CHAP. of little importance, yet perhaps not omiffible with XXXIX. of Saint Patrick. propriety. Knights To gratify the Irish by a mark of national confequence, a new order of knighthood was inftituted, the illuftrious order of Saint Patrick, of which the king is always to be fovereign, the viceroy officiating grand mafter, and the archbishop of Dublin chancellor. Among the knights were prince Ed ward, the duke of Leinster, and the earl of Courtown, On the eleventh of March they were invested at the castle; and on the feventeenth, the festival of the tutelar Saint, the ceremony of inftallation was magnificently performed. Genevans. ; From the preponderance of the aristocratic faction 1783. in the little republic of Geneva, through the interference of the neighbouring potentates in its favour, many of the popular party emigrated in difcontent, and fent commiffioners to negociate for a fettlement in Ireland. The commiffioners of a people fuffering in the cause of liberty were treated with the most respectful attention by the volunteers of Leinster and the project of a proteftant colony of industrious, wealthy, and highly civilized artizans, was eagerly embraced by the government, who ordered fifty thousand pounds from the treasury for the forwarding of the fcheme, and a town to be built, called New Geneva, for the reception of the emigants, in the county of Waterford, near the united ftream of the Barrow, Nore, and Suir, where a tract of land was fhortly to revert to the poffeffion of the crown, and intended to be appropriated in fee to the new colonists. But as the emigrants in fifted not only on being reprefented in parliament, CHAP. but alfo on being governed by their own laws, the XXXIX. treaty was interrupted, and the projected fettlement never took place, except that fome few came into Ireland, who liked fo little their new fituation that most of them in a fhort time left the kingdom. ings of the To earl Temple, whofe too fhort administration Proceedhad been of fingular utility in the making of œcono- volunteers. mical reforms in the different offices of the caftle, 1783. fucceeded the earl of Northington on the third of June 1783, when a ferment prevailed in the nation on account of an expected diffolution of parliament, which accordingly took place on the fifteenth of the following month. By an affembly of the delegates of forty-five volunteer companies of Ulfter, convened at Lifburne in the county of Antrim, on the firft of July, to deliberate on measures for a parliamentary reform, a committee was appointed for correfponding with other focieties, and a general meeting of the delegates of the province was requefted at Dungannon on the eighth of the next September. This provincial affembly, convened as thus recommended, confifting of the delegates of two hundred and feventy-two companies, published refolutions concerning the reprefentation of the people in parliament, and elected five perfons to reprefent each county in a national convention, which they appointed to be held in Dublin on the tenth of the following November, to which they entreated the volunteers of the other provinces to fend like XXXIX. CHAP. wife their delegates. The defects of which they complained in the national reprefentation were that of three hundred members, compofing the houfe of commons, only feventy-two were returned by the free election of the people; fince fifty-three peers nominated a hundred and twenty-four members, and influenced the choofing of ten; and fifty-two commoners nominated ninety-one, and influenced the choice of three. Meeting When the new parliament met on the fourteenth of a new of October, Edmund Sexten Perry was unanimoufly 1783. elected speaker by the commons; and the thanks of parliament. National 1783. both houses were voted to the feveral volunteer companies for their spirited exertions in the due execution of the laws. Likewife in a spirit of national freedom refolutions were paffed, "that in the prefent ftate of the kingdom, it was expedient that there fhould be a feffion of parliament held every year." But a momentous question foon occurred, in which parliament acted with decifion in a manner much lefs popular, yet not unpleafing to many real friends of the country. According to the invitation from Dungannon, the convention. delegates of the four provinces affembled in a national convention, on the tenth of November, in the Rotunda in Dublin; and, electing the earl of Charlemont their prefident, they appointed a committee to digeft a plan of parliamentary reform. Among the articles recommended in the report of this cammittee were thefe; that every proteftant, poffeffed of a freehold of forty fhillings value, fhould be en titled XXXIX. titled to vote for the return of representatives of any CHAP. city or borough where he fhould be refident: that every member of parliament, who fhould accept a penfion for life, or place under the crown, fhould in confequence be deprived of his feat: that each member should subscribe an oath that he had neither directly nor indirectly given any confideration with a view of obtaining the fuffrage of any elector and that the duration of each parliament fhould not exceed the term of three years. When the report was finished, a motion was made, on the twenty-ninth of the fame month, in the house of commons, by Henry Flood, for leave to introduce a bill for the more equal representation of the people in parliament. This was vehemently oppofed by Barry Yelverton, the attorney general, who declared in his fpeech that he admired the volunteers, fo long as they confined themselves to their first line of conduct," but that to receive a bill, which originated with an armed body, was inconfiftent with the dignity of the houfe, and the freedom of debate. After a very warm conteft, which continued till near three o'clock in Sunday morning, the motion. was rejected by a majority of a hundred and fiftyeight to forty-nine. A refolution was immediately after paffed by the commons" that it was then neceffary to declare that they would fupport the rights and privileges of parliament against all encroachments." They alfo voted an address to the king, in which the lords concurred, affuring his Majefty that they were determined to fupport the prefent conftitution with their lives and fortunes. VOL. II. U On CHAP. XXXIX. On the fecond of December the convention, voted an indefinite adjournment, having paffed a refolution "that they would carry on individually fuch inveftigations as might be neceffary to complete the plan of parliamentary reform ;" and having agreed to an addrefs to the king in the name of the delegates of all the volunteers in Ireland, "expreffive of their duty and loyalty, claiming the merits of their past exertions, and imploring his Majefty that their humble wish, to have certain manifeft perverfions of the parliamentary reprefentation of this kingdom remedied by the legiflature in fome reasonable degree, might not be attributed to any fpirit of innovation, but to a fober and laudable defire to uphold the conftitution, to confirm the fatisfaction of their fellow fubjects, and to perpetuate the cordial union of both kingdoms." The tame conclufion of a bu finefs, fo formidable in its outfet, had its caufes in the well-grounded confidence of the government, and the diffidence of the democratic leaders, who probably had not expected fo firm a determination to refift their demands. Men of reflexion among the volunteers were fenfible that, when Great-Britain, fortunately difengaged from foreign wars, was enabled to direct all her force to one quarter, an attempt to obtain their object by compulsion must be hopeless without the co-operation of the catholics, and that in cafe of fuccefs by this affiftance, the proteftant intereft in Ireland would be annihilated. The reformifts befides were far from poffeffing univerfally the confidence of the Irifh proteftants, many of whom regarded the advantages of the |