XLV. GOVERNMENT OF RUSSELL, 1594-1597…

XLV. GOVERNMENT OF RUSSELL, 1594-1597

[Sidenote: Arrival of Russell, 1594.]

Sir William Russell left Theobalds on June 25, and did not reach Dublin till August 1. Even at midsummer no wind served to sail out of the Dee, and at Holyhead itself there was a week's delay. Keeping to the letter of his instructions, Russell refused to receive the sword until Fitzwilliam and the Council had given him a written account of the state of Leinster and Connaught; and this ten days' pause gave Tyrone time to look about him. Ormonde went to Dublin, and waited anxiously for eleven days to see whether the northern earl would perform his promise. On August 15, and to the great surprise of all men, Tyrone made his appearance, the late Deputy having sailed for England the day before. Russell had desired his predecessor to stay and make good his charges; but Fitzwilliam declined, unless ordered to do so on his allegiance, and Tyrone was thus enabled to say that he would have easily cleared himself in his oppressor's presence, had the latter stayed but one day longer.[230]

[Sidenote: Tyrone in Dublin.]

[Sidenote: He is allowed to go free.]

On arriving in Dublin, Tyrone sent in a written submission, and two days later he presented it on his knees to the Lord Deputy sitting in Council. Again he laid all blame on Fitzwilliam and Bagenal, acknowledging that his efforts to save his life from their machinations might have some appearance of ingratitude, and professing himself ready to serve the Queen and her new Deputy. He promised to do his best to restore peace in Ulster, to expel the Scots, and to protect the Pale. He was ready to receive a sheriff, provided Armagh and Tyrone were made one county, and to have a gaol at Dungannon, and to pay a reasonable composition. He promised to send his eldest son, Hugh, to Wallop or Gardiner, who might send him to an English university within three months, to give sufficient pledges, and to molest no Englishman within his jurisdiction. The division of Armagh from Tyrone had long been part of a settled policy, and the fact that Tyrone insisted on its reversal should have been warning enough. At the same sitting of the Council Bagenal produced a written statement of his charges against the Earl. The first of these, and the one which would weigh most with the Queen, was that many of Tyrone's foster-brothers and household servants had joined with Archbishop MacGauran, who was unquestionably the emissary of Rome and Spain, and that Tyrone had nevertheless protected and favoured them. But Bagenal was naturally not ready to prove his case by witnesses then and there, and upon this it was decided not to detain the Earl, although he had come in quite voluntarily and without any condition whatever; 'and it was resolved, for weighty considerations concerning Her Majesty's service, that the Earl should not be charged with the said articles at this time, but to be deferred to a more fit time.'

Russell afterwards said that he thought it safer to let him go, because his brother Cormac MacBaron was puffed up by some late successes, and, as tanist, would naturally take advantage of the Earl's absence and be ready to cut his throat. Tyrone's submission, too, had been very humble: he had promised to banish the Scots, to appease the rebels, and to give his son as pledge. In fact his humility disappeared as soon as he was clear of the Pale; he neither expelled the Scots nor appeased the rebels, and he never sent his son to Dublin. The evident truth is that Russell, who was new to Ireland, was completely hoodwinked, and that the Council, after the manner of councils, took the course which was easiest for the moment, and sheltered both themselves and the Viceroy behind a formidable list of names.[231]

[Sidenote: Reverses in Ulster.]

[Sidenote: Russell relieves Enniskillen.]

Fitzwilliam had confessed to Perrott that he received Ireland from him in peace, and that he should do the Queen good service if he could leave it but half as well. Measured by that standard his success had not been great, for he left the island very much disturbed. Ulster was 'replenished with more treason than we have known it in former times.' Bingham had bridled Connaught; but O'Rourke was with O'Donnell, and was a constant source of danger. Feagh MacHugh and his crew were traitorously bent, and the arrival of 3,000 Scots in Donegal was likely to aggravate the general peril. After all the fighting in Fermanagh her Majesty had no stronghold left there except Enniskillen, and that was closely besieged. Sir Henry Duke and Sir Edward Herbert were sent with 600 foot and 46 horse to revictual it, but could not, and Sir Richard Bingham went to help them with 200 foot and 50 horse. Before he could arrive, Maguire and Cormac MacBaron had attacked the relieving force at the ford of Drumane on the Arney river, and routed them completely. The convoy fell into the hands of the Irish, and the place was long known as the 'ford of biscuits.' This news met Bingham on his way northwards, and he returned to Dublin. The check was a severe one, and Russell lost no time in taking the field himself. His route was by Mullingar, Athlone, Roscommon, and Boyle, over the Curlews. Lough Arrow and Lough Allen were passed on the right hand and Lough Melvin on the left, the dangers of the march being from bogs and flooded rivers rather than from armed opposition. Enniskillen was relieved for that time, and Dublin was reached on the twenty-second day. The return was by way of Cavan, and the only casualties were from drowning at the passages of the Sillees and the Erne.[232]

[Sidenote: The Queen blames Russell.]

[Sidenote: Tyrone generally suspected.]

Sir Edward Moore of Mellifont, who was on friendly terms with Tyrone, was employed to patch up a truce, and war was deferred until the new year. In the meantime Russell had to bear as best he might the Queen's severe blame for letting the Earl go, in spite of direct private orders from her. The reasons which he gave were indeed very inconclusive, and it is plain that Tyrone had known how to profit boldly by the moment of weakness which in Ireland has always attended every change of governors in old times, and every vicissitude of party in our own. But opinions were still divided as to Tyrone's real intentions. Some professed to believe that his animosity was only against Fitzwilliam and Bagenal, but others, if we may judge by the sequel, were less optimistic or better informed. Tyrone's brother had contributed to the disaster at Enniskillen, and neither he nor the O'Neills who served under him would have acted against the chief's wish. There was plenty of Spanish gold circulating in Tyrone, and powder was being made there with imported sulphur. In Roman Catholic circles there were great hopes of what the Earl would do, but some feared that he sought an earthly rather than a heavenly kingdom. It was more certain that he had enormously increased his force, and that he was daily enlarging his power over the neighbouring chiefs. He had obtained leave to import a great quantity of lead by way of roofing his house at Dungannon, and that was now available to make bullets. It is difficult to say exactly when Tyrone's correspondence with Spain began, but some great movement was clearly impending. Jesuits and seminary priests swarmed throughout Ireland, and in any city or town, says one Protestant writer, 'there is not an Irishwoman nor merchant's wife throughout the kingdom but refuseth to come to the church, save that in Dublin a few women, under twenty in all, are not quite fallen from us.'[233]

[Sidenote: The Wicklow Highlanders, 1595.]

[Sidenote: Death of Walter Reagh.]

When the Christmas festivities were over, during which the Earl of Kildare tilted at the ring, Russell went into the Wicklow mountains and returned on the third day. Feagh MacHugh was driven from Ballinacor and the house garrisoned, O'Byrne himself, with his wife and the notorious bastard Geraldine, Walter Reagh, being proclaimed traitors. Some heads were brought in, but after a few days Walter Reagh's brother, Gerald, was out with his followers and burned the village of Crumlin, not three miles from St. James's gate. The lead was stripped from the church, and carried off to make bullets. The Lord Deputy appeared in Thomas Street, had the gate opened, and sent horse in pursuit, but the mischief was already done. As such insolence could not be allowed to pass, another journey was immediately undertaken, and a camp was formed at Ballinacor. A fort was built, and there was no difficulty in getting a hundred labourers from among the O'Byrnes. But Feagh had plenty of sympathisers. In one place a girl warned six kernes of the approach of soldiers; in another a bag of bullets was found newly cast. Heads came in fast, but straggling foragers from Russell's camp were sometimes cut off. Ormonde came up from Kilkenny with a large force, and it became evident that Walter Reagh's career was near its end. One of his brothers was taken by the Kavanaghs, the Gerald who burned Crumlin was killed, and he himself was wounded in attacking the house of Sir Piers Fitzjames Fitzgerald, who was sheriff of Kildare and Ormonde's kinsman. His leg being almost broken by the blow of a hammer, he was carried by his followers to a cave, and there attended by a native leech, 'who went every second day to the woods to gather herbs.' With the help of this leech Walter's first cousin, Dermot MacPhelim Reagh, betrayed him to Sir Henry Harrington, and promised also to give up Feagh MacHugh himself. Another O'Byrne, Murrogh MacTeig Oge, is also mentioned as being in the plot. Walter Reagh was brought to Dublin, examined, and hanged alive in chains for twenty-four hours, 'as a notable example of justice.' This was Russell's opinion, but it must be evident that such barbarity could have no real effect, and in fact the Wicklow rebels were soon as strong as ever.[234]

[Sidenote: Feagh MacHugh O'Byrne.]

[Sidenote: Interference of Tyrone in Leinster.]

No sooner was Walter Reagh dead than Russell set out again for the disturbed districts of Leinster. A camp formed at Money, between Tullow and Shillelagh, was the Lord Deputy's headquarters for three weeks, and he visited all the country round, finding time for a little hunting and fishing, and receiving heads of prisoners almost daily. Several companies scoured the Wicklow mountains, but never quite succeeded in catching Feagh MacHugh. But his wife, the famous Rice O'Toole, fell into Harrington's hands, and a Dublin jury found her guilty of treason. The sentence was death by burning, as if she was considered a witch, but the Queen spared her life. The arrival of Sir John Norris required Russell's presence in Dublin, preparatory to dealing seriously with Tyrone. Sir Henry had already brought rather more than 2,000 of the Brittany veterans, and the news of their coming kept the North quiet for a moment. Garrisons were left to bridle Wicklow, and it was supposed that the fort at Ballinacor could easily hold out. But Feagh MacHugh had now a thorough understanding with Tyrone, who had promised him 1,000 men--400 from himself, 400 from O'Donnell, and 100 each from Maguire and O'Rourke. The MacMahons had also promised a hundred. These were to be maintained for a year, doubtless with some of the Spanish gold which was circulating in Ulster.[235]

[Sidenote: Recruiting for the Irish service.]

[Sidenote: Impressment.]

[Sidenote: A contractor.]

[Sidenote: How the horse were raised.]

We are now entering upon the great Tyrone war, which cost Queen Elizabeth so many men and so much money. The trained troops at her command were very few, and fresh levies were constantly required. From what took place in one county, we may judge of the method pursued all over England, and gain some idea of the drain upon the scanty population of that time. Gilbert, Earl of Shrewsbury, a great figure among the nobility of that day, was Lord Lieutenant of Derbyshire. In March, 1595, he was directed by warrant to make a compulsory levy of 100 men for the Irish service. This was done, and the new company assigned to Captain Nicholas Merriman, the captain and his two subalterns being appointed by the Crown, and not by Lord Shrewsbury, who thought some men were pressed 'rather for ill will than for any care of the Queen's service'; nor is the suggestion singular in the correspondence of this period. In the same year Derbyshire had to raise three horsemen for the Irish service, and the cost was compulsorily divided among the gentlemen and freeholders. John Manners of Haddon was assessed at 53_s._ 4_d._, while some had to pay only six shillings. In 1596, fifty more men were raised for Ireland. Directions are sometimes given that the arms and uniforms should be bought of particular persons. Captain Merriman, who was a skilled veteran, commended the armour supplied by Mr. William Grosvenor, of Bellport, who was a friend of Shrewsbury, and a 'follower of the Earl of Essex.' In April, 1597, twenty-three men were pressed for Ireland; four of them ran away, and the arms of those who did not were so bad that the officers had to buy others from the armourers at Chester. In 1598, 100 men were first levied, and after the disaster at Blackwater fifty more were wanted. These levies were not completed till the spring of 1599; but in 1600 the demands began again. One hundred and fifty were required, but some ran away, and some were inefficient, and there was a further call for fifteen men before the year was out. John Manners was also ordered to provide one light horseman, with a cuirass and staff, at his own charge, and the county was forced to have carpenters, smiths, and bricklayers among the recruits. In 1601, three horsemen and 110 footmen were raised, and there was a further levy of horse ordered as soon as it was known that Spaniards had landed at Kinsale. About 70 gentlemen and ladies are mentioned as specially contributory to this last call, and again John Manners had to supply a gelding with a good saddle, and a good man to fill it, 'furnished with a good cuirass and a caske, a northern staff, a good long pistol, a good sword and dagger, and a horseman's coat of good cloth.'

[Sidenote: Unpopularity of the service.]

[Sidenote: A ragged regiment.]

Clothing for foot soldiers was contracted for at 40_s._ a head. After the victory at Kinsale, we read of no more levies in Derbyshire, but the drain had been severe. Of foot-soldiers alone, some 450 were raised in that single county, from 1595 to 1601, and we may be sure that most of them never returned. Naturally the service was very unpopular; 'Better be hanged at home than die like dogs in Ireland' had become a Cheshire proverb. Sometimes it was necessary to 'set sufficient watch in all the highways, footpaths, and bye-lanes, for the apprehending of such soldiers as shall offer to escape before God sends a wind.' And it is not difficult to see how Shakespeare made the study for his immortal picture of the ragged regiment with whom Falstaff refused to march through Coventry. 'You appointed twelve shires,' said the Mayor of Bristol, 'to send men here for Cork. We protest unto your lordships, excepting of some two or three shires, there was never man beheld such strange creatures brought to any muster. They are most of them either old, lame, diseased, boys, or common Rodys; few of them have any clothes, small, weak, starved bodies, taken up in fair, market, and highway, to supply the place of better men kept at home. If there be any of them better than the rest we find they have been set forth for malice.... We have done what we could to put able men into silly creatures' places, but in such sort that they cannot start nor run away.'[236]

[Sidenote: Officers and adventurers.]

[Sidenote: veteran.]

But if the Irish service was odious and terrible to the poor conscript, adventurous young gentlemen sought therein the means of retrieving their fortunes and of getting out of scrapes. 'There is,' says one such, 'nothing under the elements permanent. Yesternight I lived with such delight in my bosom, concealing it, that I was for this voyage, that the overmuch heat is now cooled by a storm, and my prayer must be to send better times and fortunes than always to live a poor base justice, recreating myself in sending rogues to the gallows.' The veterans who had fought and bled in many lands were not anxious to have their places filled by lads, who were brave enough doubtless, but who had everything to learn. Complaints upon this subject are frequent, but no one has told his story better than Captain Bostock, who, having served for eighteen years by sea and land, thought he was entitled to some reward. Bostock was at the siege of Antwerp in 1582, and remained long in the Netherlands, wherever hard knocks were going. Then he commanded a ship commissioned by Henry of Navarre. Afterwards he was in the Netherlands again, under Russell and Vere, and with Lord Willoughby at the siege of Bergen. Then he commanded her Majesty's pinnace 'Merlin' in Portugal, returned to Holland, and served under Essex all the time that he was in France. His next venture was in command of a man-of-war to the West Indies. Then there was more fighting in the Netherlands, and under Fitzwilliam and Russell in Ireland. In the voyage to the Azores Bostock was captain of a man-of-war, and 'fought with a carrack every day for twenty days.' Then he served under Essex at sea and in Ireland, and at the end of it all found that he had spent 1,000_l._ of his patrimony, and was still without recognised rank. 'A soldier that is no captain,' he says, 'is more to be esteemed than a captain that is no soldier; the one is made in an hour, and the other not in many years, of both which kinds I know many.'[237]

[Sidenote: Sir John Norris.]

[Sidenote: Norris and Russell.]

[Sidenote: Essex interferes.]

Russell had asked for a good officer to help him, but, to his great disgust, the Government sent him a general with absolute authority. A commission, indeed, was to be issued by the Lord Deputy and Council, and for this Russell expressed his thanks; but the terms of it were dictated by the Queen, who fixed upon Sir John Norris as the fittest man for the place. Norris was still Lord President of Munster, but the administration of that province was left to his brother, and he was put over all the forces in Ireland, with almost unlimited authority, for the purpose of pacifying Ulster. His promises of pardon or protection were to be performed as a matter of course by the Lord Deputy and Council. The fame of Norris was deservedly great, and it seems to have been thought, as it has sometimes been thought in our own time, that the mere terror of his name would save the cost of an army. But he was under no such illusion himself, and complained before he left England that Russell was hostile to him. He was in bad health too, and declared that but for that he would post back from Bristol and refute the detractors who began to buzz as soon as his back was turned. The servile herd of courtiers well knew that abuse of Sir John Norris sounded sweet in the Earl of Essex's ears. The favourite had interfered in the appointment of officers, and was told that the general had accused him of passing over the best men. This Norris denied, declaring that he had always tried to be the Earl's friend, and wondering why the latter would always treat him as an enemy.[238]

[Sidenote: Arrival of Norris.]

Norris landed at Waterford on May 4, after a bad passage, which brought on the ague to which he was subject. He found the season so late that there was no likelihood of much grass before June, and in any case he was unable to ride for some days. Russell civilly begged that he would take his time, and he did not reach Dublin until four weeks after leaving Bristol. While riding near the city his horse fell with him, and this accident brought on a fresh attack of ague. But he saw enough in a very few days to make him realise that the struggle before him was very different from any that had preceded it. The rebels were more in number and better armed than of old, and they had plenty of ammunition. Spanish gold found its way from Tyrone to some gentlemen of the Pale, and something like a panic prevailed. Two thousand good soldiers had hesitated to march ten miles by a tolerable road from Newry to Dundalk, and had clamoured to be sent by water. The like had never been heard of before, and both gentlemen and townsmen for the first time refused even to pass the doors of a church.[239]

[Sidenote: The Irish retake Enniskillen.]

While Russell waited at Dublin for Norris, Maguire regained possession of Enniskillen. The garrison had been reduced by sickness to fourteen, who were promised their lives; but the English account says the promise was not kept. Monaghan was also threatened, and 1,400 foot and 200 horse were sent to Newry. With this force Bagenal succeeded in victualling the place, but Tyrone greatly harassed the army on its return, killing over thirty and wounding over a hundred; ten barrels of powder were expended and many horses lost. It was said that the Irish engaged were more than 5,000, and that twice or even three times that number were in the neighbourhood. The road between Dundalk and Newry was then broken up by Tyrone's orders. Russell reported that the powder left in the Master of the Ordnance's hands was less than had been burned in this one day's work.[240]

[Sidenote: Murder of George Bingham.]

[Sidenote: The Irish seize Sligo.]

Sir Richard Bingham had lost no opportunity of warning the Government how necessary it was to seize the passage between Ulster and Connaught; he had made preparations at Sligo for the occupation of Ballyshannon. His plans were frustrated by one of those unexpected acts of treachery in which Irish history abounds. The governor of Sligo, under him, was his cousin, George Bingham the younger, who seems to have depended almost entirely on Irish troops, and especially upon his ensign, Ulick Burke, Clanricarde's cousin-german and son of that 'Redmond of the besoms,' as he was called from his sweeping raids, who had been the actual murderer of Sir John Shamrock. George Bingham had lately made a descent upon Tory Island, which he plundered, and also upon MacSwiney Fanad's village at Rathmullen, where he sacked the Carmelite monastery. Ulick Burke was left in charge at Sligo, and it seems that he or his Irish followers were offended at not receiving their due portion of the spoil. Sir Richard Bingham admits that they were badly paid, and that all the mischief came from that. At all events George Bingham and eight Englishmen with him were butchered by the treacherous ensign without a word of warning. Ulick had been twice saved from hanging by Bingham, but he gave the signal by stabbing his preserver with his own hand. Sligo, with its guns and stores, was handed over to O'Donnell, and Ulick Burke became his constable. 'This,' says Sir Richard, 'is the worst news ever happened in Connaught in my time.'[241]

[Sidenote: Tyrone is proclaimed traitor.]

[Sidenote: A garrison at Armagh.]

A week after the disaster at Sligo, Norris started for Newry, whither Russell followed him five days later with 2,200 foot and 550 horse. Tyrone and his adherents were proclaimed traitors at Dundalk, both in English and Irish. The causeway through the Moyry pass had been broken up, but no resistance was offered, and a band of pioneers soon made it practicable. In the presence of the Lord-Deputy Norris disclaimed all power and responsibility, but there was no outward breach between them. Russell reached the Blackwater without serious fighting, and pitched his camp close to Armagh. The church was fortified and made capable of sheltering 200 men, and Tyrone spent his time in burning the houses round about and in razing his own castle of Dungannon. He had intended to make a great stronghold, fortified 'by the device of a Spaniard that he had with him, but in the end employed those masons that were entertained for builders up, for pullers down of that his house, and that in so great a haste, as the same overnight mustering very stately and high in the sight of all our army, the next day by noon it was so low that it could scarcely be discerned.' The arrival of cannon at Newry had already taught Tyrone that he could not defend any castle against a regular army, and he afterwards constantly acted upon that principle. Besides making Armagh tenable, Russell again relieved Monaghan. There was constant skirmishing, which cost a good many men, but nothing like a general battle. On his return to Newry the Lord-Deputy very early fell into an ambuscade, but no one was actually hurt except O'Hanlon, who carried the Queen's colours. The Moyry pass was again found unoccupied, and a council of war was held at Dundalk. Russell announced that he had fulfilled her Majesty's order, and would now leave Ulster matters to the general, according to his commission, while Bingham should attend to Connaught. Norris said he would do his best; but if his invasion of Tyrone were frustrated by want of provisions, as the Lord-Deputy's had been, he trusted it should be without imputation to him. 'And so,' says the chronicler, 'every man returned well wearied towards his own dwelling that had any.'[242]

[Sidenote: Strained relations between Norris and Russell.]

During the expedition Russell wrote to say that he agreed better with Norris than he had at first thought possible. But the general looked at everything upon the darkest side. He accused the Lord Deputy of stretching his conscience to injure him, of detaining letters so as to deprive him of the means of answering them, of making his commission less ample than the Queen had ordered; and he declared, though without actually naming Russell, that his letters to Cecil and Cecil's to him were certainly opened. He maintained that every obstacle was thrown in his way, and that his private fortune was spent without increase of honour after so many years of service. The means provided were utterly inadequate, since even Russell thought more than 3,000 men necessary for the Ulster war, and scarcely half the number were actually available. 'I wish,' he says, 'it had pleased God to appoint me to follow some other more grateful profession.'[243]

[Sidenote: Ormonde and Tyrone.]

It was not without many misgivings that the proclamation against Tyrone was allowed to issue, Burghley dreaming almost to the last moment of a pacification by Ormonde's means. But Ormonde himself had already made up his mind that Tyrone could not be trusted at all, since he had broken his last promises. Nevertheless he went to Dublin, and on arriving there found that the humour had changed. No commission came for him, and without one he could attempt nothing. His anxiety was lest the Queen should think him lukewarm, whereas his greatest wish, though far beyond his power, was that Tyrone's and every other traitor's head should be at her Majesty's disposal. He rejoiced at the appointment of Sir John Norris, and wished the Queen had many such to serve her. 'When Tyrone is proclaimed,' he said, 'I wish head-money may be promised for him, as I did for the Earl of Desmond, and pardon to be given to such others of the North as will serve against him.'[244]

[Sidenote: Bingham foresees disaster.]

Bingham came to Dublin to confer with Russell and Norris, and the result was to show clearly how much the work to be done exceeded the available means. The Governor of Connaught said no quiet could be expected in his province until the Ulster rebels were stopped at the Erne. Three whole counties were in revolt, and Clanricarde's near kinsmen had been engaged in the Sligo massacre, although he himself was loyal. Russell agreed with Bingham, but the majority of the Council were for stumbling along in the old rut. Bingham went back to Athlone, expecting nothing but disaster, and Norris went to Newry with the certain knowledge that he had not men enough to effect anything. First he tried what negotiation would do, and Tyrone sent in a signed paper which he called a submission. He was heartily sorry for his offences, and humbly besought pardon first for himself and all the inhabitants of Tyrone, but also for all his adherents who would give the same assurances, 'for that since the time I was proclaimed there have passed an oath between us to hold one course.' This submission was rejected, as it would have practically acknowledged Tyrone's local supremacy, and of this rejection the Queen quite approved.

[Sidenote: Tyrone resists Norris,]

[Sidenote: who is wounded.]

Armagh was victualled without much trouble by Norris in person, and the army then returned to Newry for more provisions. Bagenal succeeded in surprising 2,000 of the enemy's cows, and Armagh was again reached without fighting. Some days were spent in fortifying and in making arrangements for a winter garrison, but Norris failed to bring on a general engagement. Tyrone kept to his vantage-ground, but made a great effort to annoy the English at a little pass which cannot be far from Markethill. The baggage was sent on in front and escaped, but the rearguard had to fight their best. There were Scots with Tyrone whose arrows proved very effective, and the Irish horse were much more active than the English. Norris himself was shot in the arm and side, and his horse was hit in four places. His brother Thomas was shot through the thigh, and Captain Wingfield through the elbow. 'I have a lady's hurt,' said Sir John; 'I pray, brother, make the place good if you love me, and I will new horse myself and return presently; and I pray charge home.' Two other officers were killed with ten men, and about thirty men were wounded. It does not appear that Tyrone's losses were much greater, and it was evident that nothing of moment could be done with the forces at hand. Norris told Russell that he ought to send him every man he could scrape together, regular or irregular, leaving pioneers and carriers to follow as they might; and that, if this were not done, he would not be responsible for anything. He sent his brother Henry straight to England, complaining that he had but 150 draught horses, when formerly ten times that number came out of the Pale, and that he was not properly supported in any way. And yet Russell may have done his best. He did detach Thomond with five companies and 145 horse to Newry, besides sending Secretary Fenton to help the wounded general in administrative work. But to get supplies from the unwilling Catholics of the Pale was beyond his power. The gentry had promised to muster 1,000 foot and 300 horse at Kells for the defence of the border, but a month after the trysting-day only one-third of that number had arrived.[245]

[Sidenote: Death of Tirlogh Luineach O'Neill, 1595.]

[Sidenote: Tyrone is made O'Neill.]

At the moment of this first fight with Tyrone in his character of proclaimed traitor, old Tirlogh Luineach died. He had already resigned the chiefry, but it now suited his successor to drop the mask, and he went at once to Tullahogue to be invested. And yet he was quite ready to renounce the name of O'Neill four months later, though objecting to take an oath on the subject. The annalists say he had been appointed heir 'ten years before at the Parliament held in Dublin in the name of Queen Elizabeth.' But it is, of course, quite untrue that Tyrone was made tanist by Act of Parliament, and the Four Masters themselves record that Tirlogh had resigned in his favour more than two years before. In 1587 it had been intended to make Tirlogh Earl of Omagh, and thus to perpetuate the division of Tyrone. The old chief had always realised, in a vague way, that an O'Neill could not stand alone, and had listened without enthusiasm to the bards who called upon him to imitate the legendary heroes of his race, and to make himself monarch of Ireland in spite of the English. The real effect of his death was to make Tyrone chief of Ulster in the popular estimation, as he had long been in real power. He also saw that the Queen would be too strong for him unless he could make foreign alliances, and he strove to excite sympathy abroad by appearing as the head of a Catholic confederacy.[246]

[Sidenote: Tyrone has dealings with Spain.]

[Sidenote: Conditions of peace or war.]

Nothing, said the Queen, would more become this base traitor whom she had raised from the dust, than his 'public confessing what he knows of any Spanish practices, and his abjuration of any manner of hearkening or combining with any foreigners--a course fit in his offers to be made vulgar--that in Spain and abroad the hopes of such attempts may be extinguished.' Tyrone protested that he never corresponded with Spain before August 20; but this can hardly be true, for in a letter to Don Carlos, written little more than a month after that date, he complained that the King had returned no answer to frequent previous letters. He begged Philip to send 3,000 soldiers, at whose approach all the heretics would disappear, and the King Catholic be recognised as the sole sovereign of Ireland. Elizabeth shrank from the cost of war and from the suffering which it would bring, and Norris was ordered to negotiate. A general without an army is not usually the most successful of diplomatists, and Sir John had no belief in the work. There were, he said, but two courses open. One was to give Tyrone a free pardon, mainly on condition of his abjuring Spain and the Pope, by which means these potentates would be alienated from him. If there was to be fighting, then he thought it best to leave Connaught alone, and confine himself to Ulster. He demanded a separate treasurer, as Ormonde had in the Desmond times, 5,000_l._ a month for six months, and 2,000_l._ more for fortifications, and power to spend the whole as he liked. With this, but not with less, he thought he could post a garrison at Lough Foyle, for like every other competent soldier he maintained that Tyrone could be bridled only by permanent fortresses. The course which seemed easiest and cheapest was taken, and the negotiations began without sincerity on Tyrone's part, and with a presentiment of failure on that of Norris, who thought force the only remedy.[247]

[Sidenote: A truce with Tyrone.]

Norris did not himself meet Tyrone, but sent two captains, St. Leger and Warren, who made a truce to last until January 1, and for one month longer should the Lord Deputy desire it. Peace was to be kept on both sides, but none of the points at issue were decided. Tyrone and O'Donnell made separate submissions, upon which great stress was laid; but as they were both in correspondence with Spain, it is clear that their chief object was to gain time. Tyrone further declared his readiness to renounce the title of O'Neill, protesting that he had assumed it only to prevent anybody else from doing so. Upon these terms, since no better were to be had, the Queen was inclined to pardon the chief rebels; but this only encouraged them to make fresh demands. Burghley in the meantime was advising that money should be sent into Ireland, where he foresaw nothing but trouble. 'I see,' he said, 'a manifest disjunction between the Lord Deputy and Sir John Norris. Sir John was too bold to command the companies in the English Pale for Waterford without assenting of the Deputy, for out of Munster he hath no sole authority. I fear continually evil disasters.'[248]

[Sidenote: O'Donnell overruns Connaught.]

O'Donnell had in the meantime made himself master of a great part of Connaught. Bingham failed in a determined attempt to retake Sligo, and his nephew, Captain Martin, was killed by an Irish dart, which pierced the joint of his breastplate as his arm was raised to strike. Russell went to Galway, and was received with full military honours; and at first the rebellious Burkes seemed inclined to come to him. But O'Donnell entered the province, and persuaded them to content themselves with a written submission, accompanied by a statement of their complaints against Bingham. They accepted a MacWilliam at the northern chief's hands, in the person of Theobald Burke, a young man who had just distinguished himself by surprising the castle of Belleek in Mayo, and inflicting great loss on a relieving force led by Bingham's brother John; and by Christmas there was no county in Connaught, except Clare, in which the inhabitants, or great numbers of them, had not united with O'Donnell.[249]

[Sidenote: Negotiations with Tyrone, 1596.]

[Sidenote: Liberty of conscience demanded]

If a peace could be made on anything like honourable terms, Russell was authorised to act without further orders from home, and to pardon every rebel who would come in and submit himself. Wallop and Gardiner, both of whom were thought rather friendly to Tyrone, were sent as commissioners to Dundalk; but, protection or no protection, Tyrone refused to enter that town. The commissioners were fain to waive the point, and a meeting of five persons on each side was held a mile outside. Swords only were worn, and the greatest distrust was shown. 'The forces of either side stood a quarter of a mile distant from them, and while they parleyed on horseback two horsemen of the commissioners stood firm in the midway between the Earl's troops and them, and likewise two horsemen of the Earl's was placed between them and her Majesty's forces. These scout officers were to give warning if any treacherous attempt were made on either part.' Tyrone and his brother Cormac, whom the keener spirits among the O'Neills made tanist in defiance of the Queen's patent, O'Donnell, Maguire, MacMahon, O'Dogherty, O'Reilly, and many others, were at the meeting or in the immediate neighbourhood. The first article of the Irish demand was 'free liberty of conscience'--free liberty of conscience for those who were anxious to exchange the sovereignty of Elizabeth for that of Philip II. Free pardons and restoration in blood of all of the northern rebels, the maintenance of Tyrone's power over his neighbours, the acknowledgment of O'Donnell's claims in Connaught, a pardon for Feagh MacHugh, and the non-appointment of sheriffs in Ulster, except for Newry and Carrickfergus; these were the other demands, of which they believed the concession would 'draw them to a more nearness of loyalty.' They amounted, in truth, to an abrogation of the royal authority in nearly all Ulster, and in a great part of Connaught. The negotiations following lasted eleven days, with growing distrust on both sides, and at last a fresh truce was concluded, for February, March, and April. The terms, in so far as they differed from the former ones, were in favour of Tyrone and O'Donnell. On the very day that the truce was concluded, Russell wrote to complain that the commissioners were too easy with men who made immoderate demands, contrary to their former submissions; and on the next day, as if his words were prophetic, an indignant letter came from the Queen, accompanied by a much-needed remittance of 12,000_l._ She had good reason to complain that the more inclined to mercy she showed herself the more insolent the rebels became, and was particularly annoyed at the fact that the commissioners addressed Tyrone and his associates by such titles as 'loving friends,' and 'our very good lord.'[250]

[Sidenote: Neither Tyrone nor O'Donnell can be conciliated.]

[Sidenote: Their pretensions.]

So anxious were the commissioners for peace at any price that they withheld the terms on which the Queen was willing to pardon the rebels until the truce was safely concluded. Nor did they venture to show the actual articles sent from England, thinking the chiefs would be less alarmed by conditions of their own devising. Elizabeth held the language of a merciful sovereign, who was ready to pardon rebels, but who had their lands and lives at her mercy. Tyrone had forfeited his patent and should only receive back portions of his estate, while his jurisdiction over his neighbours was ousted altogether. He was to give several substantial pledges, and to send his eldest son to be educated in England. O'Donnell, Maguire, O'Rourke, and the MacMahons were to be treated with separately, and in every case members of their septs who had not rebelled were to have some of their lands. If the Earl held out, efforts were to be made to detach O'Donnell from him. All this was inconsistent with what the chiefs had demanded from the commissioners; and the latter could only give the Queen's ideas in their own language, and solicit observations from the parties concerned. Tyrone said he was anxious to send over his son, but that his people would not allow him, and, indeed, it is likely that he was afraid of his brother Cormac's doings as tanist. He had no objection to a gaol, nor to a sheriff--provided that official were an inhabitant of Tyrone--was ready to renounce the name of O'Neill, though not upon oath, and agreed to give reasonable pledges. But he would not consent to a garrison at Armagh, insisting that Tyrone and Armagh should be one county; nor would he bind himself, without the consent of his clansmen, to pay a fine in support of the garrisons at Monaghan, Blackwater, and Newry. O'Donnell was even less accommodating, ironically offering to build a gaol in Donegal, whenever he agreed to receive a sheriff there. He claimed the county of Sligo as his own, and maintained that O'Dogherty held all his territory of him. Having received these answers, the commissioners returned to Dublin, and when Gardiner went thence to England, the Queen for some time refused to see him.[251]

[Sidenote: Confusion in Connaught.]

Russell's journey to Galway had resulted in a truce, but there was no peace in Connaught. Bingham managed to victual Ballymote across the Curlew mountains, but not without the help of three veteran companies, who did all the fighting and lost five officers and fifty men. Boyle and Athlone were threatened, while a MacDermot and an O'Connor Roe were set up, as well as a MacWilliam. At last the Burkes, aided by a party of Scots, having done what damage they could on the Galway side of the Shannon, crossed the river and began to harry the King's County. The Lord Deputy started without delay, was joined by O'Molloy and MacCoghlan, and fell upon the intruders at daybreak. A hundred and forty were killed or drowned in trying to escape, and Russell then turned to the castle of Cloghan, which was strongly held by the O'Maddens. 'Not if you were all Deputies,' they replied, on being summoned to surrender, and added that the tables would probably be turned on the morrow. Russell humanely proposed that the women should be sent out, but the O'Maddens refused. Next morning a soldier contrived to throw a firebrand on to the thatched roof, which blazed up at once. A brisk fusillade was directed upon the battlements, and another fire was lit at the gate, while the assailants made a breach in the wall. Forty-six persons were cut down, smothered, or thrown over the walls, while two women and a boy were saved. The Scots who came over the Shannon had been reported as 400, and Russell made a good deal of his success; but Norris reduced the number of strangers to forty, and spoke with contempt of the whole affair.[252]

[Sidenote: The Queen on liberty of conscience.]

[Sidenote: More negotiations.]

When the Queen at last consented to hear Chief Justice Gardiner's account of his proceedings in the North, she expressed great displeasure. The demand for liberty of conscience, she said, was a mere pretext, the result of disloyal conspiracy, and put forward as an excuse for past rebellion more than from any desire to do better in future. Tyrone and the rest had no persecutor to complain of, and what they asked was in reality 'liberty to break laws, which her Majesty will never grant to any subject of any degree'--a pronouncement which might well have been quoted by the foes of the dispensing power ninety years later. And, as if it were intended to strike Russell obliquely, a new commission was ordered to be issued to Norris and Fenton. They were to meet the rebels during the truce, and to 'proceed with them to some final end, either according to their submissions to yield them pardons, with such conditions as are contained in our instructions; or if they shall refuse the reasonable offers therein contained, or seek former delays, to leave any further treaty with them.' And at the same time there was to be a general inquiry into all alleged malpractices in government which might cause men to rebel. Some of the directions to the new commissioners were rather puzzling; but the Lord Deputy and Council refused to suggest any explanation, for that they were 'left no authority to add, diminish, or alter.'

Russell indeed gave out that he would go to the North himself, and Norris was in despair. 'The mere bruit,' he says, 'will cross us, and I am sure to meet as many other blocks in my way as any invention can find out. I know the Deputy will not spare to do anything that might bring me in disgrace, and remove me from troubling his conscience here.' Russell, on the other hand, complained that Burghley was his enemy and sought out all his faults. 'I wish,' said the old Treasurer, 'they did not deserve to be sought out.'[253]

[Sidenote: Captain Thomas Lee.]

Tyrone must have been an agreeable, or at least a persuasive man, for he often made friends of those Englishmen who came under his personal influence. Such a one was Captain Thomas Lee, who at this juncture made an effort in his favour; saying that he would be loyal 'if drawn apart from these rogues that he is now persuaded by.' He would go to England or to the Deputy if he had a safe-conduct straight from the Queen, and Essex and Buckhurst might write to him for his better assurance, since he believed Burghley to be his bitter enemy. Lee confessed that he had not seen Tyrone for some time, and that he founded his opinion upon old conversations; but he was ready to stake his credit, and begged to be employed against the Earl should he fail to justify such an estimate. For having ventured to address the Queen when in England without first consulting Burghley, Lee humbly apologised, and hinted, perhaps not very diplomatically, that a contrary course might have preserved the peace. The Cecils had little faith in Lee's plausibilities, and it was reserved for Essex to employ him as a serious political agent.[254]

[Sidenote: Norris and Fenton go to Dundalk.]

[Sidenote: A hollow peace follows.]

Fenton foresaw that Tyrone and O'Donnell would probably 'stand upon their barbarous custom to commune with us in the wild fields.' And so it proved. They refused to come into any town, and proposed a meeting-place near Dundalk, with a river, a thicket, and a high mountain close at hand. This was rejected, and they then suggested that the commissioners should come on to the outer arch of a broken bridge, and back across the water, while they themselves stayed on dry land. This was considered undignified, and indeed the proposal looks like studied impertinence; and in the end it was decided that Captains St. Leger and Warren should act as intermediaries. Tyrone at once waived the claim to liberty of conscience, 'save only that he will not apprehend any spiritual man that cometh into the country for his conscience' sake.' While protesting against the continuance of a garrison at Armagh, he agreed not to interrupt the communications, and in the end he received a pardon upon the basis of the existing state of affairs. The gaol and the shrievalty were left in abeyance during the stay of the garrison; but the Queen made no objection to Armagh and Tyrone being treated as one county, or to the demand that the sheriff should be a native. The Earl disclaimed all authority to the east of the Bann and of Lough Neogh, and, while renouncing foreign aid, promised to declare how far he had dealt with any foreigner. He refused to give up one of his sons, but surrendered his nephew and another O'Neill as pledges, on condition that they should be exchanged at the end of three months. The Queen, upon whom the cost of the great Cadiz expedition weighed heavily, professed herself satisfied except on one point. Tyrone had promised some time before to pay a fine either of 20,000_l._ or of 20,000 cows, but he now maintained that the figure had been mentioned for show, and that it was an understood thing that it should not really be paid. The promise had been made to Russell, and Norris had left the matter in doubt. But it must be acknowledged that the Lord Deputy saw the real state of the case more clearly than his sovereign, and he maintained that the rebels were only gaining time till help came from Spain, and that Norris was overreached by 'these knaves.' The peace was a feigned one, the pledges were of no account, and there was no safety for the English in Ireland but in keeping up the army.

[Sidenote: Russell's strictures on Norris.]

Tyrone and O'Donnell had not met the commissioners at all, and O'Rourke had run away immediately after signing the articles. On the other hand, Norris and Fenton could report that Maguire, with several chiefs of scarcely less importance, had come into Dundalk and made humble submission on their knees. Russell acknowledged that the Queen was put to great expense in Ireland, and that there was very little to show for it, 'which,' he urged, 'is not to be laid to my charge, but unto his who being sent specially to manage the war, and for that cause remaining here about a twelvemonth, hath in that time spent nine months at the least in cessations and treaties of peace, either by his own device contrary to my liking, as ever doubting the end would prove but treacherous, or else by directions from thence.'[255]

[Sidenote: Story of the Spanish letter.]

Captain Warren remained with Tyrone for a month after the departure of Norris and Fenton for Dundalk. He then brought with him to Dublin a letter from Philip II. to the Earl, encouraging him to persevere in his valiant and victorious defence of the Catholic cause against the English. Warren promised, and his servant swore, that the letter should be returned or burned without any copy being taken. Tyrone at first vehemently refused to produce it at all, but at last agreed that the Lord Deputy should see it on these terms. Russell at once proposed to keep the document, and the Council supported him; only Norris and Fenton voting against this manifest breach of faith. The Lord Deputy had been blamed for not detaining Tyrone when he might perhaps have done so honourably, and now he was determined not to err in the direction of over-scrupulousness. Warren was naturally indignant at being forced to surrender what he had promised to keep safely, and the official excuses were of the weakest. The Earl was thanked for giving such a proof of his sincerity, and urged to say what verbal messages the Spanish bearer had brought from so notorious an enemy to her Majesty as the King of Spain.

Tyrone retorted that Warren had produced an undertaking, under the hands of the Lord Deputy and Council, to perform whatever he promised, and that they had broken his word and their own, 'wherein,' he said, 'if I be honourably and well dealt with, I shall refer myself to the answer of her most excellent Majesty.'

The whole proceeding was as useless as it was discreditable, for the letter was quite short, and Norris, after once hearing it read, was able to repeat all that it contained. O'Donnell, who was even more determined than Tyrone upon the plan of war to the knife with Spanish aid, wrote to say that he wished for peace, but could not restrain his men, and that he would give no pledge, 'inasmuch as Captain Warren performed not his promise in not returning the letter he took with him to Dublin upon his word and credit.'[256]

[Sidenote: Spaniards in Ulster.]

It was not likely that Tyrone would tell the Government what passed between him and the Spanish messenger Alonso de Cobos; for he took care to see him in the presence only of those he most trusted, such as his brother Cormac, his secretary Henry Hovenden, O'Donnell, and O'Dogherty. The Spanish ship put into Killybegs, where munitions were landed for O'Donnell, but De Cobos came forty miles by land to see Tyrone. An interpreter was necessarily employed, and he told all he knew. Cormac dictated a letter in Irish, reminding the King that he had begun the war, gloating over his successes, and promising wonders if Philip would give him 500 men in pay. The Pope sent beads, stones, and relics, which the interpreter saw, and also an indulgence for flesh every day in war time. The northern Irish, he observed, had but lately taken to fish, butter, and eggs on Fridays and Saturdays. Cormac himself told him that he expected the Spaniards very soon.[257]

[Sidenote: Bingham in Connaught.]

[Sidenote: His severity.]

[Sidenote: Norris and Bingham.]

Immediately after the receipt of the Spanish letter Norris and Fenton set out for Connaught. Tyrone himself had pointed out that the two northern provinces hung together, and the understanding between the western and northern chiefs was at this time pretty close. The Burkes insisted that all their quarrel was with Bingham and his kinsfolk only, and Norris was ready to believe the charges against him of injustice in his government, and of seizing the lands of those who opposed him. Of Bingham's severity there can be little doubt; but he had ruled cheaply and successfully, and it was not his fault if O'Donnell's road into Connaught was still open. In August 1595 the hostages in Galway gaol knocked off their irons after a drinking-bout, and passed through the open gate of the town. They found the bridge held against them, and on trying to cross the river they were intercepted by the soldiers on the other bank. All who escaped instant death were recaptured. Bingham sent a warrant to hang all the prisoners who had taken part in the attempt, and hanged they accordingly were--Burkes, O'Connors, and O'Flaherties from the best houses in Connaught. To mutinous soldiers Bingham showed as little mercy. Some recruits in Captain Conway's company made a disturbance at Roscommon, and Bingham ordered that the mutineers should be brought to the gallows, as if for execution, and then spared. This was done, but next day things were worse than ever, and a ringleader, named Colton, threatened Conway and took the colour from his ensign's hand. Captain Mostyn, whose company was also tainted, was knocked down, and the mutiny was not quelled until over thirty men were hurt. Bingham hanged Colton promptly, and most soldiers will think that he did right. But Norris had made up his mind that Connaught could be pacified by gentle means, and his hand was heavy against Bingham, especially as Russell seemed inclined to shield him. Sir Richard, on the contrary, pleaded that all his arguments had been overruled in Dublin, that he had not been allowed to defend his province for fear of hindering the negotiations in Ulster, and that the reinforcements sent to him were a 'poor, ragged sort of raw men.' Everything had turned out as he foretold, and he had never asked for money from Dublin until the neglect of his warnings had encouraged a general revolt. O'Donnell had exacted 1,200_l._ sterling from the county of Sligo since the castle there was betrayed, and his brother plundered Connaught with a rabble of Scots, while he himself helped to amuse the commissioners at Dundalk. 'I think,' he said, 'this is partly scarcity of meat at home, the people of the North being always very needy and hungry.' The Irish Council, he declared, wished to draw all eyes upon Connaught so as to hide their own failures; and as for his provincials they had a thousand times better treatment than they deserved, for their real object was to re-establish tanistry and its attendant barbarism.[258]

[Sidenote: Charges against Bingham,]

Finding the Lord General favourable to them, the Mayo Burkes plied him hard with charges against Bingham 'and his most cruel and ungodly brother John.' They had seized most of the cattle, it was urged, upon various pretences, and in three years had become possessed of many castles and of 200 ploughlands, offering no title 'but a high gallows to the possessor.' 'Her Majesty's clemency,' they said, 'is better known to strange nations than to us her poor misers, being altogether racked and governed by the Binghams, the dregs of all iniquity, here in culâ mundi far from God and our sovereign.'

Bingham came to Dublin, and both he and Norris, who agreed in nothing else, were loud in their complaints of official inaction. He strongly maintained, and he certainly was right, that the Queen's true policy was to separate the two rebellious provinces and not to include them in the same treaty. The Dundalk articles now made it impossible to garrison Ballyshannon, and Sligo was the next best thing. The Connaught rebels, he said, 'will seek to retain their titles of Macs and O's with their unhonest law, even as Ulster does.' But Norris was probably right in believing that there would be no peace between Bingham and the Burkes, since they were 'so much embrued in each other's blood;' and when he went to Connaught the accused governor was detained in Dublin by Russell, lest the sight of him should hinder the negotiations at Galway or Athlone. Bingham took care to remind Burghley that the composition was better both for Crown and subject than anything yet devised, 'for the Irish lord is the greatest tyrant living, and taketh more regality by the tanist law than her Majesty doth, or ever did, by her princely prerogative.'

[Sidenote: who leaves Ireland suddenly.]

The summer passed in futile diplomacy, while O'Donnell lived upon the western province and spared his own country. 'If Bingham,' said the Queen, 'appear guilty, he shall be removed; but we must not condemn a governor unheard and without good proof.' Tired of waiting, the suspected chief commissioner left Ireland without leave, on September 25, and on his arrival in London was committed to the Fleet.[259]

[Sidenote: Catholic confederacy,]

[Sidenote: and general attack]

[Sidenote: on English settlers.]

It suited the Queen to take an optimistic view of the situation, but the confederacy against her was spreading gradually over all Ireland. The Connaught rebels put Norris off from month to month and from week to week, while the Ulster chiefs used the respite afforded them to draw in Munster, with which the Clan Sheehy, the old Desmond gallowglasses, gave a ready means of communication. Tyrone had just received full pardon, yet he wrote as follows:--

'We have given oath and vow that whosoever of the Irishry, especially of the gentlemen of Munster, or whosoever else, from the highest to the lowest, shall assist Christ's Catholic religion, and join in confederacy and make war with us... we will be to them a back or stay, warrant or surety, for their so aiding of God's just cause, and by our said oath and vow, never to conclude peace or war with the English, for ourselves or any of us, during our life, but that the like shall be concluded for you, &c.'

Many of the scattered settlers in Munster were murdered about this time, and it was upon the property of Englishmen only that the MacSheehys and other robbers maintained themselves. In Tipperary, says the Chief Justice of Munster, there was 'a school of thieving of horses and cows where boys from every Munster county, some the bastard sons of the best of the country,' were trained in this patriotic exercise. The master and usher and seven of their pupils were tried and hanged. Care was taken that Protestant clergymen should not go scathless. One James, parson of Kilcornan near Pallaskenry, was visited by a party of swordsmen, but they were under protection and he unsuspectingly offered them refreshments. Nevertheless they murdered poor James, wounded three other Englishmen, and burned down the house; the leader swearing upon his target that he would never again seek protection, nor 'leave any Englishman's house unburned nor himself alive.' The same spirit was shown in the inland parts of Leinster, where Owen MacRory O'More was specially protected by Russell's order; but this did not prevent him from making a perfectly unprovoked attack upon Stradbally. Alexander Cosby, whose father had been slain at Glenmalure and who was himself married to a Sidney, sallied out with his two sons and the kerne under his orders. A fight took place on the bridge and the Irish were driven off, but Cosby and his eldest son fell. Dorcas Sidney ('for she would never allow herself to be called Cosby') and her daughter-in-law watched the fight out of a window and saw their husbands killed. In southern Leinster the death of Walter Reagh had not quite destroyed the old Geraldine leaven, and some of the Butlers were also engaged, greatly to Ormonde's indignation. Whatever Tyrone's own ideas were about religion, it is quite evident that out of his own district he was regarded as the leader of a crusade. The new English in Ireland were Protestants, and the instinctive horror of the natives for settlers whose notions about land were irreconcilable with their own was sedulously encouraged by priests and friars.[260]

[Sidenote: The soldiers are disorderly and oppressive,]

Elizabeth persisted in believing Tyrone's professions, only because she saw no way of forcibly subduing 'him whom she had raised from the dust.' She was 'greedy,' said her secretary, 'of that honourable course'; but Russell, who advocated the reduction of Tyrone, forgot to say how it was to be done. It was more clear to her that there was much oppression and extortion, and that her poor subjects in Ireland had a right to complain. The intolerable tyranny of sheriffs, provost-marshals, and other officers was the constant complaint from Ulster and Connaught; but those provinces were confessedly in a state of armed peace at best, and much might be said upon both sides. In Leinster and Munster the charges were more definite, and are more easily understood. They may be summed up in a declaration on the part of the inhabitants of the Pale that 'the course of ranging and extorting is become so common and gainful as that many soldiers (as is said) have no other entertainment for their captains; and many that are not soldiers, pretending to be of some company or other, have, in like outrageous sort, ranged up and down the country, spoiling and robbing the subjects as if they were rebels. And most certain it is that the rebels themselves, pretending to be soldiers, and knowing how gainful the course is, have often played the like parts.'

[Sidenote: owing to irregular payment.]

Real soldiers were so terrible that the poor people had no heart to resist even sham ones, and so the country went from bad to worse. The very fruit trees were cut down to feed barrack fires, and houses, if the wretched inmates deserted them to avoid their oppressors, were demolished for the same purpose. Very severe orders were issued, rape and theft being made capital offences, and these were not suffered to remain a dead letter; but the next Viceroy did not find that matters had been much improved. In Munster also there was plenty of military violence, and even lawyers, while complaining that the gown was quite subordinate to the sword, could not but acknowledge that sheriffs and gaolers were as bad as the soldiers. It is easy to see, and it is proved by a cloud of witnesses, that most of these horrors were caused by irregular payment of the troops, nor does Burghley himself leave us in any doubt. 'I cannot,' he says, 'forbear to express the grief I have to think of the dangerous estate of her Majesty's army in Ireland, where all the treasure sent in August is expended.' Besides pensioners and supernumeraries, there were 7,000 regular soldiers, for which the monthly charge was 8,560_l._ sterling, which necessary reinforcements would soon increase to 10,422_l._ 'for which the treasurer hath never a penny in Ireland.' And it was certain that the increase would be progressive. 'What danger this may be I do tremble to utter, considering they will force the country with all manner of oppressions, and thereby the multitude of the Queen's loyal subjects in the English Pale tempted to rebel.'[261]

[Sidenote: Feagh MacHugh is hunted down,]

[Sidenote: killed,]

[Sidenote: and beheaded.]

In November, 1595, Feagh MacHugh came to Dublin and submitted on his knees. The Queen was inclined to pardon him, but his terms were not at first considered reasonable. If confirmed in his chiefry, he professed himself ready to restrain his people, to attend assizes like other gentlemen, and to kneel before the Queen herself, 'which I more desire than anything in the world.' Even this rough mountaineer, who pointed out to Elizabeth that his property was not worth confiscating, had caught the prevailing tone of flattery. Nevertheless Feagh remained in close alliance with Tyrone, and in September 1596 he struck a blow which undid most of Russell's work in Leinster. Elizabeth had in the end agreed to pardon him, with his wife, sons, and followers, to confirm him in his chiefry by patent, and even to restore Ballinacor, which she found a very expensive possession. Eight days after this was decided at Greenwich, Feagh wrote to Tyrone, offering to trouble the English well, and begging for a company of good shot; and a month later he surprised Ballinacor. After this there was no further talk of pardon, and Russell pursued the old chief to the death. A new fort was built at Rathdrum, and Captain Lee, who was perhaps anxious to efface the memory of his ill-success with Tyrone, scoured the mountains during the winter. Cattle by the score and heads by the dozen were collected, and the end may as well be told at once. One Sunday morning in the following May Feagh was forced into a cave, 'where one Milborne, sergeant to Captain Lee, first lighted on him, and the fury of our soldiers was so great as he could not be brought away alive; thereupon the said sergeant cut off Feagh's head with his own sword and presented his head to my lord, which with his carcase was brought to Dublin... the people all the way met my lord with great joy and gladness, and bestowed many blessings on him for performing so good a deed, and delivering them from their long oppressions.' The head and quarters of this formidable marauder were exhibited upon Dublin Castle, and a sympathiser says the sight pierced his soul with anguish. Four months after, one Lane brought what purported to be the head to Essex, who sent him to Cecil for his reward. Cecil said head-money had already been paid in Ireland, and Lane gave the now worthless trophy to a lad to bury, who stuck it in a tree in Enfield chase, where it was found by two boys looking for their cattle. The Four Masters say Feagh was 'treacherously betrayed by his relatives,' for the O'Byrnes of the elder branch had never acquiesced in the dominion of the Gaval-Rannall. Thus one by one did the chiefs of tribal Ireland devour each other.[262]

[Sidenote: Complete failure of Norris in Connaught.]

Norris remained in Connaught from the beginning of June until the week before Christmas, and Fenton was with him most of the time. Nothing of any importance was done, and when their backs were turned O'Donnell entered the province and the rebellion blazed up more fiercely than ever. The Burkes and their immediate allies had 2,000 men, besides the help of O'Donnell, Tyrone, and Maguire, and it was reckoned that an army of more than 3,000 was required for Connaught alone. Bingham's ideas about cutting it off from Ulster by garrisons on the Erne were fully adopted, and the possession of Ballyshannon becomes henceforth a main object with successive governments. Yet Bingham himself was in disgrace, and Sir Conyers Clifford, a distinguished soldier whose Cadiz laurels were still green, was made governor in his room. The Irish annalists tell us that he was a much better man than his predecessor, but such praise did not make his work any easier. That Bingham was severe and even harsh is certain, that he was sometimes unjust is at least probable, and there is no reason to doubt that he was greedy about land; but he was efficient, and in the eyes of Irish chiefs and of their panegyrists that was the really unpardonable sin.[263]

[Sidenote: Dissension between Russell and Norris,]

[Sidenote: of which Tyrone takes advantage.]

'I am quite tired,' says Camden, 'with pursuing Tyrone through all his shifts and devices.' He had received his pardon in the early summer, and had spent the rest of the year in trying to forfeit it. Russell was not deceived, and he asked to be recalled, complaining bitterly that he was not credited, while Norris was 'authorised to proceed in a course of pacification which, in the opinion of the Deputy and most part of the Council, did tend directly to her Majesty's disadvantage, and the gaining of time to the said rebels,' who were on the look-out for help from Spain. In the meantime there was no lack of pretexts on either side for imputing bad faith to the other. Frontier garrisons were always involved in disputes, and blood was sometimes shed. As the winter advanced Tyrone became bolder, and at last tried to surprise the Armagh garrison, whose communications he had been threatening for some time, although he had specially covenanted not to do so. Marauding bands entered the Pale, and at Carlingford, though they failed to capture the castle, they carried off Captain Henshaw's daughters, 'the one married and the other a maid,' as prisoners to the mountains. Tyrone was himself present at the Armagh affair, where thirty-five soldiers were killed, but he pleaded that promise had not been kept with him, and that soldiers had committed outrages. He had even the impudence to pretend that the prosecution of Feagh MacHugh was such a breach of faith, though Feagh had not been included in the Dundalk treaty, and though he had attacked Ballinacor while his pardon was in preparation. Being threatened with the execution of hostages and with a new proclamation of treason, which would annul the pardon, the Earl thought it safer to yield for the time. At Christmas he threatened Newry with 5,000 men, but on the arrival of Norris there, he allowed Armagh to be revictualled. Tyrone quite understood that there was great jealousy between Russell and Norris, and he endeavoured to play off one against the other. Sir John constantly complained that the Lord-Deputy thwarted him in every possible way, and the latter as constantly denied the charge with much indignation; but he showed some rather small spite in refusing to allow Norris to send letters by his messengers. This division of authority could scarcely work well, and in the autumn of 1596 it was proposed to recall both rivals and to send Lord Burgh over with supreme authority; but the project was allowed to sleep for some months.[264]

[Sidenote: More negotiations;]

[Sidenote: but the Queen's patience is nearly exhausted.]

As soon as Armagh had been victualled, the negotiations began again. If Tyrone could complain that his hostages had not been exchanged according to the Dundalk articles, Norris and Fenton could reply that he had never given his eldest son according to promise. Once he appeared in person, and, with hat in hand, made his accustomed professions of loyalty. The latest communications with Spain had been O'Donnell's offer, and not his; but he had not again rejected Philip's overtures because the English had not kept their promises to him. He said he had written three letters to Spain; but he knew that these had been intercepted, and he forgot that he had alluded in them to many previous appeals. He altogether denied that he had incited Munster men to rebel, but he did not know that his letter sent by the MacSheehys had also been intercepted. Nevertheless Elizabeth was still ready to treat, but she told the Commissioners that her patience was nearly exhausted and that she was preparing for war. They accordingly fixed April 16 as the last day of grace, but Tyrone refused to come. He said that Norris might be overruled by Russell, who showed malice to him, and moreover Lord Burgh, about whom he knew nothing, was coming over as Deputy, who might not be as good to him as the Lord General had been. Finally, he suggested April 26 for a meeting, but this was treated as a mere evasion, and Norris returned to Dublin. Hostilities were, nevertheless, suspended throughout May and June, during which interval the change of viceroys was effected.[265]

[Sidenote: Bingham is in disgrace.]

Sir Richard Bingham lay more than two months in prison, and was then released on account of ill-health, although still considered under arrest. It was decided that he should return to Ireland, and the Queen refused to give him an audience. The charges of the Burkes against him and his were ordered to be tried at Athlone, before Norris, Fenton, and two other councillors. Clifford was to be present, though only as a spectator. Ill as he was, Bingham embarked, but was driven back, and had to recruit his strength by staying at Beaumaris. It became unnecessary that he should go at all, for news came that the peacemaking of Sir John Norris, whom he calls his 'most intollerablest' persecutor, had quite failed, and that Sir Conyers Clifford was going to govern a province whose condition grew daily worse. O'Donnell entered Connaught as usual through Leitrim, and, accompanied by his MacWilliam, plundered O'Connor Sligo's adherents, and reached Athenry, which was carried by escalade. The place was laid in ashes, and the people left houseless and naked. The invaders--3,000 foot and 200 horse--then went to Galway; but here they could do no more than burn some of the suburbs, 'for a great piece of ordnance scattered them, and, clustering again, another greater piece was let fly, which utterly daunted them.' The rebels threatened Galway with the fate of Athenry as soon as the Spaniards came, and then proceeded to ravage the open country. Clanricarde's castles were not attacked, but throughout the north-eastern part of the county there was scarcely a cottage, a stack, or a barn left unburned, and a vast booty was carried off into Donegal. 'We bear the same,' said Clanricarde, 'most contentedly, for our most gracious Princess, from whom we will never swerve for any losses or afflictions whatsoever.' Kells was burned at the same time by the O'Reillys, and everyone who knew the country saw that worse was coming. 'It was plain,' said Bingham, 'that his removal would not quiet Connaught, nor any other alteration in government there, but rather the expelling of all the English, which is generally required throughout Ireland.'[266]

FOOTNOTES:

[230] Russell to Cecil, Aug. 16, 1594, and to the Privy Council, Aug. 17; Ormonde to Burghley, Aug. 19; Russell's Journal in Carew, June to August.

[231] Submission and answers of Tyrone, Aug. 15 and 17, 1594; informations preferred by Sir Henry Bagenal, Aug. 17; Ormonde to Burghley, Aug. 19; Resolution of Council, Aug. 17, signed by Russell, Loftus, C., Jones, Bishop of Meath, Ormonde, Gardiner, C.J., Napper, C.B., A. St. Leger, M.R., R. Bingham, T. Norris, R. Dillon, G. Bourchier, M.O. The letter of the 19th to the Privy Council has the same signatures with the addition of Secretary Fenton's. Russell's additional reasons, some of them after-thoughts perhaps, are in a paper later than Oct. 31. The defeat of Duke and Herbert at Enniskillen may have frightened some of the Council. Captain Thomas Lee, in his declaration already quoted (p. 112), tells the Queen that Tyrone 'came in upon the credit of your state,' but this is quite contrary to the evidence.

[232] Summary collection of the state of Ireland by Sir W. Fitzwilliam and the Council, Aug. 1594; order by Lord Deputy Russell and Council, Aug. 13; Russell to Cecil, Aug. 16; Russell's Journal in Carew, Aug. and Sept. O'Sullivan, tom. iii. lib. 2, cap. 11. The Four Masters are somewhat incorrect, for Enniskillen was not taken by Maguire till May 1595; their information fails them for the later months of 1594.

[233] Russell's Journal in Carew, Sept. to Dec. 1594; the Queen to the Lord Deputy and Council, and a separate letter to Russell, Oct. 31. A paper containing 'presumptions' against Tyrone's loyalty belongs to the latter month of 1594, and the writer, who is evidently well informed, does not specify any actual communication between Tyrone and Spain. O'Sullivan says O'Donnell sent Archbishop O'Hely to Spain immediately after the loss of Enniskillen in February (tom. iii. lib. 2, cap. 8), and this is confirmed by Walter Reagh's examination, April 9, 1595, who said O'Hely had gone to Spain long before.

[234] Russell to Burghley and to the Privy Council, April 8, 1595; Lord Deputy and Council to the Privy Council, April 10; Sir H. Harrington to Burghley, April 10; Russell's Journal in Carew, Jan. 16, 1595, to April 10, on which day Walter Reagh was hanged. Four Masters, 1595; O'Sullivan, tom. iii. lib. 2, cap. 9.

[235] Examination of Walter Reagh, April 9, 1595, by which it appears Tyrone was intriguing with Feagh early in March; Russell's Journal in Carew, April and May; Lord Deputy and Council to the Privy Council, April 10.

[236] The details about Derbyshire are from the Belvoir MSS. in the appendix to the 12th report of the Historical MSS. Commission, vol. i. pp. 326-381; Mayor of Barnstaple to Cecil, Aug. 24, 1602; Mayor of Chester, Sept. 14 and Oct. 22 and 24, 1602; Mayor of Bristol to the Privy Council, May 29, 1602. The letters from these mayors are all at Hatfield. On Sept. 18, 1595, Burghley tells his son Robert that he knows how to provide horse for Ireland at the expense of the clergy, and this levy was made; Hugh Bellott, Bishop of Chester, to Burghley, March 13, 1596. Commissary Peter Proby writes to Burghley from Chester on April 10, 1596, that the recruits malingered and threw away arms and clothes rather than sail, and that it might be necessary to send them on board pinioned. There are many details about recruiting for Ireland in Peck's Desiderata Curiosa. In 1584 the Queen ordered some recusants, who professed themselves loyal in all but religion, to furnish certain men, or 23_l._ in lieu of each man. If they obeyed cheerfully, she said, she might perhaps 'qualify some part of the extremity that otherwise the law doth lay upon them.'

[237] George Manners to his father (John Manners) and to Edward Whittock in Belvoir Papers, May 15 and June 27, 1600; Captain Ralph Bostock to Cecil, 1600, MS. Hatfield.

[238] Sir John Norris to Cecil, April 14, 1595, from Rycott; to Burghley, April 29, and to the Privy Council, May 2, from Bristol; to Cecil, May 3, from on board ship; Russell to Cecil, May 23; Essex to Norris and the latter's answer, Aug. 13; MSS. Hatfield, ending with 'your Lordship's as shall be fit for me.' The commission is in Carew (No. 160).

[239] Russell's Journal in Carew, May 1595; Norris to Cecil, May 8; to Burghley and to Cecil, May 29.

[240] Russell to Cecil, May 23, 1595; Bagenal to Burghley, May 29; and Russell's letter of June 27; Report by Lieutenants Tucker and Perkins in Carew, June 1.

[241] Bingham to Russell, June 6, 1595; O'Sullivan (tom. iii. lib. 3, cap. 3) does not seem to see any inconsistency between what he says of the Irish soldiers being 'prædâ fraudati,' and of the Englishmen who 'vel occisi, vel fugâ salutem petentes devastatæ religiosæ domus Carmelitarum poenas sacrilegii luerunt.--Four Masters, 1595. Many English writers confuse this George Oge Bingham, who was Sir Richard's cousin, with the elder George, who was his brother.

[242] Journal of the late journey by the Lord Deputy from June 18 to July 17, 1595; Russell's Journal in Carew, June and July. The Four Masters substantially agree. The proclamation against Tyrone, O'Donnell, O'Rourke, Maguire, MacMahon and others is among the State Papers, 'imprinted in the cathedral church of the Blessed Trinity, Dublin, by William Kearney, printer to the Queen's most excellent Majesty, 1595'; see also Carew under June 28 (which is probably wrong). O'Donnell, 'whose father and predecessors have always been loyal,' is represented as Tyrone's dupe, and the Queen desires that he should be 'entertained secretly with hope, for that we have a disposition to save him.' The English Government had now discovered that Tyrone's father was a bastard; it used to be the O'Neills who said so. He was proclaimed traitor at Dundalk on June 23, and at Newry on the 26th.

[243] Russell to Burghley, July 14, 1595; Norris to Burghley, Aug. 1 and 3, and to Cecil, July 4 and 20 and Aug. 1.

[244] Ormonde to Burghley, April 3, 1595, in answer to his letter of March 21, also April 7. Some drafts of the proclamation are as early as April 10.

[245] The fight in which Norris was wounded took place on Sept. 4, 1595. O'Sullivan says it was at 'Pratum Fontis' or Clontubrid near Monaghan, but that is certainly wrong. Bagenal, who was closely engaged himself, writing to Burghley on Sept. 9, says 'nine miles from Newry,' on the direct road from Armagh. See also Captain F. Stafford's report on Sept. 12. There is a good account dated Sept. 16 in Payne Collier's Trevelyan Papers, vol. ii. Tyrone's submission, Aug. 22; Norris to Burghley, Aug. 25, and Sept. 8 and 10; to Russell, Sept. 16; Russell to Burghley, Sept. 14, and to the Privy Council, Sept. 21.

[246] Four Masters, 1593 and 1595, with O'Donovan's notes; Morrin's Patent Rolls 29 Eliz.; Philip O'Reilly to Russell, Sept. 14, 1595.

[247] Privy Council to Russell, Sept. 12, 1595; Tyrone and O'Donnell to Philip II, and to Don Carlos, Sept. 27. Piers O'Cullen, the priest, on whom the letters to Spain were found, broke his neck trying to escape from Dublin Castle (Fenton to Burghley, Jan. 12, 1596). Copies of the above are in Carew. Norris's letters to Burghley on Sept. 8, 10, and 27, and the abstract of his letters sent by Sir Henry, with Burghley's remarks.

[248] Papers in Carew, Sept. 27 to Oct. 28, 1595; Burghley to his son Robert, Dec. 2, 1595, and Jan. 2, 1596.

[249] Four Masters, 1595; Russell's Journal, Nov. and Dec. Writing to Cecil on Oct. 22, Norris says the overthrow near Belleek was shameful, the Burkes being a 'mean sort of beggars' and neither Tyrone nor O'Donnell near. See also O'Sullivan, tom. iii. lib. 3, cap. 3 and 4.

[250] The negotiations are detailed in the Carew papers for January 1596, and in Russell's Journal; and see Cecil to Russell, March 9.

[251] Articles sent from England, Sept. 28, 1595; Articles propounded by the Commissioners, Jan. 28-30, 1596, both in Carew; Cecil to Russell, March 9.

[252] Russell's Journal for March 1596, mentions 300 or 400 Scots. Tribes and Customs of Hy Many, p. 149. Norris's letter of March 20 gives some details, and also Fenton's to Cecil of same date.

[253] The Queen to the Lord Deputy and Council, March 9, 1596; Instructions for the Commissioners, March 11; Burghley to his son Robert, March 30 (in Wright's Elizabeth); Norris to Cecil, March 23, and Fenton to Cecil, April 10.

[254] Captain Thomas Lee to Burghley, April 1, 1596; Cecil to Russell, July 10, 'Captain Lee doth pretend he could do much, &c.' Lee went to Tyrone accordingly, but did nothing. His Geraldine neighbours seem to have taken this opportunity of burning a village belonging to him.

[255] The effect of her Majesty's pleasure with Tyrone's answer, April 12, 1596; Fenton to Cecil, April 10, and Norris and Fenton to the Privy Council, April 23; Russell to Burghley, April 27; the Queen to the Lord Deputy and Council, May 25; Russell to the Queen, May 16 and June 30, MSS. Hatfield. Writing to Russell on Nov. 22, 1595, Tyrone promised to levy a fine of 20,000 cows on himself and his allies; the Government had demanded 20,000_l._ Tyrone's pardon (see Morrin's Patent Rolls) is dated May 12, 1596, and he received it a few weeks later. It included the Earl's relations and all the inhabitants of Tyrone, his astute secretary, Henry Hovenden, being included by name.

[256] Philip II. to Tyrone, Jan. 22, 1596, N.S.; Norris to Cecil, June 1 (the Spanish letter was produced in Council, May 31); Lord Deputy and Council to Tyrone, June 1; Russell to Burghley, June 2; Tyrone to the Lord Deputy and Council, June 11; O'Donnell to Norris, June 26, and another undated one of the same month. We know from Henry Hovenden's letter to Tyrone on June 27 (in Carew) that the latter had advised O'Donnell to 'take hold of Captain Warren's dealing, &c.'

[257] Rice ap Hugh to Russell, May 18; John Morgan to Russell, May 21; Information of George Carwill taken at Newry on June 21. Tyrone met the Spaniard at Lifford. Writing to Norris on May 6, Tyrone and O'Donnell say they told the Spanish gentleman that they had been received to their Prince's favour and would have no foreign aid.

[258] Four Masters, 1595; Captains Conway and Mostyn to the Privy Council, April 12, 1596; Norris to Cecil, April 23 and 25; Bingham to Burghley, April 22. Norris says that Russell, though really hostile to Bingham, tried to prevent inquiries, in order to keep him (Norris) out of Connaught and leave the government there to a tool of his own.

[259] Norris to Burghley, May 4 (with enclosure), and May 16, 1596; Russell to Burghley, May 16 and June 9; Bingham to Burghley, May 18 and June 11. Bingham came to Dublin on May 8.

[260] Translation of Irish letter signed O'Neill (not Tyrone), O'Donnell, O'Rourke, and Theobald Burke (MacWilliam), July 6, 1596; Chief Justice Saxey's advertisements, January 1597, in Carew; Russell's Journal, 1596; Joshua Aylmer to Sir J. Norris, April 26, 1596; William Cosby to Russell, May 19, 1596, and an interesting note in O'Donovan's Four Masters; see also 'Report concerning O'Donnell's purposes' to Russell by Gillaboy O'Flanagan (long prisoner with O'Donnell) May 12; 'Words spoken by MacDonnell' (chief of Tyrone's gallowglasses) to Baron Elliott, June 15; Edmond and Edward Nugent to Russell, June 20; and 'Occurrents in Wexford,' June 26. As to Spanish and papal designs on Ireland about this time see Birch's Memoirs, ii. 153, 177, 180.

[261] Burghley to his son Robert, Oct. 31, 1596, in Wright's Elizabeth; Orders for the soldiers, April 18, 1596; Declaration of the state of the Pale, June 1597, and Chief Justice Saxey's declaration already quoted, all in Carew. The Four Masters absurdly say that Norris had 20,000 men with him in Connaught this year.

[262] Four Masters, 1597. For the Enfield head see the examination of John Dewrance before Richard Chandler, J.P. for Middlesex, Sept. 21, 1597, MS. Hatfield; Russell's Journal, and the letters in Carew for August, September, and December, 1596. Feagh was killed May 8, 1597; see also his own letter to Burghley, April 25, 1596.

[263] Russell's Journal; Declaration by the Lord Deputy and Council (including Norris and Fenton) in Carew, No. 261, soon after Christmas 1596.

[264] Calendar of S. P. Domestic, Sept. 30 and Dec. 22, 1596; Letters in Carew from Nov. 30 to Dec. 9. On Aug. 10 Tyrone wrote to Russell that he was surprised at his reasonable offer of peace not being accepted; this was a month after his incendiary letter to the Munster chiefs. Russell answered that peace with his sovereign was a 'proud word,' and that he was sent to 'cherish the dutiful and correct the lewd, of which number thou art the ringleader... thy popish shavelings shall not absolve thee' (MSS. Lansdowne, vol. lxxxiv). Petition of Sir W. Russell in Carew, 1596, No. 253. As to the letters see Burghley to his son Robert, March 30, 1596, in Wright's Elizabeth and elsewhere. On Oct. 22, 1596, Anthony Bacon wrote to his mother 'that from Ireland there were cross advertisements from the Lord Deputy on the one side, and Sir John Norris on the other, the first as a good trumpet, sounding continually the alarm against the enemy, the latter serving as a treble viol to invite to dance and be merry upon false hopes of a hollow peace, and that these opposite accounts made many fear rather the ruin than the reformation of the State, upon that infallible ground, quod omne regnum divisum in se dissipabitur'; which sums up the situation very well.--Birch's Memoirs, ii. 180.

[265] These abortive negotiations are pretty fully detailed in Fynes Moryson's Itinerary, part ii. book i. ch. i. under 1596; Russell's Journal.

[266] Clanricarde to Russell, Jan. 15, 1597; Oliver French, mayor of Galway, to Russell, Jan. 19; Bingham to Sir R. Gardiner, Jan. 20 and 27. These four letters are printed in Wright's Elizabeth. Russell's Journal; Four Masters, 1596 and 1597; the Queen to the Lord Deputy and Council, Dec. 4, 1596, in Morrin's Patent Rolls, under 39 Eliz.: 'As to the proceeding for the examination of the complaint against Bingham and the trial thereof, we think it meet that, after the complaints shall be made privy of our hard usage of him here, and the remitting of him to be tried in Connaught, &c.'

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XLVI. GOVERNMENT OF LORD BURGH, 1597

[Sidenote: Last acts of Russell.]

The destruction of Feagh MacHugh enabled Russell to leave Ireland without discredit, but the latter days of his government were darkened by a disaster of a very unusual kind. One hundred and forty barrels of powder which had been drawn from the quay to Wine-tavern Street exploded, accidentally as was supposed, and there was a great destruction of life and property. Men were blown bodily over the housetops, and among the dead were many 'sons of gentlemen who had come from all parts of Ireland to be educated in the city.'

[Sidenote: Appointment of Lord Burgh.]

The Queen had for some time made up her mind to entrust the civil and military government of Ireland to Thomas, Lord Burgh, though Burghley wished to leave Norris at the head of the army. Considered as general there could be no comparison between the two men; but it is absurd to say, as so many have said, that Burgh was totally ignorant of military matters. He was governor of Brill, and had fought in the Zutphen campaign, where he distinguished himself by gallantry of a rather headlong kind. But he was chiefly known as a diplomatist, and the fact that he was, or had been, a man of fortune may have weighed with the frugal Queen. Russell, who expected his recall daily, retired from Dublin Castle to a small house, and put his train upon board wages; but he need have been in no hurry, for his successor's appointment hung fire.

'The Queen,' says a well-informed news-writer, 'hastens the Lord Burgh's despatch, but by-and-by it is forgotten; it lives some day or two, and lies a-dying twenty days. Many will not believe it till they see him go; but it is very certain that nobody gives it furtherance but the Queen's own resolution; and his standing upon an imprest of 3,000_l._ and a house furnished makes her Majesty let it fall.'[267]

[Sidenote: Arrival of Burgh, May.]

The financial question was settled at last, Lord Burgh receiving 1,200_l._ for immediate needs. He carried 24,000_l._ to Ireland with him, and was allowed to retain the governorship of Brill. His health was bad, but he did not let this delay him. 'I am,' he told Cecil, 'cut all over my legs with the lancet, and have abidden loathsome worms to suck my flesh.' He could not wish even his enemies to feel such anguish. But he managed to take leave of the Queen in spite of his swollen legs, and a week after the leeching, he travelled as far as St. Albans, accompanied by Raleigh, Southampton, and other distinguished men. On the morning of his departure, he went to see Essex at Barnes, and the Earl brought him back to London in his coach. At Stony Stratford he opened his instructions, and found, to his great chagrin, that one article had been added to those which he had already seen. The Queen had been dishonoured, she said, by the facility with which knighthood had been bestowed, and he was forbidden to give it 'to any but such as shall be, both of blood and livelihood, sufficient to maintain that calling, except at some notable day of service to bestow it for reward upon some such as in the field have extraordinarily deserved it.'

He was thoroughly alive to the difficulties awaiting him in Ireland--difficulties which had been aggravated by the delay in despatching him, and now he was deprived of the means of rewarding his friends, and made to seem less trustworthy than his predecessors. He was in Dublin on the twelfth day after leaving London, and found nothing there to his liking. Almost all supplies were wanting, the number of effective soldiers was much below what it should have been, and the horses were too weak for active service.[268]

[Sidenote: Burgh and Norris.]

[Sidenote: General misery.]

It was known that Norris, who had been on bad terms with Lord Burgh in England, resented his appointment, which Essex may have promoted for that very reason, and it was supposed that he would submit to his authority grudgingly and of necessity, or not at all. But the general came to Dublin four days after the new Lord Deputy's arrival, and the latter saw no reason to complain. 'Sir John Norris and I,' he wrote to Cecil, 'have in public council and private conferences agreed well. I think you wrote to him to become compatible.' Writing on the same day, Norris says nothing against Burgh, but shows some apprehension that Russell would be his enemy, and notes that both he and the Council had stated openly, in the new Lord Deputy's presence, that there was no charge against him. But a news-writer in London, who retailed the Court gossip, talks of a solemn pacification between Norris and Burgh, 'made with much counterfeit kindness on both sides.' The general then returned to his province of Munster, begging to be recalled, and protesting at the same time that ill-health and not ill-temper had made him weary of the service. It may have been the reason why this greatest soldier of his age and country had of late constantly preferred negotiation to war. Russell was already gone, and on his arrival in London found that the Queen was too angry to see him, the world at the same time noticing that he was 'very fat, both in body and purse.' Lord Burgh threw all his energies into military organisation, and complained that his brains were tired by captains who expected to find a city of London in Dublin. Almost everything was wanting, and the general misery, he told Cecil, 'lamentable to hear as I am sure in your ears, but woeful to behold to Christian eyes. I see soldiers, citizens, villagers, and all sorts of people daily perish through famine; meat failing the man of war makes him savage, so as the end is both spoiler and spoiled are in like calamity.'[269]

[Sidenote: Burgh attacks Tyrone,]

[Sidenote: crosses the Blackwater,]

[Sidenote: and maintains his ground.]

Tyrone, with 800 foot and 80 horse, was encamped between Newry and Armagh, and Captain Turner was ordered to attack him suddenly. The surprise was almost, but not quite, complete, and the rebel Earl escaped through a bog on foot and with the loss of his hat. 'I trust,' said Turner, 'it presages his head against the next time.' Armagh was revictualled, and the Irish withdrew beyond the Blackwater. Early in July Burgh was able to advance to Armagh, whence he surveyed the famous ford which had given so much trouble. It was defended on the north side by a high bank and deep ditch manned by about forty men, and Tyrone, whose camp was near, thought it could not be carried until he had time to come up. Burgh saw that a surprise was his only chance, and, though some said he was no general, he was at least soldier enough to observe that the shape of the ground would shelter his men while they were in the water. Choosing out 1,200 foot and 300 horse, he started at daybreak and at once undertook the passage. His men wavered, but he led them on himself, and they swarmed over the breastwork before any reinforcements could arrive. The defenders ran away, and Tyrone hanged a score of them. Burgh's success, which was a great one, seems to have been entirely due to his personal gallantry. Next day Tyrone made a strenuous effort to regain the position, and half-surprised the army, who were assembled 'to hear a sermon and pray to God.' Good watch was, however, kept, and the assailants were beaten back. The soldiers fell in rather confusedly, and in pursuing their advantage went too far into the woods. Burgh gave special orders to avoid all chance of an ambuscade, but there were many volunteers whose discipline was of the slightest. Some were relatives of his own, and all served out of friendship or for the fun of the thing. The horse became entangled in the woods; Turner and Sir Francis Vaughan, the Lord Deputy's brother-in-law, were killed, and two of his nephews wounded. Again he had himself to come to the rescue, rallied the soldiers, and finally repulsed the Irish with loss. He felt he might be accused of rashness and of exposing himself; but his excuse was ready. 'I have not,' he said, 'that wherein my Lord of Essex is and all generals be in a journey happy, scarcely any of such understanding as to do what they be bidden; as he hath many: when I direct, for want of others I must execute.'[270]

[Sidenote: New fort built at the Blackwater.]

As soon as the news reached England Essex said that the extirpation of Tyrone would be easy work. Russell had ended well, Burgh had begun well, and Ireland was improving. But Feagh MacHugh's sons were as bad as their father, and Tyrone's power was destined to outlast both the life and the reputation of Essex. The Queen was much pleased, and upon the sore question of knighthood yielded so far as to say that she would sanction any reasonable list that the Lord Deputy might send over. At first she had complained of his rashness, but had satisfied herself that he had done rightly, only reminding him that he was a deputy, and that hazarding his person unduly was like hazarding her own. In seeking help from Spain Tyrone claimed a victory, and made much of having killed the Lord Deputy's brother-in-law, but he could not prevent the English from building a fort at Blackwater. It was entrusted to Captain Thomas Williams, who had served most of the princes of Christendom for twenty-three years, and who proved himself a hero indeed.[271]

[Sidenote: Burgh's plan of campaign.]

Lord Burgh's plan was that Sir Conyers Clifford should invade Tyrconnell from Connaught, while he himself was at the Blackwater, but the latter found it impossible to be ready in time. Thomond and Inchiquin, Clanricarde and Dunkellin, O'Connor Sligo, and many others obeyed his summons; his object being to take and garrison Ballyshannon, which was now recognised as the key of Connaught and Ulster. O'Donnell made great efforts to prevent this, but Clifford crossed the Erne on July 29, about half a mile below Belleek, not without severe fighting. Lord Inchiquin and O'Connor Sligo vied with each other who should be the first over, and the former, who wore a cuirass, received a bullet under one arm which went out at the other. He fell from his horse, and perished in the waters. His body was carried to Assaroe and honourably buried by the Cistercians there, but was claimed by the Franciscans of Donegal, on the ground that his O'Brien ancestors had long been buried in a friary of their order in Clare. The dispute was referred by O'Donnell to the same bishop, Redmond O'Gallagher, who had befriended Captain Cuellar in the Armada days, and to Nial O'Boyle, bishop of Raphoe. The decision was in favour of the Franciscans, and this loyal O'Brien rested among the O'Donnells, for whose overthrow he had fought so well.[272]

[Sidenote: Clifford attacks Ballyshannon,]

[Sidenote: but has to retreat.]

Four guns were brought from Galway and landed near the castle of Ballyshannon, which was defended by a garrison of eighty men, of whom some were Spaniards, and commanded by a Scotchman named Crawford. After three days' cannonade, ammunition began to run short, and little impression had been made on the castle, while O'Donnell's force grew stronger every day. Clifford's position was now very precarious, for the fords were held behind him, and all communications interrupted. He attempted to re-embark his ordnance, but the gyn broke, and he had to leave three out of four pieces behind him. Just above the fall of the Erne a passage, called by the Irish the 'ford of heroes,' was left unguarded, probably on account of its difficulty, and at daybreak Clifford, who had spent the hours of darkness in making his arrangements, waded the river unperceived by the Irish. Many were swept over the fall and out to sea, but the main body struggled over and formed upon the left bank. The O'Donnells pursued without stopping to put on their clothes, and there was a running fight for some fifteen miles; but Clifford reached Drumcliff in Sligo without much further loss. The English had no powder and were completely outnumbered, but torrents of rain fell and wetted the ammunition of their foes. Maguire and O'Rourke were both with O'Donnell in this affair. Clifford marched on foot in the rear, and indeed personal bravery was the only soldierly quality that could be shown. His ablest officer denied that forty years' service in the best European army could teach a man anything useful for Irish warfare. The service was barbarous and hateful, and he begged to be put into some other war, for in Connaught nothing was to be got or learned.[273]

[Sidenote: Tyrone's pretensions.]

After his successful journey to the Blackwater, Burgh remained some weeks in the field, and during that time he vainly endeavoured to come to terms with Tyrone. The latter refused to give the pledge demanded, and while declaring that he was reasonable and that his conscience was discharged, talked of making peace with the Queen as if he had been an independent sovereign. In the meantime he was earnestly soliciting help from Spain, and the death of Lord Kildare was one success of which he boasted. That Earl was, however, not wounded at all, though some say that the loss of two foster brothers in the late fight had preyed upon his mind. Burgh now declared that his patience was exhausted, and went back to Dublin to make preparations for a further invasion of Ulster. 'All your popish shaven priests,' he wrote to Tyrone, 'shall never absolve you, God destroying the counsels of the wicked against his anointed.'[274]

[Sidenote: Gallant defence of the new fort.]

[Sidenote: Death of Burgh.]

When Burgh had left Armagh, and Clifford had been driven from Ballyshannon, brave Captain Williams had a hard time at Blackwater. Tyrone found it impossible to prevent supplies from entering the ruined city, although he could and did surround the outpost completely; but when an escalade was attempted, the stout soldier within was more than able to hold his own. The storming party were picked men, who received the Sacrament and were sworn not to abandon their task till they had carried the fort, but they lost all their ladders and afterwards owned to 400 killed and wounded. Three days later Burgh left Dublin to relieve the beleaguered garrison, and reached Armagh without opposition. He perhaps hoped to surprise some of Tyrone's people, but met none until he came near the Blackwater, which he passed after a sharp skirmish. His intention was to advance to Dungannon, or perhaps to establish an advanced post there, but he was taken suddenly ill. The fort was victualled and relieved, and the Deputy was carried in a litter to Armagh, and thence to Newry, where he died a few days later. He made a will in the presence of several witnesses, of whom John Dymmok, author of a well-known treatise on Ireland, was one; but his strength failed before he could sign it. Bagenal and Cecil were named executors, and all goods he bequeathed to his wife, Lady Frances, to do her best for the children; and for her and them he asked the Queen's protection, 'myself having spent my patrimony and ended my days in her service.' To the Queen he left his garter and George, also his papers, and his body to be disposed of as she pleased. The dead Deputy's servants ran away, and Bagenal was in some doubt as to what he should do; for no chief governor had died in office since Skeffington's time. The body was buried at Westminster more than three months later, and Sir Francis Vere agreed to pay Lady Burgh 400_l._ a year out of his salary as governor of Brill. The money was perhaps badly paid, for the poor lady was long suppliant to Cecil, and described herself as his 'unfortunate kinswoman.'[275]

[Sidenote: Sir John Norris retires to Munster,]

[Sidenote: and dies there.]

The death of Lord Burgh was a serious loss to the Queen's service, and it did not come single. Sir John Norris retired to his province of Munster after conferring with the Lord Deputy, but there is nothing in his letters to show that the latter dismissed him in an unfriendly way. There was not much love lost between them, perhaps, but there is no evidence of anything more than this. Norris went to Waterford and Limerick, though every movement hurt him, and he reported that Munster was in a very poor state of defence. The Queen would not give the necessary funds, and the inhabitants of the town would do very little for themselves. But there was no immediate danger of a Spanish invasion, and he begged leave to recruit his health. Afterwards he could return to his post, and he was ready to remain at all risks if he could do any good. Tyrone wrote to him, but he sent the letter unopened to Burgh, apologising even for saving time by occasionally communicating directly with the English Government. He advised that the rebel should be well pressed during the summer, in which case many would leave him. 'I am not envious,' he said, 'though others shall reap the fruits of my travail, an ordinary fortune of mine.' To curry favour with Essex some insinuated that the President was shamming illness to get out of Ireland, but the event proved that his complaints were genuine. Old wounds neglected or unskilfully treated ended in gangrene, and he died at Mallow, in the arms of his brother Thomas. The most absurd fables were told about his last hours, and an historian gravely relates that the enemy of mankind, black and dressed in black, appeared to him while playing cards, reminded him of an old bargain, and claimed his soul then and there. 'We may judge,' adds this credulous writer, 'how much God helped O'Neill, who had not only often beaten Norris, the best of English generals, in battle, but also vanquished the devil himself, who is believed to have helped him according to contract.' The body was embalmed and taken to England, and Elizabeth wrote a beautiful letter of condolence to Lady Norris, in which she charged her to bear up for her husband's sake, reminding her that her own loss as Queen was scarcely less grievous or less bitter than a mother's.[276]

[Sidenote: Consequences of Burgh's death.]

[Sidenote: Belfast in 1597.]

A vacancy in the chief governorship of Ireland was always a cause of weakness, and often of disaster. Discipline was relaxed, and enemies of the Government knew how to take their advantage. At Carrickfergus, which was an exposed place, there had lately been many bickerings among the authorities; insomuch that Captain Rice Maunsell, who commanded the troops, imprisoned Charles Egerton, who was constable of the castle. One consequence was that Belfast fell into the hands of Shane MacBrian O'Neill, who hanged and disembowelled every Englishman found therein. Sir John Chichester, a younger brother of the more famous Sir Arthur, was then appointed to the military command, and his first essay was most successful. 'Belfast,' he says, 'is a place which standeth eight miles from Carrickfergus, and on the river, where the sea ebbs and flows, so that boats may be landed within a butte (musket) shot of the said castle; for the recovery whereof I made choice that it should be one of my first works; and on the eleventh day of July following attempted the same with some hundred men, which I transported thither in boats by sea; and indeed our coming was so unlooked for by them as it asked us no long time before we took the place, without any loss to us, and put those we found in it to the sword.' Shane O'Neill's castle of Edenduffcarrick was afterwards taken by Chichester, which afforded a means of victualling the Blackwater fort by way of Lough Neagh. Shane MacBrian and the other O'Neills of his sept then went to Dublin and submitted, giving sufficient hostages for their good behaviour.[277]

[Sidenote: Disaster at Carrickfergus.]

By the death of his elder brothers, Donnell and Alaster, James MacSorley had become chief of the Irish MacDonnells. Though unable to speak the Lowland tongue, he had lately been knighted by James VI. and received with much distinction at court, where his liberality and fine manners made him a favourite, and at his departure he was thought worthy of a salute from Edinburgh Castle. He and his brother Randal soon aroused suspicion at Carrickfergus. They demolished their castles at Glenarm and Red Bay, and concentrated their strength at Dunluce, which they armed with three guns taken from the Spanish Armada. These pieces they refused to surrender at Chichester's demand, and there were also suspicious dealings with Tyrone, whose daughter Randal afterwards married. The governor invited the MacDonnells to a parley, and they appeared with 600 men about four miles from the town. The immediate complaint was that they had been plundering in Island Magee. Chichester went to meet them, but his men had scarcely recovered from a long march two nights before, and much of their powder was still damp. A council of war was held, at which Moses Hill, lieutenant of horse and founder of the Downshire family, offered to surprise the MacDonnells in their camp if the governor could wait till night. This was agreed to, but rasher counsels ultimately prevailed. Captain Merriman, who was said to have captured 50,000 head of MacDonnell cattle in his time, thought it a shame to be braved by such beggars; others thought so too, and Chichester gave way willingly enough. As the English advanced the Scots retreated, but soon turned on their pursuers, whose ranks were not well kept and whose muskets were almost useless. Horse and foot were driven back pell-mell towards the town, and Chichester was killed by a shot in the head, after being wounded in the shoulder and in the leg. Maunsell and other officers also fell, and only two seem to have escaped unwounded. About 180 men were killed out of a force which probably did not exceed 300. Some saved their lives by swimming over into Island Magee, while Captain Constable and others were taken prisoners. The survivors from the battle and the officers who had remained in reserve named Egerton their governor and expected an attack, but MacDonnell chose rather to appear as an aggrieved man who had fought in self-defence. The check to the Government was a severe one, and Tyrone was greatly strengthened by it.[278]

[Sidenote: Lords Justices appointed.]

[Sidenote: Ormonde Lord General.]

The Irish Council made Sir Thomas Norris sole Lord Justice, very much against his will. He had succeeded his brother as Lord President of Munster, and left Captain Thornton there to do the work, and to draw most of the salary. This temporary arrangement was altered by the Queen, who appointed Archbishop Loftus and Chief Justice Gardiner Lords Justices, gave the supreme military command to Ormonde, with the title of Lieutenant-General, and ordered Norris back to his own province. The appointment of Ormonde involved fresh negotiations, and Tyrone was more likely to agree with him than with any English Deputy. 'You now,' the Queen wrote to her general, 'represent our own person, and have to do with inferior people and base rebels, to whose submission if we in substance shall be content to condescend, we will look to have the same implored in such reverend form as becometh our vassals and such heinous offenders to use, with bended knees and hearts humbled; not as if one prince did treat with another upon even terms of honour or advantage, in using words of peace or war, but of rebellion in them, and mercy in us; for rather than ever it shall appear to the world that in any such sort we will give way to any of their pride, we will cast off either sense or feeling of pity or compassion, and upon what price soever prosecute them to the last hour.'[279]

[Sidenote: Ormonde's futile negotiations with Tyrone,]

Tyrone himself sought an interview with Ormonde, and submitted humbly enough to him at Dundalk. 'I do,' he said, 'here acknowledge, upon the knees of my heart, that I am sorry for this my late relapse and defection.' He begged a truce for two months, and undertook not to prevent the Blackwater fort from being victualled in the meantime. In the negotiations which followed, 'free liberty of conscience for all the inhabitants of Ireland' was demanded by Tyrone; but while placing this claim in the forefront, he never really insisted upon it, and no doubt its main object was to make an impression abroad. In 1591 he had taken care to be married to Mabel Bagenal by a Protestant bishop, 'according her Majesty's laws,' and he now undertook not to correspond with Spain or any foreign nation. Another promise was to victual the garrison at Blackwater, and he did actually furnish forty beeves, ten of which were rejected by the inexorable Williams, though the leanest beef was probably better than the horseflesh upon which he and his brave men had lately lived. In the end Tyrone refused to give up his eldest son, or any hostage; but he agreed to accept a sheriff provided a gentleman of the country was appointed, to maintain and victual Blackwater fort, to renounce the name of O'Neill, to renew his submission to Ormonde in some public place, and to pay a fine of 500 cows. On receipt of his pardon, he further agreed to disperse all his forces, and send Scots or other hired strangers out of the realm.

[Sidenote: who despises a pardon.]

These terms were accepted, and a pardon passed under the great seal of Ireland; but the result was only a truce, and open hostilities were resumed within two months. At the very moment that the pardon was given, Tyrone was encouraging his confederates to believe in an imminent Spanish invasion of Munster, and it is evident that he had never intended to yield upon any essential point.[280]

[Sidenote: Munster brigandage, 1597. Florence MacCarthy.]

Munster had lately been pretty quiet, but there were not wanting signs of the tremendous storm which was soon to burst over it. The MacSheehys, the remnant of the Desmond gallowglasses, 'preyed, spoiled, and murdered' over eighty English families. Of three brothers, one was sentenced 'to have his arms and thighs broken with a sledge, and hang in chains, so was he executed without the north gate of Cork;' the second was killed by an Irish kerne, and the third fell by an English hand when Spenser's house at Kilcolman was sacked. Donnell MacCarthy saved himself by coming under protection and behaving well for a time. His father, the wicked Earl of Clancare, died late in 1596, and Sir Thomas Norris advised that some small property should be assigned to 'his base son of best reputation,' while Florence might be given the bulk of the remote and barren heritage of McCarthy More. Florence and Donell both went to plead their own causes in London, while the widowed countess complained that she and her daughter were 'prisoners there for their diet.' The poor lady begged for her thirds, 'notwithstanding any wrangling between my son-in-law, Nicholas Browne, Donell MacCarthy, and the rest.' She gained her cause, and Donell was given some lands which his father had conveyed to him. Ormonde thought the presence of Florence important for the peace of Munster, and asked Cecil not to detain him, while Florence himself begged the Secretary to let him serve her Majesty in Ireland, instead of keeping him in London at her cost. When the news of the outbreak arrived, he received 100_l._ for his journey to Ireland, but he lingered in the hope of getting all the late Earl's estate, and Essex had left Ireland before his return.[281]

FOOTNOTES:

[267] Sir T. Wilkes to Sir Robert Sidney, Jan. 17, 1597; Rowland Whyte to same, Feb. 21, March 4, April 13, in Sidney Papers, vol. ii.; Motley's United Netherlands, ch. ix. The explosion of powder was on March 13, and is recorded by the Four Masters and in Russell's Journal.

[268] Rowland Whyte to Sir R. Sidney in Sidney Papers, May 4, 1597; Lord Burgh to Cecil, April 26 and May 4, MSS. Hatfield, and to Burghley, May 23. R. O. Burgh left London May 3, and reached Dublin on the 15th. He suffered from a wound or hurt received in Holland in 1595, see his letter to Essex of Aug. 27, and that year in Birch's Memoirs, i. 285.

[269] Russell's Journal in Carew, May 1597; Chamberlain's Letters, June 11; Burgh to Cecil, May 24 and June 12; Norris to Cecil, May 24 and June 10; Russell to the Privy Council, June 25, MS. Hatfield.

[270] Captain Richard Turner (sergeant-major) to Essex, June 14; Lord Burgh to Cecil, received July 28. Several other letters are printed in the Hist. MSS., Ireland, part iv. 1, appx. 12.

[271] Essex to the Queen (July) in Calendar of S. P. Domestic; Cecil to Burgh (end of July); Tyrone to the King of Spain (not before August) 1597, in Carew, No. 275.

[272] Four Masters, 1597; Clifford to Burgh, Aug. 9. This Lord Inchiquin (Murrogh, 4th Baron) served in Perrott's Parliament.

[273] Four Masters, 1597; O'Sullivan Bere; Clifford to Burgh, Aug. 9; Sir Calisthenes Brooke to Cecil, Aug. 13. As was more fully proved in 1689, the possessors of Enniskillen and of the Erne from Belleek to Ballyshannon, about four miles, held the keys of the partition between Ulster and Connaught.

[274] Tyrone to Burgh, Aug. 10, 1597, and the answer, Aug. 16.

[275] Lord Burgh's will, Oct. 12, 1597; Sir H. Bagenal to the Queen, to Burghley, and to Cecil, Oct. 13; Rowland Whyte to Sir R. Sidney, Feb. 1, 1598, in Sidney Papers; Frances Lady Burgh to Cecil, Jan. 1599 (one of several), Hatfield. For the assault and relief of the fort see Fenton to Cecil, Oct. 5, 1597; Captain Williams to the Privy Council, Nov. 1; the Four Masters; Moryson. Burgh died Oct. 13, a wrong date being usually given; he had no recent wound apparently.

[276] Sir John Norris to the Privy Council and to Cecil, June 10, 1597; to Burghley, June 2; to Cecil, July 20; O'Sullivan Bere, tom. iii. lib. iii. cap. 10. The Queen's letter of Sept. 22 to Lady Norris, which begins 'My own crow,' has been printed by Fuller, Lloyd, and others. Norris died before Sept. 9, on which day the Presidency of Munster was placed in commission. In an undated letter at Hatfield, which evidently belongs to the early part of 1597, Norris begs leave for 'this spring' before it is too late. His lungs were affected, besides the trouble from his wounded leg.

[277] Services of Sir John Chichester and the garrison of Carrickfergus, Sept. 16, 1597.

[278] Egerton, North, Charles Maunsell, and Merriman to Lord Justice Norris, Nov. 6, 1597, enclosing Lieutenant Harte's account, who was present. Other accounts are collected in the Ulster Journal of Archæology, vol. v. pp. 188 sqq. See also Gregory's Western Highlands, chap. vi., where James MacSorley is called 'Dunluce,' as if that had been a Scotch lairdship. Chichester's overthrow was on Nov. 4.

[279] Sir T. Norris to Cecil, Oct. 31, 1597. For the terms on which Ormonde and the Lords Justices were appointed see Liber Munerum Publicorum, part ii. p. 5. The Queen to Ormonde, Dec. 29, in Carew.

[280] Submission to Ormonde, Dec. 22, 1597; the Queen to Ormonde, Dec. 29; Heads of agreement submitted at Dundalk, March 15, 1598, all in Carew; Fenton to Cecil, April 20. The course of the negotiations may be traced clearly in Moryson, under the year 1597-8. The abortive pardon was dated April 11.

[281] Florence MacCarthy's Life, chap. viii. Honora Lady Clancare and Florence MacCarthy to Cecil, July 29 and Aug. 8, 1598, MSS. Hatfield.

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XLVII. GENERAL RISING UNDER TYRONE, 1598-1599

[Sidenote: Bacon and Essex.]

[Sidenote: Bacon's advice.]

While Ormonde was trying to make peace with Tyrone, Francis Bacon was encouraging Essex to occupy himself with Irish affairs, in which he had an hereditary interest. Honour, he argued, was to be got by succeeding where so many had failed, and the lion's share would fall to him who had made choice of successful agents. Neither Fitzwilliam nor Norris had been the Earl's friends, and Russell had been a lukewarm one; whereas Ormonde and Sir Conyers Clifford were well disposed, and there was no danger in supporting them for the time. Popular opinion declared that Irish affairs had been neglected, and the mere appearance of care in that direction would win credit. Sir William Russell, Sir Richard Bingham, the Earl of Thomond, and Mr. Wilbraham, the Irish Solicitor-General, were all at hand, and the necessary information might be had from them. And then we have this truly Baconian passage: 'If your lordship doubt to put your sickle into another's harvest; first, time brings it to you in Mr. Secretary's absence; next, being mixed with matter of war, it is fittest for you; and lastly, I know your lordship will carry it with that modesty and respect towards aged dignity, and that good correspondence towards my dear kinsman and your good friend now abroad, as no inconvenience may grow that way.' In Cecil's absence Essex played the part of secretary, while Raleigh and Russell, Sir Richard Bingham, Sir Robert Sidney, and Sir Christopher Blount were all mentioned as possible viceroys; but none of them were willing to go. Bacon's further advice was asked, and his idea was to temporise with Tyrone, strengthening the garrisons and placing confidence in Ormonde, while taking steps to remedy the real abuses from which Ireland suffered. 'And,' he says, 'but that your lordship is too easy to pass in such cases from dissimulation to verity, I think if your lordship lent your reputation in this case--that is, to pretend that if peace go not on, and the Queen mean not to make a defensive war as in times past, but a full reconquest of those parts of the country, you would accept the charge--I think it would help to settle Tyrone in his seeking accord, and win you a great deal of honour gratis.'[282]

[Sidenote: The Blackwater fort beleaguered.]

The fort at the Blackwater was but a ditch intended to shelter 100 men. Lord Burgh had left 300 men there, and sickness was the natural consequence of this overcrowding. The time expired on June 7, and on the 9th the solitary stronghold was again surrounded, Tyrone swearing that he would never leave it untaken. But Williams was such a soldier as neither numbers, nor threats, nor want of support could daunt. An escalade was again attempted, with ladders made to hold five men abreast; but the two field-pieces were loaded with musket bullets and swept the trench. The captain vowed that he would blow all into the air sooner than surrender, and his courage communicated itself to his men. All who could stand at all fought bravely, and the corpses of the assailants were piled up so as to fill the ditch. No further assault was made; but victuals were scarce, and the soldiers, who did not disdain the very grass upon the ramparts, subsisted mainly upon the flesh of horses captured in several sallies. Seventeen or eighteen mares, the captain told one of Fenton's spies, would last for a month at least, and he would hold out till the middle of August. 'I protest to God,' Ormonde wrote to Cecil, 'the state of the scurvy fort of Blackwater, which cannot be long held, doth more touch my heart than all the spoils that ever were made by traitors on mine own lands. The fort was always falling, and never victualled but once (by myself) without an army, to her Majesty's exceeding charges.'[283]

[Sidenote: Preparations for relief of the fort.]

[Sidenote: Tyrone's tactics.]

Honour might require that an army should be sent, and yet there can be little doubt that Ormonde was right from a military point of view. One isolated fort could be of little use, and it was even now in contemplation to revive the settlement at Derry. About 1,000 seasoned soldiers from the Netherlands were placed under the command of Sir Samuel Bagenal, a like number of recruits were added, and the whole force was held in readiness for an expedition into Ulster. But the plan of surrounding Tyrone, which had been so often urged upon the English Government, was not destined to be carried out for some years to come. In the meantime it was decided that Captain Williams should be relieved. The forces actually available at this time did not much exceed 7,000 men, and of these somewhat more than a third were of Irish birth. About a third only were English, and rather less than a third were natives of the Pale, with English names, but with many Irish habits. The numbers which Tyrone could gather round him were at least equal to all the Queen's army in Ireland, and only a very strong body of men could hope to succeed now that the rebel chief had had time to interpose all sorts of obstacles. Earthworks had been thrown up between Armagh and the Blackwater, trees had been felled and branches intertwined across the roads, and holes had been dug in all the fords. Of the three Lords Justices, the churchman and the lawyer were opposed to the attempt altogether, believing that it was better to defend the Pale and withdraw the Blackwater garrison while easy terms could still be had. Others of the Council agreed with them, but Ormonde was supreme in military matters, and Sir Henry Bagenal was at hand to urge him that the relief of the fort concerned her Majesty's honour. Failing to dissuade him from the enterprise, the others pressed him to take the command in person, and, if he had done so, the result might have been very different. But Desmond's conqueror was now sixty-six years old, and he preferred to serve against the Kavanaghs nearer home. He remembered that the safety of Leinster had been especially entrusted to him, and Bagenal, whose town of Newry lay near the scene of action, and who was as bitter as ever against his brother-in-law, was most anxious to be employed.[284]

[Sidenote: Battle of the Yellow Ford. Complete defeat of the troops.]

[Sidenote: Death of Bagenal.]

Four thousand foot and 320 horse with four field-pieces marched out of Dundalk under Marshal Bagenal's command. Many of them were veterans who had seen continental war, but from the first ill-fortune attended them. The officers seem to have had but little confidence in their general, and the simple soldier is quick to take the cue from his immediate chief. Strict orders were given that no one should stay behind, but the young gentlemen who served as volunteers lingered in the town, and some of them were killed by the Irish horse while crossing the difficult ground between Dundalk and Newry. The main body reached Armagh without fighting, and as they approached could plainly see the enemy encamped between the town and the river. After his arrival Bagenal called a meeting of officers and told them that he intended to avoid the direct road, which was strongly held, and to march a mile or two to the right. By so doing he hoped to keep on hard ground. One bog had indeed to be passed, and his plan was to skirmish there while a passage for the guns was made with sticks and boughs. Early next morning the army marched accordingly in six divisions, with intervals of at least 600 yards, and the Irish skirmishers then began to harass them before they had gone half a mile. The little river Callan was passed at a point where there is now a bridge and a beetling mill, but which was then a ford, with a yellow bottom and yellow banks. From this point the column was fully exposed, the O'Donnells drawing round their right flank while the O'Neills pressed them on the left. Tyrone was protected by a bog, over which his men moved with the agility begotten by long practice, and O'Donnell's sharp-shooters took advantage of the juniper bushes which then studded the hills on the right. The Irish outnumbered the relieving force by at least two to one, and their loose formation gave them an advantage over the closely packed English battalions. The vanguard nevertheless struggled through the bog until they came to a ditch a mile long, five feet deep, four feet wide, and surmounted by a thorny hedge. This they carried with a rush, but not being properly supported they were beaten back, and the Marshal coming himself to the rescue was shot through the brain. The centre were delayed by the largest piece of artillery, which stuck fast while the O'Donnells easily picked off the draught-oxen. The usual confusion which follows the death of a general was increased by the explosion of two barrels of powder, from one of which a private soldier was rashly replenishing his horn. Colonel Cosby, who commanded the third battalion, hurried to the front, but it was then too late. He was taken prisoner, and his regiment shared the fate of the first two. The rear half of the army had enough to do to maintain itself against O'Donnell, Maguire, and James MacSorley, but preserved its formation, and, covered by Captain Montague's horse, made a pretty orderly retreat to Armagh. 'I protest,' said a young Irish officer afterwards distinguished in these wars, 'our loss was only for the great distance that was betwixt us in our march, for when the vanguard was charged they were within sight of our battle, and yet not rescued until they were overthrown. The explosion, and the delay about the gun, did the rest.'[285]

[Sidenote: Results of the defeat.]

Between killed, wounded, and missing the losses did not fall far short of 2,000. Not less than twenty-four officers fell, the gun which caused delay by sticking in the mud, was abandoned to the victors, many colours were taken, and nearly all the new levies threw away their arms. Several hundred Irish soldiers deserted, and with them two English recruits, who called next morning to their comrades that Tyrone would give them all twenty shillings bounty to join him. Among the captains killed was Maelmore O'Reilly, Sir John's son, who was known as 'the handsome,' and who fought with distinguished bravery. The survivors gathered in the church at Armagh, but it seemed doubtful whether they could maintain themselves there. A great part of the provisions, the conveyance of which to the Blackwater was the object of the expedition, had fallen into the hands of the enemy, and the remaining supplies would scarcely suffice for ten days. The Irish soldiers continued to desert steadily, and the disheartened remnant of the foot dared not attempt to reach Newry without help, but it was known that Maguire and O'Donnell were also short of provisions, and at last it was decided that the horse should break through the victorious Irish who swarmed round the camp. Montague performed this service successfully, though not without loss, during the night which followed the battle. Terence O'Hanlon pursued him closely, and it has been particularly recorded that Captain Romney was surprised and killed while smoking a pipe of tobacco by the roadside.[286]

[Sidenote: Panic in Dublin.]

[Sidenote: The fort evacuated.]

This disastrous battle was fought on August 14, and on the 16th Montague told the story in Dublin. Ormonde was away, and the other Lords Justices were panic-stricken. They wrote a humble letter to Tyrone, begging him not to attack the defeated troops 'in cold blood.' 'You may,' they added, 'move her Majesty to know a favourable conceit of you by using favour to these men; and besides, your ancient adversary, the Marshal, being now taken away, we hope you will cease all further revenge towards the rest, against whom you can ground no cause of sting against yourself.' This missive never reached Tyrone, and the Queen said it was stayed by accident, though the Lords Justices declared they had revoked it. 'The like,' Elizabeth declared, 'was never read, either in form or substance, for baseness.' And, as it turned out, Tyrone was not unwilling to make a bridge for his defeated enemy. He thought their supply of provisions greater than it was, and he feared that troops might land at Lough Foyle, while Armagh was still held. His own army, he said, was costing him 500_l._ a day. These reasons were not known till later, but the terms dictated by them were gladly accepted. Captain Williams and his heroic band were allowed to leave the Blackwater, the officers retaining their rapiers and horses, but without colours, drums, or firearms. The whole army then marched unmolested to Newry with their wounded and baggage. Ormonde was able to report that the loss in killed was not so great as at first reported, but might easily have been greater 'if God had not letted it; for their disorder was such as the like hath not been among men of any understanding, dividing the army into six bodies, marching so far asunder as one of them could not second nor help th'other till those in the vanguard were overthrown. Sure the devil bewitched them! that none of them did prevent this gross error.'[287]

[Sidenote: The Irish army disperses.]

The Irish leaders are said to have harangued their men before the fight upon its special importance, and many writers have blamed Tyrone for not advancing straight upon Dublin. But Celtic armies, though they have often won battles, have never known how to press a victory home. Owen Roe O'Neill, Montrose, and Dundee were all subject to the same disability; and Tyrone probably did as much as he could. 'The chiefs of Ulster,' say the annalists, 'returned to their respective homes in joy and exultation, though they had lost many men.' Dublin was in no danger, nor any of the principal towns; but the country was everywhere in a flame. O'Donnell had most of Connaught at his mercy, though Sir Conyers Clifford could hold his own at Athlone and maintain garrisons at Tulsk, Boyle, and Roscommon. Tibbot ne Long, who headed such of the lower Burkes as remained loyal, was forced to take refuge in one of the boats from which he derived his name, and MacWilliam had Mayo at his mercy. With 2,000 foot and 200 horse and accompanied by O'Dogherty, who was sent by O'Donnell to help him, he swept all the cattle, even from the furthest shores of Clew Bay. The Earl of Thomond was in England, and his brother Teig, who dubbed himself the O'Brien, overran Clare, though a younger brother Donnell remained loyal and opposed him strenuously. To hold all Connaught and Clare, Clifford had but 120 English soldiers, and had but very little effective help except from Clanricarde, who offered to supply 500 cows for 500_l._ As times stood, this was thought a very honourable offer, but O'Donnell had no difficulty in driving off 4,000 head from those who hesitated to submit.[288]

[Sidenote: General attack on English settlers.]

In the Pale and in the midland counties things were little better than in Connaught. The Lords Justices discovered a plot to surprise Dublin Castle, and hanged some of the conspirators, but Friar Nangle and other priests who were implicated escaped their vigilance. Croghane Castle, near Philipstown, was surprised by the O'Connors, who scaled the walls, killed Captain Gifford and his men, and wounded his wife in several places. The English proprietor, Sir Thomas Moore, seems to have been absent, but the Irish carried off Lady Moore and left her in a bog, where she died of cold. Alexander Cosby, the chief of the Queen's County settlers, had been killed in 1597, and his widow was fortunately in Dublin, but Stradbally fell into the hands of the O'Mores. James FitzPiers, the sheriff of Kildare, was a Geraldine, and being threatened with the pains of hell by Tyrone, he surrendered Athy to Owen MacRory O'More. Captain Tyrrell, who was Tyrone's best partisan leader, went where he pleased; and it was evident that nothing less than the extirpation of the English settlers was intended.[289]

[Sidenote: Rebellion in Munster.]

[Sidenote: The Sugane Earl.]

Of many partial attempts at recolonisation the greatest was that on the forfeited Desmond estates, and the storm was not long in reaching Munster. Piers Lacy, of Bruff in Limerick, who had already once been pardoned, went to Owen MacRory, informed him that all the Geraldines were ready to rise and make James Fitzthomas Earl, and that the MacCarthies would also choose a chief. Tyrone's leave was first asked and was readily given, for the idea of a new Desmond rebellion was already in his mind. Some months before he had spread a report that the attainted Earl's son had escaped from the Tower with the Lieutenant's daughter, that he had been warmly welcomed in Spain, and that he might soon be expected in Munster with large forces. At Michaelmas accordingly Owen MacRory, Tyrrell, and Redmond Burke, Sir John Shamrock's eldest son, led 1,400 men to the Abbey of Owny in Limerick, but made no advance while Norris was at Kilmallock. As soon as he withdrew they divided into several companies, and destroyed all that was English, and only what was English. They burned Sir Henry Ughtred's castle at Mayne near Rathkeale, which he had not attempted to defend. Cahir MacHugh O'Byrne joined O'More at Ballingarry with some of his men, and there they waited until James Fitzthomas had overcome his natural hesitation. Stimulated by the threat of preferring his younger brother, he came in with twenty gentlemen, and assumed the title of Earl as of O'Neill's gift. The plunder collected by this time was so great that a cow was publicly sold in the camp for sixpence, a brood mare for threepence, and a prime hog for a penny.[290]

[Sidenote: Ormonde's warning disregarded.]

From Golden on the Suir Ormonde wrote to warn this new Desmond of his danger, and summoned him to his presence under safe-conduct. 'We need not,' he said, 'put you in mind of the late overthrow of the Earl your uncle, who was plagued, with his partakers, by fire, sword, and famine; and be assured, if you proceed in any traitorous actions, you will have the like end. What Her Majesty's forces have done against the King of Spain, and is able to do against any other enemy, the world hath seen, to Her Highness's immortal fame, by which you may judge what she is able to do against you, or any other that shall become traitors.' But the Geraldine had made up his mind and refused to go. Practically, he complained that the State had held out hopes of the Desmond succession to him, and that he had served against his uncle on that account. A pension of a mark a day from the Queen had been paid for one year only. Others had grievances as well as himself, and indeed it was not hard to find cases of injustice. 'To be brief with your lordship,' he concluded, 'Englishmen were not contented to have our lands and livings, but unmercifully to seek our lives by false and sinister means under colour of law; and as for my part I will prevent it the best I can.'[291]

[Sidenote: The Munster settlement destroyed.]

[Sidenote: Spenser.]

Rightly or wrongly, the last Earl of Desmond had been held legitimate, and the first marriage of his father with Joan Roche treated as null and void. The boy in the Tower was therefore the only claimant whom the Government could recognise, and the sons of Sir Thomas Roe Fitzgerald were excluded. But the Geraldines accepted the new creation at O'Neill's hands, and the Queen's adherents in Ireland could for the time do no more than nickname him the Sugane or straw-rope Earl. The English settlement of Munster melted away like the unsubstantial fabric of a vision. 'The undertakers,' to use Ormonde's words, 'three or four excepted, most shamefully forsook all their castles and dwelling-places before any rebel came in sight of them, and left their castles with their munitions, stuff, and cattle to the traitors, and no manner of resistance made.... Which put the traitors in such pride, and so much discouraged the rest of the subjects as most of them went presently to the towns.' But all the settlers were not fortunate enough to reach these cities of refuge, and numerous outrages were committed. English children were taken from their nurses' breasts and dashed against walls. An Englishman's heart was plucked out in his wife's presence, and she was forced to lend her apron to wipe the murderer's fingers. Of the English fugitives who flocked into Youghal, some had lost their tongues and noses, and some had their throats cut, though they still lived. Irish tenants and servants, but yesterday fed in the settlers' houses, were now conspicuous by their cruelty. Among those who escaped to England were Edmund Spenser and his wife, but one of their children perished in the flames. The poet lost all his property, and of his life's work in Ireland only his books remain.[292]

[Sidenote: Raleigh.]

At Tallow, in Raleigh's seignory, there were 60 good houses and 120 able men, of whom 30 were musketeers; but they all ran away, and the rebels burned the rising town to the ground. The destruction of his improvements at this time may account for the small price which Raleigh's property fetched in the next reign. Among castles in the county of Cork which were abandoned without resistance by the undertakers or their agents, were Tracton, Carrigrohan, and two others belonging to Sir Warham St. Leger; Castlemagner in Sir William Becher's seignory; and Derryvillane in Mr. Arthur Hyde's. In Limerick, besides Mayne the rebels took Pallaskenry and another house from Sir Henry Ughtred, Newcastle, and two more from Sir William Courtenay; Tarbet and another from Justice Golde; Foynes, Shanet, and Corgrage from Sir William Trenchard, and Flemingstown from Mr. Mainwaring. The Abbey of Adare, which was leased to George Thornton, was also left undefended. Castle Island was taken from Sir William Herbert, and Tralee from Sir Edward Denny; and in Kerry generally all the English settlers fled.

[Sidenote: Norris.]

Mr. Wayman, a great sheepmaster, left twenty well-armed men at Doneraile, but they ran away and were all killed on the way to Cork. Norris's English sheep were stolen from Mallow; his park wall was broken down, and his deer let loose. Many settlers fled with their clothes only, and being stripped of these they died of cold on the mountains. The churches and other vacant places in Cork were filled with starving wretches. Youghal was full of them too, and so closely pressed that men scarcely dared to put their heads outside the gates. The most fortunate of the settlers were those who reached Waterford and got a passage to England. Here and there alliances among the Irish saved individual colonists from utter destruction.

Thus Oliver Stephenson, born of an Irish mother, was protected by his relations. He was summoned before the Sugane Earl, who ordered him to show cause why he should not surrender his castle of Dunmoylan, near Foynes, to Ulick Wall, who claimed it as his ancient inheritance. He was, he says, respited till May and ordered to give it up then, 'if my prince be not able to overcome their power.' Stephenson begged Norris not to construe his shift as treason, and promised in the meantime to get all the information possible from his maternal relations. Stephenson saved himself, and was afterwards trusted by Lord President Carew.[293]

[Sidenote: Hyde.]

[Sidenote: Barkley.]

Arthur Hyde was in England when the rebellion broke out, but his wife and children were at his castle of Carriganeady, or Castle Hyde, on the Blackwater. On the day that Owen MacRory and the rest entered Munster, the country people rose 'instantly before noon,' and began plundering all round. Hyde's own cattle and those of his English tenants were taken at once, but his wife and children escaped to Cork with Lord Barry's help, and his eighteen men held the castle for three weeks. Hyde landed at Youghal, but could do nothing, and his garrison, seeing that there was no chance of relief, yielded on promise of life and wearing apparel. They were stripped naked, but not killed, by Lord Roche's tenants before they had gone a mile. The Sugane, who was present in person with an overwhelming force, appointed Piers Lacy seneschal of Imokilly, and the castle was surrendered to an Irishman who claimed it. Forty persons depending on Hyde were left destitute, and he sought to form a company. Sixty-four muskets and other arms, with much ammunition, had been provided, and it is probable that things would have gone differently had Hyde been himself at home. A more successful defence was that of Askeaton, by Captain Francis Barkley. The revolt was sudden and unexpected, and he had only the provisions suitable to a gentleman's house in those days. On October 6, more than 500 English of all sorts--men, women, and children--accustomed to a decent life and nearly all householders, flocked into Askeaton at nine in the evening. The panic was so sudden that they came almost empty-handed. 'I protest unto your lordships a spectacle of greatest pity and commiseration that ever my eye beheld, and a most notable example of human frailty.' An English barque lay in the Shannon, and Barkley was fortunate enough to get rid of some useless mouths that way. Others were conveyed to Limerick, where the mayor and citizens used them well. By Ormonde's advice 120 able men were retained. With soldiers who knew the country, and who burned for revenge, this brave captain announced that he would hold out till death. Corn and beef were still to be had, and he only asked for the means to keep his men together. Askeaton did not fall.[294]

[Sidenote: The native gentry make terms with Tyrone.]

[Sidenote: Religious animosity.]

[Sidenote: Why the settlement failed.]

The White Knight, Patrick Condon, Lord Barry's brother John, and Lord Roche's son David, quickly came to terms with the rebels, and Norris believed that the rest would follow from love or fear. Lord Barry, indeed, held out bravely; but most of his neighbours had no choice, for the Government could do nothing to protect them. The Lord President could not trust his Irish troops, and had to retire from Kilmallock without fighting. Four days later, after effecting a junction with Ormonde, he was able to victual the little garrison town, but had to fall back again immediately to Mallow. Tyrone had warned his friends not to fight a pitched battle, but only to skirmish on difficult ground. After several days' desultory warfare in the woods about Mallow, Ormonde was recalled to the defence of Kilkenny and Tipperary, and Norris went back to Cork, leaving the rebels to do as they pleased. An English prisoner with Desmond could report but one family of his countrymen spared. A priest told the new-made Earl that they were Catholics, and proclamation was made that they were not to be hurt. They were robbed of all, but carried their lives to Cork. After Ormonde's departure Owen MacRory went back to Leinster with Cahir MacHugh. He had been ten days in Munster, and left all the other counties at the Sugane's mercy. The Queen was much chagrined, and blamed both Norris and Ormonde for not giving more effective support to the undertakers. But it does not appear that they were to blame, for the revolt was extremely sudden, and the settlement had not been so managed as to afford the means of resistance. 'For whereas,' says Moryson, 'they should have built castles and brought over colonies of English, and have admitted no Irish tenant, but only English, these and like covenants were in no part performed by them. Of whom the men of best quality never came over, but made profit of the land; others brought no more English than their own families, and all entertained Irish servants and tenants, which were now the first to betray them. If the covenants had been kept by them, they of themselves might have made 2,000 able men, whereas the Lord President could not find above 200 of English birth among them when the rebels first entered the province. Neither did these gentle undertakers make any resistance to the rebels, but left their dwellings and fled to walled towns; yea, when there was such danger in flight as greater could not have been in defending their own, whereof many of them had woeful experience, being surprised with their wives and children in flight.' So much for the weak defence, as well-informed Englishmen understood it. The causes of the outbreak, as seen from a Protestant and English point of view, are told by Chief Justice Saxey. Seminaries and Jesuits haunted the towns, of which the mayors were recusants, though shielded by being joined in the commission; the judges of assize were also recusants for the most part, and in charging grand juries they never spoke against foreign power, nor to advance the Queen's supremacy; the English tenants were too scattered, owing to the undertakers' slackness; and, lastly, the late exaction of cess, instead of the customary composition, had bred discontent. O'Sullivan, as usual, makes the contest one between Catholics and royalists, and the annalists, who were more emphatically Irish than Catholic, make it a war of races only. 'In the course of seventeen days,' they say, 'the Irish left not, within the length and breadth of the country of the Geraldines, from Dunqueen to the Suir, which the Saxons had well cultivated and filled with habitations and various wealth, a single son of a Saxon whom they did not either kill or expel.'[295]

[Sidenote: Rebellion in Leinster and Tipperary.]

[Sidenote: The Jesuit Archer.]

Of three branches of the Butler family ennobled by the Tudor monarchs, two were in open rebellion. Mountgarret was a young man, and was married to Tyrone's eldest daughter. He now sent to Ulster for 3,000 auxiliaries, and invited his father-in-law to spend Christmas with him at Kilkenny. In the meantime he allied himself with the Kavanaghs, and took the sacrament with Donnell Spaniagh at Ballyragget. Lord Cahir was married to Mountgarret's sister, and followed his lead. He refused to go to Ormonde when summoned, who says he was 'bewitched (a fool he always was before) by his wife, Dr. Creagh, and Father Archer.' Two loyal neighbours went to Cahir under safe-conduct, but the poor man was not allowed to see them privately. Dr. Creagh, papal bishop of Cork, and the Jesuit Archer were both present, and the peer confessed that he must be ruled by them. Creagh abused one of the visitors for not saluting him, and Archer disarmed him for fear he might hurt the bishop. The two churchmen declared that all the abbey lands should be disgorged, and that all Catholics should make open profession, 'or be called heretics and schismatics like you.' They insisted upon three points: the full restoration of the Catholic Church, the restoration of their lands to all Catholics, and a native Catholic prince sworn to maintain all these things. Gough told them that their ideas were ridiculous, and that they could not tell what his religion was because that was shut up in his own breast. He told Cahir that he was sorry to see him so 'bogged,' and unable to speak or call his soul his own; after which, he and his friend were not sorry to get away safe.[296]

[Sidenote: Weakness of the Government.]

'I pray God,' said Ormonde, 'I may live to see the utter destruction of those wicked and unnatural traitors, upon all whom, by fire, sword, or any other extremity, there cannot light too great a plague.' He pursued Owen MacRory and Redmond Burke, with a mixed multitude of Fitzpatricks, O'Carrolls, O'Kennedys, and O'Ryans, into the woods of the north-west of Tipperary, and captured 100 horses laden with the spoils of the Munster undertakers. But not very much could be done, and he complained bitterly that he was badly supported by the Lords Justices. An archbishop and a chief justice, both old men, were not the Government suited to a great crisis, and matters of such vital importance as the victualling of Maryborough were left almost to chance. Ormonde relieved the place with 300 cows collected by himself, but not without hard fighting, and the annalists oddly remark that he 'lost more than the value of the provisions, in men, horses, and arms.' The conduct of the war in Leinster was entrusted to Sir Richard Bingham, whose prophecies had been completely fulfilled, and who was appointed Marshal in Bagenal's place. Norris was to remain in Munster, Clifford in Connaught, Sir Samuel Bagenal on the borders of Ulster, and Ormonde in Dublin to control the military arrangements. To hold the towns and to temporise was all that the Queen required until a new viceroy could be had. Bingham had been often consulted of late, and much was expected from his unrivalled knowledge of Ireland; but he was past seventy, and worn out with more than fifty years' service by sea and land. He died soon after his return to Ireland, and Ormonde was left to his own devices. Before the end of the year it was known that the government would be entrusted to Essex.[297]

[Sidenote: O'Donnell in Clare, 1599.]

[Sidenote: How mortgages were redeemed.]

After the victory at the Yellow Ford, O'Donnell remained for more than six months at Ballymote. His inactivity, say the annalists with unconscious irony, was caused solely by the fact that there was no part of Connaught left for him to plunder, except Clare. The Earl of Thomond had spent the year 1598 in England, where he made a very good impression, and on his return remained with Ormonde, at and about Kilkenny. Of his two brothers, Donnell, the younger, represented him in Clare, while Teig led the opposition and made friends with Tyrone's adherents in Tipperary. Accompanied by Maguire, O'Donnell entered Clare, thoroughly plundered the baronies of Burren, Inchiquin, and Corcomroe, and returned unscathed to Mayo. Ennistymon, which was part of the territory ravaged, belonged at the time to Sir Tirlogh O'Brien, who was 'a sheltering fence and a lighting hill to the Queen's people,' and who co-operated with the force sent into Clare by Sir Conyers Clifford. Teig, after some skirmishing, thought it prudent to submit, and sessions were successfully held at Ennis. Thomond then returned to his own country and proceeded to chastise Teig MacMahon, who had lately wounded and imprisoned his brother Donnell. MacMahon had taken an English ship which was in difficulties on the coast, but 'found the profit very trivial and the punishment severe,' and he had also seized his castle of Dunbeg, which was in pledge to a Limerick merchant, but without paying the mortgagee. Carrigaholt was taken, and all MacMahon's cattle driven away. Cannon were brought from Limerick against Dunbeg, but the garrison did not wait to be fired at, 'and the protection they obtained lasted only while they were led to the gallows, from which they were hanged in couples, face to face.' Thomond then went northwards, and restored to his friends the castle from which O'Donnell had expelled them.[298]

[Sidenote: Tyrone's rule in Munster.]

During the early months of 1599 Tyrone's illegitimate son Con was preparing his way in Munster. The Earl blamed him severely for imprisoning and robbing Archbishop Magrath, of whose re-conversion he had hopes, since his liberty could not be restrained nor his temporalities touched without direct authority from Rome. 'But if,' he added, 'the covetousness of this world caused him to remain on this way that he is upon, how did his correcting touch you? Withal I have the witness of my own priest upon him, that he promised to return from that way, saving only that he could not but take order for his children first, seeing he got them, and also that he is friend and ally unto us.' Con tried to extort ransom from the astute Miler, who promised to befriend him as far as possible without 'hurting his privilege in her Majesty's laws,' but Tyrone sent peremptory orders that he should be released without any conditions. In the almost complete paralysis of authority, most of the Munster gentry made terms with Con and the new Earl of Desmond. Lord Barry and Lord Roche between them might bring 100 men to the Queen, but they had no allies worth mentioning. Norris had about 2,000 men, but the general falling away was such that he could do very little. At the end of March he left Cork with eighteen companies of foot and three troops of horse. Lady Roche, a sister of James Fitzmaurice, was ready to come out of Castletown to meet him, but Tyrone's Ulster mercenaries would not allow her. The capture of Carriglea castle was the only real success, and the Lord President returned on the ninth day, the rebels skirmishing with him to the outskirts of Cork. The rebels in Tipperary and the adjoining parts of Leinster assembled 'before an idol in Ormonde called the Holy Cross, where again they solemnly swore not to abandon nor forsake one another.' Everyone saw that a system of garrisons was the only way to break down the confederacy, but this policy was not showy enough to please the new Lord Lieutenant.'[299]

FOOTNOTES:

[282] Letter of advice to the Earl of Essex, to take upon him the care of Irish causes, when Mr. Secretary Cecil was in France (February to April, 1598), and a second letter from Bacon a little later, both printed by Spedding, vol. ii. pp. 94-1_0. There are many significant passages in Rowland Whyte's letters in Sidney Papers, vol. ii. pp. 82-97. Essex was busy with Ireland before Cecil's departure and before Bacon's first letter, for Whyte wrote on Jan. 19: 'Yesterday in the afternoon I went to the Court to attend my Lord of Essex, and he no sooner began to hearken unto me, but in comes my Lord of Thomond, in post from Ireland, and then was I commanded to take some other time.' And see Chamberlain's Letters, May 4, 1598. Spenser, who wrote in 1596 proposes that Essex should be Lord-Lieutenant, 'upon whom the eye of all England is fixed, and our last hopes now rest.'

[283] Fenton to Cecil, June 11; Ormonde to Cecil, June 18. O'Sullivan Bere (tom. iii. lib. iv. cap. iii.) owns to 120 killed in the attempted escalade. The eating of grass by the garrison recalls the defence of Casilinum against Hannibal (Livy, xxiii. 19).

[284] Loftus, Gardiner, Wallop, St. Leger, and Fenton to the Privy Council, Aug. 16; Lords Justices Loftus and Gardiner to the Privy Council ('in private'), Aug. 17; Ormonde to the Queen, Aug. 18; State of the Queen's army, March 31, 1598, printed in the National MSS. of Ireland from a paper at Kilkenny.

[285] Lieut. William Taaffe to H. Shee, Aug. 16. He calls the powder-barrels 'firkins.' Captain Montague's Report, Aug. 16; Declaration of the two Captains Kingsmill, Aug. 23, and that of Captain Billings who commanded the rearguard. All the above, with many other papers, are printed either in Irish Arch. Journal, N.S. vol. i. pp. 256-282, or in National MSS. of Ireland, part iv. 1. See also Camden and the Four Masters. There is a minute and nearly contemporary account in O'Sullivan Bere, tom. iii. lib. iv. cap. 5, but he was not present. It is O'Sullivan who mentions the junipers, which do not now grow wild about Armagh. I have carefully inspected the ground, having besides the advantage of consulting two pamphlets kindly sent to me by Mr. E. Rogers of the Armagh Library, whose great local knowledge has been brought to bear on the subject.

[286] O'Sullivan; Montague to Ormonde, Aug. 16. The English accounts specify twelve colours as lost; O'Sullivan says thirty-four.

[287] Ormonde to Cecil, Sept. 15. In writing to the same, on Aug. 24, Ormonde admits the reduced list of twenty-four officers killed and one taken prisoner, 855 men killed and 363 wounded. To these must be added the missing, and there were certainly several hundred deserters. Other English estimates of loss are considerably higher. Camden says 1,500 men were killed.

[288] Four Masters, 1598. Sir C. Clifford to the Lords Justices, Sept. 7; to Cecil, Oct. 30; Lady Clifford's declaration, Oct. 31.

[289] Lords Justices and Council to the Privy Council, Nov. 23 and 27, 1598. Sir R. Bingham to the Lords Justices (from Naas) Nov. 27. There is a MS. dialogue among the Irish S.P. for 1598, which purports to be the ocular testimony of the writer, Thomas Wilson, and which is dedicated to Essex. The interlocutors are Peregryn and Silvyn--the names of Spenser's two sons--and the dialogue, which unfolds the state of things in King's County from harvest 1597 to All Saints' Day 1598, is very much in the style of that between Irenæus and Eudoxus. Is Thomas Wilson a stalking-horse for Edmund Spenser?

[290] Four Masters, 1598; O'Sullivan, tom. iii. lib. v. cap. 2; Discourse by William Weever (prisoner with the Munster rebels) Sept. 29 to Oct. 10. Fenton to Cecil, April 20, for the Tower story.

[291] Ormonde to James Fitzthomas, Oct. 8, 1598; James 'Desmonde' to Ormonde, Oct. 12.

[292] Ormonde to the Queen, Oct. 12, 1598; Chief Justice Saxey's account, October.

[293] List of castles abandoned without resistance in Ormonde's letter to the Queen, Oct. 21, 1598; Oliver Stephenson to Norris, Oct. 16; Henry Smyth's State of Munster 'as I did see and hear it,' Oct. 30. An anonymous paper of October gives some details of Raleigh's settlement at Tallow. See also James Sarsfield, mayor of Cork, to the Privy Council, Oct. 21.

[294] Arthur Hyde to the Privy Council, Oct. 28, 1598; Captain F. Barkley to the Lords Justices, Nov. 3.

[295] Sir T. Norris to the Privy Council and to Cecil, Oct. 23, 1598; W. Weever's discourse, Oct.; Chief Justice Saxey's account, Oct.; the Queen to Ormonde and the Lords Justices, Dec. 1, and to Norris, Dec. 3; Moryson, book i. chap. i.; O'Sullivan, tom. iii. lib. v. caps. 1-5; Four Masters, 1598. Dunqueen is close to Slea Head, the westernmost point of Kerry.

[296] Ormonde to the Privy Council, Nov. 5, 1598; Edward Gough and George Sherlock to Sir N. Walshe, Nov. 16. Gough and Walshe held Cistercian lands at Innislonagh and Glandore; Sherlock had those of the Canons Regular at Cahir; but none of the three bore Protestant names.

[297] Ormonde to the Privy Council, Nov. 5, 1598; to the Queen, Jan. 19, 1599; the Queen to Ormonde and the Lords Justices, Dec. 1, 1598, in Carew. Bingham's appointment as Marshal was announced on Aug. 31, only seventeen days after Bagenal's death. He reached Ireland in October, and died at Dublin, Jan. 19. A memorial by Cecil, dated Nov. 4, 1598 (in Carew, p. 523), has the words 'Clifford betrayed, Bingham lightly condemned.' Bingham's Irish patent is dated Oct. 13, and the Queen informed the Lords Justices that she had specially chosen him, that he was to draw pay and allowances from the day of Bagenal's death, and that he was to have all the privileges that had ever attached to the office. Morrin's Patent Rolls, 40 Eliz. 57 and 58.

[298] Four Masters, 1598 and 1599. The Queen to Sir T. Norris, Dec. 3, 1598, in Carew.

[299] Four Masters, 1599. For Con O'Neill see Carew, March and April, Nos. 299-301; Journal of Sir T. Norris, from March 27 to April 4; Justice Golde to Essex, April 4; Essex to Privy Council, April 29. Lord Roche had a private quarrel with the Sugane Earl.

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