they drained and ploughed. They went to work with heart and will in the homes which they had earned, and by the natural enchantment which gives to order and industry its immediate and admirable reward, the face of Ireland began once more to wear a look of quiet and prosperity. The disorderly elements could not at once and altogether be removed. In inaccessible hiding places-in the bogs and mountains, and still enormous forests-bands of outlaws who had escaped Connaught lurked, under the name of Tories, and continued a war of plunder and assassination." The foregoing would lead us to the conclusion that the letter of the law had not been kept to, either regarding the clearance to Connaught of all the Irish, or the extirpation of the clergy. Cromwell's policy aimed to put an end to a desolating and distracting eight years' war-to revenge the atrocities that he believed had been perpetrated by the Irish during this war, and to weaken a system he thought contrary to morality and truth, as the Catholics upon the Continent had, from like motives, attempted to destroy Protestantism. The following are the most eloquent portions of Carlyle's defence of Cromwell's Irish policy: "The history of the Irish war is, and for the present must continue, very dark and indecipherable to us. Ireland has been a scene of distracted controversies, plunderings, excommunications, treacheries, conflagrations, of universal misery and blood and bluster, such as the world before or since has never seen. The history of it does not form itself into a picture, but remains only a huge blot, an indiscriminate blackness, which the human memory cannot willingly charge itself with! There are parties on the back of parties, at war with the world, and with each other. There are Catholics of the Pale, demanding freedom of religion, under my Lord This, and my Lord That. There are OldIrish Catholics, under Pope's Nuncios, under Abbas O'Teague of the excommunications, and Owen Roe O'Neill, demanding, not religious freedom only, but what we now call Repeal of the Union, and unable to agree with the Catholics of the English Pale. Then there are Ormond Royalists, of the Episcopalian and mixed creeds, strong for King without Covenant; Ulster and other Presbyterians, strong for King and Covenant; lastly, Michael Jones and the Commonwealth of England, who want neither King nor Covenant. All these plunging and tumbling, in huge discord, for the last eight years, have made of Ireland and its affairs the black un utterable blot we speak of... One could pity this poor Irish people. The claim they started with in 1641 was for religious freedom. Their claim, we can now all see, was just-essentially just, though full of intricacy; difficult to render clear and concessible; nay, at that date of the world's history, it was hardly recognizable to any Protestant man for just; and these frightful massacrings and slaughterings and sanguinary blusterings have rendered it for the present entirely unrecognizable. . Oliver's proceedings here have been the theme of much loud criticism, and sibylline execration. To those who think that a land overrun with sanguinary quacks can be healed by sprinkling it with rose-water, these letters [Cromwell's] must be very horrible. Terrible surgery this; but is it surgery and judgment, or atrocious murder merely? That is a question which should be asked and answered. Oliver Cromwell did believe in God's judgments, and did not believe in the rose-water plan of surgery." Oliver Cromwell died 3rd September 1658. In his Parliament of 1656 both Ireland and Scotland were represented. Cromwell's account of his Irish campaign is most accessible in Carlyle's edition of his Letters and Speeches. 91 92 93 141 175 Crone, Robert, an eminent artist, born in Dublin about the middle of the 18th century. Having studied at home, he proceeded to Rome, and put himself under Richard Wilson, the landscape painter. He died in London in 1779. "His landscapes are scarce, but excellent, and there are some of his drawings in the royal collection." 276 Crosbie, Richard, aeronaut, born in the County of Wicklow in 1755, was one of the first if not the first native of the British islands to make a balloon ascent. [The first ascent ever made was by Pilatre de Rozier, in a balloon of Mongolfier's, at Paris, 21st November 1783; and the first in England was by Lunardi, an Italian, in London, on the 21st September 1784.1 Crosbie was of a mechanical genius, and reading of Mongolfier's success, and having made preliminary experiments by sending up cats in cars attached to small balloons, he ascended on 19th January 1785, from Ranelagh Gardens, near Dublin, and descended safely on the North Strand. The Annual Register says: "The balloon and chariot were beautifully painted, and the arms of Ireland emblazoned on them in superior elegance of taste. His aerial dress consisted of a robe of oiled silk, lined with white fur, his waistcoat and breeches in one, of white satin quilted, a and morocco boots, and a montero cap of leopard skin. The Duke of Leinster, Lord Charlemont, Right Hon. George Ogle, attended with white staves, as regulators of the business of the day." We are not furnished with any particulars of Crosbie's life, further than that he devoted attention to aeronautics. 7(1785) 338(1785) Crotty, William, was a notorious highwayman and rapparee, who carried on his depredations in the south of Ireland early in the 18th century. His name is given to a cave and a lough amongst the Comeragh mountains. He was regarded as man of desperate courage, and unequalled personal agility, often baffling pursuers even when mounted on fleet horses. He frequented the fair green of Kilmacthomas, and openly joined with the young men in hurling and football on Sunday evenings, danced with the girls at wakes and patterns, and was familiarly received in farmers' houses. At length a Mr. Hearn, guided by the wife of one of Crotty's partners in crime, captured him after a struggle in which Crotty was shot in the mouth-a judgment, in the estimation of the people, for his having once shot a countryman through the mouth at his own fireside: Crotty and a confederate were outside the man's cabin, and the former wagered that the ball in his pistol would pass the peasant's mouth sooner than a potato they saw him lifting to his lips. Crotty was executed at Waterford, 18th March 1742, and for a long time his head remained spiked over the gateway of the jail. 146 181 tion by his captors. One who was with him to the last remarked: "His death was most edifying. Never did I attend one who made a greater impression upon me. He begged of me to tell his sister not to be troubled because of his death, which he hoped would be a happy one." An immense concourse attended his funeral at Ballymacoda. 130 Crozier, Francis Rawdon Moira, Captain, R.N., a distinguished arctic voyager, was born at Banbridge, September 1796. He entered the navy as a first-class volunteer on the Hamadryad, 12th June 1810, served in the Pacific, at the Cape of Good Hope, and elsewhere, and was appointed Midshipman, June 1812. He sailed with Captain Parry on three of his arctic voyages in the Fury in 1821, in the Hecla in 1824, and again in the Hecla, as Lieutenant, in 1827. After some years' home service, he was despatched to Davis's Strait and Baffin's Bay, in search of missing whalers, and after his return was appointed Commander in 1837. From May 1839 he was absent some years in command of the Terror, in the expedition under Captain Ross, upon a voyage of discovery in the Antarctic Ocean. During this period he was promoted to post-rank. On 26th May 1845 he sailed in command of the Terror, in company with Sir John Franklin, who commanded the expedition, in the Erebus, in search of the North-west Passage. The crews were picked, and the ships were as strong as art could make them, and well found in every respect. They were last seen by a whaler, on the 26th July, in Baffin's Bay, Crowley, Peter O'Neill, a prominent Fenian, was born 23rd May 1832, at Bally-progressing favourably. In the autumn macoda, County of Cork, where his father was a respectable farmer. His uncle, Rev. Peter O'Neill, was flogged at Cork in 1798 for alleged complicity in the insurrection of that year. Peter inherited his farm, and cultivated it with great industry and thrift. He was a teetotaller from ten years of age; he was studious in his habits, and was greatly beloved by relatives and friends. He early joined the Fenian movement, became an active propagandist, took the field in March 1867, and formed one of a party under command of Captain M'Clure in the attack on the Knockadoon coastguard station. Afterwards he took refuge with a few comrades in Kilclooney Wood, County of Cork, where, on Sunday 31st March, his small party was attacked and defeated by military and constabulary. He was mortally wounded in the fight, and died a few hours afterwards at Mitchelstown, whither he was conveyed-being treated with the greatest kindness and considera | of 1847 anxiety began to be manifested for the safety of the explorers. Expedition after expedition (some twenty in all) was sent in quest of them-not alone by the United Kingdom, but by France and the United States. In August 1850 traces of the missing ships were discovered, and it was ascertained that their first winter had been spent behind Beechey Island, where they had remained at least as late as April 1846. No further tidings were obtained until the spring of 1854, when Dr. Rae learned from the Esquimaux, that in 1850 about forty white men had been seen dragging a boat over the ice near the north shore of King William's Island, and that later on the bodies of the whole party, dead of cold and starvation, had been found by the natives, on Montreal Island, at the mouth of the Fish River. On 30th June 1857 Captain M'Clintock was despatched in the Fox, fitted out by Lady Franklin and a number 124 226 233 253 Crumpe, Samuel, M.D., a Limerick physician, born in 1766, was the author of a work upon opium, published in 1793. He gained a prize from the Royal Irish Academy for his Essay on the Means of Providing Employment for the People, also published in 1793. M'Culloch styles this "A really valuable production. principles which pervade the work are sound; and those parts of it which have special reference to Ireland are distinguished by the absence of prejudice, and by their practical good sense.' He died in 1796. 16 37† The of subscribers. He was absent two years. | sage." Captain Crozier's fellow townsIn May 1859, one of M'Clintock's sledge men have erected a fine monument to his parties discovered the following document memory. of which a facsimile is given in M'Clintock's Narrative of the Fox) under a cairn near Cape Herschel: "28th May 1847. H. M. ships Erebus and Terror wintered in the ice in lat. 70° 5' N., long. 98° 23′ W. Having wintered in 1846-27 [correctly 1845-'6] at Beechey Island, in lat. 74° 43′ 28" N., long. 91° 39′ 15′′ W., after having ascended Wellington Channel to lat. 77, and returned by the west side of Cornwallis Island. Sir John Franklin commanding the expedition. All well. Party consisting of 2 officers and 6 men, left the ships on Monday, 24th May 1847, Gm. Gore, Lieutenant., Charles F. Des Voeux, Mate." Round the margin these words are added: "[part torn off] 1848. H. M. ships Terror and Erebus were deserted on the 22nd April, five leagues N.N.W. of this, having been beset since 12th September 1846. The officers and crews, consisting of 105 souls, under the command of Captain F. R. M. Crozier, landed here in lat. 69° 37′ 42′′ N., long. 98° 41′ W. This paper was found by Lieutenant Irving under the cairn supposed to have been built by Sir James Ross in 1831, four miles to the northward, where it had been deposited by the late Commander Gore in June 1847. Sir James Ross' pillar has not, however, been found, and the paper has been transferred to this position, which is that in which Sir James Ross' pillar was erected. Sir John Franklin died on the 11th June 1847; and the total loss by deaths in the expedition has been to this date, 9 officers and 15 men. F. R. M. Crozier, Captain and senior officer-and start (on) to-morrow, 26th, for Back's Fish River. James Fitz James, Captain, H.M.S. Erebus." Two days later a boat was discovered, with two skeletons and guns and portions of books and plate that had belonged to the ill-fated expedition. This is the last that was ever ascertained concerning Captain Crozier and his brave companions. All must have perished of hunger and exhaustion. "The arctic clouds uplift A moment, and no more, "A band of gallant hearts. Well ordered, calm, and brave, Their long march to the grave."-Punch. M'Clintock named the extreme west point of King William's Island, "Cape Crozier." Sir Roderick Murchison agrees with M'Clintock and others in affirming that "Franklin and his followers secured the honour for which they died-that of being the first discoverers of the North-west Pas Cuchulaind, called by Tigernach "fortissimus heros Scotorum," one of the Red Branch knights, flourished about the 1st century. He was a native of Ulster, and was a cousin of Conall Cearnach, and of the three sons of Uisneach, the children of his aunt Ailbi. At seven years of age he was initiated into the military order, and received most of his education at Skye. At twenty-seven he was slain, according to one account by Lugaidh, grandson of Cairbre Niaser, at the battle of Murthemni, in Louth; according to another, by the sons of Calitin. His residence was at Dun-Dealgan (Dundalk): his wife, the beautiful princess Emer. Innumerable references to him are to be found in the Irish annals and Fenian tales. In O'Curry's Manners and Customs his name appears no less than 153 times. He is one of the principal characters in the Tain-Bo-Chuailgne (The Cattle Prey of Cooley), the Irish Iliad. [See MEAVE.] He is described riding in his chariot, armed with thirty-four spears and darts, and eight shields. "And he then put on his helmet of battle, and of combat, and of fighting, on his head; and from every recess and from every angle of which issued the shout as it were of an hundred warriors; because it was alike that women of the valley, and hobgoblins, and wild people of the glen, and demons of the air, shouted in front of it, and rear of it, and over it, and around it, wherever he went, at the spouting of the blood of warriors and heroes upon it.”261 His head and right hand were buried at Tara. 171 261 Cumian, or Cumene the White, Abbot of Iona, was born in Tirconuell the beginning of the 7th century. He was sent for his education to Iona, and soon outstripped "most of his contemporaries in the exercise of virtue, and all of them in learning." On his return he founded or governed an abbey in the west of Leinster. The difference concerning the celebration of Easter about this period assumed wide proportions. For a time Cumian held aloof; but after a year's consideration he was instrumental in calling a synod at Leighlin to discuss the question. The synod despatched messengers to Rome; and upon their return and report in about three years' time, it was decided to adopt the Roman usage. Cumian, as the chief mover in the matter, was reproved by his old friends the monks of Iona. They declared that he was a heretic-a deserter of the traditions of his ancestors. These feelings subsided in time, and upon the next vacancy (in 657) he was elected to succeed in the government of Iona. After adorning the position by his learning and sanctity for twelve years, he died in 669. Some religious works are attributed to him. It is to be remarked that the southern Irish Church conformed to the Roman Easter sooner than the northern and Dalriad, and that, in consequence for many years there existed the strongest feelings of antipathy between the ecclesiastics of the two sections. 339 Cunningham, John, an actor, who gained a reputation as a poet, was born in Dublin in 1729, and died at Newcastle 18th September 1773, aged about 44. At twelve years of age several of his fugitive pieces, not without merit, had found a place in the papers of his native city. Johnson says: "Although Cunningham cannot be admitted to a very high rank among poets, he may be allowed to possess a considerable share of genius. His poems have peculiar sweetness and elegance; his sentiments are generally natural, and his language simple and appropriate to his subject, except in some of his longer pieces where he accumulates epithets that appear to be laboured." He is now almost forgotten, although his tombstone avers that "his works will remain a monument for ages." 198 Curran, John Oliver, M.B., was born at Trooperfield, near Lisburn, 30th April 1819. He studied at the Universities of Glasgow and Dublin, and took his degree of M.B. in 1843. After walking the Paris hospitals, he returned to Ireland, and in 1846 became a licentiate of the King and Queen's College of Physicians. He soon took his place as a prominent medical practitioner and lecturer, a contributor to medical literature, a member of the Royal Irish Academy, and of most of the literary and scientific societies of Dublin. He fell a victim to the frightful typhus of the Famine, 28th September 1847, aged 28. He was a vegetarian from the time when, a child of four years, a friend bantered him with petting animals and eating their kind. 115 Curran, John Philpot, was born at Newmarket, County of Cork, 24th July 1750. Mr. His father was Seneschal of the Manor of Newmarket; his mother, Sarah Philpot, a woman of culture and feeling, had her memory stored with Irish legends. Her recitals cultivated the imaginative faculties of her son, and the tender love between them continued strong through life. We do not hear much of his brothers and sisters. Curran grew up a rough country lad, speaking Irish as well as English, fonder of amusement than of books. Boyse, a neighbouring clergyman, early took a liking to the boy, gave him a preliminary education, and then sent him to Midleton school, chiefly at his own cost. He entered Trinity College as a sizar, and obtained a scholarship in 1770. He was intended for the Church, and studied divinity, but never wrote more than two sermonsone for his friend "Dick Stack" (afterwards a Fellow of the College and author of a Treatise on Optics), the other preached by himself in the College Chapel as a task. In the college rows between "town and gown " he was a foremost combatantin short, we are told, he was "the wittiest and dreamiest, the most classical and ambitious of the scamps of Trinity College." On coming of age he abandoned all thoughts of entering the Church, and, having graduated, went to London and entered at the Middle Temple. His address and utterance were then so defective that he was known as "Stuttering Jack Curran." By constant practice, declaiming before a looking-glass, and studying Shakspere and Bolingbroke, he overcame natural deficiencies, and great was the surprise of the members of a debating club he occasionally attended, when one evening "Orator Mum" completely silenced an orator who had theretofore carried all before him. Thenceforward he was a constant speaker in debating societies, where from his utterances in favour of Catholic rights he was called "The Little Jesuit of St. Omers." During his second year in London he married his cousin, Miss Creagh. Her fortune and some money supplied by his family supported them until he was called to the Irish Bar in 1775. He used to say, his wife and children were the chief furniture of his apartments, and as to rent it stood much the same chance of liquidation as the National Debt. On the occasion of his first appearance, making a motion before the Chancellor at the old Courts in Dublin, his original nervousness overmastered him, and he had to resign the case into the hands of a friend. His brilliant talents soon asserted themselves, however. The first year his fees amounted disenthralled by the irresistible genius of to £100, the second to between £100 and universal emancipation." His last effort £200, and they continued to increase ra- in the trials of 1798 was for Wolfe Tone. pidly every year. He was materially as- He was not in Parliament to oppose the sisted in his advancement at the Bar by Union, which measure threw a cloud over the steady friendship of Lord Kilwarden, the rest of his life. He even contemplated his political opponent. At the Cork Sum- emigration to the United States. He had mer Assizes of 1780, he sprang at once no sympathy with Emmet in 1803, and was into fame and popularity by acting as little prepared to make allowance for Emcounsel for a Catholic clergyman who had met's having become privately engaged to been brutally horsewhipped by Lord Done- his daughter Sarah. Curran's treatment raile. Other lawyers on the circuit had of her was most severe, and she had to feared to take up the case, and Curran find a home among strangers. On Pitt's secured a verdict for his client; having death in 1806, Curran was appointed Masafterwards to fight a duel with a Captain ter of the Rolls for Ireland, a position for St. Leger, and to endure the hostility of which he was not very well qualified, and the Doneraile family. About this period we which he held but for eight years-resignfind him prior of the "Monks of the Screw," ing in 1814 upon a pension of some £3,000 a literary and convivial club numbering per annum. After his resignation of this amongst its members the most brilliant office he resided much at his mansion in men in Dublin-Grattan, Charlemont, Brompton, where he enjoyed the society Barry, Daly, Temple, Emmet, and others. of Erskine, Horne Tooke, Sheridan, the The charter song of the society, written by Prince Regent, Thomas Moore, and WilCurran, is to be found in most collections liam Godwin. His latter days were emof Irish ballad poetry. In 1783 he en- bittered by domestic troubles. The detered Parliament as member for Kilbeg-pressed state of his mind may be gathered gan; three years afterwards he was returned for Rathcormack, which he represented until 1797. But meagre reports of his parliamentary speeches have been handed down to us. He spoke on Flood's Reform Bill in 1783, again on the right of the Commons to originate money bills; and his speech in February 1785, on the abuse of attachments by the King's Bench led to a duel with FitzGibbon. That on Catholic Emancipation delivered on 4th February 1792, is perhaps the only one worthy of his reputation as an orator. He showed "that a disunited people cannot long subsist," and declared that the certain result of a union would be that public spirit would die out in Ireland, while "fifteen or twenty couple of Irish members, might be found every session sleeping in their collars under the manger of the English minister." In 1797, with Grattan and other members, he retired, hopeless of being able to assuage revolution or stem the torrent of ministerial intrigue. It was at the Bar that Curran made his reputation as a brilliant orator, and his greatest flights of genius were in defence of the United Irishmen. He acted not alone as a paid counsel, but as a friend and adviser, sympathizing to a certain extent in their aspirations, and throwing his whole heart into their defence. Hamilton Rowan's trial for seditious libel in 1793, he gave utterance to that wellremembered apostrophe to the spirit of liberty, under which, on British soil, the slave "stands redeemed, regenerated, and On from one of his letters written at this His |