portant in the state, so should the election to that high dignity be committed only to those who may at least be supposed capable of discernment sufficient to return the most eligible. As it is, the elector deriving respect from his property, his education, his understanding, and his integrity,stands upon an equal footing with the wretched ignoramus, who has been, Lord knows how, sworn into the possession of a forty-shilling freehold, but who is not worth a single groat in the world. Hence, as the number of the latter far outweighs that of the former, the power of returning members for all the counties of Ireland, for some of the cities, and for some of the boroughs, is in reality vested in the pauperism, the baseness, the ignorance, and the barbarism of the Nation.

It seems to me altogether impossible that the Imperial Legislature of these realms, (with the exception of Irish members,) can be apprised of the real nature of the elective franchise as now exercised in Ireland, because, if they were, I look upon it that such a preposterous state of things would not be suffered to exist for a moment. Their eyes, indeed, must have been in some measure opened by the news paper account of the late Elections. Still there remains a great deal with which they cannot be acquainted, and this it is my present purpose to unfold. The very necessity of registering freeholders, which registry lasts good as far as forty shilling freeholders are concerned, only six years, is of itself a proof of the impropriety of committing such a power to such hands. It originated from the abominable practice that subsisted here some forty years since, of introducing fictitious freeholders. I don't know whether it was actually begun, but I believe it was carried to the greatest excess in the county of Cork, where a candidate, as deficient in conscience as he was powerful in purse, actually obtained his return, not only against a majority of legal freeholders, but where there were certainly nearly two to one against him. It was ruled by the High Sheriff under the sanction of his assistant counsel, that whosoever gave a consistent account of his freehold, though not producing any lease or written title thereto, and should take the freeholder's, and bribery oaths, must, under the statute, be admitted as having a good and law

ful vote. It could be no matter of wonder to have two or three unprincipled fellows make up their minds for this atrocious exhibition of villainous perjury for the sake of a few guineas; but to see hundreds voluntarily offer ing themselves for so detestable a purpose in a country called Christian, will, I think, by all British readers, be deemed truly wonderful. Yet have I seen the renowned Father O'Leary sit with the utmost composure where this game was played, and, if not abetting, certainly not discouraging the actors of the nefarious draina, every one of whom was of his own communion. I need not add, that he was a friend to the ingenious purcha ser of Popish consciences. The management of the fraud was curious and well contrived. Every candidate for qualification was introduced into a room, where he received instructions as to the description of his freehold, the number of his acres, the lives in his lease, and the clear profit it brought him. When he had learned his lesson, and was prepared for such questions as would probably be asked, he was, if his own clothes happened to be too shabby for the dignity of an elector, furnished with a good voting coat. He was then introduced into Court by an agent; and in the event of surmounting all the difficulties and embarrassments of cross-examination from the lawyers on the opposite side, and passing muster as a legal elector, he returned to receive the reward of his perjury. This, however, was administered with such caution in a dark and lonely room, that none ever knew the hand that gave it. The price paid, I have reason to think, was ten guineas. I have been present in Court when one of these fellows, (they were called bucks, and perfectly well known,) after having minutely described his freehold, and the landlord under whom he derived, was a little embarrassed by the sudden appearance of the gentleman from whose estate he was about to vote. He rose with great indignation, assured the Sheriff he had never seen the man before; that he was well acquainted with all his tenants; that no such person held a foot of ground under him; and that he was willing to confirm what he said by oath. But the point was ruled; the Sheriff said it might be a matter for subsequent scrutiny, but that he must abide by the words of

the statute. Such was the decision of an Irish High Sheriff. I may be permitted to doubt whether it would have been so decided by a British one. As none but Protestants could then vote, there was added to their crimes the perjury of passing for Protestants. Heretics they might safely have sworn themselves.

The act for registering freeholders, none of whom can vote unless registered six months previous to the day of election, certainly precludes fraud and perjury of this nature, but by opening a door for the admission of voters, neither more respectable, nor more conscientious, contributes, I fear, very little to the honesty and purity of elections. The great landed proprietors themselves must of course be regarded as scrupulously averse to admitting any to be enrolled among their forty-shilling freeholders, whose interest in the premises was not in reality of that amount. Of their estates, how ever, no inconsiderable portion is leased to middlemen, who, adopting the ruinous system of letting land in small divisions, in order to get the most they can out of it during the continuance of their leases, have at length filled the country with a dense population, which, in default of manufacturing employment, increases in pauperism as it advances in numbers. Among these middlemen-of whom many are Roman Catholics as well as among the general classes of country gentlemen, there naturally exists a desire of enhancing their importance, and exhibiting their political weight and respectability by the number of voters they are able to bring into the field. A man who can command a score or two of forty-shilling militants, armed with the election franehise, and ready to march as their leader shall direct, is a champion of no mean consequence in a close contest for the representation of a county. At first they were pretty securely reckoned upon by their natural commanders; but since the priests have taken the field, and brought the thunder of the Church to bear against whatever side they choose to oppose, the elective warfare has entirely changed its nature, and those spiritual generals who lately disclaimed all political meddlings, and solicited only the uninterrupted exercise of their holy functions, have taken upon themselves the supreme, if not exclusive right, of ap

pointing representatives of Ireland in the British Parliament! The facility of making freeholders of this description, increased the number of these respectable and independent electors to an exorbitant amount. It was discovered, it seems, by sages learned in the laws, that stamped leases or powers of any sort were wholly unnecessary, and that any kind of document intimating the landlord's consent to add a life to the tenant's lease, if it had no life before, or to give the occupier of house, garden, or land, no matter how small, provided he was willing to swear his interest therein worth forty shillings, the said premises during the life of some person specified, generally an old man or woman, was perfectly sufficient to entitle him to be registered as a freeholder. When it is considered what number of this description of inhabitants abound in all parts of Ireland, how little scrupulous they are about so trifling a matter as an oath when anything is to be got by taking it, you will no longer wonder at the immense overflow of perjury and pauperism to be found in the great body of Irish electors!

I have been frequently present at sessions held for the purpose of registering freeholders, as well as at contested county elections, at both of which, and particularly the latter, the modes of proceeding were at once farcical and disgusting. At the former, the forty-shilling freeholder swears, agreeable to a printed form, that he has a freehold worth forty shillings, (describing the place where it is situated) that he is a bona fide occupier, either by grazing, or tilling, or both; and that he has it by virtue of the title then produced in Court. On the paper so produced, the clerk of the crown writes his name, and the date of the registry, then enters it into his catalogue, receives a small fee, and the business of the registry is completed. The fees of these time-serving electors, that is to say, of nineteen in every score of forty-shilling freeholders, are paid by their landlords, or, as they might have been too often called, their drivers, who settle the business with the clerk of the crown, and who get sessions held, each in his own district, for no other purpose than registering their voters. The nature of the system obliges even the respectable landed proprietor to act in some

measure on the obnoxious part of it, if he is anxious to maintain a county interest, because otherwise he will be beat out of the field by persons far below him indeed in wealth and respectability. The abuses to which it is carried are too numerous for detail; they may easily be inferred from this very statement, especially when it is considered, that on the day of election no cross-examination is allowed to take place; it is enough that the person's name is entered in the regis trator's schedule. The bribery oath may indeed be put, but this is rarely done, because the only result would be delay-no forty-shilling hero ever stumbling over that molehill. Now it must often happen that the tenure which was really worth forty shillings at the time of registry, may not be worth ten on the day of an election taking place three, four, or five years after. But no question can be put-it was sworn to five years before,-ergo,-by Hibernian logic-it must be true still. My British readers will hardly believe that two or three have often been known to register out of one house and acreone tilled it, another grazed it, and a third did both. It was in some sort true, for all lived in the same house, all had one or more pigs for grazing, and all raised potatoes; but the real value of the holding, after deduction of the rent, could not amount to more than five shillings per man. These, you will say, were pretty electors, yet truth obliges me to say, that of the droves I have seen brought to the registry sessions by land and by water, there were multitudes with even less pretensions, fellows furnished with do cuments from those who had no free hold to give-fellows who had scarce a cabin to live in, and whose only title lay in a tongue ready to swear, and a conscience wide enough to swallow any pill the master thought fit to prescribe. Surely the candidate who was honour ed with such support, had ample rea son to exclaim with Coriolanus, (Shakspeare furnishes matter for every thing,)

"Most sweet voices !"

But I come to the day of the elec. tion, and a grand day it is. Then appear the different squadrons, under the conduct of their several centurions, whose business it is to provide food and lodging; to keep them, if possible,

sober; to watch against the intrusion of emissaries from the enemy's camp, and to keep his ragged regiment from straggling. This is a task of some difficulty, particularly towards the close of election, and when the return is closely contested; for then every possible artifice is resorted to, and with most ardour on the weaker side, to turn the scale in favour of the hard run candidate. There are, however, two circumstances in the registry plan favourable to the friends of public peace, because they tend to shorten contests. One is, that there is a voting' room for every barony, so that many votes are received at the same time; and another, that no lawyers can speak in Court. There is yet a third, which is, that, by previously examining the registry, any person well acquainted with county interests can easily ascertain which of the parties has the strongest support. I should indeed rather say that it has been an advantage conducive to general tranquillity; for, as it is, the fact is quite otherwise. No landlord, however lenient, however generous, and however beloved, can reckon upon the support of his own tenantry, being Roman Catholics, even though he be himself the candidate, unless he is approved by the holy Roman Catholic Church; for into her hands the power of returning representatives is now committed, who, however qualified she may be to make saints, is not the best possible maker of senators in a Popish empire, much less in a Protestant one. France, I believe, would not easily submit to be governed by senators of her choice.Spain does, but her example is not. among the most encouraging. Mr Plunket himself will certainly not deny her present overbearing influence in this land of saints, because it is so fully borne out by facts; but he is happily possessed of a secret to neutralize these facts-nay, even to prevent their future recurrence. The divines of the holy Roman Church only want to be established in the pleasing enjoyment of power, ecclesiastical for themselves, and political for their followers! Well, what remedy can be more simple? Give them all they ask, says Mr Plunket, and they will complain no more! I like simple remedies, and if there be a more simple than this, I certainly don't know where to look for it.

In the county of Cork, as well as in several other Irish counties, there is among these forty-shilling voters, a very large proportion of 'sweet voices,' totally ignorant of any language but their own native dialect. All these of course belong to the Pope's regiment, and know nothing of Christianity save what comes through the medium of the priest. The legislature has prescribed two oaths necessary to be taken by Roman Catholics previous to their being admitted to exercise a civil privilege so important as that of the elective franchise. These are to be taken in open court, and the names or marks of the persons taking them, are entered in a roll kept by the clerk of the crown. Without a certificate under his hand, that this indispensable preliminary has been complied with, all the other preparations are nugatory. One of these is the oath of allegiance to the King, not containing many sentences-the other may be called that of allegiance to the State, abjuring and renouncing the Pope's temporal authority and so forth! This is pretty long, and the tenor and phraseology of it not very accordant with the uncultivated comprehension of poor Paddy. Many, therefore, who know enough of English to repeat it after the clerk, do in reality pronounce words and sentences, of a great part of which they know not the meaning. But the great difficulty is to manage with those who can not speak English. The Act prescribes the oath to be taken Anglice totidem verbis; and if it had said that it shall be availing to none who cannot really and bona fide so take it, the benefit would have been considerable in another point of view, by promoting the use of the English tongue. This advantage would be enhanced still more by a condition, indispensable, in my opinion, to the qualification of an elector, namely, that he should be able not only to speak English, but to read it. The Act not having provided for interpretation, and having specified a certain form of words with out express license to substitute any others for them, may not unreasonably seem to have precluded all who could not repeat, and did not understand the words of the statute. But if our State directors want first to remove mountains, they are in no want of casuistical abilities to manage at their pleasure the construction of Acts of VOL. XXII.

Parliament relative to oaths, and too often on the principles of Hudibrastic logic.

I was present when a batch of thirty or forty single-tongued freeholders appeared before the clerk of the crown, to consummate the forms of legal qualification. He, not understanding a word of their language, and supposing that they knew at least something of his, had them duly arranged in front of his chair, and produced his long scroll.

To the first man, who happened to know a few English words, but without ability to hold conversation, he began thus-"You, sir, and the rest of these gentlemen, must first declare your respective names, and afterwards repeat after me the contents of this paper, which, after you have sworn to, must be signed with the name or mark of every individual. Do you now, sir, begin by repeating your name." The person addressed looked round for relief, and was informed by a friend (in Irish) that he must say after the clerk every word that the clerk should read to him out of the paper. Thus emboldened, he requested his friend to bid the clerk begin again-this was accordingly done.-(Question) Repeat your name.your name. (Answer) Repate your name.-(Clerk) What answer is that, man?-(Freeholder) What answer is that, man?-At this there was a laugh in court, and the clerk of the crown got angry, thinking perhaps that Paddy was disposed to pass a joke upon him. An explanation, however, on the part of the leader of the band soon set matters to rights, and the first part of the business was pretty well got over, each man successively repeating his name. But the sequel baffles all description. The quickest ear, and the most flippant tongue, found it not only difficult, but impossible, except after frequent repetitions, to catch the sounds of an unknown language, and to repeat its words and sentences intelligibly. What then must have been the confusion of tongues in such a Babel as was here presented! Had the rustics been even moderately acquainted with English, still the meaning would have been for the most part shut out, being so much above the ordinary reach of their ideas; as it was, they were just as unable to pronounce their lesson as to comprehend it. The oath might have been as well admi

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