foundland House of Assembly. Nor is his Lordship very backward with Radical Reforms, similar to those for which the present Administration is remarkable. We have seen how he has followed up the appropriation principle in Canada, how he has "reformed" the church in New South Wales, and even assailed the university of Nova Scotia. Thus humbly does he labour in his vocation; and the result is, as may be expected, that he destroys the security and the peace of our possessions. With mingled weakness and violence he hurries on apparently heedless of consequences, and utterly dead to the contempt he encounters. He imparts, by his imbecility, strength to the motives of all our foes, and increases all their demands by displaying to them the existence of squeezable materials in the Cabinet, sufficient to give inducements to all who are willing to use them. How can it be otherwise? Mr. Roebuck was the agent of the rebels in Canada, and the Whigs assisted them at Bath. Mr. Leader succeeded to the post, and the Whigs voted for him in Westminster; Mr. Henry Bulwer was the paid servant of the disaffected in New South Wales, and was rewarded by a good post, first in Belgium, and then in Turkey. All those governors who have done good are recalled, and their energy becomes a recognised and punishable offence. All officers who do their duty are discouraged. So it was with Sir John Colborne and the late Governor of Upper Canada, with Chief-Justice Boulton, Colonel Arthur, Sir Benjamin D'Urban, Mr. Jeremie and others. Nothing is now required to get rid of a vigilant governor but some false charges. Nothing is wanted to procure any violent measure of innovation but a little proportionately violent agitation, no matter whether in Ireland, Newfoundland, or Van Dieman's Land. When the Roman Catholics want another grant they say, "Of course Lord Glenelg will give it." When they find it necessary to their progress in the Ionian Islands that they should have government aid, they say, "There is no doubt of Lord " when they 66 Glenelg's assistance; want a few dozen more priests in the West Indies, they exclaim, Apply to Lord Glenelg, there can be no question of his approbation !"* They display constantly the most contemptuous confidence in his indiscretion, inconsistency, and folly. They have no hesita tion in making the most extensive demands, and their past success undoubtedly is calculated to animate them with hope in all their future proceedings to secure their lost ascendency, and restore their regretted despotism. Such is a brief statement of Lord Glenelg's colonial misgoverment. No matter where he is traced, no matter how closely or how superficially he is watched, every where and in every thing there is discovered the same incapability. He holds the office some of the ablest men this country ever saw have held, and the only probable consequence of his career seems to be the decay of British influence, if not the actual loss of extensive possessions. By the courage and prudence of men who have (as we have said, and repeat again, and desire to sound loudly through the country) been disgraced and dismis ed, Canada was saved when no human foresight could have given a hope of its restoration to tranquillity and submission. He delayed vigorous measures till something more than vigour was requiredtill, in fact, a dictator could alone secure what earlier measures of a far milder character might have entirely and permanently preserved from peri. And Canada, though it be but one colony among many, is, as an exemplification of Lord Glenelg's imbecility, and of the wretched weakness of the whole Whig-radical Cabinet, a name for the whole empire. How long it shall so continue; how long our most important interests shall be made the sport of a petty and trembling faction, ridiculed at home, imposed upon by foreign countries, braved in the colonies, it is for the people of England to determine. It is idle to attempt to conceal that every year of Whig authority brands the country with disgrace, and loads her with difficulties. It may See the Catholic Magazine for these and other very edifying proofs of the esti mation in which Lord Glenelg is held. answer the purpose of hirelings to represent, that, although Lord Glenelg is inefficient, Lord Palmerston incompetent, and all the other Ministry wanting both in zeal and discretion, yet they must be kept in, all for the behoof of a Lord Normanby and a Mr Drummond; and on account of the blessings those persons are supposed to confer on Ireland. But this weak invention of the enemy, this paltry clap-trap, has no more power to delude. It has had its day, it has been exposed, and may now serve for a sarcasm, or pass current as a jest. And if it were any thing, would it really outweigh all the misdemeanors of the Ministry, and all the risks to which the nation is subject? But it is not true; it is a vain and valueless, a fraudulent and dishonest pretence; for Ireland, according to the testimony of Parliamentary returns, according to the acknowledgment even of the paupered demagogues themselves, is a volcano bursting with terrific violence and unprecedented desolation. Well, then, we say, if Ireland too is but another evidence of Whig misrule, there remains not one corner of the empire to which their evil infiuence and their pernicious counsels have not carried danger and occasioned injuries the most deep and lasting. Every where the same policy has been adopted. Every where the same results have ensued. Time can only develop still more clearly the wounds that have been inflicted on the constitution of the country, its power, and its reputation; nor is there one who in future days (and those not distant ones) will be recognised as the author of more mis-`` chiefs and the agent of more destructive and disgraceful measures, than that pretender to statesmanship who now, to the dishonour of the land, feebly acts as the ruler of our colonial dominions. A CRUSTACEOUS TOUR. BY THE IRISH OYSTER-EATER. Why then, the world's mine oyster THE important and difficult question of precedency among oysters has not yet ceased to exist as a "vexata questio" with enlightened and philosophic oyster-eaters. Information upon the subject is scanty, and when facts are few, theories abound, and conclusions are usually false and illo gical. I have employed the tedious interval of the spawning season in putting together a few memoranda of a tour in the sister island, which I venture to hope will afford better grounds for instituting an exact comparison between the present state and prospects of oyster-eating in England and Ireland than are any where to be found, and may be the means of settling disputed claims, and of uniting in one natural bond of union and mutual support, oyster-eaters of all denominations. Ancient Pistol. ing for their blood. I am well aware of the apathy of the oyster-eating public of England. But I do not despair -No, my countrymen, our oysters shall be put on a perfect equality with the oysters of Purfleet and of Milton the banks of Burren, and Carlingford, and Lissadell, shall be adequately represented in the Imperial oystercellars. Are our oysters inferior to their oysters-hence, then, for the Malahides and the the Poldoodies, we demand justice-our oysters call for justice-we require for our oysters no more, and our oysters were slaves to be content with less! The city of Londonderry lends her maiden name to the oyster of Lough Foyle, which finds a ready market in Liverpool, where the judicious tourist will do well to spend a few forenoons, the clean and well-regulated fish mar. I am aware that I shall have much ket affording every facility to the to contend with in putting forward the crustaceous epicure. Heavens! what just claims of Irish oysters. I know a goodly show the marble benches there exists an anti-Irish faction, eager boast! Gigantic turbot, already garto depreciate our oysters, and thirst- nished with the live lobster-slimy soles moist with their native element which were half a dozen of the most -gelatinous cod-heads but I digress. The Londonderry oyster, then, as best seen in the Liverpool market, is small, well shaped, white, fat, and goodly to the view, but it is by no means a superior fish-on the contrary, there is a villanous after-taste, as of mud, excessively disagreeable a ground flavour, as if the fish had licked the slimy bed of its nativity. I have eaten this fish within the walls of its native city, but even the exulting recollection of the ancient glories of Derry failed to reconcile me to the modern muddy-tasted Derry oyster. Alas! poor Derry! Progressing southwards, I arrived at Belfast, which boasts no indigenous bivalve, but adopts for her own the gigantic oyster of Carrickfergus, which, as I am informed, is the name of a city, not of an oyster-bed. Procuring a guide, I requested him to precede my steps to those Cimmerian regions "where oysters most did congregate," and presently arrived, guided more by the nose than by the other senses, at one of the retired emporia of shell-fish in the Athens of Ireland. The place was a study-soft unresisting mud formed the primitive floor, a board, unplaned and rough, elevated upon a pile of bricks, simulated a divan, while the table was supplied by two of the divan boards tacked together, and extended from end to end of the "saloon." A rushlight flickered in an old iron candlestick, and "a most ancient and fish-like smell" pervaded the apartment. Forthwith appeared a hideous crone, whose breath, redolent of whisky and tobacco, was expended in the business-like enquiry, "Wud ye we for oysters, my man?" This interrogatory was replied to by an order for half a hundred of her very primest Carrickfergus natives to begin with. "Half a hunner-a bail half-hunner-Oh! oh! oh! the man's a haveril-a hail half-hunner o' Carricks-save us!" With this ejaculation, my hostess having clutched the rushlight in her palm, decamped, leaving me in a state of tribulation that may be imagined, as the saying is, but beggars all description. In a few minutes, however, Alecto returned with the rushlight stuck in a trencher of the largest size, upon magnanimous oysters I had ever seen. stomach, clogged with its material tunics, and sadly embarrassed with its serous, mucous, and muscular coats, gave vent to its ill-humour in awful rumbling noises, such as vex the intestinal canals of Vesuvius or Stromboli. But lo! at the brow of the hill we pause-in the valley before us lies Newry-beyond, in the far distance, are seen the blue outlines of the Carlingford mountains-beyond the mountains lies the bay-at the bottom of the bay lie the oysters. "Coachman leaves here, sir." We are in Newry -and before us, on the break fast-table, in a huge wooden bowl, behold the gelatinous objects of our affections-the real, the undoubted, unsophisticated Carlingfords, and no mistake! Newry is dear to my remembrances -I have heard it called an odious hole, and so forth—to me it was every thing that was delightful, for the oysters were in season. The waiter at Black's (for your own sake go to Black's, the Shakspeare, and order your oysters in Edmund Kean's favorite room) talked about party squabbles and religious squabbles. I saw nor heard nothing of either, for the oysters were of the primest. The disaffected grumbled, it is true, about the decline of trade, and taxation, and such stuff; crops, they said, were never so bad-when, may I ask, were oysters better? Thus is it ever with perverse human nature the vice to neglect the blessings we possess, and hanker after the blessings which we possess not, to complain of the unavoidable contingencies of sublunary things, and forget, in over-wrought anticipations of unattainable felicity, that much whereof the happiness of life is made up is still within our grasp, and that whatever evils oppress us, and whatever cares corrode, still there remains for us the consolation that we have oysters of the best, and that our oysters are in season! 1 have always been prone to a belief in supernaturals, and a circumstance occurred while I was opening an acquaintance with the natives of Carlingford at Newry that by no means diminishes the Rosicrucianity of my notions of the spiritual. It was near the midnight hour-the candles down almost to the socket-I had supped sparingly on some three quarters of a hundred, more or less, of my favourite fish, scalloped, stewed, and au was naturel, kept down by half-a-dozen stiff tumblers of hot brandy and water, less or more-a sort of soporiferousness laid hold of me the full-length of the immortal Kean, presented by himself to his friend mine host of the Shakspeare, reeled in its gorgeous gilded frame-the chamber was locomotive-if I had exceeded in any way, I might have supposed myself a little "how came you so?" Be that as it may, however, a rustling noise heard outside the door, as if a barrel of oysters had been tumbled on the spot, which I verily believe to have been the case, for on a sudden the door opening wide, in came a sea of oysters, rolling heels over head, in waves of confusion to my very feet. It was, in fact, a deputation from Carlingford, sent by the natives there to invite me to a public dinner. Think of that, Master Brook! By one of those legerdemain tricks that occur so frequently at public meetings, the entire deputation got, somehow or other, upon the table, where, having wriggled themselves into something like order, a venerable bivalve, gray with barnacles and age, advanced to the front, and having opened his shell, delivered himself nearly as follows:-" Sir, the natives of Carlingford having heard, to their cost, of your arrival in this neighbourhood, and being well aware of the deadly interest you take in their affairs, have resolved to sacrifice a number of their choicest inhabitants to your judicious palate (hear, hear!' from a little fat oyster ;) and accordingly, for the honour and reputation of the natives of Carlingford (hear!' from the fat one) a sufficient number of volunteers have generously come forward (bravo!) to die gloriously for their compatriots (hear, hear! and clattering of shells on all sides.) We, the deputation in this matter appointed, do therefore respectfully solicit you to name day (hear, hear!' from the corpulent bivalve) when we may expect the pleasure of your company at the oyster-beds, for which purpose the Mayor and Aldermen of Carlingford have generously placed an oysterboat and diving-bell at your disposal. (Great and enthusiastic clattering.)" What answer I might have made to this hospitable proposal I know not, for, having taken umbrage at the eternal "hear, hear!" of the little bloated a native (there always is in deputations, if you observe, one greasy little abomination making his lungs as prominent as his belly) I watched my opportunity, and catching him between the jaws with my oyster-knife while in the act of ejaculating a "hear, hear!" I opened him in a twinkling, to the evident consternation of the surviving crustacea, who, seeing me bolt their obese colleague, retreated in the same disorder in which they had arrived! I might have treated the whole affair as the natural result of a scanty supper and limited supply of grog, had I not discovered a paper which the deputation left behind in their precipitate retreat, and which is so well considered and temperately expressed, that I do not think it unworthy a place in the records of my peregrinations. "To the Most Honourable the Marquess of Anglesey, K. G., K. St. P., G. C. B., a General in the Army, Colonel of the Seventh Light Dragoons, Lord-Lieutenant of Angleseyshire, &c. &c. &c. “The Petition of the Natives of Carlingford humbly and respectfully showeth, "That petitioners and their ancestors have been, from time immemorial, submarine inhabitants of the oyster-beds in the bay of Carlingford, whereof your Lordship is lord of the soil. "That they have enjoyed for centuries a reputation for fatness and flavour second to none, superior to most, equal to any. "That they bring higher prices, and are more in demand than any other description of oyster in Dublin and elsewhere. "That they regret to state that, of late years, owing to the poverty of the fishermen, or the system of too frequent dredging, or from indiscriminate and rapacious abstraction of the inferior fish, they have suffered in character, are less in demand, and sold at a lower price per hundred than formerly. "That whereas in personal appearance your petitioners were formerly invariably as round as a ball, white as a nut, and full as a tick, they latterly have become little better than so many bits of slate, owing to the operation of some or other of the causes above tated. I take no credit to myself for the announcement of the fact, which I state from undoubted authority, that owing to my exertions in this matter, a commission has been appointed to inquire into, and report upon, the state and prospects of the oyster-beds generally, while six-and-thirty assist ant commissioners, with a sufficient supply of biscuits, oyster-knives, and bottled stout, have already been appointed, and have actually set out to prosecute their inquiries on the spot. It is supposed that in twenty years' time there will be sufficient data accumulated to frame the first report, and that not more than thirty thousand pounds will be required annually for this commission. Indeed it is generally supposed that our paternal Government, acting on the principle embodied in the Railway Report, will discourage oyster-eating generally, except under Government auspices. It has already been calculated that no oyster-cellar under extra-ministerial management will pay more than three and a half per cent on the sunken capital, and it is predetermined to recommend a "Central Metropolitan Oyster Emporium," to be established in the Castle of Dublin, of which the celebrated Mr. Dando, the oyster-eater, is intended to be resident stipendiary commissioner ! Leaving Newry and the North, we cross the Carlingford mountains into Lowth, passing on our way many towns and villages remarkable for beggars and dirt, and one sweet little spot (Castle Bellingham) notorious for cleanliness and humming ale-good ale, rare beverage in this alcoholic clime! Oysters are not cultivated be |