the English Parliament the County of
Clare, against the whole weight of the government,--which was a bitter
pill for the Tories to swallow, especially as the great agitator
declared his intention to take his seat without submitting to the
customary oath. It was in reality a defiance of the government, backed
by the whole Irish nation. The Catholics became so threatening, they
came together so often and in such enormous masses, that the nation was
thoroughly alarmed. The king and a majority of his ministers urged the
most violent coercive measures, even to the suspension of
_habeas corpus_.

O'Connell was not admitted to Parliament; but his case precipitated an
intense turmoil, which settled the question forever; for then the great
general who had defeated Napoleon, and was the idol of the nation,
seeing the difficulties of coercion as no other statesman did, and
influenced by Sir Robert Peel (for whom he had unbounded respect), made
one of his masterly retreats, by which he averted revolution and
bloodshed. Wellington hated the Catholics, and was a most loyal member
of the Church of England; moreover, he was a Tory and an
ultra-conservative. But at last even his eyes were opened, not to the
injustices and wrongs which ground Ireland to the dust, but to the
necessity of conciliation. Like Peel, he could face facts; and when his
path was clear he would walk therein, whatever kings or ministers or
peers or people might think or say. He resolved to emancipate the
Catholics, as Sir Robert Peel afterward repealed the Corn Laws, against
all his antecedents and affiliations and sympathies, and more than all
against the declared wishes and resolutions of the monarch whom he
nominally served, yet whom he controlled by his iron will. Sir Robert
Peel, as obstinate a Tory as his chief, had been for some time convinced
of the necessity of conciliation, and at once resigned his seat as the
representative of Oxford University, which he felt he could no longer
honorably hold. In March, 1829, he brought forward his bill for the
removal of Catholic disabilities, which was read the third time, and
passed the Commons by a majority of 178. In the House of Peers, it was
carried by a majority of 104,--so great was the influence of Wellington
and Peel, so impressed at last were both Houses of the necessity for
the measure.

The difficulty now was to obtain the signature of the king, although he
had promised it as the probable alternative of r