TWO:The persons now indicted were Thomas Muir and the Rev. Thomas Fyshe Palmer. Muir was a young advocate, only eight-and-twenty years of age. He was brought to trial at Edinburgh, on the 30th of August, 1793. He was charged with inciting people to read the works of Paine, and "A Dialogue between the Governors and the Governed," and with having caused to be received and answered, by the Convention of Delegates, a seditious address from the Society of United Irishmen in Dublin, to the Delegates for promoting Reform in Scotland. He was also charged with having absconded from the pursuit of justice, and with having been over to France, and with having returned in a clandestine manner by way of Ireland. To these charges Muir replied that he had gone to France after publicly avowing his object, both in Edinburgh and London, that object being to endeavour to persuade the French Convention not to execute Louis XVI.; that when in Paris he urged this both on the ground of humanity and good policy, as tending to make constitutional reform easier, as well as the keeping of peace with England; that the sudden declaration of hostilities whilst there had warned him to return, but had closed up the direct way; that that was the reason of his taking a vessel from Havre to Ireland; that he had, however, returned publicly, and surrendered himself for trial at the earliest opportunity.Commercial and manufacturing distress was severe in the country, and the unemployed workmen flocked into Dublin and the other large towns, demanding relief and menacing the police, and directing their fury against all goods imported from England. On the 2nd of January, 1785, a Congress sat in Dublin, consisting of delegates from twenty-seven counties, and amounting to about two hundred individuals. They held adjourned meetings, and established corresponding committees in imitation of their great models, the Americans. In truth, many of the leaders of these present movements drew their inspiration now from American Republican correspondents, as they did afterwards from those of France, by whom they were eventually excited to rebellion.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit. Molestiae, quia. Obcaecati quod ab mollitia maiores ducimus, dolor natus qui quaerat illum praesentium iste quia voluptate delectus distinctio blanditiis sit totam.
