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Campbell's very characteristic remark-"I cannot justify the manner in which Captain Porteous came to his end-but no true Scotsman can sincerely regret it."

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terposition of his, farther than implicit acquiescence and entire approbation.' She was supposed to be very stingy, and foolish stories were circulated to annoy her; but she would often smile at hearing of the cold chine being turned and found bare, of the potted sawdust to reFew anecdotes and no mots enliven the bio- present lamprey, and of the want of Dr. Mead's kitchen graphy of Lord Hardwicke. He married a clever to be added to Powis House; and only observe that, unyoung widow, who managed his household as certain as was the time of the Lord Chancellor's dining, and the company that would attend him, yet if it should frugally as Lady Eldon did that of her Chancel- happen that he brought with him an ambassador or perlor, and obtained as great a reputation for stin- son of the highest rank, he never found a dinner or supginess. The lady herself averred that if her per to be ashamed of.' We may judge of the malicious husband ever by chance brought with him an turn given to her domestic arrangements, however deambassador, or person of high rank, he “ serving of praise, by the charge against her of stealing the purse in which the great Seal was kept to make a found a dinner or supper to be ashamed of;" counterpane. The truth is, that this purse-highly decowhich John, Earl of Eldon, we apprehend, could rated with the Royal Arms and other devices-by ancient not always have done. We quote Lord Camp-custom, is annually renewed, and is the perquisite of the bell's exoneration of the lady, for the sake of the Lord Chancellor for the time being, if he chooses to claim memorable relic which her thrift and good taste preserved

never

it."

Of the seven children of Lord and Lady Hardwicke, five were sons; but the interest of posterity centres wholly in the second son, the "accom

"His marriage with the young widow turned out most auspiciously. They continued to old age tenderly at-plished, high-spirited," and ill-fated Charles tached to each other. She contributed not only to his happiness but to his greatness. 'She often humorously laid claim (as she had good right to do) to so much of the merit of Lord Hardwicke's being a good Chancellor, in that his thoughts and attention were never taken from the business of the court by the private concerns of his family-the care of which, the management of his money matters, the settling all accounts with stewards and others, and above all the education of his children, had been wholly her department or concern, without any in

Poor penitent of Bethany!

The fame hath spread of thee

Yorke, who, for a few days, was trepanned into holding the Great Seal, to the betrayal of his honour and principles; and who died, too probably by his own hand, the regretted victim of a momentary weakness, where other Lord Chancellors would have brazened out their disgrace and triumphed in it.

ST. MARY MAGDALENE.

BY MRS. ACTON TINDAL.
Non Turba, non vetat Crucis,
Mortisque dire scandalum
Inter furentes, quærere
Signo peremptum, milites-
Tu prima Testis!

To the earth's utmost bound-where'er
To Jesu bends the knee;

Thy long repentance, quenchless love,
Thy sins by God forgiven,
Endear thee to each Saint on earth,
And angel bands in Heaven.
Mary! in that last darksome hour
Of agony and scorn,

When the stout-hearted and the bold
Denied their God forlorn-
Strong in thy deep humility,

Last at the cross was't thou,
Gazing in adoration rapt

Upon the thorn-crowned brow!
Mary first by the sepulchre
Thou wast at early dawn,
Faith's mighty jubilee to keep,
Hope's resurrection morn!

(To be continued.)

Hymnus Ecclesiae S. Mariæ Magdalenes.
Laden with India's fragrant spice,
'Twas all thou had'st to bring,
An offering at the lowly shrine
Of thy mocked God and King.
Mary the painters picture well
That wan sweet face of thine,
The scattered hair, the upraised eyes,
That softly tearful shine-

As though thine oft-repented sins
Yet lived in memory's sight,
And cast a chastening shadow o'er
Thy faith's triumphant light.
Mary full oft on history's page

A woman's name hath stood,

As victor, queen, or martyr-saint

A glorious sisterhood!

And none more brightly shines than thine
Amid the loved of Heaven-

The land-mark of the lost, that tells
Of hope, and sin forgiven.

WOMAN'S MORN, NOON, AND EVENING.

It was the dewy morning of the world;

It was the spring-tide of the human race;
A golden-ringed and spotted snake was curled
Around an infant's neck in fond embrace;
The full-maned lion lay beside the lamb :

A tawny, fire-eyed panther in green bowers
Was to a milk-white fawn the foster dam;
And woman gathered Eden's odorous flowers.
It was the scorching noon-tide of our star—

Hot tropic summer suns oppressed the earth;
The beams of chivalry, like lances, far

Gleamed on a battle plain of woe and dearth ;

BY GOODWYN BARMBY.

The knight lay gasping through his steel-barred helm,
The squire lay white in death and stern in pride,
The king had fled his saddle and his realm,
But woman watched her true-love knight beside.

It was the purple evening of the world

At evening time there shall be blessed light-
War's blood-red banner by fair peace was furled,

And brotherhood's clasped hands with rings were bright;
Men's homes were beautiful, and rich and high,
And earth was blooming through her grassy leas,
And over all there was a solemn sky,

And woman sat with children on her knees,

IRELAND AND HER PRESENT NECESSITIES.

BY JOHN O'CONNELL, M.P.

THE objections to an extension over Ireland of Tenant-right-that is to say, those objections which have even the appearance of validity-are principally as follows:

tion and tenant-encouragement is of very little practical value. The absurd intricacies of Lord Stanley's plan in 1845, and the equally absurd intricacies of Lord Lincoln's better-designed, but equally inefficient proposal of last session, did not even for the very moderate extent to which their proposers appeared to imagine they could work, carry with them the goodwill of the landlords--nay, they received a contemptuous toleration at their hands, only on account of their glaring and

First, That it would not be a relief to the cottier tenantry, but might, in fact, rather increase the power which mesne tenants that is to say, in plain English, the farmers-have at present over the class first named, and which they are (not without some justice) charged with abusing. Second, That there is nothing in the Tenant-hopeless defects. right to prevent the landlord from so increasing Something must be done to coerce the landhis rent as to destroy the market value of the lords, or else the Legislature will, by its conduct, holding, by frightening off those who would pur-proclaim to the world that the professions which chase.. have so loudly been made, of goodwill towards Third, The formal, and yet to a certain extent Ireland, and of a desire at length to apply a the substantial, difficulty of how and when first searching remedy to what has so well been called to set the system agoing in localities where no-her "monster-misery," were words without subthing of the kind has yet been known.

The objections to the other propositions for improving the relation between landlord and tenant must also be stated, as a settlement is scarcely to be hoped for, save upon a balance of difficulties attending the various remedial schemes proposed. To what is commonly called the “ Compensation for improvement" scheme, the following is objected:

First, The difficulty in agreeing as to what are improvements.

Second, In fixing what should rightfully be the landlord's share of the profit on the improvements, and what should be the tenant's.

stance-aggravating by insult the intolerable evils of her existing condition.

Men are not ordinarily found disposed to give up power of their own good will. The sad antipathies of sect and race which have rankled between landlord and tenant in Ireland must increase this indisposition on the part of the former to yield up any real amount of their present illimitable power over the latter. The Legislature, therefore, we repeat, must, to some extent, coerce the landlords.

If compulsion, then, is to be exercised upon the landlord, it should be that which has least doubt about it, of its ultimate benefit to himself. In the evidence on Tenant-right, the witnesses most adverse to that custom were compelled to confess that, under any circumstances, where that custom

Third, In arranging the means of adjudicating or arbitrating between landlord and tenant upon these points. One other proposition is put forward occasion-prevailed the landlord was sure of his rent. There ally as a separate scheme, and occasionally as merely a portion of either of the schemes we have been noticing-we speak of the suggested restriction of the power to recover rent to cases where there is a lease, the duration of that lease to be, at any rate, above twenty years.

We need not delay on this very fair-seeming proposition, as there is plainly not enough of comprehensiveness about it to cover the whole extent of the landlord and tenant difficulty in Ireland, while neither is there anything to prevent its being made an incident or adjunct to the measure finally adopted for that purpose.

On a review of these plans, with their difficulties, a preference by parties who would otherwise incline to the Tenant-right, is sometimes given to the "compensation" scheme, for what certainly appears a very common-sense reason, viz., that the landlords of Ireland favour more the latter than the former, and therefore will less employ against its enactment the very considerable influence in the Legislature which they undeniably possess.

But, after all, the amount of assent they have really given to any scheme for tenant-compensa

was also an unexcepted testimony to the feelings of peace and security which grew up, and were maintained, wherever it existed. Such benefits as these are predicated from the " compensation" scheme, only after the very mystified, very complicated, and very vexed question, or questions, of the respective degrees of profit, and of the manner of adjudicating these profits, shall have been satisfactorily resolved.

There is no agreement, not to say universal, but even to any appreciable extent there is nothing at all defined-upon these questions. Until such agreement and definition shall be come to, it is natural that we should look first to a system which has been tried, and where tried, has been found to work well for all.

The answers to the objection that the sub-tenants will not reap a benefit from Tenant-right (an objection, by the way, to which every plan yet proposed for settling the land quarrel in Ireland is equally liable) is simply, that that objection refers itself to a diseased state of society, curable only by measures of general policy, of which the plans for ameliorating the relations between landlord and tenant (important though that subject

is) must necessarily be subsidiary and subordinate parts.

If the farmers exercised tyranny over subtenants, it was owing to the same causes which enabled landlords to exercise tyranny over themselves, namely, that in the impoverished and exhausted condition of this country, the industrial classes have no other scope for their industry save upon the land.

Were manufactures and commerce flourishing in Ireland, the overflowings of industry would divert themselves into these channels-agriculture would be relieved of the excessive pressure of population upon it—and the competition for small holdings being thus naturally diminished, the temptations and opportunities for oppression of the farmer or cottier tenant respectively, would be correspondingly decreased.

Until the newly-opened resources of commercial and manufacturing employment shall have been, sufficiently developed, a certain amount of interference with the absolute power of the farmer would be justifiable, inasmuch as the State having interfered for his benefit with the landlord, he, therefore, in his turn, should be compelled to recognise some species of Tenant-right in his sub-tenants.

Of course, if it be said that the great general measures of remedial policy to which we have alluded as certain to take the pressure of competition off the land, are not to be expected, our argument falls to the ground, but with it falls the entire framework of society and social order in Ireland.

To the second objection, namely, that the landlord can so increase the rent of a holding as to deprive the Tenant-right of its fair marketable value, the answer is:

First, That the general practice has been that the landlord has not attempted this increase. But there is also evidence that, even where he has increased the rent, so great is the attraction of security which a recognised Tenant-right possesses for the peasant, that the marketable value does not by any means proportionably decrease. The fact is, that the landlord is ordinarily too anxious to get his arrears, which can only be paid him out of the purchase-money, to interfere much with the bargain made by the defaulting out-goer.

If the leaders of Parliamentary parties are to be at all credited, there is a general disposition to do something, at all events, towards facilitating and encouraging the granting and extending of leases; and this, together with the diminution which (from the before-mentioned general remedies) we anticipate in the present extravagant competition for land, will tend further to restrain the extreme exercise of the landord's power.

The objection of the formal, and yet to a certain extent the substantial difficulty of how and when first to set the system agoing in localities where nothing of the kind has yet been known——— is not without its difficulties; but still, we conend less in number and magnitude than those of any proposition for arbitration on a tenant's improvement.

If the Tenant-right system be acknowledged good and applicable, as we contend it to be, the only really important question is settled; and it would be absurd to suppose that the talent and ingenuity of the statesmen and lawyers of the country could not devise a means for bringing it speedily and safely into general operation.

Does any man who knows Ireland, and particularly who knows Ireland at the present anxious juncture, for a moment doubt of the beneficial effect, perhaps of the saving effect, which in the present disturbed state of the popular mind would result from an announcement, that from and after a certain not very remote day, any rent-payer of Ireland, when compelled or desirous to give up his holding, would be entitled to receive a sum of money equivalent (as in the North of Ireland at present) to ten, fifteen, or twenty years' purchase, from his successor, whether chosen by himself or by his landlord.

Now, having dealt first, because apparently first in urgency, with the question of ameliorating, by positive enactment, the relations between landlord and tenant, we naturally come to the consideration of the great remedial measures, a portion of whose indirect effect, we have already said, would assist and favour the operation of those positive enactments.

What are proposed?

The Times, with stunning iteration, jars out incessantly, "Extend the Poor Laws! extend the Poor Laws!" To this proposition it might be enough for the present to answer, that a period when the lands of Ireland are incurring such grave liabilities as they are, from the measures in progress for the employment and sustenance of the people during the calamity that has now a second year afflicted Ireland, is singularly inappropriate for charging them still further and in perpetuity

But, irrespective of the foregoing consideration, it would be a wanton act, indeed, to force an extended Poor Law upon Ireland, while in England itself the great problem of a good system is as far off from solution as at any time during all the experiments, modifications, shifts and changes by which that solution has been attempted since the times of Elizabeth. What says the Edinburgh Review of last October upon this subject?

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'We hope England will not impose upon Ireland institutions of which the utility is questionable. Such are the powers of mischief of the English Poor Law, that it threatened, not twelve years ago, to destroy the industry of the most laborious, the wealth of the richest, and the The mischief went on steadily increasing, Government morality of the most civilised nation in Europe. after Government tried vain expedients, or looked on in inactive despair. At length the almost despotic power given Lord Grey's Government by the first Reformed Parliament enabled it to apply a partial remedy. The Poor Law Amendment Bill was passed, and the plague was stayed, but not eradicated."

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"Thus, it will be seen, that during a period not merely of profound tranquillity, but of prosperity, the expenditare has gone on increasing, until, in eight years, it has risen nearly twenty-five per cent. If its advance be not checked, it must in time eat away the whole rental.

*

Of all the dangers to which we are exposed, those connected with the Poor Law are the most threatening. Scotland and Ireland are bound to study the experience of England, not as an incentive, but as a warning !" If, in despite of reason, experience, and justice, the extended Poor Law were to be fixed upon Ireland, her reve evenue-contribution, already so small in amount, would be speedily much lessened by the diminution of the consumption and use of taxed articles, from the increased poverty of the people. The pauper emigration from Ireland to this country would enormously increase, from the impossibility of adequate support at home; and the imperial coffers would be drained with the heavy and permanent applications to them, and the enormous expenditure indispensable for the keeping together the framework of Government and of society in that country.

The "reclamation of waste lands" is next spoken of; and doubtless there is much to recommend it, not as a panacea, not as a cure-extensive and permanent—such as some people regard it, for all the ills afflicting the Irish population; but as a means of procuring a breathing time; within which to examine and decide upon the real measures that will socially regenerate Ireland.

We do not purpose at present to enter into the details of reclamation plans. It is sufficient for the moment to say, that the Reports of Parliamentary Commissions and Committees, testifying to the comparatively easy and profitable improvability of the Irish waste lands, are confirmed by the testimony of every private person who has had practical knowledge of the subject. The only but great defect which is about them is, that theirs must necessarily be a process of SOME time, and can neither supply to the requirements and necessities of the existing population, nor keep pace with its annual increase.

There is a point connected with this which requires immediate attention. It is as to the course to be pursued with reference to money matters.

Is Ireland to be made to pay back the money advances-past, present, and future-which the existing emergency did and does necessitate?

We can imagine the scornful shout with which the putting of a question on such a subject will be met in most English quarters. The Times, with its usual "sucking-dove" amenities on Irish matters, will protest against even entertaining it, lest thereby encouragement be given to "Celtic cupidity and fraud!" And yet, despite of the Salmasian bolts of "the Thunderer," it is but fair to let Irish opinion and Irish argument on the question be fully made known, and treated with the cheap respect of a hearing-no matter how decisively the public mind in this country may be made up to insist upon the bond.

The present mischiefs of her state are not of Ireland's own contriving. Had she controlled the legislation affecting her interests, she would be justly chargeable with their present decay. But, for forty-six years, England has had the mastery over Irish matters and Irish opinions; and on her, therefore, the blame should fairly be laid. On this general score alone, she owes retribution, and can now make it by liberality in the money-supplies required by the crisis.

But Ireland does not shun to state particulars of her claims, if called upon to do so. The following are the leading features of her moneycase:

The enormous excess of British over Irish debt at the Union left the British minister no excuse for their consolidation; and accordingly it was arranged that the two debts should continue to be separately provided for. The active expenditure of the empire (i. e. the expenditure clear of charge of debts) was to be provided for, in the proportion of two parts from Ireland to fifteen from Great Britain. These proportions were to cease, the debts were to be consolidated, and the two countries to contribute indiscriminately by equal taxes, so soon as the said respective debts should be brought to bear to each other the proportions of the contributions-viz. as two to fifteen-provided, also, that the fiscal ability of Ireland should have come to bear a nearer proportion to that of Great Britain than it did in 1800. Now, the two to fifteen rate of contribution was denounced at the time, by Irishmen, as too high for Ireland, and afterwards so admitted by the British ministers themselves. Its consequence was, to exhaust and impoverish her to such a degree, that her debt, in sixteen years, increased nearly 230 per cent., while the British increased not quite 60 per cent. This disproportionate and unjust increase of the Irish debt brought about the two to fifteen proportion between it and the British debt.

Advantage was taken of that one single branch of the contingency contemplated in the Union Act, although the other branch of the contingency-viz. the nearer approach to equality of the respective abilities of the two countries-had not only not occurred, but, by the confession of the English ministers themselves, in 1816, the very contrary had occurred-namely, Ireland had become poorer than before, while Great Britain had actually increased in capital and re

sources.

Advantage was taken of that single branch of the contingency, to consolidate the debts, to do away with all measures of proportionate contribution, and place the purse of Ireland, without restriction or limit, in the hands of the British Chancellor of the Exchequer; thenceforward to take from it, and apply as he liked, every penny it did then, and might at any future time contain, and deprive Ireland of all chance of benefit from any surplus of revenue thenceforward and for ever.

The proper arrangement, in 1816, should have been a revision of the Union rates, lowering that

upon Ireland, and, of course, necessarily increasing, in some degree, the rate upon Great Britain. The late Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Goulburn, who cannot be at all suspected of an undue inclination towards Ireland in fiscal matters at any period of his official and parliamentary life, did himself bear testimony to the grievance which this plan would have remedied. Speaking, in 1822, to a motion of Sir John Newport's relative to Irish finances, he said "The Union contribution of 2-17ths for Ireland is now CONFESSED, ON ALL HANDS, to have been unjust!"

It is pretended that Ireland has been more than compensated for all possible fiscal losses since 1800, by her continued exemption from several taxes to which Great Britain is subject.

But the exemptions of Ireland consist only as to the land tax, the income and assessed taxes, and a portion of the excise duties, averaging about 1-14th of the whole revenue of excise; and that the total sum paid by Great Britain under these four heads does not exceed, if it even approach, to twelve millions out of the average fifty-one or fifty-two millions of imperial expenditure.

On the other hand, the excess of annual charge of the British debt, contracted before the Union, over and above that similarly contracted by Ireland, exceeds £16,000,000 (viz. Great Britain, £17,700,000; Ireland, £1,240,000; excess, £16,460,000), and this upon the most favourable view for Great Britain, of the ante-Union liabilities of the two countries.

Therefore, it appears that, if Great Britain pay separate taxation, she does so by an amount less by one-fourth than what she ought to pay.

And this, notwithstanding the income-tax which she pays, and which does not exist in Ireland. Before the imposition of that tax-viz., previous to the year 1842, the injustice to Ireland was far greater, as the separate payments of Great Britain did not amount to one-half of the sixteen millions excess of rightful liabilities above mentioned. It will, therefore, be easily seen that the operation, during 46 years, of the unjust fiscal arrangements noted in the foregoing summary, must have caused-taking not only principal, but interest and also compound interest, into account -an enormous aggregate of fiscal grievances to Ireland.

It is no answer to this, to say that Ireland's pecuniary contributions have been obviously so small that although these sixteen millions may have unfairly been made a common charge, they have really been met by Great Britain. The having made them a common charge was the grievance, as thereby the common expenditure was so much enlarged that the ability of Ireland was over-strained in the endeavour to make her bear her part of it. Had they been kept separate, as they ought to have been, the common portion of the annual expenditure would of course have been less by so much, and therefore the strain on Ireland would have been less.

That there has been no compensation for this by remission of taxation, but rather an aggrava

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Thus, up to and including last year (1845), the relief given to Ireland was, to that given to Great Britain, less than as 1 to 17, while her share of the taxes imposed has been higher than as 1 to 7.

The tax reductions of 1846 were the corn duties, and those on certain articles of foreign import, chiefly those used in the production of manufactures. England is a larger consumer of breadstuffs, it is needless to add, than Ireland, and, therefore, the relief in the respect of the corn duties must be more sensibly felt by her. The relief on articles of import, subsidiary to manufactures, must also be more beneficial to her, as she has so many and such various branches of flourishing industry in that line, and Ireland has none save the linen trade, a branch not affected by these reductions.

We are, therefore, entitled to say that the unjust disparity of taxation-relief existing at the end of the last year against Ireland has, if anything, been aggravated by the tax reductions of this

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since 1816,

£2,584,514

Total repeals of various kinds, since 1823,... 2,594,688

Total relief to Great Britain,...............£5,179,202 The Finance Committee of 1816 announced that at time there was "a very near approximation" between the rates of the assessed taxes in the two counties. It is a striking illustration of the difference between them in point of wealth, that the product of only a portion of the English assessed taxes should exceed, nearly ten times, the product of the entire of those taxes in Ireland, In fact, it was expressly stated in Parliament, in 1823, that they were finally taken off the latter

The abandoned spirit duty of 1842-3 is of course deducted in the Irish account,

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