which holy work was very naturally, in the end, productive of partial apostacy, and almost general insubordination among the Students. So much for the College, now for the Committee. WALTER Cox.

May 30.

(To be continued.)

DEFENCE OF DOCTOR HAMILL. When this Reverend Patron of Doctor Brennan, advised the Catholics of his parish to hang the Petition to Parliament up in the Fish-market, we believe it was only a figurative expression, as the Vicar General had no idea

it would be taken as a literal instruction to execute it among the Poissardes of Pill-lane. We have it from Father Byrne, scandal caterer for Doctor Brennan's handsome publication, an interpretation exactly corresponding with our idea and opinion, that hang ing it up in the Fish-market was to hang it among the Faithful under the direction of the successors of St. Peter, who, as all the world acknow ledge, with the exception of our Preaching Masters of Britain, was a Fisherman, and the Head of the Chris. tian Church. We hope that this ac knowledgement of our submission to the decree of Doctor Hamill, and to the ingenious penetration of little Father Byrne, will prevent any schism in the Church, and save the united labours of Counsellor Clinch and the

Vicar General from undertaking the long chapter the two Gentlemen were composing in their Book of Controversy, for the purpose of confuting Watty Cox, the Author and Gunsmith.

DOCTOR BRENNAN'S LEGITI

MACY.

This great questionis one day to come before a Court of Law, as the Doctor has declared over his porter among the wrestling sailors at Watkins's, on George's quay, that he will make it a

condition in his last will and testament,
that his son must encounter the heirs of
Bob Cornewall in a suit at law, for
the family estate of 9l. 13s. a year,
bought by Bob from the Doctor's
mother, and for which the Doctor very
piously kicked her into the street, at
the same time advising the old lady to
hang herself; no woman more faith-
fully took the advice of a son, or with
more exactness, as she tied her neck to
a staple in Channel-row prison, where
she departed over the first noggin of
porridge. Like the Doctor, we are
obliged, particularly on this interesting
subject, to be personal, as we want to
clear up a certain affair, and not hav
ing any apprehension from the Doctor's
prowess, as he has a constitutional
aversion to fighting, and an insupera-
ble horror at the very name of pistols.
We have secured another retreat, even
should we urge the brute into madness,
because we could not descend to enter
into combat with the partner of Hud-
dlestone, the pander and agent of Sirr,
the journeyman of drunken Fitzsimons,
the panegyrist and pensioner of the
house of Keogh, and occasionally
turnkey to Larry Tighe, late of the
house of Leinster, but at present
holding the office of keeper of Bride-
well, under Major Sirr.

Whenever the son of Brennan undertakes to recover the estate, we wish he would previously take the pret tion of reading this article in our Magazine; because we are in possession of facts, that if known to the young representative of the house of Idough, would determine his conduct, make him rather give up the 97. 13s. a year, than make the amours of his grandmother a public topic of legal investigation. We have the names of the last six husbands in our hands, and were we not tender of the feelings of the drunken bookbinder, who acted as her last and surviving husband, wę would give a complete history of the matrimonial and amorous incidents of the deceased Lady.

FRENCH

FRENCH BIOGRAPHY. (Continued from June.)

In

had acquired a habit of repeating, be published, in 1796, a General History of the Crimes committed during the Revolution, &c; a shapeless ill-digested compilation, in which we perceive throughout the taste, the style, and the discernment of a sans-culotte, or rather of a maniac. What Frenchman would have imagined in 1792, that the author of the Journal of the Revolutions of Paris would one day enumerate the crimes and victims of the Jacobins ? It is not that we pretend to blame those who stain with infamy a Carrier, a Le bon, a Collet, a Robespierre, &c.; but was it for Prudhomme to set himself up against them? Before we mention any of the contradictions which swarm in his work, we shall speak of the method which he has adopted in it: it is necessary to establish the degree of authen ticity which the facts related by him possess. As soon as he had conceived the project of publishing this compilation, he endeavoured to procure some correspondents in the departments, who could send him a picture of the miseries that their country had endured under the reign of terror: all these documents he put together without arranging or connecting them, and without correcting the different styles, (hence arise the most disgusting dissimilarity and inconsistency in the tone and the principles) and lastly, he from time to time added reflections, which make the declamatory part of it, and which, tho' the work of one man, present still more inconsistencies than all the rest. As to these inconsistencies, we will say, that from the most extravagant Jacobinism, to the least disguised Royalism, all opinions are brought forward, adopted, and defended, not only in the course of the work, but even in the parts which are by himself alone. We will not speak of his hatred and his abuse of Marie Antoinette, of Louis XVI. and of all the most respected princes or sovereigns: his principles on this subject are known and marked every where; we will not mention his

L. Prudhomme, a Printer, Jour. nalist, and writer, is particularly known by his Revolutions of Paris, and by his General History of the Crimes of the French Revolution. At the beginning of the troubles he professed principles so extravagant, that his journal always surpassed in ferocity, and especially in absurdity, that of Camille Desmoulins, and other violent Jacobins, His rage was particularly directed against Maria Antoinette, and all the Sovereigns of Europe. December, 1791, he announced, by bill in capital letters, a work entitled: Crimes of the Queens of France, down to the present Queen, inclusive. This kind of proclamation not having been at first prohibited, after some time he had another stuck up on the very door of the National Assembly, in red let ters, and beginning thus: Prudhomme to all the nations of the earth: I give notice that I shall constantly publish the crimes of all the potentates of Europe, Popes, Emperors, Kings of Spain, of Naples, &c. The first want of a people which desires to be free, is to know the crimes of its kings. Not. withstanding the vigilance of despots, I will disperse thousands of copies in their states, with my devices The Liberty of the Press or Death." He afterwards pressed on the trial of Louis XVI. to the utmost of his ability, called on the government to celebrate the festival of pikes every year on the 14th of July, and to order that this weapon should be suspended at all windows on that day. It would be too tedious to repeat here all the absurdities produced by his inflamed brain; but the reign of Robespierre appeared to calm him a little, and the sight of the blood, of which he so earnestly recommended the effusion, terrified his soul, which was certainly less cruel than he had himself believed. Not being able, however, to part with the word crime, which he

invectives

French Biography

invectives against the successive chiefs of the Montagnards; every line of his history contains fresh ones: we shall content ourselves with saying, that this enemy to crowned heads, in his article of the crimes of the Notables (for there are crimes every where) imputes it to them as a crime, that they did not procure the king resources," in order to prevent all the misfortunes which desolated the land of France;" that is to say, if we do not mistake, the revolution, and consequently the "Their establishment of the republic. base negligence," says he, " ruined the court, and left the field open to every species of crime. Posterity owes to them its contempt and its indignation: curses upon them!" and as if he had feared that some mistake should be made concerning the regret with which the fall of the monarchy at intervals inspires him, he takes care to exclaim in his third volume, page 89, that "the magistrates of the people ought to haye written in golden letters on their mantles, this maxim of the Italian Malvezzi:" I hold that there is as much liberty under a good prince, as there is tyranny in a bad republic.' We shall conclude with a remark (which may extend to many wiser, and more judicious people, than Prudhomme) which is, that though he adopted more moderate and just ideas concerning the last years of the revolution, the royalists do not pardon him not having renounced the enmities and prejudices which he adopted during the earlier troubles; and reproach him for having endeavoured to justify the crimes and assassinations of 1789 and 1790, (among others, the massacres of the unfortunate Huez, mayor of Troyes, of M. M. Montesson, Cureau, &c) by bringing up again the accusations directed against them, which are now considered as absurd lies told at that Itime to mislead the people. The great pains which he takes to justify his inti 1macy with Camille, Danton, &c. and to persuade the world that he never ap.

proved of massacres and proscriptions,
are not the least curious part of his
work. Prudhomme had been a jour-
bookbinder at Meaux; he was
neyman
governor of the hospitals of Paris in
1789, and is now a bookseller in that
city.

-000

MEMOIRS OF GARAT.

D. J. Garat, the younger, a man of letters, a member of the institute, and professor of history in the Lyceum of Paris. The tiers-état of Latour deputed him to the states-general, and in the tribune of the constituent assemthough he seldom made his appearance bly, he made known his opinions by the accounts of the meetings which he published in the Journal de Paris. He opposed the grant to the king of an absolute veto, and in 1791 undertook the defence of the minister Fleurieu, who was denounced by his clerk Bonjour. On the 3d of October, 1792, he was appointed minister of justice, and commissioned to inform Louis XVI. of his condemnation. Bertrand de Moleville accused him of having removed some papers which exculpated the king, and though he loudly protested against the charge, his antago nist persists in it in the history of the revolution. On the 18th of March, 1793, Garat became minister of the interior, and on the 27th of May made a speech to the assembly to dissipate all alarm with regard to the riots and the armed force; he justified Pache and Hébert, and protested the deputies were in no danger: "I am persuaded," he added, "that the members of the committee of twelve, who were opposed to the Jacobins, have heated their imaginations, they think that they ought to display great courage, that they ought to die to save the republic. I believe them to be virtuous, men, but virtue itself has its errors." A decree ordered this speech to be printed, and on the 31st of May the insurrection of the commune broke out. At the meet

ing

ing of the Jacobin society on the 16th
of July, Danton congratulated Garat
on the services he had rendered on the
31st of May, and reproached him for
not writing enough for a cause which
he had so materially benefited. He,
as minister, greatly contributed to the
acceptance of the constitution of 1793.
On the 2d of August Collot d'Herbois
denounced him for having addressed in-
discreet questions to the communes ; he
was in consequence put under arrest,
and summoned to the bar, where he
appeared. Danton accused him of
weakness, but defended his intentions,
and Sevestre having called to mind that
he had served the republic well on the
31st of May, the decree of arrest was re-
pealed. On the 15th he left the mi-
nistry, and declared he was going to
edit a republican paper, that he might
still be useful to the state. In the be-
ginning of October he was arrested,
but was, a few days afterwards, set at
liberty again, and on the 27th of July,
1794, was appointed one of the com-
missioners of public instruction, and
professor in the normal school. In
March, 1795, Dumont de Calvados
having proposed an inquiry into his be-
haviour on the 31st of May, he was
defended by Lavan and Bréard: 'he
then thought it right to defend him
self, and published his Particulars of
the Revolution, containing a view of
his political conduct, and was super-
seded by Ginguené as commissioner of
public instruction. Henry Lariviere
accused him in the tribune of the con-
vention respecting the tranactions of
September: he complained heavily of
these assertions, and observed he had
not been appointed minister till the 9th
of October, and that he had described
the 2d and 3d of September as the era
of the most monstrous crimes. "If,"
added he, "republicans were not, at
this moment, (Aug. 1797,) abandoned
by the laws of the republic, I might
have summoned you before the tribu-
nals, but such appeals have never been
my practice: I am little desirous of

the most allowable vengeance, and were
I very eager to obtain it, I should not
yet go and ask it of judges and juries.”
In April, 1797, when he was appoint-
ed elector of Seine and Oise, he was
insulted in the electoral assembly by
several of his colleagues as a terrorist.
At this period he wrote a long letter
in the Key of the Cabinet against La-
harpe, insisting that the term Citizen
was preferable to Sir, or Monsieur, then
coming again into general use. On the
4th of September, 1797, he was re-
turned in the list of candidates to re-
place Barthélemy and Carnot, and was
afterwards appointed a member of the
central jury of the Seine. In Febru
ary, 1798, he was sent to Naples as
ambassador, and in the speeches he
made to the king and queen, he chose
to disregard the diplomatic forms, and
entered into philosophical discussions
which were not approved by any party.
These improprieties were injurious to
his mission, and his entreaties in favour
of the Neapolitan and Sicilian patriots
under confinement were without effect.
He soon took leave of the court, and
joined the council of ancients, to whom
he was appointed secretary on the 19th
of August. On the 21st of January,
1799, he was raised to the president-
ship, and pronounced a discourse for
the anniversary of Louis XVI.'s exe-
cution. On the 8th of February, on
occasion of the declaration of war on
the king of Naples, he enumerated the
crimes and faithlessness of that sove-
reign. At the period of the elections,
he undertook the defence of Francis de
Neufchâteau, then minister of the in-
terior, who was vehemently attacked
on account of a circular letter, in
which he seemed to dictate the plan to
be followed by the elective assemblies.
In May following he devoted the au-
thors of the massacre of Rastadt to
the vengeance of all nations, and was
commissioned to pronounce the funeral
oration on the ministers who had been
the victims of it. On the approach of
the crisis of the 30th of Prairial, (19th

of