imposture;" and it is most certain, that wedded to their barbarous Brehon law, , they shewed an inveterate hatred to the English; for notwithstanding the efforts of Henry II. John, and Henry III. to introduce it among them, they even in the reign of the latter, rebelled, and collected such a formidable force, as to flatter their party with the hope of completely expelling the English ontne genus Anglorum, Hiberniæ finibus ex-turbare," says Matthew Paris. Accordingly Giraldus Cambrensis tess, that " omnes fere Anglici ab Hibernia turbebantur."

Sir John Davies, page 87 informs us, that Edward I. “ did transmit the statutes of England to Ireland, in this form-Dominus rex mandavit breve suum, in hæc verba, Edwardus dei gratia, rex Angliæ dominus Liberniæ, &c. Cancellario suo Hiberniæ salutem." He then, after mentioning them, savs-Quæ in diéta terra nostra Hibernia, ad communem utilitatem, populi nostri, ejusdem terræ observari volumus.

Sir John Davies tells us, that "Richard II. thinking the reformation of Ireland a work worthy of his own presence and pains, made two royal journies, mentioned before; at which time he received the submissions of all the Irish lords and captains, who bound themselves both by indenture and oath, to become and continue his loyal subjects; and withal, laid a project for a civil plantation of the mountains and maritime counties, between Dublin and Wexford, by removing all the Irish septs from thence, as appeareth by the covenants between the Earl Marshal of England and the Irish septs." He tells us also, that he took special care to supply and furnish the courts of justice with able and sufficient judges;" but he says, "that all his good purposes and projects were defeated by his sudden departure from Ireland, and his deposition from the throne of England. He then observes, "since whose time (viz. Richard II.) until the 39th of Elizabeth, there was never any army sent over of a competent strength to subdue the Irish, but the war was made by the English colonies, only to defend their borders; or, if any forces were transmitted, they were sent only to suppress the rebellion of such as were descended of English race, and not to enlarge our dominion over the isle." Davies tells us, that "between the 10th year of Edward II. and the 30th of Edward III. by the concurrence of the mischiefs before recited, all the old English colonies in Munster, Copnaught and Ulster, and more than a third of Leinster, became degenerate, and fell away from the crown of England, so as only the four shires of the English pale remained under the obedience of the English law." To remedy these evils, which threatened a complete extinction of the English interest, and a separation of the two kingdoms, a law was passed at Kilkenny, in the 36th year of Edward III. when the Duke of Clarence, his third son, was Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, by which it was made high treason to form an alliance with the Irish, by marriage, nurture of infants, called fosterage, or gossipred; and by the same law, if any person of English race should adopt an Irish name, or Irish apparel, or should use the Irish language, his lands and tene

ments

ments should be seized, till he gave security to the Chancery to conform himself in every respect to the English manner of living. By the same law it was ordained, that the English in all suits and controversies should be ruled and governed by the English law, and that all such as should submit themselves to the Brehon law should be adjudged traitors. The English were also prohibited from making peace or war with each other, or with the bordering enemy.-Sir John Davies often praises this law, and shews the necessity of it, to prevent the English from assimilating to the barbarous customs of the native Irish, "with whom," he says, "they married, fostered, and made gossips, so as in one age the English, both lords and freeholders, became degenerate and more Irish in their language, in their apparel, in their arms and manner of fight, and all other customs of life whatsoever." He adds, for "fosterers and gossips, by the common custom of Ireland, were to maintain one another in all causes lawful and unlawful; which, as it is a combination and confederacy, punishable in all well governed common-weals, so was it not one of the least causes of the common misery of the kingdom."

Sir John then describes the manners and morals which the English acquired by assimilating to the Irish. "I omit their common repu diation of their wives, their promiscuous generation of children, their neglect of lawful matrimony, their uncleanness in apparel, diet and lodging, and their contempt and scorn of all things necessary for the civil life of man. These were the Irish customs which the English did embrace and use, after they had rejected the civil and honourable laws and customs of England, whereby they became degenerate, and metamorphosed, like Nebuchadnezzar."

Sir John Davies, p. 148, speaks thus of the effect of these laws: "That the presence of Lord Lionel, and these statutes of Kilkenny, did restore the English Government in the degenerate colonies, for divers years; and the statute of the 10th of Henry VII. which reviveth and continueth the statute of Kilkenny, doth confirm as much; for it declareth, that as long as these laws were put in use and execution, the laud continued in prosperity and honour; and since they were not executed, the subjects digressed and rebelled from their allegiance, and the land fell to ruin and desolation. And withal, we find the effect of these laws in the pipe-rolls, and plea-rolls of this kingdom; for from the 36th of Edward III. when the Prince entered into his government, till the beginning of Richard, the Second's reign, we find the revenue of the Crown both certain and casual, in Munster, Ulster and Connaught, accounted for, and that the King's writ did run, and the common law was executed in every of these provinces."

"Ima

Mr. Plowden, whose work seems to have been written for the purpose of exculpating the Irish rebels, and of reviling the British Government, speaks thus (page 41), of these laws. gination can scarcely devise an extreme of antipathy, hatred and revenge, to which this code of aggravation was not calculated to pro

ΚΑ

voke

voke both nations. One thing alone was left to fill the measure of calamity on one side, and oppression on the other. It was a system so grievous in its nature, that had it been confined to that disastrous period of the Irish history, I should have spoken of it with the same freedom I have used in narrating other barbarous usages †, which civilization and political liberality had long entombed; but recent revivals of this system of inhumanity, render it prudent for a modern writer to use others, rather than his own language, in retailing these ancient enormities.'

In a note, Mr. Plowden says, "free quarters seem to be the modern appellation of this mischievous system of oppression; but unfortunately for Ireland, the reality has long survived its ancient appellation ‡.”

Sir John Davies frequently acknowledges, that the Irish constantly shewed a strong aversion to English law, and English connexion. In page 154, he observes, "the English colonies being in some good measure reformed by the statutes of Kilkenny, did not utterly fall away into barbarism till the wars of the two Houses (York and Lancaster) had almost destroyed both these kingdoms; for in that miserable time the Irish found opportunity, without opposition, to banish law and government out of all the provinces, and to confine it only to the English pale."

66

But the English laws could not be enforced in any part of Ireland, which was not previously conquered and kept in obedience by the sword; and therefore Davies says, page 8, for though the Prince doth bear the title of Sovereign Lord of an entire country (as our Kings did of all Ireland), yet if there be two third parts of that country wherein he cannot punish treasons, murders, or thefts, unless he send an army to do it; if the jurisdiction of his ordinary courts doth not extend into tho e parts to protect the people from wrong and oppression if he have no certain revenue, no escheats or forfeitures out of the same, I cannot justly say that such a country is wholly conquered."

Spenser, Secretary to Lord Grey, Lord Deputy of Ireland in Elizabeth's reign, observes, in his very excellent treatise on that country, of the Irish," the which, whensoever they make head, no laws, no penalties, can restrain; but that they do, in the violence of their fury, tread down, and trample under foot, all both divine and human things; and the laws themselves they do specially rage at, and rend in pieces, as most repugnant to their liberty and natural freedom, which in their madness they effect. So as it is vain to speak of planting laws, and plotting policy, till they be altogether subdued." And again the same writer observes," it seemeth hard to plant any sound ordinance,

* It was levelled only against the English subjects, who became bru tal, ferocious, and rebellious, by associating with the native Irish. + It was calculated to prevent and remedy them.

This is the rancorous overflowing of Popish bigotry.

ег

or to reduce them to a civil government, since all their ill customs 135 are permitted unto them."

What opinion must the reader entertain of Mr. Plowden's candour and veracity, when in various parts of his work he calumniates the Government by asserting, "that they were unwilling to give the Irish the benefit of the English law, in order to civilize them," when so many unequivocal proofs appear to the contrary. In page 35, he says, "It was the ill-fated policy of the English Government of that day, not only not to coalesce and unite with the native Irish *, but to go every possible length in fomenting and perpetuating dissention, animosity and hatred between the two nations."

Observations of this kind are frequently made in Mr. Plowden's work, for the purpose of calumniating the English Government, which he never misses an opportunity of doing; and yet his dulness is such, that he has quoted some passages from writers of undoubted authority, which completely refute what he endeavours to substantiate on this point. Thus in page 22, he observes, "Finglass, Chief Baron of the Exchequer in the reign of Henry VIII. says, that the English statutes passed in Ireland are not observed eight days after passing them, whereas those laws and statutes made by the Irish on. their hills, they keep firm and stable, without breaking them, for any favour or reward." He quotes the following remark of Sir John Davies on the Government of Elizabeth: "That to inure and acquaint the people of Munster and Connaught with the English Government again (which had not been in use amongst them for the space of 200 years be fore) Sir Henry Sydney had instituted two presidency courts in those provinces." This shews an evident desire of the English to intro duce their laws amongst the Irish. In the year 1596, when there was a treaty of peace between the Government and the native Irish, Mr. Plowden observes, that one of the terms required by the latter was, "that no garrison, sheriff or other officer should remain in any of their counties." A sure proof that they spurned at the English laws. He tells us also in the same page, 85, under their hands, that it was an universal Irish 'rebellion, to shake off that the Council gave it all English Government.”

In all the treaties made between the Government and the Irish Chief tains, one condition, urged by the latter, was to be exempt from English law and English officers. Thus McGuire, Chieftain of Fermanagh, gave 3co cows to free his country from a sheriff †. In two different treaties with that arch rebel the Earl of Tyrone, the Lord Deputy insists, "that he shall permit, throughout Tyrone, her Majesty's officers of justice, as the sheriffs and others, to have free liberty, to execute their offices, as is accustomed in other provinces and counties of the realm, and answer all other duties formerly agreed on ‡."

* Because they became barbarous and rebellious by so doing.

+ Moryson, page 12.

Ibid. pages 23, 194.

The

The Life of a Lover; in a Series of Letters. By Sophia Lee. Svo. 6 vols. PP. 2008. Robinson. 1804.

THOUGH this work has been so long without notice by us, we think it our duty not to pass it over without observation and reprehension, as it is one of those works too much in request at the present time, which, under the name of exquisite sensibility, excuse, and even praise, breaches of delicacy in female manners, which tend to undermine the outworks of that moral duty which alone can render the female character respectable.

Saying this of the moral tendency of the novel, we are also compelled to say, that the execution is not superior to the intention. Miss Lee has been by no means happy in the arrangement of the story; and the language, though affected, is frequently ungrammatical, and sometimes vulgar. Even the title seems exceptionable. The Life of a Lover must mean the Life of Cecilia Rivers; but the application of the word lover to a female is to us quite new. And whether the term be applied to Lord Westbury or Cecilia, it must, we think, be considered to mean the life of a lover of the opposite sex in general, than of one particular object, as Lord Westbury actually marries two women for love, and is on the point of marrying another; and Cecilia, partial as she is to Lord Westbury, has a hawk's eve for male beauty in general; and something more than a platonic friendship for Captain Percival.

We give the following short sketch of the incidents:-Cecilia Rivers, the heroine of the tale, a young woman, with no fortune, but hér mind cultivated by an education which she had finished in France, determines to fix herself in some family as a governess; and, after two two or three fruitless trials, at last is permanently engaged to educate the two daughters of the Earl and Countess of Westbury; of whose history a short sketch is given. Lord Westbury had married his tutor's daughter for love, against the consent of his father; an exemplary young woman while they lived in retirement, in consequence of the old Earl's resentment; but when, on his death, the son succeeded to the title and fortune, and brought his wife into the great world, she launched into every species of fashionable dissipation, and neglected every duty, both of a wife and a mother, except that of personal fidelity to her husband. Thus situated Cecilia is introduced into the family; but it is long before she is introduced to the master of it; for though Lord Westbury is represented as a most amiable character, home is made so disagreeable to him, by the conduct of his wife, that he is continually out. As Cecilia has many respectable friends and relations, she frequently goes into public with them, and at an opera she is first shewn Lord Westbury and his brother. She is in raptures with the brother's beauty, and falls desperately in love at first sight, which is as instantly returned; though she is not handsome, but has a certain expression of countenance that wins the af

fection