CHA P. our small fishing boats, and only one wherry could come alongside XXIII. to get a load.”

Pastoral

They add, what implies some mitigation of the famine,—

"We are in great hopes that our corn had the luck of being purchased upon the fall of the market, which, as we are advised by private letters from Holland, was no less than 30 per cent.”

They could not however do without supplies from England, and the embargo must have been further relaxed; for so late as June 11, the Bishop reports,―

If we

"We have had, and have even yet, a dreadful time of it. had not had the order in Council, many, very many, must have died for want of food; and even as it is, many will find it difficult to see the first week in August, which is the earliest time we can hope for the least new corn. I sent for 120 bushels of barley from Liverpool, and Mr. Murray for the same quantity, but we shall want the whole allowed us, except the wheat.”

Summing up the whole matter, July 25, he writes:

"I have given this year about 500 bushels of barley, which have been the support of very many families as well as private persons, which otherwise must have perished, I verily believe."

He had accompanied these his supplies with another Letter for measure, and who shall say that it was not of more profit than they all? Ascension Day drawing on, he sent out this pastoral letter:

Perambu

lation.

"To the Reverend the Archdeacon, and the rest of the Clergy of the Diocese of Sodor and Man.

"My Brethren,-The last Convocation but one, you were put in mind of a very considerable omission, in not going every Holy Thursday the boundaries of your several parishes, or some part of such as are large, which hath been practised till of late, time out of mind.

"In order therefore to the keeping up this laudable custom, you are hereby required to give notice to your parishioners on Rogation Sunday, May 3, that you purpose (God willing) to walk the boundaries of your parish, or some considerable part of them, on Holy Thursday following, and desire the people to meet you at prayers, and to accompany you.

"And that they may be better disposed to do so, you shall inform them, that besides the great advantage of settling and securing the

XXIII.

boundaries of parishes, the great design is to give public and CHAP. national acknowledgment and thanks to God, for all His blessings both by sea and land, and especially for the fruits of the earth, which at this time begin to appear; as also to beg of God to send us such seasonable weather, as that we may receive the fruits thereof, to our own comfort, and for the relief of such as are in want; and lastly, to beseech God of His mercy to preserve us from all infectious diseases and unusual mortality amongst men and beasts, and from the rage of enemies. You shall further inform them how necessary this is, to keep up a constant sense of our dependance upon Almighty God for every blessing we enjoy or hope for, whether peace or plenty, or security from our enemies, or health to enjoy th blessings.

"Now the manner of observing this laudable custom has been at certain places to read distinctly and leisurely the 103rd Psalm by the minister only. And in other places to pronounce openly the curse set down, Deut. xxvii. 17, Cursed is he that removeth his neighbour's landmark: that is, who defrauds his neighbour of any of his rights, either by fraud or force, or going to law without just cause.

"At the same time people should be exhorted to beware of the great sin of covetousness, and to be content with the blessing God has given to their own honest labours: that better is a little that the righteous have, such as they have gotten by righteous ways, than great riches of the ungodly, which they have gotten wrongfully and that God will never bless such possessions as are gotten, or defended, or kept by unjust means. Here also it will be very becoming a clergyman to warn his people against the great sin of litigiousness, by which Christian love and charity are broken, and men hazard the loss of an heavenly inheritance to gain some trifle, very often, in this world.

"There is a cursed practice carried on secretly by Satan and his instruments, which I beseech you, my brethren, take this proper occasion to speak upon: both to terrify those that practise it, and to confirm people's faith in God, against any hurt that the devil or his agents can do them.

"Many complaints have been brought into our courts against people using foolish and wicked charms and arts, either to injure their neighbour in his goods, or to transfer them to themselves, to the great dishonour of God, who alone can increase the fruits of the earth to our comfort, or withhold them for our sins.

"And indeed it is for want of a true faith in God's power and goodness that makes men afraid of what such wretched instru

CHAP. ments of Satan can do, since even the devil himself cannot hurt the XXIII. persons or goods of such as put their trust in God, and pray daily (as they should be exhorted to do) for God's protection and blessing upon themselves, their children, their goods, and their labours, which if Christians neglect to do, no wonder if Satan by a righteous judgment of God, gets a power over them, to hurt them by his wicked instruments.

"I hope, my brethren, you will consider these things, and say something upon all these heads. And may the blessing of God go along with you.-Dated at Bishop's Court the 24th of April, 1741. "THO. SODOR AND MAN.

"Collects to be used on the Perambulation:-Collect for Quinquagesima Sunday, Collect for the Third Sunday in Lent, Collect for Septuagesima Sunday, The Prayer for Rain, if then needful, In Time of Dearth and Famine, In Time of War. In the Litany the two last petitions,-viz. 'That it may please Thee to give and preserve to our use,' &c.; That it may please Thee to forgive us all our sins,' &c. And the prayer in Mr. Nelson's Book, ' For Rogation Week .'"'

Severe as this lesson of Providence was, it was lost upon that people, so far as their passion for smuggling was concerned. The very next year, 1742, June 29, he has to say:

"Our people are mighty intent upon enlarging their harbours at Peel, Ramsea, and Douglas. They have laid a small duty on all vessels, which brings in some monies to be laid out among the poor labourers." (He alludes to an act of Tynwald, Oct. 1, 1739, "for the better collecting and applying the fund settled for the repairing of the sea-ports and harbours of this isle," at the foot of which his name appears, and which had been now nearly three years in force b.) But," he goes on, "the iniquitous trade carried on by some people, especially that of running tobacco, &c. to the excessive damage of the Crown, will hinder other blessings of God from falling upon us."

66

Thus it continued through Wilson's time and long after. The full remedy of this great evil could not be applied until

See the three Homilies for Rogation-week, and the Exhortation which followeth those homilies. See also Mr. Nelson on the Fasts and Feasts, in the title Rogation, p. 514.

b Mills, p. 262.

"The Commissioners for Customs

(1764) stated the loss to the King's revenue by this illicit trade to amount to about £350,000 per annum, and the value of seizures made on the coast of Ireland from the island to be about £10,000 annually." Train, i. 248.

1829, when the feudal privileges of the Lord became finally CHAP. and unalienably vested in the English Crown.

XXIII.

The first cited letter of the Keys to Dr. Wilson contains Cardinal Fleury's a passage which may help us to the date of a very interest- Order in ing anecdote in the Bishop's life:

favour of the Isle of

"If you have any fears of the Duke's ship and cargo falling into Man. the enemy's hands, may not she be insured, or ordered to come north about, as a passage of greater security than through the King's channel, which, we are told, is very much infested with privateers."

Now Cruttwell, doubtless from Dr. Wilson's information, informs us, but without any date, that

"Cardinal Fleury wanted much to see him, and sent over on purpose to enquire after his health, his age, and the date of his consecration; as they were the two oldest Bishops, and he believed the poorest, in Europe; at the same time inviting him to France. The Bishop sent the Cardinal an answer, which gave him so high an opinion of him, that he obtained an order that no French privateer should ravage the Isle of Man."

Evidently no such order was known of at the time the above letter was written, March 17, 174%, and Fleury diedthe war still continuing-in January 1743. The correspondence alluded to, between the Cardinal and the Bishop, must have passed, and the order been given, in the interval; and it seems very likely that some friend of the island, and of Wilson, aware of what the Keys apprehended, may have contrived to make known its forlorn condition to Fleury. A word or two concerning the Bishop would naturally be added; and how could the result be other than it was? Mr. Feltham says, but without explaining it, that even in his own time, 1796, there wanted not instances of the favour borne by the French to the inhabitants of Man.

The Cardinal may, nay must, have recollected the instinctive forbearance of Marlborough and Eugene, and their soldiery, when in 1710-11 the demesnes of Cambray were at their mercy, and out of reverence to Fenelon, and fear of what might happen if he or his people should suffer wrong, not a single farm or storehouse was plundered; the property was guarded as if it had belonged to the Sovereigns of the

XXIII.

CHAP. allied armies; and when those armies were themselves in want, and the temptation became too great to help themselves from stores in Chateau-Cambrésis, the Archbishop's principal estate, which lay at their mercy, Marlborough desired Fenelon to send waggons for all the corn that was there, and made his men escort it into Cambray, to the head-quarters of the French army d

The two passages taken together form one of those bright and pleasant gleams, too rare, alas! in history, when one age or country makes a signal for good to another far away, and the answer comes promptly and cheerfully.

These public transactions have carried us on many years: we must now return to matters personal and professional.

CHAPTER XXIV.

THE DISCIPLINE UNDER THE ATHOL DOMINION. 1736-1750.

It would be an interesting question, but not easy to answer, how the discipline of the island was affected by the change of dynasty and the new enactments. On the one hand, those distressing and unseemly disputes between the Civil and Ecclesiastical Courts disappear altogether from the records. And not only so, but a case occurred in 1741, exactly calculated to elicit any claims of that sort which might be lurking in the mind of any who regretted the old oppressive ways. No less a personage than "John Christian, Major Christian. Esq., Major-General of His Grace the Duke of Atholl, his Forces and Garrisons within this Isle, and Constable of Peel Castle," makes "a humble remonstrance" to the Bishop, alleging

Case of

"That your remonstrant on Whitsunday, the 17th of this inst. May, 1741, attended Divine Service in St. Peter's Church in order to partake of the Blessed Sacrament then to be administered by the Rev. Mr. Edward Moore of the parish of St. Michael, Vicar-General of this isle. That your remonstrant did there in the most humble and seemly manner approach the altar in order to receive that Divine ordinance so essentially necessary to salvation, and having joined in the general confession, and having received the absolu

Hist. de Fenelon, par De Bausset, t. iii. 204. Paris, 1809.