should be overstocked, and our French commerce should fail?

I could wish the parliament had thought fit to have suspended their regulation of church matters, and enlargements of the prerogative, until a more convenient time, because they did not appear very pressing, at least to the persons principally concerned; and, instead of these great refinements in politicks and divinity, had amused themselves and their committees a little with the state of the nation. For example: what if the house of commons had thought fit to make a resolution, nemine contradicente, against wearing any cloth or stuff in their families, which were not of the growth and manufacture of this kingdom? What if they had extended it so far as utterly to exclude all silks, velvets, callicoes, and the whole lexicon of female fopperies; and declared, that whoever acted otherwise should be deemed and reputed an enemy to the nation? What if they had sent up such a resolution to be agreed to by the house of lords; and by their own practice and encouragement, spread the execution of it in their several countries? What if we should agree to make burying in woollen a fashion, as our neighbours have made it a law? What if the ladies would be content with Irish stuffs for the furniture of their houses, for gowns and petticoats for themselves and their daughters? Upon the whole, and to crown all the rest, let a firm resolution be taken by male and female, never to appear with one single shred that comes from England; and let all the people say,

AMEN.

B 2

I hope

I hope and believe, nothing could please his majesty better than to hear that his loyal subjects of both sexes in this kingdom celebrated his birthday (now approaching) universally clad in their own manufacture*. Is there virtue enough left in this deluded people, to save them from the brink of ruin? If the men's opinions may be taken, the ladies will look as handsome in stuffs as in brocades; and since all will be equal, there may be room enough to employ their wit and fancy, in choosing and matching patterns and colours. I heard the late archbishop of Tuam mention a pleasant observation of some body's; that Ireland would never be happy, till a law were made for burning every thing that came from England, except their people and their coals. I must confess, that as to the former, I should not be sorry if they would stay at home; and for the latter, I hope, in a little time we shall have no occasion for them.

Non tanti mitra est, non tanti judicis ostrum

but I should rejoice to see a staylace from England be thought scandalous, and become a topick for censure at visits and teatables.

If the unthinking shopkeepers in this town, had not been utterly destitute of common sense, they would have made some proposal to the parliament, with a petition to the purpose I have mentioned; promising to improve the cloths and stuffs of the nation into all possible degrees of fineness

*Her grace the duchess of Dorset, the lord lieutenant's lady, is said to have appeared at the Castle in Dublin wholly clad in the manufacture of Ireland, on his majesty's birth day, 1753.

and

and colours, and engaging not to play the knave, according to their custom, by exacting and imposing upon the nobility and gentry, either as to the prices or the goodness. For I remember, in London, upon a general mourning, the rascally mercers and woollendrapers would in four and twenty hours raise their cloths and silks to above a double price; and if the mourning continued long, then come whining with petitions to the court, that they were ready to starve, and their fineries lay upon their hands.

I could wish our shopkeepers would immediately think on this proposal, addressing it to all persons of quality and others; but first be sure to get somebody who can write sense, to put it into form.

I think it needless to exhort the clergy to follow this good example; because in a little time, those among them, who are so unfortunate as to have had their birth and education in this country, will think themselves abundantly happy, when they can afford Irish crape, and an Athlone hat; and as to the others, I shall not presume to direct them. I have indeed seen the present archbishop of Dublin* clad from head to foot in our own manufacture; and yet, under the rose be it spoken, his grace deserves as good a gown as if he had not been born among us.

I have not courage enough to offer one syllable on this subject to their honours of the army; neither have I sufficiently considered the great importance of scarlet and gold lace.

The fable in Ovid of Arachne and Pallas is to this purpose. The goddess had heard of one Arachne, a young virgin very famous for spinning and weaving they both met upon a trial of skill; and Pallas finding herself almost equalled in her own art, stung with rage and envy, knocked her rival down, and turned her into a spider; enjoining her to spin and weave for ever out of her own bowels, and in a very narrow compass. I confess, that from a boy I always pitied poor Arachne, and could never heartily love the goddess, on account of so cruel and unjust a sentence; which however is fully executed upon us by England, with farther additions of rigour and severity; for the greatest part of our bowels and vitals is extracted, without allowing us the liberty of spinning and weaving them.

The Scripture tells us that oppression makes a wise man mad; therefore consequently speaking, the reason why some men are not mad, is because they are not wise: however it were to be wished, that oppression would in time teach a little wisdom to fools.

I was much delighted with a person, who has a great estate in this kingdom, upon his complaints to me, how grievously poor England suffers by impositions from Ireland: that we convey our own wool to France, in spite of all the harpies at the customhouse that Mr. Shuttleworth, and others on the Cheshire coasts, are such fools to sell us their bark at a good price for tanning our own hides into leather, with other enormities of the like weight and kind. To which I will venture to add more that the mayoralty of this city is always executed by an inhabitant,

inhabitant, and often by a native, which might as well be done by a deputy with a moderate salary, whereby poor England loses at least one thousand pounds a year upon the balance: that the governing of this kingdom costs the lord lieutenant three thousand six hundred pounds a year; so much net loss to poor England: that the people of Ireland presume to dig for coals in their own grounds; and the farmers in the county of Wicklow send their turf to the very market of Dublin, to the great discouragement of the coal trade of Mostyn and Whitehaven that the revenues of the postoffice here, so righteously belonging to the English treasury, as arising chiefly from our own commerce with each other, should be remitted to London clogged with that grievous burden of exchange; and the pensions paid out of the Irish revenues to English favourites, should lie under the same disadvantage, to the great loss of the grantees. When a divine is sent over to a bishoprick here, with the hopes of five and twenty hundred pounds a year; and upon his arrival he finds, alas! a dreadful discount of ten or twelve per cent: a judge, or a commissioner of the revenue has the same cause of complaint. Lastly, The ballad upon Cotter is vehemently suspected to be Irish manufacture; and yet is allowed to be sung in our open streets, under the very nose of the government.

These are a few among the many hardships we put upon that poor kingdom of England; for which, I am confident, every honest man wishes a remedy: and I hear, there is a project on foot, for trans

* Mostyn in Flintshire, and Whitehaven in Cumberland.