from 6 to £700,000 worth. We import £130,000 of cottons from England, principally of the class of fustians; but the entire consumption in calicoes and muslins is supplied by ourselves. It appears that the difference of price to the consumer is, as might be supposed, enormous, nearly equivalent to the duty, and that these extravagant profits have enabled the master manufacturers to give higher wages to all classes of their workmen than are given in England. It is evident, under these circumstances, that a sudden reduction of the duty must, at least for a time, ruin the trade, which now employs from 30,000 to 40,000 persons. The individuals have little capital to bear a shock; and it would require a length of time before the various gradations of the manufacturers could accommodate themselves in their profits to so new, though, upon general principles, a much better, order of things.

The opinion which I have formed, in which Mr. Beresford concurs, is to recommend that the existing duty should be continued for a certain number of years, and then reduced gradually, so as to bring it to a 10 per cent. duty within the period of twenty years. This, I conceive, would preclude any shock, and accomplish our principle within a reasonable time. I am sorry to be obliged to press any departure from the 10 per cent. regulation, but trust Mr. Pitt will be the less averse to it, as it will be, upon the face of it, determinable, and it is the solitary instance of a prohibitory duty on this side of the Channel: consequently, the difficulty, and of course the objection, narrows itself to this point; and it may be stated that, though the stronger country can venture to lay down her prohibitions at once, in the case of the weaker a more gradual measure is requisite.

I am the more induced to hope that Mr. Pitt will enable me to soften the opposition on this point, which is warmly pressed both by Cork and Belfast, as he gave me to understand, when in England, that he would not be averse to give a temporary accommodation to the feelings of this country, where it might be important to the measure, and did not ultimately interfere

with the perfect commercial incorporation of the two countries.

I enclose the Speaker's speech: you will observe, from the schedule, the line of opposition he will take on the commercial article-upholding the commercial propositions of 1785, as only reducing the duties to the lowest in either country-that was, in fact, to the Irish duties; whereas, this measure goes to take off all duty from above 70 different articles.

Believe to be, &c.

CASTLEREAGH.

Secret.

The Bishop of Meath to Lord Castlereagh.

March 10, 1800.

My Lord-Although I necessarily feel a reluctance to obtrude myself upon your Lordship with an unsolicited opinion on any part of the great measure that you are so successfully bringing to perfection, yet I have that reliance on your Lordship's candour and goodness, that I venture to trouble you for a moment on the subject of the Union of the Churches, and the Episcopal Representation.

In the paper which I transmitted to your Lordship in London, I mentioned an apprehension that some Bishops might be found on our bench who would oppose every arrangement that did not originate with themselves. I did not make the assertion lightly, and I find my apprehensions were not groundless. The Archbishop of Cashel, at a meeting of the Bishops, preparatory to the fast, took occasion to condemn the entire article respecting the identifying of the two churches. He said, if the Government wished to unite the two Churches, he would make no objection, but that it would be essentially necessary to change the whole article, so as to secure the Church of Ireland against all possibility of change or alteration. He could not say what might become of the Church of England hereafter, but it was incumbent upon us to take care of the Church of Ireland, and he should prepare another

article, looking to that which he should propose to the LordLieutenant and your Lordship to substitute in the place of the article originally laid before Parliament.

To me and to all the other Bishops it appeared perfectly unintelligible how, in an article that was to abolish the Church of Ireland as separate or distinct from the Church of England, and to incorporate and identify the two Churches for ever under the name of the Church of England alone, the distinction of the Church of Ireland should still be preserved, and a stipulation made that it should be secure for ever against all change or alteration. The very intent and meaning of the article is to preserve the doctrines, the worship, and establishment of the Protestant religion, as now professed and maintained in Ireland, against all chance, all danger of change or alteration, by abolishing the distinction of the Church of Ireland, and making it merge into that of England; and what could be so glaring a contradiction as to introduce any worship that should convey an idea of distinction, or separatedness, or suppose a possibility of their not continuing one and the same for ever, and under all circumstances !

At the close of the original article, the doctrines, the discipline, the forms, and the worship of the Church of England, as now professed and established, are essentially secured under the proposed Union; and, by identifying the two Churches, and making them for ever one, the doctrines, the discipline, the forms, and the worship of the Church of Ireland, as now professed and established, being the same with those of the Church of England, are of course secured for ever.

In a private conversation with myself, the Archbishop treated that part of the article that mentioned the Convocation as idle and foolish. Nothing, however, can be more essentially necessary to the identity of the Churches. From the time that the Clergy ceased to tax themselves in Convocation, and mixed in that particular with the great mass of the people, by acquiring the right of voting at elections for the members of

the House of Commons, Convocations have not been viewed in the same light as of old. But the calling together the Convocation for ecclesiastical purposes, although entirely laid aside in this country, continues unaltered in England, and it is as regularly convened by the King's writ as the Parliament. The Archbishop talked of the absurdity of calling so many of the Irish Clergy to London : but he forgot that the Convocations are provincial, and the Clergy to be convened in their respective provinces. But what the Archbishop seemed chiefly to reprobate was, the idea of having any other representatives of the Bishops in the United Parliament than the four metropolitans. The idea of having a rotation of Bishops he treated as absurd, inasmuch as it would be impossible for any Bishop to make himself acquainted with parliamentary business during the short period for which he should sit in Parliament. I found most of the Bishops, indeed I may say all, agreeing with me, that acquiring a knowledge of parliamentary business was no very essential a requisite to the episcopal character. The interests of the Church in Ireland, the chief object of their attention as legislators, would be best known to them by a residence in their respective dioceses; and, at all events, nothing connected with that part of their duty could come in competition with the flagrant neglect of their pastoral functions, to which the Archbishop's regulation would necessarily open a door. Exclusive of their metropolitical jurisdiction, to which constant recourse must be had in this kingdom, the Archbishops have each an extensive diocese to superintend; and, of all the Bishops, the presence of the Primate and of the Archbishop of Dublin is the essential. There is scarcely a great institution to which they are not acting trustees, nor a charitable Board at which their attendance is not essentially necessary.

If I were not afraid of breaking in too long upon your Lordship, I could state to you a variety of other reasons for opposing the regulation, which, on the very face of it, tends to render

the four Archbishops eternal absentees, and to introduce the same disorders in the Church in this kingdom that required the intervention of Parliament, under the reigns of Henry VIII. and Queen Elizabeth.

I have the honour to be, &c.,

T. L. MEATH.

Private.

The Duke of Portland to Lord Castlereagh.

Bulstrode, Wednesday, March 12, 1800. My dear Lord-Although our friend King has not yet been able to fulfil the engagement he made with me, respecting your letter, the contents had made too great an impression upon me to suffer me to wait for it, or to let any other consideration prevent my endeavours to remove the anxiety which you feel in the supposition of your progress not having kept pace with the expectations of the King's confidential servants— a supposition which, I assure you, is totally groundless, and inconsistent with the confidence which they are disposed, and most fully warranted, to repose in your zeal as well as in your judgment. I think it is extremely probable that impatience may have been expressed, and that you may have heard of the calculations made of the time when the articles would be returned, when the attendance of members here would be desirable upon the question of Union. The liberality of the terms offered to Ireland, the very able and advantageous manner in which they have been opened, and the very great superiority which you have manifested in all the debates on the subject, will not unnaturally or very unreasonably have led people here to infer that the point was carried, and that there could be no serious intention of fighting the details, which cannot but prove more strongly the utility, the advantage, and the necessity of the measure, and expose the ignorance, the arrogance, and the interested or treacherous designs of its opponents. But, although hopes of this business being completed within a proportionable space to that which was given to the