IREN^EUS IRIDIUM. 



135 



population, afford but too convincing proofs of the 

 accuracy of what has now been stated. 



" It is, therefore, of the utmost consequence to the 

 well-being of every people, and to their protection 

 in years of scarcity, that they should not subsist prin- 

 cipally on the potato. In this country the pressure 

 of a scarcity is evaded by resorting to inferior species 

 of food, such as potatoes, and a lower standard of 

 comfort; but if our people were habitually fed on 

 the potato, this would be impracticable. The chances 

 of famine would thus be vastly increased; while, 

 owing to the low value of the potato as compared 

 with most other things, the labourers would have less 

 chance of preserving or acquiring a taste for animal 

 food, or other necessaries and luxuries ; and, conse- 

 quently, of changing, at any future period, their 

 actual condition for a better." 



Population. The reader will find in the table at 

 page 126, a list of the population of the various 

 counties of Ireland. By a recent Report of the 

 Commissioners of Public Instruction, it is estimated 

 that there are about six millions and a half of 

 Catholics in Ireland, and one million and a half of 

 Protestants. The Protestants are very unequally 

 distributed; for while Ulster has 1,100,000, being 

 about one half the entire population of that province, 

 the other three provinces have but 400,000 Protes- 

 tants in a population of above five millions. 



Contents of the article Ireland. 



History, 

 Topography, 

 Agriculture, . 

 M an uf ac tures, 

 Commerce, 

 Church, 

 Government, . 

 Revenue, 

 Social State, 

 Population, 



110 

 12'.' 

 12.3 

 VlT 

 128 

 it). 

 131 

 il). 

 ib. 

 135 



IREN^EUS, ST ; presbyter, and at a later period, 

 bishop of Lyons, towards the end of the second 

 century, a pupil of Polycarp and Papias ; a man of 

 considerable learning, and animated with an ardent 

 zeal for Christianity. He was violent in his opposi- 

 tion to the heretical Chiliasts. His works are all 

 lost, except his Libri V. adversus Hesreses, and 

 these are extant only in a translation. He suffered 

 martyrdom (after 202), and is honoured as a saint. 

 His day is April 6. His works have been edited by 

 Feuerardent (Paris, 1596, folio), Grabe (Oxford, 

 1702, folio), Massuet (Paris, 1710.) His frag- 

 ments have also been collected by C. M. Pfaff 

 (Hague, 1715). 



There are several other martyrs of this name, and 

 three men of the same name are mentioned in the 

 Greek Anthology. 



IRENE; 1. in mythology, one of the Hours (see 

 Hours), denoting peace. 



2. An empress of Constantinople, alike famous 

 for talent and beauty, and for her crimes ; was born 

 at Athens, and, in 769, married Leo IV., after 

 whose death, by poison administered by her, she 

 raised herself (780), and her son, Constantine VI., 

 who was then but nine years old, to the imperial 

 throne, with the aid of the nobles. She believed it 

 necessary to strengthen herself in this dignity by 

 new acts of violence, and caused the two brothers of 

 her murdered husband, who had formed a conspiracy 

 against her, to be executed. Charlemagne at that 

 time menaced the Eastern empire. Irene at first 

 delayed him by promises. She at last went so far 

 as to oppose him, arms in hand; but he totally 

 defeated her army in Calabria, in the year 788. 

 Two years before, she had convened two general 

 councils at Nice, in which the Iconoclasts were 

 particularly attacked. (See Iconoclasts.) When 



Constantine had grown up, he refused to permit her 

 to participate longer in the government, and actually 

 reigned alone seven years, when lie was arrested at 

 the order of his mother, his eyes plucked out, and 

 himself finally murdered. Irene was the first female 

 who reigned over the Eastern empire. Her entrance 

 into Constantinople on a triumphal car of gold and 

 precious stones, her liberality to the people, the 

 freedom which she bestowed on all prisoners, and 

 other artifices employed by her, were not sufficient 

 to secure her from the consequences of her criminal 

 accession. She had ordered many nobles into banish- 

 ment, and, to secure yet more firmly the possession 

 of the throne, had just resolved to marry Charle- 

 magne, when Nicephorus, who was placed on the 

 imperial throne, exiled her, in 802, to the isle of 

 Lesbos, where she died, in 803. 



IRETON, HENRY ; an eminent commander and 

 statesman, of the parliamentary party, in the civil 

 wars of Charles I. He was descended from a good 

 family, and was brought up to the law ; but, when 

 the civil contests commenced, he joined the parlia- 

 mentary army, and, by the interest of Cromwell, 

 whose daughter Bridget he married, he became 

 commissary-general. He commanded the left wing 

 at the battle of Naseby, which was defeated by the 

 furious onset of prince Rupert, and he himself 

 wounded and made prisoner. He soon recovered 

 his liberty, and took a great share in all the trans- 

 actions which threw the parliament into the power 

 of the army. It was from his suggestion that Crom- 

 well called together a secret council of officers, to 

 deliberate upon the disposal of the king's person, 

 and the settlement of the government. He had also 

 a principal hand in framing the ordinance for the 

 king's trial, and s&t himself as one of the judges. 

 Ireton accompanied Cromwell to Ireland, in 1649, 

 and was left by him in that island as lord deputy. 

 He reduced the natives to obedience with great 

 vigour, but not without cruelty. He died in 

 Limerick, in 1651. Hume calls him a memorable 

 person, celebrated for vigilance, capacity, and a 

 rigid exercise of justice, during his unlimited com- 

 mand in Ireland. After the restoration, his body 

 was taken up, and suspended from the gallows, 

 with that of Cromwell, and was buried in the same 

 pit. 



IRIA ; a Basque word, signifying town, city. 



IRIARTE, or YRIARTE, THOMAS D'; a Spanish 

 poet, born in 1752, and died in 1803. As a poet, 

 he is known by his Literary Fables (1782), which 

 have been translated into Engb'sh, his poem La 

 Musica (1784, 4to.), dramas, &c. His works were 

 published in 8 vols., at Madrid, in 1805. 



IRIDIUM ; the name of a metal discovered in 

 1803, by Mr Tennant, in the black residuum from 

 the solution of the ore of platinum. Its name was 

 bestowed in allusion to the rainbow (iris), in conse- 

 quence of the changeable colour it presents while 

 dissolving in muriatic acid. Its colour is white ; it 

 is brittle, and very difficult of fusion; specific 

 gravity, 18.G8. Its greatest specific gravity in the 

 unfused state is stated by Dr Turner to be 15.8628 

 Berzelius estimates its prime equivalent at 98.8. 

 Iridium is the least fusible of all metals, and the last 

 mentioned chemist failed in all his attempts to bring 

 it to a state of fluidity ; but Mr Childrun succeeded 

 in procuring a small globule, by means of his power- 

 ful galvanic apparatus. It is acted upon with diffi- 

 culty even by the nitro-muriatic acid ; but, when 

 oxidized by digestion with it, it unites with other 

 acids, and with the earths, particularly with alumine. 

 It combines with sulphur, by heating a mixture of 

 ammonia, muriate of indium , and sulphur : the 

 compound is a black powder, consisting of 100 



