No More Learning

Or if any prince should so strangely misapprehend the nature of the
contract between him and his subjects, any divine, any lawyer, to whose
advice he may have recourse, will set his mind at ease. But if this
rider should pass, it will be impossible to deny that the coronation
oath is meant to prevent the King from giving his assent to bills which
may be presented to him by the Lords and Commons; and the most serious
inconvenience may follow. These arguments were felt to be unanswerable,
and the proviso was rejected without a division, [100]

Every person who has read these debates must be fully convinced that the
statesmen who framed the coronation oath did not mean to bind the King
in his legislative capacity, [101] Unhappily, more than a hundred
years later, a scruple, which those statesmen thought too absurd to be
seriously entertained by any human being, found its way into a mind,
honest, indeed, and religious, but narrow and obstinate by nature, and
at once debilitated and excited by disease. Seldom, indeed, have the
ambition and perfidy of tyrants produced evils greater than those
which were brought on our country by that fatal conscientiousness. A
conjuncture singularly auspicious, a conjuncture at which wisdom and
justice might perhaps have reconciled races and sects long hostile,
and might have made the British islands one truly United Kingdom, was
suffered to pass away. The opportunity, once lost, returned no more. Two
generations of public men have since laboured with imperfect success
to repair the error which was then committed; nor is it improbable that
some of the penalties of that error may continue to afflict a remote
posterity.

The Bill by which the oath was settled passed the Upper House without
amendment. All the preparations were complete; and, on the eleventh
of April, the coronation took place. In some things it differed from
ordinary coronations. The representatives of the people attended the
ceremony in a body, and were sumptuously feasted in the Exchequer
Chamber. Mary, being not merely Queen Consort, but also Queen Regnant,
was inaugurated in all things like a King, was girt with the sword,
lifted up into the throne, and presented with the Bible, the spurs, and
the orb. Of the temporal grandees of the realm, and of their wives and
daughters, the muster was great and splendid. None could be surprised
that the Whig aristocracy should swell the triumph of Whig principles.
But the Jacobites saw, with concern, that many Lords who had voted for a
Regency bore a conspicuous part in the ceremonial. The King's crown
was carried by Grafton, the Queen's by Somerset. The pointed sword,
emblematical of temporal justice, was borne by Pembroke. Ormond was Lord
High Constable for the day, and rode up the Hall on the right hand
of the hereditary champion, who thrice flung down his glove on the
pavement, and thrice defied to mortal combat the false traitor who
should gainsay the title of William and Mary. Among the noble damsels
who supported the gorgeous train of the Queen was her beautiful and
gentle cousin, the Lady Henrietta Hyde, whose father, Rochester, had
to the last contended against the resolution which declared the throne
vacant, [102] The show of Bishops, indeed, was scanty. The Primate did
not make his appearance; and his place was supplied by Compton. On one
side of Compton, the paten was carried by Lloyd, Bishop of Saint Asaph,
eminent among the seven confessors of the preceding year. On the
other side, Sprat, Bishop of Rochester, lately a member of the High
Commission, had charge of the chalice. Burnet, the junior prelate,
preached with all his wonted ability, and more than his wonted taste
and judgment. His grave and eloquent discourse was polluted neither by
adulation nor by malignity. He is said to have been greatly applauded;
and it may well be believed that the animated peroration in which he
implored heaven to bless the royal pair with long life and mutual love,
with obedient subjects, wise counsellors, and faithful allies, with
gallant fleets and armies, with victory, with peace, and finally with
crowns more glorious and more durable than those which then glittered
on the altar of the Abbey, drew forth the loudest hums of the Commons,
[103]

On the whole the ceremony went off well, and produced something like
a revival, faint, indeed, and transient, of the enthusiasm of the
preceding December. The day was, in London and in many other places, a
day of general rejoicing. The churches were filled in the morning: the
afternoon was spent in sport and carousing; and at night bonfires were
lighted, rockets discharged, and windows lighted up. The Jacobites
however contrived to discover or to invent abundant matter for
scurrility and sarcasm. They complained bitterly, that the way from the
hall to the western door of the Abbey had been lined by Dutch soldiers.
Was it seemly that an English king should enter into the most solemn
of engagements with the English nation behind a triple hedge of foreign
swords and bayonets? Little affrays, such as, at every great pageant,
almost inevitably take place between those who are eager to see the show
and those whose business it is to keep the communications clear,
were exaggerated with all the artifices of rhetoric. One of the alien
mercenaries had backed his horse against an honest citizen who pressed
forward to catch a glimpse of the royal canopy. Another had rudely
pushed back a woman with the but end of his musket. On such grounds as
these the strangers were compared to those Lord Danes whose insolence,
in the old time, had provoked the Anglo-saxon population to insurrection
and massacre. But there was no more fertile theme for censure than
the coronation medal, which really was absurd in design and mean in
execution. A chariot appeared conspicuous on the reverse; and plain
people were at a loss to understand what this emblem had to do with
William and Mary. The disaffected wits solved the difficulty by
suggesting that the artist meant to allude to that chariot which a
Roman princess, lost to all filial affection, and blindly devoted to the
interests of an ambitious husband, drove over the still warm remains of
her father, [104]

Honours were, as usual, liberally bestowed at this festive season. Three
garters which happened to be at the disposal of the Crown were given
to Devonshire, Ormond, and Schomberg. Prince George was created Duke of
Cumberland. Several eminent men took new appellations by which they
must henceforth be designated. Danby became Marquess of Caermarthen,
Churchill Earl of Marlborough, and Bentinck Earl of Portland. Mordaunt
was made Earl of Monmouth, not without some murmuring on the part of old
Exclusionists, who still remembered with fondness their Protestant Duke,
and who had hoped that his attainder would be reversed, and that his
title would be borne by his descendants. It was remarked that the name
of Halifax did not appear in the list of promotions. None could doubt
that he might easily have obtained either a blue riband or a ducal
coronet; and, though he was honourably distinguished from most of his
contemporaries by his scorn of illicit gain, it was well known that he
desired honorary distinctions with a greediness of which he was himself
ashamed, and which was unworthy of his fine understanding. The truth is
that his ambition was at this time chilled by his fears. To those whom
he trusted he hinted his apprehensions that evil times were at hand.
The King's life was not worth a year's purchase: the government was
disjointed, the clergy and the army disaffected, the parliament torn
by factions: civil war was already raging in one part of the empire:
foreign war was impending. At such a moment a minister, whether Whig
or Tory, might well be uneasy; but neither Whig nor Tory had so much to
fear as the Trimmer, who might not improbably find himself the common
mark at which both parties would take aim. For these reasons Halifax
determined to avoid all ostentation of power and influence, to disarm
envy by a studied show of moderation, and to attach to himself by
civilities and benefits persons whose gratitude might be useful in the
event of a counterrevolution. The next three months, he said, would
be the time of trial. If the government got safe through the summer it
would probably stand, [105]

Meanwhile questions of external policy were every day becoming more
and more important. The work at which William had toiled indefatigably
during many gloomy and anxious years was at length accomplished. The
great coalition was formed. It was plain that a desperate conflict was
at hand. The oppressor of Europe would have to defend himself against
England allied with Charles the Second King of Spain, with the Emperor
Leopold, and with the Germanic and Batavian federations, and was likely
to have no ally except the Sultan, who was waging war against the House
of Austria on the Danube.

Lewis had, towards the close of the preceding year, taken his enemies at
a disadvantage, and had struck the first blow before they were prepared
to parry it. But that blow, though heavy, was not aimed at the part
where it might have been mortal. Had hostilities been commenced on
the Batavian frontier, William and his army would probably have been
detained on the continent, and James might have continued to govern
England. Happily, Lewis, under an infatuation which many pious
Protestants confidently ascribed to the righteous judgment of God,
had neglected the point on which the fate of the whole civilised world
depended, and had made a great display of power, promptitude, and
energy, in a quarter where the most splendid achievements could produce
nothing more than an illumination and a Te Deum. A French army under
the command of Marshal Duras had invaded the Palatinate and some of the
neighbouring principalities. But this expedition, though it had been
completely successful, and though the skill and vigour with which it
had been conducted had excited general admiration, could not perceptibly
affect the event of the tremendous struggle which was approaching.
France would soon be attacked on every side. It would be impossible for
Duras long to retain possession of the provinces which he had surprised
and overrun. An atrocious thought rose in the mind of Louvois, who,
in military affairs, had the chief sway at Versailles. He was a man
distinguished by zeal for what he thought the public interests, by
capacity, and by knowledge of all that related to the administration
of war, but of a savage and obdurate nature. If the cities of the
Palatinate could not be retained, they might be destroyed. If the soil
of the Palatinate was not to furnish supplies to the French, it might be
so wasted that it would at least furnish no supplies to the Germans. The
ironhearted statesman submitted his plan, probably with much management
and with some disguise, to Lewis; and Lewis, in an evil hour for his
fame, assented. Duras received orders to turn one of the fairest regions
of Europe into a wilderness. Fifteen years earlier Turenne had ravaged
part of that fine country. But the ravages committed by Turenne, though
they have left a deep stain on his glory, were mere sport in comparison
with the horrors of this second devastation. The French commander
announced to near half a million of human beings that he granted them
three days of grace, and that, within that time, they must shift for
themselves. Soon the roads and fields, which then lay deep in snow, were
blackened by innumerable multitudes of men, women, and children flying
from their homes. Many died of cold and hunger: but enough survived
to fill the streets of all the cities of Europe with lean and squalid
beggars, who had once been thriving farmers and shopkeepers.
Meanwhile the work of destruction began. The flames went up from every
marketplace, every hamlet, every parish church, every country seat,
within the devoted provinces. The fields where the corn had been sown
were ploughed up. The orchards were hewn down. No promise of a harvest
was left on the fertile plains near what had once been Frankenthal. Not
a vine, not an almond tree, was to be seen on the slopes of the sunny
hills round what had once been Heidelberg. No respect was shown to
palaces, to temples, to monasteries, to infirmaries, to beautiful works
of art, to monuments of the illustrious dead. The farfamed castle of the
Elector Palatine was turned into a heap of ruins. The adjoining hospital
was sacked. The provisions, the medicines, the pallets on which the sick
lay were destroyed. The very stones of which Mannheim had been built
were flung into the Rhine. The magnificent Cathedral of Spires perished,
and with it the marble sepulchres of eight Caesars. The coffins were
broken open. The ashes were scattered to the winds, [106] Treves,
with its fair bridge, its Roman amphitheatre, its venerable churches,
convents, and colleges, was doomed to the same fate. But, before this
last crime had been perpetrated, Lewis was recalled to a better mind
by the execrations of all the neighbouring nations, by the silence and
confusion of his flatterers, and by the expostulations of his wife. He
had been more than two years secretly married to Frances de Maintenon,
the governess of his natural children. It would be hard to name any
woman who, with so little romance in her temper, has had so much in
her life. Her early years had been passed in poverty and obscurity.
Her first husband had supported himself by writing burlesque farces
and poems. When she attracted the notice of her sovereign, she could no
longer boast of youth or beauty: but she possessed in an extraordinary
degree those more lasting charms, which men of sense, whose passions
age has tamed, and whose life is a life of business and care, prize most
highly in a female companion. Her character was such as has been well
compared to that soft green on which the eye, wearied by warm tints
and glaring lights, reposes with pleasure. A just understanding;
an inexhaustible yet never redundant flow of rational, gentle, and
sprightly conversation; a temper of which the serenity was never for a
moment ruffled, a tact which surpassed the tact of her sex as much as
the tact of her sex surpasses the tact of ours; such were the qualities
which made the widow of a buffoon first the confidential friend, and
then the spouse, of the proudest and most powerful of European kings. It
was said that Lewis had been with difficulty prevented by the arguments
and vehement entreaties of Louvois from declaring her Queen of France.
It is certain that she regarded Louvois as her enemy. Her hatred of him,
cooperating perhaps with better feelings, induced her to plead the cause
of the unhappy people of the Rhine. She appealed to those sentiments of
compassion which, though weakened by many corrupting influences, were
not altogether extinct in her husband's mind, and to those sentiments of
religion which had too often impelled him to cruelty, but which, on the
present occasion, were on the side of humanity. He relented: and Treves
was spared, [107] In truth he could hardly fail to perceive that he had
committed a great error. The devastation of the Palatinate, while it
had not in any sensible degree lessened the power of his enemies, had
inflamed their animosity, and had furnished them with inexhaustible
matter for invective. The cry of vengeance rose on every side. Whatever
scruple either branch of the House of Austria might have felt about
coalescing with Protestants was completely removed. Lewis accused
the Emperor and the Catholic King of having betrayed the cause of the
Church; of having allied themselves with an usurper who was the avowed
champion of the great schism; of having been accessary to the foul wrong
done to a lawful sovereign who was guilty of no crime but zeal for the
true religion. James sent to Vienna and Madrid piteous letters, in which
he recounted his misfortunes, and implored the assistance of his brother
kings, his brothers also in the faith, against the unnatural children
and the rebellious subjects who had driven him into exile. But there was
little difficulty in framing a plausible answer both to the reproaches
of Lewis and to the supplications of James. Leopold and Charles declared
that they had not, even for purposes of just selfdefence, leagued
themselves with heretics, till their enemy had, for purposes of unjust
aggression, leagued himself with Mahometans. Nor was this the worst.
The French King, not content with assisting the Moslem against the
Christians, was himself treating Christians with a barbarity which would
have shocked the very Moslem. His infidel allies, to do them justice,
had not perpetrated on the Danube such outrages against the edifices
and the members of the Holy Catholic Church as he who called himself
the eldest son of that Church was perpetrating on the Rhine. On these
grounds, the princes to whom James had appealed replied by appealing,
with many professions of good will and compassion, to himself. He was
surely too just to blame them for thinking that it was their first
duty to defend their own people against such outrages as had turned
the Palatinate into a desert, or for calling in the aid of Protestants
against an enemy who had not scrupled to call in the aid of the Turks,
[108]

During the winter and the earlier part of the spring, the powers hostile
to France were gathering their strength for a great effort, and were
in constant communication with one another. As the season for military
operations approached, the solemn appeals of injured nations to the God
of battles came forth in rapid succession. The manifesto of the Germanic
body appeared in February; that of the States General in March; that of
the House of Brandenburg in April; and that of Spain in May, [109]

Here, as soon as the ceremony of the coronation was over, the House of
Commons determined to take into consideration the late proceedings
of the French king, [110] In the debate, that hatred of the powerful,
unscrupulous and imperious Lewis, which had, during twenty years of
vassalage, festered in the hearts of Englishmen, broke violently forth.
He was called the most Christian Turk, the most Christian ravager
of Christendom, the most Christian barbarian who had perpetrated on
Christians outrages of which his infidel allies would have been ashamed,
[111] A committee, consisting chiefly of ardent Whigs, was appointed to
prepare an address. John Hampden, the most ardent Whig among them,
was put into the chair; and he produced a composition too long, too
rhetorical, and too vituperative to suit the lips of the Speaker or the
ears of the King. Invectives against Lewis might perhaps, in the temper
in which the House then was, have passed without censure, if they
had not been accompanied by severe reflections on the character and
administration of Charles the Second, whose memory, in spite of all his
faults, was affectionately cherished by the Tories. There were some
very intelligible allusions to Charles's dealings with the Court of
Versailles, and to the foreign woman whom that Court had sent to lie
like a snake in his bosom. The House was with good reason dissatisfied.
The address was recommitted, and, having been made more concise, and
less declamatory and acrimonious, was approved and presented, [112]
William's attention was called to the wrongs which France had done to
him and to his kingdom; and he was assured that, whenever he should
resort to arms for the redress of those wrongs, he should be heartily
supported by his people. He thanked the Commons warmly. Ambition, he
said, should never induce him to draw the sword: but he had no choice:
France had already attacked England; and it was necessary to exercise
the right of selfdefence. A few days later war was proclaimed, [113]

Of the grounds of quarrel alleged by the Commons in their address, and
by the King in his manifesto, the most serious was the interference
of Lewis in the affairs of Ireland. In that country great events had,
during several months, followed one another in rapid succession. Of
those events it is now time to relate the history, a history dark with
crime and sorrow, yet full of interest and instruction.




CHAPTER XII

State of Ireland at the Time of the Revolution; the Civil Power in the
Hands of the Roman Catholics--The Military Power in the Hands of the
Roman Catholics--Mutual Enmity between the Englishry and
Irishry--Panic among the Englishry--History of the Town of
Kenmare--Enniskillen--Londonderry--Closing of the Gates of
Londonderry--Mountjoy sent to pacify Ulster--William opens a Negotiation
with Tyrconnel--The Temples consulted--Richard Hamilton sent to Ireland
on his Parole--Tyrconnel sends Mountjoy and Rice to France--Tyrconnel
calls the Irish People to Arms--Devastation of the Country--The
Protestants in the South unable to resist--Enniskillen and Londonderry
hold out; Richard Hamilton marches into Ulster with an Army--James
determines to go to Ireland--Assistance furnished by Lewis to
James--Choice of a French Ambassador to accompany James--The Count of
Avaux--James lands at Kinsale--James enters Cork--Journey of James from
Cork to Dublin--Discontent in England--Factions at Dublin Castle--James
determines to go to Ulster--Journey of James to Ulster--The Fall of
Londonderry expected--Succours arrive from England--Treachery of Lundy;
the Inhabitants of Londonderry resolve to defend themselves--Their
Character--Londonderry besieged--The Siege turned into a Blockade--Naval
Skirmish in Bantry Bay--A Parliament summoned by James sits at Dublin--A
Toleration Act passed; Acts passed for the Confiscation of the Property
of Protestants--Issue of base Money--The great Act of Attainder--James
prorogues his Parliament; Persecution of the Protestants in
Ireland--Effect produced in England by the News from Ireland--Actions
of the Enniskilleners--Distress of Londonderry--Expedition under Kirke
arrives in Loch Foyle--Cruelty of Rosen--The Famine in Londonderry
extreme--Attack on the Boom--The Siege of Londonderry raised--Operations
against the Enniskilleners--Battle of Newton Butler--Consternation of
the Irish

WILLIAM had assumed, together with the title of King of England, the
title of King of Ireland. For all our jurists then regarded Ireland as
a mere colony, more important indeed than Massachusetts, Virginia, or
Jamaica, but, like Massachusetts, Virginia, and Jamaica, dependent on
the mother country, and bound to pay allegiance to the Sovereign whom
the mother country had called to the throne, [114]

In fact, however, the Revolution found Ireland emancipated from the
dominion of the English colony. As early as the year 1686, James had
determined to make that island a place of arms which might overawe Great
Britain, and a place of refuge where, if any disaster happened in Great
Britain, the members of his Church might find refuge. With this view
he had exerted all his power for the purpose of inverting the relation
between the conquerors and the aboriginal population. The execution
of his design he had intrusted, in spite of the remonstrances of his
English counsellors, to the Lord Deputy Tyrconnel. In the autumn of
1688, the process was complete. The highest offices in the state, in the
army, and in the Courts of justice, were, with scarcely an exception,
filled by Papists. A pettifogger named Alexander Fitton, who had been
detected in forgery, who had been fined for misconduct by the House of
Lords at Westminster, who had been many years in prison, and who was
equally deficient in legal knowledge and in the natural good sense
and acuteness by which the want of legal knowledge has sometimes
been supplied, was Lord Chancellor. His single merit was that he had
apostatized from the Protestant religion; and this merit was thought
sufficient to wash out even the stain of his Saxon extraction. He soon
proved himself worthy of the confidence of his patrons. On the bench of
justice he declared that there was not one heretic in forty thousand
who was not a villain. He often, after hearing a cause in which the
interests of his Church were concerned, postponed his decision, for the
purpose, as he avowed, of consulting his spiritual director, a Spanish
priest, well read doubtless in Escobar, [115] Thomas Nugent, a Roman
Catholic who had never distinguished himself at the bar except by his
brogue and his blunders, was Chief Justice of the King's Bench, [116]
Stephen Rice, a Roman Catholic, whose abilities and learning were not
disputed even by the enemies of his nation and religion, but whose
known hostility to the Act of Settlement excited the most painful
apprehensions in the minds of all who held property under that Act, was
Chief Baron of the Exchequer, [117] Richard Nagle, an acute and well
read lawyer, who had been educated in a Jesuit college, and whose
prejudices were such as might have been expected from his education, was
Attorney General, [118]

Keating, a highly respectable Protestant, was still Chief Justice of the
Common Pleas: but two Roman Catholic judges sate with him. It ought to
be added that one of those judges, Daly, was a man of sense, moderation
and integrity. The matters however which came before the Court of Common
Pleas were not of great moment. Even the King's Bench was at this time
almost deserted. The Court of Exchequer overflowed with business; for it
was the only court at Dublin from which no writ of error lay to England,
and consequently the only court in which the English could be oppressed
and pillaged without hope of redress. Rice, it was said, had declared
that they should have from him exactly what the law, construed with the
utmost strictness, gave them, and nothing more. What, in his opinion,
the law, strictly construed, gave them, they could easily infer from a
saying which, before he became a judge, was often in his mouth. "I will
drive," he used to say, "a coach and six through the Act of Settlement. "
He now carried his threat daily into execution. The cry of all
Protestants was that it mattered not what evidence they produced
before him; that, when their titles were to be set aside, the
rankest forgeries, the most infamous witnesses, were sure to have his
countenance. To his court his countrymen came in multitudes with writs
of ejectment and writs of trespass. In his court the government attacked
at once the charters of all the cities and boroughs in Ireland; and he
easily found pretexts for pronouncing all those charters forfeited. The
municipal corporations, about a hundred in number, had been instituted
to be the strongholds of the reformed religion and of the English
interest, and had consequently been regarded by the Irish Roman
Catholics with an aversion which cannot be thought unnatural or
unreasonable. Had those bodies been remodelled in a judicious and
impartial manner, the irregularity of the proceedings by which so
desirable a result had been attained might have been pardoned. But it
soon appeared that one exclusive system had been swept away only to make
room for another. The boroughs were subjected to the absolute authority
of the Crown. Towns in which almost every householder was an English
Protestant were placed under the government of Irish Roman Catholics.
Many of the new Aldermen had never even seen the places over which they
were appointed to bear rule. At the same time the Sheriffs, to whom
belonged the execution of writs and the nomination of juries, were
selected in almost every instance from the caste which had till very
recently been excluded from all public trust. It was affirmed that some
of these important functionaries had been burned in the hand for theft.
Others had been servants to Protestants; and the Protestants added, with
bitter scorn, that it was fortunate for the country when this was the
case; for that a menial who had cleaned the plate and rubbed down the
horse of an English gentleman might pass for a civilised being, when
compared with many of the native aristocracy whose lives had been spent
in coshering or marauding. To such Sheriffs no colonist, even if he had
been so strangely fortunate as to obtain a judgment, dared to intrust an
execution, [119]

Thus the civil power had, in the space of a few months, been transferred
from the Saxon to the Celtic population. The transfer of the military
power had been not less complete. The army, which, under the command
of Ormond, had been the chief safeguard of the English ascendency, had
ceased to exist. Whole regiments had been dissolved and reconstructed.
Six thousand Protestant veterans, deprived of their bread, were brooding
in retirement over their wrongs, or had crossed the sea and joined
the standard of William. Their place was supplied by men who had long
suffered oppression, and who, finding themselves suddenly transformed
from slaves into masters, were impatient to pay back, with accumulated
usury, the heavy debt of injuries and insults. The new soldiers, it was
said, never passed an Englishman without cursing him and calling him by
some foul name. They were the terror of every Protestant innkeeper; for,
from the moment when they came under his roof, they ate and drank every
thing: they paid for nothing; and by their rude swaggering they scared
more respectable guests from his door, [120]

Such was the state of Ireland when the Prince of Orange landed at
Torbay. From that time every packet which arrived at Dublin brought
tidings, such as could not but increase the mutual fear and loathing of
the hostile races. The colonist, who, after long enjoying and abusing
power, had now tasted for a moment the bitterness of servitude, the
native, who, having drunk to the dregs all the bitterness of servitude,
had at length for a moment enjoyed and abused power, were alike sensible
that a great crisis, a crisis like that of 1641, was at hand. The
majority impatiently expected Phelim O'Neil to revive in Tyrconnel. The
minority saw in William a second Over.

On which side the first blow was struck was a question which Williamites
and Jacobites afterwards debated with much asperity. But no question
could be more idle. History must do to both parties the justice which
neither has ever done to the other, and must admit that both had fair
pleas and cruel provocations. Both had been placed, by a fate for which
neither was answerable, in such a situation that, human nature being
what it is, they could not but regard each other with enmity. During
three years the government which might have reconciled them had
systematically employed its whole power for the purpose of inflaming
their enmity to madness. It was now impossible to establish in Ireland
a just and beneficent government, a government which should know no
distinction of race or of sect, a government which, while strictly
respecting the rights guaranteed by law to the new landowners, should
alleviate by a judicious liberality the misfortunes of the ancient
gentry. Such a government James might have established in the day of
his power. But the opportunity had passed away: compromise had become
impossible: the two infuriated castes were alike convinced that it was
necessary to oppress or to be oppressed, and that there could be no
safety but in victory, vengeance, and dominion. They agreed only in
spurning out of the way every mediator who sought to reconcile them.

During some weeks there were outrages, insults, evil reports, violent
panics, the natural preludes of the terrible conflict which was at hand.
A rumour spread over the whole island that, on the ninth of December,
there would be a general massacre of the Englishry. Tyrconnel sent
for the chief Protestants of Dublin to the Castle, and, with his usual
energy of diction, invoked on himself all the vengeance of heaven if the
report was not a cursed, a blasted, a confounded lie. It was said that,
in his rage at finding his oaths ineffectual, he pulled off his hat and
wig, and flung them into the fire, [121] But lying Dick Talbot was so
well known that his imprecations and gesticulations only strengthened
the apprehension which they were meant to allay. Ever since the recall
of Clarendon there had been a large emigration of timid and quiet people
from the Irish ports to England. That emigration now went on faster than
ever. It was not easy to obtain a passage on board of a well built or
commodious vessel. But many persons, made bold by the excess of fear,
and choosing rather to trust the winds and waves than the exasperated
Irishry, ventured to encounter all the dangers of Saint George's Channel
and of the Welsh coast in open boats and in the depth of winter. The
English who remained began, in almost every county, to draw close
together. Every large country house became a fortress. Every visitor
who arrived after nightfall was challenged from a loophole or from a
barricaded window; and, if he attempted to enter without pass words and
explanations, a blunderbuss was presented to him. On the dreaded night
of the ninth of December, there was scarcely one Protestant mansion from
the Giant's Causeway to Bantry Bay in which armed men were not watching
and lights burning from the early sunset to the late sunrise, [122]

A minute account of what passed in one district at this time has come
down to us, and well illustrates the general state of the kingdom. The
south-western part of Kerry is now well known as the most beautiful
tract in the British isles. The mountains, the glens, the capes
stretching far into the Atlantic, the crags on which the eagles build,
the rivulets brawling down rocky passes, the lakes overhung by groves
in which the wild deer find covert, attract every summer crowds of
wanderers sated with the business and the pleasures of great cities.
The beauties of that country are indeed too often hidden in the mist and
rain which the west wind brings up from a boundless ocean. But, on the
rare days when the sun shines out in all his glory, the landscape has
a freshness and a warmth of colouring seldom found in our latitude. The
myrtle loves the soil. The arbutus thrives better than even on the sunny
shore of Calabria, [123] The turf is of livelier hue than elsewhere:
the hills glow with a richer purple: the varnish of the holly and ivy
is more glossy; and berries of a brighter red peep through foliage of a
brighter green. But during the greater part of the seventeenth century,
this paradise was as little known to the civilised world as Spitzbergen
or Greenland. If ever it was mentioned, it was mentioned as a horrible
desert, a chaos of bogs, thickets, and precipices, where the she wolf
still littered, and where some half naked savages, who could not speak a
word of English, made themselves burrows in the mud, and lived on roots
and sour milk, [124]

At length, in the year 1670, the benevolent and enlightened Sir William
Petty determined to form an English settlement in this wild district.
He possessed a large domain there, which has descended to a posterity
worthy of such an ancestor.
On the improvement of that domain he
expended, it was said, not less than ten thousand pounds. The little
town which he founded, named from the bay of Kenmare, stood at the head
of that bay, under a mountain ridge, on the summit of which travellers
now stop to gaze upon the loveliest of the three lakes of Killarney.
Scarcely any village, built by an enterprising band of New Englanders,
far from the dwellings of their countrymen, in the midst of the hunting
grounds of the Red Indians, was more completely out of the pale of
civilisation than Kenmare. Between Petty's settlement and the nearest
English habitation the journey by land was of two days through a wild
and dangerous country. Yet the place prospered. Forty-two houses were
erected. The population amounted to a hundred and eighty. The land round
the town was well cultivated. The cattle were numerous. Two small barks
were employed in fishing and trading along the coast. The supply of
herrings, pilchards, mackerel, and salmon was plentiful, and would have
been still more plentiful, had not the beach been, in the finest part
of the year, covered by multitudes of seals, which preyed on the fish
of the bay. Yet the seal was not an unwelcome visitor: his fur was
valuable,; and his oil supplied light through the long nights of winter.
An attempt was made with great success to set up iron works. It was not
yet the practice to employ coal for the purpose of smelting; and the
manufacturers of Kent and Sussex had much difficulty in procuring timber
at a reasonable price. The neighbourhood of Kenmare was then richly
wooded; and Petty found it a gainful speculation to send ore thither.
The lovers of the picturesque still regret the woods of oak and arbutus
which were cut down to feed his furnaces. Another scheme had occurred
to his active and intelligent mind. Some of the neighbouring islands
abounded with variegated marble, red and white, purple and green. Petty
well knew at what cost the ancient Romans had decorated their baths
and temples with many coloured columns hewn from Laconian and African
quarries; and he seems to have indulged the hope that the rocks of his
wild domain in Kerry might furnish embellishments to the mansions of
Saint James's Square, and to the choir of Saint Paul's Cathedral, [125]

From the first, the settlers had found that they must be prepared to
exercise the right of selfdefence to an extent which would have been
unnecessary and unjustifiable in a well governed country. The law was
altogether without force in the highlands which lie on the south of
the vale of Tralee. No officer of justice willingly ventured into those
parts. One pursuivant who in 1680 attempted to execute a warrant
there was murdered. The people of Kenmare seem however to have been
sufficiently secured by their union, their intelligence and their
spirit, till the close of the year 1688. Then at length the effects of
the policy of Tyrconnel began to be felt ever, in that remote corner
of Ireland. In the eyes of the peasantry of Munster the colonists
were aliens and heretics. The buildings, the boats, the machines, the
granaries, the dairies, the furnaces, were doubtless contemplated by the
native race with that mingled envy and contempt with which the ignorant
naturally regard the triumphs of knowledge. Nor is it at all improbable
that the emigrants had been guilty of those faults from which civilised
men who settle among an uncivilised people are rarely free. The power
derived from superior intelligence had, we may easily believe,
been sometimes displayed with insolence, and sometimes exerted with
injustice. Now therefore, when the news spread from altar to altar, and
from cabin to cabin, that the strangers were to be driven out, and that
their houses and lands were to be given as a booty to the children of
the soil, a predatory war commenced. Plunderers, thirty, forty, seventy
in a troop, prowled round the town, some with firearms, some with pikes.
The barns were robbed. The horses were stolen. In one foray a hundred
and forty cattle were swept away and driven off through the ravines of
Glengariff. In one night six dwellings were broken open and pillaged. At
last the colonists, driven to extremity, resolved to die like men rather
than be murdered in their beds. The house built by Petty for his agent
was the largest in the place. It stood on a rocky peninsula round
which the waves of the bay broke. Here the whole population assembled,
seventy-five fighting men, with about a hundred women and children. They
had among them sixty firelocks, and as many pikes and swords. Round the
agent's house they threw up with great speed a wall of turf fourteen
feet in height and twelve in thickness. The space enclosed was about
half an acre. Within this rampart all the arms, the ammunition and the
provisions of the settlement were collected, and several huts of thin
plank were built. When these preparations were completed, the men of
Kenmare began to make vigorous reprisals on their Irish neighbours,
seized robbers, recovered stolen property, and continued during
some weeks to act in all things as an independent commonwealth. The
government was carried on by elective officers, to whom every member of
the society swore fidelity on the Holy Gospels, [126]

While the people of the small town of Kenmare were thus bestirring
themselves, similar preparations for defence were made by larger
communities on a larger scale. Great numbers of gentlemen and yeomen
quitted the open country, and repaired to those towns which had
been founded and incorporated for the purpose of bridling the native
population, and which, though recently placed under the government of
Roman Catholic magistrates, were still inhabited chiefly by Protestants.
A considerable body of armed colonists mustered at Sligo, another
at Charleville, a third at Marlow, a fourth still more formidable at
Bandon, [127] But the principal strongholds of the Englishry during this
evil time were Enniskillen and Londonderry.

Enniskillen, though the capital of the county of Fermanagh, was then
merely a village. It was built on an island surrounded by the river
which joins the two beautiful sheets of water known by the common name
of Lough Erne. The stream and both the lakes were overhung on every
side by natural forests. Enniskillen consisted of about eighty dwellings
clustering round an ancient castle. The inhabitants were, with scarcely
an exception, Protestants, and boasted that their town had been true to
the Protestant cause through the terrible rebellion which broke out in
1641. Early in December they received from Dublin an intimation that two
companies of Popish infantry were to be immediately quartered on them.
The alarm of the little community was great, and the greater because it
was known that a preaching friar had been exerting himself to inflame
the Irish population of the neighbourhood against the heretics. A
daring resolution was taken. Come what might, the troops should not
be admitted. Yet the means of defence were slender. Not ten pounds of
powder, not twenty firelocks fit for use, could be collected within
the walls. Messengers were sent with pressing letters to summon the
Protestant gentry of the vicinage to the rescue; and the summons was
gallantly obeyed. In a few hours two hundred foot and a hundred and
fifty horse had assembled. Tyrconnel's soldiers were already at hand.
They brought with them a considerable supply of arms to be distributed
among the peasantry. The peasantry greeted the royal standard with
delight, and accompanied the march in great numbers. The townsmen and
their allies, instead of waiting to be attacked, came boldly forth
to encounter the intruders. The officers of James had expected no
resistance. They were confounded when they saw confronting them a column
of foot, flanked by a large body of mounted gentlemen and yeomen. The
crowd of camp followers ran away in terror. The soldiers made a retreat
so precipitate that it might be called a flight, and scarcely halted
till they were thirty miles off at Cavan, [128]

The Protestants, elated by this easy victory, proceeded to make
arrangements for the government and defence of Enniskillen and of the
surrounding country. Gustavus Hamilton, a gentleman who had served
in the army, but who had recently been deprived of his commission by
Tyrconnel, and had since been living on an estate in Fermanagh, was
appointed Governor, and took up his residence in the castle. Trusty men
were enlisted, and armed with great expedition. As there was a scarcity
of swords and pikes, smiths were employed to make weapons by fastening
scythes on poles. All the country houses round Lough Erne were turned
into garrisons. No Papist was suffered to be at large in the town;
and the friar who was accused of exerting his eloquence against the
Englishry was thrown into prison, [129]

The other great fastness of Protestantism was a place of more
importance. Eighty years before, during the troubles caused by the last
struggle of the houses of O'Neil and O'Donnel against the authority of
James the First, the ancient city of Derry had been surprised by one of
the native chiefs: the inhabitants had been slaughtered, and the houses
reduced to ashes. The insurgents were speedily put down and punished:
the government resolved to restore the ruined town: the Lord Mayor,
Aldermen, and Common Council of London were invited to assist in the
work; and King James the First made over to them in their corporate
capacity the ground covered by the ruins of the old Derry, and about six
thousand English acres in the neighbourhood, [130]

This country, then uncultivated and uninhabited, is now enriched by
industry, embellished by taste, and pleasing even to eyes accustomed to
the well tilled fields and stately manor houses of England. A new city
soon arose which, on account of its connection with the capital of the
empire, was called Londonderry. The buildings covered the summit and
slope of a hill which overlooked the broad stream of the Foyle, then
whitened by vast flocks of wild swans, [131] On the highest ground stood
the Cathedral, a church which, though erected when the secret of Gothic
architecture was lost, and though ill qualified to sustain a comparison
with the awful temples of the middle ages, is not without grace and
dignity. Near the Cathedral rose the palace of the Bishop, whose see
was one of the most valuable in Ireland. The city was in form nearly an
ellipse; and the principal streets formed a cross, the arms of which
met in a square called the Diamond. The original houses have been either
rebuilt or so much repaired that their ancient character can no longer
be traced; but many of them were standing within living memory. They
were in general two stories in height; and some of them had stone
staircases on the outside. The dwellings were encompassed by a wall
of which the whole circumference was little less than a mile. On the
bastions were planted culverins and sakers presented by the wealthy
guilds of London to the colony. On some of these ancient guns, which
have done memorable service to a great cause, the devices of the
Fishmongers' Company, of the Vintners' Company, and of the Merchant
Tailors' Company are still discernible, [132]

The inhabitants were Protestants of Anglosaxon blood. They were indeed
not all of one country or of one church but Englishmen and Scotchmen,
Episcopalians and Presbyterians, seem to have generally lived together
in friendship, a friendship which is sufficiently explained by their
common antipathy to the Irish race and to the Popish religion. During
the rebellion of 1641, Londonderry had resolutely held out against the
native chieftains, and had been repeatedly besieged in vain, [133] Since
the Restoration the city had prospered. The Foyle, when the tide was
high, brought up ships of large burden to the quay. The fisheries throve
greatly. The nets, it was said, were sometimes so full that it was
necessary to fling back multitudes of fish into the waves. The quantity
of salmon caught annually was estimated at eleven hundred thousand
pounds' weight, [134]

The people of Londonderry shared in the alarm which, towards the close
of the year 1688, was general among the Protestants settled in Ireland.
It was known that the aboriginal peasantry of the neighbourhood were
laying in pikes and knives. Priests had been haranguing in a style of
which, it must be owned, the Puritan part of the Anglosaxon colony had
little right to complain, about the slaughter of the Amalekites, and
the judgments which Saul had brought on himself by sparing one of the
proscribed race. Rumours from various quarters and anonymous letters in
various hands agreed in naming the ninth of December as the day fixed
for the extirpation of the strangers. While the minds of the citizens
were agitated by these reports, news came that a regiment of twelve
hundred Papists, commanded by a Papist, Alexander Macdonnell, Earl of
Antrim, had received orders from the Lord Deputy to occupy Londonderry,
and was already on the march from Coleraine. The consternation was
extreme. Some were for closing the gates and resisting; some for
submitting; some for temporising. The corporation had, like the other
corporations of Ireland, been remodelled. The magistrates were men of
low station and character. Among them was only one person of Anglosaxon
extraction; and he had turned Papist. In such rulers the inhabitants
could place no confidence, [135] The Bishop, Ezekiel Hopkins, resolutely
adhered to the doctrine of nonresistance, which he had preached during
many years, and exhorted his flock to go patiently to the slaughter
rather than incur the guilt of disobeying the Lord's Anointed, [136]
Antrim was meanwhile drawing nearer and nearer. At length the citizens
saw from the walls his troops arrayed on the opposite shore of the
Foyle. There was then no bridge: but there was a ferry which kept up a
constant communication between the two banks of the river; and by
this ferry a detachment from Antrim's regiment crossed. The officers
presented themselves at the gate, produced a warrant directed to
the Mayor and Sheriffs, and demanded admittance and quarters for his
Majesty's soldiers.

Just at this moment thirteen young apprentices, most of whom appear,
from their names, to have been of Scottish birth or descent, flew to the
guard room, armed themselves, seized the keys of the city, rushed to the
Ferry Gate, closed it in the face of the King's officers, and let
down the portcullis. James Morison, a citizen more advanced in years,
addressed the intruders from the top of the wall and advised them to
be gone. They stood in consultation before the gate till they heard
him cry, "Bring a great gun this way. " They then thought it time to get
beyond the range of shot. They retreated, reembarked, and rejoined their
comrades on the other side of the river. The flame had already spread.
The whole city was up. The other gates were secured. Sentinels paced the
ramparts everywhere. The magazines were opened. Muskets and gunpowder
were distributed. Messengers were sent, under cover of the following
night, to the Protestant gentlemen of the neighbouring counties. The
bishop expostulated in vain. It is indeed probable that the vehement
and daring young Scotchmen who had taken the lead on this occasion had
little respect for his office. One of them broke in on a discourse with
which he interrupted the military preparations by exclaiming, "A good
sermon, my lord; a very good sermon; but we have not time to hear it
just now. " [137]

The Protestants of the neighbourhood promptly obeyed the summons of
Londonderry. Within forty-eight hours hundreds of horse and foot came by
various roads to the city. Antrim, not thinking himself strong enough to
risk an attack, or not disposed to take on himself the responsibility of
commencing a civil war without further orders, retired with his troops
to Coleraine.

It might have been expected that the resistance of Enniskillen and
Londonderry would have irritated Tyrconnel into taking some desperate
step. And in truth his savage and imperious temper was at first inflamed
by the news almost to madness. But, after wreaking his rage, as usual,
on his wig, he became somewhat calmer. Tidings of a very sobering nature
had just reached him. The Prince of Orange was marching unopposed to
London. Almost every county and every great town in England had declared
for him. James, deserted by his ablest captains and by his nearest
relatives, had sent commissioners to treat with the invaders, and
had issued writs convoking a Parliament. While the result of the
negotiations which were pending in England was uncertain, the Viceroy
could not venture to take a bloody revenge on the refractory Protestants
of Ireland. He therefore thought it expedient to affect for a time
a clemency and moderation which were by no means congenial to his
disposition. The task of quieting the Englishry of Ulster was intrusted
to William Stewart, Viscount Mountjoy. Mountjoy, a brave soldier, an
accomplished scholar, a zealous Protestant, and yet a zealous Tory, was
one of the very few members of the Established Church who still held
office in Ireland. He was Master of the Ordnance in that kingdom, and
was colonel of a regiment in which an uncommonly large proportion of the
Englishry had been suffered to remain. At Dublin he was the centre of a
small circle of learned and ingenious men who had, under his presidency,
formed themselves into a Royal Society, the image, on a small scale,
of the Royal Society of London. In Ulster, with which he was peculiarly
connected, his name was held in high honour by the colonists, [138] He
hastened with his regiment to Londonderry, and was well received there.
For it was known that, though he was firmly attached to hereditary
monarchy, he was not less firmly attached to the reformed religion.
The citizens readily permitted him to leave within their walls a small
garrison exclusively composed of Protestants, under the command of his
lieutenant colonel, Robert Lundy, who took the title of Governor, [139]

The news of Mountjoy's visit to Ulster was highly gratifying to the
defenders of Enniskillen. Some gentlemen deputed by that town waited on
him to request his good offices, but were disappointed by the reception
which they found. "My advice to you is," he said, "to submit to the
King's authority. " "What, my Lord? " said one of the deputies; "Are we
to sit still and let ourselves be butchered? " "The King," said Mountjoy,
"will protect you. " "If all that we hear be true," said the deputy, "his
Majesty will find it hard enough to protect himself. " The conference
ended in this unsatisfactory manner. Enniskillen still kept its attitude
of defiance; and Mountjoy returned to Dublin, [140]

By this time it had indeed become evident that James could not protect
himself. It was known in Ireland that he had fled; that he had been
stopped; that he had fled again; that the Prince of Orange had arrived
at Westminster in triumph, had taken on himself the administration of
the realm, and had issued letters summoning a Convention.

Those lords and gentlemen at whose request the Prince had assumed the
government, had earnestly intreated him to take the state of Ireland
into his immediate consideration; and he had in reply assured them that
he would do his best to maintain the Protestant religion and the English
interest in that kingdom. His enemies afterwards accused him of utterly
disregarding this promise: nay, they alleged that he purposely suffered
Ireland to sink deeper and deeper in calamity. Halifax, they said, had,
with cruel and perfidious ingenuity, devised this mode of placing the
Convention under a species of duress; and the trick had succeeded but
too well. The vote which called William to the throne would not have
passed so easily but for the extreme dangers which threatened the state;
and it was in consequence of his own dishonest inactivity that those
dangers had become extreme, [141] As this accusation rests on no proof,
those who repeat it are at least bound to show that some course clearly
better than the course which William took was open to him; and this they
will find a difficult task. If indeed he could, within a few weeks after
his arrival in London, have sent a great expedition to Ireland, that
kingdom might perhaps, after a short struggle, or without a struggle,
have submitted to his authority; and a long series of crimes and
calamities might have been averted. But the factious orators and
pamphleteers, who, much at their ease, reproached him for not sending
such an expedition, would have been perplexed if they had been required
to find the men, the ships, and the funds. The English army had lately
been arrayed against him: part of it was still ill disposed towards him;
and the whole was utterly disorganized. Of the army which he had brought
from Holland not a regiment could be spared. He had found the treasury
empty and the pay of the navy in arrear. He had no power to hypothecate
any part of the public revenue. Those who lent him money lent it on no
security but his bare word. It was only by the patriotic liberality
of the merchants of London that he was enabled to defray the ordinary
charges of government till the meeting of the Convention. It is
surely unjust to blame him for not instantly fitting out, in such
circumstances, an armament sufficient to conquer a kingdom.

Perceiving that, till the government of England was settled, it would
not be in his power to interfere effectually by arms in the affairs of
Ireland, he determined to try what effect negotiation would produce.
Those who judged after the event pronounced that he had not, on this
occasion, shown his usual sagacity. He ought, they said, to have known
that it was absurd to expect submission from Tyrconnel. Such however
was not at the time the opinion of men who had the best means of
information, and whose interest was a sufficient pledge for their
sincerity. A great meeting of noblemen and gentlemen who had property
in Ireland was held, during the interregnum, at the house of the Duke of
Ormond in Saint James's Square. They advised the Prince to try whether
the Lord Deputy might not be induced to capitulate on honourable and
advantageous terms, [142] In truth there is strong reason to believe
that Tyrconnel really wavered. For, fierce as were his passions, they
never made him forgetful of his interest; and he might well doubt
whether it were not for his interest, in declining years and health,
to retire from business with full indemnity for all past offences, with
high rank and with an ample fortune, rather than to stake his life and
property on the event of a war against the whole power of England. It
is certain that he professed himself willing to yield. He opened a
communication with the Prince of Orange, and affected to take counsel
with Mountjoy, and with others who, though they had not thrown off their
allegiance to James, were yet firmly attached to the Established Church
and to the English connection.

In one quarter, a quarter from which William was justified in expecting
the most judicious counsel, there was a strong conviction that the
professions of Tyrconnel were sincere. No British statesman had then
so high a reputation throughout Europe as Sir William Temple. His
diplomatic skill had, twenty years before, arrested the progress of the
French power. He had been a steady and an useful friend to the United
Provinces and to the House of Nassau. He had long been on terms of
friendly confidence with the Prince of Orange, and had negotiated that
marriage to which England owed her recent deliverance. With the affairs
of Ireland Temple was supposed to be peculiarly well acquainted. His
family had considerable property there: he had himself resided there
during several years: he had represented the county of Carlow in
parliament; and a large part of his income was derived from a lucrative
Irish office. There was no height of power, of rank, or of opulence, to
which he might not have risen, if he would have consented to quit his
retreat, and to lend his assistance and the weight of his name to the
new government. But power, rank, and opulence had less attraction
for his Epicurean temper than ease and security. He rejected the most
tempting invitations, and continued to amuse himself with his books, his
tulips, and his pineapples, in rural seclusion. With some hesitation,
however, he consented to let his eldest son John enter into the service
of William. During the vacancy of the throne, John Temple was employed
in business of high importance; and, on subjects connected with Ireland,
his opinion, which might reasonably be supposed to agree with his
father's, had great weight. The young politician flattered himself that
he had secured the services of an agent eminently qualified to bring the
negotiation with Tyrconnel to a prosperous issue.

This agent was one of a remarkable family which had sprung from a noble
Scottish stock, but which had long been settled in Ireland, and which
professed the Roman Catholic religion. In the gay crowd which thronged
Whitehall, during those scandalous years of jubilee which immediately
followed the Restoration, the Hamiltons were preeminently conspicuous.
The long fair ringlets, the radiant bloom, and the languishing blue eyes
of the lovely Elizabeth still charm us on the canvass of Lely. She
had the glory of achieving no vulgar conquest. It was reserved for her
voluptuous beauty and for her flippant wit to overcome the aversion
which the coldhearted and scoffing Grammont felt for the indissoluble
tie. One of her brothers, Anthony, became the chronicler of that
brilliant and dissolute society of which he had been one of the most
brilliant and most dissolute members. He deserves the high praise of
having, though not a Frenchman, written the book which is, of all books,
the most exquisitely French, both in spirit and in manner. Another
brother, named Richard, had, in foreign service, gained some military
experience. His wit and politeness had distinguished him even in the
splendid circle of Versailles. It was whispered that he had dared to
lift his eyes to an exalted lady, the natural daughter of the Great
King, the wife of a legitimate prince of the House of Bourbon, and
that she had not seemed to be displeased by the attentions of her
presumptuous admirer, [143] The adventurer had subsequently returned to
his native country, had been appointed Brigadier General in the Irish
army, and had been sworn of the Irish Privy Council. When the Dutch
invasion was expected, he came across Saint George's Channel with the
troops which Tyrconnel sent to reinforce the royal army. After the
flight of James, those troops submitted to the Prince of Orange. Richard
Hamilton not only made his own peace with what was now the ruling power,
but declared himself confident that, if he were sent to Dublin, he could
conduct the negotiation which had been opened there to a happy close. If
he failed, he pledged his word to return to London in three weeks. His
influence in Ireland was known to be great: his honour had never been
questioned; and he was highly esteemed by the Temple family. John Temple
declared that he would answer for Richard Hamilton as for himself. This
guarantee was thought sufficient; and Hamilton set out for Ireland,
assuring his English friends that he should soon bring Tyrconnel
to reason. The offers which he was authorised to make to the Roman
Catholics and to the Lord Deputy personally were most liberal, [144]

It is not impossible that Hamilton may have really meant to perform his
promise. But when he arrived at Dublin he found that he had undertaken
a task which was beyond his power. The hesitation of Tyrconnel, whether
genuine or feigned, was at an end. He had found that he had no longer
a choice.