Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 19.djvu/190

178 exporting their corn to Dublin and foreign parts; and, lastly, by the accidental discovery of marl in many places of the several parishes. Yet all this revenue is wholly founded upon corn, for I am told there is hardly an acre of glebe for the dean to plant and build on.

I am therefore of opinion, that a real unfalcated revenue of six hundred pounds a year, is a sufficient income for a country dean in this kingdom; and since the rents consist wholly of tithes, two parishes, to the amount of that value, should be united, and the dean reside as minister in that of Down, and the remaining parishes be divided among worthy clergymen, to about 300l. a year to each. The deanery of Derry, which is a large city, might be left worth 8OOl. a year, and Rapho according as it shall be thought proper. These three are the only opulent deaneries in the whole kingdom, and, as I am informed, consist all of tithes, which was an unhappy expedient in the church, occasioned by the sacrilegious robberies during the several times of confusion and war; insomuch that at this day there is hardly any remainder left of dean and chapter lands in Ireland, that delicious morsel swallowed so greedily in England, under the fanatick usurpations.

As to the present scheme of a bill for obliging the clergy to residence, now or lately in the privy council, I know no more of the particulars than what has been told me by several clergymen of distinction; who say, that a petition in the name of them all has been presented to the lord lieutenant and council, that they might be heard by their council against the bill, and that the petition was rejected, with some reasons why it was rejected; for the bishops are Rh