

41 



ADDRESS. 



To Thomas John Atkinson, Esq. 



" SIR, We, the inhabitants of Ballyshannon and its neighbourhood, 

 assembled at a meeting convened by public requisition, deeply sensible of 

 the advantages we derive from the constant attendance of so upright, intel- 

 ligent, and impartial a magistrate at our Petty Sessions Court, as also of the 

 benefits conferred upon the community by the residence amongst us of so 

 useful and benevolent a country gentleman, feel that we would be wanting, 

 not only in the gratitude which we owe you in your private capacity, but in 

 your important position as a justice of the peace for this county, were we to 

 allow the slightest impeachment of your conduct to pass unnoticed. 



" Triumphant though the refutation was with which you met the charges 

 brought against you as a magistrate upon the recent investigation held in 

 this town unfounded though these charges were proved to have been yet 

 we cannot but express our sympathy for the temporary uneasiness which 

 such an imputation must have caused ; while we deplore that there could be 

 found any to advance so groundless and unwarrantable an accusation. 



" Sir, your character, whether in public or private life, stands too high in 

 the estimation of your countrymen to admit of even a momentary impres- 

 sion being made to your prejudice. We, therefore, without distinction of 

 politics or religion, come forward to tender you our warmest congratulations 

 upon the flattering opinion which his Excellency the Lord-Lieutenant, and 

 the Lord Chancellor, have been pleased to express on the result of the 

 inquiry to which we have referred ; as, also, to offer our fervent prayer that 

 you may be long blessed with life and health, to continue in that course of 

 public and private utility, no less honourable to yourself than beneficial 

 to the inhabitants of the country in which you reside. 



" Signed by order, and on behalf of, the meeting, 



" ALEXANDER SANDERSON, Chairman." 



To the foregoing Address Mr. Atkinson then made the fol- 

 lowing reply : 



" To the Inhabitants of the Town and Neighbourhood of Ballyshannon, 

 assembled in the Town Hall, on Monday, Aug. 30, 1841. 



" GENTLEMEN, I am quite unable to express, as I would wish to do, the 

 deep sense of gratitude I owe you for your very kind and flattering address. 

 I beg you will accept my most sincere and cordial thanks for the high 

 honour you have conferred upon me. 



" I am fully aware how much your kindness has overrated any thing I 

 could have done in the discharge of my duty as a magistrate. It has ever 

 been my anxious wish to discharge those duties fairly, impartially, and 

 firmly ; and to have now the honourable testimony of the approval of so 

 numerous and respectable a meeting of those persons by whom I am so 

 long and so well known, is indeed a source of no little pride and gratifica- 

 tion to me, and a full remuneration for any trouble I have had as a 

 magistrate. To this is added the pleasing recollection that it has been my 

 good fortune to have had the assistance of those high-minded, honourable, 



