ONE AFTERNOON in 1792, a group of English law students dining in Middle Temple Hall looked suspiciously towards the door as six or seven Irish students filed in. The new arrivals sat down on the far side of the table and before long, another group of Irish students joined them. Quickly downing their glasses, they called for more wine and soon little could be heard above the boisterous laughter and Irish accents that echoed through the hall. The Irish became animated and their energy turned restless; chunks of bread started to fly across the room, a wine-sopped one hitting the startled butler in the back of the head. An English student began to protest, but was shouted down by a menacing looking figure on the Irish side of the table, whose gestures indicated that he would have liked to have carried on the discussion outside. Our English hero considered taking up the challenge but sat down after several empty wine bottles took flight, one of them narrowly missing his head. Things calmed down for a moment, but talk on the Irish side of the table turned to gambling and unpaid debts. The conversation became heated when one Irishman questioned the honour of another; blows were exchanged, challenges made and the whole party moved outside to resolve the issue. The Irish had left the building, and once again it was quiet in Middle Temple Hall.

The scene described above is an imagined reconstruction of events based on a chapter entitled ‘Advice to Irish Students of the Law in London’ from a text published in 1792. The author of this work presented the reader with a satirical account of the entire legal profession, but saved some of his sharpest words for the Irish and made his point clear from the opening sentence:

A litany of examples followed: violence; financial impropriety; drunkenness; criminal activity; and provincialism that the author weaved into a stereotypical portrait of the Irish character.