, escaped from the regions of Lucifer, could, with their wonted activity, in five days, have perpetrated more devastation than my lord Sussex and his garrisons had the pleasure of accomplishing, upon the unresisting Scotchmen, in that space of time. The merit is enhanced tenfold, by the circumstance that it was executed on an unresisting enemy; and this forms the proudest wreath of the laurel crown that entwined the brow of the mighty hero! He ran no risk of his own precious life, nor of those of his merciful and heroic followers. To spare the lives of his soldiers, is the first duty of a general. That nothing in human form ever exceeded the horrors of this exploit, within the time it occupied, cannot be doubted. Fifty castles and three hundred villages consumed in five days! Illustrious achievement! Attila or Genghis Khan might have studied the art of desolation to advantage, under my lord Sussex. With what propriety or decency writers belonging to that nation dare to stigmatize the cotemporaneous Irish as savages and

238 Cabala, 174.

barbarians, let the world judge. And be it observed, that my lord Scroope made as pleasant an inroad beyond the borders, in a different direction, at the same time; and equally signalized his humanity, and his taste for bonfires.* With similar exploits of this polished and humane nation, to which Ireland stands so much indebted for her civilization, we could fill a dozen chapters for the edification of the reader: but we presume it can hardly be necessary. Let us, however, without offence, offer a gentle hint to Englishmen, and more especially to their writers, that whenever the subject of savages and barbarians is started, it would not be improper to bear in mind the homely, but instructive proverb, "Men of glass, throw no stones." To this lesson, hardly one of them ever pays due attention,

*"The Rode of the lord Scroope, warden of the west marches of England, into Scotland,

Who, the 17th of April, at ten of the clock at night, with three thousand horse and foot, came to Ellesingham, on the Wednesday at night, and burned that town in the morning, being from Carlisle twenty miles. On Thursday, he burned besides Hoddam, the Maymes, the town, and all the houses, which is the lord Herryes'; that day they burned Trayletrow, which is the lord Maxwell's; they burned the town of Reywell, which is the lord Copland's and the lord Homeyne's. They burned the house of Copewell, and the demesne of the lord Copland's. They burned the town of Blackshieve, which is the lord Maxwell's; item, the town of Sherrington, of the same; item, the town of Lowzwood, of the same lord's."239

239 Cabala, 175.

The barbarity of English warfare, about that period, was very impartially dealt out to other nations besides the Scotch and Irish, who had no particular preference. The French* and Spaniards+ were under equal obligations.

*"Twenty days together did the lord Talbot, with fire and sword, pass through Picardy and Artois, destroying all that stood in his way, and so returneth UNENCOUNTERED.'

19240

The English, in their invasion of Spain, in the year 1566, committed such scenes of havoc and destruction, as would have become a horde of Scythians. "The town [Cadiz] they burnt, saving only the churches. The walls they battered, and towers demolished. The island itself they burned, razed, and spoiled, LAYING ALL WASTE BEFORE THEM, and leaving the rubbish to declare the ruins which the English had made."

"241

The army "coming to Vigo, found every street fenced with a strong barricado, and but only one man in the town; the inhabitants making towards Bayon, as fast as they could drive. Then wAS BOTH THE TOWN, AND ALL THE COUNTRY 77242 This was FOR SEVEN MILES COMPASS, SET ON A FLAME.' the polished, refined, and humane nation, that was to civilize the Irish, whom Leland veraciously styles "savages:" but, so far as respected warfare, the English were themselves plunged in the most savage barbarism, as a perusal of their own writers will fully evince.

349 Daniel, II. 140. 241 Speed, 1198.

242 Idem, 1191.

CHAPTER XII.

Representation in Parliament. Fraud, venality, and corruption of the executive, legislative, and judiciary. Rotten boroughs. Record of infamy, on the Journals of the House of Commons.

WE have fully established the non-existence of lord Clarendon's golden age, under three great aspects, freedom of religion, security of person, and security of property. We have proved it as fraudulent and false, as fraud and falsehood ever conspired to make any portrait. The fourth general head remains,—a fair representation in Parliament. To this we invite the reader's attention.

Under a free and independent Parliament, Ireland could not possibly have suffered the tithe of the oppressions of which the reader has had an indistinct bird's-eye view; but which, at full length, would fill folio volumes. There have been countries as much oppressed as Ireland ; and tyrants as fell, and as fierce, and as rapacious as the deputies that swayed the sceptre there. But we know of no part of Europe that has experienced, for the same length of time, that is, for six hundred years, so grinding and hideous a despotism.

In a Parliament correctly constituted, the interests of the representatives would have been so completely identified with those of their constituents, that it would have been impossible to have subjected the exercise of the national religion to pains and penalties, at the will, as we have already said, of a paltry minority of two-thirteenths of the nation, at most; or to have enacted any of those barbarous statutes which rendered the legislation of Ireland, for centuries, an object of abhorrence and detestation.

We shall consider the subject of representation under four different heads:

I. The periods of the meeting of Parliament; II. The modes of election;

III. The manner of framing laws; and

IV. The freedom of debate.

And it cannot fail to appear, that, in this respect, Ireland was as flagrantly oppressed, as we have seen under the preceding heads.

I. Periods of Meeting.

From the twenty-ninth year of Elizabeth, anno 1587, to the fifteenth of Charles I. anno 1639, embracing a period of fifty-two years, there were but two Parliaments held in Ireland;-one in 1613, under James I.; and the other in 1634-5, under Charles I.243 Thus were the powers of legislation wholly suspended, in one instance, for twenty-six, and in another for twenty-one

243 Mountmorres, II. 175.

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