DUKE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 
 
 DURHAM, NORTH CAROLINA 
 
 GIFT 
 
 OF 
 
 FRIENDS OF 
 DUKE UNIVERSITY 
 LIBRARY 
 
 FROM THE LIBRARY OF 
 WILLIAM K.BOYD 
 
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Digitized by the Internet Archive 
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A 
 
 POLITICAL HISTORY 
 
 IRELAND, 
 
 SHOWING- ITS CONNEXION WITH ENGLAND, FROM THE ANGLO-NORMAN 
 4k CONQUEST, IN 1172, BY HENRY II. , 
 
 TO THE PRESENT TIME. 
 
 BY EDWIN WILLIAMS. 
 
 NEW- YORK:. . 
 PUBLISHED BY R. ?. BIXBY & CO., 
 
 NO. 3 PARK ROW. 
 
 JARED W.BELL, PRINTER 
 
 1843. 
 
4 
 
 Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1843, by 
 II. P. BIXBY CO., 
 
 in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the Southern District of New-York. 
 
 # 
 
/ 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 — 
 
 / 
 
 7 
 
 The object of this work is briefly to delineate the prominent political 
 events in the History of Ireland, from the Anglo-Norman Conquest, in the 
 twelfth century, to the present time. The difficulty of the task has been, 
 to compress, within one hundred pages, a narrative of the historical oc- 
 currences of nearly seven centuries, with the necessary inferences and 
 remarks, for a full understanding of the progress of events, and the de- 
 velopment of national character, under changes of circumstances. How 
 well this task has been performed, I leave the reader to judge. 
 
 Among the numerous authors on the History of Ireland, whom I have 
 consulted, may be mentioned Moore, Plowden, Taylor, Barlow, and 
 some others. Of these historians, I have preferred Thomas Moore, as far 
 as he goes. Besides the advantage of being a native of the country on 
 which he writes, to be relied on for his candor and historical accuracy ; 
 the elegance of his diction, and the graphic style of his narrative, renders 
 his work very attractive ; and the pleasure of abridging such parts as I 
 have adopted, has always been attended with regret, that so many of 
 his beauties must be omitted. 
 
 It may be thought by some, that the political events recorded in these 
 pages are somewhat unequally distributed, the reigns of the Kings of 
 England previous to the Reformation, occupying the largest proportion of 
 the work. To this I may reply, that the early part of the Anglo-Irish history 
 appears to be less known than that of more recent date, and it will be found 
 that many of the occurrences of the first three centuries after the English 
 Conquest, are deeply interesting, and important to be understood by 
 those who would wish to trace the progress of events which gradually 
 led to the Union between England and Ireland. 
 
 This history, it will be observed, is arranged in chronological order, 
 divided into twelve Chapters, containing a sketch of the principal oc- 
 currences in Ireland during the reigns of all the English sovereigns, 
 from Henry IT. to Victoria. The want of such a continuous history of 
 Ireland has induced me to undertake this epitome, and I trust it will be 
 found acceptable to inquirers ; without reference to those individuals 
 
4 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 among Americans, who, caring little about facts, desire to make political 
 capital out of the question of “ Repeal,” until they are alarmed and dis- 
 persed by an anti-slavery rocket, thrown up from the shores of Ireland, 
 by one not less ardent,, perhaps, in the cause of human liberty, than was 
 his countryman, Curran, when animated by “ the genius of universal 
 emancipation.” 
 
 No philanthropist can view the dark picture of human misery dis- 
 closed in the following sketch, without feeling the deepest sympathy for 
 the wrongs of the suffering nation who have been the objects of it. With- 
 out dwelling on the past, which cannot be recalled ; to devise a remedy 
 for present evils, is the question, in which all who are of Anglo-Saxon or 
 Irish descent, must feel an interest. While, however, the British ministry, 
 and the British nation, acknowledge that this is a puzzle, to he settled by 
 the developments of the future, it cannot be expected that we, on this 
 side of the Atlantic, should undertake to solve the problem, in advance. 
 
the pope’s bull to HENRY II. 
 
 7 
 
 satisfied that a Norman conquest of the Irish would be as beneficial 
 to that people, as the conquerors considered the same had been to 
 the English. 
 
 Henry II. ascended the throne of England, in the year 1154, at 
 the age of twenty-one. In his person, the families of the Norman 
 and Saxon Monarchs were united, and he was the greatest Prince 
 of his time, for political ability. Having soon projected the acqui- 
 sition of Ireland, this ambitious young Monarch set about attaining 
 his object in the first year of his reign. But as he had no legal 
 right to the possession, nor any ground of quarrel to justify an 
 invasion, he concluded to mask his real motive under a pretended 
 zeal for the interests of religion and morality. With this view, he 
 despatched an envoy to Rome, where in 1154, an Englishman, 
 named Breakspear, had been chosen Pope, under the title of 
 Adrian IY. In applying to this Pope, for leave to take possession 
 of Ireland, Henry acknowledged in him an extent of temporal 
 power, beyond that which even Popes had then thought proper to 
 assume, and the two Englishmen seem to have understood each 
 other remarkably well in this matter, for the Pope in his answer to 
 the King, repeated what the latter admitted, and claimed a right 
 and jurisdiction, not only over Ireland, but over all other Christian 
 Islands. The following is a copy of this document/ 
 
 BULL OF POPE ADRLAN IV., 
 
 BY WHICH HE GRANTED IRELAND TO HENRY II. 
 
 Adrian, tlie Bishop, the servant of the servants of God, to his most dear son in Christ, 
 the noble King of England, sendeth greeting and Apostolic benediction. Your magnificence 
 hath been very careful and studious how you might enlarge the Church of God here on 
 earth, and increase the number of saints and elect in heaven, in that as a good Catholic 
 King, you have and do by all means labor and travail to enlarge and increase God’s Church, 
 by teaching the ignorant people the true and Christian religion, and in abolishing and 
 rooting up the weeds of sin and wickedness. And wherein you have, and do crave, for 
 your better furtherance, the help of the Apostolic See, (wherein more speedily and dis- 
 creetly you proceed,) the better success, we hope God will send ; for all they, which of 
 a fervent zeal and love in religion, do begin and enterprise any such thing, shall no doubt 
 in the end, have a good and prosperous success. And as for Ireland, and all other Islands 
 where Christ is known and the Christian religion received, it is out of all doubt, and your 
 excellency well knoweth, they do all appertain and belong to the right of St. Peter, and of 
 the Church of Rome ; and we are so much the more ready, desirous, and willing, to sow 
 the acceptable seed of God’s word, because we know the same in the latter day will be 
 most severely required at your hands. You have, (our well beloved son in Christ,) 
 advertised and signified unto us, that you will enter into the land and realm of Ireland, to 
 the end to bring them to obedience unto law, and under your subjection, and to root out 
 
 * See Leland, Winne, Plowden, and Moore’s Histories of Ireland. 
 
 367308 
 
s 
 
 PAPAL GRANT TO HENRY II. 
 
 from among them their foul sine and wickedness; as also to yield and pay yearly out of 
 every house, a yearly pension of one penny to St. Peter, and besides also will defend and keep 
 the rites of those Churches whole and inviolate. We, therefore, well allowingand favoring 
 this your godly disposition and affection, do accept, ratify, and assent, unto this your petition, 
 and do grant that you, (for the dilating of God’s Church, the punishment of sin, the reform- 
 ing of manners, the planting of virtue, and the increasing of the Christian religion,) do enter 
 to possess that land, and there to execute, according to your wisdom, whatsoever shall be 
 for the honor of God, and the safety of the realm. And further also, we do strictly charge 
 and require, that all the people of that land do with all humbleness, dutifulness, and honor 
 receive and accept you as their liege lord and sovereign, reserving and excepting the 
 right of Holy Church to be inviolably preserved, as also the yearly pension of Peter 
 pence out of every house, which we require to be strictly answered to St Peter, 
 and to the Church of Rome. If, therefore, you do mind to bring your godly purpose to 
 effect, endeavor to travail to reform the people to some better order and trade of life, 
 and that also by yourself, and by such others as you shall think meet, true and honest in 
 their life, manners and conversation, to the end the Church of God may be beautified, the 
 true Christian religion, sowed and planted, and all other things done, that by any means 
 shall or may be to God’s honor and salvation of men’s souls, whereby you may in the end 
 receive of God’s hands the reward of everlasting life, and also in the mean time, and in 
 this life carry a glorious fame and an honorable report among all nations. 
 
 The permission, (says Moore,) accorded to Henry by the Pope, to 
 invade and subdue the Irish, for the purpose of reforming them, was 
 accompanied by a stipulation for the payment to St. Peter, of a pen- 
 ny annually from every house in Ireland, this being the price for 
 which the independence of the Irish people was coolly bartered 
 away. Together with the Bull, containing the grant and 
 stipulation, was sent also to Henry a gold ring, adorned with a 
 valuable emerald, as a token of his investiture with the right to rule 
 over Ireland. 
 
 Having obtained this Bull from the Pope, other schemes and more 
 pressing interests diverted the attention of King Henry, and the 
 opinion of his mother Matilda, being opposed to his Irish enterprise, 
 the Bull was left to repose, undisturbed for some years, in the ar- 
 chives of Winchester. On the death of Pope Adrian, in the year 
 1159, Henry applied to his successor, at Rome, for a confirma- 
 tion of the grant of Ireland, which was readily complied with, in 
 the following Bull of Pope Alexander III. 
 
 “Alexander, the Bishop, the servant of the servants of God, to his dearly beloved son, 
 the noble King of England, greeting, grace and Apostolic benediction. For as much as 
 things given and granted upon good reason by our predecessors, are to be well allowed of, 
 ratified and confirmed, we well considering and pondering the grant and privilege for, and 
 concerning the dominion of the land of Ireland to us appertaining, and lately given by 
 our predecessor, we following his steps, do in like manner confirm, ratify, and allow the 
 same; reserving and saving to St. Peter and to the Church of Rome, the yearly pension of 
 one penny out of every house, as well in England as in Ireland. Provided also, that the 
 barbarous people of Ireland, by your means, be reformed and recovered from their filthy 
 
 S98?ac 
 
BARGAIN AND SALE. 
 
 9 
 
 lif« and abominable conversation; that in name, so in life and manners they may^be Chris- 
 tians, and that as that rude and disordered Church, being by you reformed, the whole 
 nation may also, with the possession of the name, he in acts and deeds, followers of the 
 same.” 
 
 Owing to the secrecy, doubtless, with which this singular grant 
 was negotiated, no intimation seems to have reached Ireland of even 
 the existence of such a document, during the whole oftne long in- 
 terval that elapsed between its first grant and the time of its promul- 
 gation, which, according to Moore, was about the year 1175. Hen- 
 ry’s chief motive for so Ions delaying the promulgation of the Papal 
 Bull, is supposed to have been the fear, lest certain aspersions con- 
 tained in that instrument, as well on the morals as the religious doc- 
 trines of the people of Ireland, might cause irritation among both 
 the clergy and laity, and prevent that quiet submission to his claims 
 which he then expected. The Papal authority was at last resorted 
 to by the King, as a means of enlisting the great body of the clergy 
 in his service, after the Irish people had shown a disposition to resist 
 his invasion. 
 
 It will be noticed that the first bargain and sale on record, respect- 
 ing Ireland, was made by two Englishmen, and confirmed by a Pope 
 who was not an Englishman. All others whom the Irish accuse of 
 having “sold their country,” were, we believe, natives; as Dermot 
 MacMorrougb, Lord Castlereagh, and so on. Their native historian 
 makes this acknowledgement : 
 
 From Moore’s History of Ireland. 
 
 The view opened by the historian (Tacitus) into the interior of Ireland’s politics at 
 that moment — the divided and factious state of her people, and the line of policy, which 
 in consequence, the shrewd Agricola, as ruler of Britain, was preparing to pursue towards 
 them — is all of melancholy importance, as showing at how early a period Irishmen had be • 
 come memorable for disunion among themselves. 
 
 “ One of their petty Kings,” says Tacitus, “ who had heen forced to fly by some do- 
 mestic faction, was received by the Roman General, and under a show of friendship, de- 
 tained for ulterior purposes.” The object of the Irishman was to induce the Romans to in- 
 vade his native country ; and by his representations, it appears, Agricola was persuaded 
 into the belief that, with a single legion, and a small body of auxiliaries, he could conquer 
 and retain possession of Ireland. 
 
 It would hardly be possible, perhaps in the whole compass of history, to find a picture 
 more pregnant with the future, more prospectively characteristic than this, of a recreant 
 Irish Prince, in the camp of the Romans, proffering his traitorous services to the stranger, 
 and depreciating his country as an excuse for betraying her. It is, indeed, mournful to re- 
 flect, that at the end of nearly eighteen centuries, the features of this national portrait should 
 remain so very little altered ; and that with a change only of scene from the tent of the Ro- 
 man General to the closet of the English Minister or Viceroy, the spectacle of an Irish- 
 man playing the game of his country’s enemies, has been, even in modern history, an occur- 
 rence by no means rare. — ( Philadelphia 8 vo. edition, page 75.) 
 
1U 
 
 INVASION AND CONQUEST BY HENRY II. 
 
 The fugitive Irish Prince, Dennot, applied for succor to Henry- 
 11., in 1168, and ofFered, if restored to his kingdom by Henry, to re- 
 ceive it as a fief, and render him homage as a vassal. Upon this, 
 the King of England granted him letters patent to raise men and 
 money in his dominions ; in consequence of which, Strongbow, 
 Earl of Pembroke, and others, engaged in the cause. The first 
 landing of the Anglo Normans in Ireland, was in 1169. A body 
 composed of fifty knights, ninety esquires, and four hundred and sixty 
 archers, in all six hundred men, was enabled by its superior disci- 
 pline, to overthrow the whole warlike force that the Irish brought 
 against them. The invaders, however, were aided by the adhe- 
 rents of Dermot, among his countrymen, and afterwards by 1200 
 men from England, under Strongbow. The conquest was easily 
 completed by Henry in person, who landed near Waterford, in Ire- 
 land, in October, 1171, with 500 knights, and about 4000 men at 
 arms. The Irish Princes and Chieftains soon submitted as tribu- 
 taries. The ensuing Christmas, the King gave an entertainment, 
 to which he invited many of the Irish Princes and Nobles, who 
 took their places at the royal board, and were, it is said, struck with 
 admiration, both at “the plenty of the English table, and the goodly 
 courtesy of the attendants.” 
 
 Henry passed about six months in Ireland, during which a Synod 
 was held by his order, at Cashel, for the promised reformation of 
 the Irish Church ; the acts of this Synod, however, do not appear 
 to have amounted to much. A Court flatterer of those times, re- 
 marks, “ It was worthy and just that Ireland should receive a bet- 
 ter form of living from England, seeing that to its magnanimous 
 King, she entirely owed whatever advantages she enjoyed, both as 
 to Church and State, and that the manifold abuses which had pre- 
 vailed in the country, had, since his coming, been brought into dis- 
 use.” Moore says, there is not anything found to justify this pom- 
 pous vaunt. The King is also said to have held a Council of the 
 Realm, at Lismore, in which “the Laws of England were grate- 
 fully accepted by all present, and under the sanction of a solemn 
 oath, established.” This Council could not properly be called a 
 Parliament, as the Irish Parliament was not established for more 
 than a hundred years after this period. The object of the King, in 
 his legislative acts, through this Council at Lismore, (Moore says,) 
 was not to innovate on the ancient Laws of Ireland, but to insure to 
 
A POLITICAL 
 
 HISTORY OF IRELAND. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 INTRODUCTION — ENGLISH CONQUEST, BY HENRY II. 
 
 The agitation of the Repeal question, by O’Connell in Ireland, 
 and his countrymen in the United States, renders some know- 
 ledge of Irish Political History desirable at this time, and as but 
 few in this country have paid much attention to the subject, it is 
 thought a brief sketch may not be unacceptable to the American 
 public. 
 
 But little is known of the ancient History of Ireland, although 
 the Irish monks have given a regular series of events, and a suc- 
 cession of Kings, commencing a few years after the deluge. Moore 
 (the Poet,) is satisfied to commence his History at one thousand 
 years before the Christian Era. Moore’s work, is, however, an able 
 History, and exhibits great labor and research. It comes down to 
 the year 1545, (at the close of the reign of Henry VIII.,) and is, 
 we believe, to be continued to the present time. 
 
 In all probability the ancient Irish were like the Britons, of 
 Celtic origin, for there was a remarkable similarity between their 
 language, manners, and customs. There are evidences that Phoe- 
 necian colonies were established on the Island at an early period. 
 The Romans continued in possession of Britain for near four hun- 
 dred years, without a single Roman having been known to set foot, 
 during that whole period, on Irish ground. 
 
 The form of government of the ancient Irish, was a political con- 
 federacy, in which separate States were governed by different 
 Kings or Princes; but on the appearance of an enemy, a Chief or 
 
6 
 
 INVASION OF IRELAND. 
 
 General was chosen, who commanded their armies, and enjoyed the 
 supreme authority, during the continuance of danger. In the fifth 
 century, Saint Patrick, (who Moore says was a native of France, 
 others say of Scotland,) introduced the knowledge of letters, and 
 planted Christianity in Ireland. The country was very friendly to 
 religion, and afforded the monks at once a safe retreat, and sufficient 
 leisure to pursue their studies. The Danes and Norwegians in the 
 eighth century, invaded Ireland, and destroyed the peace of this 
 asylum. They conquered a great part of the sea coast, and built 
 several cities. These Northmen formed alliances with the natives, 
 after many contests with them. Renewals of hostilities took place 
 from time to time, during the lapse of two centuries, resulting in 
 the final expulsion of the Northmen from Ireland. 
 
 The English Dominion in Ireland commenced in the year 1172. 
 This conquest, for some centuries, however, extended over only an 
 inconsiderable portion of the Island. At the English invasion, 
 there were five Kings in Ireland, one of whom, Dermot MacMor- 
 rough, having been expelled from his kingdom, solicited the assis- 
 tance of the King of England, Henry II., who, it will be recol- 
 lected, was great grandson of William the Conqueror. Already 
 the proximity of the two Islands, must not unfrequently have sug- 
 gested the likelihood of an invasion at no distant time, from the 
 shores of the larger and more powerful. Up to this period, the tide 
 of incursion appears to have been entirely from the Irish side of 
 Channel. On the other hand it appears certain that William the 
 Conqueror, and his sons who succeeded him on the English throne, 
 William Rufus, and Henry I. entertained serious thoughts of adding 
 Ireland to their dominions, extending the Norman conquest over 
 both Islands. William Rufus, in one of his expeditions against the 
 Welsh, is reported to have said, as he stood on the rocks of St. 
 David’s and looked at the Irish hills, that he would “ make a bridge 
 with his ships from that spot to Ireland.” 
 
 Occupied, previous to the reign of Henry II., with repelling the 
 inroads of the Scots, and attempts to reduce them under their do- 
 minion, with defending and enlarging their possessions in France, 
 and with repressing domestic animosities, the Norman sovereigns of 
 England had delayed the invasion of Ireland for about a century. 
 The proximity of its situation to England, and the fertility of its 
 soil, were not overlooked by them, and they were doubtless fully 
 
IRELAND DIVIDED AMONG THE ENGLISH. 
 
 11 
 
 his English subjects settling in Ireland, the continued enjoyment of 
 the laws and usages of that country from which they had sprung. 
 
 In all the laws and ordinances enacted by Henry, during his brief 
 stay in Ireland, for the foundation and future government of the new 
 settlement, he was guided wholly by the spirit and principles of the 
 feudal polity, according to which, the great body of the English 
 laws was at that time modelled. Thus the estates and dignities, 
 conferred by him upon his officers, were granted in consideration of 
 homage and fealty, and of military or honorary services, to be ren- 
 dered to himself and his heirs. 
 
 All Ireland was very coolly divided by Henry, among ten of his 
 English noblemen and chiefs, viz : Earl Strongbow, Robert Fitz 
 Stephens, Miles De Cogan, Philip Bruce, Sir Hugh De Lacy, Sir John 
 De Courcy, William Burke Fitz Aldelm, Sir Thomas De Clare, 
 Otho De Grandison, and Robert Le Poer ; and although they had 
 not gained possession of one third part of the kingdom, yet in title 
 they were owners and lords of all, leaving nothing to be granted to 
 the natives. Henry afterwards granted a special charter, conceding 
 the right of property and English laws to five Irish families, viz 
 the Q’JN'ials of Ulster, the O’Melachlins of Meath, the O’Connors 
 of Connaught, the O’Briens of Thomond, and the MacMorroughs 
 of Leinster. He also granted a charter to the Danes of Waterford. 
 
 The King was compelled, by pressing circumstances, to return to 
 England in April, 1172, and “we cannot but regret (says Moore,) 
 that he was so soon interrupted in the task of providing for the fu- 
 ture settlement and government of Ireland ; as there can hardly be 
 a doubt that, at such a crisis, when so much was to be instituted and 
 originated, on which not only the well-being of the new colony 
 itself, but also of its acceptance with the mass of the natives, would 
 depend, the direct and continuous application of a mind like Henry’s 
 to the task, would have presented the best, if not perhaps sole 
 chance of an ultimately prosperous result, which a work in any 
 hands so delicate and difficult, could have been expected to afford. 
 This chance, unluckily, the necessity of his immediate departure,, 
 forever foreclosed. His prodigal grants to his English followers and 
 their creatures, had established in the land an oligarchy of enriched 
 upstarts, who could not prove otherwise than a scourge and curse 
 to the doomed people whom he now delivered into their hands.” 
 
12 
 
 KING RODERIC SUBMITS TO HENRY II. 
 
 The military leaders left to rule over the country, managed their 
 trust so ill, that the Irish never became peaceable subjects of the Nor- 
 man Kings, as the English had gradually done. 
 
 Henry appointed Strongbow Governor of Ireland. As but few 
 English soldiers were left by the King, the Irish Chiefs soon refus- 
 ed to cont inue their allegiance, and Roderic O’Connor. King of Con- 
 naught. endeavored to retrieve the independence of his country ; 
 but after several engagements, he was completely subdued. Fitz 
 Aldelm, who succeeded Strongbow as Governor, by his imprudent 
 conduct, threw every thing into confusion. De Lacy, who was ap- 
 pointed to supercede him, might have restored tranquility, but John, 
 the youngest son of the English King, being appointed Lord of Ire- 
 land. by his weak and peurile conduct, soon induced the natives to 
 revolt against the English power. This revolt, with considerable 
 difficulty, was quelled by De Courcy. 
 
 After the defeat of Roderic, King of Connaught, he sent an em- 
 bassy of three dignitaries of the Church, to England',' to negotiate a 
 treaty of submission with the King of England. By this treaty, 
 Henry granted to his liegeman, Roderic, that as long as he continued 
 faithfully to serve him, he should be a King under him, ready to do 
 him service as his vassal, and that he should hold his hereditary 
 territories as firmly and peaceably as he had held them before the 
 coming of Henry into Ireland. The annual tribute demanded of 
 Roderic and the Irish at large, was a merchantable hide for every 
 tenth head of cattle killed in Ireland. In any of those districts im- 
 mediately under the dominion of the King of England, Roderic was 
 not allowed to interfere, or ro claim any authority whatsoever. In 
 this exempted English territory, which formed what was afterwards 
 called the Pale,” were comprised Dublin and all its appurtenan- 
 ces ; the whole of Meath and Leinster, besides Waterford and the 
 country from thence to Dungarvon. 
 
 By this compact it was solemnly determined that, in all future 
 time, the Kings of England should be Lords paramount of Ire- 
 land ; that the fee of the soil should be in them, and that all future 
 monarchs of Ireland, should hold their dominion but as tenants in 
 capite, or vassals of the English Crown. 
 
13 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 CONDITION OF THE IRISH PEOPLE PREVIOUS TO THE ENGLISH 
 
 CONQUEST. 
 
 The reciprocal relations of chief and vassal, which arose natu- 
 rally out of military service, and furnished one of the two great 
 principles on which the feudal system was founded, had already, 
 with its exactions of homage and fealty, formed a part of the polity 
 of the Irish. Familiarized, therefore, as had been their Princes 
 and Chieftains, to the custom of holding their territories from supe- 
 rior lords, on condition of allegiance and homage, there was to 
 them nothing novel or startling in the new forms as they deemed 
 them, of submission, by which Roderic now laid the lordship of Ire- 
 land at the feet of an English King. But though thus acquainted, 
 as were, indeed, most of what are called the barbarous nations, with 
 that part of the policy of the feudal system, which regulated the 
 military relations between chief and vassal, they were wholly igno- 
 rant of its other more important principle, which made property the 
 foundation of this mutual tie, and bound together lord and tenant 
 by reciprocal obligations of protection and service. It is not im- 
 probable, therefore, that the general readiness of the Irish Princes, 
 to tender their allegiance to Henry, arose from their habit of view- 
 ing this ceremony but as a pledge of military service, and their en- 
 tire ignorance of the important and prominent change, which, in the 
 eyes of Henry’s lawyers, would be effected in their right and title to 
 their respective territories by that ceremony. 
 
 The Irish law of Gavelkind , difFered materially from the law so 
 denominated in Kent, England. When any one died, according to 
 the old Irish law, all the possessions, real and personal, of the whole 
 family, were put together, or thrown into hotch-potch, and divided 
 anew among the survivors, by the head of the family, whom they 
 termed the Cean Finne or Caunfinny ; natural sons were admitted 
 into this distribution, though all females, wives, daughters, and oth- 
 ers, were excluded from it. The division extended to the whole 
 sept or clan, by which means, many vested freeholds came upon 
 
14 
 
 FORMER CONDITION OF THE PEOPLE, 
 
 such new partitions, to be divested during the lives of the tenants. 
 This law or custom, was productive of one of the most pernicious 
 prejudices that can pervade the useful part of a community ; it pre- 
 vented whole septs or families, however numerous and needy, from 
 learning any trade, or turning mechanics, because they would be 
 thus degraded, and the Caunfinny would, in any future partition, ex- 
 clude such as had debased themselves by such abdication of their 
 family dignity. 
 
 The national division into septs or tribes, though natural to infant 
 communities, was attended, in the progress of population, with the 
 worst of consequences ; and these were entailed upon the nation by 
 the laws of Tanistry and Gavelkind ; the latter we have just de- 
 scribed, and by the former, successors were chosen during the lives 
 of their predecessors, not only to their Kings, but also to their great 
 state and other officers, within a given line of hereditary descent. 
 
 From the earliest times, Ireland was divided into a certain num- 
 ber of small principalities, each governed by its own petty King or 
 Dynast, and the whole subordinate to a supreme Monarch, who had 
 nominally, but seldom really, a control over their proceedings. 
 This form of polity, which continued to be maintained, without 
 any essential innovation upon its principle, down to the conquest of 
 the country by Henry II., (as we have before mentioned,) was by no 
 means peculiar to Ireland,* but was the system common to the 
 whole Celtic race, if not also to the Teutonic, and like all the other 
 primitive institutions of Europe, had its origin in the East. In no 
 other country, however, do the title and power of royalty appear to 
 have been partitioned out into such minute divisions and sub-divi- 
 sions, as in the provincial government of Ireland. 
 
 As in all communities, property is the pervading cement of socie- 
 ty, a state of things such as has been just described, in which its 
 tenure was kept from day to day, uncertain, and its relations con- 
 stantly disturbed, was perhaps the least favorable that the most per- 
 verted ingenuity could have devised, for either the encouragement 
 of civilization, or the maintenance of peace. Had there been any 
 certainty in the tenure of the property, when once divided, most of 
 the evils attending the practice, might have been escaped. But the 
 new partition of all the lands, whenever a death occurred in the sept 
 
 * During the Saxon Heptarchy, the Island of Great Britain contained about fifteen king" 
 doms— Saxons, British, and Scotch. 
 
ANCIENT LAWS AND CUSTOMS. 
 
 15 
 
 or tribe, and the frequent removal of the inferior tenants, from one 
 portion to another, produced such uncertainty in the tenure of all 
 possesions, as made men reckless of the future, and completely pal- 
 sied every aim of honest industry and enterprise. By the habits of 
 idleness they engendered, the minds of the great mass of the people, 
 were left vacant and useless, to seek employment for themselves in 
 mischief, and follow those impulses of wild and ungoverned pas< 
 sion, of which their natures were so susceptible. 
 
 Another evil of the social system, under such laws, was the false 
 pride that could not fail to be engendered by that sort of mock king- 
 ship, that mimic sovereignty, which pervaded the whole descending 
 scale of their grandees, down to the Ruler of a small Rath , or even 
 the possessor of a few acres, who, as Sir John Davies says, “ termed 
 himself a lord, and his portion of land his country.” The lowest 
 of these petty Potentates, considered it degrading to follow any trade 
 or calling, and of course, were generally ready for domestic faction 
 and fierce civil broils. Nor was it only by the relative position of 
 the different classes of the country, but by that also of the different 
 races which inhabited it, that the aliment of this false pride was so 
 abundantly administered. Leaving to the descendants of the Bel- 
 gians and other early colonists, only the mechanical and servile occu- 
 pations, the Milesian or dominant caste, who claimed to be masters 
 over these and the mass of the population, reserved to themselves 
 such employments as would not degrade their high original. 
 
 From that persevering adherence, (says Moore,) to old customs, 
 habits, and by natural consequence, dispositions, which has ever dis- 
 tinguished the Irish people, the same peculiarities of character that 
 mark any one part of their country’s history, will be found to per- 
 vade every other : insomuch, that allowing only for that degree of 
 advancement in the arts and luxuries of life, which in the course of 
 time could not but take place, it may be asserted that such as the 
 Irish were in the early ages of their pentarchy. they have remained 
 to the present day. 
 
 The political and civil state of the people as above described, ap- 
 plies to them both before and after the introduction of Christianity, 
 until the changes brought about by the English conquest, under 
 Henry II. 
 
 In all probability, the elements of what is called the feudal sys- 
 tem, had existed in Ireland, as well as in Britain and Gaul, many 
 
16 
 
 FEUDAL SYSTEM — SLAVERY. 
 
 ages before even the oldest dates usually assigned to the first intro- 
 duction of feudal law into Europe ; being traceable perhaps, even 
 to the landing of the first colonists on these shores, when, in parcel- 
 ling out their new territory, and providing for its defence, there 
 would naturally be established, between the leaders and followers in 
 such an enterprise, those relations of fealty and protection, of ser- 
 vice and reward, which the common object they were alike engaged 
 in, would necessarily call forth, and in which the principle and the 
 rudiments of the feudal policy would be found. It has been shown 
 by Montesquieu, from the law of the Burgundians, that when that 
 Vandalian nation first entered Gaul, they found the tenure of land by 
 service, already existing among the people. 
 
 Slavery, from a very early period, existed among the Irish. 
 Slaves were exported from England in such numbers, that it seems 
 to have been a fashion among the people of property in Ireland, 
 and other neighboring countries, to be attended by English slaves. 
 Wherever the practice, indeed, of piracy, whether in ancient or 
 modern times, has prevailed, there the traffic in human flesh, as 
 an ordinary article of commerce, has also existed, and it was in the 
 course of a predatory expedition of Nial of the Nine Hostages to the 
 coast of Gaul, in A. D. 403, that St. Patrick, then a youth, was 
 carried away and sold as a bond slave in Ireland. Besides the 
 slaves imported from England, the Irish had also a class of bond- 
 men, called Villeins , which were regardant, as the law expresses it, 
 to the manor, and esteemed a part of the inheritance or farm. 
 
 About the period of the English invasion, 1170, a Synod con- 
 vened at Armagh, to take into consideration the perilous state of 
 the country. Concluding that the sins and offences of the people 
 were the great cause of the calamities that threatened them, they 
 resolved to seek in some general and national act of repentance, the 
 means of propitiation and self-relief. Acting upon the spirit of 
 Christian views, the Synod unanimously decreed and ordered that 
 all the English throughout the Island, who were in a state of 
 slavery, should be restored to their former freedom. 
 
 In speculating upon the aspect of Irish history at any period 
 whatsoever, full allowance is to be made for those anomalies which 
 so often occur in the course of affairs in that country, and which in 
 many instances baffle all such calculations respecting its real con- 
 dition, as are founded on those ordinary rules and principles by 
 
VIEWS OF IRISH CHARACTER, 
 
 17 
 
 which other countries are judged. Those old laws and customs of 
 the land, so ruinous, as we have seen, to peace and industry, could 
 not have been otherwise than fatal to the progress of civilization ; 
 nor can any one who follows the dark and turbid course of Irish 
 history, through the unvaried scenes of rapine and turbulence, 
 which it traverses, suppose for an instant that any high degree of 
 general civilization could co-exist with habits and practices so 
 utterly subversive of all the elements of civilized life. The picture 
 of the state of civilization among the Irish, in early times, is made 
 up of direct contrasts, and there is not a feature in their ancient 
 history indicative of an advance in social refinement, that is not 
 counteracted by some other, stamped with the strong impress of 
 barbarism. It is only by compounding these two opposite extremes, 
 that a just medium can be attained, and that the true, or at least 
 probable state of the case, can be collected from such evidence. 
 Even in the days of Ireland’s Christian fame, when amidst the 
 darkness which hung over the rest of Europe, she stood as a light 
 to the nations, and sent Apostles in all directions from her shores, 
 even in that distinguished period of her history, we shall find the 
 same contrasts, the same contrarieties of national character present- 
 ing themselves. 
 
 But there is an era still more strongly illustrative of this view of 
 Irish character, and at the same time recent enough to be within 
 the memory of numbers still alive. That it is possible for a state of 
 things to exist, wherein some of the best and noblest fruits of civili- 
 zation may be displayed in one portion of the community, while 
 the habitual violences of barbarism are raging in another, is but too 
 strongly proved by the history of modern Ireland, during the last 
 thirty years of the eighteenth century,— a period adorned by as 
 high and shining names as ever graced the meridian of the most 
 favored country, and yet convulsed by a furious struggle between 
 the people and their rulers, maintained on both sides, with a degree 
 of ferocity worthy of uncivilized life. 
 
18 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE CONSEQUENCES OF THE ENGLISH CONQUEST. 
 
 Though, by the treaty between the two Kings, (Henry and 
 Roderic,) acknowledging Henry to be lord paramount of Ireland, 
 the sovereignty over that Island, was transferred to the English 
 crown, yet in point of real power, the King of England was no 
 further advanced by it, than when, a few years before, he had set 
 sail from the Irish shore ; and at that period, as a great law autho- 
 rity, Sir John Davies, has declared, he left behind him not one more 
 true subject than he found upon his arrival. Within the same 
 limited sphere of dominion, extending not more than one third of 
 the kingdom, did the power and jurisdiction of the English crown 
 continue )to be circumscribed for centuries after, making no impres- 
 sion whatever on the laws, language, or customs of the great mass 
 of the natives, but remaining an isolated colony, in the midst of a 
 hostile and ever resisting people. 
 
 Had Ireland resisted from the first, her invaders, with a spirit 
 worthy of her ancient name, and had she, yielding only to superior 
 force, been at last effectually brought under, then indeed might the 
 two countries have had to record a conquest honorable to both ; 
 while both alike would have been spared that long train of demo- 
 ralizing consequences which arose out of the means, as rash and 
 violent as they were inefficient, employed to bring Ireland under 
 subjection. Hence the confused and discordant relations, in which 
 the two races inhabiting her shores, necessarily stood towards each 
 other — the one assuming the rights of conquest, without any power 
 to enforce them ; the other pretending to independence, with a for- 
 eign intruder in the very heart of the land ; while, to add to all this 
 confusion, there prevailed in the country two codes of laws, between 
 whose constantly conflicting ordinances, the wretched people were 
 kept distracted, while their unprincipled rulers had recourse, indif- 
 ferently, to one or to the other, according as it suited the temporary 
 purposes of spoliation or revenge. 
 
 It is said of the Norman followers of William the Conqueror, that 
 they despised the English for submitting to them so easily ; and 
 
THE ENGLISH CONQUEST IMPERFECT. 
 
 19 
 
 such was evidently the feeling awakened in their Anglo Norman 
 descendants, by the facility with which the Irish gave way to their 
 first encroachments. But as soon as these intruders began to dis- 
 cover that, however feebly opposed in their acquisition of the spoil, 
 they were not left a moment of peace or security for the enjoyment 
 of it ; when they found that the Irish “ enemy” (as the English 
 called them,) as if to atone for the weak submission of their fore- 
 fathers, neve^' once slumbered in the task of harassing the despoil- 
 er, and render the throne of their ruler a seat of thorns ; there was 
 then added to the haughty contempt they had before felt for the na- 
 tives, a deep and inveterate hatred, and how far both these feelings 
 were allowed to operate, is shown in the History of the Parliament 
 of the English Pale, where successive enactments against the 
 “ mere Irish,” exhibit almost every form of insult and injury that 
 the combined bitterness of hatred and contempt could be expected 
 to engender. 
 
 With respect to what is called Henry’s “ conquest” of this coun- 
 try ; how far that able Monarch himself was from claiming the 
 rights of a conqueror, appears from the spirit and terms of his treaty 
 with the Irish King Roderic ; according to which, but two of the 
 five kingdoms of which Ireland consisted, and three principal 
 cities, were exempted from the jurisdiction of the native Monarch, 
 while in all the other parts of the country, the ancient authorities 
 and laws remained in full force ; the Princes appointed their own 
 magistrates and officers, retained the power of pardoning and pun- 
 ishing malefactors, and made war or peace with each other, accord- 
 ing to their pleasure. 
 
 In the same Council which ratified this singular treaty, Henry 
 exercised his first act of authority over the Irish Church. As in 
 the subjection of England to the Normans, the native clergy were 
 found to be useful instruments, so in those parts of Ireland beyond 
 the English boundary, the influence of the clergy was Henry’s chief 
 support. Desirous of strengthening this interest, he now appointed 
 a native of Ireland, named Augustin, to the Bishopric of Waterford, 
 and recognising the primatial rights of Cashel, sent him to be con- 
 secrated by the Archbishop of that See. 
 
 That part of Ireland called Ulster, was first invaded by the Eng- 
 lish, under De Courcy, who, in 1177, with a small force, defeated 
 the natives in several engagements. In the same year the Pope’s 
 
20 
 
 CONTESTS BETWEEN THE ENGLISH AND IRISH. 
 
 legate, Cardinal Vivian, although he had advised the Prince of 
 Ulster to defend his territories against De Courcy, proceeded to 
 Dublin, and there convoked a general Council of Bishops and Ab- 
 bots, in which, setting forth the right of dominion over Ireland, con- 
 ferred by the Pope upon Henry, he impressed on them the necessity 
 of paying obedience to such high authority, under pain of excom- 
 munication. He also, among other regulations promulgated at this 
 Council, gave leave to the English soldiers to provide themselves 
 with victuals for their expeditions, out of the Church, into which, as 
 inviolable sanctuaries, they used to be removed by the natives ; 
 merely ordering, that for the provisions thus taken, a reasonable 
 price should be paid to the Rectors of the Churches. 
 
 Soon after the dissolution of this Council, the English Governor, 
 Fitz Aldelm, was induced to send an expedition into Connaught, in 
 consequence of a quarrel between Roderic O’Connor and his son ; 
 the latter of whom invited Fitz Aldelm to make war upon his father, 
 offering himself, to conduct into Connaught, the army destined 
 to this service. There had been, it appears, no violation of the 
 treaty between Roderic] and Henry, but the English hoped to profit 
 by this family feud. Fitz Aldelm accordingly sent a force of 
 about 500 men across the Shannon, but they were attacked by Rod- 
 eric O’Connor, and forced to retreat to Dublin, with considerable 
 loss. Roderic’s son, the traitor Murtagh, was taken prisoner ; and 
 the men of Connaught — not one of whom had followed his example 
 in joining'the English — delivered him up^into the hands of his 
 father, by whom he was punished for his treason. 
 
 To a mind acute, as was that of Henry II., it must have become at 
 this time sufficiently manifest, that out of such crude and discordant 
 materials as were now conflicting in Ireland, neither peace nor or- 
 der were likely soon to rise ; and that the grasp of one strong and 
 steady hand, acting with immediate, not deputed power, and coercing 
 all parties alike into obedience and observance of justice, presented 
 the sole means of hope that human policy could suggest, for the re- 
 duction of so crude and complicated a chaos into order. Fated as 
 Ireland was by her position, and even still more by the feuds pre- 
 vailing among her own people, to become subject to foreign domin- 
 ion, the presence, for a few years, of a ruler like Henry in the land, 
 with an army large enough to render resistance hopeless, would, by 
 lending to the new institutions introduced by him, at once enforce- 
 
HENRY APPOINTS JOHN, LORD OF IRELAND. 21 
 
 ment and superintendence, have secured both their reception by the 
 country, and their adaptation to its peculiar habits and wants ; and 
 in this manner, perhaps the euthanasia of Ireland’s independence, 
 mi ght with advantage and honor to both countries, have been effect- 
 ed. At all events, the world would, in that case, have been spared 
 the anomalous spectacle that has been, ever since, presented by the 
 two nations ; the one subjected, without being subdued ; the other 
 rulers, but not masters ; the one doomed to all that is tumultuous in 
 independence, without its freedom ; the other endued with every 
 attribute of despotism, except its power. 
 
 It can hardly be doubted that Henry was sufficiently aware of the 
 value of Ireland, to have taken more pains in laying the founda- 
 tions of English power in that Kingdom, had the cares attendant on 
 so vast an extent of dominion, and the anxieties caused by his do- 
 mestic troubles, allowed him the leisure and thought requisite for 
 such a task. The plan which occurred to him about this time, of 
 investing his youngest son, John, with the Lordship of Ireland, is 
 supposed to have been suggested by the wish to supply, as far as 
 was practicable, the want of the royal presence and sanction, in 
 the administration of that country's affairs. As his claim to the 
 Kingdom of Ireland had originally been founded on a grant from 
 the See of Rome, to the same source he now thought it right to ap- 
 ply for approval of the intended investment of the fee and power in 
 his son. Permission was accordingly granted to him by the Pope, 
 Alexander III., to bestow that sovereignty either upon John, or any 
 other of his sons he might choose ; and also to reduce to complete 
 obedience, such Chiefs of Ireland as might prove refractory. 
 
 In prosecution of this object, Henry, in May, 1177, at a Council 
 of Prelates and Barons at Oxford, constituted his son John, King of 
 Ireland. Notwithstanding this, however, the young Prince was 
 never afterwards, it appears by documents, styled otherwise than 
 Lord of Ireland, and Earl of Moreton. In conformity with this 
 change in the tenure by which that realm was held. Henry con- 
 firmed his grant of the territory of Meath to Hugh De Lacy, by a 
 new charter, besides granting large sections of Ireland to other 
 Barons and followers. Besides these grants from the crown, there 
 were also lands parcelled out by subinfeudation from the several 
 territories by which a number of the other lords engaged in these 
 wars were amply enriched and aggrandized. Hugh De Lacy was 
 
PRINCE JOHN IN IRELAND. 
 
 22 
 
 appointed the successor of Fitz Aldelm, in the government of Ire- 
 land, and afterwards married the daughter of Roderic, King of 
 Connaught. De Lacy was popular, both with the English settlers 
 and the natives. He fortified his own territory of Meath, where he 
 erected numerous castles. 
 
 In the year 1185, Henry sent his son John, whom he had made 
 Lord of Ireland, to rule over that Kingdom. This Prince was then 
 only twelve years of age, and he was accompanied by an armed 
 force sufficient to have established the English power over the 
 whole Island. The conduct of John and his adherents, however, 
 as we have mentioned, was so indiscreet and insulting towards the 
 Irish Chiefs who waited on him to welcome and acknowledge him 
 as their lord, that a spirit of revenge and resistance was awakened 
 in their bosoms, and several desperate battles between the English 
 and the natives were the consequence, in which John lost almost his 
 whole army. At length informed of the imminent danger with 
 which the very existence of his power in that realm was threatened, 
 Henry recalled the Prince and his headlong advisers to England, 
 and placed the whole power of the government, both civil and 
 military, in the hands of De Courcy. The death of De Lacy hap- 
 pening in the following year, De Courcy was left to encounter the 
 whole brunt of the Irish struggle almost alone. He owed the suc- 
 cess which in general attended his arms, far less to his own and his 
 small army’s prowess, than to the feuds and divisions which dis- 
 tracted the multitudes opposed to him. 
 
 In July, 1189, the career of the English Monarch, Henry II., was 
 closed, by his death at Chinon, in Normandy, the event being em- 
 bittered, if not accelerated by his discovery of the base treachery and 
 ingratitude towards him, of his favorite son, John. He was succeed- 
 ed by his son Richard I., ( Coeur de Lion.) The period of Anglo- 
 Irish History which follows, may safely be hurried over, through 
 more than one century of its course, without losing much that 
 either the pen or the memory can find any inducement to linger 
 upon or record. The people of Ireland, the legitimate masters of 
 the soil, disappear almost entirely from the foreground of their 
 country’s history, while a small colony of rapacious foreigners 
 stand forth usurpingly in their place. Expelled, on the one hand, 
 as enemies and rebels from their rightful possessions, by the Eng- 
 lish, and repulsed on the other as intruders, by the native septs into 
 
PARLIAMENTS AND COUNCILS. 4 
 
 23 
 
 whose lands they were driven, a large proportion of the wretched 
 people, thus rendered homeless and desperate, were forced to fight 
 for a spot to exist upon, even in their own land. 
 
 To second the sword in this mode of governing, the weapon of 
 the legislator was also resorted to, and proved a still more inhuman, 
 because more lingering, visitation. Giving a name to its own work, 
 the Law called “ enemies,” those whom its injustice had made so ; 
 and for the first time in the annals of legislation, a state of mutual 
 hostility was recognised as the established relationship between the 
 governing and the governed. 
 
 CHAPTER IY. 
 
 REIGNS OP RICHARD I., JOHN, AND HENRY III. 
 
 The kindly feelings of Richard I., towards his unworthy brother 
 John, were shown not more in the favors and dignities so prodigally 
 lavished upon him, both in Normandy and England, than in the 
 easy and generous confidence with which he still left him in unre- 
 stricted possession of the grant of the Lordship of Ireland, which 
 had been bestowed upon him by the late King. With the slight ex- 
 ception of the mention of Ireland, among those parts of the British 
 dominions, for which he requested a legate to be appointed by Pope 
 Clement III., Richard appears not to have at all interfered with 
 that country during his short, chivalrous reign. 
 
 At what period Parliaments, properly so called, began to be held 
 by the English in Ireland, there appear no means of ascertaining ; 
 but it is the opinion of Sir John Davies, that for one hundred and 
 forty years after the time of Henry II., there was but one Parliament 
 for both kingdoms, and that the Councils held occasionally, by the 
 Lords of the Pale, during that interval, were, as he expresses it, 
 rather Parlies than Parliaments. Neither were the interests of the 
 English settlement left wholly unrepresented during that period, as 
 we learn from the records of the reigns of the first three Edwards, 
 that Ireland sent representatives to the English Parliament under 
 all those Kings. 
 
24 
 
 CONTESTS WITH THE NATIVES. 
 
 The deputy appointed by John to the government of this coun- 
 try, on the accession of his brother Richard, was Hugh De Lacy, 
 son of the first Lord of Meath ; in consequence of which, John De 
 Courcy, finding himself, as he thought, unfairly supplanted, retired 
 dissatisfied to his own possessions in Ulster, and there assumed, in 
 the midst of his followers, a tone and attitude of independence 
 which threatened danger to the English interests in that quarter. 
 In the meanwhile the native Princes, encouraged by the diversion 
 to the service of the Crusades in the East, under Richard’s banner, 
 of the energies and resources of England, began to form plans of 
 combined warfare against their common foe, the invaders. During 
 the government of Marshall, the second in succession to De Lacy, 
 so great was the success of the national cause under their Chiefs, 
 that in spite of the perfidy which, as usual, says Moore, found its 
 way into the Irish councils, they succeeded in reducing several of 
 the garrisons in Munster, and after a siege, compelled Cork itself to 
 surrender. 
 
 The last of the Monarchs of Ireland, Roderic O’Connor, died in 
 1198, at the advanced age of eighty-two. During ten years of his 
 life he reigned over Connaught alone, for the eighteen following he 
 wielded the sceptre of all Ireland, and finally devoted the thirteen re- 
 maining years of his existence, to monastic seclusion and repentance. 
 
 The reign of King John, which, in the hands of the English 
 historian, presents so proud and stirring an example of resistance to 
 wrong, exhibits in the Irish records, but a melancholy picture of 
 slavery and suffering. Some brief struggles were indeed attempted 
 in the course of this reign, by the natives ; but while fondly 
 persuading themselves that, in these efforts, they fought in their own 
 cause, they were really but instruments in the hands of some rival 
 English Lords, who, by exciting and assisting the native Chieftains 
 against each other, divided and weakened the national strength, 
 and thereby advanced their own violent and rapacious views. 
 
 On the death of the Monarch, Roderic O’Connor, his two sons 
 broke out into fierce contention for the right of succession, and each 
 was assisted by different English Barons. The result was that 
 Carrach, one of the brothers, was slain, and the other, Cathal, of his 
 own free will, agreed to surrender to King John, two parts of Con- 
 naught, and to hold the third from him in vassalage, paying annually 
 for it the sum of one hundred marks. 
 
KING JOHN VISITS IRELAND. 
 
 25 
 
 The mischief of the policy pursued by Henry II., in deputing to 
 his Anglo-Norman Barons, the administration of Irish possessions, 
 was exemplified in the rivalry and quarrels that took place between 
 them, some of these suddenly enriched aristocrats, assuming a state 
 of independence, and leaguing with the native Chiefs in their local 
 feuds. 
 
 In the year 1210, King John, with a numerous army, visited 
 Ireland. The display of this force was sufficient to produce a 
 temporary calm. No less than twenty of the Irish Princes or 
 Chiefs, came to pay homage to the Monarch. Not finding any 
 enemy to encounter his mighty force, John had more leisure to 
 attend to the civil condition of the realm, and not only did he extend 
 the operation of the laws and institutions already established, but he 
 also introduced others of importance. There seems little doubt, 
 that to him is to be attributed, besides other useful measures, the 
 division of such parts of the kingdom as were in his possession, 
 into shires and counties, after the manner of England, and that the 
 first sterling money circulated in Ireland, was coined under his 
 direction. Having thus provided for the better administration of the 
 affairs of the kingdom, the King returned to England. 
 
 Throughout the remainder of this Monarch’s reign, the affairs of 
 Ireland appear to have continued in comparative tranquillity. As in 
 the contentions between John and his Barons in England, the people 
 of Ireland had taken no part, so neither in the Charter of Liberties 
 wrung from him by those turbulent nobles, did his Irish subjects 
 enjoy any immediate communion or share. 
 
 HENRY III. 
 
 King John was succeeded in the year 1216, by his son, Henry 
 III., who was but ten years old when he ascended the throne. The 
 Earl of Pembroke was, by a general Council of Barons, appointed 
 protector of the realm, and guardian of the young King. This 
 nobleman, having married the daughter and heiress of Earl Strong- 
 bow, on him devolved the Lordship or palatinate of Leinster, in 
 Ireland. He therefore felt a deep interest in the prosperity of the 
 English settlement in that Island, and accordingly, one of the first 
 measures of the new reign, was to transmit to Ireland a duplicate of 
 the instrument, by which, in a grand Council held at Bristol, Henry 
 had renewed and ratified the great Charter of Liberty, granted by 
 
26 
 
 QUARRELS AMONG THE ENGLISH BARONS. 
 
 his father. This copy of Magna Charta , however, differed in 
 some respects from the original, granted by John to his English sub- 
 jects, inasmuchas it was drawn up under the advice of several 
 noblemen interested in the soil of Ireland, and well acquainted with 
 the peculiar laws and customs of the land. The differences between 
 the two documents, imply a desire to accommodate the laws of the 
 new settlers to the customs and usages of their adopted country ; 
 the actual people of Ireland were wholly excluded from any share 
 in the laws and measures by which their own country was to be 
 thus disposed of and governed. Individual exceptions, indeed, oc- 
 cur so early as the time of King John, during whose reign there 
 appear charters of English laws and liberties, to such of the natives 
 as thought it necessary to obtain them. John and his immediate 
 successors, Henry and Edward, endeavored, each of them, to estab- 
 lish a community of laws among all the inhabitants of the country. 
 But the foreign Lords of the land, the Anglo-Norman Barons, were 
 opposed invariably to this wise and just policy ; and succeeded in 
 establishing for it a monstrous system of outlawry and proscription, 
 the disturbing effects of which were continued down from age to 
 age, nor have ceased to be felt or execrated even to the present 
 day. 
 
 The desire of plunder, which had hitherto united the English 
 settlers against the natives, was now, by a natural process, dividing 
 the enriched English among themselves. Numerous quarrels took 
 place between the Barons, particularly between De Lacy and the 
 Earl of Pembroke, in the course of which the counties of Leinster 
 and Meath were alternately laid waste. Regarding the throne as 
 their only refuge against the tyranny of the Barons, the Irish Cap- 
 tains surrendered to the King of England their ancient principali- 
 ties, and received back a portion by royal grant, to be held in future 
 by them as tenants of the crown ; thus making a sacrifice of part 
 of their hereditary rights, in order to enjoy, as they hoped, more 
 securely what remained. The fate of Connaught, however, held 
 forth but scanty encouragement to those inclined to rely on such 
 specious compacts. The engagement entered into by King John, 
 assuring to Cathal, the son of Roderic O’Connor, the safe possession 
 of a third part of Connaught, on the condition of his surrendering 
 the other two thirds to the King, was now violated by Henry III., 
 who bestowed upon one of his Barons, Richard De Burgh, the 
 
IRELAND GRANTED BY HENRY III., TO HIS SON. 27 
 
 whole of that province, to be taken possession of by him, after 
 Cathal’s death. This violation of public faith, was resisted by the 
 people of that province, who, regardless of Henry’s grant, elected a 
 successor to Cathal, as chieftain of Connaught, in his brother, who 
 was succeeded by a son of Cathal. 
 
 In the year 1254, Henry III. made a grant to his son, Prince 
 Edward, and his heirs, forever, of the kingdom of Ireland, provided 
 that the same was never to be separated from the English Crown. 
 There is reason to believe that Prince Edward once visited his Irish 
 dominions, but if so, nothing of importance occurred. 
 
 It was not without fierce and frequent struggles that the ancient 
 proprietors of the soil, suffered it to be usurped by the foreign 
 Barons. As usual, however, the dissention of the natives among 
 themselves, proved the safety and strength of the common enemy’s 
 cause. The mutual jealousy, to which joint success so frequently 
 leads, now sprung up among the different septs, and those who had 
 joined with such signal success against the English, being now 
 disunited, fell powerless before them. 
 
 The remaining years of this reign, continued to roll on in the 
 same monotonous course of fierce but ignoble strife, which had 
 darkened its records from the commencement. Scarcely had the 
 swords of the English Lords found time to rest from their wars 
 with the Irish Chiefs, than they again drew them in deadly conflict 
 with each other. 
 
 During the administration of Sir James Audley, in 1270, a more 
 than ordinary effort of vigor was made by the natives, to wreak 
 vengeance at least on their masters, if not to right and emancipate 
 themselves. Rising up in arms all over the country, they burned, 
 despoiled, and slaughtered in every direction, making victims both 
 of high and low. The Prince of Connaught took the field against 
 Walter De Burgh, Earl of Ulster, and putting his forces to route, 
 killed several noblemen and knights. Many fortified places, also, 
 were destroyed. 
 
 In the year 1272, this long reign— one of the longest to be found 
 in the English annals — was brought to a close, and Ireland 
 furnishes but few records towards the history of a reign, whose 
 course in England was marked by events so pregnant with interest 
 and importance ; events which, by leading to a new distribution of 
 political power, were the means of introducing a third estate into the 
 
28 
 
 REIGN OP EDWARD I. 
 
 Constitution of the English Legislature. It is somewhat remarkable, 
 too, that the very same order of men, the fierce and haughty 
 Barons, who laid the foundation at this time, in Ireland, of a system 
 of provincial despotism, of which not only the memory, but the 
 vestiges still remain, should have been likewise, by the strong force 
 of circumstances, made subservient to the future establishment of 
 representative government and free institutions in England. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 REIGN OF EDWARD I. 
 
 This Prince succeeded Henry III., in the year 1272 ; being on 
 his return from a Crusade to Palestine, at the death of his father. 
 There had now elapsed exactly a century from the time of the 
 landing of Henry II.; and it would be difficult to pronounce a 
 severer or more significant comment upon the policy pursued by the 
 rulers of Ireland, during that period, than is found in a petition 
 addressed to King Edward, in an early part of his reign, praying 
 that he would extend to the Irish the benefit of the laws and usages 
 of England. 
 
 It was the wise boast of the Romans, that their enemies, on the 
 day they were conquered, became their fellow-citizens. Far differ- 
 ent was the policy adopted by the rude Barons and rulers of the 
 English colony, who, seeing no safety for their own abused power, 
 but in the weakness of those subjected to them, took counsel of their 
 fears, and never relaxing the insecure hold, continued through ages 
 to keep the Irish in the very same hostile and alien state in which 
 they found them. 
 
 The reign of Edward I., which forms so eventful a portion of 
 England’s history, and combines in its course so rare and remark- 
 able a mixture of the brilliant and the solid, the glorious and useful, 
 presents, as viewed through the meagre records of Ireland, a barren 
 and melancholy waste — unenlivened even by those fiery outbreaks 
 of revenge, which at most other periods, flash out from time to time, 
 
THE IRISH PETITION FOR ENGLISH LAWS. 
 
 29 
 
 lighting up fearfully the scene of suffering and strife. In the first 
 year, indeed, of this reign, before the return of Edward from Pal- 
 estine, advantage was taken of his absence, by the natives, to make 
 a sudden and desperate effort for their own deliverance. The 
 castles of Roscommon, Aldleck, and Sligo were attacked and dis- 
 mantled or destroyed, and the Lord Justice, Fitz Maurice, was 
 seized and cast into prison. Soon after, the Scots made a sudden 
 incursion into Ireland, and committing the most cruel murders and 
 depredations, escaped into Scotland with their booty, before the 
 inhabitants had time to rally in their defence. In return, a con- 
 siderable force from Ireland, under two Anglo-Norman Barons, 
 Richard De Burgh, and Sir Eustice De Poer, invaded the Highlands 
 and Scottish Isles, spreading desolation wherever they went, and 
 putting to death all whom they could find. 
 
 In the five or six following years, Ireland was distracted by a 
 series of petty wars, in which not only EnglislTfought with Irish, 
 but the Irish, assisted by the arms of the foreigner, fought no less 
 bitter against their own countrymen. Thus, in the year 1277, in a 
 battle between the King of Connaught, and the Chief of the Mac- 
 Dermots of Moy-Lurg, the army of Connaught was utterly defeated, 
 with the loss of two thousand men, and the King himself slain. 
 It was with reference to this battle, that the Lord Justice, Robert 
 De Ufford, when called to account by King Edward, for permitting 
 such disorders, replied shrewdly, “ that he thought it not amiss to 
 let rebels murder one another, as it would save the King’s coffers, 
 and purchase peace for the land.” 
 
 The petition addressed to the King by the natives, praying for 
 the privileges of English law, not having been yet taken into 
 consideration by the Barons, Edward, in the year 1280, called upon 
 the Lords spiritual and temporal, as well as the whole body of 
 English subjects in “ the land of Ireland,” (as the district occupied 
 by the English, within the Pale , was called for some centuries,) to 
 assemble and deliberate upon that prayer. Intimating clearly the 
 views he himself entertained on the subject, he yet declares, that 
 without the concurrence of at least the prelates and nobles of the 
 land, he should not feel justified in granting the desired boon. 
 
 As the Crown, in those times, required to be bribed into justice, 
 the petitioners did not forget that necessary consideration, but offered 
 to pay into the King’s treasury eight thousand marks, on condition 
 
30 
 
 FIRST ANGLO-IRISH PARLIAMENT. 
 
 that he would grant their request • and the King, in his reply to the 
 Lord Justice, begins by mentioning — what was with him, doubtless, 
 not the least interesting part of the transaction — this tender of a sum 
 of money ; one of the most pressing objects of his policy being to 
 raise supplies for the constant foreign and internal warfare in which 
 he was engaged. He then proceeds, in this letter, to say that, 
 inasmuch as the laws used by the Irish were hateful in the sight of 
 God, and so utterly at variance with justice, as not to deserve to be 
 regarded as laws, he had considered the question deliberately, with 
 the aid of his council, and it had appeared to them sufficiently 
 expedient, to grant to the people the English laws ; provided that 
 the common consent of the English settlers, or at least of their well 
 disposed prelates and nobles, should lend sanction to such a 
 measure. 
 
 Thus laudibly anxious was this great Prince to settle calmly the 
 question, then first brought into discussion, whether the Irish were 
 to be ruled by the same laws, and enjoy the same rights and 
 privileges as the English ; a question which, under various forms 
 and phases, has remained, essentially, down to the present day, in 
 almost the same state in which Edward then found and left it. 
 Notwithstanding the urgent terms of the royal mandate, no further 
 step appears to have been taken on this important subject, either by 
 the King or Barons. 
 
 Meanwhile the entire country continued to be convulsed with 
 constant warfare, not only of Irish with English, but of the natives 
 and settlers respectively among themselves, and the long standing 
 feud between the Geraldines and the De Burghs, w T as, owing to the 
 power of the great families enlisted in it, prolonged through the 
 greater part of this reign. 
 
 The reader has already been prepared, on entering into this Anglo- 
 Irish period, to find the people of the land thrown darkly into the 
 back ground of their country’s history, while a small colony of 
 foreigners and their descendants, usurp their place. It is only in 
 the feuds and forays of the English Barons, that the historian can 
 find materials for his task. 
 
 At length an attempt was made during the government of Sir 
 John Wogan, to moderate the dissensions of these lawless Barons. 
 A general Parliament was accordingly assembled by him, in the 
 year 1295, which, though insignificant in point of numbers, passed 
 
ACTS OP THE PARLIAMENT. 
 
 31 
 
 some important measures. It was during this reign, of Edward I., 
 that the Parliament of England, after a long series of progressive 
 experiments, was moulded into its present shape ; nor did a House 
 of Commons, until this period, form a regular and essential part of 
 the English Legislature. In Ireland, where, from obvious causes, 
 the materials of a third estate were not easily to be found, the 
 growth of such an institution would be, of course, proportionably 
 slow ; and the Assemblies held there during this reign, and for 
 some time after, though usually dignified with the name of Parlia- 
 ment, differed but little, it is clear, in their constitution, from those 
 ancient common Councils, at which only the nobles and ecclesiastics, 
 together with, occasionally, a few tenants in capite , and perhaps 
 some of the retainers of the great lords, 'were expected to give their 
 attendance. 
 
 Among the acts passed by this Parliament, there is one, ordaining 
 a new division of the kingdom into counties. Another object that 
 engaged their attention, was the defenceless state of the English 
 territory, and the harassing incursions of the natives dwelling upon 
 its borders, and as this was owing chiefly to the absence of the 
 Lords marchers, it was now enacted that all such marchers as 
 neglected to maintain their necessary wards, should forfeit their 
 lands. It was ordained that all absentees should assign, out of their 
 Irish revenues, a portion for the maintenance of a military force. 
 To check the forays of the Barons, a provision was made, that for 
 the future, no lord should wage war, but by license of the chief 
 Governor, or by special mandate of the King. With a like view to 
 curbing the power of the great lords, every person, of whatever 
 degree, was forbidden to harbor more retainers or followers than he 
 could himself maintain ; and for all exactions and violence, of these 
 idle men, or kerns (as they were styled,) their lords were to be 
 made answerable. 
 
 To this Parliament is likewise attributed an ordinance, belonging 
 really, however, to a somewhat later period, which, in reference to 
 the tendency already manifested by the English to conform to the 
 customs and manners of the natives, ordains, that all Englishmen 
 should still, in their garb and the cut of their hair, adhere to the 
 fashion of their own country ; that whoever, in the mode of wearing 
 their hair, affected to appear like Irishmen, should be treated as 
 such ; that their lands and chattels should be seized, and themselves 
 imprisoned. 
 
32 
 
 IRISH TROOPS SENT TO SCOTLAND. 
 
 The year previous to the meeting of this Parliament, viz : in 
 1289, a statute was passed in England, entitled “An Ordinance for 
 the State of Ireland,” and which forms part of the evidence adduced 
 in support of the right, which has been questioned, before the Union, 
 of the Ena-lish Parliament to bind Ireland. 
 
 Supplies of troops were sent from Ireland at different intervals, 
 to the aid of King Edward in his Scottish wars ; the sort of warfare 
 the Irish were accustomed to among their own lakes and mountains, 
 rendering them a force peculiarly suited to the war in Scotland. 
 During the absence of Sir John Wogan, the Lord Justice, and other 
 English Nobles, in the expedition to Scotland, rebellion broke out 
 among the native Irish, but on the return of Wogan, a few years of 
 unwonted tranquility ensued ; owing chiefly, to the skill and firm- 
 ness with which this functionary succeeded in keeping down the 
 old family feud between the De Burghs and the Geraldines. 
 
 During the remaining years of this reign, the Irish records supply 
 us with few occurrences worthy of notice. On the renewal of 
 hostilities in Scotland, the King was again assisted by troops from 
 Ireland, under English Barons and Knights. Several contests, in 
 the meantime, took place between the English and natives in 
 Ireland, and at the hard fought battle of Glenfell, in 1306, Sir 
 Thomas Mandeville, the English leader, had his horse killed under 
 him, and his troops thrown into confusion ; but at length succeeded, 
 by skilful generalship, in retrieving the fortunes of the day. 
 
 Among the events of the last year of this reign, we find recorded 
 the murder of an Irishman, Murtogh Balloch, by an English 
 Knight, Sir David Canton, or Condon ; and the circumstances 
 attending the act must have been of no ordinary atrocity, as, by a 
 rare act of justice, in such cases, the English Knight was hanged, 
 in Dublin, for this murder, in the second year of the following 
 reign. A rising of the O’Keliys, in Connaught, where they 
 surprised and slew a number of English, and some daring efforts of 
 the wild mountaineers of Offaley, who destroyed a castle and burnt 
 the town of Ley ; are among the last of the miserable records con- 
 tributed by Ireland to the history of a reign, whose whole course, 
 as traced through England’s proud annals, presents such a series of 
 shining achievements, both in legislation and warfare, as no period, 
 perhaps, of the same duration, in the history of any other country, 
 ever yet equalled. 
 
33 
 
 CHAPTER YI. 
 
 REIGN OF EDWARD II. 
 
 This Prince succeeded his father in 1307, being in the 23d year 
 of his age. One of his 'first acts was to recall his favorite, Pier 
 Gaveston, a native of Gascony, in France, from banishment ; a step 
 which his father on his death bed, had forbidden, under pain oi his 
 malediction. Gaveston being unpopular with the Barons, they, in 
 Parliament, demanded his expulsion from England. The King, 
 however, was determined to uphold his iavorite, and advance his 
 fortunes. To the surprise and mortification of the nobles, and all 
 who had expected to see him humbled, it was discovered that Ireland 
 was the chosen place of his banishment ; that he had been sent 
 thither as the King’s Lieutenant, and went loaded with the royal 
 jewels. 
 
 During the short period of his administration, there was no want 
 of activity in the new Yiceroy, as he was almost constantly in the 
 field, engaging and subduing the refractory Chiefs, and enforcing 
 obedience to the English power. Among the benefits resulting 
 from Gaveston’s government, is mentioned, the attention paid by 
 him to the public works ; several castles, bridges, and causeways 
 having been constructed by his order. As the King, however, 
 could no longer endure his favorite’s absence, he was recalled to 
 England in 1309, the Barons giving their consent, and the people 
 absolving him from his late vow, never to return. 
 
 The successor of Gaveston, at the head of the government 
 was Sir John VYogan, a gentleman high in the royal favor, who 
 had already three times filled the office of Lord Chief Justice. 
 Soon after his arrival, a Parliament was held at Kilkenny, of which 
 the enactments are still preserved ; and among them are some 
 directed against the gross exactions and general misconduct of 
 the nobility. 
 
 Still farther to embroil and complicate the scenes of strife, of 
 which Ireland was now the theatre, each of the contending par- 
 ties became divided into fierce factions within itself ; and the brief 
 pauses between their conflicts with each other, were filled up with 
 
34 THE CHIEFS REFUSE ALLEGIANCE TO HENRY II. 
 
 equally rancorous strife among themselves. The government of 
 the kingdom, between the Irish enemies on one side, and the factious 
 English on the other, was called upon, constantly, to perform a 
 responsible and difficult task. 
 
 In the war with Scotland, which commenced after a truce in 1309, 
 the mandate of the King of England, addressed to the principal 
 Irish Chieftains, for their aid, met with no responsive obedience 
 from those heirs of Ireland’s ancient Kings. Even the slight feudal 
 link by which King John had attached those dynasts to the English 
 crown, was now evidently broken assunder, and it appears that not 
 one of the Chiefs summoned, had ever sworn fealty to Edward. 
 
 The nature of the policy, indeed, pursued by every successive 
 Governor— or rather, by those rulers of both government and 
 people, the proud and rapacious Anglo-Irish Lords — had been such 
 as to make of the nation they ruled over, not subjects, but bitter and 
 confirmed foes. Aware that the restraints of legal forms would 
 stand in the way of their own unprincipled projects, they refused to 
 the natives all that was protective in the law ; while employing 
 against them all its worst contrivances of mischief. 
 
 That a nation thus treated, should writhe impatiently under the 
 yoke, and greet with eagerness the faintest prospect of deliverance, 
 was but in the natural course of manly and patriotic feeling, and 
 the noble stand made by the Scots for their national independence, 
 had caused a feeling of hope and sympathy in every Irish heart. 
 Besides motives of revenge against the English, there was also to 
 enlist their good wishes peculiarly in the cause of the Scots, the 
 sympathy of a kindred people, a common lineage and language, and 
 the similarity still preserved, of their old national institutions. In 
 the fortunes of Robert Bruce, a lively interest appears to have been 
 taken by the Irish at an early period. In the year 1306, when 
 forced to fly, soon after his coronation, it was on a small island, a 
 few miles off the north coast of Antrim, Ireland, that he found a 
 safe place of refuge, and remained concealed during the winter, 
 returning to Scotland the ensuing spring. The strong interest then 
 felt in the adventures of the heroic Bruce, became elevated, of 
 course, into enthusiasm, when full success crowned his generous 
 struggle ; and the glorious victory of Bannockburn, in 1314, in 
 ridding Scotland of the English yoke, opened a vista, also, of hope 
 to the future fortunes of oppressed Ireland. There appeared, at 
 last, a dawning chance of her deliverance from bondage. 
 
THE SCOTS INVADE IRELAND. 
 
 35 
 
 While actively following up his victory, Bruce was waited upon 
 by deputies from the Irish, placing themselves and all that belonged 
 to them, entirely at his disposal, and praying that, if he himself, 
 could not be spared from his royal duties, he would send them his 
 brother Edward to be their King ; nor suffer, as they said, a kindred 
 nation to pine in bondage beneath the tyranny of the English. 
 Besides the accession of power and territory which the possession of 
 so fine a country would afford him, Bruce saw in the proposed 
 enterprise, a ready vent for the restless ambition of his brother, who 
 had become impatient of inferiority, even to Robert himself, and 
 already laid claim to an equal share with him in the government of 
 the Scottish realm. Robert appears, however, to have fully appre- 
 ciated the danger and difficulties of the undertaking, as some time 
 elapsed before he adopted any serious steps towards its accomplish- 
 ment ; and a few attempts by his people, in boats, on the coast of 
 Ulster, had all been vigorously repulsed. 
 
 In the meanwhile, Sir Theobald De Vernon, was appointed Lord 
 Justice of Ireland ; and in consequence of the aspect of affairs, the 
 King summoned the Anglo-Irish Nobles, to repair in person, to the 
 Parliament, at Westminster, to confer with the King and his 
 prelates and nobles, concerning the state and peaceful settlement 
 of that realm. Early in the spring of 1315, Sir Edmund Butler, 
 who had, in the interim, been made Lord Justice, returned : and on 
 the 25th of May, Edward Bruce, with a fleet of three hundred sail, 
 appeared off the north coast of Antrim, and landed at Larne, an 
 army of six thousand men. Being joined by immense numbers of 
 the Irish, their united force overran Ulster, striking terror by the 
 havoc and ruin that marked every step of their course. Whether 
 taken by surprise, or distracted by personal feuds, the English lords 
 made no adequate effort to meet this tumultuous onset ; the Earl of 
 Ulster appearing to have been the only lord who came forward to 
 face the danger, on its first burst. 
 
 Summoning his vassals to attend him at Roscommon, De Burgh 
 marched from thence to Athlone, where he was joined by Feidlim 
 O’Connor, the Prince of Connaught, with his troops. As this is the 
 only great native lord who is mentioned as adhering — and even in 
 this case but temporarily — to the side of the English, it may be 
 concluded that most, if not all, of the Chiefs enumerated in the 
 King’s writ, had joined the standard of the Scots. With no other 
 
36 
 
 EDWARD BRUCE CROWNED KING. 
 
 support than the troops of Feidlim, De Burgh marched in pursuit 
 of the invaders. He had even refused the proffered aid of the Lord 
 Justice, saying to him haughtily, “You may return home; I and 
 my vassals will overcome the Scots.” In the meantime Edward 
 Bruce, while at Dundalk, (which town he had stormed and burnt,) 
 had caused himself to be crowned King of Ireland ; and then over- 
 running the adjoining country, he returned again to the north of 
 of Ulster, taking up a post near the river Banne. Here De Burgh 
 made a vigorous attack upon the Scottish forces, but, after a fierce 
 conflict, was defeated, with great loss of men. Bruce also suffered 
 much loss, and his army being thus reduced in numbers, he de- 
 spatched the Earl of Moray into Scotland, for fresh succor. 
 
 The part taken by the Prince of Connaught, in aiding the Eng- 
 lish, drew down odium upon him among his fellow countrymen, 
 and during Feidlim’s absence, his kinsman Roderic O’Connor, tak- 
 ing advantage of the feeling against him, made himself master of 
 the Irish district of Connaught. To punish and expel this usurper 
 was now the most urgent object of Feidlim, who, with his own 
 followers alone, his English friends being too weak to assist him, 
 took the field against Roderic, and a great battle fought between the 
 two Chiefs, ended in the death of Roderic, and the discomfiture of 
 his force. To the great joy of his brother Chieftains, Feidlim now, 
 in the face of the country, renounced his alliance with the English, 
 and declared for Bruce and the Scots. 
 
 Meanwhile, the Scottish leader, following up his late victory, laid 
 seige to the strong hold of Carrickfergus, and the Irish rising in 
 arms throughout Ulster and Munster, destroyed several castles of 
 the Barons. The increasing spread of the spirit of revolt, infecting 
 some even among the English themselves, appeared to the govern- 
 ment to warrant the demand of some public pledge of allegiance 
 from those on whose loyalty the safety and maintenance of the 
 King’s government depended ; and a declaration was accordingly 
 framed, wherein, after stating that “ the Scottish enemies had drawn 
 over to them all the Irish of Ireland, several of the great lords, and 
 many English people,” the subscribers, (headed by John Fitz 
 Thomas, Baron of Offal ey,) pledged themselves to maintain loyally 
 the rights of the King against all persons whatsoever. 
 
 Bruce himself, having left some troops to carry on the seige of 
 Carrickfergus, marched his army into Meath ; where he encoun- 
 
PROGRESS OP THE WAR. 
 
 37 
 
 tered an English force under the Lord Justice Mortimer, and put 
 them to rout with great slaughter. He afterwards pushed on into 
 Kildare, defeating the English, (owing to feuds among the Barons,) 
 in several skirmishes, and putting their army to flight. Encouraged 
 by these evidences of weakness and discord in the English camp, 
 the people of Munster and Leinster rose in open rebellion, and burnt 
 the country from Arklaw to Ley. But the Lord Justice, issuing 
 out upon them, checked their depredations, and returned with four- 
 score heads, as a trophy of his triumph, to Dublin. 
 
 Towards the beginning of the year 1316, the forces of both parties 
 were early in the field ; but the Scots, after a few adventurous efforts, 
 were compelled, from the want of provisions, to return into Ulster. 
 There, taking possession ofNorthburg Castle, they sat down quietly 
 in their quarters, and Edward Bruce kept his court and took cogni- 
 zance of all pleas, as composedly as if it were in times of pro- 
 found peace. The English forces found employment in sub- 
 duing the natives, who daily infested the neighborhood of Dublin, 
 having already laid waste the town of Wicklow and the adjacent 
 country. 
 
 Occasional skirmishes took place between a detachment of the 
 English troops and the Scots, and the arrival of supplies to Bruce 
 from Scotland, in the spring of the year 1316, gave a new impulse 
 to the conflict — renewing the various horrors of massacre, burning, 
 and waste, which had been for a short time suspended. 
 
 The conduct of those lords who had stood firmly by the English 
 government, was rewarded by the King in bestowing new dignities 
 and titles on several of them. The Lord Justice Butler, was created 
 Earl of Carrick, and John Pitz Thomas, Baron of Offaley, Earl of 
 Kildare. The De Burghs and Geraldines now consented to a tem- 
 porary truce; and there appeared, among all, a firm and loyal reso- 
 lution to set themselves manfully to the defence of the realm. 
 
 They were soon furnished with a favorable opportunity of en- 
 countering, in a pitched battle, the now favorite champion of the 
 Irish, leidlim O Connor, who had atoned for his former course, by 
 a series of bold and successful irruptions into the English territory ; 
 in the course of which many gallant English knights were slain. 
 The Connaught Chief now took the field, with a large force, to meet 
 the troops under William De Burgh, assisted by Richard De Ber- 
 mingham. The two armies encountered each other near Athenry, 
 6 
 
38 
 
 ROBERT BRUCE IN IRELAND. 
 
 in the county of Galway, and, according to Irish writers, the most 
 bloody and decisive battle ensued that had ever been fought from 
 the time of the first English invasion. This mighty struggle ended 
 in the total defeat of the Irish, of whom not less than eleven thou- 
 sand, it is said, fell on the field — the gallant Feidlim, himself, (then 
 twenty-two years of age,) being among the slain, together with a 
 number of other great lords and captains of Connaught and Meath. 
 This great victory of the English gave a final blow to the power 
 of the O’Connors. 
 
 There had now elapsed more than a year since the landing of 
 Edward Bruce in Ireland ; and though his arms had been hitherto 
 invariably victorious, no definite object had yet been gained by the 
 enterprise. In tins state of the war, his illustrious brother, King 
 Robert, determined generously to come in person to his aid. En- 
 trusting the government of Scotland to his son-in-law, the Steward, 
 and Sir James Douglas, he passed over to Ireland with a considera- 
 ble body of troops. 
 
 The brave garrison of Carrickfergus, who had endured months 
 of privation and suffering, were at length reduced, by famine, to the 
 necessity of surrendering to the two brother Kings, — the lives of the 
 garrison being spared. 
 
 Towards the end of the year 1316, the English had gained some 
 important advantages over the natives. On the side of the Scots, 
 meanwhile, exertions were made to ensure a triumphant result. 
 Having collected together a force, computed at twenty thousand 
 men, independent of the tumultuous army of the northern Irish, they 
 advanced to the neighborhood of Dublin — laying waste and burn- 
 ing all in their way. The citizens of Dublin, on finding themselves 
 menaced with a siege, declared their resolution to defend, obstinately, 
 the city, setting fire at once to the suburbs. To the intrepidity, 
 indeed, and decisive conduct of the citizens of Dublin, at this crisis, 
 the very existence of the Irish government was mainly indebted for 
 its preservation. On being informed of this spirit of the inhabitants, 
 and learning also that the city was well walled, the Scottish leader 
 deemed it most prudent not to risk the delay or failure of a siege ; 
 but under the guidance of Walter de Lacy, an English knight, who, 
 in shameless defiance of his late oath of fealty, had become the ad- 
 viser and conductor of the invading army, he turned off with his 
 forces. 
 
ANNUAL PARLIAMENTS ESTABLISHED. 
 
 39 
 
 Passing into the county of Kilkenny, and from thence wasting the 
 whole country as far as Limerick, the Scots, after spreading around 
 them misery and desolation, were brought at length to feel the ex- 
 tremities of famine themselves — numbers of them perishing with 
 hunger. So far was the cause of the Scots from finding any favor 
 at Limerick, that a large army, composed of English and Irish, had 
 been collected there for the purpose of attacking them — having 
 chosen for their leader Murtogh O’Brien, Prince of Thomond — and 
 this force was about to march against the invaders, when the Scots 
 made a precipitate retreat into Ulster, in May, 1317. Here, con- 
 vinced perhaps of the hopelessness of any attempt to build up a 
 durable dominion out of materials so rude and crumbling as the 
 state of Ireland then afforded, Robert Bruce committed to his more 
 sanguine brother the further prosecution of the war, and taking 
 away with him only the Earl of Moray, returned to his own 
 dominions. 
 
 Instead of availing themselves of the weak condition to which the 
 invaders were reduced, to strike a blow that would at once sweep 
 them from the face of the land, the English leaders were quietly 
 employed in holding Parliaments, both at Kilkenny and in Dublin, 
 to consult on the state of the country, and concert measures for the 
 expulsion of the Scots. On one occasion, the debates lasted for a 
 whole week, while an army of thirty thousand men were waiting 
 orders to take the field. 
 
 Following in the train of an example in England, a petition was 
 addressed this year to the King, praying that a “parliament might 
 be held once every year in Ireland.” It is clear that neither by the 
 measures adopted in England for that purpose, nor by the prayer 
 of the Irish petition, was it meant that Parliaments should be elect- 
 ed every year, but simply that the Parliament should, every year, 
 hold a session. With respect to the Irish petition, the prayer con- 
 tained in it for a Parliament to be held annually, was granted in the 
 tenth year of this reign. 
 
 Through all the calamities and reverses that now befel the na- 
 tional cause in Ireland, the spirit of the people was chiefly sustained 
 by the exhortations of the clergy ; for it is a fact worthy of notice, 
 that the church of the Irish and the church of the English in that 
 country, were, at this time, as Avidely divided by their difference in 
 language and race, as they have been at any period since, by their 
 difference in creed. 
 
40 
 
 CIVIL WAR AND DISCORD. 
 
 The disaffection towards the ruling powers, so strongly manifested 
 imong the clergy, was not confined to the native ecclesiastics, but 
 <pread also among their English or Anglo-Irish brethren. Com- 
 plaints had been made by the English Monarch to Pope John XXII., 
 with whom he stood high in favor, of the disloyal conduct of the 
 Irish clergy ; and a letter was addressed, accordingly, by his Holi- 
 ness, to the Archbishops of Dublin and Cashel, empowering them to 
 admonish, and, if necessary, excommunicate all such rebels to the 
 English crown. 
 
 At this time, the same chaotic confusion of public and private 
 warfare seems to have prevailed over the whole kingdom. The 
 De Lacys having defied and baffled the authority of the Lord Jus- 
 tice Mortimer, and murdered an envoy sent to treat with them for 
 peace, these savage lords were attacked by the Lord Justice in their 
 own territory, driven into Connaught, and proclaimed traitors and 
 outlaws, and numbers of their followers slain. The Chief Justice 
 of the Court of Common Pleas, Sir Hugh Cannon, was murdered by 
 one of the English family of the Berminghams. 
 
 Among the Irish, meanwhile, (says Moore,) the old game of dis- 
 cord continued to be carried on with all the usual national zest ; 
 and a quarrel which had been for some time kindling between two 
 great Captains or Princes of Connaught, now led to a battle, attend- 
 ed with the slaughter of four thousand of their respective followers. 
 It was this discord among themselves, the inherent vice of the Irish 
 nation, that paralyzed then, as it has done ever since, every effort 
 for their enfranchisement, and which, at that time, would have kept 
 them hopeless and confirmed slaves, had even a whole army of Ro- 
 bert Bruces thronged to their deliverance. 
 
 The spell of inaction that had hung for months around Edward 
 Bruce — owing far more to the weakened condition of his army than 
 to any effect produced by the anathemas of the Pope — was now on 
 the point of being broken, and in a way fatal to his chivalrous enter- 
 prise and life. Alexander Bicknor, Archbishop of Dublin, had just 
 neen appointed Lord Justice, succeeding in that office the Archbishop 
 of Cashel, William Fitz John. An early and abundant harvest in 
 all those parts of the country not wholly wasted by war, enabled both 
 )f the belligerent parties to resume early their operations, in the year 
 1318 ; and Edward Bruce, taking the field with an army amount- 
 ng, as some say, to about three thousand men, marched to the 
 
DEFEAT AND DEATH OF EDWARD BRUCE. 
 
 41 
 
 raughard, (an artificial mount) a memorable spot within two miles 
 of Dundalk. He was assisted in the command by several Scottish 
 noblemen, and the three De Lacys had also joined his ranks. 
 
 The English force which had marched from Dublin, to encounter 
 this army, was commanded by the Lord John Bermingham, having 
 under him a number of distinguished officers. According to the 
 Scottish historians. Edward Bruce had, in the course of the three 
 years during which he waged war in Ireland, encountered the Eng- 
 lish armies eighteen times, and been in each battle victorious. The 
 same authorities compute his force on the present occasion to have 
 been little more than a tenth of that of his adversaries; while the 
 English chroniclers on the other hand, represent the number of 
 their own countrymen to have been not more than one half of that 
 of the Scots. On which ever side, in these widely differing state- 
 ments, the balance of truth may be supposed to lean, it is clear, from 
 both accounts, that the conflict was short ; that victory declared 
 for the English in the very first onset, and moreover, that to the 
 desperate bravery of one man that result is mainly to be attributed. 
 Under the persuasion that the death of Bruce himself would give 
 victory at once to the English, John Maupas, a brave Anglo-Irish 
 knight, rushed devotedly into the Scottish ranks to accomplish that 
 object, and when, after the battle, the body of Bruce was discovered, 
 that of John Maupas was found laying stretched across it. The 
 amount of the slain in this battle has been variously stated, being 
 made by each party proportionate to its own calculations of the 
 numbers originally engaged. The English divided the body of 
 Bruce into quarters, and sent them to be exhibited all over the 
 country ; while the head was presented as a trophy, by Berming- 
 ham, to the King of England. 
 
 The interposition of the Pope, to which we have alluded, in aid 
 of the views of the English King, was felt the more keenly by the 
 great body of the Irish Chieftains, as coming from a quarter to which 
 the ancient fame of their country for sanctity and learning might 
 well have encouraged them to look for sympathy and support. In 
 the warmth of this feeling, a remonstrance was addressed to the 
 Pope, (before the Scottish invasion,) by O’Neill, Prince of Tyrone, 
 speaking as the representative of his brother Chiefs, and of the 
 whole Irish nation. 
 
 “ It is with difficulty,” say they, “ we can bring ourselves to be- 
 lieve that the biting and venomous calumnies with which we, and 
 
42 
 
 IRISH REMONSTRANCE TO THE POPE. 
 
 all who espouse our cause, have been invariably assailed by the 
 English, should have found admittance, also, into the mind of your 
 holiness, and have been regarded by you as founded in fact and 
 truth.” Lest such an impression, however, should, unluckily, have 
 been produced, they begged to lay before him their own account of 
 the origin and state of the kingdom. — “ if indeed a kingdom we can 
 call the melancholy remains of a nation that so long groans under 
 the tyranny of the Kings of England, and of their Barons, some of 
 whom, though born among us, continue to practice the same rapine 
 and cruelty against us, which their ancestors did against ours here- 
 tofore.” 
 
 After this introduction, the Irish Chiefs proceed to give a rapid 
 sketch of the early history of their country, saying that their fore- 
 fathers came from Spain, and beginning with the sons of Milesius, 
 they lay claim to a long succession of the native Kings of Ireland, 
 to the year 1170, when Pope Adrian IV., an Englishman by birth, 
 and still more, as they add, “ by affection and prejudice, delivered up 
 a country, which its own line of Kings had preserved sacred from 
 foreign dominion through so many ages, to be the helpless prey of a 
 horde of tyrants, giving the dominion to Henry II., King of Eng- 
 land, whom he ought rather to have stripped of his own, on account 
 of his crime, in suffering or causing St. Thomas (Becket) of Canter- 
 bury, to be murdered. Ever since those English appeared first 
 upon our coasts, in virtue of the above surreptitious donation, they 
 entered our territories under a certain specious pretext of piety, en- 
 deavoring in the mean time, by every artifice malice could suggest, 
 to extirpate us root and branch, and without any other right 
 than that of the strongest, they have forced us to quit our fair 
 and ample habitations, and paternal inheritances, and to take re- 
 fuge in the mountains, the woods, and the morasses of the coun- 
 try ; nor can even the caverns and dens protect us against their 
 insatiable avarice. They pursue us even into these frightful 
 abodes, endeavoring to dispossess us of the wild uncultivated rocks, 
 and arrogating to themselves the property of every place on which 
 we can stamp the figure of our feet ; and through on excess of the 
 most profound ignorance, impudence, arrogance, or blind insanity 
 scarce conceivable, they dare to assert that not a single part of Ire- 
 land is ours, but the right entirely their own. Hence the implaca- 
 ble animosities and exterminating carnage, which are perpetually 
 carried on between us ; hence our continual hostilities, our detesta- 
 
THEIR GRIEVANCES STATED. 
 
 43 
 
 ble treacheries, our bloody reprisals, our numberless massacres, in 
 which, since their invasion to this day, more than fifty thousand men 
 have perished on both sides, not to speak of those who have of 
 famine, despair, the rigors of captivity, nightly marauding, and 
 other disorders, which it is impossible to remedy on account of the 
 anarchy in which we live,” 
 
 The remonstrance alleges that the English, depriving the people 
 of their own ancient and written code of laws, had replaced them by 
 others of their own dictation, conceived in a spirit of hatred towards 
 the people for whom they legislated ; and, in more than one in- 
 stance, providing deliberately for their extermination. 
 
 To give some idea of the iniquity of the laws under which they 
 suffered, the writers of the remonstrance cite the following in- 
 stances : — 1. That no Irishman could bring an action in the King’s 
 courts ; though every man not an Irishman could, on any charge, 
 prosecute an Irishman. 2. That if an Englishman murdered a 
 native, layman or ecclesiastic, no cognizance would be taken of the 
 crime in the King’s courts. 3. That no native woman, married to 
 an Englishman, could on his death, be admitted to the claim of 
 dower. 4. That it was in the power of any English lord to set 
 aside the last wills of the natives subjected to him, and dispose of 
 their property according to his own pleasure, appropriating it all, if 
 such was his inclination, to himself. 
 
 From a total dissimilarity, as they allege, between the English 
 and themselves, not only in race and language, but in every other 
 respect, there appeared no longer the slightest hope that they could 
 ever live peacefully together. So great was the pride and lust of 
 dominion on one side, and such the resolution on the other, to cast 
 off the intolerable yoke, that as yet there never had been, so never, 
 in this life would there be, any sincere coalition between the two na- 
 tions, entertaining natural enmity against each other, flowing from 
 mutual malignity, descending from father to son and from genera- 
 tion to generation. 
 
 They add that they had, two years before, proposed to the King 
 of England and his Council, a settlement, by whichall such lands as 
 were known to be rightfully theirs, should be secured in future to 
 them, by direct tenure from the crown ; or even agreeing, in order 
 to save the further effusion of blood, to submit to any friendly plan 
 proposed by the King himself, for a fair division of the lands be- 
 tween them and their adversaries. 
 
44 
 
 EXACTION OP COIGNE AND LIVERY. 
 
 To this proposition, they say, no answer had been returned, 
 “ Wherefore,” continue they, “ let no one feel surprise if we now- 
 endeavor to work out our own deliverance, and defend, as well as 
 we can, our rights and liberties against the harsh and cruel tyrants 
 who would destroy them; nor can we be accused of rebellion, 
 owing them no allegiance ; therefore, without the least remorse of 
 conscience, while breath remains, we will attack them in defence of 
 our just rights, and never lay down our arms until we force them to 
 desist.” In conclusion they announce to the Pope, that for the 
 more speedy and effectual attainment of their object, they have 
 called to their aid, the illustrious Earl of Carrick, Edward De Bruce, 
 a lord descended from the same ancestors with themselves, and 
 have made over to him, by letters patent, all the rights which they 
 themselves, as rightful heirs of the kingdom respectively possess, — 
 thereby constituting him King and Lord of Ireland. 
 
 The advantages resulting to the English cause from the defeat 
 and overthrow of Bruce and his army in Ireland, were not so great 
 as might have been expected. The country was exhausted by war 
 and famine, the treasury was impoverished, and the population was 
 thinned. The storm had partly subsided, but it had not wholly 
 passed away ; and to the evils already existing were added fresh 
 ones, by the notorious misrule and rapacity of those in power and 
 authority. Among other barbarous and nefarious practices which 
 sprung up during that period, there was none which embraced a 
 wider field for every species of oppression, rapine, and massacre, than 
 that which was then called coigne and livery , since known by the 
 name of free quarters, namely, the forced quartering of soldiers upon 
 the inhabitants. Of this hateful system Sir John Davies remarks, 
 11 In the time of King Edward II., Maurice Fitz Thomas, of Des- 
 mond, being chief commander of the army against the Scots, began 
 that wicked extortion of coigne and livery and pay ; that is, he 
 and his army took provisions, provender for horses, and money at 
 their pleasure, without any ticket or satisfaction. And this was, 
 after that time, the general fault of all the governors and command- 
 ers in this land.” 
 
 Historical antiquaries have been divided upon the inquiry, at 
 what period Ireland began to have a Parliament of her own ; and it 
 seems to be agreed upon by the best authorities, that until the reign 
 of Edward II., all the deliberative meetings held in that kingdom, 
 
PARLIAMENTS IN IRELAND. 
 
 45 
 
 by whatsoever name they may have been called, were rather general 
 assemblies of the great men, than, properly, Parliaments. That 
 they were sometimes considerable in numbers, as well as in rank, 
 appears from a Parliament of this desciption, held in the year 1302, 
 at which were present no less than one hundred and fifty-six per- 
 sons ; and in the following reign, a general assembly, or parliament, 
 was convened, which, in addition to all the English nobility in Ire- 
 land, included likewise the four Archbishops, ten Bishops, the Abbot 
 of St. Thomas, the Prior of Kilmainham, and the Dean and Chapter 
 of Dublin. There were likewise present, on this occasion, several 
 great Irish lords, among whom are the following, and thus desig- 
 nated : — O’Hanlan, Duke of Oriel ; O’Donell, Duke of Tyrconnel ; 
 O’Neill, Duke of Tyrone. 
 
 Until the period when regular Parliaments began to be held in 
 Ireland, it was usual to transmit thither, from time to time, the laws 
 made by the English legislature, to be there proclaimed, enrolled, 
 and executed, as laws also of Ireland ; and there can be little doubt 
 that what was then styled a Parliament in that kingdom, was no 
 more than the summoning of the great men of the realm together, 
 reading over to them the law or laws transmitted from England, 
 and enjoining that they should obey them. 
 
 No other event of importance occurred during the remainder of 
 the reign of Edward II. As a legislator, he did more for Ireland 
 than any of his predecessors ; and such, at one time, was his confi- 
 dence in his subjects there, that it is said he intended to throw him- 
 self upon their allegiance, during the progress of his multiplied ca- 
 lamities in England, which ended in his being the victim of a con- 
 spiracy, and consequent death, in 1327, in the forty-third year of 
 his age, and the twentieth of his reign. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 EDWARD III. 
 
 The reign of the third Edward will be found to differ but little 
 from those of his predecessors, with regard to Ireland, in the odious 
 picture it presents of a cruel and rapacious aristocracy let loose 
 7 
 
46 
 
 ENGLISH LAWS AGAIN ASKED FOR. 
 
 upon a defenceless, because divided, people. It would seem, indeed, 
 almost incredible that, in the chivalrous days of the Edwards, there 
 should have been found so many of high-born and warlike English 
 noblemen to take a part in the rude and inglorious frays of Anglo- 
 Irish warfare. But, besides the temptations so fertile a field of plun- 
 der held forth, a nearer insight into the homes and habits of the 
 English nobility of that period might warrant the conclusion that 
 they themselves were still very backward in civilization; and that 
 not only in the general outline, but in some of the features, also, of 
 their social condition, they differed not very much from those great 
 Irish Chieftains against whom they were now employing all the 
 worst arts of buccaneering warfare. Like the Irish Chieftain, the 
 English Baron of that day was a kind of independent potentate, re- 
 garding only the conventional law of his own class, and submitting 
 but by force to any other ; while constantly surrounded by idle and 
 ruffianly retainers, ever ready, at his bidding, for rapine and mis- 
 chief, he bore, like the Irish Chief, too close an affinity to the worst 
 species of King, to be ever expected to prove, under any circum- 
 stances, a good subject. 
 
 Though so frequently repulsed in their efforts to obtain the pro- 
 tection of the English law, the natives again, in the second year of 
 this monarch’s reign, preferred a petition to the crown, prayinar that 
 the Irish might be permitted to use the law of England, without be- 
 ing obliged to purchase charters of denization to qualify them for 
 that privilege. The writ of the King, recommending this prayer to 
 the “unprejudiced” attention of the Lord Justice, differs little in 
 phrase or tone from those of his predecessors on the same point ; 
 nor is any thing more said of the petition during the remainder of 
 this King’s reign. It was not, however, the fault of the sovereign 
 that the great benefits of English law had not been extended to the 
 natives in general ; and among the articles sent over by the King, 
 three years after this, for the reformation of Ireland, was an ordi- 
 nance framed with a view to this wise policy, expressed in these 
 terms, namely : — “ That one and the same law be observed to the 
 Irish and the English.” But this royal mandate, like all the rest, 
 in the same liberal spirit that had preceded it, was rendered null 
 by the blind selfishness of the magnates to whom it was addressed. 
 Another ordinance, transmitted at the same time to Ireland, was 
 directed against that standing evil, absenteeism . 
 
EDWARD III. FEIGNS A VISIT TO IRELAND. 
 
 47 
 
 The public announcement at this time, by the King, of his inten- 
 tion to pass over into Ireland, and apply himself personally to the 
 task of reforming the state of that realm, might well be classed with 
 those dawnings of better fortune which now and then opened upon 
 hapless Ireland, merely to close again in darkness, were it not mani- 
 fest that all the preparations made ostensibly for the King’s Irish 
 visit, were but as a blind to divert attention from the formidable ex- 
 pedition then preparing against Scotland. 
 
 The King had sent writs to the Earl of Ulster and other great 
 lords, announcing his intention of coming; and his summons to 
 the absentees, dated January, 1332, requiring them to accompany 
 him, and recover their possessions out of the hands of the rebels, is 
 addressed to Thomas, Earl of Norfolk, and twenty-two other Eng- 
 lish lords and gentlemen. But the secret scheme which had been 
 all this time maturing against Scotland, was now ripe for execu- 
 tion ; and the mask he had worn towards both countries, might 
 with impunity be cast aside. All the supplies, therefore, that had 
 been granted for his pacific visit to Ireland, he, without any scru- 
 ple, appropriated to his memorable Scottish warfare ; and found, in 
 the brilliant victory at Halidon Hill, a result far more suited to his 
 chivalrous tastes than any that the precious, but slow and remote 
 triumphs of the legislator could furnish. 
 
 The only measure which appears to have been taken by him to- 
 wards the pacification of Ireland, was the issue of writs to the Lord 
 Justice, and other public authorities, empowering them to admit to 
 the King’s peace all disaffected persons, as well English as Irish, 
 upon such terms as the Lord Justice and his Council should deem 
 honorable and expedient. 
 
 During the early part of this reign several new insurrections 
 broke forth among the natives, particularly in the provinces of 
 the South ; while the English Barons and their followers were 
 engaged in violent quarrels among themselves, in the course of 
 which many lives were lost, including several gentlemen of rank 
 and distinction. In some instances the natives were successful in 
 their contests with the government troops, and the Lord Justice, un- 
 able to cope with so general a spirit of insurrection, called in the 
 aid of Maurice Fitz Thomas, who had a few months before, been 
 created Earl of Desmond, with a grant at the same time of the 
 royal privileges of the county of Kerry. 
 
48 
 
 RENEWED WARS WITH THE NATIVES. 
 
 The palatinate now granted to Desmond, formed the ninth of 
 those petty sovereignties into which the kingdom had been wan- 
 tonly parcelled, in order to enrich and exalt a few favored indi- 
 viduals, not more to the injury of the people than to the usurpation 
 and abuse of the privileges of the crown. For, in fact, these pa- 
 latine lords had royal jurisdiction throughout their territories; 
 made Barons and Knights, and erected courts for civil and crimi- 
 nal causes, as well as for the management of their own revenues, ac- 
 cording to the forms in which the King’s courts were established in 
 Dublin. They made their own judges, sheriffs, and coroners, nor 
 did the King’s writ run in the palatinates, though they comprised 
 more than two parts of the English colonies. 
 
 In compliance with the desire of the government, and under a 
 promise from them of King’s pay, Desmond, at the head of nearly ten 
 thousand men, having the O’Brians for his allies, took the field against 
 the combined septs of Leinster, the O’Nolans, O’Morroughs, and 
 O’Dempsy’s ; and laying waste all their lands, compelled them to 
 submit and give hostages. The funds of the government being 
 found insufficient to defray the expenses of this war, or discharge 
 the King’s pay promised to Desmond, that lord had recourse, for the 
 subsistence of his troops, to the old Irish exaction of coigne and 
 livery, a mode of taxation which he himself had first brought into 
 use among the English, (having resorted to it, as we have men- 
 tioned, in the preceding reign, in the war against Bruce,) and 
 which his cousin, the Earl of Kildare, now readily adopted, after 
 his example. 
 
 The following year was but a repetition of the same violent scenes ; 
 and under the two several heads of English dissension and Irish 
 insurrection, may be classed all that is recorded of its stormy course. 
 A large number of the natives in the county of Meath were attacked 
 and put to flight by the Earls of Ulster and Ormond and the sons 
 of three Irish Kings were among the slain. While engaged against 
 other natives, headed by O’Brian, the English Earls of Ulster and 
 Desmond could not refrain from carrying on their own personal 
 quarrels, and to such lengths did their feuds proceed, that the Lord 
 Justice seized the leaders of both factions, and committed the two 
 lords to the custody of the marshal of Limerick. 
 
 In the year 1331, the Earl of Ulster was appointed by the King, 
 Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and Sir Anthony Lucy, a man of high 
 
DISAFFECTION OF THE BARONS. 
 
 49 
 
 reputation in England, but of a severe and unbending character, 
 was sent over as Lord Justice. Soon after his arrival a great victory 
 was gained over the Irish in Meath. The new Lord Justice was 
 strongly prejudiced against the Anglo-Irish, among the most dis- 
 tinguished of whom was the Earl of Desmond, whose popular 
 qualities, added to his great wealth and station, gave him an influ- 
 ence throughout the country, so powerful, in many instances, as to 
 throw the authority of the government itself into the shade. To Sir 
 Anthony Lucy, who had come prepared to uphold sternly the pow- 
 ers entrusted to him, this rival ascendency was, of course, pecu- 
 liarly obnoxious, and the jealousy it excited in his mind soon found 
 an opportunity of exploding. 
 
 A Parliament summoned by him to meet at Dublin, shortly after 
 his arrival, having exhibited but a thin attendance of great lords, 
 he thought right to adjourn it to the 7th of July, when it was held 
 at Kilkenny ; and there the Earl of Kildare, with other lords and 
 gentlemen, who had on the former occasion absented themselves, 
 gave their attendance and were freely pardoned ; having been first 
 sworn to bear allegiance and keep the peace in future. There 
 were, however, many of the powerful lords, and, among the rest, 
 Maurice of Desmond, who had pointedly withheld their presence ; 
 and an outbreak of the Irish at the same time, having appeared to 
 the Lord Justice to indicate concert between these rebels and the 
 disaffected lords, he proceeded summarily to act upon this suspi- 
 cion. Lord Henry Mandeville, and the Earl of Desmond were ar- 
 rested ; the latter being brought from Limerick to Dublin and im- 
 prisoned in the castle. Several other arrests took place, in some 
 instances, it would appear not without just grounds ; as the Lord 
 William Bermingham was, notwithstanding his splendid military 
 career, executed at Dublin. 
 
 In June, 1333, William De Burgh, third Earl of Ulster, was 
 treacherously murdered near Carrickfergus by his own servants, 
 an event, which from his youth and exalted station, excited a strong 
 and general sensation throughout the country. One feature of 
 savage life that marked this murder was the great number of per- 
 sons engaged in it. The Lord Justice found that the country peo- 
 ple had anticipated his purpose of punishing the delinquents, by 
 killing three hundred of the murderers and their abettors in one 
 day. For a long time after, the following clause used to be inserted 
 
50 
 
 DEGENERATE ENGLISHMEN. 
 
 in all pardons : “With the exception of the death of the late Earl 
 of Ulster.” The young lord, who was thus cut off in his twenty- 
 first year, left an only child, a daughter, the heiress of his great 
 possessions, who was married, in the year 1352, to Lionel, third son 
 of King Edward III. This Prince was created, in her right, Earl 
 of Ulster, and also Lord of Connaught, and after him, these titles 
 and possessions were enjoyed, through marriage or descent, by dif- 
 ferent Princes of the royal blood, until at length, in the person of 
 Edward IV., they became the special inheritance and revenue of 
 the English crown. 
 
 Immediately on the death of the Earl of Ulster, the Chiefs of the 
 junior branches of the family of the De Burghs, residing in Con- 
 naught, fearing the transfer of his large possessions into strange 
 hands by the marriage of the heiress, seized upon his estates, and 
 the two most powerful of the family, Sir William and Sir Edmond, 
 progenitors of the Earls of Clanricade and Mayo, having confeder- 
 ated together, and declared themselves independent, took possession 
 of the entire country ; the town of Galway, together with the coun- 
 try as far as the Shannon, falling to the lot of Sir William, who 
 took the title of Mac William Eighter, and Sir Edmond that of Mac- 
 William Oughter. To enlist the sympathy of the natives on their 
 side, they renounced the English dress, language, and names. The 
 example set by these “ degenerate English,” as they were styled, 
 .from this period was extensively followed throughout the kingdom ; 
 and the frequent occurrence of the words “ English rebels,” in the 
 legaj records of the times, shows that disaffection to the crown was 
 no longer confined to mere “ Irish enemies.” 
 
 In the spring of this year, the Earl of Desmond, after being impris- 
 oned for eighteen months, was released ; and in a Parliament held 
 soon after, almost all the chief noblemen of the land engaged them- 
 selves and their estates as security for his future fealty. In 1336 
 the Earl was summoned to attend the King in his expedition into 
 Scotland. 
 
 The Countess of Ulster, after the murder of the Earl, her husband, 
 fled to England, with her infant daughter, for safety. No returns 
 from her Irish possessions having been received by her, the Govern- 
 ment took all her castles, lands, and tenements there, into their own 
 hands, and assigned, for her dowry, estates of equal value in Eng- 
 land. 
 
THE KING RESOLVES ON RIGOROUS MEASURES. 
 
 51 
 
 In the year 1339, the Irish were again up in arms throughout 
 the whole kingdom. The Earl of Desmond defeated the insurgents 
 of Kerry, slaying twelve hundred of their force. The Earl of Kil- 
 dare attacked those of Leinster, pursuing the O’Dempsys* so closely 
 that many of them were drowned in the river Barrow. 
 
 The King- of England and his advisers now resolved on a course 
 of rigorous measures towards Ireland. The object of this policy to 
 be enforced, was not merely to reduce, but, if possible, break up and 
 disperse that enormous mass of wealth and power which had been 
 accumulated, in the course of nearly two centuries, by the descend- 
 ants of the first English conquerors of Ireland ; and the earliest in- 
 timation given of such a design, had been during the administra- 
 tion of Sir Anthony Lucy, in the Articles of Reform transmitted to 
 that Governor. In this instrument he had threatened that, if the 
 great landholders were not more attentive to their duties, he would 
 be compelled to take their lands and possessions into his own hands. 
 There was no attempt made, probably, at that time, to carry this 
 threat into execution. 
 
 On the arrival, however, of Sir John Darcy, who had been ap- 
 pointed Lord Justice, in 1341, it appeared that still more sweeping 
 and arbitrary measures were about to be enforced against the old 
 English ; and among the first was a general resumption of all the 
 lands, liberties, seignories, and jurisdictions, that had been granted, 
 in Ireland, not by Edward III. himself only, but by his father. In 
 all cases, likewise, whether in his time, or that of his predecessors, 
 where debts due to the crown had been either remitted or suspended, 
 it was now declared that all such indulgences were revoked, and 
 that these debts must be strictly levied, without any delay. This 
 rigorous measure the King endeavored to excuse, by alleging the 
 necessity he found himself under of providing tor the expenses of 
 the war just then renewed with France. 
 
 An ordinance issued by the King, the following year, addressed 
 to Sir John Darcy, his Justiciary, declared that, whereas it had 
 appeared to him and his Council that they would be better and more 
 usefully served in Ireland by English officers, having revenues and 
 possessions in England, than by Irish or English, married and pos- 
 
 * The O Dempsys were one of the Septs inhabiting the ancient territory of Hyfalgia, 
 comprising part of the counties of Kildare, King’s and Queen’s. Among the other Septs 
 composing this Union, were the O’Malones, O’Dalys, O’Mulloys, MacLoghlins, etc. 
 
52 
 
 CONVENTION OF BARONS. 
 
 sessing estates only in Ireland, he therefore ordered that his Justici-* 
 ary, after diligent inquiries, should remove all such officers as were 
 married and held estates in Ireland, and replace them by fit Eng- 
 lishmen, having lands, tenements, and benefices in England. 
 
 This open announcement of the royal purpose to exclude, in fu- 
 ture, from all share in the government, the Anglo-Irish, — the de- 
 scendants of those who had conquered the realm, as well as of those 
 who had ever since struggled to retain it, and to establish a purely 
 English dominion, — produced, as might have been expected, a burst 
 of indignant feeling throughout the whole of the Anglo-Irish popu- 
 lation. The jealousy long felt by the crown towards the Barons, 
 whom its own reckless favors had nursed into such portentous 
 strength, had been shown before ; but it was not until now that this 
 feeling had found vent for itself in the law ; or that the distinction 
 between the two races, the English by blood, and the English by 
 birth, was resorted to as a reason or pretext for the sacrifice of the 
 old colonists to the new. It was now too late, however, to think of 
 dislodging an evil so long and so firmly entrenched ; and the only 
 effect of the unwise aggression was, to render the party attacked 
 more sensible of their own power. 
 
 To allay the excitement caused by this measure, a Parliament 
 was summoned by the Lord Justice, to meet at Dublin in October, 
 1342 ; but the Earl of Desmond and the lords of his party, refused 
 to attend it; and, confederating with other great nobles, as well as 
 some cities and corporations, they appointed, of themselves, without 
 any reference to the head of the government, a General Assembly, 
 to meet in November, at Kilkenny. This Convention , at which 
 were present neither the Lord Justice nor any other of the King’s 
 officers, made itself memorable, not only by the peculiar circum- 
 stances under which it met, but also by a long and spirited petition 
 to the King, which, though not expressly pretending to parliament- 
 ary authority, purports to be the act of the Prelates, Earls, Barons, 
 and Commoners of Ireland. 
 
 The petition, which is in old Norman French, begins by com- 
 plaining that, in consequence of mal-administration and the un- 
 guarded state in which the country has been left, more than a third 
 part of the lands conquered by the King’s progenitors had been taken 
 possession of by his Irish enemies ; in consequence of which, his 
 liege English subjects had become so impoverished as to be even in 
 
THEIR PETITION TO THE KING. 
 
 53 
 
 want of the means of subsistence. * The great castles and fortresses 
 which, while held by the crown, formed the safeguards of the land, 
 were now in the possession ot the Irish natives ; chiefly, as the 
 petitioners allege, through the misconduct of the King’s treasurers. 
 
 After a number of other charges against the officers of the royal 
 exchequer, accusing them of fraud and overreaching, and praying 
 the King to apply a remedy, they proceed to notice the grasping 
 covetousness of his ministers, in holding each a number of lucra- 
 tive posts; and entreat that, in future, none should be allowed to 
 hold more than one office. But the late order of the King for the 
 resumption of all grants made in Ireland by himself and his royal 
 progenitors, was naturally the grievance on which their resentments 
 and recollections were most alive. Recalling to his mind the gal- 
 lant devotion of his liege English of Ireland, who, at their own cost, 
 had joined the royal banner in the wars of England with other pow- 
 ers, they contrasted this devotion with the conduct of the English 
 sent over to rule them, and who, ignorant of the country, came but 
 to enrich themselves at the expense of a people whom they misgov- 
 erned. The late royal mandate, revoking former gifts and grants, 
 they calmly, but firmly pronounce to be unjust and contrary to rea- 
 son ; as neither by their ancestors nor by themselves, had their claims 
 to the favors of the crown been ever forfeited : and they therefore 
 pray of the King that, according to the provisions of the Great Char- 
 ter, they may not be ousted of their freehold, without judgment. 
 
 Of the nature of the answer returned by King Edward to this 
 earnest remonstrance, (which enumerates many other grievances 
 and abuses, to which they pray the King to apply just and proper 
 remedies,) we are left in ignorance ; the only notice of it that appears 
 to be extant being found in a writ addressed by him to the remon- 
 strants ; wherein, acknowledging, in most gracious terms, the re- 
 ceipt of their petition, he acquaints them that his answer to its seve- 
 ral prayers had been sent, under the great seal, to John March, the 
 Chancellor, and Thomas De Wogan. He concludes this writ by 
 informing them of his intention to pass into France, with a large 
 force, and asking their aid towards his expedition. The foreign 
 
 * During the reign of Edward II., and in the first years of that of Edward III., the Irish 
 had succeeded, in some instances, in regaining possession of their ancient territories ; and 
 the greater part of the lands of Leinster had been, for some time, in the hands of Mac- 
 Morrough and O’Moore, the descendants of the original Princes of that province. 
 
 8 
 
54 
 
 RIGOROUS MEASURES AGAINST THE BARONS. 
 
 wars engaged in by Edward, withdrew his attention from his domes- 
 tic concerns, and prevented him from applying any remedy to the 
 evils which he saw, and vainly lamented. 
 
 In the year 1343, Sir Ralph Ufford, who had married the Count- 
 ess dowager of Ulster, was appointed Lord Justice ; and, by his 
 harsh and rigorous measures, made himself so odious throughout 
 the country, that the long course of tempestuous weather which 
 happened to prevail during his administration, was, by the super- 
 stition of the people, laid to his charge. The first act of his govern- 
 ment was to put down the aspiring pretensions of Desmond, who, 
 assuming his former attitude of defiance, had refused to attend a 
 Parliament summoned by Ufford, at Dublin, in 1345, and appointed 
 an assembly of his own friends and confederates, at the town of 
 Callan. But the new Governor defeated this bold design. The 
 other lords of Desmond’s party, on being prohibited by the King’s 
 writ, declined their leader’s summons ; while, at the same time, the 
 Lord Justice, marching a force into Munster, seized on that Earl’s 
 lands, and fanned them out at a rent payable yearly to the King. 
 Getting possession, also, by stratagem, of castles held by three 
 Knights, Sir Eustace Poer, Sir William Grant, and Sir John Cot- 
 trel, he hanged them, — it being charged against them that they had 
 practised the grievous exaction of coigne and livery; (by which 
 was meant food and entertainment for the soldiers, and forage for 
 the horses.) 
 
 In consequence of these strong measures, Desmond surrendered 
 himself to the Lord Justice, and was bailed on the recognizance of 
 the Earls of Ulster and Ormond, and twenty-four knights. But as 
 (through fear, it is supposed of the Lord Justice,) he failed to ap- 
 pear, according to the condition of the recognizance, his sureties 
 were left to answer for his unworthy default, whereby eighteen of 
 the knights lost their estates. Desmond, was the following year, 
 by the interposition of Sir Walter Bermingham, then Lord Justice, 
 permitted to proceed to lay his complaints before the King, by whom 
 he was graciously received, and in presenting his claims for redress 
 of the wrongs inflicted upon him by Ufford, was allowed twenty 
 shillings per day for his expenses. All the estates too of those who 
 had become bound for him, while in prison, were by letters patent 
 restored to them. 
 
CHARACTERS OP LORD JUSTICES UFFORD AND ROKEEY. 55 
 
 While successful in curbing and humbling the proud Earl of 
 Desmond, Ufford was equally fortunate in his proceedings against 
 the other great leader of the Anglo-Irish, — the Earl of Kildare ; 
 though the means employed by him for this object present a train 
 of elaborate perfidy. Having succeeded in decoying the Earl to Dub- 
 lin, for the pretended purpose of consulting with the King’s council, 
 he caused him to be suddenly arrested and thrown into prison. 
 
 The administration of Sir Ralph Ufford was brought to a close 
 by his death, in 1346, — leaving behind, as we are told, one general 
 feeling of abhorrence for his memory. Nor had this odium been 
 compensated by wordly advantages, as he died in necessitous cir- 
 cumstances; and his lady, says the chronicler, who had been re- 
 ceived like an Empress and lived like a Queen, was obliged to steal 
 away through a postern gate of the castle, to avoid the curses of her 
 enemies and the clamor of her creditors. Such are the portraits 
 given in the Irish annals of these two unpopular personages ; but 
 with every appearance, however, of having been exaggerated and 
 over-coloured by party malice. Coming on a mission so odious 
 and formidable to the fierce oligarchs of the realm, and carrying his 
 measures with such a high hand, as even the King himself shrunk 
 from enforcing, it was, perhaps, fortunate for Ufford to be thus res- 
 cued, even by death from the storm of hatred and persecution that 
 would have assailed him on his retirement. 
 
 The whole period of Ufford’s government did not extend beyond 
 a year and nine months ; and after him there was a succession of no 
 fewer than three chief Governors in the short space of two months, 
 under one of whom, (Sir John Morris,) the Earl of Kildare, who 
 had been kept nearly a year in prison, was, on the recognizance of 
 twenty-four lords and gentlemen, released from confinement. He 
 afterwards went to France with attendants, to serve the King at the 
 seige of Calais, in 1347, where, for his gallant conduct, Edward 
 bestowed upon him the honor of knighthood. The Irish forces 
 generally were honorably distinguished in this French war. 
 
 An unusual period of tranquillity ensued for some years, during 
 which the office of Lord Justice was filled by five or six successive 
 persons, of one of whom, Sir Thomas Rokeby, a homely saying is 
 recorded, characteristic, it is said, of the simple and sound integrity 
 of the man. When reproached by some one for suffering, himself 
 to be served in wooden cups, he answered, “I had rather drink out 
 
56 
 
 LIONEL, DUKE OP CLARENCE 
 
 of wood, and pay gold and silver, than drink out of gold and make 
 wooden payment.” 
 
 The Earl of Desmond had so well succeeded in ingratiating him- 
 self with the King, that he was appointed Lord Justice of Ireland 
 for life, in 1355 ; which honor, however, he survived only about 
 five months. 
 
 In the time of his successor, Sir Thomas Rokeby, who resumed, 
 on the death of Desmond, the helm of the state, an important writ 
 was issued, ordering that for the future, the Parliament of Ireland 
 should take cognizance of errors in the King’s courts there, instead 
 of, as hitherto carrying the cases to England. This useful writ 
 was iollowed afterwards by a series of judicious ordinances for the 
 better government of the church and state of Ireland. It was dur- 
 ing Rokeby’s second administration, it is believed, that the crown 
 thought fit to restore all the estates and jurisdictions which it had 
 resumed. 
 
 During the administration of James, Earl of Ormond, (who was 
 grand son of King Edward I.,) the system of legal warfare against 
 Irish natives was further shown by the issue of a mandate ordering 
 that no mere Irishman” should be made a mayor, or bailiff, or other 
 officer of any town within the English dominion ; nor be received, 
 through any motives of consanguinity, affinity, or other causes, into 
 holy orders, nor be advanced to any ecclesiastical benefice or pro- 
 motion. A modification of this severe edict took place in the follow- 
 ing year. 
 
 The Earl of Ormond having been called for a short time to 
 England, the office of Lord Justice was meanwhile held by the 
 Earl of Kildare, with the usual salary of five hundred pounds per 
 annum , out of which he had to maintain nineteen horsemen, be- 
 sides himself. 
 
 In the year 1361, King Edward announced his intention to send 
 as deputy to Ireland, his son Lionel, Duke of Clarence. This young 
 Prince, who married the daughter, as we have seen, of the late Earl 
 of Ulster, had become, in her right, possessed of that Earldom, to- 
 gether with the Lordship of Connaught. To maintain the King’s 
 power in Ireland, Edward summoned all persons holding posses- 
 sions there, to appear before him and his Council, either personally 
 or by proxy, and concert measures for the preservation and defence 
 of that realm. Among the absentees required to contribute on this 
 
APPOINTED LORD DEPUTY OF IRELAND. 
 
 57 
 
 occasion, to the raising of a military force were Maria, Countess of 
 Norfolk ; Agnes, Countess of Pembroke ; Margery De Roos ; Anna 
 Le Despenser, and several other great ladies. 
 
 After all this show of preparation, the army which accompanied 
 Lionel to Ireland consisted only of fifteen hundred men. The 
 Earl of Ormond with other distinguished noblemen and knights 
 were also attached to the service of the Duke on this occasion ; and 
 the highest expectations were formed of the benefits that were to 
 follow from the new government. By one fatal error all these well 
 grounded hopes were disappointed. The youthful Duke was sur- 
 rounded by men of English birth, who encouraged his prejudices, 
 then so common among his countrymen, against the old English 
 settlers, and induced him to slight the lords of the Pale ; these 
 haughty nobles, of course, refused to give him the least assistance 
 in his military operations. Left to the guidance of his own inexpe- 
 rienced followers, Lionel marched against O'Brian of Thomond, 
 and from his ignorance of the country, he was soon involved in dif- 
 ficulties, resulting in the loss of many of his troops. Perceiving how 
 hopeless, therefore, was any endeavor to dispense with the aid of 
 the Anglo-Irish, he was reduced to the mortifying necessity of in- 
 viting and requiring them to join his standard. As they were too 
 deeply interested in his success to regard punctilio, they ranged 
 themselves under his banner, and by this union the Munster Chief- 
 tain’s force was totally dispersed. 
 
 Returning to Dublin, after this success, the Prince conferred the 
 honor of knighthood upon many of his followers, both of the new 
 and the old English race. After he had held, for nearly three years, 
 the office of Lord Lieutenant, the Duke returned to England, in 
 1364, without having gained any important advantages over the 
 natives, or enlarged the scanty boundaries of the English power. 
 
 In the course of the three following years, the Duke of Clarence 
 was twice again entrusted with the same office. It was during his 
 last administration, in 1367, that the memorable Parliament was 
 held at Kilkenny, in which the two estates, as we are told, sat to- 
 gether, and which passed the celebrated act, generally known by 
 the name of the Statute of Kilkenny. This remarkable ordinance, 
 though directed chiefly against those old English, or, more properly, 
 Anglo-Irish, who had adopted the laws and customs of the natives, 
 contains, also, in reference to the latter, some enactments full of that 
 
58 
 
 MEMORABLE STATUTE OF KILKENNY. 
 
 jealous and penal spirit which continued, for centuries after, to per- 
 vade and infect the whole course of English legislation respecting 
 Ireland. The following are the principal provisions of this statute : 
 That intermarriages with the natives, or any connection with them 
 in the way of fostering or gossipred, (compaternity,) should be con- 
 sidered and punished as high treason ; that any man, of English 
 race, assuming an Irish name, or using the Irish language, apparel, 
 or customs, should forfeit all his lands and tenements ; that to adopt 
 or submit to the Brehon law, was treason ; that, without the permis- 
 sion of the government, the English should not make war upon the 
 natives ; that the English should not permit the Irish to pasture or 
 graze upon their lands, nor admit them to any ecclesiastical bene- 
 fices or religious houses, nor entertain their minstrels, rhymers, or 
 news-tellers. There were, also, enactments against the oppressive 
 tax of coigne and livery ; against the improper use made of royal 
 franchises and liberties, in allowing them to be sanctuaries for male- 
 factors, and one or two other such manifest abuses. 
 
 Such arbitrary measures as these are, in general, for the time 7 
 efficacious, whatever reaction their insolent defiance of the laws of 
 nature and justice must ultimately provoke. Combined with the 
 presence of the royal governor, so calming an effect did this rigor- 
 ous statute produce, that, from thenceforth, the King’s writ ran in 
 Ulster and Connaught, and the revenues of both those provinces 
 were- regularly accounted for in the exchequer. 
 
 Throughout the remainder of this long reign, there occur few 
 events deserving of notice. After closing the session of his Parlia- 
 ment, the Duke of Clarence returned to England. During the gov- 
 ernment of one of his successors, the public tranquillity which 
 had for some time prevailed, was interrupted by insurrections in 
 Leinster, which, however, were soon suppressed. 
 
 A proof of the progress made by the Irish “ rebels,” as they were 
 styled, in recovering their patrimonial lands, is afforded in a writ 
 issued in 1373, by the King, in consequence of a petition addressed 
 to him by the English settlers, praying relief from the payment of 
 scutage “on all those lands of which the Irish enemy had despoiled 
 them.” 
 
 In the year 1376, a Parliament was called, by James, the second 
 Earl of Ormond, who was then Lord Justice, to provide for the exi- 
 gencies of the Government, but refused to grant the supplies. In 
 
IRISH DEPUTIES SENT TO ENGLAND. 59 
 
 this emergency, writs were issued to the Bishops and the Commons, 
 requiring them to choose representatives to be sent to the Parlia- 
 ment of England, there to consult and agree with the King and his 
 Council on the affairs of Ireland. The Bishops were directed to 
 send over two of the clergy from every diocess : the Commons were 
 ordered to send two Representatives from each county, and two> 
 Burgesses from each city and borough. In complying, reluctantly, 
 with this order of the crown, (which may be said to have formed a 
 precedent, in some degree, for the Union of 1S00,) the clergy, no- 
 bles, and commons, declare that, according to the rights, laws, and 
 customs of the land of Ireland, from the time of the conquest thereof, 
 they never have been bound to elect or send any persons out of the 
 said land to Parliaments or Councils, held in England, for any such 
 purposes as the writ requires. 
 
 The deputies went over and assembled at Westminster ; but, as 
 they had no authority to grant subsidies, and the King wanted mo- 
 ney, their debates were a mere idle form, and they soon separated. 
 
 Among the last notices, respecting Ireland, that occur in the re- 
 cords of this reign, a curious entry in the Issue Roll, for the year 
 1376, may, for its quiet significance, deserve to be noticed: Richard 
 Dere and William Stapolyn came over to England to inform the 
 King how very badly Ireland was governed. The King ordered 
 them to be paid ten pounds for their trouble. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 EVENTS IN IRELAND, DURING THE CIVIL WARS BETWEEN THE 
 
 HOUSES OF YORK AND LANCASTER— FROM 1377 TO 14S3 
 
 OR ONE HUNDRED AND SIN YEARS. 
 
 The limits of this work will compel us to pass rapidly over many 
 interesting periods in Irish history, touching only upon the most 
 prominent political events. The preceding chapters, which we 
 have occupied with circumstances attending the reigns of the first 
 English Kings of Ireland could hardly have been more briefly des- 
 
60 
 
 ACT AGAINST ABSENTEES, IN 1379. 
 
 patched, without doing injustice to the demands of the subject. It 
 was in fact in these very times, and more especially during the 
 reign of Edward 111., that the foundations were laid of that mon- 
 strous system of misgovernment in Ireland to which no parallel 
 exists in the history of the whole civilized world ; — its dark and 
 towering iniquity having projected its shadow so far forward as 
 even to the times immediately bordering upon our own. 
 
 Enough, however, has, I trust, been related of these few eventful 
 reigns to convey a clear notion of the spirit of the law and its ad- 
 ministration during that period, as well as of the condition of the 
 country, in consequence of that spirit ; and likewise to show that, as 
 great power may be administered without tyranny, so is it possible 
 for enormous tyranny to exist without any real power. 
 
 On the death of Edward III., in 1377, after a reign of fifty years, 
 the crown devolved, without question or contest, to his grand son, 
 Richard of Bordeaux, (Richard II.,) son and heir of the Black Prince ; 
 and the young King being then but in his eleventh year, a Council 
 of Regency was chosen, to act during his minority. 
 
 An act or ordinance against absenteeism was passed in the year 
 1379. By this measure — the first ever enacted on the subject, and 
 passed by the Parliament of England, in consequence of a petition 
 from Ireland, — it was ordained that all who possessed lands, rents, 
 or offices in that kingdom, should forthwith repair thither and be- 
 come residents, for the purpose of watching and defending them ; 
 or in case that they could allege any sufficient cause for their ab- 
 sence, they were then to send^ or find in that country responsible 
 persons to act as their deputies, and defend their possessions ; other- 
 wise two-thirds of their Irish revenues were to be contributed by 
 them towards that object. Some exceptions were made to this law 
 in favor of persons in the King’s service, of students in the Univer- 
 sities, and others specified. Another step, with a view to reforma- 
 tion, was the appointment of Sir Nicholas Dagworth to proceed to 
 Ireland, furnished with instructions and powers to survey the pos- 
 sessions of the crown, and call to account the officers of the Irish 
 revenue. About the same time leave was granted by the King, in 
 consequence of a petition to that effect, for free trade in wines and 
 other merchandise, between Ireland and Portugal. The King also 
 gave liberty to his Irish subjects to work mines, paying him a ninth, 
 and to coin money. 
 
NAVAL CONTEST ON THE IRISH COAST. 
 
 61 
 
 In 1380, Edmund Mortimer, Earl of March and Ulster, and son 
 of Lionel, Duke of Clarence, was sent to Ireland as Lord Lieuten- 
 ant; and on his death, in the second year of his government, the 
 Prelates, Magnates, and Commons of the realm were summoned to 
 meet at Cork, for the purpose of electing a successor to the vacant 
 office ; and the choice falling upon John Colton, then Chancellor of 
 Ireland, he was raised to the office of Lord Justice. He held the 
 office but a few weeks, Roger, son of the late Earl of March being 
 appointed, and as he was a minor, his uncle, Thomas Mortimer, 
 acted as Lord Deputy. 
 
 The Irish coasts were, about this time, infested by the gallies of 
 France and Spain, and the English navy was called out to oppose 
 them ; the hostile fleets met in the harbor of Kinsale, and the French 
 and Spaniards were defeated, with the loss of four hundred men 
 and a great number of barges, by a combined force of English and 
 Irish. 
 
 Richard II. now gave an extraordinary proof of his weakness and 
 folly, by creating his young favorite, Robert De Yere, Earl of Ox- 
 ford, Marquis of. Dublin, and by the same patent granting to him 
 the entire dominion of Ireland, to be held of the crown by liege 
 homage, excepting those lands and cities formerly reserved to the 
 crown, and those hereditary to the Nobles and Barons of Ireland; 
 for which the Earl was bound, as soon as he could complete the 
 conquest of Ireland, to pay into the English exchequer, five hun- 
 dred marks annually during his life. In every other particular he 
 had the entire government, with power to appoint all .officers of 
 state and justice. The English Parliament, doubtless with the 
 view of ridding themselves of the favorite’s presence, confirmed the 
 grant, and allotted the sum of thirty thousand marks for the intended 
 expedition to Ireland, besides a force of five hundred men at arms 
 and one thousand archers. 
 
 Accompanied by Richard himself, De Yere proceeded as far as 
 Wales on his way to Ireland, but when about to part from him, the 
 young King found his affection for his friend was too strong to bear 
 a separation, and abandoned the intention of sending him to lie- 
 land, appointing Sir John Stanley, Lord Deputy of the realm. He 
 was succeeded by the Earl of Ormond, and both of these officers 
 acted with vigor and success while in power, defeating the natives 
 in several insurrections. Notwithstanding these partial successes 
 9 
 
62 
 
 RICHARD II. VISITS IRELAND. 
 
 the country was still a prey to all the evils of war, and the subsidies 
 demanded from the English Parliament for the use of Ireland, pro- 
 duced continual remonstrances. 
 
 The Duke of Gloucester, the King’s uncle, a Prince who com- 
 bined in himself both the high rank to which the Irish were sup- 
 posed to be partial, and the vigor of character fitted for supreme 
 command, consented to accept the office of Lord Lieutenant ; but 
 while preparing to embark, in 1393, with an army, for the seat of 
 his government, a royal order reached him, countermanding his 
 departure, and acquainting him with the King’s intention to con- 
 duct an expedition into Ireland. 
 
 The next year, 1394, Richard landed at Waterford with four 
 thousand men at arms and thirty thousand archers, attended by 
 the Duke of Gloucester, the Earls of Nottingham and Rutland, 
 Lord Piercy and other distinguished personages. With such a 
 force to command submission, there was only wanting sufficient 
 wisdom to lay the foundation of social improvement, by extending 
 the protection of English law to the whole native population. Had 
 such a course of policy been adopted by Richard, .it is fair to con- 
 clude, from the petitions addressed to some of his predecessors, pray- 
 ing for the benefits of the English law, that a measure granting this 
 desired boon to the whole kingdom, would have been hailed with 
 joy and thankfulness by the great mass of the Irish people, and 
 
 might have abridged, by many centuries, the dominion of anarchy 
 in Ihat realm. 
 
 But such, unluckily, was not the policy which this young mon- 
 arch was far-sighted enough to adopt. A merely outward show of 
 submission and allegiance, such as had been proffered to his pro- 
 progenitors, Henry II. and John, was all that his superficial and 
 hasty ambition aimed at; and this the present race of Chieftains 
 were fully as ready to proffer and promise as their ancestors. On 
 the first alarm of his arrival, at the head of so numerous a force, the 
 natives had fled to their natural fastnesses. But all intention of 
 offering resistance was soon abandoned ; and, it being understood 
 that the submission of the Chieftains would be graciously received, 
 O’Neill and other Irish Lords of Ulster met the King at Drogheda, 
 and there did homage and swore fealty, with the usual solemnities. 
 Their example was followed by Chiefs in other parts of Ireland. 
 In return for this surrender to the English King, they were to be 
 
THE KING’S SECOND EXPEDITION. 
 
 63 
 
 taken into the pay of the crown, and receive pensions during their 
 lives, together with the inheritance of all such territories as they could 
 seize from the rebels in other parts of the realm. Upon some of 
 these descendants of Kings, Richard conferred the honor of knight- 
 hood, in the Cathedral of Dublin, and the ceremony was followed 
 by a great banquet, at which the Irish Chiefs attended in robes of 
 state, and sat with King Richard at his table. 
 
 In the midst of all this parade Richard forgot not the higher du- 
 ties of his station, but commenced a system of reform which showed 
 that he was fairly disposed, had the state of his English dominions 
 allowed him leisure, to correct and remove the true causes of Ire- 
 land’s misrule. 
 
 But these wise and useful projects were suddenly interrupted by 
 the necessity of his speedy return to England, to which he was 
 urged by his Council, on account of the difficulties there. He, 
 therefore, returned in the summer of 1395, after a residence of nine 
 months, leaving his young kinsman, Roger Mortimer, Earl of March, 
 with ample powers to act as his Lieutenant. 
 
 It soon became manifest that the Irish Chieftains were insincere 
 in their late submission ; for scarcely had the King sailed, with his 
 forces, from the shore, when fierce incursions were made into the 
 borders of the Pale. The natives, however, were repulsed, with 
 great slaughter, by the English Lords, who supplied by valor what 
 they wanted in numbers. Soon after this, the young Yiceroy, the 
 Earl of March, while engaged in a conflict with the sept of the 
 O’Byrnes, was slain. 
 
 The King, determined to avenge his death, made preparations 
 for a second expedition to Ireland, and landed at Waterford, in 
 1399. At the head of his army, he immediately marched against 
 MacMorrough, the principal Irish Chieftain, who hastily retreated 
 to his woods, on the approach of the English, and completely foiled 
 their attempts. Richard, after receiving the submissions of some 
 other Chiefs, was forced to retreat. MacMorrough thought this 
 was a favorable opportunity for making terms, and proposed a con- 
 ference, in which he was met by the Earl of Gloucester, on the part 
 of the King. MacMorrough, refusing to be bound by any condi- 
 tions, though he offered to submit, the conference was broken off. 
 The English monarch returned to Dublin with his army, and vowed 
 never to depart out of Ireland until he had MacMorrough, living or 
 
64 
 
 ACCESSION OF HENRY IV. 
 
 dead, in his hands. He proclaimed, also, that whoever would de- 
 liver him into his power, dead or alive, should receive one hundred 
 
 marks of gold. 
 
 But the unfortunate monarch’s own doom was fast approaching. 
 After a stay of six weeks in Dublin, he received intelligence that 
 Henry of Bolingbroke, Duke of Lancaster, had landed in England, 
 and that many of the most powerful of the English Barons, with a 
 large portion of the people, were supporting his usurpation and pre- 
 tensions to the throne. When Richard arrived in England, he 
 soon found that the last feeble chance of preserving either his throne 
 or life had vanished. No acts of the Irish Parliament, during his 
 reign, are to be found in the Statute Book. 
 
 By Henry’s election, in 1399, to the throne of England — for such 
 was virtually the title of Henry IV. to the crown, — the seeds were 
 sown of those long and sanguinary wars between the two rivals of 
 York and Lancaster, of which the whole history is as confused and 
 uncertain as the known results were bloody, treacherous, and dis- 
 graceful. One salutafy consequence, however, of these contests 
 was the gradual extension of the powers of Parliament, and those 
 wholesome restraints upon the royal authority, which the Com- 
 mons were enabled to urge and impose. It was, unfortunately, 
 only in the evils of such a struggle that the usual destinies of Ire- 
 land allowed her to have any share. 
 
 On the accession of Henry, the Scots had declared war against him, 
 and now made several descents on the Irish coasts. The arrival 
 of the young Duke of Lancaster, as Lord Lieutenant, accompanied 
 by a strong force, promised some tranquillity. Several wholesome 
 regulations were made ; many Chieftains renewed their submissions ; 
 and a Parliament was convened to devise means for repelling the 
 Scottish invaders. The County of Dublin granted a subsidy ; troops 
 were collected, and the war carried to the coasts of Scotland. The 
 Duke of Lancaster returned to England in 1409, leaving his bro- 
 ther, Thomas Butler, the Prior of Kilmainham, his deputy. In the 
 following year, a Parliament was held, at Dublin, which made it 
 treason to exact coigne and livery. 
 
 No other event, deserving of particular notice, occurred in this 
 reign, which was brought to a close by Henry’s death, at Westmin- 
 ster, in 1413. 
 
IRISH EXCLUDED FROM CHURCH OFFICES. 
 
 65 
 
 The power of the Irish was now sufficient to compel the English 
 to pay an annual stipend, afterwards called “Black Rent,” to pur- 
 chase the protection of the native Chieftains. 
 
 Barren as are the materials of Irish history, during the time of 
 Henry IV., they are even more trivial and void of interest in 
 the reign of his successor, Henry V., who, although he had been 
 invested with the honor of Knighthood, in Ireland, having there 
 made his first essay in arms, under his cousin, Richard II., does not 
 appear to have afterwards turned his attention to the affairs of that 
 kingdom. 
 
 A succession of conflicts took place between the English and the 
 natives, attended with the usual vicissitudes of their warfare on both 
 sides. 
 
 In 1417, the King’s subjects in Ireland petitioned the English 
 Parliament that, as Ireland was divided into two nations, the Eng- 
 lish and the Irish, the latter of whom were the King’s enemies, in 
 future, no Irishman should be presented lo any ecclesiastical office 
 or benefice ; and that no native bishops should bring with them to 
 Parliaments or Councils, any Irish servant. This petition received 
 from the English Parliament a ready assent. 
 
 A small body of native Irish troops, summoned by the King to 
 join him in Normandy, on his second invasion of France, achieved 
 feats of valor, for which they received high commendations. 
 
 Henry V. died in 1422, at the age of thirty-four ; and, in the tenth 
 year of his reign, leaving his son, then an infant, [Henry VI.,] his 
 successor to the throne. The British Parliament appointed the 
 Dukes of Bedford and Gloucester, protectors, assisted by a Council 
 to manage the affairs of the kingdoms of England and France. 
 
 In turning, wearily, over the records of these rude times, the eye 
 is occasionally refreshed by glimpses of a somewhat more civilized 
 state of existence, in those grants of leave of absence accorded to 
 particular individuals, to enable them to visit, for the purposes of 
 study, the schools of Oxford and Cambridge. Others proceeded, 
 with the view of learning the legal profession, to London ; and here 
 the distaste avowed so insultingly by the English towards all con- 
 nected with Ireland, — a feeling extended to those of their own race 
 born in that country, — was most strongly and illiberally displayed. 
 
66 
 
 ENGLISH LAWS AGAINST IRISHMEN. 
 
 By a stretch of tyranny, unknown under former reigns, the Anglo- 
 Irish law students were now excluded from the Inns of Court. 
 
 The old offence, indeed, of absenteeism had begun to be regarded 
 in somewhat a new point of view; for, whereas, formerly, those 
 offending in this respect were blamed merely for their absence from 
 Ireland, the offence now most strongly protested against, was their 
 presence in England. In some enactments on the subject, during 
 the reign of Henry V., the effects of the practice are viewed in both 
 these lights. Thus, in the year 1413, it was enacted by the King 
 and Parliament, that, “for the peace and quietness of England, and 
 the increase and prosperity of Ireland, all Irishmen, Irish clerks, 
 beggars, &.c., should be removed, out of England, before All Saints 
 following ; with the exception of graduates in schools, sergeants, 
 and apprentices at law, &c.” After a few more exceptions, it is 
 added, further, that all Irishmen holding offices or benefices in Ire- 
 land, shall dwell there, for the defence of the land. 
 
 We have already had occasion to remark, as one of the anomalies 
 that mark the destiny of this nation, how small is the portion of 
 Ireland’s history that relates to the affairs of the Irish people them- 
 selves. Supplanted, as the indigenous Irish were, on their own soil, 
 by strangers, the task of dictating as well their history as their laws 
 fell early into foreign hands. In the course of time, however, a new 
 race and new relationships sprang up, from the connexions by mar- 
 riao-e and otherwise, of the English colonists and the natives, which 
 worked a change, even more in the political than in the social con- 
 dition of the country. The conquerors, yielding to these natural 
 ties, were, in their turn, conquered by the force of the national spi- 
 rit, and became, as was said in later times, even more Irish than the 
 Irish themselves. Even English gentlewomen had begun to receive, 
 without any repugnance, the tender addresses of the “ Irish enemy 
 and it appears that the fierce and formidable Chief, Art MacMor- 
 rough, in the reign of Henry IV., could boast of an English heiress 
 for his consort. 
 
 Brought up, in general, by Irish nurses, and consorting, from 
 early childhood, with their foster-brethren, it was not to be expected 
 that the sons of the middle class of the English should remain un- 
 influenced by examples so constantly acting upon them ; and the 
 force of which, through every succeeding generation, must have in- 
 creased. Such were, in fact, the effects that naturally began to 
 
ROMANTIC MARRIAGE OF THE EARL OF DESMOND. 67 
 
 unfold themselves among the descendants of the English lords. At 
 the period we have now reached, this proud and high-spirited race, 
 owing to the distraction of the attention of the English government 
 to other objects, had attained an extent of ascendancy no less preju- 
 dicial to the dignity and interests of the crown, than it was oppres- 
 sive to the people subjected to their dominion. 
 
 Of these great lords, the Earl of Ormond, who held the office of 
 Lord Lieutenant at the time of the accession of Henry YI., was one 
 of the most active and powerful ; and a factious feud between him 
 and the Talbots, kept alive, as it was, and diffused by a multitude 
 of adherents on both sides, continued to disturb the public Councils 
 through a great part of this reign. Soon after Henry’s accession, 
 the office of Lord Lieutenant was resigned by Ormond to Edward 
 Mortimer, Earl of March and Ulster. This Prince of the royal 
 blood, from whose administration much expectation might have 
 been formed that it would have proved popular and efficient, arrived 
 in Ireland 1423, but died of the plague, the following year, in his 
 own castle at Trim. Elis successor was the illustrious Lord Talbot, 
 who afterwards won for himself, in the French wars, the title of 
 the English Achilles. 
 
 Among those powerful Anglo-Irish lords who, by their own ex- 
 tortion, and the large grants of lands and liberties so recklessly 
 lavished upon them by the crown, had been raised into so many in- 
 dependent Counts Palatine, the Earl of Desmond held, at this time., 
 the most prominent station. This Lord was uncle and successor to 
 Thomas, the sixth Earl of Desmond, whose romantic marriage and 
 subsequent fate show how high, in those times, were the notions 
 entertained of noble birth. Returning, late one evening, from hunt- 
 ing, the young lord, finding himself benighted, sought shelter under 
 the roof of one of his tenants, near Abbeyfeal ; and seeing, for 
 the first time, his host’s daughter, the beautiful Catharine MacCor- 
 mac, became so enamoured of her charms, that lie soon after mar- 
 ried her. So dishonoring to the high blood of the Desmonds was 
 this alliance considered, that it drew down upon him the anger and 
 enmity of all his family. Friends, followers, and tenants at once 
 abandoned him, and even assisted his uncle, James, according to 
 the old Irish custom, to expel him from his estates, and force him 
 to surrender the Earldom. Thus persecuted, the unhappy young 
 Lord retired to Rouen, in Normandy, where he died, in the year 
 
68 
 
 LAWS AGAINST IRISH EMIGRATION. 
 
 1420. and was buried in a Convent of Friars preachers, at Paris, — 
 the King of England, (Henry V., who was then in France,) it is 
 added, attending his funeral. 
 
 In addition to his other princely possessions, James, Earl of Des- 
 mond, received, in 1439, a grant, from Robert Fitz Geoffry Cogan, 
 of all his lands in Ireland, — being no less than half of what was 
 then called the Kingdom of Cork. 
 
 Yvbile thus this lord and a few other Anglo-Irish nobles were 
 extending enormously their power and wealth, the King’s govern- 
 ment was fast declining, as well in revenue as in influence and 
 strength. In 1442, Sir Thomas Stanley, when Lord Lieutenant, 
 brought to England a most wretched account of the state of affairs 
 from the Privy Council, wherein, intreating the King himself would 
 come to Ireland, they added that his presence would be a sovereign 
 comfort to his people, and the surest remedy for all the evils of 
 which they complained. 
 
 The influx of the Irish into England continued, in both coun- 
 tries, to be a constant subject of complaint and legislation ; and, in 
 consequence of a petition to the King, presented by the English 
 House of Commons, representing the manifold crimes, of every de- 
 scription, committed by the Irish in England ; it was enacted, that 
 all persons born in Ireland should quit England within a time lim- 
 ited ; exceptions being made in favor of beneficed clergymen, grad- 
 uates in either University, who held lands in England, were mar- 
 ried there, or had English parents ; and even these to give security 
 for their future good behavior. In the year 1438, likewise, while a 
 second law was passed in England, obliging Irishmen to return 
 home, there was a statute made in Ireland, to prevent the passage 
 of any more of them into England. 
 
 As a sample of the legislation of this period, it is mentioned, that 
 in the Anglo-Irish Parliament, held at Trim, in 1447, it was enacted 
 that “any man who does not keep his upper lip shaved, may be 
 treated as an Irish enemy.” (This act remained unrepealed till 
 the second year of the reign of Charles I., or nearly two hundred 
 years after this time.) Another act of the same Parliament was, 
 that “if an Irishman, who is denizened, kill or rob, he may be used 
 as an Irish enemy, and be slain on the spot.” Another enacted, that 
 no person should use gold trappings, horse furniture, or gilded har- 
 ness, except Knights or Prelates. 
 
DUKE OF YORK APPOINTED LORD LIEUTENANT. 
 
 69 
 
 The practice of conferring the Lieutenancy of Ireland on some 
 personage of royal blood, though hitherto attended with but little 
 advantage, appears to have been still a favorite experiment ; and 
 the Duke of York, the lineal heir to the crown of England, though 
 as yet his claim had remained latent, was the personage selected 
 for that office. This Prince was nephew to the late Earl of March, 
 who died in Ireland, as we have mentioned, at the commencement 
 of this reign, and from whom he inherited the united estates of 
 Clarence and Ulster, together with the patrimonial possessions of 
 the family of March. Besides being Earl of Ulster and Cork, he was 
 Lord of Connaught, Clare, Trim, and Meath, — thus including in 
 his inheritance, at least a third part of the kingdom. He, however, 
 reluctantly left what was then considered the honorable field of 
 enterprise in France, to accept the office of Viceroy of Ireland, hav- 
 ing been removed from hiscomm and in France, to make way for 
 the Duke of Somerset. 
 
 The Duke of York resolved to secure for himself such a hold on 
 the warm affections of the Irish, as might enable him to render 
 them subservient to the advancement of his further purposes. He 
 also refused to accept the office on any but high and advantageous 
 terms, which were reduced to writing by indenture between the 
 King and himself, and besides extending his term to ten years, and 
 allowing him in addition to the revenue ot the crown of Ireland, 
 supplies of treasure also from England, agreed that he might lease 
 the King’s lands, might place and displace all officers as he chose, 
 might levy and wage what number of soldiers he thought fit, and 
 appoint a deputy, and return to England at his pleasure. 
 
 His arrival in Ireland, in 1449, was attended with circumstances 
 of splendor and magnificence, and followed by favorable conse- 
 quences. He entertained every party with equal kindness, a con- 
 scientious sense of duty appearing to pervade the whole of this 
 amiable Prince’s conduct; and the firm but fair spirit in which he 
 dealt with the natives, treating them as enemies only while they 
 resisted, and repressing without also insulting and trampling upon 
 them, afforded an example worthy of imitation by all succeeding 
 governors. Equally politic was the Viceroy’s conduct towards 
 those Anglo-Irish lords, on the skilful management of whom de- 
 pended mainly the peace and well being of the kingdom. He 
 chose the Earls of Ormond and Desmond to be sponsors to his son, 
 10 
 
70 
 
 AFFAIRS IN ENGLAND. — CADES REBELLION. 
 
 born in Dublin, (George, afterwards Duke of Clarence, known for 
 his short, stormy life and singular death ;) thus connecting himself 
 with those two powerful lords by the tie, so sacred among the Irish, 
 of gossipred , and thereby furnishing them with an additional mo- 
 tive for zeal and fidelity in his service. 
 
 But the aspect of affairs in England had now begun to foretoken 
 events, in the ultimate issue of which the future fortunes of the 
 House of York were most deeply involved. The formidable in- 
 surrection that had just broken out, in 1450, headed by an Irish- 
 man named John Cade (familarly known as the celebrated Jack 
 Cade,) proposed for its object, as some of the conspirators confessed 
 on the scaffold, to place Richard, Duke of York, on the throne of 
 England ; and by the court it was even imagined that this Prince 
 had secretly encouraged Cade’s rebellion, in order to sound the 
 feelings of the people, and learn how far they were likely to sup- 
 port him in his pretensions to the crown. Apprised speedily of this 
 state of affairs by some of those friends he had left to watch over 
 his interests, and who were now of opinion that he ought to appear 
 on the scene in person, the Duke, without waiting to ask permis- 
 sion, left his government in the hands of the Earl of Ormond, and 
 landing in England, proceeded, to the great terror of the court, to- 
 wards London, having collected on his way a retinue of about four 
 thousand men. He became, at this time, apparently reconciled to 
 the King. 
 
 The important affairs in which this Prince was subseqently con- 
 cerned fall mostly within the province of English history. But as 
 he remained to the last connected with Ireland, and still carried 
 with him the good wishes and sympathy of her people, a few of 
 the more important stages of his course may not irrelevantly be 
 noticed. At the battle of St. Albans, in 1455, the first of that series 
 of sanguinary conflicts which for thirty years after convulsed 
 England, the fortune of the day declared for York, and the King 
 himself fell into his hands. Appointed twice Protector of the realm, 
 he does not appear to have availed himself of those opportunities of 
 increasing and strengthening his own power. 
 
 The dispersion of the Yorkists after their defeat at Blore Heath, 
 rendered their cause hopeless for a time, and the Duke fled through 
 Wales, with his youngest son, to Ireland, where he was received 
 with all that enthusiasm which his cause and character had ex- 
 
IRELAND ADHERES TO THE HOUSE OF YORK. 
 
 71 
 
 cited, not only among the people of the Pale, but even in the hearts 
 of the natives themselves. 
 
 In the course of the eight years during which he had been absent 
 from that country, a succession of deputies had been appointed by 
 him. By most of the governors, Parliaments were held, of which 
 the enactments are on record ; but confined as was now the sphere 
 of the government of the Pale, the acts, except when illustrative 
 of the general state of the country, are little worthy of historical 
 notice. 
 
 The Duke of York was protected by the Irish Parliament, while 
 the English Parliament was passing an act of attainder against him, 
 his Duchess, and their two sons. The former enacted a law de- 
 claring that it had ever been the custom to entertain strangers with 
 all hospitality, and that it should be deemed high treason for any 
 authority to disturb persons so supported. It was also enacted, by 
 the same, that Ireland was to be governed only by laws passed by 
 its own Parliament — that no person should be bound to answer 
 any appeal or other matter out of Ireland. 
 
 The cause of the White Rose was now manifestly on the eve of 
 triumph, having rallied around its banner, not merely the partizans 
 of the House of York, but the great bulk of the English nation. 
 The decisive battle of Northampton, in 1460, in which the Lan- 
 caster royalists were defeated, and King Henry YI. made prisoner, 
 recalled the Duke of York from Ireland. Hastening to London, 
 where he made his entry with trumpets sounding, an armed retinue, 
 and a drawn sword borne before him, he presented himself to the 
 House of Peers, and for the first time advanced publicly his claim 
 to the crown. As he was descended from Philippa, only daughter 
 of the Duke of Clarence, second son of Edward III., he stood in 
 the order of succession before the King ; who was of the lineage of 
 the Duke of Lancaster, third son of Edward III. 
 
 The Peers pronounced the title of the Duke of York to be certain 
 and indefeasible, but they proposed, and he agreed to the proposal, 
 that Henry should retain the crown during his life, and that York 
 and his heirs should succeed after Henry’s death. The path to the 
 throne now seemed to lie open to him, if not already at his feet, 
 when a desperate effort on the part of Henry’s Q,ueen, (Margaret of 
 Anjou,) to retrieve the fortunes of her husband, led to a battle near 
 Wakefield, in which the Duke was slain. He had under him about 
 
72 
 
 ACCESSION OF EDWARD IV. 
 
 five thousand men, a force about one-fourth only of the numbers 
 said to have been on the opposite side. Near three thousand of the 
 troops of the Duke, among whom were many Irishmen, who had 
 attended him to England, fell in this hard fought battle. 
 
 Had this excellent Prince, who was killed in the fiftieth year of 
 his age, (in 1460,) lived to ascend the throne, the knowledge ac- 
 quired by him of the state of Ireland, and the general respect enter- 
 tained for his character among the people, might have enabled him 
 to spread the blessings of equal laws and good government among 
 the natives. As it was, so formidable had the inroads of the Irish 
 borderers become, that, instead of being aggressors, the proud colo- 
 nists of the Pale had been reduced to the necessity of standing on 
 the defensive, and one of the many public services rendered by the 
 Duke, during his lieutenancy, was the erection of castles on the 
 borders of Louth, Meath and Kildare, to check the incursions of 
 the natives. 
 
 So small was the portion of the inhabitants of Ireland by whom 
 the authority of English law was now acknowledged, that from the 
 four small shires alone which constituted the tenantry of “the 
 Pale” were all the Lords, Knights and Burgesses that composed its 
 Parliament summoned ; and in no other part of the kingdom did 
 the King’s writ run. These four shires, or counties, were Dublin, 
 Louth, Kildare, and Meath, — the latter including West Meath. The 
 Pale originally extended from the town of Wicklow, in the south, 
 to the point of Dunluce in the north of Ireland; — thus making 
 Louth, (as it was not unfrequently styled,) the “the heart” of the 
 Pale. 
 
 Numbers of the lords and gentry of the Pale having accompanied 
 the Duke of York to England, (many of whom fell in battle,) the 
 natives availing themselves of the absence of these great landed 
 lords, took forcible possession of several estates, which were never 
 after recovered from them. The colonists of the districts bordering 
 upon the Irish were forced to purchase a precarious exemption from 
 their inroads, by annual pensions to their Chiefs. 
 
 Such was the miserable state of weakness, disorganization, and 
 turbulence in udiich Edward IV., (son of the late Duke of York,) 
 found his kingdom of Ireland, on his accession to the throne. The 
 Earl of Kildare was chosen, by the Irish Privy Council, to admin- 
 ister the government until a new Lord Deputy was appointed. He 
 
LAWS AGAINST THE IRISH. 
 
 73 
 
 preserved the country tranquil during the brief struggle between 
 Henry VI. and Edward IV., which terminated in favor ofthe latter, (of 
 the house of York.) One of Edward’s first acts was to appoint his 
 brother, the Duke of Clarence, to the government of Ireland ; and 
 to reward the fidelity of his adherents in that kingdom, by elevating 
 the leaders to the peerage. Clarence appointed Fitz Eustace, after- 
 wards Lord Portlester, his deputy. 
 
 In the year 1463, the Earl of Desmond succeeded Lord Portles- 
 ter, as deputy of the Duke of Clarence ; and held two Parliaments 
 in the course of his government,— one of which enacted, among 
 other measures, “That any body may kill thieves or robbers, or 
 any person going to rob or steal, having no faithful men of good 
 name and in English apparel, in their company.” Also, “That the 
 Irish, within the English Pale, shall wear English habit, take Eng- 
 lish names, and swear allegiance, upon pain of forfeiture of goods.” 
 “ That English, and Irish speaking English, and living with the 
 English, shall have an English bow and arrows, on pain of two 
 pence.” 
 
 The Earl of Desmond, while distinguished by the royal favor, 
 and by his influence and popularity among the natives was destined 
 to a sudden downfall. His successor as Lord Deputy, Lord Wor- 
 cester, came from England with strong prejudices against Lords of 
 Irish birth; and his jealousies and suspicions were easily excited 
 against Desmond, by the enemies of that Lord. At a Parliament, 
 held at Drogheda, in 1467, the charge of “alliance with the Irish,” 
 was brought against the Earl, and he was attainted of high treason. 
 Unprepared, as it would seem, for so rigorous a measure, Desmond 
 was arrested, by order of the Lord Deputy, and beheaded at Drog- 
 heda. This act of tyranny did not remain long unpunished. Wor- 
 cester was recalled to England, where, in a new revolution, he suf- 
 fered the same fate which he had inflicted on Desmond. 
 
 Among the most distinguished victims to the late triumphs of 
 the Yorkists, was the Earl of Ormond, who, having been made pri- 
 soner in the bloody battle of Towton, was, a few weeks after, be- 
 headed ; and, throughout a great part of Edward’s reign, all belong- 
 ing to the family of Ormond remained in disgrace. The adherence 
 of this family to the fortunes of Henry VI. had drawn down upon 
 John, brother of the late Earl, the penalty of attainder. By a stat- 
 ute, however, made in the sixteenth year of Edward IV., the act of 
 
74 
 
 BROTHERS OF ST. GEORGE ESTABLISHED. 
 
 attainder was repealed, and the Earl restored to his lands, name, 
 and dignity. 
 
 Ireland' was, for a long time, particularly during this reign, dis- 
 tracted by the feuds between the factions of the Butlers, at the head 
 of whom was Ormond, and the Geraldines, which comprised the 
 families of Desmond and Kildare. These factions fought on oppo- 
 site sides in the great struggle between the Houses of York and 
 Lancaster. 
 
 In order to recruit, and support the small community to which the 
 English colony was reduced, a fraternity of arms was at this time 
 constituted, under the title of the Brothers of St. George, consisting 
 of thirteen persons of the highest rank and most approved loyalty. 
 To the captain of this military brotherhood, who was to be elected 
 annually, on St. George’s Day, was assigned a guard of one hun- 
 dred and twenty archers on horseback, forty other horsemen, and 
 forty pages ; and of these two hundred men consisted the whole of 
 of the standing forces then maintained by the English government 
 in Ireland. The natives, however, were too much divided among 
 themselves, and too suspicious and jealous of each other, to take ad- 
 vantage, at this time, of the weakness of the military force of the Pale. 
 
 On the death of the ill-fated Duke of Clarence, (who, it will be re- 
 membered, was drowned in a butt of Malmsey wine, by order of his 
 brother, Edward IY.,) the office of Lord Lieutenant of Ireland was 
 conferred by Edward on his second son, Richard, Duke of York; 
 and it was as deputy of this infant Prince that the Earl of Kildare 
 now held the reigns of the government, at the close of this reign, in 
 1483. 
 
 An act of the Irish Parliament, passed while the Earl of Wor- 
 cester was Lord Deputy, deserves to be noticed. It declared that 
 the Kings of England held the lordship of Ireland by a direct grant 
 from the Holy See, (the Pope of Rome,) and therefore directed that 
 all Archbishops and Bishops of Ireland, on admonition of forty days, 
 should excommunicate all disobedient subjects as heretics. 
 
 During the nominal reign of the fifth Edward, and the short 
 usurpation of Richard III., the condition of Ireland remained unim- 
 proved and unchanged. Throughout this brief and bloody period, 
 the power of the Pale was almost entirely in the hands of the Ger- 
 aldines ; the Earl of Kildare performing the functions of Lord De- 
 puty, while his brother was Lord Chancellor. The reign of Richard 
 TII. was brought to a close by the battle of Bosworth field, in 1485. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 REIGN OF HENRY VII. 
 
 The restoration of the Lancasterian line, in Henry VILfwho was 
 elected King of England after the battle of Boswortb, was very 
 unacceptable to the greater number of noble families in Ireland, 
 who were zealously attached to the house of York. From motives 
 of prudence and expediency, however, the King confirmed in office 
 all those in important stations in Ireland, which he found filled by 
 partizans of the house of York. Among these was the Earl of Kil- 
 dare, who was continued as Lord Deputy. 
 
 In order to profit by the strong feeling in favor of the Yorkists, 
 Dublin was the place selected for the opening of the plot of a strange 
 conspiracy. Early in the year 1486, there landed in that city, a 
 Priest of Oxford, named Richard Simons, attended by his ward, 
 Lambert Simnel, a boy of about eleven years of age, the son of an 
 Oxford tradesman. This youth he presented to the Lord Deputy 
 and the Council, as Edward, Earl of Warwick, son of the late Duke 
 of Clarence. The scheme was instantly and completely successful. 
 The Earl of Kildare and the people of Dublin declared in his favor, 
 and their example was followed by almost the whole of the people 
 of the Pale, who, admitting, at once, the young pretender’s title, 
 proclaimed him, by the style of Edward VI., King of England and 
 France, and Lord of Ireland. Amidst this general defection, how- 
 ever, the citizens of Waterford remained firm in their allegiance to 
 Henry, with the family of the Butlers, and a few ecclesiastics. 
 
 It seems generally to be supposed that this plot and others, during 
 this reign, had originated at the court of the Duchess of Burgundy, 
 third sister of Edward IV. Through her influence and that of her 
 relatives, a force of two thousand German troops, accompanied by 
 the two English Earls, Lincoln and Lovell, landed at Dublin, to 
 assist the conspiracy. 
 
 Meanwhile, the King, to correct the dangerous impression already 
 produced by the impostor, gave orders that the real Earl of War- 
 wick, who was confined in the Tower, should be conducted, in the 
 sight of all London, to St. Paul’s. He was also daily seen and con- 
 
76 
 
 LAMBERT SIMNEL’S CONSPIRACY. 
 
 versed with by several noblemen, his friends. This satisfied the 
 English people ; but the Irish, remote from such means of inquiry, 
 and embarked too heartily in the general cause to be at all particu- 
 lar as to its grounds, not only persisted in their adherence to Sim- 
 nel, but retorted on Henry the charge of imposture, maintaining his 
 Warwick to be the counterfeit, and their “ lad,” as they familiarly 
 styled him, the real Plantagenet. 
 
 The ultimate issue of the affair was, that Simnel, after being 
 crowned in Dublin, attended by a large force of the Irish and Ger- 
 mans, and with men of distinction in his train, landed in England, 
 in 1487. The invaders directed their course to York, their leaders 
 presuming the mass of the English ripe for revolt, but were disap- 
 pointed in their hope of being joined by the people. Simnel’s army 
 were met by the royal forces at Stoke, in Nottinghamshire, and after 
 a short and sanguinary battle, were defeated by the latter, and cut to 
 pieces. Of the eight thousand men that formed the invading army, 
 one half were left dead on the field. The royalists had greatly the 
 advantage in numbers, but the Germans and the soldiers of the Pale 
 displayed bravery worthy of a more rational cause. Among the 
 slain were almost all the chief leaders of the expedition. 
 
 The fate of Simnel foims a curious contrast to his short pageant 
 of royalty. The poor boy, with his tutor, fell into the hands of the 
 victors, and the King, seeing no harm to be apprehended from him, 
 after granting him full pardon, made him a turnspit in the royal 
 kitchen, and, not long after, raised him to the rank of a falconer. 
 
 Perceiving that the storm had now blown over, and knowing 
 that it was only by the power and influence of Kildare and a few 
 other lords that the Irish Chieftains could be kept in awe, Plenty 
 preferred the policy of pardoning that powerful nobleman, as well 
 as others who had disgraced themselves in this conspiracy. This 
 pardon he granted them in answer to their petition, acknowledging 
 their transgressions and imploring his forgiveness. 
 
 The King sent a letter, written with his own hand, to the citizens 
 of Waterford, thanking them for their fidelity ; and at the same time 
 he graciously received the deputies from Dublin, and readily granted 
 a general pardon. To secure the fidelity of his repentant subjects, 
 he sent Sir Richard Edgecombe to Ireland, with a train of five 
 hundred men, to receive anew the oaths of allegiance. He was 
 welcomed by the magistrates of the city of Dublin, and generally 
 
PERKIN WAKBECK IN IRELAND. 
 
 77 
 
 by the Barons, with apparent submission. It was not so easy to 
 prevail on the Earl of Kildare to perform homage. He invented 
 several pretexts for delay ; and when these failed, he appears to 
 have intended a religious fraud, to save him from being bound by 
 the oath of allegiance. 
 
 In the Roman Catholic Church the intention of the officiating 
 priest is held necessary to the perfection of a sacrament. If then, 
 the Host on which the Irish lords should be sworn, was consecrated 
 by a priest on whom they could prevail to withhold his intention, 
 transubstantiation would not take place; the wafer would still be 
 simple bread, and the whole an idle ceremony. It was not without 
 difficulty that Edgecombe, who suspected the fraud, prevailed on 
 Kildare to permit the Host to be consecrated by his own private 
 chaplain. 
 
 Soon after, Kildare, and several of the Irish nobility, being sum- 
 moned by Henry, went over to England, and did homage to the 
 King in person. They were magnificently entertained by Henry, 
 at Greenwich ; but had the mortification to see their former idol, 
 “the lad” Simnel, as butler at table. Kildare on his return con- 
 tinued to exercise all his former authority, and preserved the Pale 
 in greater tranquillity than it had enjoyed for a long time, although 
 many of the Irish Chiefs were at war among themselves and with 
 the Earl of Desmond. 
 
 The Simnel plot having proved so signal a failure, it would 
 seem hardly conceivable that in but a few years after, some of the 
 same personages who had been concerned in that abortive scheme, 
 should have brought forward another and similar contrivance; and 
 moreover, that the English colony in Ireland, should have been 
 again chosen, on no very flattering estimate of its honesty or dis- 
 cernment, to be the opening scene of the adventure. Of this plot, 
 as well as the former, the Duchess of Burgundy, sister of Edward 
 IV., was the prime mover, and the personage whom she now 
 brought forward, claimed to be Richard, Duke of York, son of 
 Edward IV., who had made his escape, as she pretended, from 
 the Tower, instead of having been murdered, with the elder brother, 
 (by order of Richard III.) 
 
 This individual, generally known by the name of Perkin War- 
 beck, arrived at Cork in the year 1493, in an ordinary merchant 
 vessel, from Lisbon, in Portugal. This is not the place to examine 
 11 
 
 < 
 
78 
 
 THE MEMORABLE “ POYNINGS’ ACT.” 
 
 his claims. It is difficult to prove that he was Richard Plantagenet ; 
 it is equally difficult to demonstrate that he was an impostor. 
 Horace Walpole, W. C. Taylor, and other historians inclined to the 
 opinion that his pretentions were well founded. 
 
 The mere announcement of the arrival at Cork of a youth, richly 
 attired, who called himself Richard, Duke of York, the second son 
 of Edward IV., appears to have been sufficient to rouse into activity 
 the ever ready elements of Anglo-Irish faction. The citizens of 
 Cork favored the young pretender, and the success of the plot 
 there gave it currency elsewhere. Warbeck wrote from Cork to 
 the Earls of Kildare and Desmond ; he was cheerfully recognised 
 by the latter, but before Kildare could decide on the part he should 
 take, the adventurer was invited by the King of France to his court, 
 where he was graciously received. 
 
 The King of England, afraid of another attempt at revolt in Ire- 
 land, removed Kildare and other officers of state, and appointed in 
 their places those in whom he had greater confidence. 
 
 The effect produced by the landing of Warbeck in Ireland, had led 
 Henry to consider more seriously the state of his Irish dominions, 
 and the step now taken by him, however inadequate to the exigen- 
 cies of the case, may be regarded as the first real effort of the Eng- 
 lish government to curb that spirit of provincial despotism, which it 
 had itself let loose and fostered. The person selected to carry into 
 effect the important reforms the King now meditated, and also to 
 trace out and punish the abbettors of W arbeck, was Sir Edward 
 Poynings, in whom the King placed much confidence. He was 
 attended by a Council of eminent lawyers, and a force of about a 
 thousand men. 
 
 In November of the year of his arrival in Ireland, (1484,) was 
 held that memorable Parliament at Drogheda, which enacted the 
 statute, called, after the name of the Lord Deputy, “ Poffiings ’ act” 
 The provision made by this statute was, that no Parliament should, 
 for the future, be held in Ireland until the Chief Governor and 
 Council had first certified to the King, under the great seal of the 
 land, “ as well the causes and considerations as the acts they de- 
 signed to pass, and till the same should be approved by the King 
 and Council.” This noted statute was meant as a preventive of 
 some of the evils and inconveniences which could not but arise 
 from the existence of a separate legislature in Ireland, independent 
 
PERKIN WARBECK’S FARTHER ADVENTURES. 79 
 
 of, and indispensable to that of England. The mischiefs insepara- 
 ble from the nature of such a body were shown during the contests 
 between the Yorkists and Lancasterians, and in the gross mockery 
 of a Parliament summoned to sanction the claims of the wretched 
 impostor, Lambert Simnel. 
 
 It was also enacted, in this same Parliament, that all the statutes 
 made lately in England, concerning or belonging to the public 
 weal, should be henceforth good and effectual in Ireland. The act 
 passed during the administration of the Duke of York, making Ire- 
 land a sanctuary for foreigners, and thus shielding rebels and 
 traitors, was now repealed. The. general use of bows and arrows 
 was, as usual, enjoined, and various other enactments were made 
 by this Parliament, including one for the resumption, with some 
 few exceptions, of all the grants made by the crown, since the reign 
 of King Edward II. 
 
 Perkin Warbeck, having remained some time in France and 
 Flanders, visited Ireland a second time, in 1495, but finding now 
 little support or encouragement, he sailed from Cork to Scotland, 
 having been recommended to James IV., then ruler of that king- 
 dom, not only by the Duchess of Burgundy, but in private letters 
 from the King of France and Maximilian, Emperor of Germany. 
 
 Whether King James really believed in Warbeck’s story, it is not 
 easy to discover. But it is proved by the Scottish records that he 
 had been engaged in secret correspondence with the Duchess of 
 Burgundy on the subject. Whatever his secret opinion or knowledge 
 on the subject may have been, his whole conduct implied a belief 
 in the truth of Warbeck’s claims ; he now received him with roval 
 honors, and bestowed on him the hand of the fair Catharine Gor- 
 don, the daughter of the Earl of Huntley, and grand daughter of 
 King James I. 
 
 The flattering prospects opened to Warbeck by the zealous part 
 the Scottish monarch had taken in his behalf, having vanished, the 
 unfortunate adventurer, who was still treated with all the respect 
 due to his assumed rank, resolved to try, once more, his fortune in 
 Ireland. A vessel, . and guard of thirty horse having been provided 
 for him by his royal protector, he sailed, accompanied by his wife, 
 for Cork. There he was joined by the Earl of Desmond, with a 
 force of two thousand four hundred men, and marched against Wa- 
 terford, — a fleet of eleven ships being sent to make an attack from 
 
80 
 
 DECISIVE BATTLE WITH THE NATIVES. 
 
 the river. The citizens made a vigorous defence ; and, in one of 
 their sallies, took a number of prisoners, whose heads they cut off 
 and placed upon stakes, as memorials of their victory. Discouraged 
 by losses, Desmond found himself compelled to raise the siege; 
 while Warbeck and his wife made their way back, by water, to 
 Cork, and from thence sailed to Cornwall, — being closely pursued 
 by four ships that had been sent from Waterford to apprehend him. 
 The closing scene of Warbeck’s life, took place in 1499, when he 
 was executed for treason, at Tyburn ; and with him suffered the 
 first who espoused his cause in Ireland, John Waters, Mayor of 
 Cork. His other Irish abettor, the Earl of Desmond, was far more 
 fortunate in his fate; the King not only freely pardoned all his 
 offences, but even received him into favor. 
 
 The native Chiefs having confederated against the English gov- 
 ernment in Ireland, the Earl of Kildare collected all the force he 
 was able to muster, and, being accompanied by all the great Anglo- 
 Irish lords, he met the most powerful native force that had been 
 seen since the conquest. The battle took place near Galway, in 
 1504 ; and, after an obstinate contest, the Irish were defeated and 
 routed with great slaughter. The result of this conflict was of the 
 utmost consequence to the interests of the crown and the English 
 colony ; as the power of the natives to combine successfully against 
 their oppressors, had now, to a certain extent, been tried, and had 
 utterly failed. 
 
 So pleased was the King with Kildare’s services on this occasion, 
 that, on receiving an account of the victory, he created him a Knight 
 of the Garter, and continued him, as Lord Deputy, to the close of 
 his reign, in 1509. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE REFORMATION AND ITS EFFECTS IN IRELAND. 
 
 The reign of Henry VIII. constitutes a new era in the histories 
 of both England and Ireland; and the age in which he lived may 
 be said to have constituted a new era in the history of mankind. 
 This King ascended the throne in 1509, and, during his reign, hav- 
 
THE PROTESTANT REFORMATION. 
 
 SI 
 
 ing succeeded in extinguishing the papal power in England, he at- 
 tempted to accomplish the same object in Ireland, but with different 
 success. Though supported by the Bishops of English birth, his 
 scheme was obstinately resisted by the Irish. The native Chieftains, 
 also, from a conviction that, in opposing these innovations, they 
 were maintaining the cause, not only of their independence, but of 
 their religion, were stimulated to the greatest efforts. The Irish of 
 Ulster confederated under O’Nial, as the champion of their cause ; 
 but a victory gained over them, at Ballyhae, by Lord Grey, the 
 Deputy, dissolved their union. O’Nial, and others, submitted, and 
 changed their ancient dignities for those of English nobility. Henry, 
 from a wish to confirm his authority by a more imposing title, had 
 himself styled King , instead of Lord of Ireland, under which 
 name the sovereign authority had been hitherto exercised. 
 
 About the year 1543, James V., King of Scotland, formed some 
 pretensions to the crown of Ireland, and was favored by a powerful 
 party among the Irish themselves. It is hard to say, had he lived, 
 what the consequences of his claim might have been. 
 
 The reign of Edward YI., (1547 to 1553,) was the crisis of the 
 Reformation in Ireland. The guardians of the young King, intent 
 on their own schemes of petty ambtion, neglected the important 
 interests of the nation ; and the fabric which Henry had erected 
 with so much labor, soon fell to ruin. Their treatment of the Irish 
 Chieftains destroyed the confidence of the people in the govern- 
 ment. At this unfavorable moment, the reformed liturgy was at- 
 tempted to be introduced into Ireland ; but, as might have been ex- 
 pected, was not favorably received by the people. The condition 
 of the Irish Church was far different from that of England. The 
 English owed their possession of Ireland to a bargain made with 
 the Pope and the Prelates. The Romish authority was the guar- 
 antee of their security; and the Anglo-Irish Barons gladly assisted 
 in strengthening the power which seemed alone able to ensure their 
 safety. The Roman Catholic Church had, consequently, been long 
 an estate of the realm, paramount to all the rest. 
 
 While affairs were in confusion, the death of Edward VI. pro- 
 duced a new revolution. The officers of state changed their reli- 
 gion with the same facility they had displayed on former occasions, 
 and the great body of the clergy followed their example. Those 
 priests who had married, preserved their consistency by retiring 
 from the clerical office. 
 
82 
 
 REIGNS OP MART AND ELIZABETH. 
 
 Queen Mary commenced her reign, (which lasted from 1553 to 
 1558,) by several acts, equally just, humane and politic. She granted 
 an amnesty to those who had proclaimed Lady Jane Grey in Dub- 
 lin ; she restored the Earl of Kildare to his title and estates, of 
 which he had been deprived ; and she liberated O’Connor of Offa- 
 ley, who had long been a prisoner. The restoration of the Catholic 
 religion was effected without violence ; no persecution of the Pro- 
 testants was attempted : and several of the English, who fled from 
 the furious zeal of Mary’s inquisitors in England, found a safe 
 retreat among the Catholics of Ireland. 
 
 The massacre of the natives of Leix and Offaley, who were 
 driven from their possessions by the English, pursued with fire and 
 sword, and their habitations burnt, took place during this reign. 
 These districts, by order of the government, were formed into the 
 counties of Kings and Queens, and the chief towns named Philips- 
 town and Maryborough, in honor of King Philip and Queen Mary. 
 
 The contests between the conflicting interests were carried to 
 their greatest height in the reign of Elizabeth, (from 1558 to 1G03.) 
 Partial invasions of Ireland had been attempted by the Spanish gov- 
 ernment, several years before the equipment of the armada. An 
 army of several thousand Spaniards was actually landed, attended 
 by a Pope’s nuncio, who, gained possession of Kinsale. And Eng- 
 land thus found herself in danger of being beset on the east and 
 west by the power of Spain, then formidable and centred in the 
 Netherlands, 'and their naval armaments in the harbors of Ireland. 
 
 These considerations determined the English government to 
 make uncommon efforts to secure the possession of Ireland. Very 
 ' considerable subsidies, were voted by Parliament for that purpose, 
 and an army of twenty thousand men, well provided, was sent, 
 which, assisted by the advantages and power already possessed in 
 the country, by successive reinforcements from England, and by 
 other favorable circumstances, effected a complete reduction of all 
 the different lords and chiefs who, till then, had ruled in the Island, 
 after a war which continued about seven years. Queen Elizabeth, 
 however, did not live to see Ireland entirely reduced. The final 
 capitulation of the Chieftain O’Nial was not signed until a few days 
 after her death, in 1603 
 
 Among those officers who commanded in Ireland, during the 
 reign of Queen Elizabeth, were, Sir Walter Raleigh, the Earl of 
 
RIGOROUS MEASURES OF ELIZABETH. 
 
 83 
 
 Essex, the Earl of Ormond, and Lord Grey. A small force of Span- 
 iards and Italians, sent by Philip, King of Spain, invaded Ireland, 
 and were joined by the Earl of Desmond and other Anglo-Irish and 
 Irish Catholics. The invaders fortified themselves in Kerry ; but, 
 after an assault upon them by the English, under Lord Grey, the 
 garrison surrendered at discretion, and were massacred in cold 
 blood. The execution of this barbarous service was entrusted to 
 Sir Walter Raleigh. The Queen was greatly displeased at this 
 outrage, though it was attempted to be justified by the imperious 
 circumstance of the inferiority of numbers on the side of victory. 
 
 In 15S6, the Irish Parliament passed a bill of attainder against 
 tne Earl of Desmond and about one hundred and forty of his accom- 
 plices, — all of whose estates were forfeited and vested in the crown. 
 The Desmond estates alone amounted to six hundred thousand acres. 
 A host of hungry expectants eagerly awaited the event, — hoping 
 that rich estates would reward the crimes which had brought about 
 the confiscation. In this Parliament, for the first time, several of 
 the original Irish families joined in deliberation with the settlers 
 of the Pale. There was no secret interference with the elections 
 which took place in 1584, and an independent House of Commons, 
 fairly representing the people, was returned. In the upper house 
 sat two Bishops, professed Roman Catholics, from the Sees of Clo- 
 gher and Raphoe, over which Elizabeth had, as yet, exercised no 
 control ; and Turlough, the nominal head of the O’lrials, took his 
 seat as Earl of Tyrone. This was under the administration of Sir 
 John Perrot. 
 
 In the same year, 1586, Elizabeth and her minister's entered upon 
 her favorite project, that of wholly extirpating the original popula-r 
 tion of the country, by colonizing it with English settlers. She 
 began with the the province of Munster. Letters were written to 
 every county in England, to encourage younger brothers to become 
 undertakers or adventurers in Ireland. Estates were offered in fee 
 at a small rent of three pence, and, in some places, two pence per 
 acre. Seven years were to be allowed to complete the plantation. 
 The undertaker for twelve thousand acres was to plant eighty-six 
 families on his estates ; those for less seigniories, in proportion. — 
 None of the native Irish were to be admitted among their tenantry. 
 Garrisons were provided, by government, to defend the frontiers. 
 Sir Walter Raleigh, Sir Christopher Hatton, and others, received 
 ample grants. 
 
84 
 
 EFFECTS OF ELIZABETH’S MEASURES. 
 
 The Earl of Desmond, previous to the confiscation of his estates, 
 was hunted and pursued by the English, and finally killed by an 
 Irishman named Kelly, who smote off his head and brought it to 
 the Earl of Ormond, by whom it was conveyed to the Queen and 
 exhibited on London bridge. Thus was a family extinguished 
 which had for four centuries flourished in rude magnificence, and 
 had often proved too powerful for the English government in Ire- 
 land. 
 
 The scheme of the plantation or colonization system totally failed. 
 The undertakers violated their contracts, preferring the Irish serf 
 to the independent freeholder ; and the opportunity of introducing 
 an orderly middle class into Ireland, which Elizabeth had acquired 
 at the expense of so much blood, was lost by the venality of her 
 unprincipled servants. 
 
 The judicious administration of Sir John Perrot had given to 
 Ireland unusual peace and prosperity. The conduct of his suc- 
 cessor, Fitz William, produced a new train of calamities and 
 crimes, whose consequences are scarcely yet effaced. This gov- 
 ernor had but one object in view, his own private emolument, and 
 in pursuit of this, he quarrelled with the Irish Chieftains, by his 
 treatment of whom he excited the most bitter hostility of the na- 
 tives. This led to a succession of insurrections, under different 
 governors, which terminated, as we have stated, in the final sub- 
 mission of tlft Chiefs and the people to the English power, at the 
 close of Elizabeth’s reign. 
 
 The subjugation of Ireland, which proved imperfect, cost the 
 English more than three millions sterling, and an incalculable 
 number of Elizabeth’s bravest soldiers. The unfortunate country 
 was reduced nearly to a desert ; and at least one half of the popula- 
 tion perished by famine or the sword. The finances were so dilap- 
 idated that they were inadequate to the ordinary expenses of the 
 government. 
 
 Religion could not be expected to possess much influence amid 
 the incessant din of arms. It was, to use the language of an old 
 divine, u in every body’s mouth and no body’s heart.” The efforts 
 which were made to give the struggle the character of a religious 
 war signally failed. Many of Elizabeth’s bravest soldiers were 
 Catholics, but never for a moment swerved from their allegiance. 
 
85 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 IRELAND UNDER THE STUARTS AND THE COMMONWEALTH. 
 
 The successor of Elizabeth, James I., is to be considered as the 
 first English sovereign who possessed the dominion of Ireland. At 
 this time, opposition to the English government was at an end. 
 James, during the greater part of his reign, applied himself to the 
 business of reformation, and to what was called, in the quaint phrase- 
 ology of the time, “ the plantation of Ulster.” The six counties 
 which were now forfeited by Tyrone and other northern lords and 
 chiefs, containing more that half a million of acres, were parcelled 
 out into estates of various dimensions, none exceeding tracts of 
 two thousand acres ; flattering inducements were held out to Eng- 
 lish and Scotch agriculturalists to settle on them. Much of the 
 land was purchased by some of the London trading companies, who 
 for many years, under the name of the Irish Society, retained the 
 proprietorship of extensive tracts in those counties. Large portions 
 of land were also appropriated to the clergy, and to the public 
 schools. 
 
 James was peculiarly anxious to ingratiate himself with his Irish 
 subjects by encouraging reports of his disposition to favor the rights 
 and privileges of the Catholics ; a disposition which was magnified 
 by the enthusiastic hopes of the Catholics themselves, into an actual 
 toleration of them, and they no longer thought it necessary to prac- 
 tise their religion in secrecy. But measures were soon adopted to 
 check them, and the dawning hopes of toleration were quenched 
 at once. The King, however, was still desirous of conciliating 
 the Irish, and in 1605, an act of oblivion and indemnity was passed, 
 by which all offences against the crown were pardoned, and all the 
 Irish living under Chieftains were admitted into the immediate pro- 
 tection of the King ; a measure which, according to John Davies, 
 the King’s Attorney General, “ bred such comfort and security in 
 the hearts of all men, as thereupon ensued the calmest and most 
 universal peace that was ever seen in Ireland.” 
 
 In 1613, after a lapse of twenty-seven years, a new Parliament 
 was convened in Ireland. When this Parliament assembled, vio- 
 12 
 
86 CONTEST IN PARLIAMENT, — TYRANNY OP JAMES I. 
 
 lent altercations took place between the court and country mem- 
 bers ; of the former the greater part were Protestants, and among 
 the latter were to be found the Catholic representatives, or recusants, 
 as they were then termed. The Upper House consisted of sixteen 
 barons, five viscounts, four earls, and twenty-five spiritual peers — 
 in all fifty, of whom the prelates and a majority of others, were sup- 
 porters of the government. In the House of Commons, which con- 
 tained members from forty boroughs, created by James, to provide 
 against danger of opposition, parties were nearly balanced. On the 
 vote for speaker, Sir John Davies, (the King’s Attorney General,) 
 had one hundred and twenty-seven, and for Sir John Everard, op- 
 position, ninety-seven. A scene of confusion arose, in consequence 
 of Everard’s having taken the chair Avhile the other party had re- 
 tired; and Sir John Davies was then placed in his lap. A disgrace- 
 ful tumult followed, ending in the retirement of the recusants, pro- 
 testing against the proceedings. A remonstrance was presented to 
 King James, who heard both parties in Council,- and then decided 
 in favor of his own supporters, threatening the opposition with 
 punishment if they persisted in their course, and promising his 
 favor, if they atoned by submission. The country party made no 
 farther opposition. 
 
 Flushed with the success of his first scheme of colonization, 
 James proceeded to extend the system, and after appointing a com- 
 mission of enquiry to scrutinize titles and rights, a confiscation of 
 lands in Leinster and the adjoining districts took place, to the 
 amount about of three hundred and fifty thousand acres. These 
 lands were apportioned to English settlers and to some few of the 
 natives, under regulations similar to those by which he had colo- 
 nized Ulster. The most atrocious violations of justice and private 
 rights were committed, merely to gratify the colonizing wishes of 
 the King. This was the last act of any importance which marked 
 the reign of James, except an attempt to seize upon the lands of 
 Connaught, which had been surrendered to the crown in the reign 
 of Elizabeth, and received back by the lords and gentry, as grants 
 from the Q,ueen. Having neglected the enrolment of their patents, 
 they again surrendered them to James, and paid three thousand 
 pounds to have them enrolled. The King was disposed to take ad- 
 vantage of a clerical error which occurred in the business, in con- 
 sequence of which the proprietors tendered him a bribe of ten 
 
REBELLION IN THE REIGN OP CHARLES I. 
 
 87 
 
 thousand pounds. While James hesitated between the temptation 
 of the sum in hand and a larger in prospect, he was seized with 
 mortal illness, and died in 1625, bequeathing his three kingdoms 
 to his son, the unfortunate Charles I. 
 
 On the accession of Charles I., the recusants were elated with the 
 hope of receiving greater indulgence than they had hitherto en- 
 joyed ; and as the government of Lord Falkland, (then Lord Lieu- 
 tenant,) was mild and conciliatory, the Roman Catholic religion 
 was more openly professed. This was highly offensive to the pu- 
 ritanical spirit which was then every day increasing, and such 
 representations were made to the English court, that the military 
 establishment was increased. 
 
 The succeeding admistration of Thomas Yiscount Wentworth, 
 better known by his subsequent title of Earl of Strafford, forms an 
 important era in the history of Ireland. Through ignorance rather 
 than design, he adopted a system which led to discord and calamity 
 and involved himself and his master in one general ruin. While 
 some in England speak favorably of this statesman, his name is, at 
 this day, detested in Ireland. His harsh and unjustifiable measures 
 utterly destroyed the spirit of confidence between the government 
 and people. By calling in question the titles of the landed pro- 
 prietors in Connaught, in endeavoring to compel the verdict of 
 juries in favor of the crown to the lands, he excited a suspicion of 
 farther aggressions, and this, joined with the unsettled state of Eng- 
 land, led to the catastrophe which nearly annihilated the British 
 dominion in Ireland. 
 
 The conspiracy of 1641, by which this object was to have been 
 effected, and which was detected on the day fixed on for its execu- 
 tion, was to have commenced operations by the seizure of the Cas- 
 tle of Dublin. Lord Maguire, one of its most active agents, was 
 taken and executed in London. Yet its failure in the capital did 
 not prevent its explosion elsewhere. It broke out with dreadful 
 violence in the north, where Sir Phelim O’Neill soon found himself 
 master of all Ulster, with the exception of a few of the large towns. 
 The accounts of the atrocities committed at the commencement of 
 the insurrection have been much exaggerated by the virulence of 
 party. But this much is certain, that the contest, which raged with 
 various success, and in many varieties of form, throughout the 
 country, from 1641 to 1652, was carried on with all the bitter- 
 
88 
 
 IRELAND SUBDUED BY CROMWELL. 
 
 ness that characterizes civil war, aggravated by religious ani- 
 mosity. 
 
 There are evidences, in letters of Charles I. to the Marquis of Or- 
 mond, who for some time commanded the royal forces in Ireland, 
 that he was desirous of conciliating and benefiting the Irish Catho- 
 lics, but his benevolent policy was thwarted by that nobleman, who 
 was inveterate in his hostility to that portion of his own country- 
 men. 
 
 When the tidings of the execution of the King were conveyed to 
 Ormond, in 1648, he instantly proclaimed the Prince of Wales 
 King, under the title of Charles II. 
 
 Passing over the events of “ the war of the confederates,” as it is 
 called, we can only mention a few of the circumstances of Crom- 
 well’s visit to Ireland, in the time of the Commonwealth. That 
 general eagerly sought to crush the last remaining stay of the Stu- 
 arts, in subduing their Catholic adherents in Ireland. He landed 
 at Dublin in 1 650, with a force of eight thousand foot and four 
 thousand horse, and, after two weeks, marched, with ten thousand 
 men, to Drogheda, which place he took by storm, and put the whole 
 garrison to the sword, except about thirty, who were transported to 
 Barbadoes. Cromwell made his followers believe that the Irish 
 ought to be dealt with as the Canaanites were in Joshua’s time. 
 By this terrible example, he opened to himself an easy entrance into 
 most of the other fortified places in Ireland. The embers of resist- 
 ance which his recall to England compelled him to leave unextin- 
 guished, were finally quenched by Ireton and his other generals, 
 and the country remained in a state of passive subjection to the 
 Parliament of England until the Restoration. 
 
 At the conclusion of this war of extermination, Ireland presented 
 a melancholy and affecting picture of misery and wretchedness. 
 The ravages of war had been heightened by their worst conse- 
 quences, pestilence and famine. The country was little else than 
 one vast desert. Many thousands of the people were transported, 
 by order of Cromwell, to the North American and West India plan- 
 tations. 
 
 During the rule of the Commonwealth, the landed property of 
 the country was transferred, with a few exceptions, from the ancient 
 owners of the soil, to the soldiers of the conquering army, or to 
 speculating adventurers, who advanced money to the Common- 
 
REIGNS OF CHARLES II. AND JAMES II. 
 
 89 
 
 wealth, on the assurance of repayment, with liberal interest, from 
 the confiscations that had been anticipated as the necessary conse- 
 quence of unsuccessful resistance to the constituted authorities of 
 the day. The extent of these confiscations was enormous. Of 
 upwards of nineteen millions of acres which Ireland contains, twelve 
 millions six hundred and thirty-four thousand, seven hundred and 
 eleven, were thus transferred. A transfer of persons as well as of 
 property, took place. The Roman Catholics who had not taken 
 part in the war, were distinguished as innocent papists, but com- 
 pelled to remove into Connaught, where they were allowed to hold 
 lands of inferior quality, by paying a small rent to government. 
 
 The restoration of Charles II., in 1660, was well received in Ire- 
 land, but with some anxiety. Some were impatient to be restored 
 to their old possessions, others to be confirmed in their new acqui- 
 sitions ; some were solicitous for pardon, others for reward. 
 
 An Act of Settlement, as it was called, was sent from England, 
 and passed the Irish Parliament, in 1665, by which the rights of 
 the several interests in Ireland were fixed, and a final and invaria- 
 ble rule established for the settlement of the kingdom. Commis- 
 sioners were appointed for carrying this act into execution ; diffi- 
 cult cases they were to refer to the Lord Lieutenant and Council, 
 and many years elapsed before all the applications were disposed of. 
 The Irish Catholics suffered great injustice from this measure, 
 while many of those who had obtained possessions under the con- 
 fiscations of Cromwell, were confirmed in them. 
 
 The reign of James II., commencing in 16S5, excited a hope in 
 the depressed party of Catholics that the system of proscription 
 against them was to have an end. The pusillanimity of this mon- 
 arch and the vigor of his rival, quickly dissipated any such expect- 
 ation. James, when driven from Great Britain, made an effort to 
 regain his elevated position through the energies of his Irish sub- 
 jects. But he was wholly unqualified to direct or to sustain those 
 energies. After a struggle of four years, in which he was baffled 
 at the battle of the Boyne, and afterwards, through his generals, at 
 Athlone and Aughrim, the surrender of Limerick, in 1691, extin- 
 guished every gleam of hope. The whole population submitted to 
 the English government, under William and Mary, with the excep- 
 tion of those ardent spirits who preferred the vicissitudes of a life of 
 exile, to the monotony of domestic subjugation. There went, at this 
 
90 
 
 TREATY OF LIMERICK. 
 
 time, to the continent, about fourteen thousand men, and part of 
 them were formed into a corps, in the service of France, under the 
 name of the Irish brigade, where, during the succeeding wars on 
 the continent, they performed good service against the government 
 by which they had been expatriated. The number of Irish thus 
 driven into the ranks of the enemy of England, may be estimated 
 from the fact that, according to the official statements of the French 
 army accounts, there died in that service, between the taking of 
 Limerick, in 1691, and the battle of Fontenoy, in 1745, a period of 
 little more than fifty years, no fewer than four hundred and fifty 
 thousand Irish soldiers. 
 
 By the treaty of Limerick, assented to by King William, as the 
 terms on which the Irish supporters of King James capitulated, he 
 consented that the Irish Roman Catholics should enjoy the exercise 
 of their religion, as in the reign of Charles II., and promised to en- 
 deavor to procure them farther security, when a Parliament should 
 be convened. He engaged that all included in the capitulation 
 should enjoy their estates and pursue their employments freely, as 
 in the reign of King Charles ; that their gentry should be allowed 
 the use of arms ; and that no oath should be required of any, except 
 that of allegiance. “ The Articles of Limerick,” as they were called, 
 received the royal assent of William and Mary ; they pledged them- 
 selves, and for their heirs and successors, to abide by them, and to 
 recommend such acts of Parliament as should be found to be neces- 
 sary, viz : “and shall give our royal assent to any bill or bills that 
 shall be passed by our two Houses of Parliament to that purpose.” 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 FROM THE TREATY OF LIMERICK TO THE PRESENT TIME. 
 
 The revolution of 1688, which produced so much good to Eng- 
 land, was the source of little advantage to Ireland. That liberty 
 which the English acquired for themselves, in the expulsion of 
 James II., and the bestowal of the crown on William and Mary, they 
 
REIGN OF WILLIAM AND MARY. 
 
 91 
 
 refused to communicate to others. Some allege that an excuse may 
 be found for the feelings of the English nation in the circumstances 
 under which Ireland then appeared, tier Catholic population had 
 fought against that liberty which the revolution was intended to 
 restore and confirm; and the unabated zeal with which the cause 
 of the abdicated and bigoted James was upheld in Ireland, from 
 168S to 1691, could not be supposed the most effectual means of 
 securing the favor and protection of the Whig party in England, 
 the principal supporters of William and Mary. 
 
 We shall be less surprised at the open and shameful violation 
 and defiance of the Articles of Limerick, to which the great seal of 
 England had been affixed, when we consider that, they were boasted 
 of, by the Catholic friends of James, as the most advantageous ca- 
 pitulation recorded in the annals of war ; and for that, amongst other 
 reasons, they were condemned by the Irish Protestants, and some 
 of the most violent Whigs in England, as dishonorable to the arms 
 of King William, and unjust to his best friends in Ireland. 
 
 Although Ireland, as an independent kingdom, claimed under 
 William, the same rights which it had enjoyed under his predeces- 
 sors, yet did the Parliament of England usurp the right of legislat- 
 ing for Ireland, in as free and uncontrolled a manner, as if Ireland 
 had no Parliament of her own. Thus, in the year 1691, before 
 King William had convened the Irish Parliament, the English Par- 
 liament passed an act to alter the laws of Ireland, by excluding the 
 Roman Catholics, the decided majority of the nation, from a seat in 
 either House of Parliament, (excepting, however, persons comprised 
 in the Articles of Limerick.) When a pure Protestant Parliament 
 was convened in Ireland, in 1692, although they refused to carry 
 out the views of the English Parliament, they enacted laws en- 
 croaching upon the liberties of the people ; and another Parliament, 
 in 1695, passed several penal laws against the Catholics, and in 
 direct violation of the Articles of Limerick. 
 
 As William III. held his crowli by parliamentary tenure, his 
 power as a King was quite limited,and he was therefore compelled 
 to acquiesce in the acts of both Parliaments relative to Ireland, al- 
 though contrary, as doubtless many of them were, to his views and 
 wishes. One of the acts passed by the Irish Parliament resumed 
 seventy-six grants made by King Will iam, of the forfeited estates in 
 Ireland. 
 
92 UNION PROPOSED IN THE REIGN OF Q.UEEN ANNE. 
 
 William died in 1701, and was succeeded by his sister-in-law, 
 Anne, (the last of the Stuarts,) whose reign continued until 1714. 
 
 From the reign of Queen Anne the Irish Parliament began to 
 assemble biennally. An act was passed in 1703, to prevent the 
 growth of popery, calculated to prevent the Catholics from acquir- 
 ing and holding property. A clause was added to the bill in Eng- 
 land, and assented to by the Irish Parliament, to prevent any per- 
 son from holding office who should not receive the sacrament ac- 
 cording to the rites of the established Episcopal Church. This, of 
 course, cut off Protestant dissenters as well as Catholics. During 
 this reign the Irish Peers proposed a Union with England, which 
 was coldly received in Great Britain. “ We are sensible,” say the 
 Lords, “ that our preservation is owing to our being united to the 
 crown of England, so we are convinced that it would tend to our 
 further security and happiness to have a more comprehensive and 
 entire union with that kingdom.” 
 
 The same House of Peers, on another occasion, in 1703, resolved 
 on the report of a committee, that such a representation “ be made 
 to the Queen, of the state of the kingdom, as might best incline her 
 majesty to promote such a union with England, as might qualify 
 the states of that kingdom to be represented in the Parliament 
 there.” 
 
 In 1707 they congratulated the Queen on the union of England 
 with Scotland, and beseeched her majesty to go on, and extend her 
 favor to all her subjects, &c. From the coldness with which the 
 Queen answered these addresses, it is plain that her ministers would 
 not then listen to the proposition of a union with Ireland. In the con- 
 gratulatory address of the Irish House of Commons on the Scottish 
 union, they did not hint at a similar union of England with Ireland. 
 
 On the death of Anne, the succession to the British crown passed 
 to the House of Hanover, and George I. ascended the throne, in 
 1714. The Irish Parliament recognized the King’s title, and set a 
 price on the head of the pretender, who was brother to Queen Anne. 
 
 The British Parliament passed, in 1708, an act declaring that 
 they had, of right, full power to make laws to bind the people and 
 the kingdom of Ireland, and that the House of Lords of Ireland had 
 not any appellate jurisdiction. The Irish Parliament the next year 
 passed an act to relieve Protestant dissenters from penalties inflicted 
 on them by the existing laws. 
 
POPULARITY OF DEAN SWIFT, 
 
 93 
 
 Daring the rebellion in Great Britain, in 1715, in favor of the 
 son of James II., Ireland was perfectly tranquil ; nor could the 
 slightest trace of any communication between the native Irish and 
 the adherents of the Pretender, in France or Scotland, be detected. 
 But, at the same time, the country was reduced to such a state of 
 wretchedness, and the people, precluded from the benefits of indus- 
 try by restrictive laws, were so miserably poor, that the celebrated 
 Dean Swift used to declare that he “rejoiced at a mortality as a 
 blessing to individuals and the public.” No man, at this period, 
 was more popular in Ireland than Swift. His “ Drapier’s Letters,” 
 particularly, gave him an exalted reputation for sagacity and patriot- 
 ism. “ The name of Augustus,” says Lord Orrery, “ was not be- 
 stowed upon Octavius Caesar with more universal approbation than 
 the name of the Drapier was bestowed upon the Dean. He had 
 no sooner assumed his new cognomen than he became the idol of 
 the people of Ireland, to a degree of devotion that, in the most super- 
 stitious country, scarce any idol ever obtained. Libations, large 
 and frequent, to his health were poured forth. His effigies were 
 painted in every street in Dublin. Acclamations and vows for his 
 prosperity attended his footsteps whenever he passed. He was con- 
 sulted in all points relating to domestic policy in general, and to 
 the trade of Ireland, in particular.” 
 
 In 1727, George I. was succeeded by his son, George II., who 
 reigned until 1760. An act was passed by the Irish Parliament, in 
 1728, providing that no Roman Catholic should vote at the election 
 of members of Parliament. Two years afterwards, a law was 
 enacted for promoting agriculture and the better employment of 
 the poor. 
 
 On the second attempt in favor of the dethroned Stuart family, 
 by the rebellion in Scotland, the object of which was to place 
 Charles Edward, son of the Pretender, on the British throne, the 
 Irish remained loyal to the house of Hanover, owing chiefly to the 
 good sense and liberal policy of the Earl of Chesterfield, who was 
 then Lord Lieutenant. This nobleman relaxed the rigor of the 
 law, so far as to overlook the breach of the statute committed by 
 Roman Catholics, in assembling together for Divine worship. 
 
 In the year 1759, the landing of a French force, under Thurot, 
 in the north of Ireland, afforded another test of the spirit of the 
 country. Though this petty invasion was merely a feint to veil 
 13 
 
94 
 
 IRISH VOLUNTEER ASSOCIATION. 
 
 the movements of a larger armament, and proceeded no farther than 
 the momentary possession of Carrickfergus, after which the inva- 
 ders retired ; the sensation excited by it pervaded the whole island. 
 An expression of determined resistance was universally and une- 
 quivocally displayed. 
 
 The reign of George III. extends over «i period cf sixty years, 
 namely, from 1760 to 1820. Within that period, the most moment- 
 ous circumstances took place. Ireland gained for herself a consti- 
 stitution, or independent Parliament, and lost it ; she rebelled, and 
 was subdued ; she became united to England, and now struggles 
 for repeal of the union ; she obtained Catholic emancipation, and 
 other important privileges. Within that period, too, her greatest 
 men, whose names adorn her own history and that of England, 
 appeared upon the scene ; her literary fame was exalted, and the 
 renown of her sons, in arms, was augmented. 
 
 Irish Parliaments, at one time annually elected, had become of 
 equal length with the life of the reigning monarch, unless dissolved 
 by royal prerogative. In 1768, an act was passed, limiting the 
 duration of the House of Commons to eight years ; and, at the same 
 time, the Lord Lieutenant, who had sometimes resided in England, 
 was required to reside in Ireland. 
 
 The breaking out of the American war, in 1775, afforded ample 
 scope for the newly acquired powers of the popular branch of the 
 Irish Legislature. Enlarged views of the reciprocal interests of 
 the two great portions of the empire, called for new enactments. 
 The Irish Parliament, which had hitherto generally acquiesced in 
 the arrangements transmitted from England, began to exert the 
 right of judging and of legislating for itself. The agitation of the 
 American question, and the unexpected incidents consequent on 
 hostilities with the British transatlantic colonies, afforded new cause 
 of excitement to the public mind. Most of the troops had been 
 called out of Ireland, leaving the country exposed to the danger of 
 an invasion from France. The people, therefore, armed themselves, 
 and formed an organized army of volunteers of forty-two thousand 
 men. They then began to turn their thoughts towards the internal 
 improvement of the country, and called on their representatives for 
 a repeal of obnoxious laws, which had weakened the strength of 
 the kingdom. The volunteer association assumed a new character : 
 it became a deliberative, as well as a military body. A meeting of 
 
IRISH PARLIAMENT DECLARED INDEPENDENT, IN 1782. 95 
 
 delegates from all the military corps in Ulster, convened at Dungan- 
 non, adopted resolutions declaratory of the Irish Parliament to 
 make laws, uncontrolled by any external interference. The spirit 
 thus excited, rapidly transferred itself into the Parliament. Henry 
 Grattan took the lead in the House of Commons, in asserting the 
 independence of the Irish legislature. Supported by the combined 
 exertions of the advocates of the measure, both within and without 
 its walls, he eventually succeeded in obtaining an explicit renunci- 
 ation of legislative control on the part of Great Britain. The British 
 Parliament passed acts placing the Parliament of Ireland in the same 
 state of independence, with respect to its legislation, as that of Great 
 Britain ; also, for the independence of the judges, and the right of 
 habeas corpus. The Irish Parliament voted fifty thousand pounds 
 to Mr. Grattan for his services in the struggle whicli had terminated 
 so successfully. This was in 1782, when the English ministry had 
 lost the American colonies, and, with the result of the war, their 
 places. 
 
 Several meetings of volunteer delegates and deputies took place 
 in 1783, to prepare a plan of reform ; and a national convention of 
 delegates met at Dublin, — but the measure proposed by them was 
 rejected by Parliament. The following year, a national Congress 
 of delegates, from counties and towns, met at Dublin, but effected 
 nothing of importance. After this, the volunteers gradually declined 
 in numbers and spirit, and were finally put down by a proclama- 
 tion from government, prohibiting their assemblage. 
 
 In the year 1789, a great international question arose, which 
 served to show the practical effect of the lately acquired indepen- 
 dence of the Irish Parliament. George III. beino- attacked with 
 insanity, a regency became necessary. The Parliaments of the two 
 countries were at issue on the point. While the Parliament of Great 
 Britain determined to impose, restrictions on the Prince of Wales, 
 as Regent, that of Ireland offered him the regency, unshackled by 
 any limitations other than those imposed by the Constitution on the 
 sovereign himself. Matters stood thus, when the King was declared 
 to be so far restored to the due use of his mental faculties, as to be 
 enabled to resume the government. The delegates sent from the 
 Irish Parliament to London, returned ; but, from that moment, the 
 British ministers determined, by an amalgamation of both Par- 
 liaments , to prevent the risk of such collisions in future. 
 
96 
 
 SOCIETY OF UNITED IRISHMEN FORMED. 
 
 Daring the progress of these political movements, the Roman 
 Catholics were gradually obtaining a relaxation of the laws against 
 them. In 1774, Parliament passed an act allowing them to testify 
 their allegiance. Even this was a boon; for, hitherto, the exist- 
 ence of a Roman Catholic was not recognised in the eye of the law. 
 In 1778, they were permitted to hold lands on leases for nine hun- 
 dred and ninety-nine years, on subscribing an oath of allegiance : 
 and were relieved from a law by which a son might force a settle- 
 ment from his father, by professing conformity to the established 
 (Episcopal) religion. 
 
 In the year 1793, the progress of the French revolution had ex- 
 cited a spirit of restless innovation, which, instead of endeavoring 
 to obtain the redress of real grievances, by constitutional means, 
 displayed itself in acts of violence against the constituted authori- 
 ties. The ministry, partly with a view to conciliate the great body 
 of the people, partly in accordance with the growing spirit of liberal- 
 ity, granted, through the Irish Parliament, to the Roman Catholics, 
 besides several minor privileges, the right of voting for the election 
 of members of the House of Commons, although none but Protesr- 
 tants were allowed to sit in Parliament. But this concession was 
 accepted as a right rather than as a favor. The spirit of discontent 
 was sedulously fostered by a society, consisting of both Protestants 
 and Roman Catholics, formed in Belfast, in 1791, under the name 
 of “United Irishmen,” and afterwards extended to Dublin, and 
 other places. Its professed object was the obtaining of Parliament- 
 ary reform; but, soon enlarging its views with its increase of 
 strength, it determined on obtaining a separation from England by 
 force of arms. Such was the activity of its members, that, in a few 
 years, they had organized a secret confederacy of five hundred thou- 
 sand men. Their measures, at home, were ably seconded abroad, 
 by Theobald Wolfe Tone, originally the Secretary of the society, 
 who, having been forced to fly, in order to avoid a criminal prose- 
 cution for high treason, succeeded in prevailing on the republican 
 government of France to send a large armament, under their favor- 
 ite, General Hoche, to invade Ireland. The fleet, by a most daring 
 manoeuvre, arrived in safety on the south coast of Ireland ; but the 
 vessel of their commander-in-chief having been separated from the 
 rest by a storm, Grouchy, the next in command, by his indecision, 
 lost the opportunity of effecting a landing, and the fleet, after lying 
 
 
SUPPRESSION OF THE REBELLION, 
 
 97 
 
 a few days in Ban try Bay, retraced its course, and, with the loss of 
 three vessels, the remainder arrived at Brest, in safety. 
 
 The possibility of the recurrence of such a visitation, urged the 
 government to use the most vigorous and even violent means for 
 its prevention. The Protestants were all armed under the name of 
 Yeomanry. The country was put under military law ; suspected 
 persons were seized, tried by court martial, and scourged or exe- 
 cuted by its summary sentence. Torture was employed to force 
 confession. At length, in the spring of 1798, the rebellion which 
 had been fermented by the United Irishmen, and urged forward by 
 the barbarities of the government, burst forth in the counties of 
 Wexford and Antrim. After a short, but sanguinary struggle, it 
 was quelled. A small force of about one thousand French landed 
 in the autumn of the same year, at Killala, and after routing the 
 troops collected to oppose them, penetrated as far as the county of 
 Longford, where they surrendered to the overwhelming numbers 
 brought against them by Lord Cornwallis, then Lord Lieutenant. 
 
 With the reduction of the ravaging bands in the mountains of 
 Wicklow, and with the death of Tone, the chief conspirator, ended 
 this rebellion. No sooner had the agitation, caused by the rebellion 
 subsided, than the public attention was called to the discussion of 
 that most important measure, a legislative union between Great 
 Britain and Ireland ; — a measure which was never lost sight of by 
 the British government, since the period of the regency question, in 
 1789. The means necessary to carry this measure were now 
 entrusted to the management of Lord Cornwallis, (Lord Lieuten- 
 ant,) the same who surrendered to the American and French ar- 
 mies, at Yorktown, in the United States, in 1781. This union was 
 now recommended by the Viceroy, in the name of the King, to the 
 Irish Parliament, in 1799, when the principal manager on the part 
 of the crown was Lord Castlereagh. In the House of Lords a 
 favorable address respecting union was voted by a large majority ; 
 in the Commons, after a long debate, there was a majority of only 
 one in favor of the measure, (one hundred and six to one hundred 
 and five ;) when it was again brought forward, however, those 
 who opposed the union had a majority of five, (one hundred and 
 eleven to one hundred and six,) and it was therefore postponed 
 until the next session. When the Irish Parliament again assembled, 
 on the loth of January, 1800, the subject of union became the 
 
98 
 
 THE UNION WITH GREAT BRITAIN. 
 
 principal topic of discussion. The opposition had decreased con- 
 siderably since the preceding year, although the people were divided 
 throughout Ireland into unionists and anti-unionists. After ani- 
 mated debates, the bill incorporating the two kingdoms into one, 
 passed the House of Commons, by a vote of one hundred and fifty- 
 eight to one hundred and fifteen, and the House of Lords, on the 
 first resolution, by a vote of seventy-five to twenty-six. 
 
 The debates on the question of union were protracted, and marked 
 with distinguished ability. Among the most prominent advocates of 
 the measure in the House of Commons, were Lord Castlereagh, Mr. 
 W. Smith, Colonel Fitzgerald, Mr. MacClelland, General Loftus, and 
 Lord Charles Fitzgerald, and the opponents were Mr. Henry Grattan, 
 Sir John Parnell, R. L. Edgeworth,* John C. Beresford, G. Pon- 
 sonby, Mr. Burrowes, and Mr. O’Donnell. While the subject was 
 under discussion the unionists were insulted by the lower classes 
 of the people, and the public prints joined in the clamor. Accord- 
 ing to Mr. O’Connell’s statement, while the union was in progress 
 the habeas corpus act was suspended — all constitutional freedom 
 was annihilated in Ireland — martial law was proclaimed — the voice 
 of Ireland was suppressed — the Irish people had no protection— thus 
 the union was achieved in total despite of the Irish nation.” 
 
 Mr. O’Connell also says, “ the union was inflicted on Ireland by 
 the combined operation of terror, torture, force, fraud, and corrup- 
 tion. The pecuniary corruption amounted altogether to about three 
 millions of pounds sterling. But this was not all — the expenditure 
 of patronage was still more open, avowed, and profligate ; peerages 
 were a familiar article of traffic— in short all grades of offices — the 
 sanctuary of the law and the temple of religion weretrafficed upon 
 as bribes, and given in exchange for votes in Parliament in favor of 
 the union.” 
 
 With all due respect for “ the Liberator,” we find it difficult to 
 admit the justice of this wholesale denunciation of his countrymen, 
 whatever may be said of the British government, for it must be 
 recollected, that seventy-five Irish Peers and one hundred and fifty- 
 eisfht Irish members of the House of Commons voted for the union. 
 Some allowance, perhaps, should be made for the hyperbolical lan- 
 guage in which political men sometimes indulge in the enthusiasm 
 of argument or debate. 
 
 * Father of Miss Maria Edgeworth, the authoress. 
 
CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION REFUSED. 
 
 99 
 
 Soon after the union bill had passed through both houses of the 
 Irish Parliament, Mr. Pitt brought a bill in the same form into the 
 British House of Commons, where it passed with but little opposition, 
 and the House of Lords adopted it without a division. On the 2d of 
 July, 1S00, it received the King’s signature, and went into opera- 
 tion on the 1st January, 1801. 
 
 By the act of union, the representation of Ireland was fixed at 
 twenty-eight Peers and four Prelates, to the British House of Lords, 
 and one hundred members to be elected to the House of Commons. 
 This was not considered a fair proportion .of the representation to 
 which Ireland was entitled in the British Parliament. It would 
 probably have been better for both countries, had one hundred 
 Peers and one hundred and fifty Commoners, at least, been allowed 
 seats in the United'Parliament, as representatives of Ireland.* 
 
 It had been generally understood, while negociating the union, 
 that, in the event of its taking place, the Catholics might look for- 
 ward to the removal of their disabilities. The hopes held out for 
 Catholic emancipation induced many of the Catholics to favor the 
 union, and others to remain neutral on the question ; although the 
 majority of those of that faith, as well as of the Protestants, were 
 probably opposed to the measure. In the expectations, however, 
 which the Catholics had been led to form, they were disappointed; 
 and the friends of this measure were baffled in several attempts 
 which they made to procure the repeal of Catholic disabilities. 
 
 While the Earl of Rosslyn was the keeper of the conscience of 
 his majesty, George III., the question was first mooted, whether the 
 emancipation of the Catholics in Ireland would be an infringement 
 of the coronation oath, which enjoins upon the sovereign the duty 
 of preserving and defending the Protestant religion. The doctrine 
 was particularly enforced in the enfeebling hour of disease, and the 
 impression gained with convalescence. The fancy that took pos- 
 session of the mind of the King on this subject, which led to his de- 
 claration that he never would consent to Catholic emancipation, is 
 supposed to have been impressed upon him by the suggestions or 
 arguments of Lord Loughborough, a most subtle law officer of the 
 crown. George III., being thus restrained, by conscientious scru- 
 ples, from allowing his ministers to redeem their pledges, given or 
 
 * The discontents caused by the union broke out in an insurrection in 1803, headed by 
 Mr. Robert Emmett, which was soon suppressed. Mr. Emmett was tried and executed. 
 
100 
 
 AGITATION OF THE CATHOLIC QUESTION. 
 
 implied, to grant Catholic emancipation, Mr. Pitt, Prime Minister* 
 and others of the cabinet, resigned. Mr. Pitt was afterwards cen- 
 sured for consenting to return to power, under these circumstances. 
 The public mind, both in Great Britain and Ireland, became much 
 excited on the Catholic question. Many pamphlets appeared on each 
 side. It created a new point for political adventurers to rally round ; 
 all the seceders from Mr. Pitt who emulated not his virtue, in sacri- 
 ficing situation to principle, ranged themselves underpins new 
 banner. On one side the whole corps in office, flanked by all the 
 dependants and expectants upon government patronage, and sup- 
 ported by certain members of the two hierarchies, British and Hiber- 
 nian, maintained that Catholic emancipation would be a direct vio- 
 lation of the coronation oath. On the other hand, the public beheld 
 the unusual phenomenon of the great political rivals, Pitt and Fox, 
 with their respective friends and adherents, maintaining the impe- 
 perious necessity of the measure, and denying that the free will of 
 the Executive could, in any possible case, be constitutionally fet- 
 terred from assenting to whatever bill the Lords and Commons may 
 advise ; that the coronation oath, by its words and spirit, enjoins the 
 observance of existing laws ; and the constitution leaves them es- 
 sentially open to repeal and modification, according to the exigen- 
 cies of times and circumstances. 
 
 The reign of George III. continued until 1820, but as the House 
 of Lords was opposed to Catholic emancipation, the King was 
 never called upon to veto any bill for that object. In 1810, in con- 
 sequence of the indisposition of his majesty, the Prince of Wales 
 was appointed Regent of Great Britain and Ireland, and succeeded 
 his father, in 1820, under the title of George IV.; — he reigned 
 until 1830, and by him was the bill for the removal of the dis- 
 abilities of the Catholics signed, in 1829. Three times previously 
 had the House of Commons passed a similar bill, and each of those 
 times was the measure rejected. “ The House of Lords, however, 
 yielded to the fourth assault, backed as it was, by the power of the 
 Irish nation.” 
 
 Amongst those to whom the cause of Catholic emancipation is 
 indebted for its success, the most prominent is its noted champion, 
 Daniel O’Connell, who wielded the power which he gradually ob- 
 tained, with talent and energy, far surpassing any of his predecessors 
 in the same cause. Mr. O’Connell was born in the year 1776, in the 
 
MR. O’CONNELL AND THE CATHOLIC ASSOCIATION. 101 
 
 county of Kerry, his father, Morgan O’Connell, having been one of 
 twenty-two children, of whom several lived to the age of eighty years. 
 The family are to the present day extensive proprietors of land in 
 the county of Kerry, having in this respect distinguished themselves 
 from many Irish families, who have neither retained their ancient 
 patrimony, nor received for it any reasonable equivalent. Mr. 
 O’ConneUfis descended from a line of ancestors, who once enjoyed 
 regal swfy in that part of Ireland. Kerry was once the kingdom of 
 Iveragh, and Mr. O’Connell is now at the head of one of those great 
 Irish septs, of which we have so frequently made mention in this 
 history. The territorial revenue of his inheritance is said to be 
 now four or five thousand pounds per year. He was admitted to 
 the Irish bar in 1798, and soon rose to eminence as a lawyer. We 
 believe he first appeared in political life, as an opponent of the union, 
 at a meeting of the citizens of Dublin, in 1S00, on that subject. 
 
 When the Catholics organized, a few years afterwards, for the 
 purpose of urging their claims for relief, Mr. O’Connell took a 
 prominent part among them, particularly in 1S09. Mr. Grattan 
 presented their petition to Parliament in February, 1S10, which, of 
 course, was unsuccessful. 
 
 The visit of George IV. to Ireland, in 1821, was viewed by the 
 Irish Catholics as an event likely to be of paramount importance. 
 The Catholics and Protestants united to do honor to the Kino-. Mr. 
 O’Connell and Mr. O’Gorman were the first to proffer, at the head 
 of the Catholics, their unbounded devotion to his majesty. Every 
 where he was hailed by the populace as the extinguisher of discord 
 and the father of his people. The King ordered a letter to be ad- 
 dressed to the Irish people full of excellent counsel, advising peace 
 and union, but of the actual redress of their grievances, it said not a 
 word. 
 
 The Catholic association was formed in 1823, through means 
 brought about by Mr. O’Connell and Mr. Sheil, who resolved, at 
 that time, to make an effort to arouse the Catholic people of Ireland. 
 The association was formed by thirteen persons, who met in Dub- 
 lin, on the 25th of May, 1823. Of this body Mr. O’Connell was the 
 heart and soul ; and its auxiliaries soon spread over the island, and 
 it became the most powerful instrument in bringing about Catholic 
 emancipation. 
 
 14 
 
102 
 
 CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION BILL PASSED. 
 
 In 1825, the British Parliament passed an act to suppress the 
 association, and other unlawful societies. In 1827, a motion, favor- 
 able to the Catholics, was lost in the House of Commons, two hun- 
 dred and seventy-six to two hundred and seventy-two. In the fol- 
 lowing year, it was carried, in the House of Commons, by a major- 
 ity of six, and lost, in the House of Lords, by forty-four. The same 
 year, the Catholics resolved to try the expedient of electing Mr. 
 O’Connell to Parliament, which was effected from the <k>unty of 
 Clare, notwithstanding the legal disabilities in the case. He, of 
 course, refused to take the oaths required, and was refused his seat 
 in the British House of Commons. In 1829, as we have mentioned, 
 the Catholic emancipation bill was passed by Parliament. This 
 was during the administration of Wellington and Peel, who came 
 to the conclusion that sound policy required this concession to the 
 Catholics. Mr. O’Connell was then re-elected from Clare. 
 
 The Catholic Emancipation Bill was carried in the House of 
 Commons, by three hundred and fifty-three, against one hundred 
 and eighty, and by two hundred and seventeen to one hundred and 
 twelve, in the House of Lords. The agitations respecting the Catno- 
 lic Relief Bill, had, in some measure, subsided, when, June 26, 
 1830, George IV. died., and was succeeded by his brother, the 
 Duke of Clarence, under the title of William IV. This monarch 
 reigned until the 20th of .Tune, 1837, when, on his death, he was 
 succeeded by his niece, Victoria, (her present majesty,) who was 
 then in her eighteenth year. In the reign of William IV., the Re- 
 form Bill was passed, by which the representation of Ireland, in the 
 British House of Commons, was increased five members, viz.: from 
 one hundred, to one hundred and five ; and thus a favorable oppor- 
 tunity was omitted of doing justice to Ireland, by giving her, at 
 least, fifty members more, as a fair proportion of the House, com- 
 pared with Great Britain. 
 
 During the summer of 1834, the Whig ministry endeavored to 
 carry through Parliament, a bill to enable them to take unusual 
 measures for restraining turbulence in Ireland. In consequence of 
 a difficulty experienced in passing the bill, Earl Grey and Lord 
 Althorp resigned their situations. Viscount Melbourne was then 
 appointed Prime Minister, and Lord Althorp was induced to re- 
 sume office. The Irish Coercion Bill, with certain alterations, was 
 then passed. On the 23rd of April, 1834, Mr. O’Connell, who had 
 
LAWS PASSED FOR THE BENEFIT OF IRELAND. 
 
 103 
 
 been elected from the city of Dublin, made a motion, in the House 
 of Commons, relative to a repeal of the legislative union of Ireland 
 with Great Britain, which was rejected — five hundred and twenty- 
 three to thirty-eight, — all of the Repealers , except one , being Irish 
 members. 
 
 King William IV., in consequence of an address from Parlia- 
 ment, appointed, in 1833, a commission of Protestant and Catholic 
 gentlemen, including several Prelates, to inquire into the condition 
 of the poorer classes in Ireland, and into the various institutions 
 established for their relief. This inquiry lasted untM 1836, when 
 the commissioners made their report to Parliament, embodying 
 much interesting information respecting the condition of the people 
 of Ireland, and recommending certain measures for their relief. 
 Since that time, the British Parliament have passed several impor- 
 tant laws, intended for the benefit of Ireland, particularly acts re- 
 lating to tithes, and others extending the privileges of the people 
 with regard to municipal corporations ; also, in 1S38, “ an act for 
 the more effectual relief of the destitute poor in Ireland by 
 which, among other provisions, work houses and houses of indus- 
 try were to be provided for the employment of the poor. This act 
 is disapproved of by Mr. O’Connell, and others in Ireland; but 
 many think it requires more time than it has had, to test its practi- 
 cal effects. 
 
 TITHES, AND THE ESTABLISHED CHURCH IN IRELAND. 
 
 One great cause of dissatisfaction among the Irish people, is the operation of the laws 
 for the support of religion, particularly the tithe system. The tithes, which, at the period 
 they were fixed in each parish, were regarded as a benefit, have been so perverted, in 
 Ireland, from the object of their institution, that they are regarded as a crying abuse ; and 
 in fact, have become such. The Benedictine, and other orders of Catholic monks, in the 
 middle ages, had many ecclesiastical establishments in Ireland ; and it was these orders 
 that founded, successively, all the livings, in places where a certain number of cottages 
 were clustered together. 
 
 The inhabitants helped to support these establishments, by paying a tithe of their har- 
 vests; and they experienced, in fact, a great advantage, as the order which founded the 
 living, erected a church and gave them a pastor, who spared them long journeys to per- 
 form their religious duties— who instructed their children— who was their physician, in 
 times of sickness— arbiter in their disputes— and, being in correspondence with those 
 orders who were the most skilful agriculturists in Europe, instructed them in the art of 
 agriculture, till then unknown At the period referred to, were imported into England 
 and Ireland, cattle, trees, and plants, which had never before been known in those coun- 
 
104 
 
 TITHES AND CHURCH ESTABLISHMENT. 
 
 tries. The fact deserves attention, that this tithe formed a kind of link between the igno- 
 rant and the learned, the poor and the rich ; and that the richest countries were those in 
 which there were large and small tithes; because, there the rich and the learned enjoyed 
 a wider field of action, than in those parts where the portion of the-clergy was limited to 
 the thirtieth sheaf of corn. We must further remark, that, where the cultivator was 
 not the land owner, but only the tenant, or oc cu Pier, the payment of this tithe did not fall 
 upon him; for he took the farm on lease, at a ’ ice proportioned to the burdens which it 
 had to support; and, in the end, the whole was expended in the parish. 
 
 At the period of the Reformation, this association was destroyed, and ecclesiastical pro- 
 perty confiscated. The produce of the tithes was given to Protestant Episcopal Clergy- 
 men, many of whom, having no flocks, resided in Dublin or England ; leaving the Catholic 
 agriculturists under the conscientious scruple of paying tithes to those they considered 
 heretics, and of giving a morsel of bread to their own Catholic Pastor, — which they have 
 done, for three centuries, with a devotion that proves the sincerity of their attachment to 
 the religion of their fathers, and to their sacerdotal institutions. The Presbyterians, and 
 other Protestant Dissenters, are in the same position with the Catholics, as to tithes. 
 
 Notwithstanding that the number of the members of the established (Episcopal) Church 
 is comparatively small in Ireland, (he tithes have been levied with the greatest rigor. 
 The following is a table of the number of Episcopal livings and parishes, in each ecclesi- 
 astical province of Ireland, furnished by the Commissioners who, in 1834, were charged to 
 inquire into the state of instruction : 
 
 Ecclesiastical Provinces. 
 
 Number of Livings. 
 
 Parishes. 
 
 Episcopal population. 
 
 Armagh, (Ulster,) 
 
 552 
 
 658 
 
 517,722 
 
 Dublin, (Leinster,) 
 
 311 
 
 624 
 
 177,930 
 
 Cashel, (Munster,) 
 
 469 
 
 791 
 
 111,813 
 
 Tuam, (Connaught,) 
 
 103 
 
 275 
 
 44,599 
 
 Total, 
 
 1435 
 
 2348 
 
 852,064 
 
 This shows an average of only 363 persons, (men, women, and children,) to a parish, 
 and less than COO persons, on an average, to each living. The amount of the tithes varies 
 much in the different parishes, viz. from Id. to 4s, per acre. In some of the parishes where 
 tithes are exacted, there are no Protestants. The tithe composition, for the whole tithe- 
 able land of Ireland, amounts to about £665,000 a year ; of this, about £555,000 is for 
 ecclesiastical, and £110,000 for lay tithe. 
 
 .The fixed resources of the Episcopal Church, in Ireland, are abundantly sufficient for the 
 support of the establishment. The Church possessed, in 1834, 669,247 acres, on which, if 
 leased at only £1 per acre, the rents would be more than sufficient to provide incomes for 
 the Prelates and Clergy, on the following scale: — 2 Archbishops, £4,000 each; 10 Bishops, 
 £3,000 each; 1435 beneficed Clergy, at £300 each, on aa average; 670 Curates, at £150 
 each; leaving a large surplus for contingencies. 
 
 The annual revenues of the Archbishops and Bishops, in 1831, (then 22 in number, now 
 reduced to 12,) amounted to £151,128, and the total income of the established Church was 
 £865,535. The tithes of most parishes have since been compounded for, — the amount 
 being estimated, as we have stated, at £555,000, for ecclesiastical purposes. The amount 
 of church revenues, in 1833, was stated at £937,456, including £657,670 for tithes. 
 
 The population of Ireland, according to the different religions, as furnished by the Com- 
 missioners of Inquiry, in 1834, was — Roman Catholics, 6,427,712: Episcopalians, 852,064; 
 Presbyterians, 642,356; other Dissenters, 21, 80S; total, 7,943,440. The present population 
 is about eight millions five hundred thousand, of whom about 82 per cent, are Catholics, 10 
 per cent. Episcopalians, and 8 per cent. Presbyterians and other Dissenters. 
 
 A 
 
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 Vi 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Date Due 
 
941.5 W722P 
 
 367302