which the Queen had used of him were gone abroad in the world. 'He could find no obedience.' 'His credit being gone, his power to be of service was gone also.' He therefore demanded his immediate recall that he might preserve the small remnant of his patrimony already much diminished by his coming to Ireland.' As for the charge brought against him by the Earl of Sussex, he would reply with his sword and body 'against an accusation concealed hitherto he knew not with what duty, and uttered at last with impudency and unshamefastness.' 1 But Elizabeth meant nothing less than to recall Sidney. She neither distrusted his loyalty nor questioned his talents; she chose merely to find fault with him while she made use of his services. It was her habit towards those among her subjects whom she particularly valued. Sir Francis Knowles when he arrived at Dublin could report only that Sidney had gained the love and the admiration of every one; and that his plan for proceeding against O'Neil was the first which had ever promised real success. Campaigns in Ireland had hitherto been no more than summer forays-mere inroads of devastation during the few dry weeks of August and September. Sidney proposed to commence at the end of the harvest, when the corn was gathered in, and could either be seized or destroyed; and to keep the field through the winter and spring. It would be expensive; but money well laid out was the best economy in the 1 Sidney to the English Council, May 18: Irish MSS. Rolls House. end, and Sidney undertook, if he was allowed as many men as he thought requisite, and was not interfered with, 'to subdue, kill, or expel Shan, and reduce Ulster to as good order as any part of Ireland.'1 At first Elizabeth would not hear of it; she would not ruin herself for any such harebrained madness. The Deputy must defend the Pale through the summer, and the attack on O'Neil, if attempted at all, should be delayed till the spring ensuing. But Sir Francis, who was sent to prevent expense, was the foremost to insist on the necessity of it. He explained that in the cold Irish springs the fields were bare, the cattle were lean, and the weather was so uncertain, that neither man nor horse could bear it; whereas in August food everywhere was abundant, and the soldiers would have time to become hardened to their work. They could winter somewhere on the Bann, harry Tyrone night and day without remission, and so break Shan to the ground and ruin him. Two brigantines would accompany the army with supplies, and control the passage between Antrim and the Western Isles; and beyond all, Knowles reechoed what Sidney had said before him on the necessity of paying wages to the troops instead of leaving them to pay themselves at the expense of the people. Nothing was really saved, for the debts would have eventually to be paid, and paid with interest—while meanwhile the inhabitants of the Pale were growing hostile to the English rule.' 2 1 Sidney to Cecil, April 17: Irish MSS. Rolls House. The danger to the State could hardly be exaggerated. M'Guyre had come into Dublin, with his last cottage in ashes, and his last cow driven over the hills into Shan's country; Argyle, with the whole disposable force of the Western Isles, was expected in person in Ulster in the summer. Elizabeth's irritation had been unable to wait till she had received Knowles's letters. She made herself a judge of Sidney's projects; she listened to Sussex who told her that they were wild and impossible. Whether Sussex was right or Sidney was right, she was called upon to spend money; and while she knew that she would have to do it, she continued to delay and make difficulties, and to vex Sidney with her letters. His temper boiled over again. 'I testify to God, to her Highness, and to June. you,' he wrote on the 3rd of June to Cecil, 'that all the charge is lost that she is at with this manner of proceeding. O'Neil will be tyrant of all Ireland if he be not speedily withstood. He hath, as I hear, won the rest of O'Donnell's castles; he hath confederated with the Scots; he is now in M'Guyre's country. All this summer he will spend in Connaught; next winter in the English Pale. It may please the Queen to appoint some order for Munster-for it will be a mad Munster in haste else. I will give you all my land in Rutlandshire to get me leave to go into Hungary, and think myself bound to you while I live. I trust there to do my country some honour: here I do neither good to the Queen, to the country, nor myself. I take my leave in haste, as a thrall forced to live in loathsomeness of life.’1 The council, finding Sidney's views accepted and endorsed by Knowles, united to recommend them; a schedule was drawn out of the men, money, and stores which would be required; a thousand of the best troops in Berwick, with eight hundred Irish, was the increase estimated as necessary for the army; and the wages of eighteen hundred men for six months would amount to ten thousand four hundred and eighty pounds. Sixteen thousand pounds was already due to the Irish garrison. The provisions, arms, clothes, and ammunition would cost four thousand five hundred pounds; and four thousand pounds in addition would be wanted for miscellaneous services.2 The reluctance of Elizabeth to engage in an Irish campaign was not diminished by a demand for thirtyfour thousand nine hundred pounds. Sussex continued malignant and mischievous, and there was many a Catholic about the Court who secretly wished O'Neil to succeed. 'The Court,' wrote Cecil to Sidney, 'is not free from many troubles-amongst others none worse than emulations, disdains, backbitings, and such like, whereof I see small hope of diminution.' The Queen at the beginning refused to allow more than six hundred men to be sent from England or more than four hundred to be raised in Ireland. To no purpose Cecil insisted; in vain Leicester challenged Sussex 1 Sidney to Cecil, June 3. Irish MSS. Rolls House. 2 Notes for the army in Ireland, May 30. In Cecil's hand: MS. Ibid. and implored his mistress to give way. 'Her Majesty was absolutely determined.' The Ormond business had created fresh exasperation. Sir Henry, though admiring and valuing the Earl of Ormond's high qualities, had persisted in declaring himself unable to decide the litigated questions between the house of Butler and the Desmonds. Archbishop Kirwan, the Irish Chancellor, was old and incapable; the Deputy had begged for the assistance of some English lawyers; 'but such evil report had Ireland that no English lawyer would go there." The Queen flew off from the campaign to the less expensive question. Lawyer or no lawyer, she insisted that judgment should be given in Ormond's favour. She complained that the Deputy was partial to Desmond, and—especially wounding Sidney, whose chief success had been in the equity of his administration, and whose first object had been to check the tyrannical exactions of the Irish noblemen-she required him to make an exception in Ormond's favour, and permit 'coyn and livery,' the most mischievous of all the Irish imposts, to be continued in Kilkenny. 'I am extremely sorry,' Sidney replied to Cecil, when the order reached him; 'I am extremely sorry to receive her Majesty's command to permit the Earl of Ormond to exercise coyn and livery, which have been the curse of this country, and which I hoped to have ended wholly. I would write more, if I did not hope to have my recall by the next east wind. Only weigh what I have said. 1 Cecil to Sidney, June 16: Irish MSS. Rolls House. |