tice of Ireland, members of the
board, being Catholics; and another placed at the disposal of the two
archbishops ten livings, not exceeding L800 a-year each, connected with
the suppressed bishoprics, for the purpose of being bestowed on the
junior fellows of the University of Dublin. The bill was passed on
the 30th of July, by a majority of one hundred and thirty-five
against eighty-one; and on the 2nd of August the commons agreed to the
amendments which had been made by the peers. Mr. O'Connell observed
that the lords had not made the bill much worse than they found it, and
protested against its being considered in any other light than as the
first instalment of the debt due to Ireland.

IRISH TITHE BILL.

Another measure connected with Ireland arose from the difficulty of
collecting tithes. It has been seen that in the preceding year an act
was passed, enabling government to advance to the Irish clergy such
amount of tithes as had been illegally withheld during the year 1833,
and empowered the executive, on making such advance, to levy the arrear
itself. This expedient only inflamed the animosity of the tithe-payers,
since it created a creditor whom it was apprehended would be more
difficult to resist. Ministers, therefore, resolved to relinquish
this plan; and they proposed instead of it that government should be
empowered to abandon all processes under the existing law, to pay up all
arrears, and to seek reimbursement in a different manner. On the 12th of
June Lord Althorp moved that it was the opinion of this committee that
an advance of money should be paid to the clergy of the established
church in Ireland, in order to relieve the occupying tenants from
payments on account of arrears of tithes, or composition of tithes
in the year 1833, such advance to be paid within a limited time by a
land-tax chargeable on all land liable to the payment of tithes, the
owners of which should not have paid the tithes, or composition of
tithes, which became due during such years. This was generally approved
of by O'Connell and the Irish members, though they insisted that it
should be extended to lay-impropriators as well as clerical. There were
others who opposed it because they thought it would be holding out a
premium to lawless violence, and an invitation to resistance to the
payment of tithes. Moreover, a third party were for rejecting it,
because instead of involving the principle that the Catholic population
should