1827.] The Four Nations. 



perhaps possessing more curiosity and thirst after knowledge than the 

 Englishman or the Welchman, and appearing in. consequence more 

 shrewd ; is yet not so successful, inasmuch as other persons and other sub- 

 jects are continually distracting his attention from his own concerns. It 

 has been remarked, and perhaps justly, that an Englishman always succeeds 

 best in the management of his own affairs, and that a Scotsman makes the 

 best manager for another. The Irishman has neither the unity and con- 

 stancy of purpose of the Englishman ; and altogether presents a character 

 which cannot, perhaps, be so well described as by a compound term fitting 

 the vocabulary of his country " restless indolence "immense bustle, 

 activity and pretence all the noise of the water-fall, with very little of its 

 efficiency for turning the wheel. If you are to choose a friend for life, let him 

 fee English ; if for a season, let him be Scotch ; and if for a day, let him 

 by all means be Irish. The Englishman you cannot know till you have 

 been for a considerable time in juxta position with him ; he does not as it 

 were, hang out a sign-b6ard, and you must arrive at a knowledge of his 

 character by that slow and patient process which himself employs in the 

 making of his fortune. At every single transaction you see him fully and 

 undisguisedly ; and thus when you have collected a sufficient number of 

 instances, your judgment may be reckoned as perfectly secure. The Scots- 

 man, with a great affectation of concealment, comes out much more rapidly, 

 and shews you more than you ask, or even wish for: but it requires some 

 reflection in order to separate the wheat from the chaff; and though there are 

 many instances in which this character improves upon experience, there 

 are not a few in which the result is directly opposite. For the moment an 

 Irishman seems the most disinterested of God's creatures ; and while you 

 are merely introduced to him, he will persuade you that his labour and his 

 life are to be constantly devoted to your service, and that other than your 

 happiness, he has not a single object in the world. The next casual 

 acquaintance, however, receives precisely the same protestations of friend- 

 ship ; and thus, though the man may have all the sincerity in the world 

 when he makes his promises, the carrying of the twentieth part of them into 

 effect, would be a moral impossibility. Milton's " dark with excessive 

 brightness," finds something corresponding in the Irish character, which i 

 *' heartless from excess of heart." It would be injustice to suppose that 

 there is in the people of this nation less disposition to perform what they 

 promise than in the more solid sons of the southern parts of the sister island, 

 or in the more smooth-tongued sons of the northern. Nor is there any 

 necessity for assuming so uncharitable a hypothesis, inasmuch as, espe- 

 cially in an ardent people, the very scrambling after and promising to do a 

 number of kind offices, involves, or at least soon generates a habit of non- 

 performance. There is such a thing as penury or prodigality in the ele- 

 ments of a man's character, as well as in the items of his expenditure; and 

 it is true in the or . case as well as in the other, that "the waster must 

 come to want." 



It would now remain to inquire what are the circumstances which 

 stamp upon the Four Nations those great lines of their several characters ; 

 and, in order to do this, no single theory would be of much utility. Geo- 

 graphical position may have some effect, although not much ; and so also 

 may have the relative fertility of the different divisions. Original race, 

 too, may come in for a share, and a considerable share, because thpugh 

 each nation be more or less mixed, there is still as much of a different 

 stock as stamps a peculiar physiognomy upon each ; and though this 



M.M. New Series VOL, Ilf, No. 15. 2 P 



