were even declared by those laws to be "enemies." All intercourse between the races was interdicted. The Irish could not enter any town or city without peril of their lives. They might be plundered and murdered with impunity, and even with the sanction of the laws. Numberless cases are on record, of complaints made for attacks on life and property, to which the defendants plead that "the plaintiff is an Irishman, and not of the five bloods"-namely, the five Irish families above-named,-an answer which, if verified, was always found sufficient to secure the liberation of the accused.* Thus, in the 4th of Edward II., Robert Wallace was accused at Waterford for feloniously slaying John Mac Gillimory. The prisoner confessed the fact, but pleaded that "by his slaying the aforesaid John he could not commit felony, because the aforesaid John was A MERE IRISHMAN, and not of the five bloods," and so forth. On another occasion it is recorded that William Fitz Roger was charged with slaying one O'Driscoll; the which having confessed, he (Fitz Roger) pleaded that "he could not commit felony by means of such killing; because the aforesaid Roger was AN IRISHMAN, and not of free blood; therefore the said William, as far as regards the aforesaid felony, is ACQUITTED." But, as O'Driscoll was "an Irishman of our Lord the King," the said William Fitz Roger was sentenced to pay FIVE MARKS to our Lord the King, for the value of the aforesaid Irishman!" From this may be learned the highest price at which the life of an Irishman was in those days estimated by the Anglo-Norman government.

Such was the system of separation between the two races, persevered in from the first. The colony was thus enabled to preserve itself from merging into the nation, and the foreigners from amalgamating with the Irish people. Though living together in the same land, in a comparatively narrow and insulated territory, the same feelings of hostility and hatred have descended in all their bitterness and fervour down even to the present day. Nearly seven centuries have passed, and still the conquerors and the conquered are fighting out the same old battle on the soil of Ireland.

To give a single instance from the Historical Tracts of Sir John Davies:-" In the 29th Edward I., before the justices in Oyer, at Drogheda, Thomas le Botteler brought an action of detenue against Robert de Almain, for certain goods. The defendant pleadeth: that he is not bound to answer the plaintiff for this-that the plaintiff is an Irishman, and not of free blood. And the aforesaid Thomas says that he is an Englishman, and this he prays may be enquired of by the country. Therefore let a jury come forth, and so forth. And the jurors, on their oath, say that the aforesaid Thomas is an Englishman. Therefore it is adjudged that he do receive his damages." Thus these records demonstrate (says Mr. O'Connell, in his Memoirs of Ireland) that the Irishman had no protection for his property; because, if the plaintiff, in either case, had been declared by the jury to be an Irishman, the action would be barred; though the injury was not denied upon the record to have been committed. The validity of the plea in point of law was also admitted; so that, no matter what injury might be committed upon the real or personal property of an Irishman, the courts of law afforded him no species of remedy.-IRELAND AND THE IRISH, pp. 51-2.

CHAPTER VI.

Richard Cœur-de-Lion-John-Deplorable state of the country-Henry III.-Futile attempt to introduce the English laws-Quarrels of the invaders-Irish join their armies-Edward I.-Feuds of the barons-Disregard of human life-Attempt to bribe the English into doing justice.

THE history of Ireland, for some centuries after the reign of Henry II., presents but little variety, except the variety of alternated force and fraud, of domestic treason and foreign tyranny. As king succeeded king in England, so did oppression succeed oppression in Ireland. The system of cruelty was handed down unchanged from one generation to another. Whatever change might take place in England favourable to popular liberty, it was all the same to Ireland: all parties oppressed and crushed her in their turn. The Irish annals of the period present one dismal monotony of calamity and crime.

Richard I. Cœur-de-Lion, succeeded to the throne of England, on the death of his father. His accession to power was signalized by the massacre and plunder of the Jews throughout England, to enable him to undertake a crusade for the recovery of the Holy Land. Thus, in those days of Norman tyranny it was not thought inconsistent to preface a great effort of missionary enterprize by an act of satanic cruelty and barbarism. On this occasion, the attempted recovery of the land of Jesus was heralded by a general massacre of the chosen people of God! Richard lived like a madman, and died like a fool, leaving his name as a legacy to the romancists and novelists of England. He did nothing for Ireland; but left it to the Norman barons to carry on the work of spoliation there for their own special benefit.

Richard was succeeded by his brother John-a monster, whose character stands unredeemed from infamy by a single virtue. He ascended the throne, first giving the people a sufficient proof of his humanity by the murder of his nephew Arthur. His exactions and oppressions of his English subjects soon became so intolerable, that at length they rose against him as one man, and wrung from him the celebrated Magna Charta, the key-stone of English liberty. But, successful though England was in its resistance to this tyrant, Ireland, during his reign, exhibited the same melancholy picture of slavery and suffering. Occasional attempts were still made to check the ravages of the invaders, more especially under the direction of the king of Connaught, Cuthal of the Bloody Hand; but in vain. The tide of oppression still rolled on, till at length it covered the land from side to side. Bloody feuds still continued among the native chiefs, which the foreigners artfully excited and fomented; taking advantage of the same to weaken the strength of the nation, and extend their own power. The Norman barons

themselves also not unfrequently fell out in their struggles for ascendancy; and in their feuds the native Irish generally took sides with one or other of the contending parties. With the view of checking the quarrels of these rapacious chiefs, John made a military expedition into Ireland (A.D. 1210), on which occasion many of the Irish princes and chiefs paid homage to the monarch. After the lapse of a few years, John paid a second visit to Ireland, on which occasion he transplanted many of the English laws and institutions, for the benefit of his English subjects in Ireland. From the benefit of all such laws and institutions, however, the Irish people were carefully excluded. It is not a little remarkable that throughout the stormy period of John's reign, his subjects in Ireland, English as well as native, should have made no effort to avail themselves of his embarrassments to advance their own interests and views. "On the contrary," observes Moore, “in defiance of all ordinary speculation, and a similar anomaly presents itself at more than one crisis of our history,-while England was affording an example of rebellion and riot, which mere neighbourhood, it might be supposed, would have rendered infectious, the sister country meanwhile looked quietly on, and remained in unbroken peace." The unusual tranquillity of Ireland at this time was probably owing in no small degree to the comparatively mild sway of the governors to whom were entrusted the administration of its affairs during this disgraceful and infamous English reign.

Another attempt was made in the early part of the reign of Henry III. (which commenced A.D. 1216), to introduce English laws and institutions into Ireland, for the benefit of the English subjects there. The provisions of the Great Charter were confirmed, and extended to the sister kingdom. The natives, however, were still left entirely out of consideration, and were even carefully excluded from all share in the benefits of the new laws. Applications were repeatedly made for admission within the English pale; but were as repeatedly rejected with contempt. It was the policy of the new lords of the soil to deal with the native Irish as persons beyond the protection of the laws, and with whom they were bound to keep no faith. And such was the impotence of the English crown over the tyrannical barons, that in the thirtieth year of Henry's reign a royal mandate was sent over to Ireland enjoining on them, for the sake of the public peace, to permit it to be governed by the English laws! But no: the upstart and suddenly enriched aristocracy (and such are invariably the most inveterate enemies of public liberty) would not so soon give up their privilege of oppression. They continued in the "good old way" of harrassing, plundering, and massacreing at will the native Irish. But injustice and wrong brought with them their own retribution. The barons lived in the midst of constant outrage and "rebellion"; and their lives were never to be considered safe

for a moment. Gorged with plunder, they also, by a kind of natural process, fell out among themselves, and waged destructive war upon each other; to put an end to which, the royal power was often called upon to interfere. To check and keep in awe these turbulent tyrants, the Irish in their desperation, as the Israelites in their folly, prayed for a King! They would have hailed the tyranny of One as a blessing, instead of the baronial tyranny of hundreds. The presence of Royalty, the Irish imagined, would check the career of their rapacious chiefs, both foreign and native, and accordingly they entreated the English king to send them over a member of his royal family to rule over them. The request, like all others, was refused, and Ireland was left to be victimized as before.

About this time it was, that, in spite of the oppressions practised on the Irish, the English monarch applied to them for military aid in his wars against the Welsh and Scotch, who were then struggling for their independence against the Anglo-Norman power. It has been the reproach of the people in all ages, and in almost all lands, that they have been ever ready to lend themselves as the instruments of their own degradation and slavery. No sooner have they been conquered, than they have been found ready to hug their chains, and bear them as if in triumph in the train of their conquerors. Ignorant of their own power, and unmindful of their own true dignity as men, they have lent themselves as the instruments of tyrants, for the establishment of the very system of oppression which was grinding them to the earth. They have hired themselves to their subjugators for the very purpose of trampling themselves and each other down. They have sold themselves to the very government that was seeking their own ruin and extinction as a nation. Thus the Irish were found ready to lend themselves to their English conquerors, even at this early period, to crush the liberties of the Welsh and the Scotch people *; while the Saxon inhabitants of England, who had been subjugated by the Normans, and many of them sold

There occurred frequently," says Moore, "in the course of this reign, disputes between England and Scotland, arising out of those pretensions for feudal superiority on the part of England, which were carried to their highest pitch, and realized by Henry's heroic successor. Among other preparations for an expected war at one of those junctures, a writ was addressed by the English monarch, to Donald, King of Tyrconnel, and about twenty other great Irish chiefs, requesting them to join him with their respective forces in an expedition against Scotland." And again, "During the disputes that arose between Henry and two successive sovereigns of Wales, Llewellyn and David, respecting the claim of feudal superiority advanced by the English king, a perpetual warfare continued to be maintained between the borderers of the two nations, which grew, at times, into sufficient importance to call into the field the respective sovereigns themselves. On an occasion of this kind, which occurred in the year 1245, the king, being then hard pressed by the Welsh, and likewise suffering from the intense severity of the winter, summoned to his aid Maurice Fitzgerald, with his Irish forces. Could a gallant example of self-defence have roused the Irish to an effective effort for their own deliverance, they had now, in the struggle of their brave neighbours, the Welsh, against English aggression, a precedent worthy of being emulated by them; for most truly was it said of that people, now armed to a man in defence of their mountain soil, that "their cause was just, even in the sight of their enemies." * But thus was it then, as it has been too frequently since, the hard fate of the Irish to be not only themselves the bond-slaves of England, but to be made also her unwilling instruments in imposing the same yoke of slavery upon others.— Moore's Ireland, Vol. III. p.p. 20, 23, 25, 26.

by their conquerors into slavery, were now found alike ready to oppress the Irish, the Welsh, and the Scotch, in their struggles for freedom.

The reign of Edward I., which begun in 1272, exhibits the same dreary record of fierce and ignoble strife. The annals of that period are chiefly filled with details of the feuds of the rival factions of Geraldines and De Burghs. Assassinations and murders, both among the English and native chiefs, were also fearfully frequent. There was a melancholy waste of human life, a deplorable amount of human suffering. Manhood and womanhood were alike trampled upon by tyrannic power. Irish men were murdered, and Irish women were violated, with equal impunity.* Usurpation everywhere prevailed. The people were counted as nothing. The Irish nation was now held to be comprehended within the pale over which England held rule. All beyond was considered, in the eye of the law, as a mere savage waste. Irishmen might be slaughtered or made away with, but the law afforded them no redress whatever. As by this time the English had begun to conform to the Irish dress and manner of wearing the hair, and several of them had thus been mistaken for Irishmen and murdered, it was deemed necessary about this period (1295) to enact, that all English settlers should conform strictly to the English garb and cut of the hair, on pain of forfeiture of their goods, imprisonment, and being dealt with as Irish !

Though often before rejected with scorn, many of the native chiefs again renewed their applications in this reign, for admission within the pale of the constitution. They even attempted to bribe the crown into doing them justice. "An application was made," says Leland, "to Ufford, the chief governor, and eight thousand marks offered to the King, provided he would grant the free enjoyment of the laws of England to the whole body of the Irish inhabitants. A petition, wrung from a people tortured by the painful feelings of oppression, in itself so just and reasonable, and in its consequences so fair and promising, could not but be favourably received by a prince possessed with exalted ideas of policy and government, and, where ambition did not interfere, a friend to justice." The application, however, though listened to, and "graciously considered," proved in vain; the barons took care that no extension of justice was ever made to the Irish people, which they could possibly prevent. Their invariable rule has been coercion and spoilation, down even to the present day. It is not a little remarkable, that, at the very time when the Irish were being treated with such monstrous oppression and cruelty, they furnished Edward I. with an immense army for the purpose of effecting the total subjugation of the Scottish nation! The fact is a most melancholy

A case is found detailed in the Rolls (Dub. 6 and 7 Edw. I) wherein Robert Delaroche and Adam de Waleys were indicted for violating the person of Margery O'Rorke; but it being found that "the aforesaid Margery was an Irishwoman," the accused were immediately acquitted!

At Roxburgh, says Dr. Lingard, the king found himself at the head of 8,000 horse and 80,000 foot, principally Irish and Welsh.