his industry, or otherwise, increased the value of his property since their first bill, to bring another, compelling a new account of the value of his estate, in order to a new distribution proportioned to the value of the estate at the time of the new bill preferred. They may bring such bills, toties quoties, upon every improvement of his fortune, without any sort of limitation of time, or regard to the frequency of such bills, or to the quantity of the increase of the estate, which shall justify the bringing them. This act expressly provides that he shall have no respite from the persecution of his children but by totally abandoning all thoughts of improvement and acquisition.

This is going a great way surely; but the laws in question have gone much further. Not satisfied with calling upon children to revolt against their parents, and to possess themselves of their substance, there are cases where the withdrawing of the child from his father's obedience is not left to the option of the child himself; for if the wife of a Roman Catholic should choose to change her religion, from that moment she deprives her husband of all management and direction of his children, and even of all the tender satisfaction which a parent can feel in their society, and which is the only indemnification he can have for all his cares and sorrows; and they are to be torn for ever, at the earliest age, from his house and family; for the lord chancellor is not only authorized, but he is strongly required, to take away all his children from such Popish parent, to appoint where, in what manner, and by whom, they are to be educated; and the father is compelled to pay, not for the ransom, but for the deprivation of his children; and to furnish such a sum as the chancellor thinks proper to appoint for their education, to the age of eighteen years. The case is the same if the husband should be the conformist; though how the law is to operate in this case I do not see: for the act expressly says that the child shall be taken from such Popish parent. And whilst such husband and wife cohabit, it will be impossible to put it into execution without taking the child from one as well as from the other; and then the effect of the law will be, that if either husband or wife becomes Protestant, both are to be deprived of their children.

The paternal power thus being wholly abrogated, it is

eviaent that by the last regulation the power cf a husband over his wife is also considerably impaired; because if it be in her power, whenever she pleases, to subtract the children from his protection and obedience, she herself by that hold inevitably acquires a power and superiority over her husband.

But she is not left dependent upon this oblique influence; for if in any marriage settlement the husband has reserved to him a power of making a jointure, and he dies without settling any, her conformity executes his powers, and executes them in as large extent as the chancellor thinks fit. The husband is deprived of that coercive power over his wife which he had in his hands by the use he might make of the discretionary power reserved in the settlement.

But if no such power had been reserved, and no such settlement existed, yet if the husband dies leaving his conforming wife without a fixed provision by some settlement on his real estate, his wife may apply to chancery, where she shall be allotted a portion from his leases, and other personal estate, not exceeding one-third of his whole clear substance. The laws in this instance, as well as in the former, have presumed that the husband has omitted to make all the provision which he might have done, for no other reason than that of her religion. If, therefore, she chooses to balance domestic misdemeanours to her husband by the public merit of conformity to the Protestant religion, the law will suffer no plea of such misdemeanours to be urged on the husband's part, nor proof of that kind to be entered into. She acquires a provision totally independent of his favour, and deprives him of that source of domestic authority which the common law had left to him,-that of rewarding, or punishing, by a voluntary distribution of his effects, what in his opinion was the good or ill behaviour of his wife.

any

Thus the laws stand with regard to the property already acquired, to its mode of descent, and to family powers. Now as to the new acquisition of real property, and both to the acquisition and security of personal, the law stands thus:

All persons of that persuasion are disabled from taking or purchasing directly, or by trust, any lands, any mortgage upon land, any rents or profits from land, any lease, interest, or term of any land; any annuity for life or lives, or years,

or any estate whatsoever, chargeable upon, or which may in any manner affect, any lands.

One exception, and one only, is admitted by the statutes to the universality of this exclusion, viz. a lease for a term not exceeding thirty-one years. But even this privilege is charged with a prior qualification. This remnant of a right is doubly curtailed; 1st, that, on such a short lease, a rent not less than two-thirds of the full improved yearly value, at the time of the making it, shall be reserved during the whole continuance of the term; and 2ndly, it does not extend to the whole kingdom. This lease must also be in possession, and not in reversion. If any lease is made, exceeding either in duration or value, and in the smallest degree, the above limits, the whole interest is forfeited, and vested ipso facto in the first Protestant discoverer or informer. This discoverer, thus invested with the property, is enabled to sue for it as his own right. The courts of law are not alone open to him; he may (and this is the usual method) enter into either of the courts of equity, and call upon the parties, and those whom he suspects to be their trustees, upon oath, and under the penalties of perjury, to discover against themselves the exact nature and value of their estates in every particular, in order to induce their forfeiture on the discovery. In such suits the informer is not liable to those delays which the ordinary procedure of those courts throws into the way of the justest claimant; nor has the Papist the indulgence which he allows to the most fraudulent defendant, that of plea and demurrer. But the defendant is obliged to answer the whole directly upon oath. The rule of favores ampliandi, &c. is reversed by this act, lest any favour should be shown, or the force and operation of the law in any part of its progress be enervated. All issues to be tried on this act are to be tried by none but known Protestants.

It is here necessary to state as a part of this law, what has been for some time generally understood as a certain consequence of it. The act had expressly provided that a Papist could possess no sort of estate which might affect land (except as before excepted). On this a difficulty did, not unnaturally, arise. It is generally known, a judgment being obtained, or acknowledged, for any debt since the statute of

Westm. 2, 13 Ed. I. c. 18, one half of the debtor's land is to be delivered unto the creditor until the obligation is satisfied, under a writ called Elegit, and this writ has been ever since the ordinary assurance of the land, and the great foundation of general credit in the nation. Although the species of holding under this writ is not specified in the statute, the received opinion, though not juridically delivered, has been, that if they attempt to avail themselves of that security, because it may create an estate, however precarious, in land, their whole debt or charge is forfeited, and becomes the property of the Protestant informer. Thus you observe, first, that by the express words of the law all possibility of acquir ing any species of valuable property, in any sort connected with land, is taken away and secondly, by the construction, all security for money is also cut off. No security is left, except what is merely personal, and which, therefore, most people who lend money would, I believe, consider as none at all.

Under this head of the acquisition of property, the law meets them in every road of industry, and in its direct and consequential provisions throws almost all sorts of obstacles in their way. For they are not only excluded from all offices in church and state, which, though a just and necessary provision, is yet no small restraint in the acquisition; but they are interdicted from the army and the law in all its branches. This point is carried to so scrupulous a severity, that chamber practice, and even private conveyancing, the most voluntary agency, are prohibited to them under the severest penalties and the most rigid modes of inquisition. They have gone beyond even this; for every barrister, six clerk, attorney, or solicitor, is obliged to take a solemn oath. not to employ persons of that persuasion; no, not as hackney clerks, at the miserable salary of 7s. a week. No tradesman of that persuasion is capable, by any service or settlement, to obtain his freedom in any town corporate; so that they trade and work in their own native towns as aliens, paying as such quarterage, and other charges and impositions. They are expressly forbidden, in whatever employment, to take more than two apprentices, except in the linen manufacture only.

In every state, next to the care of the life and properties

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of the subject, the education of their youth has been a subject of attention. In the Irish laws this point has not been neglected. Those who are acquainted with the constitution of our universities need not be informed, that none but those who conform to the Established Church can be at all admitted to study there; and that none can obtain degrees in them who do not previously take all the tests, oaths, and declarations. Lest they should be enabled to supply this defect by private academies and schools of their own, the law has armed itself with all its terrors against such a practice. Popish schoolmasters of every species are proscribed by those acts, and it is made felony to teach even in a private family so that Papists are entirely excluded from an education in any of our authorized establishments for learning at home. In order to shut up every avenue to instruction, the act of King William in Ireland has added to this restraint by precluding them from all foreign education. This act is worthy of attention on account of the singularity of some of its provisions. Being sent for education to any Popish school or college abroad, upon conviction, incurs (if the party sent has any estate of inheritance) a kind of unalterable and perpetual outlawry. The tender and incapable age of such a person, his natural subjection to the will of others, his necessary unavoidable ignorance of the laws, stands for nothing in his favour. He is disabled to sue in law or equity; to be guardian, executor, or administrator: he is rendered incapable of any legacy or deed of gift; he forfeits all his goods and chattels for ever, and he forfeits for his life all his lands, hereditaments, offices, and estate of freehold, and all trusts, powers, or interests therein.

All persons concerned in sending them or maintaining them abroad, by the least assistance of money or otherwise, are involved in the same disabilities, and subjected to the same penalties.

The mode of conviction is as extraordinary as the penal sanctions of this act. A justice of peace, upon information that any child is sent away, may require to be brought before him all persons charged, or even suspected, of sending or assisting, and examine them and other persons on oath concerning the fact. If on this examination he finds it probable that the party was sent contrary to this act, he is then to