with child she will say that it is the great Lord adjoining, whereof the Lords are glad and do appoint them to be nursed.

'There is another two sorts that goeth about with the Bachele of Jesus,' as they call it. These run from country to country; and if they come to any house where a woman is with child they will put the same about her, and whether she will or no causeth her to give them money, and they will undertake that she shall have good delivery of her child, to the great disruption of the people concerning their souls' health.

'Others go about with St Patrick's crosier, and play the like part or worse; and no doubt so long as these be used the word of God can never be known among them, nor the Prince be feared, nor the country prosper.'

So stands the picture of Ireland, vivid because simple, described by some half-Anglicised, half-Protestantized Celt who wrote what he had seen around him, careless of political philosophy or of fine phrases with which to embellish his diction. The work of civilization had again to begin from the foundation. Occupied with Scotland and France and holding her own throne by so precarious a tenure, Elizabeth, for the first eighteen months of her reign, had little leisure to attend to it; and the Irish leaders, taking advantage of the opportun ity, offered themselves and their services to Philip's ambassador in England. The King of Spain, who at the

1 The Baculum Jesus, said to have been brought over by St Patrick. 2 Report on the State of Ireland, 1559: Irish MSS. Rolls House.

beginning desired to spare and strengthen Elizabeth, sent them a cold answer, and against Philip's will the great Norman families were unwilling to stir. The truebred Celts however, whose sole political creed was hatred of the English, were less willing to remain quiet. To the Celt it was of small moment whether the English sovereign was Protestant or Catholic. The presence of an English deputy in Dublin was the symbol of his servitude and the constant occasion for his rebellion. Had there been no cause of quarrel the mere pleasure of fighting would have insured periodical disturbances; and in Ulster there were special causes at work to produce a convulsion of peculiar severity.

Identical in race and scarcely differing in language, the Irish of the north and the Scots of the Western Isles had for two centuries kept up a close and increasing intercourse. Some thousand Scottish families had recently emigrated from Bute, Arran, and Argyleshire, to find settlements on the thinly peopled coasts of Antrim and Down. The Irish chiefs had sought their friendship, intermarried with them, or made war on them, as the humour of the moment prompted; but their numbers had steadily increased whether welcome or unwelcome, and at Elizabeth's accession they had become objects of alarm both to the native Irish, whom they threatened to supplant, and to the English, whom they refused to obey.

Lord Sussex, who was Mary's last deputy, had made expeditions against them both in the Isles and in Ulster ; but even though assisted by the powers of O'Neil had

only irritated their hostility. They made alliance with the O'Donnells who were O'Neil's hereditary enemies. James M'Connell and his two brothers, near kinsmen of the House of Argyle, crossed over with two thousand followers to settle in Tyrconnell, while to the Callogh O'Donnell, the chief of the clan, the Earl of Argyle himself gave his half-sister for a wife.

With this formidable support the O'Donnells threatened to eclipse their ancient rivals, when there rose up from among the O'Neils one of those remarkable men who in their own persons sum up and represent the energy, intellect, power, and character of the nation to which they belong.

In the partial settlement of Ireland which had been brought about by Henry the Eighth, the O'Neils, among the other noble families, surrendered their lands to the Crown to receive them again under the usual feudal tenure; and Con O'Neil the Lame had received from Henry for himself and his heirs the title of Earl of Tyrone. For himself and his heirs-but who the heirs of Con O'Neil might be was not so easy to decide. His son Shan in explaining his father's character to Elizabeth said that he was 'a gentleman,'-the interpretation of the word being that he never denied any child that was sworn to him, and that he had plenty of them.'1 The favourite of the family was the offspring of an intrigue with a certain Alyson Kelly, the wife of a blacksmith at Dundalk. This child, a boy named Matthew, grew to

1 Shan O'Neil to Elizabeth, February 8, 1561: Irish MSS. Rolls House,

be a fine dashing youth such as an Irish father delighted to honour; and although the Earl had another younger son, Shan or John, with some pretensions to legitimacy, Henry the Eighth allowed the father to name at his will the heir of his new honours. Matthew Kelly became Baron of Dungannon when O'Neil received his earldom; and to Matthew Kelly was secured the reversion on his father's death of the earldom itself.

No objection could be raised so long as Shan was a boy; but as the legitimate heir grew to manhood the arrangement became less satisfactory. The other sons whom Con had brought promiscuously into the world were discontented with the preference of a brother whose birth was no better than their own; and Shan, with their help, as the simplest solution of the difficulty, at last cut the Baron of Dungannon's throat.

They manage things strangely in Ireland. The old O'Neil, instead of being irritated, saw in this exploit a proof of commendable energy. He at once took Shan into favour, and had he been able would have given him his dead brother's rights; but unfortunately the Baron had left a son behind him, and the son was with the family of his grandmother beyond the reach of steel or poison.

Impatient of uncertainty and to secure himself by possession against future challenge, Shan next conspired against his father, deposed him, and drove him into the Pale, where he afterwards died; and throwing over his English title and professing to prefer the name of O'Neil to any patent of nobility held under an English sove

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reign, he claimed the right of succession by Irish custom, precedent, and law. In barbarous and half-barbarous tribes there is generally some choice exercised among the members of the chief's family, or some rule is followed, by which the elder and stronger are preferred to the young and weak. In our own Heptarchy the uncle, if able and brave, was preferred to the child of an elder brother.

In Tyrone the clan elected their chief from the blood of the ancient kings; and Shan, waiving all question of legitimacy, received the votes of his people, took the oath with his foot upon the stone, and with the general consent of the north was proclaimed O'Neil.1

This proceeding was not only an outrage against order, but it was a defiance of England and the English system. The descent to an earldom could not be regulated by election, and it was obvious that the English Government must either insist upon the rights of the young Baron of Dungannon, or relinquish the hope of feudalizing the Irish chieftains.

Knowing therefore that he could not be 1560. left long in the enjoyment of his success, Shan O'Neil attempted to compose his feud with the O'Donnells, and his first step was to marry O'Donnell's sister.

1 'They place him that shall be | First was one of these, and according called their captain upon a stone to legend is the original Lias Fail or always reserved for that purpose, and thundering stone on which the Irish commonly placed on a hill.'—SPEN- kings were crowned. The Lias SER's View of the State of Ireland. Fail however still stands on Tara The stone in Westminster Abbey | Hill, ready for use when Ireland's brought from Scone by Edward the good time returns.