then in London, a petition, in the name of the said dissenting minister, in behalf of himself and others who lay under any such prosecution; and in about a fortnight's time his excellency sent over a letter, to the then lords justices, to give the attorney and solicitor general orders, to enter a noli prosequi to all such suits; which was done accordingly, though he never so much as inquired into the merits of the cause, or referred the petition to any body, which is a justice done to all men, let the case be ever so light. He said he had her majesty's orders for it: but they did not appear under her hand; and it is generally affirmed he never had any.

That his excellency can descend to small gains, take this instance: there were 8501. ordered by her majesty, to buy new liveries for the state trumpets, messengers, etc. but with great industry he got them made cheaper by 2001. which he saved out of that sum; and it is reported, that his steward got a handsome consideration besides from the undertaker.

The agent to his regiment, being so also to others, bought a lieutenant's commiffion in a regiment of foot, for which he never was to do any duty; which service pleased his excellency so well, that he gave him leave to buy a company, and would have had him keep both; but before his pleasure was known, the former was disposed of.

The lord lieutenant has no power to remove, or put in a solicitor general, without the queen's letter, it being one of those employments excepted out of his commission; yet, because sir Richard Levinge disobliged him by voting according to his opinion, he removed him, and put in Mr. Forster although

*

* Afterward recorder of the city of Dublin, and lord chief juftice of the common pleas.

he

he had no queen's letter for so doing: only a letter from Mr. Secretary Boyle, that her majesty designed to remove him.

The privy council in Ireland have a great share of the administration; all things being carried by the consent of the majority, and they sign all orders and proclamations there, as well as the chief governor. But his excellency disliked so great a share of power in any but himself; and when matters were debated in council otherwise than he approved, he would stop them, and say, "Come, my lords, I see "how your opinions are, and therefore I will not "take your votes ;" and so would put an end to the dispute.

One of his chief favourites was a scandalous clergyman, a constant companion of his pleasures, who appeared publickly with his excellency, but never in his habit, and who was a hearer and sharer of all the lewd and blasphemous discourses of his excellency and his cabal. His excellency presented this worthy divine to one of the bishops, with the following recommendation: " My lord, Mr. is a very

"honest fellow, and has no fault, but that he is a "little too immoral." He made this man chaplain to his regiment, though he had been so infamous, that a bishop in England refused to admit him to á living he had been presented to, till the patron forced him to it by law.

His excellency recommended the earl of Inchiquin to be one of the lords justices in his absence, and was much mortified when he found lieutenant general Ingoldsby appointed without any regard to his recommendation; particularly because the usual salary of a lord justice, in the lord lieutenant's ab

sence, is 100l. per month, and he had bargained with the earl for 40%.

I will send you, in a packet or two, some particulars of his excellency's usage of the convocation; of his infamous intrigues with Mrs. Coningsby; an account of his arbitrary proceedings about the election of a magistrate in Trim; his selling the place of a privy counsellor and commissioner of the revenue to Mr. Conolly; his barbarous injustice to dean Jephson and poor Will Crow; his deciding a case at hazard to get my lady twenty guineas, but in so scandalous and unfair a manner, that the arrantest sharper would be ashamed of; the common custom of playing on Sunday in my lady's closet; the partie quarrée between her ladyship and Mrs. Fl-d and two young fellows dining privately and frequently at Clontarf, where they used to go in a hackney-coach; and his excellency's making no scruple of dining in a hedge tavern whenever he was invited; with some other passages which I hope, you will put into some method, and correct the style, and publish as speedily as you can.

Note, Mr. Savage, beside the prosecution about his fees, was turned out of the council for giving his vote in parliament, in a case where his excellency's own friends were of the same opinion, till they were wheedled or threatened out of it by his excellency.

The particulars before mentioned I have not yet received. Whenever they come, I shall publish them in a second part.

SOME

SOME

REMARKS

UPON

A PAMPHLET ENTITLED, A LETTER TO THE SEVEN *

LORDS OF THE COMMITTEE APPOINTED TO EX

AMINE GREGG†. BY THE AUTHOR OF THE EX

AMINER.

FIRST PRINTED IN 1711.

THOSE who have given themselves the trouble to write against me, either in single papers or pamphlets, (and they are pretty numerous) do all agree in discovering a violent rage, and at the same time affecting an air of contempt toward their adversary;

* The committee consisted of the dukes of Devonshire, Somer set, and Bolton; the earl of Wharton; lord viscount Townshend ; lord Somers, and lord Halifax. Gregg was tried at the Old Bailey, Jan. 19. 1707-8, and condemned for high treason; but was not executed till April 28, 1708.

+"The Examiner has been down this month, and was very "silly the five or six last papers; but there is a pamphlet come out, "in answer to a letter to the seven lords who examined Gregg. "The answer is by the real author of the Examiner, as I believe, ❝for it is very well written." Journal to Stella, Aug. 24, 1711, Even to this lady, to whom he usually writes with unreserved confidence, Dr. Swift had not yet acknowledged himself to be the author of the Examiner.

which, in my humble opinion, are not very consistent and therefore it is plain, that their fury is real and hearty, their contempt only personated. I have pretty well studied this matter, and would caution writers of their standard, never to engage in that difficult attempt of despising; which is a work to be done in cold blood, and only by a superiour genius, to one at some distance beneath him. I can truly affirm, I have had a very sincere contempt for many of those who have drawn their pens against me; yet I rather chose the cheap way of discovering it by silence and neglect, than be at the pains of new terms to express it: I have known a lady value herself upon a haughty disdainful look, which very few understood, and nobody alive regarded. Those commonplace terms of infamous scribbler, prostitute libeller, and the like, thrown abroad without propriety or provocation, do ill personate the true spirit of contempt, because they are such as the meanest writer, whenever he pleases, may use toward the best, I remember indeed a parish fool, who, with a great deal of deformity, carried the most disdainful look I ever observed in any countenance: and it was the most prominent part of his folly; but he was thoroughly in earnest, which these writers are not: for there is another thing I would observe, that my antagonists are most of them so, in a literal sense; breathe real vengeance, and extend their threats to my person, if they knew where to find it; wherein they are so far from despising, that I am sensible they do me too much honour. The author of the Letter to the Seven Lords, takes upon him the three characters of a despiser, a threatener, and a railer; and succeeds so well in the two last, that it has made