his co-operation of
the legislature tended rather to reconcile the people to the system than
to encrease the discontents which it was naturally calculated to
produce, it is certain that some very celebrated characters, whose
opinions in this case deserve to be respected, had declared the most
decided disapprobation of at least that part of it which related to the
military. The conduct of my Lord Moira, in the Parliament of both
countries, himself a soldier, an Irish nobleman, and one possessed of
such a stake in the country as must make him anxious for its welfare
and its peace, has already perhaps inclined the British public to doubt
whether the enormities practised under that system were tolerable in any
country. The manly and candid opinion of the brave old Abercrombie,
"That the conduct of the army in Ireland was calculated to make them
formidable only to their friends," must have also had its weight in
ascertaining the merits of that system. That the feelings and the honour
of that venerable officer did not suffer him longer to remain in the
command of the Irish army, Ireland will long have reason to lament. The
influence of even _one_ such mind on Irish politics would have produced
the most important benefits.

For some time the administration boasted that they had at length found
the way to quiet the country. In fact, the operations of the military in
Ulster did reduce that province to a state of peace, and no disturbance
existed but what the army itself created. Less violent and
unconstitutional measures would have prevented acts of outrage--but
neither this, nor any measure of coercion, could have eradicated
discontent. As the infliction of the military system produced a gloomy
quiet in one part of the island, the disturbances broke out with much
encreased enormity in other parts of the country.--The South, hitherto
tranquil, and which at the moment of danger, when the enemy appeared on
the coast a few months before, exhibited the most enthusiastic spirit of
zeal and loyalty, now became convulsed by partial risings to an alarming
degree. The interior of the country, the King's and Queen's County, the
County of Kildare, and even the vicinity of the metropolis, the Counties
of Wicklow and of Dublin, were now in as bad a state as the pacified
North had ever been. Every reasonable man, who believes that nothing can
be produced without a producing cause, must attribute this change of
temper in the South and other pa