general respect for unbiased integrity. The number of judges in each Irish Court was fixed to three, and in England occasionally to five, that an uneven number might prevent the delay or interruption of business. The salaries of Irish judges were however too trifling, and looked for occasional increase to the bounty of the King; yet eminent English lawyers were induced to fill such stations, but landed grants from the Crown made ample compensation. When this redundancy was disposed of, we find in subsequent reigns persons sent occasionally from that country of an inferior cast and character.
We are now entering upon a reign of singular art and misfortune, in which struggles for power were conducted by men in different parties, memorable for eminent talents; however, a majority of them in each island were trained to legal pursuits, or acquired no small proficiency therein. During the period which led to this sanguinary scene there was an active president in the English and Irish Cabinet who invigorated the whole, and paved the way for an extensive and inveterate civil war.
As law was to be moulded to new purposes, its professors and their imputed principles were to Strafford and Charles objects of constant solicitude and care. An hereditary sameness marked the members, as well as the legal system, in England. Ireland was habited in a different manner, and its new Viceroy incessantly laboured to distinguish this island by tyrannic variations from English law, or subversive of its acknowledged or established principles. The unfortunate class of Irish judges had many difficulties to encounter: an hasty and indiscriminate compliance with the Castle laid them at its mercy, and prevented the well known power of directing an occasional connexion therewith to family convenience. Stern and unbending integrity ensured dismissal, and exposed an unprotected individual to exertions of perverted prerogative and unqualified tyranny. Strafford's vanity led him to think that the effect of his principles would make Ireland to lasting ages a conquered kingdom, an introductory theatre for successful tyranny, and a strong military post to awe and repress British freedom. As an
