'wronging' the head of it!-this we did not expect nor deserve. But we forgive Mr. Parnell: and, in return for his charge of ignorance,' shall simply recommend the following authorities to his knowledge.

6

In that part of Dr. Ledwich's Antiquities of Ireland, (a book of the greatest authority on such subjects,) which treats of the very scene where Mr. Parnell has laid this part of his novel, and of the very tomb of the ancient Dynasts of Wicklow, in which his descendant Berghetta is buried, we read- The valley derives its name from its first Tirbolgian possessors the Totilas, Tuathals or Tools;'-and again, the sept of the Tuathals or Tools were the ancient proprietors of this district;'-and again, the Refeart' (where Berghetta was buried) is literally the sepulchre of kings, being the burial place of the O'Tooles.'-Edit. 1790, pp. 33. 40. And Archdall says 'the Refeart, literally the sepulchre of kings, is the tomb of M'Uthiel or O'Toole, an ancient chieftain;'-and again, Laurence O'Toole was descended from the princely founders of the abbey;'-and again, a monastery was founded here by the O'Tooles.'-Monast. Hibern. pp. 769. 774. 778. Mr. Parnell sees by this time that the appellation,' whether 'vulgar' or not, is and ever was written and pronounced Toole; and we can further assure him that several worthy constituents of his own, who derive their descent from the ancient Tuathals, will be wonderfully astonished to learn from their Knight of the Shire, that they have an a, whether broad or slender, in their names.

'The reviewer next charges me (Mr. Parnell says) with fulsome flattery towards the Catholic Clergy. It might at least be termed praise, not flattery, till the truth of the praise is denied. Fulsome flattery, I imagine, is when questionable eulogy is bestowed upon a person possessed of patronage, and who having the power to reward, the motive of the eulogist must be considered, at least, equivocal.'-p. 11, 12.

own.

We might refer this erudite word-catcher to his dictionary, in which he would find that his only interpretation of the word to praise falsely, is but its secondary meaning: but we will grant him his meaning, and we will go still further and avow it for our We meant to charge him with fulsome flattery of the Catholic clergy in the sense which he gives to the words, and his sole answer to this is, How can those be flattered who have no patronage to bestow?-A mob then is never flattered!—the base passions of the populace are never pandered to!-popularity is never sought by gross and unblushing deviations from truth and principle! Alas, of all flatteries, that which Mr. Parnell excludes by his definition is the most dangerous. We have seen it in France, we now see it in England; and yet Mr. Parnell with a grave face tells us, that there can be no flattery but

of

of persons possessing patronage. But again, we will accept his definition-have the Roman Catholic clergy no patronage? no power? Will Mr. Parnell venture as a man of honour to say, that he, or his brother, or several of his friends, could hold their seats in parliament in spite of the Catholic clergy?—But we called the flattery fulsome; Mr. Parnell obliges us now to shew that it is false; this is easily done. Notwithstanding the extravagant praise of his dedication, the priest of Rahery (Mr. Parnell's representative of the body at large,) confesses that he was little fitted to benefit his flock—that he had no religion in his heart till he began to read Protestant writers-that the priests are generally religious impostors, and practise impious impositions on the ignorant people!

Mr. Parnell's next complaint is, that, in wondering how he could swear at the table of the House, that the Roman Catholic church holds doctrines impious and idolatrous, when he asserts in his dedication, that that church in Ireland possesses talents, simplicity, piety, and purity, far beyond that of the Protestant or any other church,'-we accuse him of perjury; but we beg Mr. Parnell's pardon, it is he who accuses himself. We offered him an alternative, IF (we said) he sincerely believed the Church of Rome to be purer than that of England, we wonder why he does not embrace the former-why at least he does not tell us how he reconciles those sentiments with the epithets superstitious and idolatrous;' but IF, ON THE OTHER HAND, Mr. Parnell be really a Protestant, and that these praises of the Popish church be the mere flattery of a dedicator, we cannot praise his good taste or sincerity.'-p. 479.

Against our charge, (which involved a dilemma,) he has made no defence, and he has given occasion to a new charge-which we make without dilemma or alternative-of the suppressio veri, by withdrawing the second member of our sentence, and of the suggestio falsi, by saying that we directly charged him with perjury. Of the cap which Mr. Parnell has thus forced upon his own head, he is naturally very impatient; and complains grievously of making the deficiencies of an author

a pretext for censuring his conduct as a member of parliament, but more particularly as a man and a Christian. And if it be answered that this evil results from members of parliament writing novels, we may reply that greater evil results from members of parliament turning reviewers, And the former class have this plain advantage, that they "shun secrecy and talk in open sight," whereas the latter are always exposed to the odium that rests upon safe malignity.'—p. 18.

This is very fine! but who that reads only this passage would believe that Maurice and Berghetta was, in fact, an anonymous publication?

publication? When the honourable member chose to avow it -whether before our remarks appeared or since, we really do not know, and have no great reason to care: the bravado about shunning secrecy could only have been justified by his having, at the outset, put his name to his book, and he will allow us to say that if he had done so he would have saved us more than half the pains we took in reviewing it.

He next tells us that we proceed to what is fair ground of remark, the supposed seditious tendency of the work'-but does he deny this? No; all he can say is that his design was to discourage sedition.' This is no more than we ourselves said of him: we never said nor thought that he meant to promote sedition; we clearly acquitted him of any kind of meaning; we expressly declared 'that Mr. Parnell did not know what he was saying'-that he was a child playing with fire-arms; an innocent who, by way of giving light to his neighbours, sticks his farthing candle into a barrel of gunpowder.'-p. 485.

The true question, however, is, whether, in substance, our opinion of the seditious tendency of the work was correct or not; and to this, our most serious, indeed our only serious charge, Mr. Parnell, after abusing us for the accusation, pleads guilty:'As this representation of a rebellious and infidel spirit,' he says, has given offence to those whose opinion I regard, I have altered the work so that the hero cannot be exposed to a verdict either of high treason or of felo de se.'-p. 19.

6

His next complaint is, that in ridiculing the respect paid by the Spanish Court to the Irish dynasts we continue to shew our ignorance.' We certainly continue our course, whatever it may be; and Mr. Parnell, our readers will find, continues his.

In support of the probability of this part of his narration, he tells us that the O'Donnells and O'Neils have been received with cordiality, and risen to high rank in the Spanish service. This, like the alliance between the Fitzgeralds and O'Neils, is very true; but what has it to do with the object of our ridicule? what we exposed to the wonder, or, if Mr. Parnell pleases, the ridicule of the world, were the following extracts from his work, which we quoted without adding a single observation.

"When we reached the circle where the queen sat, I made a slender curtsey, (a slender Curtsey!) preserving myself from that mean assiduousness which characterises courtiers both male and female.-She said, in Spanish, we are obliged to the princess Hi Sullivan for the honour she does our court," and seemed as if she would have said more, but was restrained by the forms of this most formal court; but these few words were accompanied by a smile of great sweetness."

'The boys, in right of their father, had the title of Prince acknow

ledged,

ledged, and the rank of Grandees of Spain superadded. And they and Geraldine received much courtesy from the Spanish court.'-p. 477. The title of Prince-in right of their father-Maurice the mower lately hanged for felony! and Mr. Parnell tells us that in wondering at this, we continue to betray our ignorance.' But this is not the worst proof of it ;-we had observed

'The Queen of Spain took as great a fancy to Geraldine as she had done to her Highness of Hi Sullivan; and having resolved to see her well married, her majesty, with a delicacy of sentiment and an easy familiarity peculiar to the court of Spain, had a list of all the unmarried grandees made out, and the grandees hereupon were drawn up in a line in the drawing-room, in order that Geraldine might pick out a husband for herself.'—p. 477.

To this Mr. Parnell gloriously replies.

'The reviewer ridicules the circumstance of a young lady being dis posed of in marriage, without freedom of choice, by a Queen of Spain. But many things, which are not so, appear ridiculous to ignorance. The reviewer might have known that the Spanish court, in common with other despotic courts, exercises that most revolting prerogative of tyranny, the disposal of the hands of its noble subjects in marriage. That it exists at the present day, the following article, inserted last year, from Madrid, testifies.

""The beautiful Duchess de la Roca has, after three months, been liberated from her confinement, to which she was subjected for having expressed her intention of marrying the Marquis del Valle de La Palermo. She has been pardoned only in consequence of the pregnancy of the queen, and remains single."'—p. 22.

We smiled at the picture of all the nobility of Spain being drawn up in file, and an Irish peasant girl being desired to make a free choice of which of them she pleased for a husband; and Mr. Parnell defends himself with a newspaper story of a Spanish lady who was not allowed to choose a husband for herself. But this tale (which we disbelieve altogether) only makes the matter worse, by shewing how unlikely it is that the Irish peasant girl should be treated with an attention which even the grandees of Spain do not receive. If Mr. Parnell had said that the queen had forced his Princess Hi Nial to a match with some particular individual, we should not have wondered-that would be in the character of this formal court; but the whole of the grandees of Spain subjected to her choice!-that, indeed, is somewhat a different case!

And so Mr. Parnell himself now begins to think; he has,' he says, 'prepared an edition of his work adapted to Ireland, and another adapted to England:'-in the former he has preserved the Spanish scenes, because, without some qualification of this kind (namely, the prospect of being made grandees of Spain), so much

VOL. XXIII. NO. XEVI.

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censure

·

censure on their old habits would not be tolerated by the Irish peasantry.'-p. 23.

This is a precious avowal. One edition is prepared for people of common sense; but for the Irish, the nonsense, and the prospect of being made Spanish princes, are necessary to render it palatable; and yet Mr. Parnell goes on abusing us for ignorance and malignity, in animadverting on this very trash which, in consequence of our advice, he has now expunged.

Mr. Parnell next protests against our remarks on the potatoe diet of the Irish peasantry. Upon this subject Mr. Parnell seems to us to be stark mad-he was bad enough in his Novel, but he is ten times worse in his Letter. Our readers will recollect that this judicious philanthrophist proposed, that the Irish peasantry should, from and after the day of publishing his novel, eat cold meat and bread, as a cheaper food than potatoes and milk, their ordinary diet. Upon this proposition, which, absurd as it is, was supported by arguments still more ridiculous, we observed, with, we think, singular forbearance, that we wished the food of the Irish peasantry could be improved; but that none but a visionary could think of changing it all together, and, above all, changing it for such reasons of economy as had occurred to Mr. Parnell.' p. 484.

We shall not stop to defend ourselves from Mr. Parnell's imputation of advocating the use of the potatoe as the sole diet of the Irish-we have expressly stated, in the strongest manner, an opposite wish; we only took the liberty of calling visionary the means by which Mr. Parnell would overturn, by a single stroke of his pen, the habits of a nation, and the reasons by which he would justify the attempt. We think for instance, that it is nearly as advantageous to the English poor to have a mixture of potatoes with their meat, as it would be to the Irish to have meat with their potatoes; but what would be thought of the man who should pretend to commence a reform of the diet of England by proscribing at once both bread and meat, and insisting on the immediate and exclusive use of cold potatoes! Mr. Parnell seems to think that whenever he can raise himself above what he calls a prejudice, he has a right to abuse every one who doubts whether a whole people, bigoted to that very prejudice, could, all of a sudden, and upon his ipse dixit, get rid of it. The following is part of his tirade against potatoes, and is really comparable to nothing but good King James's Counter-blast' against tobacco.

This dirty crop is first to be clawed out of the ground by the women's hands, then when pitted it must be perpetually turned and the shoots rubbed off to prevent spoiling; before it is cooked the women must take the potatoes to some stream of water to wash, no very short

operation