of English tyranny and crime; every reverse that befell our arms was welcomed; the Irish masses, especially of late, have made a display of their antipathy to, and hatred of, the State. There was an outbreak of disloyal rioting in Dublin at the Diamond Jubilee; but for the accident of the Spanish War there would have been a great commemoration of the rebellion of 1798; even the visit of the late Queen to Ireland was made an occasion for seditious speeches; if her death was very generally mourned, public bodies were found to refuse an expression of regret. Irish administration, I have remarked, is in many respects faulty; this is mainly because it is dependent on British parties; it fluctuates as one or the other prevails in Parliament. It sometimes represents completely opposite principles; besides, as Lord-Lieutenants and Chief Secretaries usually hold office for a short time only, they are tempted to adopt a hand-to-mouth policy, and to govern with little thought of the morrow. A marked change, however, has, in the course of time, passed over the ordinary system of administration carried on at the Castle. The aristocracy and the leading Irish gentry had still, even at the beginning of the Victorian age, much influence in directing local affairs; their authority was not nearly as great as it had been; but they were still looked up to and consulted by the central government. This state of things has long ago ceased to exist; this order of men has long ago lost all political, and nearly all social, power; it has been superseded by a bureaucratic _regime_, depending mainly on paid officials and police, which rules Ireland from the Castle, with little external support. This mode of government is imposing and apparently strong; but it is essentially weak, and has little real hold on the country; the information, with which it is amply supplied, is often false, and occasionally causes grave mistakes; it forms an administrative system resembling that of the old centralised monarchy of France, of which Tocqueville has exposed the defects and the vices. Under this _regime_, however, the law of the land has certainly been vindicated more successfully than had been the case before; the Government has acquired decidedly increased power in dealing with disorders dangerous to the State, and perhaps in holding the scales of justice even between divided classes; it has not diminished the strife of hostile Irish factions, but it has maintained order more completely than of old; and this unquestionably is a great advantage, and a real set-off against some mischiefs and failures. It would be untrue to assert that this system of rule has been the paramount and even a main cause of the great decline in agrarian crime and trouble which Ireland has happily witnessed of late years; other and far more potent causes have concurred; but it may fairly be said that it has contributed to it. It would, however, be a complete