CHAP VII 1559 that of the districts purely Irish. The garrison took from the farmers by force whatever they required for their support, paying for it in the brass shillings in which they themselves received their own wages. The soldiers robbed the people; the Government had before robbed the soldiers; and the captains of the different disThe misery tricts in turn robbed the Government by making false of the Pale. returns of the number of men under their command. They had intermarried with the Irish, or had Irish mistresses living in the forts with them, and thus for the most part they were in league with those whom they were maintained to repress; so that choosing one master instead of many, and finding themselves obnoxious to their own countrymen by remaining under a rule from which they derived no protection, the tenantry of Meath flocked by hundreds over the northern border, and took refuge with O'Neil.' Sir Edward Bellingham in 1549, by firmness of hand and integrity of heart, had made the English name respected from the Giant's Causeway to Valentia. Could Bellingham have lived a few years longer-could Somerset or Northumberland or Mary, so zealous each in their way for the glory of God,' have remembered that 1 After six years of discipline and improvement, Sir Henry Sidney described the state of the four shires, the Irish inhabitants, and the English garrison, in the following languge :— 'The English Pale is overwhelmed with vagabonds-stealth and spoil daily carried out of it; the people miserable-not two gentlemen in the whole of it able to lend twenty pounds. They have neither horse nor armour, nor apparel nor victual. The soldiers be so beggarlike as it would abhor a general to look on them; yet so insolent as to be intolerable to the people, so rooted in idleness as there is no hope by correction to amend them, yet so allied with the Irish I dare not trust them in a fort or in any dangerous service. They have all an Irish we or two-never a married wife among them; so that all is known that we intend to do here.'-Sidney to Leicester, March 5, 1566. Irish MSS. Rolls House. without common sense and common honesty at the CHAP VII bottom of them, creeds and systems are as houses built 1559 on quicksands-the order which had taken root might have grown strong under the shadow of justice, and Ireland might have had a happier future. But this was not to be. The labour and expense of a quarter of a century was thrown idly away. The Irish army, since the rebellion of Lord Thomas Fitzgerald, had cost thirteen or fourteen hundred thousand pounds, yet the Pale was shortened and its revenues decreased; the moral ruin was more complete than the financial, and the report of 1559 closed with an earnest exhortation to Elizabeth to remember that the Irish were her subjects; that it was her duty as their sovereign to bring the poor, ignorant people to better things,' and to recover so many thousand lost souls that were going headlong to the devil." Following close on the first survey, a more detailed account was furnished to Cecil of the social condition of the people. The common life of a chief and the relations between any two adjoining tribes were but too familiar and intelligible. But there was a general organization among the people themselves, extending wherever the Irish language was spoken, with a civilization of an Irish kind and an intellectual hierarchy. Besides the priests there were four classes of spiritual leaders and teachers, each with their subdivisions. of the The first,' wrote Cecil's correspondent, is called the Analysis Brehon, which in English is called "the judge;" and spiritual before they give judgment they take pawns of both the chiefs of parties, and then they will judge according to their own nation. the Irish 1 Irish MSS. Rolls House. CHAP VII discretion. 1559 will not These men be neuters, and the Irishmen prey them. They have great plenty of cattle, and they harbour many vagabonds and idle persons; and if there be any rebels that move rebellion against the prince, of these people they are chiefly maintained; and if the English army fortune to travel in that part where they be, they will flee to the mountains and woods, because they would not succour them with victuals and other necessaries. The next sort is called the "Shankee." They also have great plenty of cattle wherewith they do succour the rebels. They make the ignorant men of the country believe that they be descended of Alexander the Great, or of Darius, or of Cæsar, or of some other notable prince, which makes the ignorant people to run mad and care not what they do the which is very hurtful to the realm. The third sort is called "Denisdan," which is to say in English the "Boulde." These people be very hurtful to the commonwealth, for they chiefly maintain the rebels; and further they do cause them that would be true, to be rebellious-thieves, extortioners, murderers, ravenersyea and worse if it was possible. Their first practice, if they see any young man descended of the septs of O or Mac, and have half a dozen about him, then will they make a rhyme wherein they will commend his father and his ancestors, numbering how many heads they have cut off, how many towns they have burned, how many virgins they have deflowered, how many notable murders they have done; and in the end they will compare them to Annibal, or Scipio, or Hercules, or some other famous person-wherewithal the poor fool runs mad and thinks indeed it is so. Then will he gather a sort of rascals to him, and he must get him a prophecier who shall tell him how he shall speed as he thinks. Then 1559 will he get him lurking to the side of a wood and there CHAP VII keepeth him close till morning; and when it is daylight then will they go to the poor villages, not sparing to destroy young infants and aged people; and if a woman be ever so great with child, her will they kill, burning the houses and corn, and ransacking the poor cots. Then will they drive all the kine and plough horses, with all other cattle, and drive them away. Then must they have a bagpipe blowing before them, and if any of the cattle fortune to wax weary or faint they will kill them rather than it should do the owner good. And if they go by any house of friars or religious house, they will give them two or three beeves; and they will take them and pray for them-yea, and praise their doings, "his father was accustomed so to do;" wherein he will rejoice. and say And when he is in a safe place they will fall to a division of the spoil according to the discretion of the captain. Now comes the rhymer that made the rhyme with his "Rakery." The "Raker" is he that shall utter the rhyme, and the rhymer himself sits by with the captain very proudly. He brings with him also his harper, who plays all the while that the Raker sings the rhyme. Also he hath his bard, which is a foolish fellow who must have a horse given him. The harper must have a new saffron shirt and a mantle; and the Raker must have two or three kine; and the rhymer himself a horse and harness, with a nag to ride on, a silver goblet, and a pair of bedes of coral with buttons of silver. And this with more they look for to have for the reducing of the people to the disruption of the commonwealth and blasphemy of God; for this is the best thing the rhymer causeth them to do. The fourth sort are those which in England are called 1559 CHAP VII Poets. These men have great store of cattle, and use all the trade of the others with an addition of prophecies. These are maintainers of witches and other vile matters to the blasphemy of God and to the impoverishing of the commonwealth. 'These four septs are divided in all places of the four quarters of Ireland and some of the islands beyond Ireland, as "the Land of the Saints,"" the "Innis Buffen," "Innis Turk," "Innis Main," and "Innis Clare." These islands are under the rule of O'Neil, and they are very pleasant and fertile, plenty of wood, water, and arable ground and pastures and fish, and a very temperate air.2 "There be many branches belonging to the four septsas the Gogath, which is to say the glutton, for one of them will eat half a mutton at a sitting; another called the Carrow; he commonly goeth naked and carrieth dice and cards with him, and he will play the hair off his head; and these be maintained by the rhymers. There is a set of women called the Goyng women. They be blasphemers of God, and they run from country to country sowing sedition among the people They are common to all men; and if any of them happen to be with child she will say that it is the great Lord adjoining, whereof the Lords are glad and do appoint them to be nursed. 'There is another two sorts that goeth about with the Bachele of Jesus,3 as they call it. These run from country to country; and if they come to any house where a 1 Arran, outside Galway Bay. 2 At present they are barren heaps of treeless moors and mountains. They yield nothing but scanty oatcrops and potatoes, and though the seas are full of fish as ever, there are no hands to catch them. The change is a singular commentary on modern improvements. 3 The Baculum Jesus, said to have been brought over by St. Patrick. |