GENERAL.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXIV, Issue 33, 18 December 1896, Page 13

GENERAL.

The Records Of Dublin.— The Bixth volume of the Dublin Municipal Records, just published, carries the history of the municipality from 1695 down to 1715-16. These years may be described as the beginning of the Orange period. The attempt made during the short term of Jacobite predominance to broaden the basis of the city government and introduce principles of toleration failed with the triumph of the Orange rebellion. Accordingly the municipal government became narrower than ever, and the Dublin Council an embodiment of the worst spirit of the penal days. In the Assembly Rolls of the period we find frequent records of the deprivation of Catholics of their franchise with the consequent loss of liberty to trade. Thus, under date October 9, 169.J, there is the following entry :—": — " Whereas, one James Dennis, barber, was admitted a freeman of this citty as a French refugee, and by the same pretence obtained his f reedome of the corporation of barbers chirurgeons, at which time he took the usual oathes and subscribed the declaration, according to the custome of the citty ; but, forasmuch, as the said James Dennis is a profest Papist, having lately declared himself as such before the right honourable the Lord Mayor and severall of the aldermen ; it is, therefore, ordered and agreed upon, by the authority of the said assembly, that the said James Dennis be and is hereby disfranchised from the freedome and liberty of this citty." James Malone, a city publisher, fell under thecorporate ban in the following year, as "the principal promoter and trader in Popish books." Malone had been an alderman under King James' Charter, and king's printer in Ireland during the same brief breathing-space. One wonders whether he was any relation of Shakespeare's Malone. Another minute records the dismissal of certain "Papist" collectors of "the tole com"; while yet another records the disfranchisement of Robert Caddell, who stands indicted and outlawed for high treason against William and Mary, and who offended the Orange oligarchs in 1687 by joining in the attempt to secure a new charter. At the same time, as the native '• Papists " were getting it hot, the arrangements for the admission of French Huguenots were revived, and there are records of frequent admissions. The Dissenters were almost as vigorously assailed as the '• Papists " ; but a fortunate exception seems to have been made in the case of the Quakers, who, on taking the prescribed oaths, were made free of the city.