to pass sentence of political
death on half of their number and of transportation on the remainder.
The joy of the men of Dublin found expression in a spontaneous
illumination, and the mob broke all windows which were not lit up.

On all sides the procedure of the Government met with severe censure. As
usual, blame was lavished upon Cornwallis, Lord Carysfort warning
Grenville that the defeat was due to the disgust of "Orangemen and
exterminators" at his clemency. Buckingham, writing to Pitt on 29th
January, reported that on the estimate of Archbishop Troy, nine-tenths
of the Irish Catholics were for the Union: "Remember, however," he
added, "that this can only be done by the removal of Lord Cornwallis and
Lord Castlereagh.... I protest I see no salvation but in the immediate
change. Send us Lord Winchilsea, or rather Lord Euston, or in short send
us any one. But send us Steele as his Secretary, and with firmness the
Question (and with it Ireland) will be saved. Excuse this
earnestness."[555] Pitt took no notice of this advice, but continued to
support Cornwallis. As for the Irish Executive, it proceeded now to the
policy of official coercion recommended from Downing Street. Parnell was
dismissed from the Exchequer; the Prime Serjeant was deposed, and four
opponents of Union were removed from subordinate posts, among them being
Foster, son of the Speaker.

So confident was Pitt of victory at Dublin that he introduced the Bill
of Union at Westminster on 23rd January. The King's Speech referred to
the designs of enemies and traitors to separate Ireland from Great
Britain, and counselled the adoption of means for perpetuating the
connection. Forthwith Sheridan moved a hostile amendment. With his
wonted zeal and eloquence, he urged the inopportuneness of such a
measure when 40,000 British troops were holding down Ireland, and he
denied the competence either of the British or Irish Parliament to
decide on it. Pitt promptly refuted Sheridan's plea by referring to the
action of the English and Scottish Parliaments at the time of their
Union, and he twitted him with seeking to perpetuate at Dublin a system
whose injustice and cruelty he had always reprobated. Allowing that
British rule in Ireland had been narrow and intolerant, Pitt foretold
the advent of a far different state of things after the Union. Then,
pointing to the divergence of British and Irish policy at the time of
the Regency crisis he pronounced it a dangerous o