CHAP. XXXIX.

Reflexions on the American war Mifcellaneous tranfactions-Knights of Saint Patrick-Abortive fcheme of a Genevan fettlement-Proceedings of the volunteers-Defects of the national reprefentation -Meeting of a new parliament-National convention -Mifcellaneous transactions-Outrages—Addresses -Congrefs-Commercial propofitions-Miscellaneous tranfactions-Rightboys-Wretchedness of the peafantry-Death of the duke of Rutland Change of manners by his example-Reflexions on late hoursEnormous peculation detected by Buckingham-Offer of regency to the prince of Wales-Reinstatement of affairs-Fitzgibbon-Proceedings of the oppofitionists

-Parliamentary transactions.

THE

HE councils, by which the British cabinet had _CHAP. been influenced to enter on a war with the British

XXXIX.

on the Ame

Re- rican war.

colonies in America, were hardly more impolitic Reflexions than those by which that war was conducted. peated offers of conciliation, with augmented conceffions in each new propofal, were made, in the midst of hoftilites, to the revolted ftates; but never till it was too late; when the condition of affairs had become fuch as to cause them to be rejected;

while

CHAP. While many of the inftruments, employed to fubdue XXXIX. the colonies, were more fitted to procure the hatred than the fubmiflion of the colonists to the British government. Tribes of favages, American Indians, ufelefs in battle, butchered the unarmed in their tranfitory incurfions. The German mercenaries, too flow for American warfare, and regarding fpoil as their primary object, marked every where their progrefs with merciless rapine. Even the British, ́ the only effective troops employed on this lamentable occafion, were not fo obfervant of falutary dif cipline, but that in places, where they were at first received as friends by the inhabitants, they were af. terwards oppofed and detefted as enemies. Of the acts of devaftation and maffacre in this war the most atrocious recorded was committed at Wyoming, a new and most delightfully flourishing fettlement of about a thousand families on the river Susquehanna, which was reduced completely to a defert by a body of Indians and American royalists, denominated tories, under two leaders named Butler and Brandt, who put to death all the inhabitants of every age and both fexes by various kinds of torture. The refentment of the Americans, fired by fuch atrocities, was so ably directed by the admirable George Washington, a leader not lefs cautious of affording advantages to the enemy than alert to feize opportunities in his own favour, that the independence of the revolted states was eftablished by arms, and explicitly acknowleged by the British court in a final treaty of peace in the beginning of the year 1783. Conduct

-ed

XXXIX.

ed to its completion with a fpirit of order glorious CHAP. to the character of the Americans, this revolution, when we except the expenfes of the war, was ultimately advantageous even to Great-Britain; ince, rapidly augmented in wealth and population by an admirable system of government, these colonies afford a more gainful market than ever to British traders, without expenditure of British revenue for their defense. Their fubjugation might have involved the ruin of British liberty, together with their own impoverishment and decay.

ous tranfactions in Ire

1783.

Of the American revolution the emancipation of the Irish legislature was a confequence, acquired by the exertions of the volunteer affociations, exertions land. fo far glorious, but, like all human affairs, liable to be carried beyond the limit which true policy would prefcribe. If, after the attainment of their great object, thefe patriot bands had refigned their arms, when, on the conclufion of a general peace, they were no longer neceffary, they would forever have ftamped their paft tranfactions with the feal of honour. But, mifled by defigning or miftaken men, and influenced by the example of fome very eminent perfons in England, who afterwards proved recreant, they turned their attention to a new object, a reform of parliament, or a more equal reprefentation of the people in the houfe of commons, an object indeed desirable, in Britain, but of extremely difficult adjustment, and doubtlefs in Ireland of problematical utility. After the commencement of a difcuffion on this fubject, two events occured

of

CHAP. of little importance, yet perhaps not omiffible with

XXXIX.

of Saint

Patrick.

propriety.

Krights 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 Edward, the duke of Leinfter, and the earl of Courtown. On the eleventh of March they were invested at the caftle; and on the feventeenth, the feftival of the tutelar Saint, the ceremony of inftallation was magnificently performed.

Genevans.

From the preponderance of the ariftocratic 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 settlement 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 artižans, 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 fream 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

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 adminiftration Proceedhad been of fingular utility in the making of œcono- volunteers. mical reforms in the different offices of the castle, 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 Lisburne in the county of Antrim, on the first 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, publifhed 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