THE IVY. 315 



past, guaranteed its due payment — is withheld in 

 vaunting defiance of -that government, which, 

 while meekly acquiescing in the sovereign will of 

 rebellious subjects, offers no substitute for what 

 their loyal ministers are defrauded of : but leaves 

 them to famish, literally to starve to death, with 

 their children around them, until the senators of 

 the land shall have enjoyed their accustomed sea- 

 son of repose, and an arrangement shall take 

 place among contending parties, by which the 

 question of tithe may be ultimately adjusted. I 

 venture not on political ground ; I have but to 

 state the broad fact that the clergy of Ireland are 

 starving ; and that the sole support to which they 

 and their numerous household can look, for the 

 dreary season already set in upon us, is the spon- 

 taneous bounty of sympathizing friends in that 

 part of the church which as yet tastes not the cup 

 of external persecution. I know, and I bless God 

 for it, that a stream of Christian liberality is flow- 

 ing towards their desolated dwellings ; but even 

 the extremity of personal want does not end their 

 sufferings. They dwell among those who are 

 confederate against their lives ; and who, if the 

 plan of salvation be baffled by our means, may 

 again wet the knife, and aim the bullet, and 

 brandish the heavy stone — weapons that, have 

 each and all, within a short space of time, been 

 crimsoned with the life-blood of Protestant clergy- 



