Burke Manuscript

Burke Manuscript: Page 186

Transcript

In the sixties, Mr John Mills, the freeholder and builder of the Foresters’ Arms, in which he was doing a very good trade, took a notion into his head that a nice passenger steam boat would be a good investment for traffic to the Estuary. Accordingly he gave an order to Mr John Anderson “that shrewd Scotch blacksmith” as Mr J.E. Fitzgerald once styled him, to build him a steam boat. It was done, and she was placed upon the river with a flourish of trumpets. But, in some way, there had been a miscalculation or an oversight, for when it came to strict business, it was found that the Madras Street wooden bridge was an obstacle. Mr Mills naturally wanted to bridge taken down, as an interference with river traffic and his venture in particular. The authorities on the other hand said he ought to have measured things, and politely declined. Mr Mills then, like a Bold Briton, said the law allowed him to abate a nuisance and he would do so. So he did. He got willing assistants and chopped a hole in the Bridge. It was repaired. The steamer was idle. No money coming in. All outlay. All ending in loss of steamboat, loss of freehold & hotel, ending in poor obstinate John Mills going round with sheep trotters in a basket for sale.