One of these reports is full of information touching the drain of capital from the country, and its consequent decay, as registered by contemporaries; we shall learn from another how things stood with regard to coal.

At the time of the Union the Irish Parliament granted a bounty of 2s.

per ton on Irish coal carried coastwise to Dublin, and levied a duty of 10-1/2d.

per ton on coal imported from Great Britain.

The effect of the Union was to abolish the bounty and double the levy on imports.