ainst Whiteboyism; volunteers put themselves at the disposal of the
magistrates, and the rising was at last crushed, not without cruelty and
an unfair administration of the criminal law. The outbreak is a notable
event in Irish history, for from that time until now secret societies
which have attempted to gain their objects by lawless and bloody means
have constantly existed in Ireland. In protestant Ulster the Oakboys, as
they called themselves, rose in 1763 against an increase in the demands
for tithe and the burdens laid upon them for making and repairing roads.
Their rising was not accompanied by the cruelties which disgraced
Whiteboyism, and was speedily pacified. Some years later the greediness
of Lord Donegal, who for the sake of gain evicted over 6,000 protestant
families and replaced them by new tenants, many of them catholics,
caused a rising in Antrim and Down. Already numerous presbyterians of
Ulster, men of Scottish and English descent, had been driven by the
destruction of the woollen trade and the disabilities imposed by the
test act to emigrate to America, and many of Donegal's evicted tenantry
followed their example. Ireland lost men who should have defended
British interests, and America gained some of her best soldiers in the
revolutionary war. The feud between the protestants and catholics of
Ulster arising out of Donegal's evictions bore bitter fruit in later
troubles.

[Sidenote: _THE IRISH PARLIAMENT._]

The Irish house of commons was composed exclusively of protestants,
elected exclusively by protestants. Of its 300 members sixty-four were
returned for counties and were in some measure elected by the people.
Two were returned for Trinity College, Dublin. The remainder sat for
cities and boroughs, and of these 172 were nominated by borough-owners.
The duration of parliament was only terminated by the demise of the
crown. The house was the representative of the protestant aristocracy
and was completely out of touch with the mass of the people. It had
little control of finance, for the Irish establishments were large. The
civil list was burdened with pensions and sinecures, distributed either
as a means of parliamentary corruption, or among the supporters of the
castle policy and the hangers-on of the English court. By Poyning's law
the Irish parliament was subordinated to the English privy council, and
could not be summoned until the bills which it was called upon to pass
had received the assent o