590 PARLIAMENTARY COLBERTISM

at or above 30s.; and a duty of 10s. was imposed on every
barrel of wheat imported when the price was below 30s.!
Irishmen believed that the effect of this measure was imnif
 regard mediately perceived in the stimulus given to agriculture.
*" The exports of wheat and barley rose very rapidly from 1785,
and though they fell back for a time in the last years of the
century, this may be partly accounted for by political disturbances,
 partly by the character of the seasons which were
most unfavourable, and partly by the rapid development
of the Dublin breweries, which offered an excellent home
market for cereals. The manufacture of porter in Dublin
may be said to date from 1792? and its influence should
certainly be taken into account; but even when this is done,
it is difficult to see that the bounties of 1784 did more than
give a temporary stimulus, or that they really induced
any considerable improvement in Irish agriculture by the
application of additional capital to the land’,
Much greater success attended attempts to utilise
the natural facilities of Ireland for internal communication*
by water. These had been taken into account many years
before, and early in the reign of George I. some undertakers
were empowered to improve the navigation of the Shannon?
In the reign of George IL commissioners were appointed
to devote the produce of certain taxes to this object; and
somewhat later, they were formed into a Corporation for
promoting and carrying on Inland Navigation in Ireland®.
They accomplished but little, however, and it was only in
1784 that the matter was heartily taken up, and the work
pushed forward energetically, and perhaps extravagantly.
The Grand Canal, which connects Dublin with the Shannon,
was completed’ at an expenditure of more than a million of
money ; and the navigation of the rivers Bovne and Barrow
was improved.

A.D. 1689
-—1776.

1 23 and 24 Geo, IIL, ¢. 19, 1783-84 (Trish). 2 Newenham, op. cit. 227.
8 See the figures in Newenham, op. cit. p. 216. and Martin, Ireland before and
after the Union, 63.
4 The roads in Ireland seem to have impressed travellers very favourably.
Tyerman, Life of Whitfield, 1. 147 ; A. Young, Tour tn Ireland (1780), 11. 150. On
road-making at Letterkenny, compare Pococke’s Tour, 53.
& Newenham, 143. 6 25 Geo, II. c. 10 (Irish), Newenham, 147-8.
! Newenham 202