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    Untitled Article

    \ M The Irish were placed in an awkward and distressing position . The people could not tell which code of laws they were to obey , their own or the English . The nobles were at a loss to comprehend by what titles they held their estates , whether the ancient tenure of Tainistry , or the British fee simple .

    They were denied the benefits of either , and subject to the penalties of both , "if an Irishman killed an inhabitant of the Pale , he was tried by the British law , and executed for murder ; if an Englishman or Anglo-Irishman slew a mere Irishman , he was tried by the Brehon code , which subjected him to a fine only . It was the same in the case of property , whenever a question arose between the Irish and the Colonists . If the Brehon law invalidated the title

    of the former , the rule of that abrogated code was applied ; if it confirmed his possessions , then the law of England was appealed to , and he was stripped of his inheritance . These two codes met the Irish in every transaction of life like a doubly-armed adversary . If the Chieftain executed the ancient law within his own territory , or collected the accustomed dues from his clansmen , he was held to be guilty of high treason by the law of England . If , on his death , his heir claimed , by the same * law , to be entitled to the inheritance of his ancestor , he was answered , that by the Brehon code the inheritance had lapsed to the clan , and the Crown therefore claimed it .

    " It is not wonderful that , under circumstances of so much hardship , the Irish were impatient of their condition . It was an object of the greatest importance to the nobility to convert their titles by Tainistry into British fee simples . The Tainist was an absolute prince upon his estate , subject only to the laws which custom had established . The inheritance was in his family , but was not limited to his immediate kindred . The clansmen might exclude his Children , and elect a distant branch of the same stock to the succession .

    Again , the Tainist had no property in the land , which belonged to the clan generally , and he could claim no more than a customary usufruct for life . The substantial advantages of a British title were infinitely of more value than the power and splendonr of a Tainist's rank ; and the Irish Lords sought every means , and sometimes paid considerable sums , to be permitted to exchange their brilliant hereditary coronets , for the more solid security of an English title . '" The lower classes of the people were as anxious as the nobility to obtain the advantages of a British title . Every clan held its lands in commonage ,

    and no man could claim a spot or farm as his own . This system , which appears to have worked well when the Irish institutions were in their vigour , was found , in their decay , to be full of inconvenience . Industry languished , and was almost destroyed , by the violence of the idle and the profligate . The power of the Chief , formerly limited by the law , and well defined b y the ancient customs of the country , knew now no bounds , and fell , with a force accumulated tenfold by the calamities and distresses of the country , upon the industry of the peaceable and well-disposed . From this oppression the people longed to shelter themselves under the strong fence of an English title , which

    permitted them to rent a separate farm , each man to himself , from which the Chief could demand no more than the reserved rent , and upon which the idle clansman could make no exaction . " But down to the close of Elizabeth's reign , the entreaties of chiefs and people were unavailing to procure from the crown the privileges of British subjects . The utmost energy of the Anti-Irish faction was exerted to prevent this most desirable accommodation . Many of the Irish nobility , indeed , succeeded in obtaining patents from the crown , applying to their individual ease , and converting their Irish into British titles . 6 ut these were almost

    always procured through the influence of the officers of the crown in Ireland ; and as they exacted great sums of money for ( he occasional exertion of this influence * it is probable that the profit derived from this scaurce naay have been an impediment in the way of any general enactment which might give the Irish the benefit they sought without fee or solicitation . "—Vol . I . pp 3 D —12 .

    Untitled Article

    256 Review . —O'Dfiscol ' s History of Ireland .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1828, page 256, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2559/page/40/