expressed their resentment at "the unjust, illiberal, and im"politic opposition of many self-interested people in Great "Britain." Hence they bound themselves, until a better policy should prevail, neither directly nor indirectly to import or use any British goods which could be produced or manufactured in Ireland. In this Non-Importation agreement they were following the significant example of America; and they were followed in their turn by several counties and towns in Ireland, as Cork, Kilkenny, and Roscommon.

It must be acknowledged of the Irish people at that juncture, that their distresses were most real, and their complaints well founded. Besides the customary restraints upon their commerce, an embargo had been in force ever since 1776. Thus their great staple commodities of beef and butter were shut up and perishing in their warehouses, lest they should serve to supply the enemy; while at the same time, the linen, their great and only free manufacture, was contracted under the fatal blight of the North American war. Other causes of distress, though kept out of view by the Irish landlords, are recorded on at least as good authority. Thus writes the Lord Lieutenant: "The great leading "mischief is the rise of rents, the whole of which advance is "in addition to the former remittance drawn from hence by "those persons of property who never reside here."**

*

Another train of events at the same juncture brought the patriots a large accession of strength in urging their demands. By the calls of the American war the country had been stripped of troops. From the want of compulsory clauses, the Militia Act had remained a dead letter. Thus, when a French invasion seemed to be impending, the kingdom was found almost entirely defenceless. When there came intelligence, official, though unfounded, that the enemy meditated an attack upon the north, – when, in consequence, the people of Belfast and Carrickfergus asked

* Ann. Regist. 1779, p. 123. See also Hardy's Life of Lord Charlemont, vol. i. p. 387.

**To Lord Weymouth, May 29. 1779.

1782.

THE VOLUNTEERS.

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of the Government to send some force for their protection,the Government at Dublin could not at the time spare them any greater force than sixty troopers.* It was natural then that the people of Belfast and Carrickfergus, loyal as they were, should endeavour to protect themselves. They took up arms, and formed themselves into two or three companies. The spirit spread; and thus by degrees through all parts of Ireland, but more especially in Ulster, there arose independent companies of Volunteers. In May, 1779, they were already computed at upwards of ten thousand in number.** Many of the chief men in the country appeared at their head, as the Earl of Clanricarde in Connaught, and the Earl of Charlemont in Ulster. They chose their own officers, and though claiming arms, as Militia, from the Government stores, were in no degree subject to the Government control.

These irregular proceedings caused great perplexity in England. To defend the country from invasion was, of course, not only excusable, but praiseworthy, but, on the other hand, it was clearly both unconstitutional and dangerous to meet in arms without any direction from the Crown. On the whole, then, as soon as the immediate alarm of an invasion passed away, the Secretary of State, writing of the Volunteer Companies, instructed the Lord Lieutenant, "that "they be discouraged by all proper and gentle means.' But this order, so far at least as regarded success in its result, was far more easy to give than to obey. All the little delicate means of hinting and implying, without in set terms expressing, disapprobation, fell unheeded on dull and reluctant ears, and the Volunteers continued to grow both in numbers and in fame. Before the end of 1779, they might boast that they were not far short of 50,000 strong.

"***

Under such circumstances did the Irish Parliament meet again in October, 1779. The prospects of "the Castle" were

The Lord Lieutenant to Lord Weymouth, May 24. 1779.

** See Lord Rockingham's speech in the House of Lords. (Parl. Hist. vol. xx. p. 646.)

*** Lord Weymouth to Lord Buckinghamshire, June 7. 1779.

dark and lowering; those of the Opposition never yet so bright. They had now something better than party spirit to support them. They had a pressing grievance, they had a popular cause. They wanted but an able leader; and such a one they found in Mr. Grattan.

Henry Grattan was born in 1746. His father was a lawyer of some note; during many years both Recorder of, and Member for, the city of Dublin. Young Grattan being designed for the same profession, was entered at the Temple. Looking back in later life to his residence in London, he reverts with especial pleasure to the opportunities which he enjoyed of hearing Chatham in the House of Lords. He has left a vivid description of that great orator, and there is one of his remarks, written long after the event, which, considering his own control of popular assemblies, and his own influence on popular opinion, seems deserving of peculiar weight. "If he (Lord Chatham) had come into power in 1777, "I think he could have kept America. To him it was possible; to Lord North it certainly was not."*

From an early age did Grattan apply himself to the practice of oratory. But so singular even then were his manners, that his landlady in England requested of his friends that he might be taken away. For the gentleman, she said, is used to walk up and down the garden most of the night, talking to himself; and though alone, he is addressing some one on all occasions by the name of "Mr. Speaker;" so that he cannot possibly be in his right mind!

On returning to Dublin, Mr. Grattan began to practise as a barrister, but met with no great success. Success, indeed, by his own account, he seems to have neither desired nor deserved. Here are his own words to a friend: "I am now called "to the Bar without knowledge or ambition in my profession. "The Four Courts are of all places the most disagreeable. "My purpose is undetermined, my passion is retreat. I am

* Life of Henry Grattan, by his Son, vol. i. p. 237.

.1782.

HENRY GRATTAN.

155

"resolved to gratify it at any expense. There is certainly "repose, and may be an elegance in insignificance."*

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In 1775 Grattan entered the Irish House of Commons, as Member for the borough of Charlemont, and through the friendship of the Earl of that name. At first he was not much distinguished. But the opportunity was coming which would give his genius full play, and entitle his name for ever to the reverent recollection of his countrymen. His eloquence may be compared to that of the great orator whom he had so often heard and so much admired - Lord Chatham. On one point indeed they were most unlike. So skilled was Chatham in all the graces of action and address, that those very graces have sometimes been urged against him in reproach. The exact reverse was the case with Mr. Grattan. Thus speaks of him one of his contemporaries in his latter days: "Grattan," says Lord Byron, "would have been near it (a great orator) "but for his Harlequin delivery .... Curran used to take him off, bowing to the very ground, and thanking God he had "no peculiarities of manner or appearance, in a way irresis"tibly ludicrous."** But, on the other hand, his eloquence had many of those lightning flashes, those vehement and empassioned bursts, in which Chatham shone. Like Chatham he was wont to dwell on great principles far rather than on subordinate details. Like Chatham he had a spirit alive to every call of freedom, and chafing, as though instinctively, at every form of oppression or of wrong. There was in him, as in the English statesman, a genuine force and fervour, which, as a rushing torrent, worked out its own way, and which sometimes with the common herd might bear the name of madness. Whenever in debate the occasion was greatest, then were Chatham and Grattan greatest too; then, fearless of the frowns of power, they knew how to embody their bold thoughts in some striking phrase which, as a watchword,

*Letter to Mr. Broome, Feb. 24. 1772, as published in Grattan's Life. ** Memoranda by Lord Byron, in Moore's Life, vol. ii. p. 208., and vol. iii. p. 234. ed. 1832.

flew from mouth to mouth; then did their whole age feel the impress of their resolute will and glowing words.

Grattan was an Irishman most truly and thoroughly; an Irishman in heart, in soul, in mind. With all the quick talents of his countrymen, he had also some of their defects. It is remarkable that in the published collection of his speeches the very first sentence of the very first harangue contains a close approach at least to what we are accustomed to call an IRISH BULL. "I have entreated your attendance," says he, "that you might in the most public manner deny the claim of "the British Parliament, and with one voice lift up your "hands against it!"* There may also be ascribed to him some of that straining at effect — that unwillingness to say a plain thing in simple terms that vehement exaggeration both in sentiment and style by which the genius of his countrymen is but too often dimmed and marred. Take as one instance, out of many, Grattan's words on the French advance upon Moscow: "Ambition is omnivorous; it feasts "on famine, and sheds tons of blood that it may starve on "ice, in order to commit a robbery on desolation.”** Thus his eloquence had, perhaps, something of a local tinge, and though thriving and luxuriant in its own land, did not, at least in middle life, bear transplantation to our English soil. His temper, though warm, was generous and manly; he loved, with all his heart, the whole of Ireland, and not merely one of its parties and one of its creeds. To him at least could never be ascribed the fault with which so many of his countrymen are charged; that even within the ranks of the same party they are prone to backbite and revile each other. "I 'never knew," thus on one occasion spoke King George the Third to an eminent statesman now alive, "I never knew one "Scotchman speak ill of another, unless he had a reason for "it; but I never knew one Irishman speak well of another un"less he had a reason for it."

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The first steps of Grattan's political career were probably

*Speech of April 19. 1780.

** Speech of May 25. 1815.