Indeed, the understanding that he was prepared to introduce a measure with that object had no small weight in conciliating in some quarters support to the Act of Union.
Accordingly, when describing the arrangements which he had in view for the Church of Ireland, he indicated his intention with sufficient plainness by the statement, that "it might be proper to leave to Parliament an opportunity of considering what might be fit to be done for his Majesty's Catholic subjects;" words which were generally understood to express his feeling, that both justice and policy required the removal of the restrictions which debarred the Roman Catholics from the complete enjoyment of political privileges.

But the history and different bearings of that question it will be more convenient to discuss in a subsequent chapter, when we shall have arrived at the time when it was partially dealt with by the ministry of the Duke of Wellington.
Notes: [Footnote 125: Mr.Froude says four great families--the Fitzgeralds of Kildare, the Boyles, the Ponsonbys, and the Beresfords--returned a majority of the House of Commons ("English in Ireland," ii., 5); and besides those peers, the arrangement for the Union proved that the influence of the Loftuses and the Hills fell little short of them.] [Footnote 126: Such a system actually had existed in France, where articles of ordinary trade could not be transported from one province to another without payment of a heavy duty; but Colbert had abolished that system in France above one hundred years before the time of which we are speaking.] [Footnote 127: "History of England," vol.v., c.xxiii., p.

57.] [Footnote 128: "The English in Ireland," ii., 39.] [Footnote 129: Fronde's "English in Ireland," ii., 345.

He does not name the author whom he quotes.] [Footnote 130: _Ibid_., ii, 42.] [Footnote 131: See p.

164.] [Footnote 132: Mr.Froude imputes to Grattan a singularly base object.
"Far from Grattan was a desire to heal the real sores of the country for which he was so zealous.