he men who drew up the Declaration of
Independence knew the value of words, and that when they spoke of misery
and cruelty, of rapine, treachery and distress, they meant what they
said. Franklin's letter brings us to the eve of the Volunteer Movement,
of which much has been said in a spirit of warm praise, but which seems
to have wrought evil rather than good. This Movement, at first initiated
wholly by the Scottish and English colonists and their adherents, was
later widened so as to include a certain number of the indigenous
population; and an armed force was thus formed, which was able to gain
certain legislative favors from England, with the result that a
Parliament sitting in Dublin from 1782 to 1799 passed laws with
something more resembling justice than Ireland was accustomed to.

But this Parliament was in no sense national or representative. It was
wholly composed of the Scottish and English colonists and their friends,
and the indigenous population had no voice in its deliberations. It is,
therefore, the more honor to Henry Grattan that we find him addressing
that Parliament thus: "I will never claim freedom for six hundred
thousand of my countrymen while I leave two million or more of them in
chains. Give the Catholics of Ireland their civil rights and their
franchise; give them the power to return members to the Irish
Parliament, and let the nation be represented." At this time, therefore,
four-fifths of the nation had neither civil rights nor
franchise,--because they differed from the dominant party in England as
to the precedence of the disciples of Jesus.

It may be supposed, however, that, even without civil or religious
rights, the fate of the people of Ireland was tolerable; that a certain
measure of happiness and well-being was theirs, if not by law, at least
by grace. The answer to this we shall presently see. The Volunteer
Movement, as we saw, included certain elements of the indigenous
population. The dominant party in England professed to see in this a
grave danger, and determined to ward off that danger by sending an army
to Ireland, and quartering troops on the peasants of all suspected
districts. We must remember that the peasants, on whom a hostile
soldiery was thus quartered, had no civil rights as a safeguard; that
the authorities were everywhere bitterly hostile, full of cowardly
animosity towards them.

The result we may best describe in the words of the English generals at
the head of