It is precisely at this point that controversy grows hottest, and where it becomes hardest, therefore, to see a clear way between contending statements, which seem to meet and thrust one another, as it were at the very sword’s point.  That the sale of parliamentary seats—­so shocking to our reformed eyes—­was not regarded in the same light at the date of the Irish Union is certain, and in questions of ethics contemporary judgment is the first and most important point to be considered.  The sale of a borough carried with it no more necessary reprobation then than did the sale of a man, say, in Jamaica or Virginia.  Boroughs were bought and sold in open market, and many of them had a recognized price, so much for the current session, so much more if in perpetuity.  We must try clearly to realize this, in order to approach the matter fairly, and, as far as possible, to put the ugly word “bribery” out of our thoughts, at all events not allow it to carry them beyond the actual facts of the case.  Pitt, there is no question, had resolved to carry his point, but we have no right to assume that he wished to carry it by corrupt means, and the fact that those who opposed it were to be indemnified for their seats no less than those who promoted it, makes so far strongly in his favour.

On the other hand, the impression which any given transaction leaves upon the generation which has actually witnessed it is rarely entirely wrong, and that the impression produced by the carrying of the Irish Union—­almost equally upon its friends and its foes—­was, to put it mildly, unfavourable, few will be disposed to deny.  Over and above this general testimony, we have the actual letters of those who were mainly instrumental in carrying it into effect, and it is difficult to read those of Lord Cornwallis without perceiving that he at least regarded the task as a repellent one, and one which as an honourable man he would gladly have evaded had evasion been possible.  It is true that Lord Castlereagh, who was associated intimately with him in the enterprise, shows no such reluctance, but then the relative characters of the two men prevent that circumstance from having quite as much weight as it otherwise might.

The fact is that the whole affair is still enveloped in such a hedge of cross-statement and controversy, that in spite of having been eighty-seven years before the world, it still needs careful elucidation, and the last word upon it has certainly not yet been written.  To attempt anything of the sort here would be absurd, so we must be content with simply following the actual course of events.

[Illustration:  MARQUIS CORNWALLIS. (Engraved by James Stow from an original drawing by S.D.  Koster.)]