in political affairs, ne remained still in parliament and voted as his conscience bade, sometimes with and sometimes against the minister. Towards the close of the year 1785, when, under cover of a commercial arrangement, it was supposed a design had been formed by the British ministry to subvert the newly-acquired independence of the Irish parliament, we find him again alert and vigilant at his post. Among the celebrated proposals which were then offered to the house of commons in Ireland by an agent of the crown, and which are still remembered and execrated in that country by the name of 'Orde's Propositions, one was, "that the parliament of Ireland, in consideration of being admitted to participate equally with Great Britain in all commercial advantages, should from time to time adopt and enact all such acts of the British parliament as should relate to the regulation or management of her commerce," &c. The proposition, it was contended, would sink the parliament of Ireland into a mere register to the British legislature and this opinion was entertained not only by the public in general, but by some of the ablest men in both houses; among them by Mr Grattan, who gave to the whole system the most unqualified and strenuous opposition. This opposition proved successful, the measure was relinquished, and Mr Grattan thenceforward continued to resist, with the most zealous and persevering firmness, what he called the principles of the old court,'-principles which he looked on as tending to degrade Ireland, by corruption and influence, to the same despicable and miserable state to which she had been reduced previously to the year 1783.

From this period we find Mr Grattan an active leader of the countryparty in the house of commons, loved by the people and dreaded by the cabinet. His popularity, which had so suddenly sunk on his acceptance of the parliamentary boon, and his support of the simple repeal, had now risen to its former level, and the nation found that he was still an upright and independent senator. Among the various measures which now occupied his attention was the establishment of a provision for the clergy independent of tithes. For many years the Catholic peasantry of Ireland had been discontented, not so much with the payment of tithes to Protestant pastors, as with the rigid and oppressive manner in which they had been collected by proctors and tithe-farmers. The country had been kept by this cause for almost half a century in disturbance. Mr Grattan proposed a measure which would have removed every discontent, and at the same time have secured a provision for the clergy equal to that which they then possessed, easy and certain to them, and to the peasantry neither oppressive nor unpleasant. This plan was, however, opposed by the collective influence of the established church, and of course rejected by the legislature. Another measure which he proposed to parliament about the same time, viz. a bill to promote the improvement of barren land, by exempting reclaimed ground from payment of tithes for seven years, was but little calculated to restore the favour of the priesthood; they accordingly resisted and defeated the project, and continued thenceforward to hate and calumniate its author.

The whig club had for some time become a political body of no small consideration. Mr Grattan was one of the first, if not the very first member in point of talent and popularity. At his instance it was that the members who had been since its institution the advocates of a liberal

system, which they considered necessary to the security of the constitution and independence of the country, came now to a resolution, by which they publicly pledged themselves never to accept offices under any administration which should not concede certain measures to the people these consisted principally of a pension-bill,—a bill to make the great officers of the crown responsible for their advice and measures, another to prevent revenue-officers from voting at elections,and a place-bill. This explicit declaration of a sincere and fixed purpose respecting these essential subjects, gave the society much weight with the public, and enabled them, after a long opposition on the part of administration, to effect their purpose.

The celebrity which Mr Grattan had attained by his opposition to Mr Orde's system, and his subsequent exertions in the popular cause, procured for him, in the year 1790, an honourable and easy election as representative for the metropolis. During the existence of the parliament which then commenced, there occurred, however, a question on which Mr Grattan and a very considerable proportion of his constituents materially differed; this was the claim of the Catholics to the elective franchise. From his first entrance into parliament he had always been the decided friend of every measure which tended to abolish those political distinctions, which are founded only on a difference of religious tenets. The corporation of the city of Dublin, prone by situation and habit to religious bigotry, looked on the Catholics at once with suspicion and contempt. Enjoying a monopoly of municipal honour and emoluments, by the exclusion of all who professed a different faith, from the franchises of the capital, they considered every attempt to restore them to those franchises as an attack upon their property, or a violation of their rights. Besides these causes the then administration had, by some recent institutions, obtained a paramount influence in the corporation; and to perpetuate religious distinctions, which had hitherto kept Ireland weak, was still the court-policy. This influence, therefore, operating in conjunction with other causes, rendered the municipal officers of Dublin incapable of participating in that increased liberality of sentiment which had now every where begun to dissipate prejudice and dispel bigotry. On the question of admitting the Catholics to the privileges of the constitution, the corporation and Mr Grattan accordingly differed; and had not circumstances occurred which prevented him from becoming again a candidate for the capital, there was no chance of his being a second time elected its representative.

The war with France had now taken place; Mr Grattan approved of it, or rather he considered Ireland as bound, with all its might, to assist Great Britain, when once engaged in the contest. This, at least, was the opinion entertained by him during the short administration of Lord Fitzwilliam; and in this opinion he remained until he found that the continuation of hostilities threatened the empire with ruin, either from the incapacity of those by whom it was conducted, or the murmurs which it occasioned. During the debates on the union Mr Grattan was returned for Wicklow, for the express purpose of opposing a measure so hateful to Ireland, which he did with peculiar force.

In the British senate some of Mr Grattan's countrymen, who had been transplanted from the Irish to the British house of commons, seemed to sink beneath their former rank; but Mr Grattan in England

displayed all the force of eloquence, and splendour of thought and dic tion, which had so often been hailed by his countrymen in their own capital. The genius of Mr Grattan could live and bloom when torn from the beloved spot which gave it birth. Some of his speeches on the Catholic question have not been excelled by the greatest of native British orators. Yet he did not, of late years, indulge in the full expression of that passion and feeling which distinguished his early eloquence. He had adopted a principle of moderation, caution, and apparent equivocation, in all extreme questions, from which his latter speeches never departed; and to some he did not latterly seem to be the patriot and reformer who had half-won back the liberties of his country. His speech in 1815, on the occasion of the return of Napoleon from Elba, in which he gave countenance to the cause of legitimacy, astonished all his friends. His zeal for emancipation, however, increased with his years; only a few months before his death, he undertook to present the petition of the Irish Catholics, and to support it in parliament, although it was strongly urged by his friends that the exertion would be incompatible with his age and declining health. "I should be happy," he exclaimed, on this occasion, "to die in the discharge of my duty!” He had scarcely arrived in London with the petition, when his debility increased, and he expired on the 14th of May, 1820.

"A question," says Sir Richard Phillips, in his sketch of Mr Grattan in the Monthly Magazine,' which we have adopted with a few alterations in this article, "a question forces itself upon our attention here, which we will not shun. The enviable honour of being the author of Junius, has been successively given to various public characters, but more especially to Mr Burke, Mr Hugh Boyd, and Sir Philip Francis. The genius of Mr Burke was more than equal to all the finest qualities of that delightful work; but the character of his style is so different, that even the facility of his powers could not have borrowed a style, and used it with the ease and grace that adorns Junius. Neither Mr Hugh Boyd nor Sir Philip Francis possessed the extent of the powers and talents of Junius. They were inferior men, and look more like pigmies than giants when placed beside such a colossus as Junius. Mr Grattan possessed all the qualities which distinguished Junius, and some of them even in a greater degree; that is to say, the occasions of his orations were sometimes of a more elevated nature. All the strongest lines of Junius's style were in those of Mr Grattan. We have no room to develope this; but we should be surprised if no person of experience who reads this should recollect their saying to themselves and friends, when listening to Grattan, That is Junius! Junius could be no other man!' The early years of Grattan, at the time Junius appeared, has been objected. But Grattan was then about eighteen; and if a youth of that age could not be supposed to have all the knowledge of Junius, especially of the political position of affairs and parties, such a youth as Grattan could receive and understand all information respecting it, and could clothe the thoughts of others and of himself with a splendour which was exclusively his own. Junius might have been the production of a little junto, and probably was; but one hand chiefly wielded the pen, and the hand seems most like to the hand-writing of Grattan. When the editor of this Miscellany was engaged, a few years since, in preparing an edition of Junius, he addressed Mr Grat

tan on the subject, but received the following negation to the bypothesis that Mr Grattan was Junius :

'SIR, I can frankly assure you that I know nothing of Junius, except that I am not the author. When Junius began I was a boy, and knew nothing of politics, or the persons concerned in them. Our friend my countryman was mistaken, and did me an honour I had no pretensions to. I am, Sir, your-not Junius-but your very good-wisher and obedient servant,

Dublin, Nov. 4, 1805.

H. GRATTAN.'

"This denial the editor communicated to the widow of Mr Boyd, who certainly believed that Mr Boyd, Mr Grattan, and perhaps Mr Eden and Mr Lauchlin Maclean, were joint-partners in the production of the letters signed Junius. It may be worth while to annex her reply, as furnishing further elucidation of the subject: 'I am sorry you troubled Mr Grattan, whose denial must be believed. If he was a boy when Junius began, what must Mr B. have been, who was a year younger than Mr G.; but Mr G. forgets dates, for he was in England in 67, and I remember our dining with him in the autumn of 69, when he and the present Judge Day resided in a cottage in Windsor Forest.' The editor was induced to challenge Mr Grattan by the following passages in previous letters from Mrs Boyd, and also by recollections of Mr Jesse Foot, the eminent surgeon of Dean-street, Soho, who knew Boyd, Grattan, and Eden, and believes they were the joint authors of Junius. The editor conceives, however, that Lauchlin Maclean was one of the junto, for in his conversation with the late marquess of Lansdowne, the marquess asked him emphatically, 'What does Almon say of Maclean?' And Mr Galt, in his Majola' preserves an American anecdote of Maclean, which confirms the fact of his participation. I have no proof of Mr Boyd's being Junius, my opinion being conjectural; however, long before Mr Almon's suggestions attracted the public attention, I was clearly of opinion that Mr Boyd was the joint-author of those farfamed letters. I surmised it before he left England, and above twenty years ago, in a confidential conversation with a relation of great taste and superior talents, my reasons and conjectures were thought convincing. A celebrated character now living, I suppose to have written conjointly with Mr Boyd the letters of Junius, for they were much together, the table was always covered with papers, and they were always writing, being always disconcerted whenever I went near the table.'

"A celebrated orator was acquainted with Mr Boyd from boyhood, and they admired each other's great talents, without envy, often arguing, ever with temper, criticism and politics their chief subject. During the publication of Junius he was frequently at our house, and when I used unexpectedly to enter the parlour I found them seated at a table, on which were various papers that they would instantly cover, and in polite terms request my absence, as they were particularly busy, and oftentimes Mr Boyd would be writing at a desk in a large inner closet which he generally bolted when alone. I should be sorry to impose on the public, but there can be no imposition in my believing, from the

concurrence of many circumstances, that Mr B. was Junius, with the aid and assistance of his friend. There was one letter highly polished, which I believe to have been Mr B.'s, and which I particularly admired, my praise of which he always seemed to be particularly pleased with, and there is one of great severity which I have always attributed to his friend.'

"Of Mr Grattan's private life there is but little generally known, because little had occurred in it to interest attention. It had passed on in a smooth manner, marked equally by the practice of every conjugal and domestic virtue. In his private intercourse, Mr Grattan displayed manners that were in a high degree pleasing. Wit he seemed not to possess, and he had a cast of mind too lofty for humour; but if he did not set the table in a roar,' or dazzle with the radiance of fancy, he diffused over the convivial hour the mild charms of good humour, and softened society with unassuming gentleness.

"As a public speaker, Mr Grattan ranked in the highest class. In his orations there is a grandeur which marks a mind of superior order, and enforces at once reverence and admiration. On every subject which he treats, he throws a radiance that enlightens without dazzling ; and while it assists the judgment, delights the imagination. His style is always peculiar, for it varies its character with the occasion. At one time close and energetic, it concentrates the force of his argument, and compels conviction; at another, diffuse, lofty, and magnificent, it applies itself to every faculty of the mind, charms our fancy, influences our will, and convinces our understanding. At all times his manner was animated with a pleasing warmth, which rendered it impossible to hear him without interest; but on some occasions he exerted a power which was irresistible. Prostitution, under his influence, forgot for a moment the voice of the minister; and place, pension, and peerage, had but a feeble hold even of the most degenerate.'

On the 14th of June, according to the practice of the house, Sir James Mackintosh rose to move, that the speaker should issue a new writ for the election of a citizen to serve in parliament for the city of Dublin, in the room of the late Right Hon. Henry Grattan, deceased. He said it had been the custom to limit addresses delivered upon occasions similar to the present, to cases of death occurring under peculiar circumstances, or in the public service. Excepting in cases of considerable merit, that limit had not been exceeded; and in this particular he thought parliament had acted rightly. The honourable and learned gentleman, after adverting to the nature and character of those cases,

'The reader may contrast with this eulogy of Sir Richard Phillips, the following account of Grattan's displays in parliament by an anonymous writer:-"You saw a little, oddly-compacted figure of a man, with a large head and features, such as they give to pasteboard masks, or stick upon the shoulders of Punch in the puppet-show, rolling about like a mandarin, sawing the air with his whole body from head to foot,sweeping the floor with a roll of parchment which he held in one hand, and throwing his legs and arms about like the branches of trees tossed by the wind; every now and then striking the table with impatient vehemence, and in a sharp, slow, nasal, guttural tone, drawling forth with due emphasis and discretion a set of little smart antithetical sentences, all ready cut and dry, polished and pointed, that seemed as if they would lengthen out in succession to the crack of doom. Alliterations were tacked to alliterations,-inference was dove-tailed into inference, and the whole derived new brilliancy and piquancy from the contrast it presented to the uncouthness of the speaker, and the monotony of his delivery."