.M4 ANNUAL REGISTER, 1814. 



knowledge, which other men did 

 not enjoy. For several years 1 

 conducted the prosecutions for the 

 Crown at Wexford; and hence I 

 derived an intimate knowledge of 

 those transactions. Besides, 1 was 

 connected with no party, I was in- 

 different about party. But here I 

 stop, I willingly draw a veil over 

 the events of those days, and their 

 causes. God forbid! that I should 

 tear asunder wounds, which, I 

 hope, are completely and for ever 

 closed. 



1 have now been absent from 

 this county twelve years, (with 

 the exception of one Assizes, when 

 I came here in the King's Com- 

 mission, but upon that occasion I 

 did not sit, as I now do, in the 

 Crown Court). I can say, how- 

 ever, with the greatest truth, that 

 at no period from my earliest ac- 

 quaintance with your county, 

 down to the present time, do I 

 remember to have seen it in more 

 profound tranquillity, more per- 

 fect peace, more complete security 

 than at present, a state of things 

 indicating a due administration of 

 the laws by Magistrates, neither 

 over zealous and too active on the 

 one hand, nor too negligent and 

 supine on the other. 



Such, I do hope, is the true and 

 actual state of your county ; for, 

 Gentlemen, 1 have, I repeat it, no 

 means of knowing the fact, except 

 from the quantity of alleged crime, 

 the number of persons charged, 

 and the nature of those charges, as 

 ^gre set out in this calendar. But 

 ^vhy, gentlemen, have 1 entered 

 ;Jiuto this detail ? I answer, for 

 t,hese weighty and cogent tea- 



of disturbances have been much 

 mis-stated. In what I now say, 

 or shall say, I do not impute any 

 thing to any individual of this 

 county. I will not meddle with 

 its internal politics ; but this I 

 know, that its situation has been 

 variously represented. Several 

 advertisements in newspapers now 

 before me [The Wexford Journ- 

 als of last March and April] 

 describe this county as being in a 

 most alarming state of disturbance. 

 Other advertisements afhrm, on 

 the other hand, that the country 

 has never enjoyed more profound 

 tranquillity. These advertisements 

 have been, I understand, repub- 

 lished in the prints of Dublin and 

 London ; and have naturally ex- 

 cited strong sensations. It is not 

 for me to inquire into the motives 

 of those opposite statements. I 

 know them not. It is not my in- 

 tention, it is not my duty, to im- 

 pute any particular motives to any 

 individuals: but it is within the 

 sphere of my public duty to state, 

 for your instruction, what I have 

 observed as the origin and grounds 

 of similar reports and misrepre- 

 sentations in other counties, whi- 

 ther the discharge of my public 

 duty has called me, and where I 

 have had judicial knowledge of 

 what had passed. It may be not 

 uninstruclive to state what ap- 

 peared to me to be causes of 

 those disturbances, which have 

 occasioned those misrepresenta- 

 tions and exaggerations ; together 

 with the reasons which have im- 

 pelled the Legislature to swell the 

 Criminal Code, session after ses- 

 sion, with new statutes, for vin- 



8ons ; because much exaggeration dicatiug the peace 6f this country, 

 and misrepr«sentation have gone In my circuits through other 

 abroad, and the extent and causes parts of the kingdom, I have seen 



