His taste for ridicule of Irish politicians was not wholly gone. A few years later he attacked them in the lines beginning— "Ye paltry underlings of state; Ye senators, who love to prate ; Ye bishops far removed from saints, Why all this rage? why these complaints?" The life he led in Dublin he thus described to Pope: "I keep humble company, who are happy to come when they can get a bottle of wine without paying for it. I give my vicar a supper and his wife a shilling to play with me an hour at backgammon once a fortnight. To all people of quality and especially of titles I am not within; or at least am deaf a week or two after I am well." Even when he was a much younger man he did not take a cheerful view of "the publick." So early as 1709, in a letter to Archbishop King, he says: "The world is divided into two sects, those that hope the best, and those that fear the worst; your Grace is of the former, which is the wiser, the nobler, and most pious principle; and although I endeavour to avoid being of the other, yet upon this article I have sometimes strange weaknesses." Mrs. Pendarves, in 1732, after crossing the island from Dublin to Killala, wrote: "The roads are much better in Ireland than England, mostly causeways, a little jumbling, but very safe." In 1742, after she had visited Down Patrick, she wrote: "I never travelled such fine roads as are all over this country." In the winter of 1750, writing of returning home by moonlight from a friend's house, she said: "A comfortable circumstance belonging to this country is, that the roads are so good and free from robbers that we may drive safely any hour of the night." Arthur Young, who visited Ireland in 1776, thus writes of the roads: "A turnpike in Ireland is a synonymous term for a vile road; the bye roads are the finest in the world. It is the effects of jobs and imposition which disgrace the Kingdom." Though Mrs. Pendarves had not been "accustomed to Dublin from her youth," and though she was by birth a Granville, nevertheless, by no means did she find that town "the most disagreeable Place in Europe." On her first visit to Ireland in 1731 she wrote: There is a heartiness among the people that is more like Cornwall than any I have known, and great sociableness." On her return to England in 1733 she wrote to her sister: "I wish you and I could be conveniently transported to Ireland for one year; no place could suit your taste so well; the good-humour and conversableness of the people would please you extremely." XLVIII. DUBLIN. Decbr 12th 1727. S",-I thought to have seen your Son, or to have spoken to his Tutor. But I am in a condition to see nobody; my old disorder of Deafness being returned upon me, so that I am forced to keep at home and see no company; and this disorder seldom leaves me under two months. I I do not understand your son's fancy of leaving the University to study Law under a Teacher. doubt he is weary of his Studyes, and wants to be in a new Scene; I heard of a fellow some years ago who followed that practice of reading Law, but I believe it was to Lads, who had never been at a University; I am ignorant of these Scheams, and you must advise with some who are acquainted with them. I only know the old road of getting some good learning in a university and when young men are well grounded then going to the Inns of Court. This is all I can say in the matter, my Head being too much confused by my present Disorder. I am y obd' &c. NOTES ON XLVIII. Swift in his Letter to a Young Clergyman says: "What a violent run there is among too many weak people against university education: be firmly assured that the whole cry is made up by those who were either never sent to a college, or, through their irregularities and stupidity, never made the least improvement while they were there." The students of Dublin University he thus mentions in a letter to Pope: "You are as much known here as in England, and the university lads will crowd to kiss the hem of your garments." Wherever young Chetwode studied law, he would have had to learn law Latin. For four years longer it was to remain the language of the records in the law courts. Blackstone in his Commentaries sighs over the change that was made, when, by act of Parliament, English alone was to be thenceforth used. The common people, he said, were as ignorant in matters of law as before, while clerks and attorneys were now found who could not understand the old records. Owing, moreover, to the verbosity of English, more words were used in legal documents, to the great increase of the cost. XLIX. DUBLIN. Mar. 15th 1728-9. S-I had the favor of yours of the 5th instant, when I had not been above a fortnight recovered from a disorder of giddyness and Deafness, which hardly leaves me a month together. Since my last return from Engl I never had but one Letter from you while I was in the Country, and that was during a time of the same vexatious ailment, when I could neither give my self the trouble to write or to read. I shall think very unwise in such a world as this, to leave planting of trees, and making walks, to come into it-I wish my fortune had thrown me any where rather than into this Town and no Town, where I have not three acquaintances, nor know any Person whom I care to visit. But I must now take up with a solitary life from necessity as well as Inclination, for yesterday I relapsed again, and am now so deaf that I shall not be able to dine with my Chapter on our onely festival in the year, I mean St. Patrick's Day. As to any Scurrilityes published against me, I have no other Remedy, than to desire never to hear of them and then the authors will be disappointed, at least it will be the same thing to me as if they had never been writ. For I will not imagine that any friend I esteem, can value me the less, upon the Malice of Fools, and knaves, against whose Republick I have always been at open War. Every man is safe from Evil tongues, who can be content to be obscure, and men must take Distinction as they do Land, cum onere. I wish you happy in your Retreat, and hope you will enjoy it long and am your &c. |