ing Swift's deanship,
and indeed for a century after, is now restored to its original
magnificence. Indeed, it may be doubted whether it is not in a condition
superior to what it ever was. This superb work has been effected
entirely by the princely munificence of the Guinness family, the great
_stout_ brewers of Dublin; and Mr. Roe, a wealthy distiller, is now
engaged in the work of restoring Christ Church, the other Protestant
cathedral.

I paid a visit to the Bank of Ireland, the edifice on which the hopes of
so many patriotic Irishmen have been centred, insomuch as it is the old
Parliament-house. The elderly official who conducted us over the
building took us first through the bank-note manufacturing rooms, where
we espied in a corner a queer wooden figure draped in a queerer
uniform. Demanding its history, he said that the clothes had belonged to
an old servant of the establishment, and were discovered after his
decease a few years ago. Formerly the Bank of Ireland was guarded by a
special corps of its own, and the ancient retainer, who had been a
member of this very commercial regiment, was proud of it, and had kept
his dress as a cherished memorial. When George IV. came to Ireland, on
his celebrated popularity-hunt, in 1821--previous to which no English
monarch had visited Ireland since William III.--he graciously
condescended to give the bank a military guard, which has since been
continued. On the day I went I found a number of soldiers of the Scots
Fusileer Guards occupying the guard-room. The officer on duty receives
an allowance of two dollars and a half for his dinner. At the Bank of
England he gets instead a dinner for himself and a friend, and a couple
of bottles of wine.

The interior of the Parliament-house is almost the same as when Ireland
had her own separate legislature. The House of Lords is in precisely the
condition in which it was left in 1801. It is a large oak-paneled,
oblong chamber of no particular beauty, and might very well pass for the
dining-hall of a London guild. There is a handsome fireplace, and the
walls are in great part covered with two fine pieces of tapestry
representing the battle of the Boyne and the siege of Derry, King
William, "of glorious, pious and immortal," etc., being of course the
most conspicuous object in the foreground. The attendant stated that a
special clause in the lease of the buildings, to the Bank of Ireland
Company stipulated that the House of Lords was to