422 
town, by transcribing the following sin- 
gular occurrences, from an official list. 
of remarkable events. 
1282. This year, the Sheriffs of Salop and 
Staffordshire were compelled ‘to provide 
two hundred wood-cutters, to cut down 
timber, and other obstructions, in order to 
make way for the king’s (Edward I.) army 
to enter into Wales. 
1427. A bye-law. was. made against 
swine wandering about the town: the 
penalty was cutting off the pig’s ear for the 
first two offences; and forfeiture for the 
third. [I am acquainted with more than 
one Welsh town where some such enact- 
ment would be very beneficial even at this 
day. 
Tho. The brewers were ordered, by the 
corporation, ot to use that wicked and per- 
nicious weed, hops, in their brewings, under 
a penalty of 6s. 8d.* 
1547. This year, Adam Mytton and 
Roger Pope, the town bailiffs, ordered the 
picture of Our Lady to be taken out of 
St. Mary’s Church; and the pictures of 
St. Mary Magdalen and St. Chad, out of 
St. Chad’s Church ; the whole to be burnt. 
1552. The Magistrates were restrained 
by Act of Parliament from licensing any 
more than three persons to sell wine within 
the town. 
1585. On the 15th of May, Lord Robert 
Devereux, Earl of Essex, came through the 
town, before whom the free-school scholars 
made several orations as he passed through 
the castle gates; they standing in battle- 
array, with bows and arrows in their hands. 
1618. It was ordered by the Corpora- 
tion, that two men should be constantly 
stationed in each street to search for va- 
grants. 
(To be continued.) 
* There is, we believe, a statute still 
upon the books, containing the same pro- 
hibition. It is, of course, virtually repeal- 
ed: but it isnot a whit more unreasonable 
and absurd than the law which at this day 
prohibits the use of Spanish liquorice in 
porter.—Epir. 
—ii-— 
To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 
Sir: 
VERY man whose judgment is 
unwarped by prejudice will unhe- 
sitatingly allow, that the civil disabilities 
under which the Catholics labour, ought 
to be removed. Where is the rational 
ground upon which this boon can longer 
be withheld? I do not mean to im- 
pugn the policy which originally sug- 
gested the restrictions on the deluded 
followers of the Catholic faith, because 
the spirit of the times might, for aught I 
know, have rendered them indispensable 
for the well-being of the Protestant 
community ; but why should these: fet- 
Catholic Claims. 
[June 1; 
ters be perpetuated, when that neces-’ 
sity has ceased? Sooner or later, the 
barriers that shut out the Catholic from 
the avenues to political honour and dis- 
tinction, it is clear, must inevitably be 
removed : —if not conceded as a gift, it 
will be wrested as a right. 
The question has come to this, whe- 
ther we will, by pertinacious adherence 
to a system of exclusion, continue to 
foster and foment those animosities 
which have already done so much mis- 
chief ;—or, whether we will emancipate. 
ourselves from the debasing thraldom 
of prejudice, and extend towards our 
Catholic countrymen the olive-branch 
of Christian fellowship ? 
This is the grand panacea for the 
evils under which Ireland has groaned: 
for centuries : this would quiet, at least, 
those heart-burnings which have so long 
disturbed the tranquillity of the sister- 
island :—it would be acting as politici- 
ans—as philanthropists—as Christians : 
it would be doing (as the religion we 
profess inculcates) as we would be done: 
by. 
Iam far from wishing, Sir, to adyo- 
cate the peculiar tenets of the Catholic 
faith. However erroneous, in our judg-; 
ment, these may be, what right can we 
have, in exercising our own judgment 
in these matters, to punish others (and 
exclusion is punishment, stigma and 
odium are punishments) for exercising 
theirs, and clinging to the faith their 
conscience dictates to them to profess ? 
They are British subjects—have they 
not a right to British privileges ? If they 
are to obey the laws, have they not 
a right to demand that those laws: 
should be equal ?—that equal protec- 
tion and equal encouragement should 
be the reward of equal allegiance and 
fidelity 2? Are not, in fact, all civil and 
political obligations (like the obligations 
of all other contracts) reciprocal ? Are 
allegiance and obedience due, where pro- 
tection and justice are denied? They 
fight our battles, shall they not share 
the honours and the rewards of victory ?; 
they have an equal share in the fatigues, 
the dangers, the privations of the march, 
the battle and the siege; shall they not 
have an equal chance of all the glory, 
and all the rank and consideration, 
which their endurance and their blood 
has purchased—because, forsooth, they 
chaunt a Latin Mass, instead of prosing 
a Common Prayer, or twanging an ex- 
hortation (as is sometimes the case), in 
murdered English, through the nose !— 
or, because (a matter, to be sure, of vast - 
importance 
