Then came the excise laws, which were brought in by the Whigs; and from them, too, emanated that offensive statute by which Irish men and Irish women may be transported without judge or jury. There is, indeed, no faction so severe and cruel; they do everything by force and violence: the Whigs are the Rehoboam of England; the Tories ruled us with rods, but the Whigs scourge us with scorpions! The last time I was brought before this court, I was sent out of it to two years’ imprisonment among felons, and was condemned to pay, at the expiration of the two years, a fine of 1000_l._ to the King, which the King took and kept. But this was not all; I was bound, too, in a penalty of 5000_l._ myself, and obliged to procure two sureties in 2500_l._ each, to keep the peace for seven years.… I was carried seventy miles from my family, and shut up in a jail, doubtless with the hope that I should expire from stench and mortification of mind. It pleased God, however, to bless me with health, and, though deprived of liberty, by dint of sobriety and temperance, I outlived the base attempt to destroy me. What crime had I committed? For what was it that I was condemned to this horrible punishment? Simply for writing a paragraph in which I expressed the indignation I felt at an English local militiaman having been flogged under a guard of German bayonets! I only expressed the indignation I felt, and I should have been a base creature indeed, if I had not expressed it. But now, military flogging excites universal indignation. If there be at present any of the jury alive who found me guilty and sentenced me to that punishment, what remorse must they not feel for their conduct when they perceive that every writer in every periodical of the present day, even including the favourite publication of the Whig Attorney-General, are now unanimous in deprecating the system of military flogging altogether! Yes, for expressing my disapprobation of that system, I was tossed into a dungeon like Daniel into the lions’ den. But why am I now tossed down before this court by the Attorney-General? What are my sins? I have called on the Government to respect the law; I have cautioned them that hard-hearted proceedings are driving the labourers to despair; that is my crime. If the Government really wish to avoid disturbances in the country, let them give us back the old laws; let them give the people the old game law, and repeal the new law; and let them do away with the other grinding laws that oppress the poor. I have read with horror which I cannot describe, of a magistrate being accused to the Lord Chancellor of subornation of perjury; I have read of that magistrate being reinstated, and I have shuddered with horror at supposing that a poor starving labourer may be brought before such a