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SUMMARY OF POLITICS.

IRELAND.

A general and decided opinion of the Protestant gentlemen of rank and property of this country, has been given to the world in favour of their Catholic fellow-subjects.-This true love of country and of man so handsomely displayed by our resident mer of worth and talents, is the harbinger of coming happiness, independance and security. It is an interesting evidence of the progress of philantropy and justice, it is also a protound practical deduction of political reasoning. This state of the public protestant mind is what the enemies of Ireland always laboured to prevent. It was to hinder this feeling from becoming general, that such statesman as PITT always lighted up in our unfortunate and deluded country the torch of division and disunion. All the bad, selfish, and depraved ministers of England who, with the true spirit of their nation, wished to monopolize all the liberty and bappiness of the world to themselves, have seen and infamously acted up to the necessity of separating the hearts and affections of the Irish. By whatever denomination they were designated, an Orange and an AntiOrange party has always been fostered amongst us with savage care; our masters speculated on the dura tion of our animosities, well knowing bat a people so rich in natural resources and so great in numbers could not be well managed without the aid of this internal dividing machi nery. Ages have rolled away whilst Irishmen seem to have been intent on nothing more than thirsting for and drinking each other's blood. We have been incessantly waging wars of faction against each other, whilst the detestable machiavelian policy of our neighbours sat apart

and beheld us with the ghastly smile' of selfish pleasure, working our own weakness and national distress. Let any one acquainted but slightly with the history of party in this country reflect but a moment, and he must be convinced of its destructive tendency: He must perceive that it has been used as the best instrument by IMPERIOUS NECESSITY to paralyse our national energies, and to dupe us into misery. The names Catholic and Protestant have been trumpeted through Ireland as the watchwords of internal strife. We have, alas! been caught by the sounds and suffered-but happily they now begin to die on our ears without any emotion, and we begin to see that though there exist in religion Catholicity and Protestantism, yet that Catholicity and Protestantism are mere non-entities in politics. An alliance between the people and their landlords, where mutual interest and confidence are unequivocally understood by both, is a plain system that will produce all the solid happiness which the extinction of domestic jealousies must inevitably occasion. The impolicy of despising the people (we mean with the Irish gentry) and of enlisting in the factions of distant statesmen, whose existence in power is as uncertain as any of the varying fashions of the day, seems at length to be abandoned. The sensible resident gentlemen of Ireland, alarmed at the agitated scenes which Europe has exhibited the last twenty years, warned by the awful examples of fallen sovereigns, and extinguished dynasties, have awakened from that delusion which leagued them in the destruc¬ tive politics of another country, against the happiness and tranquillity of their peasantry.

LEWIS

LEWIS XVIII and his mendicant Court, is a living and humiliating example of the errors of former man ners. The PEOPLE whom his an. cestors, their women and parasites, despised and oppressed, have avenged themselves by a reconciliation to the brilliant and cheaper denomination of the military successor to the throne of the unfortunate CAPETS, The French canaille, as they were contemptuously termed, are now culti vating their vines and their corn on the very lands which employed their forefathers, whilst the descendant of their sovereign is a poor suitor for a livelihood at the mansion of an English nobleman, the victim of that destructive system which in the old regime of France made him to set at wought the wishes of his subjects and to adopt the haughtiness of wicked ministers.

Again we congratulate our country on the expression of unanimity which has gone forth. Equal rights will not be obtained by the People this session of parliament. Mr. Perceval will make his last stand in defence of political bigotry and intolerence; but let another year pass away and not Mr. Perceval, supported even by the Hydra behind the throne, can be able to stem the torrent of Protestant and Catholic petitions which will overwhelm him. The universal expressed sense of the Irish nation no English minister will have the hardihood to despise. The minister now, in the omnipotence of his majority and in the wantonness of power, may sport with the feelings of the Catholics of Ireland; he may add insult to privation, but we tell him boldly that the day will shortly come when he shall have no alternative remaining but either to desert his bed of roses, his beloved seat, or to advise his majesty that the temper of the times requires Catholic eman

cipation, and an entire change of system in the practical government of the Irish,

As to the refusal of the grant to the college of Maynooth, it was shameful-it was despicable-it was unworthy the grovelling spirit of the lowest pettifogging attorney. If the Catholics of Ireland would act with becoming spirit, they ought to throw up the whole original grant and support their ecclesiastical college, as they do their priests, by voluntary contributions, Did each catholic give but one shilling annually 200,000l. would be raised, a sum fifteen times more than the necessary expenditure of the college.

To the Editor.

ON THE LINEN TRADE.

Some apprehensions for the safety of what is called our staple manufacture, are entertained by many well meaning persons, if hostilities take place between England and America. The want of flaxseed, and the loss of an American market for our linens must certainly operate in a serious degree to affect the trade, but for my part, Mr. Editor, I can discover very little inconvenience to the community, by the destruction of the manufacturing system. A few rich men of extensive capital, may be driven to bankruptcy by its extinc. tion, but the valuable poor must ul. timately be benefited. England had wisely, though unfairly left us this manufacture, which depends on the caprice of foreign nations, or the chances of war for its existence, and to procure the materials of which, we must make a long and expensive voyage. We were compelled to surrender our wool, that grows at home, to our English neighbours, and wander over the western hemisphere

to

to seek the materials for a new branch of manufacturing industry. Our dear sister gave us the linen trade for two purposes. As it has been carried on with considerable success in many countries on the continent, in Flanders, Silesia, and Russia, where it has arrived to a great perfection, and can be brought to any market to rival us in price, on account of the cheapness of the necessaries of life in in those countries. England wisely rejected a trade which offered litle to her cupidity, and conferred the unprofitable boon on us, in exchange for our wool and our yarn. The consequence to Ireland is, that to be able to meet foreign linens in any market, can be only done by selling on such cheap terms, that the poor weaver or spinner, must be starved by his rich employer into such terms as will enable his linens to have any sale, where the foreign linens are at market. Having no other branch of industry to resort to, the naked females must submit to such mode of living as a proud employer dictates, so humbled are the wretches who spin flax into thread, that a woman, for 108 hours work at the wheel, never can earn more than eighteen pence, a sum unequal to the purchase of one day's food. Thus the best and most valuable of society are starved and worked, to preserve the character of what is boasted of, as our staple manufacture, nor have they any other refuge left but emigration to America, to which fly from Ui ster at least twenty-five thousand persons annually. Agriculture in Ireland offers no alternative, the lands are monopolized by the rich manufacturer, or enclosed as demenses by the Lord, and so completely is in dustry beaten down, by the manufacturing system, the feudal pride of landlords, and the disregard to tillage, poor have no refuge but eni

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gration. It would be a favorable circumstance to the tranquility and happiness of this country if England would take this linen trade with the other branches of industry from us, tillage must certainly succeed it, as the lands employed in Ulster should be applied in a more rational and beneficial manner, by feeding the people, which they now contribute to starve. There would indeed be a less number of palaces, but more cottages: tranquility would be more efficiently secured: it would be dif ficult to persuade a man possessed of a comfortable residence, to gamble it in insurrections against the chances of the bayonet and the gibbet.

The expenses and privations which we have encountered by a war of 15 years, have so raised the necessaries of life, that we cannot bring our staple to market on such terms as those people can who are not taxed as we are: and to this favourable circumstance we must date the happy extinction of weaving, spinning and hunger, inseperable companions, that have brutalized the poor and har. dened the rich, producing insurrection, civil wars, and depopulation.

ORMOND-BRIDGE.

W.

Provincial littleness and national degradation, the fatal and humiliating effects of the Union, are every day reminding us of the serious losses we have sus ained by the extinction of our legislative assemblie, Ireland, poor degraded Ireland, has nothing of her own growth of dignified im portance, nothing of worth in her men or of moment in her events, whereby to designate by a distinguished name a bridge, a street, a court, nor an ally. We must now be all English, and every vestige of Irish Dame or Irish character it would seem is to be defaced from

Our

our view. The new bridge to be thrown over the liffey, is to be christened by an English or rather an old French title. Ormond-bridge is no longer to be allowed in Dublin. This old Irish name, infamous as it has been in the history of Irish misfortunes, is still Irish, and should not be exchanged for the foreign and illegitimate one of Richmond, though a present viceroy may wear it with a little honor. The name of Ormond at least communicates ideas of martial fame, it can boast great military ruffians and princely Scoundrels, whose ambition and lust of power bartered their country's rights and religion for foreign honours and a foreign creed. It deserves the esteem even of Englishmen, in preference to that of Richmond, for it owes not its original eminence to the couch of royal guilty pleasure, but to the

tent of a hero.

AMERICA.

The French Emperor has interdicted the entrance of American shipping into any port in Europe under his influence, this measure is calculated to hasten the decision of the United States, on what course of politics they will adopt. This apparent hostility on the part of the French ruler puts a question to the American government, which must be immediately answered, if it values the vast commercial intercourse it heretofore carried on, with so much success, as to raise the American nation within twenty years, to be the second trading country in the world. We apprehend if America takes any part in the war, she will embark her fortune with France; her trading in. terest even in war must be of considerable extent, and she will not be easily influenced to abandon such a market as the entire continent of Europe, where she can dispose of all her native and imported merchan

dize, to the confined and comparitively mart which two small islands offer, where nine-tenths of her industry is precluded by law, such as the productions of China, and other countries beyond the Cape of Good Hope, with such West India produce as is not the growth of the English islands. America imports at least twenty thousand tons of teas annually, which she disposes of in the northern parts of Europe. Were she to enter into any alliance with England she should give up this trade, as the English East India company, must have the exclusive right of their own market. America also imports a considerable quantity of spices, which are disposed of in Europe, be sides Turkey coffee, articles not af lowed to be sold in England but by the East India company. In peace or war, America is not only shut out of the British market, for the sale of Eastern produce, but is precluded bringing any of the sugars of the West India islands not British into any of the dependencies of England. America will not easily be convinced of the necessity of giving up such extensive means of prosperity for an alliance, that would render her ship. ping useless, and perhaps provoke the resentment of France o such a mode of retaliation, as to exclude her, not only in war, but in peace from the European continent.

France, by its universal dominion, can gratify the commercial cupidity of America without sustaining any injury herself. England cannot indulge America in any one branch of trade without destroying some important link in her trading policy. She cannot indulge America in assisting her to a market for East India products, without hurrying her own great company to ruin, nor can she countenance the American West India trade, without destroying her own islands, planters, and merchants.

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America

America has made very serious abridgments on the East and West India trade of England; not having the expences attending great trading and military establishments, without taxes, without the heavy war insurances of her rivals, she can bring the rude produce of the two worlds cheaper to market, and has so com. pletely succeeded that she has long since undersold the English merchants in the continental markets.

Irish Fushions for May. THE genial warmth of summer having succeeded the chilling blasts and dreary rains of spring, has ena bled the peasant sons and daughters of Erin to put on a new and lighter dress. They have thrown off a con. siderable quantity of the weightier appendages of their fragmented habiliments, commonly called rags, by which the symmetry and harmony of the form were so much concealed, and by which even the difference of sex was scarcely distinguishable. The woollen and hay-rope, or girdle, has been laid aside, which used to encircle the loins, serving to keep together the upper and lower garments, connecting the buttonless breeches and the stringless petticoat, with the vest, coat, or cloak, which hung in beautiful festooning jiggets, or drapery, over the cestus. The coat and vest are now of the most delightful fawn-coloured freize, and of the real manufacture of Cunna mara. Some seem to be fonder of the blue raticen of Carrick-on Suir. The mantle of the women which flowed over all their tatters, and which was so thickly inlaid with patchwork and fanciful quilting, has disappeared, and given place to the stuff coat which universally prevails, The feet have also been released from their cumbersome winter covering of hay bandages and old hats, and the costume nud now every where is vi

sible. The Irish fair exhibit their fine-turned limbs in all the naked artless gaiety of nature," with steps as light as air," and "on the light fantastic toe" they trip it over the hovel-fringed road. The petticoats most worn are the linsey, and the most fashionable colours the narrow blue stripe with alternate grey. The form varies according to the taste and means of the wearer. Some of them are perfectly round and reach nearly to the knee, where they are sometimes met by the tops of venerable and many-holed stockings.Thro' a preposterous love for variety these stockings are not always of the same colour, and not unfrequently may be seen a black stocking on one foot and a grey one on the other. The men are equally careless, but one thing seems to be common to both sexes, the stocking never reaches with either below the ancle. Other petticoats are composed of piebald lateral fragments connected only at the top. These vibrate with the gentle zephyr and in their undu lation display a variety of graces. This petticoat is a great favourite with men of taste and lovers of simplicity. No head dress is worn, but the hair is suffered to wanton in the air, in easy negligent graceful ringlets.

The younger branches are entirely quit of their winter cloathing; as the convenient summer declares it no longer necessary to trouble the parent or torment the child by the painful task of binding their little forms in the tattered garment or broken rug. The rising race sport on the verdant lawn or hum in the busy school, unen. cumbered with any artificial covering.

What a pity that Lord Castlereagh and the Union-makers are not enjoy. ing with their ladies and little ones, this luxury of dress which they have have so generally and equally bestowed to their happy and ennobled countrymen.

POETRY.

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