The Old Parliament House

**

SECTION IV** *

The Old Parliament House *

Here, where old Freedom once was wont to wait

Her darling Grattan nightly at the gate,

Now little clerks in hall and colonnade

‘Fot the poor items of provincial trade.

Lo! round the walls that Bushe and Plunket shook

The teller’s desk, the runner’s pocket-book.”

bankofireland1.gif (14986 bytes)For more than a century the Bank of Ireland has now held undisturbed possession of the classical building that was once the home of a native parliament. Many Irishmen, however, have fond memories of the past and fond hopes for the future of the “old house in College Green,” and, even to this day, as political processions file past the Ionic colonnades, hats are lifted in token of respect and remembrance.

The site was first used for state purposes towards the end of the reign of Elizabeth. Sir George Carey, or Carew, Mountjoy’s second in command during the wars of O’Neill and O’Donnell, built an hospital in what was then an eastern suburb of the city. Carey’s Hospital passed through the hands of various officials, until it came to Sir Arthur Chichester, viceroy from 1604 to 1615, a lucky soldier of fortune, whose war services and exertions in planting Ulster with English and Scotch were rewarded with grants of land around Belfast. During his tenancy it became an official residence, and was renamed Chichester House.

It was here that warning of the intended rising of Ulster and plot to seize the Castle was brought to the lords justices in 1641. A Privy Council was at once convened, and sat in anxiety through the night. At five in the morning one of the conspirators was arrested and brought before them. He confessed his guilt, but was defiant. “It was true they had him in their power and might use him how they pleased, but he was sure he would be revenged.”

When daylight came the lords justices removed to the Castle, still very feebly garrisoned, and were relieved on their arrival to find that a body of troops, changing stations from its country quarters, had just reached Dublin and completely altered the situation. The commander had been quick to note the disturbed and panic-stricken condition of the city, and had taken measures accordingly.

The first parliament after the Restoration met in Chichester House. The speaker congratulated the new assembly on being the “choicest collection of Protestant fruit that ever grew within the walls of the Commons House.” It turned its attention mainly to wholesale confiscation of the lands of the defeated party. The same policy was pursued by a parliament of William III., which met in the same place after the defeat of the Jacobites at Limerick. Twelve years later three eminent barristers, appearing at the bar, vainly entreated the Commons not to proceed with the first instalment of the penal code against Catholics. Chichester House now began to fall into decay.

In 1729 the present structure was commenced. The front towards College Green was the first part erected. The parliament was not at this time so popular as it became later. Its subservience to Westminster had roused the indignation of the people. The Act called the Sixth of George I., which gave the British parliament the right to ride roughshod over Ireland, had been accepted with hardly a protest. The general scorn soon found vent in a nick-name. The new chamber, having a high dome-shaped roof, and not being remarkable for the intellect of its members, was christened the “Goose Pie,” a name, that remained even when the cupola was destroyed.

Dean Swift, angry at the part played by the parliament in a dispute over tithes, satirised it fiercely under the name of the Legion Club. The lampoon is a good specimen of the scathing bitterness of that terrible man.

As I stroll the city, oft I

See a building large and lofty,

Not a bowshot from the College,

Half the globe from sense and knowledge …

Tell us what the pile contains?

Many a head that holds no brains.

These demoniacs let me dub

With the name of Legion Club;

Such assemblies, you might swear,

Meet when butchers bait a bear,

Such a noise, and such haranguing

When a brother thief is hanging

Such a rout and such a rabble

Run to hear Jack-pudding gabble.”

Swift did not scruple to mention names.

In the porch Briareus stands,

Shows a bribe in all his hands,

Briareus the Secretary,

But we mortals call him Carey.”

The writings of Lucas, over-violent as they were, brought a new spirit into Irish politics. The first definite stand against external influence was made in 1753, when the House, by 122 votes to 117, asserted its right to dispose of a surplus as it pleased. The city rang its bells and lit its bonfires, while the members, who had carried the vote, were escorted home by thousands bearing torches. The feeling rapidly rose. In 1759 there were rumours of a union between Great Britain and Ireland. The mob beset the Parliament House for some hours, and compelled both peers and commoners to take oaths to resist the Union. Lord Inchiquin was severely handled because a natural impediment in his speech was thought to be assumed in order to avoid the pledge. Sir Thomas Prendergast, happening to look out from a window, was haled forth by the nose and rolled in the gutter. The riot was put down by cavalry with a considerable loss of life.

As the parliament rose in popular estimation, men of high character and talents threw themselves into the struggle. Grattan, Flood, Philpot Curran, Hussey Burgh, Hely Hutchinson, and many other brilliant orators appeared during the latter half of the 18th century. The debates were fully reported and the division lists published, so that the proceedings in the House were well known to every citizen of Dublin. The leaders of the Opposition, mostly fervent and patriotic young men, became the darlings of the people in this intellectual arena, while the Ministry of the day was derided as a pack of crafty intriguers and placemen, caring only for their sinecures and salaries. The agitation against the restriction on Irish trade came to a climax during the American War. The bayonets of the Volunteers in College Green threatened England with a second colonial war, if she refused Grattan’s demand. There was great excitement both inside and outside the House.

Hussey Burgh delivered a famous speech. He declaimed against a legal system so often heedless of the suffering it inflicted on one part of the Empire. Penalty, punishment and Ireland were, he said, almost synonymous. The English had sown their laws like dragons’ teeth, and they had sprung up as armed men. The telling classical allusion, with which he closed, called forth rounds of applause. When order was restored, Burgh’s voice was heard resigning his office under government. Grattan welcomed him with the cry, “the gates of promotion are shut; the gates of glory are opened.” Before the year was out, the British Ministry withdrew the commercial restrictions.

Grattan followed up his advantage. Still backed by the Volunteers, he demanded complete self-government. Again he was successful. The Irish parliament was released from the two fetters that hampered all its movements, Poynings’ Act and the Sixth of George I. Grattan broke into a great apostrophe. “Spirit of Swift! spirit of Molyneux! your genius has prevailed ! Ireland is now a nation in that new character I hail her, and, bowing to her august presence I say ‘Esto perpetua.’

It was the proudest day of Grattan’s life. His efforts had been crowned with a complete triumph, and, for the moment, it seemed as if the eternal problem of Irish government might be solved along the lines he had indicated. But men of his moderate character and high principles were lacking to Ireland at this juncture, when they were especially needed to work a new constitution. Grattan lived to see himself disregarded between persecutors on one hand and revolutionaries on the other. The Volunteers were either disbanded or became secret societies, drilling and arming by stealth. Agrarian outrages began to occur all over the country. The example of the French Revolution unsettled the minds of the subjects in every land, and terrified their governors into a policy of reaction and harsh repression. Ireland burst into rebellion, which was put down with the utmost severity.

The great English statesman, William Pitt, now determined to apply to Ireland a scheme of full and complete participation in the privileges of Great Britain. This was the Act of Union. The old feeling against such a measure was very strong. The first debate in the Irish House resulted in a Ministerial majority of one vote, the second in a minority of six. The populace drew the Speaker’s coach home with their own hands, and were with some difficulty restrained from tieing up the Lord Chancellor, a prominent Unionist, to the pole and compelling him to assist in the triumphal march.

Pitt was not discouraged. Every kind of influence was brought to hear on the recalcitrants. Offers of pension, place and title were made, and had their due effect. A majority was gradually ensured for the Union. Grattan was very ill, but the danger impending over the Constitution of 1782 would not suffer him to rest. Leaning heavily on the shoulders of two friends, and dressed in his old volunteer uniform, he entered the House to record his protest. It failed to shake the solidity of the government forces. The Union was carried by considerable majorities amid a state of popular feeling so intense that the streets had to be patrolled by cavalry, and an infantry regiment lay under arms in the colonnades.

Corry, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, denounced Grattan as an “unimpeached traitor.” He was answered by an invective, the phrases of which are steeped in anger and scorn. “Has the gentleman done?” said Grattan. “Has he completely done? He was unparliamentary from the beginning to the end of his speech, but I did not call him to order - why? because the limited talents of some men render it impossible for them to be severe without being unparliamentary; but before I sit down, I shall show him how to be severe and parliamentary at the same time.

I will not call him villain, because it would be unparliamentary, and he is a privy councillor. I will not call him fool, because he happens to be Chancellor of the Exchequer; but I say that he is one who has abused the privilege of parliament and freedom of debate to the uttering language which, if spoken out of the House, I should answer only with a blow.”

A duel was inevitable after such a stinging retort.

It was fought at Ballsbridge almost immediately before a crowd of spectators cheering for Grattan. Shots were twice exchanged, and Corry was wounded in the hand. The bloodshed, as often, brought about a reconciliation between the parties, who separated better friends than they had been for years.

Grattan took farewell of his parliament in another splendid speech. “Yet I do not give up the country - I see her in a swoon, but she is not dead - though in her tomb she lies helpless and motionless, there is on her lips a spirit of life and on her cheek a glow of beauty -

“Thou art not conquered; beauty’s ensign yet

Is crimson in thy lips and in thy cheeks,

And death’s pale flag is not advanced there.”

So passed away the Irish parliament after a chequered career lasting through six centuries. No one can say even yet whether the last scene in its history took place when it abolished itself in 1800. The Bank of Ireland bought the buildings for £40,000, and converted them to its own purposes, but some parts of the interior are still as they were before the Union.

The exterior has often been admired. The receding front, with its beautifully grouped Ionic columns, produces the true classical effect of dignity, harmony and simplicity. The eastern portico towards Westmoreland Street represents the solution of a difficult architectural problem. An extension of the House of Lords was projected, which necessitated the building of another entrance. As the levels were different, it would have been impossible to carry the Ionic pillars round from the College Green side, so orthodoxy was sacrificed and a new portico of the tall and slender Corinthian order was erected. The Parliament House thus embodies two styles of Greek art.

The chamber, where the House of Lords used to meet, has been left untouched. It is quite small and would hardly seat more than 60 members. The Irish peers numbered about 100, including a score of Protestant bishops. The walls are hung with two pieces of old tapestry, manufactured in 1733,** **representing the Battle of the Boyne and the Relief of Derry. In the former King William is shown on a prancing horse entering the river, where Schomberg, mortally wounded, is falling from his horse. In the latter King James and Sarsfield are directing operations against the Maiden City, which is visible on a hill in the distance. In vignettes on either side are a picture. of the breaking of the boom, so graphically described by Macaulay, and a portrait of George Walker, the warlike clergyman, who inspired the resistance and was promoted to a bishopric for his services. Walker, apparently, liked his new profession better than his old. Instead of going to his see, he followed the army and was shot dead in one of the fords of the Boyne, fulfilling in his person the prophecy that “he that taketh the sword, shall perish with the sword.”

The Lord Chancellor used to preside from a seat placed where the statue of George III. now stands. Close by are two old boxes, said to be King William’s treasure-chests. They have curiously large and complicated locks covering all the inner side of the lid. Around the walls some fine wood carving is to be seen, especially in the mantelpiece. The chairs and the large and highly-polished mahogany table are the same that did duty during the deliberations of the Irish Parliament. The arrangement is rather that of a board room or council chamber than a large assembly. Apparently the lords rarely gathered in full strength. As usual in hereditary bodies, a certain proportion were too careless and indolent to discharge their duties. The Parliament House did not figure in the lives of such men until it became their Nemesis.

Noblemen have been tried here for no less a crime than murder. Lord Santry, while in his cups in an inn at Palmerstown, had, from some whim or other, enjoined silence on all present and run his sword through an unfortunate porter who disobeyed. When charged with the crime, he elected to be tried by his peers in this chamber. The proceedings were very solemn. The executioner stood beside the prisoner, bearing an axe, which was held with edge averted until the moment of sentence, when it was turned towards the prisoner. Each juror gave in his verdict separately. In every case it was “Guilty, upon my honour.” Santry was condemned to death, but his family connections procured him a reprieve and, eventually, a full pardon, which was quite undeserved.

The body of the Duke of Rutland, who died in the viceroyalty, lay in state in the House of Lords, pending its removal to England. It must have been a sombre and impressive scene. The walls were draped for the occasion with black cloth hangings, which bore the insignia of the deceased. A number of mutes in long dark gowns and caps stood on either side, bearing branches of tapers. By the bier were motionless military figures, soldiers of the ancient corps of Battle Axes, the personal bodyguard of the departed ruler. Rarely has a Lord Lieutenant died in harness. In a sense, Rutland fell a victim to the duties of his position. His banquets were so splendid and numerous that the health of the host was undermined with overmuch conviviality.

The visitor can pass through the division lobbies of the old Parliament House. They enclose a rectangular space formerly occupied by the House of Commons. The site is now taken up by a number of small bank offices. The celebrated octagonal chamber, with its gallery capable of accommodating 700** **persons, has been cut up and altered out of all recognition. A small room associated with the Speaker is still preserved, and the Court of Requests, where deputations waited to present petitions to parliament, has become the public cash office of the bank, daily thronged by busy commercial men, who seldom give a thought to the historical memories of the place where they draw their cheques and make their deposits.

To Chapter 5. To Chart Index