RISE AND POLICY OF THE VOLUNTEERS 57 of a foreign army, but it soon became evident that they were determined to demand free trade for their own people and the same constitutional rights as their fellow subjects in England. In the words of one of their resolutions, 'they knew their duty to their Sovereign, and they were loyal; they knew their duty to themselves, and they were resolved to be free.' They were guided by the chastened wisdom, the unquestioned patriotism, the ready tact of Charlemont. Flood was conspicuous among their colonels, and though his reputation was much injured by his ministerial career, he still carried with him the memory of his past achievements and the splendour of his yet unfading intellect; and there, too, was he before whose genius all other Irishmen had begun to pale- the patriot of unsullied purity-the statesman who could fire a nation by his enthusiasm, and restrain it by his wisdom-the orator whose burning sentences became the very proverbs of freedom-the gifted, the high-minded Henry Grattan. It was a moment of supreme danger for the Empire. The energies of England were taxed to the utmost by the war, and there seemed but little doubt that the volunteers, supported by the people, could for a time at least have wrested Ireland from her grasp. A nation unhabituated to freedom, and exasperated by many grievances, had suddenly acquired this power. Could its leaders restrain it within the limits of moderation? Or, if it was in their power, was it in their will? The voice of the volunteers soon spoke in no equivocal terms on Irish politics. They resolved that Citizens, by learning the use of arms, forfeit none of their civil rights; and they formed themselves into a regular Convention, with delegates and organisation, for the purpose of discussing the condition of the country. Their denunciations of the commercial and legislative restrictions grew louder and louder; and two cannons were shown labelled with the inscription Free Trade or this!' The restrictions on trade were made the special objects of attack. I have already described the manner in which—with the exception of the linen trade-every important branch of Irish commerce and manufacture was crippled or ruined by law, and very few measures of relief had been carried during the first three-quarters of the eighteenth century. Some additional encouragement had indeed been given to Irish linen. Several temporary Acts were passed permitting Irish cattle, salted provisions, and tallow to enter England, and in 1765 Ireland was allowed to receive iron and timber direct from the colonies, but the more important disabilities remained unchanged. In 1775, however, a strong movement for free trade arose in Ireland, which fully triumphed under the influence of the volunteers in 1779. In the first of these years Irish vessels were admitted to the fisheries of Newfoundland and Greenland. In 1778 several small relaxations were made in the prohibitory laws which excluded Ireland from the colonial trade. In the beginning of 1779 an attempt was made to allay the Irish cry for the repeal of all commercial disabilities by granting new bounties to linen and to hemp, and by permitting the cultivation of tobacco in Ireland. The time, however, for such compromises had passed, and on both sides of the Channel public feeling ran dangerously high. The English manufacturers, and especially the towns of Manchester and Glasgow, were bitterly opposed to any measure of free trade, and their opposition hampered the very liberal tendencies of Lord North. The Irish were in arms, and they demanded nothing less than to be placed on the same footing with the English. Numerous meetings were held, and resolutions adopted, pledging the people neither to import nor consume any article of DEMAND FOR FREE TRADE 59 English manufacture till the commercial restrictions were removed; and when Parliament met in October 1779, Grattan moved an amendment to the Address, concluding with a requisition for free export, and it soon became evident that there was a revolt in the ranks of the Government. The Prime Serjeant, Hussey Burgh, moved an amendment slightly differing in its terms from that of Grattan, but concluding with a demand for 'free export and import.' Flood, who was still a minister, then rose and suggested that the expression 'free trade' should be employed, and spoke in favour of the amendment, which was carried in that form, the great body of the country gentlemen supporting it. A vote of thanks was unanimously passed to the volunteers; the two Houses then went in a body to present their address to the Lord Lieutenant, and the volunteers lined the road and presented arms to them as they passed. The reply to the address was studiously vague, but a spirit was now aroused in the country with which it would plainly be most dangerous to palter. Meetings of freeholders and meetings of volunteers were everywhere held, demanding free trade and calling on the House of Commons to vote the supplies only for six months. The House showed itself perfectly willing to pursue this path. A resolution was carried against the Government declaring the inexpediency of granting at this time new taxes, and the Government were again defeated on a motion granting the appropriated duties for six months only. Burgh, in a speech which was long remembered as a masterpiece of eloquence, described the extreme danger of the situation and the absolute necessity of speedy and ample concessions. Talk not to me,' he said, 'of peace; it is not peace but smothered war. England has sown her laws in dragons' teeth and they have sprung up in armed men.' Nearly at the same time a Bill abolishing the sacramental test, which was still imposed on the Irish Protestant Dissenters, was carried through Parliament with a general concurrence. Burgh resigned his office almost immediately after his great speech, but the Lord Lieutenant, though resenting bitterly his revolt, concurred fully with his estimate of the danger of the situation. Lord North had already shown himself more liberal on commercial questions than other English ministers, but he had been overborne by the demonstrations which had taken place in the chief manufacturing towns of England. The question, however, had now become much more pressing. The attitude of the volunteers and the urgent warnings of the Irish Government prevailed, and a series of English measures were carried which removed the chief grievances of which the Irish complained. The Acts prohibiting them from exporting their woollen and glass manufactures were repealed, and the whole colonial trade was thrown open to Ireland, on the sole condition that duties equal to those paid in British ports should be imposed by the Irish Parliament on the exports and imports of Ireland. The Irish were at the same time allowed to import foreign hops, to become members of the Turkey Company, and to carry on a direct trade between Ireland and the Levant sea. The importance of these measures in her commercial history can scarcely be overrated. They enabled the country for the first time for many generations to develop freely its internal resources, and they were the source of the great growth of prosperity which Ireland subsequently enjoyed. No demand could be more legitimate than that which was now conceded, but, like so many Irish demands, it was conceded reluctantly and to a menace of force, and it left an evil example behind it. THE SIMPLE REPEAL CONTROVERSY 61 The events that have been described rendered the position of Flood as minister still more irksome than it had been, and at last he took the step which it was plainly his duty to have taken before-threw up his office and rejoined his old friends. The ministers marked their displeasure at his conduct by dismissing him from the Council, and he never regained his former position in the patriotic party. He found that his long services had been forgotten during his long silence, that the genius of Grattan had obtained a complete ascendency, and that the questions he had for so many years discussed were taken out of his hands. He felt the change acutely, and it exercised a perceptible influence upon his temper. He seconded a motion of Grattan for substituting a limited for a perpetual Mutiny Act. In 1779 Yelverton brought forward a Bill for the repeal of Poynings' Law; and Flood, while supporting the measure, complained bitterly that after a service of twenty years in the study of this particular question' he had been superseded. He added: "The honourable gentleman is erecting a temple of liberty. I hope that at least I shall be allowed a niche in the fane.' Yelverton retorted by reminding them that by the civil law if a man should separate from his wife, desert, and abandon her for seven years, another might then take her and give her his protection.' I pass over the events that immediately followed the discussions of the volunteers, and the ultimate triumph of Irish independence, as belonging more especially to the life of Grattan. The next prominent transaction in which Flood appears was the fatal controversy on the subject of Simple Repeal. How far in this matter he was actuated by personal motives, and how far by pure patriotism, it is impossible to determine. This much may be said in his favour-that he supported every step of his policy by specious if not by conclusive arguments, and that he carried |