Star.
London, England, 1810-06-09 00:00:00

VICEROY OF IRELAND.

. The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER
rose to movt the consideration of his Majesty's. Mes-
sage for augmenting the salary of the Lord Lieute•
'rant of Ireland. After specifying the different pe-
riods at which an increase of s,!cli salary'hact been
made, and apologising to the House for nor sooner
bringing forward the motion, Mr. Ferceval stated,
that not only the present Lord. Lieutenant, but his
predecessors, had expended double the amount of
their salaries ; and ke would put it to the House,
whether the filling the highest offices of the state
should be the source of ruin to the individuals by
whom they were so eminently sustained. The salary
of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland was £20,000, and
yet 430.000 was the least sum required .to defray'
the eipence attending that noble office. There could
be no question as to the justice of what he proposed
to the House : if any question could be started, it
must be, whether ,the office itself was necessary ?
liavhig made op his mind as to the sum proper to be
grasited by that House, he had then turned his atten-
tion to the Civil List of Ireland. What he proposed
was tlis—that there should, be made -an increase of
not less than £lO,OOO in the salary of the Lord Lieu-
e
nant of Ireland 1. that the House should witiress his
Majesty to make such increased allowance ; and that
they should pledge themselves to make the necessary
addition to the Civil List of Ireland, till, during the
next session, they should be properly enabled to in-
vestigate the condition of the Civil List of Ireland,
and ascertain how far Idle was qualified to support
the office of her Viceroy. The Right Honourable
Gentleman here moved the Address to his Majesty
to the effect of what he had said.

Mr. TIGHE expressed his astonishment that Mi-
nisters should at this period of the Session come
down to the House with a demand for an increase
of salary to an office, which he conceived most use-

less, more especially: when the present Lord Lieu-
tenant had allowed a lapse of three years to pass, be-
fore he found out that the income already. allowed
him was inadequate to the support of that dignity
4nd splendour which was necessary to support the
Vice-regal appointment. Previous to the Union,
the Lord Lieutenants of Ireland represented the
third part of the Legislature of that country. ; since
that event, he could not be considered in so impor-
tant a light, and, in fact,--became wholly unneces-
sary. He was, left as a sort of memento mori, to

. _
preserve in the minds of that unfortunate pcbple the
recollection of the independence they once enjoyed,
but of. 'which they were now unhappily deprived.—
The measure of placing a resident Lord Lieutenant
in Ireland had never entered the heads of Miniskers
until the present reign. The first Lord LieuOnint
sent was Lord Townsend. It was notorious,-that
he was sent for the express purpose of gaining an
influence over the Legislature. This object he at-
tained, and the cue he made of it was to substitute
for the aristocracy an oligarchy of his own. The
same Influence had continued down to the appoint-
ment of Lord Cornwallis, who made use of it to
indttee the Irish Legislature to sign the instrument of
their own destruction, and to deprive their Con-
stituents of those advantages which they had so long
enjoyed, and the loss of which proved a death blow
to the independence of the country. The unnecessary
tax of the Lord Lieutenant did not alone rest with
his emoluments of £20,000 a year, bin extended still
farther. Under his immediate controul were indefi-
nite sums; at his option the Board of Works might
be ordered to raise buildings, or waste the public gm-
ney in gardening ; and in addition to this., he had full
power over the money intended for secret services, so
that the means of contributing to his own advantage
were various. If his income was increased now, a si-
milar application would be made, in the course of the
ensuing year, for the augmentation of the Salaries of
all the Civil List, which, if rejected, and the present
proposition was agreed to, would be extreme injustice.
—ln Scotland, there was no such establishment as
that of Lord Lieutenant ; there the first Civil Officer
had.bat three thousand per • annum. He coukl not
see upon what reasonable ground ten times that sum
was-to be granted to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.
Nor could be form an adequate idea, 'why Dublin
Castle was to be distinguished with Vice•royal splen-
dour any more-than Holyroodhoose. He could not
but condemn, in the most unequivocal terms, the pre-
sent attempt of the Right Honourable Gentleman
(the Chancellor of the .Exchequerl: to entrap Parlia-
ment into-a pant of- this s bet, at a period of the Ses-1
sion when it was impossible to epquire into the in-
trinsic merits of the application. Upon the whole,
lie should deem himself criminal, if he was not most
streunously to oppose a grant so profligate, for 'the