j}^^}^'- 
 
CATHOLIC ' 
 BOOKSELLER, 
 
 Boston. 
 
 1^.. 
 
 p.c.fcaiY 
 nmiNo/^ii, MASS 
 

THE IRISH -AMERICAN LIBRARY. 
 
 ^^OL. I. 
 
 English Misiee in Ireland, 
 
 A COUnSE OF LECTURES, 
 
 DEUVERED BY THE 
 
 Very Rev. THOMAS N. BURKE, O.P., 
 
 IN KEPLT TO 
 
 TAMES ANTHONY FROUDE, Esq. 
 
 toitl) an ^ppeubi^, 
 
 CONTAIKING A EEVIEW OF THE SO-CAT.T.ED "BITLI," OP ADRIAN IV., BY THE MOST 
 
 EEV. P. H. MORAN, BISHOP OF OSSORY ; AND "AN ANALYSIS OF THE 
 
 REBELLION OF 1641," BY MATHEW CAREY. 
 
 B OSTON C O LLKG¥ . T .IBHMIY 
 CHESTNUT HILL, MASS. 
 
 JV£IV YORK: 
 
 LYNCH, COLE & MEEHAN, 57 MTIERAT STREET, 
 
 1873. 
 
Bntebed according to Act of Congress, in the Year 1872, by 
 LYNCH, COLE & MEEHAN, 
 
 IN THE OrnCE OF THE LIBRARIAN OF CONGRESS, AT WASHINGTON, 
 
 Poole & Maclauchi.an, 
 
 frinters and bookbjwueks, 
 
 305-213 East i2t/i Si, 
 
u 
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 The idea of an " Ikish-Ameeican Library," similar to tlia 
 *• Library of Ireland," which Davis originated for his and our native 
 land, suggested itself to us many years ago, and vp-ould have been 
 put into practical execution before now, but that circumstances did 
 not permit us to subtract from other and more pressing duties the 
 time and personal attention that were required to make the experi- 
 ment not only successful, but worthy of the National idea it would 
 represent. The necessity of some such collection of works relating 
 to our people, — in their connection with their native and adopted 
 countries, — has, however, never been absent from our mind. And 
 recent events have so strongly demonstrated the urgency of that 
 need, that our resolution was at once taken to do what lay in our 
 power to supply the want, and at least to make a beginning of what 
 may hereafter be a work of some consequence to our people in this 
 New World. The Lrish-American element, at the present day, in 
 this Republic, is second to no other in importance as a component 
 portion of the community. Its status in the history of the coun- 
 try, from the earliest dates of which we have any authentic or reli- 
 able records, has never been insignificant Yet, with the exception 
 of two volumes (both the work of men who, however able, were 
 very imperfectly acquainted with the subjects on which they 
 treated), we have met no work that even pretended to deal with the 
 connection of the Irish race with this Republic, or preserve to futurity 
 the record of what Irish- Americans have done, and are doiag, for 
 the advancement of the land in which so many of them have 
 found citizenship and hospitable welcome. Yet this deficiency does 
 not spring from lack of material fit for authentic history. Probably 
 no other portion of the commimity possesses a richer store of materials 
 for a creditable history than can»^|M:adiujed by the Irish branch of 
 
4 INTRODUCTION'. 
 
 the great Celtic family, which has been transplanted to this North 
 American Continent. But, Tinf ortunately, this mass of inf ormatioa, — 
 invaluable to us as an essential portion of our title-deeds to the cit- 
 izenship of the United States, — has lain undeveloped and unused; 
 hidden away in family records, or only finding access to the light in 
 the uncei-tain and perishable form of newspaper publications. The 
 knowledge of many important facts relating to the share which 
 Irishmen and their immediate descendants have had in the estab- 
 lishment of this RepubUc. and its subsequent progress to prosperity 
 and greatness as a nation, is rapidly passing away with the men of 
 the last generation, who were familiar with the story. And it is 
 only occasionally, when some accidental circumstance elicits a detail 
 of those facts, that the world is apprised how, in one of the greatest 
 revolutions by which the political relations of human society have 
 ever been influenced, the children of that little island in the far-off 
 ocean, which England has been so assiduously, but vainly, endeavor- 
 ing to shut out from the gaze of manldnd, played an important part, 
 and left their mark worthily upon the past of their adopted country. 
 As an instance of the historical losses to which we have been liable 
 from the want of any permanent form of record apiDertaining to our 
 people in this country, we may cite the writings and speeches of the 
 adopted son of the great Washington — the late GtEORGE WAsnmG- 
 TON Parke Custis. That eminent gentleman, — one of the best 
 representatives of that generation, — the first-bom of the Republic, — 
 whose i^atriotism, genius, and high integrity made the American 
 name illustrious, and compelled the resj)ect and admiration of even 
 hostile critics, — that eminent gentleman thought so highly of our 
 people, for the share they had taken in the emancipation of his 
 native land, that he lost no oppoi-tunity of giving expression 
 to his favorable opinion; and, in his latter days, he claimed as 
 one of his most cherished titles, that by which he had distin- 
 guished himself as " The Old Orator of Ireland." Yet in his Biog- 
 raphy (published some years since, by one of his surviving descend- 
 ants) not one word is mentioned of all that he has said or written in 
 behalf of the country and the people in whose fate he took so deep 
 an interest ; and for the testimony which he so nobly bears to the 
 part played by the Irish, in the great struggle for the independence 
 of these States, we are indebted to the columns of an extinct and 
 almost forgotten journal, and to the painstaking care and research 
 of aiDatriotic Irish- American, Michael Hennessy, Esq., of Brook- 
 
INTRODUCTION. 5 
 
 lyn, who, with a zeal and perseverance that merit the graleful 
 recognition of his fellow-countrjTnen, has collected and made a rail- 
 able a vast amount of references and authorities, which, to the 
 student of Irish history, are invaluable, and in this country would 
 be unattamable, were it not for the excellent literary taste and i?a- 
 triotic spirit which impelled Mr. Hennessy to devote himself to the 
 congenial work of concentrating and preserving them. 
 
 There are many interesting narratives now existing in no more 
 permanent form than that of an occasional newspaper file, or 
 '' scrap-book," that would in a few years, perhaps, be of the 
 highest value to the descendants of the men by whom those events 
 of history have been acted out. To rescue from oblivion, and place 
 within the reach of all our people, as much as possible of those rec- 
 ords relating to our race in this hemisphere, shall be the mission of 
 "• The Irish- American Lebrary." There are also many splendid 
 contributions, of oratory, song, and poetic fiction, %vith which Irish 
 genius has enriched the hterature of America ; and with some of 
 these we design, also, to lighten, and, as it were, beautify, the dryer 
 but more important details of current history. The successive vol- 
 umes of the " Library " shall be issued as rapidly as the matter com- 
 prising them can be properly collated and arranged. 
 
 In selecting for the first issue of this series the lectures of Father 
 Burke in refutation of the sophistries of the EngUsh historian 
 Froude, we have been influenced not merely by the intrinsic merit 
 and beauty of those discourses, and their value as a defence of our 
 national character, but also by the consideration of that tendency of 
 the American mind which impels it to deal immediately and directly 
 with what is ^reseiit^ and to leave the remote past for more leisurely 
 consideration. The value of these lectures, both as a defence of 
 our people against a most flagrant attack, and as a future source of 
 reference in relation to many important portions of our history, will 
 be materially enhanced by the Appendix which we have added, and 
 which contains aU the most authentic historical quotations relating 
 to the matters which Mr. Froude has so artfully misrepresented or 
 mystified. 
 
 The importance and reliability of these historical notes may be 
 judged from the fact, that it was from the works from which they 
 are extracted (most of which have long been out of print,) O'Con- 
 nell principally composed his celebrated "Memoir on Ireland," 
 which has since been a hand-book for Irish national reference. We 
 
e INTRODUCTION, 
 
 have endeavored to place those portions of them which bear upon 
 the subject-matter of the Froude controversy in the shape most 
 available for the general mass of readers, who may not have leisure 
 or opportunity to hunt up these references for themselves ; in which 
 view they add materially to the value of the work ; and may, per- 
 haps, be productive of further good by stimulating some readers to 
 a more careful study of the facts of Irish history, — a correct know- 
 ledge of which is so essential in repelling attacks on our national 
 reputation, such as that projected by our latest English assailant, 
 and so happily met and defeated by the great Irish Dominican. 
 
ENGLISH MISEULE IN lEELAM). 
 
 FIEST LECTURE. 
 
 (Delivered in the Academy of MtmCy New Tork^ Nov. 12, 1873.) 
 
 NORMAN INVASION AND MISRULE. 
 
 Ladies and Gentlemen: It is a strange fact that the 
 old battle that has been raging for seven hundi^ed years 
 should continue so far away from the old land. The ques- 
 tion on which I am come to speak to you this evening is 
 one that has been disputed at many a council board — one 
 that has been disputed in many a Parliament, one that has 
 been disputed on many a well-fought field, and is not yet de- 
 cided — the question between England and Ireland. Among 
 the visitors to America, who came over this year, there was 
 one gentleman, distinguished in Europe for his style of writ- 
 ing, and for his historical knowledge, — the author of several 
 works, which have created a profound sensation, at least for 
 their originality. Mr. Froude has frankly stated that he 
 came over to this country to deal with England and the 
 Irish question, viewing it from an English standpoint ; that, 
 like a true man, he came to make the best case that he 
 could for his own country ; that he came to state that case 
 
8 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 to the American public, as to a grand jury, and to demand 
 a verdict from them, the most extraordinary that ever yet 
 Tvas demanded of any people, — namely, a declaration that 
 England was right in the manner in which she has treated 
 my native land for seven hundred years. 
 
 It seems, according to this learned gentleman, that we 
 Irish have been badly treated (that he confesses) ; but he 
 puts in as a plea that we only got what we deserved. It is 
 true, he says, that we have governed them badly ; the reason 
 is, becaus'e it was impossible to govern them rightly. It is 
 true that we have robbed them ; the reason is, because it was a 
 pity to leave them their own, — they made such a bad use of 
 it. It is true that we have persecuted them ; the reason is, 
 persecution was the fashion of the time and the order of the 
 day. On these pleas there is not a criminal in prison to- 
 day, in the United States, that should not immediately get 
 his freedom by acknowledging his crime, and pleading some 
 extenuating circumstances. 
 
 Our ideas about Ireland have been all wrong, it seems. 
 Seven hundred years ago, the exigencies of the time de- 
 manded the foundation of a strong British empire. In 
 order to do this, Ireland had to be conquered ; and Ireland 
 was conquered. Since that time (according to Mr. Froude,) 
 the one ruling idea in the Eno;lish mind has been to do all 
 the good they could to the Irish. Their legislation and 
 their action have not been always tender, but they were al- 
 ways beneficent ; they were sometimes severe ; but they were 
 severe to us for our own good : and the difficulty of England 
 has been, that the Irish, during all these long hundreds of 
 years, have never imderstood their own interests, nor known 
 what was for their own good ! N'ow, the American mind is 
 enlightened ; and henceforth no Irishman must complain of 
 the past in this new light in which Mr. Froude puts it be- 
 fore us ; and the amiable gentleman tells us, moreover, that, 
 
NOBMAN INVASION AND MISRULE. 9 
 
 what has been our fate in the past, he greatly fears we must 
 reconcile ourselves to in the future. 
 
 Mr. Froude comes to tell us his version of the history of 
 Ireland, and he also comes to solve Ireland's difficulty, and 
 to lead us out of all the miseries that have been our history 
 for hundreds of years. When he came, many persons ques- 
 tioned what was the reason or motive of his coming. I 
 have heard people speaking all around me, assigning to the 
 learned gentleman this motive or that. Some persons said 
 he was an emissary of the English Government ; that they 
 sent him here because they were beginning to be afraid of 
 the rising power of Ireland in this great nation ; that they 
 saw here eight millions of Irishmen by birth, and perhaps 
 fourteen millions Irish by immediate descent; they knew 
 enough of the Irish to know that the Almighty God blessed 
 them always with an extraordinary power, not only to pre- 
 serve themselves, but to spread themselves ; and that, in a 
 few years, not fourteen, but fifty millions of Irish blood and 
 of the Irish race would be in this land. According to those 
 who thus surmised, England wants to check the sympathy of 
 the American people for their Irish fellow-citizens ; and it 
 was considered that the best way to effect this was to send 
 a learned man with a plausible story to this country, — a man 
 with a singular power of viewing facts in the light in which 
 he wished himself to view them, and in that light to put 
 them before others; — a man mth an extraordinary power 
 of so mixing up these facts, that many simple-minded peo- 
 ple will look upon them as he puts them before them ; and 
 whose mission it was to alienate the mind of America from 
 Ireland to-day, by showing what an impracticable, obstinate, 
 accursed race we are. 
 
 Others, again, surmised that the learned gentleman came 
 for another purpose. They said : " England is in the hour 
 of her weakness ; she is tottering fast, and visibly, to her 
 
10 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 ruin. The disruption of that old empire is visibly approach - 
 ing. She is to-day cut off, without an ally in Europe;. 
 Her army is a cipher; her fleet — according to Mr. Heed, 
 the best authority on this great question — is nothing to be 
 compared with the rival fleet of the great Russian power 
 that is growing up beside her. With France paralyzed by 
 her late defeat, England lost her best ally. The three Em- 
 perors, the other day, they said, contemptuously ignored her, 
 and settled the affairs of the world without as much as men- 
 tioning the name of that kingdom that was once so powerful. 
 Her resources of coal and iron are failing ; her peoj)le are 
 discontented ; and she shows every sign of decay." Thus did 
 some persons argue that England was anxious for an Ameri- 
 can alliance; for they said: "What would be more natural 
 than that the old and tottering empire should wish to lean 
 upon the strong, mighty, vigorous young arm of America? " 
 
 I have heard others say that the gentleman came over on 
 the invitation of a little clique of sectarian bigots in this 
 country ; men who, — feeling that the night of religious big- 
 otry and sectarian bitterness is fast coming to a close before 
 the increasing light of American intelligence and education, 
 — would fain prolong the darkness by an hour or two, by 
 whatever help Mr. Froude could lend them. But I protest 
 to you, gentlemen, to-night, that 1 have heard all these mo- 
 tives assigned to this learned man, without giving them the 
 least attention. I believe Mr. Froude's motives to be sim- 
 ple, straightforward, and patriotic. I am willing to give 
 him credit for the highest motives ; and I consider him per- 
 fectly incapable of lending himself to any base or sordid 
 proceeding, from a base or sordid motive. 
 
 But, as the learned gentleman's motives have been so 
 freely criticised, and, I believe, in many cases misinter- 
 preted, so, my own motives in coming here to-night, to an- 
 swer him, may, perhaps, be misinterpreted or misunderstood, 
 
JVOMMAN INVASION AND MISRULE. \\ 
 
 unless I state tliem clearly and plainly. As he is said to 
 come as an emissary of the English Government, I may be 
 said to appear here, perhaps, as an emissary of rebellion or 
 revolution. As he is supposed by some to have the sinister 
 motive of alienating the American mind from the Irish cit- 
 izenship of these States, so I may be suspected of endeav- 
 oring to excite religious or political hatred. Now, I protest 
 that these are not my motives. I come here to-night, sim- 
 ply to vindicate the honor of Ireland and her history. I 
 come here to-night lest any man should think that, in this 
 our day, — or in any day, — Ireland is to be left without a son 
 
 who will speak for the mother that bore him 
 
 . . . . And I hold that Mr. Froude is unfit for the task 
 which he has undertaken, for three great reasons. First of 
 all, because I find, in the writings of tliis learned gentleman, 
 that he solemnly and emphatically declares that he despairs 
 of ever finding a remedy for the evils of Ireland, and that 
 he gives it up as a bad job. Here are his words, written in 
 one of his essays a few years ago : 
 
 " The present hope is that by assiduous justice, that is to 
 say, by conceding everything that the Irish please to ask, we 
 shall disarm their enmity, and convince them of our good 
 will. It may be so. There are j^ersons sanguine enough 
 to hope that the Irish will be so moderate in what they de- 
 mand, and the English so liberal in what they will grant, 
 that at last we shall fling ourselves into each other's arms, 
 in tears and mutual forgiveness. I do not share that expec- 
 tation. It is more likely that they will push their imj)ortu- 
 nities, till at last we turn upon them, and refuse to yield 
 further. There will be a struggle once more ; and either the 
 emigration to America wdll go on, increasing in voluDie till 
 it has carried the en-tire race beyond our reach, or, in some 
 shape or other, they will again have to he coerced into sub- 
 mission.^'' 
 
 Banish them or coerce them ! There is the true English* 
 
12 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IBELAND. 
 
 man speaking ! My only remedy, lie empliatically saj^s, my 
 only hope, my only prospect of a future for Ireland is, let 
 them go to America : have done with the race altogether, 
 and give us Ireland, at last, such as we have labored to 
 make it for seven hundred years — a desert and a solitude. 
 Or, if they remain at home, they will have to be coerced 
 into submission. I hold, that that man has no right to come to 
 America, to tell the American people, or the Irish in Amer- 
 ica, that he can describe the horoscope of Ireland's future. 
 He ought to be ashamed to do it, after uttering such words 
 as those. 
 
 The second reason why I say he is unfit for the task of 
 describing Irish history, is because of his contempt for the 
 Irish people. The original sin of the Englishman has ever 
 been his contempt for the Irish. It lies deep, though dor- 
 mant, in the heart of almost every Englishman. The aver- 
 age Englishman despises the Irishman, and looks down upon 
 him as a being almost inferior in nature. Now, I speak not 
 from prejudice, but from an intercourse of years, for I have 
 lived among them. I have known Englishmen, — amiable, 
 gentle, religious, charming characters, — who would not, for 
 the whole world, wilfully nourish in their hearts a feeling of 
 contempt for any one — much less express it in words : and 
 yet I have seen even these manifest in a thousand forms that 
 contempt for the Irish which seems to be a part of their very 
 nature. I am sorry to say that, in respect to this feeling, I 
 can make no exception of Catholic or Protestant among the 
 English. I mention this not to excite animosity, not to create 
 bad blood or bitter feeling. No : I protest this is not my 
 meaning. But I mention this because I am convinced it lies 
 at the very root of that antipathy and hatred between the 
 English and Irish, which seems to be incurable. And I 
 verily believe, that, until that feeling is destroyed, you never 
 can have a cordial union between the two countries ; and 
 
NORMAN INVASION AND MISRULE. 13 
 
 the only way to destroy it is to raise Ireland, so by justice 
 and by home legislation, that her people will attain to such 
 a position, as to enforce and command the respect of their 
 English fellow-citizens. 
 
 Mr. Froude, himself (who, I am sure, is incapable of any 
 ungenerous sentiment, towards any man, or any people,) is 
 an actual living example of that feeling of contempt of 
 which I speak. In November, 1865, this learned gentleman 
 addressed a Scottish assembly, in Edinburgh. The subject 
 of his address was the effect of the Protestant Keformation 
 upon the Scottish character. According to him, it made 
 the Scots the finest people on the face of the earth. Origi- 
 nally fine, they never got the last touch, — that made them, 
 as it were, archangels among men, — until the holy hand of 
 John Knox touched them. On that occasion the learned 
 gentleman introduced himself to his Scottish audience in 
 the following w^ords : — 
 
 " I have undertaken to speak, this evening, on the eftects 
 of the Reformation in Scotland, and I consider myself a 
 very bold person to have come here on any such undertaking. 
 In the first place, the subject is one with which it is pre- 
 sumptuous for a stranger to meddle. Great national move- 
 ments can only be understood properly by the people whose 
 disposition they represent. We say, ourselves, about our 
 own history, that only Englishmen can properly comprehend 
 it. It is the same with every considerable nation. They 
 work out their own political and spiritual lives through 
 tempers, humors, and j^assions peculiar to themselves : and 
 the same disposition which produces the result is required 
 to interpret it afterwards." 
 
 Did the learned gentleman offer any such apology for 
 entering so boldly on the discussion of Irish afi'airs ? Oh, 
 no ! There was no apology necessary. He was going to 
 speak only of the "mere Irish." There was no word to 
 e:s press his fear that, perhaps, he had not understood their 
 
14 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 character, or the subject of which he was about to treat. 
 There was no apology to the Irish in America, — the four- 
 teen millions before whom he so boldly told his story, en- 
 deavoring to hold them up as an irreligious, licentious, 
 contentious, obstinate, ungovernable race. None at all. It 
 was not necessary ; they were only Irish ! If they were 
 Scotch, how the learned gentleman would have come with 
 a thousand apologies for his presumption in venturing to 
 approach such a' delicate subject as a delineation of the 
 sweet Scotch character, or anything connected with it ! 
 
 What, on the other hand, is his treatment of the Irish ? 
 I have in this book before me the words that came from his 
 pen : and I protest, as I read them, I felt every drop of my 
 Irish blood boiling in my veins. I felt how bitter was the 
 taunt when he said : — " They may be good at the voting 
 booths, but they are no good to handle the rifle !" He 
 compares us, in this essay, to a pack of hounds; and he 
 says : — 
 
 " To tell Ireland to go in peace and freedom would be the 
 same as if a gentleman addressed his hounds, and said, ' I 
 give you your freedom ; now, go out and act as you please.' 
 It is needless to say that, after worrying all the sheep in the 
 neighborhood, they would end by tearing each other to 
 pieces." 
 
 I deplore this feeling. The man who is possessed by it 
 can never understand the philosophy of Irish history. 
 
 Thirdly, Mr. Froude is utterly unfit for the task of delin- 
 eating or interpreting the history of the Irish people, because 
 of the more than contempt, — the bitter hatred and detesta- 
 tion, — in which he holds the Catholic clergy and the Catholic 
 religion. In this book before me, he speaks of the Catholic 
 Church as an " Old Serpent, whose poisonous fangs have 
 b(3en drawn from her;" — as a *' Witch of Endor, mumbling 
 curses to-day because she cannot burn at the stake and shed 
 
NOBMAN INVASION AND MISHULE. 15 
 
 blood as of old." He most unfairly charges the Church with 
 and makes her responsible for the French massacre of St. 
 Bartholomew's Day ; for the persecutions and deaths which 
 originated from the revolt of the Netherlands, against the 
 Duke of Alva, under Philip II.; for every murder and 
 butchery that has been committed, he says, with the virus 
 of the most intense prejudice, that the Catholic Church lies 
 at the bottom of them all, and is responsible for them. The 
 very gentlemen that welcomed him and surrounded him 
 when he came to New York, gave him plainly to understand 
 that, where the Catholic religion is involved, where a favor- 
 ite theory is to be considered, or a favorite view has to be 
 proved, they do not consider him as a reliable or trustwor- 
 thy witness or historian Not, I again de- 
 clare, that I believe this gentleman to be capable of a lie. I 
 do not. I believe he is incapable of it. But wherever 
 prejudice such as his comes in, it distorts the most well- 
 known facts for its own purpose. Thus, the gentleman 
 wishes to exalt Queen Elizabeth by blackening the character 
 of Mary Queen of Scots; and in doing this he has been 
 convicted, by a citizen of Brooklyn, of putting his own 
 words as if they were the words of ancient chronicles, and 
 ancient laws and deeds and documents ; and the taunt has 
 been flung at him': " Mr. Froude has never grasped the 
 meaning of inverted commas." 
 
 Henry YIII., of blessed memory, has been painted by 
 this historian as a most estimable man, — as chaste as a monk. 
 Bless your souls ! you are all mistaken about him ! A man 
 that never robbed anybody ! burning with zeal for the public 
 good ! His putting away his wife, and taking young Anna 
 Boleyn to his embraces ! — oh ! that was a chaste anxiety for 
 the public welfare. All the atrocities of this monster in 
 human shape melt away under Mr. Froude's eyes; and 
 Henry YIII. rises before us in such a form, that even the 
 
16 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IBELAND. 
 
 Protestants of England, when they saw him as described by 
 Mr. Froude, cried out : — " Oh, you have mistaken your 
 man ! " One fact will show you how this gentleman writes 
 history. When Henry YIII. declared war against the 
 Church, — when England was distracted by his tyranny, — one 
 day hanging a Catholic because he would not deny the 
 supremacy of the Pope, and the next day hanging a Protes- 
 tant for denying the Real Presence in the Blessed Sacrament ; 
 — during this time, when the ministers who remained faith- 
 ful to the Pope were most odious to the tyrant ; and such was 
 the slavish acquiescence of the English people, that they be- 
 gan to hate their clergy, in order to please their king, — a 
 certain man, whose name was Hun, was lodged a prisoner in 
 the Lorillai^d Tower, and he was found in his cell, hanged 
 by the neck, and dead. There was a coroner's inquest held 
 over him, and the twelve — I can call them nothing but the 
 twelve blackguards — that were on the jury, — in order to ex- 
 press their own hatred, and to please the powers that were, 
 brought in a verdict of wilful murder against the Chancellor 
 of the Bishop of London, a most excellent priest. When 
 the Bishop heard of this verdict, he applied to the Prime 
 Minister to have the verdict quashed ; just the same as if 
 they found a verdict of wilful murder against you, who Avere 
 not yet born. He brought the matter before the House of 
 Lords, in order that the character of his Chancellor might 
 be fully vindicated. The King's Attorney-General took 
 cognizance of it ; and by a solemn decree the verdict of the 
 coroner's jury was set aside ; and these twelve men were de- 
 clared to be twelve perjurers. Now, listen to Mr. Froude's 
 version of that story. Writing the history of England, he 
 comes to that fact ; and he says ; 
 
 " The clergy at that time were reduced to such a state oj 
 immorality and wickedness, that, Hun being found de;id in 
 his cell, a coroner's jury actually found a verdict of mur- 
 
NOBMAN INVASION AND MISRULE. 17 
 
 der against the Chancellor of the Bishop of London ; and 
 the Bishop was obliged to apply to Cardinal Wolsey for a 
 special jury to try the Chancellor, because, if they took any 
 ordinary twelve men, they would be sure to find him guilty : " 
 
 — leaving the reader under the impression, that the man was 
 guilty of a murder, of which he was as innocent as Abel ; and 
 that if he were placed before any twelve of his countrymen, 
 they would find him guilty on the evidence. This is the im- 
 pression this " candid writer " leaves, knowing the facts as 
 well as I know them. 
 
 Well, now, we come to consider the subject of his first 
 lecture ; and, indeed, I must say, I never personally expe- 
 rienced the difiiculty of hunting a will-o'-the-wisp through a 
 marsh, until I came to follow this learned gentleman in his 
 first lecture. I say this, not disrespectfully to him at all ; 
 but he covered so much ground, and at such unequal dis- 
 tances, that it is impossible to follow him with anything like 
 order. He began by telling how Minister Rufus King wrote 
 a letter about certain Irishmen ; and he went on to say how, 
 — in the time of America's great Revolutionary struggle, — 
 the Catholics of Ireland sympathized with England, while 
 the Protestants of Ireland were breast-high for America. 
 All these questions — which belong to our own day, — 1 will 
 leave aside for the present ; and when I come, towards the 
 close of my lectures, to speak of them, then I shall have 
 great pleasure in taking up Mr. Froude's assertions and 
 examining them. 
 
 But, — coming home to the great question of Ireland, — what 
 does this gentleman tell us ? He tells us that, seven hun- 
 dred years ago, Ireland was invaded by the Anglo-Normans : 
 and the first thing, apparently, he wishes to do is to justify 
 this invasion, and to establish the principle that the Nor- 
 mans were right in coming to Ireland. How does he do 
 tb is ? He begins by drawing a terrible picture of the state 
 
18 ENGLISH MISRULE IM IRELAND. 
 
 of Ireland before the invasion. He says — they were cutting 
 each other's throats ; the whole land was covered with 
 bloodshed ; there was in Ireland neither religion, morality, 
 nor government ; and, therefore, the Pope found it necessary 
 to send the Normans to Ireland, as one would send a police- 
 man into a saloon where the people were killing each other. 
 This is the first justification — that in Ireland, seven hundred 
 years ago, — just before the Norman invasion, — there was 
 neither morality, religion, nor government. Let us see if 
 he is right. 
 
 The first proof Mr. Froude gives that there was no gov- 
 ernment in Ireland, is a most insidious statement. He 
 says : — 
 
 " How could there be any government in a country where 
 every family maintained itself according to its own ideas, 
 right or wrong, and acknowledged no authority ? " 
 
 "Well, if this be true, according to the modern use of the 
 word " family," certainly Ireland was in a deplorable state ; 
 every family governing itself according to its own notions, 
 and acknowledging no authority. What does he mean by 
 the word "family"? Speaking to Americans in this nine- 
 teenth century, the word "family" means every household 
 in the land. We talk of a man and his family, — the father 
 and mother, and three or four, five or six children, as the 
 case may be. This is our idea as to the word family ; and 
 using the word in this sense, I fully admit that, if every 
 family in Ireland were governed by their own ideas, admit- 
 ting no authority, Mr. Froude has established his case. But 
 what is the fact ? What is the meaning of the word " family," 
 as applied in Ireland, seven hundred years ago. The " family," 
 in Ireland, meant the sept, or tribe — all that had the same 
 name. They owned whole counties, a large extent of ter- 
 ritory. The men of the same name were called the men of the 
 
NORMAN INVASION AND MISRULE, 19 
 
 game familj ; as for instance, the McMurroughs, of Leinster ; 
 the O'Tooles, of Wicklow; the O'Byrnes, of Kildare; the 
 O' Conors, of Connaiight ; the O'Briens, of Munster ; the 
 O'Neills and O'Donnells, of Ulster. The family meant a 
 nation ; the family mean two or three counties of Ireland, 
 governed by one Chieftain ; all the men of one sept : and it 
 is quite triTe that every such family governed itself in its 
 own independence, and acknowledged no superior. That is 
 quite true. There were five great families in Ireland : the 
 O'Conors, in Connaught ; the O'Neills, in Ulster ; the Mc- 
 Laughlins, in Meath ; the O'Briens, in Munster ; and the 
 McMurroughs, in Leinster. Under these five great heads 
 there were many septs, or smaller families, each counting 
 from five hundred or six hundred to a thousand fighting 
 men : but all acknowledging, in the different Provinces, the 
 sovereignty of- these five great royal houses. These five 
 houses, again, elected their monarch, or supreme ruler, called 
 the " Ard-righ," who dwelt in' Tara. I ask, if the family 
 thus meant a w^hole sept or tribe, having a regularly consti- 
 tuted head, is it fair to say that Ireland was in a state of an- 
 archy because every family governed itself? Is it fair of 
 this gentleman thus to try and hoodwink the American jury, 
 to which he has made his appeal, by describing the Irish 
 family, which meant a sept or tribe, as a family of the nine- 
 teenth century, which means only the head of the house and 
 the mother and children? 
 
 Again, he says, the Irish people lived like the New-Zea- 
 landers of to-day, in underground caves : and then he de- 
 clares holdly — " I, myself, opened one of these underground 
 lodging-houses of the Irish people." Now, mark ! this gen- 
 tleman lives in Ireland ; and, a few years ago, he opened an 
 ancient rath in Kerry, — one of those Danish raths; — and 
 there he discovered a cave and some remains of mussel- 
 shells and bones. At the time of that discovery he had the 
 
20 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 most learned archaeologist in Ireland with him : and they 
 put their heads together about it; but Mr. Froude has vvrit- 
 ten in this very book before me that what these places were 
 intended for, — what use they were applied to, — balfled con- 
 jecture : no one could tell it. Well, if it baffled conjecture 
 then, and they could not tell what to make of it — if it so 
 puzzled him then, what right has he to come out here in 
 America, and say they were the ordinary dwellings of the 
 Irish people ? 
 
 In order to understand the state of Ireland before the 
 Norman invasion, I must ask you to consider, first, the an- 
 cient Irish Constitution which governed the land. Ireland 
 was governed by septs or families. The land, from time im- 
 memorial, was in possession of these families or tribes. Each 
 tribe elected its own Chieftain; and to him they paid the 
 most devoted allegiance and obedience ; so that the fidelity 
 of the Irish clansman to his chief was proverbial. The 
 chief, during his lifetime, convoked an assembly of the tribe ; 
 and they elected from among the members of the family the 
 best and the strongest man to be his successor : and they 
 called him the Tanist. The object of this was that the suc- 
 cessor of the King might be known, and that, at the King's 
 death, there might be no riot or bloodshed, or contention for 
 the right to succeed him. "Was not this a wise law ? An 
 elective monarchy has its advantages. The best man comes 
 to the front because he is chosen by his fellow-men. When 
 they came to select a successor to their Prince, the King's 
 eldest son had no right, because he was the King's son, to 
 succeed his father ; he might be a booby or a fool. So, they 
 wisely selected the best and strongest and bravest and wisest 
 man ; and he was acknowledged to have the right of succes- 
 sion ; he was the Tanist, according to the ancient law of Ire- 
 land. Well, these families, as I have said, in the various 
 Provinces, owed and paid allegiance to the King of the 
 
NORMAN INVASION AND MISRULE. 21 
 
 Province, wlio was one of the five gi-eat families, called "the 
 Five Bloods of Ireland." Each Prince had his own Judge, 
 or Brehon, who administered justice in solemn court for the 
 people. These Brehons, or Irish judges, were learned men. 
 The historians of the times tell us, they could speak Latin 
 as fluently as they could Irish. They had an established 
 code of law, had colleges where they studied that law ; and 
 it w^as only when they graduated in their studies that they 
 came home to their respective septs, or tribes, and were es- 
 tablished as Brehons or Judges over the people. Kowhere 
 in the history of Ireland do we read that any man rebelled 
 or protested against the decision of a Brehon Judge. Then 
 the five monarchs, in the five Provinces, elected the *' Ard- 
 righ" or High King. With him, they sat in council on na- 
 tional matters, and on all matters that concerned the whole 
 people, within the halls of imperial Tara. There St. Patrick 
 found them in the year 432, minstrels and bards, and Bre- 
 hons, princes, crowned monarchs, and High King: — there 
 did he find them, discussing, like wise and prudent men, the 
 affairs of the nation, when he preached to them the Faith of 
 Christ. While this Constitution remained, the clansmen 
 paid no rent for their land. The land of the tribe or family 
 was held in common — it was the common property of all ; 
 and the Brehon or Judge divided it, giving to each man what 
 was necessary for liim, with free right of pasturage over the 
 v/hole. They had no idea of slavery or serfdom among them. 
 The Irish clansman was of the same blood as his Chieftain. 
 The O'Brien that sat in the saddle, at the head of his men, 
 was related by blood to the Gallowglass O'Brien that fought 
 in the ranks. There was no such thing as slavery among 
 them ; no such thing as the Chieftain looking down upon the 
 people ; no such thing as cowed, abject submission on the 
 part of the people to every worthless decree. The Chieftain 
 was one of themselves ; and the men stood in the ranks aa 
 
22 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND, 
 
 freemen, jperfectly equal, one with another. We are toLJ 
 even by Gerald Barry, the lying historian, who sometimes, 
 though rarely, told the truth, that, when the English came to 
 Ireland, nothing astonished them more than the free and bold 
 manner in which the humblest man spoke to his Chieftain, 
 and the condescension and equality with which the Chieftain 
 treated the humblest soldier in his tribe. This was the an- 
 cient Irish Constitution. Does this look like anarchy ? No ! 
 It cannot be said, with truth, that there was anarchy in a 
 land where the laws were so well defined, where everything 
 was in its proper place. Mr. Froude says that there was, be- 
 cause that the Chieftains were fighting amongst themselves. 
 And so they were. But he immediately adds, that there was 
 fighting everywhere throughout Europe, after the breaking 
 up of the Roman Empire. If there was fighting going on 
 in every land, — if the Saxon was cutting the Norman's 
 throat, in England, — what right has he to say that Ireland, 
 beyond all nations, was given up to anarchy, because Chief- 
 tain drew the sword against Chieftain, frequently, or from 
 time to time ? 
 
 So much for the question of government. Now for the 
 question of religion. The Catholic religion flourished in 
 Ireland for six hundred years and more before the Anglo- 
 Normans invaded her coasts. For the first three hundred 
 years after the introduction of Christianity into Ireland, the 
 religion of the Irish was the glory of the world and the 
 pride of God's holy Church. Ireland, for these three hun- 
 dred years, was the island-mother home of saints and scholars. 
 Men came from every country of the then known world to 
 light the lamp of knowledge and sanctity at the sacred fire 
 that burned upon the altars of Ireland. Then came the 
 Danes ; and for three hundred years more our people were 
 harassed by incessant wars. The Danes, as Mr. Froude 
 remarked, — apparently with a good deal of approval, — had 
 
NORMAN INVASION AND MISRULE. 23 
 
 no respect for Christ or His religion. The first thing they 
 did was to pull do^vn the churches, and set fire to the 
 monasteries. They slaughtered the mpnks and holy priests 
 and Bishops of Ireland. The people were left without re- 
 ligious instruction, for in time of war men have not much 
 time to think af religion. For three hundred years Ireland 
 was subjected, year after year, to the incursions of the 
 Danes; until on Good Friday morning, 1014, Brian Bo- 
 roihme defeated them at the gi-eat battle of Clontarf. But 
 it was not until the twelfth century, — on the 23d of 
 August, 1103, — that they were finally driven out of the 
 country, by the defeat of Magnus, their King, on Lough 
 Strangford, in the North of Ireland. 
 
 The consequence of those Danish wars was that the 
 Catholic religion, — though it remained in all its vital 
 strength, and in all the purity of its faith, among the Irish 
 people, — w^as sadly shorn of that sanctity which adorned it 
 for the first three hundred years of Ireland's Christianity. 
 Vices sprang up among the people. They were accustomed 
 to war, war, war, night and day, for three centuries. Where 
 is the people on the face of the earth that would not be ut- 
 terly demoralized by fifty years of war, not to speak at all 
 of three hundred ? The wars of the Hoses in England did 
 not last more than thirty years ; but the people were so 
 demoralized by their efiects that, — almost without a single 
 struggle, — they changed their religion at the dictate of the 
 blood-thirsty and licentious tyrant, Henry VIII. But no 
 sooner were the Danes gone, than the Irish people assem- 
 bled their Bishops and Princes in Council. We find, almost 
 the very year after the final expulsion of the Danes, a Coun- 
 cil was held : and here gathered their bishops and priests 
 and almost all the chieftains of the land, the heads of the 
 leading septs or families: and they framed wise laws, en- 
 deavoring to repair all that Ireland lost in the Danish 
 
24 EN0LI8H MISRULE IN IRELAND, 
 
 invasion ; and strict laws of Christian morality were en- 
 forced. Again we find a Council assembled, with the Papal 
 Legate Cardinal Paparo at its head, in the year 1164, five 
 years before the Normans invaded us. Now, we find the 
 same Cardinal Paparo, the very year before the Norman 
 invasion, presiding at a Council of the Bishops of Ireland. 
 We find the people marking laws for their government, and 
 preparing to observe them faithfully. We find the Irish 
 Bishops and Archbishops supported by the swords and the 
 power of the Chieftains. We find the Pope's Legate travel- 
 ling fearlessly into Ireland, whenever his master sent him, 
 without let or hindrance ; and when he arrived he was re- 
 ceived with all the devotion and chivalrous affection which 
 the Irish have always evinced towards the representatives of 
 their religion and their God. It is worth our while to see 
 what was the result of all these Councils, what was the re- 
 sult of this great religious revival, which was taking place 
 in Ireland during the few years that elapsed between the 
 end of the Danish and the beofinning of the Norman inva- 
 sion. We find three gi-eat Irish Saints reigning together in 
 the Church. We find St. Malachi, Primate of Armagh. 
 We find him succeeded by St. Celsus ; and he again by St. 
 Gregorius, whose name is in the Martyrology of Home. 
 We find, in Dublin, St. Laurence O'Toole, of glorious mem- 
 ory. We find Felix and Christian, two Bishops reigning in 
 Lismore, in Waterford. And we find every man of them 
 filling not only Ireland, but enshrined by the whole Church 
 of God for their learning and the brightness of their sanctity. 
 We find, at the same time, Catholicus, in Down ; Augustin 
 O'Daly, in Waterford ; Dionysius, Marianus, Johannes 
 Scotus, Gregorius and others ; — all Irish monks, famous for 
 their learning, famous for their sanctity, — in the great Bene- 
 dictine Monastery of Batisbon. We find, moreover, just 
 before the Normans arrived, in 1168, a great Council was 
 
NOBMAIi INYASIOIT AND MISRULE. 95 
 
 held in Atliboy. Thirteen thousand representatives of the 
 nPvtion, — thirteen thousand warriors on horseback, with their 
 Chieftains, — attended that Council, that they might hear 
 whatever the Church commanded, and obey it. What was 
 the result of all this ? I am not speaking from any preju- 
 diced point of view. It has been said that if Mr. Froude 
 gave the history of Ireland from an outside point of viev/, * 
 Father Burke would give it from an inside view. I am 
 only quoting English authorities : and in this interval, I 
 find Langfranc, Archbishop of Canterbury, writing to 
 Brian, King of Munster, to congratulate him upon the re- 
 ligious spirit and peaceful disposition of his people. Fur- 
 thermore, St. Anselm, — one of the greatest English saints, 
 and Archbishop of Canterbury under William Hufus, — 
 has v.^ritten as follows to Murchertach O'Brien, King of 
 Munster : — 
 
 " I give thanks to God for the many good things we hear 
 of your Highness, and especially for the profound peace 
 which the subjects of your realm enjo}^. All good men who 
 hear this give thanks to God, and pray that He may grant 
 you length of days." 
 
 The man who wrote that, perhaps, was thinking of the 
 awful corruption, — the impiety and darkness of the most 
 terrible kind, — wdiich covered the Avhole land of England 
 under the reign of the ferocious " Red King," William Ru- 
 fus. Yet, the Irish were irreligious, we are told by Mr. 
 Froude! — and a good judge he must be of religion ; for he 
 says it is a well-known fact, that religion is a thing of which 
 one man knows as much as another ; and none of us know 
 anything at ail. He tells us that the Irish were without 
 religion at that very time, when the Irish Church was form- 
 ing itself into the ancient model of sanctity, which it was 
 before the Danish invasion ; when, until the time, two j^cars 
 
 before the Normans came, Ireland was at peace, and Roderic, 
 2 
 
26 ENQLI8R MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 King of Connauglit, vv^as acknowledged " Ard-rigli," by every 
 Prince and every Ciiieftain in the land. 
 
 As to the charge that Ireland was without morality, I v/ill 
 answer it by one fact: A King in Ireland stole another 
 man's v>afe. His name— ^acciirsetl — was Dermot McMur- 
 rough, King of Leinster. Every Chieftain in Ireland, — • 
 every man in the land, — rose np and banished him from 
 Irish soil, as unworthy to live in the land. If this was the 
 immoral people, — if this was the bestial, animal, depraved 
 race which Mr. Froude describes to us, on lying Norman 
 authorities, may I ask you, could not Dermot turn round 
 and say to the Chieftains : " Why do you make war upon 
 me ? have I not as good a right to be a blackguard as any- 
 body else?" 
 
 Now conies Mr. Froude, and says that the Normans were 
 sent to Ireland to teach the Irish the Ten Commandments. 
 In the language of Shakspere, I say, " I thank thee, Jew, 
 for teaching me that word." Of these Ten Commandments, 
 the most important, in relation to human society, are : 
 «' Thou Shalt not steal." " Thou shalt not kill." " Thou 
 shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife." The Normans, accord- 
 ing to Mr. Froude's own showing, had no right or title to 
 one square inch of the soil of Ireland. They came to take 
 what was not theirs, what they had no right or title to. 
 They came, as robbers and thieves, to teach the Ten Com- 
 mandments to the Irish people ; amongst them the Com- 
 mandment — " Thou shalt not steal." 
 
 Henry landed in Ireland in 1171. He was after murder- 
 ing the holy Archbishop of Canterbury, St. Thomas a 
 Becket. They scattered his brains at the foot of the altar, 
 before the Blessed Sacrament, at the Yesper hour. His 
 blood was uj^on the hands of this monster, — he who came 
 to Ireland to teach the Irish — "Thou shalt not kill!" 
 "Wi^at was the action of this " reformer " when the adulterer 
 
NOBMAN INVASION AND MISRULE. 27 
 
 was driven from the sacred soil of Erin, as one unworthy 
 to profane it by his tread. He went over to Henry II., 
 and got from him a letter permitting any of iiis subjects 
 that chose to embark for Ireland, there to reinstate the 
 adulterer and tyrant in his kingdom. They came, then, a? 
 proved, as helpers of an adulterer, to teach the Irish " Thou 
 shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife ! " Mr. Froude tells us 
 they were right — that they were apostles of purity and 
 honesty and clemency ; and Mr. Froude " is an honorable 
 man." 
 
 "Ah! but," he says, "my good Dominican friend, re- 
 member, that, if they came, they came because the Pope 
 sent them." King Henry, in the year 1174, produced a 
 letter Vv^hich he said he got from Pope Adrian IV., permit- 
 ting him to go to Ireland, and urging him, according to the 
 terms of that letter, to do whatever he thought right and fit 
 to promote the glory of God and the good of the people. 
 The date that was on the letter was 1154, consequently it 
 was tv/enty years old. During twenty years nobody had 
 ever heard of that letter except Henry, v/ho had it in his 
 pocket, and an old man, called John of Salisbury, who went 
 to Rome and got the letter in a hugger-mugger way, from 
 the Pope. It has been examined by a better authority than 
 mine — by one who has brought to bear upon it all the acu- 
 men of his great knowledge. It bears, — according to Reim- 
 er, the most acceptable authority amongst English histo- 
 rians, — the date of 1154. Pope Adrian was elected on the 
 3d of December, 1154. As soon as the news of his elec- 
 tion had arrived in England, John of Salisbury was sent by 
 King Henry to congratulate him, and get this letter. He 
 was elected on the 3d of December. It must have been a 
 month later before the news arrived in England. In those 
 days no letter could come so far, at least, under a month. 
 John of Salisbury set out ; and it must ha\ e been another 
 
28 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 month before lie arrived in Rome; consequently it must 
 have been the beginning of March, 1155, when he arrived 
 in Rome ; yet the letter of the Pope is dated 1154! It 
 was found inconvenient, this date of Reimer's ; and by 
 whatever authority he did it, it seems he changed the date 
 afterwards to 1155. 
 
 " But," says Mr. Froude, " there is a copy of this letter 
 in the archives at Rome. How do you get over that ? " 
 Well, the copy has no date at all. As Baronius, the histo- 
 rian, and the learned Dr. Mansuerius declare — a rescript or 
 document that has no date, — the day it was executed, the 
 seal and the year, — is invalid — just so much paper ; — so that 
 even if Adrian gave it, it was worth nothing. Again, 
 learned authorities tell us that the existence of a document 
 in the archives does not prove the authenticity of that doc- 
 ument. It may be kept there as a mere record. It was 
 said that Henry kept this letter a secret, because his mother, 
 the Empress Matilda, did not wish him to act on it. But if 
 he had the letter, when he came to Ireland, why did he not 
 produce it ? That was his only warrant for coming to Ire- 
 land. He came there and invaded the country, and never 
 breathed a Avord about having that letter, to a human being. 
 There is a lie on the face of it. 
 
 But Mr. Froude says that Alexander III., Adrian's suc- 
 cessor, has mentioned that rescript or document in a letter. 
 The answer I give on the authority of Dr. Lynch, the 
 author of " Cambrensis Eversus," as well as the Abbe 
 McGeoghegan, one of the greatest Irish scholars, and one of 
 the best archaeologists ; and Dr. Moran, the learned bishop 
 of Ossory — that Alexander's letter was a forgery, as well 
 as that of Adrian IV. There are many learned men who 
 admit the genuineness of both Adrian's and Alexander's 
 rescripts ; but there are* an equally large number who deny 
 it ; and I prefer to believe with them that it was a forgery. 
 
 X 
 
NORMAN INVASION AND MISRULE. 29 
 
 Alexander's letter bore the date of 1172. Let iis see is it 
 likely that Pope would give a letter to Henry, whom he 
 knew well, asking him to take care of the Church and set 
 everything in order? Remember, Adrian did not kno\N 
 him, but Alexander knew him well. Henry, in 1159, sup- 
 ported the anti-Pope, Octavianus, against Alexander. 
 Henry, in 11G6, supported the anti-Pope, Guido, against 
 Alexander. According to Mathew of Westminster, Henry 
 obliged every man in England, — from the boy of twelve 
 years up to the old man, — to renounce their allegiance to the 
 true Pope, and go over to an anti-Pope. Was it likely, 
 then, the Pope would give him a letter to settle ecclesiasti- 
 cal matters in Ireland ? Alexander himself wrote to Henry, 
 and said to him, — instead of referring to a document giving 
 him permission to settle Church matters in Ireland ; — 
 
 " Instead of remedying the disorders caused by your pre- 
 decessors, you have oppressed the Church, and you have en- 
 deavored to destroy the canons of apostolic men." 
 
 Is this the man that Alexander v/ould send to Ireland to 
 settle affairs, and make the Irish good children of the Pojie ? 
 
 According to Mr. Proude, the Irish never loved the Pope 
 till the Normans taught them. What is the fact ? Until 
 the accursed Normans came to Ireland, the Papal Legate 
 always came and went when and wherever he would, at his 
 own v/ill. iNo Irish king obstructed him ; no Irishman's 
 hand was ever raised against a Bishop, much less against 
 the Papal Legate. But the very first Legate that came to 
 Ireland, after the Norman Invasion, in passing through 
 England, Henry took him by the throat, and imposed upon 
 him an oath that, when he went to Ireland, he would not do 
 anything that would be against the interest of the King. 
 It was an unheard-of thing that a Bishop, Archbishop, or 
 Cardinal should be persecuted, until the Anglo-Noi-inans 
 
so ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 broiiglit with them their accursed feudal system, and ccm- 
 centration of power in the hands of the king, an account of 
 which I shall come to presently. Bitterly did Laurence 
 O'Toole feel it. This great heroic, patriotic saint of Ire- 
 land, when he went to England, the very moment he arrived 
 he was made a prisoner, as a man to be feared ; for the 
 King had left an order, that whenever he was found in 
 England, the Saint should never be allowed to set his foot 
 in Ireland again. And this is the man that was sent over 
 as the apostle of morality to Ireland ! the man that is ac- 
 cused of violating the betrothed wife of his own son^ Richard 
 I. ! — the man whose crimes cannot bear repetition ! — who was 
 believed by Europe to be possessed by a devil ! and of whom 
 it was "wi'itten that when he got into a fit of anger, he used 
 to tear off his clothes, and sit down naked on the ground, 
 and chew straw like a beast ! Is it likely that the Pope, 
 who knew him so well, and suffered so much from him, sent 
 him to Ireland ; — the murderer of Bishops, the robber of 
 churches, and the destroyer of ecclesiastical and every other 
 form of liberty that came before him ? No, no ! Never 
 will I believe that the Pope of Rome was so short-sighted, 
 so blind, so unjust as, by the stroke of his pen, to abolish 
 and destroy the liberties of the most faithful people that 
 ever bov/ed down in allegiance to him. 
 
 But let us suppose even that Pope Adrian gave the Bull. 
 I hold still that it was of no account, for it was obtained by 
 false pretences. It was obtained by falsely representing to 
 the Po]De that the Irish were in a state of ignorance and im- 
 morality, v/hich did not exist. Secondly, this rescript from 
 the Pope, if it was obtained, was obtained under a lie, and 
 was null and void, being obtained under false pretences. But 
 more than this ; the Pope gave Henry, in that rescript, only 
 power to go to Ireland and fix everything ; to do everything 
 for the glory of God and the good of the people. Unless he 
 
NORMAN INVASION AND MISRULE. 31 
 
 did tliis (and be never did it and never intended to do it,) 
 the rescript was null and void. But suppose that rescript 
 had actually been given; what power did it give Henry? 
 Did it make hiin master of Ireland ? Did it give him power 
 over the land of Ireland ? All that that Bull of the Pope 
 says is that he should do what is necessary for the glory of 
 God and the good of the people. By calling on the Irish 
 Chieftains to accept Henry, — at most he established only 
 what is called a *' liaute suzerainty " of Ireland. Now, you 
 must know that, in the early Middle Ages, there were two 
 kinds of sovereignty ; there was the sovereign, the acknowl- 
 edged head of the people. They were his, and he governed 
 tliem, like the Kings and Emperors of to-day in Europe. 
 But, besides this, there was the sovereign, who only claimed 
 the title of King, who only claimed the homage of the Chief- 
 tains of the land, but who left them in perfect liberty, and 
 recognized the perfect independence of the land. He re- 
 ceived the tribute of their homage and nothing more. This 
 was all the fealty that the Pope ever permitted Henry to 
 claim in Ireland, if lie permitted him to claim so much. The 
 proof lies here, that, when Henry came over to Ireland, he 
 never said to the Irish that they should give up their inde- 
 pendence. Not at all. On the contrary, he left Roderic 
 O'Conor King of Connaught, and dealt with him as a king 
 with his fellow-king. He acknowledged his royalty and na- 
 tionality ; and he only demanded of him the allegiance and 
 homage of a feudal prince to a feudal king, leaving him as a 
 ruler perfectly independent. 
 
 Again, let us suppose that Henry intended to conquer 
 Ireland, and bring it into slavery. Did he succeed ? Noth- 
 ing of the kind. When he came to Ireland, the kings and 
 princes of the Irish people said to him : — " We are willing, 
 to acknowledge your high sovereignty over us, as Lord of 
 Ireland. We are the owners of the land. You are the 
 
32 ENGLISH MISRULE m IBELANB. 
 
 Lord of Ireland _; and there is an end of it." The King was 
 acknowledged by the j^eople by the simple title of " Lord of 
 Ireland ; " nothing more. If he intended anything more — 
 if he intended to invade and conquer the country, he never 
 effected his purpose. For the Normans, for centuries, held 
 only that part of Ireland which before was held by the 
 Danes. The Irish, v/ho are naturally straightforward, and 
 always generous, in the hour of their triumph permitted the 
 Danes to remain in Dublin, Wexford, Wicklow, and Water- 
 ford. Consequently, the Danes held the whole of the eastern 
 seaboard towns. From the Hill of Howth round to Water- 
 ford harbor Avas in their possession. The Normans who 
 came over were regarded by the Irish as cousins to the 
 Danes ; and they only took the Danish territory ; — nothing 
 more. They took precisely all that the Danes had before ; 
 all that the Irish had given to the Danes, Avho were under- 
 stood to be perfectly independent. At most, it seems to us 
 that the Irish were willing to share the land with them, will- 
 ing to receive them v\^ith a certain hospitality, and to divide 
 the country with them. 
 
 Now, Mr. Froude's second j ustification of the Norman in- 
 vasion is that Ireland was a prey to the Danes, who invaded 
 the island ; and that the Irish were rendered ferocious by 
 tliese continual contests ; leaving the impression that the 
 Danish wars in Ireland v/ere only a succession of ferocious 
 individual combats, between tribe and tribe, between man 
 and man ; when the fact is, the Danish v/ars were magnifi- 
 cent national trials of strength, between two of tlie bravest 
 races that ever met each other, foot to foot and hand to 
 hand on the battlefield. The Danes were unconquerable. 
 They conquered the Saxons in En^-land. The Frenchman 
 in France w^as unable to stand his ground against them. 
 Still, for three hundred years, the Celt of Ireland disputed 
 every inch of the island V7ith them, filled every valley in the 
 
NORMAI^ INVASION AND MISRULE. 33 
 
 land with their dead bodies ; and at last drove them back 
 into the North Sea, and freed his native land from their 
 dominion forever. Yet this magnificent national contest ir- 
 represented by this historian as a mere ferocious onslaught, 
 daily renewed, between man and man, in Ireland ! 
 
 The Norman arrived : and we have seen how he was 
 received. The Butlers and Fitzgeralds went down into Kil- 
 dare ; the De Burgs, or Burkes, and the De Berminghams 
 went down into the province of Connaught. The people 
 oflered them very little opposition. They gave them a por- 
 tion of their lands, and welcomed them amongst them, and 
 began to love them as if they were their own flesh and 
 blood. Now the Norman, in England, hated and despised 
 the Saxons. So thoroughly did he despise them, that his 
 name for the Saxon was " villein " or " churl." He did not 
 allow the Saxons to sit at the same table with him ; and he 
 would not intermarry with the Saxons for long years. The 
 proud, steel-clad Normans, ferocious in passion, bold as 
 lions, formed, by their Crusades and Saracenic wars, to be 
 the bravest men then living on the fiice of the earth, ne.'''<5ir 
 allowed the Saxons to interfere in any of their disj^utes. 
 Gerald Barry, when he was speaking of the Saxons, said : 
 " I am a Welshman, and I am proud to be a Welshman ; 
 but the Saxons are the vilest and basest race on the face of 
 the earth." I am only giving his own words ; I do not say 
 that I share his sentiments. " They fought one battle," he 
 goes on to say: "they allowed the Normans to overcome 
 them, and consented to be slaves forevermore to the Nor- 
 mans." And he wrote a book, in which he says, that they 
 are by no means to be compared to the Celtic race ; " not 
 to be compared in bravery or in intelligence to the magnan- 
 imous race of the Celts." Now, the Normans went down 
 into Ireland, among ih.Q Irish people. When they went out- 
 side the English portion of the country, or the " Pale," and 
 2* 
 
34: ENGLISH MISRULE m IRELAND. 
 
 got amongst the Irish people, what is the first thing that wa 
 see ? The very first thing, I answer, is that the Normana 
 began to forget their Norman-French and their English, and 
 learned to talk the Irish. They took Irish wives and were 
 glad to get them, they adopted Irish names and Irish customs ; 
 until we find, two hundred years after the Norman invasion, 
 these proud descendants of William FitzAdelm, Earl of 
 Clanricarde, changing their names from De Burg, or Burke, 
 to McWilliam, or sons of William ; and they called them- 
 selves in Irish, " McWilliam Oughter," and " McWilliam 
 Eighter," or the Upper and Lower Mc Williams. In the 
 days of Lionel, Duke of Clarence, they called themselves by 
 that name, and adopted the Celtic laws and Celtic customs. 
 Concerning the four hundred sad years that followed the 
 Norman invasion, down to the accession of Henry VIII. , 
 Mr. Froude has nothing to say, except that Ireland, was in 
 a constant state of anarchy and confusion ; and it is too 
 true. It is perfectly true. Chieftain warred against chief- 
 tain. It was comparative peace before the invasion; but 
 when the Normans came in, they divided the Irish by craft 
 and cunning. The ancient historian Strabo, speaking of 
 the Gael, says : " The Gauls always march openly to their 
 end, and they are therefore easily circumvented." So when 
 the Normans came, and the Saxons, they sowed dissensions 
 among the Irish people. They stirred them up against each 
 other, and the bold, hot blood of the Celt was always ready 
 to engase in contest and in war. What was the secret of 
 that incessant and desolating war? There is no history 
 more painful to read than the history of the Irish people, 
 from the day that the Normans landed, until the day when 
 the groat issue of Protestantism was put before the nation, 
 and v\7hen Ireland, for the first time, imited as one man. 
 
 My friends, the true secret of that history is 
 
 the constant efibrt of the English to force upon Ireland the 
 
NORMAN INVASION AND MISRULE. 35 
 
 feudal svbtem, and consequently to rob the Irish of every 
 inch of their land and to externjinate them. I lay this 
 down as the one secret, the one thread by which you may 
 unravel the tangled skein of our history for the four hun- 
 dred years that follov/ed the Norman invasion. The Nor- 
 mans and Saxons came ^vith the express purpose anc' 
 design of taking every foot of land in Ireland and exter- 
 minating the Celtic race. It is an awful thing to think of ; 
 but vve have the evidence of history for the fact. Mrst of 
 all, Henry 11., whilst he made his treaties with the Irish 
 kings, secretl}^ divided the whole of Ireland into ten por- 
 tions, and allotted each of these ten portions to one of his 
 Norman knights. In a word, he robbed the Irish people 
 and the Irish chieftains of every single foot of land in the 
 Irish territory, and gave it to the Normans. - It is true 
 they were not able to take possession. It was as if a mas- 
 ter robber were to divide the booty before it is taken. It 
 was far easier to assign property not yet stolen than to put 
 his fellow-thieves in possession of it. There v^ere Irish 
 hands and Irish battle-blades in the way for many a long 
 year ; nor has it been accomplished to this day. 
 
 In order to root out the Celtic race, and to destroy us, 
 mark the measures of legislation which followed. First of 
 all, my friends, whenever an Englishman was put in pos- 
 session of an acre of land, he got the right to trespass upon 
 his Irish neighbors', and to take their land as far as he 
 could ; and they had no action in a court of law to recover 
 their land. If an Irishman brought an action at law against 
 an Englishman for taking half of his field, or for trespassing 
 upon his land, according to the law, from the beginning, 
 that Irishman was put out of court ; there was no action ; 
 the Englishman was perfectly justified in what he did. 
 Worse than this ; they made laws declaring that the killing 
 of an Irishman was no felony. Sir John Davis, Attorney. 
 
36 ENQLI8R MISRULE m IRELAND. 
 
 General, in the time of James I., tells us liow, upon a cer- 
 tain occasion, at Waterford, in the 29th year of Edward I., 
 of England, a certain Edward Butler brought an action 
 against Robert de Almey to recover certain goods that 
 Robert had stolen from him. The case was brought into 
 court. Robert acknowledged that he had stolen the goods ; 
 that he was a thief. The defence he put in was that Ed- 
 wa.rd, the man he had plundered, was an Irishman. The case 
 was tried. Now, my friends, just think of it ! The issue 
 that w^as put before the jury was, whether Edward, the 
 plaintiff, was an Irishman or an Englishman. The jury 
 found that Edward was an Englishman. That was enough ; 
 Robert, the thief, was obliged to give back the goods. But 
 if the jury found that Edward was an Irishman he might 
 keep the goods ; — there was no action against him. 
 
 We find upon the same authority, — Sir John Davis, — a 
 description of a certain jail-delivery at "Waterford, where a 
 man named Robert Walsh had killed the son of Ivor Mc- 
 Gilmore. He was arraigned and tried for manslaughter; 
 and, v%^ithout the slightest difiiculty, acknowledged it. 
 " Yes," he said, " I did kill him ; but you have no right to 
 try me for it : for he was an Irishman ! " Instantly he was 
 let out of the dock, on condition — as the Irishman, at the 
 time, was in the service of an English master — that he 
 shoiTld pay v/hatever the master could claim for the loss of 
 his services ; whatever was their value : but for the murder, 
 he was let go scot-free. " Not only," says Sir John Davis, 
 " were the Irish considered aliens, but they were considered 
 enemies : insomuch that though an Englishman might settle 
 upon an Irishman's land, there was no redress ; but if an 
 Irishman wished to buy an acre of land from an Englishman, 
 he could not do it." So they kept the land they had ; and 
 they were always gaining by plunder. They could steal; 
 •while we could not even buy. 
 
NOBMAJSr INVASIOir AND MISRULE. 37 
 
 If any man made a will, and left an acre of land to aii 
 Irishman, the moment it was proved that he was an Irish 
 man, the land was forfeited to the Crown of England — even 
 if it was only left in trust to him : of which we have two 
 very striking examples. We read that, in the first year ol 
 Henry VI., a certain Edward Butler, of Clonboyne, in the 
 county of Meath, left some lands in trust for charitable 
 piu'poses ; and he left them to his two chaplains, Conor 
 O'Mulrooney and John McCann. It was proved that the 
 two priests were Irishmen ; and though the land was left to 
 them in trust for charitable purposes it was forfeited to the 
 Crown, because the two men were Irishmen. Later, a cer- 
 tain Mrs. Catherine Dowdall, a pious woman, made a will 
 when she was dying, leaving some land, near Swords, in the 
 county of Dublin, to a priest named John O'Bellane : and 
 the land was forfeited to the Crown because, as it Y»'as set 
 forth, " the said John O'Bellane being one of the King's 
 Irish enemies." 
 
 In the year 1367, Lionel, Duke of Clarence, third son of 
 Edward III., came to Ireland and held a Parliament in 
 Kilkenny, which passed certain laws. Some of these laws 
 were as folio v/s : "If any man speak the Irish language, or 
 be found keeping company with the Irish, or adopting Irish 
 customs, his lands shall be taken from him and forfeited to 
 the Crown of England." If an Englishman married an Irish 
 woman, what do you think was the penalty ? He was sen- 
 tenced to be half hanged ; to have his heart cut out before 
 he was dead ; then to have his head struck off; and every 
 rood of his land passed to the Crown of England. " Thus," 
 says Sir John Davis, the great English authority, " it is 
 evident that the constant design of English legislation in 
 Ireland was to possess the Irish land, and to extirpate and 
 exterminate the Irish people." 
 
 Now, citizens of America, Mr. Froude came here to appeal 
 
38 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 to you for your verdict ; and he asks you to say : " Was not 
 England justified in her treatment of Ireland, because the 
 Irish people would not submit ? " Now, citizens of America, 
 I ask you, would not the Irish people be the vilest dogs on 
 the face of the earth if they submitted to such treatment as 
 this ? Would they be worthy of the name of men, if they 
 submitted to be robbed, plundered, and degraded ? It is true 
 that, in all this legislation, we see the same spirit of con- 
 tempt of which I sj)oke in the beginning of my lecture. But 
 remember who it was that these Saxon churls were thus 
 despising ; and ask yourselves w^hat race was it they treated 
 wath so much contumely and so much contempt, and at- 
 tempted in every way to degrade, whilst they were ruining 
 and robbing them ? What race were they ? Gerald Barry, 
 speaking <-»f the Irish race, says the Irish came from the grand- 
 est race that he knew of on this side of the world, " and there 
 are no better people under the sun." By the v/ord " better," 
 he meant more valiant or more intellectual. Those who 
 came over from England, by even the English who went be- 
 fore them, were called Saxon hogs, or churls, while the Irish 
 called them hodacli Sassenagh. These were the men who 
 showed, in the very system by which they w^ere governed, that 
 they could not understand the nature of a people who refused 
 to be slaves. They were slaves themselves. Consider the 
 history of the feudal system under which they lived. Accord- 
 ing to the feudal system of government, the King of England 
 was lord of every inch of land in England. Every foot of 
 land in England was the king's ; and the nobles, who had 
 the land, held it from the king — but they held it under feu- 
 dal conditions, the most degrading that can be imagined. 
 For instance : if a man died and left his heir, a son or 
 daughter, under age, the heir or heiress, together with the 
 estate, went into the hands of the king. He might perhaps 
 leave a widow, with ten children. She would have to sup- 
 
yOBMAJSr INVASION AND MISRULE. 39 
 
 port all the children herself, whatever way she could, out of 
 her dower ; but the estate and the eldest son or the eldest 
 daughter went into the hands of the king. Then during the 
 minority of the heir, the king could spend the revenues or 
 rent of the estate, without the knowledge of any one, or 
 could sell the castle and the estate, and no one could demand 
 an account of him ; and when the son or daughter came of 
 age, he then sold them in marriage to the highest bidder. 
 "We have Godfrey de Mandeville buying for twenty thou- 
 sand marks, from King John, the hand of Isabella, Countess 
 of Gloster. We have Isabella de Lingera, another heiress, 
 ofiering a liundred marks to King John — for what do you 
 think ? — for liberty to marry whoever she liked, and not to be 
 obliged to marry the man he would give her to. 
 If a widow lost her husband, the moment the breath was out 
 of him, the lady and the estate passed to the king; and he 
 might squander the estate, or do whatever he liked with it ; 
 and then he could sell the widow. AVe have a curious ex- 
 ample of this. We have Alice, Countess of Warwick, pay- 
 ing King John one thousand pounds sterling, in gold, for 
 leave to remain a widow as long as she liked. This was the 
 slavery called the feudal system, of which Mr. Froude is so 
 proud, and of which he says : "It lay at the root of all that 
 is noble and good in Europe." The Irish could not stand it, 
 — small blame to them ! But when the Irish people found 
 that they were to be hunted down like wolves, — found their 
 lands were to be taken from them, and that there was no 
 redress, — over and over again the Irish people sent petitions 
 to the King of England, to give them the benefit of English 
 law, and they v/ould be amenable to it. But they were 
 denied,' and told that they should remain as they were: that 
 is to say, England was determined to exterminate them, and 
 get every foot of Irish soil. This is the one leading idea or 
 principle which animated England in her treatment of Ire- 
 
40 ENGLISH MISRULE^IN IRELAND. 
 
 land throughout those four liundred years, and it is the only 
 clue you can find to that turmoil and misery, and constant 
 fighting which Avas going on in Ireland during that period. 
 
 Sir James Cusack, an English commissioner sent over by 
 Henry VIII., wrote to his Majesty these quaint words: 
 " The Irish be of opinion amongst themselves that the 'FiW^ 
 lish wish to get all their lands, and to root them out com 
 pletely." He just struck the nail on the head. Mr. Eroude 
 himself acknowledges that the land question lay at the root 
 of the whole business. Nay, more, the feudal system would 
 have handed over every inch of land in Ireland to the Norman 
 king and his Norman nobles ; and the O'Briens, the O'Neills, 
 the O'Donnells, and the O'Conors, were of more ancient and 
 better blood than that of William, the bastard Norman. 
 
 The Saxon might submit to feudal law, and be 
 
 crushed into a slave, a clod of the earth ; the Celt never would. 
 England's great mistake — I believe, in my soul, that the great 
 mistake, of all others the greatest, — lay in this, that the Eng- 
 lish people never realized the fact that, in dealing with the 
 Irish, they had to deal with the proudest race on the face of 
 the earth. 
 
 During all these years the Norman nobles, the Ormondes, 
 the Desmonds, the Geraldines, the De Burghs, were at the 
 head and front of every rebellion. The English complained 
 of them, and said they were worse than the Irish rebels ; 
 that they were constantly stirring up disorders. Do you 
 know the reason why? Because they, as Normans, were 
 under the feudal laws, and therefore the king's sherifis could 
 come down on them, at every turn, with fines and forfeitures 
 of the land held from the king. So, by keeping the country 
 ill disorder, they were always able to defy the sheriffs ; and 
 they preferred the Irish freedom to the English feudalism : 
 therefore, they fomented and kept up these discords. It 
 was the boast of my kinsmen of Clanricarde that, Avitli the 
 
NORMAN INVASION AND MISRULE. 41 
 
 blessing of God, tliey -^voultl never allow a king's writ to 
 run in Connauglit. Dealing with this period of our history, 
 Mr. Froude says that the Irish Chieftains, and their septs or 
 tribes, were doing this or that — the Geraldines, the Des- 
 monds, and the Ormondes. I say, slowly, Mr. Froude ; the 
 Geraldines and the Ormondes were not Irish Chieftains ; so 
 do not father their acts upon the Irish ; the Irish Chieftains 
 have enough to ansv/er for, during these four hundred years. 
 I protest to you that, in this most melancholy period of our 
 sad history, I have found but two casea, two instances, tliat 
 cheer me ; and both were the action of Irish Chieftains. In 
 one we find that Turlough O'Conor put away his wife; she 
 was one of the O'Briens. Theobald Burke, one of the Earls 
 of Clanricarde, lived in open adultery with the v/oman. 
 With the spirit of their heroic ancestors, the Irish Chieftains 
 of Connauglit came together, deposed him, and drove him out 
 of the place. Later on, we find another Chieftain, Brian 
 McMahon, who induced Sorley McDonnell, chief of the 
 Hebrides, or Western Islands, to put away his lawful wife, 
 and marry a da,ughter of his own. The follov/ing year they 
 fell out; and McMahon drowned his own son-in-law. The 
 chiefs, O'Donnell and CNeill, came together with their 
 forces, and deposed McMahon, in the cause of virtue, honor, 
 and womanhood. I have looked in vain through these four 
 hundred years for one single trait of generosity or of the 
 assertion of virtue among the Anglo-Norman chiefs ; and 
 the dark picture is only relieved by these two gleams of Irish 
 patriotism and Irish zeal in the cause of purity and of out 
 ragci honor. 
 
 Now, Mr. Froude opened another question in his first lect- 
 ure. He said that, during all this time, while the English 
 monarchs were engaged in trying to subjugate Scotland, and 
 trying to subdue their Fi-ench Provinces, the Irish were rap- 
 idly gaining ground, hemming the English in, and crippling 
 
42 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 tlie Pale, year by year. Tlie Englisli power in Ireland was 
 frequently almost anniliilatecl ; and the only thing that saved 
 it was the love of the Irish for their own independent way 
 of fighting, which, though favorable to freedom, was hostile 
 to national unity. He says, speaking of that time, " Would 
 it not have been better to have allowed the Irish Chieftains 
 to govern their own people ? Freedom to whom ? — freedom 
 to the bad, to the violent ! It is no freedom ! " I deny thai, 
 the Irish Chieftains, with all their faults, were, as a class, 
 bad men or violent men. I deny that they were engaged, 
 as Mr. Froude says, in cutting their peoples' throats ; that 
 they were a people who would never be satisfied. Mr, Froude 
 tells us emphatically and significantly, that " the Irish people 
 were satisfied with their Chieftains;" but the people are 
 not satisfied if their throats are being cut. The Irish Chief- 
 tains were the bane of Ireland b}^ their divisions ; the Irish 
 Chieftains were the ruin of their country by their want of 
 anion, and want of generous acquiescence in the rule of 
 some great and noble head that would save them by uniting 
 them. The Irish Chieftains, even in the days of the heroic 
 Edward Bruce, did not rally around him as they ought. In 
 their divisions is the secret of Ireland's slavery and ruin 
 through those years. But with all that, history attests that 
 they were still magnanimous enough to be the fathers of 
 their people, and to be the natural leaders, as God intended 
 them to be, of their septs, families, and namesakes. And 
 they struck whatever blows they did strike, in what they 
 imagined to be the cause of right, justice, and liberty; and 
 the only blow that came in the cause of outraged purity, 
 came from an Irish hand, in those dark and terrible years. 
 
 I will endeavor to follow this gentleman in his subsequent 
 lectures. Now a darker cloud than that of mere invasion is 
 lowering over tlie horizon of Ireland ; now comes the demon 
 of religious discord — waving the sword of religious persecu- 
 
NOBMAN' IJSfVASION' AND MISRULE. 43 
 
 tion over the distracted and exhausted land. And ^ve shall 
 see whether this historian has entered into the spirit of the 
 great contest that followed, and that, in our day, has ended 
 in a glorious victory for Ireland's Church ; which will be 
 followed, as assuredly, by a still more glorious victory foi 
 Ireland's Il^ationality. 
 
seco:nd lectuee. 
 
 {Delivered at tlie Academy of Ilimc, Nac Yorlc^ Nov. 14, 187.3.) 
 
 THE TUDORS IX IRELAND. 
 
 Ladies and Gentlemen : We now come to consider tlie 
 second lectnre of the eminent English historian who has 
 come amongst us. It covers one of the most interesting 
 and terrible passages in our history. It takes in three 
 reigns, — the reign of Henry VIII., the reign of Elizabeth, 
 and the reign of James I. : I scarcely consider the reigns 
 of Edward YI. and of Fhilip and Mary v/orth counting. 
 The learned gentleman began his second lecture with a 
 rather startling paradox. He asserted that Henry YIII. 
 was a hater of disorder. Now, my friends, every man in 
 this world has a hero. AVhether consciously or uncon- 
 sciously, every man selects out of history some character or 
 other which he admires : until at length, from constantly 
 thinking of the vii'tues and excellences of his hero, he 
 comes almost to worship liim. Before us all lie the gi-and 
 historic names that are written upon the world's annals : 
 and every man is free to select the character that he likes 
 best, and to choose his hero. Using this privilege, Mr. 
 Fro- de has made the most singular selection of his hero 
 ,that ever you or I heard of: his hero is Henry VIII. It 
 speaks volumes for the integrity of Mr. Fronde's own mind ; 
 it is a strong argument that he possesses a charity the most 
 sublime, when he has been enabled to discover virtues in 
 the historical character of one of the greatest monsters that 
 
THE TUD0E8 IN IRELAND. 45 
 
 ever cursed tlie earth. He has, however, succeeded in this, 
 which, to us, aj^pears an impossibility. And he has discov- 
 ered, amongst many other shining virtues in the characte* 
 of the English Nero, a great love for order, and a great 
 hatred of disorder. "Well, we must stop at the very first sen- 
 tence of the learned gentleman, and try to analyze it, and see 
 how much there is of truth in this word of the historian, and 
 how much there is which is only an honorable, and, to him, 
 a truthful figment of his imagination. 
 
 All order in the State is based upon three grand principles, 
 my friends, namely, — the supremacy of the law ; the respect 
 for, and the liberty of, conscience ; and a tender regard for 
 that which lies at the fountain-head of all human society, 
 namely, — the sanctity of the marriage-tie. The first element 
 of order in every State is the supremacy of the law. In this 
 supremacy lies the very quintessence of human freedom, and 
 of all order. The law is supposed to be (according to the 
 definition of Aquinas), the judgment pronounced by profound 
 reason and intellect, thinking and legislating for the public 
 good. The law, therefore, is the expression of reason; — ■ 
 reason backed by authority ; reason influenced by the noble 
 motive of the public good. This being the nature of law, the 
 very first thing that wq demand for this law is that every 
 man bow down to it and obey it. No man in the community 
 can claim exemption from obedience to the law ; least of all, 
 the man who is at the head of the community ; because he is 
 supposed to represent, before the nation, that principle of 
 obedience, without which all national order and happiness 
 perish among the people. Was Henry YIII. an upholder of 
 law? Was he obedient to the law ? I deny it : and I have the 
 evidence of all history to back me up in the denial. I brand 
 Henry YIII. as one of the greatest enemies of freedom and 
 of law that ever lived in this world ; consequently one of 
 the greatest promoters of disorder. I will only give you 
 
46 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 one example ; out of ten tlionsand, I have only selected one, 
 Wlien Henry broke with the Pope, he called upon his sub- 
 jects to acknowledge him — bless the mark! — as the spiritual 
 head of the Church. There were three Abbots of three 
 charter-houses in London, — namely, the Abbot of London 
 proper, the Abbot of Axiolam, and the Abbot of Bellival. 
 These three men refused to acknowledge Henry as the 
 supreme spiritual head of the Church. He had them ar- 
 rested, liad them tried, and had a jury of twelve citizens of 
 London to ait upon them. Now, the first princij^le of Eng- 
 lish law, the grand palladium of English legislation and 
 freedom, is the perfect liberty of the jury. The jury, in 
 any trial, must be perfectly free: not only free from all 
 coercion from v/ithout, but free even from any prejudice. 
 They must be free from any prejudging of the case; must 
 be perfectly impartial, and perfectly free to record their ver- 
 dict. These twelve men refused to convict the three Ab- 
 bots of high treason ; and tliey grounded their refusal upon 
 this : " Never," they said, " has it been heard in England 
 that it was high treason to deny the spiritual supremacy of 
 the king. It is not lav/; and, therefore, we cannot find 
 these men guilty of high treason." What did Henry do ? 
 He sent word to the jury that if they did not find the three 
 Abbots guiUy, he would visit them with the same penalties 
 that he had prepared for their prisoners ! He sent word to 
 the jury that they should find them guilty ! I brand him, 
 therefore, as having torn in pieces the charter of English 
 liberty. Magna Charta, and as having trampled upon the 
 first grand element of English law and jurisprudence, 
 namely, the liberty of the jury. Citizens of America! 
 would you, any one of you, like to be tried by a jury, if 
 you knew that the President of the United States had 
 informed that jury that they were bound to find you guilty 
 or else he would put them to death ? WJiere would there 
 
THE TUDORS AY IRELAND. 47 
 
 be liberty, — where would tliere be law, — if sucli a transac- 
 tion were permitted? And this was the action of Mr. 
 Fronde's great admirer of order — his hero, Henry YIII. 
 
 The second grand element of order is respect for con- 
 science. The conscience of a man, and consequently of a 
 nation, is supposed to be the great guide in all the relations 
 in which the people or the individual stand to God. The 
 conscience of man is so free that the Almighty God Himself 
 respects it ; and it is a theological axiom that if a man does 
 a wrong act, thinking he is doing right, the Avrong will not 
 be attributed to him by Almighty God. Was this man a 
 respecter of conscience ? Again, out of ten thousand acts of 
 his, I Aviil select one. He ordered the people of England to 
 change their religion ; ordered them to give up that grand 
 system of dogmatic teaching which is in the Catholic Church, 
 where every man knows v/hat to believe and what to do. 
 And what religion did he ofier them instead ? He did not ofi'er 
 them Protestantism, for Henry YIII. never v/as a Protestant; 
 and, to the last day of his life, if he could only have laid 
 his hands on Martin Luther, he would have made a toast of 
 him. He heard Mass up to the day of his death ; and after 
 his death there was a solemn High Mass over his inflated 
 corpse, — a solemn High Mass, that the Lord might have 
 mercy on his soul. Ah ! my friends, some otlier poor soul, 
 I suppose, got the benefit of that Mass. What religion did 
 he offer the people of England? He simply came before 
 them and said : " Let every man in the land agree with me; 
 whatever I say, that is religion." More than this, his Par- 
 liament, a slavish Parliament, — every man afraid of his life, 
 — passed a law making it high treason not only to disagree 
 with the King in anything that he believed, but making 
 it high treason for any man to dispute anything that the 
 King should ever believe in the future time. He was not 
 only the enemy of conscience ; he was the annihilator of 
 
48 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 conscience. He would allow no man to liave a conscience. 
 " I am your conscience," lie said to the nation ; " I am your 
 infallible guide in all things that you are to believe, and in 
 all things that you are to do ; and if any man sets up his 
 own conscience against me, that man is guilty of high trea- 
 son, and I will stain my hands in his heart's blood." This 
 is the great lover of order ! 
 
 The third great element of order is that upon which all 
 society is based. The great key-stone of the arch of society 
 is the sanctity of the marriage tie. Whatever else is inter- 
 fered with, that must not be touched ; for Christ, our Lord, 
 has said, " Those that God has joined together let no man put 
 asunder." A valid marriage can only be dissolved by the 
 angel of death. No power in heaven or on earth — much 
 less in hell — can dissolve the validity of a marriage. Henry 
 VIII. had so little respect for the sanctity of the marriage 
 tie that he brutally put away from him a woman to whom 
 he was lawfully married, and took in her stead (while she 
 was yet living,) a woman who was supposed to be his own 
 daughter. He married six wives. Two of them he repudi- 
 ated — divorced ; two of them he beheaded ; one of them 
 died in childbirth ; — and the sixth and last one — Mistress 
 Catherine Parr — had her name down in Henry's book, at 
 the time of his death, in the list of his victims; and she 
 would have had her head cut off, if the monster had lived 
 for a few days longe-r. This is all matter of history. And 
 now, I ask the American public, is it fair for Mr. Froude, 
 or any other living man, to present himself before an Amer- 
 ican audience, — an aiulience of enlightened and cultivated 
 people, that have read history as well as the English histo- 
 rian, and ask them to swallow the absurd paradox that Henry 
 VIII. was an admirer of order and a hater of disorder. 
 
 But Mr. Froude says : " Now, this is not fair. I said in 
 my lecture that I would have nothing to do with Henry's 
 
TUB TUnOllS IJY IRELAND. AQ 
 
 matrimonial transactions." All ! Mr. Fronde, yon were 
 \Yise. " But at least," he says, " in his relations to Ireland, 
 I claim that he was a hater of disorder ; " and the proof he 
 gives is the following : Fii-st of all he says that one of the 
 curses of Ireland was absenteeism, — the absentee landlords ; 
 and he is right. Now, Henry, he says, put an end to that 
 business in the simplest way imaginable ; he took the estates 
 away from the absentees and gave them to other people. 
 My friends, it sounds well, very plausible — this saying of 
 the English historian. Let us analyze it a little. During 
 the " Wars of the Roses," between the Houses of York and 
 Lancaster, which j^i'eceded the Keformation in England, 
 many of the English families and Anglo-Norman families 
 that were settled in Ireland, went over to England and 
 joined in the conflict. It Avas an English question and an 
 English war ; and the consequence was that numbers of the 
 English settlers retired from Ii'eland and left their estates, 
 — abandoned them entirely. Others again, — from disgust, or 
 because they had large English properties, — preferred to 
 live in their own country, and retired from Ireland to live 
 in England. So that, when Henry "VIII. came to the 
 throne of England, the English "Pale," as it was called, 
 comprised only about one-half of the counties of Louth, 
 Westmeath, Dublin, Wicklov/, and Wexford, — nothing 
 more ; only one-half of each of these counties. Henry, ac- 
 cording to Mr. Froude, performed a great act of justice, 
 when he took from these absentees their estates, and gave 
 them — to whom ? To other Englishmen, his own favorites 
 and friends. Now, the historical fact is this, that, as soon 
 as the English retired, and abandoned their estates, the Irish 
 people came in and repossessed themselves of their own prop- 
 erty. Mark, my friends, that even if the Irish people had 
 no title to that property, the very fact of the English having 
 abandoned it gave them a sufficient title; becausCj ^^ bona 
 
50 ENGLISH MISBULE IJSf IRELAND. 
 
 derellcta sunt prcemia cajnentis^'' — ^tliat is to say, things that 
 are abandoned belong to the man that first gets hold of 
 them. But much more just was the title of the Irish peoj)le 
 to that land, because it was their own, because they W€-re 
 unjustly dispossessed of it by the very men who abandoned 
 it now. And therefore they came in with a twofold title, 
 namely, "the land is ours because there is nobody to claim it, 
 the owner having retired ; and even if there were, the land 
 is ours because it v/as always ours, and we never lost our 
 right to it." When, therefore, Henry YIII., the " lover of 
 order," dispossessed the absentees of their estates, and sent 
 over other Englishmen, and handed over these estates to 
 men who would live in Ireland, and on the land, Mr. Froude 
 claims great credit for him, and says, that in so doing he 
 acted well for the Irish people. But the doing of this in- 
 volved the driving of the Irish people a second time out of 
 their own property. That was the whole secret of Henry's 
 wonderful beneficence to Ireland, in giving us "resident 
 landlords ! " Just picture it to yourselves, in this way, my 
 friends. There are a great many here who are owners of 
 property, — I sujDpose the most of you. Just suppose the 
 Government of the United States, or the President, turning 
 you out of your property, taking your houses and lots and 
 lands from you, and giving them to some friend of his own ; 
 and then saying to you : " Nov/, my friend, you must re- 
 member, I am a lover of order ; I am giving you ' a resident 
 landlord ! ' " 
 
 Henry, as soon as he ascended the throne, sent over the 
 Earl of Surrey, in the year 1520. Surrey was a brave sol- 
 , dier, a stern, rigorous man ; and Henry thought that, by 
 sending him over, and backing him with a grand army, he 
 would be able to repress the disordered elements in the Irish 
 nation. That disorder reigned in Ireland, I am the first to 
 admit ; but in tracing that disorder to its cause, I claim that 
 
THE TUDOMS m IRELAND. 51 
 
 fclie cause was not in any inherent love for disorder in the 
 Irish character, though they were always very fond of a 
 fight; I admit that attribute; — but I hold and' claim thai 
 the great cause of all the disorder and turmoil of Ireland 
 was, first, the strange and inhuman legislation of England 
 for four hundred years previously ; and secondly, the pres- 
 ence of the Anglo-Norman lords in Ireland, who fostered 
 and kept up disturbances in the country in order that they 
 might have an excuse for not paying their feudal dues and 
 duties to the king. 
 
 Surrey came over and tried the strong hand for a time ; 
 but he found, — brave as he was, and accomplished General 
 as he was, — he found that the Irish were a little too many 
 for him ; and he sent word to Henry : " This people can 
 only be subdued by conquering them utterly, — by going in 
 amongst them with fire and sword. And this you will not 
 be able to do because the country is too large, and so geo- 
 graphically difficult, that it is impossible for an army to pen- 
 etrate into its fastnesses, to subjugate the whole population." 
 Then it was that Henry took up the policy of conciliation 
 • — v/hen he could not help it. Mr. Froude makes it a great 
 virtue in this monarch that he endeavored to conciliate the 
 Irish. He did it because he could not help it. 
 
 And now, my friends, there is one passage in the corre- 
 spondence between Surrey and Henry the Eighth that speaks 
 volumes ; and it is this : When the Earl of Surrey arrived 
 in Ireland he found himself in the midst of war and confu- 
 sion. But the people who v/ere really at the source of all 
 that confusion he declares to be not so much the Irish, or 
 their Chieftains, as the Anglo-Norman and English lords in 
 Ireland. Here is the passage in question. There were two 
 Chieftains of the McCarthys, — Conor Og McCarthy and 
 McCarthy Ruadh, or the Red McCarthy. Surrey wrote of 
 these two men, to Henry VIII., and ho says : — " These are 
 
52 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 tvfo wise men, and more conformable to order than some of 
 the Englishmen here." Thus out of the lips of one of Ire- 
 land's bitterest enemies, I take the answer to Mr, Fronde's 
 repeated assertion that we Irish are so disorderly, and such 
 lovers of turmoil and confusion, that the only way to reduce 
 us to order is to sweep us away altogether. 
 
 The next feature of Surrey's policy, when he found he 
 could not conquer Ireland with the sword, was to set Chief- 
 tain against Chieftain. And so he writes to Henry: — "I 
 am endeavoring," he says, "to perpetuate the animosity be- 
 tween O'Donnell and O'Neill in Ulster." Here are his 
 words : — " It would be dangerful to have them both agree 
 and join together." It would be dangerous! Well might 
 jMr. Fronde say, that, in the day in which we, Irish, shall 
 be united, we shall be invincible, and no power on earth 
 shall keep us slaves. " It Avould be dangerful to have them 
 both join together; and the longer they continue at war, the 
 better it will be for your Grace's subjects here." Now, 
 mark the spirit of that letter, and you mark the whole geni- 
 us of England's treatment of Ireland. He was not speak- 
 ing of the Irish as subjects of the King of England. He 
 has not the slightest consideration for the unfortunate Irish, 
 whom he was pitting against each other. " Let them bleed," 
 he says ; " the longer they continue at war, — the grea,ter 
 number of them that are swept away, — the better it will be 
 for your Grace's subjects here.". The spirit of the legisla- 
 tion, the spirit of the law, was intended only to protect the 
 English settler, and to exterminate the Irishman. This Sir 
 John Davies himself, Attorney-General of King James I., 
 declares lay at the root of all England's legislation for Ire- 
 land for four hundred years, and was the cause of all the 
 misery and all the evils of Ireland. 
 
 Surrey retired after two years ; and then, according to 
 Mr. Froude, Henry tried " Home Kule " in Ireland. Here 
 
TEE TUD0R8 IN IRELAND. 63 
 
 again the learned historian tries to make a point for his hero ; 
 and Irishmen, he says, admire the memory of this man 
 " He tried ' Home Kule ' with you. He found that you 
 were not able to govern yourselves ; and he was obliged to 
 take the whip and drive you." Let us see what kind of 
 " Home Rule " did Henry try. One would imagine that 
 " Home Rule," in Ireland, meant that Irishmen should man- 
 age their own affairs, should have the making of their own 
 laws ; it either means this, or it means nothing. It is " a 
 delusion, a mockeiy, and a snare," unless it means that the 
 Irish people have a right to assemble in their own Parlia- 
 ment, to govern themselves by legislating for themselves, 
 and by making their own laws. Did the " Home Rule " of 
 Henry VIII. mean this ? Not a bit of it. All he did was to 
 make the Earl of Kildare Lord Lieutenant, or Lord Deputy, — 
 to f)lace an Irishman — that is to say an Anglo-Norman Irish- 
 man — at the head of the State, for a few years. And in this 
 consisted the whole scheme of the " Home Rule " attributed 
 by Mr. Froude to Henry VIII. He did not call upon the 
 Irish nation and say to them, '' Return members to Parlia- 
 ment, and I will allow you to make your own laws." He 
 did not call upon the Irish Chieftains, the natural represent- 
 atives of the nation, — the men in whose veins flowed the 
 blood of Ireland's Chieftaincy, for thousands of years ; he 
 did not call upon the O'Briens, the O'Neills, the McCarthys, 
 and the O'Conors, and say to them, " Go, and assemble ; 
 make your own laws ; and, if they are just laws, I will set 
 my seal upon them ; and let you govern Ireland through 
 your o\Yii legislation." No ; but he called on a clique of 
 Anglo-Norman lords, — the most unruly, the most \rarlike, 
 the most restless pack that ever you or I read or heard of in 
 all history, — and he said to these men : " Take and govern 
 the country ; I vest the government in your hands." 
 
 No sooner did Henry leave these men to govern Ireland, 
 
54 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND, 
 
 than tliey began to make war upon the Irish. Kildare was 
 made Lord Deputy in 1522 ; and the very first thing those 
 Anglo-Norman lords did was to assemble an army and lay 
 waste all the territory of the Irish Chieftains around them. 
 They killed the people, burned the villages, and destroyed 
 everything. Then, after a time, they fell out among them- 
 selves, — these Norman lords. The great family of the But- 
 lers, the Earls of Ormonde, became jealous of Kildare, who 
 was a Fitzgerald, and began to accuse him to the King of 
 treasonable actions. In 1524, the Earl of Kildare entered 
 into an undoubtedly treasonable correspondence with Francis 
 I., King of France, and Charles V., Emperor of Germany. 
 He was called to England for the third time to answer for 
 his conduct; and, in 1534, Henry put him in prison. Then 
 his son, Lord Thomas Fitzgerald, — called " Silken Thomas," 
 — a brave, hot-headed, rash young Norman noble, — revolted, 
 because his father was a prisoner in England, and it was told 
 him that the old Earl was about to be put to death. Henry 
 declared war against him, and he declared war against the 
 King of England. The consequence of this Avar was that the 
 whole province of Munster and a great part of Leinster were 
 ravaged ; — the people were destroyed ; towns and villages were 
 burned ; until, at length, there was not as much left in nearly 
 one-half of Ireland as would feed man or beast. So that 
 this " Home Rule " of Henry resulted in the rebellion of 
 his Norman lords ; and the treason of Kildare ended in the 
 ruin of nearly one-half the Irish people. 
 
 Perhaps you will ask me, did the Irish people take any 
 part in that war, so as to justify the treatment they re- 
 ceived ? I answer, they took no part in it ; it was an Eng- 
 lish business from beginning to end ; and the Irish Chief- 
 tains took little or no interest in that war. We read that 
 only O'Carroll, O'Moore, of Offaly ; and O'Conor— only 
 three Irish Chieftains sided with the Geraldine's and drew 
 
THE TUDORS /lY IRELAND. 55 
 
 tlie Bword against Henry ; — three Chieftains of rather small, 
 unimportant septs, who by no means represented the Irish 
 people of Munster or any other Province. And yet upon 
 the Irish people fell the avenging and destroying hand of 
 Henry the Eighth's army. 
 
 Mr. Fronde goes on to say, " The Irish, somehow or other, 
 yet seemed to like Henry VIII." Well, if they did, I don't ' 
 admire their taste. He j)leased them, says Mr. Froude, and 
 they got fond of him ; and then he adds the reason why ; 
 and it was that Henry never showed any disposition to dis- 
 possess the Irish people of their lands or to externiinate 
 them. Now, I take him up on that. Is it true or is it 
 not? Fortunately for the Irish Historian, the State papers 
 are open to us as well as to Mr. Froude. What do tke 
 State papers of the reign of Henry tell us ? They tell us 
 that project after project was formed, during the reigii of 
 this monarch, to drive the whole Irish nation into Con- 
 naiiglit, or west of the Shannon. That Henry YIII. wished 
 it; that the Irish Council, that (according to Mr. Froude) 
 governed Ireland by " Home Rule," wished it ; and that 
 the people of England desired it. And one of those State 
 papers is in these words : — 
 
 " Considering these premises brought to pass, there shall 
 no Irish be on this side of the waters of Shannon, unprose- 
 cuted, unsubdued, and unexiled. Then shall the English 
 Pale be fully the distance of two hundred miles in length 
 and more." 
 
 More than this, we have the evidence of the State papers 
 of the time, that Henry YIII. meditated and contemp»lated 
 an utter extirpation, — the utter sweeping away and destruc- 
 tion of the whole Irish race. We find the Lord Deputy 
 and Council, in Dublin, wTriting to his Majesty; and here 
 are their words. They tell him that his project is impracti- 
 calle ; they say : 
 
56 ENGLISn MISnULE IJV IRELAND. 
 
 " The land is large : by estimation as large as England : 
 so that to inhabit the whole with new inhabitants would be 
 an enterprise so great, that there is no prince christened that 
 might commodiously spare so many subjects to depart out 
 of his realms ; but to encompass the destruction and total 
 subjection of the land would be a marvellous and stupendous 
 achievement from the great difficulties, both by lack of 
 inhabitants and the great hardiness of these Irish, who can 
 endure both hunger, and cold, and thirst, and evil lodging, 
 far more than the inhabitants of any other land. And it 
 would be unprecedented, the conquest of this land. We 
 have not heard nor read of any country that vv^as subdued 
 by such a conquest, the whole inhabitants of which had been 
 utterly extirpated iind banished." 
 
 Great God ! is this the man that Mr. Froude tells us was 
 the " friend of Ireland," that never showed any design to 
 take their lands or to dispossess them of their possessions ! 
 This is the man — the model " admirer of order," the " hater 
 of disorder ! " Surely, he was bound to create magnificent 
 order ; for, if a people are troublesome, and you want to 
 reduce them to quiet, the best way, and the simplest way, is 
 to kill them all. Just like some of those people in England 
 — nurses, we read of, a few years ago, — that were farming 
 out children ; and, when a child was a little fractious, they 
 gave it a nice little dose of poison ; and they called that 
 "quieting" it. 
 
 Do you know the reason why Henry YIII. pleased the 
 Irish, — for there was no doubt about it, — that they were 
 more pleased with him than with any other English mon- 
 arch, uj) to that time ? The reason is a very simple one. 
 He had his own designs ; but he concealed them. He was 
 meditating, like an anticipated Oliver Cromwell, the ruin 
 and destruction of the Irish race. But he had good sense ; 
 he kept it to himself; and it only came out in the State 
 papers. But he treated the Irish with a certain amount of 
 courtesy and politeness. Henry, Avifh all his faults, was a 
 
THE TUJbOES m IRELAND. 57 
 
 le{«rned man, an accomplished man, a man of the very hest 
 manners, — a man that, with a bland smile, would give you 
 a warm shake of the hand. It is true, the next day he 
 might have your head cut off; but still he had the manners 
 of a gentleman. And it is a singular fact, my friends, that 
 the tvv^o most gentlemanly Kings in England were the two 
 greatest scoundrels, perhaps, that ever lived, — Henry YIII. 
 and George lY. Henry had dealt with the Irish people 
 with a certain amount of civility and courtesy. He did not 
 come in amongst them, like all his predecessors, saying: 
 " You are the King's enemies; you ought all to be put to 
 death ; you are without the pale of law ; you are barbarians 
 and savages : and I will put you under my lieel." Henry 
 came and said : " Now let us see if w^e cannot arrange our 
 dilEculties; let us see, if we cannot live in peace and 
 quiet ; " and the Irish people were charmed with the man's 
 manner. Ah ! my friends, there was a black heart under 
 that smiling face; but it was also true, — a fact that Mr. 
 Froude acknowledges, — that Henry YIII. had a certain 
 amount of popularity with the Irish people ; which proves 
 that, if England only knew how to treat us with a certain 
 amount of kindness, they would, long since, have won the 
 heart of Ireland, instead of alienating and embittering it by 
 the injustice as much as by the cruelty of their laws. . . . 
 .... And this is what I meant on last Tuesday night, 
 when I said that the English contempt of Irishmen is really 
 the evil that lies deep at the root of all the bad spirit that 
 exists between the two nations ; for the simple reason that 
 the Irish people are too intellectual, too strong, too ener- 
 getic, too pure of race, and of blood too ancient and too 
 proud, to be despised. 
 
 And now, my friends, Mr. Fronde, in his second lecture, 
 gave us a proof of the great love the Irish people had for 
 Henry YIII. He says they were so fond of that King that 
 3* 
 
58 E]SrOLI8H MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 actually, at liis request, Ireland threw the Pope overboard. 
 I use thie gentleman's own words : " Ireland threw the 
 Pope overboard ! " No, Mr. Fronde, fond as we were of 
 your glorious hero, Henry VIII., we were not so enamored 
 of him, we had not fallen so deeply in love with him as to 
 give up the Pope for him. "What are the facts of the case ? 
 Henry, about the year 1530, got into difficulties witli the 
 Pope, which ended in his denying his authority and supremacy 
 as the head of the Catholic Church. He then picked out an 
 apostate monk, — a man who gave up his faith, — a man with- 
 out a shadow of either conscience, character, or virtue, — 
 and he had him consecrated as the first Protestant Arch- 
 bishop of Dublin. He was an Englishman named Brown — 
 George Brown ; — and Henry sent him over to Dublin, in 
 the year 1534, with a commission to get the Irish nation to 
 follow in the wake of the English, and to " throw the Pope 
 overboard " and acknowledge the supremacy of Henry. 
 Brown arrived in Dublin. He called the Bishops together 
 ■ — the Bishops of the Catholic Church ; and he said to them : 
 " You must change jowy allegiance. You must give up the 
 Pope, and take Henry, King of England, in his stead." The 
 Archbishop of Armagh, in those days, was an Englishman 
 whose name was Cromer; and the moment the old man 
 heard these words, he rose up from the Council Board and 
 said: "What blasphemy is this I hear? Ireland will never 
 change her faith ; Ireland never will renounce her Catholicity ; 
 and she would have to renounce it by renouncing the head 
 of the Catholic Church." And all the Bish- 
 ops of Ireland followed the Primate, all the priests of Ire- 
 land followed the Primate ; and George Brown wrote the 
 most lugubrious letter home to his protector, Thomas Crom- 
 well, telling him : "I can make nothing of this people ; and 
 I would return to England, only I am afraid the King would 
 have my head taken off." 
 
THE TUDORS IJSf IRELAND. 59 
 
 Three years later, however, Brovvii and the Lord Deputy 
 summoned a Parliament, and it was at this Parlia]nent of 
 1537, according to Mr. Froude, that "Ireland threw the 
 Pope overboard." Now, what are the facts ? A Parlia- 
 ment v/as assembled ; and, from time immemorial, in Ireland, 
 whenever a Parliament was assembled, there were three 
 delegates, called proctors, from every Catholic diocese in 
 Ireland, who sat in the House of Commons, in vii-tue of their 
 office ; — three priests from every diocese in Ireland. When 
 , this Parliament was called, the first thing they did v/as to 
 banish the proctors and deprive them of their seats in the 
 House. Without the slightest justice, without the slightest 
 show or pretence of either right, or law, or justice, the 
 proctors were excluded ; and so the ecclesiastical element — 
 the Church elemeiit — was completely precluded from that 
 Parliament of 1537. Then, partly by promises, partly by 
 bribes, partly by threats, this venal Parliament of the 
 " Pale," — this English Parliament, — this Parliament of the 
 rotten little boroughs that surrounded Dublin, and the five 
 half-counties that we have seen, — v^illingly took an oath 
 that Henry v/as the head of the Church; and Mr. Froude 
 calls this the apostasy of the Irish nation ! "With that 
 strange want of knowledge (for I can call it nothing else,) 
 of our religion, he imagines that Ireland remained Catholic, 
 even though he asserts that she gave up the Pope. They 
 took, he says, the oath — Bishops and all — and thereby ac- 
 knowledged the supremacy of Henry VIII. But, neverthe- 
 less, they did not become Protestants ; they still remained 
 Catholics ; and the reason why they did not take the same 
 oath to Elizabeth, was because Elizabeth insisted on their 
 taking the Protestant religion as well as the oath of suprem- 
 acy. I answer him, at once, and will set him riglit upon 
 this question. The Catliolic Church teaches, and has always 
 taught, that no man iq a Catholic who is not in communion 
 
6CI ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 of obedience with the Pope of Rome. Henry VIII., who 
 was a learned man, had too mucli theology, and too much 
 logic, and too much sense to become what is called a Protes- 
 tant. He never embraced the doctrines of Luther ; and h(3 
 held on to every iota of Catholic doctrine to the last day of 
 his life, save and except that he refused to acknowledge the 
 Pope. But, in the day that Henry VIII. refused to ac- 
 knowledge the Pope, he ceased to be a Catholic. And to 
 pretend or to hint that the Irish people were so ignorant 
 as to imagine that they could " thi-ow the Pope overboard," 
 and still remain Catholic, is to offer to the genius and in- 
 telligence of Ireland a gratuitous insult 
 
 It is true that some of the Bishops apostatized : I 
 
 can call it nothing else. They took the oath of supremacy 
 to Henry VIII. , and tlieir names, — living in the execration 
 of Irish history, — are : Eugene McGinnis, Bishop of Down 
 and Conor ; Roland Burke (I am sorry to say), Bishop of 
 Clonfert ; Florence Kirwan, Bishop of Clonmacnoise ; Ma- 
 thew Saunders, Bishop of Ossory; and Hugh O'Carolan, 
 Bishop of Clogher. Five bishops only apostatized, the rest 
 of Ireland's episcopacy remained faithful; — and George 
 Brown, the apostate Archbishop, acknowledges in a letter, 
 written at this time, that of all the priests of the diocese of 
 Dublin he could only find three that would take the oath to 
 Henry VIII. There was a priest down in Cork, — he was 
 an Irishman, rector of Shandon ; his name was Dominic 
 Tyrrell. He was offered the Bishopric of Cork, if he took 
 the oath ; and he took it. There was a man named Wil- 
 liam Myah ; he was offered the Diocese of Kildare if he 
 took the oath ; and he took it. There was another, Alex- 
 ander Devereux, Abbot of Dunbrody ; he was offered the 
 Diocese of Ferns, in the county of Yv^exford, in order to in- 
 duce him to swear allegiance to the English King : and he 
 did it. These are all the names that represent what Mr. 
 
TEE TUDOES IN IRELAND. 61 
 
 Froude calls the national apostasy of Ireland. Out of sa 
 many hundreds, eight men were found wanting; and Mr. 
 Froude turns round, quietly and calmly, and tells us that 
 the Irish Bishops and people "threw the Pope overboard." 
 
 He makes another assertion, and I regret he made it. I 
 regi'et it, because there is much in the learned gentleman 
 that I admire and esteem. He asserts that the Bishops of 
 Ireland, in these days, were immoral men ; that they had 
 families ; that they were not like the venerable men v/hom 
 we see in the episcopacy of to-day. Now, I answer, that 
 there is not a shred of testimony to bear up Mr. Froude in 
 this wild assertion. I have read the history of Ireland — 
 national, civil, ecclesiastical — as far as I could ; and no- 
 where have I seen even an allegation, much less a proof, of 
 immorality against the Irish clergy, or their Bishops, at the 
 
 time of the Reformation But, perhaps, when 
 
 Mr. Froude said this, he meant the apostate Bishops. If so, 
 I am willing to grant him whatever he chooses in regard 
 to them, and whatever charge he lays upon them, the heav- 
 ier it is, the more pleased I am to see it coming from that 
 source. 
 
 The next passage in the relation of Henry VIII. to Ire- 
 land, goes to prove that Ireland did not " throw the Pope 
 overboard." My friends, in the year 1541, a Parliament 
 assembled in Dublin, and declared that Henry VIII. was 
 " King of Ireland." They had been four hundred years and 
 more fighting for that title ; and at length it was conferred 
 by the Irish Parliament upon the English monarch. Two 
 years later, in gratitude to the Irish Parliament, Henry 
 called all the Irish Chieftains over to a grand assembly at 
 Greenwich ; and on the 1st day of July, 1543, he gave the 
 Irish Chieftains their English titles. O'Neill, of Ulster, 
 got the title of Earl of Tyrone ; the glorious O'Donnell, 
 the title of Earl of Tyrconnell ; Ulic McWilUam Barko 
 
62 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 was (jailed the Earl of Clanricarde ; Fitzpatrick got the 
 name of Baron of Ossoiy; and they returned to Ireland 
 with their new titles. Henry, free, open-handed, generous 
 ieWow, as he was — he was really very generous — ^gave those 
 Chieftains not only the titles, but a vast amount of proper- 
 ty ; only it happened to be stolen from the Catholic Church. 
 He was an exceedingly generous man with other people's 
 goods. In order to promote the authorized reformation — 
 not Protestantism, but his own reformation — in Ireland, 
 Henry gave to these Irish Earls, with their English titles, 
 all the abbey lands and convent and church lands that lay 
 within their possessions. The consequence was that he 
 enriched them ; and to the eternal shame of the O'Neill 
 and O'Donnell, McWiliiam Burke and Fitzpatrick of Os- 
 sory, they had the cowardliness and weakness to accept 
 those gifts at his hand. They came home with the spoil 
 of the monasteries, and their English titles. And now, 
 mark. The Irish people were as true as steel in that 
 day when the Irish Chieftains proved false to their country 
 and their God. Nowhere in the previous history of Ireland 
 do we read of the Clans rising against their Clueftains. 
 Nowhere do we read of the O'Neill or O'Donnell dispos- 
 sessed by his own people. But on this occasion, when they 
 came home, mark what followed. O'Brien, Earl of Tho- 
 mond, when he arrived in Munster, found half his domin- 
 ions in revolt against him. McWiliiam Burke, Earl of 
 Clanricarde, when his people heard that their leader had 
 accepted the Abbey lands, the first thing they did was to 
 depose him, and set up against him another man, with the 
 title of The McWiliiam Oughter de Burgh. Con O'Neill, 
 Earl of Tyrone, when he came home to Ulster, was taken 
 by his own son, and clapjDcd into jail ; and he died there, 
 all his people abandoning him. O'Donnell, Earl of Tyr- 
 connell, came home, and his own son and all his people rose 
 
THE TUDORS IN IRELAND. 63 
 
 against Mm and drove him out from the midst of them. 
 jS'ow, I say, in the face of all this — Mr. Fronde is not justi- 
 fied in stating that " Irehind threw the Pope overboard." 
 These Chieftain^ did not renounce the Catholic religion ; 
 they only renounced the Pcipal supremacy. They did not 
 come i\Dme Protestants ; they only came home schismatics, 
 and ver}'- bad Catholics ; and Ireland would not stand them. 
 Henry died in 1547; and I verily believe that, with all 
 the badness of his heart, had he lived a few years longer, 
 he would not have been a curse, but a blessing to Ireland ; 
 for the simple reason that those who came after him were 
 worse tlian himself. He was succeeded by his child-son, 
 Edward VI., who was under the care or guardianship of the 
 Duke of Somerset. Somerset was a thoroughgoing Protes- 
 tant. Somerset did not believe in the Papal supremacy ; 
 he did not believe in the Blessed Sacrament, nor in anything 
 that savored of the teachings of the Catholic Church. He 
 was opposed to them all. As soon as Henry was dead, and 
 young Edward had been proclaimed King, he sent over to 
 Ireland orders to put the laws in force against the Catholic 
 Church. Consequently the churches were pillaged; the 
 Catholic priests were driven out ; and as Mr. Froude puts 
 it, " the emblems of superstition were pulled down." The 
 emblems of superstition, as Mr. Froude calls them, were 
 the figure of Jesus Christ crucified, the statues of His 
 Blessed Mother, and the pictures of His Saints. All these 
 things were pulled do^^Ti and destroyed. The crucifix was 
 trampled under foot. The ancient statue of Our Lady of 
 Trim, in the county of Meath, was publicly burned. The 
 churches were rifled and sacked ; and, as Mr. Froude elo- 
 quently says, " Ireland was taught the lesson that she must 
 yield to the new order of things or stand by the Pope." 
 *' Irish traditions and ideas," Mr. Froude says, " became 
 inseparably linked with religion." Glory to you, Mr. 
 
64 ENGLISH MISPMLE m IRELAND, 
 
 Froude. He goes on to say in eloqnent language: *' Ire^ 
 land chose her place on tlae Pope's side, and chose it irrev- 
 ocably ; and from that time the cause of the Catholic re- 
 ligion and Irish independence became inseparably and irrev- 
 ocably one." 
 
 Edward VI. died after a short reign ; and then came 
 Queen Mary, kno^vn in England by the title of " Bloody 
 Mary." She was a Catholic ; and without doubt, she per- 
 secuted her Protestant subjects. But Mr. Froude, speaking 
 of her in his lecture, says : " There was no persecution of 
 Protestants in Ireland, because there v/ere no Protestants 
 to be persecuted." And he goes on to say : " Those who 
 were in Ireland, when Mary came to the throne, fled." 
 Now, my friends, I must take the learned historian to task 
 on this. The insinuation is, that if the Protestants had 
 been in Ireland, the Irish Catholic people would have per- 
 secuted them. The impression he desires to leave on the 
 mind is that we. Catholics, would be only too glad to im- 
 brue our hands in the blood of our fellow-citizens, on the 
 question of religion, or difference in doctrine. He does 
 this to convey the impression, as much as to say that, if the 
 Protestants were in Ireland, whatever chance they might 
 have in any other country, they had no chance at all in 
 Ireland. 
 
 Now, w^hat are the facts, — the historical facts? The 
 facts are that, during the reign of Edward YI.^ and during 
 the latter years of his father's reign, certain apostates from 
 the Catholic Church were sent over to Ireland as Bishops ; 
 — men, whom even English history convicts and condemns 
 for almost every crime. As soon as Mary came to the 
 throne, these gentlemen did not wait to be ordered out; 
 they went out of their own accord. It was not a question, 
 at ail, of the Irish people ; it was not a question for Ire- 
 land ; it was a question between the Queen of England and 
 
THE TUDORS IN IRELAND. 65 
 
 certain Eiiglisli Bishops that were foisted iipon the Irish 
 Church. Thej thought it the best of their play to clear 
 out at once ; and I verily believe that they acted very pru- 
 dently. Bat so far as regards the Irish people, I claim for 
 my native land that she never persecuted on account of re- 
 ligion. I am proud, in addressing an American audience, 
 to be able to put in this high claim for Ireland. The genius 
 of the Irish people is not a persecuting one. There is not a 
 people on the face of the earth so attached to the Catholic 
 religion as the Irish race : but there is not a people on the 
 face of the earth so unwilling to persecute or to shed blood 
 in the cause of religion as the Irish. And, here are my 
 proofs: Mr. Froude says that the Protestants fled out of 
 Ireland as soon as Queen Mary came to the throne; but Sir 
 James Ware, in his " Annals," tells us that the Protestants 
 were being persecuted in England under Mary, and that 
 they actually fled over to Ireland for protection. He gives 
 even the names of some of them. He tells us that John 
 Harvey, Abel Ellis, Joseph Edwards, and Henry Hall, na- 
 tives of Cheshire, came over to Ireland to avoid the perse- 
 cution that was raging in England ; and they brought with 
 them a Welsh Protestant minister named Thomas Jones. 
 These four gentlemen were received so cordially, were wel- 
 comed so hospitably, that they actually founded highly re- 
 spectable mercantile families in Dublin. 
 
 But we have another magnificent proof that the Irish are 
 not a persecuting race. When James II. assembled his 
 Catholic Parliament in Ireland, in 1689, — after they had 
 been for more than one hundred years under the lash of their 
 Protestant fellow-citizens, after they had been robbed and 
 plundered, imprisoned and put to death for their adherence 
 to the Catholic faith, — at last the wheel gave a turn ; and, ii^ 
 1689, the Catholics were up and the Protestants were do'.vn. 
 That Parliament assembled to the number of two hundred and 
 
66 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 twenty-eight members. The Celts — the Irish, the Catholic 
 element — had a sweeping majority. What v,^as the first law 
 that they made ? The very first law that that Catholic Par- 
 liament passed was as follows : — 
 
 "AYe hereby decree that it is the law of this land of Ire- 
 land that, neither now nor ever again, shall any man be per- 
 secuted for his religion." 
 
 That was the retaliation we took on them. Was it not 
 magnificent? Was it not grand ? a magnificent specimen of 
 that spirit of Christianity, that spirit of forgiveness and 
 cliarity without which, if it be not in a man, all the dog- 
 matic truths that ever were revealed will not save or enno- 
 ble him. 
 
 IsTow, comiiig to " good Queen Bess," as she is called, I 
 must say that Mr. Froude bears very heavily upon her, and 
 speaks of her really in language as terrific in its severity as 
 any that I could use, and far more, for I have not the learn- 
 ing nor the eloquence of Mr. Froude. He says one little 
 thing of her, however, that is worthy of remark. He 
 says : — 
 
 " Elizabeth was reluctant to draw the sword ; but when 
 she did draw it, she never sheathed it until the star of free- 
 dom was fixed upon her banner, never to pale." 
 
 Now, that is a very eloquent passage ; but the soul of elo- 
 quence is truth. Is it true, historically, that Elizabeth was 
 reluctant to draw the sword ? Answer it, ye Irish annals ! 
 Answer it, oh history of Ireland ! Elizabeth came to the 
 throne in 1558. The following year, in 1559, there was a 
 Parliament assembled by her order in Dublin. Wliat do 
 you think were the laws of that Parliament ? It was not a 
 Catholic Parliament, nor an Irish Parliament. It consisted 
 of seventy-six members. Generally speaking. Parliaments 
 in Ireland used to have from two hundred and twenty to two 
 
THE TUDOES IIT IRELAND. 67 
 
 hundred and thirty members. This Parliament of Elizabeth 
 consisted of seventy-six picked men. The laws that that 
 Parliament made were, first : — " Any clergyman not nsing 
 the Book of Common Prayer (the Protestant prayer-book), 
 or nsing an}'' other form^ either in j^ublic or in private, the 
 first time that he is discovered, shall be deprived of his bene- 
 fice for one year, and suffer imprisonment in jail for six 
 months. For the second ofience he shall forfeit his income 
 forever, and be put in jail at the Queen's good pleasure ; " 
 to be let out whenever she thought proper. For the third 
 offence he was to be put in close confinement for life. This 
 was the lady that was " reluctant to draw the sword ! " and, 
 my friends, remember that this w^as the very year after she 
 was crowned Queen — the very next year. She scarcely 
 v/aited a year. This was the woman "reluctant to draw the 
 sword ! " So much for the priests ; now for the laymen. If 
 a layman were discovered using any other prayer-book except 
 Queen Elizabeth's prayer-book, he was to be put in jail for 
 one year ; and if he were caught doing it a second time, he was 
 to be put in prison for the rest of his life. Every Sunday 
 the people were obliged to go to the Protestant Church ; and 
 if any one refused to go, for every time that he refused he 
 was fined twelve pence — that would be about twelve shillings 
 of our present money ; and besides the fine of twelve pence, 
 he was to " incur the censures of the church ! " " The star 
 of freedom," says Mr. Froude, '*' was never to pale." " The 
 Queen drew the sword in the cause of the star of freedom ! " 
 But, my friends, freedom meant whatever fitted in Eliza- 
 beth's mind. Freedom meant slavery tenfold increased, with 
 the addition of religious persecution, to the unfortunate 
 Irish. If this be Mr. Fronde's idea of the star of freedom, 
 all I can say is, the sooner such stars fall from heaven and 
 the firmament of the world's history, the better. 
 
 In. what state was the Irish Church? Upon that subject 
 
68 ENGLISH MISRULE Iif IRELAND. 
 
 we have the authority of the Protestant historian, Lelancl. 
 There were two hundred and twenty parish churches in 
 Meath, and in a few years time there Avere only one hundred 
 and five of them left with the roofs on. 
 
 " All over the kingdom" (says Leland) " the people were 
 left without any religious worship, and under tlie pretence 
 of olicying the orders of the State, they seized all the most 
 valuable furniture of the churches, which was actually ex- 
 posed for sale without decency or reserve." 
 
 A number of hungry adventurers were let loose upon the 
 Irish churches and uj^on the Irish peo[)le by Elizabeth. 
 They not only robbed them and plundered their churches, 
 but they shed the blood of the Bishops and priests and of 
 the people in torrents, as Mr. Froude himself acknowledges. 
 He tells us that, after the second rebellion of the Geraldines, 
 such was the state to which the fair Province of JMunster was 
 reduced, that you might go through the land, from the farther- 
 most point of Kerry until you came into the eastern plains 
 of Tipperar}', and you would not as much as hear the whis- 
 tle of a ploughboy, or behold the face of a living man. But 
 the trenches and ditches were filled with the corpses of the 
 people, and the country was reduced to a howling, desolate 
 wilderness. The poet Spenser describes it emphatically, in 
 language the most terrific. Even he, case-hardened as he 
 vv^as, — for he was one of the plunderers and persecutors him- 
 self — acknowledges that the state of Munster was such that 
 no man could look upon it with a dry eye. Sir Henry Sid- 
 ney, one of Elizabeth's own deputies, addressing her, says 
 of the overthrown churches : — 
 
 '' There are not, I am sure, in any region where the name 
 of Christ is professed, such horrible spectacles, as are here 
 to be beheld ; as the burning of villages, the ruin of 
 churches, — yea, the view^ of the bones and skulls of the 
 dead, who, partly by murder and partly by famine, have died 
 
THE TUDOBS IlSf IRELAND. 69 
 
 in tlie fields. It is such that hardly any Christian can with 
 a dry eye behold." 
 
 Her own Minister, — her own General! — there is his 
 testimony of the state to which this terrible woman reduced 
 unhappy Ireland. Strafford, another English authority, 
 says : — " I knew it was bad in Ireland ; but that it was so 
 stark-wrought I did not believe." 
 
 In the midst of all this persecution, what was still the 
 reigning idea in the mind of the English Government ? To 
 root out and to extirj^ate the Irish from their own land, 
 added to which was now the element of religious discord and 
 persecution. It is evident that this was still in the minds 
 of the English people. Elizabeth, who, Mr. Froude says, 
 " never dispossessed an Irishman of an acre of his land," dur- 
 ing the terrible war which she waged in the latter days of her 
 reign against the heroic Hugh O'Neill, of Ulster, threw out 
 such hints as these : " The more slaughter there is, the bet- 
 ter it will be for my English subjects ; the more land they 
 will get." This is the woman, who, Mr. Froude tells us, 
 never confiscated, and would never listen to the idea of 
 confiscation of property ! This woman, when the Geraldines 
 were destroyed, took the whole of the vast estates of the 
 Earl of Desmond, and gave them all, quietly and calmly, to 
 certain English planters, that she sent over from Lancashire, 
 Cheshire, Devonshire, and Somersetshire. And in the face 
 of these historic truths, recoided and stamped on history, I 
 cannot understand how any man can come forward and say 
 of this atrocious woman that whatever she did she intended 
 it for the good of Ireland. 
 
 In 1602, she died, after reigning forty-one years, leaving 
 Ireland at the hour of her death one vast slaughter-house. 
 Munster was reduced to the state described by Spenser. 
 Connaught was made a wilderness through the rebellion of 
 the Clanricardes, or the Burke family. Ulster, through the 
 
70 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 agdiicy of Lord Mountjoy, was left the very picture of deso- 
 lation. The glorious Ked Hugh O'Donnell and the magnifi- 
 cent O'Neill were crushed and defeated after fifteen years of 
 war. And the consequence was that, when James the First 
 succeeded Elizabeth, he found Ireland almost a wilderness. 
 What did he do ? He acted well at first. He promised 
 the Irish that they should be left their lands. He succeeded 
 to the throne of England in 1G03 ; and for four years — I 
 must give him the credit — for four years he kept his word. 
 But, in 1607, Hugh O'Neill, and O'Donnell, of Tyrconnell, 
 fled from their country to escape imprisonment ; and then, 
 Sir Arthur Chichester, an Englishman, the agent of the 
 King, developed one of the most extraordinary systems that 
 ever was heard of in the relation of one country to another. 
 They took the whole of the province of Ulster, and scarcely 
 left to the Irish a foot of land of their finest province. 
 They transferred it from the original population ; and handed 
 it over to settlers from Eagland and from Scotland. It was 
 called "The Plantation of Ulster." They gave to the 
 Protestant Archbishop of Armagh 43,000 acres of the finest 
 land in Ireland. They gave to Trinity College, in Dublin, 
 30,000 acres. They gave to the " Skinners " and " Cord- 
 wainers " and " Drysalters," all those corporations of trade 
 in London, 208,000 acres of the finest land in Ireland. 
 They brought over a colony of Scotch Presbyterians, and of 
 English Protestants, and gave them tracts of a thousand and 
 fifteen hundred and two thousand acres of land, making 
 them swear, as they did so, that they would not employ one 
 single Irishman, or single Catholic, nor let them come near 
 them. Thus millions of acres of the finest land in Ireland 
 were taken at one blow from the Irish ; and the people were 
 crushed out of their property. 
 
 Mr. Froude, in his rapid historical sketch, said that all 
 this, of course, bred revenge; and he tells us that, in 1641, 
 
THE TUDOES Ili IRELAND. 71 
 
 the Irish rose in rebellion. So they did. Now, he makes 
 one statement, and with the refutation of that statement I 
 will close this lecture. Mr. Froude tells us that, in the 
 rising under Sir Phelim O'Neil, in 1642, there were 38,000 
 Protestants massacred by the Irish. That is a grave charge, 
 a most terrific one, in the case of a people : and if it be 
 true, all I can say is that I blush for my fathers. But if it 
 be not true, why, in the name of God, repeat it ? Why not 
 wipe it out from the records for a lie as it is. Is it true ? 
 The Irish rose under Sir Phelim O'Neill. At that time 
 there was a Protestant parson in Ireland who called himself 
 a Minister of the AYord of God. He gives an account of 
 the whole transaction in a letter to the people of England, 
 begging of them to help their fellow-Protestants of Ireland. 
 Here are his words : "It was the intention of the Irish to 
 massacre all the English. On Saturday they were to disarm 
 them, on Sunday to seize all their cattle and goods, and on 
 Monday they were to cut all the English throats. The 
 former they executed ; the latter — that is the massacre — 
 they failed in." Petty, another English authority, tells us, 
 that there were 38,000 Protestants massacred at that time. 
 A man of the name of May foots it up at 200,000. I sup- 
 pose he thought " in for a penny in for a pound." But 
 there was an honest Protestant clergyman in Ireland vvdio 
 examined minutely into the details of the whole conspiracy, 
 and of all the evils that came from it. What does he tell 
 us? 
 
 "I have discovered" (he says — and he gives proof, 
 State papers and authentic records) — '* that the Irish Cath- 
 olics in that rising massacred 2,100 Protestants; that other 
 Protestants said there were 1,600 more ; and that some 
 Irish authorities themselves say there were 3,000, making 
 altogether 4,026 persons." 
 
 This is the massacre that Mr. Froude speaks of; he tosses 
 
72 ENGLISH MISnULE IJV IRELAND. 
 
 it off, as if it were Gospel, — 38,000 Protestants were mas- 
 sacred — that is to say, lie multiplies the original number by- 
 ten ; whereas IMr. Warner, the authority in question, says 
 actually that there were 2,100 ; and I am unwilling to be- 
 lieve in the additional numbers that have been stated. And 
 this is the way that history is written ! This is the way 
 that people are left under a false impression ! 
 
 And now, first of all, that we have seen the terrible nat- 
 ure of the evils which fell upon Ireland in the days 
 of Henry VIII., Eliz^ibeth, and James I., I ask you, people 
 of America, to set these two thoughts before your minds, 
 contrast them, and give me a fair verdict. Is there any- 
 thing recorded in history more terrible than the persistent, 
 undying resolution, — so clearly manifested, — of the English 
 Government to root out, extirpate and destroy, the people 
 of Ireland? Is there anything recorded in history more 
 unjust than this systematic, constitutional robbery of the 
 people whom Almighty God created in that island, to 
 whom he gave that island, and who have the aboriginal 
 right to every inch of Irish soil ? On the other hand, can 
 history bring forth a more magnificent spectacle than the 
 calm, firm, united resolution with which Ireland stood in 
 defence of her religion, giving up all things rather tlian sac- 
 rifice what she conceived to be the cause of truth ? Mr. 
 Froude does not believe it is the cause of truth. I do 
 not blame him. Every man has a right to his religious 
 opinions. But Ireland believed it was the cause of truth ; 
 and Ireland stood for it like one man. I speak of all these 
 things only historically. I do not believe in animosity. I am 
 not a believer in bad blood. I do not believe, with Mr. 
 Froude, that the question of Ireland's difiiculty nuist re- 
 main without solution. I do not give it up in despair. But 
 this I do say, that he has no right, nor has any other man 
 the right, to come before the audience of America, — of 
 
TEE TUDORS IN IRELAND. 73 
 
 America, that has never persecuted in the cause of re- 
 ligion, — of America, that respects the rights even of the 
 meanest citizen upon her imperial soil, — and to ask that 
 American people to sanction by their verdict the robberies 
 and persecutions of which England is guilty. 
 4 
 
THIED LECTUKE. 
 
 (Lelivered in the Academy of Music^ New Tork^ Mov. 19, 1872.) 
 
 THE CPtOMWELLIAN ERA. 
 
 Ladies and Gentlemen : We now approach, in answering 
 Mr. Froude, to some of the most awful periods of onr his- 
 tory. I confess that I approach this terrific ground with 
 sadness, and I extremely regret that Mr. Froude should 
 have opened up questions which oblige an Irishman to 
 undergo the pain of heart and anguish of spirit, which a re- 
 vision of this portion of our history must occasion. 
 
 The learned gentleman began his third lecture by remind- 
 ing his audience that he had closed the second lecture with 
 a reference to the rise, progi-ess, and collapse of a great 
 rebellion, which took place in Ireland in the year 1641 — 
 that is to say, somewhat more than two hundred years ago. 
 He made but a passing allusion to that great event in our 
 history ; and in that allusion — if he has been reported cor- 
 rectly — he stated simply that the Irish rebelled in 1641 : 
 that was his first statement — that it was a rebellion; 
 secondly, that this rebellion began in massacre and ended 
 in ruin ; thirdly, that, for nine years, the Irish leaders had 
 the destinies of their country in their hands ; and fourthly, 
 that these nine years were years of anarchy and mutual 
 slaughter. Nothing, therefore, can be imagined more melan- 
 choly than the picture drawn by this learned gentleman of 
 those nine sad years, and yet I will venture to say, and 
 hope I shall be able to prove, that each of those four state- 
 ments is without sufficient historical foundation. 
 
TEE CROMWELLIAN EBA. 
 
 75 
 
 My first position is that the movement of 1641 was not a 
 rebellion ; second, that it did not begin with massacre, 
 although it ended in ruin ; third, that the Irish leaders had 
 not the destinies of their country in their hands during those 
 nine years; and fourth, that whether they had or not, 
 those years were not a period of anarchy and mutual 
 slaughter. They were but the opening to a far more terrific 
 period. We must discuss these questions, my friends, 
 calmly and historically. "We must look upon them rather 
 like antiquarians prying into the past, than with the living, 
 warm feelings of men, whose blood boils up at the remem- 
 brance of so much injustice and so much bloodshed. 
 
 In order to uuderstand these questions fully and fairly, it 
 is necessary for us to go back to the historit^al events of the 
 time. We find, then, that James I., the man who '* plant- 
 ed " Ulster, — that is to say, who confiscated, utterly and 
 entirely, six of the fairest counties in Ireland, — an entire 
 Province, — rooting out the aboriginal Irish Catholic inhabi- 
 tants, even to a man, and giving the whole country to 
 Scotch and English settlers of the Protestant religion, under 
 the condition that they were not to employ even as much as 
 an Irish laborer on their grounds — that they Avere to banish 
 them all; — we find that this man died in 1625, and was 
 succeeded by his unfortunate son, Charles I. When Charles 
 came to the throne, bred up as he was in the traditions of a 
 monarchy which Henry YIII. had rendered almost absolute, 
 as we know; — whose absolute power was still continued 
 under Elizabeth, under a form the most tyrannical ; — v/hose 
 absolute power was continued by his own father, James I. ; 
 ■ — Charles came to the throne with the most exasjo-erated 
 ideas of royal privilege and royal supremacy. But, d\iring 
 the days of his father, a new spirit had grown up iu Scotland 
 and in England. The form which Protestantism took in 
 Scotland was the hard and uncompromising, and, I will add, 
 
76 ENGLISH MISRULE I2i IRELA2W. 
 
 cruel, form of Calyinism, in its most repellent aspect. The 
 men ^vho rose in Scotland in defence of their Presbyterian 
 religion, rose not against Catholicity at all, but against the 
 Episcopal Protestantism of England. They defended what 
 they called the "Kirk," or the " Covenant." They fought 
 bravely, I acknowledge, for it ; and they ended in establish- 
 ing it as the religion of Scotland. Now, Charles I. was an 
 Episcopalian Protestant of the most sincere and devoted 
 kind. The Parliament of England, in the very first years 
 of Charles, admitted members who were strongly tinged with 
 Scotch Calvinism; and they at once showed a refractory 
 spirit to their King. He demanded of them certain subsi- 
 dies, and they refused him. He asserted certain sovereign 
 rights, and they denied them. But whilst all this w^as go- 
 ing on in England, from the year 1G30, to, let us say, the 
 year 1641, what was taking pkice in Ireland ? One Prov- 
 ince of the land had been completely confiscated by James I. 
 Charles I. was in want of money, for his own purposes ; his 
 Parliament refused to grant him any ; and the poor, op- 
 pressed, down-trodden, persecuted Catholics of Ireland im- 
 agined, naturally enough, that the King, beiug in difiiculties, 
 would turn to them, and, perhaps, lend them a little counte- 
 nance and a little favor, if they proclaimed their loyalty and 
 stood by him. Accordingly, the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, 
 Lord Falkland — sincerely attached, as he was, to his royal 
 master — hinted to the Catholics, and proposed to them, that, 
 as they were under the most terrific penal laws, from the 
 days of Elizabeth and James I., — that, perhaps, if they 
 should now petition the Iving, they would get certain 
 "graces" or concessions granted to them. AVhat these 
 " graces " were, simply involved permission to live in their 
 own land, and permission to worship their God according to 
 the dictates of their own conscience. They asked for noth- 
 ing more, and nothing more was promised to them. When 
 
THE CROMWELLIAN ERA, ^7 
 
 their petition went before the King, his Royal Majesty of 
 England issued a proclamation, in which he declared that it 
 was his intention, and that he had plighted his word, to 
 grant to the Catholics, and to the people of Ireland, certain 
 concessions and indulgences which he named by the name of 
 " graces." No sooner did the newly-founded Puritan ele- 
 ment, in England and in the Parliament, — that were fight- 
 ing against their King, — no sooner did they hear that the 
 slightest relaxation of the penal laws was to be granted to 
 the Catholics of Ireland, than they instantly rose and pro- 
 tested that it should not be. And Charles — to his eternal 
 disgrace — ^^broke his word with the Catholics of Ireland, a.f- 
 ter they had sent him £120,000 in acknowledgment of his 
 promise. - More than this, it was suspected that Lord Falk- 
 land was too mild a man, too just a man, to be a,llowed to 
 remain as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. He was recalled ; 
 and, after a short lapse. Went worth, who was afterwards 
 Earl Strafford, was sent to Ireland as Lord Lieutenant. 
 
 Yv^entworth, on his arrival, summoned a Parliament, which 
 met in the year 1634. He told them the difficulties the 
 King Avas in ; he told them how the Parliament in England 
 was rebelling against him ; and how he looked to his Irish 
 subjects as loyal. He, perhaps, told them that, amongst 
 Catholics, loyalty was not a mere sentiment, but an unshaken 
 principle, resting upon conscience and, religion. And then 
 he assured them that Charles, the King of England, still in- 
 tended to keep his word and grant them the concessions ©r 
 "graces." 
 
 ISText came the usual demand for money ; and the Irish 
 Parliament granted six subsidies of £50,000 each. Strafforii 
 wrote to the King, congratulating him on getting so much 
 money out of Ireland; "For," said he, "your Majesty re- 
 members, that you and I expected only £30,000, and they 
 have granted subsidies of £50,000." More than this, they 
 
78 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 granted him 8,000 mfantry and 1,000 horse, to fight againsi 
 his Scottish rebellious subjects and enemies. 
 
 The Parliament met the following year, in 1635; and 
 what do you think was the fulfilment of the Koyal promise 
 to the Catholics of Ireland ? Strafibrd had got the money. 
 He did not wish to comf)romise his master, the King ; and 
 he took upon himself, and fixed upon his own memory the 
 indelible shame and disgrace of breaking his word, which 
 he had plighted, and disappointing the Catholics of Ireland. 
 Then, in 1635, the real character of this man came out; and 
 what do you think was the measure he proposed ? He in- 
 stituted a Commission for the express purpose of confiscat- 
 ing, — in addition to Ulster, that was already gone, — the 
 whole Province of Connaught, so as not to leave an Irish- 
 man or a Catholic one square inch of ground in that' land. 
 This he called the " Commission of Defective Titles." The 
 commissioners were men that were to inquire into the title 
 that every man had to his property, and to inquire into it 
 with the express and avowed purpose of finding a flaw in it, 
 if they could, and confiscating the land to the Crown of Eng- 
 land. Now, remember how much was gone already, my 
 friends. The whole of Ulster was confiscated by James I. 
 The same King had taken the county of Longford from the 
 O'Farrells, vv^ho owned it from time immemorial. He had 
 seized upon Wicklow, and taken it from the O'Tooles and 
 O'Byrnes. He had taken the northern part of the county 
 of Wexford from the O'Kavanaghs. He had taken Iracken, 
 in the Queen's County, from the McGeoghegans. He had 
 taken Kilcoursey, in the King's County, from the O'Molloys. 
 And novv^j with the whole of Ulster, and the better part of 
 Leinster in his hands, this Minister had instituted a Com- 
 mission by which he was to obtain the whole of the Province 
 of Connaught, root out the native Irish population, expel 
 every man that owned a rood of land in the Province, and 
 
THE GBOMWELLIAN ERA. Y9 
 
 reduce them to beggary, starvation, and deatli. Hero is the 
 description of his plan as given by Leland, a historian who 
 was hostile to Ireland's faith and Ireland's nationality. Lel- 
 and thns describes the business : — 
 
 " This project was nothing less than to subvert the title 
 of every estate in every part of Connaught, — a project which, 
 when first proposed in the late reign, was received v/ith hor- 
 ror and amazement, but v/hich suited the undismayed and 
 enterprising genius of Lord Wentworth." 
 
 Strafford's Commission, accordingly, began in the County 
 of Roscommon, passed thence into Sligo, thence to IVIayo, 
 and thence to Gal way. Now, mark how he managed this 
 tribunal. The only way by which a title could be upset, 
 Avas by having a jury of twelve men, to declare by their 
 verdict whether the title was valid or not. Strafford began 
 by packing the juries, — packing them ! It is the old story 
 over again, — the old policy that has been continued down 
 to our time, — the policy of a packed and prejudiced jury. 
 He told the jury, before the trial began, that he expected 
 them to find a verdict for the king ; and between bribing 
 them and threatening them, he got juries to find for him, 
 until he came into the county of Galway. And to the 
 honor of old Galway be it said, that as soon as the Comm.is- 
 sion arrived in that county, they could hot find twelve jurors 
 in the county of Galway base enough and wicked enough to 
 confiscate the lands of their fellow-subjects. What was the 
 result ? The result was that the county Galway jurors 
 w^ere called to Dublin before the Castle Council Chamber, 
 and every man of them w^as fined £4,000, and v/as put into 
 prison until the fine was paid. Every inch of their i)rop- 
 erty was taken from them ; and the High Sherift" of the 
 county Galway, not being a wealthy man, died in jail be- 
 cause he was not able to pay his fine. More than this. 
 Not content with threatening the juries, and coercing them, 
 
80 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 my Lord Strafford went to tlie Judges, and told tliem that 
 they were to get four shillings in the pound for the value of 
 every piece of property they confiscated to the Crown of 
 England, Then, he boasted, publicly, that he had made 
 the Chief Baron and the Judges attend to this business as 
 if it were their own private concern. This is the kind of 
 rule the English historian comes to America to ask the hon- 
 est and upright citizens of this free country to indorse by 
 their verdict, and thereby to make themselves accomplices 
 of English fraud and robbery. 
 
 In this same year, Strafibrd instituted another tribunal in 
 Ireland, which he called the "Court of Wards;" and do 
 you know what this was ? It was found that the Irish peo- 
 ple, gentle and simple, as they were, were very unwilling to 
 become Protestants. I have not a harsh word to say of 
 Protestants. But this I will say, that every high-minded 
 Protestant in the world must admire the strength and fidel- 
 ity with which Ireland, because of her conscience, clung to 
 her ancient faith. This tribunal was instituted in order to 
 get the heirs of the Catholic gentry, and to bring them up 
 in the Protestant religion. And it is to this " Court of 
 Wards" that we owe the significant fact that some of the 
 most ancient and the best names in Ireland, — the names of 
 men Avhose ancestors fought for faith and fatherland, — are 
 now Protestants, and the enemies of their Catholic fellow- 
 subjects. It was by this, and such means as this, that the 
 men of my own name became Protestants. There was no 
 drop of Protestant blood in the veins of the Dun Earl, or 
 Bed Earl of Clanricarde. There was no drop of any other 
 than Catholic blood in the veins of the heroic Burkes who 
 fought during the long five hundred years that went before 
 
 this time There was no Protestant blood in 
 
 the O'Briens of Munster, or in the glorious O'Donnells 
 and O'Neills of Ulster, that are Protestants to-day. Let 
 
TEE CROMWELLIAN ERA. 81 
 
 no Protestant American citizen here imagine tliat I am 
 speaking in disdain of him or his religion. jS^o ; but as a 
 historian, I am pointing out the means, — which every high- 
 minded man must pronounce to he nefarious, — by which 
 the aristocracy of Ireland v;ere obliged to change their re- 
 ligion. 
 
 The Irish, meantime, w^aited, and waited in vain, for the 
 fulfilment of the King's promise, and the concession of the 
 "graces," as they were called. At length, matters grew 
 desperate between Charles and his Parliament ; and, in the 
 year 1640, he again renewed his promise to the Irish 
 people ; and he called a Parliament which gave him four 
 subsidies, 8,000 men, and 1,000 horse, to fight against the 
 Scotch, who had rebelled against him. Strafibrd went home 
 rejoicing that he had got those subsidies and this body of 
 men ; but no sooner did he arrive in England, than the Par- 
 liament, now in rebellion, laid hold of him. In that same 
 year, 1640, Straflford's head was cut off; and he would be a 
 strange Irishman that would regret it. 
 
 Meantime, the people of Scotland rose in armed rebel- 
 lion against their King. They marched into England, and 
 v/hat do you think they made by their movement ? They 
 got a full acknowledgment of their religion, which was not 
 the Protestant, but Presbyterian ; they got £300,000 ; and 
 they got, for several months, £850 a day to support their 
 army. Then they retired into their own country, having 
 achieved the purposes for which they had rebelled ; and, in 
 the meantime, the Catholics of Ireland were ground into 
 the very dust. What wonder, I ask you, tha.t, seeing the 
 King so afraid of his English people, though personally in- 
 clined to grant these " graces " — as he had declared that he 
 wished to grant them ; he had declared that it was his in- 
 tention to grant them ; he had plighted his royal word to 
 grant them, — what wonder that the Irish thought they had 
 4* 
 
82 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 every evidence that, if the King were free, he would grant 
 them ? But he was not free, because his Parliament and 
 the Puritan faction in England were in rebellion against 
 him. So the Irish said ; " Our King is ]iot free ; if he 
 were, he would be kind to us ; let us rise, then, in the 
 name of the King and assert our own rights." They rose 
 in 1641; the}^ rose like one man; every Irishman — and 
 every Catholic in Ireland, rose on the 23d of October, 1641, 
 with the exception of the Catholic Lords of the " Pale." 
 And, now, I give you the reasons of this rising, as recorded 
 ill the " Memoirs " of Lord Castlehaven, who Avas by -no 
 means prejudiced in favor of Ireland. He tells us that they 
 rose for six reasons. The first was because they were gen- 
 erally looked down upon as a conquered nation, and seldom 
 or never treated like natural or free-born subjects. The old 
 evil still coming up, my dear friends. The very first reason 
 given by this Englishman, why the Irish people rose, was 
 that the English people treated them contemptuously. Oh ! 
 when will England learn to treat her subjects or her friends 
 with common respect? When will that proud, stubborn 
 Anglo-Saxon haughtiness condescend to urbanity and kind- 
 liness in dealing with those around them ? I said it in my 
 first lecture ; I said it in my second lecture ; and I now re- 
 peat it in this, that it was the contempt as much as the hat- 
 red of Englishmen for Irishmen that lay at the root — that 
 lies at the root to-day — of that bitter spirit and terrible an- 
 tagonism that exists betv/een those two nations. 
 
 The second reason given by my Lord Castlehaven is, 
 that the Irish saw that six whole counties in Ulster were 
 escheated to the Crown and little or nothing restored to the 
 natives ; but in great part bestowed by King James I., on 
 his own countrymen — the Scotch. The third reason was, 
 that in Strafford's time, the Crown laid claim to the 
 counties of Roscommon, Mayo, Galway, and Cork, and to 
 
THE CROMWELLIAN ERA. 83 
 
 parts of Tipperaiy, Wicklow, Limerick, and other counties. 
 The fourth reason was, that great severities were used 
 against the Roman Catholics, which to a people so fond of 
 their religion as the Irish were, was no small inducement to 
 make them, whilst there was an opportunity, stand upon 
 theii guard. The fifth reason was, they saw how the Scots, 
 by pretending grievances, and taking up arms to get them 
 redressed, had not only gained divers privileges and im- 
 munities, but a grant of £300,000, for their visit to 
 England, besides £850 a day for several months together. 
 The sixth and last reason was that they saw the storm 
 drawing near ; — such a misunderstanding arose between the 
 King and the Parliament, that they believed the King 
 would grant them anything that they could in reason de- 
 mand ; at least more now than they could otherwise expect. 
 Now, I ask if these reasons were not sufficient? I appeal 
 to the American people, — I appeal to men who know 
 what civil and religious liberty means to a proud, high- 
 spirited people, whose spirit was never broken, and never 
 will be ; — to a people not inferior to the Anglo-Saxon, either 
 in gifts of intellect or in bodily energy ; for a people thus 
 persecuted, thus down-trodden, — as our fathers were, — would 
 not any one of these reasons be sufficient justification to 
 rise ? And, with this accumulation of causes, w^ould they 
 not have been the meanest of mankind if they had not 
 seized upon that opportunity ? 
 
 An English Protestant Avriter of the times, in that very 
 year 1641, writing in Howell's JUbernicKS, says that the 
 Irish had sundry grievances and grounds of complaint touch- 
 ing both their estates and consciences, which they pretended 
 to be far greater than those of the Scots. " For, still, they 
 think," he says, "that if the Scots were suffered to intro- 
 duce a new religion, it was a reason that they should not 
 
84: ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 be punished for the exercise of their own, which they glo- 
 ried never to have altered." 
 
 There was another reason for the revolt, my friends, and 
 a very potent one. It was this : Charles had the weakness 
 and the folly — I can call it nothing else — to leave at the 
 head of the Irish Government two Lords Justices, named 
 Sir John Borlaese and Sir William Parsons. These were 
 both ardent Puritans and partisans of the Parliament. 
 They were anxious to see the fall of the English monarch, — 
 for they were his bitterest enemies ; and they thought that 
 lie would be embarrassed, in his fight with the Parliament 
 in England, by a revolution in Ireland. And so the very 
 men who were the guardians of the State lent themselves to 
 promote the rebellion by every means in their power. For 
 instance, six months before the revolt broke out, Charles 
 gave them notice that he had received intelligence that the 
 Irish were going to rise. They took no note whatever of 
 the King's advertisement. The Lords of the *' Pale," who 
 refused to join the Irish in their uprising, applied to the 
 Lords Justices in Dublin for protection ; and it was refused 
 them. They asked to be allowed to come into the city, that 
 they might be safe from the incursions of the Irish. That 
 permission was refused them ; and they were forced to stay 
 in their castles and houses, out in the country; and the 
 moment that any of the Irish in revolt came near them, 
 their houses and castles were declared forfeited to the State. 
 Thus the English Catholics and Lords of the " Pale," — the 
 Gormanstowns, the Howths, the Trimblestons, and many 
 others, — were actually forced by the Government to join 
 hands with the Irish, and to draw their swords in the glo- 
 rious cause that was before them. Moreover, the Irish 
 knew that their friends and fellow-countrymen were earning 
 distinction, honor, and glory, upon all the battle-fields of 
 Europe, in the service of Spain, France, and Austria; — and 
 
THE CROMWELLIAN ERA. 85 
 
 they Loped, not without reason, that these friends, theii' 
 countrymen, would help them in the hour of their need. 
 Accordingly, on that 23d of October, 1641, they rose. 
 What was the first thing they did? According to Mr. 
 Froude, the first thing they did was to massacre all the 
 Protestants they could lay their hands on. Well, thank 
 God, that is not the fact. The very first thing their leader. 
 Sir Phelim O'Neill, did, was to issue a proclamation on the 
 very day of the rising, which he spread throughout all Ire- 
 land, and in which he declared : — 
 
 " We rise in the name of onr Lord the King. We rise 
 to assert the power and prerogative of the King. We de- 
 clare we do not wish to make war on the King or any oae of 
 his subjects. We declare, moreover, that we do not intend 
 to shed blood, except in legitimate warfare ; and that any 
 one of our troops, any soldier, who robs, plunders, or sheds 
 blood, shall be severely punished." 
 
 Did they keep this declaration of theirs ? Most inviola- 
 bly. I assert in the name of history, that there was no 
 massacre of the Protestants ; and I will prove it from Prot- 
 estant authority. We find dispatches from the Irish Gov- 
 ernment to the Government in England, dated the 25th to 
 the 27th of that same month, in which they give an account 
 of the rising of the Irish people. There they complained, 
 telling how the Irish stripped their Protestant fellow-citizens ; 
 how they took their cattle, took their houses, took all their 
 property ; but not one single word or complaint about the 
 shedding of one drop of blood. And if they took their cat- 
 tle, houses, and property, you must remember that they were 
 only taking back what was their own. A very short time 
 afterwards the massacre began ; but who began it ? The 
 Protestant Ulster settlers fled from the Irish. They brought 
 their lives with them at least ; and they entered the town of 
 Carrickfergus, where they found a garrison of Scotch Puri- 
 
SQ ENGLISH MISRULE m IRELAND. 
 
 tans. Now, in the confusion that arose, the poor country 
 people, frightened, fled into an obscure part of the country, 
 near Carrickfergus, — a peninsula, called Island Magee. They 
 were there collected for the purposes of safety, to the num- 
 ber of more than three thousand. The very first thing that 
 these English Puritans and the Scotch garrison did, when 
 tliey came together, was to sally out of Carrickfergus, in the 
 night time, and to go in among those innocent and unarmed 
 people ; and they slaughtered every man, woman, and child, 
 until they left three thousand dead behind them. We have 
 the authority of Leland, the English Protestant historian, 
 who expressly says that " this was the first massacre com- 
 mitted in Ireland, on either side.'^^ This was the first massa- 
 cre ! How, in the name of Heaven, can any man so learned, 
 and I make no doubt, so truthful as Mr. Froude, — how can 
 he assert that these people began by massacring thirty-eight 
 thousand of his fellow-countrymen and fellow-religionists, 
 when we have, in the month of December, a few months 
 after, a Commission issued by the Lords Justices in Dublin 
 to the Dean of Kilmore and seven other Protestant clergy- 
 men, to make diligent inquiry about the English and Scotch 
 Protestants who were robbed and ^^lundered y but not one 
 single word — not one single question — of those who were 
 tnurdered ? 
 
 Here are the words of Castlehaven : 
 
 '' The Catholics were urged into rebellion ; and the Lords 
 Justices were often heard to say that the more that were in 
 rebellion the more lands would be forfeited to the Crown." 
 
 It was the old story ; — it was the old adage of James the 
 First: " Poot out the Catholics — root out the Irish, and 
 give Ireland to English Protestants and Puritans, and you will 
 regenerate the land." Oil ! from such regeneration of my 
 own or any other people, good Loi'd deliver us, I pray ! 
 *' This rebellion," says Mr. Froude, " began in massacre and 
 
THE CnOMWELLIAN ERA. 87 
 
 It ended in ruin the most terrible ; but, if 
 it began in massacre, Mr. Fronde, yon must acknowledge, 
 as a historical truth, that the massacre was on the part of 
 your countrymen, and your co-religionists. 
 
 Then, the Irisli having risen, the war began. It was a war 
 between the Puritan Protestants of Ulster and other parts of 
 Ireland, aided by constant armies that came over to them 
 from England. It was a war that continued for eleven years ; 
 and it was a war in which the Irish Chieftains had not the 
 destinies of the nation in their own hands, but were obliged 
 to fight, and fight like men, in order to try to achieve a better 
 
 destiny and a better future for their people 
 
 Who can say that the Irish Chieftains held the destinies of 
 Ireland in their own hands during these nine years, when 
 they had to meet every successive army that came to them 
 inflamed wdth religious hatred and enmity, and animated, I 
 must say, by a spirit of bravery of which the world has sel- 
 dom seen the like. Then, Mr. Fronde adds that these were 
 " years of anarchy and mutual slaughter." Now let us con- 
 sider the history of the events. 
 
 No sooner had the English Lords of the " Pale " — who 
 were all Catholics — joined the Irish, than they turned 
 to the Catholic Bishops of the land. They called them 
 together in a Synod; and on the 10th of May, 1642, the 
 Bishops of Ireland, the Lords of Ireland, and the gentry 
 and Commoners and estated gentlemen of Ireland met 
 together and founded what is called the " Confederation of 
 Kilkenny." Amongst their number they selected for the 
 Supreme Council, three Archbishops, two Bishops, four 
 Lords, and fifteen Commoners. These men were to meet 
 and remain in permanent session, watching over the country, 
 making laws, watching over the army ; and above all, pre- 
 venting cruelty, robbery, and murder. A regular govern- 
 ment was formed. They actually established a mint, and 
 
88 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND, 
 
 tliere coined money for the Irish nation. They established 
 an array under Lord Mountcashel and General Preston ; and 
 in a short time after, under the glorious and immortal Owen 
 Roe O'Neill. During the hrst months they gained some 
 successes. Most of the principal cities of Ireland opened 
 their gates to them. The garrisons were carefully saved 
 from slaughter ; and the moment they laid down their arms 
 their lives were as sacred as that of any man in the ranks of 
 the Irish armies. Not a drop of unnecessary blood was 
 shed by the Irish with any sort of countenance on the part 
 of the Government of the country — that is to say, the Su- 
 preme Council at Kilkenny. I defy any man to prove that 
 there was a single law, which that Supreme Council enacted, 
 that was not enacted to prevent bloodshed or murder. 
 
 Now, after a few months of success, the armies of the 
 Confederation experienced some reverses. The Puritan 
 party was recruited and fortified by English armies coming 
 in ; and the command in Dublin was given to a Governor 
 whose name ought to be known to every Irishman ; — his 
 name was Sir Charles Coote. Some of his exploits are thus 
 portrayed by Clarendon, who was no friend of Ireland : — 
 
 " Sir Charles, besides plundering and burning the town 
 of Clontarf, at that time, did massacre sixteen townspeople, 
 men and women, besides three suckling infants ; and in that 
 very same week fifty-six men, women, and children, in the 
 village of Bullock, being frightened at v^^hat was done at 
 Clontarf, went to sea to shun the fury of a party of soldiers, 
 who came out from Dublin under command of Col. Ciiflford. 
 Being pursued by the soldiers in boats, they were overtaken 
 and thrown overboard." 
 
 Sir William Borlaese had, by letter, advised the Governor, 
 Sir Charles Coote, to burn all the corn, and to give man, 
 woman, and child to the sword ; and Sir Arthur Loftus 
 wrote to the same purpose and effect. An edict of the 
 
THE CBOMWELLIAN ERA. 89 
 
 Council at that time will tell you in what spirit our Protes- 
 tant friends waged their w^ar with us : — 
 
 " It is resolved that it is fit that his Lordship," (and, 
 mind, this was given to the Marquis of Ormonde,) — " that 
 his Lordship do endeavor to wound, kill, slay, and destroy, 
 by ail the ways and means that he may, all the said rebels, 
 their adherents and relatives ; and burn, spoil, waste, con- 
 sume, destroy, and demolish, all the places, towns, and 
 houses where the rebels are or have been relieved or har- 
 bored ; and all the hay and corn therein, and kill and de- 
 stroy all the men there inhabiting capable of bearing arms. 
 Given at the Castle of Dublin, on the 23d day of February, 
 1641," and signed by six precious names. 
 
 Listen to this : — 
 
 " Sir Arthur Loftus, Governor of Naas, marched out with 
 a party of horse. He was met on the way, and joined by 
 another party sent from Dublin, by the Marquis of Or- 
 monde ; and they both together killed such of the Irish as 
 they met, and did not stop to inquire whether they were 
 rebels or not." 
 
 But, oh ! my friends, listen to this : — 
 
 " But the most considerable slaughter was in a great strait 
 of furze, situated on a hill, v/here the people of several vil- 
 lages, taking alarm, had sheltered themselves. Now, Sir 
 Arthur having invested the hill, set fire to the furze on all 
 sides, w^here the people being in considerable numbers, were 
 all burned, men, women, and children. I saw," (says Castle- 
 haven,) " the bodies and the furze still burning." 
 
 "In the year 1641 or 1642, many thousands of poor in- 
 nocent people of the county of Dublin, shunning the fury of 
 the English soldiery, fled into the thickets, w^hLch the sol- 
 diers actually fired, killing as many as attempted to esca2>e, 
 or forcing them back to be burned. And, as to the rest of 
 wiC inhabitants, for the most part, they died of famine." 
 
 Not only by land, where we read, sometimes, of seven 
 thousand of our people, men, women, and children, without 
 discrimination, being destroyed by these demons, — not only 
 
90 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 were the Irish pursued on the land, but even on the sea. 
 We read that there was a hiw passed that if any Irishmen 
 were found on boa,rd ship, by his IMajesty's cruisers, they 
 were to be destroyed. Clarendon gives this account : — 
 
 "The Earl of Warwick, as often as he met an Irish frigate, 
 or such freebooters as sailed under commission, all the sea- 
 men who became prisoners who belonged to the nation of 
 Ireland ; they tied them, back to back, and threw them over- 
 board into the sea, without distinction as to their condi- 
 tion, for they were only Irish." " In this cruel manner very 
 many poor men perished daily. Of all of which the King 
 knew nothing, and said nothing, because his Ma;jesty could 
 not complain of it without being concerned in it, in favor 
 of the rebels in Ireland." 
 
 Again : — 
 
 " The Marquis of Ormonde sent Captain Anthony Wil- 
 loughby, with 150 men, who had formerly served in the 
 fort at Galway, from thence to Bristol, to look after and 
 follow a party of men who were in the SQj^-vice of the King, 
 and had actually fought for him. The ship in which they 
 sailed was taken by Capt. Swanley, who threw seventy of 
 the soldiers, who were Irish, overboard, although these 
 same soldiers had faithfully served his Majesty against the 
 rebels during all the time of the war." 
 
 You will ask me, '^ Was that Captain punished for the 
 murder ? " Here is the punishment he got. In June, 
 1G44, we read in the Journal of the English House of Com- 
 mons, tha.t Capt. Swanley was called into the House, and 
 had thanks given to him for his good service, and a chain of 
 gold, equal in value to £200 ; and that Captain Smith also 
 had another of £100 in value given him. 
 
 " Sir Richard Grenville was very much esteemed by the 
 Earl of Leicester, who was Lord Lieutenant for Ireland ; — • 
 and more still by the Parliament, for the signal acts of 
 cruelty he committed on the Irish ; hanging old men who 
 were bedridden, because they v/ouid not discover where 
 
THE CBOUWELLIAN ERA. 91 
 
 their money was bidden; and old women, some of tliem of 
 quality, after lie Iiad plundered them, and found less than 
 he expected." 
 
 In a word, they committed atrocities which I am ashamed 
 and afraid to mention. The soldiers tossed the infants 
 taken from their dead mothers' bosoms on their bayonets. 
 Sir Charles Coote saw one of his soldiers playing with a 
 child, throwing it into the air, and then spitting it upon his 
 bayonet as it fell; and he laughed and said "he enjoyed such 
 frolic " ! They brought children into the world before their 
 time by the Csesarean operation of the sword ; and the chil- 
 dren thus brought forth in misery from out the wombs of 
 their dead mothers, they immolated and sacrificed in the 
 most cruel and terrible manner. I am afraid, — I say, again, 
 I am afraid of your blood and mine, to tell you the one- 
 tenth, aye, the one-hundredth part of the cruelties that 
 those terrible men put upon our people. 
 
 Now, I ask you to contrast this with the manner in which 
 the Irish troops and the Irish people behaved. Lord Castle- 
 haven says : 
 
 " I took Naas, and I found in it a garrison of English 
 soldiers, seven hundred strong ; and I saved the life of every 
 man amongst them, and made them a present to General 
 Oliver Cromwell, with the request that, in like circum- 
 stances, he would do the same by me." 
 
 But it was only a few days later the town of Gouran 
 capitulated. Cromwell promised quarter ; but as soon as he 
 entered, he took the governor of the town, and all the offi- 
 cers of the army, and put them all to death. 
 
 '' Sir Wm. St. Leger, going down into Munster, slaugh- 
 tered every man, woman, and child he met on his marcli ; 
 and, among others, was a man named Philip Ryan, who was 
 the principal farmer of the place, whom he put to death 
 without the slightest hesitation. But some of Philip Eyan's 
 friends, brothers, and relatives, retaliated somewhat on the 
 
92 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 English ; and there was a fear that the Catholic peopk*^ 
 would massacre all the Protestant inhabitants of the place." 
 
 Now, mark what follows: — 
 
 " All the rest of the English "—(this is in Carte's " Lif(3 
 of Ormonde ") — " all the rest of the English were saved by 
 the inhabitants of. that place ; their houses and all their 
 goods, which they confided to them, were safely returned. 
 Doctor Samuel PuUen, the Protestant Chancellor of Cashel, 
 and the Dean of Cionfert, with his wife and children, were 
 preserved by Father James Saul, a Jesuit. Several other 
 Pomish priests distinguished themselves on this occasion by 
 their endeavors to save the English. One Father Joseph 
 Everard and Father Pedmond English, both of them Fran- 
 ciscan Friars, hid some of them in their chapel, and actually 
 under the very altar. The English who were thus pre- 
 served were, according to their desires, safely conducted 
 into the county Cork by a guard of the Irish inhabitants of 
 Cashel." 
 
 Now, my friends, the war went on, from 1641 to 1649, 
 with varying success. Cardinal Rinuccini was sent over by 
 the Pope to preside over the Supreme Council of the Con- 
 federation of Kilkenny, and about the same time news came 
 to Ireland that gladdened the nation's heart, namely, that 
 the illustrious Owen Poe O'Neill had landed on the coast 
 of Ulster. This man was one of the most distinguished 
 officers in the Spanish service at a time when the Spanish 
 infantry were acknowledged to bo the finest troops in the 
 world. He landed in Ireland, he organized an arm}^, drilled 
 them, and armed them, however imperfectly. But he was a 
 host in himself; and, in the second year after his arrival, he 
 drew up his army to meet General Monroe, and his English 
 forces, at the ford of Benburb, on the Black water. The 
 battle began in the morning, and raged throughout the early 
 hours of the day ; and, before the evening sun had set, 
 England's main and best army was flying in confusion, and 
 
THE CBOMYiELLnm EUA. 93 
 
 thousands of lier best soldiers were stretched upon the fiekl 
 and choked the ford of Benburb ; v/Liie the Irish soldier 
 stood triumphant upon the field which his genius and his 
 valor had won. 
 
 Partly through the treachery of Ormonde and Preston ; 
 partly and mainly through the English lords who were co- 
 quetting with the English Government, the Confederation 
 began to experience some of its most disastrous defeats ; and 
 Ireland\s cause was already broken, and almost lost, when, 
 in the year 1G49, Oliver Cromwell arrived in Ireland. Mr. 
 Froude says, and truly, that be " did not come to make war 
 with rose-\vater," but with the thick warm blood of the Irish 
 people. And Mr. Froude prefaces the introduction of Oliver 
 Cromwell in Ireland by telling us that the Lord-General was 
 a great friend of Ireland, that he was a liberal-minded man, 
 and that ho interfered with no man's liberty of conscience. 
 And he adds that, — " If CromwelFs policy were carried out, 
 in all probability I would not be here speaking to you of our 
 difficulties with Ireland to-da,y." He adds, moreover, that 
 " Cromwell had formed a design for the pacification of Ire- 
 land, v.diich would have made future trouble there impossi- 
 ble." What was this design? Lord Macaulay tells us 
 what this design was. Cromwell's avowed purpose was to 
 end all difficulties in Ireland, — whether they arose from the 
 land question or from the religious question, — by putting a 
 total and entire end to the Irish race ; by extirpating them 
 off the face of the earth. This was an admirable policy, my 
 friends, in order to pacify Ireland and create peace : for the 
 best way and the simplest way to keep any man quiet is to 
 cut his throat. The dead do not speak ; the dead do not 
 move ; the dead do not trouble any one. Cromwell came to 
 destroy the Irish race, and the Irish Catholic faith of the 
 people, and so put an end at once to all claims for land, and 
 to all disturbances arising out of religious persecution. But, 
 
04: ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 I ask this learned gentleman, does he imagine that the peo- 
 ple of America are either so ignorant or so wicked as to ac- 
 cept the monstrous proposition that a man who came into 
 Ireland with such an avowed purpose as this can be declared 
 a friend of the real interests of the Irish people ? Does he 
 imagine that there is no intelligence in America, that there 
 is no manhood in America, that there is no love of freedom" 
 in America, no love of religion and of life in America ? And 
 the man must be an enemy of freedom, of religion, and of 
 life itself before such a man can sympathize with the blood- 
 stained Oliver Cromwell. These words of the historian, I 
 regret to say, sound like bitter irony and mockery in the 
 ears of the j^eople whose fathers CroniAvell came to destroy. 
 But he says the Lord Protector did not interfere with any 
 man's conscience. The Irish demanded liberty of conscience. 
 " I interfere with no man's conscience," said Cromwell : " but 
 if, by liberty of conscience, you. Catholics, mean having 
 priests and the Mass, I tell you you cannot have this ; and 
 you never will have it, as long as the Parliament of England 
 lias power to prevent it." I now ask you, my friends, what 
 these words mean ? To grant the Catholics liberty of con- 
 science, their conscience telling them that their first and 
 greatest duty is to hear the Mass ; to grant them liberty of 
 conscience, and then deny them priests to say the Mass : as- 
 suredly it is a contradiction in words : it is an insult to the 
 intelligence, to propound so extravag^it a proposition ! 
 " Oh ! but," Mr. Froude says, " you must go easy. Of 
 course, I acknov/ledge that the Mass is a beautiful rite, an- 
 cient and beautiful ; but you must remember that, in Crom- 
 well's mind, the Mass meant the system that was shedding 
 blood all over Europe ; the system of the Church that never 
 knew mercy, that slaughtered the Protestants everywhere ; 
 and therefore he was resolved to have none of it." Ah ! 
 my fiiends, if the Mass were the symbol of slaughter. 
 
THE CROMYiELLIAN EBA. 95 
 
 Oliver Cromwell would have had more sympathy with th(? 
 Mass. 
 
 And so the historian seeks to justify cruelty in Ireland 
 against the Catholics, by alleging cruelty on the part of Cath- 
 olics, against their Protestant fellow-subjects in other lands. 
 Now, these words the historian has repeated, over and over 
 again, in many of his writings, and at other times, and in 
 other places ; and I may as well at once put an end to this. 
 Mr. Froude says : " I hold the Catholic Church accountable 
 for all the blood that the Duke of Alva shed in the Nether- 
 lands ; " and I say to Mr. Froude I deny it. Alva fought 
 in the Netherlands against the subjects that rebelled against 
 Spain. Alva fought in the Netherlands against a people the 
 first principle of whose new religion seemed to be an upris- 
 ing against the authority of the State. With Alva or his 
 state questions the Catholic Church had nothing to do ; and 
 if Alva shed the blood of rebels, and if those who rebelled 
 happened to be Protestants, that is no reason to father the 
 shedding of that blood upon the Catholic Church. Mr. 
 Froude says that the Catholic Church is responsible for the 
 blood that was shed in the massacre of St. Bartholomew's 
 Day, by Mary de Medicis, in France. I deny it. The 
 woman that gave that order had no sympathy with the 
 Catholic Church. It was altogether a State measure. She 
 saw France divided into factions ; and she endeavored, by 
 court intrigue and villainy of her own — for a most villainous 
 woman she was — she endeavored to stifle opposition in the 
 blood of the people. Tidings were sent to Pome that the 
 King's life was in danger, and that that life had been pre- 
 served by Heaven ; and Pome sang a Te Deum for the safety 
 of the King, and not for the blood of the Huguenots. 
 Amongst the Huguenots there were Catholics that were 
 slain, because they were of the opposite faction ; and that 
 
96 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IBELAND. 
 
 alone proves that the Catholic Church was not answerable 
 for the shedding of such blood. 
 
 But, on the other hand, the blood that was shed in Ire- 
 land was .shed exclusively on account of religion, at this 
 particular time ; for when, in 1643, Charles I. made a 
 treaty for a cessation of hostilities with the Confederation 
 of Kilkenny, the English Parliament, as soon as they heard 
 that the King had ceased hostilities for a time with the 
 Irish Catholics, at once intervened, and said the war must 
 go on. They said : " We will not allow hostilities to cease ; 
 we must root out these Irish Papists, or else we shall incur 
 danger to the Protestant religion." I regret to say, my 
 Protestant friends, that the men of 1643, the members of 
 the Puritan Houses of Parliament in England, have fas- 
 tened upon that form of religion which you profess the for- 
 mal argument and reason why Irish blood should flow in 
 torrents, — lest the Protestant religion might suffer! In 
 these days of ours, when we are endeavoring to put away 
 all sectarian bigotry, we deplore the faults committed by 
 our fathers on both sides. Mr. Froude deplores the blood 
 that was shed as much as I do ; but, my friends, it is a his- 
 torical question, arising upon historic facts and evidence ; 
 and I am bound to appeal to history as well as my learned 
 antagonist, and to discriminate and put back the word 
 which he puts out, namely, that toleration is the genius of 
 Protestantism. He asserts — and it is an astounding asser- 
 tion — in this, his third lecture, that religious persecution 
 was hostile to the genius of Protestantism. Nay, he goes 
 further. Speaking of the Mass, he says, that " the Catho- 
 lic Church has learned to borrow one beautiful gem from 
 the crown of her adversary. She has learned to respect the 
 consciences of others." I wish that the learned gentleman's 
 statements could be more approved by history. Oh ! much 
 I desire that, in saying those words, he had spoken historic 
 
TEE CROMWELLIAN ERA. 97 
 
 truths ! No doubt he believes v/hat he says ; but I ask 
 him, and I ask every Protestant here, at what time, in what 
 age, or in what land has Protestantism ever been in the 
 ascendant without persecuting the Catholics who were 
 around them ? It is not in bitterness I say it, but it is 
 simply as a historic truth. I cannot find any record of his- 
 tory, — any time during these ages, up to a few years ago, — 
 any time when the Protestants in England, in Ireland, in 
 Sweden, in Germany, or anywhere else gave the slightest 
 toleration, or even permission to live, where they could 
 take it from their Catholic fellow-subjects. Even to-day 
 where is the strongest spirit of religious persecution exhib- 
 ited ? Is it not in Protestant Sweden ? Is it not in Prot- 
 estant Denmark ? And who to-day are persecuting ? I 
 ask you is it Catholics ? No, but Protestant Bismarck, in 
 Germany. All this I say with regret. I am not only a 
 Catholic, but a priest ; not only a priest, but a monk ; 
 not only a monk, but a Dominican monk ; and, from out 
 the depths of my soul, I repel and repudiate the principle 
 of religious persecution in any cause, or in any age, or in 
 any land. 
 
 Oliver Cromwell, the apostle of blessings to Ireland ! 
 landed in 1G49, and went to work. He besieged Drogheda, 
 which was defended by Sir Arthur Aston and a brave gar- 
 rison. He made a breach in the walls ; and when the gar- 
 rison found that their position was no longer tenable, they 
 asked, in tlie military language of the day, if they would be 
 spared, — if quarter would be given them. And quarter 
 was promised if all the men would cease fighting and lay 
 down their arms. They did so ; and the promise was ob- 
 served until the town v^ras taken. When the town was in 
 his hands, Oliver Cromwell gave orders to his army for 
 the indiscriminate massacre of the garrison, and every man, 
 woman, and child in that large city. The people, v/hen 
 5 
 
98 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 tliey saw the soldiers slain around them, — ^v^hen they sa"v\ so 
 many killed on every side. — when they saw the streets of 
 Drogheda flowing wdth blood for five days, — fled to the 
 number of one thousand aged men, women, and children, 
 and took refuge in the great church of St. Peter, in Drog- 
 heda. Oliver Cromwell drew his soldiers around that 
 church, and out of that church he never allowed one of 
 those thousand innocent people to escape alive. He then 
 proceeded to Wexford, vrhere a certain commander named 
 Stafford admitted him into the city ; and he massacred the 
 people there again. Three hundred of the w^omen of Wex- 
 ford, A\dth their little children, gathered round the great 
 market-cross in the public square of the city. They 
 thought in their hearts that all terrible as Cromwell was, 
 he would respect the sign of man's redemption and spare 
 those who were under the arms of the Cross. Oh! how 
 vain the thought ! Three hundred poor defenceless women 
 were there, screaming for mercy, under the Cross of Jesus 
 Christ; and Cromwell and his barbarous demons around 
 them, destroying them, so as not to let one of these inno- 
 cents escaj)e ; until they were ankle deep in the blood of the 
 women of Wexford ! 
 
 Cromwell retired from Ireland after having glutted him- 
 self with the blood of the people. He retii-ed from Ireland ; 
 but he wound up the war by taking 80,000, — some say 
 100,000, — of the men of Ireland, and driving them down to 
 the southern ports of Munster, where he shipped them — 
 80,000 at the lowest calculation — he shipped them to the 
 sugar plantations of the Barbadoes, there to work as slaves ; 
 ,and in six years time, such was the treatment they re- 
 ceived, that, out of eighty thousand, there were only twenty 
 men left. He collected six thousand Irish boys, fair and 
 beautiful stripling youths ; and he put them into ships and 
 sent them off also to the Barbadoes, there to languish and 
 
THE CROMWELLIAN ERA. 99 
 
 die before ever tliey came to the fulness of their age and 
 manhood. Oh ! great Go*d ! is this the man that has an 
 apologist in the learned, the frank, the generous and gent! e- 
 manlj historian, who comes in oily words to tell the Amer- 
 ican people that Cromwell was one of the bravest men that 
 ever lived, and one of the best friends that Ireland ever 
 had! 
 
 Now, we must pass on. Oliver Cromwell died in 1658. 
 Here is a most singular assertion of Mr. Froude, who tells 
 us that, much as he regrets all the blood that was shed, and 
 all the terrible vengeance that was poured out, still it result- 
 ed in great good to Ireland ; and the good consisted in this : 
 — The Parliament, after Cromwell's victories, found them- 
 selves masters of Ireland, and the Irish people lying in 
 blood and in ruin before them. What was their next move ? 
 Their next move was to pass a law driving all the jieople of 
 Ireland who owned any portion of the land, — all the Irish 
 land-owners, — and all the Catholics, — out of Ulster, Mun- 
 ster, and Leinster ; and, on the 1st of May, 1C54, all the 
 inhabitants of Ireland were driven across the Shannon into 
 Connaught. The coarse phrase used by the Lord Protector, 
 on this occasion, was that they were to "go to hell, or to 
 Connaught " ! The solemnity of the historic occasion which 
 brings us together will not permit me to make any remark 
 upon such a phrase as this. However, the Irish did not 
 choose to go to hell, but they were obliged to go to Con- 
 naught Lest, however, that any relief 
 
 might come to them by sea, — lest they might ever enjoy the 
 sight of the fair provinces and fair lands that were once 
 their own, — the English Parliament made a law that no 
 Irishman, banished into Connaught, was to come within four 
 miles of the river Shannon, on one side, or four miles of the 
 sea on the other side. There was a cordon of English 
 soldieiy and English forts drawn around them ; and there 
 
100 EJS-GLISH MISRULE m IRELAND. 
 
 tliey were to live, in the bogs, in the fastnesses, and iu the 
 wild wastes of the most desolate country in Ireland; and 
 there they were doomed to expire by cold, by famine, and 
 by every form of sniiering that their Heavenly Father 
 might permit to fall upon them. 
 
 Tlien we read that numbers of Englishmen came over ; — ■ 
 and I don't blame them ; — for the fair, plains of Munster 
 were there Vv'aiting for them. The splendid vales of Leinster 
 were there, v^^ith their green bosoms waiting for the hand 
 that would put in the ploughshare or the spade into the 
 bountiful earth ; — waiting for an owner. So the English 
 came from every direction to get this fair land of Ireland, — 
 WiQ fairest under heaven. Cromwell settled down his 
 troopers there, — chose rough, Puritan soldiers, who came to 
 Ireland with the Bible in one hand and the sword in the 
 other. They took possession of the country ; and, according 
 to Mr. Froude, here is the benefit that resulted from Crom- 
 well's transplantation, — that, " in fifteen years, they changed 
 Ireland into a garden " ! All the bogs were drained ! — all 
 the fields were fenced in ! and all the meadows were mowed ! 
 all the fallow fields were ploughed ; and the country was 
 smiling in peace ! There never was anything so fine seen in 
 Ireland, as the state of things brought about by Cromwell ! 
 More than that ; the poor Irish peasantry, that were harass- 
 ed and plundered by the priests, and bishops, and chieftains, 
 now enjoyed j^eace and quiet and comfort as the servants of 
 the new English owners and possessors of the soil ! Well ! 
 I wish, for Ireland's sake, that this picture were true. I 
 would have no objection to see one-half of Ireland in the 
 hands, for a time, of the English settlers, if the other half 
 was possessed by the Irish, and they lived there happy and 
 comfortable in their homes. But these fifteen years, of 
 which Mr. Froude speaks, must have begun in 1G53 ; because 
 it was only in September of that year that the Englisli Par- 
 
THE CnOMWELLIAN ERA. 101 
 
 liament declared the war over in Ireland. Up to that time 
 there was war and bloodshed. IsTow there was peace ; but 
 what kind of peace ? Oh, my friends^ they made a solitude, 
 — they made a desert ; and Mr. Froude calls it peace ! He 
 calls it peace ; and it was a peaceful desert ! 
 
 Oliver Cromwell died in 1658 : and now I want to read 
 for you the state of Ireland — the " garden " — Mr. FrouSe's 
 " garden," — at that time : — 
 
 *' Ireland, in the language of Scripture, now lay void as a 
 wilderness. Five-sixths of her people had.perished. Men, 
 women, and children were found daily perishing in the 
 ditches — starved. The bodies of many wandering orphans, 
 whose fathers had embarked for Spaiu, and whose mothers 
 had died of famine, were preyed upon by the wolves." 
 
 In the years 1652 and '53, a terrible famine had swept 
 over the whole country ; so that a man might travel twenty 
 or thirty miles and not see a living creature. Man, beast, 
 and bird, were all dead, or had quitted those desolate places. 
 The troopers would tell stories of places w*here they saw a 
 smoke, — it was so rare to see either fire or smoke by day or 
 by night. In two or three cabins where the soldiers went, 
 they found none but aged men, women, and children, who, 
 in the words of the Prophet, had " become like a bottle in 
 the smoke — their skins black like an oven, because of the 
 terrible famine." They were seen to eat the filthy carrion 
 out of the ditches, — black and rotten, — so great was their 
 hunger. It was even said that they took the corpses out of 
 the graves. A party of horsemen, out hunting " Tories," 
 on a dark night, descried a light, and thought it was a fire 
 which the Tories had made. They used to make fires in 
 those vraste places, to cook their food and warm themselves. 
 Drawing near, they saw that it was a ruined cabin. Sur- 
 rounding it on all sides, some of them alighted and peeped 
 in at the window ; and there they saw a great fire of wood, 
 
102 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 and, sitting around it, was a company of miserable old 
 women and children ; and there, between them and the fire, 
 a corpse lay broiling, which, as the fire roasted it, they cut 
 and ate ! 
 
 The year before Cromwell died, in 1657, we find a mem- 
 ber of the Irish Parliament, Major Morgan, declaring that 
 the whole land of Ireland was in ruins. " For, besides the 
 cost," he says, " of rebuilding the churches and court- 
 houses, and the market-houses, — they were under very heavy 
 charges for publip rewards, paid for the destruction of three 
 beasts." What do you think the three "beasts" were? 
 The wolf, the priest, and the Tory! Nov/ let me explain 
 the state of this " garden " to you. During those fifteen 
 years, of which Mr. Froude speaks so flatteringly, there was 
 actually a grant of land issued, within nine miles of the 
 city of Dublin, on the north side, — that is to say, on the 
 most cultivated side, — to a man — with an abatement of one 
 hundred pounds a year in his rent, — provided he would en- 
 gage to kill the wolves. The wolves increased in Ireland 
 from the desolate state of the country. They fed upon the 
 carcasses of men and beasts ; and they increased in Ireland, 
 so that, actually, they came famished up to the very gates 
 of Dublin, and had to be driven away ! Does this look like 
 a " garden " ? Is this the kingdom of peace, plenty, and 
 happiness, where the Irish peasant was, at length, getting 
 fat in comfort ; where everything was peace and serenity ; — ■ 
 where the bogs were all drained, and the fields were so care- 
 fully fenced in, by the dear Cromwellians that had got pos- 
 session of the land? When the relics of the Irish army 
 were embarking for Spain, some of the Irish officers had their 
 dogs, — magnificent Irish wolf-dogs,— which thc^y wanted to 
 take with them ; but they were stopped ; and the dogs were 
 taken from them, for the purpose of hunting the wolves that 
 
THE CROMWELLIAIT EBA. 103 
 
 infested the country. That is my first answer to Mr. 
 Fronde's assertion that Ireland was a " garden." 
 
 The second " beast " mentioned by Major Morgan, in the 
 Irish Honse of Commons, was the priest. He was to be 
 hunted down like the wolf. There were five pounds set 
 upon the head of a dog-wolf, and there were live pounds set 
 upon the head of a priest ; and ten pounds upon the head 
 of a Bishop or a Jesuit. ]Mr. Froude says that these severe 
 laws were not put into execution. He tells us that, while 
 Parliament passed these laws, they privately instructed the 
 magistrates that they were not to execute them. Not 
 they ! — so merciful, so tolerant is the genius of Mr. Fronde's 
 Protestantism ! We have, however, the terrible fact before 
 us, that Parliament after Parliament made law after law, 
 commanding the magistrates, under heavy fines, — ^under 
 heavy penalties of fine and forfeiture, — to execute these 
 laws. We find the country filled with informers ; we find 
 priest-hunting actually reduced to a profession in Ireland ; 
 and we find, strange enough, Portuguese Jews, coming all 
 the way from Portugal, in order to hunt priests in Ireland, 
 so profitable was the occupation. In 1698, under William 
 the Third, there were in Ireland 495 regular and 872 secu- 
 lar priests; and in that very year, out of 495 friars, 424 
 were shipped off from Ireland into banishment, into sla- 
 very ; and, of the 800 and odd secular priests that remained 
 in the land, not one of them would be allowed to say Mass, 
 in public or private, until he first took the Oath of Abjura- 
 tion, and renounced the See of Pome ; in other words, un- 
 less he became a Protestant. It is all very well for my 
 learned friend to tell us that the laws were not put into exe- 
 cution. But what is the meaning of such entries as these ? — 
 
 *' Five pounds on the certificate of Thomas Stanley." — 
 (This was in the year 1657, the year the severe lav/s were 
 not enforced !) — "To Thomas Gregson, Evan Powell, and 
 
104 ENGLISH MISRULE IH IRELAND. 
 
 Samuel Alley, being three soldiers in Colonel Abbott's horse 
 dragoons, — for arresting a Popish priest by the name of 
 Donongh Hagerty, taken and now secured in the county 
 jail at Clonmel ; and the money" (it says) " is to be equally 
 divided between them ! " 
 
 " To Arthur SpoUen, Robert Pierce, and John Bruen, 
 five pounds, to be divided equally between them, for their 
 good service performed in apprehending and bringing before 
 the Right Honorable Lord Chief Justice Pepys, on the 21st 
 of January, one Popish priest named Edwin Duhy." 
 
 " To Lieutenant Edmn Wood, on the certificate of Wm. 
 St. George, Esq., Justice of the Peace of the county of 
 Cavan, twenty-nve pounds, for five priests and friars appre- 
 hended by him, namely, Thomas McGeoghegan, Turlough 
 McGowan, Hugh McGowan, Terence Fitzsimmons, and 
 another, who, on examination, confessed themselves to be 
 priests and friars." 
 
 " To Sergeant Humphrey Gibbs," (a nice na]ne,) "and to 
 Corporal Thomas Hill, of Colonel Lee's company, ten 
 pounds, for apprehending two Popish priests ; namely, Mau- 
 rice Prendergast and Edward Eahy, v/ho were sentenced to 
 the jail of Wexford, and, afterwards, being adj udged accord- 
 ingly, were transported to foreign parts." 
 
 The third " beast " was the " Tory," which means, that, 
 in these terrible years, seves.'al of the Irish gentlemen, and 
 Irish people, who were ordered to transplant themselves 
 into Connaught, not finding there the means of living, re- 
 mained in the desolate countries of Leinster and Munster ; 
 and there, goaded to desperation, formed themselves into 
 wild bands of outlaws, robbing the cattle of the Cromwellian 
 settlers ; descending upon them, with fire and sword ; achiev- 
 ing, in their own vray, " the wild justice of revenge." If 
 Ireland was the " garden " that Mr. Froude describes it to 
 be, how comes it to pass that no Cromwellian settler, 
 throughout the length and breadth of the land, dared to 
 take a piece of land unless there was a garrison of soldiers 
 within his immediate neighborhood ? Nay, even under the 
 
THE CROMWELLIAJSf ERA. 105 
 
 very eyes of the garrison of Timolin, in Meath, the " Tories " 
 came down, and robbed, plundered, set fire to, and destroyed 
 fcbe homesteads of certain English Cromwellian settlers ; for 
 which all the people of the neighborhood, of Irish names 
 and of Irish parentage, were at once taken and banished out of 
 the country. In a word, the outlaws who, thirty years af- 
 terward, appeared as " Rapparees," — who are described to 
 us in such fearful terms, by the English historians, — con- 
 tinued to infest and desolate the country ; and we find ac- 
 counts of them in the State papers, and other papers, down 
 to the latter end of the reign of George III. And this was 
 the "garden"! This was the land of peace, of comfort, 
 and of plenty ! 
 
 Now, my friends, came the Restoration. In 1659, Charles 
 IL was restored to the throne of England. Well, the Irish 
 had been fighting for his father ; they had bled, and suftered, 
 fighting against his enemies ; and they were now banished 
 into Connaught. They naturally expected that, when the 
 rightful heir to the throne would come into his rights, they 
 would be recalled and put into their estates. They might 
 have expected more. They might have expected to be re- 
 warded by honors, titles, and wealth. But what is the fact ? 
 The fact is that Charles II., at the Restoration, left nearly 
 the whole of Ireland in the hands of the Cromwellian set- 
 tlers ; and, by the " Act of Settlement and Explanation," 
 secured them in these estates, leaving the property and the 
 wealth of the country to the men who had brought his 
 father to the scafiold ; and leaving in beggary, destitution, 
 and ruin, the biave and loyal men who had fought for him 
 and his house. At first, indeed, there was a " Court of 
 Claims " opened ; for, remember, that, in England, no sooner 
 had Charles come to the throne, than all the Cromwellian 
 settlers who had taken the property of the English Royal- 
 ists were at once put out, and the English lords and gentle- 
 
lOG ENGLISH MISRULE IN IBELAND. 
 
 men got back their jiroperties and estates. But not so in 
 Ireland. The " Court of Claims " was opened in the first 
 year of the reign of Charles. As soon as it -was perceived 
 that the Irish Catholics began to claim their property, the 
 Government shut up the Court at once. Three thousand 
 of these claims remained unheard. As Leland says : — 
 
 " The people of Ireland were denied the justice which is 
 given to the commonest criminal — the justice of having a 
 fair and impartial hearing." 
 
 Nugent, afterwards Lord Riverston, writes at this time : — 
 
 "There are in Ireland to-day, five thousand men whc 
 never were outlawed, who yet have been put out of theii 
 estates ; and now by law they never can recover their es- 
 tates again." 
 
 More than this. No sooner was Charles seated on the 
 throne, than the English and Irish Parliaments began to 
 afflict and grind the already down-trodden people of Ireland 
 by legislation the most infamous that can be imagined. In 
 1G73, the English Parliament furiously demanded that the 
 King should exj)el all the Catholic Bishops and priests from 
 Ireland, and prohibit the Papists from dwelling there with- 
 out a license. In order to encourage the Protestant 
 *' planters," Charles, — against his conscience, and against 
 his royal gratitude, — obeyed them. Law after law was 
 passed in that and the succeeding years, abolisliing and de- 
 stroying, as far as they could, every vestige of the Catholic 
 religion in Ireland. Mr. Froude here again makes the cus- 
 tomary assertion, that, " when the Eestoration came, the 
 Catholic religion and the Catholic priests came back with 
 it." He tells us that the Catholic Archbishop of Dublin 
 " was received in state at the Castle." What are the facts ? 
 The Primate, Edmund O'Eeilly, was banished. Peter 
 Talbot, the Archbishop of Dublin, — although, being in a 
 
THE CnOMWELLIAJS' ERA. 107 
 
 dying state, lie had got lea^-e, but a short time before, to re- 
 turn to Ireland, that he might die in the land of his birth, 
 — was arrested in Maynooth, near Dublin, and shut up in a 
 dungeon ; and there he died a miserable death of martyr- 
 dom. ^Q find, at this very time, a reward of ten pounds 
 offered for any one who should discover an ofiicer of the 
 army attending at Mass ; five pounds for a trooper ; and 
 four shillings for any private soldier, who was discovered to 
 have heard Mass. Oliver Plunkett, the holy Primate of 
 Armagh, was seized by Lord Ormonde, in 1679. The}' 
 knew that they could not convict him of any lawlessness oi 
 treason in Ireland ; and they brought him over to London, 
 packed an English jury to try him; and they murdered 
 him at Tyburn, in this j^ear. 
 
 It is true that these penal laws were relaxed for some years 
 before the death of Charles II. That event took place in 
 1G85 ; and James TL came to the throne. Three years after- 
 wards, William of Orange landed to dispute with him the title 
 to the crown of England. Now, that James II. was the lawful 
 King of England, no man will deny. William was married 
 to Mary, the daugliter of James ; and William came to 
 England with an army of 15,000 men at his back, pretending 
 that he came only to inquire about the birth of the Prince 
 of Wales, who was the lawful heir to the crown. Well, 
 James, as soon as William arrived with his army, fled to 
 France. Mr, Froude tells us that he abdicated vvhen he fled 
 to Prance. I deny that James II. abdicated. Mr. Froude 
 has no authority to say it. He only retii-ed, for a time, 
 from the face of his enemy. He called upon his subjects, 
 both in England and Ireland, to stand to their King like 
 \0j2l men. The English betrayed him ; the Irish, — fools as 
 they were, — rose up again for a Stuart King, and declared 
 they were loyal men, and they would stand by their mon- 
 arch. 
 
108 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 James came to Ireland iii 1G89 ; and he summoned a Par- 
 liament, of which Mr. Froude speaks in his lecture. lie 
 speaks of that Parliament as a persecuting Parliament. He 
 says that " they attainted every single Protestant proprietor 
 in Ireland, by name ; " and that they did this, " lest any ciio 
 should escape out of their net." Isow, what are the facts of 
 that Parliament of 1689 ? The very first thing that they 
 declared, although they had suffered more than any other 
 people from religious persecution, — the very first law they 
 made was that there should be no more religious persecution 
 in Ireland, and that no man, from that day forward, should 
 suffer for his conscience or his faith. It is perfectly true 
 that they passed a bill of attainder ; but they passed that 
 bill not against Protestants but against every man of the 
 land that was in arms against King James, whom they rec- 
 ognized as their king ; — every man who refused to obey him 
 and his government. I ask you, in doing that, did they not 
 do their duty ? Did they not do precisely what is always 
 done in times of rebellion ? England was in rebellion against 
 James. James was the lawful king. James was in Ireland ; 
 and the Irish Parliament, with James at their head, declared 
 that every man who was in arms against him was to be out- 
 laAved. Against these outlaws the Bill of Attainder was 
 passed, — this " persecuting measure " of which Mr. Froude 
 speaks when he mentions this Parliament. 
 
 William came to Ireland, and opened the campaign in. 
 1690. Mr. Froude says, in his description of him, that 
 William brought with him only a small army, badly 
 equipped, badly drilled ; but that the Irish were never so 
 strong, never so well drilled, or so perfectly equipj^ed as they 
 were at the time. Now here are the numbers as given by 
 history : — William's army consisted, at first, of 46,000 vet- 
 eran soldiers, v/ell clad, well fed, and perfectly drilled and 
 equipped. The Irish army of James numbered 23,000 im- 
 
TEE CBOMWELLIAN ERA. 109 
 
 perfectly disciplined troops, wanting in nearly everything 
 necessary for a campaign*. " Thig we have on the evidence of 
 the Duke of Berwick, who vv^as serving in the army at the 
 time. At the battle of the Boyne, Mr. Froude says tha*" 
 " the Irish did not make even a respectable stand " ! And 
 I regret, — I bitterly regTet, — that the learned gentleman 
 should, himself, have so far forgotten what was due to him- 
 self, as to have ventured, even in the faintest whisper, to 
 impute a want of courage to the soldiers of Ireland. At the 
 battle of the Boyne, James and his army were on the south 
 bank of the river. William with his army advanced down 
 from the north. The muster roll of William's army, on that 
 morning, shows the figure of 51,000 men. The army of 
 James had not increased from the original 23,000. William 
 was a lion-hearted and brave soldier. James, I am sorry to 
 say, had forgotten the tradition of that ancient courage and 
 gallantry which belonged to him as Duke of York, when he 
 was Lord High Admiral of England. On one side was " an 
 army led by a lion ; " on the other was " an army led by a 
 stag." The Irish have fixed upon James an opprobrious 
 name, in the Irish language, which on an occasion like this 
 I will not repeat. 
 
 On the morning of the battle of the Boyne, William de- 
 tached 10,000 men, who went up the stream some miles, to 
 ford it near the Hill of Slane. James could scarcely be pre- 
 vailed upon to send one or two regiments of horse to oppose 
 these 10,000 men, with their artillery, headed by the Duke 
 of Schomberg. The evening before the battle, James sent 
 away six guns towards Dublin. How many do you think 
 remained ? Only six pieces of artillery remained with the 
 Irish on that day! How many were opposed to them? 
 We have it on historic record, that William brought into 
 the field on that day at the Boyne, fifty heavy pieces of ar- 
 tillery and four mortars. Then he advanced and crossed 
 
110 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 the river. These Irish troops, of whom Mr. Fronde says 
 that " they did not make even a respectable stand," were 
 ontgeneralled that day. They had at their head a timorous 
 king, — !a king who had already sent away his artillery and 
 his baggage ; who had drawn around his person, two miles 
 away, all the best disciplined of the French soldiers; and 
 these raw levies of young Irishmen v/ere opposed to 51,000 
 of the bravest men of Europe. Well, William crossed the 
 Boyne, and the Duke of Berwick is my authority for stating 
 this. He says: — 
 
 " With admirable courage and gallantry, the Irish troops 
 charged the English ten times after they had crossed the 
 river." 
 
 Ten times did these poor young fellows, with no General, 
 and scarcely an officer, charge upon the English' with a dash 
 as brave as that with which O'Brien, Lord Clare, swept 
 down upon them at Fontenoy. Ten distinct times did they 
 dash against the terrible lines of William's veterans. And 
 when they retreated, they retreated like an army, in perfect 
 order, at the command of their superior officers. 
 
 Now came the siege of Athlone. In that same year, 1690, 
 the English army advanced, on the line of the Shannon, 
 against Athlone. And here, Mr. Fronde says, that, " At 
 Athlone the Irish deserted posts which they easily might 
 have made impregnable." Now, what are the facts ? The 
 town of Athlone stands on the river Shannon, partly on one 
 bank and partly on the other, connected by a stone bridge. 
 The portion of the town that is on the Leinster side is 
 called the " English town ; " that upon the Connaught side 
 is called the " Irish town." When the English army ad- 
 vanced against the town of Athlone, in the first siege. Col- 
 onel Richard Grace, who held the town, beat back tlie ]i]ng- 
 lish, — many times, — aye, eight times more than his number, 
 • — with so much bravery, that the whole army of England 
 
THE CROMWELLIAN ERA. m 
 
 was obliged to retire from before Atlilone, and give up tlie 
 siege. 
 
 Then, William advanced upon Limerick. He brought 
 with him the whole strength of his army. He had, when 
 he went to Limerick, 20,000 men in regular line of battle. 
 In the town of Limerick there v/as an army of James's made 
 up partly of Irish, under the immortal Sarsfield, and partly 
 of French, under a General named Lazun. When the great 
 Englisli army, with its King, was approaching the city, the 
 French General, seeing it so defenceless, actually left the 
 town with his troops, swearing that " the town could be tak- 
 en with roasted aj^ples." Sarsfield, with the Irish, remained. 
 W^illiam advanced before the town and battered it with his 
 cannon, until he made a breach thirty-six feet wide ; and then 
 he assaulted it with 12,000 of his picked men. They actu- 
 ally entered the town, and were beaten out of the walls of 
 Limerick ; — beaten back over the broken interior walls, — 
 beaten so that, whilst even the women of Limerick entered 
 into the contest, fighting side by side with the men, — after 
 three hours and a half of fighting, William, Prince of Orange, 
 withdrew from the assault, leaving 2,000 men and 155 officers 
 in the breach of Limerick. The next day King William 
 sent a message to the city, asking them for leave to bury his 
 dead ; and the answer he got was : " Begone ! we will give 
 you no leave. Take yourself away ; and we will bury your 
 dead ! " 
 
 In the second siege of Athlone, in the following year, the 
 English town was occupied by Colonel Fitzgerald. General 
 St. Ruth, with the Irish army, lay two miles away, on the 
 other side of the Shannon. The English to^\"n was assailed 
 by William's General, Ginckle, with 8,000 men against the 
 400 who defended it. Fitzgerald and his Irish troops re- 
 mained, and stoi3ped the v/hole English army, and fought 
 Tuitil, out of the 400 men, not 200 were left, before they 
 
112 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 crossed tlie bridge and gave up tliat portion of the town^ 
 Before they crossed the bridge they broke one of the arches ; 
 and then crossing over they joined the garrison in the Irish 
 town. The English army with all their artillery battered the 
 Irish town until they did not leave a house standing there, 
 or a stone upon a stone. Before they forced the Irish troops 
 to retire, the English attempted to plank over the broken 
 arch of the bridge. They had their guns ranged to sweep it. 
 Eleven Irish soldiers came out to tear up the planks, and 
 cast them into the river; and such was the sweeping fire of 
 the English artillery, that out of the eleven, only two of the 
 poor fellows survived. Again the Euglish advanced to the 
 attack ; and again eleven other Irish sergeants of the various 
 regiments came out in the face of the whole English army, 
 and in the face of all their artillery, and deliberately de- 
 stroyed the wooden bridge they were making over the Shan- 
 non. And when the town was taken, at last, it was a mere 
 heap of ruins. It was taken not through any want of bra- 
 very on the part of the Irish soldiers, but through the folly 
 and obstinacy of the French General, St. Buth, who refused 
 to succor them or stand by them. 
 
 Of Aughrim I will not speak ; because Mr. Eroude him- 
 self acknowdedges that, at Aughrim, the Irish soldiers fought 
 bravely. And because I have for this English gentleman, 
 really and truly, a sincere regard and esteem, I would ask 
 him to do what I myself would do if I were in his position : 
 I would ask him to reconsider the word by which he seems 
 to imply a taint of cowardice on Irishmen, at home and 
 abroad, and, in the name of God, to take that word back. 
 
 In 1G91, the second siege of Limerick began ; and so gal- 
 lant was the resistance, so brave the defence, that William 
 of Orange, who was a brave man, — and if left to himself 
 would have been a tolerant and mild man, — offered terms. 
 He bore no ill-will to the Irish, because he was a stranger to 
 
THE CROMWELLIAN EUA. 113 
 
 them, and only came to Ireland simjoly as a warrior in tLe 
 service of v/ar ; he saw in the Irish a high-spirited and brave 
 people ; and he was obliged to come to terms. In the arti- 
 cles of capitulation signed for tlie Irish, they received hon- 
 orable terms from the royalty of England. By those very 
 articles, their rights, as citizens and as Catholics, to every 
 liberty of conscience and of religion were recognized. 
 Scarcely was the treaty of Limerick signed by the Lords 
 Justices, than a French ileet entered the Shannon, — a French 
 fleet of eighteen ships of the line, with tv/enty transports, 
 bringing 3,000 men, 200 officers, and above all, 10,000 stand 
 of arms, with clothing and provisions. They came ; but 
 they came too late for Sarsfield and for Ireland. Sarsfieid 
 had surrendered. He might have taken back that word ; he 
 might have broken these articles, when he found the French 
 forces and fleet at his back. But Sarsfield, to his glory, was 
 an Irishman ; — and he was far too honorable a man to vio- 
 late the treaty of Limerick which he had signed with his 
 honorable hand. Would to God that the honor of Sarsfield 
 had also been in the hearts of the other men, who, on the 
 part of England, ^signed that treaty ! But, no ! The Lords 
 Justices went back to Dublin, with the treaty signed, with 
 the honor of the royalty of England committed to it ; and 
 the next Sunday after they arrived in Dublin, they went 
 to Christ Church Cathedral to perform their devotions ; 
 and the sermon was preached by a Dr. Dop})ing, the liOrd 
 Bishop of Meath. Nov/, I am more or less a professional 
 preacher, — not so much a lecturer as a preacher, — and I 
 have a certain feeling of esjn-it du corps — I have the feeling 
 for preachers that every man has for his own profession. I 
 like to see them uphold the honor of their profession. — 
 Wliat do you think v/as the sermon that Dr. Dopping 
 preached. He preached, — I regret to say and I am ashamed 
 to say (it is true he was a Protestant Bishop) — but still he 
 
114 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 preached on the sin and the sinfulness of keeping your oath 
 or faith with a Papist. 
 
 Immediately after the articles of Limerick were signed", — 
 we liMve the testimony of Harris, the historian of William 
 the Third. He says : 
 
 "Justices of the Peace, and Sheriffs, and other Magis- 
 trates, presuming on their power in the country, did, in an 
 illegal manner, dispossess several of their Majesties' subjects 
 not only of their very goods and chattels, but of their lands 
 and tenements, to the great disturbance of the peace, the 
 subversion of the law, and the reproach of their Majesties' 
 Government." 
 
 We find those Lords Justices themselves, in a letter of the 
 19th November, six weeks after the treaty was signed, — 
 complaining that their lordships had received complaints 
 from all parts of Ireland of the ill-treatment of the people 
 who had submitted to their INIajesties' protection, ^nd were 
 included in the articles of that treaty. And the consequence 
 was that, actually, the men who refused to embark with 
 Sarsfield, to go to Spain and France, came in thousands to 
 beg of the English Lords Justices to give them leave, to let 
 them go and join Sarsfield in exile, — to let them go to fight 
 the battles of France, Spain, and Austria, — because thei-e 
 was no room in Ireland for a Catholic and an Irishman, nor 
 even for an honest man. 
 
 JSToY*^ began a time the most lamentable for Ireland. Wil- 
 liam himself was anxious to keep his royal word, and would 
 have kept it, if they had allowed him. But the same pres- 
 sure was put upon him as was brought to bear on Charles I. 
 The Irish Protestant faction would not allow a Catholic to 
 live in the land. Tiie English Parliament would not allow 
 a Catholic to breathe in the land. William was coerced to 
 comply with their requests ; and a series of the most terri- 
 ble laws that can be imagined were passed in the very teeth 
 
THE CROMWELLIAN ERA. 115 
 
 of the articles that were signed at Limerick. Three years 
 after the siege of Limerick, the two Parliaments were urged 
 by the grievances of the Protestants of Ireland. The poor 
 fellows complained "that the Catholics would not give them 
 leave to live " ! They poured in their petitions to the House 
 of Commons. We find a petition from the Protestant Mayor 
 and Aldermen of Limerick, complaining, in their o^n words, 
 that they were " greatly damaged in their trade by the great 
 number of Paj^ists residing there ; " and praying to be re- 
 lieved of them. We find the " coal-porters " of Dublin send- 
 ing in a petition to Parliament, and it was as follows : — 
 " Petition of one Edward Spragg " (another nice name) 
 " and others, in behalf of themselves and other Protestant 
 porters, in and about the city of Dublin," — comj^laining that 
 one Darby Pyan, a Papist, actually employed porters of his 
 own religion. And the petition was entertained by the Irish 
 House of Commons, and was sent to the " Committee on 
 Grievances." Listen to the words and description by the 
 historian, John Mitchel, of this time : — 
 
 " The Parliament met, and they passed an Act for the bet- 
 ter securing of the Government against the Papists; and the 
 fii'st act of that Parliament was that no CathoJic in Ireland 
 was to be allowed to have a gun, pistol, or svord, or any 
 kind of weapon of offence or defence. The consequence of 
 disobeying this law was fine and imprisonment, at the dis- 
 cretion of the court, or else the pillory or whipping." 
 
 Kow here are the reflections of Mr. Mitchel : — 
 
 " It is impossible to describe the minute and curious tyr- 
 anny to which this statute gave rise in every j^arish of the 
 island ; especially in districts where there was an armed Yeo- 
 raanry, exclusively Protestant. It fired ill with any Catholic 
 who, for any reason, fell under the displeasure of his formida- 
 ble neighbors. Any pretext was sufficient to point him out 
 for suspicion. Any neighboring magistrate might visit him, 
 at any hour of the night, and search his bed for arms. iSTo 
 
116 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 Papist vras safe from suspicion who had any money 1o pay 
 in lines ; and woe to the Papist who had a handsome daugh- 
 ter!" 
 
 The second act that they passed was designed to brutalize 
 the Irish Catholic people, by ignorance. They made a law 
 that no Catholic was to teach ; no Catholic was to send his 
 son to a Catholic school, or to a Catholic teacher. No Cath- 
 olic child was to be sent out of Ireland to receive a Catholic 
 education elsewhere ; and if any parent or guardian were found 
 sending money, clothing, or anything else to a Catholic child, 
 in a Catholic school, there was forfeiture, imprisonment, or a 
 fine ; and for a second offence he was treated as guilty of high 
 treason and was liable to be put to death for doing it. 
 
 The third act they passed was : — 
 
 " That all Popish Archbishops, Bishops, Vicars-General, 
 Deans, Jesuits, Monks, Friars, and all other regular Popish 
 clergy, and all Papists exercising any ecclesiastical jurisdic- 
 tion, — shall depart out of this Kingdom before the 1st day 
 of May, 1698." 
 
 If any remained after that day, or returned, the delinquents 
 were to be transported ; and if they returned again, they were 
 to be guilty of high treason, and to suffer accordingly ; — that 
 is to say — to be hanged^ drawn, and quartered. 
 
 You would imagine now, at least, that the Papists were 
 down as far as they could be put down. You would imagine, 
 now, at least, that the Protestant religion was safe in Ire- 
 land. Ah ! no, my friends. William was succeeded by his 
 sister-in-law. Queen Anne. She was a Stuart; she was a 
 daughter of James II., for whom Ireland shed its blood ; she 
 • was a granddaughter of Charles I., for whom Ireland shed 
 its blood ; and one would imagine she would have some heart, 
 some feeling for that people. Here is the way she showed 
 it. A Parliament, under this good Queen, passed a law " to 
 prevent the growth of Popery " ! What a strange plant this 
 
THE CROMWELLIAN EBA. II7 
 
 Popery must be ! They had been chopping it up, and cutting 
 it down, trampling it under foot, blowing it up with gun 
 powder, digging it out by the roots, as if they thought that 
 would extirpate it ; and yet, year after year, Parliament said : 
 " We must stop the growth of Popery," and passed laws to 
 stop the growth of Popery, By the first act of this Parlia- 
 ment of good Queen Anne, it was enacted that, if the son ol 
 any Papist should ever become Protestant, his father might 
 not sell or mortgage his estate, or dispose of it, or any portion 
 of it, by sale ; for the Protestant son became master of his 
 father's estate. Or if any child, no matter how young, con- 
 formed to the Protestant religion, he reduced his father at 
 once to be a tenant for life; and the child was to be taken 
 from the father, and placed under the guardianship of some 
 Protestant relative. This clause of this act, according to law, 
 made a Papist incapable of purchasing any landed estates, 
 or collecting rents or profits arising out of the land, or hold- 
 ing any lease for life, or for any term exceeding thirty-one 
 years, unless in such lease the reserve rent were at least one 
 thii'd of the improved rent value. That is to say, that if 
 a Protestant discovered that a Catholic had improved his 
 land, so as to make it one-thii'd more in value, the Protestant 
 could seize the money, could seize the land, could get a re- 
 ward for betraying his neighbor to the Government. 
 
 Finally, they capped the climax by passing a law that no 
 Papist or Catholic was to have a horse worth more than five 
 pounds. If he had one worth five thousand pounds, and a 
 Protestant came up to ofier him five pounds for the horse ; 
 — whether he took it or not, the Protestant was at liberty to 
 seize the Catholic's property. In a word, every enactment 
 that could degrade, vilify, or annihilate the people, was the 
 order of the day, and the business of Parliament, from the 
 days of Elizabeth down to the days when America burst her 
 
118 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IBELAND. 
 
 c^fiains, and before her terrible presence England grew afraitl, 
 and began to relax her penal laws. 
 
 I feel, my friends, that I have detained you too long upon 
 a subject which, indeed, was dreary and desolate ground to 
 travel over. For my pai-t, I never would have invited the 
 citizens of America, or my fellow-countrymen, to enter upon 
 such a desolate waste, to renew, in my heart and yours, so 
 deep and terrible a sorrow, if Mr. Froude had not compelled 
 m.e to lift the veil, and to show you the treatment which our 
 fathers received at the hands of England. I do it not at all 
 to excite national animosity, not at all to stir up bad blood. 
 I am one of the first willing to say, " Let by-gones be by- 
 gones ; let the dead past bury its dead." But, if any man, — 
 I care not who he be, how great his reputation, how grand 
 his name, in any walk of learning, or of science, or history ; — 
 if any man dare to say that England's treatment of Ireland 
 was just, — Avas necessary, — was such as can receive the ver- 
 dict of an honest man or of an honest people ; — if any man 
 dare to say that, either at home or abi'oad, the Irish have 
 ever shown the white feather in the hour of danger, — if I were 
 on my death-bed I would rise up to contradict him. 
 
FOUKTH LECTUEE. 
 
 {Delwei'ed in the Academy of Music^ New YorJc^ Nov. 21, 1872.) 
 
 IRELAND AND AMERICA. 
 
 Ladies and Gentlemen: I perceive, from tlie public 
 papers, that Mr. Froude seems to be somewhat irritated by 
 remarks that have been made as to his accuracy as a histo- 
 rian. Lest any word of mine might hurt, in the least de- 
 gree, the just susceptibilities of an honorable man, I beg, 
 beforehand, to say that nothing was further from my 
 thoughts than the slightest word either of personality or 
 disrespect for one who has won for himself so higli a name 
 as the English historian. And, therefore, I sincerely hope 
 that it is not any word of mine, — which may have fallen 
 from me, even in the heat of our amicable controversy, — 
 that can have given the least offence to that gentleman. 
 Just as I would expect to receive from him, or from any 
 other learned and educated man, the treatment which one 
 gentleman is supposed to show to another, so do I also wish 
 to give him that treatment. 
 
 And now, my friends, we come to the matter in hand. 
 On the last occasion, I had to traverse a great portion of my 
 country's history in reviewing the statements of the English 
 historian ; and I was obliged to leave almost untouched one 
 portion of that sad story ; namely, the period which covers 
 the reign of Queen Anne. This estimable lady, of whom 
 history records the unwomanly vice of an overfondness for 
 eating — came to the English throne, on the demise of 
 
120 BJ'iGLISir MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 William of Orange, in 1702; and on that throne she sat 
 until 1714. As I before remarked, it was, perhaps, natural 
 tha-t the Irish people, — the Catholics of Ireland,— trodden 
 into the very dust, — should have expected some quarter 
 from the daughter of the man for whom they had shed their 
 blood, and from the granddaughter of the other Stuart 
 King for whom they had fought with so much bravery in^ 
 1G49. The return that the Irish people got from this good 
 lady was quite of another kind from what they might have 
 expected. Not content with the atrocious laws that had 
 been already enacted against the Catholics of Ireland ; not 
 content with the flagrant breach of the Articles of Limerick, 
 of which her royal brother-in-law, William, was guilty ; — 
 no sooner does Anne come to the throne, and send the Mar- 
 quis of Ormonde, as Lord Lieutenant, to Ireland, than the 
 Irish Ascendancy, — that is to say the Protestant faction in 
 Ireland, — got upon their knees to the new Lord Lieutenant 
 to beg of him, for the honor of the Lord, to save them from 
 these desperate Catholics ! Great God ! — a people, robbed, 
 persecuted, and slain, until only a miserable remnant of 
 them were left; — without a voice in the nation's councils; 
 — without a vote, even at the humblest board that sat to 
 transact the meanest parochial business ; — these were the 
 men against whom the strong Protestant Ascendancy of 
 Ireland made their complaints, in 1703. And so well were 
 these complaints heard, my friends, that we find edict after 
 edict coming out, declaring that no Papist should be allowed 
 to inherit or possess land, or to buy land, or have it even 
 ■under a lease : declaring that if a Catholic child wished to 
 become Protestant, that moment that child became the 
 owner and the master of his father's estate ; and his father 
 remained only his pensioner, or a tenant for life upon the 
 bounty of his apostate son ; declaring that, if a child, no 
 matter how young, — even an infant, — conformed and be- 
 
IRELAND AND AMERICA. 121 
 
 came Protestant, — that moment that child was to be re- 
 moved from the guardianship and custody of the father, and 
 was to be handed over to some Protestant relation. Every 
 enactment that the misguided ingenuity of the tyrannical 
 mind of man could suggest was adopted and put in force. 
 " One might be inclined," says Mr. Mitchel, " to suppose 
 that Popery had been already sufficiently discouraged ; see- 
 ing that the Bishops and clergy had been banished, that 
 Catholics were excluded, by law, from all honorable or luc- 
 rative employments ; carefully disarmed, and plundered of 
 almost every acre of their ancient inheritance." But 
 enough had not yet been done to make the Protestant inter- 
 est feel secure ; consequently new laws were enacted, and 
 new clauses were added, under this " good Queen Anne," 
 declaring that no Papist or Catholic could live in a walled 
 town, especially in the towns of Limerick or Gal way ; that 
 no Catholic could even come into the suburbs of these 
 towns ; they were obliged to remain several miles outside 
 the town, as if they were lepers, whose presence would con- 
 taminate their sleek and pampered Protestant fellow-citizens 
 of the land. 
 
 The persecution went on. In 1711, we find them enact- 
 ing new laws ; and later on, to the very last day of Queen 
 Anne's reign, we find them enacting their laws, hounding on 
 the magistrates and the police of the country, and the in- 
 formers of the country, — oflfering them bribes and premiums 
 to execute these atrocious laws, and to hunt the Catholic 
 people and the Catholic priesthood of Ireland as if they 
 were ferocious and untamable wolves. And, my friends, 
 Mr. Froude justifies all this on two grounds. Not a single 
 word has he of compassion for the people who were thus 
 treated. Not a single word has he of manly protest against 
 the shedding of that people's blood by unjust persecutions, 
 as well as their robbery by legal enactment. But, he says, 
 6 
 
122 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 there were two reasons wliich, in his mind, seemed to 
 justify the atrocious action of the English Government. 
 The fii-st of these was, that, after all, these laws were only 
 retaliation, ui:)on the Catholics of Ireland, for the terrible 
 persecutions that were sujffered by the Huguenots, or Prot- 
 estants of France. And, he says, that the Protestants of 
 Ireland were only following the example of King Louis 
 XIV., who revoked the "Edict of Nantes." Let me ex- 
 plain this somewhat to you. The " Edict of Nantes " was a 
 law that gave religious liberty to the French Protestants as 
 well as the French Catholics. It was a law founded on 
 justice. It was a law founded on the sacred rights that be- 
 long to man. And this law was revoked ; consequently the 
 Protestants of France were laid open to persecution. But, 
 there is this difference between the French Protestants and 
 the Catholics of Ireland : — The French Protestants had 
 never had their liberty guaranteed to them by treaty ; the 
 Irish Catholics had their liberties guaranteed by the Treaty 
 limerick, — the treaty they won by their own brave 
 etfids and swords. The *' Edict of Nantes " was revoked ; 
 '- that revocation was no breach of any royal word 
 pledged to them. The Treaty of Limerick was broken with 
 the Catholics of Ireland ; and, in the breach of it, the King 
 of England, the Parliament of England, the aristocracy of 
 England, and the people of England, as well as the mis- 
 erable Irish Protestant faction at home, became perjurers 
 before history and the world. Here are the words of the 
 celebrated Edmund Burke on this very subject of the rev- 
 ocation of this edict : — 
 
 " This act of injustice " (says the great Irish statesman), 
 ** which let loose on that monarch, Louis XIV., such a tor- 
 rent of invective and reproach, and which threw such a dai'k 
 cloud over the splendor of such an illustrious reign — falls 
 far short of the case of Ireland." 
 
IRELAND AND AMERICA. 123 
 
 Kemember, be is an English statesman, — tlioiigh of Irish 
 birth, — and a Protestant who speaks : 
 
 '' The privileges which the Protestants of France enjoyed 
 antecedent to this revocation, were far greater than the 
 E-oman Catholics of Ireland ever aspired to, under the Prot- 
 estant Establishment. The number of their sufferers, if 
 considered absolutely, is not half of ours ; and, if consid- 
 ered relatively to the body of the community, it is perhaps 
 not a twentieth part. Then the penalties and incapacities 
 which grew from that revocation, are not so grievous in their 
 nature, or so certain in their execution, nor so ruinous, by 
 a great deal, to the people's prosperity in that State, as those 
 which were established for a perpetual law in the unhappy 
 country of Ireland." 
 
 In fact, what did the revocation of the Edict of Nantes 
 do ? It condemned those who relapsed into the Protestant 
 faith, after having renounced it, — it condemned them ; not, 
 indeed, to the confiscation of their goods, — there was no 
 confiscation, except in cases of relapsation, and in cases of 
 quitting the country. There was nothing at all of that com- 
 plicated machinery which we have described in referring to 
 Ireland's persecutions ; there was nothing at all beggaring 
 one portion of the population, and giving its spoils to the 
 other part ; while, side by side with this, we find the Irish 
 people ruined, beggared, persecuted, and hunted to the 
 death ; and Mr. Froude, the English historian, says : " Oh, 
 we were only serving you as your people, and your own 
 fellow-religionists in France, were serving us ! " 
 
 The other reason that he gives to justify these persecu- 
 tions, was that " the Irish Catholics were in favor of the 
 Pretender," — that is to say — of the son of James ll. ; — 
 *' and consequently were hostile to the Government." Now, 
 to that statement I can give, and do give a most emphatic 
 denial. The Irish Catholics had had quite enough of the 
 Stuarts : they had shed quite enough of their blood for that 
 
124 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 treacherous and shameless race ; they had no interest what- 
 ever in the succession ; nor cared they one iota whether the 
 Elector of Hanover, or the son of James II., succeeded to 
 the throne of England. For well they knew, whether it was 
 Hanoverian or Stuart that ruled in England, the faction at 
 home in Ireland, and the prejudices of the English peoj^le, 
 would make him, whoever he was, a tyrant over them and 
 over their nation. 
 
 Thus the jDcrsecution went on ; and law after law was 
 passed, to make perfect the beggary and the ruin of the 
 Irish people ; until at length Ireland w^as reduced to such 
 a state of misery, that the very name of Irishman was a 
 reproach ; and a small number of the glorious race had 
 the miserable weakness to change their faith, and to deny 
 the religion of their fathers and their ancient race. The 
 name of Irishman was a reproach ! My friends, Dean 
 Swift was born in Ireland : and he is looked upon as a pa- 
 triotic Irishman ; yet Dean Swift said : — " I no more 
 consider myself an Irishman, because I happened to be born 
 in Ireland, than an Englishman, chancing to be born in Cal- 
 cutta, would consider himself a Hindoo ! " Of the degi'ada- 
 tion of the Irish, and their utter prostration, he went so far 
 as to say, that he would not think of taking them into ac- 
 count, on any matter of importance, " any more than he 
 would of consulting the swine " ! Lord Macaulay gloats 
 over the state of the Catholics in Ireland, thus ; and Mr. 
 Froude views, — perhaps not without some complacency, — 
 their misery. Lord Macaulay calls them " Pariahs," and 
 says that they had no existence, that they had no liberty 
 even to breathe in the land, and that land their own ! And 
 we find this very view emphasized by Lord Chancellor 
 Bowes, in the middle of the century, rising in an Irish 
 court, laying down the law quite coolly and calmly, and say- 
 ing that, — 
 
IRELAND AND AMERICA. 125 
 
 '^ The la.w did not presume a Papist to exist in the king- 
 dom, nor could they breathe without the connivance of Gov- 
 ernment ! " 
 
 Chief Justice Kobinson made a similar declaration. Here 
 are the words of his Lordship, the Chief Justice : — 
 
 " It appears " (he says) " plain, that the law does not 
 suppose any such person to exist, as an Irish Roman Catho- 
 lic." 
 
 And yet, at that very time, we find Irishmen proclaiming 
 their loyalty, and saying, " Look at the Catholics of Ireland, 
 how loyal they are ! " Mr. Froude says that they favored 
 the "Pretender" at the very time when the Government 
 itself was attributing the quietude of the people in Ireland, 
 not to their prostration, not to their ruin, — as was the real 
 state of the case, — but to their devoted loyalty to the Crown 
 of England ! "Well did that brave Irish gentleman, John 
 Mitchel, reject that idea. " They were," he says, " as de- 
 graded as England could make them ; but there was another 
 degradation that could only come through themselves, that 
 they were not guilty of; — and that would be the degrada- 
 tion of loyalty." 
 
 Now, my fiiends, we have at this very time an Irishman 
 of the name of Phelim O'Neill, — one of the glorious old line 
 of Tyrone, — one in whose veins flowed the blood of the 
 great and the heroic " Red Hugh," who struck the Saxon 
 at the " Yellow Ford," and purpled the stream of the Black- 
 water with his blood ; one in whose veins flowed the, per- 
 haps, still nobler blood of the immortal Owen Roe O'Neill, 
 the glorious victor of Benburb. This Phelim O'Neill 
 changed his religion and became a Protestant. But it 
 seemed to him a strange and unnatural thing that a man of 
 the name of O'Neill should be a Protestant ; so he changed 
 his name from Phelim O'Neill, and called himself " Felix 
 Neale" ! There has been a good deal said lately about the 
 
126 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IBELAND. 
 
 pronunciation of proper names, and what they rhyme with. 
 This man made his name rhyme with eel, — the slippery eel. 
 Now, on this change of the gentleman's name and religion, 
 an old Irish priest wrote some Latin verses, which were 
 translated by Clarence Mangan. I will read them, just to 
 let you see how things were in Ireland at that time : — 
 
 " All things has Felix changed. He changed his name ; 
 Yet, in himself, he is no more the same. 
 Scorning to spend his days where he was reared, 
 To drag out life among the vulgar herd, 
 And trudge his way through bogs, in bracks and brogues, 
 He changed his creed, and joined the Saxon rogues 
 By whom his sires were robbed ; and laid aside 
 The arms they bore, for centuries, -with pride, — 
 The ' ship,' the ' salmon,' and the famed ' Red Hand; ' 
 And blushed when called O'Neill ia his own land ! 
 Poor, paltry skulker from thy noble race ! 
 Infelix EeliXj weep for thy disgrace ! " 
 
 But, my friends, the English Ascendancy, — or the Protes- 
 tant Ascendancy in Ireland, if you will, — seeing, now, that 
 they had got every penal law that they could ask for; 
 seeing that the only thing that remained for them was to 
 utterly exterminate the Irish race, — and this they had 
 nearly accomplished : for they had driven them into the 
 wilds and wastes of Connaught ; and they would have killed 
 them all, only that the work was too much, and that there 
 was a certain something in the old blood, and in the old 
 race, that still terrified them when they approached them ; 
 they had so far subdued the Catholics, that they thought, 
 now, at last, their hands were free, and nothing remained 
 for them but to make Ireland, as Mr. Froude says, " a 
 garden." They were to have every indulgence and every 
 privilege. Accordingly, they set to work. They had their 
 own Parliament. No Catholic could come near them, or 
 
IRELAND AND AMERICA. 127 
 
 come into tlieir towns; they were forbidden to present 
 themselves at all. They were greatly surprised to find that, 
 now the Catholics were crushed into the very earth, Eng- 
 land began to regard the Cromwellians themselves with fear 
 and hatred. What ! They, the sons of the Puritans ! Thej^, 
 the brave men that had slaughtered so many of the Irish, 
 and of the Catholic religion ? Are they to be treated un- 
 justly? Is their trade, or their commerce, or their Par- 
 liament to be interfered with? Ah! now, indeed, Mr. 
 Froude finds tears, and weeps them over the folly of Eng- 
 land ; because England interfered with the commerce and 
 with the trade of the Protestant Ascendancy in Ireland. 
 But England did it. These Irish Protestant tradesmen were 
 first-class woollen weavers : they made splendid cloth, which 
 took the very best prices in all the markets of Europe, be- 
 cause the wool of the Irish sheep was so fine. The English 
 Parliament made a law that the Irish traders were not to 
 sell any more cloth ; they were not to go into any of the 
 foreign markets to rival their English fellow-merchants. 
 They were to stay at home ; they had the island, and they 
 might make the most of it ; but, any trade, any freedom ; 
 anything that would enrich Ireland, — that the English 
 Parliament denied. Mr. Froude attributes this, in his lect- 
 ure, to the accident that England, at that time, happened to 
 be under the dominion of a paltry, pitiful-hearted lot of 
 selfish money-jobbers : "mere accident," according to him: 
 but an accident which he confesses so discontented the Orange 
 faction in Ireland, that many hundreds of them emigrated, 
 and came over to America, to settle in the New England 
 States. There, as he asserts, with some truth, they carried 
 their hatred with them, that was one day to break up the 
 British Empire. I have another theory on this great ques- 
 tion. I hold that it was no accident of the liour, at all, that 
 made England place her restrictive laws on the Irish woollen 
 
128 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 trade. I hold that it was the settled policy of JEr.gland, 
 These men, who were now in the ascendancy in Ireland, im- 
 agined that, because they had ruined and beggared the an- 
 cient race, and the men of the ancient faith, therefore they 
 were friends, and they would be regarded as friends by Eng- 
 land. I hold that it was at that time, — as in a great meas- 
 ure it is to-day, — the fixed policy of England to keep Ireland 
 poor, to keep Ireland down, to be hostile to Ireland, no 
 matter who lives in it — whether he be Catholic or Protes- 
 tant, whether he be Norman, Cromwellian, or Celt. " Your 
 ancestors," says Curran, speaking to the men of his time, a 
 hundred years afterwards, — " your ancestors thought them- 
 selves the oppressors of their fellow-subjects; but they were 
 only their jailors ; and the justice of Providence would have 
 been frustrated if their own slavery had not been the pun- 
 ishment for their vice and their folly." That slavery came, 
 and it fell on commerce. The Protestant inhabitants of Ire- 
 land, the Protestant traders of Ireland, the " j)!^^^®^'^?" ^^^ 
 the sons of the " planters " were beggared by the hostile leg- 
 islation of England, simply because they were now in Ire- 
 land and had an interest in the Irish soil, and in the welfare 
 of the country. 
 
 The inimitable Swift, speaking on this subject, makes use 
 of the following quaint fable of Ovid. He says : 
 
 " The fable which Ovid relates of Aracline and Pallas is 
 to this purpose. The goddess had heard of one Aracline, a 
 young virgin, very famous for spinning and weaving. They 
 both met upon a trial of skill, and Pallas, finding herself al- 
 most equalled in her own art, stung with rage and envy, 
 knocked her rival down, and turned her into a spider, en- 
 joining her to weave forever out of her own bowels and in a 
 very narrow compass." " I confess," (the Dean goes on,) 
 " that from a boy, I always pitied poor Arachne, and never 
 could heartily love the goddess, on account of so cruel and 
 unjust a sentence, which, however, is fully executed upon 
 
IRELAND AND AMERICA, 12S 
 
 IIS by England^ with further adclitions of rigor and seiveriiy; 
 for the greatest part of our bowels and vitals is extracted 
 v/ithout allowing us the liberty of spinning and weaving." 
 
 He alludes in this to a strange piece of legislation, which 
 Mr. Fronde acknowledges. The Irish vv^ool was famous for 
 its superior fineness, and the English were outbid for it by 
 the French manufacturers. The French were v/illing to 
 give three shillings a pound for the wool ; and the English 
 passed a law that the Irish people, — the farmers, — should 
 not sell their wool anywhere but in England ; so they fixed 
 their o^vn price on it ; and they took the wool, made cloth, 
 and, as the Dean says, poor Ireland, — Arachne, — had to give 
 her vitals without the pleasure of spinning or v/eaving. Then 
 the Dean goes on to say : — 
 
 " The Scripture tells us that oppression makes a wise man 
 mad ; therefore the reason that some men in Ireland are not 
 mad is because they are not wise men. However, it were 
 to be wished that oppression would in time teach a little 
 wisclom to fools." 
 
 Well, we call Dean Sv/ift a patriot. How little did he 
 ever think, — as great a man as he was, — of that oppression, 
 compared with which the restriction upon the wool trade was 
 nothing, — the oppression that beggared and ruined a whole 
 people ; that drove them from their land ; that drove them 
 from every pleasure in life; that drove them from their 
 country ; that maddened them to desperation ; and all be- 
 cause they had Irish names and Irish blood, and because 
 they would not give up the faith which their consciences 
 told them was the true one. 
 
 And now, my friends, Mr. Froude, in his lecture, comes 
 at once to consider the consequences of that Protestant emi~ 
 gration from Ireland ; and he says : " The manufacturers of 
 Ireland and the workmen were discontented, and they 
 shipped off and came to America." And then he begins to 
 6* 
 
laO ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 enlist tlie sympatliies of America upon the side of tlie Prot- 
 estant men who came over from Irehind. If he stopped 
 here, I would not have a word to say to the learned histo- 
 rian. When an Englishman claims the sympathy of this, or 
 of any other land, for men of his blood and of his religion — 
 if they are deserving of that sympathy, I, an Irishman, am 
 always ready, and the first, to grant it to them, with all my 
 heart. And, therefore, I do not find the slightest fault with 
 this learned Englishman, when he challenges the sympathy 
 of Ameri«a for the Orangemen of Ireland, and the Protes- 
 tants who came to this country. If those men were deserv- 
 ing of American sympathy, why not let them have it ? 
 
 But, Mr. Froude went on to say, that, whilst he claimed 
 sympathy for the Protestant emigrants from Ireland, as 
 stanch Republicans and lovers of American liberty, the 
 Catholics of Ireland, on the other hand, were clamoring at 
 the foot of the throne, — telling King George III. that they 
 would be only too happy to go out at his command, and to 
 shed American blood in his cause. "Was that statement 
 true or not ? My friends, the learned gentleman quoted a 
 petition that was presented to Sir John Blaquiere, in 1775, 
 the very year that America began to assert her indepen- 
 dence. In that petition he states that Lord Fingal and sev- 
 eral other Catholic noblemen of Ireland, speaking in the 
 name of the Irish people, pronounced the American Pevolu- 
 tion an unnatural rebellion ; and expressed their desire to go 
 out, and to devote themselves, for " the best of kings," to 
 the suppression of American liberty. First of all, I ask, 
 when, — at auy time in our history, — was Lord Fingal, or 
 Lord Howth, or Lord Kenmare, or any one of these *' Cath- 
 olic Loi-ds of the Pale," as they were called, — when, at any 
 time in our history, has any one of them been authorized to 
 
 speak in the name of the Irish people Their 
 
 presence in Ireland, — although they have kept the Catholic 
 
IRELAND AND AMERICA, 131 
 
 faith, — their presence in Ireland in every struggle, in Qxery 
 national movement, has been a cross, a hindrance, and stum- 
 bling-block to the Irish nation ; and the people know it well. 
 But, not doubting Mr. Fronde's word at all, and only anx- 
 ious to satisfy myself by historic research, I have looked for 
 this petition. 1 have found, indeed, a petition in " Curry's 
 Collection." I have found a petition signed by Lord Fingal 
 and other Irish Catholic noblemen, addressed to his Majesty 
 the King, in which they protest their loyalty in terms of the 
 most slavish and servile adulation. But in that petition I 
 have not been able to discover one single word about the 
 American Bevolution, not a single word of address to the 
 King, expressing a desire to destroy the liberties of Amer- 
 ica ; not one word about America at all. I have sought, 
 and my friends have sought, in the records, and in every 
 document that was at our hands, for this petition of which 
 Mr. Froude speaks ; and we could not find it at all. There 
 must be a mistake somewhere or other. It is strange that a 
 petition of so much importance should not be published 
 amongst the documents of the time. We know that Sir 
 John Blaquiere was Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant 
 of Ireland. Naturally enough, the petition would go to 
 him, not to rest with him, but to be presented to the King. 
 And, yet, I think I may state with certainty, that the only 
 petition that w^as presented to the King, in 1775, was the 
 one of which I speak, and in which there was not a single 
 word about America, or about the American Revolution. 
 But the learned historian's resources are far more ample 
 than mine; his resources of time of preparation and of tal- 
 ent; his resources in the varied sources of information 
 amongst which he has lived and passed his years ; — and no 
 doubt he Avill be able»to explain this. In any case, the pe- 
 tition of which he spoke must have passed through Sir John 
 Blaquiere's hands, for he was the Secretary of the Lord 
 
132 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 Lieutenant; then it must have passed from him to the Lord 
 Lieutenant, to be inspected by him ; then, from him to the 
 Prime Minister of England ; and then to his Majesty, the 
 King. We have an old proverb in Ireland, which indicates 
 the way they manage these things at home : — " Speak to the 
 maid, to speak to the mistress, to speak to the master." 
 
 And now I come to the question. In that glorious year 
 of 1775, the Catholics of Ireland were down in the dust; 
 the Catholics of Ireland had no voice ; they had not as much 
 as a vote for a parish beadle, much less for a Member of 
 Parliament. Does Mr. Froude mean to tell the American 
 people that these unfortunate people would not have wel- 
 comed the cry that came across the Atlantic, — the cry of a 
 people who rose like a giant — yet only an infant in age, — 
 proclaiming the eternal liberty of men and of nations, — ■ 
 proclaiming that no people upon the earth should be taxed 
 without representation ; and gave the first blow, right across 
 the face of English tyranny, that that old tyrant had received 
 for many a year ; a blow before which England reeled, and 
 which brought her to her knees ? Does he mean to tell you 
 or me, citizens of America, that such an event as this would 
 be distasteful to the poor, oppressed Catholics of -Ireland ? 
 It is true that England had crushed them as far as she 
 could, but she had not taken the manhood out of them. 
 Now, here are the proofs of this : — 
 
 Howe, the English General, in that very year of 1775, 
 writes to his Government, expressing his preference for Ger- 
 man troops. You know England was in the habit of em- 
 ploying Hessians. I do not say this with the slightest feel- 
 ing of disrespect ; I have the deepest respect for the great 
 German element in this country ; but in these times, certain 
 it is, and it is an historic fact, that thfe troops of Hesse Cas- 
 sel, Hesse Darmstadt, and other of the smaller German 
 States, were hired out by their princes to whoeAer took 
 
IRELAND AND AMERICA, 133 
 
 them, and engaged them to fight their battles. General 
 Howe proceeds to compliment the old race of Ireland, by 
 giving emphasis to his '' great dislike for Irish Catholic 
 soldiers ; as they are not at all to be depended upon." 
 
 They sent out four thousand troops from Ireland ; but 
 listen to this : — Arthur Lee, a diplomatic agent of America 
 in Europe, writes home to his Government in June, 1777, 
 and he says : 
 
 " The resources of our enemy " (that is to say, of Eng- 
 land) " are almost annihilated in Germany, and their last 
 resort is to the Roman Catholics of Ireland. They have al- 
 ready experienced their unwillingness to go, every man of a 
 regiment raised there " (in Ireland) " last year, having oh- 
 liged them to ship him off tied and houndP 
 
 When the Irish Catholic soldiers heard that they were to 
 go to America to cut the throats of the American people, and 
 to scalp them, they swore they never would do it ; and they 
 had to take them and carry them on board the ships. But 
 Arthur Lee goes on to say, " and most certainly they will 
 desert more than any other troops whatsoever " ! 
 
 Francis Plowden, a historian of the time, tells us, that the 
 war against America was not very popular, even in England. 
 *"■■ But, in Ireland," he says, " the people assumed the cause 
 of America from sympathy." 
 
 Let us leave Ireland and come to America. Let us see 
 how the great men, who were building up the magnificent edi- 
 fice of their country's freedom, — laying the foundation in 
 their own best blood, in those days, — how they regarded the 
 Irish. In 1790, the immortal George Washington received 
 an address from the Catholics of America, signed by Bishop 
 Carroll, of Maryland, Dominick Lynch, of New York, 
 and many others. In reply to that address, the calm, mag- 
 nificent man makes use of these words : — 
 
 " I hope " (he says) " ever to see America among the fore- 
 
134: ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 most nations in examples of justice and liberality; audi 
 presume that your fellow-citizens will not forget the patriotic 
 part which you took in the accomplishment of their revolu- 
 tion, and the establishment of their government ; or the im- 
 portant assistance they received from a nation in v/hich the 
 Roman Catholic religion is professed." 
 
 In the month of December, 1781, the Friendly Sons of 
 Saint Patrick, in Philadelphia, (of which the first as well 
 as the last President was General Stephen Moylan, brother 
 of the Catholic Bishop, Francis Moylan, of Cork,) made 
 George Washington an adopted member of their society. 
 These friendly Sons of Saint Patrick were great friends of 
 the great American Father of his country. When his army 
 lay at Yalley Forge, twenty-seven members of this society 
 of the Friendly Sons subscribed between them, in July, 1780, 
 one hundred and three thousand five hundred pounds, Penn- 
 sylvania currency, — principally gold or silver coin, — for 
 the American troops, who were in dire want of provisions. 
 George Washington accepts the fellowship of their society, 
 and he says : — " I accept with singular pleasure the ensign 
 of so worthy a fraternity as that of the Sons of St. Patridk 
 in this city — a society distinguished for the firm adherence 
 of its members to the glorious cause in which we are em- 
 barked." 
 
 During that time, what greater honor could have been be- 
 stowed by Washiugton, than that which he bestowed upon 
 the Irish ? When Arnold betrayed the cause at West Point 
 — the traitor Arnold — a name handed down to eternal exe- 
 cration in the history of America, — Washington was obliged 
 to choose the very best and most reliable soldiers in his army, 
 and send them to West Point — to guard the place that was 
 so well-nigh being betrayed by the traitor. From his whole 
 army he selected the celebrated " Pemisylvania Line," as 
 they were called ; and those men were mainly made up of [rish- 
 
IRELAND AND AMERICA, 135 
 
 men. Nay, more ; not merely of Protestant Irishmen, or 
 Korth of Ireland men, or of those who were in that day 
 called " Scotch Irish," — for that was the name which, in the 
 era of the Revolution, designated Mr. Fronde's friends, who 
 emigrated from Ulster. But looking over the muster-roll of 
 the " Pennsylvania Line," we find such names as Dufioy, 
 Maguire, and O'Brien ; — these were the names — these and 
 such as these are the names — not of '' Palatines," nor of 
 Scotch " Planters," in Ireland, but they are the names of 
 
 thorough-bred Irish Celts And now I wish to 
 
 give you a little incident in the history of that celebrated 
 corps, to let you see how their hearts were in relation to 
 America : — ■ 
 
 *' During the American Revolution," (says Mr. Carey,) " a 
 band of Irishmen were embodied to avenge in the country 
 of their adoption, the injuries of the country of their birth. 
 They formed the major part of the celebrated Pennsylvania 
 Line. They bravely fought and bled for the United 
 States. JMany of them sealed their attachment with their 
 lives. Their adopted country was shamefully ungrateful. 
 The wealthy, the independent, and the luxurious, for whom 
 they fought, were rioting in the superfluities of life, while 
 their defenders were literally half starved and half naked. 
 Their shoeless feet marked with blood their tracks upon the 
 highway. They long bore their grievances, joatiently. They 
 at length murmured. They remonstrated ; they implored a 
 supply of the necessaries of life, but in vain ; a deaf ear was 
 turned to their complaints. They felt indignant at the cold 
 neglect and ingratitude of that country, for which so many 
 of their companions in arms had expired on the crimson field 
 of battle. They held arms in their hands. They had 
 reached the boundary line, beyond which forbearance and sub- 
 mission become meanness and pusillanimity. As ail appeals 
 to tiie gratitude, justice, and generosity of their country had 
 proved unavailing, they determined to try another course. 
 They appealed to her fears ; and they mutinied." 
 
 "Well, as soon as the English commanders heard that tlie 
 Irish soldiers had mutinied, what did they do ? 
 
136 ENGLISH MISRULE m IRELAWD. 
 
 "The intelligence was carried to the British can: p, and 
 there it spread joy and gladness. Lord Howe hoj)ed tliat a 
 period had arrived to the rebellion, as it would have been 
 termed, and that there was a glorious oj^portunity of crush- 
 ing the half-formed embryo of the Republic. He counted 
 largely on the indignation and on the resentment of the na- 
 tives of the Emerald Isle ; he knew the irascibility of their 
 tempers ; he calculated on the diminution of the strength of 
 the rebels, and accessions to the number of the royal army. 
 Messengers were dispatched to the mutineers. They had 
 carte blanche. They were to allure the poor Hibernians to 
 return, like Prodigal Children, from feeding upon husks, to 
 the plentiful fold of their royal master. Liberality herself 
 presided over Howe's offers. Abundant supplies of provi- 
 sions, comfortable clothing, to their heart's desire ; all 
 arrears of bounty ; and pardon for past offences were 
 offered. There was, however, no hesitation among these 
 poor, neglected warriors. They refused to renounce pov- 
 erty, nakedness, suffering, and ingratitude. Splendid temp- 
 tations were held out in vain ; there was no Judas, no Arnold 
 there. They seized upon the tempters. They trampled 
 upon their shining ore. They sent them to their General's 
 tent. The miserable wretches paid with their forfeited Kves 
 for attempting to seduce a band of ragged, forlorn, and de- 
 serted, but illustrious heroes. We prate " (he says) '' about 
 the old iloman and Grecian patriotism. One-half of it is 
 false. In the other half there is nothing that excels this 
 noble trait, which is worthy of the pencil of a West or a 
 Trumbull." 
 
 Mark ! how it is that America regarded them — mark the 
 testimony of some of America's greatest men. Mr. Froude 
 seems to think that the American people look upon the 
 Irish nation and the Irish people pretty much with the 
 eyes with which the men of the last century would look 
 upon them in Ireland, where the Irish nation meant the 
 Protestant people of Ireland, and the Catholics did not ex- 
 ist at all. Was this the view that America and her states- 
 men took of them ? No ! Here is the testimony of George 
 
IRELAND AND^ AMERICA. 137 
 
 Wasliington Parke Custis, the adopted son of Washington. 
 The Irish, in 1829, won Catholic Emancipation ; and before 
 that time, when they were struggling for emancipation, they 
 appealed for sympathy and moral support to America. And 
 now this is how this great American gentleman, who had 
 been one of the foremost of American advocates for the 
 emancipation of the Irish Catholics, speaks of them : 
 
 " And why is this imposing appeal made to our sympa- 
 thies ? It is an appeal fi-om the Catholics of Ireland, whose 
 generous sons, alike in the days of our gloom and of our 
 glory, shared in our misfortunes and joyed in our successes ; 
 who, with undaunted courage breasted the storms which 
 once, threatening to overwhelm us, howled with fearful and 
 desolating fury through this now happy land; who, with 
 aspirations, deep and fervent, for our cause, whether under 
 the walls of the Castle of Dublin, in the shock of our liber- 
 ty's battles, or in the feeble and expiring accents of famine 
 and misery, amid the horrors of the prison ship, cried from 
 their hearts, ' God save America ! ' Tell me not " (he goes 
 on to say) — " tell me not of the aid we received from 
 another European nation, in the struggle for Independence. 
 That aid was most, nay, all-essential to our ultimate suc- 
 cess ; but remember the years of the conflict that had rolled 
 away ; and many a hard field had been fought ere the fleets 
 and the armies of France gave us their powerful assistance. 
 We gladly and gratefully admit that the chivalry of France, 
 led by the young, the great, the good and gallant Lafayette, 
 was most early and opportunely at our side. But the 
 capture of Burgoyne had ratified the Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence. The renowned combats of the Heights of 
 Charleston and Fort Moultrie; the disastrous and bloody 
 days of Long Island, of Brandywine, and of Germantown ; 
 the glories of Trenton, of Princeton, and of Monmouth, all 
 had occurred ; and the rank grass had grown over the grave 
 of many a poor Irishman who had died for America, ere the 
 Flag of the Lilies floated in the field by the Star-spangled 
 
 Banner Of the chiefs of tlie army and the navy of 
 
 the Be volution, we have to thank Caledonia for the honored 
 names of Mercer, McDougal, Stirling, St. Clair, and the 
 
138 ENGLISH MISBTILE m IRELAND, 
 
 cMvalric Jones ; England for a Davie. But of the opera* 
 lives in war — the soldiers I mean — np to the coming of the 
 French, Ireland furnished in the ratio of a hundred for one 
 of any foreign nation "whatever." 
 
 Then this generous American gentleman, to whom Ire- 
 .land appealed for sympathy — for Mr. Froude's is not the 
 first appeal that has been made to the people of America ; — 
 this high-minded gentleman goes on to say : 
 
 " Then honored be the good old service of the sons of 
 Erin, in the War of Independence. Let the shamrock be 
 intertwined with the laurels of the Revolution ; and truth 
 and j ustice, guiding the pen of history, inscribe on the tab- 
 lets of America's remembrance — eternal gratitude to Irish- 
 men ! " 
 
 Kemember that this was "Washington's adopted son ; re- 
 member that he tells us, that the old, gray-headed, crippled 
 veterans, who had fought under his father's banner in that 
 War of Independence, were accustomed to come to his 
 house ; and there he would receive them at his door, and 
 bring them in ; and he tells us most affectionately of one 
 old Irishman who had fought in the wars; who, after 
 drinking the health of the gentlemen who had entertained 
 him, lifted up his aged eyes, and, with tears, said : " Here's 
 to the memory of General Washington, who is in heaven ! " 
 He says on the same occasion : 
 
 " Americans, recall to your minds the recollections of the 
 heroic time when Irishmen were our friends, when in the 
 whole world we had not a friend beside. Look to the 
 period that tried men's souls, and you will find that the 
 sons of Erin rushed to our ranks; and amid the clash of 
 steel, on many a memorable day, many a John Byrne was 
 not idle." 
 
 Kemember, he does not say "many a Spragg^'' or 
 ** many a Gibhs^ or the men that ^me over with Crom- 
 
IRELANB AND AMERICA. 139 
 
 well ; but, honest Jolin Byrne ! Who was this honest 
 John Bjrrne of whom he speaks ? He was an Irish soldier 
 of Washington's, who was taken prisoner by the English, 
 and put on board a prison-ship, in the harbor of Charleston ; 
 and we have it on the authority of Mr. Custis, that he 
 there was left in chains in the hold of the ship, pesti- 
 lence being on board. He was more than half-starved ; he 
 was scarcely able, when he was summoned on deck, to crawl 
 like a poor, stricken creature to the commander's feet, to 
 hear what sentence was to be pronounced upon him. And 
 then the English commander offered him liberty, life, 
 clothing, food, and money, if he would give up the cause in 
 which he was taken prisoner, and join the ranks of the 
 British army. In a voice scarcely able to speak, with a 
 hand scarcely able to lift itself, the Irishman looked to 
 Heaven, and, throwing up his hands, cried out, " Hurrah 
 for America ! " 
 
 In the face of such facts, in the face of such testimony, in 
 the presence of the honored name and record of George 
 Washington, testifying to what Irish Catholic men have 
 done for America, Mr. Froude speaks as vainly as if he 
 were addressing the hurricane that sweeps over his head, 
 when he tries to impress the American mind and the Amer- 
 ican people with any prejudice against the Catholics of Ire- 
 land. 
 
 What does MacNevin tell us? In the year 1807, when 
 America was preparing for her second war with England, 
 MacNevin records, that, " One of the offences charged upon 
 the Irish — and one among the many pretexts for refusing 
 redress to the Catholics of Ireland, was that sixteen thou- 
 sand of them fought on the side of America." But he adds 
 that, "many more thousands are ready to maintain tlie 
 Declaration of Independence ; and that will be their second 
 offence." 
 
140 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 NoTV, my friends, there are other testimonies as well as 
 these of the men of the time. We have the testimony of 
 American literary gentlemen, such, for instance, as that of 
 Mr. James K. Paulding. Here are the words of this dis- 
 tinguished gentleman : — 
 
 " The history of Ireland's unhappy connection ^dth Eng- 
 land exhibits, from first to last, a detail of the most perse- 
 vering, galling, grinding, insulting, and systematic oppression 
 to be found anywhere, except among the helots of Sparta. 
 There is not a national feeling that has not been insulted 
 and trodden under foot ; a national right that has not been 
 withheld, until fear forced it from the grasp of England ; or 
 a dear or ancient prejudice that has not been violated in 
 that abused country. As Christians, the people of Ireland 
 have been denied, under penalties and disqualifications, the 
 exercise of the rites of the Catholic religion, venerable for 
 its antiquity, admirable for its unity, and consecrated by 
 the belief of some of the best men that ever breathed. As 
 men they have been deprived of the common rights of 
 British subjects, under the pretext that they were incapable 
 of enjoying them, which pretext they had no other founda- 
 tion for than resistance of oppression, only the more severe 
 b}^ being sanctioned by the laws. England first denied them 
 the means of improvement, and then insulted them with the 
 imputation of barbarism." 
 
 Dr. Johnson had anticipated Mr. Paulding when he said : — 
 " There is no instance, even in the Ten Persecutions, of 
 such severity ar> that which has been exercised over the 
 Catholics of Ireland." 
 
 Thus thought and thus spoke the men whose names are 
 bright in the records of literary America, and of the world. 
 Take again the ;iddress agreed to by the members of the 
 Legislature of JMsryland. Speaking of Ireland, these Amer- 
 ican Senators and Legislators say : — 
 
 " A dependency of Great Britain, Ireland has long lan- 
 guished under oppression reprobated by humanity, and dis- 
 countenanced by just policy. It would argue penury of 
 
IRELAND AND AMERICA. \i\ 
 
 human feelings, and ignontnce of human rights, to submit 
 patiently to those oppressions. The lapse of centuries has 
 witnessed the struggles of Ireland but with only partial suc- 
 cess. Rebellions and insurrections have continued with but 
 short intervals of tranquillity. Many of the Irish, like the 
 FrencL, are the hereditary foes of Great Britain. America 
 has opened her arms to the oppressed of all nations. No 
 people have availed themselves of the asylum with more 
 alacrity or in greater numbers than the Irish. High is the 
 meed of praise, rich is the reward which Irishmen have 
 merited from the gi'atitude of America. As heroes and 
 statesmen they honor their adopted country." 
 
 Bravo America ! When such glorious words as these are 
 wiped out of the records of American history ; when the 
 generous sentiments which inspired them have ceased to be 
 a portion of the American nature ; — then, and not before 
 then, will Mr. Froude get the verdict which he asks from 
 America to-day. 
 
 I have looked through the *' American Archives " and I 
 have found that the foundation of this sympathy lies in the 
 simple fact that the Catholics of Ireland were heart and soul 
 with you — with you, American gentlemen — with you and 
 your fathers in their glorious struggle. I find in the third 
 volume of the " American Archives " a letter from Ireland, 
 dated September 1st, 1775, to a friend in New York, in 
 which the writer says : — 
 
 " Most of the people here wish well to the cause in which 
 you are engaged, and would rejoice to find you continue 
 firm and steadfast. . . . They" (the Government) "are 
 raising recruits throughout the kingdom. The men are told 
 they are only going to Edinburgh to learn military disci- 
 pline, and are then to return." 
 
 Before they got a single Irishman to enlist they had to 
 tell him a lie, well knowing that, if they told him that they 
 were going to arm him and send him to America to fight 
 
142 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IBELANB. 
 
 against the American people, he would never think of enter- 
 ing the ranks of the British Army. A certain Major 
 Koache went down to Cork to recruit men for America, and 
 he made a great speech to them. I read his speech ; it was 
 very laughable. He called upon them as Irishmen, by all 
 that they held sacred, and the glorious nationality to which 
 they belonged, the splendid monarch that governed them, — 
 and in fact the very words almost which Mr. Froude alleges 
 to have been used by Lord Fingal, were used by Major 
 Koache to these poor men. And then he held up the golden 
 guineas and pound notes before them : and here is the re- 
 sult, as given in the third volume of the " American Ar- 
 chives : " 
 
 " An account of the success of Major Roache in raising 
 recruits to fight against the Americans. The service is s© 
 distasteful to the people of Ireland in general, that few of 
 the I'ecruiting officers can prevail upon the men to enlist 
 and fight against their American brethren." 
 
 The same year, in the British House of Commons, Gov- 
 ernor Johnstone said : — 
 
 " I maintain that some of the best and the wisest men in 
 this country are on the side of the Americans; and that, in 
 Ireland, three to one are on the side of the Americans." 
 
 In the House of Lords, in the same year of '75, the Duke 
 of Kichmond makes this statement : — 
 
 " Attempts have been made to enlist the Irish Roman 
 Catholics, but the Ministry know well that these attempts 
 have proved unsuccessful." 
 
 We find again the Congress of America addressing the 
 people of Ireland, in that memorable year of 1775; and 
 here are the words that America's first Congi-ess sends over 
 the Atlantic waves to the afilicted, down-trodden, Catholic 
 Irish : — 
 
IBELAND AND AMERICA. 143 
 
 "Accept our most grateful acknowledgments for the 
 friendly disposition you have always shown towards us. 
 We know that you are not without your grievances; we 
 sympathize with you in your distress, and are pleased to 
 find that the design of subjugating us has persuaded the ad- 
 ministration to dispense to Ireland some vagrant rays of 
 ministerial sunshine. Even the tender mercies of govern- 
 ment have long been cruel towards you. In the rich past- 
 ures of Ireland many hungry parricides have fed and grown 
 strong laboring in her destruction." 
 
 We find such words as these addressed not to the ** Pala- 
 tines " and " Planters ; " for if the Congress of America was 
 addressing the Planters and Cromwellians in Ireland, they 
 would not have had the bad taste to use such language as 
 this; "In the rich pastures of Ireland many hungiy parri- 
 cides have fed and have grown strong laboring in her de- 
 struction." 
 
 Benjamin Franklin, of glorious and immortal name, was 
 in Versailles, as Minister from the American Government ; 
 and he writes to the people of Ireland, in Octoberj 1778. 
 Here are his words : — 
 
 " The misery and distress which your ill-fated countiy has 
 been so frequently exposed to, and has so often experienced 
 by such a combination of rapine, treachery, and violence as 
 would have disgraced the name of government in the most 
 arbitrary country in the world, have most sincerely affected 
 your friends in America, and have engaged the most serious 
 attention of Congress." 
 
 Now I come to another honored name ; and I find the 
 testimony of Gulian C. Verplanck. When the Catholic 
 Emancipation Act was passed, the:*'e was a banquet in the 
 city of iSTew York to celebrate the event ; and this distin- 
 guished American gentleman proposed a health, or a toast, 
 and it was a Catholic toast — " The memory of the Penal 
 Laws — requiescant in pace. May they rest in peace." " And 
 
144 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. ! 
 
 now that they are gone," continues Mr. Yerplanck, " I have \ 
 a good word to say for them." What was that good word ? | 
 Here it is : — 
 
 " Both in the glorious struggle for independence, and in 
 our more recent contest for national rights, those laws gave ^ 
 to the American flag the support of hundreds of thousands \ 
 of brave hearts and strong arms ; and have they not, too, con- 
 tributed at the same time an equal proportion of intellectual i 
 and moral power ? " I 
 
 Coming down to our time, passing over the testimony of j 
 
 Henry Clay and his sympathies with the Irish nation (which < 
 
 he speaks of as so " identified ^vith our own as to be almost '. 
 
 part and parcel of ours — bone of our bone and flesh of our \ 
 
 flesh ") — passing over this magnificent testimony, America, \ 
 
 even at this hour, is mourning over the grave of a great man. | 
 But a few days ago a nation accompanied to his last resting- 
 place William H. Seward. And this illustrious statesman 
 
 said in 1847 : — : 
 
 " Ireland not only sympathized profoundly with the trans- : 
 Atlantic colonies in their complaints of usurpation, but with 
 
 inherent benevolence and ardor she yielded at once to the | 
 
 sway of the great American idea of universal emancipation. • 
 
 The bitter memory of a stream of ages lifted up her thoughts ; \ 
 
 and she was ready to follow to the war, for the rights of hu- j 
 man nature, the propitious God that seemed to lead the way." 
 
 Finally, one extract and I have done with this portion of 
 my lecture. I find that such were the relations between \ 
 Ireland and America in this struggle, that a certain Captain ^ 
 Weel s, of the ship Heprisal, in the summer of 1776, cap- 
 tured three prizes near the West Indies, which were English ; 
 property. He detailed some of his own men on board of \ 
 them, and sent them to the nearest port to be adjudged as j 
 prizes. Shortly after, he came across another vessel, and he I 
 let her go, finding she was Irish property. 
 
IRELAND AND AMERICA. 145 
 
 The Marquis de Chasteloux, a distinguished Frenchman, 
 who was in America in 1782, published an account of his 
 travels in America. An English gentleman in his transla- 
 tion of this work, in a note to a friendly allusion to an Irish 
 soldier of the Revolution, writes thus : — 
 
 " An Irishman, the instant he sets foot on American 
 ground, becomes, ipso facto^ an American. This was uni- 
 formly the case during the whole of the late war. Whilst 
 Englishmen and Scotsmen were regarded with jealousy and 
 distrust, even with the best recommendation of zeal and 
 attachment to the cause, a native of Ireland stood in need 
 of no other certificate than his dialect.'^'' 
 
 Which shows that the Irishman that our friend is speak- 
 ing of was not a Palatine nor a Planter, but a genuine 
 Paddy ^ and no mistake. 
 
 " His sincerity was never called in question ; he was sup- 
 posed to have a sympathy of sufiering : and every voice 
 decided, as it were, intuitively in his favor. Indeed," (he 
 adds,) "their conduct in the late revolution amply j ustified 
 this favorable opinion ; for whilst the Irish emigrant was 
 fighting the battles of America, by sea and land, the Irish 
 merchants, particularly at Charleston, Baltimore, and 
 Philadelphia, labored with indefatigable zeal, and at all 
 hazards, to promote the spirit of enterprise, and increase 
 the wealth and maintain the credit of the country. Their 
 purses were always opened, and their persons devoted to the 
 common cause. On more than one imminent occasion Con- 
 gress owed their existence, and America possibly her preser- 
 vation, to the fidelity and firmness of the Irish. I had the 
 honor " (he says) " of dining with an Irish Society, com- 
 posed of the steadiest Whigs on the Continent, at the City 
 Tavern, in Philadelphia, on St. Patrick's Day." 
 
 Mr. Froude must not run away with the assertion that the 
 Lish merchants of Charleston, and Baltimore, and Phila- 
 delphia were the Puritan settlers. If they had been, they 
 would have gone home and eaten a cold dinner on St. Pat- 
 rick's Day. 
 
 7 
 
146 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 So much for America, and Ireland's relations with her. 
 
 When the four thousand men were asked for by the Eng- 
 lish Government, to go out and fight Americans, they 
 offered to send to Ireland four thousand Protestant Hes- 
 sians ; and the Irish Parliament of that day must have had 
 a ray of grace, for they refused the Hessians. They said 
 " No ! If the country is in danger, we can arm some of 
 our Protestant people, and they can keep the peace." Out 
 of this sprang the " Volunteers of '82." Mr. Froude has 
 little or nothing to say of them ; consequently, as I am an- 
 swering, or trying to answer him, I must restrict myself 
 also in their regard. All I can say is this : Ireland, in 1776, 
 began to arm. At first the movement was altogether a 
 Protestant one, and confined to the North. The Catholics 
 of Ireland, ground, as they were, into the very dust, — no 
 sooner did the Catholics of Ireland hear that their Protes- 
 tant oppressors were anxious to do something for the old 
 land, than they came and said to them ; " "We will forgive 
 everything that ever you did to us ; we will leave you the 
 land ; we will leave you our country ; we will leave you the 
 wealth and the commerce ; all we ask of you is to put a gun 
 into our hands, for one hour, for Ireland." At first they 
 were refused, and, my friends, when they found they would 
 not be allowed to enter the ranks of the " Yolunteers," they 
 had the generosity, out of their poverty, to collect money 
 and to hand it over to clothe the army of their Protestant 
 fellow-citizens. Anything for Ireland ! Anything for the 
 man that would lift his hand for Ireland, no matter what 
 his religion was ! The old generous spirit was there ; the 
 love that never could be extinguished was there, self-sacri- 
 ficing as of old ; aye, the humble love for any man, no mat- 
 ter who he was, that was a friend of their native land — was 
 there, in such generous acts as this of the blood of the 
 O'Conors, the O'Briens, the O'Neills, and the O'DonneUs. 
 
IBELAND AND AMERICA. 147 
 
 But, after a time, our Protestant friends in the " Yolun- 
 tet?rs " began to think that tliese Catholics, after all, were 
 fine, strapping fellows. Somehow, centuries of persecution 
 could not knock the manhood out of them. " They be strong 
 men," says an old writer, " and can bear more of hard liv- 
 ing, hunger, and thirst than any other people that we know 
 of." God knows, our capability of enduring nakedness, hun- 
 ger, and thirst, and every other form of misery, was well 
 tested ! 
 
 Accordingly, we find that, 1780, there were fifty thousand 
 Catholics amongst the Volunteers — every man of them with 
 arms in his hands. Mr. Froude says that Grattan — the im- 
 mortal Gra,ttan — whilst he wished well for Ireland — whilst 
 he was irreproachable in every way, public or private, — that 
 at this time he was guilty of a great mistake. For, says the 
 historian, " England had long ruled Ireland badly ; but she 
 had been taught a lesson by America, and she was now anx- 
 ious to govern Ireland properly and well"; and no sooner 
 was an abuse pointed out than it was immediately remedied; 
 and no sooner was a just law demanded than it was immedi- 
 ately granted ; and the mistake Grattan made was that, in- 
 stead of insisting on just legislation from England, he stood 
 up and insisted on the legislative independence of the Irish 
 nation, and that the Irish should have the making of their 
 own laws. Thus," according to Mr. Froude, " the energies 
 of the nation, which were wasted in political contention, 
 could have been husbanded to influence England to grant 
 just and fair laws." But he goes on the assumption, my 
 dear American friends, and others, — the gentleman assumes 
 to say that England was willing to redress grievances, to re- 
 peal the bad laws and make good ones ; and he proves this 
 assertion by saying that " she struck off the wrists of the 
 Irish merchants the chains of their commercial slavery," 
 and that she " restored to Ireland her trade." You remem- 
 
148 ENGLISH MISRULE IN mELANI). 
 
 b( T that tliis trade was taken away from them : the woollen 
 trade, like nearly every other form of trade, was discounte- 
 nanced or mined. 
 
 Now, I wish, for the sake of the honor of England, that 
 she was as generous, or even as just, as Mr. Froude repre- 
 sents her, and, no doubt, would wish her to be. But we 
 have the fact before us, that, in 1779, when a movement was 
 made to rejoeal the law restricting the commerce of Ireland, 
 the English Parliament, the English King, the Lord Lieu- 
 tenant of Ireland and the English Government opposed it to 
 the very death. They would not have it : not one fetter 
 would they strike off from the chain that encumbered even 
 the Protestant "planters" of Ireland. And it was only 
 when Grattan rose up in the Irish Parliament, and insisted 
 that Ireland should get back her trade — it was only then, 
 that England consented to listen — because there were fifty 
 thousand "Volunteers" armed outside. 
 
 The state of Ireland at this time is thus described : — 
 
 " Such is the Constitution that three millions of good, 
 faithful subjects, in their native land, are excluded from 
 every trust, power, and emolument in the State, civil and 
 military ; excluded from all corporate rights and immunities ; 
 expelled from grand juries, and restrained in petit juries; ex- 
 cluded in every direction from every trust, from every in- 
 corpoi'ated society, and from every establishment, occasional 
 or fixed, that was instituted for public defence ; from the 
 bank, from the bench, from the exchange, from the univer- 
 sity, from the college of physicians, and from what are they 
 not excluded?" (demands the writer.) "There is no in- 
 stitution which the wit of man has invented, or the progress 
 of fiociety has produced, which private charity or public mu- 
 nificence has founded for the advancement of education 
 around us, for the permanent relief of age, infirmity, and 
 misfortune, the superintendence of which, in all cases where 
 common charity would be jDromoted, from the enjoyment of 
 which the Legislature has not excluded, and does exclude 
 the Catholics of Irel^d." 
 
IRELAND AND AMEBIC A. 149 
 
 Grati;aii rose up in the Senate, and, lifting up his heroic 
 hand and voice to Heaven, he swore before the God of Jiistice 
 
 that that shoukl come to an end The English 
 
 Government met him with a determination as great as thai 
 of the Irish patriot, and swore equally that that should re- 
 main the law. Was it not time to assert for Ireland her 
 independence? Mr. Froude claims that England vv^illingly 
 consented to give up the restrictions on Irish commerce. 
 When Grattan proposed it in the House, an official of the 
 Government, named Hussey Burgh, rose up, to the astonish- 
 ment of the Government, and seconded Grattan's resolution, 
 to the rage and consternation of the Government faction, 
 and the unequivocal dissatisfaction of the Executive and the 
 Ministerial bench. "Hussey Burgh, the Prime Sergeant, 
 was one of the most eloquent and fascinating men of the 
 day ; he was an official of the Government, and its stanch 
 supporter, — one to whom, from the spirit of his office, pa- 
 triotism should have been impossible." He moved "that 
 we beg to represent to his Majesty that it is not by any 
 temporary expedients, but by free trade alone, that this na- 
 tion is now to be saved from impending ruin." 
 
 While they were fighting the Government from within, 
 Grattan took good care to have the Volunteers drawn out 
 in the streets of Dublin — there they were in their thousands, 
 — armed men, drilled men; and they had their cannon with 
 them, and about the moutlis of the guns they had tied a la- 
 bel or card, inscribed with these Avords : " Free Trade for 
 Ireland, or else — " So it happened that Lord North was 
 obliged, greatly against his will, to introduce measures to 
 restore to Ireland her trade. Now, I ask, was not Henry 
 Grattan justified, seeing that it was only by pointing the 
 cannon's mouth at "the best of Governments" they threw 
 off the restraints on Irish trade; — was he not justified when 
 he said, " The English Parliament will never do us justice ; 
 
160 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 and, in the name of God, now that we have onr men armed 
 around us, let us demand for IreUind perfect independence 
 of the people and the Parliament of England, and the right 
 to make whatever laws are most conducive to the welfare 
 of our own people." 
 
 It is perfectly true that Grattan failed ; it is perfectly true 
 that although that declaration of independence was pro- 
 claimed by law, and, as Mr. Froude observes, " Home Kule 
 was tried in Ireland from '82 to '99, and it was a failure." 
 All this is true ; but why was it so, my friends ? Keflect 
 upon this ; the Irish Parliament did not represent the na- 
 tion. The Irish Parliament consisted of three hundred mem- 
 bers; and of these three hundred there were only seventy- 
 two that were elected by the people. All the others were 
 " nomination boroughs," as they were called. Certain great 
 lords, peers, and noblemen had three or four little towns on 
 their estates, which towns returned a member of Parliament ; 
 and the poor people who had the votes were completely at 
 the mercy of the landlord, — the rack-renting landlord, — and 
 whomsoever he nominated was elected as member. Just as, 
 in the Protestant Church, whenever a bishop dies, the Queen 
 writes to the clergy and says: " You v/ill name such a one 
 for bishop ; " and, then, they elect him, after the Queen has 
 nominated him. 
 
 Even of the seventy-two, who were, in some sense, repre- 
 sentatives of the people, whom did they represent ? There 
 were nearly three millions of Catholics in Ireland, men of 
 intellect and of education, in spite of all the laws that were 
 made against schools and colleges for Catholics ; there were 
 nearly three millions of Irish Catholics in the land, and not 
 a man of them had a vote even for a Member of Parlia- 
 ment. And, therefore, this wretched Parliament, that only 
 represented one-tenth of the nation, if it was venal and 
 corrupt, it is no disgrace to the Irish people, and it is no 
 
IRELAND AND AMEEICA. 151 
 
 argament to prove tliat tliey did not know how to govern 
 themselves. 
 
 Meantime, the " Volunteers " made the most tremendous 
 mistake, and that was by letting Catholics in amongst theit 
 ranks. This is what my Lord Sheffield says ; — and it will 
 give you clearly to understand, ladies and gentlemen of 
 America, how the English people looked upon us Irish one 
 hundred years ago ; indeed, according to Cobbett, one of 
 their most distinguished writers, this was how they looked 
 upon you, until you taught them with the sword to look 
 upon you with more respect : " It is now necessary," says 
 Lord Sheffield, 'Ho go back to the year 1778, to take notice 
 of a phenomenon which began to appear at that time ; it is 
 a wonderful thing." What was it ? 
 
 " The like has never been seen in any country, at least 
 where there was an established government. To describe 
 it : it is an army unauthorized by the law, and unnatural ; 
 aud generally known by the name of the Volunteers of 
 Ireland. The arms issued from the public stores were in- 
 sufficient to supply the rapid increase of the Volunteers ; 
 the rest were procured by themselves, and the necessary 
 accoutrements, with a considerable number of field-pieces. 
 The Opposition in England speak highly of them ; and the 
 supporters of the Government in both countries mention 
 them with civility." 
 
 It is not easy to be uncivil to an army of 95,000 men. 
 
 "The wonderful efforts of England in America were, 
 somehow or other, wasted to no purpose." 
 
 The wonderful efforts of England in America were wasted 
 to no purpose ! There happened to be a man in the way, 
 and that man was George Washington. 
 
 He goes on to speak of the Volimteers. The "many- 
 headed monster," as he calls it, " now began to tliiuk it 
 
152 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 would be proper to reform the State and to purge the Par- 
 liament of Ireland." Henry Grattan said, 
 
 " I will never claim freedom for 600,000 of my country- 
 men while I leave 2,000,000 or more of them in chains. 
 Give the Catholics of Ireland their civil rights and their 
 franchise ; give them the power to return members to the 
 Irish Parliament, and let the nation be represented; put 
 an end to the rotten nomination boroughs : let the members 
 represent the people truly, and you will have reformed your 
 Parliament, and you will have established forever the liber- 
 ties which the Volunteers have won." 
 
 This was what the Volunteers wanted ; and for this they 
 got, from my Lord Sheffield, the very genteel name of " the 
 many-headed monster." But they did something still more 
 strange than this. *' So far," he says, " everything went on 
 as might have been expected. But there is another part of 
 their conduct neither natural nor rational. Some of the 
 corps, for the purpose of increasing their numbers, perhaps, 
 or possibly without consideration, admitted Roman Catho- 
 lics." [They must have been mad. They did it " without 
 consideration."] *' And others, perhaps, enrolled them 
 latterly for the sake of acquiring numbers and strength to 
 force a reform of the government from England " — [to force 
 a reform, which England would never permit ; because she 
 wanted to have a rotten Parliament to her hand, and 
 through that Parliament to destroy the country] : — 
 
 " Well, but that Protestants should allow and encourage 
 this also, and form a whole corps of Roman Catholics, when 
 all Europe was at peace, is scarcely to be believed, — above 
 all, in view of their number. It has become the system of 
 the Roman Catholics to enroll as many as possible, particu- 
 larly since the peace of last summer ; and there is nothing 
 unequivocal in this. Already, perhaps, five thousand of 
 these are in arms, and in a year or less, they may be ten 
 thousami. All the Protestants are gradually quitting the 
 service; and the only Protestants are those who continue 
 
IRELAND AND AMERICA. 153 
 
 since the peace, in order to prevent the Yohmteer arms 
 from fallin2: into more danscerous hands, and to counter- 
 bahince the Catholics." 
 
 Then he goes on to say : 
 
 " They are many. If they were only one-fifth, instead 
 of four-fifths, of the people, the writer of this observation 
 would be the last man to suggest a difliculty about their 
 being admitted into power or every right or advantage given 
 to them. But they do not forget the situation in which 
 their ancestors have been. They are not blind to what they 
 miglit acquire. Persevering for upwards of two centuries 
 under every discouragement, under every severity, subjected 
 to every disadvautage, does not prove an indifierence to the 
 principles of their religion. Thinking as they do, feeling as 
 they do, believing as they do, they would not be men if 
 they did not wish for a change. Nor would Protestants be 
 worthy of the designation of reasonable creatures if they 
 did not take precautions to prevent it." 
 
 Thus, it is to this fact, that the English Government 
 steadily opposed Peform, — that they would not hear of 
 Reform, because they wanted to have a venal, corrupt, 
 miserable seventy-two in their hands, — it is to this fact, 
 and not to any mistake of Grattan, that we owe the collapse 
 of that magnificent revolutionary movement of the '' Irish 
 Volunteers." 
 
 Well, England now adopted another policy. We have 
 evidence of it. As soon as William Pitt came into office 
 as Pi'emier,_ his first thought was — " I will jjut an end to 
 this Irish difficulty. I will have no more laws made in 
 Ireland, for Irishmen. I will unite the two Parliaments 
 into one, and I will not leave Ireland a single shadow of 
 Legislative Inde])endence." This being the programme, how 
 was it to be worked out? Mr. Froude says, or seems to 
 say, that " the Rebellion of '98 was one of those outbursts 
 of Irish ungovernable passion and of Irish incoastancy, 
 
154- ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 accompanied by cowardice and by treachery, with wliich " 
 (acciording to him) " we are all so familiar in the history of 
 Ireland." Now, I have a different account of '98. Mr. 
 I'ronde says that " the Rebellion arose out of the disturb' 
 ance of men's minds created by the French Revolution ; " 
 and, indeed, there is a great deal of truth in this. The 
 French Revolution set all the world in a blaze, and the 
 flame spread, no doubt, to Ireland. 
 
 Mr. Froude goes on to say that " the Irish Government 
 were so hampered by this free Parliament, this Parliament 
 of Grattan's, that although they saw the danger approach- 
 ing, they could not avert it ; — their hands were bound ; 
 nay, more," he adds, " the Government, bound by constitu- 
 tional law, and by Parliament, could not touch one of the 
 United Irishmen until they had first committed themselves 
 by some overt act of treason ;■ — in other words, until they 
 had first risen." 
 
 Now, according to this historian, there was nothing done 
 to molest, slay, or persecute the people of Ireland until 
 they rose in arms in '98. My friends, the rising of 1798 
 took place on the 23d of May. On that day the " United 
 Irishmen" rose. I ask you now to consider whether the 
 Government had any share in that rising, or in creating 
 that rebellion ? 
 
 As early as 1797, the country was beginning to be dis- 
 turbed, according to Mr. Froude ; and, during the first 
 three montlis of January, February, and March, in '98, we 
 find Lord Moira giving his testimony as to the action of the 
 English Government. 
 
 " My Lords," (he says in the House of Lords,) " I have 
 seen in Ireland the most absurd, as well as the most disgust- 
 ing tyranny, that any nation ever groaned under. I have 
 been myself a witness of it in many instances ; I have seen 
 it practised unchecked, and the effects that have resulted 
 
IBELAND AND AMERICA. 155 
 
 from it have been such as I have stated to your lordsliips. 
 I have seen in that country a marked distinction between 
 the English and the Irish. I have seen troops that liave 
 been sent there full of this prej udice — that every inhabitant 
 of that kingdom is a rebel to ^q British Govermnent." 
 
 Troops were sent there before the Rebellion, and told — 
 *' every man you meet is a rebel." — " I have seen most 
 wanton insults practised upon men of all ranks and con- 
 ditions." 
 
 They sent their thousands into Ireland in preparation for 
 the Rebellion ; they had, between Welsh and Scotch and 
 Hessian regiments, and between English and Irish militia, 
 an army of one hundred and thii-ty thousand men prepared 
 for the work ; and, in this way, they goaded the people on 
 to rebellion. The rack, indeed, was not at hand, but the 
 punishment of "picketing" was in practice, which had been 
 for some years abolished as too inhuman even for the treat- 
 ment of savages. 
 
 Lord Moira goes on to say that he had knoAvn of a man 
 who, in order to extort confession of a crime from him, was 
 ** picketed" until he actually fainted; — ["picketing" 
 meant putting them on the point of a stake upon one foot,] 
 — " and picketed a second time until he fainted again ; and, 
 again, as soon as he came to himself, picketed the third 
 time until he fainted once more ; and all this on mere sus- 
 picion." 
 
 Not only was this punishment used, but every species of 
 torture. Men were taken and hung up until they were half 
 dead, and then threatened with a repetition of the cruel tort- 
 ure unless they made confession of imputed guilt. They 
 sent their soldiers into the country, and quartered them at 
 what was called " free quarters." The English Yeomanry 
 and the Orange Yeomanry of Ireland lived ujDon the people ; 
 they violated the women, they killed the aged, they plun- 
 
156 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 dered the houses, they set fire to the villages, they exercised 
 every form of torture the most terrible, — this terrible sol- 
 diery. All this took place before a single rising in Ireland, 
 before the rebellion of '98 sprung up at all. We had a 
 brave and gallant man sent to Ireland at that time — Sir 
 Kalph Abercrombie ; — and he declared he was so frightened 
 and disgusted at the conduct of the soldiers, that he threw 
 up his commission, and refused to take the command of the 
 forces in Ireland. He issued a general order in February, 
 '98 — the rebellion did not begin until May. He began his 
 general order with these words : — " The very disgraceful 
 frequency of great cruelties and crimes, and the many com- 
 plaints of the conduct of the troops in this kingdom, has too 
 unfortunately proved the army to be in a state of licentious- 
 ness that renders it formidable to every one, except the 
 enemy." Then he threw up his commission in disgust ; and 
 General Lake was sent to command in Ireland. He says : — 
 
 " The state of the country and its occupation previous to 
 the insurrection, is not to be imagined, except by those who 
 witnessed the atrocities of every description committed by 
 the military and the Orangemen, that were let loose upon 
 the unfortunate and defenceless population." 
 
 Then he gives a long list of terrible hangings, burnings, 
 and murderings. We read that " at Dunlavin, in the county 
 of Wicklow, previous to the rising, thirty-four men were 
 shot without any trial." But it is useless to enumerate or 
 continue the list of cruelties perpetrated. It will suffice to 
 say that where the military were placed on free quarters all 
 kinds of crimes were committed; but the people were no 
 worse off than those living where no soldiers were quar- 
 tered ; for in the latter places the inhabitants were called to 
 their doors and shot without ceremony, and every house was 
 plundered or burned. Nay, more ! We have Mr. Emmet, 
 in his examination, giving his evidence and declaring that 
 
IRELAND ASD AMERICA, ^^ I57 
 
 Hi was the fault of tlie Government, this rebellion of '98 
 The Lord Chancellor put the following question to Mr 
 Emmet : " Pi"ay, Mr. Emmet " — this was in August, '98 — 
 " what caused the late insurrection ? " to which Mr. Emmet 
 replied, " Free quarters, house-burnings, tortures, and thf 
 military execution's in the counties of Kildare, Canow, and 
 Wicklow." Before the insurrection broke out, numbers of 
 houses, with their furniture, in which concealed arms had been 
 found, were burned. Numbers of people were daily scourged, 
 picketed, and otherwise put to death to force confession of 
 concealed crime or plots. Outrageous acts of severity w^ere 
 often committed even by persons not in the regular troops. 
 But we have the evidence of the brave Sir John Moore, the 
 hero of Corunna. He was in Ireland at the time, in mili- 
 tary command, and he bears this testimony. Speaking of 
 Wicklow, the very hot-bed of the insurrection, he says, that 
 " moderate treatment by the Generals and the preventing of 
 the troops from pillaging and molesting the people, would 
 soon restore tranquillity ; the latter would certainly be quiet 
 if the Yeomanry would behave with tolerable decency, and 
 not seek to gratify their ill-humor and revenge upon the 
 poor." 
 
 We have the testimony of Sir William Napier, not an 
 Irishman, but a brave English soldier, saying : 
 
 " What manner of soldiers were these fellows who were let 
 loose upon the w^retched districts in which the Ascendancy 
 were placed, killing, burning, and confiscating every man's 
 property ; and, to use the venerable Abercrombie's words, 
 ' they were formidable to everybody but the enemy ' ? We 
 ourselves were young at the time ; yet, being connected with 
 the army, we were continually among the soldiers listening 
 with boyish eagerness to their ex2:)eriences ; and well we 
 remember, with horror, to this day, the tales of lust, of 
 bloodshed and pillage, and the recital of their foul actions 
 against the miserable peasantry, which they used to relate." 
 
15S ,, ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND, 
 
 I ask you, in all this goading of tlie people into ret el 
 lion, who was accountable if not the infamous governmepnt 
 which, at the time, ruled the destinies of Ireland ? I ask 
 you are the Irish people accountable, if, from time to time, 
 the myrmidons of England have been let loose upon them, 
 ravaging them like tigers, violating every instinct of Irish 
 love of land, of Irish purity, of Irish faith ? Is it not a 
 natural though a terrible thing, that, after all these provoca- 
 tions, which they deliberately put before the people, they 
 goaded them into the rebellion of '98, and so pre2)ared the 
 way for that union of 1800 which followed. Mr. Froude 
 says : " Several hot-headed priests put themselves at the 
 head of their people." There was a Father John Murphy 
 in the county of Wexford. He came home from his duties, 
 one day, to find the houses of the poor people around sacked 
 and burned; to find his unfortunate parishioners huddled 
 about the blackened walls of the chapel, crying : " Soggarth 
 dear, what are we to do ? what are we to do ? where are we 
 to fly from this terrible persecution that has come upon us ? " 
 And Father John Murphy got the pikes, put them in their 
 hands, and put himself at their head ! So you see, my 
 friends, there are two sides to every story. 
 
 My friends, I have endeavored to give you some portions 
 of the Irish side of the story, resting and basing my testi- 
 mony upon the records of Protestant and English writers, 
 and upon the testimony, which I have been so proud to put 
 before you, of noble, generous American people. I have to 
 apologize for the dryness of the subject, and the imperfect 
 manner in which I have treated it, and also for the uncon- 
 scionable length of time in which I have tried your patience. 
 In the next lecture we shall be approaching ticklish ground : 
 ■ — " Ireland since the Union ; " Ireland as she is to-day ; and 
 Ireland as, my heart and brain tell me, she shall be in some 
 future day. 
 
FIFTH LECTURE. 
 
 {Deluered in the Academy of MiLsic, New Torh^ Nov. 26, 1872.) 
 
 THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 
 
 L.\J)TES AND Gentlemen : On this day, a paragraph in a 
 nev/spaper, the I^ew Yo7^k Trihune, was brought under my 
 notice ; and the reading of it caused me very great pain and 
 anguish of mind ; for it recorded an act of discourtesy offered 
 to my learned antagonist, Mr. Froude, and supposed to be of- 
 fered by Irishmen in Boston. In the name of the Irishmen of 
 America, I tender to the learned gentleman my best apologies. 
 I beg to assure him, for my Irish fellow-countrymen in this 
 land, that we are only too happy to offer to him the courtesy 
 and i\\e hospitality that Ireland has never refused, even to 
 her enemies. Mr. Froude does not come among us as an 
 enemy of Ireland ; but he professes that he loves the Irish 
 people ; and I am willing to believe him. And when I read 
 in the report of his last lecture, which I am about to answer 
 to-night, that he said that he " would yield to no man in his 
 love for the Irish people," I was reminded of what O'Con- 
 nell said to Lord Derby on a similar occasion. When the 
 noble lord stated in the English House of Lords that he 
 would yield to no man in his love for Ireland, the great 
 Tribune rose and said : " Any man that loves Ireland can- 
 not be my enemy. Let our hearts shake hands." I am 
 sure, therefore, that I speak the sentiments of every true, 
 Irishman in America, when I assure this learned English 
 gentleman that, as long as he is in this country, he will re* 
 
160 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 ceive at the hands of the Irish citizens of America nothing 
 but the same courtesy, the same polite hospitality and atten- 
 tion, which he boasts that he has received from the Irish 
 people in their native land. I beg to assure him that we, 
 Irishmen, in America, know well that it is not with dis- 
 courtesy, or anything approaching to rudeness or violence, 
 that the Irish citizens of America ever expect to make their 
 appeal to this great nation. If ever the reign of intellect 
 and of mind was practically established in this world, it is in 
 glorious America. Every man who seeks the truth, every 
 man who j^reaches the truth, — whether it be religious truth 
 or historical truth, — will find an audience in America. And 
 I hope he never will find an Irishman to stand up and offer 
 him discourtesy and violence, because he speaks what he 
 imagines to be the truth. 
 
 So much being said in reference to this paragi-aph to which 
 I have alluded, I now come to the last of Mr. Froude's lect- 
 ures, and to the last of my own. The learned gentleman, 
 in his fourth lecture, told the American people his view of 
 the movement of 1782, and of the subsequent Irish rebellion 
 of 1798. According to Mr. Froude, the Irish made a great 
 mistake in 1782 by asserting the independence of the Irish 
 Parliament. "They abandoned," says this learned gentle- 
 man, " the paths of political reform ; and they clamored for 
 political agitation." Now, political agitation is one thing, 
 and political reform is another thing. Political reform, my 
 friends, means the correcting of great abuses, the repealing 
 of bad laws and the passing of good measures, salutary and 
 useful, for the welfare and Avell -being of the people. Accord- 
 ing to this learned gentleman, England, — taught, by her bit- 
 ter American experience, that coercion v/ould not answ*er 
 with the people, and that it is impossible to thrust unjust 
 laws down the throats of a people or a nation, even at the 
 sword's point — according to him, England was only too will- 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND, 161 
 
 ing, too happy, in the year 1780, to repeal all the bad laws 
 that had been passed in the blind and bigoted ages that had 
 gone by, and to grant to Ireland a real redress of all her 
 grievances. But, says Mr. Froude, " The Irish people 
 were foolish. Instead of demanding from England the re- 
 dress of these grievances, they insisted npon their National 
 and Parliamentary independence ; and," he adds, '' they were 
 foolish in this ; for that very independence led to interior con- 
 tention, contention to conspiracy, conspiracy to rebellion, re- 
 bellion to tyranny." Now, I am as great an enemy of polit- 
 ical agitation as Mr. Fronde, or any other man. I hold, and 
 I hold it by experience, that political agitation distracts men's 
 minds from the more serious and the more necessary occupa- 
 tions of life ; that political agitation draws men's minds away 
 from their business, and from the sober pursuits of industry ; 
 that it creates animosities and bad blood between citizens ; 
 that it affords an easy and profitable employment for worthless 
 demagogues ; and very often brings to the surface the vilest 
 and meanest elements of society. All that I grant. But, at 
 the same time, I hold that political agitation is the only re- 
 source left to a people who endeavor to extract good laws 
 from an unwilling and tyrannical government. May I ask 
 the learned historian what were the wars of the seventeenth 
 century, in France, in Germany, and in the Netherlands ? — 
 the wars that Mr. Froude himself admires so much, and for 
 which he expresses so much sympathy ; — what were they 
 but political agitation taking the form of armed revolt, in 
 order to extort fcom the governments of that time v/hat the 
 people considered to be just measures of toleration and lib- 
 erty of conscience ? With these wars, that were waged by 
 the people in armed revolt, against France, against Spain, in 
 the Netherlands ; against the Emperor Charles the Fifth, of 
 Austria ; — with these Mr. Froude has the deepest sympathy ; 
 because they were wars made by Protestants against Catholia 
 
1613 ENGLISH MI8BULE IN IRELAND, 
 
 governmeri ts. The men who made these wars were imiovji^- 
 tors, or revolutionists in every sense of the word. They 
 wanted to overturn not only the altar, but also the estab- 
 lished forms of government. But with the Irish, who only 
 stood in defence of their ancient religion and of their time- 
 honored altars, of their lives and property ; — not of their 
 freedom — for that was long gone ; — for the Irish — this 
 learned gentleman has not a word, except expressions of dis- 
 dain and disapprobation. 
 
 And now we come to consider whether Mr. Froude is 
 right, when he says that the Irish foolishly clamored for 
 political agitation in 1780, when they might have obtained 
 23olitical reform. Now, mark : — In 1780, the Irish j^eople 
 — and mainly the Protestant portion of the Irish people, — 
 demanded of the English Government the repeal of certain 
 laws that restricted and almost annihilated the trade and 
 commerce of Ireland. These laws had been passed under 
 William III. They were levelled at the Irish woollen 
 trade; they forbade' the exportation of manufactured cloth 
 from Ireland, except under a duty that was a prohibitive 
 tariff. They went so far as to prohibit the Irish people 
 from even selling their fleeces — their wool — to any foreign 
 power except England. England fixed her own prices ; and 
 Mr. Froude himself acknowledges that although the French 
 might be offering three shillings a pound for the wool, 
 Ireland was obliged to sell it to the English merchant at 
 his own price. When the Irish people demanded the 
 repeal of this unjust measure, I ask you, was England 
 willing to grant it ? Was England, as Mr. Froude saj^s, 
 only anxious to discover the unjust law in order to re- 
 peal it, and to discover grievances in order to redress 
 them? I answer, no. England nailed her colors to the 
 mast, and said, " I never will grant the repeal of the re- 
 strictive duties upon. Irish trade. Ireland is down, and I 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 163 
 
 will keep her do^m." The proof lies here : The English 
 Government resisted Grattan's demand for the emancipation 
 of Irish industry, until Henry Grattan brought 50,000 
 ** Volunteers ; " and the very day that he rose in the Irish 
 Parliament, to proclaim that Ireland demanded her commer- 
 cial rights once more, the Volunteers, in College Green and 
 Stephen's Green, in Dublin, had their artillery out, and had 
 them planted before the door of the House of Commons ; 
 and around the mouths of the guns they had put a label — 
 
 a significant label — " Free Trade for Ireland ; or ! " If 
 
 England was so trilling to redress every Irish grievance — 
 if the Irish people had only to say, " Look here, there is 
 this law in existence ; take it away, for it is strangling and 
 destroying the commerce of the country " — if England was 
 so willing to take away that law, — and Mr. Eroude says she 
 was; if she was only anxious to hear where the defect was 
 in order to remedy it, why, in the name of God — why, in 
 that day of 1780, did she hold out until, at the very can- 
 non's mouth, she was obliged to yield the commercial inde- 
 pendence of Ireland ? Is it any wonder that the Irish 
 people thought, with Henr}'- Grattan, that, if every measure 
 of reform was to be fought for, tliat the kingdom would be 
 kept in a perpetual state of revolution ? Is it any wonder 
 that men said : — " If we have got to fight for every act 
 of justice, we must always be ready, with our torches 
 lighted and our cannons loaded " ? Is it any wonder that 
 the Irish peo})le should have said, in that day, with their 
 immortal leader : " It is far better for us to have our own 
 Parliament, free and independent, to take up tlie making of 
 our own laws, and consult for our interests, and in peace, 
 quietness, and harmony, to take thought for the wants of 
 Ireland and legislate for them " ? And this is what Mr; 
 Eroude calls "clamoring for political agitation." Thus we 
 Bee, my friends, — (and, remember, tliis evening, fellow- 
 
164: ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 countrymen, that I am emphatically and especially appealing 
 to America ; that I expect my verdict this evening, as Mr. 
 Fronde got his ; but it is not from Dr. Hitchcock ; it is not 
 the puny crow of a barndoor fowl, but it is the scream oi 
 America's Eagle that I expect to hear this evening ;) — thus 
 we see that the action of 1782, by which Grattan obtain- 
 ed and achieved the independence of the Irish Parlia- 
 ment, did not originate in any innate love of the Irish for 
 political agitation, but in the action of the British Govern- 
 ment, that forced it upon them, and gave them only two 
 alternatives — "Remain subject to me, to my Parliament; 
 but I never will grant you an^^thing except at the cannon's 
 mouth ; or take your own liberty and legislate for your- 
 selves." Oh ! Henry Grattan ! you were not a Catholic ; 
 and yet I, a Catholic priest, here, to-night, call down ten 
 thousand blessings on thy name and memory ! 
 
 It is true that that emancipated Parliament of 1782 
 failed to realize the hopes of the. Irish nation; — perfectly 
 true! The Parliament of 1782 was a failure. I grant it. 
 Mr. Froude says that that Parliament was a failure because 
 the Irish were incapable of self-legislation. It is a serious 
 charge to make against any people, my friends ; yet I, who 
 am not supposed to be a ])hilosopher — and, because of the 
 habit that I wear, I am not supposed to be a man of very large 
 mind, — I stand up here to-night and assert my conviction 
 that there is not a nation nor a race under the sun that is 
 not capable of self-legislation, and that has not a right to the 
 inheritance of freedom. But, if the learned gentleman 
 wishes to know what was the i oal cause of that failure, I 
 will tell him. The emancipated Parliament of 1782, al- 
 though it inclosed within its walls such honored names as 
 Grattan and Flood, yet it did not represent the Irish nation. 
 There were nearly three millions and a half of Irishmen in 
 Ireland at that day ; — three millions of Catholics, and half a 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 165 
 
 million of Protestants ; and the Parliament of 1782 only rep- 
 resented the half million. Naj, more : examine the Consti- 
 tution of that Parliament, and see who they were ; see how 
 they were elected, and you will find that not even the hali 
 million of Protestants were fairly represented by that Par- 
 liament. The House of Commons held 300 members. Of 
 these 300 there were only 72 elected by the people ; the rest 
 were the nominees of certain great lords — certain large 
 landed i^rojDrietors. A man happened to have an estate, — 
 a side of the country, which contained three or four towns or 
 villages, — and each town returned its member. The land- 
 lord v/ent in and said : " You will elect such a man ; he is 
 my nominee ; " and he was elected at once. They were 
 called " rotten boroughs ; " they were called " nomination 
 boroughs ; " and they were also called " pocket boroughs," 
 because my lord had them in his pocket. Have any of you, 
 Irishmen, who are here present to-night, ever travelled from 
 Dublin to Drogheda ? There is a miserable village ; — half 
 a dozen wretched huts ; — it is the dirtiest, filthiest place I 
 ever saw ; and that miserable village returned a member to 
 the Irish Parliament ! Had that Parliament of 1782 repre- 
 sented the Irish people — [the three millions of Catholics 
 had not as much as a vote ; — the best and most intellectual 
 Catholic in Ireland had not even a vote for a member of 
 Parliament;] — had that Parliament represented the Irish 
 nation, it would have solved the problem of " Home Pule " 
 in a sense favorable to Ireland, and very unfavorable to the 
 theories of Mr. Froude. 
 
 The Irish people knew this well ; and the moment that the 
 Parliament of 1782 was declared indeiDendent of the Parlia- 
 ment of England, — was declared to have the power of origi- 
 nating its own acts, of legislating, and being responsible to 
 no one except the King, — that moment the Irish people 
 clamored for reform. They said : '' Reform yourselves now, 
 
166 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 Parliament. Let the people in, and represent them 
 fairly ; and you will make a grand success of your indepen- 
 dence." 
 
 The " Volunteers," to their honor, cried out for reform. 
 In their first meeting at Dungannon, when they were 95,000 
 strong, the one thing they demanded w^as reform of the Par- 
 liament. The " United Irishmen " who, in the beginning, were 
 not a secret society, nor a treasonable society, but open, free, 
 loyal men, embracing the first names and first characters in 
 Ireland, — the " United Irishmen " actually originated as a 
 society, embracing the best intellect in Ireland, for the 
 purpose of forcing reform on the Parliament. It may be 
 interesting to the citizens of America who have honored 
 me with their presence this evening; it may be interest- 
 ing to my Irish fellow-countrymen to know what were 
 the three principles upon which the society of United Irish- 
 men was formed. Here they are : Pirst of all, the first res- 
 olution of that society was that " the weight of English in- 
 fluence, in this Government, and this country, is so great as 
 to require cordial union among all the people of Ireland to 
 maintain that balance which is essential to the preservation 
 of our liberties and to the extension of our commerce." 
 Pesolution Is^o. 2, *' That the only constitutional means by 
 which this influence of England can be opposed is by com- 
 plete, cordial, and radical reform of the representation of the 
 people in Parliament." Pesolution No. 3, " That no reform 
 is just which does not include every Irishman of every re- 
 ligious persuasion." There you have the whole programme 
 of this formidable society of the " United Irishmen ; " and 
 
 1 ask you, citizens of America, is there anything treasonable, 
 is there anything reprehensible, is there anything deserving 
 of imprisonment, of banishment, or death in such a resolu- 
 tion as this ? Who opposed and hindered that reform ? 
 who stood between the Irish people and their Parliament 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 167 
 
 and said — " No ; there shall be no reform ; you mnst re- 
 main the representatives of a faction, and not of the nation ; 
 you must remain the corrupt and venal representatives of 
 only a small portion even of the Protestant faction." Who 
 said this ? The Government of England. Here is my 
 proof. On the 29th of November, 1783, Mr. Flood intro- 
 duced into the Irish Parliament a bill of reform. The mo- 
 ment that bill was read, an honorable member rose up to 
 oppose it. That member was Barry Yelverton, who was 
 afterwards Lord Avonmore. He was the Attorney-General 
 of the Government for Ireland ; and he gave to the bill an 
 official and Governmental oj^position. The bill v/as thrown 
 out by a majority of 159 to 77 ; the 159, every one of them, 
 having a bribe in his pocket. Then, the Attorney-General, 
 Mr. Yelverton, rose up; and he made this motion, "that it 
 has now become necessary to declare that this House will 
 maintain its just rights and privileges against all encroach- 
 ments whatsoever;" — the "just rights and privileges" being 
 the right to represent a faction, and exclude from all repre- 
 sentation five-sixths of the people of Ireland. 
 
 " From agitation," says Mr. Froude, " grew conspiracy ; 
 from conspiracy, rebellion." By conspiracy, he means the 
 society of " United Irishmen." By rebellion, he means the 
 uprising of '98. Now, in my last lecture, I have shown 
 you, on the evidence of such illustrious men as Sir Ralph 
 Abercrombie, and Sii* John Moore, the hero of Corunna, that 
 the rebellion of '98 was, primarily and originally, the work 
 of the British Government, which goaded the Irish people 
 into revolt. "We have also seen, a moment ago, that the 
 society of " United Irishmen " was not a conspiracy, but a 
 public society, — a magnificent union of the best intellects 
 and best men in Ireland for a splendid and patriotic pur- 
 pose, to be accomplished by fair, loyal, and legitimate 
 means. But the principle upon which the " United Irish- 
 
168 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 men " were formed was the principle of effecting a union 
 among all Irishmen ; and this was enough to alarm the 
 Government, whicli, from time immemorial, for many cen- 
 turies, had ruled Ireland through division. The motto — 
 the word — that Mr. Froude so eloquently used, when he 
 eaid, that " on the day that Ireland will be united she will 
 be invincible," — ^that was present in the mind of England's 
 Prime Minister, the celebrated William Pitt, when he re- 
 solved on three things: He resolved first, to disarm the 
 "Volunteers;" secondly, to force the "United Irishmen" to 
 become a secret society or conspiracy ; and thirdly, he re- 
 solved to force Ireland into a rebellion, that he might have 
 her at his feet. How did he bring these three things 
 about ? Remember that I am reviewing all these things his- 
 torically. I have no prejudices in the matter. I declare 
 to you, that, with the exception of the momentary ebullition 
 or boiling up of the blood that I feel in my chamber, when 
 preparing these lectures, I feel nothing but that. I am not 
 like others. I believe, for instance, that Mr. Froude has 
 no business to write history, because he is a good philoso- 
 pher. A philosopher is a man who endeavors to trace efiects 
 to their causes ; who sets up a theory and tries to work it 
 out ; and that is the last man in the world that ought to 
 write history. And why ? Because a historian is supposed 
 to be a narrator of dry facts ; and I hold, ought not to deal 
 in theories or fancies at all. I believe my learned antago- 
 nist to be too much of a philosoj^her to be a good historian. 
 I also believe that he is too much of a historian to be a good 
 philosopher. 
 
 The first of these three designs of William Pitt was ac- 
 complished in 1785. He increased the standing army in 
 Ireland to 15,000 men. He obtained, from the Irish Par- 
 liament, a grant of £20,000, to clothe and arm the militia. 
 Between the army on the one side, and the militia on 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND, 169 
 
 the other, he took the *' Volunteers " in the centre, and 
 disarmed them. On the day when the last of the " Volun- 
 teers " laid down their muskets, Ireland's hopes were laid 
 down with them. 
 
 The second of these designs, — namely, the forcing of the 
 ** United Irishmen " to become a secret conspiracy, he 
 effected in this manner : — In February, 1793, he passed two 
 bills through Parliament, called the " Gunpowder Bill," and 
 the " Convention Bill." A public meeting of the " United 
 Irishmen" was held in Dublin; — a public meeting, — there 
 was nothing secret about it, — to protest against the inquisi- 
 torial measures of certain agents of a secret committee of the 
 House of Lords, in goiug into people's houses at any hour 
 of the day or night, without any authority, — under pretence 
 that there was gunpowder concealed in the house. For this 
 meeting, held legally and constitutionally, the Hon. Simon 
 Butler, who was president of the meeting, and Mr. Oliver 
 Bond, who was the secretary, were both imprisoned six 
 months, and fined £500 each. AVhen this illustrious soci- 
 ety found that they were thus persecuted, they were obliged 
 to take refuge in secresy ; and thus it was that the " United 
 Irishmen " were forced to become a conspiracy. 
 
 The ftst really treasonable project that was ever put be- 
 fore the " United Irishmen," was put before them in April, 
 1794, by the Rev. William Jackson, a Protestant clergyman, 
 who came over commissioned by the French Convention; 
 and the Be v. WilKam Jackson, who was a true man, was 
 accompanied on that mission by a certain John Cockayne, 
 an English lawyer, from London ; and he was the agent of 
 William Pitt, the Prime Minister of England. Thus did the 
 society of the " United Irishmen " become a secret conspir- 
 acy ; and this was the action of the English Government. 
 Before that, it was perfectly legitimate and constitutional. 
 Ah ! but it had an object, which was far more formidable to 
 8 
 
170 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 the Englisli Goveminent than any commission of Irish trea- 
 son. The Ensxlish Government is not afraid of Irish trea- 
 son ; but the Enghsh Government trembles with fear at the 
 idea of Irish union. The " United Irishmen " were founded 
 to promote union among all Irishmen, of every religion ; 
 and the English Minister had said in his own mind : " Trea- 
 son is better than union. I will force them to become a 
 treasonable conspiracy ; and their project of union will be 
 broken up." It is worth your while, my American friends, 
 to hear what was the oath that was administered by the 
 "United Irishmen." Here it is. Let us suppose that I 
 was going to be sworn in : — 
 
 "I, Thomas Burke, in the presence of God, do pledge 
 myself to my country, that I will use all my abilities and in- 
 fluence in the attainment of an impartial and adequate rep- 
 resentation of the Irish nation in Parliament, and, as a most 
 absolute and immediate necessity for the attainment of this 
 chief good of Ireland, I will endeavor, as much as lies in my 
 ability, to forward and perpetuate the identity of interests, 
 the union of rights, and the union of power among Irishmen 
 of all religious persuasions, without which every reform in 
 Parliament must be partial, not national ; inadequate to the 
 wants, and wholly and entirely insufficient for the freedom 
 and happiness of this country." • 
 
 This was the United Irishman's oath. I protest before 
 high Heaven to-night, that, priest as I am, if I were asked, 
 in 1779, to take that oath, I would have taken it and kept 
 it. Remember, my friends, that it was no secret oath ; re- 
 member that it was no treasonable oath ; remember that it 
 was an oath that no man could refuse to take, unless he was 
 a dishonorable man and a traitor to his country. 
 
 The founder of this society was Theobald Wolfe Tone. I 
 admit that Mr. Tone was imbued with French revolutionary 
 ideas; but he certainly never attempted to impress these 
 views upon the society until Mr. William Pitt, the Prime 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 171 
 
 Minister of England, forced that society to become a secret 
 organization. 
 
 The third object of the Premier and the Government, 
 namely, to create an Irish rebellion, was accomplished by 
 the crnelties and abominations of the soldiers, who Wure quar- 
 tered at " free quarters " upon the. people, destroying them, 
 — violating that most sacred and inviolable sanctuary of 
 Irish maidenhood and womanhood, — burning the people's vil- 
 lages, plundering their farms, demolishing and gutting their 
 houses; until, at length, they made life more intolerable 
 than death itself; goading the people, at the very bayonet's 
 point, to rise in that fatal Rebellion of '98. 
 
 Thus I answer Mr. Fronde's assertion that " the Irish peo- 
 ple left the i)aths of political reform, and clamored for polit- 
 ical agitation; from agitation grew conspiracy, and from 
 conspiracy grew rebellion." Now, you may ask mej what 
 motive had William Pitt, the Premier of England, to do all 
 this. What advantage was it to him to have conspiracy and 
 rebellion in Ireland ? Oh ! my friends, I answer you, that 
 William Pitt was a great English statesman, and a great 
 English statesman, in those days, meant a great enemy to 
 Ireland. The object of great statesmanship, from time to 
 time, is the effort and object of concentration ; — a fatal prin- 
 cijjle, — a fatal principle, whenever it interferes with the just 
 liberty, the time-honored traditions, or the genius of a free 
 jDCople. Pitt saw Ireland with a Parliament, free and inde- 
 pendent, making her own laws and consulting her own in- 
 terests. He said to himself: "This will never do; this 
 country will grow happy and prosj^erous — this country will 
 be powerful : and that will not subserve my purposes, my 
 imperial designs. What do I care for Ireland or the Irish ? 
 My only care is for the British Empire ; I may have to cross 
 their purposes, and interfere with their interests in a thou- 
 sand ways ; I may have to injure them, in this way or that ; 
 
172 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 but I cannot do it, so long as tliey have a free Parliamtnt." 
 And lie made up his mind to destroy the Irish Parliament, 
 and to cany the " Act of Union." He knew well that, as 
 long as Ireland was happy, peaceful, and prosperous, he never 
 could effect that. He knew well that it was only through 
 humiliation and blood — through the ruin and destruction oi 
 Ireland, that he could do it ; and, cruel man as he was, he 
 resolved to plunge the kingdom into rebellion and bloodshed 
 in order to carry out his own infernal English State policy. 
 And yet, dear friends, especially my dear American friends, 
 my gi-and jury, — for I feel as if I were a lawyer — pleading 
 the case of a poor defendant, that has been defendant in 
 many a court, for many a long century : tlie plaintiff is a 
 great, rich, powerful woman ; the poor defendant has nothing 
 to commend her but a heart that has never yet despaired — a 
 spirit that never yet was broken ; and a loyalty to God and 
 to man that never yet was violated by one act of treason : — 
 I ask you, O grand jury of America, to consider how easy it 
 was to conciliate this poor mother Ireland of mine, and to 
 make her peaceful and happy. Pitt himself had a proof of 
 it in that very year, 1794. Suddenly the imperious and 
 magnificent Premier of England seemed to have changed his 
 mind, and to have adopted a policy of conciliation and kind- 
 ness towards Ireland. He recalled the Irish Lord Lieuten- 
 a,nt, Lord Westmoreland, and he sent to Ireland Earl Eitz- 
 william, who arrived on the 4th of January, 1795. Lord 
 Fitzwilliam was a gentleman of liberal mind and a most es- 
 timable character. He felt kindly towards the Irish people ; 
 and before he left England, he made an express compact with 
 William Pitt that, if he was made Lord Lieutenant of Ire- 
 land, he would govern the country on principles of concilia- 
 tion and kindness. He came. He found in Dublin Castle 
 a certain Secretary Cooke, a petty tyrant ; and he found the 
 great family of the Beresfords, who, for years and years, had 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 173 
 
 monopolized all the public offices and emoluments of the 
 State, and held uncontrolled sway over the destinies of Ire- 
 land. He dismissed them all, — sent them all " to the right 
 about ; " — and he surrounded himself with men of liberal 
 minds and large, statesmanlike views. He began by telling 
 the Catholics of Ireland that he would labor for their eman- 
 cipation. A sudden peace and joy spread throughout the 
 nation. Every vestige of insubordination and rebellion 
 seemed to vanish out of the Irish mind. The people were 
 content to wait. Every law was observed. Peace, happi- 
 ness, and joy were, for the time being, the portion of the 
 Irish people. How long did it last ? In an evil hour, Pitt 
 returned to his old designs. Earl Fitzwilliam was recalled 
 on the 25th of March ; and Ireland enjoyed her hopes only 
 for two short months. 
 
 "When it was ascertained that Lord Fitzwilliam was about 
 to be recalled, there was scarcely a parish in Ireland that did 
 not send in petitions, resolutions, and prayers to the English 
 Government to leave them their Lord Lieutenant. All to 
 no purpose. The policy v>^as changed. Pitt had made up 
 his mind to carry the Union. On the day that Lord Fitz- 
 william left Dublin, the principal citizens took the horses 
 from his carriage ; and they drew the carriage themselves 
 down to the water's side. All Ireland was in tears. " The 
 scene," says an historian of the time, '* was heart-rending ; 
 the whole nation was in mourning." How easy it was, my 
 American friends, to conciliate these people, whom two short 
 months of kindness could have thus changed ! Oh ! if only 
 the English Government, the English Parliament, the Eng- 
 lish people, — if they could only realize to themselves, for 
 ever so short a time, the mine of affection, that glorious 
 heart, that splendid gratitude that lies there in Ireland, but 
 tc which they have never appealed and never touched ; — but 
 
174: ENGLISH MISRULE IK IRELAND. 
 
 instead, they have turned the very honey of human nature 
 into the gall and bitterness of hatred ! 
 
 The rebellion broke out. It was defeated ; and as Mr. 
 Froude truly says, the victors took away the old privileges, 
 and made the yoke heavier. By the " old privileges," peo- 
 ple of America, Mr. Froude means the Irish Parliament 
 that was taken away. I hope, citizens of America, that this 
 English gentleman, who has come here to get " a verdict " 
 from you, will be taught by that verdict that the right to 
 home legislation is not a privilege, but the right of every 
 nation on the face of the earth. Then, in the course of his 
 lecture, going back to strengthen his argument, he says : — 
 " You must not blame England for being so hard upon you, 
 Irishmen, She took away your Parliament; she afflicted 
 you with a heavier yoke than you bore before. She couldn't 
 help it ; it was your own fault ; what made you rebel ? " 
 This is the argument which the learned gentleman uses. He 
 says that the penal laws would never have been established, 
 never v/ould have been carried out, only for the revolution 
 of 1600 in Ireland. Now, the revolution of IGOO means 
 the war that Hugh O'Neill made, in Ulster, against Queen 
 Elizabeth. And, according to this learned historian, the 
 penal laws were the result, the effect, the consequence of 
 that revolution. Remember, he fixes the date himself: — he 
 says IGOO. Now, my friends, here is the record of history : 
 The penal laws began to operate in Ireland in 1534. In 1537 
 the Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of Ireland, who 
 was an Englishman — his name was Cromer — was put into 
 jail aitd left there for denying the supremacy of Henry the 
 Eighth over the Church of God. Passing over the succeed- 
 ing years of Henry the Eighth's reign ; passing over the en- 
 actments of Somerset, under Edward the Sixth, we come to 
 Elizabeth's reign ; and we find that she assembled a Parlia- 
 ment in 15G0, — forty years before Mr. Froude's revolution. 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 1Y5 
 
 Here is one of the laws passed by tliafc Parliament : All of- 
 ficers and ministers, lay or ecclesiastical, — that took iis in, 
 you see, — were bound to take the oath of supremacy, and 
 were bound to swear that Queen Elizabeth was the Popess 
 — that she was the head of the Churoh ; that she was the 
 successor of the Apostles — that she was the representative 
 of St. Peter, and,, through him, of the Eternal Son of God ! 
 Queen Elizabeth ! All were obliged to take this oath under 
 pain of forfeiture and total incapacity. Any one who main- 
 tained the spiritual supremacy, — mind, the spiritual suprem- 
 acy, — of the Pope was to forfeit, for the first offence, all 
 his estates, real and personal ; and if he had no estate, and 
 if he was not worth £20, he was to be put in jail for one 
 year. For the second ofience he was liable to the penalty of 
 " praemunire." And, for the third oflence, he was guilty of 
 high treason, and put to death. These laws were made, and 
 commissioners were appointed to enforce them. Mr. Froude 
 says they were not enforced in Ireland. But we actually 
 have the acts of Elizabeth's Parliament, appointing magis- 
 trates and officers to go out and enforce these laws. And 
 these laws were made forty years before the revolution 
 which Mr. Froude alludes to as the revolution of 1600. How, 
 then, can that gentleman ask us to regard the penal laws as 
 the efifect of that revolution ? In my philosophy, and, I be- 
 lieve, in that of the citizens of America, the effect gener- 
 ally follows the cause; but the English philosophical his- 
 torian puts the efiect forty years ahead of the cause. That 
 is, as we say in Ireland, " putting the cai't before the horse." 
 But, Mr. Froude told us, if you remember, — in his sec- 
 ond lecture, if you have read it, — that tlie penal laws of 
 Elizabeth were occasioned by the political necessity of her 
 'situation. Here is his argument as he himself puts it. He 
 says : — " Elizabeth could not afford to let Ireland be Catho- 
 lic ; because if Ireland were Catholic, Ireland would be hos~ 
 
176 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 tile to Elizabeth." I may tell you now (I hope the ladies 
 who are here will excuse me for mentioning such a thing), 
 that Queen Elizabeth was not a legitimate child. Her name, 
 in common parlance, is too vile for me to utter, or for the 
 ladies here to hear. Suffice it to say that Elizabeth's mother 
 was not Elizabeth's father's wife. The Queen of England 
 knew the ancient abhorrence that Ireland had for a base- 
 born child. She knew that abhorrence grew out of Ireland's 
 Catholicity ; and therefore she could not allow Ireland to re- 
 main Catholic (says Mr. Froude), because Ireland would be 
 hostile to her if Ireland remained Catholic. The only way 
 in which tliis amiable Queen could root out the Catholics of 
 Ireland was by penal laws ; making it a felony for any Irish- 
 man to remain in Ireland a Catholic. Therefore, the English 
 historian says : that " she passed these laws because she 
 could not help herself; " and that she was " coerced to do so 
 by the necessity of her situation." Now, I argue from this 
 very argument of Mr. Froude himself, that if Elizabeth, as 
 he states in his second lecture, was obliged to pass these 
 penal laws, whether she would or not, why does he turn 
 round and say that those penal laws were the effect of Hugh 
 O'Neill's revolution ? If they were the result of Elizabeth's 
 necessity, then they were not the result of the immortal 
 Hugh O'Neill's brave efforts. 
 
 His next assertion, ray friends, is that, after the American 
 war, England was only too well disposed to do justice to Ire- 
 land ; and the proof lies here : He says that the laws against 
 Catholics were almost repealed before 1798. Yery well. I 
 ask you, dear friends, to reflect upon what these large meas. 
 ures of indulgence to the Catholics were of which Mr. 
 Froude speaks. Here they are: In the year 1771, Parlia- 
 ment passed an act, to enable Catholics to take a long lease 
 of fifty acres of bog. My American friends, you may not un- 
 derstand the word bog. We Irish understand it. It means • 
 
THE FUTURE OF mELAND. 17 7 
 
 a marsh wliicli is almost irreclaimable ; Y/hicli you m-ay 
 drain and drain until doomsday, and it Aviil still remain tlit 
 Oiiginal marsh. You may sink a fortune in it, in arterial 
 drainage, in " top-dressing," as Ave ca,ll it in Ireland ; and, if 
 y ou let it alone for a couple of years, and then come back and 
 look at it, it has asserted itself, and is a bog once more. 
 However, my friends, the Parliament was kinder than you 
 imagine, for, while they granted to the Catholic power to 
 take a long lease of fifty acres of bog, they also stipulated, 
 that if the bog was too deep for a foundation, he might take 
 half an acre of arable land upon which to build a house. 
 Half an acre ! For the life of him, not more than half an 
 acre. However, this holding, such as it was, should not be 
 within a mile of any city or town. Oh, no ! And mark 
 this ! If half the bog y/ere not reclaimed, that is five-and- 
 twenty acres, within twenty-one years, the lease was forfeited. 
 Well, my friends, the Scriptures tell us that King Pharaoh, 
 of Egypt, was very cruel to the Hebrews, because he ordered 
 them to make bricks without straw ; but here is an order to 
 the unfortunate Irishman to reclaim twenty-five acres of bog, 
 or else give up the lease. Now, beggarly as that concession 
 was, you will be astonished to hear that the very Parliament 
 that passed it was so much afraid of the Protestant Ascend- 
 ancy in Ireland, that in order to conciliate them for the slight 
 concession, they passed another bill gi-anting £10 a year, in 
 addition to £30 already ofi'ered, for every " Popish " Priest 
 duly converted to the Protestant religion ! 
 
 In October, 1777, the news reached England that General 
 Burgoyne had surrendered to the American General Gates. 
 The moment that news reached home. Lord North, v/ho was 
 then Prime Minister of England, immediately cried out and 
 expressed an ardent desire to relax the penal laws on Catho- 
 lics. In January, 1778, the folio v/ing year, the indepen- 
 dence of America was acknowledged by glorious France. 
 8* 
 
178 ENGLISH MISRULE JJV IRELAND. 
 
 The moment that piece of news reached England, the English 
 Parliament at once passed a bill for the relaxation of the 
 laws on the Catholics. In May of the same year the Irish 
 Parliament passed a bill, — now mark, — to enable Catholics 
 to lease land — to take a lease for 999 years. So it seems 
 we were to get out of the bog at last. They also, in that 
 year, repealed the unnatural penal laws which altered the 
 succession in favor of the child that became Protestant, and 
 gave him his father's property ; also repealing the law for 
 the i^rosecution of priests, and for the imprisonment of 
 *' Popish " schoolmasters. In the year 1793, they gave back 
 to the Catholics the power of electing Members cf Parlia- 
 ment — the 2)0^ver of voting ; and they also gave them the 
 right to certain commissions in the army. That is, posi- 
 tively, all that we got. And that is what Mr. Froude calls 
 almost a total repeal of the laws against Catholics. We 
 could not go into Parliament; we could not go on the 
 bench; we could not be magistrates; we were still the 
 "'' hewers of wood and drawers of water ; " and this mild 
 and benign Englishman comes and says : '' Why, you fools, 
 you were almost free ! " O people of America ! if this be 
 Mr. Fronde's notion of civil and religious freedom, I appeal 
 to you, for Ireland, nob to give him the verdict. 
 
 " The insurrection of '98," continues the learned gentle- 
 man, " threw Ireland back into a condition of confusion and 
 misery, from which she was partially delivered by the Act 
 of Union." The first part of that proposition I admit ; 
 the second I emphatically deny. I admit that the unsuc- 
 cessful rebellion of '98 threw Ireland back into a state of 
 misery. Unsuccessful rebellion is one of the greatest calami- 
 ties that can befall a nation ; and the sooner Irishmen and 
 Irish j^atriots understand this, the better it will be for them 
 and their country. But I emphatically deny that the Act 
 of Union was any remedy for these miseries ; that it was 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 1Y9 
 
 any healing whatever for the wounds of Ireland; that it 
 was anything in the shape of a benefit or a blessing. I 
 assert that the Union of 1800, by which Ireland lost her 
 Parliainent, was a pure curse for Ireland, from, that day to 
 this, and nothing else ; and that it is an evil which must 
 be remedied if the grievances of Ireland are ever to be 
 redressed. 
 
 I need not dwell upon the wholesale bribery and cor- 
 ruption by which the infernal Castlereagh, the political 
 apostate, carried that detestable Act of Union. Mr. Froude 
 has had the good taste to pass by the dirty subject without 
 touching it, and I think I can do nothing better. 
 
 He says: — "It was expected that whatever grievances 
 Ireland complained of would be removed by legislation after 
 the Act of Union." It was expected, it is quite true. 
 Even the Catholics expected something. They were prom- 
 ised, in writing, by Lord Cornwallis, that Catholic Emanci- 
 pation should be given them if they would consent to the 
 Union. Pitt himself pledged himself, through his Lord 
 Lieutenant, that he would never take office and that he 
 would never administer or serve in the Government unless 
 Catholic Emancipation was made a Cabinet measure. Ihe 
 honor of Pitt was engaged ; the honor of England was en- 
 gaged ; the honor of the brave, though, in America, unfor- 
 tunate soldier, Cornwallis, was engaged. But the wicked 
 act was accomplished ; and, then, the Catholics of Ireland 
 were left to sing Tom Moore's song — " I'd mourn the hopes 
 that leave me." They were left to meditate in bitterness 
 of spirit upon the nature of English faith. 
 
 ISTow, let me introduce an honored name that I shall re- 
 turn to by and by. A£ that time the ParKament of Ireland 
 was bribed with money and with titles, and the Catholic 
 people of Ireland were bribed by promised emancipation, 
 if they would sanction the Union. Then it was that a 
 
180 ENOLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 young man appeared in Dublin, speaking for the first time 
 against the Union, in the name of the Catholics of Ireland ; 
 and that young man was the glorious Daniel O'Connell. 
 Two or three of the Bishops gave a kmd of tacit, negative 
 assent to the measure, in the hope of getting Catholic Eman- 
 cipation. I need hardly tell you, my friends, that the 
 Catholic lords of the Pale were only too willing to pase 
 any measure that the English Government would require. 
 O'Connell appeared before the Catholic Committee in Dub- 
 lin, and here are his words, — remember that they are the 
 words of the Catholics, of the people, of Ireland: — "Sir," 
 he said, "it is my sentiment, and I am satisfied it is the 
 sentiment not only of every gentleman that hears me, but 
 of the Catholic people of Ireland, that they are opposed to 
 this injurious, insulting, and hated measure of union. And 
 if its rejection has to bring upon us the renewal of the 
 penal laws, we would boldly meet the proscription and op- 
 pression, which have been the testimony of our virtue, and 
 throw oui-selves once more on the mercy of our Protestant 
 brethren, sooner than give our assent to the political murder 
 of our country." " I know," he says, " I do know that, 
 although exclusive advantages may be ambiguously held 
 forth to the Irish Catholic, to seduce him from the sacred 
 duty which he owes to his country, yet I know that the 
 Catholics of Ireland will still remember that they have a 
 country ; and they will never accept of any advantage as a 
 sect which would debase and destroy them as a people." 
 Shade of the great departed, you never uttered truer words. 
 Shade of the great O'Connell, every true Irishman, priest 
 and layman, subscribes to these glorious sentiments, wher- 
 ever that Irishman is to be found. 
 
 Now Mr. Froude goes on, in an innocent sort of way. 
 He says ; " It is a strange thing that, after the Union was 
 passed, the people of Ireland were still grumbling and com- 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 181 
 
 plaining ; yet tlaey had no foundation for their comj^laints ; 
 they were not treated nnjustly." These are his words. 
 Good God ! people of America, what idea can this gentle- 
 man have in this ? What did this Union, which he admire? 
 so much, and which he declares that England will maintain, 
 — what did it bring to Ireland ? Y/hat gain did it bring to 
 Ireland, and what loss did it inflict on her? I answer, 
 from history. The gain of the Union to Ireland was simpl} 
 nothing, — absolutely nothing; — and I ask you to consider 
 two or three of the losses. 
 
 First of all, then, remember, my friends, that Ireland, 
 before the Union, had her own National Debt, as she had 
 her own military establishment. She was a nation. The 
 National Debt of Ireland, in the year 1793, did not amount 
 to three millions of money. In the year 1800, the year of 
 the Union, the National Debt of Ireland amounted ta 
 twenty-eight millions of money. They increased it ninefold 
 in six years. How? I will tell you. England had, in 
 Ireland, for her own purposes, at the time of the Union, 
 126,500 soldiers. Pretty tough business, that, of keeping 
 Ireland down in these days ! She made Ireland pay for 
 every man of them. She did not pay a penny of her own 
 money for them. In order to carry the Union, England 
 spent enormous sums of money for bribes to spies and in- 
 formers and to Members of Parliament. She took every 
 penny of this money out of the Irish treasury. There were 
 eighty-four rotten boroughs disfranchised at the time of 
 the Union ; and England paid to those who owned those 
 boroughs, or who had the nomination of them, — she actually 
 paid them one million two hundred thousand pounds ster- 
 ling for their loss ; the loss being in losing the nomination 
 boroughs, the loss by the proprietor of the corrupt influence 
 in returning these members to Parliament. Ireland was 
 made to pay this money. O'Connell, speaking on this sub 
 
1S2 ENOLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 ject, some years later, says : — " Really, it was strange that 
 Ireland was not asked to pay for the knife with which, 
 twenty- two years later, Castlereagh cut his throat ! ' ' 
 
 But if the debt of Ireland was swollen from three millions 
 before the Union, to twenty-eight millions, I ask you to 
 consider what followed. We now come to the period after 
 the Union. Mark, my friends ! In January, 1801, — yon 
 may say the year of the Union, — the debt of England was 
 four hundred and fifty millions and a half pounds sterling ; 
 and to pay that debt they required £17,708,800; conse- 
 quently they had to raise by taxation, eighteen millions, to 
 pay the interest on the debt of four hundred and fifty mil- 
 lions in that year. Such was the condition of England. In 
 the year 1817, sixteen years after, the same debt of England 
 had risen from four hundred and fifty millions to seven 
 hundred and thirty-five millions, — nearly double ; and they 
 had an annual charge of twenty-eight millions odd to pay. 
 So, you see, they doubled their national'debt in the sixteen 
 years during which Pitt had waged war with Napoleon. 
 They were obliged to subsidize and to pay Germans, Rus- 
 sians, and all sorts of people to fight against France. At 
 one time William Pitt was supporting the whole Austrian 
 army. The Austrians had the men, but no money. Now, 
 mark this! In Ireland, the debt, in 1801, was twenty- 
 eight and one-half millions ; and, consequently, the annual 
 taxation was one million two hundred and fifty thousand 
 pounds. In the year 1817, the same Irish debt, which, six- 
 teen years before, was only twenty -eight millions, was now 
 £112,704,000 sterling, and the taxes amounted to four mih 
 lions one hundred and four thousand pounds sterling. In 
 other words, in sixteen years the debt of England was 
 doubled ; but the debt of Ireland was made four times as 
 much as it was in the year in which the Act of Union was 
 passed. You may ask me how did that happen ? It hap- 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 1S3 
 
 pened from tlie very fact that, being united to England, 
 having lost our Parliament, the English Chancellor of the 
 Exchequer took and kept the money and the Irish ac- 
 counts, — kept the books. Ireland lost the privilege of keep- 
 ing her own accounts. And this is the account he brought 
 against Ireland in 1817. 
 
 Ireland was so lightly burdened with debt, at the time of 
 the Union, as compared with England, that the English did 
 not ask us, when they united our Parliament to their own, 
 — they did not presume to ask us, they had not the pre- 
 sumption to ask us, — to take share and share alike in the 
 taxes. Why should they ? We only owed twenty millions 
 and they owed four hundred and fifty millions. Why 
 should we be asked to pay the interest on their debt ? 
 They were rich and could bear that taxation ; Ireland was 
 poor, and she could not bear it. Ireland was, consequently, 
 much more lightly taxed than England. It was very much 
 easier to pay interest on twenty millions of pounds than on 
 four hundred and fifty millions. But there was an agreement 
 made by Castlereagh with the Irish Parliament. It was 
 this. He said: — "That if the Irish national debt ever 
 comes up to one-seventh of the national debt of England, 
 then we will throw it all in together and tax the people 
 share and share alike." The object of running up the Irish 
 debt was to bring it up within one-seventh of the English 
 debt. This they accomplished in 1817. Then the Irish 
 and the English were taxed indiscriminately, and they all 
 alike were obliged to pay the taxes for the interest on the 
 four hundred and fifty millions of debt that the Crown 
 of England had incurred, before the Union at all. And 
 the Irish, he says, were not unjustly treated ! " Ah, but," 
 says Mr. Froude, '* consider the advantages of the Union ! 
 You have the same commercial privileges that the English 
 
184 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 had." To this, I answer, in the words of the illustrious, 
 the honest, the high-minded John Mi.tchel : — 
 
 " It is true," (says Mr. Mitchel,) " that the laws regulat- 
 ing trade are the same in the two islands. Ireland may 
 export flax and woollen cloths to England ; she may import 
 her own tea from China and sugar from Barbadoes; the 
 laws which made these acts penal offences no longer exist ; 
 and why? Because they are no longer needed. By the 
 operation of these old laws Ireland was utterly ruined. 
 England has the commercial marine ; Ireland has it to 
 create. England has the manufacturing machinery and 
 skill of which Ireland was deprived by express laws made 
 for that purpose. England has the current of trade setting 
 strongly in her own channels, while Ireland is left dry. To 
 create or recover, at this day, the great industrial and com- 
 mercial resources, and that in the face of wealthy rivals tliat 
 are already in full possession, — is manifestly imjoossible 
 without one or the other of these two conditions, namely — ■ 
 an immense command of capital, or efi'ectual protective 
 duties. But, b}'" the Union, our capital was drawn away to 
 England ; and by the Union we were deprived of the power 
 of imposing protective duties." 
 
 It was to this very end that the Union was forced upon 
 Ireland through intolerance of Irish prosperity. " Don't 
 unite with us, sir," says the honest old man. Dr. Samuel 
 Johnson, when addressed on the subject of union in his day. 
 " Don't unite with us, sir ; we shall rob you ! " In the 
 very first year after the Union was passed, Mr. Foster 
 stated in the English House of Parliament, that there was a 
 falling off in the linen trade of Ireland of five millions less 
 of yards exported. The same gentleman, three years later, 
 stated that in 1800, — the year of the Union, — the net 
 produce of the Irish revenue was £2,800,000, while the 
 debt was only £25,000,000. Three years later, after three 
 years' experience of the Union, the debt had increased to 
 £53,000,000, and the revenue had diminished by £11,000. 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 185 
 
 Ireland was deserted. That absenteeism, which was the 
 curse of Ireland in the days of Swift, had so increased by 
 the Union, that Dublin became almost a deserted city, and 
 all the cities in Ireland were as places in the wilderness 
 At this very day, in Dublin, the Duke of Leinster's city 
 palace is turned into a museum of Irish industry. Powers- 
 court House, in Dame Street, has become a draper's shop ; 
 Tyrone House is a school-house; the house of the Earl of 
 Bective was pulled down a few years ago, to build up a 
 Scotch Presbyterian Meeting-House in its place. Charle- 
 mont House, — Lord Charlemont's residence, — was sold 
 about six months before I came to America ; and it is now 
 the head office of the Board of Works ; Aldborough House 
 is a barrack ; Belvidere House is a convent. So, fashion, 
 trade, commercial activity, intellectual enterjjrise, political 
 interest, everything has gone to London ; and Ireland may 
 fold her hands, and sigh over the ruin that is left her 
 now. And that is the result of the Union. The criimbling 
 Liberties of Dublin attest the decay and ruin of the trade of 
 Ireland ; the forsaken harbors of Limerick and Gahvay tell 
 of the destruction of her commerce ; the palaces of Dublin, 
 abandoned tc decay, announce that she is no longer the resi- 
 dence of her nobility ; the forlorn custom-houses tell of her 
 income transferred elsewhere. What do we get in return 
 for all this ? Absolutely nothing. Every Irish question 
 goes now to London to be debated ; and the moment an 
 Irish member stands up in the House, the first thing he 
 may expect is to be coughed down, sneered down, or crowed 
 down — unless, indeed, he has the lungs of an O'Connell to 
 turn upon them, like an African lion, and, with a roar, put 
 down their beastly bellowing. 
 
 Pitt promised Emancipation. Six months after the 
 Union was passed, he retired from office, on the pretence, 
 indeed, that the King would not grant Emancipation, and 
 
186 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 would not keep his word. But it is well known that the 
 true r( ason why Pitt retired was that his Continental policy- 
 had failed. The people of England were tired of his wars, 
 and were clamoring for peace. Pitt was too proud a man to 
 sign even a temporary peace with Prance ; and he retired in 
 sullen pride and disgust. He retired under the pretext 
 that he would not be allowed to carry Catholic Emancipa- 
 tion. Some time later, after the Addington Administration 
 was broken up, Mr. Pitt returned again, the second time, to 
 be the Premier of England. Not one word escaped his lips 
 about Catholic Emancipation ; and he resisted it until his 
 death. He was as great an enemy to the Catholics of 
 Ireland as ever poor, old, foolish, mad George the Third 
 was. And it was only after twenty-nine years of heroic 
 effort, that the great O'Connell rallied the Irish nation, and 
 succeeded for a time in uniting all the Catholics of Ireland 
 as one man, as well as a great number of our noble-hearted 
 Protestant fellow-Irishmen. And when O'Connell came, 
 and knocked at the doors of the British Parliament, with 
 the hand of an united Irish people, — when he spoke with the 
 voice of eight millions, — then, and only then — even as the 
 walls of Jericho crumbled at the sound of Joshua's trumpet, 
 — so did the old, bigoted threshold of the British House of 
 Commons tremble, while its doors burst open and let in the 
 gigantic Irishman that represented eight millions of the 
 people of Ireland. The English historian cannot say that 
 England granted Catholic Emancipation willingly. She 
 granted it as a man would yield up a bad tooth to a dentist. 
 O'Connell put the forceps into that false old mouth. The 
 old tyrant wriggled and groaned. The bigoted j^rofligate 
 who then disgraced England's crown, shed his crocodile 
 tears over the bill. The eyes that were never known to 
 weep over the ruin of female virtue, — the face that never was 
 known to change color in the presence of any vile deed or 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 187 
 
 accusation of vice, — that face grew pale ; and George the 
 Fourth wept for sorrow when he had to sign the bill. The 
 man who had conquered Napoleon upon the field of AVater- 
 loo ; the man who was declared to be the invincible victor, 
 and the greatest of warriors, — stood there with that bill in 
 his hand, and said to the King of England : "I would not 
 grant it, your Majesty, any more than you : but it is forced 
 from you and me. You must either sign that paper, or pre- 
 pare for civil war and revolution in Ireland." I regret to 
 be obliged to say it, but really, my friends, the history of my 
 native land proves to me that England never granted any- 
 thing from love or through a sense of justice, or from any 
 other motive than from a craven fear of civil war, or of 
 some serious inconvenience to herself. 
 
 Now, having arrived at this point, Mr. Froude glances, 
 I must say in a magnificently masterly manner, over the 
 great questions that have afiected Ireland since the day 
 Emancipation was passed. He speaks words of most elo- 
 quent compassion over the terrible visitation of '46 and '47, 
 — words the reading of which brought tears to my eyes ; 
 and for the words of compassion that he gave to the people^ 
 whose sufferings I vvitnessed, I prayed to God to bless him 
 and reward him. He speaks v/ords of generous, enlightened, 
 and statesmanlike sympathy with the tenant-farmers and the 
 peasants of Ireland : and for these words, Mr. Froude, if you 
 were an Englishman ten thousand times over, I love you. 
 He does not attempt to speak of the future of Ireland. 
 Perhaps it is a dangerous thing for me to attempt ; yet I 
 suppose that all that we have been discussing in tlie past 
 must have some reference to the future ; for surely the ver- 
 dict that Mr. Froude looks for is not a mere verdict of abso- 
 lution for past iniquities. He has come here, — though he is 
 not a Catholic — he has come to America like a man going to 
 confession. He has cried out loudly and generously, " We 
 
188 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 have sinned, we have sinned, we have grievously sinned ; " — 
 and the verdict which he calls for must surely regard the 
 future more than the past. For how, in the name of com- 
 mon sense, can this great historian, or any man, ask for a 
 verdict justifying the rule of iniquity, the heart-rending 
 record of cruelty, injustice, fraud, robbery, bloodshed, and 
 wrong which we have been contemplating in company with 
 Mr. Froude? It must be for the future. What is that 
 future ? Well, my friends,- — first of all my American grand 
 jury, — you must remember that I am only a monk and not 
 a man of the world ; I do not understand much about these 
 things. There are wiser heads than mine ; and I will give 
 you their opinions. There is one class of men who love 
 Ireland — and I will only speak of those who love Ireland — ■ 
 who love her sincerely ; — there is one class of men who love 
 Ireland, and who think, in their love for Ireland, that the 
 future of Ireland is to be wrought out by insurrection, 
 rising in arms against the power which holds Ireland en- 
 slaved, if you will. Well, if the history which Mr. Froude 
 has been just telling us, and which I have endeavored to 
 review for you — if it teaches us anything as Irishmen, it 
 teaches us that there is no use in appealing to the sword or 
 to armed insurrection for Ireland. Mr. Froude says that we 
 will only succeed when the Irish people have two things 
 they do not seem to have now, namely, — union as one man, 
 and a determination not to sheath that sword until the work 
 is done. I know that I would earn louder plaudits, citi- 
 zens of America, and speak more popular language to the 
 ears of my auditors, if I declared my adhesion to this class 
 of Irishmen. But there is not living a man that loves Ire- 
 land more dearly than I do. There are those who may love 
 her more effectively and serve her with greater distinction — ■ 
 but no man loves Ireland more tenderly and more sincerely 
 than I do. I prize, citizens of America, the good- will of my 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 189 
 
 fellow-Irislimen ; I prize it next to the grace of God. I 
 also prize the popularity which, however unworthily, I pos- 
 sess with them ; but T tell you American citizens, that for all 
 that popularity, for all that good- will, I would not compro- 
 mise one iota of my convictions, nor would I state what I 
 do not believe to be true. I do not believe in insurrection- 
 ary movements in a country so divided as Ireland. 
 
 There is au other class of Irishmen who hold that Ireland 
 has a future — a glorious future, — and that that future is to 
 be wrought out in this way. They say, — and I think with 
 justice and right — that wealth acquired by industry brings 
 with it power and political influence. They say, therefore, 
 to the Irish at home, "Try to accumulate wealth; lay hold 
 of the industries, and develop the resources of your country. 
 Try, in the meantime, and labor to effect that blessed union 
 without whicli there never can be a future for Ireland. 
 That union can only be effected by largeness of mind, by 
 generosity, and urbanity amongst fellow-citizens; by rising 
 above the miserable bigotry that carries religious differences 
 and religious hatreds into the relations of life that do not 
 belong to religion." Meantime, they say to the men of Ire- 
 land, " Try and acquire property and wealth. This can 
 only be done by developing assiduous industry ; and that 
 industry can only be exercised as long as the country is at 
 peace, and as long as there is a truce to violent political 
 agitation." Then these men — I am giving the opinions of 
 others, not my own — these men say to the Irishmen in 
 America, — " Men of Ireland in America — men of Irish 
 birth — men of American birth but of Irish blood — we believe 
 that God has largely intrusted the destinies of Ireland to 
 you. America demands of her citizens only energy, in- 
 dustry^ temperance, truthfulness, obedience to the laws ; and 
 any man that has these, with the brains that God has given 
 to every Irishman, is sure in this land to realize fortune and 
 
190 ENGLISH MISMULE ZzY IRELAND. 
 
 a grand future. If you are faitliful to America in these 
 respects, America will be faithful to you. And in propor- 
 tion as the great Irish element in America rises in wealth, 
 it will rise in political influence and power — the political 
 influence and power which in a few years is destined to 
 overshadow the whole world, and to bring about, through 
 peace and justice, far greater revolutions in the cause of 
 honor and humanity than have ever been efiected by the 
 sword." This is the programme of the second class of Irish- 
 men ; and I tell you candidly, that to this programme I 
 give my heart and soul. 
 
 You will ask me about separation from the crown of 
 England. Well, that is a ticklish question, ladies and 
 gentlemen. I dare say you remember that, when Charles 
 Edward was Pretender to the Crown of England, during the 
 first years of the House of Hanover, there was a toast which 
 the Jacobite gentlemen used to sdve. It v/as this : — 
 " God bless the King, our noble faitb's defender ; 
 Long may he Uve ; and down with the Pretender. 
 But which be the Pretender — which be King, — 
 God bless us all, that's quite another thing." 
 
 And yet, with the courage of an old monk, I will tell you 
 my mind on this very question. History tells us that em- 
 pires, like men, run the cycle of years of their life, and then 
 die ; no matter how extended their power, no matter how 
 mighty their influence, no matter how great their sway, how 
 invincible their armies ; the day comes, the inevitable day, 
 that brings with it decay and disruption. Thus it was with 
 the empire of the Medes and Persians ; thus it was with the 
 mighty empire of the Assyrians; thus with the Egyptians 
 of old ; thus with the Greeks ; thus with Pome. Who would 
 ever have imagined, for instance, 1,500 years ago — before 
 the Goths first came to the walls of Pome — who would have 
 imagined that the power that was to rule with undisputed 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 191 
 
 sway over a territory greater than the whole Roman Empire, 
 would be the little unknown island flung out in the Western 
 Ocean, known only by having been conquered by the 
 ilomanS, the ultima thule, the tin island in the far ocean ? 
 And this was Enj^land. Who would have imagined that in 
 the cycle of time this would come to pass ? Now, my 
 friends, England has been a long time at the top of the 
 wheel ; do you imagine she will always remain there ? I do 
 not want to be one bit more loyal than Lord Macaulay : and 
 Lord Macaulay describes the day " when the traveller from 
 New Zealand shall take his stand upon the broken arch of 
 London Bridge to sketch the ruins of St. Paul's." Is that 
 wheel of England rising or falling ? Is England to-day what 
 she was twenty years ago ? England, twenty years ago, in 
 her first alliance with Napoleon, had a finger in every pie 
 in Europe — and Lord John Kussell and Lord Palmerston 
 were busy-bodies of the first order. England to-day has no 
 more to say in the affairs of Europe, than the Emperor of 
 China has. You see I am only talking philosophy. A 
 few months ago, the three great Emperors, — of Germany, 
 Austria, and Russia, — came together in Berlin to fix the 
 map of Euro})e ; and they did not even pay the courtesy 
 of asking England to come in, to know what she had to 
 say about it. The army of England to-day is nothing, a 
 mere cipher. The German Emperor can bring his 1,200,000 
 men into the field; and England, for the very life of her, 
 cannot put 200,000 men against him. An English citizen — 
 a loyal Englishman — wrote a book called " The Battle of 
 Dorking," in which he describes a German army marching 
 on London. The Englishman was loyal ; and Avhy should I 
 be more loyal than he? Of England's navy, Mr. Reade, 
 Chief Constructor of the British navy, has written an article 
 in a London paper, in which he declares and proves that, at 
 this moment, the British fleet would be afraid to go into 
 
192 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 Kussian waters. They are not able to meet Kussia. And 
 why should I be more loyal than Mr. Keade ? An empire 
 begins to totter and crumble to decay, when it withdraws its 
 forces from its outlying provinces ; as, in the decay of Rome, 
 the Roman legions were withdrawn from Britain. England, 
 to-day, says to Canada and Australia, " Oh, take your 
 government into your own hands ; we don't want to be 
 bothered with you any more ! " England, that, eighty years 
 ago, fought for the United Colonies of America, as long as 
 she could put a man into the field, has changed her policy. 
 An empire is crumbling to decay when she begins to buy off 
 her enemies, as in the case of the Roman Empire, when she 
 began to buy off the Scythians, the Dacians, and other bar- 
 baric races, that were coming down upon her before her 
 Empire fell. England, a few days ago, was presented with 
 a little bill by America. She said, " Vv^hy, Jonathan, I owe 
 you nothing ; " and John Bull buttoned u]3 his pocket and 
 swore he would not pay a cent. And then America said, 
 *' Look here, John, if you don't, — look at this ! " — and she 
 took the sword and held it by both hands : — " whichever end 
 you like." John Bull paid the bill. 
 
 My friends, it looks very like as if the day of Lord Ma- 
 caulay's New Zealander was rapidly approaching. On that 
 day, my opinion is, that Ireland will be mistress of her own 
 destinies, with the liberty that will come to her, not from 
 earth, but from that God whom she has never forsaken. 
 And the whole question is, will Ireland, on that day, be wor- 
 thy of the glorious destiny that is in the womb of time and 
 the hand of God ? I say that Ireland will be worthy of it, 
 if that day dawn upon a united people, upon a faithful peo- 
 ple, upon a people that will keep, every man, his faith in God 
 and in his holy religion, as his fathers before him kept it in 
 the dark hour and in the terrible day of persecution. I say 
 that Ireland will be worthy of her destiny, if on that day, 
 
TEE FUTURE OF IRELAND. I93 
 
 when it dawns upon her, she will be found as distinctive, as 
 individual a people and race, as she is to-day in her aiBiction 
 and in her misery ; if she foster her traditions, if she keep up 
 her high hopes, if she keep the tender, strong love that her 
 people always have had for the Green Isle that bore them — 
 then will Ireland be worthy of her destiny. What shall that 
 destiny be? My friends, if Mr. Froude has proved any- 
 thing, I think he has proved this general proposition, that, 
 although Almighty God lavished upon the English people 
 many gifts, there is one gift he never gave them ; and that is 
 the gift of knowing how to govern other people. To govern 
 a people requires, first of all, strict justice ; and, secondly, to 
 have the interests of the people at heart — their real interests ; 
 and, thirdly, it requires tact and urbanity. The French have 
 this, but the English have not. Look at Alsace and Lor- 
 raine ; — look at the suffering people, the brave people, emi- 
 grating like one man, attaching themselves to France, though 
 she is down in the dust, rather than enter into rich and tri- 
 umphant Germany. And why ? Because France won theii* 
 hearts by her justice, by her consulting their true interests, 
 and by her French urbanity and tact. The history of the 
 English Government's connection with Ireland is a history 
 of injustice ; it is a history of heartlessness ; and it is, above 
 all, a history of blundering want of tact : not knowing what 
 to do with the people ; never understanding them ; knowing 
 nothing at all of their genius, their prejudices, and the shape 
 and form of their national character. 
 
 But there is another nation that understands Ireland, and 
 hfis proved that she understands Ireland ; whose statesmen 
 l^.ave always spoken words of bright encouragement, of tender 
 sympathy, and of manly hope to Ireland in her darkest 
 days; and that nation is the United States of America; the 
 mighty land, placed by the Omnipotent hand between the far 
 East on the one side, to which she stretches out her glorious 
 9 
 
194 ENGLISH MISRULE IN IRELAND. 
 
 arms, over tlie broad Pacific ; whilst, on tlie other, she sweeps 
 with her left hand over the Atlantic, and touches Europe ; 
 the mighty land, enclosing in her splendid bosom untold re- 
 sources of every form of commercial and other wealth ; the 
 mighty land, with room for three hundred millions of men ; 
 with millions of the oppressed ones, all the world over, fly- 
 ing to her more than imperial bosom, there to find liberty 
 and the sacred rights of civil and religious freedom. Is there 
 not every reason to suppose that, in that future Avhich we 
 cannot see to-daj^, but which lies before us, — America will be 
 to the Avhole world what Rome was in the ancient days, what 
 England was but a few years ago, — the great storehouse of 
 the woild, the great ruler, — the pacific ruler, — of the desti- 
 nies of the whole world : the great manufacturing power, dis- 
 pensing from out her mighty bosom all the necessaries and 
 all the luxuries of life to the whole world around her ? — that 
 she may be destined, — as I believe she is destined, — ^to rise 
 rapidly into that gigantic form that will overshadow all other 
 nations. When that glorious day comes to pass, what is more 
 natural than that Ireland, now, as I sujDpose, misti-ess of her 
 own destinies, should turn and stretch out the arms of her 
 sympathy and love across the intervening waves of the At- 
 lantic, and be received, an independent State, into the mighty 
 confederation of America. America, — mark, I am not speak- 
 ing treason — remember, I say distinctly, all this is to come 
 to pass after Macaulay's New Zealander has arrived; — 
 America will require an emporium for her European trade. 
 Ireland lies there right between her and Europe, with her 
 splendid coast line, and vast harbors and bays, able to shel- 
 ter all her commercial and other fleets. America may re- 
 quire a great European storehouse, a great European hive 
 for her manufactures ; and Ireland has enormous water- 
 power, now flowing idly to the sea, but which yet, in the fut- 
 ure day, may be busy in turning the wheels set upon these 
 
THE FUTURE OF IRELAND. 105 
 
 streams by American-Irish capital and Irish industry. If 
 ever that day comes, if ever that union comes, it will be no 
 degradation to Ireland to join hands with America, because 
 America does not enslave her States ; she accepts them on 
 terms of glorious equality : she respects their rights, and 
 blesses all who cast their lot with her. 
 
 Now, I have done with this subject and with Mr. Froude. 
 I have one word to say before I retire, and that is, if during 
 the course of these five lectures one single word personally 
 offensive to this distinguished gentleman has escaped my 
 lips, I take that word back now ; I apologize to him before 
 he asks me ; and I beg to assure him that such a word never 
 came wilfully from my mind or from my heart. He says 
 he loves Ireland ; and I believe according to his lights he 
 does love Ireland ; but our lights are very different from his. 
 Still the Almighty God will judge every man according to 
 his lights. 
 
CONCLUDING LECTURE. 
 
 {Delivered in the Academy of Music ^ Brooklyn^ December 19, 1872. 
 
 Ladies and Gentlemen: I need not telL..you that this 
 world in which we live is a very changeable world. We 
 have seen so many changes ourselves, in our own day, that 
 we have learned to be astonished at nothing. We have seen, 
 but a few years ago — only four years ago — France, reputed 
 the bravest and most powerful nation in Europe. To-day, 
 France is down in the dust ; and there is no one found so 
 poor as to do glorious France honor. So, in like manner, a 
 few years ago, when Lord Palmerston was at the head of the 
 English Ministry, England was considered one of the most in- 
 fluential and one of the most powerful nations of the earth : 
 and to-day we see how things are changed. In our own time, 
 we remember, whenever England had any argument to state, 
 any theory of a national kind to propound, any cause to de- 
 fend, she sent her fleets and her armies. Even as late as 
 1858, she had an argument with the Emperor of Russia; 
 and she sent her fleets and armies to discuss the question 
 at the point of the sword. Later still,- — but a few months 
 ago, I may say — she had an argument with the Emperor, as 
 he was called, of Abyssinia ; and she sent her army there to 
 try conclusions and to reason with him. To-day, my friends, 
 she has an argument with Ireland ; and instead of adopting 
 the old policy of sending some Cromwell or other over there 
 at the head of an army, to argue with the Irish, — with the 
 Bible in one hand and the sword in the other, — she sends 
 over to America a talking man, to talk over it. 
 
 .England has tried issues with my native land for many 
 a long century ; for seven hundred years on the National 
 
REPLY TO MP. FBOUDE'S ''LAST WORDSy 197 
 
 question ; for three liiiiiclred years on the still more im- 
 portant religions question. On the religious question Eng- 
 land is fairly beaten ; and on the National question, al- 
 though we have not yet triumphed, she has never been 
 able to knock the nationality out of Ireland. So what 
 does she do ? The days are past and gone when she could 
 send her Cromwell or her William of Orange to Ireland : 
 and to-day she has nothiug better to fiill back upon than to 
 send an Englishman over to America to abuse us, — to try 
 and make out that we are the most ungovernable and the 
 most God-abandoned race on the face of the earth. So he 
 comes, and delivers his message. AYhen first he came he 
 told the people of America, if you remember — you all re- 
 member it as well as I do, — that he intended, as far as he 
 could, to justif}^ England's treatment of Ireland; and con- 
 sequently, that this was his intention is clearly manifested 
 by the simple fact that he has gone into the whole history 
 of the relations between England and Ireland. He has 
 gone through them all. He began with the Norman inva- 
 sion ; and he came down to the present year, for the sole and 
 avowed purpose of white-washing England as far as he could, 
 and making out that, after all, she was not so bad as people 
 were inclined to believe she was. And when he was followed 
 on this great issue, my friends, Mr. Eroude turns around 
 and says : " You are all greatly mistaken. I don't want a 
 verdict from the American people, to justify England. I 
 don't want to put America in the confessional, and make my 
 country kneel down and get a plenary absolution for aM that 
 she ever did to Ireland. That is not my intention at all. 
 My intention is, and the verdict I seek is simply this : There 
 is a movement going on in Ireland now called the * Home 
 Kule ' agitation. Irishmen," he says, "are beginning at home 
 to say that they have the right to make their own laws, and 
 to be governed by their own laws. They say that it is 
 not right, nor fair, nor just, that the things that could be so 
 well done at home, should be so badly done in London, by 
 men who know very little about Ireland, and who care less. 
 Now," he says, " I come to America simply to obtain the 
 verdict of American public opinion to this eftect : that the 
 Irish don't know how to govern themselves ; that whatever 
 
198 BEPLT TO MR. FROUDE'S ''LAST WORDS:' 
 
 oilier virtues or talents tliey have, they have not the talent 
 nor the virtue of self-government ; they are not wise enough, 
 they are not prudent enough, they are not temperate enough, 
 they are not suJSicientiy civilized nor sufficiently tolerant to 
 govern themselves ; and I will prove it from their history ; 
 and I ask the American people to send over this word to the 
 Irish, ' Now, boys, have sense. You don't know what is for 
 your own good ; — you never did, and Mr. Froude has 
 brought it home to us. You may liave a great many 
 virtues, — he acknowledges that you have some ; — but you 
 have no sense at all. We have sense ; and the English 
 people have — and always had — twice as much sense as you 
 have. They know how to govern you beautifully — oh ! 
 how sweetly ! Leave yourselves entirely in their hands, and 
 they will make the finest laws that ever were heard of for 
 your special use and benefit. They love you like the apple 
 of their eye. They are very anxious to see Ireland prosper- 
 ous, wealthy, rich, and powerful ; they are very anxious to 
 give you all that they have themselves ; and a great deal 
 more. So, Mr. Froude says, all you have to do, liow, is 
 to keep yourselves quiet ; leave the Parliament Avhere it is, 
 and send your Members of Parliament over there. Let the 
 English members and the Scotch members, — who have a 
 sweeping majority, — let them make laws for you ; and these 
 will be salutary and beautiful laws for Ireland. You don't 
 know how to make such laws yourselves. You don't know 
 anything about your own interests, or the principles of gov- 
 ernment. You don't understand your own country.' " And 
 he expects America, like an old woman, to send over this 
 advice to Ireland. 
 
 It is not with Mr. Fronde's facts in detail, so much, that 
 I have to deal, as with the spirit of the man. In his reply 
 to my lectures, he distinctly states that he does not seek 
 justification for England's past conduct ; but that ho came 
 here to arouse public American opinion against the princi- 
 ple, so dear to Irishmen, that they have the right, and that 
 God has given them the power, and the intelligence, and the 
 capability to make their own laws and to be governed by 
 them. He has traced England's dealings with Ireland : he 
 has traced them, no doubt, in a masterly manner. I wish I 
 
REPLY TO MB. FROUDE'S ''LAST WORDS/' 199 
 
 could do it half so well. But, my friends, tlirouglioiit, the 
 leading idea in the mind of this historian, clearly manifested 
 and avowed by him, is to bring home to every tliinking man 
 in this land the conviction that we Irish did not know how 
 to govern ourselves. He says, — they have had the country 
 in their own hands for centuries, and how did they govern 
 it ? The Chieftains were harrying the very life out of the 
 people. Ireland was divided into little factions ; and, in- 
 deed, he went on to say, in a manner that does not reflect 
 credit upon him, — that every family in the land had its ovv^n 
 independence, and governed itself. Ireland was divided 
 into small factions ; each faction had its own chief ; and 
 every chieftain was engaged, from Monday morning till 
 Saturday night, and including Sunday, in cutting somebody 
 else's throat, and getting his own cut in return. According 
 to Mr. Froude, it was a miracle that there were a hundred 
 people left in Ireland at the time when there were three, 
 four, or five millions. What would you say, my friends, if 
 I went back to Ireland or England, after my year's residence 
 in New York ; and if I said in a public lecture, " Do you 
 know what life is in New York, or Brooklyn, or Jersey 
 City? Every family is independent; and every father of a 
 family, with his sons, is engaged every day in cutting their 
 neighbors' throats ; and I will give you proof of it — their 
 own newspapers. They tell us that at this moment there 
 are eighteen or twenty men in jail in New York for murder ; 
 how in the saloons and drinking-places they stab one an- 
 other, and they shoot one another. Tiiey tell us hov/^ men 
 are knocked down in the street ; how a gentleman from 
 Kentucky, the other day, walked out of the hotel, and sight 
 nor light of him was never seen again. This is the way 
 they live in New York, — worse than a parcel of savages, — 
 worse than the red Indians." Now I ask you, if I went 
 back to Dublin or London, and said these words, how would 
 you feel about it ? Would you feel quite pleased in your 
 minds ? Would you say I was telling the truth ? or would 
 you not say, " Surely, I never thought that Father Tom 
 Burke was such an infernal liar ? " 
 
 I assert that there is not a people living more capable of 
 self-government and of making their own laws and living 
 
200 REPLY TO MB. FROUDE'8 ''LAST WORDS:' 
 
 ■under them than the Irish people to whom I belong : and I 
 will prove it from Mr. Fronde himself. I will not go out- 
 side of him. Mr. Fronde admits, as every thinking man 
 must, that the great elements of self-government among a 
 people are, first of all, respect for justice and for law ; sec- 
 ondly, fidelity to principle ; thirdly, afiection for their own 
 lavv s, and love of the law ; and fourthly, a capability of bo- 
 ing formed by those who govern them and direct them. 
 These are the four great attributes that belong to a people, 
 and that entitle them, if they have them, to the right of self- 
 government. I grant you, that if a race or a people had no 
 respect for the law ; — if tliey despised the law, and were anx- 
 ious to violate the law precisely because it was the law, that 
 that people do not deserve to have the power of making 
 their own laws ; and it would be a mercy from God if some- 
 body governed them and made laws for them. But are tbe 
 Irish that people ? Listen, my friends : Mr. Fronde, in the 
 course of his lectures, has quoted frequently a great author- 
 ity in Irish history, viz. : Sir John Davis, who was Attor- 
 ney-General in the reign of James the First. This was an 
 Englishman — or I believe, indeed, a Welshman — that came 
 over from England for tlie express purpose of j^lunderiug 
 the Irish of their property ; and he, accordingly, accumula- 
 ted vast wealth, and had great estates in Ireland. Yet this 
 man writes these words : " There is no people under Heaven 
 that love equal and fair justice like the Irish." " There is no 
 people," he -adds, " who are more willing to submit to fair, 
 impartial justice, even though it go against themselves, than 
 the Irish." Elsewhere he writes, " AVhen things are peaceful, 
 and there is no war going on, the Irish are far more fearful 
 of offending against the law than the English." If I quoted 
 from some Donough O'Brien, or some Terence O'Neill, or if 
 I quoted the " Four Masters," for this, Mr. Fronde would 
 turn round on me and say : " Oh, ho ! Do you hear the 
 Friar quoting the old Franciscans, — the old Irish Monks ! 
 Oh!" he would say, (if he knew Irish) — " 5o T)-oti<v^|ie <v 
 Di<v <x-i|i-i<x6! " but he hasn't the grace to know it. 
 
 But I have been reviewing the lectures in which I an- 
 swered Mr. Fronde ; and although a New York newspaper 
 has charged me with quoting Catholic authorities, I protest 
 
REPLY TO MB. FROUDE'S ''LAST WORDS:' 201 
 
 to yoTi, my friends, I can say with truth, from the first 
 W()rds of those lectures down to the last, every single author- 
 ity that was quoted by me was a Protestant or an English- 
 man, And does not the history of Ireland bear out the 
 truth of what Sir John Davis says ? There were two par- 
 ties in Ireland for 700 years, my friends ; these v/ere the old 
 native Irish, the Mac's and the O's, — the O'Connors, the 
 O'Briens, the McMurroughs, the O'Bp^nes, the O'Tooles, 
 the O'Neills, and the O'Donnells. These were the genuine 
 Irish : it was to these men that God Almighty had given 
 Ireland ; and the soil was theirs, for they held it by the 
 right by which every people hold their own land, viz. : the 
 right of a gift from God. Then came the Normans, the 
 Fitzgeralds, the De Courceys, the Butlers, the Burkes ; and 
 when they entered Ireland, they became, in a hundred years, 
 *' more Irish than the Irish themselves." That is the old 
 phrase. Mr. Froude quotes it, and says: " Perhaps Father 
 Burke never heard of that phrase ! " The Lord be praised ! 
 as if we didn't all know that phrase since we were weaned. 
 But I may remark, in all Mr. Froude's reply to me, that he 
 takes it for granted — I suppose because I am an Irishman — 
 that I know nothing about my native land. " Perhaps 
 Father Burke doesn't know this," and " perhaps Father 
 Burke didn't read that ; " but I will tell him about this and 
 that. " Perhaps Father Burke never heard that the Normans 
 were more Irish than the Irish themselves." They were. 
 But of all the traits of the Irish character that the}^ took 
 up, the most prominent amongst those, in which they beoame 
 truly " more Irish than the Irish themselves," was their love 
 of fighting and of devilment in general. They became the 
 most unruly lot in the land ; and we have the proof of it in 
 this: that we have the Earl of Surrey writing home to Henry 
 the Eighth, who had sent him to Ireland, telling him about 
 the Irish Chieftains — the Mac's and the O's; he says, "they 
 are wise men, your Majesty, and good and quiet men ; a 
 great deal better than the English." 
 
 If then the first element and the first attribute of a 
 
 people to entitle them to self-government, be their respect 
 
 for justice and for law, I hold, upon the evidence of English 
 
 authorities, that no man can deny to the Irish nation 'the 
 
 9* 
 
202 REPLY TO MR. FROUDE'8 ''LAST WORDS:' 
 
 right given by God to every people to govern themselvea 
 according to their own laws. But there is another trait in 
 the character of the Irish people that Mr. Froude brings out, 
 both in his lectures and in former essays ; and it is well 
 worthy of remark. He says : " They are a people that are 
 singularly adapted to good government." And do you 
 know the instance he gives? He says, in one of his es- 
 says : 
 
 " Take a wild, ragged peasant boy — one that is willing to 
 fling up his caubeen into the air, and hurrah for Smith 
 O'Brien, and hurrah for every Fenian, and hurrah for every 
 Irish patriot. Catch that boy " — 
 
 " Catch" him ! as if he were talking of some young beast 
 or wild savage ! — 
 
 " Catch hiui, drill him, and teach him, and in a few years 
 you will have one of the finest policemen of any people on 
 the face of the earth." 
 
 And this he gives as a very good instance that the Irish 
 people, as he asserts, beyond all other people, are capable 
 of a perfect discipline, under good, wise government. Now, 
 I take him on that point; and I say, if, according to you, 
 my learned friend, a year or two of discipline and of justice 
 and of good government will make such a perfect subject 
 out of an Irishman, tell us, if you please, Mr. Froude, how 
 is it that for seven hundred years you have never been able to 
 make good subjects out of them ? The reason is that, for 
 seven hundred years, Ireland has never known, for twenty- 
 four consecutive hours, what good government or sensible gov- 
 ernment meant. The Scripture says that one of the greatest 
 curses that can fall upon a people is to give them a child for 
 their king : that is to say, a child without reason, without 
 wisdom. And the curse of Ireland has been that she has 
 been governed fur seven hundred years, not by one child, 
 nor by one booby, but by a nation of boobies that never 
 knew how to govern. Any other people under the same 
 government would have been driven mad. The Irish have 
 only been made national — every man of them — to the heart's 
 core. 
 
 The third great element that asserts a people's right to 
 
BEPLT TO MR. FROUDE'S ''LAST WORDS:' oqs 
 
 g(tvevn tliemselves is their fidelity to principle. A mao 
 without principle cannot govern himself; and a nation with- 
 out principle loses the sacred right to self-government by 
 the judgment of God. What do I mean by principle? I 
 mean certain ideas of right and wrong, fixing themselves ii^ 
 the mind and in the heart and in the conscience of the 
 people, anji taking such hold of that mind and heart and 
 conscience that no power on earth or in hell can tear those 
 principles out of the national life. Show me a single prin- 
 ciple in ihe history of the English people to which they have 
 clung with this fervor. There is not one, except, indeed, if 
 you will, the princi[)le of extending their empire by robbery 
 and by the confiscation of their neighbors' goods. Y/as the 
 princi})le of religion so fixed in their minds ? No ; for at 
 the bickling of Henry VIII. they changed their religion. 
 Was the principle of devotion to the thione so fixed in tlieir 
 minds '? Is o ; for at the wave of Cromwell's sword all Eng- 
 land bowed before him ; and England cheered him in the 
 day when he cut ofi' the head of England's king. What 
 principle is there revealed in the philosophy of their history, 
 for which that people were ever prepared to sufter, much 
 less to die'? Now, the whole history of the Irish race, 
 from the day that their history dawns upon us, down to 
 this hour, is the assertion of an eternal principle, no matter 
 at what sacrifice or what cost. The first and strongest princi- 
 ple that can govern the mind, the heart, and the conscience 
 of any man, and, consequently, of any people, is their fidelity 
 to what they know to he the truth and their duty to God. 
 Unless you admit this religious principle in the mind and in 
 the cmiscience of the man with whom you have to deal, the 
 less you have to say to him, the less you trust him, the bet- 
 ter. Tell me, my friends, is there a man amongst you who 
 would place, say $10,000, in trust, depending upon the honor 
 of a man who told you he had no religious principle whatever ; 
 that he had no rules governing his conscience ; that he did 
 not care a snap of his fingers for religion ? You would take 
 good care to keep your money out of his hands, I tell you. 
 Ireland, for fifteen hundred years, has held the Catholic 
 faith among the nations. The Catholic faith has three ef- 
 fects operating upon the man, and, consequently, upon the 
 
204: REPLY TO MR. FROUDE'S ''LAST WORDS:' 
 
 Deople who profess it. First of all, it acts upon the intel- 
 lect as an intellectual conviction of the strongest kind, as- 
 senting and consenting to the truth. Secondly, it acts upon 
 the heart, purifying the affections and strengthening all the 
 emotions of the spirit in man. Thirdly, it acts upon the 
 conscience, in the form of a strict, immutable, unchanging law, 
 to which every man who professes it, — be he great or small, 
 gentle or simple, — must bow down and conform himself alike. 
 I assert that the Catholic religion alone possesses this triple 
 influence over the intelligence, heart, and conscience of man ; 
 and I will prove it in three words, although it does not enter 
 into the subject of my lecture. First of all, among all re- 
 ligions, it alone acts upon the intellect. The Catholic relig- 
 ion alone tells a man what to believe, and tells him that with 
 so much certainty that he is not at liberty to change it. The 
 best Protestant in the United States can become a Methodist, 
 or a Presbyterian, or a Quaker, or a Mormon, or anything 
 you like. He will go to hear the Eev. Mr. So-and-so this 
 Sunday ; and he will go to hear the Eev. Mr. Somebody-else 
 on the next Sunda3\ On one day he will hear the Eev. Mr. 
 So-and-so say that black is white; and the next Sunday 
 Eev. Mr. Such-a-one will tell him that white is black. He 
 has no fixed principle of belief; he has no real, unchang- 
 ing, intellectual faith at all. His mind is like the open high- 
 way, where every traveller can pass along. The Catholic 
 religion alone influences the heart ; and I assert this for her 
 on the simple ground that she alone takes hold of the heart 
 of man, and fixes it forever in one form of afiection or love. 
 If she calls that man to the priesthood, she consecrateg him 
 forever to the love of the Church, the altar, and the sduls of 
 his brethren. Not a single thought, nor aftection, nor emo- 
 tion of any other love must ever enter that consecrated 
 mind, or must ever be let into his heart. She seals, with 
 her sacramental blessing, the matrimonial bonds, and they 
 are fixed forever, — that man and that woman. Heaven and 
 earth may be moved ; every other engagement may be bro- 
 ken ; every other oath may be violated ; but the Catholic 
 Church* says that the oath which binds the husband to the 
 wife, and the wife to the husband, is an oath as immutable, 
 in mutual fidelity and love, and as unchanging ar, the oath 
 which binds Christ to His Church. 
 
REPLY TO MB. FROUDITS ''LAST WORDS:' 205 
 
 linallj, she alone lays hold of the conscience of a man, 
 shakes him, brings him face to face with himself, teaches 
 him to look at himself with fearless eye, teaches him, in 
 her sacraments and in her confessional, to bring up all 
 that was basest, vilest, meanest and most shameful of his 
 sinsj to lay them out there under his own eyes, and con- 
 fess them with his lips. And I say that this is the first 
 principle of fidelity in a nation, — fidelity to the principles 
 of their religion. For fifteen hundred years, Ireland, in- 
 tellectually, heartily, and conscientiously, has held that 
 Catholic faith. For three hundred years the Danes endeav- 
 ored to change that faith into paganism ; for the Danish war 
 was a religious war. Ireland fought ; fought with heroic 
 strength, fought with unwearying arm, fought Avith undying 
 though bleeding heart ; and for three hundred years she 
 struggled; until at length she cast the Dane to the earth, 
 and the Christ put his foot upon the neck of tlie Pagan 
 Thor of the Scandinavian. Another cycle of three hun- 
 dred years came, and it was no longer the Dane, but 
 it was the Saxon that held his sword at the throat of 
 Ireland, and said, even as the Dane of old said to her, 
 *' Oh, Erin, Paganism or death ; " so he said to her, 
 " Protestantism or death." And Ireland answered, as she 
 had answered the Dane of old : " I will fight, I will sufter, 
 I will die. All this I know how to do ; and well. Bat my 
 faith I never will change from God, from His Christ, and 
 from His Holy Church." And just as, after three hundred 
 years of war, on that Good Friday morning, the sun, as it 
 rose in the heavens, beheld an Irish King, with his Irish 
 army, triumphant, pealing forth their notes of gladness 
 over the stricken and conquered Danes ; so, after three hun- 
 dred years of the second cycle, the sun arose, on that fair 
 May morning, in 1829, and beamed upon the face of the 
 great O'Connell and the Irish nation, v/aving, over the 
 ruined battlements of the tyrant old blood-stained Estab- 
 lished Protestant Church of Ireland, the glorious banner of 
 civil and religious equality and freedom which was to be 
 ours forever. 
 
 Does Mr. Froude tell me, or tell America, that, — our peo- 
 ple having thus stood in the gap, for six hundred years,. 
 
206 BEPLY TO MR FROUDE'8 ''LAST WORDS." 
 
 faithful to the first principle — the religious principle — the 
 principle which includes every other form of virtue and 
 principle, and which, if a man is faithful to it, will make 
 him honest, pure, and faithful in all his commercial, domes- 
 tic, civil, and national relations ; — does this man mean to tell 
 me that a people that have never shown that fidelity to 
 princii)le, either to God or to king, are fitted by the Al- 
 mighty God to govern and make laws for such a people as 
 the Irish ? 
 
 It is worthy of remark, my friends, that the loyalty to 
 God, which distinguished Irish Catholics, was carried into 
 their other relations of life ; and none were so loyal, even 
 to kings that were unjust to them, I scarcely mention 
 this in their favor ; — I scarcely look upon it as praise- 
 worthy ; yet I must say, whenever England rebelled against 
 her king, Ireland stood up and said : " I will not change 
 from him ; if he was my king yesterday, he has not for- 
 feited his right; and I will be faithful to him to-day." 
 Charles the First was King of England and Ireland : Eng- 
 land rebelled against him ; the people and Parliament rose 
 against him ; the Scotch sent down their army to fight 
 against him. Ireland came out like one man, and said : 
 *' This man has done nothing to forfeit my allegiance. I 
 will not give up my legitimate monarch." James the Sec- 
 ond fled from England, and the English people at once 
 said : " Oh, let him go." (And, dear knows, they were 
 right ! ) Poor, foolish Ireland, strong in the principle of 
 loyalty, — strong in principle, — said : " I will fight for him ; 
 for he was my king. If he was my king yesterday, and I 
 was obliged to obey him, why should I not obey him to- 
 day ? " They took the field, and bled profusely. I men- 
 tion this only to show you that, if Mr. Froude's argument 
 against Irish self-government is based upon Irish want of 
 principle, I gather up the refutation of his assertions from 
 out tlie history of England; and I fling them into his face, 
 and tell him to go home again. 
 
 The Irish people have shown the four great attributes 
 which entitle a people to self-government: namely, that 
 they not only love justice and obey the law, but that they 
 love the law, provided it be a just and natural Jaw; and 
 
BEPLT TO MR FROUDE'S ''LAST WORDS:' 207 
 
 allo\r that law to sink into tlieir lives : that they are willing 
 to conform all their actions to it ; and that their love of 
 good law is only second to the love which they bear for 
 their religion. This I will prove. For four hundred 
 years, England strove, with might and main, to change the 
 laws of Ireland : and she failed. From the year that 
 Strongbow landed, in 1169, until that year, in the six- 
 teenth century, when Henry the Eighth was proclaimed 
 " King of Ireland," — nay, for many years after, — the Irish 
 people, in spite of all the efforts of England, clung to their 
 old Brehon laws, lived under them, and obeyed them. 
 And I tell you they were right. I tell you, my friends, 
 that there is one portion of Irish history that is not suffi- 
 ciently known, — not sufficiently considered by the people, 
 either in Ireland or America, — nor by historians, like my 
 friend, Mr. Froude. We are all accustomed to speak, 
 to-day, of the Consiitutiou of America as one of the most 
 glorious, — perliaps the most glorious, — on the face of the 
 earth. And why? Because that Constitution gives the 
 most liberty of any other, — the most liberty to every 
 citizen of the State, no matter how humble he may be; 
 because that Constitution will not i-ecognize' the right 
 of any one man in the State to injure or tyrannize over 
 another : — because that Constitution admits the State gov- 
 • ernments on terms of equality, — every State having its 
 own laws, having its own government, having its own 
 Executive, for its own affiairs; — because that Constitution 
 has known how to reconcile the individual liberty, — the 
 State liberty, — with the strong central government which is 
 represented in the President of the United States, who is 
 elected every four years. If we look back at the ancient 
 nations of Europe, there never was anything like the gi'cat 
 American Republic. We do not find it. We do not find 
 the State governments in any of the old nations, or in any of 
 the modern nations of Europe. But this very day wo find 
 England, — having robbed Ireland of her State government, 
 ■ — having robbed Scotland of her State government. Vv'e 
 find Bismarck plotting to rob the German States of their 
 State governments, and concentrate all in the hands of three 
 or four men that they may have absolute power over the 
 
5108 REPLY TO MR FROUDE'S ''LAST WORDS:'' 
 
 lives, and, certainl}^, over the liberties of their fellow-subjects. 
 AVe find nothing like the American Constitution, for indi- 
 vidual libei'ty, elsewhere. We find nothing like the Ameri- 
 can Constitution in that grand pi-inci2:>le, that the wisdom of 
 the whole nation is appealed to ; every man is asked his 
 opinion : '* Who is the best statesman ? — who is the wisest, 
 the bravest, and the most virtuous man ? — tell us who he is ; 
 and we will put him in the Pi-esidency, and make him, for 
 the time being, supreme magistrate and ruler of the land." 
 If you go back to the most ancient nations, you will find 
 notliing of this, until you come upon the ancient Celtic 
 Constitution of Ireland. There, my friends, will you find 
 the very model and tj^pe of that glorious government which 
 Washington, and Jetierson, and the other heroes of your 
 revolutionary era established for the happiness of this land. 
 They found the model of the American Constitution in the 
 ancient Celtic Constitution of Ireland. The land was 
 divided into five great portions ; and each portion w^as rec- 
 ogTiized as an independent State. INIunster, Connaught, 
 Ulster, Leinster, and Meath, wei-e perfectly independent, 
 one from another. They were governed by great chiefs, who 
 were elected by every man in the land. Every man had his 
 voice and his vote. The tribe elected their chief. The 
 tribe elected a man who was to succeed the chieftain. And 
 these five great nations, or " Five Bloods," as they were* 
 called, enjoyed, on the Democratic principle, their State 
 Kights and State independence. Then, at certain times, 
 they had the election of their President. They came to- 
 gether and elected the bravest and best, wisest and most 
 prudent and most virtuous man, and placed him upon the 
 throne in Tara, as universal King, or ^Inb-niSj of ^H Ireland. 
 He governed the various States ; but they were careful, and 
 he was careful, to respect their independence. There was 
 no centralization. The King of Munster, the Prince of 
 Ulster, the King of Connaught, the Kings of Meath and 
 Leinster, rode down from the slopes of Tara, — after having 
 elected their supreme m-onarcli, — they rode down as free, 
 as independent in State rights, as if they had never elected 
 a chief to govern them all. No matter wliat were the faults, 
 — and they were many, — of that old Irisli Constitution, I 
 
REPLY TO MR FROUDE'8 ''LAST WORDS:' 209 
 
 claim for it this glory, in this century of ours, — that the 
 American Constitution is nothing more or less than a faith- 
 ful copy of the old Irish laws, under which our fathers 
 lived, in peace and in haj)piness, until in a moment of the 
 anger of God,^ — even as fire was let down upon the cities of 
 old, — the Saxon was let in, as a curse, upon Ireland. 
 
 If the time permitted, I could contrast the freedom and 
 equality of these grand Republican principles of the Irish 
 Constitution, — I could contrast its workings with the giind- 
 ing, absolute tyranny of that feudal system under which 
 England was governed, — and w^hich they endeavored to es- 
 tablish in Ireland. The King was absolute, — lord and mas- 
 ter of every inch of land : it was his, — his personal property; 
 and any man who held land, held it by virtue of a grant 
 from the King, on condition of doing v/hatever service the 
 King commanded him to do. In other words, he held it 
 under a condition of slavery. Then, the owner of the land 
 held the tenants upon the land as mere serfs or slaves. If 
 he injiired them in person or property, there was no redress. 
 Their domestic affairs were left under his control. If a son 
 or daughter of a family died, he could seize upon their por- 
 tion ; he could seize upon their property and squander it ; 
 and no one coukl call him to account. The King of England 
 could, and often did, beggar the first families in the land ; 
 and no one could call him to account ; because by the feu- 
 dal law, the King was not accountable for whatever he did. 
 
 Well, my friends, there was a gi-eat laugh, the other night 
 (in " Association Hall," I believe they call it ; — I was 
 thinking it was " Conciliation Hall," — remembering the old 
 places) ; there was a great laugh raised by the English his- 
 torian at the expense of the poor Irish Friar. " Oh," said 
 he, " whatever else Father Burke is, he is a wonderful man 
 at totting up numbers." Then he was kind enough to make 
 a tot for me that I never made for myself. I asserted (and 
 not upon my own authority; but I expressly said that I 
 heard men say), that there w^ere, jDrobably, fourteen niillions 
 of human beings, of Irish descent and Irish blood, in this 
 land of America. Making up the account, briefly, with the 
 millions that fled from Ireland, I asserted that, perhaps, there 
 were eight millions of our people who came to this land. 
 
210 REPLY TO MB. FBOUDEPS ''LAST WOBDS:' 
 
 Mr. Froude totted the eiglit Diillions up to fourteen, and he 
 made a tot of twentj^-two millions. That had not entered 
 into my head ; but he was kind enough to lend me the use 
 of his brains and his figures. Then Mr. Froude comes out 
 with his account. According to him, of all the millions in 
 America, there are only four millions, altogether, with a 
 drop of Irish blood in their veins! Well, perhaps I over- 
 shot the mark a little. I protest to you, I do not think I 
 did. I think that, if the men, women, and children of Irish 
 descent, — in some way or other of Irish blood, — were put 
 on one side, in these United States of America, — that men 
 v/ould be greatly surprised at the millions they would foot 
 up. We were, in Ireland, nearly nine millions and a quar- 
 ter, in 184G-7. There are not much more than half that 
 number in Ireland to-day ; and there have not been, for some 
 years. It is acknowledged that a million and a half or two 
 millions may have been swept away by the visitation of 
 God, — by the terrible famine and by the pestilence that en- 
 sued. But, still, you have to account for three or four mil- 
 lions. They must have emigi-ated, — have gone somewhere : 
 they did not fly up to the moon. Then, since that year of 
 '47, every year has sent out to America its hundreds of 
 thousands of Irishmen. They must be foimd somewhere. 
 Then, Irishmen have families, like other peoj)le ; and, gen- 
 erally speaking, good long families too, God bless them ! 
 But I need not enter upon this subject; it has already been 
 settled by statistics. In a popular Irish journal of New 
 York, this very week, it is stated that there must be at least 
 more than twelve millions of Irish descent in America ; and 
 I hold that twelve millions is not so far from fourteen as 
 four millions is from twelve. If I made a mistake, I only 
 overshot the mark by two millions : Mr. Froude undershot 
 it by eight millions. And I thank God that there are, in 
 America, eight millions more Irish people, and people of 
 Irish blood, than Mr. Froude thought. It is a portentous 
 state of affairs for the learned gentleman. Perhaps, if he 
 Icnew that his four millions meant something more like four- 
 teen, he would have been more careful, and have taktm 
 thought, before he came to America to blackguard us. 
 
 The next great point that Mr. Froude makes against me 
 
REPLY TO MR. FROUDE'S ''LAST WORDS."' 211 
 
 is where lie states that I said, that when the Irish rose in 
 the " rebellion," as he calls it, of 1641, — I denied that they 
 massacred thirty-eight thousand Protestants. My friends, 
 you know there are two ways of looking at everything, and 
 there are two names for almost everything, even the name 
 of a man. A man's friends call him the finest fellow in the 
 world, — a fine, hearty fellow, — and his enemies say he is a 
 dirty blackguard. There was a rising in Ireland, in 1G41 ; 
 — Mr. Froude calls it a "rebellion." The circumstances of 
 that rising were these : The Parliament of England rebelled 
 against their King ; the people of England rebelled against 
 their King ; the Scotch rebelled against their King, though 
 he was one of their own countrymen, and had their Scotch 
 blood in his veins. The Irish people arose, in the name of 
 the King ; and they demanded of him, as a reward (literally 
 and truly, I can call it nothing else,) — they rose in the name 
 of the King, and demanded leave to live in their own land, 
 and the free exercise of their own religion. The King prom- 
 ised he would give this to them ; and this promise was called 
 the " graces " of the King. A certain Irish noble, — Sir 
 Phelim O'Neill, — headed that rising; and lie produced a 
 document, with the Royal Seal of the Majesty of England to 
 it ; and he told the Irish people that he had authority from 
 the King to call upon them to rise. That document, my 
 friends, vras a forgery, like many another document. It was 
 as gi*eat a forgery as the " Bull " of Pope Adrian, that pre- 
 tended to give Ireland to England, — as confounded a forgery 
 as ever came out of hell. Sir Phelim O'Neill, when he was 
 dying, acknowledged that that document vv^as a forgery. 
 But the Irish people believed him when he said it was a gen- 
 uine document ; and they rose in the name of the King, be- 
 lieving in the commission that Sir Phelim O'Neill produced. 
 And Mr. Froude calls this " rebellion." because this was a 
 forged document. Now, suppose a man came into yovir 
 house, produced a bank check and said, " \Yiil you cash that 
 for me ? " You look at it and sa}^, " Is it all right ? " He 
 tells you that it is ail right; and, believing it to be all right, 
 you cash it. Then you go to the bank, present it for pay- 
 ment, and discover that it is a forgery : and the banker 
 takes you by the collar and says : " You thundering robber ! 
 
212 REPLY TO MB. FR0UDEP8 ''LAST WORDS." 
 
 do you want to rob me ? " Why, you would say : " I am 
 very sorry for it. I have lost my money. But do not call 
 me a thief ; because I did not know that it Avas a forgery." 
 Now, Mr. Froude calls this rising in the King's name, in 
 1641, a " rebellion," under a document to which was at- 
 tached, fraudulently, a seal (but still the real Seal of Eng- 
 land) ; and though the Irish people knew nothing about it, 
 he turns on us and calls us rebels for this ! And this is the 
 first thing that he asserts, — that the rising in '41 was a "re- 
 bellion." But he adds, a moment after, that the Catholics 
 arose, and that the very first thing they did was to slaughter 
 thirty-eight thousand Protestants. And he gives, as author- 
 ity. Sir John Temple. Well, my friends, Mr. Froude knew 
 very well, when he was quoting that authority, that there 
 was another authority that said there were two hundred 
 thousand Protestants killed ! Two hundred thousand ! Sir 
 William Petty (whom this learned gentleman quotes as an 
 authority several times, " Sir William says this," and " Sir 
 William says that ;") Sir William Petty says that there was 
 great cruelty. Mr. Froude does not quote him; he pares 
 the "massacre" down to thirty-eight thousand. And do 
 you know the reason ? The secret is, Sir William Petty 
 overshot the mark, and made out that there were more Prot- 
 estants killed, that year, than there were in all Ireland! 
 All the Protestants in Ireland did not come up to two hun- 
 dred thousand, at the time. Sir William forgot this ; and 
 he said two hundred thousand were massacred ; but ]Mr. 
 Froude remembered it well, and would not quote him. He 
 thought, " I will not quote him ; but I v/ill quote the other 
 liar, that says there were thirty-eight thousand." Is it not 
 a strange thing, my friends, that at that very time,' — in that 
 very year, — a Presbyterian minister went through Ireland, 
 for the express purpose of finding out how many people were 
 killed ; and he declares that there were only four thousand 
 one hundred at the very outside ; but he does not believe 
 that there were so many. And, yet, this man comes to 
 America, and repeats again, and emphatically, the old lie, 
 that has been exploded years and years ago ; and he asks the 
 American people to believe that we Irish cannot govern our- 
 selves ; for he says, — "This is what they did before; and 
 
BEPLY TO MB. FROUDE'S ''LAST WOBDS:' 213 
 
 this is what they will do again, if yon give them the cnrse 
 of ' Home Rnle,' and the power of making their own laws ! " 
 Bnt, on the other hand, we have the account of another 
 massacre, in which three thousand Catholics were killed by 
 the garrison of Carrickfergus. Mr. Fronde says : " Oh ! 
 Father Burke knows how to tot up well ; he multiplies his 
 numbers by a hundred. There were only thirty persons 
 killed, and he says, * three thousand ; ' that is a hundred 
 times thirty ! " Well, my friends, according to Mr. Froude, 
 there were only thirty 2^ersons killed ; but according to a Prot- 
 estant author, who wrote shortly aftei', there were thirty fam- 
 ilies j and there is a great deal of difference between thirty 
 persons and thirty Irish families , of ten or twelve persons 
 each. But I meet him thus : — within ten years after the 
 event took 2:>lace, there was an official account, printed and 
 published in London, by an Englishman, asserting that there 
 were three thousand men, women, and children murdered; 
 — that the man who published that account publicly defied 
 any one to contradict it ; and the very men who were there 
 in Ireland at the time, — who had an interest in contradict- 
 ing it, — were afraid to contradict this man : and none ever 
 gainsaid it. Can it be true that there were only thirty 
 people slain, as Mr. Froude says there v/ere, — when a man 
 came out, within ten years after the event, in London, and 
 published his account, and said there w-ere three thousand 
 people killed, and defied anybody to contradict him. And 
 each of the interested parties knew well that this man had 
 made such a statement ; yet not a man of them ever contra- 
 dicted him. 
 
 Mr. Froude attaches great importance to this pretended 
 massacre of '41 ; and he makes his usual appeal. He says : 
 " Let a Commission be sent over to Dublin to search the 
 State papers ; let the Lord Chancellor be on it ; let this lord 
 and that lord be on it ; and they will find that I am right, and 
 that Father Burke is wrong." I will answer the whole thing 
 at once. I will not go rummaging among State papers; for 
 the majority of these State papers are infernal lies, written 
 by courtiers, interested men, — men who at the time were en- 
 gaged in plundering the Irish, and were anxious to find 
 some excuse for plundering them, — accusing them of every 
 
214 REPLY TO MR. FROUDES ''LAST WORDS:' 
 
 crime, — just as Mr. FrOude himself is doing, — in order to 
 justify the asking of a verdict against them ; — so these men 
 that wrote the bulk of these State papers were acknowledged 
 interested parties, whose interest it was to abuse and vilify 
 the Irish. I will not go to these State papers, and take their 
 bigoted statements. But, there is the historical fact, that, 
 when the accusation was made, at the very time it was pub- 
 lished, it was refuted, and the refutation of it was never so 
 much as questioned or denied by the very men who had a 
 hand in the concoction of that pretended " massacre." 
 
 Mr. Froude, I am sorry to say, repeats and reiterates 
 the charge of cowardice against the Irish. In answer- 
 ing my lectures, Mr. Froude said that he never doubted 
 Irish courage, — he never denied it. But, last night, in 
 Philadelphia, he repeated his statement, that the Irish 
 did not know how to fight. It is strange, too, for he 
 acknowledges, and says in another part of his lecture, that 
 all the evils of Ireland, — all the miseries of Ireland, — arose 
 out of the irrepressible love the people had for fighting ; 
 and, in another place, he comes out and says they did not 
 know how to fight: and he asserts again that the Irish 
 troops did not behave well at the battle of the Boyne. 
 But what then ? What have I to say ? What I have to 
 say is not on Catholic evidence, nor on Irish evidence, but 
 it is on English Protestant authority. The Duke of Ber- 
 \\dck, an Englishman, declares, — and he was in command at 
 the battle of the Boyne, — that James — (you all know the 
 name we give him) — King James had brought all the 
 French veteran troops around him, to guard his person; 
 and he left the brunt of the battle to fall upon his Irish 
 regiments. King James on that day, — between the French 
 and Irish and all, — was only able to put twenty-three 
 thousand men into the field ; whereas the muster-roll of 
 William of Orange totted up to fifty thousand men, and 
 fifty pieces of artillery. King James had only twenty-three 
 thousand men, all told, and twelve pieces of cannon ; but he 
 sent away six of them the night before the battle ; so that 
 there were only six left. William crossed the Boyne ; and 
 the Duke of Berwick tells us that the Irish infantry and 
 cavalry charged that entire army ten times, before they re- 
 
BEPLT TO MB. FBOUDE'S ''LAST WOBDSy 215 
 
 tired from the field. Ten distinct times, he says, the Irish 
 infantry charged, — filing themselves upon them, like lions or 
 tigers. And it was only when they found that it was not 
 in the power of human beings, for so small an army, reduced 
 to a few thousand men, to make an impression upon the 
 ranks of fifty thousand veterans — it was only then that they 
 retired from the field. But we have the list of killed and 
 wounded, which is the surest test, whether men behave well 
 in a battle or not. AVe find that the Irish gave more than 
 they got ; for we find that the list of killed and wounded in 
 the Irish army did not come up to that of the English army 
 by nearly a thousand men. 
 
 Take the siege of Athlone. Mr. Froude tells us that, at 
 Athlone, the Irish made no stand, but gave up a position 
 which, in the hands of brave men, would be impregnable. 
 Did they ? At the first siege of Athlone, — for there were 
 two sieges, as at Limerick, — in the first siege of Athlone, 
 Colonel Richard Grace, with eight hundred men, held the 
 town against the whole English army, and drove them back. 
 In the second siege of Athlone, Colonel Fitzgerald com- 
 manded four hundred men, on the Leinster side of the Shan- 
 non ; and held the " English town," as it was called, with 
 these four hundred men. There was an army of from fifteen 
 to eighteen thousand against him ; and he held that town, 
 until, out of the four huudred men, there were only two 
 hundred of the garrison left. Every man of them saw his 
 fellow-soldier fall by his side ; and still they fought. And 
 when they did retreat, they cut down an arch of the bridge 
 that spanned the Shannon between them and the Connaught 
 side of the town of Athlone. When the whole English be- 
 sieging army brought their tremendous artillery to cover 
 their troops as they flung planks across, that they might fall 
 upon that handful of two hundred Irish soldiers, then a 
 party, — some twenty men, — came out from Fitzgerald's gar- 
 rison, and in spite of the English artillery, in spite of 
 their musketry, and under their very eyes, they tore the 
 planks up again, and flung them into the stream. And out 
 of the twenty men only two returned into the city. If jMr. 
 Froude calls this cowardice, I do not know what he under- 
 stands by courage. I think it would be time enough for the 
 
216 REPLY TO MR. FBOUDE'S ''LAST WORDS.'' 
 
 learned gentleman to accuse the men of Ireland of being 
 cowards, when he finds that he can accuse the women of 
 Ireland of beuig cowards. When William of Orange laid 
 siege to Limerick, — in the first siege, — he battered down 
 the walls, until he made a breach thirty-six feet wide. He 
 then picked out twelve thousand of his best soldiers, and 
 sent them to enter the city through the broken walls. And 
 when they climbed the ruined ramparts, they found the 
 women of Limerick, — the pure-minded, holy maidens and 
 glorious mothers of Limerick, — standing side by side and 
 shoulder to shoulder with their brothers, their husbands, and 
 their fathers. And the women of Limerick beat back the 
 twelve thousand Englishmen ; so that when they withdrew, 
 they left two thousand of their dead before the walls of the 
 grand old city. 
 
 Moreover, the learned gentleman — (I declare I am begin- 
 ning to doubt whether he is a learned gentleman at all) — 
 says that, when James the First confiscated six counties of 
 "Ulster, — oh ! he says, it was all a piece of good nature on 
 the part of James to turn the Irish out of their land ; for 
 he let them all in again. It is true, he says, that he confis- 
 cated two millions five hundred thousand acres of Irish 
 land ; but he gave two millions of it back, and kept only five 
 hundred thousand acres for the Scotch and English that he 
 brought over. Well, first of all, I do not understand the 
 good-natured playfulness of turning men out of their pro- 
 perty. Even if he did let them back again, I think it was a 
 great inconvenience. How would you like it yourselves ? 
 Suppose the United States Marshal came to your door, and 
 ordered you out of your store, or premises, and had soldiers 
 to oblige you to go out, and kept you walking about the 
 streets three or four days, and then came and said : " Oh, 
 my fine fellow, you can go back again ; " how would you like 
 it ? The learned gentleman (as they call him) glosses over 
 the real state of this business. According to him, the Irish 
 got back two millions of acres out of two millions and a half. 
 May I ask, even if this were true, (and it is not true,) — 
 what right had James to keep the other half million ? If a 
 man had twenty dollars, and a pickpocket took that twenty 
 dollars out of his pocket, and then gave him back fifteen, 
 the first thing he would ask him is to give back the other 
 
REPLY TO MR. FROUDE'S ''LAST WORDS:' 217 
 
 five. But, according to Mr. "Froude, t]ie Irish were benev- 
 olently treated. They were robbed of two millions and a 
 half acres of choice land ; but they got "back two millions ; 
 and so they onglit to be happy and contented. James, he 
 says, did not absolutely take away these two million and a 
 half acres. According to Mr. Fronde, the Irish got them 
 back, provided they took the oath of allegiance? and the 
 oath of allegiance was simply an oath to be good and peace- 
 ful citizens ! But there was another oath that they were 
 expected to take, and were obliged to take ; and that was the 
 '* Oath of Supremacy," by which they abjured the Catholic 
 religion ; and, in any case, a man could not get his land back 
 until he declared his disbelief in the religion of his fathers, 
 — until he practically became an infidel or a Protestant. 
 Mr. Froude does not mention it ; but I will tell you who 
 mentions it. Cox, the historian, mentions it ; — the man 
 who wrote the history of the times tells us, ajid gives authority 
 for it ; — he tells us tliat it was in the written instructions to 
 the Protestants and Presbyterians that they were not to let 
 the Irish back, unless they took the " Oath of Supremacy." 
 And when they had swallowed the pill, had become Protes- 
 tants, — perjured themselves, — when the tempter had bribed 
 them to stain their souls with sin, — in what capacity were 
 they let back ? That is the question. The English settlers 
 found that the land was too much for them ; they found that 
 they could not till it, and work it ; and that they could not 
 get the Irish to do as the slaves and serfs of England did. 
 So they turned to the King, and said : " Where is the use 
 of giving us all this land, unless you allow us to employ the 
 Irish people who are here to work it ? " Then he gave them 
 leave to get the Irish to work it ; and let them build their 
 mud-cabins, and to be cottiers or tenants on their own inher- 
 itance, provided that they would first swear away their re- 
 ligion. This is the real state of the case. Nevertheless Mr. 
 Froude says James was so good, and so kind, and so benign, 
 that when he took away two millions and a half of acres, 
 he gave them all back again, only asking the original owners 
 to take the oath of allegiance ! There are two ways of tell- 
 ing a story; and I am beginning to think there are more 
 than two ways of writing history. 
 10 
 
218 BEPLT TO MR. FBOUDE'S ''LAST WOBDS.'' 
 
 Then Mr. Froude comes to tlie question of the Parliament, 
 • — the " Irish Parliament," he says ; — and he gives his argu- 
 ment ; on which I take him up, because it is the back-bone 
 of his whole case. He says to the American people : " Please 
 give me your verdict, and say, once for all, to the Irish in 
 America, to stop their nonsense about the independence of 
 Ireland ; and, as to the Irish at home, tell them to be quiet, — 
 to be good and peaceful, — and let us, English, make their 
 laws for them ; because, wdien they had the power to make 
 their own laws, they did not know how to make them. They 
 made bad laws; and the proof lies here: — In 1782, England 
 granted a total and complete independence to the Irish Par- 
 liament." That is quite true ; but how did she grant it ? 
 She granted it when the " Volunteers " drew up their can- 
 non, — had them loaded, — had their torches lighted, and 
 around the mouth of each cannon a label with these words 
 written on it : — " Freedom for Ireland or else — " So, my 
 learned friend says: "England granted Ireland her inde- 
 pendence in 1782," just in the same way as you would give 
 up your purse to a man you met on the street, who might 
 draw out of his pocket a Derringer revolver, and put it to 
 your throat, so that you felt the cold steel, and might say to 
 you: "Give me that purse, or take the contents of this !" 
 You might give it up, and then say : " What a fine liberal 
 fellow I was to give that man my purse ! " Ireland brought 
 the cannon right to the heart of England in '82, and said : 
 " Come, now, the question at issue between us is this : I 
 want free trade ; I want the power of making my own laws. 
 Give it to me ; or take the contents of this." England gave 
 it ; and then Mr. Froude comes over to America and says : 
 '* We were so good, — we gave them their independence ; but 
 they made a bad use of it." It was only sixteen years from 
 '82 to '98 ; and Mr. Froude says the Irish, being allowed to 
 make their own laws, went " from anarchy to conspiracy, and 
 from conspiracy into rebellion." I answer : First, Mr. 
 Froude is wrong when he says that it was the independence 
 of '82 and the political agitation of the time, that sprang up 
 with it, that occasioned the Kebellion of '98. I answer, se- 
 condly, that the independent Parliament of '82 did not re- 
 present the Irish people. In that Irish Parliament there were 
 
IIEPLT TO MR. FROUDE'S ''LAST WORDS:' 219 
 
 three hnndred members of the Irish House of Commons ; and 
 out of this three hundred, there were only seventy-two elected 
 by the people. All the rest were the nominees of the " pocket 
 boroughs," or " rotten boroughs," so called ; because, really, 
 all the landlords of the land, that owned them, picked up 
 every fellow that they thought would vote according to their 
 wishes and desires. There were only seventy-two elected by 
 the people. Who were the people, may I ask ? There were, 
 in that year, verging up to three millions of Catholics in Ire- 
 land, and between five hundred and six hundred thousand 
 Protestants. Whom did the Irish Parliament represent? 
 Here you have, on one side, half a million of comparative 
 strangers, — men who came into Ulster under James the 
 First ; Cromwellites, who were settled in Leinster and INIuns- 
 ter, and protected in their occupation by Cromwell and by 
 his successors. Were these men the Irish nation ? I^To ; 
 there was not a drop of Irish blood in their veins. They 
 had no Irish sympathies with them. Who were the Irish 
 nation? Three millions of the Irish people, who remained 
 firm as a -rock : first, to the religion of their fathers, and 
 secondly, to the love that they bore the green old land, 
 that was their mother ? They were the Irish people — the 
 nation ; and that Parliament of '82 represented only five 
 hundred thousand strangers. Not a single Catholic in. 
 Ireland sat in that Parliament ; not a single Catholic in 
 Ireland had even a vote to return a member to that Parlia- 
 ment. They might as well have been wild Indians ; they 
 might as well have been brute beasts. They had no recog- 
 nition; and I deny that the Parliament of 82, — free and in- 
 dependent, and in a great measure, patriotic as it was, — I 
 deny that it was a representative of the Irish nation. Grat- 
 tan himself seems to have felt remorse when he was claiming 
 the independence of the representation of so paltry a faction ; 
 for he said, " I never will ask the independence of six hun- 
 dred thousand Irishmen, while I leave three millions of 
 them in slavery." If that Parliament failed ; — even if the 
 experiment was a failure ; — I deny that it was " Home Eule " 
 at all. I deny that it was an Irish Parliament ; and I hold 
 that Mr. Froude has no business to tell us, because a few 
 Protestants and Orangemen, in 1782, did not know how to 
 
220 BEPLT TO MB. FROUDE'S ''LAST WORDS:' 
 
 go^ei-n Ireland, tlia.t, therefore, the Irish people do not 
 know how to elect members and make their own laws. But, 
 my friends, bad as that Parliament was, — corrupt as it was, 
 — I deny that it was the cause of the Rebellion of '98. I 
 deny that *' political agitation, leading to conspiracy," was 
 the cause of that Rebellion. No ; no ! So long as the Muse 
 of History writes, so long will it go down to future genera- 
 tions, that it was the premeditated design of the Prime Minis- 
 ter of England to precipitate the action of the Govei^nment, 
 and to drive the Irish people into the Rebellion of '98. It 
 was done calmly and coolly and for a purpose. William Pitt 
 resolved to i^ass the bill of Union, and rob the Irish people 
 of their Parliament ; and he could not do it unless he dis- 
 turbed the country by anarchy and war. He deliberately 
 goaded the Irish people into reljellion. He sent over troops 
 to Ireland, and fsinatics from England. He brought from 
 Germany the ferocious Hessians, who were quartered on the 
 people, and committed such ravages amongst them, — burning 
 their houses, killing their men, and worse than killing their 
 women, — that the Irish were maddened into rebellion. 
 Here is the proof of it, — here, from the gallant Sir Ralph 
 Abercrombie, who Avas made Commander-in-Chief in Ireland, 
 the Spring before the Rebellion. He found the army that 
 he came to command in such a state, that, after reproaching 
 them for their wickedness and insubordination, he gave up 
 the command, and washed his hands clean out of it. Sir 
 John Moore, the hero of Corunna, gives his testimony to the 
 same effect. Lord Moira, an Englishman, who gave evidence 
 before the House of Lords, deposes deliberately to the cruelty 
 and ferocity of the Hessian soldiers, who were let loose upon 
 the Irish people, and luaddened them into rebellion. Take 
 the case of the celebrated Father John Murphy, who headed 
 the rebels in '98. He was a quiet, unpretending priest, say 
 ing his " ofl&ce," visiting the sick, going about among the peo- 
 ple, taking care of his chapel and chapel-house, and going 
 through all the duties of an ordinary, hard-working parish 
 priest in the country. He was at a sick call, attending at 
 the bedside of a dying person ; and, when he came back, he 
 found his chapel burned to the ground, and the jooor people 
 gathered about the ruined sanctuary, huddled together in fear 
 
REPLY TO MR. FROUDSPS ''LAST WORDS:' 221 
 
 and terror ; for the soldiers, or " tlie army," as they used to 
 call them, had come down upon them. They asked him : 
 " In the name of God ! what are we to do ? It is impossible 
 to live in this country. It would be better to be dead ! " 
 And he answered, like a true man ; "It would not be bet- 
 ter to be dead ; but it would be better to take up the pikes 
 and, in the name of God, strike a blow for Ireland !" My 
 friends, I am not a warrior, I am not a man of war, nor of 
 blood, nor a man of revolution. I am the quietest and most 
 peaceable of men; but, I declare to you, I do not know 
 what I should have done, in Father John Murphy's position, 
 except what Father John himself did. 
 
 But, after all, all these things are questions of the past, 
 my friends ; and we are more interested in questions of the 
 present, and of the future, than we are in things of the past. 
 The question, after all, is — is this thing to be continued '? — 
 is all this injustice, all this coercion, all this aggravation of 
 a nation, and keeping it down, — all these assertions that the 
 people have no right, no title to govern themselves, — all this 
 justification of tyranny and spoliation, — is all this to. con- 
 tinue ? Well, according to Mr. Froude, it is ; and he is an 
 authority, because he has said, in one of his essays, " I don't 
 see any way out of the Irish difficulty, except one of two 
 things : first, let all the Irish go to America, and let us lose 
 sight of them altogether, and have the island to ourselves ; 
 or, secondly, let them go on in their old ways, and we will 
 have to coerce them into submission." Either exile or coer- 
 cion, my friends, according to Mr. Froude. Well, I answer : 
 I may tell Mr. Froude, — and I think with truth, — I do not 
 like bragging or boasting; but, I am not blind to the signs of 
 the times ; and I may tell Mr. Froude, and I think with 
 truth, that the Irish are not prepared to emigrate altogether. 
 I am not sure but it may be a pleasant tiling to cross the 
 Atlantic: — I did not find it pleasant. It may be a fine 
 thing, and a pleasant thing, to find a home, and freedom, 
 and everything that the heart can desire, in America, ilany 
 of you have found a home ; and if you all have found it, the 
 better pleased I will be. But, after all, there is such a coun- 
 try as Ireland on the face of the earth ; and a sweet old coun- 
 try I have always found her to be. There are such a people 
 
222 REPLY TO MR. FROUDE'S ''LAST WORPS:' 
 
 as fclie Irish j^eople, who have held that land for ages acd 
 ages, in weal and in woe. That land God gave to the Irish 
 people ; and, with the blessing, and under the hand of that 
 God, that land will belong to the Irish people until the day 
 of judgment. Mr. Fronde's scheme of universal emigra- 
 tion is a wild dream. I knew liim to be a philosopher ; I 
 suspected him to be a historian ; but I did not think or ima- 
 gine that he was a poet, until I heard him talk of the uni- 
 versal emigration of the Irish race. Well, then there re- 
 mains nothing more except to coerce us into submission ; by 
 which he means that, if the agitation for " Home Rule " con- 
 tinues, England will meet it in the old style, by a Coercion 
 Bill. This was the old legislation for Ireland. I remember, 
 in my own days, if the people wanted anything, — if the Cath- 
 olics wanted their emancipation, — if the people wanted mu- 
 nicipal or parliamentary reform, — the way that they were 
 treated by the English Government was to pass a coercion 
 bill ; — that is to say, if any meetings were held, all the peo- 
 ple attending them were to be fined, and the place was put 
 under martial law. The people were to be ground to the 
 very earth ; and no man was to be allowed to speak his opin- 
 ion. This is Mr. Fronde's second remedy. 1 may as well 
 tell him that the time for coercion bills has gone by. We 
 will have no more of them ; and I will tell you what has 
 assisted in passing them away forever. You will be sur- 
 prised to hear it from me ; I may as well speak my senti- 
 ments and my convictions ; and I verily believe that the 
 National Schools of Ireland, v/ith all their faults, have put 
 an end to coercion bills forever. You may as well try to 
 stop the sweeping of the hurricane by putting up your feeble 
 hands against it ; you may as well try to stop the lightnings 
 of heaven by holding up your fingers against them, as try to 
 stop by coercion the expression of the minds and desires of 
 an educated people. It will never be done. The Irish peo- 
 ple to-day are, at an average, as well educated as any other 
 people in the world. You rarely meet in Ireland, to-day, a 
 man or woman who does not know how to read and wiite ; 
 and you will rarely meet a man who does not feel a mixture 
 of joy and pride and anger when he reads or hears of the 
 wrongs and glories of his old country. " England," says 
 
REPLY TO MB. FEOUDE'8 ''LAST WORDS:' 223 
 
 Mr. Fronde, " is greatly afraid slie will have to go back to 
 measures of coercion again." I tell him, let England make 
 her mind easy ; she never will have to go back to them again ; 
 for the simple reason that she never will be able. 
 
 What future is before Ireland? Oh, my friends, what 
 can I say ? Before me lies the past of my native land : I 
 can weep over her wrongs. Before me lies the Ireland of 
 to-day, and I can sympathize with her sorrows. I believe 
 I can see the dawning of her hopes. Of the future it be- 
 comes me not specifically to speak. I am a man of peace, 
 not of war. It only remains for me to say that, next to the 
 duty that I owe to God and His holy altar, is the duty that 
 I owe to thee, oh ! land of Ireland ; to pray for thee ; to sigh 
 for thy coming glory ; and to be ready — whenever the neces- 
 sary conditions shall convince me that the fit hour has corae 
 — to take a man's part in the vindication of thy name. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 P^RT I. 
 
 THE " BULL OF ADEIA:tT lY." 
 
 THE GEEAT NORMAN FORGERY. 
 
 Wliat Dr. Thdner said of it, and Frmide suppressed. 
 
 [The annexed review of the controversy on the so-called ' ' Bull " 
 of Pope Adrian lY, , purporting to cede Ireland to Henry II. , was 
 contributed to the "imA Ecclesiastical Record'''' for November, 
 
 There was a time when it would be little less than trea- 
 son to question the genuineness of the Bull by which Pope 
 Adrian lY. is supposed to have made a grant of Ireland to 
 Henry the Second ; and, indeed, from the first half of the 
 thirteenth to the close of the fifteenth century, it was prin- 
 cipally through this supposed grant of the Holy See that the 
 English Government sought to justify their claim to hold 
 dominion in our island. However, opinions and times have 
 changed, and at the present day this Bull of Adrian has as 
 little bearino; on the connection between England and this 
 country as it could possibly have on the union of the Isle of 
 Man with Great Britain. 
 
APPENDIX. 225 
 
 On tlie otlier hand, many strange things have been said 
 during the past months in the so-called Nationalist jonr- 
 nals, whilst asserting the genuineness of this famous Bull. 
 I need scarcely remark that it does not seem to have been 
 the love either of our poor country or of historic truth that 
 inspired their declamation. It proceeded mainly from their 
 hatred to the Sovereign Pontiff, and from the vain hope that 
 such exaggerated statements might in some way weaken the 
 devoted affection of our people for Rome. 
 
 Laying aside such prejudiced opinions, the controversy as 
 to the genuineness of Adrian's Bull should be viewed in a 
 purely historical light, and its decision must depend on the 
 value and weight of the historical arguments which may be 
 advanced to sustain it. The following is a literal transla- 
 tion of the old Latin text of Adrian's Bull : — 
 
 " Adrian, Bishop, servant of the servants of God, to our 
 most dear Son in Christ, the illustrious King of the English, 
 greeting and the Apostolical Benediction. 
 
 ** The thoughts of your Highness are laudably and profit- 
 ably directed to the greater glory of your name on eai'tli and 
 to the increase of the reward of eternal happiness in heaven, 
 when as a Catholic Prince you propose to yourself to extelid 
 the borders of the Church, to announce the truths of Chris- 
 tian Faith to ignorant and barbarous nations, and to root 
 out the weeds of wickedness from the field of the Lord ; and 
 the more effectually to accomplish this, you implore the 
 counsel and favor of the Apostolic See. In which matter 
 we feel assured that the higher your aims are, and the more 
 discreet your pi-oceedings, the happier, with God's aid, will 
 be the result ; because those undertakings that ]:)roceed fi'om 
 the ardor of faith and the love of religion are sure always to 
 have a prosperous end and issue. 
 
 " It is beyond all doubt, as your Highness also doth ac- 
 knowledge, that Ireland, and all the islands upon Avhich 
 Christ the San of Justice has shone, and which have re- 
 ceived the knowledge of the Christian faith, are subject to 
 the authority of St. Peter and of the most Holy Roman 
 
226 APPENDIX, 
 
 Church. Wlierefore we are the more desirous to sow In 
 them an acceptable seed and a pUmtation pleasing unto G(»d, 
 because we know that a most rigorous account of them shall 
 be required of us hereafter. 
 
 " Now, most dear Son in Christ, you have signified to us 
 that you propose to enter the island of Ireland to establish 
 the observance of law amongst its people, and to eradicate 
 the weeds of vice ; and that you are willing to pay from 
 evfery house one penny as an annual tribute to St. Peter, and 
 to preserve the rights of the Church of that land whole and 
 inviolate. We, therefore, receiving with due favor your 
 pious and laudable desires, and gi^aciously granting our con- 
 sent to your petition, declare that it is pleasing and accept- 
 able to us, that for the purpose of enlarging the limits of the 
 Church, setting bounds to the torrent of vice, reforming 
 evil manners, planting the seeds of virtue, and increasing 
 Christian faith, you should enter that island and carry into 
 efl'ect those things which belong to the service of God and to 
 the salvation of that people ; and that the people of that 
 land should honorably receive and reverence you as Lord ; 
 the lights of the churches being pi-eserved untouched and 
 entire, and reserving the annual tribute of one penny from 
 every house to St. Peter and the most Holy Roman Church. 
 
 " If, therefore, you resolve to carry these designs into ex- 
 ecution, let it be your study to form that people to good 
 morals, and take such order both by yourself and by those 
 {\iiom you shall find qualified in faith, in words, and in con- 
 duct, that the Church there may be adorned, and the prac- 
 tices of Christian faith be planted and increased ; and let all 
 that tends to the glory of God and the salvation of souls be 
 so ordered by you that you may deserve to obtain from God 
 an increase of everlasting reward, and may secure on earth 
 a glorious name throughout all time. Given at Rome," etc. 
 
 Before we proceed with the inquiry as to the genuineness 
 of this letter of Pope Adrian, I must detain the reader with 
 a few brief preliminary remarks. 
 
 First : Some passages of this important document have 
 been very unfairly dealt with by modern writers while pur- 
 porting to discuss its merits. Thus, for instance, Professor 
 
APPENDIX. 227 
 
 Richey, in his " Lectures on Irish History," presenting a trans 
 lation of the Latin text to the lady pupils of the Alexandra 
 College, makes the Pontiff to write : 
 
 " You have signified to us, our well-beloved son in Christ, 
 that you propose to enter the island of Ireland in order to 
 subdue the peojyle, etc. . . . We, therefore, regarding 
 your pious and laudable design with due favor, etc., do here- 
 by declare our will and pleasure, that for the purpose of en- 
 larging the borders of the Church, etc., you do enter and 
 take possession of that island.'''' 
 
 Such an erroneous translation must be the more blamed 
 in the present instance, as it was scarcely to be expected 
 that the ladies whom the learned lecturer addressed would 
 have leisure to consult the original Latin text of the docu- 
 ment which he professed to translate. This, however, is not 
 the only error into which Professor Pichey has been be- 
 trayed regarding the Bull of Adrian TV. Having mentioned 
 in a note the statement of Poger de Wendover, that the 
 Bull was obtained from Pope Adrian in the year 1155, he 
 adds his own opinion that " the grant appears to have been 
 made in 1172." However, at that date. Pope Adrian had 
 been for about thirteen years freed from the cares of his 
 Pontificate, having passed to a better world in the year 
 1159. 
 
 Second: Any one who attentively weighs the words of 
 the above document will see at once that it prescinds from 
 all title of conquest, whilst at the same time it makes no 
 gift or transfer of dominion to Henry the Second. As far 
 as this letter of Adrian is concerned, the visit of Henry to 
 our island might be the enterprise of a friendly monarch, 
 who, at the invitation of a distracted state, would seek by 
 his presence to restore peace and to uphold the observance 
 of the laws. Thus, those foolish theories must at once be 
 net aside, which rest on the grr undless supposition that Pope 
 
228' APPENDIX. 
 
 Adrian autliorized the invasion and plunder of our people by 
 the Anglo-Norman adventurers. 
 
 Third : There is another serious error which must also 
 be set at rest by the simple perusal of the above document. 
 I mean that opinion which would fain set forth the letter of 
 Pope Adrian as a dogmatical definition of the Holy See, as 
 if the Sovereign Pontiff then spoke ex cathedra, i.e., solemnly 
 propounded some doctrine to be believed by the Universal 
 Church. Now it is manifest from the letter itself that it 
 has none of the conditions required for a definition ex 
 cathedra : it is not addressed to the Universal Church ; it 
 proposes no matter of faith to be held by all the children of 
 Christ ; in fact, it presents no doctrine whatever to be be- 
 lieved by the faithful, and it is nothing more than a com- 
 mendatory letter addressed to Henry, resting on the good 
 intentions set forth by that monarch himself. There is one 
 maxim, indeed, which awakens the suspicions of the old Galli- 
 can school, viz., that "all the islands are subject to the au- 
 thority of St. Peter." However, it is no doctrinal teaching 
 that is thus propounded ; it is a matter of fact admitted by 
 Henry himself, a principle recognized by the international 
 law of Europe in the middle ages, a maxim set down by the 
 various states themselves, the better to maintain peace and 
 concord among the princes of Christendom. To admit, how- 
 ever, or to call in question the teaching of the civil law of 
 Europe, as embodied in that maxim, has nothing whatever 
 to say to the great prerogative of St. Peter's successors, 
 whilst they solemnly propound to the faithful, in unerring 
 accents, the doctrines of Divine faith. 
 
 Fourth : To many it will seem a paradox, and yet it is a 
 fact, that the supposed Bull of Pope Adrian had no part 
 whatever in the submission of the Irish Chieftains to Henry 
 the Second. Even according to those who maintain its gen- 
 uineness, this Bull was not published till the year 1175, and 
 
APPENDIX. 229 
 
 certainly no mention of it was made in Ireland till long 
 after the submission of the\ Irish Princes. The success of 
 the Anglo-Normans was mainly due to a far different cause, 
 viz., to the superior military skill and equipment of the in- 
 vaders. Among the Anglo-Norman leaders were some of 
 the bravest knights of the kingdom, who had won their lau- 
 rels in the wars of France and Wales. Their weapons and 
 armor rendered it almost imj^ossible for the Irish troops to 
 meet them in the open field. The cross-bow, w^hich was 
 made use of for the first time in this invasion, produced as 
 great a change in military tactics as the rifled cannon in our 
 own days. When Henry came in person to Ireland his nu- 
 merous army hushed all opposition. There were 400 vessels 
 in his fleet, and if a minimum of twenty-five armed men be 
 allowed for each vessel, we will have an army of at least 
 10,000 men fully equijiped, landing unopposed, on the south- 
 ern shores of our island. It is to this imposing force, and 
 the armor of the Anglo-Norman knights, that we must in 
 great part refer whatever success attended this invasion of 
 the English monarch. 
 
 To proceed now with the immediate matter of our present 
 historical inquiry, the following is the summary of the argu- 
 ments in favor of the authenticity of Pope Adrian's letter, 
 inserted in the Irishman newspaper of June the 8th last, by 
 J. C. O'Callaghan, Esq., editor of the '* Macarise Excidium," 
 and author of many valuable works on Irish history : 
 
 " We have, firstly, the testimony of John of Salisbury, 
 secretary to the Archbishop of Canterbury, and one of the 
 ablest writers of his day, who relates his having been the 
 envoy from Henry to Adrian, in 1155, to ask for a grant of 
 Ireland, and such a grant having then been obtained, accom- 
 panied by a gold ring, containing a fine emerald, as a token 
 of investiture, with which grant and ring the said John re- 
 turned to Henry. We have, secondly, the grant or Bull of 
 Adrian, in extenso, in the works of Giraldus Cambrensis and 
 
•230 APPENDIX. 
 
 his contemporary, Kadulfus de Diceto, Dean of London, as 
 well as in those of Roger de Wendover and Matthew Paris. 
 We have, thirdly, several Bulls of Adrian's successor. Pope 
 Alexander III., still further to the purport of Adrian's, or 
 in Henry's favor. We have, fourthly, the recorded public 
 reading of the Bulls of Adrian and Alexander, at a meeting 
 of Bishops in Waterford, in 1175. We have, fifthly, after 
 the liberation of Scotland from England, at Bannockburn, 
 and the consecpient invitation of Bruce's brother, Edward, 
 to be King of Ireland, the Bull of Adrian prefixed to the 
 eloquent letter of remonstrance, which the Irish presented to 
 Pope John XXII., against the English ; the same Bull, 
 moreover, referred to in the remonstrance kself, as so ruin- 
 ous to Treland ; and a copy of that Bull, accordingly, sent 
 back by the Pope to Edward II. of England, for his use un- 
 der those circumstances. We have, sixthly, from Cardinal 
 Baronius, in his great work, the ' Annales Ecclesiastici,' un- 
 der Adrian IV., his grant of Ireland to his countryman, in 
 full, or, as is said, ' ex codice Vaticano diploma datum ad 
 Henricum, Anglorum Begem.' We have, seventhly, the 
 Bull in the Bullarium Bomanum, as printed at Pome in 1739. 
 The citations and references in su])port of all the foregoing 
 statements will be found in the * Notes and Illustrations ' of 
 my edition of * Macariae Excidium ' for the Irish Archaeolog- 
 ical Society in 1850, given in such a manner as must satisfy 
 the most sceptical." 
 
 Examining these arguments in detail, I will follow the 
 order thus marked out by Mr. O'Callaghan. 
 
 1. — We meet, in the first place, the testimony of John of 
 Salisbury, who, in his ^' Metcdogicus^^ (lib. iv., cap. 42), 
 writes, that being in an official capacity at the Papal court, 
 in 1155, Pope Adrian IV. then granted the investiture of 
 Ireland to the illustrious King Henry II. of England. 
 
 I do not wish in any way to detract from the praise due 
 to John of Salisbury, who was at this time one of the ablest 
 courtiers of Henry II. However, the words here imputed 
 to him must be taken with great reserve. Inserted as they 
 are in the last chapter of his work, they are not at all re- 
 
APPENDIX. 231 
 
 quired by the context : by cancelling tliem the wliole pas* 
 sage runs smoother, and is more connected in every way. 
 This is the more striking, as in another work of the same 
 writer, which is entitled " Polycraticus^'' we meet with a de- 
 tailed account of the various incidents of his embassy to 
 Pope Adrian, yet he there makes no mention of the Bull in 
 Henry's favor, or of the gold ring and its fine emerald, or 
 of the grant of Ireland, all of which would have been so im- 
 portant for his narrative. 
 
 We must also hold in mind the time when the " 3Ieta* 
 logicus'''' was written. The author himself fixes its date; 
 for, immediately before asking the prayers of " those who 
 read his book, and those who hear it read," he tells us that 
 the news of Pope Adrian's death had reached him a little 
 time before, and he adds that his own patron, Theobald, 
 Archbishop of Canterbury, though still living, was weighed 
 down by many infirmities. Now, Pope Adrian departed 
 this life in 1159, and the death of Archbishop Theobald hap- 
 pened in 1161. Hence, Gale and the other editors of John 
 of Salisbury's works, without a dissentient voice, refer the 
 ^^ Metalogicus ^^ to the year 1159. 
 
 Now, it is a matter beyond the reach of controversy, that 
 if Henry the Second obtained the investiture of Ireland 
 from Adrian IV., he kept this grant a strict secret till at 
 least the year 1175. For twenty years, i.e., from 1155 to 
 1 175, no mention was made of the gift of Adrian. Henry did 
 not refer to it when authorizing his vassals to join Diarmaid, 
 in 1167, when Adrian's Bull would have been so opportune to 
 justify his intervention ; he did not mention it when he him- 
 self set out for Ireland to solicit and receive the homage of 
 the Irish Princes ; he did not even refer to it when he as- 
 sumed his new title and accomplished the purpose of liis 
 expedition. The Council of Cashel, in 1172, was the first 
 episcopal assembly after Henry's arrival in Ireland; the 
 
232 APPENDIX. 
 
 Papal Legate was present there, and did Adrian's Bull exist, 
 it should necessarily have engaged the attention of the as- 
 sembled Fathers. Nevertheless, not a whisper as to Adrian'a 
 grant was to be heard at that famous Council. Even the 
 learned editor of " Cambrensis Eversus^'' whilst warmly as- 
 serting the genuineness of Adrian's Bull, admits " there is 
 not any, even the slightest, authority, for asserting that its 
 existence was known in Ireland before the year 1172, or for 
 three years later " — (vol. ii., p. 440, note z.) It is extremely 
 difficult, in any hypothesis, to explain in a satisfactory way 
 this mysterious silence of Henry tlie Second, nor is it easy to 
 'understand how a fact so important, so vital to the interests 
 of Ireland, could remain so many years concealed from those 
 who ruled the destinies of the Irish Church. For, we must 
 hold in mind, that throughout that interval Ireland num- 
 bered among its Bishops one who held the important office 
 of Legate of the Holy See ; our Church had constant inter- 
 course with England and the Continent, and, through St. 
 Laurence O'Toole and a hundred other distinguished prelates, 
 enjoyed in the fullest manner the confidence of Borne. 
 
 If Adrian granted this Bull to Henry at the solicitation of 
 John of Salisbury, in 1155, there is but one explanation for 
 the silence of this courtier in his diary, as set forth in the 
 " Polycraticus^'' and for the concealment of the Bull itself 
 from the Irish bishops and people, viz., that this secresy 
 was required by the state policy of the English monarch. 
 And, if it be so, how then can we be asked to admit as genu- 
 ine this passage of the " Metalogicus^^ in which the astute 
 agent of Henry, still continuing to discharge offices of the 
 highest trust in the court, would proclaim to the world as 
 early as the year 1159, that Pope Adrian had made this for- 
 mal grant of Ireland to his royal master, and that the sol- 
 emn record of the investiture of this high dignity was pre 
 served in the public archives of the kingdom ? 
 
APPENDIX. 233 
 
 it must also be added, that there are some jArases in this 
 passage of the " Metalogicus " which manifestly betray the 
 hand of the impostor. Thus, the words, " usque in hodier- 
 num die^i,^'' imply that a long interval had elapsed since the 
 concession was made by Pope Adrian, and surely they could 
 not have been penned by John of Salisbury, in 1159. Much 
 less can we suppose that this writer employed the words 
 ^^ jure hcereditario lyossidendam.'''' No such hereditary right 
 is granted in the Bull of Adrian. It was not dreamt of even 
 during the first years of the Anglo-Norman invasion, and it 
 was only at a later period, when the Irish Chieftains scorn- 
 fully rejected the Anglo-Norman law of hereditary succes- 
 sion, that this expedient was thought of for allaying the fierce 
 opposition of our people. 
 
 Thus we are forced to regard the supposed testimony of 
 John of Salisbury as nothing more than a clumsy interpola- 
 tion, which probably was not inserted in his work till many 
 years after the first Anglo-Norman invasion of our island. 
 
 2. — I now come to the second and main argument of those 
 who seek to defend the authenticity of Pope Adrian's Bull. 
 We have Gircddus Camhrensis, they say, a contemporary 
 witness, whose testimony is unquestionable. He inserts in 
 full this letter of Adrian IV., and he nowhere betrays the 
 slightest doubt in regard to its genuineness. 
 
 Some years ago, we might perhaps have accepted that flat- 
 tering character of Giraldus Cambrensis, but at the present 
 day, and since the publication of an accurate edition of liis 
 historical works, it is impossible for us to do so. 
 
 It was not till many years after the death of Pope Adrian 
 that Gerald de Barry, better known by the name of Giral- 
 dus Cambrensis, entered on the stage of Irish history. 
 Twice he visited Ireland after the year 1183, and on both 
 occasions he discharged those duties which, at the present 
 
•234 APPENDIX. 
 
 day, would merit for him tlie title of special court correspond- 
 ent with the invading army. The Expugnatio J^ibernica, 
 in which he inserts Adiian's Bull, may justly be said to have 
 been written to order. Hence, as a matter of course, Giral- 
 dus adopted in it as genuine every document set forth as such 
 by his royal master, and any statements that strengthened 
 the claim or promoted the interests of his brother Welsh 
 adventurers were sure not to be too nicely weighed in the 
 scales of criticism by such a historian. The editors of the 
 works of Giraldus, just now published under the direction 
 of the Master of the Rolls, have fully recognized this special 
 feature of the historical writings of Giraldus. The official 
 catalogue describing the " Expugnatio Hihernica^'' of which 
 we treat, expressly says : 
 
 " It may be regarded rather as a great ejDic, than a sober 
 relation of facts occurring in his own days. No one can 
 peruse it without coming to the conclusion that it is rather 
 a poetical fiction than a prosaic, truthful history." 
 
 In the preface to the fifth volume of the '' Historical Trea- 
 tises of Giraldus," the learned editor. Rev. James F. Dimock, 
 enters at considerable length into the inquiry, whether the 
 Expugnatio Hihernica was to be accepted as genuine and 
 authentic history. I need do no more than state the con- 
 clusions which he enunciates : — 
 
 " I think I have said enough to justify me in refusing to 
 accept Giraldus's history of the Irish and of their English 
 invaders as sober, truthful history." 
 
 And again he writes : " My good friend and pre-laborer 
 in editing these volumes of Giraldus's work " (Mr. Brewer) 
 " says of the ' Expjugnatio^ that Giraldus would seem to 
 have regarded his subject rather as a great epic, which un- 
 doubtedly it was, than a sober relation of facts occurring in 
 his own days. . . . This is a most true and characteris- 
 tic description of Giraldus's treatment of his subject: the 
 treatise certainly is, in great measure, rather a poetical fio 
 tion than a prosaic, truthful history." 
 
APPENDIX. 235 
 
 I must further remark as another result from Rev. Mr. 
 Dimock's researches, that the old text of Giraldus in refer* 
 ence to Pope Adrian's Bull, from which Mr. O'Callaghan's 
 citations are now made, is now proved to be singularly de- 
 fective. I Avill give the pithy words of that learned editor, 
 which are stronger than any I would wish to use : — 
 
 "iV^o more absurd or nonsensical muddle was ever blun- 
 dered into by the most stupid of abbreviators^ 
 
 It is of course from the ancient MSS. of the work that 
 this corruption of the old text is mainly proved; but it 
 should indeed be apparent from an attentive study of the 
 very printed text itself; for, as Mr. Dimock remarks, being 
 accurately translated, its words " marvellously contrive to 
 make Henry, in 1172, apply for and procure this privilege 
 from Pope Adrian, who died in 1159 ! And with equally 
 marvellous confusion they represent John of Salisbury, who 
 had been Henry's agent in procuring this privilege in 
 1155, as sent, not to Ireland, but to Rome, for the purpose 
 of publishing the Bull at Waterford, in 1174 or 1175 ! " 
 
 I will only add, regarding the testimony of Giraldus Cam- 
 brensis, that in the genuine text of the " Expugnatio Siber- 
 7iica " he places on the same level the Bull of Adrian IV. 
 and that of Alexander III. Nevertheless, as we will just 
 now see, he elsewhere admits that there were many and grave 
 suspicions that the supposed Bull of Alexander had never 
 been granted by the Holy See. 
 
 The other names mentioned together with Giraldus will 
 not detain us long. They are all writers who only incident- 
 ally make reference to Irish matters, and in these they 
 naturally enough take Giraldus for their guide. 
 
 Ralph de Diceto wrote about 1210, and like Giraldus re- 
 ceived his honors at the hands of Henry the Second. Irish 
 historians have not yet accepted him as a guide in reference 
 
236 APPENDIX. 
 
 to matters connected with our country. For instance, the 
 Synod of Casliel, of 1172, which was one of the most impor- 
 tant events of that period of our history, is described by him 
 as held in Lismore. 
 
 Koger de Wendover was a monk of St. Albans, who died 
 6th of May, 1237. His " FLores Historiaruvi " begins with 
 the creation of the world, and ends two years before his 
 death in 1235. He merely comjDendiates other sources 
 down to the beginning of the thirteenth century. It is only 
 the subsequent portion of his work which is held in esteem 
 by our annalists. 
 
 Matthew Paris was a brother religious of Roger de Wen- 
 dover, in St. Albans, where he died in 1259. Mr. Coxe, 
 who edited a portion of the " Flores Ilistoriarum " for the 
 English Historical Society (1841-1844), has proved that, 
 down to the year 1235, Matthew Paris only compendiates 
 the work of Wendover. At all events his " Ilistoria Major'''' 
 is of very little weight. A distinguished German historian 
 of the present day, Schrodl, thus conveys his strictures on 
 its merits : — 
 
 " Se trompe a chaque instant, et, entraine par son aveugle 
 rage de critique, donne pour des faits historiques des anec- 
 dotes piquantes qui n'ont aucune authenticite, des legendes 
 deraisonnables et toutes sortes des details suspects, exageres 
 et calomnieux." 
 
 To the testimony of such writers we may well op2:>ose the 
 silence of Peter de Blois, secretary of Henry tlie Second, 
 though chronicling the chief events of Henry's reign, and 
 the silence of all our native annalists, not one of whom ever 
 mentions the Bull of Adrian. 
 
 3. — But it is time to pass on to the third argument which 
 is advanced by our opponents. It is quite true that wo 
 have some letters or Bulls of Pope Alexander III. connected 
 with the Irish invasion. Three of these, written in 1172, 
 
APPENDIX. :237 
 
 are certainly authentic. They are preserved in the " Liber 
 Niger Scaccarii^'* from which they were edited by Hearne, 
 and in later times they have been accurately printed by Mr. 
 O'Callaghan and Rev. Dr. Kelly. They are addressed re- 
 spectively to the Irish bishops, King Henry, and the Irish 
 Princes. So far, however, are these letters from corroborat- 
 ing the genuineness of Pope Adrian's Bull, tliat they fur- 
 nish an unanswerable argument for wholly setting it aside as 
 groundless and imauthentic. They are entirely devoted to 
 the circumstances of the invasion of our island and its 
 results, and yet the only title that they recognize in Henry 
 is "that monarch's power, and the submission of the Irish 
 Chieftains." They simply ignore any Bull of Adrian, and 
 any investiture from the Holy See. 
 
 There is however another Bull of Alexander III., pre- 
 served by Giraldus Cambrensis, which is supposed to have 
 been granted at the request of King Henry, in 1172, and is 
 confirmatory of the gift and in vesture made by Pope Adrian : 
 and Mr. O'Callaghan holds that this Bull of Alexander 
 III. sets at rest forever all doubt as to the genuineness of 
 the grant made by Adrian lY". 
 
 The question at once suggests itself: — Is this Bull of 
 Alexander III. to be itself admitted as genuine and authen- 
 tic ? If its own authority be doubtful, surely it cannot 
 sufiice to prop up the tottering cause of Adrian's Bull. Now 
 its style is entirely different from that of the three authentic 
 letters of which we have just spoken. Quite in opposition 
 to these letters, " the only authority alleged in it for 
 Henry's right to Ireland is the Bull of Adrian," as Dr. 
 Lanigan allows. The genuine letters are dated from Tus- 
 culum, where, as we know from other sources, Alexander 
 actually resided in 1172. On the other hand, this confirma- 
 tory Bull, though supposed to have been obtained in 1172, is 
 dated from Rome^ thus clearly betraying the hand of the 
 
238 APPENDIX. 
 
 impostor. Such was the disturbed condition of Rome at 
 that period that it was impossible for His Holiness to reside 
 there, and hence we find him sometimes holding his Court in 
 Tusculum, at other times in Segni, Anagni, or Eerrara. It 
 was only when these disturbances were quelled that Alexan- 
 der III. was able, in 1178, to return in triumph to his capital. 
 But there is still another reason why we must doubt of 
 the authority of this confirmatory Bull. The researches of 
 Eer. Mr. Dimock have proved that Ussher long ago re- 
 marked, that this Bull of Alexander originally formed part 
 of the work of Giraldus Cambrensis, altliough later copyists, 
 and the first editors, including the learned Camden, recog- 
 nizing its spuriousness, excluded it from Giraldus's text. 
 The matter is now set at rest, for the ancient MSS. clearly 
 prove that it originally formed part of the " Expugnatio 
 Hibernica.'''' Thanks, however, to the zeal and industry of 
 Mr. Brewer, we are at present acquainted with another 
 work of Giraldus, written at a later period than his His- 
 torical Tracts on Ireland. It is entitled " De I^rincipiis 
 Instructionis,'''* and was edited in 1846, for the " A.nglia 
 Christiana " Society. Now, in this treatise Giraldus refers 
 to the Bull of Alexander III., of which we treat, but he pre- 
 fixes the following remarkable words : — 
 
 ^'Some assert or imagine that this IBull was obtained from 
 the Pope : hut others deny that it was' ever obtained from the 
 Pontiff y " Sicut a quibusdam impetratum assertitur aut 
 confingitur ; ab aliis autem usquam impetratum fuisse nega- 
 tur." 
 
 Surely these words should suffice to convince the most 
 sceptical that the fact of the Bull of Alexander being re- 
 cited by Giraldus, in his " Expugnatio Ilibernica^'' is a 
 very unsatisfactory ground on which to rest the arguments 
 for its genuineness. 
 
 4. — As regards the Synod of Waterford, in 1175, and the 
 
APPENDIX. 209 
 
 statement that the Bulls of Adrian and Alexander were 
 published therein for the first time, all these matters rest on 
 the very doubtful authority of Giraldus Cambrensis. We 
 have no record in the Irish Annals that any general meet- 
 ing of the Irish Bishops was held in Waterford in 1175. 
 The circumstances of the country rendered such a Synod im- 
 possible ; for war and dissensions raged throughout the 
 length and breadth of our island. It was in that year, how- 
 ever, that the first Bishop was appointed by King Henry, 
 to the See of Waterford, as Ware informs us ; and, perhaps, 
 we would not err were we to suppose that the Synod so 
 pompously set forth by Giraldus, was a convention of the 
 Anglo-Norman clergy of Waterford, under tlieir newly 
 appointed Prelate, all of whom would, no doubt, joyfully 
 accept the official documents presented in the name of the 
 King, by Nicholas of Wallingford. 
 
 Leland supposes that this Synod of Waterford was not 
 held till 1177. The disturbed state of the kingdom, how- 
 ever, rendered a Synod equally impossible in that year, and 
 all our ancient authorities utterly ignore such a Synod. 
 
 5. — In the " Remonstrance " addressed by the Irish 
 Princes and people to John XXII., about the year 1315, 
 r'^'peated mention is made of the Bull of Adrian. But then 
 it is only cited there as a conclusive argument ad hominem^ 
 against the English traducers of our nation, " lest the bitter 
 and venomous calumnies of the English, and their unjust, 
 and unfounded attacks upon us and all who support our 
 rights, may in any degree influence the mind of your Holi- 
 ness." The Bull of Adrian lY. was published by the Eng- 
 lish, and set forth by them as the charter-deed of their 
 rule in Ireland ; yet they violated in a most flagrant manner 
 all the conditions of that Papal grant. The Irish Princes 
 and people, in self-defence, had now made over the sovereignty 
 
240 APPENDIX. 
 
 of the island to Edward de Bruce, brother of the Scottish 
 King ; they style him theii' adopted monarch, and they pray 
 the Pope to give a formal sanction to their proceedings. 
 Thus, throughout the whole Hemonstrance, the Bull of 
 Adrian is used as a telling argument against the injustice of 
 the invaders, and as a precedent which John XXII. might 
 justly follow in sanctioning the transfer of the Irish crown 
 to Edward Bruce. But in all this the historian will find no 
 grounds for asserting the genuineness of the supposed Bulls 
 of Adrian or Alexander. We will just now see that at this 
 very time the Irish people universally regarded these Bulls 
 as spurious inventions of their English enemies. 
 
 6. — Baronius, the eminent ecclesiastical historian, inserts 
 in his invaluable Annals the Bull of Adrian IV., " from a 
 Vatican Manuscript." This is the sixth argument advanced 
 by Mr. O'Callaghan. 
 
 It is not my intention to question in any way the services 
 rendered by Cardinal Baronius to the cause of our Church 
 History ; but at the same time no one will deny that con- 
 siderable progress has been made in historical research dur- 
 ing the past three hundred and fifty years, and many docu- 
 ments are now set aside which were then accepted as un- 
 questioned on the supposed reliable authority of preceding 
 chroniclers. 
 
 In the present instance we are not left in doubt as to the 
 source whence Baronius derived his information regarding 
 Adrian's supposed Bull. During my stay in Eome I took 
 occasion to inquire whether the MSS. of the eminent annal 
 ist, which are happily preserved, indicated the special " Vat- 
 ican Manuscript " referred to in his printed text ; and I 
 was informed by the learned archivist of the Vatican, Mon- 
 signor Theiner, who is at present engaged in giving a new 
 edition, and continuing the great work of Baronius, that the 
 
APPENDIX. 241 
 
 Codex 'Vatlcanus referred to is a MS. co\)j of the History 
 of Matthew Paris, which is preserved in the Yatican Li- 
 brary. Thus it is the testimony of Matthew Paris alone 
 that here confronts us in the pages of Baronius, and no new 
 argument can be taken from the words of the eminent an- 
 nalist. Relying on the same high authority, I am happy to 
 state that nowhere in the private archives, or among the 
 private papers of the Yatican, or in the " Hegesta,'''^ which 
 Jaffe's researches have made so famous, or in the various 
 indices of the Pontifical Letters, can a single trace be found 
 of the supposed Bulls of Adrian lY. and Alexander III. 
 
 7. — The last argument advanced by Mr. O'Callaghan will 
 not detain us long. The insertion or omission of such 
 ancient records in the Bullarium, is a matter that depends 
 wholly on the critical skill of the editor. Curious enough, 
 in one edition of the Bullarium, as may be seen in the ref- 
 erences of Dr. Lanigan, Adrian's Bull is inserted, whilst no 
 mention is made of that of Alexander ; in another edition, 
 however, the Bull of Alexander is given in full, whilst the 
 Bull of Adrian is omitted. "We may "well leave our oppo- 
 nents to settle this matter with the conflicting editors of the 
 Bullarium. They, probably like Baronius, merely copied 
 the Bull of Adrian from Matthew Paris, and erred in doing 
 so. Labbe, in his magnificent edition of the Councils, also 
 ])ublishes Adrian's Bull, but then he expressly tells us that 
 it is copied from the work of Matthew Paris. 
 
 We have thus, as far as the limits of this article will 
 allow, examined in detail the various arguments which sup- 
 port the genuineness of the supposed Bull, and now it only 
 remains for us to conclude that there are no sufficient 
 grounds for accepting that document as the genuine work of 
 Pope Adrian. 
 
 Indeed, the Irish nation at all times, as if instinctively, 
 
242 APPENDIX. 
 
 shrunk from accepting it as genuine, and unhesitatingly 
 pronounced it an Anglo-Norman forgery. We have already 
 seen how even Giraldus Cambrensis refers to the doubts 
 which hael arisen regarding the Bull of Pope Alexander ; 
 but we have at hand still more conclusive evidence that 
 Adrian's Bull was universally rejected by our people. 
 There is, happily, preserved in the Barberini Archives, 
 Kome, a MS. of the fourteenth century, containing a series 
 of official papers connected with the Pontificate of John 
 XXII., and amongst them is a letter from the Lord Justici- 
 ary and the Hoyal Council of Ireland, forwarded to Pome 
 under the Poyal Seal, and presented to His Holiness by 
 William of Nottingham, Canon and Precentor of St. Pat- 
 rick's Cathedral, Dublin, about the year 1325. In this 
 important, but hitherto unnoticed document, the Irish are 
 accused of very many crimes, among which is insidiously 
 introduced the rejection of the supposed Bulls : 
 
 ^^ Moreover^ they assert that the King of England^ under 
 false pretences and by false JBullsj obtained the dominion of 
 Ireland^ and this opinion is commonly held by them.'''' 
 '' Asserentes etiam Dominum Begem Anglije ex falsa sug- 
 gestione et ex falsis Bullis terram Hibernioi in dominium 
 impetrasse ac communiter hoc tenentes." 
 
 This national tradition was preserved unbroken through- 
 out the turmoil of the jfifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and 
 on the revival of our historical literature in the beginning 
 of the seventeenth century, was registered in the pages of 
 Lynch, Stephen White, and other writers. 
 
 It will be well also, whilst forming our judgment regard- 
 , ing this supposed Bull of Adrian, to hold in mind the dis- 
 turbed state of society, especially in Italy, at the time to 
 which it refers. At the present day it would be no easy 
 E^fctter indeed for such a forgery to survive more than a few 
 weeks. But at the close of the twelfth century it was far 
 
APPENDIX. 243 
 
 otherwise. Owing to the constant revolutions and disturb- 
 ances that then prevailed, the Pontiff was oftentimes obliged 
 to fly from city to city ; frequently his papers were seized 
 and burned, and he himself detained as a hostage or prisoner 
 by his enemies. Hence it is that several forged Bulls, ex- 
 amples of which are given in " Camhrensis JEversus,'^ date 
 from these times. More than one of the grants made to the 
 ISTorman families are now believed to rest on such forgeries ; 
 and that the Anglo-ISTorman adventurers in Ireland were not 
 strangers to such deeds of darkness, appears from the fact 
 that a matrix for forging the Papal Seal of such Bulls, now 
 preserved in the P. I. Academy, was found a few years ago 
 in the ruins of one of the earliest Anglo-Norman monasteries 
 founded by De Courcy. 
 
 The circumstances of the publication of the Bull by Henry 
 were surely not calculated to disarm suspicion. Our oppo- 
 nents do not even pretend that it was made known in Ireland 
 till the year 1175, and hence, though publicly granted with 
 solemn investiture, as John of Salisbury's testimony would 
 imply, and though its record was deposited in the public 
 archives of the kingdom, this Bull, so vital to the interests 
 of the Irish Church, should have remained dormant for 
 twenty years, unnoticed in Rome, unnoticed by Henry's 
 courtiers, still more, unnoticed by the Irish Bishops, and I 
 will add, unnoticed by the Continental Sovereigns so jealous 
 of the power and preponderance of the English Monarch. 
 For such suppositions there is indeed no parallel in the 
 whole history of investitures. 
 
 It is seldom, too, that the hand of the impostor may not 
 be detected in some at least of the minor details of the spu- 
 rious document. In the present instance more than one 
 ancient MS. preserves the concluding formula of the Bull : 
 " Datum Romse," dated from Home. Now this simple 
 formula would suffice of itself to prove the whole Bull to be 
 
244 APPENDIX. 
 
 a forgery. Before the news of the election of Pope Adiian 
 to the Chair of St. Peter could reach England, that Pontiflf 
 was obliged to seek for safety in flight from his capital. 
 Kome was in revolt, and Arnold of Brescia sought to renew 
 there a spectre of the old Pagan Republic. John of Salis- 
 bury, in his " Poly cr aliens ^^"^ faithfully attests that, on his 
 arrival in Italy, the Papal Court was held not in Pome, but 
 in Beneventum : it was in this city he presented to Pope 
 Adrian the congratulations of Henry II. ; and he mentions 
 his sojourn there during the three months that he remained 
 in Italy. This is farther confirmed by the Italian chronicles. 
 Baronius saw the inconsistency of the formula. Datum 
 Homce^ with the date 1155, and hence, in his Annals, he 
 entered Adrian's Bull under the year 1159 ; but if this date 
 be correct, surely then that Bull could not have been 
 brought to Henry by John of Salisbury, and the passage of 
 the " Metalogicus " referring to it, must at once be admitted 
 a forgery. Other historians have been equally puzzled to 
 find a year for this supposed Bull. For instance, O'Hal- 
 loran, in his History of Ireland, whilst admitting that the 
 Irish people always regarded the Bull as a forgery, refers its 
 date to the year 1167, that is, eight years after the death of 
 Pope Adrian IV. 
 
 There is only one other reflection with which I wish to 
 detain the reader. The condition of our country, and the 
 relations between Ireland and the Englisli King, which are 
 set forth in the supposed Bull, are precisely those of the year 
 1172; but it would have required more than a prophetic 
 vision to have anticipated them in 1155. In 1155 Ireland 
 was not in a state of turmoil or verging towards barbarism ; 
 on the contrary, it was rapidly progressing and renewing its 
 claim to religious and moral pre-eminence. I will add, that 
 Pope Adrian, who had studied under Irish masters, knew 
 well this flourishing condition of our country. In 1172, 
 
APPENDIX. 245 
 
 ho^«^ever, a sad change had come over our island. Four 
 years of continual warfare, and the ravages of the Anglo- 
 Norman filibusterers, since their first landing in 1168, had 
 well-nigh reduced Ireland to a state of barbarism, and the 
 authentic letters of Alexander III., in 1172, faithfully de- 
 scribe its most deplorable condition. Moreover, an expedi- 
 tion of Henry to Ireland, which would not be an invasion, 
 and yet would merit the homage of the Irish princes, was 
 simply an impossibility in 1155. But owing to the special 
 circumstances of the kingdom, such in reality was the expe- 
 dition of Henry in 1172. He set out for Ireland, not avow- 
 edly to invade and conquer it, but to curb the insolence- and 
 to punish the deeds of pillage of his own Norman free- 
 booters. Hence, during his stay in Ireland he fought no 
 battle and made no conquest ; his first measures of severity 
 were directed against soaie of the most lawless of the early 
 Norman adventurers, and this more than anything else recon- 
 ciled the native Princes to his military display. In return he 
 received from a majority of the Irish Chieftains the empty 
 title of Ard-righ, or " Head Sovereign," which did not sup- 
 pose any conquest on his part, and did not involve any 
 surrender of their own hereditary rights. Such a state of 
 things could not have been imagined in 1155 ; and yet it is 
 one which is implied in the spurious Bull of the much- 
 maligned Pontifi", Adrian the Fourth. 
 
 t P. F. M. 
 
PA.IIT II. 
 
 THE INSUERECTION OF 1641. 
 
 ANALYSIS OF THE LEGEND, AND EXPOSURE OF SIR JOHlf 
 temple's FALSIFICATIONS. 
 
 [In his " Vindkim Eibernicce,''^ first published in Philadelphia, in 
 1819, ISIathew Carey gives the story told by Sir John Temple of the 
 pretended "Rebellion" of 1641, with an analysis of the legend, in 
 which (even from English authorities) the contradictions and exag- 
 gerations of Temple and Borlase are exposed. The full text is ap- 
 pended.] 
 
 21ie Insurrection in 1641. Was there a General Conspira- 
 cy of the Irish Catholics, in that year^ to Murder 
 the Protestants? 
 
 "A perjur'd wretch, whom falsehood clothes, 
 Ev'n like a garment — 
 WTio in the day's broad searching eye, 
 Makes God bear witness to a lie." — ChurcMU. 
 
 The decision of this question is attended with far more 
 difficulty than any of those hitherto presented to the view 
 of the reader. The nature of the case does not admit of the 
 same kind of evidence as I have been hitherto enabled to 
 produce, and which, I flatter myself, has been found irre- 
 sistible. 
 
 The tale of this conspiracy has been so universally credit- 
 ed ; so large a portion of the possessors of confiscated prop- 
 erty in Ireland have been for one hundred and eighty years 
 interested in afibrding it support and countenance ; so much 
 
APPENDIX. 247 
 
 art and talent have been, during that time, employed in giv- 
 ing it an air of plausibility ; there is so much difficulty in 
 proving a negative in any case, more particularly in the 
 present one, which is naturally, and has been moreover art- 
 fully, involved in mystery ; and it is so extremely arduous 
 an undertaking to operate upon the public mind, when im- 
 bued with inveterate prejudices, that the task is truly Her-- 
 culean, and I should have abandoned it as impracticable, but 
 that the narrative itself is replete with so many incredible 
 and incongruous circumstances, as to carry strong internal 
 evidence of fraud. 
 
 In order to give the story fair plaj^, and to enable the 
 reader to form a correct opinion on the subject, with all the 
 evidence before him, I shall give the v/hole account of ^sgi 
 discovery of the plot, as it stands in Temple's History of the 
 Iiish Rebellion, the authority almost solely relied on by all 
 the subsequent writers on the subject. Some slight extracts 
 are added from Borlase, containing a few additional par- 
 ticulars. 
 
 To simplify the examination, the narrative is divided into 
 short sentences, each containing perfect sense, to oblige the 
 reader to pause and reflect, as he proceeds. 
 
 The discussion of tliis question being one of the main ob- 
 jects of the woik, the reader's calm and candid consideratioH 
 of it is earnestly invoked. It is hoped that, laying aside all 
 preconceived opinions on the subject, he will revolve it in his 
 mind, as if it were wholly new, and he had now, for the first 
 time in his life, to form a decision on it. 
 
 There are, unfortunately, too many to whom a comj)liance 
 with this request is impossible : and indeed a larg^g propor- 
 tion of mankind can never command independence of mind 
 enough even to examine evidence that militates with their 
 early, and, of course, inveterate prejudices; far less ever to 
 abandon those prejudices. There are, therefore, thousands 
 
248 APPENDIX. 
 
 who would as soon doubt any of the demonstrations of 
 Euclid, or the existence of the solar system, as the existence 
 of the universality of the plot of " the execrable rehellion of 
 1641." 
 
 To this contracted class I do not address myself: with 
 them I have no fellowship : " Ea^cu though one were to rise 
 from the dead," his testimony would not convince them. 
 Let them hug the chains of ^heir bigoted prejudices. The 
 appeal is to that respectable description of readers, whose 
 minds, open to conviction, are at all times ready to yield 
 to the force of evidence, how strongly soever it may militate 
 against opinions which have '* grown with their growth." 
 The favorable decision of one such reader, vvith a clear head 
 and sound heart, would outv/eigh the disapprobation of a 
 whole army of the slaves of prejudice. 
 
 Extracts from Temple's History of the Irish Hehellianj^ 
 
 1. " Sir William Cole, upon the very first apprehensions 
 of something that ho conceived to be hatching among the 
 Irish, did write a letter to the lords justices and council, 
 dated the 11th of October, 1641. 
 
 2. "Wherein he gave them notice of the great resort 
 made to sir Pheliin O'Neal, in the county of Tyrone, as also 
 to the house of the lord 3Iacguire, in the county of Fer- 
 managh, and that by several suspected persons, fit instru- 
 ments for mischief; 
 
 3. "As also that the said lord Macguire had of late made 
 several journies into the Pale and other places, and had spent 
 his time onuch in icriting letters and sending despatches 
 abroad. 
 
 4. " These letters ictre received by the lords justices and 
 council ; 
 
 5. "And they, in answer to them, required him to be 
 very vigilant and industrious to find out what should be 
 
 * The I'eader will please to observe, that these extracts are taken verhatirn. fi'oru 
 the original work ; and, unless where otherwise distinctly marked by a dash, form an 
 unbroken consecutive series. 
 
APPENDIX. 249 
 
 the occasion of these several meetings, and speedily to adver- 
 tise them thered f, or of any other particular that he con- 
 ceived might tend to the public service of the state." 
 
 6. " They [the lords justices] had not any certain notice 
 of the general conspiracy of the Irish, until the 22d of 
 October, in the very evening before the day appointed for 
 the surprise of the castle and city of Dublin. 
 
 7. " The conspirators being, many of them, arrived within 
 the city, and having that day met at the Lion tavern, in 
 Copper alley, and there tui-ning the drawer out of the room, 
 ordered their afiairs together, and drunk healths upon their 
 knees to the happy success of the next morning's v/ork. 
 
 8. " Owen O'Connally, a gentleman of' a mere Irish fam- 
 ily^ but one that had long lived among the English, and 
 been trained up in the true Protestant religion, came unto 
 the lord justice Parsons, about JsINE o'clock that even- 
 ing ! ! 
 
 9. " And made him a broken relation of a great con- 
 spiracy for the seizing upon his majesty's castle of Dublin. 
 
 10. ''He gave him the names of some of the chief con- 
 spirators! assured him that they were come up expressly 
 to the town for the same purpose ; and that next morning 
 they would undoubtedly attemj)t, and surely effect it, if 
 their design were not speedily prevented ; 
 
 11. "And that he had understood all this from Hugh 
 Mac-Mahon, one of the chief conspirators, who was then in 
 town, and came up out thh very same afternoon^ for the ex- 
 ecution of the plot ; 
 
 12. "And with v/hom indeed he had been drinking soTne- 
 what liberally ^ and as the truth is, did then make such a 
 broken relation of a matter that seemed so incredible in 
 itself, as that his lordship gave very little belief to it at 
 frst I ! ! 
 
 13. "In regard it came from an obscure perso7i, and one, 
 as he conceived, somewhat distempered at that time. 
 
 14. "But howsoever, the lord Parsons gave him order to 
 go again to Mac-Mahon! ! ! and get out of him as much 
 certainty of the plot! ! ! with as many particular circum- 
 stances, as he could ! ! ! straitly charging him to return back 
 unto him the same evening ! ! ! 
 
250 APPENDIX. 
 
 15. "And in the mean time, having by strict commands 
 given to the constable of the castle, taken order to have the 
 gates thereof well guarded^ as also with the Tnayor and 
 sheriffs of the city to have strong watches set upon all parts 
 of the same, and to make stay of all strangers, 
 
 16. "He ^y!%Yii privately ! ! about ten of the clock thai 
 night, to the lord Borlase's house loithout the town, and 
 there acquainted him with what he understood from O'Con- 
 ally. 
 
 17. " They sent for such of the council as they knew then 
 to be in the toivn.^ 
 
 18. " But there came only unto them that night sir 
 Thomas Rotheram and sir Robert Meredith, chancellor of 
 the exchequer : v/itli these they fell into consultation lohat 
 was fit to he done! ! ! ! attending the return of O'Conally. 
 
 19. " And finding that he staid somewhat longer than the 
 time prefixed, they sent out in search after him ; 
 
 20. " And found him seized on by the watch, and so he 
 had been carried away to prison, and the discovery that 
 night disappointed, 
 
 21. " Had not one of the lord Parson's servants, expressly 
 sent, amongst others, to walk the streets, and attend the mo- 
 tions of the said 0' Conally, come in, and rescued him, and 
 brousrht him to the lord Borlase's house. 
 
 * Although I shall analyze this precious nan-ative at length, before this chapter is 
 closed, I cannot refi-ain from calling the reader's attention to these two paragi-aphs, 
 16 and 17, as they alone would be sufficient with impartial men, to discredit the whole 
 plot. Sir William Parsons, being in the city of Dublin, at nine o'clock at night, is 
 infoi-med of a plot to explode in thirteen hours. — Instead of at once seizing the con- 
 spirators, he sends a drunken man, whoso absence must have excited suspicion, to 
 make further discoveries — and at ten o'clock, he goes '•'■privately"^ to lord Borlase's 
 house " out of toion"' — and then sends for such of the council as he knew to be then 
 '"'• in town.''^ Was there ever a more Munchausen tale? It is hardly calculated to 
 impose on an idiot. How far out of town sir John's house was, cannot be ascertained 
 — suppose only a mile. Then he walked a mile — the messenger another — and such 
 of the council as were found, had to walk a third mile, and for what ? To be so far 
 removed from the scene of action, and from the means of appl}-ing a remedy to the 
 impending evils, as to give every opportunity to the conspirators to insure their suc- 
 cess I Here was a most pernicious delay, when every moment was invaluable ! ! Had 
 there been any reality in the plot, sir Vrilliam would have remained "m toicn^'' — 
 collected all of the coimcil there at the time — sent a messenger " otct of town " for 
 sir .John Borlase — and then collected the whole body at then- posts, where they ought 
 to be on such an emergency. 
 
APPENDIX. 251 
 
 22. " O'Conally having somewhat recovered himself from 
 his distemper, occasioned partly, as he said himself, by the 
 horror of the plot revealed to him, partly by his too liberal 
 drinking with Mac-Mahon, that he might the more easily 
 gv-^t away from him, (he beginning much to suspect and feai 
 his discovery of the plot,) 
 
 23. " Confirmed what he had formerly related, and added 
 these further particulars set down in his examination, as 
 foUoweth : 
 
 " Tlie examination of Owen 0' Conally^ gentleman^ taken 
 before us^ luhose names ensue, October 22, 1641. 
 " Who being duly sworn and examined, saith : 
 
 24. " That he being at Moniniore, in the county of Lon- 
 donderry, on Tuesday last ! he received a letter from colonel 
 Hugh Oge Mac-Mahon, desiring him to come to Gonaught, 
 in the county of Monaghan, and to be with him on 'Wednes- 
 day or Til ursday last ! 
 
 25. '' Whereupon he, this examinate, came to Gonaught 
 on Wednesday night last ; 
 
 26. " And finding the said Hugh come to Dublin, fol- 
 lowed him hither ; 
 
 27. " He came hither about six of the clock this evenmg f 
 
 28. " And forthwith went to the lodging of the said 
 Hugh, to the house near the Boat, in Oxmantown ; 
 
 29. "And there he found the said Hugh, and came vdtli 
 the said Hugh into the town, near the pillory, to the lodging 
 of the lord Macguire ; 
 
 30. " Where they found not the lord within ; and there 
 they drank a cup of beer ; 
 
 31. " And then luent back again to the said Hugh kis 
 lodging ; * 
 
 32. " He saith, that at the lord Maguire his lodging, the 
 said Hugh told him that there were and would be this night 
 great numbers of noblemen and gentlemen of the Irish 
 Jpapists, from all the parts of the kingdom, in this town ; 
 
 33. " Who with himself had determined to take the castle of 
 Dublin, and possess themselves of all his majesty's ammuni- 
 tion there, to-morroiv morning, being Saturday ; 
 
 34. " And that they intended first to batter the chimnies 
 
 * Here again is a dodging '■•into toivn "' and ''oiU of loiC7i,^' 
 
252. APPENDIX. 
 
 of the said to^vn ; and if the city would not yield, then to 
 batter down the houses ; 
 
 35. " And so to cut off all the Protestants that would not 
 join with them ! 
 
 36. " He further saith, that the said Hugh then told him, 
 that the Irish had prepared men in all parts of the kingdom, 
 to destroy all the English inhabiting there, to-morrow morn- 
 ing by ten of the clock ! ! 
 
 37. " And that in all the sea-ports, and other towns in 
 the kingdom, all the Protestants should be killed this night I ! 
 and that all the posts that could be, could not prevent it ; 
 
 38. " And further saith, that he moved the said Hugh to 
 forbear executing of that business, and to discover it to the 
 state, for the saving of his own estate ; 
 
 39. " Who said he could not help it ; but said, that they 
 did owe their allegiance to the king, and Avould pay him all 
 his rights : but that they did this for the tyrannical govern- 
 ment that was over them, and to imitate Scotland, which 
 got a privilege by that course ; 
 
 40. " And he further saith, that when he was with the 
 said Hugh, in his lodging the second time, the said Hugh 
 swore, that he should not go out of his lodging that night ; 
 but told him that he should go with him the next morning 
 to the castle ; and said, if this matter were discovered, some 
 body should die for it ; 
 
 40^. " Whereupon this examinate feigned some necessity 
 for his easement ; went down out of the chamber ; and left 
 his sword in pawn ; and the said Hugh sent his man down 
 with him ; and when this examinate came down into the 
 yard, and finding an opportunity, he, this examinate, learpt 
 over a wall and two pales ! ! ! and so came to the lord jus- 
 tice Parsons. 
 
 "October 22, 1641. 
 
 William Parsons, 
 Thomas Rotheram, 
 Robert Meredith, 
 Owen O'Conally." 
 
 41. " How it came to pass that the other lord justice at- 
 tested not the examination, {it being took in his house, he 
 2)resent,) hath begot some doubts, evidencing how (since) 
 counsels swerved into cabals." 
 
APPENDIX. 253 
 
 42. ^' Hereupon the lords took present order to have a 
 watch privately set iipon the lodging of 3fac-Mahon^ as also 
 upon the lord 3Iacguire ! ! ! ! ! * 
 
 43. " And so they sat up all that night in consxdtation ! ! ! 
 having far stronger presumptions upon this latter examina- 
 tion taken than any ways at first they conlcl entertain. 
 
 44. " The lords justices, upon a further consideration, 
 there being come unto them early next morning ! several 
 others of the privy council, sent before day, and seized %ipon 
 Mac-Machon, then icith his servant in his oimi lodging. 
 
 45. " They at first made some little resistance with their 
 drawn swords ; but finding themselves over-mastered, pres- 
 ently yielded. 
 
 46. "And so they were brought before the lords justices 
 and council, still sitting at the lord Borlase's house, f 
 
 47. " Where, upon examination, he did without much 
 difficulty confess the plot, resolutely telling them, that 
 on that very day^ all the forts and strong places in Ireland, 
 would he taken ! ! 
 
 48. " That he, with the lord Macguire, Hugh Birn, cap- 
 tain Brian O'JSTeil, and several other Irish gentlemen, were 
 come up expressly to surprise the castle of Dublin. 
 
 49. " That twenty men out of each county in the king- 
 dom ! ! I were to be here to join with them. \ 
 
 50. " That all the lords and gentlemen in the kingdom, 
 that were p>ap)ists, were engaged in this plot ! ! ! 
 
 51. " That what was that day to he done in other parts of 
 the country, was so far advanced by that time, as it was im- 
 possible for the wit of man to prevent it ! 
 
 52. " And withal told them, that it was true they had him 
 in their power, and might use him how they pleased, but he 
 was sure he should be revensed." 
 
 * The lords jiistices have information of a plot to explode in a few hours, whereby 
 they are to be murdered, and as a precautionary measure, "se< a watch privately 
 'uX)on the lodgings^'' of the chief conspirators '. I 
 
 t It appears, therefore, that the council was sitting all night "a< lord Borlase''s 
 house,'' " out of town,''' so as to leave the conspirators free scope to carry their proj- 
 ects into execution " in town.'" Was ever an imposture so absurdly compacted ? 
 
 X There are thirty-two counties in Ireland, some of them one hu7idred and fifty 
 miles from Dublin — and twenty men were to he marched from each county, to e;c© 
 cute a plot requiring the utmost secresy I ! An admii-able scheme 1 
 
254 APPENDIX. 
 
 53. Extract from " Tlie lords chief justices' letter to tlie 
 lord lieutenant, October 25, 1G41, sent by Owen O'Conally, 
 tlie first discoverer. * 
 
 " May it please your lordship, 
 
 54. " On Friday, the 22nd of this month, after nine 
 o'clock at niqht^ this bearer, Owen O'Conally, SERVANT 
 TO SIR JOHN CLOTWORTHY, KNIGHT, came to me, 
 the lord justice Parsons, to my house, 
 
 55. " And in great secresie (as indeed the cause did re- 
 quire,) discovered unto me a most wicked and damnable 
 conspiracy, plotted, contrived, and intended to be also acted 
 by some evil-affected Irish Papists here. 
 
 56. " The plot was on the then next morning, Saturday, 
 the 23d of October, being St. Ignatius's clay, about nine of 
 the clock ! to surprise his majesty's castle of Dublin, his 
 majesty's chief strength of this kingdom ; wherein also is the 
 principal magazine of his majesty's arms and munition. 
 
 57. " And it was agreed, it seems among them, that at 
 the same hour, all other his majesty'' s forts and magazines 
 of arms and munition in this kingdom ! ! should be sur- 
 prised by others of those conspirators : 
 
 58. " And farther, that all the Protestants and English 
 throughout the lohole kingdom, that would not join with 
 them, should be cut of!'! ! and so those Papists should then 
 become possessed of the government and kingdom at the 
 same instant. 
 
 59. "As soon as I had that intelligence, I then immedi- 
 ately repaired to the lord justice Borlase ; and thereupon 
 we instantly assembled the council. 
 
 60. " And having sate all that night ! ! ! also all the next 
 day, the 23d of October, in regard of the short time left us 
 for- the consultation of so great and weighty a matter, 
 although it was not possible for us, upon so few hours' 
 warning, to prevent those other great mischiefs which were 
 
 * Thus it appears that the lords justices did not think it necessary to write the 
 lord lieiitenant, then in London, till IMonday the 25th, respecting a conspiracy for the 
 destruction of "all the Protestants in Ireland that would not join it," which was to 
 have exploded on the 23d 1 
 
APPENDIX. 255- 
 
 to be acted, even at the same hour and at so great a dis* 
 tance, in all the other parts of the kingdom ; * 
 
 61. " Yet such was our industry therein, having caused 
 the castle to he that night strengthened with armed men^ and 
 the city guarded, as the wicked councils of those evil per- 
 sons, by the great mercy of God to us, became defeated, so 
 as they were not able to act that part of their treachery, 
 which indeed was principal. 
 
 62. "And which, if they could have effected, would have 
 rendered the rest of their purposes the more easy. 
 
 63. " Having so secured the castle, we forthwith laid 
 about for the ap^^rehension of as many of the offenders as 
 we could, many of them having come to this city but that 
 night, intendiug, it seems, the next morning, to act their 
 parts in those treacherous and bloody crimes. 
 
 64. " The first man apprehended was one Hugh Mac- 
 Mahon, Esq., (grandson to the traitor Tyrone,) a gentleman 
 of good fortune in the county of Monaghan, who, with 
 others, vms taken that inorning in Dublin, having, a,t the 
 time of their apprehension, offered a little resistance with 
 their swords draAvn ; but finding those we employed against 
 them more in number, and better armed, yielded. 
 
 65. " He, upon examination before us, at first denied all ; 
 but in the end, when he saw we laid it home to him, he 
 confessed enough to destroy himself, and impeach some 
 others, as by a copy of his examination herewith sent, may 
 appear to your lordship. 
 
 66. " We then committed him until Ave might have fur- 
 ther time to examine him again, our time being become more 
 needful to be employed in action for securing this place, 
 than examining. This Mac-Mahon had been abroad, and 
 served the King of Spain as a lieutenant colonel. 
 
 67. " Upon conference with him and others! ! ! and call- 
 ing to mind a letter ive received the iveek be-fore from sir 
 William Cole! ! ! a copy whereof we send your lordship 
 here inclosed, we gathered, that the lord 3Tacguire was to he 
 an actor in surprising the castle of Dublin ! ! ! ! ! \ 
 
 * " Which were to be acted, even at the same hour, m all other parts of the king- 
 dom " — but which were not acted, nor attempted. 
 
 t After ha\ing set a guard on his house the precedmg night, they required all this 
 variety of mfonnation, to '■'■gather that the lord Macguire icas to be an actor in 
 surpiUsing the castle of Duhlin < " 
 
256 APPENDIX. 
 
 08. " Wherefore we held it necessaiy to secure him im- 
 mediately, thereby also to startle and deter the rest, when 
 they found him laid fast." 
 
 Extracts from JBorlase's " History of the Execrable Irish 
 
 Hebellion.^'' 
 
 G9. '' In the interim, the lord Parsons, (being touched 
 
 \vith the relation,) repaired, about ten of the clock at night, 
 
 to the lord Borlase, at Chichester house, without the town ; 
 
 70. " And disclosed to him what O'Conally had imparted ; 
 which made so sensible an impression on his colleague, as 
 (the discoverer being let go,) he grew infinitely concerned 
 thereat, having none to punish, if the story should prove 
 false, or means to learn more, were it true. 
 
 71. "In the disturbance of which perplexity, Owen 
 O'Conally comes, (or, as others write, was brought,) where 
 the lords justices were then met ; sensible that his discovery 
 was not thoroughly believed, professing that whatever he 
 had acquainted the lord Parsons with, (touching the con- 
 spiracy,) was true : 
 
 72. "And could he but repose himself, {the effects of 
 di'inh being still iqyoii him,) he should discover more. 
 
 73. " Whereupon he had the conveniency of a bed.'''' 
 
 74. "In the interim, the lords justices summoned as 
 many of the council as they could give notice to, to their 
 assistance that night at Chichester house. 
 
 75. "Sir Thomas Potheram, and Sir Robert Meredith, 
 chancellor of the exchequer, came immediately to them. 
 
 76. "They then with all diligence secured the gates of 
 the city, * with such as they could most confide in, and 
 strengthened the warders of the castle, (which were a few in- 
 considerable men,) with their foot guard, \ usually attending 
 their persons, charging the mayor and his brethren to be 
 
 * "They secured the gates of the city." That is to say, the conspirators were 
 "i'?i the towiV—axiA they '■'■out o/ «o?c?i "—they therefore must have shut them- 
 Bolves out. 
 
 + '• The foot guard." Thus the safety of the city was confided, at a time of such 
 imminent danger, to '■'■the warders,''' '■'■ a. few incorisiderable men," and "the foot- 
 guard" of the lords justices, '■'■ tisually attending their ijersons,''' vftiich. cannot be 
 presumed to have been more than ten or a dozen at most ! 
 
APPENDIX. 257 
 
 watchful of all j^e^sons that should walk the streets that 
 night///'' 
 
 77. " Hugli Oge Mac-Mahorij Esq., gTandson by Lis 
 mother to the traitor Tir-Owen, a gentleman of good fort- 
 une in the county of Monaglian, who had served as a lieu- 
 tenant-colonel in the king of Spain's quarters, was, after 
 some little resistance, apprehended before day in his oivn 
 lodgings, over the water, near the Inns, and brought 
 to Chichester house ; 
 
 78. " Where, upon examination, he did, v/ithout much 
 difficulty, confess the plot, resolutely telling them, That ON" 
 THAT VERY DAY, {it icas uow about five in the morning y the 
 23d of Oct., 1641 ! ! !) that all the forts and strong places in 
 Ireland would be taken," &c., (fee. 
 
 79. " Before Mac-Mahon was apprehended, O'Conally, 
 having 07i his repose recovered himself, had his examination 
 taken, in these words : " [as before.] 
 
 A.nalysis of the foregoing legend. 
 
 I. A Roman Catholic colonel is engaged in a plot, the ob- 
 ject of Avhich is " to massacre all the Protestants in the 
 kingdom^'' " except those who would join " in murdering 
 their brethren. 
 
 II. This colonel, in w^ant of a confederate, sends about 
 fifty miles to O'Conally, a Protestant^ to reveal to him this 
 project. » 
 
 III. O'Conally, who, in order to attach importance to his 
 testimony, in some of the statements is styled " a gentleman^'' 
 is, in fact and in truth, merely a servant to Sir John Clot- 
 worthy, one of the most envenomed enemies of the Poman 
 Catholics, and, of course, a very suitable person to be in- 
 trusted with such a secret, and very worthy to b-3 sent for 
 to a place distant forty-five miles. 
 
 lY. O'Conally receives a letter on Tuesday, \hQ 19th of 
 
258 APPENDIX. 
 
 October, at what hour is not known, — say nine ©""clock ; 
 and, iDliolly ignorant of the nature of the affair wliich leads 
 to the invitation, makes all his preparations at once, and 
 commences his journey, we will suppose, about noon the 
 same day. 
 
 Y. He arrives on 'Wednesday night, the 20th, at Con- 
 aught, after a journey of about forty -five miles : and be it 
 observed, en 2:>assanty that a journey of forty-five miles, at 
 that period, was nearly as arduous an undertaking, and re- 
 quired almost as much preparation, as a journey of one hun- 
 dred and fifty at present. 
 
 YI. Colonel Mac-Mahon, whose invitation had given 
 O'Conally the option of coming on Wednesday OR TJiursday, 
 so far broke his engagement, that he had started, on Wednes- 
 day, for Dublin, previous to O'Conally's arrival, which took 
 place on the night of that day. 
 
 YII. O'Conally, nothing discouraged by the breach of en- 
 gagement on the part of the colonel, follows him to Dublin. 
 
 YIIl. He arrives in that city on the memorable Friday, 
 the 22d of October, " about six o'clock in the evening" one 
 
 HOUR AFTER SUNSET. 
 
 IX. Conaught, in Monaghan, is not to be found on any 
 map. I will therefore suppose it to have been in the centre 
 of the county. 
 
 X. Monimore, by Pinkerton's map, is about forty miles 
 in a direct line from- the centre of the county of Monaghan 
 — and this centre is about sixty miles also in a direct line 
 from Dublin. The whole distance must, by the usual circui- 
 tous windings of the road, have been at the very least one 
 hundred a,nd ten miles. 
 
 XI. The climate of Ireland is very moist. Eains are gen- 
 erally abundant, particularly in autumn. Of course, the 
 roads at that season were very probably miry, and difficult 
 to travel. 
 
APPENDIX, 259 
 
 XII. It thus appears, tliat O'Conally has performed a 
 journey of about forty-five iniles in a day and a half ; that 
 is, from mid-day on Tuesday, to Wednesday night : and a 
 hundred and ten in three days and a half, at a season of the 
 year, when the sun hose about seven, and set about 
 FIVE ! ! and this exploit was accomplished at a time when 
 there were no diligences, post-coaches, post-chaises, or steam- 
 boats, to insure exj^edition ; and when, moreover, the roads 
 were in all probability in very bad order. 
 
 XIII. Nothing discouraged by the fatigue of his journey 
 of a hundred and ten miles, nor by his previous disappoint- 
 ment, nor by the daikness of the evening, he commences a 
 search for the lodgings of an entire stranger, who had arrived 
 that evening ! Wonderful to tell, and impossible to be be- 
 lieved, he is said to have succeeded, and to have found out 
 the stranger's lodgings ! And let it not be forgotten, that 
 on this night the moon was invisible^' a circumstance admi- 
 rably calculated to aid his researches ! 
 
 XIY. Although the colonel was engaged in a plot to ex- 
 plode 7iext day, at teii o'' clock, A. 31., O'Conally finds him 
 alone, between six and seven f o'' clock on Friday evening^ in 
 the suburbs. He appears to have seen none of his brother 
 conspirators before nine, at which time O'Conally left him. 
 
 XY. The colonel takes him to the lodgings of a brother 
 conspirator " into town^'' at the distance, probably, of a mile 
 or two. 
 
 XYI. This conspirator not being at home, the colonel, 
 after having taken a drink of beer with his new friend, 
 
 * Extract of a letter from the Vice-Provost of the University of Pennsylvania. 
 "Dear Sir, January 6, 1819. 
 
 "I find that it was Neto Moon^ at Dublin, at about two o'clock in the morning 
 of the 24th of October, 1611, O. S. Consequentlj' the moon must have been invisibla 
 on the whole night of the 22cl-23cl of that month. 
 
 "Your?, etc., 
 "Mr, M. Caret. "R. M. PATTERSON." 
 
 1 It must have required some time to find out Mac-Mahon's lodgings. 
 
260 APPENDIX. 
 
 freely communicates " that there were and would be, this 
 night, great numbers of noblemen and gentlemen of the 
 Irish, from all parts of the kingdom," v/liose object was '' ta 
 cut off all the Protestants that looulcl not join tJiem.'''' 
 
 XVII. And they then went back to " the said Hugh his 
 lodgings^'' in the suburbs, "near Oxmantown," Avliere 
 O'Conally drank till he was drunk. 
 
 XVIII. O'Conally notwithstanding this untoward circum- 
 stance, and that he was, two hours afterwards, unable to re- 
 late a consistent story, was alert enough " to leap over a 
 wall,'''' and afterwards over ''^ two pales P 
 
 XIX. Notwithstanding his disordered state, he was able 
 to find his way to sir "William Parsons, into the town, to 
 whom he communicated the whole affair. 
 
 XX. Here let us observe that this very sir William had 
 received information of a plot, several days before, from sir 
 William QiqXq, '•'• upon the very first apprehension of some- 
 thing he conceived to he hatching among the Jrish^ 
 
 XXI. And further, that this lord justice had written to 
 sir William Cole, " to be very vigilant in inquiring into the 
 occasion of those meetings ; " whereby it appears that he 
 had suspicions of a conspiracy. 
 
 XXII. Notwithstanding this information, sir William 
 Parsons, who was jealous of some plot " hatching among the 
 Irish ; " who, of course, ought to be on the qui vive, and to 
 take alarm on the slightest intimation of any scheme of that 
 kind ; when he received this " broken relation of a matter 
 so hicr edible in itself, gave very little belief to it at first, in 
 regard it came from an obscure person, and one, as he con- 
 ,ceived, somewhat distem2)ered at that time." 
 
 XXIII. " His lordship," with most wonderful sagacity, 
 " hearing this broken relation " of a plot to explode in about 
 twelve or thirteen hours, for the purpose of cutting the 
 tliroats of all the Protestants, sends the informer ! ! between 
 
APPENDIX. 261 
 
 nine and ten at night ! ! with " order to go again to Mac- 
 MiJbon, and get out of him as much certainty of the plot as 
 he could ! ! ! " 
 
 XXIV. This informer who " had been drinking somewhat 
 liberally " — and was " somewhat distempered at the time^"* 
 was a most admirable spy to make further discoveries, and 
 " to get out of Mac-Mahon as much certainty of the plot, 
 with as many particular circumstances as he could ! ! ! " His 
 fitness for this employment at such a critical moment, was 
 further proved by the circumstance that on his return he was 
 so far intoxicated, " the effects of drink being still %ipon 
 him,'''' that he could not give in his testimony, till he slept 
 himself sober ! ! ! Therefore, the " conveniency of a bed " 
 being afibrded him, " on his repose, having recovered him- 
 self, he had his examination taken." 
 
 XXY. After sending O'Conally to Mac-Mahon's lodgings, 
 with strict orders " to return back unto him the same even- 
 ing," sir William v.^ent '^privately, at about ten of the clock 
 that night, to Lord Borlase's house, without the town," 
 whereas O'Conally was directed to come to him at his house 
 
 " IN THE town." 
 
 XXYI. " They sent for such of the council as they knew 
 then to be in the town," to lord Borlase's house, " without 
 THE town." 
 
 XXVII. There they fell into deep consultation "what 
 was fit to be done, attending the return of O'Conally." 
 
 XXVIII. They then sent in search of him, and found 
 that he had been taken by the watch, and rescued by the 
 servants of sir William Parsons, " who had been sent, 
 amongst others, to walk the streets, and attend his motions," 
 
 XXIX. " Sensible that his discovery was not thoroughly 
 believed, he professed that whatever he had acquainted the 
 lord Parsons with, was true ; and could he but repose him- 
 
262 APPENDIX. 
 
 self, (the effects of drink being still upon Jiim,) he should dis- 
 cover more." 
 
 XXX. " Whereupon he had the conveniency of a bed.'''' 
 
 XXXI. " Having, (on his repose,) recovered himself, ^^ 
 he gave in his deposition. 
 
 XXXII. This is dated the 22d, and of course must have 
 been made before twelve o'clock. 
 
 XXXIII. This deposition gave a full detail of a most 
 murderous plot, whereby " cdl the Protestants and English 
 throughout the whole kingdom, ivere to be cut off the next 
 inorning^'' 
 
 XXXIV. Possessed of this deposition, which required 
 the most decisive measures of precaution, it becomes a seri- 
 ous question, what did the lords justices do ? On this point 
 the Avhole merits of the question might be rested : and in- 
 deed the investigation of any other might be wholly omitted. 
 The answer is, " They took present order to have a watch 
 privately set upon the lodgings of Mac-Mahon, as also upon 
 the lord Macguire ! ! f"^ 
 
 XXXY. In a plain simple case, in which a school-boy of 
 ten years old could have at once pointed out the course to 
 be pursued, they spend no less iha^n five precio%is hours, ^Hn 
 consultation,'''' and in devising ways and means for the pub- 
 lic safety, notwithstanding that the sword, not of Damocles, 
 but of Mac-Mahon, and his bloody-minded associates, hung 
 over them. " They sat up all that night in consultation," 
 " having far stronger presumptions,* upon the latter exam- 
 ination taken, than any ways at first they could entertain." 
 
 XXXVI. The result of their long and painful consulta- 
 tion, from twelve o'clock at night till five in the morning, 
 
 * O'Conally swore positively that there was a conspiracy " to murder all the Pr )te8- 
 tants that would not join" with the conspirators. Yet the justices from thia une- 
 quivocal testimony only derived ^'j;>7'esumptions " of their danger I 
 
APPENDIX. 263 
 
 was, that at tliat late hour, they at length adopted the reso- 
 lution of apprehending Mac-Mahon !!!!!! 
 
 XXXVII. The lords justices had received the names of 
 some of the principal conspirators from O'Conally, and, 
 among the rest, of lord Macguire; had '"''privately set a 
 loatch^ on Friday night," at his lodgings ; they must of 
 course have known that he was equally implicated with Mac- 
 Mahon, and equally demanded the exercise of their vigil- 
 ance ; and yet they did not think of arresting him, until 
 after the seizure of the latter, and " a conference with him 
 and others, and calling to mind a letter received the week 
 hefore from sir William Cole^"^ they " gathered " that he 
 '• was to be an actor in surprising the castle of Dublin ! " 
 
 XXXVIII. Ovv^en O'Conally swears, that " in all parts of 
 the kingdom, all the English inhabiting there," are to be 
 "destroyed to-morrow ^morning ^ " but, in the very next sen- 
 tence, he swears, " that all the Protestants, in all the sea- 
 ports, and other towns in the kingdom, should be killed this 
 nighty It is not easy to conceive, how, after they were 
 " all killed'^'' on Friday night, they could be " all destroyed " 
 on Saturday morning. 
 
 XXXIX. O'Conally's deposition states, that the massacre 
 is to begin at " ten o'clock on the 23d; " to be general " in 
 all parts of the kingdom ; " that all the English inhabitants 
 are to be cut off; and that " all the posts that could be, 
 could not prevent it." As this is the cardinal point in the 
 affair, on which the Vvhole turns, if it can be proved to be so 
 unequivocally false and groundless, as to be utterly destitute 
 of even the shadow of truth, then is the entire story a fab- 
 rication, and O'Conally a perjurer. 
 
 XL. That this explosion did not take place ; and that, of 
 course, there could not possibly have been a general conspir- 
 acy, there is superabundant testimony, as will appear in the 
 subsequent paragraphs. 
 
264 APPENDIX. 
 
 XLI. 1 will first premise, that, as the arrest of Mac- 
 Mahon and Macguire, in consequence of the pretended dis- 
 covery of the sham plot, took place on the 23d of October, 
 at five o'clock in the morning, just five hours before the time 
 fixed for commencing the massacre, that circumstance could 
 not have prevented an explosion in any other part of the 
 kingdom, except in a very small portion of the circumjacent; 
 country. 
 
 XLII. Yet on Monday, the 25th of October, the lords 
 justices wrote an elaborate and detailed account of the pro- 
 ceedings of the insurgents in the north of Ireland, with i 
 prolix statement of various outrages, not only without the 
 least hint or surmise, but even with an utter exclusion of 
 every idea, of murder or shedding of blood. 
 
 XLIII. And further, I invoke the most earnest attention 
 of the reader to this all -important fact — Notwithstanding 
 the pretended generality of the plot, the lords justices, by 
 public proclamation, on the 29th of October, declared that 
 the insurrection was confined to " the mere old Irish of the 
 province of Ulster, and others who adhered to them." 
 
 XLIY. These two strong facts prove that such parts of 
 O'Conally's deposition as relate to the general extent of the 
 conspiracy, and the plot to "cut off all the Protestants 
 throughout the kingdom," are wholly false, and that he of 
 course was an abandoned perjurer; and would decide the 
 question on these vital points, beyond appeal or controversy. 
 But much stronger evidence remains behind, derived from 
 Temple, Borlase, Carte, Leland, and Warner, to which I 
 now invite the attention of the reader. 
 
 XLY, Munster continued tranquil for six weeks, although, 
 according to the testimony of Warner, it contained but one 
 troop of horse : * and of course, when defended by such an 
 
 * " In the province of Munster, of which sir William St. Leger was lord president, 
 the EngUsh were very numerous, and ready to assemble in a body to preserve the 
 
APPENDIX. 265 
 
 insignificant force, had there been any reality in the plot, the 
 Irish could and would have totally overwhelmed their op- 
 pressors. * 
 
 XLYI. Connaught was in the same state for six weeks, 
 principally owing to the influence of lord Clanrickarde, a 
 Roman Catholic, f 
 
 peace and safety of the country. But they were utterly destitute of arms ; and all the 
 solicitations made by sir William, which were strong and numerous, could not per- 
 suade the lords justices and coimcil to spare him any. He was a brave old soldier, of 
 great experience and activity ; and did everything that it was possible for a man to 
 do with one troop of horse, which was all Ma gxiard for the whole province ; a 
 guard scarcely sufficient to repress the insolence of robbers, in a time of profound 
 peace, much less in a time of such general spoil and distm-bance. But, with the 
 assistance of the noblemen and gentry of the province, it continued quiet for above 
 six weeks ! ! ! Indeed, no man of quality, or gentleman of EngUsh blood, either Pa- 
 pist or Protestant, had as yet joined the rebels." — Warner, 130. 
 
 * There is a discrepancy between Temple and Borlase as to the time when the insur- 
 rection commenced in Muuster : the former stating it "the beginning," and the latter 
 '• the midst," of December. This does not, however, afreet the disproof of O'ConaUy's 
 deposition, which, in either case, is notoriously false. 
 
 " The flame having marched through Ulster and Leinster, it discovers its furj% 
 about the beginning of December, 1641, in Munster, which province till that time, 
 (by the moderation of the state, ) had stifled its rage, then expressing its consent with 
 the other provinces." — Borlase, 49. 
 
 "The whole province of Munster, about the midst of this month of December, 
 BEGAN to declare themselves in open rebellion." — Temjile, 155. 
 
 "In Munster, sir William St. Leger, the lord president, a soldier of activity and 
 experience, and possessed even with an inveteracy against the Irish, could not obtain 
 arms or soldiers sufficient for a time of peace, much less for a juncture of distrac- 
 tion and disorder. Yet the strength of the EngUsh Protestants, and the loyalty of 
 the Irish gentry, as yet preserved this province from any material disorder y — Lel- 
 and, iii., 158. 
 
 t " The lord Ranelagh was president of Connaught : and aU that province, except a 
 few pillagers in the coimty of SUgo, had, owing in a great measure to the forward 
 zeal and activity of lord Clanrickarde, though a Roman Catholic, tiU this time, con- 
 tinued quiet." — Wariier, 157, 
 
 " The infection of the Pale having spread in the remoter parts, about the middle 
 if December, the whole province of Connaught in a manner revolted, the county of 
 Galway, of which lord Clanrickarde was governor, excepted." — Ibid., 158. 
 
 "The peace and security of Connaught were equally neglected by the chief gov- 
 ernors, although the English power was inconsiaerable in this iJrovince, and the 
 Irish natives kept in continual alarm for twenty-five years by the prospect of a general 
 plantation, which, tfaougn suspended, had not been formaU^^ relinquished. Yet here., 
 too, the good affections of the principal i7ihabitants stemmed the torrent of rebeU 
 lion.'''' — Lelandf 158. 
 
266 APPENDIX, 
 
 XLYII. Leinster was likewise tranquil, except some out- 
 rages of small importance, until the beginning of December; 
 as the summons to the lords of the Pale to come to Dublin, 
 to consult on the aflfairs of state, was dated the 3d of that 
 month, at which time there was no appearance of serious 
 disturbance ; and the butchery at Santry, by the sanguinary 
 and merciless ruffian, sir Charles Coote,* which was obvi- 
 ously kitended to provoke, and actually led to, the insurrec- 
 tion in that province, took place on the 7th. 
 
 XL VIII. And further, we have the testimony of Warner 
 and Carte, f that the insurrection was for about six weeks 
 confined almost wholly to the province of Ulster. 
 
 XLIX. That the original views of the insurgents did not 
 comprehend a general massacre, or even single murders, we 
 have further testimony, clear and decisive, derived even from 
 Temple, as well as Warner, and Leland, which, independent 
 of all other proof, would be suffi.cient to settle this question 
 forever, and utterly overwhelm O'Conally's perjured legend. J 
 
 L. Moreover, if there had been a plot for a general insur- 
 
 * "The town being left at his [sir Charles Coote's] mercy, to which he appears to 
 be a stranger, he put to death several persons, wUhotit distinction of age or sex! ! I 
 in revenge of the several spoils committed on the English in those parts." — War- 
 ner, 165. 
 
 " In revenge of their depredations, he [sir Charles Coote] committed such tmpro- 
 voked, such tmthless, and indiscriminate carnage in the town, as rivalled the utmost 
 extravagancies of the Northerns.'' — Leland, iii., 169. 
 
 t "Had the lords justices and coimcil acquitted themselves like men of probity and 
 understanding, there was time enough given them to suppress an insurrection which 
 for six weeks icas confined almost to the province of Ulster, without any chief that 
 was so considerable as sir Phelim 0"Neal." — Warner, 130. 
 
 "iVo one nohleman of the kingdom, nor any estated gentleman of English race, 
 engaged in the rebellion, or joined with the rebels in action, till the month of Decem- 
 ber ; for as to those gentlemen of the county of Louth, who submitted to them before, 
 being unable to defend themselves or to make resistance, they had not yet appeared 
 in action. The rebellio7i till then had been carried on bij the mere Irish, and CON- 
 FINED TO ULSTER, to some few comities in Leinster, atid that of Leitrim in 
 Coiinaught.'''' — Carte, i., 243. 
 
 i ' It was resolved" by the insurgents '■'■not to kill any, but where of necessity 
 they should be forced thereunto by opposition." — Temple, 65. 
 
APPENDIX. 267 
 
 rectioTi, and siicli a massacre as O'Conally swore to, there 
 would have been evidence produced from some of the conspir- 
 ators : but notwithstanding the lords justices had recourse 
 to tht, execrable aid of the rack, and put Mac-Mahon and 
 otherji to the torture, there is not, in the examinations of 
 the former, a single word to corroborate the sanguinary part 
 of O'Conally's deposition. The examinations of the rest 
 were never published. 
 
 LI. There is not to be found in Temple, Borlase, Carte, 
 Warner, Leland, Clarendon, nor, as far as I have seen, in 
 Bushworth, the examination of a single person engaged in 
 a conspiracy which was said to have extended throughout 
 the whole kingdom, except those of Mac-Mahon and lord 
 Macguire ! ! ! ! That of the latter was not taken till March, 
 1642. 
 
 Perhaps the preceding analysis of this miserable legend 
 might supersede the necessity of adding anything further on 
 the subject. But its great importance, and a deep solicitude' 
 to dispel the thick mists with which prejudice and fraud have 
 overspread it, induce me to place it in a new form, and bring 
 it more home to the mind of the reader. The reasons for 
 adopting this measure, which might otherwise appear a work 
 of supererogation, will probably so far satisfy the reader, as 
 to preclude the necessity of an apology. 
 
 Queries. 
 
 Is there a man in the world who can seriously believe : 
 
 I. That a Gatliolic colonel, engaged in a plot to murder 
 the Protestants^ would send forty-five miles for a Protestant, 
 SERVANT to a Protestant gentleman, an inveterate enemy to 
 the Roman Catholics, as an accomplice ? 
 
 II. That a journey of a hundred and ten miles could be 
 performed in three days and a half, the sun rising about 
 
268 APPENDIX. 
 
 seven, and setting about Jive, at a season of the year ^\fhen 
 the rains, then usually prevalent, must have rendered tho 
 roads almost impassable ; and by a man who knew nothing 
 of the business which led to the summons he had received, 
 and who, of course, had no temptation to make any extra- 
 ordinary exertion? 
 
 III. That a stranger, arriving in the suburbs of a city an 
 Iwiir after sunset, and fatigued with a long journey, should, 
 ivithout any aid from the moon, immediately commence a 
 search for and actually find out the lodgings, of another 
 stranger, who had arrived a few hours before ? 
 
 TV. That sir William Parsons, who had, at nine in the 
 evening, received intelligence of a plot, to explode at ten the 
 next morning, and the names of some of the principal con- 
 spirators, should be so misguided, as to send back the 
 drunken informer, " to get out of Mac-Mahon as much cer- 
 tainty of the plot as he could," instead of immediately ap- 
 prehending the conspirators ? 
 
 V. That being " in toivn^''' he would have gone " without 
 the town''"' and sent there for such of the council as lived " in 
 town,'''' when such an awful explosion was likely to take 
 place ? 
 
 YI. That when the informer returned to the lords justices, 
 he would be allowed to go to bed, before taking his examin- 
 ations ? 
 
 YIL That the lords justices would have remained all 
 night, and until five o'clock in the morning, at lord Borlase's 
 house, without the town, and closed the gates, thus shutting 
 themselves out from the defence of the castle ? 
 
 YIII. That when O'Conally had slept himself sober, and 
 made circumstantial deposition of such alarming particulars, 
 the council would have been such idiots as to take no other 
 precaution than merely '' to have a watch set privately upon 
 the lodgings of Mac-Mahon, and also upon lord Macguire," 
 
APPENDIX. 209 
 
 as if they liad been plotting to rob orchards or hen-roosts, to 
 bar out a schoolmaster, break lamps in a midnight frolic, or 
 attack the watchmen, instead of plotting to seize the castle, 
 subvert the government, and cut the throats of one or two 
 hundred thousand people ? 
 
 IX. That the privy covincil would not, under such circum- 
 stances, have instantly apprehended the conspirators, instead 
 of " sitting all night in council," upon one of the simplest 
 points ever discussed, and which could have been decided in 
 five minutes, as well as in five hours, five weeks, or five years ; 
 on which the most prompt and decisive measures were im- 
 periously necessary ; and at a moment when, if there were 
 any truth in the statement of O'Conally, the salvation or de- 
 struction of the state might depend on a single hour ? 
 
 X. That having taken the precaution, on Friday night, of 
 " setting a watch privately upon the lodgings of lord Mac- 
 guire," thereby establishing their belief that he was an ac- 
 complice in the plot, they would not have arrested him at 
 the same time they arrested Mac-Mahon, but v\^aited " till 
 conference with the latter and others, and calling to mind sir 
 William Cole's letter," which led them to " gather that the 
 lord Macguire was to be an actor in surprising the castle of 
 Dublin ? " 
 
 XI. That a conspiracy, which was to explode throughout 
 the whole kingdom on the 23d of October, should be arrested 
 in Leinster, Connaught, and Munster, by the detection of it, 
 in Dublin, a few hours before the aj)pointed time ? 
 
 XII. That if it had been intended to murder " all the 
 Protestants throughout the kingdom,'''' who " would not join 
 the conspirators," there would have been no intelligence of 
 a single murder on the 25th, or that, on the 29th, the lords 
 justices should explicitly declare, that the insurrection vras 
 " confined to the mere old Irish in the province of Ulster, 
 and others who had joined them ? " 
 
270 APPENDIX. 
 
 XIII. That though the lords justices had recourse to the 
 execrable expedient of putting Mac-Mahon and others to the 
 rack, they should not have extorted a word from any of 
 them, to support the charge of murderous intentions, if any 
 conspiracy had existed, for " cutting off all the Protestants 
 and English throughout the kingdom ? " 
 
 XIV. That no examinations should have ever been taken 
 of any other of the conspirators ? 
 
 XV. That if there were a general conspiracy, and of 
 course a large assemblage of people in Dublin, for the '^uv- 
 pose of seizing the castle on the 23d, the lords justices would 
 not have been able, on the morning of that day, to appre- 
 hend more than two of the leaders and a few common ser- 
 vants ? 
 
 XVI. That to execute an enterjDrise of which the success 
 absolutely depended on promptitude and secresy, people 
 would be collected from all the thirty-two counties of Ireland, 
 at various distances, ten, twenty, thirty, fifty, one hundred, 
 and one hundred and fifty miles from the scene of opera- 
 tions ? 
 
 XVII. And finally, whether, the deposition of O'Conally 
 being incontrovertibly established as false, and he of course 
 perjured, in the two vital points, — 
 
 I. The universality of the plot, and 
 
 II. The determination to massacre all who would not join 
 in it, 
 
 — there can be any credit whatever attached to the remain- 
 der of his testimony ? And whether it does not necessarily 
 follow, that the whole was a manifest fraud and imposture, 
 designed to provoke insurrection, and lead to its usual and 
 inevitable result, — confiscation ? 
 
 Before the reader decides on answers to these queries, it 
 is hoped he will bear in mind the strong facts adduced in 
 
APPENDIX. 271 
 
 Chapter XX. to prove that the seventeenth century vv^as, in 
 the fullest sense of the word, the age of perjury, forgery, and 
 fabricated plots. He will there see, that in London, the 
 boasted courts of justice were at that period mere slaugh- 
 ter-houses, where the depositions of men, stained and 
 covered over with crimes of the most atrocious nature, as 
 the leopard is covered v/ith spots, were received without 
 hesitation in cases where the lives of innocent men were at 
 stake, and were finally immolated. He will likewise behold 
 the horrible fact, that the testimony of a man whose perj%iry 
 was detected in open court^ and there confessed hy himself^ 
 was afterwards admitted, and was the means of consis^ninsc 
 innocent persons to the ignominious death of the gallows. 
 
 Let him also bear in mind, tliat forged j^lots, supported 
 by perjury, had been one of the regular and uniform 
 machines of the government of Ireland, from the invasion 
 to that period; and steadily from the Kestoration in 16G0, 
 till the Revolution in 1688 ; and had produced the forfeiture 
 of millions of acres. 
 
 And further, let it not be forgotten, that all the writers. 
 Clarendon, Carte, Warner, Leland, Gordon, etc., agree, that 
 the grand object of the lords justices was, in the beginning, 
 to extend the flames of civil war ; and, when the insurrec- 
 tion had by these means become genei-al, to prevent a cessa- 
 tion of hostilities, for the purpose of producing extensive 
 confiscations. 
 
 With all these strong facts taken into view, I then invite 
 a decision ; and entertain no doubt of a favorable verdict. 
 
 On this subject I have no hesitation in pledging myself, 
 that if any independent and upright judge or lavvyer of any 
 court in France, Germany, England, Scotland, Ireland, or 
 the United States, will pronounce affirmative answers to the 
 above queries, so as to imply a belief in the reality of the 
 conspiracy, as deposed to by the " Protestant gentleman," 
 
eT2 APPENDIX. 
 
 alias " servant,^'' I will cheerfully suppress this work, and 
 consent to have it burned by the hands of the common 
 hangman. 
 
 [In the 28th chapter of his " Vindicm Hibemicce'''' (2d edition, 
 1823), Mr. Carey proceeds, in the annexed manner, to dispose of 
 the question, whether there was any massacre of Protestants in 
 1641.] 
 
 TFas there really a 3fassacre of the Protestants in 1641 ? 
 
 TInparalleled Exaggeration. More Protestants pretended 
 to he killed than there were on the Island. Conclusive 
 Evidence drawn from Sir William Petty. Carte's and 
 
 Warner'' s Refutation of tlie Legend. 
 
 " Falsehood and fraud grow up in every soil, 
 The product of all climes." — Addison. 
 
 Although I have already in the first chapter incidentally 
 touched on the numbers said to be massacred by the Irish 
 in the insurrection of 1G41, I think it proper to resume the 
 subject, and go into it somewhat more at length, as it is a 
 cardinal point in the vindication I have undertaken. 
 
 In order to proceed correctly in the investigation, I shall 
 let the accusers narrate their own tales, in order to ascer- 
 tain what is the sum and substance of the allegations : — 
 
 '^ The depopulations in this province of 3Iunster do well 
 near equal those of tlie whole kingdom !! ! " — Temple, 103. 
 
 '' There being, since the rebellion fii'st broke out, imto 
 the time of the cessation made Sept. 15, 1G43, which was 
 not full two years after, above 300,000 Pritish and Protes- 
 tants cruelly murder edj in cold hlood, destroyed some other 
 way, or expelled out of their habitations, according to the 
 strictest conjecture and computation of those who seemed 
 best to undei-stand the numbers of English planted in Ire- 
 land, besides those few vjhich fell in tlie heat of fight during 
 the war.''"' — Ibid., 6. 
 
 " Above 154,000 Protestants were massacred in that 
 kingdom from the 23d October to the 1st March following." 
 — Papin, ix., 343. 
 
APPENDIX. 273 
 
 " By some computations, those who perished by all these 
 cruelties are supposed to be 150,000 or 200,000. Bj the 
 most moderate, and probably the most reasonable account, 
 they are made to amount to forty thousand ! if this extenu- 
 ation itself be not, as is usual in such cases, somewhat ex- 
 aggerated! ''' — H-iune, iii., 545. 
 
 " A general insurrection of the Irish spread itself over the 
 whole country, in such an inhuman and barbarous manner, 
 that there were forty or fifty thousand of the English Protes- 
 tants 7)iurderedj before they suspected themselves to he in any 
 danger^ or could provide for their defence, by drawing 
 together into towns or strong houses." — Clarendon^ E., II. 
 
 That " Saul slew his thousands, and David his tens of thou- 
 sands," was, in " olden time," sung by the women of Israel. 
 Every Pliilistine was magnified into ten ; every ten into a 
 hundred ; and every hundred into a thousand. But the 
 amplifying powers of the Jewish women fade into insignifi- 
 cance, when compared with those of the Anglo-Hibernian 
 writers. Every Englishman that fell in battle, or otherwise, 
 was murdered. Every man was magnified into a hundred ; 
 every ten into a thousand; and every hundred into ten 
 thousand. 
 
 Such a spirit of exaggeration has prevailed, in a, greater or 
 less degree, in all ages. Even in common occurrences, 
 hardly calculated to excite any interest, we find, every day 
 of our lives, that the statements of current events are so 
 highly colored, as to difier full as much from the reality, as 
 the countenance of a meretricious courtesan, who has ex- 
 hausted her stores of carmine and white lead, difiers from 
 the undisguised countenance of an innocent country damsel, 
 who depends wholly on the pure ornaments of beneficent 
 Nature. This being undeniably the case, on topics v>^here 
 no temptation to deception exists, how dreadful must be the 
 falsehood and delusion in the present case, where ambition, 
 avarice, malice, bigotry, national hatred, and all the other 
 
2Y4 APPENDIX. 
 
 dire passions that assimilate men to demons, were goaded 
 into activity ! 
 
 In all other cases, but that of the history of Ireland, to 
 convict a witness of gross, palpable, and notorious falsehood, 
 would be sufficient to invalidate the whole of his evidence ; 
 but such has been the wayward fate of that country, that 
 the most gross and manifest forgeries, which carry their 
 own condemnation with them, are received by the world as 
 though they were 
 
 " Confirmation strong as proofs of Holy Writ." 
 
 Or, when some are found too monstrous to be admitted, 
 their falsehood and absurdity do not impair the public 
 credulity in the rest of the tales depending on the same 
 authority. 
 
 The materials for Irish statistics, at that early period, are 
 rare j a deficiency which involves this subject in considerable 
 difficulty. V7ere correct tables of the population of Ireland 
 to be had, the task would be comparatively easy ; and I 
 could put down all those tales, with as much ease as I have 
 stamped the seal of flagrant falsehood on tlie many impost- 
 ures already investigated. 
 
 But I avail myself of a sound rule, — to employ the best 
 evidence that the nature and circumstances of the case will 
 admit; and there are fortunately, some important data, on 
 which to reason, in the present instance, and to shed the 
 light of truth on this intrica»fce question, and dispel the 
 dense clouds with which it has been environed by fi'aud and 
 imposture. 
 
 Sir William Petty, the ancestor of the Lansdowne family, 
 laid the foundation of a princely fortune in the depredations 
 perpetrated on the Irish, after the insurrection of 1641. Of 
 course, he had no temptation to swerve from the truth in 
 their favor; on the contrary, it was his interest, equall}? 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 IJYO 
 
 witli the otlier possessors of the estates of the plundered 
 Irish, to exaggerate their real crimes, and to lend the coun- 
 tenance of his reputation to their pretended ones. Hence, 
 his testimony, on this ground, and as a cotemporary, cannot, 
 so far as it tends to exonerate those upon whose ruin he raised 
 his immense estate, be excepted against by the enemies of 
 the Irish. I shall therefore freely cite him in the case : and 
 the reader will at once perceive to what an extent delusion 
 has been carried on this subject. 
 
 He states the aggregate number of the Protestants who 
 perished in eleven years, to have been 1 12,000 ; of wliom 
 " two-thirds were cut off by war, plague, and famine." It 
 is obvious to the meanest capacity, — if, of 112,000, the whole 
 number that fell in that space of time, two-thirds were cut 
 off " by war, plague, and famine," — that those who fell, out 
 of war, in eleven years, were only 37,000 ! I hope to prove, 
 that even this statement, so comparatively moderate, is ex- 
 travagantly beyond the truth. 
 
 Sir William Petty confutes himself, beyond the jiower of 
 redemption. 
 
 " Mark how a plain tale shall put him down." 
 
 He bequeathed to posterity some statistical tables, which 
 throw considerable light on this subject. They are very 
 meagre, it is true ; but, meagre as they are, I believe there 
 are no others ; at all events, I know of none : and must 
 therefore avail myself of them. 
 
 He informs us, that the population of Ireland, in 1641, 
 was, 1,466,000 ; * and that the relative proportion of the 
 Protestants to the Catholics Avas as tv/o to eleven : f of 
 course, it follows, that the population was thus divided : — 
 
 * "This shows there were, in 1G41, 1,406,000 people. "—PeJily- 
 t For the present I admit this proportion ; as, however exaggerated the number of 
 the Protestants may be, it does not affect the point at issue. But, from various cLr- 
 t;umsa.nces. it is doubtful whether there was one Protestant to eleven Eoman Cath- 
 olics. 
 
276 APPENDIX: 
 
 about 1,241,000 Eoman Catholics, a,nd 225,000 Protestants. 
 Erom this conclusion there is no appeal. 
 
 The supplies of people from England and Scotland, until 
 after the final defeat, capture, condemnation, and death of 
 Charles I., were inconsiderable :* and surely it is impossible 
 for a rational being to believe, that out of 225,000, there 
 could have been 112,000 destroyed, and the residue have 
 been able to baffle and defeat the insurgents, who comprised 
 the great mass of the nation. It will therefore, I trust, be 
 allowed, as an irresistible conclusion, that Sir William Petty's 
 calculation, although, so far, more moderate than any of the 
 " tales of terror " quoted at the commencement of this chap- 
 ter, is most extravagantly overrated, probably trebled or 
 quadrupled ; and must, of absolute necessity, be false. 
 
 But even admitting it to be correct, what an immense dif- 
 ference between 37,000 in eleven years — and the numbers 
 so confidently stated by the various writers of Irish history ! 
 What astonishment must be excited by Burton's 300,000, 
 in a few months ; Temple's 300,000, in less than two years ; 
 May's 200,000, in one month ; AYarwick's 100,000, in one 
 week ; or Rapin's 40,000, in a few days ! Surely there is 
 not, in the history of the world, any parallel case of such 
 gross, palpable, shocking, and abominable deception. Can 
 language be found strong or bold enough to mark the dis- 
 honor of those who knowingly propagated such falsehoods, 
 or the folly or neglect of those who adopted and gave them 
 currency ? Their names ought to be held up, as " a hissing 
 and reproach," to deter others from following in their foul 
 and loathsome track of calumny and deception. 
 
 On the subject of the number of victims of the pretended 
 massacre, the observations of Carte are so j udicious and un- 
 answerable, that they would be sufficient, independent of 
 
 * More Protestants, it is highly probable, removed from Ireland during the progress 
 jf the war, than the number of soldiers who were sent thither from England. 
 
APPENDIX. 277 
 
 the (jther evidence I have produced, to put down forever 
 those miserable legends about so many hundreds of thousands 
 of the Protestants cut off in a few weeks, or months or 
 years, and to stamp on the foreheads of their authors the 
 broad seal of imposture. He states that the extravagant 
 numbers, asserted to be massacred, were "more than there 
 were of English, at that time, in all Ireland.'''' 
 
 "It is certain, that the great body of the English was 
 settled in Munster and Leinster, where very few murders 
 were committed / and that in Ulster, which was the dismal 
 scene of the inassacre, there were above 100,000 Scots, who, 
 before the general plantation of it, had settled in gi*eat num- 
 bers in the counties of Down and Antrim : and new shoals 
 of them had come over, upon the plantation of the six es- 
 cheated counties : and they were so very powerful therein, 
 that the Irish, either out of fear of their numbers, or some 
 other politic reason, spared those of that nation, making 
 proclamation, on 2ycdn of death, that no Scotsman should he 
 Wjolested in body, goods or lands, whilst they raged with so 
 much cruelty against the English." — Carte, I., 177. 
 
 To these facts, he adds the following reflections : 
 
 " It cannot therefore reasonably be presumed, that there 
 were at most above 20,000 English souls, of all ages and 
 sexes, in Ulster at that time ; and of these, as appears by 
 the lords justices' letter, there were several thousands got 
 safe to Dublin, and icei^e subsisted there for many months 
 afterwards y besides 6,000 women and children, which Cap- 
 tain Mervyn saved in Fei-managh ; and others that got safe 
 to Derry, Coleraine, and Carrickfergus, and went from these 
 and other ports into England." 
 
 It is impossible to reconcile the latter part of these quota- 
 tions with the rest ; a case, as we have repeatedly stated, 
 that incessantly occurs in Irish histories. The author in- 
 forms us, on rational grounds, that there were " not more 
 than 20,000 English in Ulster ^ " that " several thousands 
 got safe to Dublin j " that " G,000 women and children were 
 
278 APPENDIX, 
 
 saved in Fermanagli ; " and that " others got safe to Deny, 
 Coleraine, and Carrickfergus." These all-important and con- 
 clusive facts he connects with a statement of " the extreme 
 cruelty with which the insurgents raged against the Eng 
 lish," and with a notice of the " dismal scene of the massa 
 ere,'''' the subjects of which massacre are not very easiljf 
 found, and, at all events, could not have been very numer- 
 ous : for, let us add together " several thousands," and 
 *' 6,000," and the "others" who "got safe" into the speci- 
 fied towns, where there were numerous garrisons ; where, of 
 course, in a time of violence and commotion, the inhabitants 
 of the circumjacent country would naturally seek refuge ; 
 and where, it is not extravagant to suppose, that " the 
 others," who thus "got safe," might have amounted to 
 some thousands : let us then deduct the aggregate from 
 20,000, the total number of English, and we shall find a 
 slender remainder. But the plain fact is, that the writers 
 on this subject are so haunted by the idea of a massacre, 
 that although it rests on the sandy foundation of forgery 
 and perjury, as shall be fully proved in the sequel, and al- 
 though many of their own statements, in the most unequiv- 
 ocal manner, give it the lie direct, their minds cannot be 
 divested of the terrific object. These passages from Carte 
 furnish a strong case in point. The most ardent friend of 
 Ireland could not desire a much more complete proof of the 
 fallacy of the accounts of the pretended massacre than is 
 here given by this author himself, who, nevertheless, won- 
 derful to tell ! appears to resist the evidence of his own 
 facts, and to be blind to the obvious inference to which they 
 inevitably lead. 
 
 Ferdinando Warner, a clergyman of the Church of Eng- 
 land, appears to have been the only writer who has gone into 
 any elaborate investigation of the legendary tales of the pre- 
 tended massacre ; and his views of the subject will deserve 
 
APPENDIX. 279 
 
 tlie most serious attention of the reader. After stating the 
 uncertainty of the accounts, and tlie consequent difficulty of 
 making an exact estimate, he pronounces a strong and une- 
 quivocal sentence of condemnation on the Munchausen tales 
 "we are combating; and avers, that 
 
 " It is easy enough to demonstrate the falsehood of the re- 
 lation of every Protestant historian of this rebellion.'''' 
 
 He proceeds to render a satisfactory account of the grounds 
 on which this statement rests : 
 
 *' To any one who considers how thinly Ireland was, at 
 that time, 2^^02yled by Protestants, and the province of Ulster 
 'pa,rticidarly, luhere was the chief scene of the massacre, those 
 
 RELATIONS, UPON THE FACE OF THEM, APPEAR INCREDIBLE.' 
 
 " Setting aside all opinions and calculations in this affair, 
 which, besides their uncertainty, are without any precision 
 as to the space of time in which the murders were commit- 
 ted, the evidence from the depositions in the manuscript 
 above mentioned stands thus : — The number of people killed, 
 upon positive evidence, collected in two years after the in- 
 surrection broke out, adding them all together, amounts only 
 to two thousand one hundred and nine y on the reports of 
 other Protestants, one thousand six hundred and nineteen 
 more y and on the report of some of the rebels themselves, 
 a further number of three hundred/ the v/hole making 
 four thousand and twenty-eiglit. Besides these murders 
 there is, in the same collection, evidence, on the report of 
 others, of eight thousand killed by ill-usage : and if we 
 should allow that the cruelties of the Irish out of war, ex- 
 tended to these numbers, which, considering the nature of 
 several of the depositions, I think in my conscience we can- 
 not, yet to be impartial we must allow, that there is no 
 pretence for laying a greater number to their charge. This 
 account is also corroborated by a letter, which I copied out 
 of the council books at Dublin, written on the fifth of May, 
 sixteen hundred and fifty -two, ten years after the beginning 
 of the rebellion, from the parliament commissioners in Ire- 
 land to the English parliament. After exciting them to 
 
*280 APPENDIX, 
 
 further severity against the Irish, as being afraid ' their l>e- 
 havior towards this people may never sufficiently avenge 
 their murders and massacres, and lest the parliament; might 
 shortly be in pursuance of a speedy settlement of this na- 
 tion, and thereby some tender concessions might be con- 
 cluded,' the commissioners tell them that it appears ' besides 
 eight hundred and forty-eight families, there were killed, 
 hanged, burned, and drowned, six thousand and sixty-two."^ " 
 — 'Warner, 297. 
 
 Thus I close this subject with stating, that these hundreds 
 of thousands are reduced by Carte to 20,000, less '' several 
 thousands " and " 6,000 women and children," and " oth- 
 ers;" and by Warner to about 12,000, of whom only 4,028 
 were murdered ; a large portion of which detail, *' in his con- 
 science," he cannot allow ! Would it not be an insult to the 
 reader, to offer another word, to prove the utter falsehood 
 of all the terrific statements given of the subject, whereby 
 the world has been so long and so grossly deceived ? 
 
 [In a subsequent notice of these statements, Mr, Carey (chap, 
 xxix. , second edition) still further exposes the falsehoods and exag- 
 gerations of the English writers.] 
 
 To establish the falsehood of these hideous portraits of 
 cruelty, a few lines might suffice. Those lines would carry 
 conviction. It would be enough to state the simple fact, 
 that the originals were drawn by the miserable and aban- 
 doned falsifiers, who have so long deluded the world with a 
 belief that there were 100,000 persons massacred in one 
 week, 200,000 in a month, and 300,000 in two years; 
 (whereas sir William Petty, as I have stated, makes the 
 whole number that fell in eleven years, by war, plague, fam- 
 ine, and massacre, 112,000, which I have proved extrava- 
 gantly overrated ; and Warner, who had no partiality for the 
 Koman Catholics, and who took more pains to investigate 
 the subject than any other Avriter, either of the seventeenth 
 or eighteenth century, reduces the number hilled out of war 
 
APPENDIX. 281 
 
 to 4,028 ; with which Carte's account appears to correspond ;) 
 — who have recorded, that a general insurrection and massa- 
 cre took place throughout the kingdom, on the 23d of Octo- 
 ber, 1641, whereas three-fourths of it was, for entire weeks 
 afterwards, in a state of perfect tranquillity ; — who have also 
 recorded the falsehood, that Ireland enjoyed a sort of millen- 
 nium for forty years previous to the insurrection, whereas 
 she suffered, during that period, every species of the most 
 revolting tyranny ; in a word, who are in almost every page 
 of this work convicted of a total disregard of truth. All 
 these stories were dictated by the same spirit of imposture ; 
 penned by the same writers ; rest, of course, on the same 
 authority ; and the falsehood of those already discussed be- 
 ing unanswerably proved, the residue must share the same 
 sentence of condemnation. 
 
 Temple, of all the writers whom I have quoted, is the only 
 original author. His hook is one unvaried tissue of fables^ 
 of which he was himself so much and so justly ashamed, that 
 he endeavored to suppress it/ a7id actualli/ refused permis- 
 sion to the booksellers of London to print a second edition.^ 
 But his endeavors were in vain ; it too much flattered the 
 existing prejudices, — too much favored the views of those 
 who unjustly possessed the estates of which the Irish were 
 plundered, to hope that it would be allowed to sink into ob- 
 livion. 
 
 * Extract of a letter from the earl of Essex, lord-lieutenant of Ireland, to Mr. 
 Secretary Coventry. 
 
 DUBLIN Castle, J.vn. 6, 1674-5. 
 "I am to acknowledge the receipt of yours of the 22d of December, wherem you 
 mention a book that was newly published, concerning the cruelties committed in Ire- 
 land, at the beginning of the late war. Upon further inquiry, I find sir J. Temple, 
 master of the roUs here, author of that book, was this last year sent to by several 
 stationers of London, to have his consent to the printing thereof. But he assures 
 me that he utterly de?iied it ; and whoever printed it, did it without his knowledge. 
 Thus much I thought fit to add to what I formerly said upon this occasion, thai I 
 might do this gentleman right, i7i case it was suspected he had any share in pub 
 li.'ifiing this new edition.'''' 
 
2S2 APPENDIX, 
 
 Carte's account affords a most striking display of the in« 
 fatuation that prevails on tliis topic. The reader, in page 
 378, will find that he statesj that the English were princi- 
 pally settled in Leinster and Munster ; that there were few 
 murders committed in those provinces ; that the insurgents 
 spared the Scotch, who composed the great mass of the Prot- 
 estant population of Ulster ; that there were not in that 
 province more than 20,000 English ; that of this number 
 *' several thousands " escaped to Dublin ; that " G,000 were 
 saved in Fermanagh ; " that " others," not improbably thou- 
 sands, found an asylum in three fortified towns : and yet thia 
 same historian, in the very same page, and at the distance 
 of a few lines, pathetically and feelingly informs his readers, 
 that rivers of blood loere shed ! ! and massacres -perpetrated^ 
 lohicli it woidd he shocking to humanity to repeat ! ! 
 
 While stating these particulars, mixed sensations of as- 
 tonishment and indignation are excited, which the reader 
 may conceive, but wliich language cannot express. One is 
 lost in the mass of reflections excited by this stupendous de- 
 lirium of the human mind. It affords another instance of 
 the gross and glaring contradictions so constantly found be- 
 tween the difierent parts of the same history of Irish aftairs. 
 It is an extraordinary fatality, from which even the very 
 few whose intentions appear correct have not escaped. 
 
 Of all the writers on this subject, tliere is none deserving 
 of more tmqualified censure than II%ime. He was under the 
 influence of none of the dire passions that actuated some of 
 the others. With a powerful mind and keen penetration, it 
 was his duty to have examined carefully the credibility of 
 his authorities ; and it required a very cursory examination, 
 indeed, of Temple's history, to be satisfied that to cj^uote it 
 was an ineffable disgrace. Yet, astonishing to tell, out of 
 forty-eight references, in his account of the pretended mas- 
 sacre of 1641, there are no less than thirty-three to Temple, 
 eleven to E-ushworth, and only two each to Nalson and 
 Whitelock. How utterly unworthy this procedure was of 
 the talents and reputation of Hume ; how indelible a stain 
 it attaches to his memory; and how far, as respects this in- 
 dividual case, he is reduced to a level with the common race 
 of historians, may be readily conceived, from the extracts 
 
APPENDIX. 28S 
 
 which I shall produce from Temple's history. A large por- 
 tion of the most horrible passages, for which he quotes that 
 work, are grounded on hearsay testimony ; which is dis- 
 tinctly stated in the depositions, and which therefore could 
 not have been unknown to Hume, and ought to have for- 
 bidden him to place the least dependence on their authority. 
 But his offence is not confined to the original use of those 
 " tales of terror." No : a much higher and more inexpiable 
 one remains behind. Dr. John Curry published a work of 
 transcendant merit, of which the title is " Historical and 
 Critical Review of the Civil Wars of Ireland," in which he 
 fully displayed the falsehood, and completely overthrew the 
 narrative, of Temple. The peculiar characteristic of this 
 work is, that almost every important fact it contains is sup- 
 ported by the most indisputable authority, not merely in 
 the form of reference, but generally by exact quotation. It 
 may be safely asserted, that a more valuable historical work 
 was never published. The author, in 1764, sent a copy of 
 it to David Hume, then at Paris, with a request that he 
 would give it a candid consideration, and correct the errors 
 that he had committed, by his dependence on such a decep- 
 tions guide as Temple. To this letter Hume sent an " eva- 
 sive ansvjer^'' * in which he declined committing himself by 
 any promise ; and never, in any subsequent edition, cor- 
 rected a single error in this part of his work. On this con- 
 duct, there can, among ujDright men, be but one sentence 
 pronounced, — a most unqualified sentence of reprobation. 
 
 MR. FROUDE'S "RELIABLE AUTHORITIES." 
 
 In a little volume, entitled a " Historical Memoir of the 
 Irish Rebellion of 1641," (which O'Connor assigns to Dr. 
 
 * Hume's "answer " was as follows : — "I am here at such a distance from my authori- 
 ties, that I cannot produce all the arguments which determined me to give the account 
 you complain of, ^-ith regard to the Irish massacre. I only remember I sought trath, 
 and thought I found it. The insurrection might be excused as having liberty for its 
 object. The violence also of the puritanical parliament struck a just terror mto all 
 the Catholics. But the method of conducting the rebellion, if we must caU it by that 
 name, was certainly such, and you seem to own it, as deserved the highest blame, 
 and was one of the most violent efforts of barbarism and bigotry united. D. H." 
 
284 APPENDIX. 
 
 John Curry,) published in London, as a rej)ly to Harris's 
 attack on Henry Brooke's " Trial of the Cause of the Catho- 
 lics," the author in his " Introduction " records his opinion, 
 as given below, as to the credibility of Temple, Borlase, and 
 Clarendon, all of whom are cited by Mr. Froude as " reliable 
 authorities" on the subject of the "rebellion" of 1641 : — 
 
 " The last of these writers breathes nothing but loyalty to 
 the King, and indignation against both the English and the 
 Irish rebels ; the first plainly intimates his afiection to the 
 rebels in England, and suffers just so much seeming loyalty 
 to drop from his pen, as was necessary to his Tiiaia design of 
 blackening most effectually the Irish rebels y and as for Bor- 
 lase, who has botched up what he calls a history, from ]yil- 
 fered parcels out of both, he is a perfect mongrel, sometimes 
 of one party, and sometimes of another ; but always incon- 
 sistent with himself." 
 
 In another part of the same Introduction the author of the 
 " Memoir " says : — 
 
 " In order to show upon what goodly authority those 
 slanderers have grounded their dreadful charge of cruelties, 
 pretended to have been committed by the Irish rebels, . . . 
 I will more particularly exhibit the characters of the original 
 relators of them ; namely. Sir John Temple, Roger, first 
 Earl of Orrery, and Dr. Edward Borlase, as they have been 
 impartially drawn by that eminent Protestant historian, the 
 Bev. Dr. ISTalson [author of the ^ Historical Collections ']. 
 That candid writer, after assuring us that ' the then Lords 
 Justices of Ireland, Parsons and Borlase, did by their au- 
 thority command man}'- things which did not only exasper- 
 ate, but 'render the Irish desperate,' adds : ' It is no less no- 
 torious that Sir John Temple, in writing the history of this 
 rebellion, loas bound by confederacy to assert the proceed- 
 ings of these Lords Justices; and I cannot (says he) find 
 him highly in reputation with the usurpers of the Parlia- 
 mentarian faction, and by them empowered as a commis- 
 sioner to impose, iqyon the Protestant subjects of Pr eland, that 
 traitorous, disloyal, and solemn league and covenant, which 
 
APPENDIX. 285 
 
 was a direct oath of confederacy, not only against, but pur- 
 posely to ruin and destroy the king, the church, and the loyal 
 party; I cannot observe his hook to he 2^i^inted in London^ hy 
 puhlic allowance, in the year 1646, at a time when no 
 books were licensed, but such as made court to the prevail- 
 ing faction of the usurpers, or which might be helpful to sup- 
 port these calumnies against his Majesty, especially as to 
 the Irish Rebellion, — without a too just suspicion of his in- 
 tegrity. 
 
 '' ' The late Earl of Orrery cannot escape the like suspi- 
 cion ; . . . nor is it possible to regard him as an impar- 
 tial writer, who in the blackest of times rendered himself, 
 by his services to the usurper (Cromwell), so notoriously 
 conspicuous to the three kingdoms; being, during that gloomy 
 scene, Lord President of Munster. And to instance another 
 of his titles, though not so illustrious, he was agent for the 
 fanatics established by Cromwell in the estafes of those Irish, 
 who, rej^enting of theii' folly, had served his Majesty against 
 the English rebels. 
 
 '"As for Dr. Borlase, besides the nearness of his relation 
 to one of the Lords Justices, and his being openly and 
 avowedly a favorite of the faction, and the men and actors of 
 those times, he is an author of such strange inconsistency, 
 that his book is rather a paradox than a history ; and it 
 must needs be so ; for (I know not by what accident,) the 
 copy of the manuscript written by the Kt. Hon. the Eiui of 
 Clarendon, happening to fall into his hands, he has very 
 unartfully blended it with his own rough and unpolished 
 heap of matters ; so that his book looks like a curious em- 
 broidery, sewn with coarse thread upon a piece of sack-web ; 
 and, truly, had he no other crime but that of a plagiary, it 
 is such a sort of theft to steal the child of another's brain, 
 that may very well render him suspected not to he overstocked 
 with honesty and justice, so necessary to the reputation of an 
 unhlemished historian. But it is far more unlawful to alter 
 the lawful issue of another man's pen, and thereby disable it 
 from propagating truth, and to teach it to speak a language 
 vhich the parent never intended. And yet this is the case 
 in Dr. Borlase's history, in ivhich he has taken great2:)cii^^ to 
 expunge some and alter many pjOjSsages? " * 
 
 * "'Nalson's "Historical Collectious." Introduction. 
 
286 APPENDIX, 
 
 llae character of tlie "evidence" on wliicli the stories 
 of Temple and Borlase rest is thus detailed by the same 
 writer : — 
 
 " Let ns, therefore, by a word or two, try the depositions 
 in Temple and his copier, Borlase, by the touchstone ot 
 Lord Anglesey and Dr. Pett. And, first, are the matters 
 sworn in these depositions credible ? So far from it, that 
 they are forced to have recourse to a miracle — (the appari- 
 tion of hundreds of ghosts, crying for vengeance on the 
 Irish !) to save some of them from appearing incredible and 
 absurd ! Secondly — were the persons swearing credible ? 
 They were, many of them, weak women and illiterate men : 
 not capable of reading or subscribing their own depositions, 
 and therefore apt to be imposed upon and deceived by those 
 who read to them. A great number of them swore on mere 
 hearsay. Some of them, afterwards, touched with remorse, 
 solemnly declared the contrary of what they had sworn ; and 
 they were all, at the time of making their depositions, either 
 interested or malicious enemies to those against whom they 
 made them. 
 
 "Accordingly, at the trial of qualifications, at Athlone, 
 (a court held by the regicides,) where the book called the 
 * black-book,' which contained these examinations, was jDro- 
 duced, the same was so falsified in most particulars, as well 
 by the witnesses themselves, who were pretended to have 
 been duly sworn, as also by the persons said to have been 
 murdered, ivho were then, and are yet (says my author, 1662) 
 living / that the said hook was, for shame, laid aside as no 
 evidence. And several persons who had taken examinations 
 touching these murders, have frequently since acknowledged 
 the falsity of the matters published by them, as being had 
 from the information of those who, by the hurry of the 
 times, and their own frights, were so transported, that they 
 swore all their neighbors, whom they left behind them, were 
 murdered ; whereas all, or most of them, were afterwards 
 found living." 
 
 Of the bloodthirsty readiness with which Sir Charles 
 Coote entered upon the work of plundering and slaughtering 
 the defenceless people, the evidence is given in a letter ad- 
 
APPENDIX. 287 
 
 (li*essed by the Lords of the Pale " to the nobility and gentry 
 of the County of Galway." This document, the author of 
 the "Historical Memoir" states, was dated December, 1641, 
 and received the 2d of February following, showing that 
 previously that part of Ireland had taken no share in the 
 insurrection ; while the manner in which those who did rise 
 were goaded on is shown in the context. The writers say : 
 
 '^ You, we are confident, with the same affliction, took 
 notice with us to how little purpose we sat in Parliament ; 
 when redress of our grievances must not only move first 
 from, but receive the approvement of those wlio, commonly, 
 were the authors of them. These, with the late demeanors 
 of some ministers of the State, since tliis commotion, by 
 cruelly putting to death some of his Majesty's subjects in 
 the county of Wicklow, as also at Santry, and burning sev- 
 eral gentlemen's houses and haggards, and taking away all 
 their goods without any other cause than that they ivere 
 Catholics y as also the inhuman advice of Sir Charles Coote 
 to the Lord Justices, to execute a general massacre upon all 
 of our religion, ivhich he offered to perform, had the Council 
 consented thereto, having induced us to enter into an asso- 
 ciation, wherein we desire you will be pleased to join, that, 
 with an unanimous consent, we may vindicate the honor of 
 our sovereign, assure the liberties of our consciences, and 
 preserve the fi-eedom of this Kingdom, under the sole obedi- 
 ence of his sacred Majesty, Avliom God long preserve," etc. 
 
 THE MASSACRE IN " ISLAND-MAGEE." 
 
 In his " Review of the Civil Wars in Ireland," the 
 learned Dr. John Curry gives the following particulars re- 
 garding the massacre of the Irish at " Island-Magee," by 
 the English and Scotch Puritans of Carrickfergus : — 
 
 '' The report that his Majesty's Protestasit subjects first 
 fell upon and murdered the Roman Catholics, got credit and 
 reputation, and was openly and frequentl}^ asserted," says 
 
288 APPENDIX. 
 
 Jones, Bishop of Meafch, in a letter to Dr. Borlase, in 1679. 
 And Sir Auclley Mervyn, Speaker of the House of Commons, 
 in a public speech to the Duke of Ormonde, in 1662, con- 
 fesses, " that several pamphlets then swarmed, to fasten the 
 rise of tJds rebellion uj^on the Protestants y' and that they 
 drew the first blood." And, indeed, whatever cruelties may 
 be charged upon the Irish, in the prosecution of this war, 
 *' their first intention, we see," says another Protestant 
 voucher, (Warner, " Hist. Irish Hebellion,'^'' jj. 47,) " went 
 no further than to strip the English and the Protestants of 
 their power and possessions, and, unless forced to it by 
 opposition, not to shed any blood." Even Temple confesses 
 the same ; for, mentioning what mischiefs were done in the 
 beginning of this insurrection, he says : " Certainly, that 
 which these rebels mainly intended at first, and most busily 
 employed themselves about, was the driving away the Eng- 
 lishmen's cattle, and possessing themselves of their goods." 
 (Temple's " Irish Hehelliony) 
 
 In a MS. journal of an officer in the King's service, 
 quoted by Mr. Carte {^^ Life of Ormonde,''^ vol. i.), wherein 
 there is a minute and daily account of everything that hap- 
 pened in the North of Ireland during the first weeks of this 
 insurrection, there is not even an insinuation of any cruel- 
 ties committed by the insurgents, on the English or Protes- 
 tants, although it is computed by the journalist " that 
 the Protestants of that province had killed near a thousand 
 of the rebels, in the first week or two of the rebellion." 
 And, on the 16th of November, 1641, "Mr. Robert Wall- 
 bank came from the North, and informed the Irish House 
 of Commons, that two hundred of the people of Coleraine 
 fought with one thousand of tlie rebels, slew six of them, 
 and not one of themselves hurt. That, in another battle, 
 sixty of the rebels were slain, and only two of the others 
 hurt ; none slain." {lournals of the Irish Commons^ Ap- 
 pendix.) Nor do we find, in this account, the least men- 
 tion of cruelties then committed by the Irish; but much of 
 the success and victory of his Majesty's Protestant subjects, 
 as often as they encountered them.* 
 
 * Leland, iu his '■'■History of Ireland,'" vol. iii., p. 101, says: "It was deter- 
 mined (by the insurgents, in the beginning of the insurrection) that the enterprise 
 Bhould be conducted, in every quarter, with as little bloodshed aa possible." 
 
APPENDIX. 289 
 
 That a great number of unoffending Irisli were massacred 
 in Island-Magee, by Scottish. Puritans, about the beginning 
 of this insurrection, is not denied by any adverse writer that 
 I have met with. An apology, however, is made for it by 
 them all, which, even if it were grounded on fact, as I shall 
 presently show it is not, would be a very bad one, and seems, 
 at least, to imply a confession of the charge. Those writers 
 pretend that this massacre was perpetrated on those harm- 
 less people, in revenge of some cruelties before coromitted, 
 by the rebels, on the Scots, in other parts of Ulster. But as 
 1 find this controversy has been already taken up by two 
 able Protestant historians, who seem to difier fibout the time 
 in which that dismal event happened, perhaps by laying be- 
 fore the reader the accounts of both, with such animadver- 
 sions as naturally arise from them, that time may be more 
 clearly and positively ascertained. 
 
 A late learned and ingenious author of a history of Ire- 
 land (Leland) has shifted off this shocking incident from ISTo- 
 vember,1641 (in which month it has been generally placed), 
 to January following, many weeks after horrible cruelties 
 (as he tells us) had been committed by the insurgents on the 
 Scots in the North. " The Scottish soldiers," says he, 
 " who had reinforced the garrison of Carrickfergus, were 
 possessed of an habitual hatred of Popery, and inflamed to 
 an implacable detestation of the Irish, by multiplied accounts 
 of their cruelties. In one fatal night they issued from Car- 
 rickfergus, into an adjacent district called Island-Magee, 
 where a number of the poorer Irish resided, unoffending and 
 uataiiited ivith the rebellion. If we may believe one of the lead- 
 ers of this parti/, THIRTY FAMILIES were assailed hy 
 them, in their beds, and massacred with calm and deliberate 
 cruelty. As if," proceeds the historian, " the incident were 
 not sufficiently hideous, Popish writers have represented it 
 v/ith shocking aggravation. They make the number of the 
 slaughtered, in a small and thinly inhabited neck of land, to 
 amount to three thousand, a wildness and absurdity into 
 which other writers of such transactions have been betrayed ; 
 they assert that this butchery was committed in the begin- 
 ning of November, 1641, that it was the first massacre com- 
 mitted in Ulster, and the great provocation to all the out- 
 rages of the Irish in this quarter. Mr. Carte seems to favor 
 
290 APPENDIX. 
 
 this assertion ; liacl lie carefully perused the collection of 
 original depositions now in the possession of the XJnivers; ty 
 of Dublin, he would have found his doubts of facts and 
 dates cleared most satisfactorily ; and that the massacre at 
 Island-Magee, as appears from several unsuspicious evi- 
 dences, was really committed in the beginning of January, 
 Y/hen the followers of O'Nial had almost exhausted their 
 barbarous malice." * {Hist, of Ireland, vol. iii.) 
 
 Before I examine the several particulars of the foregoing 
 account, I must observe that the objection taken from the 
 smallness of the place, as if it were incapable of containing 
 three thousand inhabitants, is grounded on a misapprehen- 
 sion of some circumstances in this event. For the Irish 
 that were destroyed consisted not only of the inhabitants of 
 the place, but also, and for the greatest part, of the country 
 people residing in its neighborhood, who, upon the invita- 
 tions of Colonel Chichester and Sir Arthur Tyrringham, had 
 fled to Carrickfergus for protection, on the first eruption of 
 these tumults. " The tov/n of Carrickfergus," says Mr. 
 Carte, " was then the place of the greatest strength in the 
 North ; and as Colonel Chichester and Sir Arthur Tyrring- 
 ham had, on the evening of the 23d of October, received 
 intelligence of the insurrection, they immediately, by beat 
 of drum and kindling of fires, apprised all the country people 
 round them of their danger ; so that the poor country people, 
 who had not yet stirred, flocked to that place continually, 
 with all they could carry of their substance " (another temp- 
 tation to commit the massacre), " in such multitudes of men, 
 women, and children, that the town was overthronged." 
 The same author also informs us, that " Colonel Chichester 
 and Sir Arthur Tyrringham invited several of the most emi- 
 nent of the Irish thereabouts, who yet remained quiet in 
 
 * Sii- Piiciim O'Neil. This assertion has no other foundation than the depositions 
 in the Univeroily of Dublin. What credit is due to these we shall just now see ; but 
 if any re.i,'ard at all is to be had to such of them as have been carefully selected from 
 the rest and pubUshed by Temple and Borlase, in their histories of this rebellion, we 
 shall find some of them vouching the contrary of this relation, viz., that Sir Fhelim 
 O'Xeil did not order the cruelties he is charged with ordering till many weeks after 
 Januarj', 1641. For by Captain Parian's examination, " Sir Phelim began his nias- 
 saeres after his flight from Dundalk." (Temple, p. 85.) Now his flight from Dim. 
 dSlk, according to Carte, did not happen till about the latter end of March following, 
 {''■ Life of Ormonde" yo\. i.) 
 
APPENDIX. 291 
 
 their houses, to come to Carrickfergiis for security ; "who ac- 
 cordingly went thither, hut ivei-e made prisoners on their 
 arrival.''^ 
 
 And because it is allowed that Mr. Carte seems to favor 
 the assertion " that near three thousand innocent Irish were 
 massacred in Island-Magee, in the beginning of November, 
 1G41," it is but just to produce the reasons which appear to 
 have inclined him to that way of thinking, by inserting the 
 passage at large, wherein they are contained : — 
 
 "On the 15th of November," says this well-informed 
 writer, "the rebels, after a fortnight's siege, reduced the 
 castle of Lurgan ; Sir William Bromlow, after a stout de- 
 fence, surrendering it on the terms of marching out with his 
 family and goods; but such was the unv/orthy disposition 
 of the rebels, that they kept him, his lady, and children, 
 prisoners, rifled his house, plundered, stripped, and killed 
 most of his servants, and treated all the townsmen in the 
 same manner. This," adds he, "was the first breach of faith 
 which the rebels were guilty of in these parts (there was 
 then no other insurrection in any of the other parts of Ire- 
 land), in regard of articles of capitulation ; for, v/hen Mr. 
 Conway, on November the 5th, surrendered his castle of 
 Bally-aghie, in the county of Deny, to them, they kept the 
 terms for which he stipulated, and allowed him to march 
 out with his men, and to carry away trunks with plate and 
 money in them. Whether," proceeds Mr. Carte, " the slaugh- 
 ter made hy a party from Carrickfergus, in the territory 
 of 3Iagee, a long narrow island, in which, it is affirmed, that 
 near three thousand harmless Irish men, women, and children 
 were cruelly massacred, happened before the surrender of 
 Lurgan, is hard to be determined ; the relations published 
 of facts, in those times, being very indistinct and uncertain, 
 with regard to the time they were committed, though it is 
 confidently asserted that the said massacre happened in this 
 month of November." 
 
 Let us now try these different accounts by the only sure 
 test of dates and facts. It is confessed on all hands that 
 the chiefs of the insurgents, through fear of the Scots in 
 Ulster, (" who," as the Earl of Clanrickarde informs us, 
 " were forty thousand well-armed men, Avhen the rebellion 
 
2i^2 APPENDIX. 
 
 commenced," at the same time that tlie rebels were, at least, 
 by half less numerous, and furnished with few better weapons 
 than '* staves, scythes, and pitchforks,") published a procla- 
 mation "forbidding their followers, on pain of death, to 
 molest any of the Scottish nation, in body or goods." Tem- 
 ple acknowledges that " this proclamation was, for a time, 
 observed ; " and from Mr. ^Yallbank's report, already men- 
 tioned, to the House of Commons, of the constant success 
 of his Majesty's forces in defeating the insurgents in different 
 parts of Ulster, from the 23d of October to the 16th of 
 November following, we may reasonably suppose that it 
 v/as at least observed till that day, for it is surely in the 
 highest degree improbable that these chiefs would, at any 
 time before, have wantonly provoked the resentment of so 
 formidable a body of men, by any cruel outrage or hostile 
 act. But it is unquestionably evident, that the Scots in 
 Ulster did some remarkable execution on the Irish, several 
 days before the 15 th of November, the day on Avhich 
 Lurgan was surrendered. For Sir V/illiam Parsons, in a 
 letter from Dublin, of the 13tli of that month, to the Earl 
 of Cianrickarde, acquaints him, as with a welcome piece of 
 news, that " the Scots did hold the northern Irish haixl to 
 it, having killed some of them." And Sir William St. 
 Ledcjer, ajrudoina:, as it were, the Scots the honor of that 
 action, told the Earl of Ormonde, on the 14th, that, " had 
 it pleased God that his lordship had been there with his 
 hundred horse, and himself to wait upon him, the Scots 
 should never have had the honor to put such an obligation 
 on Ireland." 
 
 From hence, I think, may fairly be deduced the only rea- 
 son, why the behavior of the insurgents to Sir William 
 Bromlow, on the 15th of November, was so very different 
 from that which they had before shown to Mr. Conway, on 
 the 5 th of the same month, viz. : because the massacre in 
 question was perpetrated on their innocent, iinoffending 
 people, in that interval of time ; which, no doubt, provoked 
 them to the above-mentioned breach of articles at the sur- 
 render of Lurgan, and to several other acts of injustice and 
 cruelty in the prosecution of this war. 
 
 The deduction now made is so agreeable to dates and 
 facts, that I am surprised to find tliis first breach of articles 
 
APPENDIX. 293 
 
 bj tlie insurgents ascribed to any other cause ; especially to 
 one which appears manifestly repugnant to both. This 
 cause, we are informed, was the repulse, defeat, and slaughter 
 of a considerable body of the rebels at the siege of Lisburn, 
 by a Scottish garrison stationed there ; for thus the before- 
 cited history relates the immediate effects Vv'hich that disas- 
 ter produced in these rebels : " But such success " (of the 
 Scots) " was attended with consequences truly horrible ; the 
 Irish, incensed at resistance, carried on their hostilities with- 
 out faith or humanity. Lurgan v^as surrendered by Sir 
 William Bromlow, on terms of security to the inhabitants, 
 and permission of marching out with his family, goods, and 
 retinue ; but all were instantly seized, and the whole town 
 given up to plunder." Thus have we a cause plausibly as- 
 signed, v/hich did not exist until many days after its sup- 
 posed effect v/as produced. For the defeat and slaughter of 
 the rebels at Lisburn, or, as it was then called, Lisnegarvy, 
 did not happen, according to Borlase, till the 28th Novem- 
 ber; but Lurgan, as we have seen, was surrendered to them 
 on the 15th of that month, thirteen days before. 
 
 Let us now see upon what grounds this massacre in 
 Island- Magee is transferred from November, 1G41, to the be- 
 ginning of January following. One would ex})ect to find an 
 assertion so singular supported by some solid, or at least 
 plausible proof; but instead of meeting with any such, in 
 the place before quoted from this history, we are only there 
 directed to look out for it (v/here certainly it never can be 
 found) in the collection of original manuscript depositions 
 now in the possession of the University of Dublin. But Ave 
 shall presently demonstrate the insufficiency, not to say fu- 
 tility, of proofs drawn from these depositions.^' And, in 
 truth, if they were to be admitted as proofs, or evidence in 
 any degree, there is hardly anything so incredible or absurd, 
 that might not, with equal reason, be obtruded upon us for 
 genuine history. Every suggestion of frenzy and melan- 
 choly ; miraculous escapes from death, visions of spirits 
 cha,unting hymns ; ghosts, rising from rivers, brandishing 
 
 * " A.n.v one (says Mr. Carte) who has ever read the examinations and dcpositiona 
 here referred to, which were generally given npon hearsay, and contradicthig 'One 
 another, would think it very hard upon the Irish, to have all those, \vithout disti no- 
 tion, to be admitted as evidence." 
 
294 APPENDIX. 
 
 swords, and slirieking revenge, would have a juBt and ra- 
 tional title to our belief, having, all of them, received the 
 sanction of these vouchers. 
 
 The original depositions in the 2^ossession of the University 
 of Dublin considered/^ 
 
 I shall now briefly consider the nature of that evidence 
 which has hitherto induced so many people, learned and un- 
 learned, to give, or at least seem to give credit to those hor- 
 rible relations of murders and massacres which have been 
 imputed to these insurgents; — evidence that, in itself, is 
 so manifestly futile, contradictory, or false, that I am j:)er- 
 suaded every person of common sense would be ashamed to 
 produce the like upon any ordinary occasion. 
 
 The evidence I mean is that huge collection of manu- 
 script depositions (consisting of thirty-tv/o folio volumes) 
 which are said to have been sworn, on the subject of the out- 
 rages and depredations committed by the insurgents, in this 
 war, and are now in the possession of the University of 
 Dublin. From this enormous heap of inalignity and non- 
 sense, Temple and JBorlase have selected such examinations as 
 ap>peared to them the least exceptionahle, and consequently the 
 most likely to obtain credit to their horrible narrations. To 
 these, therefore, I shall refer the reader as a select sjyecimen 
 of the rest: after I have submitted to his consideration what 
 Dr. Warner (who, it seems, underwent the drudgery of per- 
 using and examining the whole collection) has left as his 
 opinion of it. " Besides the examinations," says he, 
 *' signed by the commissioners, there are several copies of 
 others, said to be taken before them, which are, therefore, of 
 no autliority ; and there are many depositions taken ten years 
 after, which are still less authentic. As gi-eat stress," adds 
 the Doctor, " has been laid upon this collection, in print and 
 conversation, among the Protestants of Ireland ; and as the 
 whole evidence of the massacre turns upon it, T si)ent a gi^eat 
 deal of time in examining these books ; and I am sorry to 
 saj^, that they have been made the foundation of mucli more 
 clamor a,nd resentment than can be warranted by truth and 
 
 * Curry's "Review of the Civil Wars iii Ireland '' (ISIO), Chap, IV. 
 
APPENDIX. 295 
 
 "There is one circumstance in these books, not taken no- 
 tice of by any before me, which is, that though all the ex- 
 aminations signed by the Commissioners are said to be upon 
 oath, yet in infinitely the greater number of them, the words 
 ' being duly sworn,' have the pen drawn through them, Avith 
 the same ink with which the examinations are written ; and 
 in several' of those where such words remain, many parts of 
 the examinations are crossed out. This is a circumstance . 
 which shows, that the bulk of this immense collection is 
 parole evidence ; and what sort of evidence that is, may be 
 easily learned by those who are conversant with the common 
 people of any country, especially when their imaginations 
 are terrified, and their passions heated by sufferings. Of 
 what credit are depositions worthy," adds he, " (and several 
 such there are,) that many of the Protestants, that w^ere 
 drowned, were often seen in erect postures in the river, and 
 shrieking out revenge ? " * 
 
 At the same time that Dr. Warner rejects the deposi- 
 tions now in the possession of the University of Dublin, he 
 informs us, " that he has, in his own possession, a choice and 
 duly attested copy of such of these examinations only, as 
 were taken on oath ; vv^hich," says he, " 'demonstrates the 
 falsehood of tiie relation in every Protestant history of this 
 'rebellion.^'' Had the Doctor favored the v/orld with a pub- 
 lication of these choice examinations, or even an abstract of 
 them, we should then be in some measure able to judge of 
 their authenticity ; whereas at present we have only his bare 
 word for it. However, from an anecdote which he himself 
 has related, concerning the first real and original examina- 
 tions, we may fairly conclude that his fp.vorite copy of them, 
 however well attested, deserves not a jot more credit than 
 those which he has already so justly condemned. That 
 anecdote imports, " that soon after the Restoration, when the 
 claims in favor of innocents were canvassed, and the House 
 of Commons desired, that none of those whose names could 
 be found in the depositions, might be heard, relating to such 
 
 * "Hundreds of ghosts of Protestants" (says Temple, from these depositions), 
 " that were dro'-vned by the rebels at Pcrtuadoi:\7i bridge, 'icere seen in the river boU- 
 uiiright, and were heard to cry out for reve?ir/e on these rebels. One of the ghostt 
 was seen with hands lifted up, and standmg in tliat posture, from the 2dih of Decem- 
 ber to the latter end of the following Lent 1 " 
 
20G APPENDIX. 
 
 claims of innocency ; the Duke of Ormonde, thongli no friend 
 to the Irish, for good reasons rejected the proposal. The 
 Duke," adds he, " probable knev/ too much of these exam- 
 inations, and the methods used in procuring them, to give 
 them such a stamp of authority ; or otherwise it would have 
 been the clearest and shortest proof of the guilt of such as 
 were named in them." 
 
 Upon this occasion, I submit it to the consideration of 
 every candid and intelligent reader, whether depositions 
 found insufficient to convict the persons, or confiscate the 
 properties of the Irish then living, ought to be now deemed 
 proper and competent evidence to impeach the characters 
 or principles of their innocent descendants, at that time un- 
 born ? or whether any person now existing can be thought 
 to be so well qualified, either by want of partiality to the 
 Irish, or by the knowledge of their case, to judge of the 
 Aveight or futility of that evidence, as the Duke of Ormonde 
 Avas, at that juncture? And, conscious of this material de- 
 fect in the original examinations, with what probability of 
 success could Dr. Warner rely on his ov/n copy of them, how 
 well soever attested, as capable of ascertaining the facts, 
 which he has so confidently related out of it ? * 
 
 [The able and painstaking author of " The CrornweUian Settle- 
 ment of Ireland" (Mr. John P. Prendergast), whom Mr. Froude 
 himself quotes as a most reliable historian, in the second edition of 
 his work (London, 1S70) makes .he following observations on the 
 evidence relied on by the English fabricators of the massacres of 
 1041.] 
 
 '' The proper evidences to prove or disprove this dreadful 
 massacre are, of course, authentic contemporaneous docu- 
 ments — not compilations of a later age, like Hume's ' His- 
 tory of England,' or even the ponderous pamphlets of pra^ty 
 writers of the day, like Milton and Clarendon, strangers to 
 Ireland and its transactions. 
 
 * Warner himself confesses, "that so many of the rebels' sayings to their Protes- 
 tant and English prisoners, which are recorded even in the choice manuscript collec- 
 tion of depositions in his custody, are so ridiculous, incredible, or contradictory to 
 cue another, as show plainly, that they spoke what their own or different passions of 
 their leaders prompted them to." 
 
APPENDIX. 29 T 
 
 *' Tliere is one document that ouglit to be decisive in this 
 case and it would have been so if the English c«f Ireland 
 were not interested enough, and the English of England 
 prejudiced enough, to propagate and perpetuate any cal- 
 umny, to the damage of the fame and national character of 
 the j^eople of Ireland. It is the follovving : Just two months 
 after the outbreak, the Government issued a Commission 
 under tlie Great Seal, to seven despoiled Protestant Minis- 
 ters, to take evidence ujDon oath ' to keep up the memory of 
 the outrages committed by the Irish to posterity.' 
 
 " The Commission, dated 23d of December, 1641, was, 
 in its original form, to take an account of losses. It was 
 amended, on the 18th of tTamiary, 1642, to include Tiiurders. 
 So that this was an after-thought ; a thing scarce possible, if 
 there had been a general massacre. The first Commission 
 recites ' that many British and Protestants have been sep- 
 arated from their habitations, and others deprived of their 
 goods ; ' the Commissioners are accordingly to examine upon 
 oath, concerning the amount of loss, the names of the rob- 
 bers, and v/hat traitorous speeches were uttered by the rob- 
 bers or others. The second adds, ' And what violence was 
 done by the robbers, and how often, and what numbers 
 have been murthered, or have perished afterwards, on the 
 way to Dublin or elsewhere.' And the remonstrance shows 
 that the outrages, in spite of the Commissioners' attempt 
 to present the most terrible pictures, were, for the most 
 part, only such as necessarily followed the stripping the 
 English and driving them from their possessions, as these 
 planters had driven the Irish from theirs, thirty years be- 
 fore ; and that the murders were fewer than have occurred in 
 similar insurrections, where of course some would be slain 
 resisting the pillagers of their homesteads. The Commis- 
 sioners seem unconscious of any general massacre. The 
 murders they record are the occurrences of four months, 
 collected from difierent parts of Ulster. In the few in- 
 stances where any numbers were slain, some of them at 
 least were plainly acts of war, — though the Commissionej'S 
 would have them supposed to be cold-blooded murders, — • 
 and occurred late in December. So far therefore from war- 
 ranting the supposed extensive massacre of the English, 
 this official account disproves it, and shoves how baseless is 
 
298 APPENDIX. 
 
 Clarendon's story of forty tlioiisand or fifty thousand Eng- 
 lisli murdered before they knew where they were, or of an 
 incredible number of men, women, and children promiscu- 
 ously slaughtered in ten days, as he elsewhere has it ; or of 
 one hundred and fifty -four thousand, or three hundred 
 thousand, massacred in cold blood. The letters of the Lords 
 Justices during the first months of the rebellion are equally 
 silent concerning any massacre ; and their Proclamation of 
 8th February, 1642, while it falsely charges the Irish with 
 the design, says it had failed. All the accounts of the time 
 
 are full of the crowds driven out, not murdered 
 
 '•Bishop Bedel, of Kilmore, remained in his palace unharm- 
 ed, his flocks untouched, surrounded by crowds of English 
 that fled thither as to a port of safety, and lay in his barns 
 and stables, and even on hay in the churchyard. Thither 
 fled the Bishop of Elphin and a train of Koscommon exiles, 
 and there he enjoyed such a heaven upon earth for three 
 weeks, that he would willingly have endured another Irish 
 stripping to enjoy again such holy converse. For the Irish 
 never hindered these two Bishops and their poor flocks from 
 using their religious exercises,* though their own was made 
 a crime ; and seven priests, reprieved by the King, were 
 hanged in England at this time, at the angry demand of the 
 House of Commons, simply for saying Mass. In November, 
 an Irish priest arrived at Bishop Bedel's to conduct them to 
 Dublin. The Bishop of Elphin and the rest departed, leav- 
 ing Bedel and his family behind. Bedel died there in Feb- 
 ruary, 1642, and the Irish paid him honor by firing over his 
 grave. His family continued there unmolested until the 15th 
 of June, 1642, when they joined a party of 1340 English, that, 
 by treaty with the Irish, were escorted safely to Sir Henry 
 Tichborne's garrison at Drogheda. Of the Bishop of Elphin's 
 company not one miscarried, nor was a thread of the gar- 
 ments that Bedel gave the stripped English touched by the 
 
 rebels on their way Bedel is always represented to 
 
 have died a prisoner, though he was only removed for a 
 fortnight to the neighboring Castle of Cloughouter, by order 
 from Kilkenny, on the advance of an English force, and 
 
 * Life of Bishop Bedel, by his son-in-law, Alexander Clogy, Minister of Cavan. 
 London, 1862. 
 
APPENDIX. 299 
 
 then restored to his son-in-lavv-'s house. In like manner Sir 
 Pheliin O'Neil is handed down by history as the murderer 
 of Lord Caulfiekl, his neighbor in the country, and friend in 
 Parliament. Yot he treated him and his family with great 
 care when he surprised the fort of Charlemont, on the 23d 
 of October, 1641 ; and there Lord Caulfiekl was kept until 
 the 14th of January, 1642, v/hen he was sent with an escort 
 towards Cloughouter Castle, by a similar order, (probably 
 from Kilkenny,) to that which brought Bishop Bedel thither. 
 They were to rest the first night at Sir Phelim O'N'eil's 
 Manor of Kynard (now Calledon) ; but as Lord Caulfield 
 vras entering the gate, he was shot in the back by Edmund 
 O'Hugh, a foster-brother of Sir Phelim, and thus murdered 
 in the absence and without the knowledge of Sir Phelim. 
 That Sir Phelim had no part in this murder is certain ; for 
 he wa,s sorely distressed at it, and had O'Hugh committed 
 to Armagh jail for trial for the murder: but he escaped; 
 whereupon Sir Phelim had the sentry hanged for his conniv- 
 ance or neglect." 
 
FEOUDE'S FALSITIES. 
 
 WHAT THE AUTHOR OF " THE CROMWELLIAN SETTLEMESTT OF 
 IRELAND " SAYS OF THEM. 
 
 [In the annexed letters, addressed to the press of Ireland and 
 America, by Mr. Prendergast, author of ' ' The CromweUian Settle- 
 ment of Ireland," that gentleman convicts Mr. Froude not only of 
 circulating historical falsehoods long since proved to be such, — but 
 even of suppressing facts Vv^hich have been distinctly brought under 
 his (Mr. Fronde's) notice ; in order to present to his readers a false 
 and distorted view of the action of the English (and in particular of 
 Cromvs^eU) towards the Irish people and their clergy. ] 
 
 Sandymount, Dublin, Nov. 5, 1873. 
 Sir, — Mr. Froude, I believe, is lighting a fire that he has 
 little conception of. Deep as our hatred has hitherto been, 
 at our unparalleled historic wrongs, it is as nothing to the 
 intense detestation we shall hereafter hold the English in. 
 Though the vile English press are unwilling to commit 
 themselves to the support of Mr. Fronde's crusade against 
 the exiled Irish vmtil they see the success of it, it is easy to 
 perceive how they sympathize with it, and how gladly they 
 would see the Americans hate us as deeply as they do them- 
 selves. For, in truth, the self-imposed mission of this friend 
 and lover of Ireland (God save us from our English lovers!) 
 is to turn the Americans against us. With hypocritical flat- 
 tery he pretends to seek American opinion. " We ourselves 
 are at our wit's eiid," he says. " If America will counsel 
 England what to do, she will listen gratefully. And if a 
 time is ever to come when Celt and Saxon are to live side 
 
APPENDIX, 301 
 
 by side in peace and in quiet, it v/ill be when America tells 
 tbe Irish that they must depend for the future on their own 
 industry." America has become the Supreme Court of 
 Appeal, he says, witli English hypocrisy ; and he asks 
 their judgment. But he has already renounced it! Sup- 
 pose America should say : " Try our Constitution ; give 
 Ireland a Federal Union ; make her a State like one of the 
 States of our Union." Oh, no ! Even if that be necessary 
 to Ireland's happiness, England, he tells them beforehand, 
 will not do it. " She will not commit political suicide by 
 any measure that might tend to sej)aration." 
 
 What he wants, then, is judgment in England's favor, and 
 against Ireland. 
 
 His language is that of the hypocrite, and there is 
 poison under that tongue. A more calumnious harangue 
 than his lectures cannot be conceived. 
 
 He admits the brutal cruelties of the English, but repre- 
 sents them as called forth by the still greater crimes of the 
 Irish. Witness his approval of Cromwell's massacre of the 
 inhabitants of Drogheda, together with the flower of the 
 English veterans fighting under the King's commission; I 
 leave out the Irish soldiery. But is it come to this, that 
 the filling of ladies, women, girls, and innocent children, 
 which was the sport of Cromwell's soldiers for two whole 
 days, is to be approved of by Englishmen at this time of 
 day? 
 
 He (Mr. Froude) did not think it so cruel as the oppres- 
 sion and lawlessness which brought misery into every poor 
 man's cabin. It is plain he knows little of the history of that 
 time. But were what he states as true as it is false, would 
 that justify such a deed ? 
 
 It is such deeds that bring English power to be hated 
 and finally overthrown everywhere. This very massacre of 
 Cromwell's works at this day. It makes us loathe the name 
 
302 APPENDIX. 
 
 of Englisliman as the incarnation of cruelty. It might 
 teiTify temporarily; but it fixed National hatred perpet- 
 ually. 
 
 Look at the rebellion of 1798. The English intrusted the 
 Orangemen with the bayonet, and that favorite instrument 
 of theirs for spreading their power — the cat-o'-nine tails. 
 The rebellion was put down, but they have left a hatred 
 that will never be put down. So in India, in the late mu- 
 tiny. Their floggings, killings, hangings, burnings, blowing 
 away from guns, have left such hatreds that the English 
 there live in anticipation of another outbreak, and the 
 wounds made in 1857 will never heal. 
 
 Mr. Froude is now reopening every old wound, and Eng- 
 land may perhaps have to curse the day when the cold- 
 blooded hypocrite was born. Listen to him describing his 
 love for the Irish. " They either," he says, " attract strongly 
 or repel strongly." Him they attracted ! During the last 
 thirty years he has been thrown (that is, he has thrown him- 
 self) much amongst them. He has spent his college vaca- 
 tions, when a young man, wandering in the mountains. 
 He has lived in peasants' cabins for months together. He 
 was once overtaken by illness in the wilds of Mayo, and " the 
 poor creatures," he adds, v/ith English contemptuousness, 
 " treated me with a tenderness I can never forget." And 
 well this viper repays their kindness by slandering the na- 
 tion ; out-slandering, indeed, all our former maligners — and 
 that is no easy task. 
 
 Who made this man our judge ? He seems possessed of a 
 devil that gives him a supposed dominion over Ireland. 
 Ireland has put money into his purse. In his ten long vol- 
 umes, his few chajDters on Ireland have given the greatest 
 charm to his work. The subject, though old, is ever new 
 and fresh, like the people. He is still determined to make 
 money of us. But now he advances beyond the domain of 
 
APPENDIX. 303 
 
 j)ast history ; he sets himself up as our censor, and the 
 guide of America in her opinion of the Irish. 
 
 That he will rue his conduct I have no doubt. I liave 
 never yet seen any one undertake the running down of Ire- 
 land that did not bring his own reputation to ruin. The 
 conscience of the world revolts secretly against the cruel in- 
 justice of the deed. 
 
 But, be this as it may, Mr. Froude has done what can 
 never be undone. 
 
 No Irisliman will ever rest satisfied till he is freed from 
 the misery of living under a people who, though they know 
 that the strongest feature in the character of the Irish is 
 their national feeling, yet seek to depreciate the nation with 
 a watchfulness that never sleeps and a malignity that never 
 tires. 
 
 The reputation this man has acquired as a historian 
 only serves him the better to slander the Irish. I do not 
 believe he can have made any search into the original 
 sources of any period but that period which his history 
 treats of. If he has, nothing but reckless hatred of the Irish 
 could induce him to represent them as cowards-^to repre- 
 sent 200,000 well-drilled Irish, under Ormonde, as driven, 
 like chaff, before Cromwell and 18,000 English ! 
 
 The English of Ormonde's army refused to fight as com- 
 rades with the Irish. When Cromwell appeared before the 
 walls of some towns held for the King, the English garri- 
 sons opened their gates and gave up their officers — their 
 English officers — to be hanged. All the English garrisons 
 of Munster revolted from Ormonde when Cromwell was at a 
 distance, and kept them for Cromwell at his approach. At 
 Rathmines, the treachery oi some of the English regiments 
 who v/ent over to Col. Michael Jones, the Parliamen- 
 tarian Governor of Dublin, in the middle of the battle, 
 helped mainly to cause Ormonde's defeat. The Scottish 
 
30i APPENDIX, 
 
 Presbyterians, another part of Ormonde's supposed 200,000 
 men, were equally indisposed to light as faitliful comrades of 
 the Irish. And the troops of the late Catholic Confederates, 
 — little else but a sudden levy of a mass of peasants, — had 
 no heart to fight under commanders of English blood and 
 interest, though Catholic in religion, who were ready to be- 
 tray the cause rather than it should become a national con- 
 flict, the only thing that could have rallied the Irish. 
 
 The Ulster Irish, called " the Nunciotists," vv'^ere the only 
 body who maintained the cause of Ireland for Ireland's sake. 
 Thus the discipline of these troops of Ormonde is as untrue 
 as the numbers stated by Mr. Froude. Let us pass, then, 
 from this slanderer's charge against the Irish of cowardice 
 (and let all Irishmen, whether their coats be red or green, 
 or blue or black, note it), to the equally false charge he 
 makes asrainst our fathers of a massacre. The Irish Catho- 
 lies, it seems, rose and massacred an unarmed crowd of 
 38,000 confiding and unsuspecting Protestants ! " The valet 
 that helped to undress his master over night, stood with a 
 pike by his bedside in the morning." This sensational draw- 
 ing, v^dien once indulged in (and Froude, Macaulay, and Gar- 
 lyle have all sacrificed truth and honesty to this vicious 
 taste), overpowers all the better feelings. 
 
 There was no massacre. It was not a rising of Catholics 
 upon Protestants, but of an oppressed nation against their 
 tyrants, in the interest of their rightful King. Mr, Froude 
 defends us from the charge of murdering 150,000. On the 
 best computation, says this friend of the Irish, it was only 
 38,000. 
 
 ' ' An open foe may prove a curse, 
 But a pretended friend is worse ! " 
 
 I have, in the Second Edition of the ''Cromwellian Set- 
 tlement," appealed to the collection of outrages and murders 
 
APPENDIX. 305 
 
 made by order of the Englisli House of Commons in Marcli, 
 1642, under a Royal Commission, composed of seven de- 
 spoiled Protestant ministers, for the purpose of damning us 
 all to posterity, for disproof of this supposed massacre. 
 And I confidently rest the case upon it. I have read, I 
 thinkj all the papers of the time, and the result of all is the 
 same. 
 
 But enough of this. The lie will be repeated — this and 
 a thousand daily national insults will be our fate — until that 
 which happened in the case of America happens in Ireland. 
 T am old enough to remember when the insultinsf of the 
 Americans (not long escai)ed from the yoke) was nearly as 
 much the sport of the English as taunting the Irish (still 
 under it) is now. But from the time of the success of the 
 Americans in their war against the Mexicans, it ceased. As 
 soon as they became weak again (or were supposed to be 
 weak), during the late civil war, the insolence and brutality 
 of the English burst forth again. Then it all subsided again 
 when the Northern States were victorious, and the Englisli 
 became so mean as to submit to be judged by the three ex 
 'post facto rules of International Law, and to submit to an 
 Award by Arbitrators, in order to cover their shame in 
 paying that fine for their insolence which they saw the 
 Americans were resolved to exact, and these once proud 
 English did not dare to refuse. 
 
 As soon as the Irish are feared, they will be honored by 
 this bruta], this repulsive people. — Your obedient servant, 
 
 John P. Pre^^dergast. 
 
 Sandymount, Dublin, Yltli Nov.^ 1872, 
 
 Sir, — Some persons may think the language of my letter 
 
 of the 5th of this month, concerning Mr. Eroude, too strong. 
 
 Perhaps the}^ will deem it too weak, as I do, when they have 
 
 read his book called "The English in Ireland in the Eigh- 
 
306 APPENDIX, 
 
 teentli Century." At tlie time I wrote I had only seen tlie 
 account of his speech at Delmonico's, upon his reception, and 
 the abstract of his first lecture. Since I have read his book 
 I would wish to alter one phrase. I would withdraw the 
 term " Cold-blooded hypocrite," and substitute *' Blood- 
 thirsty fanatic." His lectures give no measure of the malig- 
 nity of his book. The man seems to be absolutely possessed, 
 filled with demoniac hate. There is nothing in the world 
 like his present efibrt except Peter the Hermit's preaching 
 the Crusade. His thirst for the destruction of the Irish is 
 only equalled by the zeal of the Crvisaders against the Infi- 
 dels. If he could, he v.^ould raise against the Irish the cry 
 of " Hep ! Hep ! " to which thousands of Jews throughout 
 Europe were massacred. He aims at agitating and rousing 
 both Endand and America a(:rainst us. He has laid the 
 fuel here for rebellion and civil war, and he then crosses 
 the Atlantic to secure, if he can, the assistance of America 
 towards our subjection. Their acquiescence is all he asks. 
 " It will be worth twenty batteries of cannon to the Eng- 
 lish," he says. If this is not his purport, words have no 
 meaning. No Southern planter, infuriated at the prospect 
 of his slaves acquiring their freedom, or the Spartans, mad- 
 dened at the resistance of the helots, can be more demon- 
 like than this Froude. " Cromwell ! " <' Cromwell ! " '' Crom- 
 Avell ! " is the beginning, middle, and ending of his book, his 
 dream, his aspiration. " Leave them to us ! oh, leave the 
 Irish to our tender mercies, and the world shall see Crom- 
 weliian rule re-established in that accursed land!" This is 
 his prayer. It is the old story of the Spartans seeking and 
 getting the aid of the Athenians to keep the helots of Sparta 
 in subjection. Twice did Athens help Sparta to bring back 
 the helots under the Spartan cat-o'-nine-tails. And well 
 w-as Athens repaid, when some years later Sparta reduced 
 the Athenians to slavery, and the Spartan army surrounded 
 
APPENDIX. 307 
 
 Atliens Yvitli bands of music playing, for greater trinmpli 
 to tliemselves and indignity to her, while they forced her 
 own sons to take do\vn the city walls. They even talked 
 of sowing the ground where the city stood with salt ! It 
 remains to be seen what course the Americans will take. 
 Let no one deem my language too heated till they have read 
 Froude's book. If I mistake not, it will be translated into 
 many languages. I trust it may. The world will then begin 
 to form some notion of the character of the race the Irish 
 have had to deal with. I shall fearlessly await the judg- 
 ment of mankind. His book smells of blood. Every hor- 
 rible dream of the enraged, the terrified English of 1641 is 
 reproduced under pretence of an answer to my defence of 
 the Irish against the false charge of the stupendous massacre 
 of 300,000 or 38,000 Protestants, or less, as this kind friend 
 and lover of the Irish suggests, by the Papists. The one 
 number is as false as the other. It is nothing to the pur- 
 pose (as an answer) to show that at Portadov>^n numbers of 
 Protestants, varying, according to different accounts, from 
 GO to 200, were butchered in December, 1641, or that mauy 
 were massacred in the same month at Lisgool Castle, in the 
 county of Fermanagh. The latter was a siege; those at 
 Portadown were prisoners. The war of "no quarter," on 
 the part of the English, had begun. 
 
 The killing of women and children by the Irish, where 
 true, is horrible (in many instances the reports are perfectly 
 false), but it is far less horrible than the same crime author- 
 ized by Sir Charles Coote and other English commanders 
 in this war, as in the wars of Elizabeth's day, mentioned by 
 Froude himself. Bat be the stories against the Irish in 
 this respect true or false, it is no ansv/er to my denial oi 
 the appalling account of the massacre, miless it were of num- 
 bers, amounting to thousands, which is not pretended. But 
 
308 APPENDIX, 
 
 it serves Mr. Froucle's jmrpose of spreading war and blood 
 again. 
 
 I remember well, the first time I appeared in the Four 
 Courts Library after publishing the "Cromwellian Settle- 
 ment," that one of her Majesty's counsel addressed me, 
 "Why, Prendergast, I hear you deny tlie Irlslb rebellion of 
 1G41 ! " Much of Mr. Fronde's parade of murders is about 
 as little to the point as my learned friend's idea of my argu- 
 ment — • 
 
 ' ' Whose notions fitted things so well, 
 That which v/as which he could not tell, 
 But of teutimes mistook the one, 
 For t'other, as great clerks have done." 
 
 Mr. Froude, however, is not so stupid. He knows well 
 enough that the question is, "V7as there a massacre in 
 Ulster, of thousands, at or shortly after the outbreak of 23d 
 of October, 1641?" It is remarkable that, often as the 
 Irish had before been forced into rebellion or war, no such 
 national crime was ever alleged against them. Mr. Froude 
 makes the priests and the Catholic religion to be at the root 
 of the massacre. He has been to the returns of the Com- 
 mission of the seven despoiled ministers, made in March, 
 1642, for inflaming the English of that day, and reproduced 
 now by Mr. Froude for the same purpose at this day. From 
 thence he takes Bishop Jones's tale of a great meeting of 
 monks at Multifarnam Abbey, in the county of Y/estmeath, 
 where the project of a massacre was said to be debated. 
 The tale is that of an informer, incredible to those who 
 know the history of that time, and are familiar v/ith the 
 tales that were then coined and credited, or pretended to he 
 credited. But, says Mr. Froude, the Irish priests themselves 
 admitted that 150,000 Protestants had been murdered by 
 their Popish parishioners. Froude, in his kind feeling for 
 
APPENDIX. 309 
 
 the Iris.li ivli07ii he so loves, does not believe in the numbers : 
 be believes in 38,000 or even less, and finally says that the 
 mind was incapable of making any rational computation 
 because of the terror, but that the numbers were enormous ; 
 and the priests had themselves to blame for being the 
 authors of this frightful tale. But suppose it should turn 
 out that English Protestants and not Irish priests were the 
 authors of this 150,000 Protestants massacred? Well, the 
 tale will still pass current under Mr. Fronde's brilliant 
 painting, and the efforts of the poor defender of the defamed 
 Irish and their priesthood will not be regarded or even 
 heard. Now, what is the foundation of this tale? A 
 passionate friar named O'Mahony urged the native Irish 
 to continue the war with the English rather than accept 
 the peace (afterwards known as the peace of '46) on terms 
 he deemed derogatory and ruinous. Those terms their 
 Catholic leaders, of English blood, were determined to ac- 
 cept, and they caused O'Mahony's book, called " Disputatio 
 Apologetica," printed in Latin at Frankfort, in Germany, 
 to be publicly burnt. " Fight on," said O'Mahony ; " you 
 have already slain 150,000 of your enemies, the heretics 
 [i.e. English], in these foui" or five years, since 1641 to the 
 time of my wi^iting this work, in this present year, 1645. 
 Your foes have publicly proclaimed it in their printed 
 declarations ; jou yourselves do not dispute the fact, and 
 as for myself, I believe they have lost even more. I only 
 wish we could say, alV^ There is no need of wasting time 
 in comment on this piece of evidence. It is a sample of 
 the kind of proofs used in every part of this controversy. 
 
 Sir John Temple is another wi1|beS8 of Mr. Froude's. 
 "Sir John Temple," he says, "considered that 150,000 
 perished in two months (that is, by the end of December, 
 1641) and 300,000 in two years." This is from his " Irish 
 Rebellion," a book pablished in 1646, for the purpose of pre- 
 
310 APPENDIX, 
 
 venting the peace then on the point of being signed, and to 
 hinder any peace at any future time between the English 
 and Irish, as Sir John Temple expressly declares. Yet Sir 
 John's own letter of 12tk December, 1641, to the King, 
 given by Mr. Froude, because he thinks it will lead ordinary 
 readers to accept it as proof of the astounding massacre, 
 proves the contrary. He prints the passage he relies on 
 in italics. It is this : — '' Many thousands of our nation are 
 already perished " (page 105 in note). Is this proof of a 
 massacre? Does it not even contradict the statement in 
 his book of 150,000 being dead at this time, not by mas- 
 sacre, but through fatigue, famine, disease, and in other ways. 
 But what are all these horrors, supposing them to be 
 true, to the acts done by the orders of legitimate authority ? 
 The manner of English war in Ireland has ever been to 
 massacre women and children. 
 
 " My manner of dealing " (says Sir Henry Gilbert) " was, 
 I slew all those from time to time that did belong to, feed, 
 accompany, or maintain any outlaws or traitors, and after 
 summoning any fort or castle, if they did not immediately 
 yield it, I vfould not afterwards take their surrender, but 
 won it perforce, how many lives soever it cost, putting man^ 
 woman, and child of them to the sivord/ being of opinion that 
 no conquered nation will ever yield willingly their obedience 
 for love, but rather for fear." 
 
 This is from Mr. Fronde's "Elizabeth," 10th volume, page 
 507. The year is 1569. 
 
 Are the acts of Irish j)easants at all equal in atrocity to 
 the murders done by order of the Parliament of England 
 (only that " Parliament can do no wrong "), in drowning 
 the King's Protestant soldiers, taken at sea coming at the 
 King's orders to his aid in England ? If they were Irish, 
 even though Protestants and valiant servitors against the 
 Confederate Catholics, they were to be thrown overboard; 
 and 70 soldiers of Colonel Willoughby's regiment, all 
 
APPENDIX. 311 
 
 Protestants, and many women, being taken by a Parliamem: 
 sLip on their passage to Bristol in 1644, were so dealt with 
 (Proclamation of the Supreme Council of Confederate Cath- 
 olics, July 6, 1G44 ; Carte Papers, vol. xi., Public Kecord 
 Office, Ireland). I should not venture to offer any Catholic 
 document for proof (for it would not be believed by Mr. 
 Froude), only that the fact is confirmed by the correspond- 
 ence of Protestants who, of course, never tell lies (though 
 Mr. Froude himself admits the magnifying 38,000 or less 
 into 150,000), and that the fact is confirmed by the Marquis 
 of Ormonde and the public and 2:»ri\'ate correspondence of the 
 day. The English made a boast of it. Captain SAvanley (honor 
 to the English navy !) tied the men in pairs, back to back, 
 and flung them into the sea at Milford Haven. The weekly 
 papers were merry over it. One said, " that Captain Swan- 
 ley took six score " (they swelled the butchers' bill to make 
 it more delightful to the English taste for blood) " English- 
 Irish and sent them a-fishing to the bottom of the sea." 
 Another said " that Captain Swanley made those Irish 
 drink their bellies' full of salt water." Another "that 
 Captain Swanley made those who would not take the Cove- 
 nant take the water with their heads downward." Another, 
 " that the Captain made trial if an Irish cavalier could swim 
 without hands." (Mercurius Aulicus for May 16, 1644, p. 
 983.) ' And Captain Swanley received the thanks of Parlia- 
 ment and a chain of gold worth 200^. 
 
 There is here no mention of women, though they may 
 have been drowned. For, after the defeat of the king at 
 Naseby, more than 100 women, some of them the wives of 
 English Iloyalist officers, were cut to pieces ; and the excuse 
 was, that they were believed to be Irishwomen, wives and 
 followers of soldiers of the King's Irish army. But there is 
 no time, no need for multiplying instances. I must pass to 
 the massacre at Drogheda hy Cromwell : — 
 
312 APPENDIX. 
 
 " The Irish histories say " (says Mr, Froucle) '' that there 
 was an indiscriminate massacre of men, women, and chil- 
 dren. Cromwell's own account" (he continues) "mentions 
 only men in arms, and priests, who, as having been the insti- 
 gators of the worst crimes, Avere held less innocent than 
 those who had committed them. It is possible, he adds, 
 that in such a scene women and children may have been 
 accidentally killed ; but there is no evidence of it from an 
 eye-witness, and only general rumors and reports at seconcl- 
 hand. Of authentic evidence," (he continues,) " in addi- 
 tion to Cromwell, two letters, one of them from a Koyalist, 
 disprove conclusively the story of a general massacre. A 
 printed official list of the officers and soldiers slain at the 
 storuaing of Drogheda, supplied to the Parliament, brings 
 the number to nearly 3,000, besides many inhabitants. 
 These citizens "^"^ (says Mr. Froude) '■^fought by the side of 
 the troops and sliared their fate.'''' (" English in Ireland in 
 the Eighteenth Century," p. 124, note.) 
 
 The proofs, however, of a general massacre are only too 
 numerous to quote. The Marquis of Ormonde, in the same 
 work, says, '' Cromwell outdid himself," that it recalled the 
 " massacre and tortures of the early Christians, and the 
 cruelties of Auiboyna." I never heard it disputed by any 
 one who had read history, except Carlyle, Mr. Froude's 
 model. The great question in dispute is, " Did they massa- 
 cre after promising quarter ? " He says there is iio evidence 
 of any massacring of women and children from an eye-wit- 
 ness. So far is this from the truth, that there is an account 
 by an eye-witness and actor in no less common a book — a 
 book in constant use, namely, in Anthony Wood's " Athe- 
 ns© Oxonienses." The account is to be found in the auto- 
 biography of Anthony Wood, given in the preface to Bliss'.') 
 edition of the " Athense," in four volumes quarto. Anthony 
 Wood's eldest brother, Thomas Wood, Master of .Irts of the 
 University of Oxford, was a captain in Colonel Henry In- 
 goldsby's troop at the siege of Drogheda, " and returned " 
 
APPENDIX. 313 
 
 (says Anthony Wood) "from Ireland to Oxford for a time to 
 take up the arrears of his studentship at Christ Church." 
 It was the winter after the siege. " At which time, being 
 often with his mother and brethren," says Anthony Wood, 
 " he was wont in the winter evenings to tell them of the 
 most terrible assaulting and storming of Drogheda, wherein 
 he himself had been engaged." He told them, continues 
 Anthony, " that 3,000 at least, besides women and children, 
 were, after the assailants had taken the town, put to the 
 sword on the 11th and 12th of September, 1649." He 
 told them " that when they (the soldiery) were to make their 
 way up to the lofts and galleries in churches, and up to the 
 towers whither the enemy had fled, each of the assailants 
 would take up a child and use it as a buckler of defence as 
 they mounted the steps to keep themselves from being shot 
 or brained. After they had killed all in the Church of St. 
 Laurence, they went into the vaults underneath, where all 
 the flower and choicest of the women and ladies had hid 
 the«aselves. One of these," he continues, " a most hand- 
 some virgin, arrayed in costly and gorgeous apparel, kneeled 
 down to Xhomas Wood with tears and prayers to save her 
 life ; and he being struck with a profound pity, took her 
 under his arm and went out of the church with intentions to 
 let her shift for herself, but a soldier perceiving his inten- 
 tions, thrust his sword up her fundament." (Reason will 
 be shown before I have done for using Anthony Wood's 
 dreadful language.) What (it will be said) must have been 
 Captain Thomas Wood's horror to find this beautiful, trem- 
 bling creature, who trusted to his protecting arm, thus cruel- 
 ly and inhumanly butchered by this brute of an Englishman, 
 as she leaned upon him while getting up the steps of the 
 vault ? Of course he struck him, in horror and disgust, 
 with the flat, if not with the edge, of his sword ? Hear 
 Anthony Wood's account of what his brother told him. 
 
314 APPENDIX. 
 
 ""Whereupon Captain Wood, seeing lier gasping, took lier 
 money, jewels, etc., and flung her down over the works!" 
 In other words, this English officer and gentleman, and Mas- 
 ter of Arts of the University of Oxford, turned upon this 
 }>oor tortured creature, robbed her, and flung her alive, over 
 the walls of Drogheda! But "those citizens of Drogheda 
 fighting beside the troops necessarily shared the fate of the 
 Irish soldiery." " It is possible that in such a scene women 
 and children may have been accidentally killed ! " Y/as 
 this lovely girl, whose beauty and elegance disarmed even 
 her furious conqueror, accidentally killed ? Was the trem- 
 bling crowd of terrified ladies of the best quality, that, like a 
 herd of hunted deer, had sought shelter in the vaults under 
 St. Laurence's church, and were there massacred — were 
 these ladies and their children citizens fiorhting beside the 
 troops ? 
 
 " There is no evidence of an indiscriminate massacre of 
 men, women, and children from an eye-witness, only general 
 rumors and reports at second hand." Is not Captain 
 Thomas Wood's account the account of an eye-witness ? 
 And are the cotemporaneous printed letters of the Marquis 
 of Ormonde to the King mere general rumor and rej)ort at 
 second-hand? But what will be thought of Mr. Froude's 
 candor and conscientiousness when it is known that he had 
 in his hands, at the time of publishing his book, the evi- 
 dence of Captain Thomas Wood and the letter of the Mar- 
 quis of Ormonde, extracted in handwriting? For Mr. 
 Froude having written to a friend of mine to know if there 
 was anything beyond Irish rumor for the story of a general 
 massacre, my friend sent the letter to me at Oxford, whence 
 I furnished him with the extracts, and they were by him 
 sent to Mr. Froude. I had quite forgotten it till after I had 
 written the gi-eater part of this letter. His high commen- 
 dation is given to this massacre ; for he not only adopts the 
 
APPENDIX. 315 
 
 language of his hero, but glories in the deed, and vaunts it 
 at this hour. "I am persuaded," wrote Cromwell (it is 
 from Froude I quote), " that it is a judgment of God upon 
 these wretches who have imbrued their hands in so much 
 innocent blood, and that it will tend to prevent the effusion 
 of blood for the future, which are satisfactory grounds for 
 such actions, which otherwise could not but work much re- 
 morse and regret." How utterly mistaken this infallible 
 hero of Mr. Froude was, the tenor of Mr. Froude's whole 
 book is enough to show. ********* 
 
 There is not time nor space to show the reckless audacity 
 of his statements of the prosperity he supposes to have fol- 
 lowed Cromwell's rule in Ireland during that tyrant's life- 
 time. The whole is an argument for the restoration of the 
 naked sword as the sole instrument of English rule in Ire- 
 land. The book, I say again, smells of gore, as if he were 
 athirst for Irish blood. ********* 
 
 Mr. Froude, in denying the massacre of women and chil- 
 dren (with what truth and candor may be now left to the 
 judgment of the unprejudiced), relies upon Cromwell's state- 
 ment as mentioning among the slain only men in arms and 
 priests. These Mr. Froude boldly states to have been the 
 instigators of the worst crimes, and as less innocent than 
 those that committed them, to have been justly massacred. 
 That Mr. Froude will find plenty of charges against priests 
 of having committed atrocities in the rebellion of 1G41, I 
 know. I have read more of their crimes ia this rebellion, 
 or war, than most men ; far more than Mr. Froude ever has 
 read, or will read. I am not of their religion ; but this I can 
 say, that I have never, to my recollection, found any of these 
 charges substantiated. The more horrible the details of the 
 imputed crime, the more quickly is the judgment made cap- 
 tive through the imagination ; though the opposite ought to 
 be the course. Yet, often have I found some terrible impu- 
 tation against priests end in an act of benevolence, carefully 
 
316 APPENDIX. 
 
 ecreened by tlieir adversaries beliind a mass of horrid imput- 
 ed details that are left imbedded, as it were, in the memory, 
 the good deed so hid as to be forgotten. Let any one in 
 search of instances read the lately published Life of " Bishop 
 Bedel," by Alexander Clogy, the bishop's son-in-lav/, com- 
 panion of his father-in-law in his so-called imprisonment, 
 and the account wiitten by Bedel's son, only published 
 within the past year. I am probably, in this, doing a disser- 
 vice to these ecclesiastics, for every vile imputation will be 
 caught \\^ to be repeated, their good deeds kept back. 
 
 This leads me naturally to a subject connected witli the 
 treatment of the Irish priesthood by the English at a later 
 period, that can scarcely be handled without indelicacy. 
 But I have made a covenant with myself that I will for the 
 future be deterred by no personal considerations, by no mis- 
 placed modesty, in this great conflict with the tyrants and 
 maligners of Ireland and the Irish. For have they not sent 
 forth their standard-bearer (unless it be true that he has 
 gone forth of his own demoniac design, as he says,) to the 
 ends of the world to rouse the English race against us ? Last 
 year, when I had occasion to treat of Cromwell's massacre at 
 Drogheda, modesty made me suppress the gross language of 
 Anthony Wood in giving an account of the death of the tort- 
 ured, murdered virgin. His plainer, coarser terms leave a 
 never-to-be-forgotten image. I should hesitate now to touch 
 what I must treat in plain language but for the necessity of 
 the case, and because Mr. Eroude has ali'eady done so. I now 
 proceed. It is two or three years since I was applied to to 
 know what authority there was for the story related by 
 ^Plowden, that the same penalty that was inflicted on Abe- 
 lard, had, in the year 1723, been actually decreed by both 
 Houses of Parliament in Ireland (so far as their limited 
 power enabled them) against every priest in Ireland who 
 should not quit his country by a certain day. For many 
 
APPENDIX. 317 
 
 years I had searched in vain. I remember consulting 
 Coxe's " Life of Walpole," as he was said by Plowden to 
 have stopped the bill at the intercession of Cardinal Fleury. 
 It was stated by Plowden that the Commons presented the 
 bill to the Lord Lieutenant (the Duke of Grafton) on the 
 15th of November, at the Castle, and that they most ear- 
 nestly requested his Grace to recommend the same in the 
 most effectual manner, to his Majesty's goodness, and that 
 by his Grace's " zeal for the Protestant interest the same 
 might be permitted to pass into a law." As the public rec- 
 ords have now been thrown open to the public by the in- 
 tervention of Lord Romilly, the Master of the Polls, so that 
 what was previously accessible only at an enormous cost, and 
 in many cases not at all, I determined to ascertain, if possi- 
 ble, the truth. Taking up the printed journals of the House 
 of Commons of the year 1723, I found that a bill " To Pre- 
 vent the Further Growth of Popery" had passed through all 
 its stages, and that it was agreed that the Speaker, with the 
 House, should attend the Lord Lieutenant and desire it 
 might be transmitted to England, and effectually recom- 
 mended by the Lord Lieutenant to be allowed to pass into a 
 law, just as stated by Plowden. I forthwith (it was on the 
 23d February, 1869) proceeded to the Parliamentary Rec- 
 ords, then under the care of Sir Bernard Burke, the keeper 
 of State papers (they have since been removed to the public 
 record office), and after some search among the draughts of 
 Heads of Bills, I found the paper wanted. It was what 
 lawyers call, in the case of depositions taken in Chancery, 
 the " dominical " — that is to say, the rough original manu- 
 script of the bill on paper, in the form of a barrister's 
 brief. It was interlined, passages roughly scored out, 
 and slips of paper containing stringent provisions were 
 attached by black and red wafers here and there to the mar- 
 gin. Among the many provisions against unregistered 
 
318 APPENDIX. 
 
 priests, there was one making it death, without benefit of 
 clergy, with forfeiture of lands and goods as in high treason, 
 for any one to give a mouthful of bread or a glass of water 
 to any unregistered bishop, priest, or monk returning into 
 Ireland after he had once been banished ! 
 
 There were also heavy penalties against unregistered 
 priests saying Mass. Several persons had on examinations 
 before justices of the peace, says the preamble, confessed that 
 they had heard JNIass by priests suspected to be unregistered, 
 yet by the arts and contrivances of the priests, who fre- 
 quently had a curtain drawn between them and their con- 
 gregation, no discovery could be made of the person saying 
 Mass, that it might appear whether he was duly qualified to 
 say Mass. For the future, therefore, the officiating priest 
 was to appear with his face bare, under heavy penalties, and 
 the door of every chapel was to be kept open, that the 
 Cromwellian squireen riding by might see the priest's face. 
 If found shut, the chapel was to be shut up forever, and all 
 persons present to be heavily fined. But I in vain looked 
 for the enactment recorded by Plowden. I accordingly 
 made a return to my inquirers that I was now satisfied, as I 
 had long before suspected, that it was an invented tale. 
 Just two years after, however, happening to take up a vol- 
 ume in manuscript containing entries of the letters of the 
 Lord Lieutenant and Council for the year 1719, amongst the 
 papers in the State Paper Department in Dublin Castle, I 
 found that the whole v»^as perfectly correct as stated by 
 Plowden, except in two particulars, one that he had mis- 
 taken the year, the other that he supposed the joenalty to be 
 general for all priests, instead of being confined to unregis- 
 tered priests. The following is the letter referred to : — 
 
 "Council Chamber, Dublin Castle, 
 '' 21th of August, in^. 
 
 " My Lords — We herewith transmit to your Excellencies 
 
APPENDIX. 319 
 
 tlie following bill : — ^ An Act for Securing the Protestant 
 Int(,'rest of this Kingdom by further amending the several 
 Acts of Parliament made against Papists, and to Prevent the 
 Gro^vth of Popery.' The heads of this bill arose in the 
 House of Commons, who, being sensible (as the truth is) 
 that there are now more unregistered Priests and Popish 
 Archbishops, Bishops, Jesuits, Priars, and others exercising 
 foreign ecclesiastical jurisdiction in this kiugdom than ever 
 heretofore, notwithstanding the many laws against the same, 
 found it impossible to prevent that evil otherwise than by 
 subjecting persons who should be convicted of being unregis- 
 tered Popish Priests, Popish Archbishops, &c., to greater 
 penalties than those they v/ere liable to by the former acts. 
 After the country had paid a sum of twenty pounds to the 
 discoverer of every such offender, and been at great expense 
 in prosecuting and convicting them of the oiience, they are 
 only liable to transportation, unless they return after being 
 transported, but for so doing are punishable with death. 
 Priests, Friars, &c., are no sooner transported but new ones 
 come over from Prance, Spain, or Portugal, so that their 
 number continues as great as ever. The common Irish will 
 never become Protestant or well affected to the Crown while 
 they are supplied with priests, friars, &c., who are the foment- 
 ers and disturbers here. So that some more effectual rem- 
 edy to prevent priests and friars coming into this kingdom 
 is perfectly necessary. The Commons proposed the marking 
 of every person who shall be convicted of being an unregis- 
 tered priest, friar, &c., and of remaining in this kingdom 
 after the 1st of May, 1720, with a large P, to be made with 
 a red-hot iron on the cheek. The Council generally disliked 
 that punisliment, and have altered it into that of castration, 
 which they are persuaded will be the most effectual remedy 
 that can be found out to clear the nation of those disturbers 
 of the peace and quiet of the kingdom, and would have been 
 very well pleased to have been able to have found out any 
 other punishment v/hich might in their opinion have remedied 
 the evil. If your Excellencies shall not be of the same sen 
 timents, they submit to your consideration whether the 
 punishment of castration may not be altered to that pro- 
 posed by the Commons, or some other effectual one which 
 may occur to your lordships' consideration, but are fully con- 
 
320 APPENDIX, 
 
 vinced there is an absolute necessity of making the law 
 against uni^egistered priests and friars more severe than it 
 now is. 
 
 " There are several other good clauses and provisions in 
 this bill, of which the nation will receive great benefit, and 
 which are very needful to be enacted into law. 
 
 " We therefore desire your Excellencies will be pleased 
 that it be returned in form under the Great Seal. — We are 
 your Excellencies' most humble servants, 
 
 ''Bolton." (Charles Paulet, Marquis of Win- 
 chester, Duke of Bolton.) 
 " MiDDLETON." Cane, (Alan Broderick, Lord 
 
 Middleton.) 
 " John Meath." (John Evans, Bishop of Meath.) 
 " John Clogher." (John Sterne, Bishop of Clo- 
 
 gher.) 
 " Santry," (Sir James Barry, Lord Santry.) 
 " (Sir) Oliver St. George. 
 " E. Webster. 
 
 " B. TiGHE. 
 
 " To their Excellencies the Lords Justices of Great Brit- 
 ain, Whitehall. 
 
 " Under Cover — To Charles Delafoy, Secretary to their 
 Excellencies the Lords Justices of Great Britain, \Vhitehall." 
 
 Now for Mr. Froude's treatment of this event. He knew 
 he could not avoid it, or ignore it, or misstate it, as he has 
 done so many other events. For, having met Mr. Fronde 
 shortly afterwards, making his searches in the State Paper 
 Department, at Dublin Castle, I thought it right to tell him 
 of my discovery. But he was already aware, so he told me, of 
 the fact, having seen the original letter in the Public Becord 
 Office, London. There was something, however, so extra- 
 ordinary in the man's demeanor that I had my misgivings 
 that he intended to misdeal with the transaction in some 
 way, so I published it in the Freeman's Journal of the 
 28th April, 187L I confess I had great curiosity to see 
 how lie would treat the matter in these circumstances. In 
 
APPENDIX. 321 
 
 "The Englisli in Ireland in tlie Eighteenth Century," he 
 gives a chapter to this subject, and it is worth a longer ex- 
 position (may I not say exjjosure ?) than your limited space 
 can grant me. Let me first take his divisions of the chapter. 
 It is Book iv., chapter iv. : — 
 
 " Intended severities against the Irish Priests — Fiction 
 and Fact — The Registered and Unregistered Clergy — Un- 
 certain dealings with them by the Government — Need of 
 more systematic methods — Alteration of the heads of a Bill 
 by the Council- — Singular character of that alteration — The 
 Bill thrown out by the House of Lords — Further eiforts in 
 the Viceroyalty of the Duke of Grafton — Postponement 
 of the question in England." 
 
 Let it be remembered that I had bound him with such 
 strong cords by publishing the entire letter beforehand that 
 there was no possibility of his misstating the terms or the 
 scope of it ; and then observe the writhings and twistings 
 of this English viper, that, nursed in his youthful sickness by 
 the poor peasantry of Mayo, and since that day a frequent 
 visitor of Ireland, seeks to spit his venom against us at home 
 by publishing this book, and then immediately rushes to 
 America to endeavor to instill into the English race abroad 
 the same hatred Jie and his colleagues are filled with at home, 
 because we will not be their slaves. 
 
 " In the midst of the heat and dust of the Wood hurri- 
 cane (Wood's halfpence) the heads of a bill — if we are to 
 believe the standard Irish historian " (says Froude), " were 
 introduced, carried, earnestly recommended to the Home 
 Government, of so extraordinary a nature that, were the 
 story true in the form in which it has come down to us, the 
 attempt by an Englishman to understand the workings of 
 Irish factions might well be abandoned as hopeless. ' In the 
 year 1723, &c.,' says Plowden," (and then he gives the ex- 
 tract I have already given.) " A statement so positively 
 made," (he continues,) " has passed into the region of ac- 
 knowledged certainties. It has been beaten into the metal 
 of the historical thoroughfare, and, being unquestioned, haa 
 
322 APPENDIX. 
 
 been moralized over by repentant Liberal politicians as il- 
 lustrating the baneful effects of Protestant ascendancy." 
 
 Any one would suppose from this opening that " the Irish 
 historian " was the trickster and the cheat, and not the English 
 historian the fraudulent knave. For it is nothing but knav- 
 ery to try by the use of such terms to make the careless 
 reader to believe beforehand that Plowden's statement 
 differs as much as "fiction" does from "fact" (according to 
 one of the headings in the table of this chapter), instead of 
 being substantially true, though not in form, as he had no 
 means of access to the original and authentic documents. 
 There is something more than " some chrysalis of fact," as 
 Mr. Froude calls it, underlying Plowden's statement. 
 This punishment, this shocking outrage upon decency and 
 humanity, was actually recommended from Ireland to the 
 Government in England, though Plowden did not know 
 that it was a substitute for another and scarcely less inhu- 
 man punishment, the branding of unregistered priests with a 
 large «' P " with a red-hot iron on the cheek. 
 
 Mr. Froude, with all the art of an orator, next introduces 
 the priests, and divides them into two classes — the registered 
 and the unregistered ; — 
 
 " The registered, for the most part, orderly, and well- 
 disposed, the unregistered being the Regulars, the Jesuits, 
 the priests trained in Spain, France, and Flanders. These, 
 he continues, fed continually on the recollection of their 
 wrongs, and lived in constant hope of aid from the Catholic 
 powers to root out the Protestants and shake off the yoke 
 of Great Britain, receiving tlieir instructions from Pome or 
 Flanders, or the mock court of the Pretender. They were 
 the persistent enemies of the English settlement, the recruit- 
 ing sergeants, who gathered the thousands of eager Irish 
 youths that were enlisted annually for the Catholic armies, 
 the impassioned feeders of the dreams which were nourished 
 in the national heart, of the recovery of the Irish race, the 
 return of the Stuarts, and the expulsion of the detested 
 Saxon. They were the originators of all the political 
 
APPENDIX. 323 
 
 troubles which contmiied to distract Ireland. In Kerry, 
 where the cause needed thoroughgoing men, the registered 
 priests were put out of their cures as too soft and malleable, 
 and their places taken by others of stronger national type " 
 (observe the insult, the taunt to the nation), *' who were the 
 encouragers of the hougher and the ravisher, the smuggler 
 and the Kapparee — whose business was to render futile the 
 efforts of the English settlers to introduce order, and enforce 
 the law. If English authority was to be maintained, it was 
 fair and reasonable to distinguish between the registered 
 and unregistered priests." 
 
 The purpose of all this rhetorical abuse of the unregis- 
 tered clergy is as a preface to the branding bill and its 
 shocking substitute, as suggested by the Lord Lieutenant 
 and Privy Council, a Castration Act. The number of pre- 
 lates, friars, and unregistered priests was daily growing 
 larger. There was no sufficient penalty to prevent their re- 
 turning. A Committee of the House of Commons accord- 
 ingly di-ew a bill, which they considered, says Mr. Fronde, 
 would keep such persons at a safe distance. And among 
 other clauses it contained a provision, " that every unregis- 
 tered priest found in the kingdom after the 1st of May, 
 1720, might" (says Mr. Froude) **be branded with a hot 
 iron in the cheek, as a mark by which he might be identi- 
 fied." He does not say (according to the fact) to be marked 
 with a large *' P," made with a red-hot iron on the cheek. 
 Now, hear this cynic on the necessity of the stronger pen- 
 alty. " The Council," says Froude, " among whom was the 
 Lord Lieutenant, the Chancellor, and tAvo bishops, consid- 
 ered the branding both too mild, and that it would fail in 
 its effects. The hot iron had been already tried, he says, 
 for the Kapparees, but the Eapparees made it a common 
 practice to catch and brand other innocent persons to destroy 
 the distinction. These four or five noble lords, *'says 
 Froude, (as if they were not the Lord Lieutenant and the 
 Privy Council, the government in a great measure of Ire- 
 
324 APPENDIX. 
 
 land !) " did certainly recommend as a substitute for the iron 
 a penalty, which was reported, rightly or wrongly, to have 
 been used in Sweden with efiect against the Jesuits." And 
 here this brutal cynic pretends to relieve the priests of 
 Ireland from its being supposed that this treatment was for 
 the purpose of securing their chastity, by suggesting that this 
 mutilation proceeded on another ground, and was for another 
 end. 
 
 But let us have done with the disgusting subject and 
 disgusting man, who seems to be as lost to all sense of 
 modesty as of humanity. He it is, who, in an article in the 
 Review he edits, in describing "A Fortnight in Kerry" 
 (where, however, he spent two summers), foully and inde- 
 cently libelled the memory of O'Connell, the Liberator, and 
 was then surprised to find that the people of Kerry looked 
 coldly upon him. Does he take us for dogs ? That we are 
 not men ? Or else that we are sunk so low as not to dare 
 to resent the insults any Englishman may put upon us ? 
 And this libeller of our name and nation, of all things, 
 indeed, sacred and profane, except the " E-oyal Irish " 
 Sepoys, and the Ulster Janissaries, talks of spending his 
 days among us ! Heaven forbid ! Girls of Ireland, remem- 
 ber the outspoken approver of the murder of your poor 
 tortured sister at Drogheda ! Mothers, think of the 
 children used by the English as shields while fighting their 
 way up the stairs of the church-towers ! Ladies, forget not 
 the crowds of those of your own rank slaughtered in cold 
 blood in the vaults beneath ! He sanctions it all. He is 
 guilty of it all. Make the country too hot with your indig- 
 nation to hold him. Men of Ireland, treat him not to the 
 penalty devised against your clergy, but brand him with the 
 red-hot iron of tongue and pen on one cheek with a large 
 '' L " as liar, on the other, with an " S " as slanderer of this 
 nation. — Your obedient servant, 
 
 John P. Prendergast; 
 

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