with the reverence due to the superiority of his genius, and the inflexibility of his integrity. But Mr Grattan could do no more with the materials he had to work with; he looked forward with generous enthusiasm to that hour when he could take, under the protecting shelter of his free constitution, the catholic as well as the protestant. He thought he had raised a flame of patriotism in the protestant bosom, which might, in no very remote day, communicate its light to the most distant corner of his country. He raised a vast superstruc ture on a small foundation; and in his endeavours to enlarge the base, the insidious artifices of monopoly overthrew the dazzling edifice, and buried his labours in the ruins.

This Irish parliament of 1689 was composed of protestants and catholics. It may not be uninteresting to the descendants of those men who took a part in the assertion of national freedom, to read over the names of their ancestors; they will there find a full reply to the impudent accusation, that the liberal and enlightened catholic was the advocate of passive obedience. They will observe in the proceedings of this calumniated assembly, the true spirit of independence, taking such broad and firm ground as would have rendered it invincible under a monarch of courage or of talent. Mr Leland has industriously laboured to perpetuate the slanders of Archbishop King, and sets down such palpable absurdities as must excite the indignation of every

* See Appendix.

reader. It will not be supposed that at the very moment the Irish protestant was sitting on the same benches with his catholic countryman, making and administering the laws of his country, asserting the liberties and the rights of conscience, the catholic counsellors of King James should have been recommending his Majesty to order a public plundering of the bakers throughout the metropolis, in order that the protestants might be starved; yet Mr Le land feels it his duty, as an honest historian, to reecho the vicious fabrication of King. "Yet cer

tain it is," says Mr Leland, "that during that melancholy interval in which the popish laity were predominant, protestants felt all the distresses arising from a state of war and disorder, aggravated by the wanton insolence of their adversaries. If they attempted to purchase corn, or other provisions, with the brass coin, these were instantly seized for the king's use, and the proprietors imprisoned as men who intended to supply the enemy. We were at a loss,' saith Archbishop King, what the meaning of taking away corn from protestant farmers, housekeepers and bakers, should be, when there was no scarcity in the kingdom; but Sir Robert Parker, and some others, blabbed it out in the coffee-house, that they designed to starve one half of the protestants and hang the other, and that it would never be well till this was done. We were sensible that event; for no protestant could get a bit of bread, and hardly a drop of drink, in the whole city of Dublin. Twenty or thirty soldiers stood constantly about every bake

they were in earnest by the

house, and would not suffer a protestant to come in." Mr Leland is not content with taking this infamous and audacious falsehood from King; he consents to indorse it with his own opinion of its truth, and asserts its credibility without producing a single witness to confirm it. His observation is as follows: "Such representations are sometimes derided as the fictions of an inflamed fancy. But however improbable those instances of senseless tyranny may appear, they are confirmed by undoubted traditions received from the sufferers, and transmitted with every circumstance of credulity." The Irish catholic should no longer wonder, that the protestant youth who has been obliged to read the pages of Mr Leland, should have gone into the world with the prejudices of his preceptor. This single fact, to which neither the religion nor the patriotism of Mr Leland could prompt him to refuse his assent, is sufficient to corrupt the heart and bias the understanding of him who is taught to consider Mr Leland as an authority on whom he can rely-who swallows his calumnies as facts, and his destructive principles as the future guide of his political conduct. The march of education in this country has in a great measure dissipated the vicious labours of the bribed historian. The Irish mind investigates, reflects, and compares. The understanding is no longer outraged by the artifices of fraud, or the credulity of prejudice; the whole scene is carefully examined, and justice is at length performing her - duty to an abused nation.

The Irish parliament had now (1689) proceeded a good way in laying the ground-work of Ireland's future independence and happiness, when the Duke of Schomberg, at the head of ten thousand men, invaded their country. He arrived at Carrickfergus on the 13th of August 1689, which, after some resistance, was obliged to yield to the superior power of the invader. The Duke of Berwick collected all the troops he could procure, and proceeded towards Newry to interrupt the progress of Schomberg. The Duke was soon followed by the Earl of Tyrconnel with twenty thousand men: Schomberg retreated, and fortifying himself in his camp, waited the advance of the Irish army. The generals of the latter preferred relying on the possible losses which the English might sustain in an unwholesome position, to any experiment by force to expel them their country. Half the English troops fell victims to disease; and Schomberg thus suffered the winter months to pass in an inglorious inactivity. His army, however, was soon reinforced in the spring of the following year. Seven thousand Danes joined the English, with an abundant supply of military stores for the use of Schomberg's troops. Schomberg immediately opened the campaign; and the fort of Charlemont, in the north of Ireland, was forced to surrender, after a bravely contested siege, under the command of Teague O'Regan. slowness of Schomberg's progress in Ireland roused the impatience of William and the English nation, and he determined to put an end to the campaign in his own person. The English sovereign landed

The

at Carrickfergus, at the head of a large force, accompanied by the young Duke of Ormond, the Earls of Oxford, Scarborough, and Manchester. Harris, in his life of William, says, "the English army, when mustered at Loughbrickland, were at the lowest estimate thirty-six thousand strong, English, French, Dutch, Danes, and Brandenburghers, all well appointed in every respect." William immediately proceeded to arrange the opera tions of the campaign; for, says this active soldier, "I have not come to Ireland to let grass grow under my feet." feet." James left Dublin the 16th of June, at the head of six thousand men, and proceeded to join his army, then encamped at Castletown Bellew, near Dundalk. Never was a monarch supported in a contest for empire with more enthusiasm than James was by the Irish; and never was a victory more certain to Ireland, if it had pleased Providence that the director of her resources and her spirit had possessed the talents and the vigour necessary in so great a struggle.

While William halted at Newry three or four days, waiting for his artillery, and deliberating whether he should march straight to Dundalk, or take the road by Armagh, one of his reconnoitring parties was observed every night to insult a guard of cavalry posted at the pass of Half-way bridge, between Dundalk and Newry. A detachment of horse and foot was placed in ambuscade, under Colonel Dempsey and Lieutenant-Colonel Fitzgerald, to cut it off, and succeeded. The party, consisting of two hundred foot, and sixty dragoons,