selves with the proceedings of the asso- Sir George Hill said, he did not mean Mr. Van Homrigh, member for Drogheda, defended the Catholic bishop, Dr. Curtis, from the charge of improperly interfering in matters of state. There could not be a more loyal man than Dr. Curtis; who, in fact, owed his appointment to the good opinion of the duke of Wellington. The hon. gentleman proceeded further to observe, that at a dinner lately given by a distinguished nobleman at which Dr. Curtis was present, the memory of his royal highness the duke of York being proposed, Dr. Curtis made an eloquent speech, in which he eulogized the virtues of the deceased prince, and lamented the language made use of, against his royal highness, by certain members of the association. Mr. Secretary Peel said, that before he came down to the House, he had formed a resolution not to express any opinion on the subject now under discussion. He should, therefore, cautiously abstain from offering any remarks at present on a question that was appointed for discussion on an early day. If, however, he carefully abstained from entering upon topics that would soon be discussed, he hoped no one would suppose that, on that account, he felt less interest in the question. He preferred, which he should present, was attended When he stated that twentyseven Irish peers had signed this petition, he might add, that every man whose name was attached to it was a resident land-owner. Every one who did not come within that class, however high his rank or fortune, was excluded from joining in this petition. No persons were more interested in the welfare of Ireland than the petitioners. Not a sentence in the petition could be traced to any hostile feeling. No acerbity of language was used. The petitioners merely prayed for a continuance of the laws by which Roman Catholics were excluded from power; and they proceeded to state the grounds on which they conceived that continuance neces sary. He was glad to be selected as the channel through which this petition was to be presented to the House. He could not look at the names subscribed to it, without recollecting how many of them deserved well of their country, on account of the public services which they had ren dered to it as magistrates; and how many of them were entitled to the admiration and respect of all those who came in contact with them in private life, on account of their many amiable and valuable qualities. He was, therefore, grateful to them for having selected him as the organ to make their wishes known to the Commons House of Parliament on this all-important subject. Lord Nugent presented the petition of the Roman Catholics of Great Britain, praying to be relieved from the legal disabilities under which they laboured at present. In presenting it, the noble lord stated, that upon several previous occasions he had presented to the House petitions from that portion of his majesty's subjects which had now intrusted him again with the duty of representing their case to Parliament, and as they had no new grievance to complain of, they had not introduced any new matter into the substance of their petition. That petition was signed by twenty-three thousand persons, and might, had it been deemed necessary, have been still more numerously signed. He did not, however, press it on the consideration of the House, so much on account of the numbers who had signed it, as on account of the injustice under which they suffered. If, instead of being the petition of the Catholic aristocracy and proprietary of the country, the petition had been the petition of but one individual, and that individual of the obscurest description, he should have felt it to be his duty to call the attention of parliament to the singular grievances under which he described himself to labour. The petitioners, however, deserved the regard of the House, on account of their being distinguished by their rank, their property, their learning, and their unwearied and unimpeached loyalty. They said, that the restrictions were imposed upon them originally under false pretences and for false objects, and were now continued under pretences and for objects equally false. They desired the House to consider the question of emancipation, not as an Irish but as a British question; and requested him to state to it, that they had put forth two declarations, which were appended to their petition, one containing an explanation of the manner in which they paid allegiance. to the king, and another containing an explanation of their religious tenets, as 1 far as they affected their politics. The originals of those declarations were placed in the British Museum, where the original charter, which secured the liberties of England was also placed, signed by the ancestors of some of the very men whose names were subscribed to the present petition. The petitioners stated, that they came before the new parliament with a sanguine hope, that their complaints would be listened to, and their grievances redressed. They acknowledged with gratitude the justice which they had already met with from the House of Commons, and added, that their confidence in it was increased by a knowledge acquired during the late elections of the increase of liberal feelings in all parts of England. They asked to be relieved from the consequences of the bloody Popery code, which had been originally enacted without reason, and was now retained without necessity. They prayed for emancipation, not only for themselves, but for every species of dissenters from the Established Church, who were liable to any disqualifications on account of their religious tenets. The Petition was brought up and read; setting forth, "That the Petitioners beg leave to represent that, on the opening of the first session of Parliament, they feel it their duty to renew the application they have more than once successfully made to the House, to pass a Bill for the repeal of the penal and disabling Laws under which they yet labour; that they worship the same God, are liege subjects to the same King, and live under and acknowledge the same Constitution as the House; the friends of the country are theirs; her enemies are theirs; in her fleets and armies they render her important services; to her support they essentially contribute; there is no class of British subjects upon whose attachment and active co-operation the House themselves have greater reliance; that the Petitioners have beheld, and continue to behold, with unspeakable satisfaction, the steady and regular advance which the cause of Catholic emancipation has made, and is making, in the public mind; during the late election, attempts were made to prejudice the electors against them and their friends, by the cry of no Popery; but the places in which it served those who used it were few; in several it was received with the most marked disdain; may every dis ઃ by their countrymen, that in wise, good, and liberal councils our country has taken the lead, and directed the opinion of the world; will this appear in her perpetuating Laws which all allow to have been enacted during a national delirium; by all the feelings which bind the House to their country and their countrymen; by every reason which makes it wise to consolidate their interests, to extinguish disunion, and annihilate discontent among them; by the justice and humanity which every Government owes to every class of subjects; by the undeniable truth, that equal openings and equal rewards are due, by the Laws of God and man, to equal industry and equal merit; and above all, by the sacred precept of the God of all Christians, that ingenuous artifice of controversy, by whom any other class of his Majesty's Roman or against whomsoever used, and every Catholic subjects; they beg leave to annex measure that tends to disunite, to keep up a copy of that Address also, to their animosity, or to prejudice one portion of humble Petition; they further request the subjects against another, similarly fail! House to consider the progress of public that the Petitioners have declared, and opinion on the Continent in favour of they again declare, that they bear ani- civil and religious liberty; they beg leave mosity to no individual of any commu- to mention, that the late Marquess of nion, sect, or party; that they embrace Londonderry announced in the House of all their countrymen and fellow-subjects, Commons, in the debate on the Catholic whatever be their religious denomination, Relief Bill, on the 28th day of February, as friends and brethren; and that they 1821, that the only one question upon most sincerely and fervently wish to see which the Congress of Vienna were unanithem all united in the participation of mous, was that of doing away with disevery civil right and blessing which they tinctions and preferences on account of solicit for themselves; that they have al-religion;' that it has always been asserted ways been willing to lay before the public, in the fullest and most explicit manner, all their religious doctrines, and to disclaim every anti-civil or anti-social principle imputed to them; for this purpose they have often referred to authentic documents, in which their religious tenets are to be found, and have often printed, published, and circulated them; and that among these documents are the answers of the Foreign Universities to the questions suggested by Mr. Pitt; that very recently (the Petitioners now mention a fact to which they most earnestly solicit the attention of the House) an exposition of their religious principles, framed by the English and Scottish Catholic Prelates, has been laid before the public; that they have presented copies of this all things which you would that men declaration to his most excellent Majesty, should do to you, you should do also to to his illustrious Brothers, to the Cabinet them as Roman Catholics suffering unMinisters, to the Prelates of the Estab- der the operation of unjust and oppressive lished Church, and to the Universities of laws; and as British subjects, jealous of Oxford, Cambridge, Edinburgh, Aber- the fair reputation of their country, which deen, Glasgow, and St. Andrew's; and these Laws disgrace; the Petitioners most that they have deposited the original in earnestly pray the House to take the British Museum; they respectfully case into their consideration, and to pass take leave to annex a copy of it to their a Bill which, by repealing every Law present Petition, and to refer to it as a which imposes any declaration, oath, c full and explicit exposition of the religious test, relating to religious opinions as a tenets of the Roman Catholics, on points qualification for holding civil office, or therein mentioned; together with this De- enjoying civil rights, may relieve them. claration, they have extensively circulated from every penalty and disability yet reamong their Protestant fellow country-maining in force against them, and may men, an Address, expressing their ad- wipe away the stigma of intolerance which herence to it, calculated, to the best of now attaches to their country." their judgment, to remove any unfavourable impression existing in their minds, respecting their civil and social principles, GRANT TO THE DUKE AND DUCHESS and laying before them a brief statement oF CLARENCE.] On the order of the of the grievances which the Roman Ca- day for the second reading of the Duke tholics of Great Britain suffer by the and Duchess of Clarence's Annuity Bill, present state of the penal laws beyond Sir R. Heron observed, that the duke Ordered to lie on the table. or of Clarence ought to be satisfied with what the country had already done for him. The hon. member concluded by moving, as an amendment, "That the bill be read a second time this day six months." Mr. E. Davenport seconded the motion. When the distress which prevailed in the manufacturing towns was considered, ministers came, he thought, with a very bad grace to propose a grant of this nature. There was one contingency not provided for by the bill. Suppose his majesty should contract another matrimonial alliance [a laugh]. What then was to become of this 9,000l. a year. Such an occurrence was not at all improbable; though it might form a very good joke to the gentlemen on the other side, though, as he thought, not a very decorous one. The duke's salary. had already been increased several times upon the ground of the high price of provisions. Mr. Wells said, he could not conscientiously approve of any addition to the salary of the duke of Clarence. rupt? It was a mean and scandalous waste of the public money. If he could lay on the table of the House accounts of the distress occasioned by taxation, he could prove that, for the 9,000l. proposed, fifteen thousand persons had been turned out of their homes. Sift To The House divided: For the Second Reading 128: For the Amendment 39. HOUSE OF LORDS. CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION IRISH VESTRIES.] Lord King said, he had a petition intrusted to him by the Catholics of Ireland; and, as it related to the state in which they were placed with respect to the church of Ireland, he had been unwilling to present it before he saw an Irish prelate in the House. The petition complained of the exactions which were practised on the property of the Catholics at the will and pleasure of Protestants, for Protestant purposes, and with very little check given to them by those who had the power to control such proceedings. The petition stated the grievances the Catholic suffered from being obliged to pay sums of money, levied by vestries, where Protestants voted away the money, nineteen-twentieths of which were paid by Catholics; Catholics being excluded by law from voting at vestries on a great many occasions. The petition stated, that the church of Ireland was the richest primeval Christian church in the world; the people the poorest and most wretched in any country. The number that professed the faith of the Established Church was comparatively the smallest in any country in the world which was burthened with an established church. The petition went on to state the injustice of persons being allowed to tax others, while the classes who paid the money had no control whatsoever over them. He was aware of an act being passed professing to be for the relief of the Roman Catholics, as assessed by Protestant vestries. That act, however, so far from being a relief, was an aggravation of the evil. Whether this was true or not he could not say; but that was the opinion of those who stated that they were aggrieved. Certainly, Catholics were, in a Mr. Hume wished to ask the right hon. great many cases, excluded from being pregentleman how, as an honest man, he sent at vestries. It was true that they had could propose such a vote, when he must a right of appeal; but, coupled with a conknow that as a financier, he was bank-dition which few Catholics, he was afraid, Mr. Alderman Waithman said, he would not object to a liberal allowance to every branch of the royal family. Notwithstanding the distress felt throughout the country, he would not now oppose a grant for that purpose; but he looked upon the present proposition as one of the most illtimed measures that was ever submitted to parliament. The very day it was introduced, the House had heard from the right hon. gentleman a most gloomy description of the condition of the people. In his magisterial capacity, upwards of eighty persons had been summoned before him for non-payment of church and poor rates, which could not be enforced against more than ten. He was astonished that the right hon. gentleman should have courage to make the proposition on the very evening when a committee of emigration was moved for, to provide means for sending the industrious but distressed people out of the country. Mr. Monck described the various sources of the duke's income, and contended that his royal highness had already a sufficiency to support his dignity. The additional allowance was most unseemly in the present state of public distress. were enabled to comply with; namely, sureties of 1007. each, to answer any costs that might be given against the appellant. In order that their lordships might see that the petitioners did not complain without reason, he would read to them some of the exactions practised on the Catholics, which would appear quite incredible, had they not been sanctioned by the authority of a parliamentary return. He thought their lordships would be astonished at some of the items. In the parish of St. Thomas, Dublin, at a vestry composed of Protestants, voting away money that was paid by the Catholics, the following were charges, year after year, that were exacted from the Catholics: for wine to the sacrament, 281., for a sextoness 301. for a sexton 30%., for a beadle 201. There was, besides, an extraordinary compensation made to the rev. Mr. Field, and the rev, Mr. Copland, for attending early service, of 501. each. Two women were also paid for attending early service; so that it would appear that the vestry was first of all forced to pay the preachers for their attendance, and afterwards to buy a congregation to hear them. The two women had a yearly stipend allowed them for attending as well as the clergyman; and thus their lordships might go on year after year, for as sure as the same sum was charged for the clergyman attending, so sure were the two old women paid for their attendance. And it was the same with the sacramental wine. Every year 287. was charged for that article; it would seem, therefore, that there was no falling off in the number of the communicants. He would now take another parish. In that parish he found that 150l. was charged for compensation for early service there was paid to the organist 701.; to Margaret Ryan, gallery keeper, 201.; to assistant gallery-keeper 201.; to the vestry-keeper 207.; to the organblower, 201.; for sacramental wine, 201. In another parish, 597. 11s. 8d. was charged for the sacramental wine. He thought such a charge quite enormous. In Dublin, the diocese was charged with the expense of repairing the cathedral. In England, it was both the law and the practice to pay for the repairs of the cathedral out of the property of the cathedral. But in Ireland the cathedrals were thrown upon the parish. In the diocese of Waterford, in the union of Trinity, there was this item: for repairing the roof of the cathedral; 2207., levied by the vestry, and 1 In paid for by the Catholics. He would now go to another cathedral, that of Lismore. In 1812, 957. was paid for repairing the cathedral gates; in 1813, 1007.; in 1814, 1227. 8s. 1d.; in 1815, 517.; in 1816, 1007.; and in the year 1817, 207. What did their lordships think the expense of repairing these gates amounted to?-to a sum of no less than 4887. Michael Angelo had said that the gates of a celebrated church in Florence were so beautiful that they were fit to be the gates of Paradise. He did not know whether the gates of Lismore cathedral were equal to those famous gates in Florence, but he thought it was the highest price ever paid for gates in the world. These expenses were paid for by the parish, nineteen-twentieths of which were composed of Catholics. He would now take another diocese, that of Cork. Here the items were as follows:-Paid to the parish clerk, 20.; for singing anthems, 347. 2s.; for instructing the boys, 221.; for the sacramental wine, 221.; and to parish clerk for evening attendance, 347.; as if he had not enough already; for washing the church linen, 97. 2s.; for candles for the church, 30%. All this sounded most extraordinary to English ears. the diocese of Elfin there was paid for repairs done by order of the bishop, 2207. Cash paid to the bishop for outlay by him two sums of 501., and one of 331. From these charges it appeared to him, that the vestries imitated a certain assembly, which never made the expenses it had to vote as small but as great as possible. The vestries were to be sure but a very humble imitation. A person once went into that assembly, and he thought it a very strange place, in which very strange things were done. One man handed up a paper, and mumbled a few unintelligible words over it, which he afterwards found to be a vote of some millions. So a Protestant carpenter hands up to a Protestant mason an estimate of necessary repairs, and they get a very good job between them, and it turns out that there is a very large sum to be paid. One reason that was given why so few Catholics attended the vestries was, the general satisfaction their proceedings had given. How far that was the case, would appear from the opinion of those who were interested in the matter; who stated, that a small proportion of the parish, an interested minority, was enabled t tax, to a great amount, the majority who were composed of Catholics. It was most to |