Life
fl.1804;
Ulster writer, and holder of LLB.; author of A Description of The Condition
And Manners as well as of The Moral and Political Character, Education [... &c.] of the Peasantry of Ireland, such as
they were between the Years 1780 & 1790 (1804); also poss., writings
on conveyancing; not to be confused with the publisher-editor of songs
and ballad collections (c.1850).
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Works
A Description of the Condition and Manners as well as of the Moral
and Political Character, Education of the Peasantry of Ireland, such
as they were between the years 1780 & 1790, when Ireland was Supposed
to have arrived at Its Highest Degree of Prosperity and Happiness
(London: printed for the author by C. Barber 1804), 43 pp.
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Quotations
[Readers
of such chapbook novels as The Adventures of Captain Phreny [viz., Freney] and Redmond O’Hanlon have thereby been] ‘familiarised
to offences of the most violent and atrocious nature; and were taught
to look upon robbers, incendaries, murderers, and violators of women,
as objects of admiration. The transition from theory to practice was but
short – And crimes proceeded more frequently from an inherent depravity
in the perpetrators, than from that desire of gain which constitute their
origin in other countries.’ (A Description of the Condition And
Manners ... of the Peasantry of Ireland [... &c.] (London:
C. Barber 1804), pp.40-41; cited in Rolf Loeber and Magda Stouthamer-Loebber,
‘Fiction Available To And Written For Cottages And Their Children’,
Bernadette Cunningham and Máire Kennedy, eds., The Experience
of Reading: Irish Historical Perspectives (Dublin: Rare Books Group
1999), p.128.
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