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following reflections of Moryson are a clear illustration of this, and the truth of them is but too strongly felt even in our own times."These undertakers did not people their seignories, granted them and their heirs by patent (as they were bound), with well affected English, but either sold them to English Papists (such as were most turbulent, and so being daily troubled and questioned by the English magistrates, were likely to give the most money for the Irish land); neither did they build castles, and do other things (according to their covenants) for the public good, but only sought their private ends, and so this her Majesty's bounty to them turned not to the strengthening, but rather to the weakening of the English government in that province of Munster.*" Moryson further observes, " and to speak the truth, Munster undertakers above mentioned, were in great part cause of this defection, and of their own fatal miseries. For whereas 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 best men of quality never came over, but made profit of the land; others brought over no more English than their own families, and all entertained Irish servants and tenants, who were now the first to betray themt." It is observable, that the leading features of all the rebellions in Ireland, since the beginning of Elizabeth's reign, have been the same. 1641 the Popish servants and tenants betrayed their Protestant masters; they did so in 1689, and their treachery was notorious in 1798.Moryson tells us, that " the rebels in Munster had taken a solemn oath at the public cross in that province, to be stedfast in rebellion $." In the year 1644, the confederate Catholics assembled at Kilkenny, prescribed an oath of association §, and the Popish priests were ordered to exhibit it to their flocks. The same took place in 1689; and it is well known that the black, or bloody oath, enjoining the extirpation of heretics, was taken in, and previous to the year 1798. The Popish priests were the chief instigators in these rebellions, during which the foreign enemies of the empire were invited to assist the natives in separating Ireland from England; oaths of allegiance were uniformly disregarded, as much as in the year 1798, because, by the fundamental principles of their religion, enjoined by their general councils, they are considered as null and void, when taken to a Pro

testant state.

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Notwithstanding the forbearance of the English government, and the singular clemency which the natives experienced during this tebellion, raised by the Fitzgeralds, Mr. Plowden, with his usual acrimony against the Protestant state, makes the following observations" From this time is to be dated the commencement of that unparalleled system of confiscation and depopulation, which being in its nature

► Moryson, page 5. Borlase, p. 127 to 129.

+ Ibid, 26.

‡ Page 33.

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diametrically opposite from that of union *, pointedly marks the evils which so long afflicted Ireland, from the want of this salutary measure. In order to extirpate the aboriginal owners of the soil, transpose the property, and alter the very face of the country, Elizabeth now entered on her favourite scheme of planting and re-peopling Munster with an English colony." "Whether in this (as in more recent instances) the system of mildness, or that of rigour, were ultimately more conducive to the welfare of the state, will ever be controverted by the respective advocates for moderation or terrorism."

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The third great rebellion in Elizabeth's reign was raised in the year 1595, by Hugh O'Neal, spurious son of Matthew O'Neal, Baron of Dungannon, and nephew of Shane, or John O'Neal, the traitor. He entered, at an early period of life, into the service of government as an officer; and had acquired polished manners by an English education. By his insinuating manners, and his flattery of the Queen, he prevailed on her to confer on him the family estate and the title of Tyrone. Under the mask of gratitude and loyalty, he harboured inveterate hatred and treasonable designs against the government; and the following artifice enabled him to carry them into practice. He insidiously offered to maintain a body of troops in his province, to preserve the peace, and prevent insurrections; and, bis offer having been incautiously accepted, he by changing them often instructed great numbers of his adherents in military discipline, with a view of making them subservient to his traiterous purposes.

Such was his hypocrisy, that after he had embarked in rebellion, and had sent missionaries to Spain for assistance, he made the warmest assurances of loyalty; he wrote letters to the Earl of Kildare to seduce him from his allegiance, and to solicit his co-operation. This rebellion, which lasted till the year 1602, laid waste and depopulated a great part of the North, and at last occasioned much carnage and desolation in the province of Munster; of which Fynes Moryson, sceretary to Lord Mountjoy, Lord Deputy of Ireland, gives in various parts of his Itinerary a woeful description. In speaking of the county of Tyrone he says, "having with our eyes daily seen the lamentable estate of the countrie, wherein we found every where men dead of famine, insomuch that O'Hagan protested unto us, that between Tullogh Oge and Toome, there lay unburied a thousand dead; and that since our first drawing this year to Black water, there were about 3000 starved

* Mr. Plowden acknowledges, in his Postliminous Preface, that he was paid by the Minister of England to write such a history as would reconcile the Irish to the Union, and attach them to the British nation. But as he has done the reverse, by endeavouring to inflame and exaspe. rate the Irish against them, by giving a false and exaggerated statement of their sufferings from the tyranny and cruelty of the English government, it is believed, and not doubted, but that he has received higher wages from very different masters.

in Tyrone. And sure the poor people of these parts never yet had the means to know God, or to acknowledge any other sovereign than the O'Neals, which makes me more commiserate them, and hope better of them hereafter *"

In the progress of this rebellion, the conduct of this arch-traitor Tyrone exhibited dreadful proofs of perfidy, aggravated by perjury: for he obtained pardon no less than five times, in consequence of having submitted and taken oaths of allegiance, which he never hesitated to violate; and he constantly amused government with propositions for truces and armistices, to which he never adhered. The reader may judge of the baseness of this traitor, from the following instance of his treachery. In the year 1593 he solicited pardon, with that degree of humility which indicated sincere contrition, and it was granted to him in the most solemn manner under the great seal. Soon after he attacked the English at Black water unawares, when they were lulled into a supine and fatal security, and killed 1500 soldiers, and thirteen valiant officers, with. Sir Henry Bagnall, the Marshal who commanded them; and Moryson observes, that " many of them were of the old companies, which had served in Brittany under General Norris t." Many such instances of his perfidy occurred. The mistaken lenity of government, occasioned by the credulity of the Queen, in placing any reliance on the feigned repentance and dutiful submission of rebels, was the real cause that this destructive rebellion was not sooner put an end to. Besides the following observation, Moryson frequently mentions this, in his very excellent work, and he was an eye witness of it. "Lastly, the rebellion was nourished and increased, by nothing more than frequent protections and pardons, granted even to those who had formerly abused this mercy, so as all entered and continued to be rebels, with assurance to be received to mercy at their pleasure, whereof they spared not to brag, and this heartened the rebel, no less than it discouraged the subject ‡." The Queen was so sensible of this, and enraged at the perfidious conduct of the native Irish in abusing the royal mercy, that she at last said, in a letter to Mountjoy, " by nourishing the Irish who are snakes in our bosom, whilst we hold them, and when they are out, do convert upon ourselves, the experience and strength they have gotten by our making them to be soldiers. We find it now grown to a common opinion, that it is as good to be a rebel as a subject §." Moryson, in speaking of Sir Richard Bingham, governor of Connaught, says, "howsoever, himself very well experienced in the country, and those who best understood the Irish nature, found nothing so necessary for keeping them in obedience as severity, nor so dangerous for the increase of murders and outrages, as indulgence towards them ||."

It appears that Tyrone, during his delusive assurances of loyalty,

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* Folio edition of 1617, p. 237.

+ Moryson, p. 24, 25.

‡ Folio edition, p. 13. § Moryson, p. 56. 1 Ibid. p. 17.

constantly

constantly kept an agent in Spain to negotiate for succours*. Two invasions of the Spaniards took place in the course of this rebellion, one consisting of 6000 men at Kinsale, under Don John d'Aquila †, who were joined by Tyrone, O'Donnel, and all the strength of the Irish I. Previous to this two ships arrived from Spain with arms and ammunition, and conveying many priests, who gave assurances of immediate succours. One of them, who called himself the Pope's Legate, Ambassador from Spain, and Archbishop of Dublin, said, that he was content to suffer death if he did not preach in Dublin before Michaelmas-day §. The following incidents prove that religious bigotry was the chief spring of action in this rebellion. Many of the Irish having submitted and solicited pardon, sent to Rome for dispensations for having done so ||. After the landing of the Spaniards, a friar, dressed as a soldier, passed through Clonmell and Waterford, " having bulls from the Pope, with indulgences to those who should aid the Spaniards (sent by the Catholic King to give the Irish liberty from the English tyranny, and the exercise of the true old apostolic religion), and authority to excommunicate those that should, by letters, plots, or in person, joyn with her Majesty, whom the Pope had excommunicated, and thereby absolved all her subjects from their oath 'of allegiance ."

The Pope's Nuncio was killed at Carbery, at the head of a body of rebels **. Moryson observes, " the foresaid priest was a man of special authority, and had power over all spiritual livings in Ireland, so as upon his death the M'Carthys, and all Carbery, submitted to mercy." This incontestibly proves that this fanatic was the firebrand of rebellion. The Lords of the Pale were wavering, and their fidelity depended on the success of the English arms. The Lords Mountgarret and Cahir were active rebels, and so was Lord Rock ††. The two last submitted and received pardon, but afterwards rebelled.

M'Guire and M'Mahon raised a great rebellion in Connaught, in the year 1594, to which they were incited by Guaranus, a priest, appointed Primate of all Ireland by the Pope, and who predicted their success; but they were defeated by Sir Richard Bingham §§.

Moryson, page 206, tells us, that Lord Mountjoy wrote to the Lords in England the 24th of May, 1601, that the O'Driscals, O'Donovans, and some of the McCarthys, became odious to the rebels in general, for having come in and submitted.

Sir George Carew, Lord President of Munster in the year 1602, signified his fears to Lord Mountjoy, that a general defection would take place on the landing of the Spaniards, because such rebels as sought mercy with all humility, and with a promise of meriting it

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by future services, "now since the Spanish ship arrived *, were grown proud (calling the King of Spain their king, and their ceasing from rebellion, to be the betraying of their King and the Catholic cause) yea, fell nothing from their insolence, though they had been sometimes beaten by him †." In another letter, he says, should the Spaniards land in Ireland, from the general disaffection which prevailed, " it will then be no longer the war of Ireland, but the war of England in Ireland, to the infinite danger of both, which we beseech you give us leave still to remember you of $." Lord Mountjoy says, "that the Spaniards, relying on the disaffection of the Irish, would upon their revolt, and with their assistance, invade England from Ireland §." The following adage has been many centuries adopted in Ireland, and regarded as a prophecy which must be fulfilled, by the bigotted Irish, as it has been justly considered the most vulnerable part of the empire:

"He that will England win,
Must with Ireland first begin ||."

That arch traitor Tyrone, when his country was exhausted and laid waste, when he was deserted by his followers, and he had no longer the means of continuing in rebellion, solicited the royal mercy, and obtained it in the year 1603. He and Roderick O'Donnel, who also had been an active and inveterate rebel, were graciously received by James I. who conferred the earldom of Tyrconnel on the latter.It is most certain that he received his pardon from the Queen, though Mr. Plowden, with his usual inaccuracy, asserts the contrary; for it appears that he solicited pardon in the month of March 1602, and again in December, in consequence of which Mountjoy granted him a safe conduct, dated the 24th of March, 1602**. In the month of March, 1603, he received letters from the Queen, of the 16th and 17th of February, authorizing him to pardon him; and she did not die till the 24th of March ††.

When Tyrone attended Mountjoy to London, in order to inake his submission to James I. he was in inany places grossly insulted; and when on his return to Ireland, he was in such imminent danger, from the indignation of those, whose relations had fallen by his treachery and rebellious spirit in Ireland, that the sheriffs were obliged to attend him from place to place with troops of horse, till he embarked for Ireland ‡‡.

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* This alluded to a ship which arrived with arms, ammunition and money at Ardea, to the Munster rebels.

+ Moryson, p. 225. Ibid. p. 227. § Ibid. p. 136. || Ibid. p. 3. 1 In a letter to the King of Spain he made an apology for submitting, saying, that "he had continued in action till all his nearest kinsmen and followers had forsaken him." Moryson, p. 281. ** Ibid. p. 278. ++ Ibid. p. 282. ‡‡ Ibid. p. 296.

NO, XCIV. VOL. XXIV,

D

Mr.

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