every possible degree of popular and even of aristocratic eclat. The attendance of the Duke of Leinster and several other peers was secured. The name of Grattan stood at the head of a list of patriotic commoners. To these were added some leading men from the Bar, and many persons of opulence and weight from the commercial classes. Such a mass of respectability, it was hoped, would protect the meeting from any factious obstruction; but among the precautionary arrangements, there was one conspicuous novelty that inevitably provoked it. The Lord Mayor of Dublin, (Alderman M'Kenny) with a courage that did him infinite honour, consented to call the meeting, and take the chair. The Rotunda was fixed upon as the most convenient place for assembling-and it had the farther attraction of being, from its associations with the memory of the old volunteers of Ireland, a kind of consecrated ground for civil purposes. But the offence was commensurate. That a chief magistrate of the city of Dublin, the corporation's "own anointed," should be so lost to all sense of monopoly and intolerance as to give the sanction of his presence at such a place, on such an occasion, was an innovation of too perilous example to pass unpunished. The aldermanic body quivered with indignation; the common council foamed with no common rage; the corporate sensibilities of the minor guilds burst forth in vows and projects of active vengeance. Before the appointed day arrived, it was matter of notoriety in Dublin, that a formidable plan of counteraction had been matured, and was to be put into execution. On the morning of the meeting, some of the principal requisitionists assembled at Charlemonthouse to make the necessary arrangements for the business of the day. They continued there until it was announced that the Lord Mayor had arrived, and was ready to take the chair, when they proceeded through the adjoining gardens of Rutland-square towards one of the backentrances of the Rotunda. There was something peculiarly dispiriting in their appearance, as they slowly and silently wound along the narrow walks, more like a funeral procession, than a body of men proceeding to bear a part in a patriotic ceremony; but every sentiment of popular ardour was chilled by the apprehension that an effort, from which the most beneficial results had been anticipated, might terminate in a scene of disgraceful tumult. Even the presence of Grattan, who was in the midst of them, had lost its old inspiring influence. His name, his figure, his venerable historic features, his very dress-a threadbare blue surtout, of the old Whig-club uniform, buttoned closely up to the chin, and giving him something of the air of a veteran warrior all these recalled the great national scenes with which his genius and fame were identified. But the more vivid the recollection, the more powerful the present contrast. The despondency of age and of declining health had rested upon his countenance. Instead of the rapid and impatient movements, with which in the days of his pride and strength he had been wont to advance to the contest, launching defiance from his eye, and unconsciously muttering to himself, as he paced along, some fragments of his impending harangue, all was now tardiness and silence, and quietude even to collapse. As they approached the building, the cheerings of the multitude within burst forth through the open windows. The well-known sound, for a moment, roused the veteran orator; but the impression was evanescent. There was no want

:

of excitement in the spectacle within. Upon entering the grand room of the Rotunda, they found about four thousand persons, the majority of them red-hot Irish politicians, congregated within its walls. The group I have described made their way to the raised platform, upon which the Lord Mayor had just taken the chair, and where a vacant space upon his right had been reserved for them. The left was occupied by a detachment from the Corporation, headed by a formidable alderman. The Lord Mayor opened the business of the day by reading the requisition, and explaining his reasons for having called the meeting. "Murmurs on the left," in the midst of which up rose the leader of the civic host to commence the preconcerted plan of operations. Without preface or apology, he called upon the chairman to dissolve the meeting. He cautioned him, as the preserver of the public peace, not to persevere in a proceeding so pregnant with dangers to the tranquillity of the city. Let him only look at the assemblage before him, which had been most unadvisedly brought together under the sanction of his name, and reflect, before it was too late, upon the frightful consequences that must ensue, when their passions should come to be heated by the discussions of topics of the most irritating nature. Was it for this that the loyal citizens of Dublin had raised him to his present high trust? Was it to preside over scenes of riot, perhaps of .." Here the worthy alderman was interrupted, according to his expectations, by tumultuous cries "to order." A friend from the left rushed forward to sustain him; a member of the opposite party jumped upon the platform to call him to order, and was in his turn called to order by a corporator. Thus it continued until half a dozen questions of order were at once before the chair, and as many persons simultaneously bellowing forth their respective rights to an exclusive hearing. To put an end to the confusion, the chairman consented to take the sense of the meeting on the motion for an adjournment, and having put the question, declared (as was the fact) that an immense majority of voices was against it. This was denied by the left side, who insisted that regular tellers should be appointed. A proposition, at once so unnecessary and impracticable, revealed their real object, and was received with bursts of indignation; but they persevered, and a scene of terrific uproar ensued. It continued so loud and long, that those who surrounded the chair became seriously alarmed for the result. They saw before them four thousand persons, inflamed by passion, and immured within a space from which a speedy exit was impossible. In addition to the general excitation, violent altercations between individuals were already commencing in the remoter quarters of the meeting, and if a single blow should be struck, the day must inevitably terminate in bloodshed. At this moment, when the tumult was at its height, two figures particularly attracted attention ;-the first from its intrinsic singularity-it was that of a noted city brawler (his name I now forget) who had contrived to perch himself aloft upon a kind of elevated scaffolding that projected from the loyal corner of the platform. He was a short, sturdy, half-dwarfish, ominous-looking caitiff, with those peculiar proportions, both as to person and features, which, without being actually deformed, seem barely to have escaped deformity. There was a certain extra-natural lumpish conformation about his neck and shoulders, which gave the idea that

the materials composing them must have been originally intended for a hump; while his face was of that specific, yet non-descript kind, which is vulgarly called a phiz,-broad, flat, and sallow, with glaring eyes, pug nose, thickish lips, and around them a circle of jet-black (marking the region of the beard) which neither razor nor soap could efface. The demeanour of this phenomenon, who brandished a crabstick as notorious in Dublin as himself, and wore his hat with its narrow upturned brim inclined to one side (the Irish symbol of being ready for a row) was so impudent and grotesque as to procure for him at intervals the undivided notice of the assembly. His corporation friends let fly a jest at him, and were answered by a grin from ear to ear. This was sure to be followed by a compact full-bodied hiss from another quarter of the meeting, and instantaneous was the transition in his countenance, from an expression of buffoonish archness to one of almost maniacal ferocity. This "comical miscreant," contemptible as he would have been for any other purpose, proved a most effective contributor to the scene of general disturbance. Apart, at the opposite extremity of the platform, in view of this portent, and exposed to his grimaces and ribald vociferations, sat Henry Grattan, a silent and dejected spectator of the turmoil that raged around him. The contrast was at once striking and afflicting, presenting, as it were, a visible type of the condition of his country, in the triumph of vulgar and fanatical clamour over all the efforts of a long life, exclusively devoted to her redemption. But to resume:-The confusion continued, and the symptoms of impending riot were becoming momentarily more alarming, when Mr. Wallace (to whom it is full time to return) had the merit of averting such a crisis. In a short interval of diminished uproar, one of the most prominent of the disturbers was again on his legs, and recommencing, for the tenth or twentieth time, a disorderly address to the chair, when Mr. Wallace, who had not previously interfered, started up from his seat beside the chairman, advanced towards the speaker, and called him to order. The act itself was nothing-the tone and manner every thing. There was in the latter a stern, determined, almost terrific energy, which commanded immediate and universal silence. In a few brief sentences, he denounced the palpable design that had been formed to obstruct the proceedings, exposed the illegal and indecent artifices that had been resorted to, and insisted that the parties who were dissatisfied with the decision of the chair on the question of adjournment, should forthwith conform to the established usage in such cases, and leave the room. The voice of authority, and of something more, in which this was said, produced the desired effect. The multitude shouted forth their approbation. The civic chieftain, after performing astonishing feats of aldermanship, judged it prudent to retire without a farther struggle. He was followed by his corps of discontents, about fifty in number, and the business of the day, after a suspension of two hours, proceeded without interruption.

Mr. Wallace is one among the few of the present leading men at the Irish Bar, who have dedicated much time to literary pursuits. His general reading is understood to be various and extensive. In the year 1796, two years before he was called to the Bar, he composed an Essay on the variations, in the prose style of the English language, from the period of the Revolution, which obtained the gold medal prize of the

Royal Irish Academy. It is written with much elegance, is entirely free from juvenile or national finery, and bears evident marks of those powers of discrimination which were afterwards to procure for the possessor more substantial results than academic honours. In the same year he published a Treatise of considerable length upon the manufactures of Ireland. The latter I have never seen, but I have heard an anecdote regarding it which may be mentioned as illustrative of the purity with which Irish academic justice was in those days administered. It was originally composed, like the former, as a prizeessay. The academy hesitated between it and the rival production of one of their members, a Mr. Preston, and referred the decision to a committee. The committee deputed the task to a sub-committee, and the latter to three persons, of whom Mr. Preston was one. The prize was accordingly adjudged to that gentleman's production, and Mr. Wallace revenged himself of the academy by publishing his work, and prefixing to it a detailed account of the transaction.

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In concluding my notice of this able person, I have only to add, that he has, according to general report, some intention of procuring a seat in the ensuing Parliament. Should he do so, it may be safely predicted that his career there will be neither "mute" nor 'inglorious." His manliness, integrity, and determination, as well as his general talents, would be soon found out in that assembly, and ensure him upon all occasions a respectful hearing. The enlightened portion of the Irish administration would find in him a strenuous supporter of no ordinary value; and the country at large (independently of the benefit of his other exertions) would have a security that no hackneyed and scandalous misrepresentations of its condition, no matter from whose lips they might come, would be allowed to pass in his presence without peremptory contradiction and rebuke.

THE FIRST TALE OF LOVE.

Aн, see where the tender tale is telling

To her downcast eye the glad tear rushes,

The deep sigh of bliss from her bosom is swelling,

And her cheek, half averted, is burning with blushes.
Nor yet does she open her heart's recesses,

Half doubting her joy, and half believing;

In secret the spot and the moment she blesses-
But her lips faintly murmur that men are deceiving.

While, looking fond triumph, her 'raptured lover
Presses the arm that on his reposes,

Reads in her mien what no tongue could discover,
And tells her her path shall be all over roses :

And brightly as swells the moonlight ocean,

When the breath of a sweet summer-night fleets over,

So heaves her fair bosom with tender emotion,

So soft on her ear fall the words of her lover.

Oh, who but has felt or fancied the pleasures
A moment of love so pure can awaken?

And what is the world, with its toils and its treasures,
That for it this flow'ret of Heaven's forsaken ?
Give the lover, with her whom he loves, at even
To rove by the stream of their own dear valley-
To the cold-hearted world be its vanities given!

Our life is too short with its spring-flowers to dally.

J.

THE ENGLISH MALADY.

"Il y a plus de défauts dans l'humeur, que dans l'esprit."

LA ROCHEFOUCAULD.

THE English language is rich in terms for expressing the various shades and nuances of intellectual and sensitive endowments and infirmities. Unlike the French, who are confined to the one poor "l'esprit," we have wit, fancy, imagination, sense, humour, fear, apprehension, and many other expressions of modality; for all of which the aforesaid "l'esprit" is for the most part compelled to do duty alone and unassisted. So likewise our mother-tongue indicates no less than three distinct modifications of that malevolence with which too frequently we regard our friends and associates; ill-temper, ill-nature, and illhumour. By an ill-tempered man, we mean one who is impatient of trifling annoyances, who is roused by petty provocations, to hasty and unmeasured language and actions, but who is generally as easily appeased; his fire being, like that of straw, as evanescent as it is sudden. Such an individual, when the corns of his irritability are not trodden upon, may be gay, cheerful and benevolent; and if the habit has not been suffered to gain head, need not be

In general, however, he is an unsafe companion; and to converse with him is to inhabit over a volcano.

An ill-natured man is one who has a perverse pleasure in the misfortunes of his fellow-creatures; one who enjoys all the vexations and disappointments of his neighbours; not because they afford materials for laughter, but because they give pain to the victims. The best natured man in the world may be amused by the perplexity of a dinerout, if caught in a beau-trap, when "figged out" for the occasion, and hurrying on at the last moment in his way to the friendly mahogany ; or at a bungling pretender to the off-edge, when he comes with his sederunt upon the ice, with more force than good-will. If a plate of hot soup should empty itself on a friend's spick and span casimeers, rendering it a doubtful point whether the grease or the caloric constitute the largest part of what Jeremy Bentham would call the matter of punishment, he might indulge in a smile, or even jeer the sufferer with the customary axiom of "summum jus summa injuria ;" but his laugh will be tempered with a certain share of sympathy, and a friendly apprehension of enhancing the evil by the appearance of too much gratification. With an ill-natured man, the pleasure on such occasions will be proportioned exclusively to the pain. He prefers a broken leg to a bruise; he would like the broth to scald, and the inexpressibles to be neither cleansable nor replaceable. Such a man chuckles when his friend gains a blank in the lottery, or marries a tartar, or loses a favourite horse, or sees his play damned, exclaiming, "Ah, now he will be taken down a peg;" "Now we shall see him buckle too," or the like expression of spite and triumph. Such a fellow was designed by nature to fill the office of the slave in the conqueror's car, and damp the gratification of successful merit, by reminding the general of his mortality. Times of public calamity and "pecuniary crisis" are his harvest-home. The first thing he looks to in a newspaper is the list of bankrupts; and next to that he enjoys an action for crim-con, or for