The most stirring appeals were made to the independent citizens by the free citizens, to shake off the incubus of Corporate monopoly and plunder, to act as became men; to show "that all public spirit was not lost; to let other cities know that the freemen of Limerick were not biassed by the influence of the great or mighty, or misled by narrow party views; that they scorned the base practices of selling their votes for a dinner.1 "A lover of Liberty" came out in a powerful letter (1760) "to the gentlemen, clergy, and freemen of Limerick," in which he asserts the independence of the city, and suggests that young Mr. Massy, the son of Dean Massy, should be selected with Mr. Pery as a candidate on the independent interest for the city. Mr. Pery at the election of 1670 was the favourite. The exertions of Dean Massy in favor of the free citizens, and his anxiety to rescue the charities from the harpy grasp of the Corporation, caused him to be esteemed. That the son of so deserving a man should be well received by the citizens was not surprising; but the Smyth interest was dominant. Many however who were induced to divide their votes, voted for Mr. Pery and Mr. Massy, while others of them, voted for Mr. Massy and Mr. Smyth.2 The toll collectors pursued their detestable vocation with "The Man who relieved the citizens from the embezzlement of Treasurers and oppressions of long taxes."

May the Independent Electors of Ireland be always represented by those they love." "Speedy restoration to the just rights and privileges of the citizens of Limerick." "May all those who desert their friends fall into the hands of their enemies."

"A firmer tenure to the Judges of Ireland."

"May young patriots fill the places of old courtiers "

1 Papers of John O'Donnell, Esq. of Liberty Hall.

2 Among those who voted for Massy and Smyth we find the names of Gough, Rawlins, Copley, Mac Adam, Kendal, Wastecoat, Brimmer, Stritch, Bluet, &c., whilst the names of Frankin, Wright, Monsell, Miles, &c., appear on the independent side also. Mr. Pery and Mr. Smyth were returned.

The Corporation Memorial against the Bill for inquiry and reform contained these names:The Mayor (weigh master), Francis Sargent and John Monsell, Sheriffs (the former under influence), Alderman Sexton (a lease), Alderman Wight (ditto), Alderman Jones (comptroller), Alderman John Shepherd (would not vote for until he had known the contents), Alderman Peter Sargeant (a lease), Richard Graves (do), Geo. Stammer (do), Robert Hallam (Town Clerk and Scavengerer), John Bull (son-in-law to Alderman the Mayor), Jos. Crips (son to Alderman), Wm. Wakeley, Jos. Barrington (Treasurer), Christopher Carr Christopher (stepson to Peter), Geo. Sexton, jun. (son to Alderman Sexton), Jos. Johns (a large sum due to him) Exham Vincent (a lease), Wm. Gubbins.

Against the memorial of the Corporation were :

Alderman Maunsell, Alderman Long, Alderman Baylee, Robert Davis, Geo. Waller, Richard Maunsell, Jun., Henry Holland, John Samuel Taverner, Andrew Welsh, Christopher Bridson, Thomas Pearce. Papers of John O'Donnell, Esq. of Liberty Hall.

"The Corporation of Clothiers," a very prominent and important body, were mixed up in the proceedings of these times, and having been called upon to give a character of one James Lombard, who, we must believe, had rendered himself obnoxious to some parties, and who was a ready man at the side to which the Clothiers were opposed, gave him a certificate, which for plain speaking is a model composition.*

*"We, the Master and Wardens of the Corporation of Clothiers, and the undernamed inhabitants of the City of Limerick, do hereby declare and certifie, that we know James Lombard of the sd. City, who was bred to the Clothing trade, and now a Common and notorious bum, to be a person of a bad reputation, and a very infamous character, and do really believe he would swear the greatest falsehood if importuned to do so for a Consideration, so he thought he could do it with impunity, or secure from the punishment of the Law. "Dated this 16th of May, 1761.

such unscrupulous rapacity that they defied every effort to make things in any degree tolerable to the neighbouring farmers and gentlemen, whom, in many cases, they deterred from growing corn at all, there being no other market but Limerick, and the exactions being so insufferable that the agriculturists could not sustain them. This state of things continuing, and the oppressions becoming more intolerable and cruel every day, the Protestants resolved to appeal to Parliament for redress. A curious correspondence took place between Mr. O'Donnell, secretary to the free citizens, and Dan. Hayes, Esq. In a letter to Hayes, the secretary

Mr. Richard Parsons, writing to Dean Massy, from Carrigogunnell, October 30th, 1761, states, that the act of Parliament which was intended for the protection and the good of the farmers, they (the Corporation vampires) have turned to oppression-" in short, they have made me tired of farming, for I can assure you on oath, that these twenty years back except the last two years, that I sent into Limerick upwards of five hundred barrels of corn, but I was so oppressed with the usage I got in Limerick that I would not be any longer in their power, and have entirely quit tillage, nor have I sent one barrel of corn into Limerick those two years past, or ever will till the times alter."

2 Daniel Hayes, Esq. was a native of the county of Limerick, and was gifted with very superior talents. He published a volume of poems which went to a second edition-the latter rarely to be met with, was printed by A. Watson, in Mary-street. Hayes's "Farewell to Limerick" is a powerful Satire on the state of society in the city in 1751, when it was written. He was a Fellow Commoner of Trinity College, Dublin. He died in London, on the 20th July, 1767, having giving directions in his will that his remains should be conveyed to St. Mary's Cathedral, Limerick, for interment. He bequeathed the greater part of his property to the county of Limerick hospital, which, however, never received the benefit of the bequest. His monument consists of a plain, white marble slab, affixed to a pillar in the south transept of St. Mary's Cathedral, with the following inscription:

DAN. HAYES AN HONEST
MAN AND A LOVER OF HIS
COUNTRY.

Hayes's letter to Mr. O'Donnell is characteristic:

DEAR JACK,

Chelsea, April 6th, 1762.

Your letter surprised me not little, when I found that you had so far succeeded against my old friends the Corporation. But what in the name of wonder could suggest to you that I had, or could have, any intercourse with, or access to, Lord Bute. He is, believe me, too great a personage for any Irishman in this kingdom to address as you mention; except Lord Shelburne. I could, perhaps, get a written memorial delivered to him, or inscribe him a book, or get now and then to the foot of his table. But to attempt influencing his voice, and that too in the Privy Council! Good God, Jack, what an idea you must have of a Prime Minister! I could indeed point out a very easy channel for your agent to come at the other Secretary; but as the Corporation of Limerick, the magistracy in particular, behaved to me with such unparalleled lenity and friendship in my last and greatest distresses; it would be the basest ingratitude to attempt (however feebly) to subvert their interests."

Besides, good Jack, believe me, that a partizan is of all officers the soonest forgot, and the least thanked or rewarded. If the agent for your Corporation has cleverness enough to procure Sir Harry Erskine (who has the greatest influence with Lord Bute; being his near relative, and having recently married his cousin), he may do you infinite disservice. For to my knowledge Sir Harry gratefully remembers the freedom of the city conferred upon him. This, upon my honour, I never hinted to any man; and I suppose you can keep your own secrets. The future maxim of my life shall be, to steer wide of all parties, ruptures, and dissentions; you are sure of enemies, who will engrave your actions on a table of brass; of friends who will commit them to a rotten cabbage leaf.

to the free citizens enters into many subjects, and particularly recommends him to use his influence with Lord Bute and the members of the Privy Council to have justice done to the aggrieved and plundered citizens of Limerick.' It should be stated that previously to this correspondence, they had framed a petition to Parliament, in the name of John O'Donnell, their independent secretary, containing all their complaints, and signed by upwards of five hundred persons of all ranks of city and country, but not signed by any Catholics. The petition was presented to Parliament on the first day of its sitting by the city representative, Counsellor Edmond Sexton Pery, and was backed by other representatives of Limerick and Clare. A committee was appointed by Parliament to examine into the causes of complaint, and Mr. E. Sexton Pery was appointed chairman of the committee. Many members of the Corporation were summoned to Parliament for the sixth of November, that being the day the committee was to sit, as were also many of the other inhabitants of all ranks and stations. The grievances which the citizens suffered from the Corporation, and on which they were chiefly examined, were the unreasonable practice of quartering the soldiery on Catholics, and on those whom the Corporation did not like, without ever paying for such quarterage, though the Government allowed payment; the dirty manner in which the streets and city were kept; the exacting of customs at the gates, double what the law allowed, and for articles which were not liable to custom; and for exacting tolls in the market, treble what the laws and Parliamentary schedule allowed; the partial administration of justice between party and party, and the neglect of magistrates in the administration of justice, and visiting and regulating the markets; the demanding and misapplication of the revenues of the city for over thirty years previously, and the Corporation farming to each other for ever the city lands for a crown or twenty shillings a year, which were worth to each individual £200 or £300 per annum; the depriving the freemen and free citizens of their rights in the electing of Mayors, Sheriffs, &c., and not granting them a common speaker, or calling a court of D'Oyer Hundred; the selling for life, in some particulars, employments in the Corporation, which were to be elected for every year-these and many other charges against the Corporation were evidently proved before the committee, and the consequence was a new law for the better regulation of the City of Limerick was enacted on the 21st of December, the committee unanimously agreeing to 31 resolutions, which, on the 23rd of December were reported to the whole House, and on the 24th, the House, according to order, took into consideration the report made on the 23rd relative to the petitions of John O'Donnell and others, and the resolutions of the committee were read and agreed to by the whole House." The injurious power

I have not seen either of the agents who have come over, but hope to have that pleasure before long; and after all that has been or that will be said upon this matter, my humble opinion is, that Lord Halifax's pleasure will direct the Committee-table; they say he is much admired amongst you; he is very much so here; and I believe there is not an abler or better man in England. You do not mention what party he espouses, or whether he meddles at all. I should, however, conjecture he is with you, as the Bill passed in Ireland. If so, you may almost depend upon success; nay, the Bills having past, and touching (I suppose) nothing upon the Crown's prerogative, should in my conception, ensure its stability; for it can hardly be supposed that the memorial of any single body should countervail the two great councils of the kingdom. I should be excessively glad to serve James, and perhaps may before I die. My best respects to your wife, and believe me, Your's very truly, D. HAYES.

John O'Donnell, Esq Liberty Hall, Limerick.

Write to me the news of the country without minding politics, or the want of franks. 1 O'Donnell's Papers.

2 White's MSS.

exercised by Arthur Roche was particularly condemned by the resolutions of the House he was declared unfit to hold any office in the city-and it was ordered that leave be given to bring in the heads of a bill for the better regulation of the Corporation of the City of Limerick, and for redressing the several grievances under which the citizens and inhabitants labour, and that Mr. Pery, Mr. Charles Smyth, Mr. Recorder, Dr. Lucas, Mr. Sergeant Paterson, and Mr. Lucius O'Brien, do prepare and bring in the sameOrdered that the same report be printed. We give the sequel in the language of White.1

1762.-1. The act for the better regulation of the Corporation and City of Limerick, having, with some amendments, passed the Privy Council of Ireland, was brought over to England for the purpose of passing there by Mr. Nicholas Smyth, agent to the freemen, but it was opposed there by Mr. Andrew Shepherd, agent to the Corporation, who represented to the Council of England that the freemen of Limerick were entirely influenced by the papists; that it was a Popish faction which introduced said bill; that there were near one hundred priests and friars in Limerick ;2 and that said bill was contrary to law, and an infringement on the Royal Prerogative from which the charter derived. The Solicitor-General and Attorney-General for England represented the bill in this false and odious light, and therefore, it was thrown out and not passed into law.

2. Counsellor Edmond Sexton Pery foreseeing that the bill would meet with this opposition in England, did very wisely introduce into other acts of Parliament clauses for the better redress of the many grievances and abuses under which the citizens of Limerick did labour, and which answered the purpose almost as well as if the bill did pass, that the customs on the gates and the tolls in the markets should be taken from them, tolls alone which are mentioned in the dockett, ratified by Parliament in the year 1723-4, and that no more should be taken than what is there specified, and that under the severest penalty on the exaction of said tolls and customs, and on the chief magistrate, if he should neglect punishing according to law such exaction. By this clause the tolls and customs which are usually exacted are lessened by more than one half. By another clause in another act, the levying of public taxes and rates which were formerly assessed on the inhabitants by some members of the Corporation, according to their arbitrary pleasure, and by which the Catholics were greatly depressed, I say, these taxes and rates are so lessened by so many of the respective parishioners as are appointed by a vestry held for the purpose, and that assessment to be laid proportionally on all the parishioners, who, in another vestry, were to approve of the same, and then said assessment to be given to the treasurer of the Corporation, who must levy said money from every inhabitant according to said assessment, and who is to get a shilling for each pound so raised, for his trouble. By this law Protestants and Corporation men are liable to be equally taxed as Catholics which was never done before. By another law, the lamp money which was hitherto raised by the Corporation by exacting a crown a year out of every house in the street, must now be raised by a vestry in like manner as the public rates; by another law, all disputes with the Corporation must not be tried in the city, but in and by a jury of twelve men in any other county.

3. By an order of the barrack board, no soldiers are to be quartered on the inhabitants, save on their march, and that to be done in an equal manner, 2 A notorious lie, whereas there were but sixteen.-White's MSS.

1 White's MSS.

and if there should be a necessity of quartering any soldiers on the city, their lodgings are to be paid for by the commanding officer.

4. The Roman-Catholic merchants this year refused paying Cockett duties. to the Corporation, on compounding for them by paying to the Corporation £5 every year, and they judged such duties to be an unlawful exaction, and to which no one was liable but foreigners alone who followed trade in Limerick.

5. On the 5th of May, the Corporation party in the Council made 150 freemen, chiefly strangers, in order to have a majority among the freemen in the Court of D'Oyer Hundred.

This movement was a heavy blow to the Corporation; and that it was inflicted by the hands of honest Protestants must be ever a cause of sincere congratulation to the citizens of Limerick.1

As we have already stated, the state of feeling between landlord and tenant was becoming unpleasant in the extreme. About the month of January, 1762, some persons, who called themselves levellers or Whiteboys, to the amount of some hundreds, some say thousands, did much mischief by night, levelling hedges of those who had encroached on any of the commons, by digging up the lay rich ground of those who would not set land to the poor for tillage, burning the barns and haggarts, &c. By degrees they spread over Munster, did incredible mischief in the counties of Waterford, Tipperary, and Cork, as also in the county of Limerick, and in the parish of Kilfinnane, where, in one night, they dug up twelve acres of rich fattening ground be longing to a Mr. Maxwell, houghed some cattle, &c. White says, "there is no knowing where this will stop; but the Government has given orders to the respective Governors of the counties to inspect into the causes of these evils, and for that purpose to assemble the justices of the peace; it is surprising that though there are such numbers, none of them discover on their companions, that they are never seen by day, and that they damage, indiscriminately, both Catholics and Protestants, and even punish the Priests who exert themselves against them. Our Bishop has sent his mandate to his Parish Priests to speak against them."

It was proved on the trials for these offences that in almost every instance the promoters and instigators of them were Protestants-Protestant tenants who had resolved to wring justice from the lords of the soil. At a Special Commission held in June of this year, 1762, two men named Banyart and Carthy, were tried, found guilty, and executed at Gallows Green on the 19th of that month. In reference to some of the causes of these disturb ances, Mr. Lucius O'Brien, member for Clare, made a remarkably bold and telling speech, in his place in Parliament, in which he lamented the deplorable condition of the inhabitants of the county in which he lived (Clare.) arising from the total neglect of those who had nominally the care of their souls, and the tythe of their property (the Protestant clergy) in Clare, he continued to say, there were seventy-six parishes and no more than fourteen churches, so that sixty-two parishes were sinecures. Who can suppose that men will patiently suffer the extortion of a tythe monger, where no duty for which the tythe is paid has been performed in the memory of man. It has been said that to prevent opposition to such demands we should put in force our penal laws against those that have opposed them already, but give me leave, Sir, to say that no penal law, however sanguinary in itself, and however rigorously executed, will subdue the natives of a free country into a tame and patient acquiescence in what must appear to be the

In this year, 1762, Cornelius Magrath, an Irish giant, who was born in the Silver Mines, Co Tipperary, in 1736, died in College Green, Dublin, He was seen in Cork by Dr. Smith.Smith's MSS. in Royal Irish Academy. 2 White's MSS.