were no ships to carry the enemy away, this was their conclusion (against the will of the Deputy, who wept thereat) that the leaders should be saved and all the rest put to the sword for an example, and that the Irish should be hanged; which was presently done.

XXXV. DESOLATION OF MUNSTER AFTER
THE WARS

[Edmund Spenser, View of the Present State of Ireland, Spenser's Works (Globe ed.), p. 654.]

Notwithstanding that the same (Munster) was a most rich and plentiful country, full of corn and cattle, that you would have thought they would have been able to stand long, yet ere one year and a half they were brought to such wretchedness, as that any stony heart would have rued the same. Out of every corner of the woods and glens they came creeping forth upon their hands, for their legs could not bear them; they looked like anatomies of death, they spake like ghosts crying out of their graves; they did eat of the dead carrions, happy were they if they could find them, yea, and one another soon after, insomuch as the very carcasses they spared not to scrape out of their graves; and if they found a plot of watercresses or shamrocks, there they flocked as to a feast for the time, yet not able long to continue there withal; that in short space there were none almost left, and a most populous and plentiful country suddenly made void of man and beast.

XXXVI. SHANE O'NEILL AT THE COURT
OF ELIZABETH

[William Camden, Annales rerum Anglicarum et Hibernicarum regnante Elizabetha, ad Annum Salutis 1589 (1615), pp. 78-9.]

[1562] And now Shane O'Neill came from Ireland, to keep the promise he had made a year before, with an escort of gallowglass, armed with battle-axes, bare-headed, with flowing

Spenser was in Ireland from 1580 to 1598. His View was written in 1596 and published posthumously. He held several Irish offices, and secured much landed property in the South, especially after the confiscation of the estates of the Earl of Desmond in 1586. He was present at the capture of the Fort of Smerwick in 1580, and approved of the massacre. It is possible that his picture of misery quoted here is overdrawn, but see Sir Henry Sydney's letter to the Queen (20 April, 1567), quoted in Collins, Letters and Memorials, I. 24, and Sir Warham St. Leger's account of the State of Munster after the war, quoted by Bagwell, op. cit. III. 98. Sir William Pelham, the Lord Justice, had promised the Privy Council (16 Feb., 1579) to make “ as bare a country as ever Spaniard set his foot in," and the threat seems to have been fulfilled.-Cal. Carew MSS., II. 220. See pp. 247 n. 4, 252 n. I.

See p. 87 n. 3.

curls, yellow shirts dyed with saffron . . . large sleeves, short tunics and rough cloaks, whom the English followed with as much wonderment as if they had come from China or America. O'Neill was received with all kindness, and throwing himself at the Queen's feet he owned with lamentation his crime of rebellion and begged for pardon. When asked with courtesy by what right he had excluded Hugh his brother Matthew's son from his ancestral lands, he replied boldly, as he had done in Ireland, "By the best of right. For I," he said, "as the true and legitimate son and heir of Con, born of his lawful wife, have entered upon my father's estate. Matthew was the son of a blacksmith of Dundalk, not true born, but born after Con's marriage with his wife Alison and craftily passed off on Con by the mother as his son, so as to cheat me of the possessions and title of O'Neill. If I were to suffer such a wrong no other of the family of the O'Neills would ever endure it. The surrender made by my father to Henry VIII and the grant which Henry made him by letters patent, was of no value, since Con had no estate in what he surrendered save for his own life, nor could he yield it without the consent of the chiefs and people by whom he had been chosen to the dignity of O'Neill. Such letters patent are of no avail, unless the true head of the family is first approved by the oath of twelve men, which in this case was not done. But I am the true heir by the law of God and man, being the first son of my father born in lawful wedlock, and called O'Neill by the common consent of chiefs and people according to the law of our ancestors called tanistry, by which the man grown is to be preferred before the boy, and the uncle to his nephew whose grandfather has outlived his father. Nor have I taken to myself one whit more authority over the chiefs of Ulster than my ancestors exercised in their own right in times past, as I can bring forth proofs to show. But I have spoken of this elsewhere." So the Queen believed his tale, and he was sent home with honour and for some time served well and loyally against the robbers of the Hebrides.2

XXXVII. SHANE O'NEILL TO CHARLES IX OF FRANCE AND TO THE CARDINAL OF LORRAINE 3 [Letter to Charles IX (25 April, 1566). Cal. S.P. Ireland, pp. 298–9.]

Desires that the perpetual treaty proposed by the late king may be concluded. 5,000 or 6,000 French, well-armed, to be presently sent to assist in expelling the English. Shane and his successors a See p. 46.

I See p. 59 n. 2.

3 Both these letters of Shane are reproduced in Gilbert's Facsimiles of National MSS. of Ireland, IV. iii., append. vi., pp. 70-1.

will be humble subjects to the Crown of France. King Charles to write to the Queen of Scots in their favour. Relates that on his repair to England, notwithstanding the safe conduct obtained for himself and retinue from the Queen, the senseless Council of England (consilio insipienti Anglie), the Lord Lieutenant and the Council and nobility of Ireland, some of his gentlemen were detained as hostages, and imprisoned as criminals, but all have now of the grace of God returned to Ireland.

Letter to the Cardinal of Lorraine.

Beseeches the Cardinal, in consideration of his defence of the Romish faith, to persuade the French King to send the aid he needs. [Originals in Latin.]

XXXVIII. THE POWER OF SHANE O'NEILL

[Edmund Campion, History of Ireland (ed. Ware, 1633), chap. x.]1

...

Shane was reputed for the rightful O'Neill . . . challenged superiority over the Irish lords of Ulster, warred also upon the English part, subdued O'Reilly, imprisoned O'Donnell, his wife and his son, enriched himself with all O'Donnell's forts, castles and plate .. fortified a strong island in Tyrone, which he named spitefully "Foogh-ni-Gall," that is, the "hate of Englishmen," whom he so detested, that he hanged a soldier for eating English biscuit. . . . He was yet persuaded . to reconcile himself to good order, and to remember the honourable estate wherein King Henry placed his father . . . and made a voyage into England, where the courtiers noting his haughtiness and barbarity, devised his style thus: "O'Neill the Great, cousin to Saint Patrick, friend to the Queen of England, enemy to all the world besides." Thence he sped home again, graciously dealt with, used civility . . . ordered the North so properly, that if any subject could approve the loss of money or goods within his precinct, he would assuredly either force the robber to restitution, or of his own cost redeem the harm to the loser's contentation. Sitting at meat, before he put one morsel into his mouth, he used to slice a portion above the daily alms, and send it namely to some beggar at his gate, saying it was meet to serve Christ first.3 But the lords of Ulster, and elsewhere,

Part of Campion's description, which was written in 1569, is obviously copied from the preamble to the Act of Attainder of Shane O'Neill (11 Eliz. c. 1), Irish Statutes (1786), I. 322.

Recte, Fuath na nGall.

3 For a graphic account of the camp of Shane O'Neill, see the Four Masters, V., 1555

whom he yoked and spoiled at pleasure, abhorring his pride and extortion, craved assistance of the Deputy, for redress thereof. O'Neill advertised, increaseth his rage, disturbeth and driveth out Maguire the plaintiff, burneth the Metropolitan Church of Armagh, because no English army might lodge therein. besiegeth Dundalk, practiseth to call strangers into the land for aid, as appeareth by those letters which Sir Henry Sydney, Lord Deputy, intercepted, occupieth all the North of Ireland, being 100 miles broad, 120 long.

XXXIX. THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE

O'NEILLS ABOLISHED

[Act of Attainder of Shane O'Neill (11 Eliz. c. 1). Irish Statutes (1786), I. 335-]

Forasmuch as the name of the O'Neill, in the judgements of the uncivil people of this Realm, doth carry in itself so great a sovereignty, as they suppose that all the lords and people of Ulster should rather live in servitude to that name, than in subjection to the crown of England be it therefore, by your Majesty, with the assent of the lords spiritual and temporal, and the Commons in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, that the same name of O'Neill, with the manner and ceremonies of his creation, and all the superiorities, titles, dignities, pre-eminences, jurisdictions, authorities, rules, tributes, and expenses, used, claimed, usurped, or taken by any O'Neill, as in right of that name, or otherwise, from the beginning, of any the lords, captains, or people of Ulster, and all manner of offices given by the said O'Neill, shall from henceforth cease, end, determine, and be utterly abolished and extinct for ever. And that what person soever he be that shall hereafter challenge, execute, or take upon him that name of O'Neill, or any superiority, dignity, pre-eminence and jurisdiction, authority, rule, tributes, or expenses, used, claimed, usurped, or taken heretofore by any O'Neill, of the lords, captains, or people of Ulster, the same shall be deemed, adjudged, and taken high treason against your Majesty, your crown and dignity and the person or persons therein offending, and being thereof attainted, shall suffer and sustain such pains of death, forfeiture of lands and goods, as in cases of high treason by the law of this Realm hath been accustomed and used.

And for the better extirpation of that name, be it further enacted . . . that all the lords, captains and people of Ulster, shall be from henceforth severed, exempted, and cut off from all rule and authority of O'Neill, and shall only depend upon your imperial

crown of England, and yield to the same their subjection, obedience, and services for ever.

XL. ROYAL PROCLAMATION AGAINST THE EARL OF TYRONE (1595)

66

[Cal. Carew MSS., III. 111.]

Whereas the Queen advanced Hugh O'Neill, the son of one Matthew Ferdorcha O'Neill, a bastard son of Con O'Neill, commonly called " Great O'Neill," in Tyrone, to the noble dignity of an Earl, endowed him with larger territories than any other Earl of Ireland, allowed him yearly 1,000 marks sterling, and at his repair into England gave to him and his heirs by letters patent very large possessions and rule over sundry her subjects; yet nevertheless he has fallen from allegiance, and committed sundry foul murders and other violent oppressions against her subjects; as namely in hanging one of Shane O'Neill's sons, born of more noble parents than the Earl himself, for which act he was pardoned, upon promise of amendment; but he has since taken by force two others of the said Shane O'Neill's sons, holding them captives in places unknown. Aspiring to live like a tyrant over a great number of good subjects then in Ulster, he has lately allured O'Donnell, the chieftain of Tyrconnel (by matching with him in marriage), whose fathers and predecessors have always been loyal, to enter into rebellion; and has in like manner comforted and provoked, with the aid of his brethren and bastards, certain other disobedient subjects, as Maguire, chieftain of Fermanagh, the traitor O'Rourke's son, and sundry of the MacMahons of Monaghan, to invade divers countries in and near to the English Pale. In order to become Prince of Ulster, he has also partly by force, partly by false persuasions, allured and drawn to concur with him in rebellion a great part of the chieftains of Ulster.

For these causes her Majesty doth now, upon the preparation of her army, notify to all her good subjects, both English and Irish, the said Earl to be accepted the principal traitor and chief author of this rebellion, and a known practiser with Spain and other her Majesty's enemies; commanding all her subjects that have aided and accompanied him, and yet shall now desire to live peaceably in her favour, to withdraw themselves from him and his complices. And when her army shall enter Ulster, if they come to the Lord Deputy, they shall upon their submission have pardon of their lives

and lands.

The modern county of Donegal.