IRELAND.

Earl Fortescue, the Lord-Lieutenant, was married to Lady Somer- ville, by the Bishop of Cagbel, at the Vice-regal Lodge, Phoenix Park, on Monday, the 26th,,Jely„ -The ceremony was strictly private, only the immediate relatives M the bride and bridegroom being present. Lord and Lady Fortescue repaired immediately afterwards to Maretimo, the seat of Lord Cloncnrry, at Black Rock.

Lord Morpeth arrived at Kingstown, from England, on Friday even- ing, and immediately proceeded to Phoenix Park.

In the Postscript of our last number we mentioned that Lord Dufferin had died suddenly, during the night, on board a steam-boat going from Liverpool to Belfast. The contents of his stomach have been exa- mined, and the conclusion is that his death was caused by an over-dose of morphine.

At the meeting of the Repeal Association, on Monday, Mr. O'Con- nell made his reappearance, with a speech and a document which he called a "declaration." The Dublin election claimed his first attention. The present Members, he averred, had been returned by "that class of animals called Assessors' "- He read an advertisement from the Evening Mail of 2d January 1837, from the Committee of the Irish Conservative Election Fund, in which it was set forth that the battle of the constitution was to be fought in the Registry Court and at the hustings; and this document was signed by R. N. Nash, J. Long- field, and John Francis Waller, the Assessor at the late election. This was a pretty judge to expect impartiality from! He, the Assessor, very soon disco- vered, that by refusing the right of voting to those who had ate words " house and premises ' in their certificates of registry, it would greatly militate against the Liberal candidates. On the other hand, this judge decided that the words " house and appurtenances" were good. What inconsistency was here exhi- bited!

He analyzed the poll-returns, to show that the vast majority of elec- tors possessing property qualifications had voted for himself and Mr. Hutton ; the Tories' majority consisting of freemen. It had been said that there was a change of public opinion, because some Roman Catho- lics voted against him— Such was not the case; there were not twenty Roman Catholics in all : one was Counsellor Makay, who assigned a list of reasons for voting for the Con- servatives ; hut, on turning to the book published by West and Grogan, he found that Makay voted for West and Hamilton in 1835, and also in 1837; therefore he had no right to be set down as a Roman Catholic who had changed his opinions.

Then he turned to Carlow election, where the Tory majority was this year reduced to 7, having been 167 at the last election. Colonel Bruen had threatened to exact every shilling from those who had voted against him and owed him money : they could pay him with the Insolvent Debtors Act ; but they should be protected— This Association and the friends of liberty in Ireland should, however, step in and protect the honest voters of Carlow from the threatened persecution. Already a fund had been formed, called the " Counties League Fund," fur the protection of those electors. He had handed in 430/, from persons who con- tributed it for the relief of those voters; and he would now move that 5001. be sent down to Carlow. On Sunday next a meeting would be held in Carlow to give the League full effect. Meetings were also organizing in Kildare, Meath, Clare, Limerick, Queen's County, and several other counties; and he did not doubt that in a short time such a fund would be formed as would enable the Liberals to protect the poor tenantry who dared to vote according to their con- sciences.

Mr. O'Connell then produced his " Declaration of the Grievances and Rights of the People of Ireland." It is a long document, like an ordinary Hereditary-bondsmen letter, but somewhat more solemn and formal in construction. The usual quotation appears in its ampler form-

" Hereditary bondsmen, know ye mt. . Who would be free. themselves must strike the blow?

Can Gaul or Mibeovito relieve you ?—No! By your own right arms your freedom must be wrought"

Mr. O'Connell begins by saying that he will neither mitigate nor exaggerate, for a plain statement of facts will have a more powerful effect than the most imaginative description. The first article in this plain statement runs thus-

" No country upon the face of the globe ever inflicted upon any other country such wrongs and iniquitous oppressions as England has inflicted upon Ireland."

The changes are rung on this favourite assertion ; as thus, in the fourth article--

" So far from having relaxed in the antipathy to the Irish people, and their hatred of the religion of the Irish nation, the English people now exhibit more venomous virulence and acrimony than ever they did in the worst periods of our history."

The stock illustrations, Lord Morpeth's vote against the extension of the Irish franchise, and the Tory majority just elected by the English constituencies, are repeated : this " wicked hostility to Ireland and to her Catholic people is vicious, almost to a pitch of demoniacal insanity." Contrasted with the English is the conduct of the Scotch, the majority of whom are " decidedly favourable to Ireland." Facts 14, 15, and 16 in the " plain statement," stand thus- " 14. That under the Administration conducted by Peel and Lord Stanley, it will be imprudent, and indeed utterly unsafe, to call out the Irish Militia, as that force must necessarily be constituted in the proportion of ninety-nine Catholics to one of every other religion.

" 15. That Foreign Powers, in dealing with the Peel-Stanley Administration, will avail themselves of the weakness and wickedness of that Administration, occasioned by their misgovernment of Ireland.

" 16. That the conduct of the Tory aristocracy and electors in England is thus manifestly marked by that insane self-delusion and political extravagance which appear from history to precede, as they presage, some signal national vengeance of the Almighty." Next follows a list of " grievances of which the Irish people com- plain "—the Irish Church, unequal franchise, and so forth : "one of the most emaciating nature is the enormous increase of the absentee drain occasioned by the Union"; the Union itself being the crowning griev- ance. Then there is a list of " additional calamities " which the Orange-Tory party " audaciously threaten to inflict upon the Irish nation " ; beginning with " the Scorpion Bill of Stanley," and proceed- ing in a string of assumptions as to what the party will do ; ex. 9r. " The Stanley-Peel party declare that they will fill the bench of justice with the most acrimonious partisans they can and—with men who declare their con- viction that the Irish are systematic perjurers, and that perjury is encouraged by their religion. • • a a • The Peel-Stanley party declare that the press in Ireland shall be subdued; that in the present iniquitous state of the libel law they will meet every un- palatable truth by a state-prosecution ; that they will prevent the exposure of their crimes by all the inflictions which a bad law and partisan judges can pos- sibly furnish, by the summary process of attachment, and by the equally vexatious though more tedious proceeding by ex-officio information or indict- ment.

" In fine, between present grievances and future oppressions, the object of the Peel-Stanley party is to deprive the people of Ireland of all constitutional channels of exertion and of every ray of hope, and ultimately to force them, if possible, into open insurrection."

" We caution you, beloved friends," proceeds Mr. O'Connell, " not to be provoked into any such course" ; and he exhorts them not to he without hope,—assuring them (in proper Irish fashion) that " among the English people Ireland has many active and zealous friends," though "the friends of Ireland, to be sure, are comparatively few among the English people "; but then the majority of the Scotch are with them, and the Queen- " The Queen, my friends, our noble Queen, heartily and sincerely desires to see justice done to Ireland : your enemies are equally her enemies; she is in their toils ; she wears their fetters. But, with the blessing of Heaven and the aid of good men, her bonds shall he broken, your enemies scattered, and she shall be restored to the brilliant freedom of her majestic throne."

So he recommends that every parish in Ireland shall hold simulta- neous meetings to address the Queen ; and especially that they should " peaceably and constitutionally declare their determination, by enrolling themselves in the Loyal National Repeal Association of Ireland."

" Let, then, one shout arise from the Giant's Causeway to Cape Clear—from Connemara to the Hill of Howth—let there be but one universal voice upon the breeze of heaven, " Hurrah for Repeal ! ! ! " DANIEL O'CONNELL, Chairman of the Committee."

Among the subscriptions announced at this meeting were, 53/. from a body Irishmen calling themselves the Temperance and Repeal of the Union Society of Providence, in Rhode Island, United States; 181. sent through the Reverend Michael Brennan, a priest residing at Belleville, Hastings County, Canada, with a request that the Contributors might be enrolled us members of the Repeal Association ; and 430/. towards the fund for indemnifying the voters in Carlow, already alluded to in Mr. O'Connell's speech.

After Mr. O'Connell left Cork, he proceeded on Wednesday to Kil- kenny; where he was escorted into the town by a great number of the people. He delivered an address on his standing topics—the " animal called an Assessor," English hatred of Ireland, and England's critical position with discontent at home and hostility abroad, and so on ; not forgetting the usual recommendation- " From Connemara to the Hill of Howtb, from the Giant's Causeway to Cape Clear, let us raise the shout of Repeal I"

A meeting was held on Tuesday, at the Dahlia Corn Exchange, on the requisition of Mr. O'Connell, to arrange plans for supporting the Liberal interest at the ensuing municipal elections. Mr. O'Connell said, that if proper exertions were made, eleven out of the fifteen wards

might be secured. He promised to remain in Dublin to watch the elec- tion : he should have little to do during the next session of Parliament, except to watch Stanley.

The Dublin correspondent of the Morning Chronicle collects judicial testimony to the tranquillity of the country. The Judges in Clare, Wicklow, and Leitrim, congratulated the Grand Juries upon the very small number of prisoners for trial ; the Chief Baron congratulated the Grand Jury of Sligo upon the peace and good order of their district; Mr. Justice Torrens observed that the cases at Wexford were few, and, generally speaking, not of a serious character ; Baron Foster said that the crimes of which the twenty .six prisoners on the calendar at Kildare were accused, were of a nature to afford just cause for congratulating the county on the good order and tranquillity it at present enjoys ; Mr. Justice Perrin declared that the calendar at Louth was unprecedentedly light, and did great credit to that large and populous county; the Leinster Express, a Tory paper, says "the dock is empty"; ; Mr. Justice Torrens announced in Waterford city that there were only three cases for trial, though those were serious ; in Waterford county Baron Pennefather felicitated the Grand Jury on the quiet and peace- able character of their district.

The correspondent of the Tinier, on the contrary, collects formidable paragraphs about " the state of the country," of a very different tenour. Yesterday it had a string of these. Four men were arrested with un- usually long pikes at Deninga ; the people of the neighbourhood, says the Kilkenny Moderator denouncing the Police for interfering with the pikemen. The Roman Catholis who voted for Colonel Bruen are per- secuted in Carlow, their property destroyed, their wives pelted with stones, or stripped naked and driven abroad for ferocious mockery, while in some chapels a pen has been erected in which to confine the erring voters during Divine service. At Glinubreeda, the Nenagh Guardian says a man was beaten almost to death, and robbed. The Tipperary Constitutional tells of eight pikemen who repulsed the Police that were about to arrest them at Lacoppal Bridge ; of another party, of eight, who broke open a }melee at Lisronagh, and beat two men ; and of a third party, of three, who broke open a house on a Sunday and carried away two guns. These accouuts, hoe ever, have neither the comprehensive- ness nor the high authority of the judicial declarations.

The Dublin papers are busy with a marvellous ghost-story. One John Fortune, a porter on the Kingstown Railway, has appeared to his sister, a servant, after his own death, and duly instructed her to pay some small debts, the memory of which prevents his repose. One of these was 3d., for some cherries which he bought of a stall-woman near the station ; and the largest of them was 3s. for drink on sundry occasions. It is said that these debts are all found to have been correctly stated by the late Mr. Fortune, though in some instances the creditor had forgotten the matter. In one case the ghost, by divers knocks, manifested a de- cided objection to one Mrs. Marshall's being paid a claim for more than was justly due to her-98. instead of 2s. ; the creditor ultimately found that she was mistaken, and not " old Truepenny."