it on in concert with Tirone, after having thus provoked and injured him, is, indeed, a mystery not easily unravelled.*

Sir John Temple's account of this conspiracy is much shorter than that of either of these bishops, but equally incoherent and absurd. "In this state," says he, " the kingdom continued under some indifferent terms of peace and tranquillity, until the earl of Tironet took up new thoughts of rising into arms. And into this rebellious design he drew the whole province of Ulster, then entirely at his devotion. But his plot failed; and finding himself not able to get together any considerable forces, he, with the principal of his adherents, quit. ting the kingdom, fled into Spain."‡

The contradiction of Tirone's having drawn the whole province of Ulster into his rebellious designs, and at the same time, his not being able to get together any considerable forces, is too glaring to need any further animadversion.

These are the only written accounts I have yet met with, after a very diligent search, of this conspiracy and flight of the earls, from which, I presume, the candid reader will conclude,

3 See his History of the Irish Rebellion.

• Incredible as these things are, yet in order to carry on the farce thoroughly, and to garble up O'Cahane's great estate among the rest, O'Cahane himself was afterwards seized as one of the conspirators, and forfeited like the other gentlemen of Ulster. The king and council, however, discovered some tenderness with respect to him, before his actual seizure. For they desired the deputy" to bring him to conformity, by shaking the rod over him; but if that would not do, his majesty was pleased, that he should use his discretion in drawing down some force upon him." This letter is dated January 24th, 1607. And in another letter of the 20th of November following, they say, " but for O'Cahane, whom it seemeth you have imprisoned, we like well of the course you have taken with him. And we allow also very well of your placing his son in the college.”—Desiderata Curiosa Hibern. p. 508-13.

†Tirone was at this time so closely looked after," that he was heard to complain, that he had so many eyes watching over him, as that he could not drink a full carouse of sack, but the state was advertised thereof within a few hours."-Sir John Davis's Hist. Relat. p. 117.

"Tirone (on this occasion) fled privately into Normandy, in 1607, thence to Flanders, and then to Rome; where he lived on the pope's al owance, became blind, and died in the year 1616. His son was, some years after, found strangled in his bed at Brussels; and so ended his race." Borlase's Reduct. of Ireland, p. 184.

that there never was any such conspiracy; and that these accounts were then framed, however injudiciously, to give some color of right to public acts of slander, oppression and rapine.*

Dr. Leland has justly observed on this occasion,+ "That it seems extraordinary, that the northerns, who were still smarting with the chastisement they had received in the late rebellion, whose consequence and influence were considerably di minished, and who were very lately reconciled to government, and invested with their honors and estates, should precipitately involve themselves in a new rebellion." Such an event indeed, in these circumstances, not only seems extraordinary, but actually is, at least in a moral sense, utterly incredible.

But as the same historian endeavors to refute the only traditional account which has been hitherto handed down to us of it, viz. that the flight of the earls was occasioned by the treachery of one of the family of St. Lawrence; by merely supposing," that, if any art or treachery had been used to

4 Hist. of Ireland, vol. ii.

Our historians assert, as some alleviation of the general distress caused by the seizure of these six counties in Ulster, that many of the catholic natives were permitted to settle on these plantations, and even to purchase some part of them; but it appears from sir Thomas Philips's account, which is unquestionable," that the fundamental ground of this plantation was the avoiding of natives, and planting only with British." Har ris's Hibern. fol. 131.-" It is true," says the same sir Thomas, "that, after a prescribed number of freeholders and leaseholders were settled upon every town-land, and rents therein set down, they might let the remainder to natives for lives, so as they were conformable in religion, and for the favor, to double their rents." MSS. fol. 108. For which reason it probably was, that of about two hundred undertakers in the whole plantation of these six escheated counties, there were not, in the year 1608, more than about ten or twelve Irish.-See Pinnar's List, Harris's Hibern. fol. 127.

The O'Farrels of the county of Longford, in their remonstrance, November 10th, 1641, set forth, among other grievances, "that the restraint of purchase, in the mere Irish, of lands in the escheated counties, and the taint and blemish of them and their posterities, did more discontent them, than that plantation-rule; for that they were brought to that exigence of poverty, in these late times, that they must be sellers and not buyers of land."-Borl. Ir. Rebel. fol. 53, note.

"The six escheated counties in Ulster, amounted to five hundred thou sand acres."-Lel. Hist. of Irel. vol. iii. p. 429.

render the earls obnoxious to the law, they would themselves have explained the deep scheme, and have left some memorials, in vindication of their conduct, either in Spain or Rome, where they were entertained and protected. But as no such memorials (says he) have appeared, they seem to have acquiesced in the charge of conspiracy against the English government." But to this it may be answered, on a much more probable supposition, that these noblemen were not, perhaps, expert at drawing up memorials; or rather, that they were in too desponding and necessitous a condition, to do more than relate their misfortunes, and the manner in which they were brought on them, verbally, in order to obtain a subsistence from those courts to which they fled for refuge; and that this traditional account was originally derived, and uniformly handed down to us, from such verbal relation.

That St. Lawrence was capable of that and greater wickedness, we shall be very apt to suspect, if we give credit to the following passage related of him by Mr. Cambden: "Towards the end of the former reign, when the unfortunate earl of Essex unexpectedly returned to England, from his viceroyship of Ireland; on the road, and in his way to court, lord Grey, of Wilton, one of his greatest enemies, rode swiftly by him, without speaking to or saluting him: the earl fearing that his lordship would misrepresent him to the queen; and sir Thomas Gerard riding after him, and requesting, but in vain, that he would do the earl no ill office at court; Christopher St. Lawrence, who among others attended the earl from Ireland, offered his service to kill both lord Grey on the road, and the secretary at court. But the earl of Essex, (adds my author) heartily averse to such wickedness, would by no means consent to it."5

But let us try the force of this historian's negative reason. ing, on the opposite side of the question. The king himself was so apprehensive that this affair of the earls" might ble mish" (as he expresses it in a proclamation on that occasion) "the reputation of that friendship which ought to be mutually observed between him and other princes, that he thought it not amiss, to publish some such matter, by way of procla mation, as might better clear men's judgments concerning the 5 Elizabeth, p. 741.

K

same." At the same time solemnly promising, "that it should appear to the world as clear as the sun, by evident proof, that the only ground and motive of these earls departure, was the private knowledge and inward terror of their Qwn guiltiness." But neither in that proclamation, nor in any other authentic instrument, nor in any manner whatever, did his majesty deign, ever after, to enlighten the world, even with the least glimpse of evident proof, that such was the only motive of these earls departure. And I shall leave it to the decision of every candid reader, whether this non-performance of his majesty's solemn promise, be not a better negative proof of the nullity and fiction of this conspiracy of the earls, than the bare non-appearance of a memorial in their vindication, can be deemed of its reality?

CHAP. VI.

Puritan bishops of Ireland.

DURING sir Arthur Chichester's government, several of the established clergy were puritannically affected, if not puritans professed. Of this number was the famous doctor, afterwards primate, Usher; for when in the year 1605, he was Provost of the College of Dublin, "the whole doctrine of Calvin' was, by his management, received as the public belief of the Irish church, and ratified by Chichester in the king's name."— It was, in short, he that drew up those Calvinistical articles then agreed to in convocation; which were afterwards condemned and abolished by lord deputy Wentworth, containing arrant Brownism, and conforming not only the Lambeth-articles, suppressed by queen Elizabeth, and afterwards rejected by king James, but also several particular fancies and notions of his own."

"After the repeal of the Irish act against the bringing in of the Scots, retaining them, and marrying with them, the Scottish presbyter came over to Ireland in great numbers. These the Irish bishops condescended to ordain, not as performing the function of bishops, for they would not receive ordination 6 Lel. Hist. of Irel. p. 425.

Carte's Ormond.

2 Id. ib. vol. i. fol. 73. 3 Presbyterian Loyalty, p. 162,

from them as such, but as mere presbyters, assisting with some of their own ministers, in order to qualify them to enjoy benefices in the church. And these bishops were so exceedingly complaisant, on such occasions, that they left out all those expressions in the established form of ordination which these ministers excepted against; inserting and using such others as they consented to and approved of. After this method Mr. Blair was publicly ordained by Dr. Ecclin, bishop of Down, in the church of Bangor; and all those of the presbyterian persuasion, who were ordained in Ireland between the years 1622 and 1642, were ordained after the same method; and all of them so ordained enjoyed the churches and tythes, though they remained presbyterians still, and used not the liturgy. And there was, adds my author, a civil comprehension between them, and a sort of an ecclesiastical comprehension too; for they frequently met, and consulted with the bishops about the affairs of common concernment to the interest of religion; and some of them were members of the convocation in 1634." The same author informs us, "that these presbyters employed them. selves in their ministerial work, to the approbation of all the moderate and sober episcopalians, and particularly of the great primate Usher, from whom they had great applause."

CHAP. VII.

Warm contests in the Irish house of commons.

IN the year 1613, a parliament was called, wherein the

• The only parliament that was held in Ireland since the year 1586.— Ware's Annals.

"About the 18th of May, 1613, the lord deputy, with all the peers of the realm, and the clergy, both bishops and archbishops, attired in scarlet robes very sumptuously, with sound of trumpets; the lord David Barry, viscount Buttevant, bearing the sword of state, and the earl of Thomond, bearing the cap of maintenance; and after all these, the lord deputy (now Baron of Belfast) followed, riding upon a most stately horse, very richly trapped, himself attired in a very rich and stately robe of purple velvet, which the king's majesty had sent him, having his train borne up by eight gentlemen of worth. They rode from the castle of Dublin to the cathedral church of St. Patrick, to hear divine service, and a sermon preached by the reverend father in God, Christopher Hampton, archbishop of Armagh, and primate