s for,
the perfection of the representative system.

But I deny that Ulster was in such a state as to justify the measure
that was then taken--for it was not in open and avowed rebellion, nor
was the system of the disorderly people in that province either too
subtle or too strong for an active magistracy, constitutionally aided by
the military. The disturbances amounted to nothing more than the
assemblage now and then of parties of people on the original principle
of the Orange-men (who to the disgrace of legislature, have, in a
certain place, more than once, been called the friends of the
constitution,) breaking houses and plundering arms; and I contend, that
with a proper force left always at the disposal and under the direction
of active magistrates, those individual acts of outrage might have been
prevented. The pretext, that the magistrates were terrified from acting
by frequent assassination, is empty--courage is not exclusively the
boast of the military in Ireland; and every country in which the
Insurrection Act has been carried into operation has produced numbers of
magistrates who dared to meet all the odium and all the danger which the
execution of that unpopular act imposed on them.

Under this Proclamation, Gen. Lake deprived of arms not only the
traiterous and the disaffected, but the loyal and most zealous friends
of the constitution. Where arms were expected and not found, a very new
mode of trial was instituted. The suspected or accused person was
suspended by the neck until the process of strangulation was nearly
completed. He was then let down, and if he was still pertinacious, the
touchstone was again tried, until he either confessed or accused others.
In other cases, it was ascertained what quantity of arms should be
brought in by a certain village or district--if the full quantity could
not be produced by the inhabitants, their habitations were reduced to
ashes to detect the concealment. These seem to have been ordinary modes
of proceeding under the military system; there were others more
irregular and eccentric which the zeal of the soldiers frequently
prompted them to indulge in.

Of the system thus steadily pursued by the Irish administration, the
Irish legislature expressed their most hearty and zealous
approbation.--Throughout the whole train of violent measures to which
the Irish administration resorted, the Irish Parliament went with them
_pari passu_. Without stopping to enquire whether t