But a new attempt was now made to improve the political condition of the wretched country. That distinguished
statesman, Edmund Burke (S550), had already tried to secure a fair measure of commercial liberty for the island,
but without success. Since the reign of Henry VII the so-caled "free Parliament" of Ireland had been bound hand and foot by Poynings's Act (S329, note 1). The eminent Protestant Irish orator, Henry Grattan, now urged the
repeal of that law with al his impassioned eloquence. He was seconded in his efforts by the powerful influence of
Fox in the English House of Commons. Finaly, the obnoxious act was repealed (1782), and a, so-caled,
independent Irish Parliament, to which Grattan was elected, met in Dublin.
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But although more than three quarters of the Irish people were Catholics, no person of that faith was permitted to
sit in the new Parliament or to vote for the election of a member. This was not the only injustice, for many
Protestants in Belfast and the north of Ireland had no right to be represented in it. Such a state of things could not fail to excite angry protest, and Grattan, with other Protestants in Parliament, labored for reform. The discontent
finaly led to the organization of an association caled the "Society of United Irishmen." The leaders of that movement hoped to secure the cooperation of Catholics and Protestants, and to obtain fair and ful
representation for both in the Irish Parliament. A measure of political reform was secured (1793), but it did not
go far enough to give the relief desired.
Eventualy the Society of United Irishmen became a revolutionary organization which sought, by the help of the
French, to make Ireland an independent republic. The sprigs of shamrock or shamrock-colored badges
displayed by these men gave a new significance to "the wearing of the green."[1] By this time many Protestants had withdrawn from the organization, and many Catholics refused to ask help from the French revolutionary
party, who were hostile to al churches and to al religion.
[1] See a quotation from the famous Irish song, "The Wearin' o' the Green," in the "Shan Van Vocht," in the
"Heroic Balads," published by Ginn and Company.
Then a devoted band of Catholics in the south of Ireland resolved to rise and, trusting to their own right arms, to
strike for independence. A frightful rebelion broke out (1798), marked by al the intense hatred springing from
rival races and rival creeds, and aggravated by the peasants' hatred of oppressive landlords. Both sides
perpetuated horrible atrocities. The government employed a large force of Orangemen,[2] or extreme
Protestants, to help suppress the insurrection. They did their work with remorseless cruelty.
[2] Orangemen: the Protestants of the north of Ireland, who had taken the side of Wiliam of Orange in the
Revolution of 1688-1689 (S499). They wore an orange ribbon as their badge, to distinguish them from the
Catholic party, who wore green badges.
562. Union of Great Britain and Ireland, 1800; Emmet.
Matters now came to a crisis. Wiliam Pitt, son of the late Earl of Chatham (S550), was Prime Minister. He
believed that the best interests of both Ireland and England demanded their political union. He devoted al his
energies to accomplishing the work. The result was that in the last year of the eighteenth century the English
Government succeeded, by the most unscrupulous use of money, in gaining the desired end. Lord Cornwalis,
acting as Pitt's agent, confessed with shame that he bought up a sufficient number of members of the Irish
Parliament to secure a vote in favor of union with Great Britain. In 1800 the two countries were joined—in name
at least—under the title of the "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland."[3]
[3] The first Parliament of the United Kingdom met in 1801.
Pitt used al his powerful influence to obtain for Ireland a ful and fair representation in the united Parliament
(1801). He urged that Catholics as wel as Protestants should be eligible for election to that body. But the King
positively refused to listen to his Prime Minister. He even declared that it would be a violation of his coronation
oath for him to grant such a request. The consequence was that not a single Catholic was admitted to the
Imperial Parliament until nearly thirty years later (S573).
Two years after the first Imperial Parliament met in London the Irish patriot, Robert Emmet, made a desperate
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effort to free his country (1803). To his mind the union of England with Ireland was simply "the union of the shark with its prey." He staked his life on the cause of independence; he lost, and paid the forfeit on the scaffold.
But notwithstanding Emmet's hatred of the union, it resulted advantageously to Ireland in at least two respects.
First, more permanent peace was secured to that distracted and long-suffering country. Secondly, the Irish
people made decided gains commercialy. The duties on their farm products were removed, at least in large
degree, and the English ports hitherto closed against them were thrown open. The duties on their manufactured
goods seem to have been taken off at that time only in part.[1] Later, absolute freedom of trade was secured.
[1] See May's "Constitutional History of England," Lecky's "England in the Eighteenth Century"; but compare O'Connor Morris's work on "Ireland, from 1798 to 1898," p.58.
563. "The Industrial Revolution" of the Eighteenth Century; Material Progress; Canals; the Steam Engine, 1785.
The reign of George III was in several directions one of marked progress, especialy in England. Just after the
King's accession the Duke of Bridgewater constructed a canal from his coal mine in Worsley to Manchester, a
distance of seven miles. Later, he extended it to Liverpool; eventualy it was widened and deepened and became
the "Manchester and Liverpool Ship Canal." The Duke of Bridgewater's work was practicaly the
commencement of a system which has since developed to such a degree that the canals of England now extend
nearly 5000 miles, and exceed in length its navigable rivers. The two form such a complete network of water
communication that it is said no place in the realm is more than fifteen miles distant from this means of
transportation, which connects al the large towns with each other and with the chief ports.
In the last half of the eighteenth century James Watt obtained the first patent (1769) for his improved steam
engine (S521), but did not succeed in making it a business success until 1785. The story is told[1] that he took a
working model of it to show to the King. His Majesty patronizingly asked him, "Wel, my man, what have you to
sel?" The inventor promptly answered, "What kings covet, may it please your Majesty,—POWER!" The story is perhaps too good to be true, but the fact of the "power" could not be denied,—power, too, not simply
mechanical, but, in its results, moral and political as wel.
[1] This story is told also of Boulton, Watt's partner. See Smile's "Lives of Boulton and Watt," p.1. Newcomen had invented a rude steam engine in 1705, which in 1712 came into use to some extent for pumping water out of
coal mines. But his engine was too clumsy and too wasteful of fuel to be used by manufacturers. Boulton and
Watt built the first steam-engine works in England at Soho, a suburb of Birmingham, in 1775; but it was not until
1785 that they began to do sufficient business to make it evident that they were on their way to success.
Such was the increase of machinery driven by steam, and such were the improvements made by Hargreaves,
Arkwright, and Crompton in machinery for spinning and weaving cotton, that much distress arose among the
hand spinners and hand weavers. The price of bread was growing higher and higher, while in many districts
skiled operatives working at home could not earn by their utmost efforts eight shilings a week. They saw their
hand labor supplanted by great cotton mils filed with machinery driven by "monsters of iron and fire," which never grew weary, which subsisted on water and coal, and never asked for wages.
Led by a man named Ludd (1811), the starving workmen attacked a number of these mils, broke the machinery
to pieces, and sometimes burned the buildings. The riots were at length suppressed, and a number of the leaders
executed; but a great change for the better was at hand, and improved machinery driven by steam was soon to
remedy the evils it had seemingly created. It led to an enormous demand for cotton. This helped to stimulate
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cotton growing in the United States of America as wel as to encourage the manufacture of cotton in Great
Britain.
Up to this period the north of England had remained the poorest part of the country. The population was sparse,
ignorant, and unprosperous. It was in the south that improvements originated. In the reign of Henry VIII, the
North fought against the dissolution of the monasteries (SS352, 357); in Elizabeth's reign it resisted
Protestantism; in that of George I it sided with the so-caled "Pretender" (S535).
But steam transformed an immense area. Factories were built, population increased, cities sprang up, and wealth
grew apace. Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, Nottingham, Leicester, Sheffield, and Liverpool made the North a
new country. (See Industrial Map of England, p.10.) Lancashire is the busiest cotton-manufacturing district in
Great Britain, and the saying runs that "what Lancashire thinks to-day, England wil think to-morrow." So much for James Watt's POWER and its results.
564. Discover of Oxygen (1774); Introduction of Gas (1815).
Notwithstanding the progress that had been made in many departments of knowledge, the science of chemistry
remained almost stationary until (1774) Dr. Joseph Priestley discovered oxygen, the most abundant, as wel as
the most important, element in nature.
That discover "laid the foundation of modern chemical science." It enlarged our knowledge of the composition of the atmosphere, of the solid crust of the earth, and of water. Furthermore, it revealed the interesting fact that
oxygen not only enters into the structure of al forms of animal and vegetable life, but that no kind of life can exist without it. Finaly, Priestley's great discovery proved to be of direct practical utility, since the successful pursuit of innumerable trades and manufactures, with the profitable separation of metals from their ores, stands in close
connection with the facts which his experiments with oxygen made known.
As intelectual light spread, so also did material light. In London, up to near the close of the reign of George III,
only a few feeble oil lamps were in use. Many miles of streets were dark and dangerous, and highway robberies
were frequent. At length (1815) a company was formed to light the city with gas. After much opposition from
those who were in the whale-oil interest the enterprise succeeded. The new light, as Miss Martineau said, did
more to prevent crime than al the Government had accomplished since the days of Alfred. It changed, too, the
whole aspect of the English capital, though it was only the forerunner of the electric light, which has since
changed it even more.
The sight of the great city now, when viewed at night from Highgate archway on the north, or looking down the
Thames from Westminster Bridge, is something never to be forgotten. It gives one a realizing sense of the
immensity of "this province covered with houses," which cannot be got so wel in any other way. It bring to mind, too, those lines expressive of the contrasts of wealth and poverty, success and failure, inevitable in such a place:
"O gleaming lamps of London, that gem the city's crown,
What fortunes lie within you, O lights of London town!
. . . . . . . . . . .
O cruel lamps of London, if tears your light could drown,
Your victims' eyes would weep them, O lights of London town."[1]
[1] From the play, "The Lights of London."
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The same year in which gas was introduced, Sir Humphry Davy invented the miner's safety lamp. Without
seeking a patent, he generously gave his invention to the world, finding his reward in the knowledge that it would
be the means of saving thousands of lives wherever men are caled to work underground.
565. Steam Navigation, 1807, 1819, 1840.
Since Watt had demonstrated the value of steam for driving machinery (S563), a number of inventors had been
experimenting with the new power, in the hope that they might apply it to propeling vessels. In 1807 Robert
Fulton, an American, built the first successful steamboat, and made the voyage from New York to Albany in it.
Shortly afterwards his vessel began to make regular trips on the Hudson. A number of years later a similar boat
began to carry passengers on the Clyde, in Scotland. Finaly, in 1819, the bold undertaking was made of
crossing the Atlantic by steam. An American steamship, the Savannah, of about three hundred tons, set the
example by a voyage from the United States to Liverpool. Dr. Lardner, an English scientist, had proved to his
own satisfaction that ocean steam navigation was impracticable. The book containing the doctor's demonstration
was brought to America by the Savannah on her return.
Twenty-one years afterward, in 1840, the Cunard Company established the first regular line of ocean steamers.
They sailed between England and the United States. Since then fleets of steamers ranging from two thousand to
more than forty thousand tons each have been built. They now make passages from continent to continent with
the regularity of clockwork, and in fewer days than the ordinary sailing vessels formerly required weeks. The fact
that during a period of more than seventy years one of these lines has never lost a passenger is conclusive proof
that Providence is on the side of steam, when steam has men that know how to handle it.
566. Literature; Art; Education; Travel; Dress.
The reign of George III is marked by a long list of names eminent in letters and art. First in point of time among
these stands Dr. Samuel Johnson, the compiler of the first English dictionary worthy of the name, and that on
which those of our own day are based to a considerable extent. He was also the author of the story of
"Rasselas,"—that notable satire on discontent and the search after happiness. Next stands Johnson's friend,
Oliver Goldsmith, famous for his genius, his wit, and his improvidence,—which was always getting him into
trouble,—but stil more famous for his poems, and his novel, "The Vicar of Wakefield."
Edward Gibbon, David Hume, author of the wel-known "History of England," and Adam Smith come next in
time. In 1776 Gibbon published his "Decline and Fal of the Roman Empire," which after more than a hundred
years stands the ablest history of the subject in our language. In the same year Adam Smith issued "An Inquiry
into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations," which had a great effect on legislation respecting
commerce, trade, and finance. During this period, also, Sir Wiliam Blackstone became prominent as a writer on
law, and Edmund Burke, the distinguished orator and statesman, wrote his "Reflections on the French
Revolution."
The poets, Burns, Byron, Sheley, and Keats, with Sheridan, the orator and dramatist, and Sterne, the humorist,
belong to this reign; so, too, does the witty satirist, Sydney Smith, and Sir Walter Scott, whose works, like those
of Shakespeare, have "made the dead past live again." Then again, Maria Edgeworth and Jane Austen have left
admirable pictures of the age in their stories of Irish and English life. Coleridge and Wordsworth began to attract
attention toward the last of this period, and to be much read by those who loved the poetry of thought and the
poetry of nature; while, early in the next reign, Charles Lamb published his delightful "Essays of Elia."
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In art we have the first English painters and engravers. Hogarth, who died a few years after the beginning of the
reign, was celebrated for the coarse but perfect representations of low life and street scenes; and his series of
Election pictures with his "Beer Lane" and "Gin Aley" are valuable for the insight into the history of the times.
The chief portrait painters were Reynolds, Lawrence, and Gainsborough, the last of whom afterwards became
noted for his landscapes. They were folowed by Wilkie, whose pictures of "The Rent Day," "The Reading of the Wil," and many others, tel a story of interest to every one who looks at them.
Last came Turner, who in some respects surpassed al former artists in his power of reproducing scenes in
nature. At the same time, Bewick, whose cuts used to be the delight of every child that read "Aesop's Fables,"
gave a new impulse to wood engraving, while Flaxman rose to be the leading English sculptor, and Wedgwood
introduced useful and beautiful articles of pottery.
In common-school education little advance had been made for many generations. In the country the great mass
of the people were nearly as ignorant as they were in the darkest part of the Middle Ages. Hardly a peasant over
forty years of age could be found who could read a verse in the Bible, and not one in ten could write his name.
There were no cheap books or newspapers, and no proper system of public instruction. The poor seldom left
the counties in which they were born. They knew nothing of what was going on in the world. Their education was
wholy of the practical kind which comes from work and things, not from books and teachers; yet many of them
with only these simple helps found out two secrets which the highest culture sometimes misses,—how to be
useful and how to be happy.[1]
[1] See Wordsworth's poem "Resolution and Independence."
The ordinary means of travel were stil very imperfect. Stage-coaches had been in use for more than a hundred
and fifty years. They crawled along at the rate of about three miles an hour. Mail coaches began to run in 1784.
They attained a speed of six miles an hour, and later of ten. This was considered entirely satisfactory.
The close of George III's reign marks the beginning of the present age. It was indicated in many ways, and
among others by the declining use of sedan chairs, which had been the fashion for upwards of a century, and by
the change in dress. Gentlemen were leaving off the picturesque costumes of the past,—the cocked hats,
elaborate wigs, silk stockings, ruffles, velvet coats, and swords,—and gradualy putting on the plain democratic
garb, sober in cut and color, by which we know them to-day.
567. Last Days of George III.
George III died (1820) at the age of eighty-two. During ten years he had been blind, deaf, and crazy, having lost
his reason not very long after the jubilee, which celebrated the fiftieth year of his reign (1809). Once, in a lucid
interval, he was found by the Queen singing a hymn and playing an accompaniment on the harpsichord.
He then knelt and prayed aloud for her, for his family, and for the nation; and in closing, for himself, that it might please God to avert his heavy calamity, or grant him resignation to bear it. Then he burst into tears, and his
reason again fled.[1] In consequence of the incapacity of the King, his eldest son, the Prince of Wales, was
appointed regent (1811), and on the King's death came to the throne as George IV.
[1] See Thackeray's "Four Georges."
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568. Summary.
The long reign of George III covered sixty very eventful years. During that time England lost her possessions in
America, but gained India and prepared the way for getting possession of New Zealand and Australia. During
that period, also, Ireland was united to Great Britain. The wars with France, which lasted more than twenty
years, ended in the great naval victory of Trafalgar and the stil greater victory on the battlefield of Waterloo. In
consequence of these wars, with that of the American Revolution, the National Debt of Great Britain rose to a
height which rendered the burden of taxation wel-nigh insupportable.
The second war with the United States in 1812 made America independent on the sea, and eventualy compeled
England to give up her assumed right to search American vessels. The two greatest reforms of the period were
the abolition of the slave trade and the mitigation of the laws against debt and crime; the chief material
improvement was the extension of canals and the application of steam to manufacturing and to navigation. The
"Industrial Revolution" transformed the North of England.
GEORGE IV—1820-1830
569. Accession and Character of George IV.
George IV, eldest son of the late King, came to the throne in his fifty-eighth year; but, owing to his father's
insanity, he had virtualy been King for nearly ten years (S567). His habits of life had made him a selfish, dissolute
spendthrift, who, like Charles II, cared only for pleasure. Though while Prince of Wales he had received for
many years an income upwards of 100,000 pounds, which was largely increased at a later period, yet he was
always hopelessly in debt.
Parliament (1795) appropriated over 600,000 pounds to relieve him from his most pressing creditors, but his
wild extravagance soon involved him in difficulties again, so that had it not been for help given by the long-
suffering taxpayers, His Royal Highness must have become as bankrupt in purse as he was in character.
After his accession matters became worse rather than better. At his coronation, which cost the nation over
200,000 pounds, he appeared in hired jewels, which he forgot to return, and which Parliament had to pay for.
Not only did he waste the nation's money more recklessly than ever, but he used whatever political influence he
had to opposesuch measures of reform as the times demanded.
570. Discontent; the "Manchester Massacre" (1819).
When (1811) George, then Prince of Wales, became regent (S567), he desired to form a Whig ministry, not
because he cared for Whig principles (S479), but solely because he would thereby be acting in opposition to his
father's wishes. Finding his purpose impracticable, he accepted Tory rule (S479), and a Cabinet (S534) was
formed with Lord Liverpool as Prime Minister. It had for its main object the continued exclusion of Catholics
from representation in Parliament (S478).
Lord Liverpool was a dul, wel-meaning man, who utterly failed to comprehend the real tendency of the age. He
was the son of a commoner who had been raised to the peerage. He had always had a reputation for honest
obstinacy, and for little else. After he became Premier, a prominent French lady, who was visiting England,
asked him one day, "What has become of that VERY stupid man, Mr. Jenkinson?" "Madame," answered the unfortunate Prime Minister, "he is now Lord Liverpool."[1]
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[1] Earl's "English Premiers," Vol. II.
From such a Cabinet or Government, which continued in power for fifteen years, nothing but trouble could be
expected. The misery of the country was great. Food was seling at famine prices. Thousands were on the verge
of starvation, and tens of thousands did not get enough to eat. Trade was seriously depressed, and multitudes
were unable to obtain work. Under these circumstances, the suffering masses undertook to hold public meetings
to discuss the cause and cure of these evils; but as violent speeches against the Government were often made at
the meetings, the authorities dispersed them on the ground that they were seditious and tended to riot and
rebelion.
Many large towns at this period had no voice in legislation. At Birmingham, which was one of this class, the
citizens had met and chosen, though without legal authority, a representative to Parliament. Machester, another
important manufacturing town, now determined to do the same thing. The people were warned not to assemble,
but they persisted in doing so, on the ground that peaceful discussion, with the election of a representative, was
no violation of law. The meeting was held in St. Peter's Fields, and, through the blundering of a magistrate, it
ended in an attack by a body of troops, by which many people were wounded an a number kiled (1819).
571. The Six Acts (1819); the Conspiracy.
The bitter feeling caused by the "Manchester Massacre," or "Peterloo," as it was caled, was stil further aggravated by the passage of the Six Acts (1819). The object of these severe coercive measures was to make it
impossible for men to take any public action demanding political reform. They restricted freedom of speech,
freedom of the press, and the right of the people to assemble for the purpose of open discussion of the course
taken by the Government. These harsh laws coupled with other repressive measures taken by the Tories (S479),
who were stil in power, led to the "Cato Street Conspiracy." Shortly after the accession of George IV a few
desperate men banded together, and meeting in a stable in Cato Street, London, formed a plot to murder Lord
Liverpool and his entire cabinet at dinner at which al the ministers were to be present.
The plot was discovered, and the conspirators were speedily disposed of by the galows or transportation, but
nothing was done to relieve the suffering which had provoked the intended crime. No new conspiracy was
attempted, but in the course of the next ten years a silent revolution took place, which, as we shal see later,
obtained for the people that fuler representation in Parliament which they had hitherto vainly attempted