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any adjustment of rival creeds and races, so much as in the adoption, the general adoption, of a better system of farming. Let her children attend to her fertile soil; let them consult the genius of her mild but variable atmosphere; let them readily and with alacrity seize upon such openings as the extension of the linen trade and the opportunity for flax culture now offer to them, and, without presuming to guarantee any sudden or startling results, I think there is every hope for sure and progressive ones. And, upon this head, I have read with extreme pleasure the communications which have lately passed between the enterprising community of Belfast and the spirited Mayor of the city of Cork; and, though Dublin may not be exactly a party to those negotiations, yet, I have every confidence that when Belfast and Cork shall be sowing to any considerable extent, they will leave some rich droppings midway, for Dublin, on their passage. And with respect, Gentlemen, to your own city of Dublin, notwithstanding the fact of the severe pressure upon the country generally, Dublin could not fail to bear its share, yet I fail to discern any marks of a stagnant or retrograde community. The uninhabited houses, which seven years ago amounted to above 1,900, are now only 700. An enterprising firm has commenced considerable operations for the building of iron ships and the making of ocean steamers. An entirely new business in Ireland, that of a sugar refinery, is in the process of being introduced into Dublin. But, apart, Gentlemen, from these minute statistics, for which I do not feel a meeting like this to be the occasion, I will only speak of what I have seen achieved here in Dublin during the period of my own Viceroyalty. Putting aside schools, prisons, reformatories, those weapons of warfare which society must be always waging with ignorance, violence, and crime-putting aside the undeniable improvements visible everywhere in the aspect of private houses, of shop fronts, of banks, of insurance offices, and other commercial buildings of a like class-I have seen myself the rise of manifold churches of all denominations in a style of architecture of which, at least, none of them need be ashamed. Need I mention that vast cathedral restoration which reproduces the piety of the mediaval ages amongst us? I have seen two noble museums opened-one in the College Park, the other upon Leinster Lawn; I have seen a new bridge opened; I have seen a large dock opened; I have seen a very spacious cattle market opened; I have seen three statues to eminent men rise in the most com

manding positions of your thoroughfares; I have seen the foundation laid of a splendid winter garden; I have seen inaugurated a magnificent system of waterworks, and only yesterday I witnessed the efficient provision made for the extinction of fires; and, what I am sure gratifies me more than all the rest, I have seen three ample and commodious hospitals thrown open for the relief of human disease and suffering. Boldened thus by what has been already done, I venture to cast my eyes forward, and to anticipate the time when Dublin, having gradually cleared itself of its impurities, its squalid buildings, and its choked-up thoroughfares, shall display on that broad slope which stretches from its heathery mountains down to its sapphire seas, rows of gay villas and shining terraces, of stately buildings and fine philanthropic institutions, all constructed in a style of architecture worthy of its unparalleled site, and in accordance with its past renown and its future fortunes.

MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY, ROYAL DUBLIN SOCIETY.

CEREMONY OF LAYING THE FOUNDATION STONE.

[MARCH 7TH, 1856.]

L.

E. FOOT, Esq., one of the Honorary Secretaries of the Society, having read the Address,

The EARL OF CARLISLE replied in the following terms:

MY LORDS AND GENTLEMEN,

I take a very special pleasure in bearing the part in the interesting ceremonial of the day which you have been good enough to allot to me. The undertaking we are thus about to initiate has attracted the species of support which is most in harmony with the prevailing spirit of our institutions. It has received that degree of countenance from the State

which it should be the province and the pride of a paternal Government to manifest towards every design to promote the enjoyment and elevation of the community at large; and at the same time it has elicited the amount of individual effort and liberality which is the best guarantee of a continued interest and encouragement. Under these united auspices I trust I am amply justified in the hope that the building about to arise on the spot already connected with high ancestral recollections of Ireland may, with its kindred departments, furnish ever-increasing accommodation for the pursuits of useful knowledge and humanizing accomplishments, and open for the coming generations worthy temples of science, art, and learning, at whose shrine they may be taught how most to reverence their Creator, and how best to benefit their fellowcreatures.

HENRY KEMMIS, Esq., Q. C., one of the Vice-Presidents of the Royal Dublin Society, having returned thanks to the Earl of Carlisle, said in conclusion:-Your Excellency has on this day expressed, in terms more graceful and eloquent than I could venture to do, your feelings upon the subject, and I feel sure that one who takes so deep an interest in all questions affecting the arts and sciences as your Excellency, must rejoice that the extended nature of the Society's operations has necessitated that enlargement of its premises of which it is now taking the initiatory step. I must also remind your Excellency that the Society is one into which no differences of sect or diversity of opinion upon religion or politics ever intruded; but all its members concur in forwarding the object of the day, and in endeavouring to keep pace with the growing requirements of an age of civilization.

The EARL OF CARLISLE, in returning thanks, said :—

MR. VICE-PRESIDENT, MY LORDS, AND GENTLEMEN,

I beg to return my best thanks for the kind expressions you have just addressed to me. I fully recognise, as must every well-wisher of Ireland, the eminent services which the Society, of whose origin you have now spoken, has rendered to the best interests of science, art, and literature; and I trust that the new Museum, of which we have just laid the first stone, may, by its future results and history, cause us always to feel pride and pleasure in the good work in which we have now been sharers. I shall but say in addition, that the first use which I shall make of the stone now laid [here His Excellency stood upon the

block of granite] is to use it as a vantage-ground from which to ask you all to join with me in giving three cheers for Her Majesty the Queen.

THE INAUGURATION OF MOORE'S STATUE.

[OCTOBER 14TH, 1857.]

MY LORD CHARLEMONT, LADIES, AND GENTLEMEN,

THERE

HERE is no need that I should tell you how glad I feel to take my part in the work of this day. It is well for you now, men and women of Dublin—it will sound well for you in all time to come, that it can be said of you that you have got the start of London itself in raising an out-of-door statue to one of the sacred band of poets. Kings, warriors, and statesmen have their statues to meet the public gaze under the open vault of heaven. The sister capital of Scotland has the statue of her great true-born son, Sir Walter Scott; and I trust you will all give me credit for being enough of an Irishman to feel glad and proud to join you in placing here, in the heart of the city of Dublin, while an Earl of Charlemont sits in the chair beside me, the statue of Thomas Moore. It has been a most lawful, as well as a most graceful, debt for Ireland to pay. The genius, the temperament, and the affections of Moore were all eminently Irish; they had all that mellow and tender glow, like the atmosphere which melts round your native hills

"More dear in thy sorrow, thy clouds, and thy tears,
Than the rest of the world in its sunniest spheres."

I hope you will bear with me when endeavouring, as I go along, as much as possible, to illumine my rugged prose with gleams of his song. Our bard, as all who hear me must be aware, had very strong national and political feelings; indeed, he could not feel at all without feeling warmly; but I know it will be felt on all sides, why, in an hour like this, we should steer quite clear of any topic of controversy. Yet I cannot, even in compliment to such an hour and to such a man, consent

so wholly to pass over what is due to still higher claims as not to admit that, with the many calls upon our sympathy and our admiration, there was something to rebuke, especially in connexion with his early life and youthful muse. Let us, however, now only remember that, if our bard at one time flew to the bower "where pleasure lies carelessly smiling at fame," he, as you have been well reminded, was the same bard who strung such strains as these to his maturer lyre :

"False is the light on glory's plume,

As fading hues of even;

And love and hope and beauty's bloom
Are blossoms gathered for the tomb;

There's nothing bright but Heaven."

And, what is still more valuable as the touchstone of character, there was no one by whom the most essential, and loving, and holy relations of life as son, as brother, as husband, as father, and as friend-were more tenderly and steadfastly fulfilled. It is, however, in the lustre of his poetical reputation that we have chiefly to regard him to-day; and probably there never was one who bore the bright name of poet who ever equalled or approached him in the union of the most exquisite ear for melody and metre with the liveliest play of wit, the most sparkling warmth of fancy, and the tenderest susceptibility of feeling. In his most sustained effort he devoted those qualities to that far country which now engages so many of our painful anxieties—the gorgeous and mysterious East. But it was to his own green Erin-to her legends and her melodies-that the most thrilling and impassioned accents of his lyre were tuned; to the harp of Tara, the glories of Brian, to the golden collar of Malachi, to the crystal of Avoca, to the round towers beneath Lough Neagh, to Moyle's roaring waters, to the bed of St. Kevin, to the white steed of the O'Donohoe, to the eyes of Nora Creina, to

"The chosen leaf of bard and chief,
The green immortal shamrock."

So that it might truthfully be said of himself

"Dear harp of my country, in darkness I found thee;
The cold chain of silence had hung o'er thee long,
Till proudly, my own island harp, I unbound thee,

And gave thy full chords to light, freedom, and song."

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