Perhaps it may be the elevated standard on which they are placed, gives them this wondrous _coup-d'oeil_, and enables them to take wider views than mortals less eminently situated; perhaps it is some old leaven of privileges derivable from right divine. But no matter, the thing is so. Napoleon well knew the temper of Frenchmen in his day, and how certain short words, emblematic of their country's greatness and glory, could fascinate their minds and bend them to his purpose. In Russia, the czar is the head of the church, as of the state, and a mere word from him to one of his people is a treasure above all price. In Holland, a popular monarch taps some forty puncheons of schnapps, and makes the people drunk. In Belgium, he gets up a high mass, and a procession of virgins. In the States, a rabid diatribe against England, and a spice of Lynch Law, are clap-trap. But every land has its own peculiar leaning--to be gratified by some one concession or compliment in preference to every other. Now, when Lord Normanby came to Ireland, he must have been somewhat puzzled by the very multiplicity of these expectations. It was a regular “embarras de richesses.” There was so much to give, and he so willing to give it! First, there was discouragement to be dealt out against Protestants--an easy and a pleasant path; then the priests were to be brought into fashion--a somewhat harder task; country gentlemen were to be snubbed and affronted; petty attorneys were to be petted and promoted; all claimants with an “O” to their names were to have something--it looked national; men of position and true influence were to be pulled down and degraded, and so on. In fact, there was a good two years of smart practice in the rupture of all the ties of society, and in the overthrow of whatever was respectable in the land, before he need cry halt. Away he went then, cheered by the sweet voices of the mob he loved, and quick work he made of it. I need not stop to say, how pleasant Dublin became when deserted of all who could afford to quit it; nor how peaceful were the streets which no one traversed--_ubi solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant_. The people, like Oliver, “asked for more;” ungrateful people! not content with Father Glynn at the viceroy's table, and the Bishop of “Mesopotamia” in the council, they cried, like the horseleech's daughters, “Give! give!” “What would they have, the spalpeens?” said Pierce Mahony; “sure ain't we destroying the place entirely, and nobody will be able to live here after us.” “What do they want?” quoth Anthony Blake; “can't they have patience? Isn't the church trembling, and property not worth two years' purchase?” “Upon my life!” whispered Lord Morpeth, “I can't comprehend them. I fear we have been only but too good-natured!--don't you think so?” And so they pondered over their difficulties, but never a man among them could suggest a remedy for their new demand, nor make out a concession which had not been already made.