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TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY

^^-^

TWO CHAPTERS

IRISH HISTORY

I. THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II

II. THE ALLEGED VIOLATION OF THE TREATY
OF LIMERICK

I'.Y

T. DUNBAR JNGRAM, LL.D.

AUTHOR OF
' A HISTORY OF THE LEGISLATIVE UNION OF GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND '

" Irish policy is Irish history, and I have no faith in any statesman
who attempts to remedy the evils of Ireland who is either ignorant of the
past or who will not take lessons from it." — Beaconsfield.

iLontion

MA'CMILLAN AND CO.

AND NEW YORK

1888

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II

PAGE

Section I. Ireland from 1641 to the Accession of

James II . . . .1

„ II. The Preparation for the Parliament . 29

III. The Parliament of 1689 . . .59

CHAPTER II

THE ALLEGED VIOLATION OF THE TREATY OF LIMERICK

Section I. The Second Siege and Treaty of Limerick 93

„ II. The Charge of Intolerance against the

Irish Protestant Parliament . .124

APPENDIX

1. Two Columns of Names from the List of Persons

Attainted by the Irish Parliament . . 141

2. Treaty of Limerick, as Ratified by their Majesties'

Letters Patent under the Great Seal of England 143

250245

CHAPTER I
THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II

' > > >

■

SECTION I

IRELAND FROM 1641 TO THE ACCESSION OF JAMES II

The forty years which immediately preceded the break-
ing out of the Eebelliou of 1G41 were the most peaceful
and prosperous which Ireland had seen for centuries. The
industrial progress of the island during this period was
remarkable. For the first time in her history Ireland paid
her way. The soil was greatly improved by applying to it
modes of husbandry with which the native inhabitants had
hitherto been unacquainted. New and profitable employments
were introduced, manufactures were established. The linen
manufacture in particular had made such an advance as to
establish among our historians the mistaken idea that it was first
introduced by Lord Strafford. 1 The value of lands and their
rents had increased. In 1640 the customs amounted to almost
four times the sum which was received from them at the
commencement of the century. Shipping had increased a

1 Lon" before Strafford was born linen cloth was manufactured in
and exported from Ireland. To buy linen cloth, except in open fair,
was punishable by the 33 Henry VIII, c. 2. By the 11 Eliz. c. 10 it
was forbidden to export linen yarns without paying the enormous duty
of twelvepence a pound. By the 13 Eliz. c. 1 it was provided that
none but merchants inhabiting staple or corporate towns should export
cloth made of linen yarn. The Eev. Charles O'Conor says, " The
antiquity of linen cloth in Ireland is lost in the night of the remotest
ages of our history." — Historical Address, pt. ii. p. 255.

■

• ■

TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

hundredfold, commerce had extended, and the export trade
was in the most satisfactory condition. Sir John Davis,
writing in 1G13, tells us in his quaint and figurative language
that the strings of the Irish harp were all in tune and made
a good harmony in the commonwealth : " So as we may well
conceive a hope that Ireland . . . will from henceforth prove
a land of peace and concord." 1

But the strings of the Irish harp were not fated to be long
in tune, or to give forth harmonious sounds. The growing
prosperity of Ireland was shattered in a moment. Encouraged
by the Scotch invasion of England, and by the successes which
his revolted subjects had obtained over Charles I, the Irish
wantonly threw away the blessings offered them by Providence.
The rebellion broke out on the 22d of October 1641. At first
it was purely anti-English. The northern rebels declared that
" they would not leave an Englishman in the country ; that
they would have no English king, but one of their own
nation, and Sir Phelim O'Neal should be their king ; that
neither the King nor Queen of England should govern Ireland
any longer ; that if they had His Majesty in their power
they would flay him alive ; that they would give a great sum
of money to have his head," etc. 2 But Roger Moore persuaded
the rebels to refrain from open threats against the English,
and to rest the whole merits of their case upon the subject
of religion. The race-feeling of the northern Irish against
the English was so strong that it even extended to and was
directed against the Roman Catholics of the Pale because
they were of English descent. Whilst Ambrose Bedell, son

1 For evidence as to the prosperous condition of Ireland before
1641 see Leland, iii. 41 ; Clarendon's Irish Rebellion, pp. 6-9 ; O'Conor's
Historical Address, pt.*ii. p. 255; Carte's Ormond, i. 87, folio ed. ; Sir
George Radcliffe's Essay towards a Life of Lord Strafford. Richard
Belling, in his History of the Irish Confederation, gives very strong
testimony to the same effect.

2 Carte's Ormond, i. 178.

sec. I THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 3

of the well-known Bishop Bedell, was prisoner among the
rebels, he often heard the Ulster Irish threatening those of
the Pale and using such expressions to them as these, " You
churls with the great breeches, do you think that, if we were
rid of the other English, we would spare you ? No ! for we
would cut all your throats, for you are of one race with
them, though we make use of you for the present." 1

When the rebellion broke out, more than two-thirds of
the landed property of Ireland was in the hands of the
Eoman Catholics, who were Celts either by blood or by
traditions. 2 This one fact, of which there is not the slightest
doubt, reveals to us the striking difference between the way
the Normans acted in England and that in which the English
acted in Ireland ; and brings out the startling contrast
between the conduct of the Saxon after the conquest and
that of the Irish native after the English invasion. In
England, after the battle of Hastings, there was not a single
estate, certainly not one that was desirable in a Norman's eye,
which was not transferred to one of the invaders. Yet the
despoiled Saxon, after a few generations, forgot his wrongs and
coalesced with his conqueror to form with him a national
unity. In Ireland, notwithstanding some cases of encroach-
ment, the Celt over the greater portion of the country was left
in possession of his land. But the Irish native has ever sullenly
refused to unite loyally with the Englishman and to share his
labours and progress. To him time has brought no amnesty of
complaints,no limitation of offences, and no healing onits wings.
The reason of the difference in the conduct of the Saxon and
the Celtic communities is not far to seek. Long before the
Norman conquest the steady pressure of force had consolidated

1 Deposition of Ambrose Bedell, Hickson's Ireland in the Seven-
teenth Century, i. 218.

2 Sir William Petty's Political Anatomy of Ireland. Colonel
Laurence says the Roman Catholics before the rebellion owned ten
acres to one possessed by the English. — The Interest of Ireland, pt. ii. c. 2.

4 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chai>. i

the Saxon principalities into a kingdom, and the idea of a single
sovereign and central power had taken a firm hold on the English
mind. But nothing like this had happened in Ireland, where
a crowd of chiefs exercised perpetual wars against one another.
The tribal or clannish spirit, which is wholly antagonistic to
the conception of a State or to union under a strong central
authority, survived in the Irish Celt. 1 It was this spirit
which disabled him in the past from raising himself to the
idea of a united nation : it is the same spirit which at the
present time disqualifies him from conceiving that of an
Empire. So deeply is this notion of a limited separate
interest apart from the general interests of the common weal,
engrained in the Irish mind, that it has been introduced into
our parliamentary system by the representatives of Celtic
Ireland. These representatives, unable to grasp the concep-
tion of serving for the whole realm, have cast aside the
sacred duty of voting freely and independently according to
their conscience. They have bound themselves by a covenant
to sit, act, and vote, not as the interests of the Empire demand,
but according as a majority of themselves shall dictate. 2

The failure of Great Britain to conciliate the Irish Celt is
but a temporary one. For it is not for want of the incorpor-
ating genius that she has not succeeded in this case. The
British race has proved, and is daily proving, its capacity for
absorbing and assimilating alien and foreign nationalities.
The Scotch, Welsh, and Cornish Celts are hardly distinguish-

1 A keen observer remarked the disintegrating effects of the tribal
system in Gaul. In Gallia, says Csesar, non solum in omnibus pagis
partibusque, seal pene etiam in singulis domibus factiones sunt.

2 This covenant runs as follows : " I pledge myself that in the
event of my election to Parliament I will sit, act, and vote with the
Irish parliamentary party ; and if at a meeting of the party, convened
upon due notice specially to consider the question, it be determined
by a resolution supported by a majority of the entire parliamentary
party, that I have not fulfilled the above pledge, I hereby undertake
forthwith to resign my seat."

sec. I THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 5

able from the rest of our nation. Danes and Normans have
for centuries sunk into the general body of the people. The
French Huguenots and the Flemish artisans have long for-
gotten the land and the tongue of their fathers. The Hindoo,
the Mussulman, the Sikh, and the Buddhist are pressing
eagerly into the family of the imperial mother. Of the three
hundred millions of British subjects, more than a third of the
human race, three and a half millions only — Irish Celts —
stand apart sullen and discontented. The Irish branch of the
great Celtic family alone remains unreconciled. It is the
only one among the Celtic communities which has given up
its own tongue and adopted that of the invader, together with
his manners, customs, arts, and literature, and has at the
same time refused to consider itself a child of the same house-
hold with the stranger. Yet there is nothing in the Celtic
nature which presents a perennial bar to complete incorporation.
Not to speak of the cases of Scotland, of Wales, and of Cornwall,
the Celts of Gaul borrowed the language and civilisation of
Borne, and became in time as Roman as the Bomans themselves.
The rebellion of 1641 lasted more than eleven years, for
it was not until the 27th of September 1653 that the Parlia-
ment was enabled to declare it at an end. It would be
impossible within a limited space to give even a sketch of the
boundless confusion and universal misery of these disastrous
years. Europe has never witnessed, even in the Thirty Years'
war, such a scene of discord and anarchy as prevailed in this
small island during this period. It is wearisome to read, it
would be useless, if possible, to relate the innumerable compli-
cations, transformations, entrances and exits, which took
place. 1 There were always five parties in the field, sometimes

1 Thus Owen Roe O'Neill was (1) opposed to Munro and the
Ormondists ; (2) to the Confederates, while he supported the Nuncio
and the papal party ; (3) he joined the parliamentary party and
relieved Londonderry, which Coote held for that party ; Owen receiv-
ing £2000 in money, some ammunition, and 2000 cows ; (4) he

6 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

six, — the Northern Irish, the Royalists under Ormond, the
Confederates of Kilkenny, the parliamentary party, the
Nuncio's party, and Munro's Presbyterians. Though we can
but glance at the actors and events of the rebellion, we are
only too well acquainted with its fatal results. The historian 1
informs us that " the desolation of the island was complete.
One third of the people had perished or been driven into
exile. Famine and plague had finished the work of the
sword. The fields lay uncultivated ; and the miserable
remnants of the flying population were driven to live on
carrion and human corpses. The wolves so increased in
numbers, even around the city of Dublin itself, that the
counties were taxed for their extermination, and rewards were
paid of five pounds for the head of a full-grown wolf, and two
pounds for that of a cub." 2

When the English Government at the close of the re-
bellion had obtained possession of the country, and subdued
the factions which had so long preyed on the vitals of Ire-
land, the parliamentary scheme for the settlement of Ireland
was carried into effect. The plan had been drawn up in
August 1G52, before the complete pacification of the country,
and is to be found among the Acts of that year. 3 This plan

finally agreed to unite with Ormond, and was on his march to join him
when he died at Cloughouter, 6th November 1 649. The career of Ebher
MacMahon, Bishop of Clogher, was as variable as that of Owen O'Neill.

1 Walpole.

" Ludlow says that at the end of the war " a proclamation was
published forbidding the killing of lambs and calves for the year next
ensuing, that the country might recover a stock again, which had
been so exhausted by the wars that many of the natives who had com-
mitted all manner of waste upon the possessions of the English were
driven to such extremities that they starved with hunger ; and I have
been informed by persons deserving credit that the same calamity fell
upon them even in the first year of the rebellion through the depreda-
tions of the Irish • and that they roasted men and eat them to supply
their necessities." — Memoirs, i. 338.

3 " Settling of Ireland," c. 13, 1652. Qcohell's Acts and Ordinances,
p. 197.

sec. I THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 7

will ever be regarded with different eyes by two classes of
readers. One class, fixing its attention on the sufferings of
individuals and the vicissitudes of families, will deplore the
misfortunes of ancient and respectable houses, and exclaim
against the scheme and its projectors. The other class will
merge their compassion for individuals in their indignation
at the misery of the great body of the people brought to
destruction by the sins and wickedness of their natural
leaders. The general scope of the settlement w T as to punish
the Irish aristocracy and gentry who had misgoverned their
country, arrested the growing prosperity of Ireland, and
plunged the land into a scene of bloodshed and anarchy
compared with which the French Revolution was a peaceful
reform. The object of the settlement was to bring home and
limit the punishment to the castle and mansion, while it
held out security and protection to the cottage and the hovel.
The settlement has been misrepresented, but it remains in
black and white, and ought to be examined and consulted by
all who wish to have clear and distinct ideas respecting it.
The first thing which strikes a reader of it is its leniency. 1
It was not a plan for the transplantation of a whole com-
munity, but for the removal of the leaders of that community,
who had neglected the laws upon which societies are based,

1 Here are all the provisions of the Settlement with the exception
of two, which relate to estates tail and individuals under articles of
surrender : —

" 1. 'All husbandmen, ploughmen, labourers, artificers and others
of the inferior sort ' are received into protection. They and all per-
sons ' having no real estate nor personal estate to the value of ten
pounds ' [a sum equivalent to .£50 now] are pardoned for any act or
thing done during the rebellion.

"2. All who before the 10th of November 1642 contrived or
promoted the rebellion, murders, and massacres, excepted from
pardon.

" 3. Jesuits and priests who had contrived or promoted the re-
bellion, or any of the murders and massacres, excepted.

" 4. A hundred and six Anglo-Irish and Irish persons excepted by
name.

8 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

who had turned their country into a hell upon earth for
twelve long years, and who had caused the death of more
than half a million of their fellow citizens. The follies and
crimes of the Irish aristocracy and gentry were infinitely
greater than those which the French aristocracy and gentry
expiated a hundred and fifty years later by a universal con-
fiscation and their own decimation. The Irish had established
a government in opposition to that of England ; they had
convened a general assembly of their nation regularly formed
into Lords and Commons ; raised armies and appointed
generals ; erected courts of justice ; drawn up a new oath
of allegiance ; despatched envoys to invite foreign powers,
the Pope, Emperor, and King of France, to lend their assist-
ance ; and finally they had hawked the crown of Ireland
about Europe, and ottered it to any Catholic prince who
would take it under his protection. Yet the punishment
which overtook the Irish aristocracy was infinitely less severe
than that which befell the nobility and gentry of France.

" 5. Principals and accessories to the murder of private persons,
not officers either in the English, or Irish armies, excepted.

" 6. Twenty- eight days, after publication of a future notice,
allowed to persons in arms to submit, otherwise excepted.

" 7. Persons who had borne high commands, as generals, colonels,
governors of forts, marshals of provinces, etc., to be banished during
pleasure of Parliament and to forfeit two-thirds of their estates ; lands
to the value of the remaining third to be assigned to their wives and
children in such parts of Ireland as the Parliament should determine.

"8. Power to parliamentary commissioners or commander-in-chief
to declare pardon for their lives to all other persons who had been in
arms ; such persons, however, to forfeit two-thirds of their estates,
lauds to the value of the remaining third to be assigned them in such
parts of Ireland as the Parliament should determine.

"9. All Roman Catholic proprietors who had resided in Ireland
from the commencement of the rebellion to the 1st of March 1650,
and had not manifested their constant good affection to the Common-
wealth, to forfeit one-third of their Lands ; lands to the value of the
other two-thirds to be assigned them in such places as the Parliament
should think lit. All others who had not manifested 'their good
affection ' to forfeit one-fifth."

sec. i THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 9

Not a head of the whole Irish body fell upon the scaffold
except for private murder, 1 and when the convulsion had been
brought to a close, a decent competence in land was allowed
its members for the support of themselves and their families.

After the rebellion the landed property which re-
mained in the hands of the Roman Catholics amounted to
about one hundred thousand Irish acres of profitable lands in
the other parts of Ireland, and seven hundred thousand acres
of the same kind in Connaught and Clare. 2 This proportion
continued down through the interregnum till the restoration
of Charles II in 1660. 3

When in 1655, at the end of the rebellion, the English
settlers obtained possession of the lands which were dis-
tributed to them under the Parliamentary Settlement, the
desolation of the country was complete. Ireland was a
wilderness, over which the storms of war, of pestilence, and
of famine had raged without intermission for twelve years.
But the adventurers and soldiers set to work with a will,
aided by the peasants, who remained in their homes as
tenants or servants to the new proprietors. Industry, as
usual, was followed by its natural results, and Ireland soon
began to put on a new face. Even Clarendon, the author of
the absurd story that the English Parliament intended the
extermination of the Irish, admits that the country flourished
to an unexampled extent under this arrangement. Two
pictures of the state of Ireland, one of its condition before

1 Sir Phelim O'Neill was not only tried for treason, but for
being accessory to six murders. — Hickson's Ireland in the Seventeenth
Century, i. 157.

2 State of the Papist and Protestant properties in Ireland in 1641,
1653, ami 1662. In the Thorpe collection.

3 Sir William Petty estimated the surface of Ireland in this way —
10,500,000 Irish acres = 16,800,000 English acres, of which 3,000,000
were bogs, unprofitable land, etc., leaving 7,500,000 = 12,000,000 Eng-
lish measurement of good land. Ireland actually contains 20,815,460
English acres ; so that Petty underestimated the contents of the country
by a little more than four millions of English acres.

10 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

the Parliamentary Settlement, and the other subsequent to it,
will give us an idea of the misery to which the Irish aristo-
cracy and the priesthood had reduced the island, and of the
prosperity which sprang up with the order and industry
introduced by the settlers. Colonel Eichard Laurence, a par-
liamentary officer, and afterwards a member of the Council of
Trade in the reign of Charles II, is the author of the first : —

"About the years 1652 and 1653 the plague and famine had
swept away whole countries, that a man might travel twenty or
thirty miles and not see a living creature, either man, beast, or
bird, they being either all dead or had quit those desolate places,
that our soldiers would tell stories of the place where they saw
a smoke, it was so rare to see either smoke by day or fire or
candle by night ; and when Ave did meet with two or three poor
cabins, none but very aged men with women and children, and
those with the prophet might have complained, We have become
as a Lottie in the smoke, our skin is as black as an oven because of the
terrible famine, I have seen those miserable creatures plucking
stinking carrion out of a ditch black and rotten, and have been
credibly informed they have digged corps out of the grave to eat.
But the most tragical story I ever heard was from an officer
commanding a party of horse hunting for tories in a dark night,
[who] discovered a light which they supposed to be a fire, which
the tories usually made in those waste countries to dress their
provisions and warm themselves ; but drawing near they found
it a ruined cabin, and besetting it round some did alight and
peep in at the window, where they saw a great fire of wood and a
company of miserable old women and children sitting round it.
and betwixt them and the fire a dead corpse lay broiling, which
as the fire roasted they cut off collops and eat." 1

Clarendon presents us with the subsequent picture : —

" And which is more wonderful, all this [the Parliamentary
Settlement] Avas done and settled within little more than two
years, to that degree of perfection that there Avere many build-
ings raised for beauty as Avell as use, orderly and regular planta-
tions of trees, and raising fences and enclosures throughout the
kingdom, purchases made by one from the other at very valuable

1 The Interest of Ireland in its Trade and Wealth, ii. 8G.

sec. i THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 11

rates, and jointures made upon marriages, and all other con-
veyances and settlements executed as in a kingdom at peace
within itself, and where no doubt could be made of the validity
of titles." 1

At the commencement of the reign of Charles II in 1G60
the three provinces of Ulster, Leinster, and Minister were,
with the exception of the remnant which had been left to the
Eoman Catholics who had shown a constant good affection
to the commonwealth, in the possession of the adventurers
and soldiers. The contents of these provinces amounted to
sixteen millions of English acres. The restoration upset com-
pletely the settlement which had been effected by the Parlia-
ment. Whatever legal title the adventurers might have to
their lands, inasmuch as their claims rested on Acts 2 of
Parliament which had been assented to by Charles I before
the war, the soldiers knew that the courts of justice would
not recognise their rights which were based on parliamentary
ordinances only. But the adventurers and soldiers were well
aware that their cause was one and the same. They there-
fore united, and after careful consideration they politicly
determined to submit their interests to the king. Charles
issued his declaration for the settlement of Ireland and for
the satisfaction of the several interests on the 30th of
November 1660. The Act of Settlement professed to be
founded on this declaration, and to have for its object the
execution and carrying out of the same. For this purpose,
by one sweeping clause, it vested in the king three-fourths of
the whole land of Ireland. There can be little doubt that
Charles was unfavourably disposed to the Cromwellian occu-
pants, the large majority of whom were nonconformists,
and who were regarded by him as Republicans. But the
king was prudent enough to see that he could not act against

1 Works of Lord Clarendon, 2 vol. edition, ii. 1028.
2 17 Chas. I, ce. 34, 35, 36, 37.

12 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

the wishes of the English Parliament, which would not con-
sent to hand back Ireland to the authors of its late evils. The
Act of Settlement did not give satisfaction, and its comple-
ment, the Act of Explanation, was passed in 1655. This
latter Act was essentially a compromise between the several
contending parties, and ought to have been regarded as final
by them all. 1 For to render such an arrangement possible,
the adventurers and soldiers, at the request of the forfeited
Eoman Catholic proprietors, voluntarily gave up a third of
their lands. The Act was understood by the Protestant
owners to be a final settlement. But the Irish claimants
never intended to abide by a compromise which they them-
selves had proposed. They accepted what the Act gave them,
and waited for an opportunity of recovering all. An occasion
arrived which to their blind greed appeared to be a propitious
one. They grasped at all, and in the attempt they effected
the ruin of their country and of themselves.

The result of these two Acts was, as Sir William Petty
informs us, that the Eoman Catholics obtained possession of
about a third of the profitable land of Ireland, viz. 2,280,000
Irish acres or 3,648,000 English acres. If we remember that
coarse land was excluded from this computation, and that
Petty underestimated the superficial contents of Ireland by
four millions of English acres, the Eoman Catholic proprietors
must have had in their hands at the accession of James II
between five and six millions of English acres.

The prosperity which set in with the parliamentary or

1 " The Roman Catholics at last, to end all disputes, proposed that
if for the satisfaction of their interests the adventurers and soldiers
would part with one-third of the lands respectively enjoyed by them
on 7th May 1659 in consideration of their adventures and service,
they were ready to agree to it. This proposal was in fine accepted.
. . . Thus was the settlement of Ireland at last effected by the
common consent of the agents of all the several interests concerned." —
Carte's Ormond, ii. 303. See also the report of the English Attorney-
General, Sir Heneage Finch, dated 1st February 1671.— Carte, Append.

sec. i THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 13

Cromwellian Settlement continued during the whole reign of
Charles II. We have several glowing accounts of the con-
dition of Ireland during this reign, and at the accession of
James, drawn by contemporaries and eye-witnesses. But
three only shall be referred to here, those of Chief- Justice
Keating, Archbishop King, and a gentleman who took
refuge in England from the troubles of 1G88. That of the
Chief-Justice I shall quote hereafter, when describing the
subsequent desolation. The agreement between all these
descriptions, though by different hands, is very striking.

Archbishop King tells us that at King James's " coming
to the crown, Ireland was in a most flourishing condition.
Lands were everywhere improved, and rents advanced to
near double what they had been a few years before. The
kingdom abounded with money ; trade flourished, even to the
envy of our neighbours; cities, especially Dublin, increased
exceedingly ; gentlemen's seats were built or building every-
where ; and parks, enclosures, and other ornaments were
carefully promoted, insomuch that many places of the
kingdom equalled the improvements of England. . . . And
the king's revenue increased proportionably to the kingdom's
advance in wealth,- and was every day growing. It amounted
to more than three hundred thousand pounds per annum — a
sum sufficient to defray all the expenses of the crown, and
to return yearly a considerable sum into England, to which
this nation had formerly been a constant expense."

The account 1 given by the refugee is equally positive.
" By the favour of heaven upon the extraordinary fertility of
the land, Ireland was under very auspicious circumstances.
The Church flourished, trade increased, the cities and towns
were every year enlarged with new additions, the country
enriched and beautified with houses and plantations ; the
farms were loaden with stock, and ready and quick markets

1 Apology for the Protestants of Ireland, 1689.

14 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

there were to vent them. The laws had a free and uninter-
rupted course, and a standing army was so far from being a
terror that they were the comfort and security of the people.
In a word, peace, wealth, and plenty were become universal
and epidemical, and all things conspired to a generous emula-
tion with our mother and neighbour, England."

Such was the condition of Ireland at the accession of
James. That of the Eoman Catholic subject was equally
favourable. The position of the Irish Eoman Catholic was
very different from and far superior to that of his English co-
religionist. The penal enactments on the Irish Statute Book
were fewer and less severe than those in England. In England
every priest who received a convert into the bosom of the
Church of Eome was liable to be hanged. In Ireland he
incurred no such danger. A doubtful but favourable con-
struction was placed on the Irish Act of Supremacy, and
enabled Eoman Catholics to fill public offices. " In England,"
says Macaulay, " no man could hold office, or even earn his
livelihood as a barrister or a schoolmaster, without previously
taking the oath of supremacy ; but in Ireland a public
functionary was not held to be under the necessity of taking
that oath unless it were formally tendered to him. It there-
fore did not exclude from employment any person whom the
Government wished to promote. The sacramental test and
the declaration against transubstantiation were unknown;
nor was either House of Parliament closed against any
religious sect." In truth the state of the Irish Eoman
Catholics was much better than that described by Macaulay,
and deserves a short consideration. For it will be seen
how, when a legal toleration was within their reach, they
refused to hold out their hands for it, and disqualified
themselves from attaining it by declining to give a proof of
their fidelitv and allegiance to the government.

Shortly after the restoration of Charles II a petition was

sec. l THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 15

presented to the English House of Peers in favour of the Roman
Catholics, and a motion was made in the House for a relaxa-
tion of the penal laws. It was known that the king was in
favour of the proposal, and the Lords were unanimous, " there
not appearing one lord in the house who seemed to be un-
willing that those laws should be repealed." 1 A committee
was appointed to examine and report on the penal statutes.
As soon as the committee was appointed, the Catholic peers
and their friends were diligent in their attendance for some
days, but on a sudden the committee was discontinued and
was never subsequently revived. The truth was that the
Roman Catholics had quarrelled amongst themselves. Dis-
sensions had broken out between their laity, their secular
and their regular clergy. Some meetings of a general com-
mittee, consisting of their principal lords, the superiors of
orders, and the secular priests, were held at Arundel House.
Difficulties were started at these meetings respecting the
form of an oath or subscription which, it was intended, should
be taken by Roman Catholics ; and also respecting a proposi-
tion, that none but secular priests under bishops should be
allowed in England, and that all regulars should be forbidden
the kingdom. There had long been grave disputes and
differences among the English Roman Catholics respecting
their internal government and the oath of allegiance ; these
were revived on this occasion and the general committee was
dissolved to meet no more. 2

The prospect of relief afforded by the action of the English
House of Lords and the known partiality of Charles en-
couraged the Irish Roman Catholic clergy and laity in 1661

1 Clarendon's Life ; Rev. Joseph Berington's Memoirs of Panzani,
p. 309.

2 Clarendon's Life; Berington, p. 310. A full account of the dis-
sensions which had prevailed for eighty years among the English
Roman Catholics is to he found in Berington's Panzani, and also in Sir
John Throckmorton's Letters to the Catholic Clergy of England.

16 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

to petition the king for a mitigation of the laws which affected
them. The conduct of this clergy l during the rebellion of
1641 had been so mad, reckless, and disloyal that it was felt
to be useless to present a petition without a renunciation of
the principles on which they had acted during that period. 2
They were advised to incorporate in their petition a declaration
of their sentiments respecting the obedience and allegiance
which was due from them to the Civil Power. This advice
was given in order to get rid of the grand objection to their
claims, namely, that the toleration of the Eoman Catholic

1 The Duke of Ormond, who knew them well, describes the Eoman
Catholic clergy of these times as " the worst spiritual guides that
ever led a poor people to destruction." — Ormond to Orrery. The
letter is given in French's Unkinde Desertor, 1676.

2 It would he impossible to overstate the crimes and follies of the
Irish Eoman Catholic bishops and clergy during the rebellion. The
following are some and only some of them : —

1. The Synod of Armagh, within six months after the breaking
out of the insurrection, pronounced it to he lawful and pious.

2. On the 10th of May 1642, that is within eight months of the
same period, a general synod declared it to be just and lawful.

3. At the last synod it was resolved to send envoys to the Pope,
Emperor, and King of France to solicit assistance.

4. The hishops and clergy opposed the peace of 1646 with the king,
excommunicated their own commissioners who negotiated it, and forhade
the celebration of divine service in all towns and cities adhering to it.

5. They deposed the Supreme Council and assumed the govern-
ment themselves.

6. They opposed the cessation of arms with Inchiquin on the
ground that he was a heretic, and excommunicated its adherents.

7. They excommunicated the king's lord-lieutenant and drove him
from the country.

8. They applied to the Pope to become protector of Ireland ; on
the Pope's refusal they made a treaty with the Duke of Lorraine,
vesting royal authority in him with the title of Protector Royal of
Ireland.

9. They veered round from their former protestations of loyalty
and favoured the progress of the parliamentary arms. They refused
to excommunicate those who joined Cromwell or helped him with
contributions or supplies. Hence the open markets, and the pin-
visions sold freely in Cromwell's camp ; a state of things which
( larlyle attributes to Cromwell's justice and ready money.

sec. i THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 17

religion was inconsistent with the safety of a Protestant
State. Accordingly Sir Richard Belling, 1 formerly secretary
to the Kilkenny Confederation, drew up what was afterwards
known as the Loyal Eemonstrance of the Eoman Catholic
Clergy of Ireland. For the purpose of drawing up this docu-
ment Belling made use of three negative propositions con-
tained in a declaration signed by a great number of English
Eoman Catholics and presented to the Parliament in 1647. 2

1 This was the gentleman who, when envoy of the confederation,
induced the Pope to send Rinuccini to Ireland.

2 " The Roman Catholics of this nation, taking into consideration
the twelve proposals of his Excellency Sir Thomas Fairfax [that the
penal statutes should be repealed, and that the Roman Catholics should
enjoy liberty of conscience by grant from the Parliament] lately pub-
lished this present year 1647, and how prejudicial and destructive it
might be to them at this time tacitly to permit an opinion (by some
conceived) of an inconsistency in their religion with the civil govern-
ment of this kingdom by reason of some doctrines and positions
scandalously laid upon them, which might thereby draw on persons
that cannot conform themselves to the religion here established an
incapacity to receive and be partakers of a general benefit intended for
the ease of tender consciences, have thought it convenient to endeavour
the just vindication of their integrities therein. And to remove the
scandal out of all the minds and opinions of moderate and charitable
persons, do declare the negative to these propositions following : —

" That the Pope or Church hath power to absolve any person or
persons whatsoever from his or their obedience to the Civil Govern-
ment established in this nation.

"II

" That it is lawful by the Pope's or Church's command or dispensa-
tion to kill, destroy, or otherwise injure any person or persons what-
soever, because he or they are accused or condemned, censured or
excommunicated for error, schism, or heresy.

"Ill

" That it is lawful in itself or by the Pope's dispensation to break
either word or oath with any person abovesaid, under pretence of
their being heretics." — Walsh, History of the Remonstrance, pp. 522, 523.
This declaration was condemned the following year by Innocent X, and
its subscribers censured by a particular decree. — Throckmorton, 1st
Letter, p. 145.

18 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

Changing the words as required by the new circumstances of
the case, Belling followed closely the expressions and inten-
tions of the English petition.

The Irish Remonstrance acknowledged the king to be the
supreme lord and rightful sovereign of Ireland ; that the
clergy were bound to obey him in all civil and temporal
affairs, and to pay him loyalty and obedience notwithstanding
any sentence or declaration of the Pope ; it disclaimed all
foreign power, papal or princely, spiritual or temporal, that
should pretend to free them from this obligation ; and de-
clared that all princes of what religion soever were indepen-
dent under God ; and that it was impious and against the
Word of God to maintain that any private subject might kill
the prince though of a different religion.

A copy of this Remonstrance was sent to London and
there signed by twenty-three Eoman Catholic ecclesiastics
and ninety-seven of the Irish nobility and gentry who were
in that city. It was then presented to the king, and was
received most graciously by him.

As the prospect was held out to the Eoman Catholics of
Ireland of obtaining relief from the penal laws, it became
desirable to know whether the Kemonstrance represented the
real opinions of their clergy on the question of allegiance and
obedience to the Civil Power. If it did, there could be no
objection to an acknowledgment by that body of their loyalty
to the established government. If, on the other hand, it did
not, all further discussion was at an end, and the State could
only come to the conclusion that both the Roman Catholic
clergy and the laity, over whom they exercised a dominant
influence, were unfit to be admitted into the constitution.
To prevent all excuses and subterfuges, and to give an oppor-
tunity for a free and fair discussion of the subject of civil
obedience, the Duke of Ormond allowed a national Synod of the
Roman Catholic clergy to be convened at Dublin. The Synod

sec. i THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 19

met on the 11th of June 1666, and continued its sittings till
the 25th of the same month. But it soon appeared that the
Irish clergy still clung to a dogma which has since been given
up by the Koman Catholic world; namely, that the Pope
has the power of deposing kings and of dispensing with the
allegiance due to them from their subjects. The Synod de-
clined to sign the Loyal Eemonstrance, and drew up on the
16th of June what they called " a remonstrance and protesta-
tion of their loyalty." This latter document contained no
denial of the Pope's deposing power, and when read by the
light of that doctrine was evasive and offered no guarantee
of their loyalty and obedience to the Civil Power.

No sooner had it become known at Eome that it was pro-
posed by the Eoman Catholic clergy of Ireland to present a
declaration of their loyalty to the Civil Power than the
thunders of the Vatican were heard. The Nuncio at Brussels,
De Vecchiis, who then exercised a superintendence over Irish
religious affairs, condemned in July 1662 the Piemonstrance
on the ground that it denied the Pope's deposing power. 1 In
the same month Cardinal Barberini, in a letter addressed to
the noblemen and gentry of Ireland, 2 declared that the
Eemonstrance was a violation of the Catholic faith. And
shortly before the meeting of the Synod in 1666, Eospigliosi,
then Nuncio at Brussels and afterwards Cardinal, wrote to
the Irish bishops and clergy that subscription to the Eemon-
strance would be grievous and hurtful to the Catholic
religion. 3 In thus condemning a declaration of their loyalty
by the Eoman Catholics of Ireland, the Eoman court and its
ministers continued a policy on which they had long acted.
In 1646 their own Nuncio, Einuccini, on an occasion when
he wanted to gain the Irish nobility and gentry to his designs,

1 Throckmorton's Letters to the Catholic Clergy, etc., p. 154.
2 Ad prcestantes vims Hibernice. — Walsh, p. 17.
3 Walsh, p. 633.

20 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

made a speech in which he boasted of his fidelity to the
Koyal cause. He was at once reprimanded from Borne for
having used such expressions. Cardinal Pamphili, the Pope's
Secretary of State, wrote to him in these words : " The Holy
See never can by any positive act approve of the civil
allegiance of Catholic subjects to a heretical prince. From
this maxim of the Holy See have arisen many difficulties
and disputes in England about oaths of allegiance. And
His Holiness's displeasure is the greater because you
have left the original of your speech in the hands of the
Catholic confederates, which, if published, will furnish
heretics with arguments against the Pope's power over here-
tical princes, seeing that his minister exhorts the Catholics
of Ireland to allegiance to a heretical king." 1

Again in December of the same year Pamphili informed
Einuccini " That it had been the constant and uninterrupted
practice of the Holy See never to allow its ministers to make
or to consent to any public edict of Catholic subjects for the
defence of the crown and person of a heretical prince ; that
his conduct furnished pretences to the enemies of the Holy
See to reflect upon her as deviating from the maxims of sound
policy to which she had ever yet adhered ; and that the Pope
desired that he would not by any public act show that he
knew or consented to any declaration of allegiance which
Irish Catholics might for political reasons be compelled or be
willing to make to the king." 2

It is now admitted by all Eoman Catholics that both the
oath of allegiance drawn up by James I in England in 1G05,

1 Carte's Ormond, i. 578 ; O'Conor's Historical Address, pt. ii. p. 415,
and the authorities there quoted. On receipt of this letter, Rinuccini,
pretending that lie had lost his own copy of the speech, applied to
Lord Mountgarret, President of the Supreme Council, for the ori-
ginal, and returned in its stead a mutilated copy from which the offen-
sive passage was omitted. — Carte's Ormond; O'Conor's Historical
A ddress.

2 O'Conor's Historical Address and Hutton's Bimiccini, p. 580.

SEC. i THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 21

and the Irish Remonstrance of 1662, are perfectly free from
any objection, and contain nothing inconsistent with their
faith or with their duty to the head of their church. 1 James
knew that some Roman Catholics whose civil principles were
sound and loyal seriously objected to the oath of supremacy.
He therefore drew up a political test in the oath of allegiance
to which it was thought all Catholics would cheerfully sub-
scribe. 2 When this oath was first proposed it " was eagerly
and generally taken by many of the secular clergy, of the
Benedictines, and of the lay Catholics," 3 and also by the Arch-

1 "The instrument [the Irish Remonstrance] is now acknowledged
by Catholics to be perfectly free from objection." — Throckmorton's
Letters to the Catholic Clergy, p. 155.

" James II, when Duke of York, took the oath of allegiance, and
intimated his intention of enforcing it when king." — Butler's Memoirs
of the English Catholics, ii. 220.

" The apostolic delegate, Blackwell, in the reign of James I, took
the oath himself and advised the English Catholics to take it." — lb.
p. 211.

" Why was this oath condemned ? I defy any Catholic to find
anything in it repugnant to his religion." — Rev. Chas. O'Conor's
Historical Address, pt. ii. p. 160.

" A slight attention to the nature of the condemned oath would
have convinced them [the Catholic laity] that nothing by it was de-
manded of them which as subjects they ought to refuse, and that
nothing was renounced in it which affected their religion." — Throck-
morton, 2d Letter, p. 91.

Butler says it was a lamentable error to refuse the oath. — Memoirs
of the English Catholics, ii. 203.

"The oath accordingly when tendered was taken by many
Catholics, laity and clergy, and a ray of returning happiness gleamed
around them. But a cloud soon gathered on the seven hills ; for it
could not be that a test, the main object of which was an explicit re-
jection of the deposing power, should not raise vapours there."' — Rev.
Joseph Berington's Panzani, p. 75.

Father Walsh advised all Roman Catholics to take the oath of
allegiance and to sign the Remonstrance. " May you . . . offer that
you will at the choice of the Parliament either take the oath of alle-
giance . . . or sign the loyal formulary." — Address to the Catholics, etc.

2 3 Jas. I, c. 4, § 15. James's oath is generally known as that of
allegiance, the oath of Elizabeth as that of supremacy.

3 Throckmorton, p. 134.

22 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

priest Blackwell, 1 the apostolic delegate in England, who
advised his flock to take it. There was at last, after so many
years, a prospect of a modus vivcndi being established between
the English Eoman Catholics and the Government ; a recon-
ciliation between them and the State under the protection of
which they lived. But the bright scene was soon clouded.
Paul V in a brief of the 23d of October 1606 condemned the
oath as containing " many things adverse to faith and salva-
tion." The authenticity of this brief was generally doubted,
and the Eoman Catholics continued to manifest their allegiance.
On this a second brief followed in 1607, which established
the validity of the former and enforced submission. In 1608
a third brief was issued repeating the condemnation of the
oath, and ordering all priests who had taken it, and did not
retract within a limited time, to be deprived of their faculties. 2
Finally in 1626 a fourth condemnation was published by
Urban VIII. 3 The same unhappy policy was again adopted
in 1662, and the Irish Eemonstrance was also con-
demned.

Protestants are too apt in their criticisms to confound the
essential tenets of the Eoman Catholic faith with the behaviour
and policy of the governors and directors of the Eomish
Church, and Eoman Catholics naturally resent judgments
which mix up divine things with the consequences of human
frailty. But the political action of individuals, whether
Popes or Cardinals, is open to the world, and may be praised

1 The last of the Marian bishops, Watson, died in 1584. Con-
trary to the wish of the English Catholics, who desired the appointment
of bishops, a new office and title were created. Blackwell was made
archpriest and superior over the clergy of England and Scotland in
1598. Blackwell was deposed in 1008 for taking the oath of
allegiance and recommending the Catholics of England to take it.
See Throckmorton's Letters and Berington's Memoirs of Panzani.

2 llirockmorton, pp. 135, 136.

3 This was the Pope who, as Cardinal Newman informs us, de-
clared that Rome bewailed with "tears of blood" the conduct of the
Papacy towards England. Video meliora yroboquc, deteriora sequoi:

sec. i THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 23

or censured by all, either Catholics or Protestants. It is the
unquestionable duty of every subject, and of every class of
subjects, when called upon by the Supreme Power in the
State, to give such assurance of his or their allegiance as that
power may require, either by an oath or solemn declaration,
provided there is nothing in the oath or declaration which is
opposed to his or their faith and conscience. There was
nothing contrary to Catholic faith or conscience in the oath
of allegiance or in the Irish Piemonstrance. Yet the Roman
Catholics of England were forbidden to take the oath of
allegiance ; those of Ireland were prohibited from signing
the Remonstrance. The authors of the briefs against the
English oath and of the prohibitions against signing the Irish
Remonstrance forbade the reception of the Roman Catholics
of England and Ireland into our constitution, and shut the
gates of admission in the face of millions of faithful and
obedient believers who looked to them for guidance. These
rulers and councillors, to maintain an ambitious claim which
had no better foundation than the arrogance of former pontiffs
and the " weak concessions of mortals," prevented a reconcilia-
tion of the members of their church with the governments
under which they lived as subjects. Unwilling to give
up an old and rusty weapon which had been opposed
with success in every kingdom of Europe, and which they
have since abandoned, the vicars of Him, whose kingdom is
not of this world, left the Roman Catholics of these countries
exposed to laws necessarily severe. 1 For the subject who
refuses to give guarantees of his loyalty is justly suspect as

1 " And Paul himself could sit undisturbed in the Vatican, hear-
ing that men were imprisoned and that blood was poured out in
support of a claim which had no better foundation, surely he knew,
than the ambition of his predecessors and the weak concessions of
mortals ; he could sit and view the scene, and not in pity at least wish
to redress their sufferings by releasing them from the injunctions of
his decree." — Rev. Joseph Berington's Panzani, p. 86.

24 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

an enemy, and justly condemned to exclusion from the full
rights of citizenship.

Notwithstanding the refusal of the Irish bishops and
clergy to give a pledge of their loyalty and obedience to the
State in all civil matters, the Roman Catholics of Ireland
enjoyed from 1660 to the accession of James II a toleration
which, when compared with the contemporaneous condition
of the Protestant subjects under the Catholic Governments of
Europe, was a state of perfect freedom. Archbishop King
tells us that, when James came to the throne, there was " a
free liberty of conscience by connivance though not by law."
But as the evidence of this prelate is sometimes called in
question, Roman Catholic testimony will be adduced. Father
Walsh, writing in 1672, informs us that Charles II effectu-
ally countermanded " the winds and tempests of persecution
throughout Ireland." l In his speech to the Synod in June
1666 the same ecclesiastic reminded the assembled fathers,
who must have been acquainted with the facts, " of the ceas-
ing of persecution, release of prisoners, general connivance at
the exercise of their religion through all provinces and parts
of Ireland, even within the walls of corporate towns and
garrisons." 2 In the same month eighteen Catholic priests
presented a petition or letter of expostulation to the Synod,
advising the signature of the Remonstrance, in which these
words occur : " Is it not further as manifestly apparent how
graciously that instrument [the Remonstrance] after the sig-
nature of it was received by His Majesty ? How immediately
the persecution in this kingdom ceased by His Majesty's
express commands. Nay, how ever since both people and
clergy of our communion have enjoyed the great tranquillity

1 Father Walsh informs us that at this time the number of secular
priests was more than a thousand, and of the regulars eight hundred.
Cardinal Moran, in his Life of Archbishop Plunket, estimates the seculars
at a thousand and the regulars at six hundred.

2 History of the Remonstrance, p. 654.

sec. i THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 25

and freedom in point of exercising our religion and functions
which we have so gladly seen and which we so thankfully
acknowledge to be still continued to us, yea, in a higher
measure enjoyed by us at this present than we could almost
have not long since either believed or hoped we should live
to see." 1 In 1670 the Lord Lieutenant received special in-
structions to favour and protect the remonstrant, that is the
loyal, priests. 2 Archbishop Plunket writes in the same year
to the Cardinal Protector at Borne : " The Viceroy of this
kingdom shows himself favourable to the Catholics, not only
in consequence of his natural mildness of disposition, but
still more on account of his being acquainted with the benign
intentions of His Majesty in reference to his Catholic sub-
jects." 3 In another letter of the same year, addressed to the
new pontiff, Clement X, the same prelate says : " We experi-
ence in this kingdom, Holy Father, the benign influence of
the King of England in favour of the Catholics, so that all
enjoy great liberty and ease. Ecclesiastics may be publicly
known, and are permitted to exercise their functions without
any impediment." 4 When the Duke of Ormond resumed the
viceroyalty in 1677, Dr. Plunket "often speaks of his govern-
ment as peaceful and mild." 5 Such was the general tenor of
the conduct of the Government towards the Irish Soman
Catholics, though it was sometimes disturbed for short in-
tervals on occasions of national excitement, such, for example,
as that which was consequent on the so-called Popish plot.

But the best test of the toleration granted to the Boman
Catholics may be derived from their own conduct. Did they
show by the humility of their proceedings that they con-
sidered themselves as oppressed and as excluded from freedom
of action? Did their bishops and clergy refrain from the

1 History of the Remonstrance, p. 698.

2 Life of Archbishop Plunket, by Archbishop (now Cardinal) Moran,
p. 48. 3 lb. p. 51. 4 lb. p. 52. 5 lb. p. 55.

26 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

open exercise of their functions, and was their carriage that
of those who felt themselves to be persecuted ? At or about
this time it was death, or what was worse than death, the
galleys, for a Protestant divine to celebrate the offices of his
religion in the Catholic countries of Europe. 1 The conduct
of the Eoman Catholic ecclesiastics in Ireland presents
a lively contrast to the state of things on the Continent.
Within three months after his arrival from Borne in 1670
Archbishop Plunket " solemnised two synods of his clergy,
and moreover convened and presided at a general synod of
the Irish bishops, which was held in Dublin ; and before the
month of September in the same year we find him summon-
ing a provincial council of Ulster, and enacting many salutary
decrees for the correction of abuses and the advancement of
ecclesiastical discipline in that province." 2 In 1678 the same
prelate convoked another provincial synod at Ardpatrick,
where decrees were made and enactments passed. 3 In 1670
Peter Talbot, titular Archbishop of Dublin, appeared before
the Privy Council in his episcopal habits, a thing of which
there had been no precedent since the Eeformation. On
another occasion the same archbishop applied to the Lord
Lieutenant for the loan of some of the State hangings, silver
candlesticks, plate, and other utensils, for the purpose of mak-
ing use of them at the celebration of high mass. The request
was complied with. 4 But this is not all: we are informed by
Archbishop Plunket, in a letter to the Nuncio in the year
1673, that the same Peter Talbot, " during the past four
years, waged an open war against the Duke of Ormond, who

1 This subject is more fully treated in the following chapter.

2 Moran's Life of Archbishop Plunket, p. 56.

3 lb. p. 58.

4 The loan was accompanied with a complimentary message from
the Lord Lieutenant's secretary, Sir Ellis Leighton, " that he hoped
to have high mass at Christ Church at Christmas." — Secret Consults,
etc. ; State Tracts, iii. 620 ; Leland, iii. 462.

sec. i THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 27

is the most powerful subject of His Majesty in this kingdom." 1
Let us imagine, if we can, what would have been the fate of
a Protestant ecclesiastic in Austria, Spain, France, or Savoy,
who would at this time have opposed, not a powerful ex-
viceroy, but even a parish officer. If we consider this, we
shall be able to guess at the difference between the position
of a Eoman Catholic in Ireland and that of a Protestant in
these Catholic kingdoms at this period. It is absurd and in
the highest degree ungrateful for Irish Eoman Catholic writers
to speak of the conduct of the Government as oppressive at a
time when the Protestant subjects of Catholic kingdoms were
hunted like wolves or mad dogs, and persecuted, not as being
dangerous to the safety of the State, but for holding religious
opinions different from those professed by their rulers. If
these partisans were acquainted with comparative history,
they would thankfully acknowledge that their co-religionists
enjoyed at this time in Ireland a toleration which was un-
known to Catholic governments, and which was simply
marvellous considering the spirit of the times and the dis-
affection of the subjects to whom it was extended — a dis-
affection which was so soon again to manifest itself, for the
second time within forty years, at the expense of the ruin of
the country and at the cost of a hundred thousand lives.

The condition and circumstances of the Eoman Catholic
laity at the accession of James II were as favourable as the
position of the clergy. Archbishop King tells us that great
numbers of them had acquired considerable estates " either
by traffic or by the law, or by other arts and industries."
And Colonel Laurence, writing in 1682, speaks strongly
of their general prosperity at the time. " For," says he,
" although a considerable number of them may be of des-
perate fortunes, being branches of those ruined families
sequestered for former rebellions, to whom war is the best

1 Moran's Life of Archbishop Plunket, p. 88.

28 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

trade and revenge desirable wages — if they gain nothing they
cannot lose much. But this is not the case of the body of
them. There are many of their nobility 1 and gentry enjoy
plentiful estates with the favour and countenance of their
prince, some of whom never quitted the interest of the Crown
in the last twelve years' war, and now reap the profit of it.
And multitudes of the commons are wealthy merchants in
our cities and rich farmers in the country,/who, although they
be strict Papists, yet are friendly and good neighbours and
just and honest dealers, who have as much reason to dread a
war as the English themselves." 2

1 At the accession of James II the number of the Catholic peers
was about forty.

2 Interest of Ireland in its Trade and JVealth, ii. 89. When Colonel
Laurence published this book he had been thirty -three years in
Ireland.

SECTION II

THE PREPARATION FOR THE PARLIAMENT 1

It was in a country so circumstanced, rapidly advancing in
prosperity, 2 and in which the Eoman Catholic subject enjoyed
a toleration which was absolute freedom when compared with
the position of Protestants under the Catholic governments
of Europe, that the king, Tyrconnel, and the Irish priesthood
entered upon a conspiracy which was to end in the
desolation of the island. The old attempts were to be
renewed, and the old game of 1641, which had ended so
disastrously, was to be played over again. But the conditions
of the game were now altered. A king of Great Britain and
his secret council 3 had joined the conspiracy. James had

1 Portions of this and the following section appeared in a pamphlet
which I published anonymously in Dublin, 1886.

2 " This kingdom improves visibly, and it is improved beyond
what could have been reasonably hoped for in the space of twenty
years. Nor can anything but a civil war or some other of God's
national judgments stop the career of prosperity it is in." — Ormond to
the King, 1681 ; Carte, Append.

3 It is from James's own statement that we have the most certain
evidence of the existence of this secret council. " He [Sunderland]
persuaded the king to appoint some of the most considerable Catholics
to meet at certain times either at his office or at Mr. Chiffinch's to
consult of matters relating to religion, and he pretending to be much
inclined to and at the last professing himself a Catholic, was not only
admitted, but soon had the chief direction of this secret juncto ; it was
a sort of committee from the Cabinet Council itself, whither by degrees
he drew all business, and by consequence made himself umpire of the
whole transactions relating to the Government." — Clarke's Life of James
II, ii. 74.

30 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

found that his attack on the liberties and constitution of
England was not as likely to succeed as he had once hoped.
He was therefore resolved, as he informed some of his friends
and followers who began to doubt the result of his schemes,
to provide for himself and them " a sure sanctuary and retreat
in Ireland if all those endeavours should be blasted in England
which he had made for their security, and of whose success
he had not yet reason to despair." 1 He determined there-
fore to exalt the power and influence of the Eoman Catholic
body in Ireland, and to destroy the Protestant or English
interest in that country, in order that he and his party might
have a refuge or fortified camp to which they could retreat,
and from which they could either negotiate or defend them-
selves with the aid of France. To carry out this scheme
James selected Tyrconnel as his instrument. Though Tyr-
connel's appointment was opposed by every moderate English
Eoman Catholic about the king, 2 James insisted on his
nomination. " There is work to be done in Ireland," said he,
" which no Englishman will do."

Tyrconnel had long been the agent at the English Court
of that Irish party which desired the repeal of the Acts of
Settlement and the restoration of the Eoman Catholics to the
forfeited estates, a scheme which was dreaded by the English
Catholics as dangerous and revolutionary. He was supported

1 Secret Consults, etc.; State Tracts, iii. 61G. "Jacques II des le
commencement de son regne, avoit fait visiter toutes les places mili-
taires de cette ile par le lord Darmouth, grand maitre de l'artillerie
d'Angleterre. Son rapport, qui est sous nos ycux, prouve le dessein
forme d'arracher la preponderance aux Anglois et de former en Irlande
un systeme de defense pour une hypothesis qui s'est realisee ; la
necessite pour le Roi de se refugier parmi les Irlandois Catholiques."
" Les desseins du Roi sur l'Irlande embrassoient l'espace de cinq amines,
le temps lui parassait necessaire pour fortifier le Royaume, et pour y
preparer un asyle, independant de son successeur, aux Catholiques." —
M azure, Revolution de 1688, ii. 115, 287.

2 Lord Bellasis said at the Council Board, "That fellow, Dick
Talbot, is fool and madman enough to ruin ten kingdoms."

sec. ii TIIK ililSIl PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 31

at the Court by the Queen and Father Petre, though opposed
by the Privy Council and the House of Commons. This latter
assembly had even petitioned Charles II in 1673 to dismiss
him from all command, civil or military, and to forbid his
appearance at Court. If but a part of what lias been said of
i his man be true, he was a prodigy of wickedness. Some
virtues at least enter into our conception of a political leader,
but Tyrconnel appears to have been deficient in every quality
required. There was neither conscience, veracity, nor pru-
dence in the man. He was not even faithful to the family of
the master to whom he owed everything. 1 If James had had
the feelings of a man, he would have detested one who had
attempted to blacken the good fame of his first wife. But
Tyrconnel was the chosen leader of the Irish priesthood, and
by their influence, backed by the king's knowledge of Tyrcon-
nel's wish to destroy the Protestant interest in Ireland, James
was induced to employ him, first as commander of the forces
in that country, and afterwards as Lord Deputy. The recom-
mendation of the Irish priesthood in favour of Tyrconnel is
still extant. 2 It was found amongst the papers of Tyrrell,
titular Bishop of Clogher, and secretary to Tyrconnel. An
extract will show how highly Tyrconnel and his services were
valued by the Irish clergy : " And since of all others the
Earl of Tyrconnel did first espouse and chiefly maintain,
these twenty -five years last past, the cause of your poor
oppressed lioman Catholic clergy, and is now the only subject
of your Majesty under whose fortune and popularity in this
kingdom we dare cheerfully and with assurance owli our
loyalty and assert your Majesty's interest, do make it our
humble suit to your Majesty, that you will be pleased to
lodge your authority over us in his hands, to the terror of the

1 Tyrconnel made overturns to France for casting off all connection
with England, and, in the event of James's death, for placing the crown
of Ireland on his own head. — Mazure, Revolution de 1688, ii. 287.

2 King's State of the Protestants, Append.

32 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chai>. i

factious and encouragement of your faithful subjects here.
Since his dependence on your Majesty is so great, that we
doubt not but that they will receive him with such acclama-
tions as the long -captivated Israelites did their redeemer
Mordecai. And since your Majesty ill glory and power does
equal the mighty Ahasuerus, and the virtues and beauty of
your Queen is as true a parallel to his adored Hester, we
humbly beseech she may be heard as our great patroness
against that Haman x whose pride and ambition of being
honoured as his master may have hitherto kept us in slavery."
We may well wonder that the Irish clergy should choose
such a representative and leader. However this may be, it is
certain that they and Tyrconnel, with the assent and con-
currence of James, began a conspiracy against the liberties,
property, and Church of the Protestants in Ireland. The aim
of the conspiracy was threefold — Eoman Catholic ascendency
in this country, and the exclusion of Protestants from all
civil and military employment ; the complete separation of
Ireland from England ; and the restoration of the land to the
Irish. The events subsequent to the commencement of the
year 1685, and up to the landing of William, the conduct of
James's Irish Government, and the legislation of the Irish
Parliament, leave no doubt of the existence and aims of this
conspiracy. The means intended to effect these aims were,
first, to get possession of the whole civil, military, and judicial
power in the nation ; secondly, to master the representation ;
and thirdly, to call a Parliament which should give effect to
their policy. If there are minds so constituted as to remain
unconvinced by the logic of facts and conduct, at least they
cannot refuse credence to written testimony. Among the
letters of the same Tyrrell there was found one addressed to
the king, in which the programme of the conspirators was
clearly explained, and this programme was afterwards literally

1 Orinond.

sec. ii THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 33

carried out. The letter is long, and in parts imperfect ; but
sufficient remains to indicate its scope and meaning. 1 The
paragraph which refers to the means to be adopted for work-
ing out the ends of the conspiracy is here given. The writer,
after recommending the king to promote Catholics to " the
most eminent and profitable stations," and expressing a fear
that the Protestants in his English army would be inclined
to fight for the king, Parliament, and Protestant religion
against the king as Papist, his Popish cabals, and popery,
goes on to say : " To prevent which, as matters now stand,
there is but one sure and safe expedient, that is, to purge
without delay the rest of your Irish army, increase and make
it wholly Catholic ; raise and train a Catholic militia there ;
place Catholics at the helm of that kingdom ; issue out quo
warrantos against all the corporations in it ; put all employs,
civil as well as military, into Catholic hands. This done,
call a Parliament of loyal " — here the document is illegible
for a few lines. But the sketch is complete, and we shall
soon see that the line of action recommended in this letter
was at once put into operation. The letter was sent to James
in August 168G, while Lord Clarendon was Lord Lieutenant,
and Tyrconnel Commander-in-Chief in Ireland. The first
step taken in prosecution of the conspiracy was

1. The Disarming of the Protestants

The Duke of Ormond, when Lord Lieutenant in the years

1662-69, had raised and armed a body of twenty thousand

men as a militia, to protect the English settlers and to

restrain the banditti which then infested the country. After

the rebellion of Monmouth in England, under the pretence

that this militia was well affected to his claims, an order

came from England, while Lord Granard and Archbishop

1 The letter is given in the Appendix to King's State of the Pro-
testants.

34 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

Boyle were Lords Justices, 1 that its arms should be taken
and deposited in magazines in each of the counties. The
carrying out of the order was entrusted to Tyrconnel, and
the militia was disarmed. But this was not sufficient. It
was resolved to disarm all the Protestants, and to deprive
them even of their private weapons, which were necessary
for the defence of themselves or their houses. Accordingly
" it was given out that if any arms were reserved under any
pretence, such as that they were their own and not belonging
to the public, it would be regarded as a proof of disaffection." 2
The terror inspired by this menace was so great that the
Protestants delivered up the arms and weapons which they
had bought with their own money and for their own protec-
tion. Though the settlers were obliged by the terms of their
patents of plantation to keep arms in readiness for the king's
service, and the country was in a very disturbed condition,
they were deprived of all means of defence, and left " without
any one weapon in their houses, and the Irish were all
armed." 3 While this was being done, and the Protestants
disarmed, the native Irish were, on the other hand, permitted
by Tyrconnel to retain their weapons. We have in Lord
Clarendon's letters an account of a warm debate which took
place in the Privy Council on this matter. Many of its
members — for the Protestants had not yet seceded from it —
complained of the state of the country, and of the English
settlers being left totally defenceless among a peasantry who
were hostile to the Protestants and unwilling to aid them
when attacked. The Lords Justices who were present
declared that they had given orders to collect the arms of the
militia only, but admitted that those of private persons also

1 Lord Granard and the Chancellor, Archbishop Boyle, were Lords
Justices between the recall of the Duke of Onnond in 1685 and the
arrival of Lord Clarendon in January 1G8G.

2 Secret Consults, etc.

:! Clarendon to Lord Rochester, Clarendon's Gorr. i. 217.

sec. ii THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 35

had been taken, under the pretence of disarming the militia.
One of them, Lord Granard, added that this was done, he
knew not " by what officiousness." We know by what and
by whose officiousness it was done. This illegal measure was
undertaken by Tyrconnel, and accomplished by him alone.

The natural consequences of this measure ensued. No
sooner had the English settlers been disarmed than the
banditti and rapparees issued from their haunts and com-
menced their outrages against the Protestants. Persons
were set upon and dangerously wounded in the open day. 1
Houses were attacked, and the flocks and herds of the English
driven away or destroyed. Crimes were so multiplied that
Special Commissions had to be issued to clear the jails ; 2 and,
worst of all, the officers and soldiers of the army, which
Tyrconnel was then engaged in filling up with Catholics,
contributed to the outrages and the general disorganisation
of the kingdom. They even interfered with the revenue
officers in the discharge of their duties, and prevented the
collection of the king's taxes. 3 The historian 4 tells us that
these " new arms in new hands were made use of as might
have been expected. The soldiers harassed the inhabitants,
and lived upon them at free quarters. Tyrconnel, instead of
punishing these offences, encouraged them." When soldiers
were taken red-handed in the commission of crime, they were
claimed by their officers from the civil power ; and, in con-
sequence of this conduct of the officers, magistrates refused
to take examinations where any of the army were concerned. 5

1 Clarendon to Sunderland, Clarendon's Coir. i. 215, 230.

2 Clarendon to Sunderland, Corr. ii. 106.

3 Clarendon to Rochester, Corr. ii. 4. 4 Dalrymple.

5 " Some [the soldiers] are taken in committing felonies four or
five miles from the town and carried before the next justice of the
peace. . . . These things some of the officers are much dissatisfied at,
thinking that men once in the king's pay must upon no pretence be
taken hold of by the civil magistrate." — Clarendon to Sunderland,
18th December 1686. "The justices of the peace are very unwilling

36 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY char i

Lord Clarendon complains of the excesses even of the officers,
and mentions an extraordinary outrage committed by one of
them, Lord Brittas, on the High Sheriff of a county. We
give it in his own words, and the instance will show to what
a state the country had been reduced. " The High Sheriff of
the county sent an injunction out of Chancery to my Lord
Brittas, to quit the possession of another man with whom his
lordship has a suit. My lord beat the man most terribly
who brought the injunction, and not being satisfied therewith,
he took a file of his men with him, found out where the sheriff
himself was, dragged him into the streets, and caused him to be
beaten most cruelly, saying he would teach him how to carry
himself towards the officers of the king's army." If such an out-
rage could he committed with impunity l against a high public
officer, it is easy to imagine the condition of private persons.
These proceedings spread universal terror and alarm, and
their effects soon showed themselves in the decline of the
country. Trade and agriculture decayed rapidly ; landlords
hastened to sell their estates for whatever could be got;
merchants closed their accounts, and withdrew themselves
and their stocks to England ; farmers threw up their leases ;
manufactories were shut up; 2 the revenue declined; an

to take examinations where any of the army are concerned, though I
have signified to them that they need not fear doing their duty, espe-
cially where the lives of any of His Majesty's suhjects are concerned."
Clarendon to Sunderland, Clarendon's Gorr., ii. 137.

1 This crime was not punished. Lord Brittas apologised for it to
the Lord Lieutenant. This ruffian afterwards sat in the Dublin
Parliament. Two equally shameful outrages are told of Lord Clancarty,
another of Tyrconnel's officers. — Secret Consults, etc.

2 "The other day, my Lord Chief Justice being with me and dis-
coursing from his observations in bis late circuit of the great decay of
the inland manufactories and the damp that seemed to be upon the
minds of the trading people and husbandmen, I said to him, etc. . . .
I can myself give one instance of a man in the county of Cork who,
about eighteen months since, had forty looms at work, and about six
months since he put them all off ; has given his landlord warning, for
he was a great renter, that he will leave his lands. There is another

sec. ii THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 37

exodus, on a scale hitherto happily unknown in these islands,
began. As early as June 1686 Lord Clarendon writes : " It
is impossible to tell you the alterations that are grown in
men within this month ; but the last week — for I am very
inquisitive to be informed of those particulars — one hundred
and twenty people went in one ship from hence to Chester,
and multitudes are preparing, from all parts of the kingdom,
to be gone as fast as they can get in their debts and dispose
of their stocks. Great sums of money are brought to town,
and more is daily coming up to be sent away ; and in regard
the exchange is so high, for it is risen twenty shillings in
£100 within these four days, and that no returns, even at
these high rates, can be gotten into England, they are en-
deavouring to remit their money into France and Holland, to
draw it from thence hereafter at leisure. In the meantime,
there is no money in the country, and the native commodities
yield nothing. The king's quit -rents and chimney -money
come in very slowly. To distrain signifies nothing or very
little, for the collector cannot sell the distress when he has
taken it, that is, nobody will buy it." 1 And, again, in
August of the same year : " Those traders who have got
home their effects have withdrawn themselves and their
stocks out of the kingdom, which is undeniable matter of
fact. I can name several who paid the king many thousands
a year to his duty who are absolutely gone, and left no factors
to carry on their trade, by which means several thousands of
natives, who were employed in spinning and carding of wool/are
discharged and have no work. There are likewise multitudes
of farmers and renters gone to England, who, though they were
not men of estates, yet the improvements of the country and the

in the province of Munster, likewise, who keeps five hundred families
at work. This man, sending to a tenant for £30 which he owed him,
was presently accused by the said tenant of having spoken treasonable
words." — Clarendon to his brother, 30th May 1686.
1 Clarendon to Rochester, Corr. i. 464.

38 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

inland trade was chiefly carried on by them." In a word, the
desolation which afterwards, within a few months, overtook the
land was already settling down upon it ; and Ireland, which
only two years ago was, as Chief Justice Keating called it, " the
most improved and most improving spot of ground in Europe,"
was fast becoming a desert. Most of the English inhabitants
fled, and art, industry, and capital fled with them.

2. The Exclusion of Protestants from the Army

The army of Ireland, at the accession of James, consisted
of about seven thousand men, " as loyal and as cordial to the
king's service as any one could be ; both officers and soldiers
had been inured to it for many years. They looked on him as
their master and father, entirely depending on him, and ex-
pecting nothing from anybody else. When Monmouth's and
Argyle's rebellion called for their assistance to suppress them,
no people in the world could show more cheerfulness or
forwardness than they did. Most of the officers of this army
had been so zealous to serve the king that they had by his
permission and encouragement bought their employments ;
many of them had laid out their whole fortunes and con-
tracted debts to purchase a command." 1 Tyrconnel, who was
not able to put a regiment through its exercise, 2 came to
Ireland as general of the forces in 1686, with blank commis-
sions and with instructions to admit Roman Catholics into the
army, which up to this time was exclusively Protestant. These
instructions of the king implied no more than that all
subjects indiscriminately should be admitted to his service.
Tyrconnel himself admitted to Lord Clarendon that such was
their meaning, luit his declarations that no distinction should

'O'

1 King.

2 "Lord Tyrconnel himself, after all his infallible skill, cannot
draw up a regiment, which is visible here." — Clarendon to Rochester,
Corr. i. 436.

sec. ii THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 39

be made between Roman Catholic and Protestant differed
greatly from the proceedings which at once commenced, for
Tyrconnel was acquainted with the real wishes of the king. 1
Within a short time after his arrival, between two and three
hundred officers were removed without any reason assigned.
These gentlemen, who had bought their commissions, and
many of whom had shed their blood for the crown, were
dismissed without allowance or compensation. The letters
of Lord Clarendon are full of the many hard cases of these
officers, whom he knew to be good soldiers and loyal subjects.
For some he pleaded with Tyrconnel in vain, and others he
recommended to the king and his friends in England. The
majority 2 went abroad, and many of them took service in
Holland, thus swelling the number of William's friends and
James's enemies. Of the persons who were appointed in their
stead all were Roman Catholics, but this was the only qualifica-
tion required. The majority consisted of such as were entirely
ignorant of military duties, or were taken from the meanest
of the people. Some had been grooms, some footmen, and
some noted marauders. Archbishop King mentions the case
of the famous rapparees, the Brannans, who were made officers,

1 Dalrymple tells us that James afterwards complained that Tyr-
connel exceeded his orders. The truth is, the statements of the king
and of Tyrconnel are equally unworthy of credit. James says in
his Memoirs that he was pleased with Tyrconnel's conduct ; " to him
[Tyrconnel], therefore, the king gave a power to regulate the troops,
to place and displace whom he pleased, which he executed very much
to the king's satisfaction and advantage." On the other hand, Tyr-
connel informed Clarendon that the work was entirely the king's.
Clarendon thus reports Tyrconnel: "Here are great alterations to be
made and the poor people who are put out think it my doing, and

G d me I have little or nothing to do in the matter ; for I

told the king that I knew not two of the captains, nor other inferior
officers in the whole army. I know there are some hard cases which

I am sorry for ; but by G I know not how to help them. You

must know, my lord, the king, who is a Eoman Catholic, is resolved
to employ his subjects of that religion." — Corr. i. 481.

2 One of these dismissed officers was Gustavus Hamilton, afterwards
Governor of Enniskillen, who did good service for King William.

40 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

and says that he had been informed that there were at least
twenty tories officers in one regiment, and that there were very
few regiments without some. Lord Clarendon complains of the
excesses committed by these new officers, and points to great
abuses committed by them with regard to the subsistence money
of the army. " Scarce a colonel of the army," he writes, " knows
anything of his regiment." D'Avaux, in one of his despatches,
informs the French king that the colonels of the Irish army
were generally men of good family, who had never seen service,
but that the captains were butchers, tailors, and shoemakers. 1
The change or remodelling of the army, as it was termed,
was not limited to the officers. Tyrconnel, with equal
brutality and disregard of common humanity, disbanded
between five and six thousand common soldiers. The dis-
missal of the soldiers to beg through the country created even
a greater sensation than that of the officers, " because their
clothes having been taken from them when they were broke,
they wandered, half naked, through every part of the king-
dom." 2 In Dublin four hundred of the regiment of the
guards were turned out in one day, three hundred of whom
had no " visible fault." 3 The same thing was done at the
same time throughout the country. The new officers received
orders to enlist none but Roman Catholics. 4 " I will give you,"
says Lord Clarendon, " one instance only : Mr. Nicholas Darcy,
who has the company late Captain Motloe's, called his com-

1 " La pi apart de ces regimens sont levez par dez gentils homines
qui n'ont jamais este a l'armee. Ce sont des taillenrs, des bouchers, des
cordonniers, qui ont forme" les compazines, et qui en sont les capitaines."

2 Dalrymple. " This part he [Tyrconnel] acted in a most insult-
ing barbarous manner, causing poor men that had no clothes on their
backs but red coats to be .stripped to their shirts and so turned off ; and
of all this he himself was an inhuman spectator." — Secret Consults, etc.

3 Clarendon to Rochester, Corr. i. 476.

4 " The turning out so many men in an instant, taking in none but
natives in their room, and the very indiscreet conduct of some of the
new officers in declaring they will entertain no English nor any Pro-
testants, does frighten people." — Clarendon to Sunderland, ib. p. 485.

sec. ii THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 41

pany together, and asked them if they went to mass, to
which forty of them said ' no,' whereupon he immediately
dismissed them, and said he had kept as many above a week
at his own house upon his own charge, who, the next morn-
ing, were all admitted." Of the class of recruits who replaced
the veterans dismissed by Tyrconnel, let two contemporaries
speak : " When any new men are listed, they are sent to the
commissary to be sworn. The first thing they say is, that
they will not take the oath of supremacy ; he tells them he is
not to tender it to them, therefore they need not fear ; that
they are only to take the oath of fidelity, which is the oath
mentioned in my instructions, and taken by the Roman
Catholic judges. That they swallow ; and being asked
whether they understood what they have sworn, the answer
was, ' yes, they had been sworn to be true to the Pope and
their religion ;' and being told by some that they had been
sworn to be true to the king, they replied, ' their priest had
told them they must take no oath but to be true to the Pope.' " l
The other witness is Mr. Stafford, a Roman Catholic who,
through the interest of his son, lately appointed a Master in
Chancery, had been made a Justice of the Peace. In a
charge to the grand jury, at the quarter sessions held at
Castlebar in October 1686, this gentleman naively remarked:
" I shall not need to say much concerning rogues and vaga-
bonds, the country being pretty well cleared of them, by
reason His Majesty has entertained them all in his service,
clothed them with red coats, and provided well for them." 5

1 Clarendon's Corr. i. 476.

- This charge is so amusing that the whole of it is here given.
"Gentlemen, the spoiling of your garrans in their infancy, so that
they are not afterwards fit to do His Majesty any service ; of this beware,
gentlemen. Next, your burning corn in the straw, contrary to an Act
of Parliament. But perhaps this Lustrabane bread may palate your
mouth very well ; but you want the straw in winter to lie upon your-
selves, for you generally lie upon straw, and for fodder for your cattle,
so that you are forced to lift them up by the tail ; of this also beware,

42 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

3. The Remodelling of the Courts of Justice

Lord Clarendon was dismissed at the end of 1686, and
Tyrconnel arrived in Ireland, and was sworn in as Lord
Deputy on the 11th February 1687. During Clarendon's
administration Sir Charles Porter had been Lord Chancellor.
He had been originally chosen because it was supposed that
he held strong opinions in favour of absolute authority. But
latterly he had shown himself restive at the proceedings of
Tyrconnel, and had taken occasion to declare publicly that
"he came not over to serve a turn, nor would he act against
his conscience." Accordingly he was dismissed, and Tyr-
connel brought over with him a ready-made chancellor.
One Alexander Fitton, who had been detected in forgery at
Westminster and Chester, and fined by the House of Lords,
was taken out of prison and made Lord Chancellor of Ireland. 1
His single merit was that he was a convert to Catholicism.
A few circumstances of the many related of this judge will
give us an idea of his fitness for this great post. He was in
the habit of declaring from the bench that all Protestants
were rogues, and that amongst forty thousand of them there
was not one who was not a traitor, a rebel, and a villain. He
overruled the common rules of practice and the law of the
land, stating, at the same time, that the Chancery was above all
law, and that no law could bind his conscience. After hearing
a cause between a Protestant and Roman Catholic, he would
say that he would consult a divine, and he would then retire
to take the opinion of his chaplain, an ecclesiastic educated
in Spain. As assistants to the Chancellor, Dr. Stafford, a
priest, and Felix O'Neill, were appointed Masters. To these
the causes between Protestants and Roman Catholics were

gentlemen. I shall not need," etc., as above. Clarendon answers for
the fact of this address having been delivered. — Gorr. ii. 5G.
1 Fitton sat in the Dublin Parliament as Lord Gosworth.

sec. ii THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 43

generally referred, and upon their report the Chancellor passed
his orders and decrees.

In each of the Common Law Courts three judges then
sat. Up to 1684 these judges had been Protestants. But
when Tyrconnel came into power, two Eoman Catholics were
at once appointed, and one Protestant retained, " pinioned," as
Archbishop King expresses it, by his two brethren. The
Protestant " to serve for a pretence of impartiality, and yet to
signify nothing," the two Catholics to secure the majority.
A Mr. Thomas Nugent, the son of an attainted peer, and who
afterwards sat in James's parliament as Lord Riverstown,
" who had never been taken notice of at the bar but for more
than ordinary brogue and ignorance of the law," 1 and whom
Lord Clarendon calls " a very troublesome, impertinent
creature," was made Chief Justice of the King's Bench. 2 The
appointment of the son of an attainted person to decide
whether the outlawries against his father and others should
be reversed, and whether the settlement of the lands should
stand, boded no good to the present possessors. Their fears
were quickly verified. Nugent, we are told, reversed the
outlawries as fast as they came before him. In all the cases
between Catholics and Protestants which came into his
Court, he was never known, in a single instance, to give
judgment for one of the latter. When accused persons were

1 King.

2 A charge which this judge delivered to the Dublin Grand Jury
in 1688 will enable us to form an idea of him. "The Lord Chief
Justice Nugent, than whom perhaps the Bench never bore a more con-
fident ignorant Irishman, gave the charge to the Grand Jury, in which
he applauded and extolled above the height of an hyperbole the
magnanimous and heroic actions of the great and just King James ;
and on the contrary cast the most vilifying reproaches upon the Prince
of Orange. . . . His conclusion was that now the States of Holland
were weary of the prince, and that they had sent him over to be
dressed as Monmouth was, but that was too good for him. And that
he doubted not before a month passed to hear that they were hung up all
over England in bunches like ropes of onions." — Secret Consults, etc.

44 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chai>. i

acquitted on the palpable perjury of the witnesses for the
prosecution, he would not allow the witnesses to be prosecuted,
alleging that they had sworn for the king, and that he
believed the accused to be guilty, though it could not be
proved. He declared from the bench on circuit that rapparees
were necessary evils. I shall hereafter call attention to two
extravagant decisions of this judge. The other members of
this Court were Lyndon, a Protestant, and Sir Brian O'Neal,
an inveterate enemy of Englishmen and Protestants.

The Court of Exchequer was then the only one from
which there lay no appeal or writ of error into England, and
there was therefore no check upon the reversal of outlawries
or restraint on decisions contrary to the Acts of Settlement.
In consequence the whole business of the kingdom, so far
as it related to these matters, and all actions of trespass and
ejectment, were brought into this Court. Stephen Eice, an
able but intemperate Ptoman Catholic, was appointed Chief
Baron. His hostility to the Acts of Settlement and the
Protestant interests was notorious. 1 Before he was made a
judge he was often heard to say that he would drive a coach-
and-six through these Acts, and before they were repealed
by the Irish Parliament which afterwards sat in Dublin he
frequently declared on the bench that they were against
natural equity, and could not oblige. He used to say from
the same place that the Protestants should have nothing from

1 In the spring of 1688 Nugent and Rice were sent over to Eng-
land by Tyrconnel with the draft of an Act for the repeal of the Acts
of Settlement. Sunderland says that lie was ottered .£40,000 for his
concurrence and support. When the matter was first laid before the
Privy Council, Lord Bellasis proposed that Nugent and Rice should be
committed or commanded to return to Ireland immediately. It was
resolved however to hear them. It became known in London that
they were the bearers of a proposel to repeal the Acts. On the day
they proceeded (o the Council their coach was surrounded by boys
carrying sticks with potatoes stuck on them, and crying out, "Make
room for the Irish ambassadors." — Sunderland's Letter ; Earris, Life
of Will. Ill, Appen. ; Secret Consults ; State Tracts, 3.

sec. ii THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 45

him but the utmost rigour of the law. His Court, we are
informed, was immediately filled with Papist plaintiffs.
" Every one that had a forged deed or a false witness met
with favour and countenance from him ; and he, knowing that
they could not bring his sentences to England to be examined
there, acted as a man that feared no after-account or reckon-
ing. It was before him that all the charters in the kingdom
were damned, and that in a term or two, in such a manner that
proved him a man of despatch, though not of justice. If he
had been left alone, it was really believed that in a few
years he would, by some contrivance or other, have given
away most of the Protestant estates in Ireland.", 1 The com-
panions on the bench of the Chief Baron were Sir Henry
Lynch, equally hostile to the Protestants, and Baron Worth, 2
a Protestant.

The Court of Common Pleas was deserted, the business of
the kingdom being carried into the King's Bench and the
Exchequer. Two of the judges of this Court were able, up-
right, and honourable men — Keating, the Chief Justice, a
Protestant, and Daly, a Eoman Catholic. In the correspond-
ence of Lord Clarendon Keating appears as the one dignified
character of the letters, and he afterwards showed his worth
in the Privy Council before he was dismissed from that

1 King.

2 Tyrconnel was at one time anxious to remove Worth. Clarendon
tells us his opinion of this judge. " Well," said Lord Tyrconnel, •" I
have only one thing more to say at present, and that is concerning

Baron Worth, who, by G , is a d d rogue." " How so, my

Lord ?" said I. " A pox," said he ; "you know he is a Whig, and the
greatest favourer of fanatics in the world." On Clarendon's saying
that he only knew Worth as a judge, and that he behaved himself as

an honest man, Tyrconnel replied, "By G , I will prove him to

be a rogue." " Pray do, my Lord," said Clarendon ; "any charge you
bring against him shall be examined." To this Tyrconnel answered,

" By G , I will have it brought to the Council Board. The king

lias an ill opinion of him, and I will do his business." — Clarendon's
Gorr. i. 457.

46 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

body, and by his very noble letter to King James against the
repeal of the Acts of Settlement. Daly was also opposed to
their repeal, and was afterwards impeached by the Irish
Parliament for having said in private that they were not a
parliament, but a mere rabble, such as at Naples had thrown
up their hats in honour of Massaniello. 1 He was only saved
by the sudden joy of the Commons on a false report that
Londonderry had surrendered. 2 The third judge was Peter
Martin, a Roman Catholic.

4. The Appointment of Catholic Sheriffs and
Justices of the Peace

Tyrconnel, having remodelled the Courts of Justice to
his satisfaction, proceeded to secure to his creatures the exe-
cution of the laws and the nomination of juries. In January
1686 Lord Clarendon drew up a list of sheriffs for the follow-
ing year. He tells us he bestowed particular care in making
this list ; that before making it he had made inquiries from all

1 Daly was accused of having made use of the following expres-
sions : " That instead of being a parliament, as we pretend, we are
more like Massaniello's confused rabble, every man making a noise for
an estate and talking nonsense when our lives are in danger ; we ex-
pect a sudden invasion from England and a bloody war likely to ensue.
As persons altogether unmindful of the ruin that hangs over our
heads, and without taking any care to prevent it, we are dividing the
bear's skin before she is taken. All the honour we do His Majesty is
by reflecting on his royal father and brother as wicked and unjust
princes, charging them with enacting those laws that were contrary to
the laws of God and man." — True Account of the Present State of Ire-
land, London, 1689.

2 " Tuesday, the 4th instant, we had an alarm that Derry was
burnt with bombs, that the king's army had taken it, and put all in it
to the sword. Nugent, of Carlandstown, brought this news into the
House of Commons just when they were putting to the vote whether
they should prosecute the impeachment against Judge Daly. Some
think Nugent, being his friend, did it designedly. The news was
received with loud huzzas, and in that good and jolly humour they
acquitted the judge." — Letter from Dublin, 12th June 1689, attached to
The Journal of the Proceedings of the Parliament in Ireland, 6th July 1689.

sec. ii THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 47

persons he could trust, and had taken advice from all quarters
respecting the nominations. He was so well satisfied with it
that he wrote to Lord Sunderland, " I will venture to say it
is the best list of sheriffs that has been for these many years,
both for loyalty, prudence, and impartiality." Tyrconnel,
however, was not content with this selection of loyal, prudent,
and impartial gentlemen. He went over to England, and
there, though he had given no intimation in Ireland of his
dissatisfaction, and though he was aware who were on the roll
before his departure, he complained to the king of Clarendon's
selection. The list was sent back to Clarendon with objections,
to which he was required to give an answer. The objec-
tions were that the gentlemen nominated were Cromwellians
or tainted with Whiggism. 1 The objections were satisfactorily
answered, and Clarendon's nominees were appointed. But
Tyrconnel resolved that none should be appointed for the
next year but those of his own way of thinking. He and his
creature Nugent, in October 1686, took the extreme step of
drawing up a list of those whom they wished to be appointed
for the following year, and presented it to the Lord Lieu-
tenant. Clarendon complained of their conduct to the king.
In a letter to James, 16th October 1686, he writes: "I
humbly beg your Majesty's permission upon this occasion to
inform you that the day before my Lord Tyrconnel went
hence, he and Mr. Justice Nugent gave me a paper of the
names of the persons who were thought to be fit to be sheriffs

1 Tyrconnel mentioned this objection to- Lord Clarendon in his

usual language. " By G , my lord, I must needs tell you, the

sheriffs you made are generally rogues and old Cromwellians." Lord
Clarendon explained the great care he had taken in drawing up the
list and ended by saying that " he would justify that these sheriffs,
generally speaking, were as good a set of men as any had been chosen
these dozen years ; and that he would be judged by the Roman

Catholics in any county. To which Tyrconnel answered, " By G ,

I believe it, for there has not been an honest man sheriff in Ireland
these twenty years." — Clarendon's Corr. i. 442.

48 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

for the next year. I confess, sir, I thought it very strange,
to say no worse of it, for any two men to take upon them to
<nve a list of men for sheriffs over the whole kingdom — to
anticipate the representation of the judges, who are the
proper persons to offer men fit for those employments, and
without so much as leaving room for the Chief Governor to
have an opinion in the matter. This list is pretended to be
made indifferently of Roman Catholics and Protestants ; but
I am sure several of them, even of those who are styled
Protestants, are men no ways qualified for such offices of
trust." 1 The king took no notice of this complaint, and
Tyrconnel was allowed to have his way.

Lord Clarendon was right in saying that this list was
pretended to be made indifferently of Roman Catholics and
Protestants. In 1687 there was but one Protestant 2 sheriff
appointed in all Ireland, and this one was put in by mistake
for another of the same name who was a Catholic. Macaulay
has, from contemporary sources, left us a lively picture of these
sheriffs. "At the same time the sheriffs, to whom belonged the
execution of writs and the nomination of juries, were selected
in almost every instance from the caste which had, till very
recently, been excluded from all public trusts. It was
affirmed that some of these important functionaries had been
burned in the hand for theft; others had been servants to
Protestants, and the Protestants added, with bitter scorn,
that it was fortunate for the country when this was the case,
for that a menial who had cleaned the plate and rubbed clown
the horse of an English gentleman might pass for a civilised
being when compared with many of the native aristocracy
whose lives had been spent in coshering or marauding." It
was so difficult to find Roman Catholics fit to fill this office that
many of those appointed for 1G87 had to be re-appointed for

1 Clarendon to the king, Corr. ii. 36.
2 Charles Hamilton.

sec. ii THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 49

1688. Harris informs us that during these two years not a
single instance can be found of a Protestant recovering a debt
by execution — " because the poverty of the sheriffs was such
that all men were unwilling to trust an execution upon a
bond for twenty pounds into their hands, they not being
responsible for so small a sum, as many found by too late an
experience." l

It is to be remembered that Tyrconnel's sheriffs were
dispensed from taking the oaths required by law on enter-
ing upon their office. Harris, in his edition of Ware's
Writers of Ireland, tells us how one of these sheriffs was
treated by the well-known Charles Leslie, 2 the apologist of
King James. The appointment of a disqualified person to
the shrievalty of the county of Monaghan alarmed the local
gentry. Whereupon they repaired for advice to Leslie, who
was then confined by the gout to his house. He told them
" that it would be as illegal in them to permit the sheriff to
act as it would be in him to attempt it." But they, insisting
that Mr. Leslie should appear in person on the bench at the
approaching Quarter Sessions, promised that they would all
act as he did, and he was carried there in much pain and with
much difficulty. Upon inquiry whether the pretended sheriff
was legally qualified, he answered pertly " that he was of the

1 " But in plain matters of debt due by bond, or made out by full
undeniable ordinance, the judge did commonly grant executions even
against Papists ; but tbe matter was so managed with the sheriff that
the debtor might go publicly about his affairs in sj)ite of the decrees
or executions against him in the hands of the sheriff, who woidd be
sure to avoid him upon all occasions. I should be extreme tedious
... if I should here give an account of all the oppressions and unjust
proceedings of this kind to which I was myself a witness." — A Short
View, etc., London, 1689.

2 Clarendon thus speaks of this gentleman : "I shall take it for a
very great favour if you will bestow the Chancellorship of Connor
upon Mr. Charles Lesley, a man of good parts, admirable learning,
an excellent preacher, and of an incomparable life." — Corr. i. 405.
Leslie was appointed Chancellor of Connor in 1687.

50 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

king's own religion, and that it was His Majesty's will that
he should be sheriff." Mr. Leslie replied " that they were
not inquiring into His Majesty's religion, but whether he had
qualified himself according to law for acting as a proper
officer ; that the law was the king's will, and nothing else to
be deemed such ; that his subjects had no other way of know-
ing his will but as it is revealed to them in his laws, and it
must always be thought to continue so, till the contrary is
notified to them in the same authentic manner." Wherefore
the Bench unanimously agreed to commit the pretended
sheriff for his intrusion and arrogant contempt of the Court. 1
That the same interest might be predominant in every
part of the kingdom, the commissions of the peace underwent
a similar regulation. It is true that some few Protestants
were continued in it ; but they were rendered useless and
insignificant, being overpowered by the great number of
natives joined with them, and " those, for the most part, of
the very scum of the people, and a great many whose fathers
had been executed for theft, robbery, or murder." 2 So little
regard was had to character that a man was appointed
chief magistrate in a northern city who had been condemned
to the gallows for his crimes. 3 Of one of these justices I
have already spoken — the gentleman who stated from the
bench that all the rogues and vagabonds of the country had
been swept into the new-modelled army.

5. The Attach on the Corporations

But however large these strides were, they fell short of
the projects of Tyrconnel and his party. Speedily as the
forfeitures were being reversed, and the land restored to the
natives, they were not satisfied. He and they aimed at the

1 Ware's Works, edition of 1764.
2 Harris. 3 Burdy.

sec. II THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 51

total extirpation of the English interest by means of an Irish
Parliament. The corporations, about a hundred in number,
were in the hands of the Protestants, and these bodies enjoyed
the right of sending representatives to the legislature. Tyr-
connel, having secured the appointment of native returning
officers in the counties, turned his attention to the towns.
All the corporate towns of Ireland, with the exception of
Dublin, Limerick, Waterford, and Cork, which had been built
by the Danes, had been founded by the English settlers at
their own cost and charge to be the strongholds of their
interest. Thirty of them had been built in the reign of
James I. alone, 1 and almost every householder in them
was a Protestant. The first attempt was made on the Cor-
poration of Dublin. Tyrconnel, then Lord Deputy, sent
for the Lord Mayor and aldermen, and asked them to sur-
render their charter, stating that the king had resolved to
call in all the charters in the country in order to enlarge
their privileges, and that His Majesty expected their ready
. compliance. To this request it was answered that a common
council would be called, and the matter laid before it. This
was done, and the Mayor was authorised to tell the Deputy
that the rights and privileges of the corporation were secured
by one hundred and thirty charters, and to pray him that
their ancient government should be continued to them.
Tyrconnel, as usual with him, fell into a tempest of passion,
rated them soundly for their rebellion, and told them to go
their ways and resolve to obey, lest a worse thing should
befall them. 2 Overwhelmed by these menaces and reproaches,
the Mayor called another council ; but the members persisted
unanimously in refusing to surrender their charters. To
qualify the refusal a deputation proceeded to the castle to
acquaint Tyrconnel with the reasons for their refusal, and to
pray for time to petition the king, who, on a former occa-
1 Harris. - Ralph.

52 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

sion, had acknowledged their eminent sufferings for his royal
father, and assured them that he would reward them therefor.
With this acknowledgment and promise Tyrconnel was now
made acquainted, but without effect. He commenced to
storm as before, and said that instead of writing in their
favour to the king he would write against them. 1 A quo
warranto was immediately issued against the corporation.
The case came on before Chief Baron Eice in the Exchequer,
into which Court this and all the subsequent quo warrantos
were brought, to prevent writs of error into England. The
corporation was not allowed as much time to put in their
plea as was necessary to transcribe it. A date being mis-
taken by the clerk in one of their charters (we have seen
that they had a hundred and thirty), the corporation prayed
leave to amend it. Leave was refused, and judgment was
given against them. The fate which befell the corporation
of the capital was that of all the corporations in the country.
Within the short space of two terms — such was the despatch
of Tyrconnel's judges — the charters of all the corporations in
uhe kingdom were forfeited or superseded.

New charters were granted ; but by these new charters
the corporations were made absolute slaves to the caprice
of the Lord Deputy. A clause was inserted in all of them
empowering Tyrconnel to put in and turn out whom he
pleased without trial or reason shown. In filling up the new
corporations it was the general rule that two -thirds of the
members should be Catholics and one-third Protestants. The
Protestants declined to serve at all. Of the Catholics ap-
pointed many never saw the town for which they were
named, nor were concerned in trade ; some were named for
several corporations ; most of them were in indigent circum-
stances. 2 The case of one illustrious town will explain to
us the sweeping changes wrought throughout the kingdom.

1 Ralph. " Harris.

sec. ii THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 53

The charter of Londonderry 1 had been declared forfeited, and
its corporation remodelled. Among its new aldermen and
burgesses, sixty-five in number, twenty were Protestants and
forty-five were Eoman Catholics. 2

6. Remodelling of the Privy Council

The Privy Council in Ireland at this time had duties,
and acted a part in the constitution which was not performed
by the Privy Council in England. No proposed Act could
be introduced into the Irish Legislature until the Lord
Lieutenant and his council had certified the causes and
reasons for it. It became necessary, therefore, to remodel
this body also. A large number of Eoman Catholics were
introduced, or rather drafted into it, for some who were
named for it were either ashamed or unwilling to accept the
honour. In May 1686 twenty new members were added, of
whom eighteen were Eoman Catholics. Two were Protestants,

1 " The same being done in all other corporations either by volun-
tary resignation or a short trial, more for form than with design to
avoid it, it cost no great trouble except at Londonderry (a stubborn
people as they appeared afterwards), who stood an obstinate suit, but
were forced at last to undergo the same fate with the rest." — Clarke's
James II.

2 Macaulay is mistaken in saying that there was only one person
of Anglo-Saxon extraction in the new-modelled corporation. He was
misled by two lines in the " Londeriados," a poem written between the
years 1695-99—

' ' In all the corporation not a man
Of British parents except Buchanan."

Among the names of the new corporators are to be found Manby,
Dobbin, Hamilton, Burnside, Lecky, Stanley, Gordon, etc. — Hempton,
Siege and History of Londonderry. The " Londeriados " informs us of
the class from which the new members were chosen —

" For burgesses and freemen they had chose
Brogue-makers, butchers, raps, and such as those."

This poem is to be found in Hempton. When the corporation was
new modelled, its plate was wisely hidden until better times.

54 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

and one of them, Lord Granard, who had been deprived
of his regiment in the remodelling of the army, was
appointed President of the Council, an office until then
unknown in Ireland. 1 Lord Granard declined to act.
In fact, all the Protestant lords ceased to attend, "since
they were so vastly outnumbered as to prevent their
doing either the Protestants or their country service." 2

Thus was the whole military, civil, and administrative
power in the country transferred to the native Irish. The
transference was undertaken by Tyrconnel with a light heart ;
but the cost of the operation was the ruin of the English
settlers and the desolation of the kingdom. The first steps
of Tyrconnel — the disarming of the Protestants, and their
exclusion from the army — had alarmed the settlers, and
stirred up against them an excitable and hostile population.
I have already spoken of the fatal consequences of these
proceedings. When it became known that Tyrconnel had
been appointed Lord Deputy 3 the alarm became universal,
and the exodus of the English assumed a proportionate
magnitude. Every Protestant who was able withdrew him-
self and his family to England or Scotland. 4 So anxious were
men to be gone that they tempted the clangers of the Irish
Sea in skiffs and open boats. When Lord Clarendon relin-

1 " For there never was a President of the Council here before ; and
the statute takes no notice of, nor appoints a place for such an office
here, as it does in England." — Clarendon's Gorr. i. 417.

2 Harris.

3 " The confirmation of this dismal news reaching the ears of the
Protestants in Ireland struck like a thunderbolt. Perhaps no age
or story can parallel so dreadful a catastrophe among all ages and
sexes as if the day of doom was come ; every one lamenting the dread-
fulness of their horrible condition, and almost all that could by any
means deserted the kingdom if they had but money to discharge their
passage. A demonstration of this were those infinite numbers of
families which flocked over from Dublin to the Isle of Man and other
places." — Secret Consults, etc.

4 Among the refugees of 1687 was the celebrated William Moly-
neux.

sec. ii THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 55

quislied the Government in 1G87 to Tyrconnel, fifteen hundred
families left Ireland with him. During the first year of
Tyrconnel's administration the evils increased and the con-
dition of the country became still more deplorable. Lament-
able as this state was in 1687, the sufferings became greater
when in the winter of the following year the army was
increased. Fifty thousand 1 Irish troops, ill-disciplined and
hostile to the Protestants, were let loose on the country. At
the same time large bodies of the peasantry collected and
ravaged the land unchecked. What few effects had been
left to the unfortunate Protestants were at once swept away. 2
" The destruction of property which took place within a few
weeks," says Macaulay, " would be incredible if it were not
attested by witnesses unconnected with each other and
attached to very different interests. There is a close and
sometimes almost a verbal agreement between the descrip-
tions given by Protestants who, during that reign of terror,
escaped at the hazard of their lives to England, and the
descriptions given by the envoys, commissaries, and captains
of Lewis. All agreed in declaring that it would take many
years to repair the waste which had been wrought in a few
weeks by the armed peasantry. The French ambassador
reported to his master that in six weeks 50,000 horned
cattle had been slain, and were rotting on the ground all
over the country. The number of sheep that were butchered
during the same time was popularly said to have been
three or four hundred thousand." 3

1 This is the lowest calculation. Ranke says : " Nach den gering-
sten Angaben wohlunterrichteter betrug sie doch 50,000 man."

2 Keating's letter to King James in Append, of King.

3 This estimate is much below that of the refugee Protestants.
One of them describes these ravages as. follows : " And, to be short, the
spoil was so general and great that in December and part of January
last they had destroyed in the counties of Cork and Kerry above four
thousand head of black cattle, as cows and oxen, and there and in the
county of Tipperary two or three hundred thousand sheep. And so in all

56 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

A patriotic eye-witness has left us two pictures of the
country which bring into glaring contrast the past and the
then present state of Ireland, and disclose the former pros-
perity and the latter desolation. Chief- Justice Keating,
"whom all parties will own to be a good man," 1 in his
celebrated letter to King James, in May 1689, tells him how
Ireland — "from the most improved and improving spot of
earth in Europe ; from stately herds and flocks ; from plenty
of money at 7 or 8 per cent, whereby trade and industry
were encouraged, and all upon the security of those Acts
of Parliament; from great and convenient buildings newly
erected in cities and other corporations, to that degree that
even the city of Dublin is, since the passing of these Acts,
and the security and quiet promised from them, enlarged to
double what it was ; and the shipping in divers ports were
five or six times more than ever was known before, to the
vast increase of your Majesty's revenue " — was reduced " to
the saddest and most disconsolate condition of any kingdom
or country in Europe." The same judge, who remembered
what the country had been only four years before, lamented
at the Assizes 2 at Wicklow, in language of extraordinary
earnestness and force, the miseries of the kingdom. He told
the Grand Jury that a great part of the island was devastated
by a rabble armed with unusual weapons : " I mean half-
pikes and skeans; I must tell you plainly it looks rather
like a design to massacre and murder than anything else.

other parts, especially the provinces of Minister and Leinster propor-
tionally ; so that before the beginning of February it was thought
they had destroyed in all parts of the kingdom above one million head
of cattle, besides corn and houses, and thereby utterly spoiled the most
plentiful country in these parts of Europe ; so that twenty years of
perfect peace cannot be thought to restore it to the state in which it
was at the death of King Charles the Second." — Ireland's Lamentation,
1689 ; see also A Short View, etc., 1089.

1 Clarendon.

2 State Trials, xii. 615, 635.

sec. ii THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 57

I am told that open markets are set up in this county — a fat
bullock for five shillings and a fat sheep for one shilling.
Under the old law the Jews were not to seethe the kid in
the mother's milk ; but these unmerciful wretches go further
than that, sparing none, but destroying old and young. It
would make every honest man's heart to bleed to hear what
I have heard since I came into this county. It is ill in
other parts of the country ; but here they spare not even the
wearing clothes and habits of women and children, that they
are forced to come abroad naked without anything to cover
their nakedness ; so that besides the oath you have taken,
and the obligation of Christianity that lies upon you as
Christians, I conjure you by all that is sacred, and as ever
you expect eternal salvation, that you make diligent inquiry."
In a subsequent case at the same Assizes he renewed his
complaint. " There are such general and vast depredations in
the country that many honest men go to bed possessed of
considerable stocks of black and white cattle, gotten by great
labour and pains, the industry of their whole lives, and in
the morning when they arise not anything left them, but,
burned out of all, to go a begging, all being taken away
by rebels, thieves, and robbers, the sons of violence. On this
side the Cape of Good Hope, where are the most brutish and
barbarous people we read of, there is none like the people of
this country, nor so great a desolation as in this kingdom.
It is come to that pass, that a man that loses the better part
of his substance chooses rather to let that, and what he has
besides, go, than come to give evidence. And why ? Because
he is certain to have his house burnt and his throat cut if he
appears against them. Good God, what a pass are we come
to ! " In reading these descriptions and lamentations it must
never be forgotten that up to this time, and long afterwards,
all Ireland south of Dublin was peaceful and free from the
ravages of war ; yet the country had been changed into a

58 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

wilderness by the devastations of the peasantry and the
connivance of Tyrconnel's government.

The Protestants computed their losses during these four
years of misgovernment at eight millions of money. 1 Macau-
lay points out that all such estimates must be inexact. " We
are not, however, absolutely without materials for such an
estimate. The Quakers were neither a very numerous nor a
very opulent class. We can hardly suppose that they were
more than a fiftieth part of the Protestant population, or that
they possessed more than a fiftieth part of the Protestant
wealth of Ireland. They were, undoubtedly, better treated
than any other Protestant sect. James had always been
partial to them. 2 They own that Tyrconnel did his best to
protect them, and they seem to have found favour even in
the sight of the rapparees. Yet the Quakers computed their
pecuniary losses at a hundred thousand pounds." If we take
into consideration what must have been spared to the Quakers
by the protection of Tyrconnel and the favour of the rapparees,
the estimate of their losses by the general body of the Protest-
ants will not appear to be exaggerated.

1 Vindication of the Protestants of Ireland, 1689 ; Cliaracter of the
Protestants of Ireland, 1689.

2 The Quakers were certainly well affected to James and were in
consequence favoured by him. When Dykvelt came over to England
in 1687 he succeeded in reconciling all the nonconformists, except
this body, to the interest of William. — Mazure's Histoire de la Revolution,
iii. 11. Quakers were introduced as numerously as their small
numbers allowed, into the remodelled corporations in Ireland, and
two, Anthony Sharp and Samuel Clarrage, were made aldermen of
Dublin, and excused from the oaths. — Ireland's Lamentation. Story
informs us " they say it was a Quaker that first proposed this
invention of brass money ; but whoever it was, they did that party a
signal piece of service, since they would never have been able to have
carried on the war without it. However, the Quakers have been very
serviceable to that interest, for I am assured by some in the Irish
army that they maintained a regiment at their own cost, besides
several presents of value that they made to the late king." — Impartial
History, p. 50.

SECTION III

THE PARLIAMENT OF 1689

James landed at Kingsale on the 12th of March 1689, and
on the 14th proceeded to Cork, where he commenced to act
as a king. He created Tyrconnel a duke, and issued an edict
against exporting wool to England, while giving a general
liberty for sending it to Erance. 1 From Cork he rode to
Dublin, which he reached on the 24th. 2 Erom St. James's
Gate, the one by which he entered, he was conducted to the
Castle by the Lord Mayor and aldermen, the judges and
State officers, and a muster of about twenty coaches. The
sword of State was carried by Tyrconnel immediately before
James, who was mounted on a " padnag in a plain cinnamon-
coloured cloth suit and black slouching hat, and a George
huno; over his shoulder with a blue ribbon." On his arrival
at the gate of the castle he was met by the host, covered
by a canopy borne by four bishops, accompanied by a numer-
ous train of friars singing. On seeing this procession James
immediately dismounted and fell on his knees to receive a bless-
ing from the Roman Catholic primate, who was present. He

1 Life of James II., written by himself ; Macpherson's Original
Papers, i. 176.

2 " It was impossible for the king to proceed immediately to
Dublin, for the southern counties had been so completely laid waste
by the banditti whom the priests had called to arms that the means
of locomotion were not easily to be procured. Horses had become
rarities ; in a large district there were only two carts, and those
D'Avaux pronounced good for nothing." — Macaulay.

3 Ireland's Lamentation, being a short account, etc., 1689.

60 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

then rose and passed into the castle, from which a banner waved
with this inscription on it, Now or never ; now and for ever}

The next morning he called a council, and having first
erased from its list the names of Lord Granard and Chief-
Justice Keating, he ordered five proclamations to be issued,
— (1) for raising the value of the currency ; 2 (2) summoning
a parliament for the 7th of May following ; (3) requiring all
who had left the kingdom to return with assurance of pro-
tection ; (4) commending his Eoman Catholic subjects for
having armed themselves, yet " whereas it had encouraged
some certain robberies," ordering all who were not in the army
to lay up their weapons in their houses ; (5) enacting the
carriage of provisions to the army in the North, and forbidding
his soldiers and officers from seizing any without payment.

Some writers have expressed the opinion that, although
James during his stay in Ireland was not a king de jure, yet
that he ought to be considered as a king de facto. James
never was a king de facto of or in Ireland. 3 A king de facto
is one who is in peaceable possession of a kingdom, though
a flaw in his title may exist, or be afterwards discovered.
When James landed in Ireland the entire north was in
possession of those who disputed his title and had transferred
their allegiance to William. During the whole period of his
stay in Ireland James was strictly a militant challenger. The
only claim which James ever had to the crown of Ireland
was in right of his English crown. By the statute law
of Ireland the Irish crown was inseparably annexed to that
of England, and the possessor of the latter became at once

1 Apology for the Irish Protestants ; State Tracts, 3.

2 A guinea was raised to twenty-four shillings ; an English shilling
to thirteenpence ; a ducatoon from 6s. to 6s. 3d. ; a cob from 4s. 9d.
to 5s. ; a French louis to 19s. — Ireland's Lamentation, etc.

3 Plowden says in his Review that James continued to be after his
flight from England both de jure and de facto king of Ireland. But
Plowden's opinions and facts are of about equal value. Cbarles O'Conor
justly accuses him of misrepresentation and ignorance of Irish history.

sec. in THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 61

and ijjso facto entitled to the crown of Ireland. Upon the
transfer of the English crown, in whatever manner it was
effected, the transferee became at once, and without any action
of the Irish Parliament, the rightful sovereign of Ireland. If
James had forfeited the crown of England — a position which
cannot be questioned, inasmuch as our whole constitution is
based upon it — he had no right whatever, when he arrived in
Ireland, to the crown of that country. 1 He was an adventurer,
and exactly in the position of Lambert Simnel who was crowned
in Dublin, except that James had once been the lawful sovereign
of Ireland. It follows from this that James was incapable of
summoning an Irish parliament. But this was not the only
illegality which tainted the assembly called by him. By the
law of Ireland no parliament could be called without a warrant
under the Great Seal of England certifying the laws which were
to be passed, and permitting the meeting of the legislative body.
No doubt these considerations did not infiuencethe lowerorders
of Irish who flocked to James's standard, and who were ac-
quainted with no law except that of their native impulse. But
there was not a member of James's council, nor of the Dublin
assembly, that did not know that the Parliament was sum-
moned by one who had no right to call it, and that it was an
act of treason to sit in it or to take a part in its proceedings.
James was now among subjects from whom he was to
experience nothing but slights, insults, and open opposition
to the new policy which he had determined to adopt in
Ireland. There was already, though as yet unknown to
either party, a growing incompatibility between the views of
James and those of his Irish supporters who were bent on
the restoration of the land to its former owners and the
separation of Ireland from Great Britain. James had lately,
under the advice of Louis XIV, modified his former inten-

1 The crown of England was offered to and accepted by William
and Mary on the 13th of February 1689.

62 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

tion of an immediate repeal of the Acts of Settlement. The
French king had recommended him to defer this project till
he had repossessed himself of the English throne, and in the
meantime to reconcile the Irish Protestants to his interests. 1
In 1687 James and Tyrconnel had an interview at Chester,
and there it was agreed between them to proceed at once
with the repeal of the Acts of Settlement and with the con-
sequent confiscation of the estates of the Protestants. 2 But
when this resolution was adopted James was still king ;
subsequent events had wrought a change in his views. Every
reason was in favour of the deceitful and disingenuous policy
which was recommended by Louis. It would have pleased
the party of James in England ; its tendency was to lessen
the opposition of the Protestants of Ireland. The repeal of
the Acts of Settlement was viewed unfavourably by the vast
majority of the English Jacobites, even by the Eoman
Catholics of that party ; and James was well assured that
if he pronounced for the independence of Ireland, England
would never forgive the king who had declared for such
a measure. The circumstances of Ireland lent additional
weight to the advice of Louis. If ever a man was bound to
conciliate the Protestants of Ireland it was James. He was
well aware that all the wealth and resources of the island
were in their possession, and that nothing would strengthen
the hands of his English and Scotch friends, and allay the
suspicions entertained of him, so much as justice and kind-
ness to the Irish Protestants. It would have been a com-
plete answer to his enemies if he could have shown that in

1 Ranke, History of England, iv. 536, translation.

2 " Pendant ce voyage, my lord Tyrconnel s'etoit rendu a Chester
aupres du Roi et prit les ordres sur l'lrlande. Un inois apres, Barillon
annoncoit a Louis XIV la resolution de renverser ce que Ton nommoit
l'etablissment, c'est^a-dire, de rendre aux Irlandois les biens dont ils
avoient ete depossedes sous la republique. Cet etablissment avoit etd
confirme a la restauration." " Les mesures," desoit Barillon, " sont
prises pour en venir a bout." — Mazure, La Revolution de 1688, ii. 286.

sec. in THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 63

Ireland, where he was supported by the majority, he had not
only abstained from ill-treating the Protestants, but had on
the contrary protected and supported them. James saw that
his interests demanded the conciliation of the Irish Pro-
testants, and that a policy of amnesty and mildness would
strengthen his claims and increase his chances of restoration. 1
His aim was to recover his British throne either by means of
a peaceful recall or by an invasion. Ireland was regarded by
him merely as a stepping-stone to that end. It was of the
highest importance to him not to offend his English friends
by throwing Ireland into confusion, or to renew their fears
by oppressing the Irish Protestants. On the other hand,
if it should become necessary to invade England, and to
encourage his supporters there by an imposing display of
force, it was to the Irish army that he could look for success
in his undertaking. He could neither make use of that
army, nor even keep it together, if he placed himself in oppo-
sition to the wishes of those who raised and maintained it. 2
The French friends who accompanied James into Ireland
joined the Irish party, and were of opinion that his only
hope of safety lay in throwing himself heart and soul into
the views of the extreme Irish faction ; while Melfort and
his English councillors recommended the conciliation of the
Protestants. James's private wishes were undoubtedly in
favour of restoring the lands to the native Irish. Yet he
could not but see in his lucid moments that a general con-

1 Ranke tells us that a proclamation, assuring the Protestants of
the restoration to their estates and of their admission to public offices,
was actually drawn up by order of James after his arrival in Ireland,
but that its publication was prevented by the Irish and Frencb
factions.

2 The Irish army was not paid till after the arrival of James.
He himself mentions this, " for the troops being raised and having no
pay, were forced to live on the people ; and though the officers had
undertaken to maintain them at their own charge, there were very
few that did it effectually." — Life of James II, written by himself ;
Macpherson's Original Papers, i. 176.

64 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

fiscation would injure his prospects. But James discovered
that it was easier to excite hopes than to arrest them at
maturity. He and Tyrconnel had been working for years
for the repeal of the Acts of Settlement, and he was now
carried away by the flood the gates of which he had himself
opened. The underhand shifts and vacillations to which he
was forced by his present desire to conciliate the Protestants,
and at the same time to retain the affections of his Irish
allies, were pitiable. He would and he would not, one day ex-
horting the Protestant bishops to oppose the repeal of the Acts
of Settlement, the next urging on their revocation more speedily
than it would otherwise have gone. At the very time when
he was secretly encouraging the Protestant peers 1 to oppose
in every way their repeal, the following scene took place in the
House of Lords, which James attended every day. On the 28th
of May a motion was made for adjourning over a holiday.
" The king asked, ' What holiday ? ' Answered, ( the restoration
of his brother and himself.' He replied, ' the fitter to restore
those loyal Catholic gentlemen who had suffered with him and
been kept unjustly out of their estates.' The motion rejected." 2
But the recovery of his other kingdoms by James was
a matter of the smallest importance to the vindictive and im-
provident men who now had him in their power. They saw,
or thought they saw, for there was not one of them gifted
with a particle of political foresight or wisdom, a propitious
opportunity for carrying into effect their extravagant schemes.

1 "I appeal to the Earl of Granard whether Duke Powis did not
give him thanks from King James for the opposition he made in the
House of Lords to the passing the Act of Attainder and the Act for
repeal of the Acts of Settlement, and desired that he and the other
Protestant lords should use their endeavours to obstruct them. To
which the Lord Granard answered that they were too few to effect
that ; but if the king would not have them pass, his way was to
engage some of the Eoman Catholic lords to stop them. To which
the duke replied with an oath that the king durst not let them know
that he had a mind to have them stopt." — Leslie's Answer to King, p. 99.

2 Journal of the proceedings in the Irish Parliament, 1689.

sec. in THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 65

They quickly took the measure of James and discovered
what a king of shreds and patches had come among them. 1
Encouraged by the internal troubles of Great Britain, and
resolved to carry out their plans of confiscation and proscrip-
tion, they made use of James and of his title of king solely
for their own purposes, and compelled him to renounce his
policy of conciliation, and in so doing to consummate his
own ruin and that of his family. 2 Now that they had the
whole power of the kingdom in their hands, they threw
moderation and all thoughts of the future to the winds. 3
They made what was virtually a declaration of war against
England and the English interest in Ireland, while at the
same time they gave a dreadful note of warning respecting
the treatment which awaited the Protestants of Ireland in
case they should remain masters of the country. The object
of the Irish party was the threefold one which is sure to
make its appearance in every Irish agitation, whatever may

1 On the 18th of May, in the midst of their preparations for con-
fiscation and proscription, the Irish around James sent to England,
without his knowledge as he tells us, and published there a proclama-
tion in his name, declaring that the Protestants were living under
James in the greatest freedom, quiet, and security both as to their
properties and religion. Some Scotch officers who, in the winter of
1689, came over to Dublin, said that if their countrymen had known
how the Protestants had been treated in Ireland not a man of them
would have fought for James. This proclamation is to be found in
Parliamentary History, v. 303 ; and in Clarke's Life of James, ii. 362.

2 Speaking of the Acts to which he was obliged by his Irish allies
to consent, James says "nothing but his unwillingness to disgust
those who were otherwise affectionate subjects could have extorted
[this consent] from him. It had without doubt been more generous
in the Irish not to have pressed so hard upon their prince when he
lay so much at their mercy, and more prudent not to have grasped at
regaining all before they were sure of keeping what they already
possessed." — Clarke's Life, ii. 361.

3 " But the Irish, by reckoning themselves sure of their game, when
in reality they had the worse of it, thought of nothing but settling
themselves in riches and plenty by breaking the Act of Settlement,
and by that means raise new enemies before they were secure of master-
ing those they had already on their hands."— James's words, ib. ii. 354.

66 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

have been its commencement, — Roman Catholic ascendency,
separation from Great Britain, and the possession of the land.
The first the Irish had already obtained by the means I have
mentioned. They were now about to make their final and fatal
attempt to attain the latter two. Tyrconnel and his party had
been for four years making their preparations for a Parliament
which should fully carry out Irish ideas. The hour was now
come, and in May 1689 a Parliament assembled in Dublin
which has ever since been to all impartial men who are
acquainted with its proceedings a world's wonder.

This parliament met on the 7th of May and continued its
sittings till the 20th of July following. I have already
pointed out the double illegality which attached to it ; that
it was summoned by one who had no right to call it, and
that it sat directly in the teeth of Poynings' law. 1 The con-
stitution of this assembly was peculiar. Out of ninety Pro-
testant lords only five temporal peers and four bishops
attended. Ten Eoman Catholic peers had obeyed the writ of
summons ; but by the reversal of old attainders and new
creations, seventeen more, all Ptoman Catholics, were introduced
into the house. Of the twenty-four Catholics who generally
attended, fifteen had had their attainders reversed, and. four
were minors. No Eoman Catholic prelates were summoned.
This was greatly against the wish of the Parliament, which
desired that all the Protestant bishops should be excluded,
and Roman Catholics summoned in their place. 2 It was the
work of the king, who still hoped that some moderation would
be observed, and encouraged the Protestant bishops in their at-
tendance and opposition to the repeal of the Acts of Settlement.

1 Yet Poynings' law was not repealed by this Parliament. A Bill
to that effect was introduced into the Commons, hut on James express-
ing his dissatisfaction the Bill was allowed to drop. — King.

2 " Diese Versamnilung missbilligte, dass die Protestanischen Bis-
chofe nicht mit einem Schlage entfernt, und Catholische an ihre Stelle
gesetzt wurden." — Banke.

sec. in THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 67

This conduct of James was remarked with dislike, and he
was accused of being an Englishman, and of showing too
much lenity to the Protestants. A Roman Catholic author
and actor in these scenes tells us that the king's conduct in
the temple showed him to be a good Catholic, but his conduct
in the senate proved him to be a Protestant. 1

The House of Commons then consisted of three hundred
members, elected by the freeholders in counties, and by the
burgesses in corporations. Tyrconnel took care to pack this
house with his creatures. We have seen how the sheriffs of
counties and the corporations had been secured. 2 To make
certain that none but safe men should be returned, letters
were sent with the writs recommending the persons whom
Tyrconnel wished to be elected. Upon the receipt of these
letters the sheriff or magistrate assembled such as he thought
fit, and these, without making any noise about it, made a
return, so that the Protestants either did not know of the
election, or were afraid to appear at it. 3 Two hundred and
thirty-two members were returned. Six only were Protest-

1 " James, however, was so intent upon following the advice of his
favourites, not to act anything in favour of the Irish or for the re-
establishment of the worship of Eome that might dissatisfy his Pro-
testant subjects in England [who, as they believed, would undoubtedly
recall him if he continued his wonted moderation], that pursuant to
this maxim, he would not admit the Eoman Catholic bishops to take
their places in the Assembly of the States, though he allowed it to
four Protestant bishops, all the rest of that stamp being gone into
England to join with "William, and these also declared for him as soon
as he appeared with any power in Ireland. So that whoever considers
the different behaviour of this prince in the temple and senate would
take him for a serious Roman Catholic in the one, and a true Protestant
in the other." — Colonel Kelly, Macarice Excidium.

2 When the elections took place few of the new charters to the
corporations had passed the seal. — List of the Lords Spiritual and
Temporal, etc., 1689. In the Secret Consults, published 1690, it is
stated " most of the new charters are yet in the Attorney General's
hands for want of paying the fees, and the several corporations act
without them."

3 Harris, Life of Will. III.

68 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

ants. 1 Thirty-four 2 boroughs and counties were not repre-
sented.

It was a Parliament so summoned and so constituted that
proceeded to pass Acts " which seem to have been framed by
madmen." 3 The king, in his opening speech, had referred in
cautious terms to the Acts of Settlement. After stating that
he was " against invading any man's property," he proceeded,
" I shall most readily consent to the making of such good,
wholesome laws as may be for the good of the nation, the
improvement of trade, and relieving such as have been
injured by the late Acts of Settlement, so far forth as may be
consistent with reason, justice, and the public good." These
words have been tortured into an attack on these Acts ; but
nothing was further from -James's thought than their present
repeal. Some hard cases had undoubtedly occurred on the
former settlement of the nation, and it was the king's wish
that a sum of money should be set apart to indemnify the
sufferers, 4 or that a compromise between the old and present
proprietors should be effected. But such moderation was

1 Of these six two, Sir John Mead and Joseph Coghlan, members
for the University, opposed the repeal of the Acts of Settlement, and
finding that they could do no good, retired from the House. — List of
the Lords, etc., 1689.

2 Harris.

3 Dalrymple.

4 James tells us in his Memoirs : " It is certain that many of the
wise and judicious Catholics thought such an accommodation very
practicable ; that the great improvements had so enhanced the value
of most estates as would allow the old proprietors a share of equal
income to what their ancestors lost, and yet leave a competency for the
purchasers, who might reasonably be allowed the benefit of their own
labours. And in such turbulent times and difficult circumstances it
was just that all pretenders should recede in some degree from the
full of their pretensions for the accommodation of the whole; no side
being so apt to grumble when all men share the burden, especially it
being of that consequence to prevent a universal discontent, both for
the king's present necessities, the public quiet and general safety of
the people. There is no doubt but the king's inclinations were the
same." — Clarke's Life, ii. 358.

sec. in THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 69

hateful to the Irish. A Bill for repealing the Acts of Settle-
ment was brought in by Chief-Justice Nugent, and received
with a hurrah, " which more resembled the behaviour of a
crew of rapparees over a rich booty than that of a senate
appointed to rectify abuses, and restore the rights of their
fellow-subjects." 1 James did his best to prevent the Bill
passing. He even threatened to dissolve the Parliament.
But his expostulations and remonstrances only irritated the
Irish against him. They said openly that if he did not give
them back the land they would not fight for him. Even the
soldiers in the streets shouted the same thin" after him as
he passed by. 2 James still resisted, and at the last moment
resolved on a dissolution. But his evil genius, 3 D'Avaux,
stood beside him. The united Irish and French factions were
too strong for James alone and unsupported. He yielded.
" Alas !" said the unfortunate king, " I am fallen into the hands
of people who will ram that and much more down my throat."
A general 4 in the service of James was asked, a few
months later, how it was that the king had consented to the
Act of Attainder and the repeal of the Acts of Settlement.
" Sir," was the answer, "if you did but know the circumstances
the king is under, and the hardships these men put upon him,
you would bemoan him with tears instead of blaming him.
What would you have him do ? All his other subjects have

1 Ralph.".

2 Ranke ; Leslie. The king was " at the same time as good as told
underhand, that if he consented not to it, the whole nation would
abandon him." — James's words, Clarke's Life, ii. 360.

3 Macaulay says, " it is not too much to say that of the difference
between right and wrong Avaux had no more notion than a brute."
It was D'Avaux who proposed to James a general massacre of the
Protestants if an army should land from England. " Qu'ainsi j'etois
d'avis," wrote the unconscious scoundrel, " qu'apres que la descente
etant fait, si on apprenoit que de Protestans se fussent souleves en
quelque endroit du royaume, on fit main basse sur tous generalment."
— Quoted by Ranke.

4 Major-General Maxwell, a Roman Catholic.

70 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

deserted him ; this is the only body of men he has now to
appear for him ; he is in their hands, and must please them." 1

James was obliged to yield. The Acts of Settlement
were repealed, and twelve millions of acres were transferred
to the Irish. 2 The original Act of Settlement had been
confirmed by two subsequent Acts and many patents, both
of Charles and James. The Lords Lieutenant, and judges on
their circuits, had been repeatedly ordered to proclaim the
settled resolution of these princes to maintain them. Trusting
to the Acts and these frequent declarations, the proprietors
had reared stately buildings and carried out extensive im-
provements and reclamations of the soil. Seats had been
erected and parks enclosed. Many of the estates had passed
into the hands of purchasers for valuable consideration.
Manufactories had been established in divers places, " where-
by the meanest inhabitants were at once enriched and civil-
ised ; it would hardly be believed it were the same spot of
earth." Thousands had sold small estates and freeholds in
England, 4 and laid out their prices in Irish land. Purchases,
settlements, leases, money investments, jointures for widows,
and portions for children — all the multifarious dispositions of
property required by society for the welfare of families, for
its trade and commerce, or the reclamation, improvement,
and adornment of the soil — had been made on the faith of
these Acts and an undisputed possession of many years. All
these were now swept away at one stroke, without compensa-
tion or provision for the unhappy sufferers. James alone
manifested compassion for these unfortunates. To make some
compensation for the evil inflicted against his will, he gave
ten thousand pounds a year out of his own estate.

Well might Chief - Justice Keating indignantly ask :

1 Leslie, p. 100.

2 Even the son of Sir Phelim O'Neill was restored to the estate of
which his father was so justly deprived.

' s Keating. 4 lb.

sec. in THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 71

" Where or when shall a man purchase in this kingdom ?
Under what title or on what security shall he lay out his
money, or secure the portions he designs for his children, if
he may not do it under the security of divers Acts of Parlia-
ment, the solemn and reiterated declarations of his prince,
and a quiet and uninterrupted possession of twenty years
together ? And this is the case of thousands of families who
are purchasers under the Acts of Settlement and Explanations."
Lest some owners of land should be forgotten, or not in-
cluded in the sweeping net of this Act, a clause was added
whereby the property of all those who dwelt or stayed in any
part of the three kingdoms which did not acknowledge James,
or who aided or corresponded with such since the 1st of August
1688, was declared to be forfeited. There had been for some
time a constant and lively correspondence between Ireland
and England and between the rest of Ireland and the north.
So that every one who had been in England or the north of Ire-
land after the 1st August 1688, and every one who corresponded
with any such persons, lost his estate. By a strain of severity
at once ridiculous and detestable, almost every Protestant in
Ireland who could write was to be deprived of his estate. 1
Nor was this a mere threat. Air. Lecky says that these
words would, if strictly construed, comprehend all Irish pro-
prietors who were living peacefully in England, or who had
written on private business to any one residing in a part of
the kingdom which acknowledged William. But he thinks
they were intended to include those only who had taken an
active part against James. Nugent, Tyrconnel's Chief-Justice
of the King's Bench, entertained no such doubts as to the
effect of these words. This judge decided that accepting and
paying a bill of exchange was a correspondence with the
enemies of King James. And in another case, where an
attorney had received letters from clients asking him to

1 Leland.

72 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

apply for a reprieve of sentence for them, Nugent held that
this also was a correspondence with the enemy, and im-
prisoned the attorney on a charge of high treason.

The same author has been courageous enough to assert that
compensation for some of the despoiled owners was provided
in this Act of Eepeal. No statement could be more directly
in opposition to the facts of the case. If compensation means
an equivalent for property taken away, and that is the only
meaning which the word bears in the English language, there
was no compensation for any class. It is true that the Act
speaks of compensation, but all that is contained in the
enactment is a mere conditional promise to be fulfilled, if
ever, in the future, and even that is limited to one class,
namely purchasers. All who derived from the original
grantees by descent, by devise, or by-marriage, far the greater
number, were absolutely excluded. It is a strange use of
language to call such a partial and ineffectual provision com-
pensation, and to give to the mere shadow the name of the
substance. But when we come to examine the so-called
compensation to purchasers we find it a mere pretence. 1 To
tell us that men, who had purchased themselves, or whose
fathers had done so, were, at the commencement of a war,
expelled from their homesteads and from the lands they had
tilled with a promise of reparation if funds should be dis-
covered at the termination of the contest, and to oall this
compensation, is to mock us. The naked truth is that in the

1 Chief-Justice Keating addressed his celehrated letter to James on
behalf of " many thousands " of the Purchasers, the class for which Mr.
Lecky says compensation was provided. Keating was of opinion that
the compensation was a mere sham. The first sentence of the letter
declares that its design is "to prevent the ruin and desolation which
a Bill now under consideration in order to be made a law will bring
upon them ami their families in case your Majesty doth not interpose."
Another sentence is, "but the way prescribed by this Bill is to rob the
innocent purchasers, creditors, and orphans of their estates, to do it
contrary to the public faith, laws of the land, and precept of Holy
Writ, etc."

sec. in THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 73

whole black transaction there was not a single bright spot to
relieve the darkness of this savage and impolitic Act. No
neutral-tinted words can hide from us the enormous propor-
tions of the iniquity. It was the eviction of a people ; a univer-
sal spoliation, the like of which had not been seen in Europe
since the confiscations which followed the Norman Conquest.
Tens of thousands of innocent and improving owners, —
for all derivative interests (except leases for twenty -one
years) went with the fee, — were beggared at a blow, and were
thrown homeless and helpless on the world without means and
without hope. Such was the selfish greed of the Irish that they
paid no regard to a circumstance to which their attention w r as
called, viz. the vast improvements which had been made by the
British or Protestant proprietors. James himself tells us " that
the improvements had so- enhanced the value of most estates
as would allow the old proprietors a share of equal income to
what their ancestors lost, and yet leave a competency for the
purchasers, who might reasonably be allowed the benefit of
their own labours." * But as the same prince informs us, the
Irish " thought of nothing but settling themselves in riches
and plenty," and reason and justice were whistled down the
wind. If we remember that the Irish Protestants strictly
obeyed the law of their country in transferring their alle-
giance to William, who by the parliamentary grant of the
English Crown had become ipso facto the rightful sovereign of
Ireland, we cannot help considering their fate as hard indeed.
The Act of Eepeal not only repealed the Acts of Settle-
ment, but, inasmuch as it went back to the 22d of October
1641, and also included the estates of all those who resided
in the parts where James's authority was not recognised and
of those who corresponded with them, it confiscated the real
property of every Protestant in Ireland, except perhaps 2 that

1 Clarke's Life, ii. 358.

2 I say "perhaps," for if any of these persons were in possession

76 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

ladies; seven, bishops; eighty -five, knights and baronets;
eighty-three, clergymen ; and two thousand one hundred and
eighty-two, esquires, gentlemen, and tradesmen. All these
persons — that is the whole Protestant nobility, gentry, and
traders of Ireland — were "declared and adjudged traitors con-
victed and attainted of high treason," and were to suffer, in
the words of the Act itself, " such pains of death, penalties,
and forfeitures respectively as in cases of high treason are
accustomed," unless they, by certain days fixed in the Act, sur-
rendered themselves to such justice as was then administered
to Protestants in Dublin.

The manner of inserting names on this record of penalties
and death, and the haste with which it was drawn, were
equally remarkable. Any member who had a personal
quarrel or enmity against another, or desired his estate, or
owed him a debt, had only to hand in his name to the clerk
at the table, and it was inserted without discussion. No
difficulty was made in any case except that of Lord Strafford,
and a few words disposed of the objection. As to the haste
with which the list was drawn up, we are told that " perhaps
no man ever heard of such a crude, imperfect thing, so ill
digested and composed, passed in the world for a law. We
find the same person brought in under different qualifications.
In one place he is expressly allowed till the 1st of October to
come in and submit to trial, and yet in another place he is
attainted if lie do not come in by the 1st of September.
Many are attainted by wrong names. Many have their
Christian names left out, and many whose names and sur-
names are both put in are not distinguished by any character
whereby they may be known from others of the same name." l
Owing to this haste many escaped by accident, as did the
Fellows and Scholars of Trinity College, and many of the
king's adherents were included. The most remarkable of

1 King.

sec. in THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 77

these were Dodwell, " the most learned man of whom the
Jacobite party could boast ;" 1 Colonel Keating, who was then
actually serving in James's army before Derry; and Lord
Mountjoy, who was imprisoned in France, whither he had
been sent by Tyrconnel himself. 2

The savage cruelty of an Act which doomed thousands to
the gallows and the quartering-block is abhorrent to human
nature, but the chicanery with which it was conceived and
carried out was even more detestable. It has been mentioned
that days were fixed in the Act before which the attainted
persons must surrender themselves. It was known that such
a surrender was physically impossible. The 1st of October
was the latest date for surrendering. There was an exceed-
ingly strict embargo laid on all vessels in Ireland, so that not
a single ship or boat was suffered to pass thence to England
before the 1st of November. The embargo was equally strict
on the other side, so that it was impossible for the attainted,
even if they had notice of the law, to return and surrender
themselves. But good care was taken that the sufferers
should have no notice until the last day of grace had long 3
expired. The Act took away the power of pardon from the
king, unless the pardon was enrolled before the last day of
November. To prevent the attainted persons knowing that
their names appeared on the list, it was kept carefully con-
cealed. Some Protestant adherents of James were anxious
to know whether any of their friends had been proscribed,
and tried to obtain a sight of the list. Solicitation and

1 " Who, for the unpardonable crime of having a small estate in
Mayo, had been attainted by the Popish Parliament at Dublin." —
Macaulay.

2 Two columns of this list of doom, one taken from the front and
the other from the back of the same page, are given in the Appendix.

3 Harris and King say four months. " The Act was kept con-
cealed in the custody of the Chancellor. The king, four months after-
wards, learned by an accident the force of a law which so much en-
trenched on his own prerogative." — Macpherson, i. 629.

78 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

bribery proved vain. Not a single copy got abroad till the
time limited for pardon had expired. When James learned
that the power of pardoning had been taken from him by the
Act, he was indignant, and remonstrated with Nagle, the
Attorney - General. 1 This officer had the impertinence to
remind the king that he had read the Act before giving his
consent to it. The king replied that he had depended upon
his Attorney-General for drawing the Act, and that if Nagle
had drawn it so that there was no room for pardoning, he
had been false to his sovereign, and had betrayed him.
When the same Nagle, 2 as Speaker of the Commons, pre-
sented this Bill of Attainder to James for his consent, he was
not ashamed to say that many were attainted upon such
evidence as fully satisfied the House, and the rest were
attainted " upon common fame." Nagle was a Roman
Catholic lawyer of repute, yet, on such a solemn occasion,
he did not hesitate to say that common fame or report was
sufficient evidence to deprive thousands of his fellow-citizens
of their lives and fortunes.

All impartial readers of history are appalled by the magni-
tude of this legislative scheme of judicial murder. The Irish
Roman Catholic writers palliate, or, what is more shameful,
conceal it. They cannot see that, in so doing, they make them-
selves participators in the crime of their fathers, and that, in
declining to award historical justice to the misdeeds of their
ancestors, they unconsciously prove the hereditary trans-
mission of political incapacity to their race. The rule of
duty that recognition of the sin, acknowledgment of the
error is the first step to repentance, is as true in public as in

1 James complains in his Memoirs that he was obliged to give up
his prerogative of pardon in this Act. — Clarke's Life, ii. 361.

2 Nagle was the first man who ventured openly to propose the
repeal of the Acts of Settlement. In his Coventry letter of 26th
October 1686 he advocated their repeal, chiefly on the ground that
they weakened the Roman Catholic interest in Ireland.

sec. in THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 79

private life. But this rule is unknown, or, if known, is not
practised, by these authors and apologists. O'Connor calls
the Act of Attainder a state engine. Plowden says, it con-
tains not one word relating to religious distinction, as if an
open reference to such a motive of this kind would be allowed
to appear at such a crisis. Curry, M'Geoghegan, and Cusack
are silent respecting it. M'Gee's expressions are, "an Act
of Attainder against persons in arms against the sovereign
whose estates lay in Ireland was adopted." Haverty dis-
misses it as if it referred merely to property. His words are :
" As to the Act of Attainder, passed on the same occasion,
its results, so far as the question of property was concerned,
would have been nearly identical with those of the Act of
Settlement, the persons who would be affected by both
being nearly the same." It would be difficult to compose
sentences more misleading than those of these two latter
authors.

Some of these writers have excused the Act of Attainder
on the ground that no blood was actually shed under its
authority. As well might the assassin who laid a spring-gun
with the object of murder excuse himself on the ground that
his intended victim had returned by another path. Fortunately
for those threatened by the Act, they were beyond the reach of
their vindictive enemies. An early flight had saved them.
We can only judge of the intentions of men by their acts.
If the Irish Legislature did not desire blood, why were the
pains and penalties of death inserted in this enactment, when
forfeiture of property only would have effected the ruin of
their adversaries ? And why was the Act concealed till the
last day of grace had expired ? Why, too, was the power of
pardon withdrawn from the king ? As long as these questions
remain unanswered, there is but one conclusion to which
reasonable men can come. And that conclusion is, that
if the refugees had returned, and the English deliverer

80 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

had not appeared, there would have been another bloody-
page added to the history of this country.

Mr. Lecky, in his remarks on this infamous Act of
Attainder, has made the extraordinary statement that a Bill
of Attainder " precisely similar " to that of the Irish Parlia-
ment was brought forward in the English Commons and was
passed in that House. This is an astounding assertion. It
takes away our breath to hear that in the seventeenth century
a barbarous and bloody Bill of general proscription was intro-
duced and passed in a civilised assembly such as the Commons
of England. Very little is known of this English Bill, as the
references to it in the Journals of the House are short and
compendious, but fortunately the clause which confiscates the
estates of those attainted by it survives, and enables us to arrive
at the number affected. 1 They are exactly eighteen in number,
all persons well known to the English Parliament. What " pre-
cise similarity " can exist between an Act which proscribed the
whole nobility, gentry, and trading community of a country,
whose names and whose guilt or innocence could not possibly
have been known to the Parliament which doomed them, and
a bill which attainted eighteen influential adherents of
James, the majority of whom had fled from England with
him, I am unable to see. Mr. Lecky actually taunts Mac-
aulay with not having disclosed this English Bill.

By an Actof this Parliament the payment of tithes by Eoinan
Catholics to the Protestant clergy was abolished. Eor three
years before the passing of the Act hardly any tithes had been
recovered by the Protestant clergy. The priests had begun,
even so early as 1685, to declare that the tithes belonged to
them, and they had forbidden the people to pay them as the
law required. 2 They said openly that the king, who was
anxious to protect the Protestants, had no power to interfere

1 Journals of the House of Commons, x. 269.
2 Lord Clarendon to the King, 14th August 1680.

sec. in THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 81

with the property of the Church. The Dublin Parliament
now confirmed this violation of the law. To reduce the en-
dowments of the Protestant Church, says Macaulay, " without
prejudice to existing interests, would have been a reform
worthy of a good prince and of a good Parliament. But no
such reform would satisfy the vindictive bigots who sate at
the King's Inns. By one sweeping Act the greater part of
the tithe was transferred from the Protestant to the Roman
Catholic clergy ; and the existing incumbents were left, with-
out one farthing of compensation, to die of hunger."

There was an appearance of justice attending the Act for
the transference of the tithes to the Roman Catholic priest-
hood, notwithstanding that vested interests were cruelly and
ruthlessly passed over. Nothing can be said in favour of
another law which accompanied that for the abolition of tithes.
At this time there was hardly a Roman Catholic householder
in the corporate towns and cities. These corporate towns,
with the exception of Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Gal way, and
Waterford, had been built at the expense and charges of the
Protestant settlers. In these towns a small rate or tax had
been imposed on houses by Act of Parliament, 1 and this tax
was payable to the Protestant clergymen who ministered
there. This was, therefore, a matter exclusively between the
Protestants and their own clergy. James desired sincerely
to protect the Protestant clergy of Ireland, for they had
espoused his interest most cordially when he was Duke of
York, and his right to the succession questioned. But the Irish
legislators were resolved to make the country Roman Catholic,
and they passed an Act abolishing these payments for the
maintenance of the Protestant ministers in towns. By these
two Acts all the endowments of the Protestant Church, and
all the provision made for the maintenance of her clergy,
were at one blow swept away. Her ministers were left to

1 17 and 18 Charles II, c. 7.
G

82 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chai . i

the charity of their flocks, or death by starvation. It excites
a smile when we read that these two Acts were accompanied
by a third in favour of liberty of conscience. It was a strange
conjunction, and worthy of this Parliament — liberty of con-
science and the starvation of ministers of religion. We must
not, however, forget that the Act for liberty of conscience
was the work of James, and that the other two proceeded
from fanatics and bigots.

In the meantime the sins of the Executive fully equalled
the mad criminality of the Legislature. I do not here speak
of the debasement of the coinage and the innumerable oppres-
sions committed under and by means of it ; l the second and
third disarming of the Protestants ; the press for horses ; the
quarterings of soldiers ; and the extortion and robberies com-
mitted by them. 2 These things the Eoman Catholic apolo-
gists have excused, on the ground that a state of war prevailed,
and that every Protestant was a rebel at heart. I shall not
even mention the general seizure of Protestant schools
throughout the country, and the attack on Trinity College.
But there were other proceedings, to justify which no attempt
has ever been made, and respecting which a judicious silence

1 "A mortgage for a thousand pounds was cleared off by a bag of
counters made out of old kettles. The creditors, who complained to the
Court of Chancery, were told by Fitton to take their money and be
gone. But of all classes the tradesmen of Dublin, who were generally
Protestants, were the greatest losers. Any man who belonged to the
caste now dominant might walk into a shop, lay on the counter a bit
of brass worth threepence, and carry off goods to the value of half a
guinea." — Macaulay.

2 " The misery of this town is very great, some being little better
than dragooned by the quartering of soldiers ; some have ten, some
twelve, some twenty or thirty, quartered on them ; and yet I cannot
find that, besides what came in to-day, there were above three thousand
and odd men in town. But the reason is plain : each man has many
quarters, and some captains make thirty or forty shillings a week by
them. They come in by twelve, one, or two of the clock by night to
demand quarters, and turn people out of their beds, beat, wound, and
sometimes rob them." — Letter from Dublin, 12th June 1689.

sec. in THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 83

has been observed. While the Irish Legislature was over-
turning the established order of things, a persecution of the
Protestants was raging, with the connivance of the Govern-
ment, through the three provinces which owned James's
authority. These provinces were quiet, and their Protestant
inhabitants made a merit of their obedience. Yet they were
obliged to witness what the king himself called the general
desolation of the land, and to suffer, in James's words, " many
robberies, oppressions, and outrages, committed through all
parts of the kingdom to the utter ruin thereof, and to the great
scandal of the Government, as well as of Christianity." There
was a complete relaxation of all civil and military authority l
through these provinces, though untouched by war. The judges
neglected their duties ; the justices of the peace acted illegally
and in favour of malefactors, and the officers and soldiers of the
army contributed to the general anarchy. 2 All peasantries
outrun the wishes of their Government when they suppose
those wishes are favourable to them. The hints of further
rapine given in the Acts of Attainder and Kepeal of the
Settlement were greedily received and speedily acted on by
that of Ireland. 3 The Protestants were scattered, unarmed
and defenceless, among a hostile and barbarous population,
and the Government of Tyrconnel connived at their ruin.
When that is said, all is said. The pathetic consists in
details, and the heart cannot take in more than one picture

1 Instructions of James to the Commissioners of Oyer and Ter-
miner. They are given in the appendix to King.

2 " Jamais troupes n'ont marche comme font celles-cy ; ils vont
comme des bandits, et pillent tout ce qu'ils trouvent en chemin." —
D'Avaux.

3 " The miserable usage in the country is unspeakable, and every
day like to be worse and worse ; many allege that the rapparees have
secret orders to fall anew on the Protestants that have anything left ;
the ground of this may be their pretending such an order, for they
commonly pretend an order for any mischief they have a mind to." —
Letter from Dublin, 1689.

84 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chai\ i

of distress at the same time. The imagination cannot con-
ceive, language is inadequate to describe, the sum-total
of individual suffering comprised in the ruin of a whole
community.

The accounts of the state of the country do not rest on
Protestant testimony alone. During the winter of 1689
James issued, through his principal Secretary of State, 1
instructions to the judges, in which he accused them of
" having strangely neglected the execution of their commis-
sions," and stated that this neglect was " the chiefest cause of
the general desolation of the country." These instructions
are too long to be given in full ; but as they are strictly
contemporaneous, and afford official information of the state of
Ireland, I shall quote two paragraphs : " Let the present general
cries of the people for justice, and the present general oppres-
sion under which the country groans, move you to have
compassion of it, and to raise in you such a public spirit as
may save it from this inundation of miseries that breaks in
upon it by a neglect of His Majesty's orders, and by a general
relaxation of all civil and military laws. Consider that our
enemies, leaving us to ourselves, as they do, conclude we
shall prove greater enemies to one another than they can
be to us, and that we will destroy the country and enslave
ourselves more than they are able to do. What in-
humanities are daily committed against one another gives
but too much ground to the truth of what our enemies con-
clude of us."

But James's endeavours to reduce the general anarchy,
and to restore some degree of law and order, were fruitless.
His authority was neglected, and in every step he took he
was thwarted and disobeyed by the Irish faction which had
ldm in their power. His unwillingness to consent to the

1 White, an Irish Catholic, created Marquis d'Albaville by the

King of Spain.

SEC. in THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 85

Acts of Attainder and Eepeal of the Settlement, his struggles
to protect his Protestant subjects, and his attempts to secure
the administration of justice and the punishment of male-
factors, had made him thoroughly unpopular. There was
already gathering about him that hatred which has attended
his memory in this country, and has attached to his name in
Irish a filthy and disgusting word. To the natives James was
a foreigner and an Englishman. To one who had lived among
civilised men the Irish schemes of extirpation and revenge
were hateful and abhorrent. 1

It has been denied that the churches of the Protestants
were seized by the Eoman Catholics. Nothing can be more
true than that this was done, especially those which had been
built on consecrated ground where the chapels of abbeys
formerly stood. 2 It is proved beyond all doubt by the
petitions of the Protestants, and by James's proclamation, 8
declaring that the seizure of churches was a violation of
his Act for liberty of conscience. Archbishop King asserts
that nine churches out of ten were taken possession of
throughout the country, twenty-six alone in the diocese of
Dublin. Leslie denies that a single church, except Christ
Church, and that only because it was reputed the king's
chapel, was taken by the order or connivance of the king.
The assertion and qualified denial are both true. James, we
know, was desirous to protect the Protestant clergy, and thus

1 " But, above all, some of them moving to him for leave to cut
off the Protestants, which he returned with indignation and amaze-
ment, saying, ' What, gentlemen, are you for another forty-one ? ' —
which so galled them that they ever after looked upon him with a
jealous eye, and thought him, though a Roman Catholic, too much an
Englishman to carry on their business." — Leslie.

- A Short View of the Methods made use of in Ireland for the Sub-
version, etc., 1689.

3 " The king published soon after a proclamation for surrendering
all the Protestant churches which had been seized upon by the
Catholics, and took great care to have all grievances of that nature
redressed." — Clarke's James IT.

86 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

to disprove the allegations of his enemies that his liberty of
conscience was but a mask assumed for an occasion. But we
must draw a distinction between James and the Irish min-
isters who surrounded him. The latter connived at the
claims of the Soman Catholic priesthood and the excesses of
an excited population. When the king gave a positive order
that the church at Wexford should be restored to the Pro-
testants, the order was eluded or disobeyed by his ministers.
Tyrconnel's Government even proceeded so far as to forbid,
contrary to the Act for liberty of conscience, the Protestants
to assemble in churches or elsewhere on pain of death. 1 Yet
this was the Act upon which James rested his hopes of
regaining his English throne and conciliating - his English
subjects.

Leslie, upon whose statements the Irish writers rely,
insists strongly upon this distinction between the king and
his Irish ministers. 2 He says : " Before I enter upon this
disquisition I desire to obviate one objection which I know
will be made. As if I were about wholly to vindicate all
that Lord Tyrconnel and other of King James's ministers
have done in Ireland, especially before this revolution began,
and which most of anything brought it on. No ; I am far
from it. I am sensible that their carriage in many particulars
gave greater occasion to King James's enemies than all the
other maladministrations which were charged against his
Government." And in another place he repeats the state-
ment : " I am very sensible of the many ill steps which were

1 Dalrymple.

2 Leslie's authority is deservedly high. He was a man of great
logical acuteness and of the purest life. He was the son of that
bishop who valiantly defended his palace at Raphoe against the
parliamentary forces. Leslie conscientiously refused to take the oaths
to William and Mary, and was in consequence deprived of his church
preferments. He followed James to France, and did not return to
Ireland till 1721, where he died in the following year at his house in
Glaslough in the county of Monaghan.

sec. in THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 87

made in King James's Government, and, above all, of the
mischievous consequences of Lord Tyrconnel's administration,
which the most of any one thing brought on the misfortunes
of his master."

Such is the story, told in plain unvarnished language, of
the Irish Parliament of James II. Twice within forty years
had the Irish Koman Catholics attempted to break away
from Great Britain, and to establish an independent kingdom
under the protection of a Foreign Power. Both attempts,
that of 1641 and that of 1688, were undertaken while the
attention of Great Britain was turned away from Ireland
and occupied with her own domestic disputes with her
sovereign. In the first attempt the Irish had possession of
the country for eight years, from 1641 to the landing of
Cromwell in 1649. The sun never looked down upon such a
scene as Ireland exhibited during this period. Violence,
pillage, and rapine were universal, and prevailed in every
corner of the island, while at the same time rabid animosities
divided the several parties which had sprung up from each
other, and forbade their union. Ireland was a land of
Ishmaels, where every man's hand was directed against his
brother. The results of the internecine and multifarious con-
tests may be told in words, but the imagination cannot even
attempt to picture to itself the horrors of the situation in
which the country stood at the end of the rebellion. Ireland
had become a desert in which wolves had taken the place of
men. More than six hundred thousand of its inhabitants
had perished in the war, 1 or by the famine and pestilence
which accompanied it.

In 1688 the Irish again obtained a momentary possession
of the country, and the same results which had attended the
former followed the second attempt. But these results were

1 Petty says 616,000.

88 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

of shorter duration in 1688, owing to the speedier interference
of Great Britain. 1 In their short ascendency of four years,
the Irish did nothing but pillage, confiscate, and attaint.
During this limited period they slaughtered hundreds of
thousands of cattle and sheep, and once more turned Ireland
into a desert. Besides the destruction of 100,000 lives, the
waste committed by the Irish from 1686 to 1690 was so great
that it was estimated that it would take twenty years of
steady industry to replace the loss which the country had
undergone.

If the rebels of 1641, or if the crew of Irish and French
adventurers who were in temporary possession of the country
in 1688 had succeeded in their efforts, they would have de-
stroyed the British colony in Ireland, and its destruction
would have been a loss to the civilised world. For that
colony, like the nation from the bosom of which it sprang,
has also been the alma vivum mater ; the nursing mother of
heroes, statesmen, administrators, poets, and orators. It is
remarkable what a long list of eminent men this small off-
shoot of the Anglo-Saxon race has contributed to the roll of
British worthies. Their names are known and their voices
are heard wherever the English language is spoken. I need
only mention some of the names on this register of honour ;
many more will occur to the memory of every reader —
Boyle, Burke, Berkeley, Canning, Castlereagh, Clare, Usher,
Wellington, Wellesley, the two Lawrences, Sterne, Swift,
Edgeworth, Grattan, Plunket, Goldsmith, Steele, Napier.

1 Mr. Gladstone must have had in view such interpositions of
Great Britain as tl lose of 16*41, 1688, and 1798, when he delivered
the following admirable words : " My firm belief is that the influence
of Great Britain in every Irish difficulty is not a domineering and
tyrannising hut a softening and mitigating inlluence, and that were
Inland detached from her political connection with this count iv, and
left to her own unaided agencies, it might he that the strife of parties
would then burst forth in a form calculated to strike horror through
the land." — Hansard's Parliamentary Debates, clxxxi. 721.

sec. in THE IRISH PARLIAMENT OF JAMES II 89

Nor has the seed failed or the race degenerated. Their suc-
cessors are worthy of the inheritance of high endeavour
which has been handed down to them.

The quick-witted Irish Celt has taken advantage of a
generic word, " Irish," and has claimed these eminent citizens
as his kinsmen and as witnesses of the capacity of his race.
But the claim is unfounded and cannot be maintained. The
distinguished men of whom I have been speaking were the
products of a different civilisation, and of a widely different
culture from that of the Irish Celt. They were British to
the backbone, reared on British pap, and nourished on the
living traditions of the British peoples. They had not been
taught that history, as narrated by Protestant writers, was a
fable ; that the Beformation was a crime, or at the best a
fatal step backwards ; that onr martyrs were rebels against
divine authority ; and that our great Elizabeth was a bastard
and a wanton. Nor had they been fed on the audacious
falsehoods and half-truths which misrepresent the conduct
of Great Britain to Ireland, and nourish hatred and dis-
affection to her government and institutions. 1 Sharers in

1 Mr. Gladstone has described in vigorous language the teaching
which has been addressed to the Irish Celts : " What that literature
is is well known. It is well known how it teaches and preaches in
every form, with an amount of boldness and audacity varying from
week to week and from month to month, hatred of the institutions and
government of the United Kingdom. It is known how that weekly
literature -poisons the minds of the people in Ireland who read it against
all law and against the constitution of their country. It is known
how it inflames the passions of the people by rhetorical descriptions of
the wrongs of other days. It is known how it makes it impossible for
those who read that literature, and read none other, to know the
truth with respect to public affairs and the real conduct and intentions
of the Government of the country. It is well known how constantly
— sometimes openly and undisguisedly, sometimes under some disguise
more or less thin — it points, not to any constitutional means for the
redress of what may be deemed grievances, not to any action within the
law and constitution, but to violence and civil war." — Hansard, cc. 100,
17th March 1870.

90 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, i

the labours which contributed to the making of the common
country, they loved to consider themselves as fellow-work-
men in building up a renowned empire. No thought of dis-
union, no forgetfulness of common aims, ever palsied their
arms or drove them to stand apart in sullen discontent. It
would have been an irreparable loss, not only to the United
Realm but to the world, if, in the religious convulsions of
Ireland, which were only chapters in the general religious
strife of Europe, the community which produced these men
had been crushed out of existence, or its higher civilisation
subordinated to a lower.

CHAPTER II

THE ALLEGED VIOLATION OF THE TREATY

OF LIMERICK

SECTION I

THE SECOND SIEGE AND TREATY OF LIMERICK 1

After the well-contested battle of Aughrim, on the 12th of
July 1691, the defeated Irish army divided, one branch
taking its way to Galway, the other to Limerick. The
English army marched first to Galway, whither some regi-
ments of Irish, thinned by the slaughter at Aughrim and
utterly demoralised, had repaired under the command of
D'Usson and Lord Dillon. On the 21st of July Galway
surrendered on terms ; the garrison was permitted to retire
to Limerick, a full amnesty for past offences was granted,
and it was agreed that the names of the Eoman Catholic
clergy should be given in to the English general, and that
they, as well as the laity of the place, should be allowed the
private exercise of their religion without being prosecuted on
any penal laws for the same. 2

From Galway Ginkell and the English army advanced
slowly to Limerick and appeared before that town on the
26th of August, on which day the second siege commenced. 3

1 In 1788 Dr. Arthur Browne, fellow of Trinity College and re-
presentative in the Irish Parliament for the University of Dublin,
published a pamphlet entitled, A Brief Review of the question whether
the Articles of Limerick have been violated ? I have made use of this
publication. The author does not mention the proposals first made by
the garrison, which, in my opinion, give the key to the whole matter.

2 Story, Continuation, p. 166.

3 lb. and Diary of the Siege of Limerick, Dublin, 1692. The 26th
of August is the 5th of September as we count now.

94 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

Two successful engagements were fought by Ginkell's troops
under the walls, the second of which, that at Thomond
bridge, wrought such an effect that a parley was beaten by
the besieged on the next day, the 23d of September. Less
than a month's resistance had tamed the courage or exhausted
the patience of the Irish leaders. They were eager to capitu-
late, Sarsfield the most eager of them all. A gallant soldier,
Colonel Kelly, an actor in and a describer of these scenes,
informs us, that what " raised the admiration of all people
and begat an astonishment which seemed universal over all
Ireland, was the sudden unexpected prodigious change of
Sarsfield, who appeared now the most active of all the com-
manders to forward the treaty, and took most pains to per-
suade the tribunes and centurions to a compliance. . . .
Sarsfield, in whom the Irish nation reposed their greatest
confidence, and who, as they all believed, would be the last
man to hearken to a treaty, was now the most earnest to
press it on." : Negotiations were opened by the Irish, and
hostages were exchanged with a view to a further and per-
manent treaty. On the 27th of September the garrison sent
a paper to Ginkell containing the terms on which they were
willing to surrender. These terms proposed by the Irish were
seven in number : —

" 1. That their Majesties will by an Act of indemnity
pardon all past crimes and offences whatsoever.

" 2. To restore all Irish Catholics to the estates of which
they were seized or possessed before the late revolution.

" 3. To allow a free liberty of worship, and one priest
to each parish, as well in towns and cities as in the
country.

" 4. Irish Catholics to be capable of bearing employments,
military and civil, and to exercise professions, trades, callings,
of what nature soever.

1 Macarice Excidium, published by the Irish Archaeological Society.

sec. i ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 95

" 5. The Irish army to he kept on foot, paid, etc., as the
rest of their Majesties' forces, in case they be willing to serve
their Majesties against France or any other enemy.

" 6. The Irish Catholics to be allowed to live in towns
corporate and cities, to be members of corporations, to ex-
ercise all sorts and manners of trade, and to be equal with
their fellow Protestant subjects in all privileges, advantages,
and immunities accruing in or by the said corporations.

" 7. An Act of Parliament to be passed for ratifying and
confirming the said conditions." l

When these proposals of the Irish were submitted to
Ginkell, they were at once rejected. 2 That general said that
" though he was in a manner a stranger to the laws of Eng-
land, yet he understood that those things they insisted upon
were so far contradictory to them and dishonourable to him-
self that he would not grant any such terms." 3 Ginkell
immediately ordered an additional battery to be thrown up
for mortars and guns. The rejection of their terms cast a
duty upon the Irish leaders of which they were incapable,
and which they certainly did not perform. They were even
unconscious of it, for Ginkell was interrupted in his prepara-
tions by another message from the garrison asking him to let
them know what terms he was ready to offer. In answer to
this message Ginkell sent them twelve articles much the
same as those which were afterwards agreed on, 4 and declared
that he would allow of no others. These articles were
accepted by the Irish on the 28th of September, and it was
arranged that there should be a cessation of arms until the
arrival of the Lords Justices from Dublin.

The original proposals of the garrison deserve our most
careful attention, for they and the rejection of them by

1 Story, Cont. p. 230.

2 " The general returned them with disdain." — Diary of the Siege.

3 Story, Cont. p. 230. 4 lb. p. 231.

96 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

Ginkell throw a flood of light upon the subsequent treaty,
and upon what the Irish understood they were to get by that
treaty. The Irish had demanded that they should enjoy
freedom of worship ; that it should be declared that they
were capable of civil and military employment; that they
should not be debarred from exercising any trades or pro-
fessions ; that they should be privileged to become members
of corporations ; and that they should be allowed to dwell
in corporate towns and cities. These demands were all
at once repudiated by Ginkell as being " contradictory " to
the laws. Yet, on the very next morning, the Irish leaders,
knowing that these demands had been rejected as totally
inadmissible, sent commissioners to the English camp, who
then and there accepted the only terms which Ginkell con-
sidered himself authorised to offer. It is therefore evident
that the Irish, when they accepted the articles which Ginkell
conceded, and which were afterwards drawn out into the
treaty of Limerick, were well aware — (1) that freedom for
their worship would not be granted ; (2) that no Irish Eoman
Catholic was to be capable of civil or military employ; (3)
that Irish Catholics would not be allowed to exercise every
trade and profession ; (4) that they were not to be members of
corporations ; and (5) that they were not to be permitted to
dwell in corporate towns or cities. The Irish, knowing that
their own conditions had been rejected as illegal, were con-
tent to accept and sign others. However the final treaty
might be drawn, it is certain that not one of the rejected
terms was expected by either party to be included in it.
Ginkell had repudiated the whole body of them as being
contradictory to the laws ; the Irish leaders, by continuing
the negotiations after their demands had been rejected, waived
those which they had formerly made. If written documents
and acts done at a supreme crisis have any meaning, it is
beyond doubt that the English general repudiated each and

sec. i ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 97

every claim of the Irish, and that the Irish leaders after such
repudiation agreed to surrender Limerick upon other and
lower terms, which they knew did not include a single
demand put forward previously by them on behalf of the
Irish Roman Catholics.

Eeaders will observe the seventh demand of the Irish,
that an Act of Parliament should be passed to confirm what
they asked for. It was not in the power of the king, as the
executive, to grant terms which would have altered the whole
law of the land and abolished all the restrictions which were
imposed on the Roman Catholics. That could be effected by
the Legislature alone. That this was well understood by the
Irish is shown by this demand.

On the 1st of October the Lords Justices, Coningsby and
Porter, arrived in the camp, and on the 3d what is commonly
called the Treaty of Limerick was signed. 1 The use of the
singular number is misleading, for there were in fact two
treaties, the one civil, containing thirteen articles, and the
other military, containing twenty-nine. The military treaty
was subscribed by the generals on both sides only ; the civil
treaty was signed by Ginkell and also by the Lords Justices
on behalf of the king.

With the military treaty we have comparatively little to
do. It was absolute and subject to no subsequent revision.
Its terms contained nothing which did not lie within the
power of the executive to grant, nor was it necessary that
they, unlike those of the civil treaty, should be submitted to
Parliament for its confirmation and approval. By its articles
it was agreed that such Irish and French officers and soldiers
as should declare their wish to go to France should be con-
veyed thither, and should in the meantime remain under the
command of their own superiors ; that Ginkell should furnish
a sufficiency of vessels to carry the troops to France ; and

1 The treaty is given in the Appendix.
H

98 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, n

that there should be a cessation of arms on land and at sea
with respect to the ships designed for the transportation of
the army until they should return to their respective harbours.
The military treaty was strictly complied with, and all its
terms were honourably carried out. Not only were the
regular Irish and French troops duly conveyed, but even the
rapparees and partisans were furnished with the means of
transport. Many of the Irish soldiers afterwards refused to
proceed to France, but this they did in consequence of letters
and reports received from those who had been already con-
veyed there as to the manner in which the first arrivals had
been treated in France. No opposition was offered to the
departure of any. We know from Story that the Irish troops
on their march to embark at Cork deserted in dozens ; and
on the 8th of December three entire regiments, Colonel
Macdermot's, Colonel Brian O'Neill's, and Colonel Felix
O'Neill's, part of the army designed for France, refused to go,
broke up, and returned to their homes. 1 That the agreement
to furnish a sufficiency of transports was also loyally observed,
we have the evidence of Sarsfield himself, who, in December,
released the English general from providing any further
shipping. "Whereas," such is the wording of the release,
"by the articles of Limerick, Lieutenant -General Ginkell,
commander-in-chief of the English army, did engage himself
to furnish ten thousand ton of shipping for the transporting
of such of the Irish forces to France as were willing to go
thither ; and to facilitate their passage, to add four thousand
ton more, in case the French fleet did not come to this king-
dom to take off part of these forces ; and whereas the French
fleet has been upon the coast and carried away some of the
said forces, and the Lieutenant -General has provided ships
for as many of the rest as are willing to go as aforesaid, I do
hereby declare that the said Lieutenant-General is released

1 Story, Gont. p. 291.

sec. i ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 99

from any obligation he lay under from the said articles to
provide vessels for that purpose, and do quit and renounce
all further claim and pretension on this account." 1

The importance to the Irish leaders of the military treaty
and of the transport of the Irish troops to France has been
minimised or kept out of sight. It is hard to understand
how a garrison, well furnished with arms and fully pro-
visioned, 2 surrendered to an army which did not exceed it
in numbers ; and that too at a time when everything was in
favour of a prolonged defence. The only effectual way of
reducing the town was to invest it on all sides. To do this,
it would have been necessary to divide the English army, and
a division of the forces would have given the predominance to
the enemy. 3 The season was far advanced, the winter was
near and the rains had set in. The whole plain about the
city might shortly become a lake of stagnant water. It
would then be necessary to remove the English army to a
healthier and drier spot than could be found on the banks of
the Shannon. If so, the siege would have to be turned into
a blockade, as, indeed, had lately been urged in a council of
war on the 17th September in the English camp. The city

1 Story, Gont. p. 292.

2 " The garrison was well supplied with provisions, they were
provided with all means of defence." — Macpherson, History of Great
Britain, i. 695. " The garrison was healthy, well supplied, and in
numbers equal to their assailants." — -Leland, iii. 611.

3 " It was dangerous for the besiegers to continue in their present
station on the approach of winter, and hazardous to divide an army
sufficient only for assailing the town on one side ; and yet the only
effectual way of reducing it was to invest it on all sides, by cutting off
the garrison from all intercourse with the county of Clare." " The
besieging army had made no impression on the principal part of the
city ; it was inferior in numbers to that of the garrison ; winter was
fast approaching, and at the very moment French succours were on the
coast." — Parnell's Historical Apology for the Irish Catholics. The
apologist does not see that in recording these facts he is recording the
disgrace of the Irish leaders who prematurely surrendered the city.
When the English took possession of the town, Story found all the
works "exceeding strong." — Cont. p. 256.

100 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

would then have been safe till the spring, and long before the
spring the promised succours from France, which were known
to be on their way, would have arrived. The contest could
then have been carried on till the condition was insisted on
that a Parliament should be called and a real improvement
effected in the position of the Eoman Catholics under the
sanction of the Legislature. Had this been done, had the
Irish leaders conducted an obstinate defence, instead of a mere
show of defence, they might have done something more for
their Eoman Catholic brethren than leave behind them their
signatures to an illusory document. They might have effected
something for an unfortunate people whom they themselves
had called to arms, and whom they were now preparing to
desert in their utmost need.

It was indeed a mystery at the time, as Colonel Kelly
tells us, why the Irish leaders were so eager to surrender, " a
mystery which requires some further time to unriddle." So
anxious w r ere these gentlemen to conclude the capitulation,
that they signed the articles without the clause, afterwards
known as the disputed clause, which they subsequently asked
Ginkell to insert ; nor did they make any conditions for the
restoration of the estates of prisoners ; or for the orphans of
those who had been slain in the service of him whom they
regarded as their king. 1 But what was most shameful of all,
they made no efforts, as we shall see, after their first pro-
posals, to secure liberty for the Eoman Catholic worship or a
single condition for their bishops and clergy. Well might
a brave and single-minded soldier exclaim, " That the most
zealous Eoman Catholics of the universe should conclude a
peace with the sworn enemy of the true worship without
conditions for their sacred bishops or obtaining security for
their free exercise of the divine ceremonies, is a mystery that
surpasses the weak capacity of man to comprehend." 2

1 Macarice Excidium. " lb.

sec. i ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF* KIMERICa 101

The Duke of Berwick, who had been so lately among
these leaders and had served with them, furnishes us with
the key to the mystery. The Irish commanders were eager
to be gone to fresh fields and pastures new, where they
might acquire military rank and consequence. " They " [the
Irish commissioners], says the Duke, " were much to blame
in neglecting to include in the agreement all the Irish in
general ; for the generals of the enemy would have consented
to everything for the sake of putting an end to the war ; but
the incapacity of the deputies who were entrusted by the
garrison to conduct the capitulation, and perhaps the fear
that this proposition might be an obstacle to the transporta-
tion of the troops, which some persons for views of private
interest were particularly desirous of, might be the reason why
it was not even mentioned." 1 It was of the utmost import-
ance to the Irish commanders to carry with them to their
new country a large and effective body of soldiers. Upon
their doing so depended their future rank and position.
France possessed a numerous and gallant army of her own,
proud of its achievements, and jealous of the order of pro-
motion. It was not likely that solitary exiles unaccompanied
by followers would obtain high rank in such an army. But
if those exiles could bring with them a numerous and efficient
body of troops, capable of forming an army in itself, all this
would be changed and their position and prospects would be
assured. Hence it is that out of the twenty-nine articles of
the military treaty, and the thirteen of the civil treaty, or
forty-two in all, one short and illusory paragraph only is
devoted to the claims of the general body of the Pioman
Catholics — a clause too which makes no attempt to improve
their condition, but leaves them to suffer in the future as they
had suffered in the past. The Irish Ptoman Catholics have
always felt, and felt with justice, that there was something

1 Me'moires du Marechal de Berivicl; i. 102.

102 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

wrong, some one to blame, in the matter of the Treaty of
Limerick. Misled by their hatred of England and by the
audacious assertions of their writers, they have placed the
blame on the wrong shoulders. They have not perceived
that the blame attached, not to King William or to the Irish
Parliament, but to their own trusted but incompetent and
fainthearted leaders.

We now come to the civil treaty, which differed from the
military convention in one essential point. It was conditional
on the approbation and confirmation of the Irish Parliament,
to the ratification of which it was made expressly subject.
The military convention related to matters which were to be
immediately carried into effect, and which lay within the
power of the king to grant or refuse. The civil treaty
referred to the status of the general body of the Roman
Catholics of Ireland, and to things which were beyond the
power of the Executive and required the sanction of the
Legislature. From the very nature of the matters treated of in
it, even if there had not been a special stipulation to that effect,
the civil articles must have been laid before the Parliament
for its confirmation. There are thirteen articles in the civil
treaty, all of which, except one, relate to individuals or classes
of persons then in existence. It is evident that no privileges
can be claimed for a national body under terms which refer
to particular times or specified individuals. The first article
is the only one which relates to the general body of the Irish
Roman Catholics, and it and the twelfth make the whole
treaty conditional on its ratification by Parliament.

" 1. The Roman Catholics of this kingdom shall enjoy such
privileges in the exercise of their religion as are consistent
with the laws of Ireland, or as they did enjoy in the reign of
King Charles the Second ; and their Majesties, as soon as
their affairs will permit them to summon a Parliament in
this kingdom, will endeavour to procure the said Roman

sec. i ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 103

Catholics such further security in that particular as may
preserve them from any disturbance upon the account of the
said religion."

" 12. Lastly, the Lords Justices and General do undertake
that their Majesties will ratify these articles within the space
of eight months or sooner, and will use their utmost endea-
vours that the same shall be ratified and confirmed in
Parliament."

It might be thought on reading the first clause that the
Roman Catholics of Ireland had enjoyed privileges in the
reign of Charles II which this treaty endeavoured to revive,
and that they looked back fondly on their social position in
that reign. As a matter of fact, no change whatever had
been made in their state since that reign. They were, when
the treaty was negotiated, exactly in the same position which
they had occupied in the reign of Charles. No alteration
had taken place except that during their short ascendency
under James all law had been violated, and the Constitution
overturned. What takes place in the treaty is in effect this :
"We are to remain then," say the Irish commissioners, "in
the same state and subject to all the restrictions and disabili-
ties we now labour under." " Yes," reply the Lords Justices ;
" the general has already refused to grant the proposals made
by you, as contradictory to the law. To change that law
requires the interposition of the Legislature ; all we can offer
is a promise that the king will endeavour to obtain a mitiga-
tion of your lot from that Legislature." The Irish leaders,
with arms in their hands, with a large and disciplined force
at their back which equalled in number the English army,
and with French aid on its way, 1 were content to yield up
their last citadel in return for a promise the fulfilment of
which they knew did not depend on the king, but upon the

1 The French succours arrived within three days after the treaty
was signed.

104 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

will of a Parliament which was not in existence, and which
had not been summoned for more than a quarter of a century.
That this is the meaning of the only clause in favour of
the Eoman Catholics is evident when we remember that that
body was then precisely in the same position in which it had
been in the reign of Charles II. This will appear more clearly
if the condition of the Eoman Catholics at that time be fully
set out. The following was the position of that body in the
last year of Charles II : —

1. It was a criminal offence, punishable the second time
with imprisonment for life, for a Eoman Catholic ecclesiastic
to say mass. 1

2. It was a criminal offence, punishable the third time
with imprisonment for life, for any Eoman Catholic to hear
mass. 2

3. Every Eoman Catholic was bound, under a pecuniary
penalty, to attend a Protestant church. 3

4. No Eoman Catholic priest could remain in Ireland
without taking the oath of supremacy and renouncing the
authority of the Pope in civil matters. 4

5. No Eoman Catholic priest could enter the kingdom
without taking the same oath, and renouncing the same
authority. 5

6. Every Eoman Catholic, knowing that a priest had not
taken the oath of supremacy, was bound to inform against
him under penalties of fine and imprisonment.

7. No Eoman Catholic could act as a schoolmaster, or
even as a private tutor, without taking the oath of supremacy
and renouncing the authority of the Pope. r

1 2 Eliz. c. 2, § 2.

2 This was decided on the word "maintain" in the third section of
the 2 Eliz. 3 2 Eliz. c. 2, § 3.

4 27 Eliz. c. 2, an English Act extending to all Her Majesty's
dominions.

5 lb. 6 Ih. 7 IT and 18 Chas. II, C. G, § 6.

sec. I ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 105

8. No Eoman Catholic could send his children abroad
to be educated without the special license of the Privy
Council, 1 and Protestant guardians might be appointed to
Roman Catholic wards. 2

9. No Roman Catholic could be a justice of the peace,
mayor, recorder, alderman, magistrate, or burgess of any
corporation. 3

10. No Eoman Catholic could purchase or take a lease of
a house within any corporate town without the license of the
Lord Lieutenant and Privy Council. 4

11. By an order of the Parliament in the reign of Charles
II, no Roman Catholic could sit as a member without taking
the oath of supremacy and renouncing the authority of the
Pope. 5

In addition to these restrictions, proclamations and pro-
hibitions forbidding the exercise of the Eoman Catholic
religion were occasionally issued in the reign of Charles II.
Thus in this reign a proclamation was issued ordering all
Eoman Catholic artisans and shopkeepers to depart from
Kilkenny and the other large towns. 6 In 1GG6 the Lord
Lieutenant banished a large part of the Catholic clergy out
of the kingdom, so that there were only three bishops remain-
ing in the country. 7 And in 1679 a proclamation was issued
that Eoman Catholic ecclesiastics should depart from the
kingdom, and that their seminaries and convents should be
suppressed. 8

Such was the strictly legal position of the Irish Eoman
Catholics, and such were the restrictions under which they lay
in the reign of Charles II. The noble lords and the distinguished

1 27 Eliz. c. 2 (English).

2 14 and 15 Chas. II, c. 19, § 14.

3 Rules made by the Lord Lieutenant and Council under the
authority of 17 and 18 Chas. II, c. 2.

4 17 and 18 Chas. II, c. 2, § 36. 5 Curry, ii. 82.

6 lb. p. 84. 7 lb. p. 93. s Leland, iii. 47 4.

106 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

commoners, who were now bargaining so closely in forty-two
articles for their own broad lands, 1 and for the transport of
the troops which were to lend them prestige in a foreign
country, were content that this state of things should con-
tinue. After their first proposals on the 27th of September,
they did not make a single effort to ameliorate the condition
or to remove the restrictions under which those whom they
were preparing to desert had long suffered. Had the Irish
chiefs held out like brave men till the arrival of the French
succours, and then demanded that a parliament should be
called to ratify a real improvement in the position of the
Roman Catholics, they would have been merely fulfilling a duty
which they owed to a population which they themselves had
rashly called to meet the dreadful risk of winning or losing
all. Had Limerick been defended with the stubborn courage
with which the northern farmers had defended the city of
Derry, the whole subsequent history of the Irish Eoman
Catholics would have been different. But the unconquerable
will which derives fresh energy from despair, the obstinate
valour which does not know when it is beaten, were wanting
to the Irish leaders. In the northern city to utter the word
" surrender " was death to the speaker ; in Limerick there
was a race to capitulate. The defenders of Deny could not
purchase a small fish for money, and dogs, cats, and vermin
had become delicacies; the besieged in Limerick had two
months' supplies, says Story, " of the finest French biscuit I
ever tasted," and the city was not closed in on the Clare side
until the very day before the parley was beaten. Famine,
pestilence, and the strange diseases which an unwholesome
diet and the stench from unburied bodies beget, had thinned
the numbers and blackened the faces of the surviving citizens

1 By the civil treaty the estates of the Irish officers in all the
Irish garrisons were secured to them ; this proviso was continued by
the subsequent Act of Parliament.

sec. i ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 107

of Deny ; the soldiers of Limerick were healthy and well
nurtured. Three months of such suffering as is to be found
only in a beleaguered city had not quelled the spirit of the
northern Protestants ; twenty-seven days was the utmost limit
of the endurance of the mock heroes who were strutting upon
the Limerick stage, and declaring that they were fighting for
their king, their country, and the freedom of their religion.
To all who are acquainted with the stories of Deny, of Eochelle,
and of Saragossa ; to all brave men who are conscious to
themselves what they are capable of doing and suffering
for their country and their religion, the second defence of
Limerick must ever appear to be a contemptible sham and
not a reality.

It is vain to urge in defence of the Irish leaders that they
relied on the hope that the king would be able to obtain from
the Parliament further securities for the free exercise of the
Eoman Catholic religion. No one knew better than Sarsfield the
folly of such expectations. In a political and religious crisis
such as then existed, the wishes of a sovereign were certain
to be neglected, and the policy of a king who was a foreigner
and knew nothing of the country was sure to be examined, criti-
cised, and opposed. The example of the English Legislature,
which was then exasperated against the Eoman Catholics, would
naturally be followed by an Irish parliament which would
consist of members whose estates had been confiscated, and who
had themselves been condemned to death by a Eoman Catholic
assembly. Sarsfield and the other Irish commissioners knew
well that it did not lie within the province of the executive
to relax or dispense with general laws. Sarsfield had been a
captain in King James's life-guards in England. He was in
that country during the whole contest regarding the dispens-
ing power. He was well aware of the extent of the royal
authority and the limitations on the sovereign's powers. He
knew that the King of England was of himself unable to

108 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

touch one of the laws which affected the Irish Roman
Catholics. Nor was Sarsfield alone in the negotiation of the
treaty. He was supported by three distinguished lawyers,
Sir Garret Dillon, Sir Theobald Butler, 1 and Colonel Brown,
who were equally well acquainted with the power of the
sovereign and the rights of the legislature. These gentlemen
were easily satisfied. They were content with a single clause
which in its first part was illusory and contained no promise
of alleviation, and in its second merely contained an under-
taking, the success of which depended on the approbation of
a third party unknown and yet unborn. It is no wonder that
Colonel Kelly exclaims against the treaty and declares that it
was a marvel surpassing the capacity of man to understand
how the Irish leaders came to conclude a peace " without
conditions for their sacred bishops or obtaining security for
the free exercise of their divine ceremonies."

But these leaders had resolved to desert the people whom
they had called to arms, and were careless in what condition
they left their brethren. A high authority has praised the
conduct of the Irish chiefs in leaving their country at this
juncture. "Whatever," says Sir Walter Scott, "our opinion
may be of the cause for which the followers of James
abandoned their country and fortunes, there can be but one
sentiment concerninc; the courage and self-devotion with
which they sacrificed their all to a sense of duty." But
there is a higher self-devotion than following a king, or like
well-endowed adventurers, — for their trains of soldiers were
the capital of the Irish captains, — pushing their fortunes in a
new country with delightful prospects of rank and promotion ;
and that is, to abide with one's own people ; to console them
under their afflictions ; to share their sufferings ; and with
them to struggle into the full freedom of emancipation. I
can see no difference in principle between the conduct of

1 Solicitor-General to the Irish Government of James II.

sec. i ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 109

Sarsfield and his companions who abandoned Ireland in 1691,
and that of the French nobles who deserted their country in
1790. Sarsfield was the one man in Ireland whose remain-
ing in the country would have been of infinite service to his
co-religionists, and his retiring to a hostile kingdom aggra-
vated most seriously the misfortunes of those who were left
behind. Before leaving the country he declared publicly to
his troops that they were going to France only to return to
Ireland as a conquering army. 1 There can be very little
doubt that the fear of such a return, and the existence of an
Irish army on a hostile shore, ready to invade the country at
a moment's notice, was one of the principal causes which
prevented the full ratification of the Treaty of Limerick, and
compelled the Irish Parliament to reduce the Roman Catholics
to complete political impotence by penal enactments as to
property and the tenure and acquisition of land. " If," was
the consideration which was present to the minds of the
members of the Irish Parliament, " we cannot prevent an
invasion, we can at least lessen the power of the disaffected
in the country to give aid to the invaders."

The sum total then of the only provision in the civil
treaty, as far as an improvement in the condition of the Roman
Catholics is concerned, was absolutely nil. In other words,
they were to remain as they were. This provision, lame as
it is, would have, if ratified by Parliament, secured them
against the imposition of further disabilities. But this pro-
vision was by the twelfth article conditional on its confirma-
tion by Parliament. The Irish commissioners acknowledge
in the treaty that the consent of Parliament was necessary to
its confirmation, otherwise the covenant to solicit its approval
is unmeaning. It is clear that when they requested a
parliamentary ratification, they did themselves in effect show
that they considered such confirmation was required to

1 Story, Cont. p. 259.

110 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

complete the treaty. The Irish commissioners were well
aware that the Lords Justices were the delegates of the
Crown and not of a parliament which was not in existence.
They knew that it did not lie within the delegated powers of
such officers to sanction provisions which might bind or
hamper the legislative discretion of a future parliament, and
therefore they only demanded a promise of the king's
endeavours to have the treaty confirmed by that parliament.
On the other hand, the Lords Justices were careful to act
within their delegation. They did not undertake that
parliament would confirm the treaty, nor did they even
speak of the probability of that event. It would have been
absurd for them to have promised on behalf of a future
parliament which was sure to consist of members justly
indignant with the oppression, spoliation, confiscation, and
proscriptions, which they had suffered during the domination
of the Eoman Catholics.

That the king did keep his promise and did endeavour to
mitigate the laws which pressed upon the Eoman Catholics of
Ireland is certain. From the moment the Treaty of Limerick
was signed, he and his representatives, the Lords Justices,
exerted the powers of government to indulge and protect that
body in every possible way. The treaty was carried out as
if it was binding and did not require the ratification of
Parliament. Catholic gentlemen who had been in James's
army were admitted to or continued in the commission of the
peace ; Catholic officers were restored into the army, and the
oaths were altered to suit their consciences, that part which
required them to renounce the jurisdiction of the Pope and of
other foreign powers being left out; 1 the reversals of out-
lawries and attainders recommenced, and sixty -five great
proprietors who were not within the articles of Limerick were

1 Articles of impeachment of the Lords Justices, Parliamentary
History, v. 817.

sec. i ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 111

reinstated by the special favour of the Crown; 1 their estates
were restored to twelve hundred and eighty-three persons
who were adjudged to come within the Treaty of Limerick ; 2
protections were granted to Eoman Catholics whereby Pro-
testants were hindered from their legal remedies. 3 The dis-
puted clause in the treaty was, before ratification in Parliament,
treated as binding, and under it many Catholics repossessed
themselves of the estates which they had forfeited by their
rebellion. 4 We are told by a Eoman Catholic historian that
duringthe first four years of William's reign"the Irish Catholics
enjoyed the full and free exercise of their religion ; they were
protected in their persons and properties; their industry was en-
couraged, and under his mild and fostering administration the
desolation of the late war began to disappear, and prosperity,
peace, and confidence to smile once more on the country." 5

The king had undertaken in the twelfth article to use his
utmost endeavours to have the treaty ratified and confirmed
in Parliament. This was therefore his first duty. The
willingness or unwillingness of the Parliament to concede
this would enable him to judge how far he could proceed in
his intention to obtain further securities for the exercise of
the Eoman Catholic religion. A Parliament was accordingly
summoned and met on the 5th of October 1G92, a twelve-
month after the surrender of Limerick. A Bill was sent over
from England for the confirmation of the Treaty of Limerick,
and the members were told that they had nothing else to do but
pass it and the other Government measures, inasmuch as their
provisions had been "as well debated already as was needful." (
It soon became evident, however, that the king and the Irish

1 Keport on Irish Forfeitures, State Tracts, ii. 709 ; and Address of
the English Commons, Parliamentary History, v. 768.

2 Report on Irish Forfeitures, State Tracts, ii. 711.

3 Address of the English Commons, Pari. History, 5, 768. i lb.

5 O'Conor's History of the Irish Catholics, pp. 116, 117.

6 Account of the Parliament in 1692, Dublin, 1793.

112 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

Parliament took very different views of the policy which
should be adopted for governing Ireland. The king was at a
distance and knew nothing of the circumstances of the
country. The lot of the members of the Parliament was to
live among a people who outnumbered the Protestants by
five to one, and who had, in two late rebellions, threatened
them and their brethren not only with forfeiture and confisca-
tion but with the extirpation of themselves and their religion.
To confirm the articles of Limerick appeared to them the
same thing as to sign away every guarantee of their lives and
security. 1 They were deaf to every suggestion which
emanated from the Crown. They threw out one of the
money bills because it had not taken its rise in their house,
and carried a resolution that it was the undoubted right of
the Irish Commons to prepare and resolve the ways and
means of raising money ; they declared the Bill for confirm-
ing the Act of Settlement and Explanation to be a Bill " of
such pernicious contexture as instead of confirming it would
have unsettled the greatest part of the estates of the king-
dom;" 2 they agreed to a report of a committee that the
continuance of Papists in the army was of dangerous con-
sequence ; and they rejected the Mutiny Bill in resentment
of the admission of such officers, though it had been specially
recommended to their consideration by the Government. It
was clear that there was no hope of getting the treaty ratified
by a parliament in such a humour. The brief and stormy
session of less than a month was closed with an angry rebuke
from the Lord Lieutenant, who accused the Parliament of
1 laving invaded the prerogative of the Crown, and insisted
that his rebuke should be inserted in the journals of the

1 " The first article of which, if confirmed, would make popery an
established religion, and the sixth would deprive all Protestants of
their actions against the Papists, by whom they were plundered even
while they lived in peace with them." — Account of the Parliament in
1692, Dublin, 1793. 2 lb.

sec. i ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 113

House. The Parliament was prorogued till April 1693, and
finally, after a further prorogation, dissolved in September of
the same year.

Two years were allowed to elapse before another Parlia-
ment was called in 1695. An interval of quiet was necessary
to let the heats and passions on both sides cool down. The
king again renewed his request that the Parliament should
ratify the treaty as it stood, but he soon found that all his
endeavours were ineffectual. Though he very unwillingly con-
sented to give up the disputed clause in the treaty, and
though to conciliate the Parliament he relinquished the
power of reversing Irish outlawries, 1 the House was not to
be brought over to his views. Induced, however, by the
king, they entered upon the consideration how far they might
in prudence ratify the treaty. They confirmed sub moclo and
with considerable qualifications some of the clauses which
referred to individuals and certain classes of persons in
existence at the time the treaty was made, and they also
restored all the Irish officers in Limerick and the other Irish
garrisons to their estates. 2 But beyond this they would not
go. They passed over in silence the first and only clause
which related to the Boinan Catholics as a body, and by so
doing they refused to confirm that clause. They saw that if
they were to ratify it they would debar themselves from
enacting any further restrictions which, in their legislative
discretion, the circumstances of the times and of the king-
dom might require. If, by a legislative enactment, they had
confirmed the words contained in the first clause, viz. "that
the Bornan Catholics should continue to enjoy such privileges
in the exercise of their religion as they had enjoyed in the
reign of Charles II," they would have been bound by them ;

i 9 Will. Ill, c. 5.

2 " An Act for the confirmation of articles made at the surrender
of the city of Limerick."— 9 Will. Ill, c. 2.

114 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

and the imposition of further disabilities might 1 have been
a violation, not of the treaty to which they were not a
party, but of their own law recognising and adopting that
treaty. But the Irish Parliament was resolved to keep its
hands free from any obligation of this kind, and to make
itself a party to the treaty only in such a manner as would
leave its future discretion untrammelled. If then the Irish
Parliament was not in the first instance a party to the treaty,
as most certainly it was not, not being in existence when it
was made ; if the treaty was by express stipulation within
its four corners, reserved for the consideration, and made
subject to the approbation and confirmation of Parliament ;
and if that Parliament, after consideration of its terms, re-
fused its approval and ratification, it is impossible to argue
that the treaty was violated by the Parliament, or that the
Parliament was restrained in any way from imposing on the
Eoman Catholics the restrictions which it afterwards imposed.
Nor was the treaty violated by the king. We have seen
that William performed his part, and that what he undertook
was loyally carried out. He observed every stipulation in
that part of it which is known as the military articles, and
which did not require the intervention of the Legislature.
He ratified the civil treaty, as he was bound to do, within
eight months from its being signed, but subject again in
words to the approbation and confirmation of Parliament. 2

1 I say might, for it is clear that even if the first Parliament of
William had ratified every clause in the treaty, subsequent Parliaments
would not have been bound thereby. The safety of the state, a change
in the circumstances of the kingdom, would justify any alteration in
the laws. It is a maxim of our constitution that subsequent Parlia-
ments are not bound by the decisions of earlier ones. But I am con-
sidering the matter on moral grounds and not as a special pleader.

2 " And as to such parts thereof, for which an Act of Parliament
shall be found to be necessary, we shall recommend the same to be
made good by Parliament, and shall give our royal assent to any bill
or bills that shall be passed by our two Houses of Parliament to that
purpose." — Eatification by William, 24th February 1692.

SEC. I ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 115

He used his utmost endeavours to mitigate the condition of
the Roman Catholics, and struggled to the best of his abilities
to obtain from the Parliament the ratification and confirma-
tion of the treaty as a whole.

It has never been stated by any Eoman Catholic writer
of authority that William himself violated the treaty. Even
the Irish authors have done justice to the truth and honour
of the king. O'Conor, in his History of the Irish Catholics,
informs us that William, in pursuance of his stipulation, " had
often recommended the ratification of the treaty to Parlia-
ment," 1 a fact with which we are also acquainted from the
preamble to the Act of the ninth of William. And when
some of the Catholics appeared by counsel at the bar of the
Irish Commons to oppose the proposed Act of Anne 2 in 1703,
no allegation was made that the Treaty of Limerick had then
been violated either by the king or any one else. All that
was urged was, that the proposed Act against which they
were petitioning would, if passed, infringe the treaty. But it
was forgotten by Sir Theobald Butler, who appeared for the
petitioners, that the civil treaty was conditional on the appro-
bation and confirmation of the Parliament, and that it had
never been confirmed by that body, though he was so rash as
to affirm that it had been so ratified. He must have known
that this general statement was unfounded, and that the
Parliament had been careful not to ratify the treaty as it
stood, but only such parts of it as to leave their future
discretion uncontrolled by any recognition of the treaty as a
whole.

The accusation of violating the treaty has been directed
not against the king but against the Irish Parliament. The
charge is that that body, by the Act of Anne in 1703 to

1 History of the Irish Catholics, p. 136.

2 2 Anne, c. 6 — " An Act to prevent the further growth of
Popery."

116 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

'prevent the further growth of Popery, and by other subsequent
Acts, violated rights which were secured by the treaty.
There is no ground whatever for this accusation. The civil
treaty was not absolute but conditional, both expressly in
words and from the nature of the matters in it, on the
approval of the Parliament ; that body was not a party to it,
and when the treaty was submitted to it for its consideration,
the Legislature rejected the only clause which referred to the
Roman Catholics in general. The Parliament had no share
in the treaty save that it ratified certain articles in it
which referred only to classes and persons in existence when
the treaty was made. And having repudiated the only
clause which referred to the body of the Roman Catholics,
it is absurd to say that it violated that clause by sub-
sequently imposing restrictions which it considered to be
necessary.

But it may be urged that the Irish Parliament, though
not a party to the treaty, was bound legally, or if not legally
at least morally, to ratify the civil treaty. If this be so, the
Irish Parliament is justly charged with a violation of it, or,
more properly, with the violation of a treaty which, though
concluded by the sovereign alone, was yet binding on it.
This is a grave statement ; let us examine what justice there
is in it.

The doctrine that a Legislature is legally or constitution-
ally bound to ratify a treaty made by the executive, to which
that Legislature is not a party and of which it disapproves,
is a new one and a stranger to our system of law. Large as
the power is which is lodged in the executive to declare
war or to make treaties of peace, Parliament has always
retained the privilege of controlling the exercise of such a
power, and of showing its disapprobation either by refusing
supplies for carrying on the war, or by declining to enact
such laws as may be necessary to complete the peace. The

BEO. i ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 117

argument that the Irish Parliament was bound to ratify
whatever treaty the Crown had made with the Limerick
garrison, and to pass an Act confirming that treaty without
exercising its legislative discretion thereupon, proves too
much. For let us suppose that William had chosen, in his
ignorance of the country, to grant more favourable terms than
those conceded by him. That he had agreed, for instance,
to the public establishment of the church of the Eoman
Catholics, or that he had undertaken that all the laws
against that body, from the Act of Uniformity downwards,
should be swept away. Would any one gravely maintain
that Parliament was bound to ratify such terms ? Such a
doctrine would deprive Parliament of all power of controlling
the executive, and would degrade it into a mere machine for
registering the acts of the sovereign. The Parliament un-
doubtedly possesses the right of refusing to ratify treaties
made with foreign powers, and if so, it has at least an equal
right of declining to confirm one made with subjects of
the realm. It has this right, even in those cases where
the treaty is absolute in its terms, and is not bound to con-
firm it, unless it meets with its approval. Much more has the
Parliament this right when the treaty is conditional only,
and expressly made subject to its confirmation. Inasmuch
as the civil Treaty of Limerick was conditional and stipulated
to be submitted to the Parliament for its approval and con-
firmation, it was the duty of the Irish Legislature to consider
its terms, and if, in the exercise of its consultative discretion,
the Parliament came to the conclusion that those terms were
opposed to the interests of the nation, it was bound to reject
them. This was not the first occasion on which the Irish
Parliament refused to confirm a treaty made by its king.
The Parliament of Charles II declined to ratify in the Act
of Settlement the treaty and the engagements which the
sovereign had entered into with the Irish in 1648.

118 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

Nor was the Irish Parliament morally bound to ratify
the civil treaty. The only just way of judging actors in the
past is to place ourselves, as far as we can, in their position,
to look at their surroundings from their point of view, and
to weigh and consider the circumstances of the kingdom
and what appeared to be the obvious necessities of the times.
Let us consider the sufferings which the members of the
Parliament which refused to ratify all the treaty of Limerick
had lately gone through ; the dangers of the State ; the prob-
ability of an invasion which would again throw Ireland
into confusion ; and the necessity of weakening the dis-
affected at home to prevent their giving aid to the invaders.
If we do so, no impartial man can deny that the Irish
Parliament was, according to the views and standard of those
times, justified in following the example of England, and in
reducing the Irish Soman Catholics to political impotency. If
the Irish Parliament sinned in acting as it did, it sinned under
infinitely greater provocations than the English people, from
whose legislation every enactment in the Irish penal code
was borrowed. And if we extend our views beyond England
we shall find that the conduct of the Irish Parliament towards
the Soman Catholics was complete and absolute toleration
when compared with the bloody and merciless persecution of
their Protestant subjects by the Catholic Governments of
France, Spain, Savoy, and Austria.

1. Within the fifty years which preceded the surrender of
Limerick, two universal rebellions of the whole body of Irish
Soman Catholics against the Protestants had taken place, in
1641andl689. Onboth these occasions the attention of En gland
was called away from Ireland on account of political crises of
her own. The opportunities were eagerly seized on by the Irish
Soman Catholics to separate from England, and to destroy the
Protestant interest in Ireland. The horrors and barbarities
which marked the insurrection of 1641 have been palliated,

sec. i ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 119

denied, or minimised by some modern Roman Catholic writers, 1
but they were admitted and deplored by every contemporaneous
Catholic of position or authority — by such men as Lord
Clanricarde, Lord Castlehaven, Owen Eoe O'lSTeil, 2 Father
Walsh, 3 Father Caron, 4 and George Leyburn, 5 chaplain to
Henrietta Maria. " It is a fact," says the Piev. Charles
O'Conor, a Catholic clergyman and historian, "as certain as
any in history, that they [the Irish rebels of 1641] were
taught to expect impunity only from extirpation; 6 fearing that
their men might disperse and throw themselves on the king's
mercy, the leaders resolved that all should be equally guilty ;
that they should embark in wickedness beyond redemption."
During this rebellion the crown of Ireland was hawked about
Europe bythe Irish leaders and offered to any foreign prince that
would take the kingdom under his protection. 7 This rebellion
cost six hundred thousand lives, more than a third of the whole
population of Ireland, and reduced the country to a desert.
The rebellion of 1689 was as universal as that of 1641.

1 In 1645, in the middle of the rebellion, a book was published
by an Irish Jesuit, Connor O'Mahony, in which be congratulates his
Roman Catholic countrymen on baving slaughtered 150,000 of the
Protestants between the years 1641 and 1645. Tins book was con-
demned by the Supreme Council at Kilkenny in 1648. The Nuncio,
Rinuccini, attempted to save it from condemnation. It would thus
appear that the archbishop approved the sentiments, and believed in
the estimates, of the book.

2 General of the Irish Celtic army.

3 Author of the History of the Irish Remonstrance, etc.

4 Author of Loyalty Asserted. "Ware enumerates seven works of
his and speaks highly of him.

5 Sent on a political mission to Ireland by the king.

6 Historical Address, pt. ii. p. 243.

7 When in 1661 deputies were sent over to England by the Irish
Roman Catholics to plead for their estates, the document, offering the
crown of Ireland to any Catholic prince that would take it, was pro-
duced. It was signed, among others, by the deputies, who could not
deny their signatures. When Charles II saw the paper he was indig-
nant and " sharply reproved the deputies for daring to appear before
him " with so much guilt upon them, " and forbade them for ever his
presence and court." — Harris, William III, i. 252.

120 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

" It is notorious," says a report of the English House of
Commons in 1693, 1 that not an Irishman who was in Ireland
during the late rebellion and capable of being guilty thereof,
either by being actually in arms or by aiding, abetting, and
assisting the rebels, is innocent." But the proceedings, which
were in this outbreak aimed at the destruction of the Pro-
testants, were of a different nature from those adopted in
1641. Legal chicanery was called in to aid open violence in
the field. A Eoman Catholic Parliament, as we have seen,
was convened in Dublin on the 7th of May 1689, and passed
Acts which were aimed at the destruction of the Protestants.
One of these Acts repealed the Act of Settlement, and at one
blow transferred twelve million acres of land from Protestant
proprietors to Irish rebels. Another was the Act of At-
tainder. By this latter Act the whole Protestant peerage,
gentry, and trading classes of Ireland were at one sweep
(without a crime — for they were bound by the law of Ireland
to refuse allegiance to a sovereign dethroned by the English
Parliament, 2 and without the hope of pardon — for this pre-
rogative was taken away from James by the Act) con-
demned to death. In the Parliament which w T as asked
to adopt as its own Act the civil treaty of Limerick, there
was probably not a single individual who had not been
doomed by the Eoman Catholic assembly to the scaffold or
the block ; whose lands had not been taken from him ; and
whose estate had not been turned from a garden to a wil-
derness.

2. When the cpiestion of confirming the civil treaty was
debated and considered in Ireland, there was a large Irish
army ready to embark and to invade either England or
Ireland according to the orders it should receive. Twenty

1 Journals of the House of Commons, xi. 56.

2 By the Irish Act 33 Henry VIII, c. 1, the Kin- of England is,
immediately and without the sanction of an Irish Act, King of Ireland.

sec. i ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMKKKK 121

thousand 1 embodied and disciplined Irish troops in the service
of France kept both the English and Irish Parliament in a
state of constant alarm. In 1692, a few months after the
surrender of Limerick, an invasion was actually prepared.
A camp was formed in Normandy, and all the Irish regi-
ments were assembled there under the command of Sarsfield
to take part in it. James himself went down to the coast
and witnessed the sea-fight which put an end for the
present to his hopes of returning to England. In Ireland it
was observed "that multitudes of the Roman Catholics
quitted their habitations, ran from province to province to
hold consultations together, and were in continual fluctuation
of action and spirits — certain indications that they were
preparing for some great design. 2 In 1696 another invasion
was planned. The Duke of Berwick was sent to England to
ascertain what force the Roman Catholics could bring into the
field, and to assure them that his father would join them with
12,000 veterans. Two regiments of horse were prepared in
London, and eight of horse and foot were levied in Lancashire,
the most Catholic portion of England. Contemporaneously
with these plans for invasion and insurrection, a succession
of assassination plots exasperated and alarmed the English
and Irish Parliaments. Was it any wonder that these legis-
latures regarded the Roman Catholics as enemies that could
not be appeased or conciliated, and that they resolved to reduce
them to political insignificance ? But the Irish Parliament
had a justification for their conduct which that of England
had not. " Fifty-two rebellions," it is declared in a report of
the English Commons, "which the Irish have been guilty
of, may sufficiently evince that nothing can reconcile the
implacable hatred of them to the British nation ; and

1 James II says in his Memoirs "near 30,000 men." — Clarke's
Life of James II, ii. 465.

2 Dalrymple, Memoirs of Great Britain and Ireland, iii. 229.

122 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

the only way of securing that kingdom to the crown of
England is the putting it out of the power of the Irish
again to rebel, gentle means having hitherto always proved
ineffectual ; and the favour they received after being con-
quered in one rebellion always laid a foundation for the
next." 1

3. The Irish Parliament had before their eyes what they
believed to be the sad proofs of what their fate would be if a
Eoman Catholic Government were reinstated in Ireland. No
such Government could be restored without the help of Louis
XIV, the friend and patron of James, to whose assistance the
Irish Eoman Catholics had long looked. The conduct of this
sovereign to his own subjects enabled the Irish Protestants to
foresee what their position would be under a Government sup-
ported and directed by him. 2 Six years before the surrender of
Limerick Louis had violated every feeling of mercy and
policy and revoked the Edict of Nantes. The dragonnades
followed, and a ferocious soldiery was let loose to devastate
and depopulate a quarter of France. Thousands of both
sexes and of every age were slaughtered or done to death in
some shape or other. Murder, torture, rape, every form of
cruelty, were called in to add to the numbers of the converts
to the Eoman Catholic Church. In less than six weeks eighty
thousand of the persecuted Protestants abjured. 3 "From
torture to abjuration," says St. Simon, "and from that to the
communion, there was only twenty-four hours' distance, and
executioners were the conductors of the converts." At the
period we are speaking of, there were in the streets of London,

1 12 tli of January 1693. Journals of the English Commons,
xi. 57.

2 " King James had the scheme of the revocation [of the Edict of
Nantes] imparted to him before it was issued ; he expressed the
greatest delight at it."-— Kanke, History of England, iv. 267, translation.

3 60,000 in Basse-Guienne, 20,000 in Haute-Guienne. — Martin,
Histoire de France, xiv. 43.

sec. i ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 123

and scattered through the towns of England, besides those
who had gone to the colonies or come to Ireland, upwards
of thirty thousand 1 French Protestants of every rank, from the
noble to the artisan, who had been driven from their country
for professing the religion which the Irish Parliament pro-
fessed.

1 " Report of the English House of Commons, 1 3th February
1691 ;" Journals of the House, x. 666. Mazure makes the number
50,000. Michelet puts it at 80,000.

SECTION II

THE CHARGE OF INTOLERANCE AGAINST THE IRISH
PROTESTANT PARLIAMENT

It was certainly not from any feeling of religious intolerance
that the Irish Parliament refused to confirm the Treaty of
Limerick\/ Nothing can be more unfair than the conduct of
some English authors who point to the Irish penal code as
the essence of intolerance, without stating that there was
not a single penalty, disability, or restriction in that code
which was not derived from their own legislation. The

Whig writers, who are able to see no salvation without or
beyond their own narrow and limited bounds, and whose un-
disturbed self-complacence amuses while it irritates their
readers, are the chief offenders in this respect. Burke de-
scribes the Irish system as " an unparalleled code of oppres-
sion," and Macaulay speaks of the Irish Statute Book as
" being polluted by intolerance as barbarous as that of the
dark ages."' J If these writers had made themselves acquainted
with the jurisprudence of England, they would have learned
that the penal code of their own country was more severe
than that of Ireland. They would have discovered that
many enactments borrowed from the English code had been
mitigated and softened down before they were adopted by the
Irish Parliament. Thus in England it was death for a priest
to receive a convert into the bosom of the Church of Eome ;
in Ireland the penalty was imprisonment only. In England

sec. ii ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 125

the legislature attempted — happily without avail — to prevent
a Roman Catholic succeeding to the estate of his father ; l in
Ireland this was softened into a descent of the estate in
gavelkind. In England no Roman Catholic could purchase a
lease or term of the shortest duration ; in Ireland Roman
Catholics were allowed to acquire terms for thirty-one years.
Even the law which excluded Irish Roman Catholics from
Parliament was passed, not by the Irish, but by the English
Legislature. 2 An Irish Protestant may recall with pride and
satisfaction the fact that of the three governments in the
empire the Irish Parliament was the first to relax the penal
laws against the Roman Catholics.

And what a difference existed between the position of the
Protestants in England and those of Ireland, and the respect-
ive dangers which threatened them ! If it be true, as most
assuredly it is, that nothing but hard necessity and the im-
perative law of self-preservation can justify penal enactments
against our fellow -subjects, what justification can England
offer for such enactments compared to the thousand times
stronger one which the Irish Parliament can produce ? In
England the Roman Catholics were a small and inconsider-
able minority, the Protestants being more than a hundred to
one. 3 In Ireland the Catholics formed an overwhelming

1 1 1 and 12 Will. Ill, c. 4, § 4, 1700. The Act was evaded in two
ways. " First, there being in all families a gradation of age among
the several heirs to the same estates, it happened that though the
person who was come to the age of eighteen did not take the oaths
prescribed by the law, yet the title of the Protestant heir remained
undecided as long as any next popish heir was under age. Secondly
(and this was the main inconveniency), it lying by that clause upon
the next heir to him who at the age of eighteen refused to declare
himself a Protestant, to prove that he had not made that declaration,
it was impossible for the next heir to prove such a negative. "— Parlia-
mentary Hitfory, vi. 514.

2 3 William and Mary, c. 2, § 5, 1691.

3 James II in his Memoirs estimates them as " at least two hundred
to one." — Clarke's Life of James IT, ii. 442.

126 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

majority, being to the Protestants as at least five to one. In
England the greater portion of the Catholic secular clergy —
I do not speak of the missionary regulars who were the real
authors of the early penal laws — and of the Catholic laity
had long been loyal ; in Ireland both the priests and their
people were implacably opposed to the Government and the
Protestant religion. A perpetual crop of rebellions had not
taught the English Protestants to distrust their Soman
Catholic fellow-subjects, nor inculcated the necessity of bind-
ing them hand and foot to keep them quiet. The English
Protestants had not seen themselves disarmed by their
adversaries, excluded from the army, and exposed in their
defenceless state to the outrages of an uncivilised and
fanatical peasantry which did not even understand the
English tongue. They had not witnessed their Courts of
Justice handed over to their declared enemies, and the whole
executive power in the country transferred to their foes.
The members of the English Parliament who passed in 1700
the Statute for the further preventing the growth of Popery?
the model and precedent of the similarly-named Irish Act, 2
had not been condemned to death for obeying the laws of
their country by a Soman Catholic Parliament sitting in their
capital. They had not been driven into exile from their
native land ; nor had their estates, their demesnes, and their
pleasant homes been taken from them and given over to
others. Yet all these things had taken place in Ireland in
the late rebellion of 1689; infinitely worse things had hap-
pened in 1 641. If we consider this condition of affairs and
are able to comprehend all that it means and includes, and if
we compare the position of the Irish Protestants, few in
number and scattered among a hostile population, with that
of their English brethren dwelling in peace and security

1 11 and 12 Will. Ill, c. 4 [English].
2 2 Anne, c. 6, 1703.

sec. ii ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 127

among their friends, we shall be almost tempted at the first
view to believe that the penal laws were, in England, the
results of a childish panic, and that in Ireland they were the
consequences of a justifiable and necessary policy.

The narrator or historian who, like the Irish Roman
Catholic writers, limits his views to one country without
taking into account contemporaneous events in neighbouring-
nations, conceals half the truth, and blindfolds while he mis-
leads his readers. Ireland was not so remote as not to be power-
fully influenced by the movements which took place in other
parts of Europe, particularly in those with which she had
been long and intimately acquainted. France and Spain, the
favourite resorts of disaffected Irishmen, were the two powers
which were best known to Irish Roman Catholics and em-
bodied their idea of what a Government should be. It is
instructive to consider the position of the Protestant subjects
in those countries and to compare it with that of the Eoman
Catholics under a Protestant Irish Parliament, I do not use
the language of exaggeration or overstep the limits of literal
truth when I say, that the position of the Irish Ptoman Catholics
at the worst period of the penal laws was a paradise, when com-
pared with the condition of the Protestants in France, Spain,
Austria, and Savoy, at the same period. Though the Protestants
in these countries were, like the Ptoman Catholics of England,
an inconsiderable minority, and a body from which no secular
danger was to be feared, they were persecuted with a ferocious
cruelty which was aimed at their extermination. There is a
sure test by which we can determine whether religious enact-
ments are or are not persecuting laws. If such enactments
are politically necessary, if they are required by the safety
of the State, then, provided they are not more severe than
need requires, they cease to be persecuting laws, however
much their necessity may be deplored. If we try the Irish
penal laws by this test we must acknowledge that there was

128 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

a justification for their enactment. But there was absolutely
no justification for the contemporaneous laws against the
Protestants in France, Spain, Savoy, and the dominions of the
House of Austria. In France the Protestants had remained
perfectly quiet for two generations, 1 ever since the taking of
liochelle and the settlement effected by Eichelieu. Many of
them had been called to office by Colbert ; many of them also
had been employed by Mazarin, who even appointed one of
them, Hervart, Comptroller General of the Finances. During
the life of Mazarin there was no excitement among them and
no question of religion arose. At the time when their per-
secution began, the French Protestants were hardly distinguish-
able from their fellow-subjects, except by the greater purity
of their lives and morals, 2 and were sinking quietly and
gradually into the general body of the French people.

Long before its formal revocation the Edict of Nantes had
been violated. The persecution of the Protestants com-
menced immediately after the death of Mazarin in 1661.
They were forbidden to sing their Psalms even in their own
houses. Their children, at the age of seven, were invited by
law to renounce their families, to declare themselves Catholics,
and to exact an allowance from their parents ; or they were
taken from them and distributed in convents or other institu-
tions. Many of their churches were razed to the ground,
eighty in one diocese alone, and their endowments confiscated

1 " Xulle injustice, mil outrage ne reussissait ;i lasser la patience de
nos protestants. II etait difficile de trouver a la persecution quelque
pretexte politique." — Miclielet, LouU XI I ' it In revocation de l'4dit de
Nantes. "Cependant apres la prise de la Rochelle et l'edit de grace
Les ^uerres civiles cesserent, et il n'y cut plus que disputes. On ini-
primait de part et d'autre de ces .^ros livres qu'on ne lit plus." —
Voltaire, Du calvinisme sous Louis XI V.

2 " L'explication est donnee par les plus sages catholiques et les
mieux informed, les gouverneurs, les intendants. lis temoignent qui,
ni pour les moeurs, ni pour l'instruction, les catholiques ne soutenaient
In eomparaison aver les protestants, ni les pretres avec les ministres."
— Miclielet, Louis XIV et la revocation de V4d.it de Nantes.

sec. ii ALLEGED VIOLATION OK TREATY OF LIMERICK 129

to Eoman Catholic uses. Decree succeeded decree against the
Protestants with frightful rapidity. 1 An ordinance was pub-
lished in 1681 declaring that it was a mistake to suppose that
the king forbade the maltreatment of the Protestants. The
natural consequences of such a decree ensued. Many Pro-
testants were put to death at Grenoble and Bordeaux.
Massacres were committed in the Vivarais and Cevennes.
The dragonnades commenced, and the effect was so terrible
that entire towns declared themselves catholic. Thus the
city of Mines was converted within twenty-four hours, and
Montauban and many other places after a few days. A
universal terror preceded the red uniform and the high caps
of the dragoons, who committed every kind of outrage and
excess. Colbert, who knew the value to France of the in-
dustry and intelligence of the Protestants, at last appealed to
the king, and the dragonnades were for a time suspended.
But this illustrious man died in 1683, and with him died the
last hopes of the Protestants of France. It was resolved to
revoke the edict of Nantes. The king signed its repeal on
the 17th of October 1685, and the decree of revocation was
registered on the 22d of the same month.

By this fatal Act the martyrdom of a whole people was
decreed, and industrial France was delivered up to military
execution. Open and merciless war was declared against
every Protestant man, woman, and child in France, while
at the same time the frontiers were closed so that the victims
could not escape. The penalty of death was imposed on
emigration, and the informer who denounced an intending
emigrant was rewarded with half his possessions. It was a
hunt of the Protestants in an enclosed arena, where every
avenue of escape was barred. The house of every Protestant

1 Apres la treve de Ratisbonne, les declarations et arrets hostiles

au Protestantisme se succederent avec une rapidite ethavante." — Martin,
Histoire de France.

130 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

became the scene of a tragedy. Women were outraged. 1
young girls were whipt by soldiers to convert them, and
every child of five years of age was torn from its mother."'
All, says a French historian, which man can suffer without
immediate death, was inflicted on the Protestants. All the
diabolical inventions of robbers for the extortion of money from
their captives were had recourse to by the soldiers to make
conversions. Fire was applied to the feet of some of the
sufferers; others were flogged; others hung up by their ex-
tremities till they abjured. Mothers were tied to their bed-
posts while their starving infants were withheld from the
nourishment of the breast till the acknowledgment of con-
version was made. 3 Nor was the penalty of death absent.
The stake, the wheel, and the gibbet had their multitudes of
innocent victims ; and the galleys, a fate worse than death,
were filled with Protestant ministers. Nothing was wanting
to the immolation of a whole community. To keep the
Protestants, who had been forcibly converted, from straying
from the Catholic fold, those of them who reverted to the
faith of their fathers were burnt alive, and those who refused

1 " Tout etait en fait permis aux soldats sauf le viol et le
meurtre, et encore cette restriction ne fut-elle pas to uj ours respectee ;
d'ailleurs beaucoup de malheureux moururent ou demeurerent estropies
des suites des traitements qu'ils avaient subis, et les tortures obscenes
infiigees aux femmes ne differaient guere du dernier outrage que par
line perversite plus raffinee." — Martin, Histoire de France. " Mais le
viol etait defendu, quelle moquerie ! On ne punit personne, meine
quand il fat suivi de meurtre. On eut soin de loger les officiers
ailleur que les soldats, de peur qu'ils ne les genassent." — Michelet.

2 " Un edit de Janvier 1686 ordonna que les enfants de cinq a
seize ans fussent enleves a leurs parents lu'ivtiques et remis a des
parents catholiques, ou s'ils n'en avaient pas, a des catlioliques designes
par les juges." — Martin.

3 " Toutes les inventions diabolic pies des routiers du moyen age pour
extorquer de l'or a leurs captifs furent renouvelees 9a et la pour
arraclier des conversions : on chauffa les pieds, on donna l'estrapade,
on suspendit les patients par les extremity ; on lia de jeunes meres
aux colonnes de leur lit pendant que leur enfant a la mamelle se tor-
dait de i'aim sous leurs yeux." — Martin, Histoire de France, xiv. 50.

sec. ii ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 131

to receive the sacrament at the hour of death, according to
the Eonian form, were denied six feet of their native soil to
cover their remains. Their bodies were drawn naked on a
hurdle and thrown into the public sewer, there to be de-
voured by obscene vermin. 1 As if to show to foreign Protest-
ant Governments that the persecution was the result of a
universal Catholic conspiracy against the Protestant religion,
and to shut out the Pioman Catholic subjects in their dominions
from the hopes of toleration, the head of the Church of Pome,
in 1686, celebrated the revocation of the edict of Nantes by a
public and solemn Te Deum.

Can the word " life," asks Michelet, be applied to the
existence passed by the French Protestants after the revoca-
tion of the edict of Nantes ? Yes, it was life, is the answer,
but it was the life of a hunted hare, trembling with ears erect
at every rustle, and momentarily expecting the approach of the
destroyer. Even the events, births and marriages, which bring
joy and gladness into families, served but to renew the fears and
anguish of the Protestants, who performed every ceremony of
their religion at the risk of the galleys. The Protestant wife
lamented when she became aware that she was about to be-
come a mother, for she knew well the long agony of affliction
which awaited her offspring, and that Protestants were re-
garded as worse than infidels and more dangerous than mad
dogs. The condition of the French Protestants, though some-
what alleviated by the improvement in manners, remained
unaltered till the opening of the great revolution. Yet the
spirit of fanaticism was not dead ; it slumbered merely, and the
slightest suspicion was sufficient to revive it, as the misfortunes
of the Calas family in 1762 only too surely demonstrated. 2

1 Quelques-uns qui rejeterent l'hostie apres l'avoir recue, furent
eondamnes a etre brules vifs. Les corps de ceux qui ne voulaient pas
recevoir les sacrements a la mort etaient traines sur la claie et jetes a
la voirie." — Voltaire, Siecle de Louis XIV.

2 At the succession of Louis XVI Turcot endeavoured to have

132 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

In the presence of such a scene of calamities as this, the
complaints of the Irish Eoman Catholic writers, that their co-
religionists were excluded from public employment — that a
change was made in the devolution of landed property — or
that a disobedient son could alter his father's fee into a life
estate, fall upon our ears like idle and trifling declamation.
The French Protestants had not deserved their exclusion
from the rights of citizenship by a perpetuity of rebellions ;
they were loyal and well affected to the State. Yet compare
their condition under a Eoman Catholic Government with that
of the irreconcilable Irish Eoman Catholics under a Protestant
Parliament. There was in Ireland a priest in every parish,
registered by order of the Government and under its protection.
The Irish Eoman Catholic was free, though there were laws in
the statute book against his religion, to serve his God according
to his convictions. He might build places of worship and
attend them openly in perfect security. His person was at
his own disposal, and he might transplant himself and his
industry to a foreign country. His family and home were
sacred. The laws were not interpreted to him and executed
against him by a ferocious and fanatical soldiery opposed to
his belief. The recognised Primate of his church, as if to
proclaim the toleration of the Government, resided in the
capital and within the shadow of the Castle. In Prance
every Protestant church had been razed to the ground and
its endowments and funds transferred to Catholic uses. Every
Protestant minister had been banished at a notice of fifteen
days, and his return forbidden on pain of death. All the
ceremonies of the Protestant church were performed at the
risk of the galleys — a punishment in comparison with which
death itself was a release. It was death for the French

the clause which hound the King of France to exterminate the
heretics in his dominions removed from the coronation oath. Turgot's
endeavour was successfully opposed hy the French clergy. — Tissot's
Life of Turgot.

sec. ii ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 133

Protestants to assemble in any place to exercise their religion,
and death to fly the country where they were doomed to such
suffering. Every Protestant child was required to be baptized
by a Catholic priest, and at the age of five years was taken
from its mother. 1 The comparative toleration which was re-
fused by a Eoman Catholic Government to its own kindred and
blood, to subjects whose only desire was to live in peace
in the land of their fathers, and who spoke the French
tongue, was granted by an Irish Protestant Legislature to a
half- civilised people who, by rebellion after rebellion, had
shown themselves its implacable enemies ; who had lately in
their Parliament condemned the Protestant nobility and
gentry to confiscation and death ; and who were aliens to it
in language and blood. The toleration of the Protestant
Legislature of Ireland was, considering the standard of the
times and its own dangerous position in the midst of a hostile
population, as remarkable as it was premature and unknown
to the neighbouring nations. It was the first awakening, the
early development, of that spirit which conceded complete
toleration in 1793, and which has since matured into the
lofty indifference of modern Great Britain to the variations
of dogma and ritual.

A few words will suffice with respect to Spain. Life,
under such conditions as I have described, was allowed to the
Protestants in France, but bare life was denied them in Spain.
In the latter country they were hunted and exterminated like
wolves or other wild animals. The possession of a forbidden
book, or the deposition of another under torture, was suffi-
cient to consign a Protestant to the flames. Eecantation did

1 " L'enlevement des enfants mit le dernier sceau a la persecution.
L'edit de revocation avait seulement statue que les enfants a naitre
seraient eleves dans la religion catliolicjue. Un edit de Janvier 1686
ordonna que les enfants de cinq a seize ans fussent enleves a leurs
parents heretiques et remis a des parents catholiques, ou s'ils n'en
avaient pas, a des catholiques designes par les juges." — Martin, Histoire
de France, xiv. 51.

134 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

not save the abjuring victim, for the Government and its
instrument, the Inquisition, wished to strike a general and
preventive terror into the whole nation. Nor was the absence
of evidence against suspects any security, for they were
tortured till they informed against themselves or against their
friends and relations. Death itself did not put an end to the
vengeance of the Inquisition. If subsequent evidence, even
the testimony of a tortured prisoner, was forthcoming, the
memory of the dead was declared to be infamous, his house
was razed to the ground, his property was confiscated and his
bones were dug up and committed to the flames. It is repul-
sive to pursue the loathsome subject. One fact alone is
sufficient to reveal to us the spirit which existed in Spain.
The fires of persecution were kept alive up to 1781. During
the eighteenth century upwards of sixteen hundred victims
were burnt alive for entertaining opinions differing from those
of the Spanish Church.

In the mountains of Savoy, on the borders of Piedmont
and Dauphine, there had long existed one of the most ancient
Protestant churches in the world. This church had often
passed through the fire of persecution, and had been for many
generations fed and nurtured on the blood of its martyrs. 1
At the period we are speaking of, three of the high valleys,
St. Martin, Perouse, and Lucerne, had obtained from the
Government of Savoy toleration for their religion. When
the dragonnades had penetrated to Dauphine, the Protestants
of Briancon and Pignerol took refuge among the peaceful
inhabitants of these valleys. Louis XIV was indignant that
these exiles should find an asylum with the brethren of their
faith. He ordered the Duke of Savoy to occupy the valleys
with his troops and to convert the Vaudois. The Duke

1 Headers will remember Milton's words recording the persecutions
of this people at another period —

" Avenge, Lord, Thy slaughtered saints whose bones
Lie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold," etc.

sec. ii ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 135

published an ordinance banishing the French refugees from
his territories. But this did not satisfy Louis, whose conduct
at this time was a dreadful prognostic to the Irish Protestants
of what was in store for them should a lioman Catholic Govern-
ment be restored with the aid of the French king. Accordingly,
at the instigation of Louis, the duke, by an edict of the 1st of
February 1686, prohibited the exercise of the reformed faith,
and ordered that the Protestant schools should be closed
upon pain of death. All Protestant ministers, schoolmasters,
and the French refugees, were directed under the same
penalty to leave Piedmont within fifteen days. To carry out
the persecution Louis offered the duke a body of four thou-
sand French troops, and they and the Piedmontese soldiers
invaded at the same time the three valleys. Those of St.
Martin and Lucerne were forced by the French troops, who
committed unheard-of atrocities. Mutilation of the unfor-
tunate Protestants was a favourite amusement of the soldiers.
Some of the inhabitants were burnt alive at once, others were
burnt more methodically, joint by joint, at each refusal to
abjure. Women were slaughtered, and young children were
hurled down the precipices, the soldiers laughing at the
bounds and ricochets of the bodies of the victims. While
these things w r ere being done by the French soldiers, the
Piedmontese troops entered the valley of Perouse, and having
induced the unhappy Protestants by false promises to lay
down their arms, massacred at Tour three thousand old men,
women, and children. More than ten thousand of the young
and able-bodied men were bound and sent to Turin, from
whence they were afterwards distributed through the prisons
of Piedmont, where the greater part of them perished from
bad treatment and misery. 1

1 The details of this persecution are to be found in Martin's
Histoire de France, vol. xiv. ; and in Michelet, Louis XIV et la revoca-
tion de I'e'dit de Nantes.

136 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

The dragonnades were not peculiar to France. Austria
can also lay claim to having made use of this means of con-
verting the Protestants. In 1672 the Austrian dragonnades
against the reformed in Hungary commenced. We have the
details of this persecution, not from the records of the Pro-
testants only, but also from the official documents of the
Viennese Cabinet, which Michiels has examined and made
use of. Eoman Catholic bishops, each with a train of three or
four hundred dragoons, and attended by a squadron of Jesuits,
perambulated the country. As soon as the motley horde
arrived at a town or village, the inhabitants were collected, a
Jesuit declaimed a sermon, the soldiers levelled their carbines,
and the place was converted. 1 The obstinate were banished,
their property confiscated, and Jesuits were installed in the
churches, schools, and manses, which had been built by the
Protestants at their own charges. But, as is usual in such
cases, the persecution waxed warmer and fiercer as it pro-
ceeded. On the 5th of May 1675 all the Protestant pastors
and schoolmasters were summoned to appear before a Catholic
tribunal at Pressburg. Those of them who did not obey the
summons were instantly condemned and a price set upon
their heads. Pour hundred obeyed and attended. They
were charged with innumerable crimes, but the principal
heads of accusation imputed to them neglect in worshipping
the saints, insults to the Virgin Mary by comparing her to
their own wives, trampling under foot the Holy Sacrament
and venerable body of Jesus. All were declared guilty of
high treason. The condemned were required to sign one of
two documents. By one the signatory swore to abandon his
religious duties and to be faithful to the prince, and in return
he might remain in the country ; by the other the signer
undertook to leave his native land never to return. Both
documents were confessions of guilt, and rendered the person

1 Michiels's Secret History of the Austrian Government, p. 140.

bec. ii ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 137

signing liable to the penalties prescribed by the laws against
heretics. A hundred ministers signed one or other of the
documents. On the rest sentence of death was pronounced.
But as the Government was ashamed to execute so many,
they were disposed of in various ways. Some were sent to
the State prisons, where they were loaded with chains and
employed in disgusting work ; others were sold as convicts,
and others w T ere sent to the galleys at Naples, Venice, or
Trieste. 1

In 1687 took place the long-continued butchery of Eperies,
which lasted nine months. A court was established at this
place, presided over by Antonio Caraffa, cousin of the apostolic
Nuncio Cardinal Caraffa, and a man well fitted to carry out
the threat of the emperor that he would take Hungary
captive, and make her first mendicant and then Catholic. 2 A
scaffold was erected in the market-place, and thirty execu-
tioners in green liveries obeyed the orders of Caraffa. The
tortures inflicted and the murders committed during these
nine months are almost incredible. The details are so fright-
ful that the historian, Michiels, is obliged to apologise for
producing them. Yet, says he, the facts of history must not
be concealed : " let us then have the courage to be present,
without giving way, at the tortures of the Hungarian patriots
and reformers." It is not necessary here to recall the hideous
story. It is sufficient for us to know that every kind of
torment known to the wild Huron or the Turk was resorted
to at Eperies. The stake, the wheel, impalement, laceration,
red-hot pincers, the introduction of wares at a white heat into

1 Twenty-eight of these martyrs, all that remained alive at Naples,
were claimed and released hy Admiral Euyter in 1676. As late as
1731, 30,000 Protestants were expelled from Salzburg and driven
into exile by the Austrian Government. Those who read these
lines will recollect Goethe's " Hermann und Dorothea," the incidents of
which are founded on this exodus.

2 " Faciam Hungariam captivam, postea mendicam, deinde
Catholicam."

138 TWO CHAPTERS OF IRISH HISTORY chap, ii

the natural passages of the body, all the cruel inventions of
man in his most savage mood, were made use of. The
Hungarians found such arguments to be irresistible, and all
who did not fly the country were converted to the Eoman
Catholic faith. 1

Such was the scene of persecution and horror which
Catholic Europe presented to the eyes of the Protestant Parlia-
ments of England and Ireland, and which convinced those
bodies that there was a universal conspiracy against Protestant
opinions and Protestant Governments. Can we wonder at
this conviction ? Will any one presume to say at this day
that such a conspiracy did not exist, either openly acknow-
ledged and conducted by the Jesuits, or acquiesced in and
helped forward by Eoman Catholics in general ? 2 We must
remember too that at this time the Eoman Court and the
Eoman Catholic clergy of Ireland still clung to the doctrine
that it lay within the power of the Pope to dethrone
sovereigns and to transfer to others the allegiance of their
subjects : — a doctrine which led directly to the belief which
was general among the English and Irish Protestants that
the Eoman Catholic religion was inconsistent with the exist-
ence of their own Governments. 3

1 " Grace aux livres des ex<5cuteurs, grace aux lettres de Leopold,
nous savons les petits moyens qui opererent ces ceuvres pieux. Des
ministres brules vifs a feu lent, des femmes empalees an fer rouge, des
troupeaux d'hommes vendus aux galores turques et venitiennes, voila
ce qui fit le miracle. Les Hongrois trouverent ces arguments des
jesuites irresistibles. Tout ce qui ne s'enfuit pas du pays fut touche
et sentit la grace." — Michelet, Louis XIV et la revocation de I'e'dit de
Nantes.

2 Catliolic France, as a whole, approved of the revocation of the
edict of Nantes.

:s It is certain that this doctrine and its propagation by the
missionary regulars, such as Parsons, were the sole causes of the enact-
ment of the early penal laws. " It will be found on dispassionate
inquiry," says the Eev. Charles O'Conor, "that the penal laws were
enacted not against any one article of the Catholic faith, but for putting
away all usurped powers and authorities," etc. "Had these [foreign]

sec. ii ALLEGED VIOLATION OF TREATY OF LIMERICK 139

As late as 1G66 the Irish Roman Catholic clergy, in their
synod in Dublin, refused to sign the " Loyal Remonstrance,"
which abjured this doctrine, and the Papal Nuncio at Brussels,
De Vecchiis, condemned the Remonstrance because it denied
the deposing power of the Pope. Irish writers and declaimers
would do well to ponder on these things, and, before
they rail against the intolerance of the Irish Parliament, to
raise their eyes beyond the confines of their own country, and
consider both the contemporaneous events in neighbouring
nations and the irreconcilable disloyalty of their own clergy
and laity. The members of the Irish Parliament would have
been angels if they had acted differently from what they did,
and conceded more to their Roman Catholic countrymen ; and
we are fools to listen to accusations of intolerance against
men in their position, surrounded by dangers which menaced
themselves, their posterity, and their religion, and who saw
nothing around them but the merciless persecution of their
Protestant brethren by the Roman Catholic Governments of
Europe.

seminaries never existed, we had not heard of the seditious doctrines
which I have mentioned, nor should we have been oppressed by the
subsequent cruel laws enacted against our religion." — Sir John
Throckmorton. " Had these men [the English clergy who retired to
the continent] remained at home, patient of present evils and sub-
missive, as far as might be, to the laws ; had they continued the
practice of their religion in retirement and distributed without clamour
instruction to those that claimed it, the rigour of the Legislature would
soon have relaxed ; no jealousy would have been excited, and no penal
statutes, we may now pronounce, would have entailed misfortunes upon
them and their successors." — Rev. Joseph Berington.

APPENDIX

TWO COLUMNS OF NAMES FKOM THE LIST OF PEKSONS
ATTAINTED BY THE IRISH PARLIAMENT

William Aldington and Richard
Silver, all late of the county
of Waterford and Cork.

Henry Brady of Tomgraney, in
the county of Clare, Gent.

Richard Pickett of Clonmel, in
the county of Tipperary, Esq.

John Lovett, Esq.

Castle, Gent.

Joseph Ruttorne, Gent.

Thos. Valentine, Gent.

George Clark, Gent.

John Bright, Gent.

George Clarke, Gent.

Thomas Chimmicks, Gent.

William Warmsby, Gent.

Richard Clutterbuck, Gent.

Erasmus Smith, Esq.

William Watts, Gent.

John Evelin, Gent.

Shapcoate, Gent.

Page, Gent.

Thomas Moore, Gent.

Humphery Wray, Gent.

Edward Crafton, Gent.

Alderman Clark.

John Clark, Gent.

Arthur Anneslow.

William Warwick and Purefoy

Warwick, Gents.

Captain Coape.

Robert Boyle.

Hugh Radcliffe, Gent.

Edward Nelthrop, Gent.

Robert Dixon.

Samuel Clark, Gent.

John Jones, Gent.

Henry Bayne, Gent.

George Clark, Gent.

Edward Hutchinson, Gent.

Richard Aid worth, late Ch.

Rememb.
John Briggs, Gent., and John

Bucksworth, Esq., all late of

the county of Tipperary.
John Kingsmeale of Castlefin, in

the county of Donegal, Esq.
James Hamilton of Donmanagh,

in the county of Tyrone,

Gent.

142

APPENDIX

John Aungier, minister of Lur-

Thomas Moore.

gan, in the county of Cavan.

Humphery Wray.

Erasmus Smith.

Edward Grafton.

Harrison.

Alderman Clerk.

Achilles Daunt.

Arthur Anslow.

John Power, Lord Decies.

William Warwick.

William Gibbs.

Henry Genny, Clerk.

Loftus Brightwell.

Thomas Assington, Clerk.

Robert Beard.

Christmas Genny, Clerk.

Mathias Aldington.

Thomas Chaplin, Gent.

William Aldington.

Archibald Wood, Gent., and

John Lovett.

John Ball, Gent., all in the

John Castle.

county of Ardmagh.

Joseph Ruttorne.

Captain Thomas Smith of Tuam,

Thomas Valentine.

in the county of Galway.

George Clerk.

William Caulfield, Gent,

John Bright.

Edward Eyre, Gent.

George Clerk.

Col. Theodore Russel.

Thomas Chimmicks.

Robert Mason, Gent.

William Warmsby.

Samuel Hudson, Clerk, and

Richard Clutterbuck.

Robert Eacelin, Dean of Tuam,

Erasmus Smith.

all in the county of Galway.

William Watts.

Henry Dowdall of Grange, in

John Evelin.

the county of Roscommon, Esq.

Shapcoate.

William Dowdall, Gent.

Page.

John French, Esq.

TREATY OF LIMERICK

AS RATIFIED BY THEIR MAJESTIES' LETTERS PATENT UNDER

THE GREAT SEAL OF ENGLAND

Gulielmus et Maria, Dei gratia, Angliae, Scotne, Franciae et
Hiberniae, Rex et Regina, Fidei Defensores, etc. Omnibus ad quos
prsesentes literoe nostra? pervenerint, salutem ; Inspexiraus irrotula-
ment quarund. literarum patentium de confirmatione geren. dat. apud
Westmonasterium vicesimo quarto die Februarii ultimi prseteriti in
Cancell. nostr. irrotulat. ac ibidem de Record, remanen. iu hcec verba.

William and Mary, by the grace of God, etc. To all to whom
these presents shall come, greeting : Whereas certain articles bearing
date the third day of October last past, made and agreed upon between
our Justices of our Kingdom of Ireland and our General of our forces
there, on the one part ; and several Officers there, commanding within
the city of Limerick in our said kingdom, on the other part. Where-
by our said Justices and General did undertake that we should ratify
those articles within the space of eight months or sooner ; and use
their utmost endeavours that the same should be ratified and confirmed
in Parliament. The tenor of which said articles is as follows : —

Articles agreed upon the third day of October 1G91 between the
Right Honourable Sir Charles Porter, Knight, and Thomas Coningsby,
Esq., Lords Justices of Ireland, and his Excellency the Baron de
Ginkell, Lieut. General and Commander in chief of the English army
on the one part, and the

Right Honourable Patrick, Earl of Lucan, Percy Viscount Galmoy,
Col. Nic. Purcel, Col. Nicholas Cusack, Sir Toby Butler, Col. Dillon,
and Col. John Browne, on the other part ; in the behalf of the Irish
inhabitants in the city and county of Limerick, the counties of Clare,
Cork, Kerry, Sligo, and Mayo, in consideration of the surrender of the

144 APPENDIX

city of Limerick, arid other agreements made between the said Lieut.
General Ginkell, the Governor of the city of Limerick, and the
Generals of the Irish army, bearing date with these presents, for
the surrender of the said city and submission of the said army.

1. The Roman Catholics of this kingdom shall enjoy such privi-
leges in the exercise of their religion as are consistent with the laws
of Ireland, or as they did enjoy in the reign of King Charles the
Second ; and their Majesties, as soon as their affairs will j)ermit them to
summon a Parliament in this kingdom,will endeavour to procure the said
Roman Catholics such further security in that particular, as may pre-
serve them from any disturbances upon the account of their said religion.

2. All the inhabitants or residents of Limerick, or any other
garrison now in the possession of the Irish, and all officers and
soldiers now in arms under any commission of King James, or those
authorised by him to grant the same, in the several counties of
Limerick, Clare, Kerry, Cork, and Mayo, or any of them [and all such
as are under their protection in the said couuties], 1 and all the commis-
sioned officers in their Majesties' quarters that belong to the Irish
regiments now in being, that are treated with, and who are not
prisoners of war, or have taken protection, and who shall return and
submit to their Majesties' obedience; and their and every of their heirs,
shall hold, possess, and enjoy all and every their estates of freehold
and inheritance, and all the rights, titles, and interest, privileges and
immunities, which they and every, or any of them, held, enjoyed, or
were rightfully and lawfully entitled to in the reign of King Charles
II, or at any time since by the laws and statutes that were in force
in the said reign of King Charles II ; and shall be put in possession
by order of the Government of such of them as are in the king's
hands, or the hands of his tenants, without being put to any suit or
trouble therein ; and all such estates shall be freed and discharged
from all arrears of Crown rents, quit rents, and other public charges
incurred and become due since Michaelmas 1G88, to the day of the
date hereof. And all persons comprehended in this article shall have,
hold, and enjoy all their goods and chattels, real and personal, to them
nr any of them belonging and remaining, either in their own hands, or
the hands of any jiersons whatsoever, in trust for, or for the use of them
or any of them; and all and every the said persons, of what profession,
trade, or calling soever they be, shall, and may use, exercise, and

1 The words between brackets are the disputed clause, see the

ratification at the end. The treaty was signed without this clause.

APPENDIX 145

practise their several and respective professions, trades, and callings,
as freely as they did use, exercise, and enjoy the same in the reign of
King Charles II. Provided that nothing in this article contained be
construed to extend to or restore any forfeiting person now out of the
kingdom, except what are hereafter comprised. Provided also, that
no person whatsoever shall have or enjoy the benefit of this article,
that shall neglect or refuse to take the oath of allegiance, made by the
Act of Parliament in England, in the first year of their present
Majesties, when thereunto required. 1

3. All merchants, or reputed merchants of the city of Limerick,
or of any other garrison now possessed by the Irish, or of any town
or place in the counties of Clare or Kerry, who are absent beyond the
seas, that have not borne arms since their Majesties' declaration in
February 1G88, shall have the benefit of the second article, in the
same manner as if they were present ; provided such merchants and
reputed merchants do repair into this kingdom within the space of
eight months from the date hereof.

4. The following officers, viz. Colonel Simon Luttrel, Captain
Rowland White, Maurice Eustace of Yermanstown, Chievers of
Maystown, commonly called Mount-Leinster, now belonging to the
regiments in the aforesaid garrisons and quarters of the Irish army,
who were beyond the seas, and sent thither upon affairs of their
respective regiments, or the army in general, shall have the benefit
and advantage of the second article, provided they return hither within
the space of eight months from the date of these presents, and submit
to their Majesties' Government, and take the above-mentioned oath.

5. That all and singular the said persons comprised in the second
and third articles, shall have the general pardon of all attainders,
outlawries, treasons, misprisions of treason, premmiires, felonies,
trespasses and other crimes and misdemeanours whatsoever by them
or any of them committed since the beginning of the reign of James
II ; and if any of them are attainted by Parliament, the Lords
Justices and General will use their best endeavours to get the same
repealed by Parliament, and the outlawries to be reversed gratis, all
but writing clerks' fees.

6. And whereas these present wars have drawn on great violence
on both parts, and that if leave were given to the bringing of all sorts

1 I, A. B., do sincerely promise and swear that I will he faithful
and bear true allegiance to their Majesties King "William and Queen
Mary. So help me God.

146 APPENDIX

of private actions, the animosities would probably continue that have
been too long on foot, and the public disturbances last: for the quieting
and settling, therefore, of this kingdom, and avoiding those incon-
veniences which would be the necessary consequence of the contrary,
no person or persons whatsoever, comprised in the foregoing articles,
shall be sued, molested, or impleaded at the suit of any party or
parties whatsoever, for any trespass by them committed, or for any
arms, horses, money, goods, chattels, merchandises, or provisions what-
soever, by them seized or taken during the time of the war. And no
person or persons whatsoever, in the second or third article comprised,
shall be sued, impleaded, or made accountable for the rents or mean
rates of any lands, tenements, or houses, by him or them received or
enjoyed in this kingdom, since the beginning of the present war to the
day of the date hereof, nor for any waste or trespass by him or them
committed, in any such lands, tenements, or houses ; and it is also
agreed that this article shall be mutual and reciprocal on both sides.

7. Every Nobleman and Gentleman comprised in the said second
and third article shall have liberty to ride with a sword and case of
pistols, if they shall think fit ; and keep a gun in their houses for the
defence of the same, or for fowling.

8. The inhabitants and residents in the city of Limerick and
other garrisons shall be permitted to remove their goods and chattels
and provisions out of the same, without being viewed and searched,
or paying any manner of duties, and shall not be compelled to leave
the houses or lodgings they now have, for the space of six weeks next
ensuing the date hereof.

9. The oath to be administered to such Eoman Catholics as
submit to their Majesties' Government, shall be the oath above said,
and no other.

10. No person or persons who shall at any time hereafter break
these articles, or any of them, shall thereby make or cause any other
person or persons to forfeit or lose the benefit of the same.

11. The Lords Justices and General do promise to use their
utmost endeavours that all the persons comprehended in the above-
mentioned articles shall be protected and defended from all arrests
and executions for debt or damage, for the space of eight months next
ensuing the date hereof.

12. Lastly, the Lords Justices and the General do undertake that
their Majesties will ratify these articles within the space of eight
mouths, or sooner, and use their utmost endeavours that the same
shall be ratified and confirmed in Parliament.

APPENDIX 147

13. And whereas Colonel John Brown stood indebted to several
Protestants, by judgment of record, which appearing to the late
government, the Lord Tyrconnel and Lord Lucan took away the
effects of the said John Brown had to answer the said debts, and
promised to clear the said John Brown of the said debts; which
effects were taken for the public use of the Irish and their army ; for
freeing the said Lord Lucan of his said engagement, passed on their
public account, for payment of the said Protestants, and for prevent-
ing the ruin of the said John Brown, and for satisfaction of his
creditors, at the instance of the Lord Lucan, and the rest of the
persons aforesaid, it is agreed that the said Lords Justices, and the
said Baron de Ginckle, shall intercede with the King and Parliament,
to have the estates secured to Roman Catholics by articles and
capitulation in this kingdom charged with, and equally liable to the
payment of so much of the same debts, as the said Lord Lucan, upon
stating accounts with the said John Brown, shall certify under his
hand, that the effects taken from the said Brown amount unto ;
which account is to be stated, and the balance certified by the said
Lord Lucan, in one and twenty days after the date hereof.

For the true performance hereof, we have hereunto set our hands.

Present, Scravenmore, CHARLES PORTER,

H. Mackay, THOS. COMNGSBY,

T. Talmash. Baron de GINCKLE.

And whereas the said city of Limerick hath been since, in pursu-
ance of the said articles, surrendered unto us : Now know you that
we, having considered of the said articles, are graciously pleased
hereby to declare, that we do for us, our heirs, and successors, as far
as in us lies, ratify and confirm the same, and every clause, matter,
and thing therein contained. And as to such parts thereof, for which
an Act of Parliament shall be found to be necessary, we shall recom-
mend the same to be made good by Parliament, and shall give our
royal assent to any bill or bills that shall be passed by our two houses
of Parliament to that purpose. And whereas it appears unto us,
that it was agreed between the parties to the said articles that after
the words, Limerick, Clare, Kerry, Cork, Mayo, or any of them, in the
second of the said articles, the words following, viz. " And all such
as are under their protection in the said counties," should be inserted
and be part of the said articles : Which words having been casually
omitted by the writer, the omission was not discovered till after the
said articles were signed, but was taken notice of before the second

148 APPENDIX

town was surrendered ; and that our said justices and general, or one
of them, did promise that the said clause should be made good, it
being within the intention of the capitulation and inserted in the
foul draft thereof: Our further will and pleasure is, and we do
hereby ratify and confirm the said omitted words, viz. " And all such
as are under their protection in the said counties," hereby for us, our
heirs and successors, ordaining and declaring, that all and every
person and persons therein concerned shall and may have, receive,
and enjoy the benefit thereof in such and the same manner as if the
said words had been inserted in their proper place in the said second
article, any omission, defect, or mistake in the said second article in
any wise notwithstanding. Provided always, and our will and
pleasure is, that these our letters patents shall be enrolled in our
Court of Chancery in our said kingdom of Ireland within the space
of one year next ensuing. In witness, etc.

MILITARY ARTICLES agreed upon between Lieutenant -General
Ginckle, Commander-in-chief of the English army, on one side,
and the Lieutenant-Generals D'Usson and De Tesse, Commanders-
in-chief of the Irish army, on the other side, and the general
officers hereunto subscribing : —

1. That all persons, without any exception, of what quality or
condition soever, that are willing to leave the kingdom of Ireland,
shall have free liberty to go to any country beyond the seas [England
and Scotland excepted] where they think fit, with their families,
household stuff, plate, and jewels.

2. That all general officers, colonels, and generally all other
officers of horse, dragoons, and foot -guards; troopers, dragoons,
soldiers of all kinds that are in any garrison, place, or post, now in
the hands of the Irish, or encamped in the counties of Cork, Clare,
and Kerry ; as also those called rapparees or volunteers, that are
willing to go beyond the seas as aforesaid, shall have free leave to
embark themselves wherever the ships are that are appointed to
transport them, and to come in whole bodies as they are now com-
posed, or in parties, companies, or otherwise, without having any
impediment directly or indirectly.

3. That all persons above mentioned, which are willing to leave
Ireland and go into France, shall have leave to declare it at the times
and places hereafter mentioned, viz. the troops in Limerick on Tuesday
next at Limerick ; the horse at their camp on Wednesday ; and the
other forces that are dispersed in the counties of Clare, Kerry, and
Cork on the 8th instant, and on none other, before Monsieur
Tameron, the French intendant, and Colonel Withers ; and after such
declaration is made, the troops that will go into France must remain
under the command and discipline of their officers that are to conduct
them thither; and deserters on each side shall be given up and
punished accordingly.

150 APPENDIX

4. That all English and Scotch officers that serve now in Ireland
shall be included in this capitulation, as well for the security of their
estates and goods in England, Scotland, and Ireland [if they are
willing to remain here], as for passing freely into France, or any other
country to serve.

5. That all the general French officers, the intendant, the
engineers, the commissaries at war, and of the artillery, the
treasurer, and other French officers, strangers, and all others what-
soever that are in Sligo, Eoss, Clare, or in the army, or that do
trade or commerce, or are otherwise employed in any kind of station
or condition, shall have free leave to pass into France or any other
country, and shall have leave to ship themselves with all their
horses, equipage, plate, papers, and all their effects whatever ; and
that General Ginckle Avill order transports for them, convoys and
carriages, by land and by water, to carry them safe from Limerick to
the ships where they shall be embarked, without paying anything for
the said carriages, or to those that are employed therein, with their
horses, carts, boats, and shallops.

6. That if any of the aforesaid equipages, merchandise, horses,
money, plate, or other movables or household stuff belonging to the
said Irish troops or to the French officers or other particular persons
whatsoever, be robbed, destroyed, or taken away by the troops of the
said general, the said general will order it to be restored, or payment to
be made according to the value that is given in upon oath by the person
so robbed or plundered ; and the said Irish troops to be transported
as aforesaid, and all persons belonging to them, are to observe good
orders in their march and quarters, and shall restore whatever they
shall take from the country or make restitution for the same.

7. That to facilitate the transporting the said troops, the general
will furnish fifty ships, each ship burthen two hundred tuns, for which
the persons to be transported shall not be obliged to pay, and twenty
more if there shall be occasion without their paying for them ; and
if any of the said ships shall be of lesser burthen, he will furnish more
in number to countervail, and also give two men-of-war to embark the
principal officers and serve for a convoy to the vessels of burthen.

8. That a commissary shall be sent forthwith to Cork to visit the
transport ships and see what condition they are in for sailing, and
that as soon as they are ready, the troops to be transported shall
march with all convenient speed the nearest way in order to embark
there ; and if there shall be any more men to be transported than can
be carried off in the said fifty ships, the rest shall quit the English

APPENDIX 151

town of Limerick and march to such quarters as shall be appointed
for them convenient for their transportation, where they shall remain
till the other twenty ships are ready, which they are to be in a
month, and may embark on any French ships that may come in
the mean while.

9. That the said ships shall be furnished with forage for horse,
and all necessary provisions to subsist the officers, troopers, dragoons,
and soldiers, and all other persons that are shipped to be transported
into France ; which provision shall be paid for as soon as all are dis-
embarked at Brest or Nantz upon the coast of Brittany or any other
part of France they can make.

10. And to secure the return of the said ships [the danger of the
seas excepted] and payment for the said provisions, sufficient hostages
shall be given.

11. That the garrisons of Clare castle, Ross, and all other foot
that are in garrison in the counties of Clare, Cork, and Kerry, shall
have the advantage of this present capitulation ; and such part of
those garrisons as design to go beyond seas shall march out with
their arms, baggage, drums beating, ball in mouth, match lighted at
both ends, and colours flying, with all provisions, and half the ammu-
nition that is in the said garrisons, and join the horse that march to
be transported ; or if then there is not shipping enough for the body
of foot that is to be next transported after the horse, General Ginckle
will order that they be furnished with carriages for that purpose ;
and what provision they shall want in their march, they paying for
the said provisions, or else that they may take it out of their own
magazines.

12. That all the troops of horse and dragoons that are in the
counties of Cork, Kerry, and Clare, shall also have the benefit of this
capitulation ; and that such as will pass into France shall have
quarters given them in the counties of Clare and Kerry apart from
the troops that are commanded by General Ginckle until they be
shipped ; and within their quarters they shall pay for everything
except forage and pasture for their horses which shall be furnished
gratis.

13. Those of the garrison of Sligo that are joined to the Irish army
shall have the benefit of this capitulation, and orders shall be sent
unto them that are to convoy them up to bring them hither to
Limerick the shortest way.

14. The Irish may have liberty to transport nine hundred horses,
including horses for the officers, which shall be transported gratis ;

152 APPENDIX

and as for the troopers that stay behind, they shall dispose of them-
selves as they shall think fit, giving up their arms aud horses to such
persons as the general shall appoint.

15. It shall be permitted to those that are appointed to take
care for the subsistence of the horse that are willing to go into France,
to buy hay and corn at the king's rates wherever they can find it in
the quarters that are assigned for them, without any let or molesta-
tion ; and to carry all necessary provision out of the city of Limerick ;
and for this purpose the general will furnish convenient carriages for
them to the places where they shall be embarked.

16. It shall be lawful to make use of the hay preserved in the
stores of the county of Kerry for the horses that shall be embarked ;
and if there be not enough, it shall be lawful to buy hay and oats
where ever they can be found at the king's rates.

17. That all prisoners of war that were in Ireland the 28th of
September shall be set at liberty on both sides ; and the General
promises to use his endeavours that those that are in England or
Flanders shall be set at liberty also.

18. The general will cause provisions and medicines to be fur-
nished to the sick and wounded officers, troopers, dragoons, aud
soldiers of the Irish army that cannot pass into France at the first
embarkment ; and after they are cured, will order them ships to pass
into France if they are willing to go.

19. That at the signing hereof the general will send a ship express
to France, and that besides he will furnish two small ships of those
that are now in the river of Limerick to transport two persons into
France that are to be sent to give notice of this treaty, and that the
commanders of the said ships shall have orders to put ashore at the
next port in France they shall make.

20. That all those of the said troops, officers or soldiers of what
character so ever that will pass into France shall not be stopped on
the account of debt or other pretext.

21. If after the signing this present treaty and before the arrival
of the fleet, a French packet-boat or other transport-ship shall arrive
from France in any part of Ireland, the general will order a passport
not only for such as must go on board the said ships, but to the ships
to come to the nearest port or place where the troops to be trans-
ported shall be quartered.

22. That after the arrival of the fleet there shall be free com-
munication and passage between it and the quarters of the above-
said troops ; and especially for all those that have passes from the

APPENDIX 153

chief commanders of the said fleet or from Monsieur Tameron the
intendant.

23. In consideration of the present capitulation the' two towns of
Limerick shall be delivered and put into the hands of the General,
or any other person that he shall appoint, at the times and days
hereafter specified, viz. the Irish town, except magazines and hospital,
on the day of the signing these present articles ; and as for the
English town, it shall remain together with the island and free
passage of Thomond Bridge in the hands of those of the Irish
army that are now in the garrison or that shall hereafter come from
the counties of Cork, Clare, Kerry, Sligo, and other places above
mentioned, until there shall be conveniency found for their trans-
portation.

24. And to prevent all disorders that may happen between the
garrison that the general shall place in the Irish town which shall
be delivered to him, and the Irish troops that shall remain in the
English town and the island, which they may do until the troops to
be embarked on the first fifty ships shall be gone for France, and no
longer, they shall intrench themselves on both sides, to hinder the
communication of the said garrisons, and it shall be prohibited on
both sides to offer any tiling that is offensive, and the parties offending
shall be punished on either side.

25. That it shall be lawful for the said garrison to march out at
once or at different times as they can be embarked, with arms, bag-
gage, drums beating, match lighted at both ends, bullet in mouth,
colours flying, six brass guns such as the besieged shall choose, two
mortar pieces, and half the ammunition that is now in the magazines
of the said place ; and for this purpose an inventory of all the am-
munition in the garrison shall be made in the presence of any person
that the general shall appoint the next day after the present articles
be signed.

26. All the magazines of provisions shall remain in the hands of
those that are now employed to take care of the same for the subsist-
ence of those of the Irish army that will pass into France ; and
if there shall not be sufficient in the stores for the support of the
said troops whde they stay in this kingdom and are crossing the seas,
that upon giving an account of their numbers, the general will furnish
them with sufficient provisions at the king's rates; and that there
shall be a free market in Limerick and other quarters where the said
troops shall be. And in case any provisions shall remain in the
magazines of Limerick when the town shall be given up, it shall be

154 APPENDIX

valued and the price deducted out of what is to be paid for the
provisions to be furnished to the troops on shipboard.

27. That there shall be a cessation of arms at land as also at
sea with respect to the ships, whether English, Dutch, or French,
designed for the transportation of the said troops until they shall be
returned to their respective harbours ; and that on both sides they
shall be furnished with sufficient passports both for ships and men ;
and if any sea -commander or captain of a ship, any officer, trooper,
dragoon, or soldier, or any other person, shall act contrary to this
cessation, the persons so acting shall be punished on either side and
satisfaction shall be made for the wrong that is done ; and officers
shall be sent to the mouth of the river of Limerick to give notice to
the commanders of the English and French fleets of the present con-
juncture that they may observe the cessation of arms accordingly.

28. That for surety of the execution of this present capitulation
and of each article therein contained, the besieged shall give the
following hostages.

29. If before this capitulation is fully executed there happens any
change in the government or command of the army, which is now
commanded by General Ginckle, all those that shall be appointed to
command the same, shall be obliged to observe and execute what is
specified in these articles, or cause it to be executed punctually, and
shall not act contrary on any account.

D'Usson,

Le Chevalier de Tesse,

Latour Montfort,

Mark Talbot,

Lucan,

Jo. Wauchop,

Galmoy,

m. purcell.

THE END

Printed by R. & R. Clark, Edinburgh.

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

A HISTORY OF THE LEGISLATIVE UNION OF
GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND.

Demy 8vo. 10s. 6d.

Mr. John Bright in his letter to the Times, 8th August 1SS7, says :— " I have read Mr.
Dunbar Ingrain's book with great interest, and hope it may be widely read. . . . Mr. Ingram's
excellent book will be very useful with all who can read and reason upon the great contest
which is now before us."

The Spectator says :— " With the greatest possible delight we recognise that this task has
been fairly undertaken by very competent hands, and that the result is, on the whole, in the
highest degree satisfactory. . . . The service which he has rendered to the country at tin'
present time is very great ; and we cannot too strongly urge all those who care to be brought
into contact with original authorities, and to have decisive evidence laid before them, to con-
vince themselves how completely baseless most of the charges against Pitt and Castlereagh
are. . . . We heartily commend the book to the attention of all those who either care for the
honour of English statesmen in the past or who have been affected in the present controversy
by the argument that her independence was in 1801 filched from Ireland by the influence of
English gold poured into the lap of traitors."

The St. James's Gazette says :— " He has dealt with his task with a praiseworthy industry.
He never exceeds the scope of his work. His facts are well authenticated, and the conclusions

lie draws from them are fair and temperate."

The Scotsman says : — " His History of the Legislative Union may be recommended as an
interesting and valuable discussion of the question ; and Mr. Ingram has the high merit of
giving chapter and verse for all his most potent assertions. . . . Nobody can read his book
without coming to the conclusion that many of the popular theories respecting the passing of
the Union are absolutely devoid of foundation."

The Guardian says : — " It is for the most part valuable . . . for its facts, which are
admirably full. . . . 'The Union was practically carried in 1799.' There is thus neither good
evidence nor good presumption in favour of the wild language with which we are so
familiar. Such is the case which Dr. Dunbar Ingram lays before us with great care and
skill."

John Bull says : — " Dr. Ingram has done good service in the compilation of ' A History of
the Legislative Union of Great Britain and Ireland.' In it he has exposed many popular err< >rs
and misconceptions relative to that history. . . . It is most advisable at the present time that
the clouds of misrepresentation . . . should be dispelled by the plain statement of facts here
put forward, supported as it is by documentary evidence which cannot be shaken."

The Glasgow Herald says:— "This is a very able, and, in the present political crisis, a
very important work. ... It is impossible here to follow the chain of evidence which Mr.
Ingram has, with painstaking labour, evolved in support of his assertions. It is clear,
coherent, and incontestable. He abundantly makes out his case, and is to be complimented
upon one of the most valuable additions to the literature of the Irish question."

The Adelaide Observer says :—" The book, apart from the question of his partisanship,
contains much information which will be welcomed by the ordinary reader who wishes to
obtain an insight into the relations which existed between England, afterwards Great Britain,
and Ireland prior to 1S00."

MACMILLAN AND CO., LONDON.

MESSRS. MACMILLAN AND CO.'S PUBLICATIONS.

Letters on Unionist Delusions. By A. V. Dicey, B.C.L., of the Inner

Temple, Barrister-at-Law ; Yinerian Professor of English Law ; Fellow i if All Souls College,
Oxford; Hon. LL.D., Glasgow. Crown Svo. 2s. 6d.

The Guardian says : — " Mr. Dicey writes both as a man of letters and as a man of war. He
is just the adviser whom the times need. His arguments are tlm.se of a quietly reflecting
thinker; his counsels are bold and plain. . . . The bunk is for its size perhaps the most preg-
nant we have ever read. . . . We cannot thank Mr. Dicey enough for the service he has
rendered to the Unionist cause by its publication. It ought to form the combative text- book
of every combative Unionist."

The Belfast Northern Whig says : — " These remarkable letters. . . . Their publication at the
present juncture is opportune, and Professor Dicey's little volume should have a wide cir-
culation."

and

A New Book by Mr.. James Russell Lowell.

Political Essays. By James Russell Lowell, author of ' ' Democracy
Other Addresses," etc. Extra crown Svo. 7s. 6d.
The Academy says : — " The essays Mr. Lowell has reprinted are important, not alone for their
historical interest — which is considerable — but still more because they show us clearly the
attitude and the tone of 'the independent in politics' at the time of the great national crisis."

Now publishing, crown 8vo, price 2s. M. each.

TWELVE ENGLISH STATESMEN.

The Times says : — " We had thought that the cheap issues of uniform volumes on all manner
of subjects were being overdone ; but the "Twelve English Statesmen," published by Messrs.
Macmillan, induce us to reconsider that opinion. Without making invidious comparisons, we
may say that nothing better of the sort has yet appeared, if we may judge by the five volumes
before us. The names of the writers speak for themselves."

William the Conqueror. By Edward A.

Freeman, D.C.L., LL.D. [Beady.

Henry II. By Mrs. J. R. Green. [Ready.
Edward I. By F. York Powell.
Henry VII. By James Gairdner.
Cardinal Wolsey. By Professor M. Creigh-

ton, M.A., D.C.L., LL.D. [Heady.

Elizabeth. By the Dean of St. Paul's.

Oliver Cromwell. By Frederic Hard

[Ready.
William III. By H. D. Traill. [Ready.

Walpole. By John Morley. [In the press.
Chatham. By John Morley. [Shortly.

Pitt. By John Morley.
Peel. By J. R. Thursfield.

The Statesman's Year -Book. A Statistical and Historical Annual of the
States of the Civilised World for the year 1887. Twenty-fourth Ajinual Publication.
Revised after Official Returns. Edited by J. Scott Keltie, Librarian to the Royal
Geographical Society. Crown Svo. 10s. 6d.
Annals of Our Time. A Diurnal of Events, Social and Political, Home and
Foreign, from the Accession of Queen Victoria to the Peace of Versailles, 2Sth February
1871. By Joseph Irving. Sixth Edition, revised. Svo. ISs. Supplements from Feb-
ruary 1S71 to March 1S74. Svo. 4s. (3d. From March 1S74 to July 1S7S. 8vo. 4s. 6d.
From July 1S7S down to the Jubilee-Day of Queen Victoria's Reign. [In the Press.

How the Peasant Owner Lives in Parts of France, Germany, Italy, and
Russia. By Lady Verne v. Crown Svo. 3s. 6d.
The Morning Post says : — "All who wish for the dissemination of sound ideas calculated to
refute the present fallacies advocated by many on the proprietorship of land will welcome
Lady Verney's book. In a small space her book offers a large amount of interesting and highly
instructive information."

The Perthshire ^Advertiser says: — "Lady Verney's remarks are particularly appropriate at
this time when so much is being talked about peasant ownerships in Ireland."

The Leeds Mercury says :— " Much maybe learned from the book concerning the actual con-
dition of the peasantry in Europe.",,

Works by the Author of "Hogan, M.R"
Globe Svo. 2s. each.

Hogan, M.P. Flitters, Tatters, and the Counsellor;

The Honourable Miss Ferrard. Weeds; and other Sketches.

Ismay's Children. Christy Carew.

The Times says of Ismay' s Children : — " Another novel from the pen of the author of if

M. I'., and one which can have nothing but commendation. . . . The series of pictures which it
comprises of Irish life and character is full of beauty, humour, and pathos."

The Guardian says : — " Amongst the various books which have been written on Ireland it
is not too much to say that Ismay' s Children is one that has depicted most powerfully and
accurately the conditions of tin' Irish peasantry. . . . The book, as a whole, captivates the
imagination and bites itself in the memory."

The St. James's Gazette says : — " Read tins work [Ismay's Children] For .'in exposition of Irish
life, Irish scenery and character, and you will find both entertainment and information."

MACMILLAN AND CO., LONDON.

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY
BERKELEY

Return to desk from which borrowed.
This book is DUE on the last date stamped below.

DEC 2 1947

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