MANNERS. U3 



Let me, however, conclude what I have to obferve on the 

 conduct of the principal people refiding in Ireland, that there 

 are great numbers among them who are as liberal in all 

 their ideas as any people in Europe ; that they have leen the 

 errors which have given an ill character to the manners of 

 their country, and done every thing that example could effect 

 to produce a change : that that happy change has been partly 

 effected, and is effecting every hour, infomuch that a man may 

 go into a vaft variety of families which he will find actuated 

 by no other principles than thofe of the moil cultivated polite - 

 nefs, and the moil liberal urbanity. 



But I mud now come to another clafs of people, to whofe 

 conduct it is almoft entirely owing, that the character of the 

 nation has not that luilre abroad, which I dare ailert, it will 

 foon very generally merit : this is the clafs of little country 

 gentlemen * ; tenants, who drink their claret by means cf 

 profit rents ; jobbers in farms ; bucks ; your fellows with 

 round hats, edged with gold, who hunt in the day, get drunk 

 in the evening, and fight the next morning. I ihall not 

 dwell on a fubjecl: fo perfectly difagreeable, but remark that 

 thefe are the men among whom drinking, wrangling, quar- 

 reling, fighting, ravifhing, &c. &c. &c. are found as in tneir 

 native foil ; once to a degree that made them the peft of fo- 

 ciety ; they are growing better, but even now, one or two of 

 them got by accident (where they have no bufinels) into bet- 

 ter company are fufficient very much to derange the pleafures 

 that reiult from a liberal converfation. A new fpirit ; new 

 fafiiions ; new modes of politenef* exhibited by the higher 

 ranks are imitated by the lower, which will, it is to be hoped, 

 put an end to this race of beings ; and either drive their fons 

 and coufins into the army or navy, or fink them into plain 

 farmers like thofe we have in England, where it is common 

 to fee men with much greater property without pretending- 

 to be gentlemen. 1 repeat it from the intelligence I receiv- 

 ed, that even this clafs are very different from what they 

 were twenty years ago, and improve fo fad that the time 

 will foon come when the national character will not be de- 

 graded by any fet. 



That character is upon the whole refpectable : it would 

 be unfair to attribute to the nation at large the vices and fol- 

 lies of only one clafs of individuals. Thofe perfons from 

 whom it is candid to take a general eilimate do credit to 

 their country. That they are a people learned, lively and in- 

 genious ; the admirable authors they have produced will be 



Vol. II. H an 



* This expreflion is not to lie taken in a general fenfe. God for- 

 bid I Jhould give this character, of all country gentlemen of finall 

 fortunes in Ireland : 1 have myfclf been acquainted luith exceptions, 

 / mean only that in general they are not the moft liberal pec fie in 

 the 



