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suade Matthews to allow a passage; but he was proof against their entreaties as well as Monroe's threats, resolutely telling them, that it was to no purpose, he and his men being determined to lose their lives rather than run the hazard of such an affront as had been given lately at Belfast. Monroe seeing nothing was to be done, marched off next morning very peaceably, but threatening to return within a fortnight with artillery that should fetch down their colours from their castles.

Upon the news of the Scots seizing Belfast', the council of Kilkenny sent to the lord lieutenant, pressing him to declare the Scots rebels, and to join his forces with that army, which they were drawing out into the field to oppose them. Their affairs were in great distractions by reason of the competition between the marquis of Antrim and the earl of Castlehaven; the one having the supreme command of all their forces, the other having one independent on any but the council; the first desiring the benefit of his commission, which the council would not grant, the latter endeavouring to preserve his possession. Neither of these would yield to his rival, but 497 both were ready to submit to the marquis of Ormond, if he could be prevailed with to accept the command of all the Irish forces. Mr. Belling and Dr. Fennel, the marquis's particular friends, were strangely surprised to hear the thing moved, and to find such a likelihood of its being received. They wrote to his excellency, to learn if it was as new to him as it was to themselves, and to receive his instructions for their own conduct, in case the motion should be made in form to the council, which they had as yet prevented, to get time to know his sense of the matter, being apprehensive that the bare offer of such a command, unless he might accept it, would be to his prejudice. Daniel O'Neile pressed the marquis of Ormond See Collection of Letters, No. CCXCVIII.

! K. 416. CCCXI. and K. 471.

to receive the army, if offered him; conceiving it to be the only way, as well to secure himself, as to preserve the kingdom in unity and obedience to his majesty. 105 The arguments for it were, that he might draw the dependence of the Irish forces upon himself, and be able to dispose of them for his majesty's service, which could scarce be expected if the command were put into other hands; that it would put an end to the contention between two great men, and their factions, which was likely to frustrate all their designs against the Scots, and embroil them in unseasonable and destructive quarrels among themselves; that his majesty's authority, countenancing their actions against the Scots, would draw many of the best affected protestants to join in the service, and deter others from appearing actively against it; that, if he accepted the command, the Irish council would provide for the English army under his charge; and that it was to be feared his refusal of it might disoblige his kindred, allies, and friends of that party, and so lessen his power to serve the king, and hinder the Irish from paying the rest of the supply due to his majesty, they having a pretence to refuse it, on account of their being damnified, as much as it amounted to, by the preys of the English garrisons since the cessation.

106 The marquis of Ormond did not think these motives sufficient to be put in balance with his majesty's honour and service; which could not but suffer by the lord lieutenant's mixing the king's rightful power and unblemished forces with the wild usurped authority and unlawful arms of the other party; without which the thing desired could not be done. He could not take it upon him without his majesty's command and approbation, which would give such offence to all his subjects in England and elsewhere, as would have fatal consequences on his affairs. These were reasons more than sufficient to hinder the marquis of Ormond from complying with the proposal, if

107

he had not picqued himself on the honour of his family; the greatest glory of which, he thought, consisted in this, that from the first planting of it in Ireland, it had never been tainted with disloyalty in the chief of it, except that in the dispute for the crown between the houses of York and Lancaster (where the variety of success, at one time or other, involved all men of action under the charge) one of his house suffered for the cause of Henry VI. He knew himself already proscribed by the parliament for his loyalty; yet he would never do any thing to justify such proscription, though it might carry an appearance of present security and future advantage.

Such were the reasons upon which he refused the command proposed to him; and the same held in some degree against their desire, that he would immediately proclaim the Scots rebels, and declare war against them. That step he was sure would not reclaim them, and he feared it would afford the ill-affected so specious a pretence for their own defection, and furnish them with such plausible arguments to seduce others, that he was confident he should be suddenly and totally deserted by all the protestants. For such of them as were left in the 498 kingdom, having lost their estates and fortunes by the rebellion, were reduced to such extremity of want and despair, that seeing no likelihood of being restored to them by a peace, they would be tempted to seek subsistence, and become adventurers with those that carried on the war, and would offer them present relief, and shares in the booty. John Walsh was deputed by the Irish council on June 8 to treat with him on these heads; and such was the distress of the army and protestants about Dublin, by the failure of the excise, the blocking up of the harbour by the parliament ships, and the utter exhausting of all credit both public and private, that the lord lieutenant did not think it prudent to give them a h L. 84, 156, 165, 183, 193. See Collection of Letters, No. CCCXI.

short and flat denial. All his hopes of subsistence depended at that time entirely upon the Irish; they had promised to send an immediate supply of six hundred barrels of corn and four hundred beeves, and were actually preparing it. An absolute breach with them might provoke them to stop that supply, (for which they did not want a colour,) and to hinder the commerce and freedom of the markets, which now the freedom of the port was destroyed, would starve them in a moment.

108 In this situation he chose to entertain them with a treaty tending to the same end as that which they proposed, but very different in the manner, till he could have the king's directions for his conduct. The Irish pretended they had received advice from their commissioners in England, that his majesty had actually sent orders to the lord lieutenant, that he should join in the service against the covenanting Scots; but he absolutely denied the receiving, and in fact never did receive any such orders. He proposed to them as a preliminary, that they should supply his majesty's armies under his command, and that the charge might not be uncertain, he stinted the number to six thousand foot and six hundred horse; whereof, in Leinster, three thousand eight hundred foot, and three hundred horse; in Munster, one thousand two hundred foot, and two hundred horse; in Connaught, seven hundred foot, and one hundred horse; and in Ulster, three hundred foot. In case a proper provision were made for the maintenance of those forces, the times and manner of payment settled, and good assurance given thereof, he undertook to keep them from annoying the provinces, or breaking the cessation, and to maintain them in obedience to his majesty's authority. He made the like engagement for the garrisons of Carlingford, Grenecastle, the Newry, Dundalk, Drogheda, and all others in Leinster; and that the earl of Clanrickard should have authority from his majesty and directions to act in Con

naught, pursuant to what should be undertaken for the advantage of the service. This he thought would be best promoted, not by such an useless and dangerous declaration as they desired against the Scots, which would hazard the fidelity of his own troops, but by drawing them down to the frontiers towards the Scots, where without any declaration he did not question but to draw from them many of their best armed soldiers, horse and foot, and to divert a great part of their forces, which else would be entirely bent against the Irish. These propositions he made the ground of a treaty, which the council of Kilkenny were not fond of entering upon, but still insisted on a declaration against the Scots, being either deceived by the flattering accounts sent them out of England, or buoyed up with hopes, that the distress of his majesty would force him to comply with a demand; which whatever it promised in its first appearance or might procure from them, would in the end be ruinous to his affairs, or make him necessarily dependent upon them for the footing which he yet held in Ireland. This was a consequence to be avoided at any rate, and the marquis of Ormond constantly persisted in his resolution. of not issuing a declaration, which might have made many of the old Scotch and English officers desperate, who 499 had only submitted to invincible necessity in their joining with Monroe, and waited a favourable season to shew their affections to his majesty's service.

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Whilst these things passed in Ireland, a treaty was carrying on at Oxford for settling the peace of that kingdom. The Irish were by the articles of the cessation allowed to send agents to his majesty; and in the November following the general assembly met at Waterford for that purpose. The choice fell upon the lord Muskery, Alexander Macdonel, Nic. Plunket, sir Robert Talbot, Dermot O'Bryen, Rich. Martin, and Geoffrey Brown.

h G. 303.