natural for sectaries to hope that their security will at least not be impaired, or themselves exposed to the malice and bigotry of any future ecclesiastical faction: and when they observe that the concluding Article leaves it in the power of the United Parliament to modify all Laws which shall not be expressly recognised by the Act of Union, they must be under some degree of apprehension, until their privileges be put out of danger. Such considerations as these have induced some respectable ministers to wish that the advantages we have hitherto enjoyed may be in some manner referred to, or incorporated, in the compact between the two Kingdoms.

This wish, my Lord, does not originate in any desire to embarrass Government, nor, in my opinion, can the agitation of our claims have any such effect. For my own part, after very deliberate and dispassionate consideration, I am a decided friend to the Union, and, at the same time, so sensible of the great difficulties and jarring interests which your Lordship has to encounter and reconcile, that I should willingly sacrifice a personal advantage rather than impede such a necessary measure. I am so far from desiring to add to the perplexity of this vast business, that I am in some degree actuated by a persuasion that a satisfactory settlement of the affairs of the Presbyterians will essentially promote the grand object which Government has in view. This I conceive to be the tranquillity of the country, which, I presume, will be best provided for by placing every class of subjects on a good and unalterable footing, so as to give content and security. From the temper with which the Union has been received in this country, I am persuaded that its popularity and efficacy, in this point of view, will depend on the terms, and the measure suggested in this letter cannot fail to be very acceptable to the great majority of the inhabitants. On the other hand, any vexatious interference on the part of the Church would produce greater discontent than the most grievous exertion of civil authority. I am, therefore, humbly of opinion that it is consonant to this intention of Go

vernment to quiet all such fears and to bar all such irritation for ever. With respect to any additional advantages that may be intended for us, we freely leave them to the liberality of Government and the long-experienced bounty of the Crown. We are only anxious at present to have our rights ascertained and perpetuated on the principles on which they were conferred.

It is not necessary to trouble your Lordship with any detail of our transplantation into this country, the important services performed by our ancestors, and the grants and immunities bestowed upon us in different reigns. Your Lordship knows that we are not Dissenters in the same sense with the Puritans of England and their descendants, but were planted here by Government as a separate Church, and never belonged to the Church of Ireland, but zealously and effectually co-operated with it in the settlement, reformation, and preservation of this kingdom.

By 6 George I., c. 5, we are exempted from a variety of penalties and discouragements, and our worshipping Societies are protected. By 11 George II., c. 10, our people are secured against ecclesiastical prosecution on account of Presbyterian marriages. By 21 of George III., c. 25, marriages celebrated by Dissenting ministers between Dissenters are declared valid. By 32 George III., c. 11, s. 12, we are authorized to solemnize marriages between Dissenters and Catholics, and, by another Statute of the present King, the Test Act was repealed. These, my Lord, are valuable privileges, but they are precarious under the Articles of Union; and your Lordship will readily sympathize with us in our anxiety to have them ratified. They are also essentially different from the Catholic claims. Ours are ancient, theirs are novel; ours have been already enacted by Parliament, theirs it is thought hazardous to propose to our Legislature. Their pretensions may be more wisely and liberally disposed of by the Imperial Parliament: ours can be felt and understood only in Ireland.

This last observation, my Lord, I wish to impress deeply upon your mind. mind. Were there no other difference between the settlement of this question by the Irish and by the Imperial Parliament, this has very considerable weight, that we could rest upon a recognition in the Act of Union as irreversible and calculated to inspire perfect confidence; whereas, any Statute passed subsequent to the Union may be repealed. But, my Lord, there is this essential distinction that our history is perfectly well known, both to the Executive Government and the Parliament of this country; while, in England, we are either unknown, or looked upon as an obscure sect of schismatics. Another point of difference is, that the Imperial Parliament cannot confer any benefit upon us that they shall not be prepared to extend to the English Dissenters, and might even be persuaded to reduce us to the same level. There is yet another circumstance, which, your Lordship must allow me to say, is of primary importance in this business—I mean, the personal character and connexions of his Excellency and your Lordship. To both the history and state of this country are well known, and both are anxious for its tranquillity and prosperity; but we naturally look to your Lordship, as a native of Ireland and of Ulster, interested in the welfare and ambitious of the approbation of this part of the kingdom, and descended from a father and grandfather who have been distinguished by singular constancy in their adherence to our principles and communion. We, therefore, cannot willingly forego the patronage of such a friend, in such a situation as your Lordship

holds.

I hope, my Lord, I have chosen the most favourable season for this application, when your Lordship has surmounted the principal difficulties of this arduous undertaking, and may be reasonably supposed to have leisure to attend to minuter parts of the detail. One reason for intruding on your Lordship at all is, that you might wish to be apprized of the business to be laid before the standing Committee of the Synod, should

that body be convened, which some gentlemen have in contemplation.

I have the honour to be, &c.,

WILLIAM BRUCE.

The Right Hon. G. Rose to Lord Castlereagh.

Old Palace Yard, April 10, 1800.

My dear Lord-Mr. Cooke has put into my hand a letter from Mr. Maclean, of the Custom House, to you, enclosing Schedules, prepared by the Commissioners of the Revenue, of such duties as they conceived will be necessary to lay upon certain articles enumerated, the produce of Great Britain, in order to countervail the internal duties which exist in Ireland upon similar articles, the produce or manufacture of the latter. On the first view of this Schedule, it appears indispensably necessary that it should be reconsidered. In the instance of silk, the proposed duties would operate as a complete prohibition of the article, because the arrangement presumes that, in all cases, 16 ounces of thrown silk will make but 12 ounces of manufactured, and the rate is suggested according to these proportions: whereas, in some instances, (from the addition of gum, &c.) the manufactured goods will weigh more than the raw material. You will see that, in the proposal sent from hence some months ago for countervailing duties, the quantity of silk was considered in each species of the manufacture: the principle adopted in those Tables appears to be the only correct one to act upon, but I have never heard whether they were approved of or not. Some silk goods are made, I understand, of raw, and some of thrown; but the whole, in your Tables, is calculated on the latter, which is higher than in the former by nearly three to one, I believe. No provision is made for mixed goods (such as your poplins, &c.) as in the Tables sent from hence. Some alteration will be necessary in the case of Sugar, which you will see by referring to our suggestions respecting

that article where the different sorts of the refined are distinguished.

With respect to the Excise duties, it will hardly be possible to form a correct opinion without further information: it appears at present doubtful whether, in some instances, at least, they would protect your manufactures. The Irish wine measure differs from the English, but whether the beer gallon is different I do not know; nor am I aware why the duty should be charged upon the barrel of 32 gallons, which is not the English and seems not to be the Irish barrel.

The Sixth Article embraces so great a variety of things as to render it difficult (as it strikes me) to effect a complete and satisfactory arrangement under it without a complete knowledge of the rates of duty which constitute, and of other circumstances which affect, the English, Scotch, and Irish Revenue. Perhaps it might be convenient to send over some persons here perfectly conversant with the latter.

I write this on the first view of the subject; but I hope, in two or three days, to have an opportunity of talking fully with Mr. Pitt upon it, and I will then trouble your Lordship again. I am, &c.,

GEORGE ROSE.

Lord Camden to Lord Castlereagh.

Secret and Confidential.

Wildernesse, April 11, 1800.

Dear Castlereagh-I so fully meant to have answered the letter received from you on the 7th of March, the day after I received it, that I did not advert to it in the letter I actually did write to you (on business) of that date. I am particularly sorry I have not written, as, from the letter I received from you to-day, I fear you might interpret my silence as conveying some insinuation that I did not acquit you of that construction on your speech, which, God knows, I never entertained, and which none of the newspapers I saw gave any ground to suppose you had or could have said what you tell me has been