When Solomon said there was nothing new under the sun, he never knew Lord Normanby. That's a fact, and now to show cause.
No attribute of regal, and consequently it may be inferred of vice-regal personages, have met such universal praise from the world, as the wondrous tact they would seem to possess, regarding the most suitable modes of flattering the pride and gratifying the passions of those they govern.
It happens not unfrequently, that they leave this blessed privilege unused, and give themselves slight pains in its exercise; but should the time come when its exhibition may be deemed fit or necessary, their instinctive appreciation is said never to fail them, and they invariably hit off the great trait of a people at once.
Perhaps it may be the elevated standard on which they are placed, gives them this wondrous _coup-d'oeil_, and enables them to take wider views than mortals less eminently situated; perhaps it is some old leaven of privileges derivable from right divine. But no matter, the thing is so. Napoleon well knew the temper of Frenchmen in his day, and how certain short words, emblematic of their country's greatness and glory, could fascinate their minds and bend them to his purpose. In Russia, the czar is the head of the church, as of the state, and a mere word from him to one of his people is a treasure above all price. In Holland, a popular monarch taps some forty puncheons of schnapps, and makes the people drunk. In Belgium, he gets up a high mass, and a procession of virgins. In the States, a rabid diatribe against England, and a spice of Lynch Law, are clap-trap. But every land has its own peculiar leaning--to be gratified by some one concession or compliment in preference to every other.
Now, when Lord Normanby came to Ireland, he must have been somewhat puzzled by the very multiplicity of these expectations. It was a regular "embarras de richesses." There was so much to give, and he so willing to give it!
First, there was discouragement to be dealt out against Protestants--an easy and a pleasant path; then the priests were to be brought into fashion--a somewhat harder task; country gentlemen were to be snubbed and affronted; petty attorneys were to be petted and promoted; all claimants with an "O" to their names were to have something--it looked national; men of position and true influence were to be pulled down and degraded, and so on. In fact, there was a good two years of smart practice in the rupture of all the ties of society, and in the overthrow of whatever was respectable in the land, before he need cry halt.