of national wrong and national difficulty, they were astonished at
the first actual realization of popular revenge. The Englishman had heard
of wars as the child hears of spectres--none had seen them, and the
narratives served only to excite the imagination. But the tremendous
novelty of revolt was now at their doors. Whether the Irish revolters
acted in concert with the undying hostility of France, or with the
factions reform of England; the danger in either case assumed a shape of
the most appalling magnitude. Opposition, in the very prospect of power,
shrank from possession; as the stormers of a fortress might start back
when they saw the walls rolling down before them in some sudden convulsion
of nature. They had predicted every casualty which could befall a country,
ruled by a cabinet inexorably closed against themselves. But when their
predictions had changed their character from the fantastic and remote into
the substantial and immediate--when the clouds which they so often
predicted to be advancing over the prosperity of the land, seemed to have
suddenly rushed forward, and condensed and darkened with the full freight
of national havoc; they as suddenly flew to shelter in utter inaction, and
left the minister to meet the storm. Pitt was soon equal to the crisis.
The orders which he dispatched to Ireland were stamped with all the
considerate vigour of his matchless ability. I had sent him all the
information which could be obtained of the progress and purposes of the
revolt, with the suggestions arising from the contingency. His remarks on
my communication were brief, but incomparably clear, direct, and decided.
Their tenor was, that I should distinguish accurately between the deluded
and the deluders--that I should assure the loyal of the unhesitating
support of England--and that, in all instances, I should cultivate the
national loyalty, reward the generous obedience, and sympathize with all
the gallant and generous qualities of a people with whom every thing was
to be done, by taking an interest in their feelings. These principles were
so entirely my own, that I acted upon them with double zeal, and with
complete success. The loyalty of Ireland rapidly exhibited itself in the
most willing sacrifices; all ranks of opinion coincided in the necessity
of bold and instant action; and from day to day, party, absorbed in the
sense of the national exigency, disappeared, and patriotism rose. The
leading men of both sides