The battle of the faith in Ireland

Front matter

THE UNIVERSITY Ot' ILLINOIS LIBRARY ,

From the collection of James Collins, Drumcondra, Ireland, Purchased, 1918.

Or6b

Preface

The title of tliis volume may be taken as an epitome of its contents.

The Battle of the Faith in Ireland has been long and varied . It extends from the day the apostate friar, George Browne, Avas intruded into the See of Dublin, until the Catholics had grown so numerous, that it was no longer safe to keep them in bondage ; for it is only Avithin the last feAv years that any English statesman even pretended to make them concessions from motives of justice. They ought to be grateful, and no doubt are very grateful, that Avithin the present generation, England’s greatest orator and statesman has laboured heart and soul to make atonement for their past wrongs, by vAUse and enlightened legislation.

In projecting this work, the Author did not intend it to be anything approaching a complete history of Ireland for the period it treats of. His object Avas to cull from the materials before him such historical facts as, on the one hand, Avould serve to show the wily astuteness and unflagging energy Avith which the enemies of the Catholic Faith carried on their work, and on the other, the continuous battle that Av^as Avaged against them — a battle sometimes AA^ell planned and successful — often desultory , ill directed, and ending in disaster, but neA^er abandoned> So that during this lengthened period, Ireland might be correctly described by ^^^(gt^^ressive motto of the

IV

PREFACE.

O’Gradys — VulnePvAtus non Yictus — often defeated but still unsubdued.

As the Author proceeded with his work, he sometimes found it difficult to settle how much of the general history ought to be introduced. As a rule he elected to admit as much of it as the nature of his plan would permit, both for information sake, and to add interest to his narrative. The great leading events have been fully and carefully dealt with, such as the Plantation of Munster and Ulster, the war of 1641, the battles of Benburb and Kathmines, Cromwelhs career in Ireland, the two sieges of Limerick, &c. These were real battles in the military sense, but there were others of a different kind, fought more persistently and with quite as much danger to Catholic Faith, namely, the battles of Legislation, of Education, and of Proselytism : to these the Author has devoted as much space as he had at his command. The trial was long and severe, but the children of God^s Church in Ireland have come out of the fiery furnace, unscathed and triumphant.

The Author begs to tender his grateful thanks to the gentlemen who kindly put this volume through the Press, when he, on account of illness, was unable to give it his attention.

St. Mary's, Maynooth,

1st December j 1886.

CHAPTER I. Page

Introduction — First perverts, Earl of Ossory and Lord Butler — Their immediate promotion — Henry VIII. appoints George Browne Archbishop of Dublin on the death of Archbishop Allen — Staples of Meath (note) — The flag of Ireland the flag of Catholicity— George Browne’s episcopate a failure — His opinion of the Irish people — Staples — Lord Deputy, Leonard Gray — Browne’s complaints to Thomas Cromwell — The King’s contempt for him — His slavish meanness — The Act permitting the clergy to marry — Its spirit and tenor — Eulogium on celibacy — Primate Dowdall — Mary becomes queen — Her government in Ireland — Protestant historians on Mary’s restoration of Catholicity — Henry’s bishops deprived — Lord Deputy Sussex (note) — Henry’s first scruples about his marriage with Catherine (note) — Elizabeth’s accession.

— Persecuting laws — The Irish Parliament of 15|^ — Its constitution— Its terrible enactments — “ Plantation of Munster” — The Earl of Desmond — Frivolous charges brought against him — He is confined in the Tower of London — Anecdote of him (note) — Lord Deputy Sydney — His high-minded conduct in regard to Desmond— Desmond’s vast possessions coveted for an English Plantation— Younger sons of English gentlemen to be undertakers — Irish not to be employed in any capacity — The Plantation not a success — Position of priests — Sydney’s dispatch from Munster to England — Connaught in Elizabeth’s time — Catholics of the Pale — The Geraldines — Fitton — Bingham, . , . 1

CHAPTER 11.

Catholicity in Ulster — Elizabeth’s want of power there — Froude and Hugh O’Neill — Froude’smisrepresentation — Camden’s account — Elizabeth’s great kindness to O’Neill according to Mr. Froude — Falsehood about Hugh O’Neill having been brought up a Protestant at the Court of Elizabeth — His first recorded visit to England was in 1567 — His probable age then — About twenty-seven years — Carew MSS. — Captain Lee’s brief declaration — O’Neill’s conduct when with the Lord Deputy — Captain Lee’s hopes of his conversion — His influence over the Ulster Catholics unimpaired — The young Earl of Desmond’s reception in Munster— Miler Magrath^ (note) — Formidable opposition to Elizabeth at this time — Price, a spy on young Desmond — Great pains taken to make his coming known — The people’s conduct towards him at Cork — His reception at Kilmallock — Immense crowds there — Their indignation at finding he was a Protestant— They hurry away faster than they came — Application of their action to the case of O’Neill — The young Earl of Desmond returned to England and soon died, . , . • ■ • •IT

VI

Chapter III

rage.

The Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy tendered as one This

system produced some two hundred martyrs — the vast majority of whom were priests — Also very many confessors — Many heroic laymen also suffered — Among the martyrs there were fourteen bishops — Examples of the punishments inflicted — Forty-two priests drowned— Bishop O’Haly and Father O’Rourke seized on landing — Brought before Drury, Lord Deputy — Declared boldly their calling and mission — They were racked, their bones being broken with hammers, and needles thrust under their nails — They were hanged upon a tree, where their bodies remained 14 days as targets for the bullet practice of the soldiers — Bishop’s warning to Drury — He dies in a few days at Waterford in great agony— Countess of Desmond — She was a Butler, being daughter of Lord Dunboyne — Lord Deputy Gray — Slaughter at Smerwick, Hov., 1580 — Martyrdom of Father Moore, Oliver Plunket, and William Walsh — Their sufferings — Theirprofession of faith — Martyrdom of Father Daniel O’Nielan at Youghal— Martyrdom of Most Rev. Dr. O’Hurly, Archbishop of Cashel — His arrival in Ireland— Goes to Slane Castle— Chief- Justice Dillon interviews him — The Archbishop flies from Slane Castle — Fleming, Baron of Slane, brought before the Council in Dublin — being “ tepid in faith,” he revealed what he knew of the Archbishop, who was arrested in Carrick-on-Suir and brought back to Dublin, where he was subjected to the most fiendish torments — He is despatched by the Lords- Justices lest his punishment should be mitigated — Relaxation of persecution — Lord Bacon — Mountjoy — The princely policy— Martyrdom of O’Rourke, Prince of Breffnie — Villainy of James I. — O’Rourke’s profession of faith — His desire to be hanged with a gad in the Irish fashion, . 24

Chapter IV

James I. — Expectations of clemency from him disappointed — Catholics too importunate — Penalties for not attending Protestant worship increased — Church-Papists — Protestant Bishop of Cork,

&c., on Lord Barry’s conduct — Ever “ Massing” every where — Horsfall of Ossory — J ustice Saxey — Brouncker banishes priests illegally — Rewards offered for seizing them — The king’s procla,- mation banishing priests — Zeal of the priests according to Sir J. Davys — The Flight of theEarls did not make the Catholics despair — Priests return from abroad — Devotion of Irishwomen to the faith — Fines for absence from Protestant service — The Star Chamber (note) — Appeal against the King’s Proclamation — Chichester’s knavery — New clause added to proclamation — The Dublin Corporation summoned to attend service in Christ’s Church — Heavy fines for not attending — Try to save their property— Prevented by the Star Chamber — Petition from the Catholics — Brouncker’s intemperate zeal checked by the Council — The fines for not appearing at Protestant service actively enforceddn Connaught,' . * . • . . . .33

CONTENTS.

Vll

CHAPTER V. Page

Plantation of Ulster— The dispossessed natives compelled to inhabit certain barren districts — Soldiers planted amongst them to overawe them and observe their movements — Scandalous robbery of the natives — Thewoodkern — The escheated lands over 3,000,000 acres — Derry given to twelve London companies — Fraudulent surveys — Trinity College — Wentworth fines the London companies— The views of J ames and Chichester on Popery in Ireland — The Parliament of 1613— Irish peers’ address to the king — Heads of bills — Creation of forty new boroughs to swamp the constituencies— Immense grants to Chichester — Contention about the Speakership — “Letter of divers Lords of the Pale” — House packed by government officials — Deputation to England — Lord Deputy sends officials beforehand to the king — The Catholics set a subscription on foot to defray the expenses of their deputation, which Chichester suppressed by proclamation — His misrepresentations to the king — Substance of Chichester’s proclamation— The king’s conduct towards the deputation — King sends commissioners to Ireland — A sham commission, the Lord Deputy, who was most inculpated, having been put on it with four others — A report was of course drawn up, which the king having “ well perused and considered,” denounced the Catholic Deputation in a proclamation — Chichester created a Baron with a grant of the whole of Innishowen, O’Doherty’s country — The king at length gives an answer to the Catholic Deputation ; its purport (note) — Chichester recalled — Sir Oliver St. John sent in his place — His government — A continuous persecution of the Catholics — Ruined by continual fines— St. John recalled and made a Viscount— Falkland sent over — Ussher’s sermon at his installation— Proclamation ordering all priests to quit the country in 40 days — James’s plan to plant Leinster and Connaught as he had done Ulster — Artful warrant to Chichester — Leland’s view — Sham investigation — Real reason for seizing land — Forfeitures in Connaught — Barefaced robbery of the people, , . 41

Chapter VI

Irish Court of Wards established by James I. in 1617 — Unconstitutionally, too, for he called it into existence without the consent of Parliament — Its rules and provisions — Constructed to rob the Catholics both of their property and their faith — Persons to whom Wards were assigned (note) — Number of minors disposed of in eight years — Many of them the most important Catholic heirs in the Kingdom — Elizabeth had a similar but less perfect system — George 16th Earl of Kildare, first Protestant Geraldine in Leinster — Two previous members of the family assumed to be Protestants — The eleventh Earl — His appointments under Elizabeth — His will— His trial— Sometimes spoke with suspicious contempt of Papists — Viscount Baltinglass’s letter to the Earl — The Catholic fugitive Geraldine— Educated by (Cardinal Pole — Master of Horse to Cosmo, Duke of Florence — Gomes to England, and marries the Lady Mabel Browne — His Career — viii

CONTENTS.

Page.

His sons Henry and William — Gerald 14tli Earl — His mother an Englishwoman — Fond of putting himself forward as an Englishman to Cecil and the Queen — A perpetual suitor for gifts and preferments — Generally regarded as a Protestant — Curious facts which throw a doubt on this — Grants to him by James I. — Dr. Knox, Bishop of Eaphoe — Sent to tear Catholicity up by the roots — Kildare's speech to the Viceroy — Kildare takes ill at Dublin Castle, believes himself poisoned, rides hurriedly home to Maynooth, sends for a priest, and is dead before morning — O'Daly’s account — Chichester’s letter to Salisbury— Wardship of Kildare’s son — The enchanted Earl —

The fairy Earl — Character of the 16th Earl — Viscount Thurles — His age when made a Ward — King James’s shameless injustice about the Ormonde property (note) — Death of James — Amount of his confiscations — The Kanelaghs (note), . . .57

CHAPTEE VIL

Charles, the third and only surviving son of James L, becomes King — The Irish Catholics unmolested in the beginning of his reign — War with Spain — Lord Deputy Falkland appealed to Irish landowners for funds for the war — They promised to raise what he called for — Two-thirds of the landowners who met the Viceroy were Catholics, and the cry was raised they were going to buy toleration — The Protestant bishops met and drew up what they termed the “ J udgment of divers of the Archbishops, &c.”

— Contents of the document — £120,000 were raised, for which Charles granted fifty- one “Graces,” as those concessions were called — The “ Graces” did not apply exclusively to the Catholics, the majority of them applied to Protestants as well as Catholics — Ussher’s religious liberty — Buying and selling Church Livings — Falkland ordered to summon a Parliament — Suspicious mistake, Parliament not legally convened— Leland’s view— Proclamation against priests — Catholics pay nine-tenths of the subsidies — Persecuting outrage in Cook St., Dublin — Imprisonment of eight Catholic aldermen— 15 Catholic churches and a Catholic college seized — The King approves of it all — The English Privy Council to the Irish Privy Council — Elizabeth’s law against saying Mass — Catholics aroused to a sense of their position — Wentworth, sent to Ireland — The fine of 12d. a Sunday on Catholics for being absent from Protestant service despised by Wentworth — A mere trifle to him — He had higher aims, and was determined to complete the confiscation of the soil of Ireland — Wentworth summons a Parliament — The Catholic element still predominant — His plan for ruling the Parliament —

He put as many dependants of the Crown into Parliament as he could — Wentworth the subservient tool of the King — Meanness and falsehood of both — Wentworth deceives the Parliament — Turns his attention to the planting of Connaught— Ormonde gives his property up to the King— Others do the same — Wentworth goes to Connaught with an imposing retinue — The whole of that Province to be confiscated and planted — Leland — The Connaught proprietors not so facile as Ormonde — Wentworth’s speech at Boyle — Lawyers were heard on both sides — King’s

CONTENTS.

IX

Page.

title found at Boyle — Sligo and Mayo followed the example —

The Galway Grand Jury was not so pliant — They were nearly all Catholics — Besides they hoped for support from the House of Clanrickard — They refused to find for the King — Wentworth became furious, and determined to ruin them, which he was not slow to do — Kot only the jurors but the whole county was punished — J udges openly bribed, . . . .74

Chapter IX

The causes which led to the War of 1641 — Misstatements of Protestant historians — Temple — Clarendon — Carte — Warner — Proclamation against priests — Chichester’s villainy — Approved of by James — Toleration ! — The Protestant Bishop of Raphoe — Articles sent to Chichester — James Hamilton — Bishop Knox again (note) — Report of Commissioners on religion — Sir Oliver St. John succeeds Chichester as Lord Deputy — Citation and punishment of Lord Inchiquin by Lords- Justices — Anderson the priest hunter — Proclamation for bishops, priests, &c., to depart from Ireland within forty days — Another report concerning the state of the Church in Ireland — The English invasion — WarnePs opinion — Roman colonization — English ditto in Ireland — Irish motives for resistance — “Faith and Fatherland '' — Sir Phelim O’Keill — Remonstrance of the Catholics at Trim — Intolerance of the Puritans — Dr. Anderson’s opinion — Proclamation against Recusants — The Covenanters (note) — Catholics influenced by the success of the Puritans — Archbishop Laud — Fearful blasphemy (note) — Leslie takes the field against the King — Enthusiastic conscription throughout Scotland — The Scots cross the border and plunder the two northern counties of England — Charles was obliged to treat with the Scotch rebels at Ripon — The Irish miscalculate their resources — The Rising of 1641 — Restrictions on education — Irish students abroad, . , . , , ,96

Chapter X

Roger O’Moore — Young O’Neill — Sir Richard Plunket — Lord Maguire — Hugh Oge M‘Mahon — Philip O’Reilly — Torlogh O’Neill — First meeting at Roger O’Moore’s lodgings — Hopes and plans — Arrival of Neill O’Neill — Cardinal Richelieu — Death of Don John O’Neill — 23rd Oct., fixed on for the Rising of the Catholics — Resolution to surprise Dublin Castle — Defections — Wonderful secrecy — Owen O’Connolly — The British Officer on O’Connolly— Fosterage (note) — Lord Maguire and O’Connolly in Dublin — O’Connolly goes to the Lord Justice Parsons and turns informer — Great reward to O’Connolly — His end, . 108

Chapter XI

Earlier events of the War — Island Magee — Shooting of Sir Toby Caulfield — Sir Phelim O’Neill’s reverses — Landing of Owen

X

CONTEIsTS.

Page.

Eoe O’Neill — Conduct of the Lords- Justices — The accession of the Palesmen to the Rising — The Rising in Munster and Connaught — Parsons and Borlase — The English Pale — Grievances laid before the King — Fraudulent adjournment of Parliament— Palesmen wait on the Lords- Justices — Their treatment by them — Parliament meets in November — Castlehaven at Maddinstown— Sir Charles Coote — Julianstown — Interview between Palesmen and Native Irish — Temple’s falsehood about Julianstown — Ormonde’s expedition to Naas — Father Higgins -^Ormonde’s expedition northwards — Offered submission by some Palesmen, but did not accept it — JMisrepresentation of this in England — Imprisonment of Lord Dunsany — Persons put to the rack — Rising of Munster — St. Leger — His cruelties — Request of the Munster gentlemen — St. Leger calls them “rebels” — Taking of Cashel — Good treatment of English there by the victorious Irish— Lord Mountgarret — Lords- Justices despise or pretend to despise the defection of the Pale — Connaught — Clanrickard’s terms with Galway not ratified — Willoughby — No submissions to be received, . . .115

Chapter XII

Synod of Kells — Dease of Meath — Congregation at Kilkenny — General Assembly — Oath of Association — Supreme Council —

Seal of the Confederation — Generals appointed for the four Provinces — The King’s difficulties with the Parliamentarians —

Sets up his standard at Nottingham — Preston’s successes — Owen Roe O’Neill — His correspondence with Leslie — Operations in Munster — Note on Leslie — Note on Inchiquin — Inchiquin’s soldiers sicken of fresh meat — Lieut.-Gen. Bourke — Fort of Galway — Bourke, Bishop of Clonfert — Confederation agents abroad — Grievances of the army — King’s cause in England — Battle of Edge Hill — Goodwin and Reynolds — Beginning of Cessation — Commissioners from Confederation — Sharp reply from Supreme Council— Phrase “ Odious Rebellion ” — Supreme Council modify their .first letter — Lords- Justices against Cessation— Ormonde sick — Wins the army — Goes to the Council Chamber — His progress to New Ross — His parley with the • Sovereign of the town — Battle of New Ross — Lord Lisle (note) — Catholic Grievances — Cessation left to Ormonde — Activity of the Confederates at home and abroad — Straits of Inchiquin —

Sir Philip Percival — Clanrickard — Herrings for the army — Clanrickard’s proceedings — Motives for Cessation — State of the Catholic Army — Arrival of Scarampi — Belling’s reasons for Cessation — Scarampi’s reply — Cessation agreed to — Views of the Privy Council — Articles of Cessation signed at Sigginstown, . 161

Chapter XIII

Succours sent to Charles — Defeated at Nantwick — Supreme Council opposed to private persons raising an army for the King — Ormonde made Lord Lieutenant — The four things he was to attend to — Advantages of the Cessation to Charles — His diffi-

CONTENTS.

Page,

culties — The Puritans — Monroe and the Covenant— Covenant taken in spite of the King’s Proclamation against it — Puritan views about it — Violations of the Cessation — Owen O’Neill observes it — English Parliament opposed to it — Dr. Leland’s opinion — Owen O’Connolly’s mission — Difficulties of English Colonels in Ulster — Ulster Protestants and the Covenant — Monroe and New Scots — Their slaughter of Irish peasants — Break the Cessation — Scotch army — Owen O’Neill — Monroe disregards the Cessation— O’Neill in Waterford — Castlehaven goes to Ulster— His ill success there — Fennell does not aid O’Neill— Earl of Antrim — Supreme command offered to and declined by Ormonde — Catholic agents sent to Oxford — The King writes to Ireland for Commissioners — Archbishop Ussher — Protestant (assumed) Deputation — Chief demands of the Catholics — Young Coote — Demands of the particular Protestants — The King in a dilemma — His answer to the Catholics — Matter referred to Ormonde — Most Kev. Dr. Fleming — Ormonde’s Counter Claims — The Irish answer — Unlegalized toleration for Catholics — Ormonde would not declare the Covenanters rebels — He offers to resign — His powers enlarged — Wardships restricted — Personal favours to Ormonde — Custodiums — Ormonde persists in calling the Catholics rebels — Captain S wanly — Lady Alice Moore— Young Lord Moore — George Stroude — The King’s absurd concessions to Moore — Monroe and Ormonde — Clanrickard— Irish would not go to Scotland — The Peace — It falls through — Ormonde’s demands, . 200

Chapter XIV

Glamorgan’s mission — Failure of Charles’splans— Ormonde — Reasons of Glamorgan’s mission— Ormonde’s religious declaration— Glamorgan’s powers — Charles’s double dealing — Glamorgan — Treaty with the Catholics — Declaration of General Assembly — Rinuccini, the Pope’s Nuncio, arrives — Delivers his views — Discovery of the secret treaty — How 1— Sent to the English Parliament — Charge of Treason preferred against Glamorgan by Lord Digby — He is imprisoned — Action of the Supreme Council — Fatal delays — Digby’s real motive (note) — His character — The Parliament complains that Irish rebels had been brought over to England and Scotland— The King disavows Glamorgan — Sir Thomas Fairfax — Padstow — Discovery of letters at — Ormonde — Digby — Lord Muskerry — N. Plunket — Glamorgan’s titles — King’s letter to Ormonde — Ditto — Dr. Lingard’s view — Glamorgan — Treaty agreed to at Rome — The Queen agrees to the Roman treaty, and why ? — The General Assembly accepts Ormonde’s peace, although opposed by the Nuncio — Its provisions and chief objects, ........ 224

Chapter XV

The Peace of forty-six — Published on 29th July — Ormonde’s policy— Ormonde’s power in the Supreme Council — Meeting of prelates at Waterford — Oath of Association discussed there — Commissioners’ apparent neglect of instructions — Ormonde’s great error — Glamorgan’s mission — The peace condemned — The reasons —

Xll

CONTENTS.

Battle of Benburb — Numbers engaged — Carte’s misstatements about Monroe’s advance — Authorities contradicting it — Monroe’s generalship at Benburb — The Nuncio calls O’Neill south — Ormonde in danger — Carte’s astounding assertion — Ormonde opens negotiations with the Parliament — Dissolution of the old Supreme Council — Jealousies of generals — Battle of Dungan’s hill — The attempt on Dublin — The Nuncio proceeds to Kilkea Castle — Father R. Nugent — The Countess of Kildare — The Confederate armies at Lucan and Leixlip — Clanrickard’s peace — The mysterious messenger — O’Neill retires into Meath — Preston’s prevarications — Ormonde moves into Westmeath and Longford to subsist his army — His agreement with the Parliament Commissioners— Addendum to concessions offered to the Catholics — Sacrifices of families — Ormonde’s treatment by the Parliamentary Commissioners — He is compelled to leave Dublin Castle before the appointed time — He commissioned others to give up the regalia — Bellings’ unsustained assertion about the King’s order to Ormonde — Ormonde’s habit of avoiding the King’s orders — He tells him to make peace with the Irish at any cost — Supposed letter of Charles from Newcastle — EpLcopalianism abolished in Dublin by the Parliament’s Commissioners — Ormonde’s treatment after arriving in England — Is obliged to go to France — Nuncio’s report on the state of the kingdom —

— Inchiquin’s butcheries at Cashel — Taaffe’s inaction — Correspondence of Ormonde with Inchiquin — Taaffe at Knocknaness (note) — Ormonde goes to France — His diplomatic skill — His hatred of the Catholics, and its cause — His hatred of the Nuncio and O’Neill — His mode of dealing with the Catholics — Thoughts of a foreign protectorate — Embassies sent — The Nuncio’s view — Ormonde’s view — Swamping of the General Assembly — The Embassy to France, how managed — Ormonde’s advice to the Queen — Preston and Taaffe’s instructions— The Nuncio and O’Neill — The Cessation with Inchiquin — His treatment of the Assembly — Nuncio’s reasons against the truce with Inchiquin — Reply of the Supreme Council — Truce made with Inchiquin — The Nuncio privately leaves Kilkenny — He publishes an Interdict and Excommunication — Appeal against them — Taaffe and Clanrickard’s expedition — The Nuncio goes to Galway — Preston marches against O’Neill — The assembling of a Synod prevented — O’Neill proclaimed a rebel — Charges against the Nuncio — He sails from Galway — His character— The spirit of the historians of 1641 — Borlase — Abbizzi’s letter — Removal of the censures delayed, . , . 240

Chapter XVI

Ormonde returns to Ireland — Proceeds to Carrick' Castle — He brings but a small sum of money to pay the troops — Pretended he brought drafts on various merchants — The army becomes discontented — Inchiquin is alarmed and sends for Ormonde — Report of Mr. Fanshaw coming with supplies — Ormonde goes to Kilkenny — Enters it in regal splendour — Is enthroned in the Castle — ^Declares the Confederation dissolved — Remonstrance of the English army — Its effect in Ireland — Execution of the King.

CONTENTS.

Xlll

— The Prince proclaimed King as Charles 11. by Ormonde in such towns as owned his sway — Overtures to O’Neill — O’Neill’s difficulties — Deserted by more than half his army and their commanders— Reply to Ormonde — His demands — Ormonde willing to grant them, but the Commissioners were against them, and no terms were come to — O’Neill concludes a truce with Monk — Inchiquin before Dundalk — Monk’s soldiers desert him — Colonel Trevor gets bargains — Monk summoned to London, where he was censured — Junction of the Confederate army with Ormonde’s — Reinforcements sent to J ones — Cromwell coming — Lord Dillon of Costello at Finglas — Rathmines taken — Baggotrath — Purcell sets out to fortify it — Ormonde went early next morning to see it — Little or nothing had been done — He went back to hed-—E.Q was soon aroused — Mounts his horse to ride towards Baggotrath, but meets Purcell’s men flying towards him — Ormonde’s men fled also — It was a route and a slaughter — The Irish were of opinion that Ormonde had a secret understanding with the Parliament, his overthrow was so complete — Jones’s feelings — The killed, wounded, and prisoners — Numbers engaged — Purcell and his party — The Irish blamed — No cause for it — Purcell’s negligence — Carte and Cox — The English officer — State of Ormonde’s camp — O’Neill’s opinion of Ormonde’s army — ■ Ormonde at Ballysonan — Ormonde’s lies — Coote at Derry — O’Neill and Coote — O’Neill takes ill before Derry — His death — Supposed to be poisoned — He comes to terms with Ormonde, but too late — His character as a general, a Catholic and a patriot, 289

Chapter XVII

Cromwell — Different opinions about his character — His idea that he had a mission — His early life — His family — His education — The time of his call — He pays ship money — Drainage of the Fens — Description of him by Sir Philip Warwick — Carlyle’s commentary on it — He joins the Independents in the House of Commons — Seeks popularity with the army — Pride’s Purge — His assumption that he was specially guided by God — His occasional mildness and apparent timidity — He opens the King’s coffin — Turns tyrant — Dismisses the Long Parliament — His

Eious sorrow for having been obliged to do so — Description of im as he then was — Preaching and praying — Burnet’s opinion of him — Reticent about his own views, but always trying to sound others — Had the gift of tears — Moves the House of Commons by them — Is compared to Joel, Samson and David — Brings the army to London — Forty-seven members imprisoned and ninety-six excluded from the House — This was called Pride’s Purge — The principles of Cromwell and his party — His ambition — ■ Opposition to it — Fairfax — London opposed to Cromwell’s ambition — Colonel Jephson’s motion — The instrument of government— Sir Christopher Pack’s motion — Lambert and Desborough against kingship — Cromwell tries to win them to his views in vain — The army opposed to them — Being foiled, he refuses the title of King — His spy system — Examples of it — Made England respected abroad — The Dutch ambassador’s opinion of him — Striking announcement of his daughter’s marriage in Court