The Sun.
London, England, 1839-04-17 00:00:00

MALTA.

Mr. LANGDALE wished to put a question to the
Under Secretary for the Colonies. The Honourable
Member was aware, that some time last year, papers
were laid on the table of the House, containing a commu-
nication between the Bishop of Malta and the Govern-
ment, and also a communication wi.h the Court of Rome
respecting an oath which he was to take to form
part of that Council, and he objected to do so.
In the beginning of Jan. last, a proclamation was issued by
the Governor of Malta, requiring all Maltese Catholic
subjects to take the oaths prescribed to be taken by the
Catholics of this country. Great excitement had been crea-
ted in Malta, and he wished to ask whether the proclamation
was issued upon the sole responsibility of the Governor
or whether any instructions were sent out from the Colo-
nial Office, requiring him to adopt such a course of pro-
ceeding.
Mr. LA BOUCHERE said that no information had
been receivod at the Colonial Office of such a proclama-
tion having been issued, and that no complaints had come
from the inhabitants en the subject.
POSTAGE.
Mr. GIBSON seeing the Honourable Member for
Greenock in his place, was induced to put a question
to him in the absence of the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Very numerous petitions had been presented to the
House, praying for an extensive alteration in the
Postage-laws, yet still very considerable doubt
existed as to the intentions of the Goverment upon the
subject. The Hon. Member had taken considerable in-
terest in the matter. He therefore wished to ask him whe-
ther, if the Chancellor of the Exchequer did not, he in-
tended to bring forward any measure founded upon the Re-
port of the Committee of which he was Chairman.

Mr. WALLACE was in hopes that the numerous
petitions which had been presented to the House upon
the subject, would induce the Chancellor of the Exchequer
to take the matter into his own hands. If, however, he
did not do so, it certainly was his intention to introduce a
measure founded upon the Report of the Committee of
which he had the honour to be Chairman, in three or fsur
weeks' time—say about the middle of May.—( Hear.)
The Consolidated Fund Bill was read a third time and
passed.

GOVERNMENT OF IRELAND.
The Order of the Day for resuming the debate on Irish
affairs having been read,
Mr. H UM E presented fifteen petitions from parishes in
Down, Cavan, and Kilkenny, and from Killarney, praying
the House to insure to Ireland the same policy of govern..
ment as they had enjoyed during the last three years.
Mr. O'CONNELL presented petitions from parishes
in the counties of Cork, Dublin, Leitrim, Monaghan,
Queen's County, Waterford, and Tipperary ; Lurgan, iu
Cavan ; Derry Patrick, Dublin ; M'Taggart, Wexford ;
Killybad, Monaghan; Dunsereene and Dunessin, Meath ;
Cluncawley, and Duncormick, Wexford; the town of Wex-
ford; Bardallagh, Wexford; Killigee, Tyrone ;
Limerick ; St. Andrew's, Dublin ; Borranghan, Tippe-
rary ; Kilheagan, Kilkenny ; Drumkeil, Armagh ; Drum-
ballirooney, Down; Clunard, Boheigh, Leitrim; Ardragb,
Londonderry; Drumkean, Limerick; St. Peter's, Dublin;
Wicklow ; Ardhoe, Tyrone ; Drumnagh, Queen's County;
Templerome, Donegal ; Lankell, Tyrone ; Karlesmus.
tans ; Ballimacarry, Down ; Balhaughlin, Dublin;
Lady's Island, Wexford ; Laurie, Cavan ; Tamlachocree,
Dublin; Monogee, Wexford; Old Connaught, Dublin;
Devenish, Fermanagh ; Rochliske Down ; Castletown,
Cavan ; Louchbcglin Monivea, Wexford ; Cabin-
teely, Dublin ; Danouse, Tyrone ; Kilbroney, Down ;
Ennistillee, Donegal; Climad, Monaghan ; the island
of Roshlin on the coast of Donegal ; Dunrear, Wex-
ford ; clonmeed, Donegal. The Honourable and
Learned Member said that the next petition he had
to present was one of very great importance, signed by the
Duke of Leinster in behalf of the Nobility, Gentry, and
other inhabitants of Ireland, assembled at a great public
meeting on the 1 I th of April last. The petition
emanated from one of the most numerous and
influential meetings ever before held in Ireland.
They viewed (the petitioners went on to state) with the
deepest an;dety, the sixer,l;ol23 efforts now being made by the
ancient enemies of Ire2nti to regain possession of that

power which they bad in former times abused, with the
most disastrous consequences to the people of Ireland, as
the natural records of that country could too well testify.
They viewed the present crisis as one including nothing
less than the fate of the British empire. They assured
the House, that they regarded with consummate hatred
and scorn the gross artifices end niisstaternents that had
been resorted to by their enemies, for the purpose of
alienating the Irish people from the confidence and sym-
pathy of the great body of their English fellow-subjects—
( Cheers)—and, with the object of stirring up international
jealousies, the ite.idions endeavours of that party to establish
hostile distinctions between Irish and British interests.
The petitioners viewed with disgust and abhorrence the
efforts that had been made by their enemies to sully the
character of their nation, and to re-establish the dominion
of a party whose name was identified with the darkest
periods of oppression and misrule. They called upon the
Ilouse to aid the popular energies in resisting a desperate
party, who deprive their petitioners of those constitutional
privileges which they had of late enjoyed in common with
the rest of their fellow-subjects. They stated that
the condition of Ireland had been improving in spite
of all the :efforts of the anti.national party to frus-
trate the course of impartial justice, and to vitiate the
operation of those healing measures which they had not
beers able to withhold. Justice and impartial laws had
never been known in Ireland until that party had
been stripped of every remnant of Executive power. Once
more endeavouring to restore the sway of cruelty and op-
pression by every species of malignity and falsehood—fur
example, that property in Ireland had become insecure—
that there was a wide spread conspiracy for the purposes
of massacre, and ultimately for the dismemberment
of the empire—that crime stalked abroad unpunished—that
between the force of fear and corruption practised on
jurors and witnesses, the laws were baffled, the
high prerogative of mercy was abused—( Hear, hear)—
and that a rebellious confederation was encouraged : for
the remedy of those alleged evils, the restoration of the
late dominant party was proposed. But the petitioners
unequivocally denied that such was the state of
things. These charges were wilful and malicious
falsehoods—( Cries of " Hear 1")—for the returns already
laid before Parliament, and the results of the late circuits
would show that a decrease of crime and an increase fo
convictions bad succeeded as compared with the
number of offenders, that jurors and witnesses
freely discharged their duty free from corruption,
and intimidation.—( Hear, hear.) Further, property in
Ireland had of late acquired a much higher rate of value.—
( Hear.) The alleged conspiracies were not political ones,
but the result of personal crimes, from which unhappily no
country was entirely free. The petitioners, in conclusion,
prayed the House to resist this attempt to restore the
ancient system of baleful domination, and to support the
present system of Executive Government in Ireland. The
petition was technically signed by the Duke of Leinster
and the Secretaries, but it bore the weight of the most im-
portant meeting that ever was held in Ireland —( Cheers.)
The Hon. and Learned Member then brought up the peti-
tions, which were ordered to be laid upon the table.
Mr. H. GRATTAN presented twenty-one petitions
from various places in Ireland, praying the House to sup-
port the present Ministerial policy in Ireland. Likewise
a petition from the county of Meath, agreed to at a meeting
at which the High Sheriff presided against the Repeal of
the Corn-laws.

Mr. P. HOWARD presented a petition from Teign-
mouth, in the county of Northumberland, expressive of
confidence in the Ministerial policy in Ireland.
Sir M. BELLEW presented petitions from places in
the county of Down, approving of the Ministerial policy
in Ireland.

Mr. E. B. ROCHE presented several petitions from
various parts of Ireland, the total number of signatures to
which amounted to 29,059, to the same effect.
Mr. M. J. O'CONNELL presented similar petitions
from different parts of Kerry.
Mr. 13E AMISH also presented similar petitions.
ADJOURNED DEBATE.
_ _ _ .

On the reading of the Order of the Day for the resump-
tion of the adjourned debate on Lord John Russell's
resolution,
Mr. EMERSON TENNENT rose to address the
House in opposition to the resolution of the Noble Lord
the Secretary of State for the Home Department, relative
to the policy pursued by the Government with respect to
Ireland, The Hon. Member said—The principal grounds
on which the Noble Lord has brought forward this mo-
tion, consequent upon the appointment of the Committee
in the House of Lords, to inquire into the nature and extent
of crime in Ireland, are first an apprehension of some-
thing unconstitutional in that proceeding as a virtual in-
terference with the Executive Government ; and, se-
condly, a desire to vindicate the Irish Administration from
an implied censure of the House of Lords for the existence
of an excess of crime in that country. The Right
Hon. Baronet (Sir Robert Peel), in bringing forward
his amendment, has gone so fully into both branches of
the subject, and especially into the Constitutional view of
this proceeding of the Noble Lord, that even had it not
been my wish to confine myself to the one topic on which
the Noble Lord has joined issue with the country,
namely, the Irish policy of the Government, it would have
been impossible for roe to have found one point in the
general question which has not been previously exhausted
by his speech.—( Hear.) But without presuming to reite-
rate that ground—without referring to what has been the
conduct of former administrations in reference to similar pro-
ceedings of the House of Lords, I cannot avoid remarking
that there is something rather extraordinary in the vigour
with which the Noble Lord has fastened upon this one
vote of the House of Lords, when, upon many other recent
occasions, votes have been passed not only in that House,
but in this, which could be regarded in no other light than
as a virtual interferene2 with, and censure upon the Exe-
cutive Government, but upon which, nevertheless, the
Noble Lord and his colleagues saw no such necessity for re-
sorting to a proceeding like the present for their vindication.
It cannot, I presume, be concluded that the Committee of
the House of Lords, which sat last year to inquire into the
conduct of the Irish Government, in the matter of appoint-
ing Sheriffs (and which has been followed by such salutary
practical results) was any other than a constitutional inter-
ference with the Executive Government, and a stern cen-
sure on its errors—and yet both the Noble Lord opposite
and the Noble Marquis, whose conduct was most inti-
mately implicated in that proceeding, saw fit to acquiesce
in it without any appeal to a counter-vote of this House.
Again, Sir, the Noble Lord, the Member for Sussex (Lord
George Lennox) brought forward last year a motion which
he succeeded in carrying, for an inquiry into the system of
promotion in the Royal Marines--that motion was resisted
by the Government, expressly on the ground of its having
an undue interference with the Executive—and yet in that
vote also, when carried against him, the Noble Lord (Lord
John Russell) quietly acquiesced without any ap-
peal to the House to rescind or to reverse
it. But now, when a proceeding has been adopted by
the House of Lords which may or may not issue in a cen-
sure upon one branch of the policy of the Irish Govern-
ment (but which cannot in any event be a more direct
censure upon it than was the inquiry into the illegal ap-
pointment of Sheriffs last year), the Noble Lord and his
colleagues sound the constitutional alarm, and fly to this
House for shelter and protection. And as to the censure
which the Noble Lord professes to discover in this pro-
ceeding of the House of Lords, I presume there is more
of the promptings of conscience than of fair and candid
consideration in that apprehension of the Noble Lord.
Previous Governments in similar investigations have dis
covered no equal grounds for indignation or alarm, and
neither Lord Liverpool nor Mr. Goulburn shrunk from
the inquiry into the state of Ireland in 1824 and 1825, al-
though the extraordinary prevalence of crime
these periods was urged as the immediate, c a
though
h
not the only grounds for investigation.—(Cheers.
But after all, Sir, although it is a
matter of date
thus thus to identify the crimes of Ireland with the Govern-
ment of the day, it is not pretended that it is for the mere
existence or the extent of that crime that t e present or
any other Government is really responsible,h but for the
nature of the means which they have employed
and to suppress it. If the Noble Lord and his C Colleagues
shrink from any thing in this investigation, it must be,
apprehend, from that branch of the inquiry. The Noble
Lord, the Secretary for Ireland, on a former occasion
imputed to this side of the House that we had been the
first to render the Government of the day responsible for
every act of violence and outrage which might occur in
Ireland. The Noble Lord was incorrect in that as-
sertion, as the first parties to lay down that principle,
and to charge the disorders of that unhappy country on
the existing Government, were the Honourable and
Learned Member for Dublin and the Hon. Member for
Kilkenny, who so far back as 1833, avowed it as their con-
viction, that " all the crimes which were then committing
in Ireland were to be laid at the door of the Whigs," and
that it was " the administration of the King's Government
which had rendered life and property insecure in that
country.' Sir, if that doctrine be true as to the administra-
tion of 1833, I should be glad to know what there is in the
Government of 1838 to take it out of the same rule ?
Unless, indeed, it be the principle laid down by Lord
Wellesley, in his celebrated letter to Earl Grey, " that
outrage and agitation were mutually cause and effect," and
that whilst the latter was put down by every exertion of
the Government of 1833, agitationhasbeen cherished as the
very life-blood of the Government of 1835. But, Sir,
divested of all extraneous considerations,
the simple ques-
tion which the Noble Lord's motion has brought to a direct
issue, and which the labours of the Committee, now sit-
ting, will place undisguisedly before the country, is this :
Has the Government of Lord Norrnanby, or has it not,
taken every rational and proper precaution for the
suppression of crime and outrage in Ireland during
the period of their administration of affairs in that country?
Sir, into the extent of crime and outrage in Ireland, or
into the question of the comparative amount at this mo-
ment as compared with its prevalence in former years, it
is by no means my intention to enter—as wall because
the attention of the House has been of late repeatedly
called to that melancholy subject, as because her Majesty's
Ministers have admitted its existence, and taken their
grrosusinnod,rlely upon the point of their policy for its sup-
peto make theß e side
revolting Sir
investigationsi t is
unn e
e e s
sa
whetherr y
for m
committals
purpose
have been 5,000 less in the past year than of the year pre.
ceding, or whether convictions have increased during the
same period in the same formi,lable ratio. It is unnecessary
for me to correct discrepancies of 14,000 01nm:es in one
criminal return, or to supply deficiencies of 7,000 iii an-
other. It is ,ufficient for the Legislature to pause, when
the admitted and deplorable fact, that no less than 27,000
criminals have been committed during one year for trial in
Ireland, and that 160,000 have been summarily convicted
dui ing the same brief space of minor offences against the
laws ; and all this occurring in a country of which the Hon.
and Learned Member for Dublin declared, in 1830, in rebuk-
ing an observation of the lion. Member for Shrewsbury,
that its moral character stood so high that it was impossi.
ble to elevate it higher, and that the very existence of crime
was every year disappearing—a country of which the
Noble Lord the Secretary for the Home Department, no
later than 1837, stated in his place in this House, that it
was "almost entirely undisturbed by crime and rapidly im-
proving in its national condition." Sir, when we find her
Majesty's Ministers, both in this House and elsewhere,
contented to ground their defence upon the assertion that
the state of crime in that country, if not improved, is at
best no worse at the present moment than in former years

hat homicides, if they have not diminished, at least have
not multiplied in amount--when we find a state of society
ill which murders are so prevalent, that the victims of a
year are 'so longer reckoned by tens, but by hecatombs,
is is not time for us to pause, and to inquire into the cause
and the remedy for such a visitation ? When " iniquity has
come in like a flood," instead of uselessly calculating the
drops, it is time to rouse ourselves, and to inquire what
precautions have been taken to drive back the current.—
( Cheers.) The public cannot be satisfied with the simple
explanation that crime is not greater now than when her
Majesty's Ministers came into office--?the point on
which they mill require to be satisfied is this,
what steps have been taken to render it less ?
The exposition would extend further than would be war-
ranted by the indulgence of the House to point out the
connexion between such lamentable offences and those
habits of turbulent excitement which are inseparable from
perpetual political agiiation, and by which men's minds be-
come first familiarised with violence, and finally recur,.
ciled to crime ; or to show me how far that great originat-
ing cause, the political agitation which seems peculiar to
I eland, has been, if not recognised and encouraged, at
least sympathised in and unrepressed by her Majesty's
Government. From a diffidence of the patience of the
House to listen to any lengthened statement, I shall ab-
stain altogether from that topic as to how far the conduct
of the Irish administration may be inculpated as the cause
of Irish disturbance, and confire myself to the one issue
which they have themselves selected, of the principles and
policy by which they have attempted its suppression.—
( Hear, hear.) The first and most formidable feature in
the failure of the administration of the law in Ireland
of late years, and that which has created the greatest
alarm and less of confidence in its efficiency, has been the
difficulty of obtaining convictions in criminal cases—owing
to the sympathy of jurors—the impossibility of procuring
information as to the commission of offences—the intimida-
tion which deterred the generality of witnesses from coming
forward to prosecute—and the persecution and violence
which have, in numerous instances, been visited on those
who ventured to do so. Sir, if the illegal appointment of
Sheriffs on the mere nomination of the Crown had no other
effect than promoting this discomfiture of the law, that one
error alone would be sufficient to implicate her Majesty's
Ministers in the abetting crime in Ireland. The only
conceivable object which the Lord Lieutenant could have
in travelling out of the Judges' return was, to select that
individual whose appointment would be most agreeable to
the popular party—the popular Sheriff, as a matter of
course, fcund it his interest to prepare a popular panel, and
the greater the condescension which he exhibited in se
looting jurors from the lowest class who were eligible
to serve, the better understanding and the closer
sympathy was he certain to insure between the jurors
of the county and the individuals on whose guilt
they were to decide.—( Hear, hear, and cheers.) Sir,
there is no more convincing assertion of a principle
than the production of a striking exception, and if a doubt
upon that matter can be reasonably entertained, I would
pint at once to the instance of the Special Commission
which the Lord Lieutenant felt himself constrained, after
all his boastines of tranquillity, to send to Tipperary at the
close of the last year. The Sheriff, who prepared the
panel upon that occasion, was one chosen in the consti-
tutional mode from the list which the Judges had returned,
and well aware of the cause which had so long defeated
the current of the law, he selected his jurors, not from the
freize-coated 40a. freeholders, but from the men of pro-
perty and intelligence in the county, and what was the
result ? The murderers in the dock, aware that their last
scheme for escaping had been defeated, first challenged
the entire array ! then objected to every name in the num-
ber, which law permitted to the accused, and were finally
convicted of their offences, because instead of twelve com-
miserating sympathisers they had twelve intelligent and
independent men for their jury.--( Loud cheering. )
Connected with the prosecution of criminal offences in Ire.
land, there is another proceeding, the propriety of which
has been so often and successfully questioned in this House
that there is but one observation which I am anxious to
make upon it—l mean the alteration in the practice of set-
ting aside jurors at the instance of the Crown, as introduced
by Sir Michael O'Loghlen. lam aware that the expla-
nation given by the Government is this, that the Crown
Solicitor was instructed to refrain from objecting to jurors
on the score of religion or politics alone, and to interpose
only in cases where grounds of specific objection had come
positively within their knowledge. But whatever these
-
specific instructions may have been, it is an indisputable
fact, that an impression was created, and still does exist in
the minds both of the people of Ireland and of the Law
Officers of the Crown, that the practice of objecting in any
case was unfavourably regarded by the Government, and
discountenanced by them ; and instances might be multi-
plied without end, in which it would be impossible to per-
suade the people of Ireland, that the most lamentable
evasions of justice had not arisen from this single
cause. But in an especial degree this impression as to
the feeling of the Irish Administration, has proved preju-
dicial to te fair course of the law, inasmuch as the Crown
Solicitors on the serious circuits, being removable by the
authorities at the Cagle, would be most likely, if they
exercised any discretion at all, to incline to that course
which they fancied would be most gratifying to their supe-
riors, and would consequently be biassed by self-interest
in interfering as slightly as possible with the panels, no
matter how objectionable they might be. As illustrative
of this tendency, I will mention one instance of very
recent occurrence. A Crown Solicitor in Ireland lately
objected on one trial to no less than eighteen or twenty
names which were called upon the jury. The prisoners
were, I believe, ultimately convicted, but so confident
were the people in the sympathy of the Government, tha.:
a memorial was instantly forwarded to Lord I:,,rmanby
front the Liberal Club, to complain of so flagrant an
instance of politieal persecution. The officer of the
Crown was of course something alarmed to receive. in co,—
sequence, a communication from the Cattle, directing him
to account for the transaction, to which be forwarded a ready
reply that he hod received positive information that the
persons whom he had set aside were all members of the
very Club who had forwarded the complaint, and having
been actually contributors to a fund subscribed for the de-
fence of the very prisoners at the dock, nevertheless most
virtuously indignant at being deprived of the pleasure of
sitting as Jurors at this trial ! This reply was, of course,
conclusive. But suppose in this case that the grounds of
objection, though equally valid, had been less clear and
specific, in what peril would not the Crown Solicitor have
felt that he had placed the tenure of his office? Or is it
likely that this same individual, with the consciousness of
his liability to be similarly summoned to an account upon
every future occasion, will act with that intrepid judgment
and cool deliberation which the duties of his office would
demand and require, or that for the future he will not have
many an individual upon a Jury whom his moral conviction
would constrain him to set aside, but whom caution and self-
interest will compel him to retain, in the absence of legal
evidence to justify his conduct if called to account for hie re.-
moval ? A third, and by no means unimportant peculiarity in
the mode of conducting criminal prosecutions in Ireland, is
the practice of waiving the right to reply to the counsel
for the prisoner by the counsel for the Crown. This is
another of those baits for popularity on the score of a spu-
rious humanity, which are characteristic of the present
Irish Administration, and the dangerous tendency of which
must be instantly apparent on the slightest consideration
of the class of jurors whom they have to address—of the
inconsistent and contradictory nature of the defences, whose
falsehood, and whose perjury, it would be their duty to
expose, but which, owing to the abandonment of their
functions, almost invariably lead to the acquittal of the
offender. So, is it to be wondered at that, with these
three causes in active operation ; with this mischie-
vous tampering with the machinery of justice, prosecu-
tions for criminal offences should have become but a mere
farce—a solemn absurdity in Ireland ? With prejudiced
juries, sele led by partizan Sheriffs, with their purification
discountenanced by the Government authorities, and their
misconceptions and ignorance never once grappled with or
dispelled by the address of the counsel for the Crown, is it
at all surprising, or unaccountable that convictions should
be of scanty occurrence, or that crime should be as-
sociated with almost absolute impunity in Ireland I
Is it to be wondered at that the culprit and his friends
should look forward with indifference to the solemn
mockery of a trial, that the only individuals who should
have real grounds for apprehension are the disheartened
and discomfited complainants, and that the gaols should
become as often the welcome refuge of the discredited and
terrified witnesses as the abode of the criminals, whom
they fruitlessly sought to convict ?—( Hear, hear.) With-
out ellu4ing to the remoter districts of Ireland, of which
I have no personal knowledge, I state it as a fearful
illustration of the consequences of this defective
and perverted system, that in the most disturbed
counties of the North of Ireland, namely, Louth, Mo-
naghan, and Armagh, there has not been for
the last four years one single conviction or punishment for
murder, although no less than 146 indictments have been
tried for thst crime, under this defective and perverted
system. I state that as a formidable illustration of the
disc mfiture of law in Ireland, and I call upon the
Noble Lord to refute it. I call upon him to point to one
solitary instance in which the crime of murder, though of
melancholy frequency as to occurrence, has been either de-
tected, convicted, or punished as such, in those
three counties during the entire period of the administra-
tion of Lord Normanby ? And yet these are the results;
these are the evidences of that policy of die Executive Go-
vernment of Ireland, on whose wise and efficient adminis-
trution of the law, we are this evening invited to bestow the
In per consistencyeneanr y withtuh tselei iiso)
rflai
eiccepes
testimony of cur confidence and approval.—( Hear.)
s
tonin
eorif'oo therg att
ve
eLordporievm€L:
mercy,
oefnacnont
for annulling them when obtained. " Discretion," Lord C linden said, "is the law of tyrants ;" and certainly in
this instance the Marquis of Normanby has ventured
upon an experiment in its exercise which any living man,
but one either divested of fear or indifferent to responsi-
bility, would have trembled to attempt.—(Cheers.) Sir,
Ilaabywilling, for the seke or argument, to take Lord Nor-
m
nn's own explanation of his motives—l am willing to
adopt the apology which was offered for him by Lord
Melbourne in the course of last year, that his unlimited
pardons conferred upon the convicted felons in Ireland
wore merely an experiment to ascertain " what advanta-
geous impression they might create at the moment; and
how far the spirit of tranquility might be fostered
and encouraged by their display. (Hear, hear.) But
even admitting the philosophy of that intention
is there any man in his senses who can calmly approve
of either the extent of the operation, or the. time which
was selected for the experiment? Was it a prudent period
to select for such a hazardous cast, when it had been pub-
lie'y asserted and corroborated by gloomy experience, that
the murder of any individual in Ireland could be compassed
for a reward of half-a-crown to a hired conspirator? Was
that a judicious moment to choose for experimenting on law ?
Was it practicable' to propitiate assassins by assurances of
pardon ?_.( Hear, hear.) Was it a prudent moment when
the fever of criine was at its height, when the gaols of Ire-
land were swarming with their formidable visitants—was
that a rational moment to select for the romantic adventure
of Lord Mulgrave, in throwing wide the prison doors, and
appealing to the chivalrous honour of their inmates, to " go
and sin no more ?"—( Cheers.) Sir, it was one of these
wild exploits in Government, which even successs would
be insufficient to justify, but which has been most palpably