"Oh! Oh! Mr. Armstrong, is this the man I have trusted the care of my people to ?"--" Why, I am a better man than you are," he replied. "How can that be?"-"I'll tell you: the people you gave into my charge, I have all safe and sound; but there are you, the priest, and your curate, and you have let the devil take a man from among the middle of you." "How so?" said Skelton. "Sure," he answered, "Dick Saggerton, you know, a day or two ago, cut his throat in the town with you, and the devil has carried him off in spite of you all." This, it seems, was really the case.

The irregularity of his people required every exertion. Their heads, it appears, were too often disordered, and their manners corrupted, by whiskey, which was too plentifu by means of the private stills.

One day he met a carpenter drunk, who was repairing the church, and checked him for his drunkenness, and neglecting the business he was employed about; he then said, the people of Fintona were all beggars, yet they were still drinking. "Sir," replied the man, "Solomon gives us liberty to drink, for he says, Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, and wine to those that be of heavy hearts. Let him drink, and forget his poverty, and remember his misery no more.'* You see then poor people should drink to keep up their spirits."

He saw a mill grinding malt for whiskey on a Sunday, and in his lecture took notice of it, as usual, saying, "We have malt on this side, and malt on that side. Ah! my poor parishioners loose their souls by it; the distillers are the cause of this, who are hanging by the tongue in hell.”— "Sure he lies" (one of them who was drunk in church said to another one beside him), " for you're not there, and I'm not there."

Another Sunday he carried off a parcel of boys' clothes who were stripped and playing ball.

In his own conduct he always set an example of strict piety and morality. Besides his private prayers, which were at least twice a day, he had family prayers every evening, to which he summoned the people of the town by the ringing of a hand-bell.

His neighbours frequently resorted to his lodgings, being

* Prov. xxxi. 6,7,

amused and instructed by his agreeable conversation. With some of them he used to play cards after dinner, to keep himself awake, for he was apt to slumber at that time.

Having a few of his parishioners with him one evening at his lodgings, he happened to fall asleep; and then, while one of them blowed his nose very violently with his handkerchief, another one plucked the handkerchief smartly, so as to make the noise very shrill. This instantly awakened Mr. Skelton, who said, "What, you're blowing a trumpet in my room to insult me;" and then starting up, he said he would beat them, and turned them out of the room. However, he received them again into favour, on their humbly begging to be reconciled to him, for they did not wish to fall out with him, his company being so agreeable.

It may be supposed, that even before he got the living of Fintona, he had improved, as much as possible, his extraordinary talent for preaching. When he preached charity sermons in Dublin, as he often did, he always brought thither a crowded audience. It was remarked, that on these occasions he generally got more for the poor than any one else, and well might he enjoin charity to others, who set such a noble example of that virtue in himself. His manner in the pulpit was unusually vehement, suitable to the warmth of his feelings. Some degree of vehemence in a preacher is absolutely requisite in the present days, when mankind are so careless about religion; indeed it requires no ordinary skill to make an audience listen for twenty minutes with tolerable attention. He never made use of spectacles in the pulpit, not even in his old age; in which he justly consulted the feelings of his audience: for surely it is disgusting to see a preacher mount the pulpit, and clap a pair of spectacles on his nose, to drawl out his dull lecture to his drowsy people. When he turns up his eyes off the paper, and looks at us through the spectacles which we see glittering on his nose, his appearance for an orator is really burlesque. To avoid all this, Mr. Skelton first made his own sermons, so that he had a great part of them already in his head; and next he had them copied in a large fair hand, which a young man could read at three yards distance. Consequently, in his very advanced age he could easily read them without spectacles. He generally hired a servant who could write a

tolerable hand to copy, at leisure hours, his sermons and other writings, in which he always improved by practice. Surely our beneficed clergy could at least afford to do this; and then they would no longer contribute by their spectacles to set their congregations asleep; to which indeed they are sufficiently inclined of themselves.

Being in Lisneskea church one Sunday, where the rector spoke in a lows queaking voice, he remarked to him after dinner, before some others," Sir, you speak in company loud enough, but you squeak so in church, that we can't know a word you say."

In Fintona church he took down the pulpit, and in its place raised the reading-desk to such a height, as to serve both for reading desk and pulpit. This gave him more room for action, with which, as already mentioned, he always set off his sermons.

In 1770, he published his works by subscription, in five volumes octavo, for the benefit of the Magdalen charity. The first volume contains Deism Revealed, the second and third, the sermons he published in England, the fourth, an additional volume of sermons never published before. To these four volumes he prefixed a dedication addressed to lady Arabella Denny, the illustrious patroness of the charity above-mentioned, dated Fintona, June 7, 1770. The fifth volume, which consists of miscellanies, he dedicates to the Rev. Dr. Henry Clarke, who had some time been his tutor in the university. These five volumes were printed by William Watson of Capel-street, and obtained for the charity 5001.

The additional volume of sermons he preferred to the others, as his understanding was more mature when he wrote them. His sermon on these words," The children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light," I have always admired for its just observations on mankind.

In the fifth volume, there are a few pieces not published before, of which it may be necessary to take notice.

First; Reasons for Inoculation; in which he mentions, that, some time before he wrote this little piece, seven children, on an average, died each day of the small-pox at Lisburn.

Second; An account of a well or pool near Clonis in the county of Monaghan, famous for curing the jaundice. The cure he supposes not owing to the virtue of the waters, but to the mode of application.

Third; Observations on a late Resignation. It alludes to the conduct of the Rev. Mr. Robertson, late of the established church, a short account of whom may not be unnecessary. He had the benefice of Rathvilly, in the diocess of Leighlin and Ferns; but as he could not believe in the Trinity, he resigned it through a scruple of conscience. On his resignation, he published his reasons entitled "An Inquiry," &c. which Mr. Skelton thought a book very agreeably written. He then wrote to Mr. Robertson, requesting he would come and spend the remainder of his life with him, and take part of what he had; if not, he offered him a large share of his income to support him. In his letter to him he said, "We should often argue, but never dispute; if we could not concur in one creed, we should at least coalesce in one heart," Such were his proposals to a man whose religious opinions differed so widely from his own. But Mr. Robertson nobly refused, and preferred retiring to a country part of England, where he kept a school for his bread. They were intimate ever after, and continued a regular correspondence with each other. When he sent his grandson afterward to our university, he committed him chiefly to the care of Mr. Skelton, who would not allow him, on urgent occasions, to be in want of money. This was a man that, without any pompous display of principle, quietly resigned a good living for conscience' sake. Skelton assured me that Mr. Lindsey, who made such a parade about his honesty, was not influenced by motives as pure as his, as the society which he established in London brought him more yearly than the vicarage he resigned.

Fourth; A dream. This is intended to expose the folly of fashion. In imagination it is not deficient; but it is too long, and its style stiff and affected. It requires no ordinary skill to make fiction appear pleasant.

Fifth; Hilema. By this he means a copse, or shrubbery. It consists of a variety of short observations, some of which, if written in an easy style, would be agreeable. There are also in it a few anecdotes well worth reading.

His good friend the bishop of Clogher coming to visit him at Fintona this year, arrived at his lodgings on a Sunday morning, when he had his hat on in his room, and was just ready to go to church. The bishop, it was observed, on entering, took off his hat, but he kept his on. Yet no one had a higher respect than he for his worthy patron, though he might not strictly observe every little ceremony.

At Fintona, this year, there were some remarkable events. One or two persons killed themselves; others were murdered; one man in particular was murdered in the street opposite to his window; which had such an effect on him, that he instantly made his escape from the place in dread of his life, imagining, if he stayed, that he also should be murdered. He durst not venture back again for three months, it was so long before he could shake off his apprehensions.

The county of Tyrone, he said, was remarkable for many murders, the perpetrators of which generally escaped unpunished. However, it has at last been thought expedient to punish them. In April 1788, I saw three of their heads fixed on Omagh jail for a barbarous murder lately committed.

It is to be hoped, for the honour of humanity, that Mr. Skelton was in no real danger of his life at Fintona; for they must have been worse than savages, had they attempted to injure a man, who was constantly doing good among them. Even in plentiful times he gave nearly the half of his income to the poor; or should he any year happen not to give so much, he only reserved his money to be more liberal to them at a season of scarcity. At the division of the poor's-money every Easter, he always joined to the whole collection 20 or 301. of his own. Besides, he very often put a guinea in the poor-box, and seldom less than a crown. He also gave money to buy flax-seed to those who stood in need of it. Indeed he was constantly dividing his charities, either publicly or privately, among the necessitous. Yet in the distribution of these, he was scarcely ever imposed on by improper objects, he examined so strictly into the condition of those he relieved. To the strolling beggars he was not, I must own, very liberal, for he suspected the most of them to be impostors. In one of his pieces he says," of all nuisances and grievances incident to poor Ireland, strolling beggars are the worst."