ment resentment at individuals, but no measures for the general benefit. These Parliaments, it is true, were chiefly assembled under Protestant influence; but it will hardly be asserted, that the wisdom of their decisions is likely to be much increased by the admission of O'Connell and his band of Catholic Repealers; and, in truth, such is the exasperation of the parties in Ireland at each other, and the vehement passions which they bring to bear upon public affairs, that it is apparent that the dissolution of the Union would be instantly followed by such extreme measures as would speedily rouse a civil war, of the most sanguinary character, over the whole country, and terminate in the re-establishment of English ascendency, after years of suffering, as the only means of saving either life or fortune out of the general wreck.

Holding it, therefore, as a proposition too clear to admit of dispute, that the amelioration of Ireland is to be based on British connexion, and founded on the measures to be brought forward in the British Parliament, we shall consider the means which exist for the alleviation or removal of Irish grievances, and by which ultimately the state of that country may be rendered somewhat more tranquil than it is under its present distracted rule.

We have already stated, in the first paper of this series, that the great and lasting misfortune in Ireland has been that they have received institutions in imitation of England, for which they are obviously disqualified, and which are adapted to a totally different state of society; and that, in consequence, the administration of justice has become defective, the protection of life and property imperfect, and impunity been practically afforded to criminals and anarchists of the very worst description. This is an evil of the utmost magnitude; striking, as it obviously does, at every species of industry, or the growth of any habits of subordination or regularity, and tending to continue that state of anarchy in which the country has so long been plunged, and which perpetuates the redundant and miserable population, which has so extensively overspread the British isles.

The obvious and only remedy for this deplorable state of things, lies in the establishment of a vigorous and efficient government, so organized as to meet and curb the wicked in all their enterprises; and that by such means the disturbances of Ireland might be effectually quelled, and order completely re-established, is evident from the success which has attended similar undertakings in other countries where the case was, to all appearance, still more hopeless. Scotland, in 1696, was very nearly in as bad a state as Ireland is now. Its whole population was not 1,000,000; and of these 200,000 were sturdy beggars, who lived at free quarters on the inhabitants, and, as Fletcher of Saltoun said in his memorable speech on the subject, feared neither God nor man. The country was divided by religion; had been the seat of civil war for seventy years; and its nobles, instead of being disposed to co-operate with Government for the restoration of order, were almost all leagued together to place a rival family on the throne. How then was this state of anarchy checked in that country? By an admirably organized system of criminal law, and a resolute executive, which gradually extinguished the private feuds of the inhabitants, rendered hopeless the system of intimidation and violence which had so long prevailed, and at length established order and tranquillity throughout a kingdom which had been desolated by feuds and civil wars for three centuries. Ireland is doubtless in a deplorable state of anarchy; but it is not so bad as La Vendée and Britanny were, after a million of Frenchmen had perished in the desperate conflict of which that heroic land was the theatre, and every family mourned several of its members cut off by republican vengeance; and yet by the able efforts of Hoche and Carnot, followed by the wise measures of Napoleon, peace was completely restored to its infuriated inhabitants. It is evident, therefore, that the thing may be done; the only question is, whether Government have resolution enough to go on with the necessary measures to effect the object.

The root of the whole evils complained of in the administration of

justice in Ireland, is to be found in the placing the chief execution of the criminal law in the hands of an unpaid magistracy, composed of gentlemen of the country who are personally implicated in the feuds which divide the inhabitants, instead of intrusting it to public officers connected with government, and acting under the control of an undivided responsibility. We are quite aware what tender ground this is, and how nearly it touches many of the most venerable and esteemed institutions of England. In the observations which follow, therefore, we mean nothing disrespectful to the centre of the empire. We know how well their criminal machinery acts there, and what a magnificent example of civilisation has grown up under its influence. What we allege is, that it is unsuited to the more fervid temperament, stronger passions, and inferior civilisation of the sister island; and that, without disputing its efficacy in England, it may at least be affirmed that experience has proved that it is entirely inapplicable to the Irish population.

We have the less hesitation in bringing forward these views, because they are entirely conformable to the opinion entertained by the committee, who have collected such a valuable mass of evidence on the state of Ireland during the last session of Parliament.—In their Report it is stated,

"The defects in the means of administering the laws consist principally in the magistrates not having proper legal assistance in discharging what may be considered the technical and formal parts of their duties; in the insufficient means for investigating and tracing crimes, from their commission to the arrest of the de

linquents; and also in great negligence and irregularity in conducting all the proceedings, from the time of the arrest until the delinquents are brought before the judge and jury for trial; and above all, in the want of some system for the speedy and immediate bringing to justice offenders against the public peace, so as to meet in an early stage the effect of conspiracies to subvert the law.

"In order to provide a remedy for these defects the Committee are of opinion, that instead of a Clerk of the Crown for each circuit in Ireland, there ought to be, according to the plan recently acted

upon by the Irish Government in the case of one circuit, a Clerk of the Crown for each county; and that he should be made an efficient officer for assisting the magistrates in the investigation of crimes immediately on their commission, and in For this purpose taking examinations. he should have an office in the county town, and a sufficient number of clerks

to attend and afford assistance to the ma

gistrates at the petty sessions, to receive their instructions, and to be ancillary to of their duties for the detection and puthem in every respect in the discharge nishment of crime. The establishing of an efficient office of this kind would not only very much contribute to render the laws more powerful, in preventing the violation of them with so much impunity as is now the case, but it would also be of great value in introducing a salutary improvement in the discharge of the magisterial duties, by rendering their proceedings more strictly conformable to the forms and rules of law; a circumstance which will lead to a more upright and efficient administration of justice, and go far at the same time to remove unfavourable impressions sometimes entertained by the people against the magistrates."

The remedy here proposed is not only one of obvious utility, and plainly suitable to the evils which have risen to so alarming a height, but it is one of tried efficacy and experienced fitness in another part of the island, where the anarchy now felt in Ireland once existed to as great an extent; but it has gradually been brought under by the steady adoption of the very system of criminal justice, which a sense of unbearable evils has here suggested to the Parliamentary committee on Irish affairs.

The Procurator Fiscals, as they are called, of the Scotch counties, who have been in full activity for the last 150 years, are exactly the clerks of the crown suggested for the Irish counties. They are public officers appointed for each county, by the Crown, or the Sheriff, and they are intrusted with the prepara

tion of all the criminal cases which occur within their district. When any offence is committed, the injured party lays his story before this officer, and he thenceforward has no trouble in the matter, except to appear and give evidence when called on for that purpose. In this way the

investigation of crimes is intrusted to a public officer, without any division of responsibility, who is constantly on the spot ready to receive information, and who soon acquires, from his extensive experience in these matters, a degree of skill which no person but one of professional habits can by possibility attain. The number of cases amounting in the larger counties to 300 or 400, which annually go through the office of this officer, renders him and his clerks in a short time perfectly familiar, not only with the forms of criminal procedure, but the mode of detecting crime, the haunts of offenders, and the most desperate characters who infest his district, while at the same time his public situation renders him incomparably less the object of popular obloquy, than country gentlemen or clergymen, who act as justices of the peace. So completely has this been proved by experience in Scotland, that though the justices have the same power in most respects as their English brethren, their criminal jurisdiction has almost fallen into disuse, and all the criminal business is prepared by these public officers, in whose hands experience has proved it is so much better conducted than by private individuals, or the ordinary magistracy.

But it is not enough that an officer with an efficient board of clerks should exist in every county to prepare all the criminal cases which occur in his district; it is indispensable that some means 'should also be devised for trying offences immediately when they arise, and not permitting the ruinous delay to ensue which now generally intervenes between the commission of the crime and the punishment of the offenders. As matters stand in Ireland at present, it generally happens that the violent and illegal associations with which the country in the South and West is everywhere more or less overspread, acquire an uncontrolled command over the lives and properties of the inhabitants before any Court meets for the punishment of the numerous crimes which have been committed by its members; and thus the disorders are all committed before the terrible examples occur, which are intended to overawe

VOL. XXXIII. NO. CCV.

the guilty. The authority of the law, indeed, is in the end vindicated; but not until murder, conflagration, and robbery have for months overspread the land; and when the assizes or special commission do meet, it is only to wreak the vengeance of an offended nation upon hundreds of captives, who were led to the perpetration of their crimes by the tardiness of the law in unsheathing its sword. The committee have also reported on this evil, and the means of remedying it.

"In adverting to the late mischievous associations in the Queen's County, under the name of Whitefeet, and the frequent recurrence of similar associations in other parts of Ireland, the Committee, although impressed with the strongest disinclination to recommend any new law which should in any degree be a departure from the established constitutional

rule of law, when they see by experience so much crime has been committed, and so much injury sustained, from time to time, from these associations, are of opinion, a law might be passed which, without being in any degree a departure from the principles of the Constitution, would enable the Executive Government to put into force the administration of justice more speedily, and at a less expense, than can be done at present. But before they proceed to state the provisions of such a law, they beg to remark, that although it is quite true, as has been stated by the Chief Justice of the King's Bench, in his charge to the Grand Jury of the Queen's County, that the ordinary and regular laws have been found sufficient to put down the various Whiteboy associations which have from time to time existed, it is equally true, that in every instance every association has made itself complete master of the county where it has been formed, and committed all kinds of crimes and enormities with impunity for a considerable period before the enforcement of the powers of the law has produced a remedy. The practice of having recourse to a Special Commission, as the means of carrying into effect a vigorous application of the rigours of the law, has led to this; and while this practice is the sole remedy which is had recourse to, the same result will necessarily occur, because the expense which attends the sending down of a Special Commission, and the difficulty of making out a case for it to act upon, must lead to postponing the appointment of it until a long time after an illegal conspiracy has commenced its operations. In

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point of fact, although the law has in general proved sufficiently strong and effectual for the ultimate suppression of Whiteboy associations, it has not been effectual in affording protection to the public against being exposed to the crimes and atrocities of those conspiracies for a considerable period previous to their being completely repressed.

"The first object of the law which the Committee recommend to be passed, is to give power to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, if a case of violent disturbance of the peace by a Whiteboy association shall actually occur, to issue his warrant for a special assembling of the Court of Quarter Sessions, at a period when, according to the ordinary course of the law, it could not assemble; and if the occasion should seem to require it, to appoint a person of high standing at the bar to act as Assessor to the Court. The Court to try all prisoners charged with Whiteboy and other offences below the rank of capital felonies; and to continue to sit by adjournment from time to time until tranquillity shall be restored."

An able officer, Colonel Sir John Harvey, holding a high situation in the Irish police, gives the following decisive evidence in favour of a public prosecutor in Ireland :—

"Do you think that the English principle of law, that the person injured shall be the prosecutor for the injury, and incur the expense of seeking redress, though the injury is considered to be an injury to the public, should be applied to Ireland?-No; I think it should always be treated as an injury to the public, and a public prosecutor appointed; that might remedy the evil.

"If there was a public officer that should take charge of the informations laid before the magistrate, and superintend laying the bills before the grand jury, and, if found, see that the case was properly conducted in court; if all that was conducted by a public officer at the public expense, would that tend to give the law full effect?-Yes, and it would lead to create a respect for the law, which does not now exist.

"Is there not now so much impunity that the people are careless of committing offences?-Such has long been my impression.

May not the impunity allowed in those smaller crimes in ordinary times, form the basis and tend to the extension of insurrectionary crimes, when attempted to be introduced by some factious or Whitefeet party?—Yes, I think so.

"And that the present laxity amounts to a sort of bounty upon crime?—Yes, it relaxes the morals of the people, and makes them indifferent to the commission of petty crimes; whereas if they were properly punished, we should have a very different state of things in Ireland."

Here again we have experience in Ireland, leading to the adoption of the same system, which for three centuries has been established with the happiest effects in Scotland.

The Committee have been most meritorious in the labour they have bestowed on the accumulation of evidence on this subject; but their recommendations, in many respects, are tinged by a degree of timidity, arising from an unwillingness to deviate from old institutions, evidently unsuitable to the circumstances of the country. The recommendation just quoted is a signal proof of this observation. For an evil of acknowledged magnitude, of long standing, and universal extent, they propose assembly of an extraordinary Court only the inadequate remedy of the from the Lord Lieutenant. of Quarter Sessions, by proclamation temporary and casual measures will Such never be attended with any lasting good effect in a country so grievously distracted as Ireland is, and where the people have so long been accustomed to comparative impunity for every species of outrage. To strike terror into a disorganized, disaffected, and almost insurgent peasantry, it is indispensable that the ordinary courts and the common law should be able to reach them at all times. Such a system would be an act of selves; for how often does it happen mercy to the deluded wretches themthat a few striking examples at first are sufficient to put a stop to a syshead, the transportation of hundreds tem, which, if allowed to rise to a can hardly extinguish ?

To grapple with this dreadful evil, which lies at the root of so many of the disorders of Ireland, we would propose that there should be established in every county permanent magistrates, paid by the Crown, selected from men of character and eminence at the bar, who should be authorised at all times to summon juries for the trial of offenders against the public peace, and to inflict any punishment short of death. The in