Of course be batters up the pastors of the people; but he might as well leave _that_ alone; the priests are too cunning for all that balderdash nowadays. They'll insist on something real, tangible, and substantial. What they say is this: "The landlords used to have it all their own way at one time. _Our_ day is come now." And there they're right, Tom; there's no doubt of it. O'Connell said true when he told the English, "Ye're always abusing me,--and call me the 'curse of Ireland' and the destroyer of the public peace,--but wait a bit. I 'll not be five years in my grave till you 'd wish me back again." There never was anything more certain. So long as you had Dan to deal with, you could make your bargain,--it might be, it often was, a very hard one,--but when it was once made, he kept the terms fairly and honestly! But with whom will you treat _now?_ Is it with M'Hale, or Paul Cullen, or Dr. Meyler? Sure each of them will demand separate and specific conditions, and you might as well try to settle the Caffre war by a compact with Sandilla, who, the moment he sells himself to you, enters into secret correspondence with his successor. I'm never so easy in my mind as when I see the English in a row with the Catholics. I don't care a brass farthing how much it may go against us at first,--how enthusiastically they may yell "No Popery," burn cardinals in effigy, and persecute the nuns. Give them rope enough, Tom, and see if they don't hang themselves! There never came a fit of rampant Protestantism in England that all the weak, rash, and ridiculous zealots did n't get to the head of the movement. Off they go at score, subsidizing renegade vagabonds of our Church to abuse us, raking up bad stories of conventual life, and attacking the confessional. There never were gulls like them! They swallow all the cases of cruelty and persecution at once,--they foster every scoundrel, if he's only a deserter from us,--ay, and they even take to their fireplaces the filthiest novels of Eugene Sue, if he only satisfies their rancorous hate of a Jesuit. And where does it end? I'll tell you. Their converts turn out to be scoundrels too infamous for common contact; their prosecutions fail,--why would n't they, when we get them up ourselves?--John Bull gets ashamed of himself; round comes the Press, and that's the moment when any young rising Catholic barrister in the House can make his own terms, whether it be to endow the true Church or to smash the false one! As for John Bull, he never can do mischief enough when he 's in a passion, but he's always ready to pay double the damage in the morning. And as for putting "salt on our tails," let him try it with the "Dove of Elphin," that 's all. I was forgetting to tell you that I sent back Vickars's address, only remarking that I was sorry not to know his sentiments about the Board of Trade. _Ver. sap._ LETTER X. CAROLINE DODD TO MISS COX, AT MISS MINCING'S ACADEMY BLACK ROCK, IRELAND.