_January 26th._--At Hatchford for three or four days. O'Connell's trial moves heavily along; nobody takes much interest in it, or expects any serious result from it. The Opposition mean to begin the session with an attack on the Government _de rebus Hibernicis_--rather dangerous warfare. Charles Buller wrote to O'Connell in his own name and Hawes's, asking him if anything could be done, and what. He wrote a very civil answer, saying he was happy to communicate with them, though it was quite useless; he could not give up Repeal, and England hated Ireland with too much intensity to render her real justice, especially John Russell, who was the bitterest enemy of the Catholic religion, his hatred to which he had proved on innumerable occasions. However, he said, he would never do anything to obstruct any practical results, if they were possible, and he would tell them how his influence might be annulled and his political power put an end to. He then told him some half-dozen, items of 'justice,' the principal one of which was the Church. He said that the Irish never would be satisfied as long as the Protestant Church stood in all its predominance amongst them, a badge of their servitude and oppression, hateful, offensive, and mortifying to the Irish people; that what they wanted was perfect religious equality, and this could only be obtained by sweeping away all Church establishments, and paying neither. The rest of his recommendations were pretty much the same as when he has been in the habit of holding forth in his speeches and writings. There was nothing new in his letter, and nothing to lay hold of; he passed over the real evils which weigh down the people, and their causes--poverty, hunger, nakedness, no employment, no capital flowing there to set them to work. We shall have plenty of wrangling and violence, but no good will come of it all. The Irish question is a mighty maze, it is a vast babel of conflicting opinions, and hostile passions and prejudices. In the great divisions of party there are innumerable sub-divisions upon all Irish matters; there are vast masses of opinions, jostling with other masses, intermingling in a confused conflict, not arranged in one compact body against another compact body, with one distinguishing banner over each; and out of all this confusion it is impossible to look for any satisfactory and reasonable solution of all the difficult questions that are afloat. CHAPTER XVII.