HIS GRANDFATHER. 369 



stone, " in whose eyes O'Connell seems the greatest 

 Irishman that ever lived. Neither Swift nor 

 Grattan can be placed in the scale against him. 

 If there were competition among the dead heroes 

 of Irish history, I suppose Burke and the Duke 

 of Wellington would be the two most formidable 

 competitors. But the great Duke is, in mathemati- 

 cal phrase, incommensurable with O'Connell. There 

 are no known terms which will enable us to pit 

 the military faculty against the genius of civil 

 affairs. If we take that genius alone into view, it 

 can hardly be doubted that O'Connell is the greater 

 man. With respect to Burke, it seems safe to say 

 that, if far greater than O'Connell in the world 

 of thought, he was far inferior to him in the world 

 of action." 



It is time, however, that I should turn to the 

 article in the same magazine from Sir William* 

 Gregory's pen, which appeared three months later 

 than that of Mr Gladstone from which I have just 

 quoted. Sir William begins by telling us that he 

 was brought up from a child in the society of 

 Dublin Castle, in which his grandfather, also 

 named Sir William Gregory, was one of the most 

 prominent and quite the most durable of officials. 

 " He was Under Secretary for Ireland," writes his 

 grandson, "from 1813 to 1831, when he retired 

 with a pension and with the distinction of Privy 

 Councillor." During that long period he enjoyed 

 the confidence of all the Chief Secretaries and Lord 



2 A 



