Chapter XIII: Part 13

[4] Colonel John Birch (1616-1691) was of Lancashire. Swift calls him "of Herefordshire," because he had been appointed governor of the city of Hereford, after he had captured it by a stratagem, in 1654. Devotedly attached to Presbyterian principles, Birch was a man of shrewd business abilities and remarkable oratorical gifts. On the restoration of Charles II., in which he took a prominent part on account of Charles's championship of Presbyterianism, Birch held important business posts. He sat in parliament for Leominster and Penrhyn, and his plans for the rebuilding of London after the Great Fire, though they were not adopted, were yet such as would have been extremely salutary had they been accepted. Of his eloquence, Burnet says: "He was the roughest and boldest speaker in the house, and talked in the language and phrases of a carrier, but with a beauty and eloquence, that was always acceptable." The reference to the carrier is purposely made, since Birch did not hide the fact that he had once pursued that occupation. Swift was twenty-four years of age when Birch died, so that he must have been a very young man when he heard Birch make the remark he quotes. [T. S.]

[5] Sir Thomas Littleton (1647?-1710) was chosen Speaker of the English House of Commons by the junto in 1698. Onslow, in a note to Burnet's "History," speaks of the good work he did as treasurer of the navy. Macky describes him as "a stern-looked man, with a brown complexion, well shaped" (see "Characters"). At the time of Swift's writing the above letter, Littleton was member for Portsmouth. [T. S.]

[6] Viscount Molesworth, in his "Considerations for promoting the Agriculture of Ireland" (1723), pointed out, that even with the added expense of freight, it was cheaper to import corn from England, than to grow it in Ireland itself. [T. S.]

[7] Mr. Lecky points out that in England, after the Revolution, the councils were directed by commercial influence. At that time there was an important woollen industry in England which, it was feared, the growing Irish woollen manufactures would injure. The English manufacturers petitioned for their total destruction, and the House of Lords, in response to the petition, represented to the King that "the growing manufacture of cloth in Ireland, both by the cheapness of all sorts of necessaries of life, and goodness of materials for making all manner of cloth, doth invite your subjects of England, with their families and servants, to leave their habitations to settle there, to the increase of the woollen manufacture in Ireland, which makes your loyal subjects in this kingdom very apprehensive that the further growth of it may greatly prejudice the said manufacture here." The Commons went further, and suggested the advisability of discouraging the industry by hindering the exportation of wool from Ireland to other countries and limiting it to England alone. The Act of 10 and 11 Will. III. c. 10, made the suggestion law and even prohibited entirely the exportation of Irish wool anywhere. Thus, as Swift puts it, "the politic gentlemen of Ireland have depopulated vast tracts of the best land, for the feeding of sheep." See notes to later tracts in this volume on "Observations on the Woollen Manufactures" and "Letter on the Weavers." [T. S.]

[8] That Swift did not exaggerate may be gathered from the statute books, and, more immediately, from Hely Hutchinson's "Commercial Restraints of Ireland" (1779), Arthur Dobbs's "Trade and Improvement of Ireland," Lecky's "History of Ireland," vols. i. and ii., and Monck Mason's notes in his "History of St. Patrick's Cathedral," p. 320 _et seq._ [T. S.]

[9] Barnstaple was, at that time, the chief market in England for Irish wool. [T. S.]

[10] In 1726, Swift presented some pieces of Irish manufactured silk to the Princess of Wales and to Mrs. Howard. In sending the silk to Mrs. Howard he wrote also a letter in which he remarked: "I beg you will not tell any parliament man from whence you had that plaid; otherwise, out of malice, they will make a law to cut off all our weavers' fingers." [T. S.]

[11] This last sentence is as the original edition has it. In Faulkner's first collected edition and in the fifth volume of the "Miscellanies" (London, 1735), the following occurs in its place: "I must confess, that as to the former, I should not be sorry if they would stay at home; and for the latter, I hope, in a little time we shall have no occasion for them."

Swift knew what he was advising when he suggested that the people of Ireland should not import their goods from England. He was well aware that English manufactures were not really necessary. Sir William Petty had, a half century before, pointed out that a third of the manufactures then imported into Ireland could be produced by its own factories, another third could as easily and as cheaply be obtained from countries other than England, and "consequently, that it was scarce necessary at all for Ireland to receive any goods of England, and not convenient to receive above one-fourth part, from thence, of the whole which it needeth to import" ("Polit. Anatomy of Ireland," 1672). [T. S.]

[12] Faulkner and the "Miscellanies" (London, 1735) print, instead of, "as any prelate in Christendom," the words, "as if he had not been born among us." The Archbishop was Dr. William King, with whom Swift had had much correspondence. See "Letters" in Scott's edition (1824).

Dr. William King, who succeeded Narcissus Marsh as Archbishop of Dublin in March, 1702-3. Swift had not always been on friendly terms with King, but, at this time, they were in sympathy as to the wrongs and grievances of Ireland. King strongly supported the agitation against Wood's halfpence, but later, when he attempted to interfere with the affairs of the Deanery of St. Patrick's, Swift and he came to an open rupture. See also volume on the Drapier's Letters, in this edition. [T. S.]

[13] Faulkner and the "Miscellanies" of 1735 print this amount as "three thousand six hundred." This was the sum paid by the lord-lieutenant to the lords-justices, who represented him in the government of Ireland. The lord-lieutenant himself did not then, as the viceroy of Ireland does now, take up his residence in the country. Although in receipt of a large salary, he only came to Dublin to deliver the speeches at the openings of parliament, or on some other special occasion. [T. S.]

[14] The Dublin edition of this pamphlet has a note stating that Cotter was a gentleman of Cork who was executed for committing a rape on a Quaker. [T. S.]

[15] Said to be Colonel Bladon (1680-1746), who translated the Commentaries of Cæsar. He was a dependant of the Duke of Marlborough, to whom he dedicated this translation. [T. S.]

[16] Lord Grimston. William Luckyn, first Viscount Grimston (1683-1756), was created an Irish peer with the title Baron Dunboyne in 1719. The full title of the play to which Swift refers, is "The Lawyer's Fortune, or, Love in a Hollow Tree." It was published in 1705. Swift refers to Grimston in his verses "On Poetry, a Rhapsody." Pope, in one of his satires, calls him "booby lord." Grimston withdrew his play from circulation after the second edition, but it was reprinted in Rotterdam in 1728 and in London in 1736. Dr. Johnson told Chesterfield a story which made the Duchess of Marlborough responsible for this London reprint, which had for frontispiece the picture of an ass wearing a coronet. [T. S.]

[17] The original edition prints "ministers" instead of "chief governors." [T. S.]

[18] In 1720 Bishop Nicholson of Derry, writing to the Archbishop of Canterbury, describes the wretched condition of the towns and the country districts, and the misery of their population:

"Our trade of all kind is at a stand, insomuch as that our most eminent merchants, who used to pay bills of _1,000l._ at sight, are hardly able to raise _100l._ in so many days. Spindles of yarn (our daily bread) are fallen from _2s. 6d._ to _15d._, and everything also in proportion. Our best beef (as good as I ever ate in England) is sold under _3/4d._ a pound, and all this not from any extraordinary plenty of commodities, but from a perfect dearth of money. Never did I behold even in Picardy, Westphalia, or Scotland, such dismal marks of hunger and want as appeared in the countenances of most of the poor creatures I met with on the road." (Brit. Mus. Add. MSS. 6116, quoted by Lecky.) [T. S.]

[19] The "absentee" landlord was an evil to Ireland on which much has been written. It was difficult to keep the country in order when the landed proprietors took so little interest in their possessions as to do nothing but exact rents from their tenants and spend the money so obtained in England. Two, and even three, hundred years before Swift's day "absenteeism" had been the cause of much of the rebellion in Ireland which harassed the English monarchs, who endeavoured to put a stop to the evil by confiscating the estates of such landlords. Acts were passed by Richard II. and Henry VIII. to this effect; but in later times, the statutes were ignored and not enforced, and the Irish landlord, in endeavours to obtain for himself social recognition and standing in England which, because of his Irish origin, were denied him, remained in England indulging himself in lavish expenditure and display. The consequences of this were the impoverishment of his estates and their eventual management by rack-renters. These rack-renters, whose only interest lay in squeezing money out of the impoverished tenants, became the bane of the agricultural holder.

Unfortunately, the spirit of "absenteeism" extended itself to the holders of offices in Ireland, and even the lord-lieutenant rarely took up his residence in Dublin for any time longer than necessitated by the immediate demands of his installation and speech-making, although he drew his emoluments from the Irish revenues. In the "List of Absentees" instances are given where men appointed to Irish offices would land on Saturday night, receive the sacrament on Sunday, take the oath in court on Monday morning, and be on their way back to England by Monday afternoon.

It has been calculated that out of a total rental of £1,800,000, as much as 33-1/3 per cent. was sent out of the country. [T. S.]

[20] Sheridan, in the sixth number of "The Intelligencer," contributes an account of the state of Ireland, written to the text, "O patria! O divûm domus!"

"When I travel through any part of this unhappy kingdom, and I have now by several excursions made from Dublin, gone through most counties of it, it raises two passions in my breast of a different kind; an indignation against those vile betrayers and insulters of it, who insinuate themselves into favour, by saying, it is a rich nation; and a sincere passion for the natives, who are sunk to the lowest degree of misery and poverty, whose houses are dunghills, whose victuals are the blood of their cattle, or the herbs in the field; and whose clothing, to the dishonour of God and man, is nakedness. Yet notwithstanding all the dismal appearances, it is the common phrase of our upstart race of people, who have suddenly sprang up like the dragon's teeth among us, _That Ireland was never known to be so rich as it is now_; by which, as I apprehend, they can only mean themselves, for they have skipped over the channel from the vantage ground of a dunghill upon no other merit, either visible or divineable, than that of not having been born among us.

"This is the modern way of planting Colonies--Et ubi solitudinem faciunt, id Imperium vocant. When those who are so unfortunate to be born here, are excluded from the meanest preferments, and deemed incapable of being entertained even as common soldiers, whose poor stipend is but four pence a day. No trade, no emoluments, no encouragement for learning among the natives, who yet by a perverse consequence are divided into factions, with as much violence and rancour, as if they had the wealth of the Indies to contend for. It puts me in mind of a fable which I read in a monkish author. He quotes for it one of the Greek mythologists that once upon a time a colony of large dogs (called the Molossi) transplanted themselves from Epirus to Ætolia, where they seized those parts of the countries, most fertile in flesh of all kinds, obliging the native dogs to retire from their best kennels, to live under ditches and bushes, but to preserve good neighbourhood and peace; and finding likewise, that the Ætolian dogs might be of some use in the low offices of life, they passed a decree, that the natives should be entitled to the short ribs, tops of back, knuckle-bones, and guts of all the game, which they were obliged by their masters to run down. This condition was accepted, and what was a little singular, while the Molossian dogs kept a good understanding among themselves, living in peace and luxury, these Ætolian curs were perpetually snarling, growling, barking and tearing at each other's throats: Nay, sometimes those of the best quality among them, were seen to quarrel with as much rancour for a rotten gut, as if it had been a fat haunch of venison. But what need we wonder at this in dogs, when the same is every day practised among men?

"Last year I travelled from Dublin to Dundalk, through a country esteemed the most fruitful part of the kingdom, and so nature intended it. But no ornaments or improvements of such a scene were visible. No habitation fit for gentlemen, no farmers' houses, few fields of corn, and almost a bare face of nature, without new plantations of any kind, only a few miserable cottages, at three or four miles' distance, and one Church in the centre between this city and Drogheda. When I arrived at this last town, the first mortifying sight was the ruins of several churches, battered down by that usurper, Cromwell, whose fanatic zeal made more desolation in a few days, than the piety of succeeding prelates or the wealth of the town have, in more than sixty years, attempted to repair.

"Perhaps the inhabitants, through a high strain of virtue, have, in imitation of the Athenians, made a solemn resolution, never to rebuild those sacred edifices, but rather leave them in ruins, as monuments, to perpetuate the detestable memory of that hellish instrument of rebellion, desolation, and murder. For the Athenians, when Mardonius had ravaged a great part of Greece, took a formal oath at the Isthmus, to lose their lives rather than their liberty, to stand by their leaders to the last, to spare the cities of such barbarians as they conquered. And what crowned all, the conclusion of their oath was, We will never repair any of the Temples, which they have burned and destroyed, lest they may appear to posterity as so many monuments of these wicked barbarians. This was a glorious resolution; and I am sorry to think, that the poverty of my countrymen will not let the world suppose, they have acted upon such a generous principle; yet upon this occasion I cannot but observe, that there is a fatality in some nations, to be fond of those who have treated them with the least humanity. Thus I have often heard the memory of Cromwell, who has depopulated, and almost wholly destroyed this miserable country, celebrated like that of a saint, and at the same time the sufferings of the royal martyr turned into ridicule, and his murder justified even from the pulpit, and all this done with an intent to gain favour, under a monarchy; which is a new strain of politics that I shall not pretend to account for.

"Examine all the eastern towns of Ireland, and you will trace this horrid instrument of destruction, in defacing of Churches, and particularly in destroying whatever was ornamental, either within or without them. We see in the several towns a very few houses scattered among the ruins of thousands, which he laid level with their streets; great numbers of castles, the country seats of gentlemen then in being, still standing in ruin, habitations for bats, daws, and owls, without the least repairs or succession of other buildings. Nor have the country churches, as far as my eye could reach, met with any better treatment from him, nine in ten of them lying among their graves and God only knows when they are to have a resurrection. When I passed from Dundalk where this cursed usurper's handy work is yet visible, I cast mine eyes around from the top of a mountain, from whence I had a wide and a waste prospect of several venerable ruins. It struck me with a melancholy, not unlike that expressed by Cicero in one of his letters which being much upon the like prospect, and concluding with a very necessary reflection on the uncertainty of things in this world, I shall here insert a translation of what he says: 'In my return from Asia, as I sailed from Ægina, towards Megara, I began to take a prospect of the several countries round me. Behind me was Ægina; before me Megara; on the right hand the Piræus; and on the left was Corinth; which towns were formerly in a most flourishing condition; now they lie prostrate and in ruin.

"'Thus I began to think with myself: Shall we who have but a trifling existence, express any resentment, when one of us either dies a natural death, or is slain, whose lives are necessarily of a short duration, when at one view I beheld the carcases of so many great cities?' What if he had seen the natives of those free republics, reduced to all the miserable consequences of a conquered people, living without the common defences against hunger and cold, rather appearing like spectres than men? I am apt to think, that seeing his fellow creatures in ruin like this, it would have put him past all patience for philosophic reflection.

"As for my own part, I confess, that the sights and occurrences which I had in this my last journey, so far transported me to a mixture of rage and compassion, that I am not able to decide, which had the greater influence upon my spirits; for this new cant, of a rich and flourishing nation, was still uppermost in my thoughts; every mile I travelled, giving me such ample demonstrations to the contrary. For this reason, I have been at the pains to render a most exact and faithful account of all the visible signs of riches, which I met with in sixty miles' riding through the most public roads, and the best part of the kingdom. First, as to trade, I met nine cars loaden with old musty, shrivelled hides; one car-load of butter; four jockeys driving eight horses, all out of case; one cow and calf driven by a man and his wife; six tattered families flitting to be shipped off to the West Indies; a colony of a hundred and fifty beggars, all repairing to people our metropolis, and by encreasing the number of hands, to encrease its wealth, upon the old maxim, that people are the riches of a nation, and therefore ten thousand mouths, with hardly ten pair of hands, or hardly any work to employ them, will infallibly make us a rich and flourishing people. Secondly, Travellers enough, but seven in ten wanting shirts and cravats; nine in ten going bare foot, and carrying their brogues and stockings in their hands; one woman in twenty having a pillion, the rest riding bare backed: Above two hundred horsemen, with four pair of boots amongst them all; seventeen saddles of leather (the rest being made of straw) and most of their garrons only shod before. I went into one of the principal farmer's houses, out of curiosity, and his whole furniture consisted of two blocks for stools, a bench on each side the fire-place made of turf, six trenchers, one bowl, a pot, six horn spoons, three noggins, three blankets, one of which served the man and maid servant; the other the master of the family, his wife and five children; a small churn, a wooden candlestick, a broken stick for a pair of tongs. In the public towns, one third of the inhabitants walking the streets bare foot; windows half built up with stone, to save the expense of glass, the broken panes up and down supplied by brown paper, few being able to afford white; in some places they were stopped with straw or hay. Another mark of our riches, are the signs at the several inns upon the road, viz. In some, a staff stuck in the thatch, with a turf at the end of it; a staff in a dunghill with a white rag wrapped about the head; a pole, where they can afford it, with a besom at the top; an oatmeal cake on a board at the window; and, at the principal inns of the road, I have observed the signs taken down and laid against the wall near the door, being taken from their post to prevent the shaking of the house down by the wind. In short, I saw not one single house, in the best town I travelled through, which had not manifest appearances of beggary and want. I could give many more instances of our wealth, but I hope these will suffice for the end I propose.

"It may be objected, what use it is of to display the poverty of the nation, in the manner I have done. I answer, I desire to know for what ends, and by what persons, this new opinion of our flourishing state has of late been so industriously advanced: One thing is certain, that the advancers have either already found their own account, or have been heartily promised, or at least have been entertained with hopes, by seeing such an opinion pleasing to those who have it in their power to reward.

"It is no doubt a very generous principle in any person to rejoice in the felicities of a nation, where themselves are strangers or sojourners: But if it be found that the same persons on all other occasions express a hatred and contempt of the nation and people in general, and hold it for a maxim--'That the more such a country is humbled, the more their own will rise'; it need be no longer a secret, why such an opinion, and the advantages of it are encouraged. And besides, if the bayliff reports to his master, that the ox is fat and strong, when in reality it can hardly carry its own legs, is it not natural to think, that command will be given, for a greater load to be put upon it?" [T. S.]

[21] This was a project for the establishment of a national bank for Ireland. Swift ridiculed the proposal (see p. 31), no doubt, out of suspicion of the acts of stock-jobbers and the monied interests which were enlisted on the side of the Whigs. His experience, also, of the abortive South Sea Schemes would tend to make his opposition all the stronger. But the plans for the bank were not ill-conceived, and had Swift been in calmer temper he might have seen the advantages which attached to the proposals. [T. S.]

[22] Thus in original edition. In Faulkner and the "Miscellanies" of 1735 the words are, "altogether imaginary." [T. S.]

[23] The motto round a crown piece, which was the usual price of permits. [_Orig. edit._]

[24] The Dean of St. Patrick's. [F.]

[25] Paul Lorrain, who was appointed ordinary of Newgate in 1698, compiled numerous confessions and dying speeches of prisoners condemned to be hanged. A letter to Swift, from Pope and Bolingbroke, dated December, 1725, mentions him as "the great historiographer," and Steele, in the "Tatler" and "Spectator," refers to "Lorrain's Saints." Lorrain attended some famous criminals to the scaffold, including Captain Kidd and Jack Sheppard. [T. S.]

[26] The following is an account of the proceedings of both the houses of the Irish parliament upon the subject of this proposed bank.

In the year 1720, James, Earl of Abercorn, Gustavus, Viscount Boyne, Sir Ralph Gore, Bart., Oliver St. George, and Michael Ward, Esqs., in behalf of themselves and others, presented a petition to his Majesty for a charter of incorporation, whereby they might be established as a bank, under the name and title of the Bank of Ireland. They proposed to raise a fund of £500,000 to supply merchants, etc., with money at five per cent., and agreed to contribute £50,000 to the service of government in consideration of their obtaining a charter. In their petition they state, that "the raising of a million for that purpose is creating a greater fund than the nation can employ." Soon after the above-mentioned petition was lodged, a second application was made by Lord Forbes and others, who proposed raising a million for that purpose, and offered to discharge "the £50,000 national debt of that kingdom, in five years from the time they should obtain a charter." The latter application, being subsequent in point of date, was withdrawn, Lord Forbes and his friends having acquainted the Lord-lieutenant that, "rather than, by a competition, obstruct a proposal of so general advantage, they were willing to desist from their application." The former was accordingly approved of, and the King, on the 29th of July, 1721, issued letters of Privy Seal, directing that a charter of incorporation should pass the Great Seal of Ireland. ("Comm. Journ.," vol. iii, Appendix ix, page cc, etc.)

When the parliament of Ireland met, on the 12th of September following, the Duke of Grafton, lord lieutenant, in his speech from the throne, communicated the intention of his Majesty to both houses, and concluded by saying, "As this is a matter of general and national concern, his Majesty leaves it to the wisdom of Parliament to consider what advantages the public may receive by erecting a bank, and in what manner it may be settled upon a safe foundation, so as to be beneficial to the kingdom." The commons, in their address, which was voted unanimously on the 14th, expressed their gratitude for his Majesty's goodness and royal favour in directing a commission to establish a bank, and on the 21st moved for the papers to be laid before them; they even, on the 29th, agreed to the following resolution of the committee they had appointed, "that the establishment of a bank upon a solid and good foundation, under proper regulations and restrictions, will contribute to restoring of credit, and support of the trade and manufacture of the kingdom;" but, when the heads of a bill for establishing the bank came to be discussed, a strenuous opposition was raised to it. On the 9th of December Sir Thomas Taylor, chairman of the committee to whom the matter had been referred, reported "that they had gone through the first enacting paragraph, and disagreed to the same." Accordingly, the question being proposed and put, the house (after a division, wherein there appeared 150 for the question and 80 against it) voted that "they could not find any safe foundation for establishing a public bank," and resolved that an address, conformable to this resolution, should be presented to the lord-lieutenant. (Comm. Journ., vol. iii, pp. 247-289.)

The proceedings of the House of Lords resembled that of the Commons; on the 8th of November they concurred with the resolution of their committee, which was unfavourable to the establishment of a bank. A protest was, however, entered, signed by four temporal and two spiritual peers, and when an address to his Majesty, grounded on that resolution, was proposed, a long debate ensued, which occupied two days. On the 9th December a list of the subscriptions was called for, and on the 16th they resolved, that if any lord, spiritual or temporal, should attempt to obtain a charter to erect a bank, "he should be deemed a contemnor of the authority of that house, and a betrayer of the liberty of his country." They ordered, likewise, that this resolution should be presented by the chancellor to the lord lieutenant. ("Lord's Journal," vol. ii, pp. 687-720.) _Monck Mason's "Hist. St. Patrick's Cathedral_," p. 325, note 3. [T. S.]

[27] The title, Esquire, according to a high authority, was anciently applied "to the younger sons of nobility and their heirs in the immediate line, to the eldest sons of knights and their heirs, to the esquire of the knights and others of that rank in his Majesty's service, and to such as had eminent employment in the Commonwealth, and were not knighted, such as judges, sheriffs, and justices of the peace during their offices, and some others. But now," says Sir Edward Walker, "in the days of Charles I., the addition is so increased, that he is a very poor and inconsiderable person who writes himself less."

Accordingly, most of the signatures for shares in the projected National Bank of Ireland, were dignified with the addition of Esquire, which, added to the obscurity of the subscribers, incurs the ridicule of our author in the following treatise. [S.]

[28] SUBSCRIBERS TO THE BANK, PLACED ACCORDING TO THEIR ORDER AND QUALITY, WITH NOTES AND QUERIES.

A true and exact account of the nobility, gentry, and traders, of the kingdom of Ireland, who, upon mature deliberation, are of opinion, that the establishing a bank upon real security, would be highly for the advantage of the trade of the said kingdom, and for increasing the current species of money in the same. Extracted from the list of the subscribers to the Bank of Ireland, published by order of the commissioners appointed to receive subscriptions.

_Nobility._

Archbishops 0
Marquisses 0
Earls 0
Viscounts 3
Barons 1
Bishops 2
French Baron 1

N. B.: The temporal Lords of Ireland are 125, the Bishops 22. In all 147, exclusive of the aforesaid French Count.

_Gentry._

Baronets 1
Knights 1

N. B. Total of baronets and knights in Ireland uncertain; but in common computation supposed to be more than two.

Members of the House of Commons--41. One whereof reckoned before amongst the two knights.

N. B. Number of Commoners in all 300.

Esquires not Members of Parliament--37

N. B. There are at least 20 of the said 37 Esquires whose names are little known, and whose qualifications as Esqrs. are referred to the king at arms; and the said king is desired to send to the publisher hereof a true account of the whole number of such real or reputed Esqrs. as are to be found in this kingdom.

_Clergy._

Deans 1
Arch-Deacons 2
Rectors 3
Curates 2

N. B. Of this number one French dean, one French curate, and one bookseller.

Officers not members of Parliament--16

N. B. Of the above number 10 French; but uncertain whether on whole or half pay, broken, or of the militia.

_Women._

Ladies 1
Widows 3 whereof one qualified to be deputy-governor.
Maidens 4

N. B. It being uncertain in what class to place the eight female subscribers, whether in that of nobility, gentry, &c. it is thought proper to insert them here betwixt the officers and traders.

_Traders._

{ Dublin 1 a Frenchman.
Aldermen of { Cork 1
{ Limerick 1
Waterford 0
Drogheda 0
&c. 0

Merchants 29, _viz._ 10 French, of London 1, of Cork 1, of Belfast 1.

N. B. The place of abode of three of the said merchants, _viz._ of London, Cork and Belfast, being mentioned, the publisher desires to know where the rest may be wrote to, and whether they deal in wholesale or retail, _viz._

Master dealers, &c. 59, cashiers 1, bankers 4, chemist 1, player 1, Popish vintner 1, bricklayer 1, chandler 1, doctors of physic 4, chirurgeons 2, pewterer 1, attorneys 4 (besides one esq. attorney before reckoned), Frenchmen 8, but whether pensioners, barbers, or markees, uncertain. As to the rest of the M----rs, the publisher of this paper, though he has used his utmost diligence, has not been able to get a satisfactory account either as to their country, trade or profession.

N. B. The total of men, women and children in Ireland, besides Frenchmen, is 2,000,000. Total of the land of Ireland acres 16,800,000. (Vide Reasons for a Bank, &c.)

Quære, How many of the said acres are in possession of 1 French baron, 1 French dean, 1 French curate, 1 French alderman, 10 French merchants, 8 Messieurs Frances, 1 esq. projector, 1 esq. attorney, 6 officers of the army, 8 women, 1 London merchant, 1 Cork merchant, 1 Belfast merchant, 18 merchants whose places of abode are not mentioned, 1 cashier, 4 bankers, 1 gentleman projector, 1 player, 1 chemist, 1 Popish vintner, 1 bricklayer, 1 chandler, 4 doctors of physic, 2 chirurgeons, 1 pewterer, 4 gentlemen attorneys, besides 28 gentleman dealers, yet unknown, _ut supra_?

Dublin: Printed by John Harding in Molesworth's Court, in Fishamble Street. (_Reprinted from original broadside, n.d._)

[29] In the capacity of a postillion, no doubt. [T. S.]

[30] Which means that she kept an eating-house or restaurant, and became eventually a bankrupt. [T. S.]

[31] The livery of a footman. [T. S.]

[32] As a constable. [T. S.]

[33] An innkeeper. [T. S.]

[34] This paragraph is printed as given by Faulkner in ed. 1735, vol. iv. [T. S.]

[35] See note on Paul Lorrain, p. 34. It was the duty of the Ordinary of a prison to compose such dying speeches. [T. S.]

[36] His parents were Dissenters, and gave him a good education. [T. S.]

[37] Sir Henry Craik remarks on this title: "In modern language this might well have been entitled, 'The theories of political economy proved to have no application to Ireland.'" The word "controlled" is used in the now obsolete sense of "confuted." [T. S.]

[38] Sir John Browne, in his "Scheme of the Money Matters of Ireland" (Dublin, 1729), calculated that the total currency, including paper, was about £914,000, but the author of "Considerations on Seasonable Remarks" stated that the entire currency could not be more than £600,000. Browne was no reliable authority; he is the writer to whom Swift wrote a reply. See p. 122. [T. S.]

[39] See "A Short View of the State of Ireland," p. 86. [T. S.]

[40] Lecky refers to a remarkable letter written by an Irish peer in the March of 1702, and preserved in the "Southwell Correspondence" in the British Museum, in which the writer complains that the money of the country is almost gone, and the poverty of the towns so great that it was feared the Court mourning for the death of William would be the final blow. (Lecky, vol. i., p. 181, 1892 ed.). [T. S.]

[41] Those of Charles II. and James II. in which, for political reasons on the part of the Crown, Ireland was peculiarly favoured. [S.]

[42] This was Dr. Nicholas Barbou, the friend of John Asgill and author of two works on trade and money. After the Great Fire of London he speculated largely in building, and greatly assisted in making city improvements. He was the founder of fire insurance in England and was active in land and bank speculations. He died in 1698, leaving a will directing that none of his debts should be paid. [T. S.]

[43] The beggars of Ireland are spoken of by Bishop Berkeley. But Arthur Dobbs, in the second part of his "Essay on Trade," published in 1731, gives a descriptive picture of the gangs who travelled over Ireland as professional paupers. In the 2,295 parishes, there was in each an average of at least ten beggars carrying on their trade the whole year round; the total number of these wandering paupers he puts down at over 34,000. Computing 30,000 of them able to work, and assuming that each beggar could earn _4d._ a day in a working year of 284 days, he calculates that their idleness is a loss to the nation of £142,000. (Pp. 444-445 of Thom's reprint; Dublin, 1861) [T. S.]

[44] See Swift's terrible satire on the "Modest Proposal for preventing Children of Poor People from being a burthen." [T. S.]

[45] A small country village about seven miles from Kells. [T. S.]

[46] Esther Johnson. [T. S.]

[47] Stella's companion and Swift's housekeeper. [T. S.]

[48] See Swift's "Directions to Servants." [T. S.]

[49] By Acts 18 Charles II c. 2, and 32 Charles II c. 2, enacted in 1665 and 1680, the importation into England from Ireland of all cattle, sheep, swine, beef, pork, bacon, mutton, cheese and butter, was absolutely prohibited. The land of Ireland being largely pasture land and England being the chief and nearest market, these laws practically destroyed the farming industry. The pernicious acts were passed on complaint from English land proprietors that the competition from Irish cattle had lowered their rents in England. "In this manner," says Lecky, "the chief source of Irish prosperity was annihilated at a single blow." [T. S.]

[50] The original Navigation Act treated Ireland on an equal footing with England. The act, however, was succeeded in 1663 by that of 15 Charles II c. 7, in which it was declared that no European articles, with few exceptions, could be imported into the colonies unless they had been loaded in English-built vessels at English ports. Nor could goods be brought from English colonies except to English ports. By the Acts 22 and 23 of Charles II. c. 26 the exclusion of Ireland was confirmed, and the Acts 7 and 8 of Will. III. c. 22, passed in 1696, actually prohibited any goods whatever from being imported to Ireland direct from the English colonies. These are the reasons for Swift's remark that Ireland's ports were of no more use to Ireland's people "than a beautiful prospect to a man shut up in a dungeon." [T. S.]

[51] See note on page 137 of vol. vi of this edition. "The Drapier's Letters." [T. S.]

[52] Lecky quotes from the MSS. in the British Museum, from a series of letters written by Bishop Nicholson, on his journey to Derry, to the Archbishop of Canterbury. The quotation illustrates the truth of Swift's remark. "Never did I behold," writes Nicholson, "even in Picardy, Westphalia, or Scotland, such dismal marks of hunger and want as appeared in the countenances of the poor creatures I met with on the road." In the "Intelligencer" (No. VI, 1728) Sheridan wrote: "The poor are sunk to the lowest degrees of misery and poverty--their houses dunghills, their victuals the blood of their cattle, or the herbs of the field." Of the condition of the country thirty years later, the most terrible of pictures is given by Burdy in his "Life of Skelton": "In 1757 a remarkable dearth prevailed in Ireland.... Mr. Skelton went out into the country to discover the real state of his poor, and travelled from cottage to cottage, over mountains, rocks, and heath.... In one cabin he found the people eating boiled prushia [a weed with a yellow flower that grows in cornfields] by itself for their breakfast, and tasted this sorry food, which seemed nauseous to him. Next morning he gave orders to have prushia gathered and boiled for his own breakfast, that he might live on the same sort of food with the poor. He ate this for one or two days; but at last his stomach turning against it, he set off immediately for Ballyshannon to buy oatmeal for them.... One day, when he was travelling in this manner through the country, he came to a lonely cottage in the mountains, where he found a poor woman lying in child-bed with a number of children about her. All she had, in her weak, helpless condition to keep herself and her children alive, was blood and sorrel boiled up together. The blood, her husband, who was a herdsman, took from the cattle of others under his care, for he had none of his own. This was a usual sort of food in that country in times of scarcity, for they bled the cows for that purpose, and thus the same cow often afforded both milk and blood.... They were obliged, when the carriers were bringing the meal to Pettigo, to guard it with their clubs, as the people of the adjacent parishes strove to take it by force, in which they sometimes succeeded, hunger making them desperate." (Burdy's Life of Skelton. "Works," vol. i, pp. lxxx-lxxxii.) [T. S.]

[53] See on this subject the agitation against Wood's halfpence in the volume dealing with "The Drapier's Letters." [T. S.]

[54] Faulkner and Scott print this word "irony," but the original edition has it as printed in the text. [T. S.]

[55] The original edition has this as "Island." Scott and the previous editors print it as in the text. Iceland is, no doubt, referred to. [T. S.]

[56] Bishop Nicholson, quoted by Lecky, speaks of the miserable hovels in which the people lived, and the almost complete absence of clothing. [T. S.]

[57] Hely Hutchinson, in his "Commercial Restraints of Ireland" (Dublin, 1779; new edit. 1888) points out that the scheme proposed by the government, and partly executed, by directing a commission under the great seal for receiving voluntary subscriptions in order to establish a bank, was a scheme to circulate paper without money. This and Wood's halfpence seem to have been the nearest approach made at the time for supplying what Swift here calls "the running cash of the nation." [T. S.]

[58] England.

[59] Scotland and Ireland.

[60] The Irish Sea.

[61] The Roman Wall.

[62] The Scottish Highlanders. [T. S]

[63] Charles I, who was delivered by the Scotch into the hands of the Parliamentary party. [T. S]

[64] See note to "A Short View of the State of Ireland." [T. S.]

[65] The King of England. [T. S.]

[66] The Lord-Lieutenant. [T. S.]

[67] The English Government filled all the important posts in Ireland with individuals sent over from England. See "Boulter's Letters" on this subject of the English rule. [T. S.]

[68] See notes to "A Short View of the State of Ireland," on the Navigation Acts and the acts against the exportation of cattle. [T. S.]

[69] The laws against woollen manufacture. [T. S.]

[70] Absentees and place-holders. [T. S.]

[71] The spirit of opposition and enmity to England, declared by the Scottish Act of Security, according to Swift's view of the relations between the countries, left no alternative but an union or a war. [S.]

[72] The Act of Union between England and Scotland. [T. S.]

[73] The reference here is to the linen manufactories of Ireland which were being encouraged by England. [T. S.]

[74] Swift here refers to the sentiment, largely predominant in Scotland, for the return of the Stuarts. [T. S.]

[75] Alliances with France. [T. S.]

[76] Alluding to the 33rd Henry VIII, providing that the King and his successors should be kings imperial of both kingdoms, on which the enemies of Irish independence founded their arguments against it. [S.] Scott cannot be correct in this note. The allusion is surely to the enactments known as Poyning's Law. See vol. vi., p. 77 (note) of this edition of Swift's works. [T. S.]

[77] Disturbances excited by the Scottish colonists in Ulster. [S.]

[78] The subjugation of Scotland by Cromwell. [S.]

[79] That is to say, to interpret Poyning's law in the spirit in which it was enacted, and give to Ireland the right to make its own laws. [T. S.]

[80] Free trade and the repeal of the Navigation Act. [T. S.]

[81] Office-holders should not be absentees. [T. S.]

[82] That the land laws of Ireland shall be free from interference by England, and the produce of the land free to be exported to any place. [T. S.]

[83] The laws prohibiting the importation of live cattle into England, and the restrictions as to the woollen industry, were the ruin of those who held land for grazing purposes. [T. S.]

[84] The Act of 10 and 11 William III., cap. 10, was the final blow to the woollen industry of Ireland. It was enacted in 1699, and prohibited the exportation of Irish wool to any other country. In the fifth letter of Hely Hutchinson's "Commercial Restraints of Ireland" (1779) will be found a full account of the passing of this Act and its consequences. [T. S.]

[85] Edward Waters and John Harding, the printers of Swift's pamphlets. See volume on "The Drapier's Letters." [T. S.]

[86] The text here given is that of the original manuscript in the Forster Collection at South Kensington, collated with that given by Deane Swift in vol. viii. of the 4to edition of 1765. [T. S.]

[87] The letter was written in reply to a letter received from Messrs. Truman and Layfield. [T. S.]

[88] Dr. William King, Archbishop of Dublin. [T. S.]

[89] Swift betrays here a lamentable knowledge of the geography of this part of America. Penn, however, may have known no better. [T. S.]

[90] William Burnet, at this time the Governor of Massachusetts, was the son of Swift's old enemy, Bishop Burnet. [T. S.]

[91] Burnet quarrelled with the Assembly of Massachusetts and New Hampshire because they would not allow him a fixed salary. The Assembly attempted to give him instead a fee on ships leaving Boston, but the English Government refused to allow this. [T. S.]

[92] The original MS. on which this text is based does not contain the passage here given in brackets. [T. S.]

[93] Swift is here supported by Arthur Dobbs, who in his "Essays on Trade," pt. ii. (1731) gives as one of the conditions prejudicial to trade, the luxury of living and extravagance in food, dress, furniture, and equipage by the Irish well-to-do. He describes it "as one of the principal sources of our national evils." His remedy was a tax on expensive dress, and rich equipage and furniture. [T. S.]

[94] The text of this tract is based on that given by Deane Swift in the eighth volume of his edition of Swift's works published in quarto in 1765. [T. S.]

[95] This refers to Whitshed. [T. S.]

[96] The Fourth. See vol. vi. of present edition. [T. S.]

[97] Some ten years after Swift wrote the above, the roads of Ireland were thought to be so good as to attract Whitefield's attention. Lecky quotes Arthur Young, who found Irish roads superior to those of England. (Lecky's "Ireland," vol. i., p. 330, 1892 ed.) [T. S.]

[98] Lecky (vol. i., pp. 333-335, 1892 edit.) gives a detailed account of the destruction of the fine woods in Ireland which occurred during the forty years that followed the Revolution. The melancholy sight of the denuded land drew the attention of a Parliamentary Commission appointed to inquire into the matter. The Act of 10 Will. III. 2, c. 12 ordered the planting of a certain number of trees in every county, "but," remarks Lecky, "it was insufficient to counteract the destruction which was due to the cupidity or the fears of the new proprietors." [T. S.]

[99] Swift always distinguished between the Irish "barbarians" and the Irish who were in reality English settlers in Ireland. Swift, for once, is in accord with the desires of the English Government, who wished to eradicate the Irish language. His friend the Archbishop of Dublin and his own college, that of Trinity, were in favour of keeping the language alive. (See Lecky's "Ireland," vol. i., pp. 331-332.) [T. S.]

[100] See Swift's "Proposal for the Universal Use of Irish Manufactures." [T. S.]

[101] See Swift's "Proposal for the Universal Use of Irish Manufactures." [T. S.]

[102] The text here given is that of Scott read by the "Miscellaneous Pieces" of 1789. The "Observations" were written, probably, in 1729. [T. S.]

[103] Monck Mason has an elaborate note on this subject ("Hist. of St. Patrick's Cathedral," pp. 320-321, ed. 1819), which is well worth reprinting here, since it is an excellent statement of facts, and is fully borne out by Hely Hutchinson's account in his "Commercial Restraints of Ireland," to which reference has already been made:

"In the year 1698 a bill was introduced into the English Parliament, grounded upon complaints, that the woollen manufacture in Ireland prejudiced the staple trade of England; the matter terminated at last in an address to the King, wherein the commons 'implored his majesty's protection and favour on this matter, and that he would make it his royal care, and enjoin all those whom he employed in Ireland, to use their utmost diligence, to hinder the exportation of wool from Ireland (except it be imported into England), and for the discouraging the woollen manufacture, and increasing the linen manufacture of Ireland.' Accordingly, on the 16th July, the King wrote a letter of instructions to the Earl of Galway, in which the following passage appears: 'The chief thing that must be tried to be prevented, is, that the Irish parliament takes no notice of what has passed in this here, and that you make effectual laws for the linen manufacture, and discourage as far as possible the woollen.'--The Earl of Galway and the other justices convened the parliament on the 27th of September; in their speech, they recommended a bill for the encouragement of the manufactures of linen and hemp, 'which,' say they, 'will be found more advantageous to this kingdom than the woollen manufacture, which, being the settled trade of England from whence all foreign markets are supplied, can never be encouraged here.' The house of commons so far concurred with the lords justices' sentiments as to say, in their address of thanks, that they would heartily endeavour to establish the linen manufacture, and to render the same useful to England, and 'we hope,' they add, 'to find such a temperament, with respect to the woollen trade here, that the same may not be injurious to England' ('Cont. Rapin's Hist.,' p. 376). 'And they did,' says Mr. Smith, 'so far come into a temperament in this case, as, hoping it would be accepted by way of compromise, to lay a high duty of ... upon all their woollen manufacture exported; under which, had England acquiesced, I am persuaded it would have been better for the kingdom in general. But the false notion of a possible monopoly, made the English deaf to all other terms of accommodation; by which means they lost the horse rather than quit the stable' ('Memoirs of Wool,' vol. ii., p. 30). The duties imposed by the Irish parliament, at this time, upon the export of manufactured wool, was four shillings on the value of twenty shillings of the old drapery, and two shillings upon the like value of the new, except friezes. But this concurrence of the people of Ireland seemed rather to heighten the jealousy between the two nations, by making the people of England imagine the manufactures of Ireland were arrived at a dangerous pitch of improvement, since they could be supposed capable of bearing so extravagant a duty: accordingly, in the next following year, the English parliament passed an Act (10-11 William III: cap. 10), that no person should export from Ireland wool or woollen goods, except to England or Wales, under high penalties, such goods to be shipped only from certain ports in Ireland, and to certain ports in England: But this was not the whole grievance; the old duties upon the import of those commodities, whether raw or manufactured, into Great Britain, were left in the same state as before, which amounted nearly to a prohibition; thus did the English, although they had not themselves any occasion for those commodities, prohibit, nevertheless, their being sent to any other nation.

"The discouragement of the woollen manufacture of Ireland, affected particularly the English settlers there, for the linen was entirely in the hands of the Scotch, who were established in Ulster, and the Irish natives had no share in either. It is stated in a pamphlet, entitled, 'A Discourse concerning Ireland, etc. in answer to the Exon and Barnstaple petitions,' printed 1697-8, that there were then, in the city and suburbs of Dublin, 12,000 English families, and throughout the nation, 50,000, who were bred to trades connected with the manufacture of wool, 'who could no more get their bread in the linen manufacture, than a London taylor by shoe-making.'

"Mr. Walter Scott says ('Life of Swift,' p. 278) that the Irish woollen manufacture produced an annual million, but this is not the fact; Mr. Dobbs in his 'Essay on the Trade of Ireland,' informs us, from the custom-house books, that in the year 1697 (which immediately preceded the year in which the address above-mentioned was transmitted to the king) the total value of Irish woollen exports, of all sorts, was only _£23,614 9s. 6d._, and in 1687, when they were at the highest, they did not exceed _£70,521 14s. 0d._ It moreover appears, that the greater part of these exports were of a sort which did not interfere with the trade of England, _£56,415 16s. 0d._ was in friezes, and _£2,520 18s. 0d._ coarse stockings, the rest consisted in serges and other stuffs of the new drapery, which affected not the trade of England generally, but only the particular interests of Exeter and its neighbourhood, and a very few other inconsiderable towns.