unanimous in their views. Chichester obtained ample powers to arrange the lower house. Forty new boroughs were formed, many of them consisting merely of a few scattered houses; some of them were not incorporated until after the writs were issued. The Catholics were taken by surprise, as no notice had been given either of the Parliament or the laws intended to be enacted. Six Catholic lords of the Pale remonstrated with the king, but he treated them with the utmost contempt. The house assembled; there was a struggle for the speaker's chair. The Catholic party proposed Sir John Everard, who had just resigned his position as justice of the King's Bench sooner than take the oath of supremacy; the court party insisted on having Sir John Davies. The Catholics protested, and sent a deputation to James, who first lectured them to show his learning, and then imprisoned them to show his power. Some kind of compromise was eventually effected. A severe penal law was withdrawn; a large subsidy was voted. In truth, the Irish party acted boldly, considering their peculiar circumstances, for one and all refused to enter the old cathedral, which their forefathers had erected, when Protestant service was read therein on the day of the opening of Parliament; and even lord Barry retired when he laid the sword of state before the lord deputy. We may excuse them for submitting to the attainder of O'Neill and O'Donnell, for there were few national members who had not withdrawn before the vote was passed.

Chichester retired from the government of Ireland in 1616. In 1617 a proclamation was issued for the expulsion of the Catholic clergy, and the city of Waterford was deprived of its charter in consequence of the spirited opposition which its corporation offered to the oath of spiritual supremacy. In 1622 viscount Falkland came over as deputy, and Usher, who was at heart a Puritan, preached a violent sermon before him, in which he suggested a very literal application of the text' He beareth not the sword in vain.'

On the accession of Charles I., in 1625, it was so generally supposed he would favour the Catholic cause, that the earliest act of the new Parliament in London was to vote

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a petition, begging the king to enforce the laws against recusants and popish priests. The viceroy, lord Falkland, advised the Irish Catholics to propitiate him with a voluntary subsidy. They offered the enormous sum of 120,000l., to be paid in three annual instalments, and in return he promised them certain 'graces.' The contract was ratified by royal proclamation, in which the concessions were accompanied by a promise that a Parliament should be held to confirm them. The first instalment of the money was paid, and the Irish agents returned home to find themselves cruelly deceived and basely cheated. Falkland was recalled by the Puritan party, on suspicion of favouring the Catholics; viscount Ely and the earl of Cork were appointed lords justices; and a reign of terror was at once commenced.

Wentworth assembled a Parliament in July 1634, the year after his arrival in Ireland. Its subserviency was. provided for by having a number of persons elected who were in the pay of the crown as military officers. The ' graces' were asked for, and the lord deputy declared they should be granted if the supply was readily voted. 'Surely,' he said, 'so great a meanness cannot enter your hearts as once to suspect his majesty's gracious regards of you, and performance with you, when you affix yourself upon his grace.' This speech so took the hearts of the people, that all were ready to grant all that might be demanded; and six subsidies of 50,000l. each were voted, though Wentworth only expected 30,000l. In the meanwhile neither Wentworth nor the king had the slightest idea of granting the 'graces;' and the atrocious duplicity and incomparable 'meanness' of the king is placed eternally on record, in his own letter to his favourite, in which he thanks him for keeping off the envy [odium] of a necessary negative from me, of those unreasonable graces that people expected from me.' Wentworth himself describes how two judges and Sir John Radcliffe assisted him in the plan, and how a positive refusal was made to recommend the passing of the 'graces' into law at the next session.

One of the 'graces' was to make sixty years of undisputed possession of property a bar to the claims of the

crown; and certainly if there ever was a country where such a demand was necessary and reasonable, it was surely Ireland. There had been so many plantations, it was hard for anything to grow; and so many settlements, it was hard for anything to be settled. Each new monarch, since the first invasion of the country by Henry II., had his favourites to provide for and his friends to oblige. The island across the sea was considered 'no man's land,' as the original inhabitants were never taken into account, and were simply ignored, unless, indeed, when they made their presence very evident by open resistance to this wholesale robbery. It was no wonder, then, that this 'grace' should be specially solicited. It was one in which the last English settler in Ulster had quite as great an interest as the oldest Celt in Connemara. The Burkes and the Geraldines had suffered almost as much from the rapacity of their own countrymen as the natives, on whom their ancestors had inflicted such cruel wrongs. No man's property was safe in Ireland, for the tenure was depending on the royal will; and the caprices of the Tudors were supplemented by the necessities of the Stuarts.

But the grace' was refused, although, probably, there was many a recent colonist who would have willingly given one-half of his plantation to have secured the other to his descendants. The reason of the refusal was soon apparent. As soon as Parliament was dissolved, a commission of 'defective titles' was issued for Connaught. Ulster had been settled, Leinster had been settled, Munster had been settled; there remained only Connaught, hitherto so inaccessible, now, with advancing knowledge of the art of war, and new means of carrying out that art, doomed to the scourge of desolation.

The process was extremely simple. The lawyers were set to work to hunt out old claims for the crown; and, as Wentworth had determined to invalidate the title to every estate in Connaught, they had abundant occupation. Roscommon was selected for a commencement. The sheriffs were directed to select jurors who would find for the crown. The jurors were made clearly to understand what was expected from them, and what the consequences would be

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if they were 'contumacious.' The object of the crown was, of course, the general good of the country. The people of Connaught were to be civilised and enriched; but, in order to carry out this very desirable arrangement, the present proprietors were to be replaced by new landlords, and the country was to be placed entirely at the disposal of the sovereign.

It was now discovered that the lands and lordships of De Burgo, adjacent to the castle of Athlone, and, in fact, the whole remaining province, belonged to the crown. It would be useless here to give details of the special pleading on which this statement was founded; it is an illustration of what has been observed before, that the tenure of the English settler was quite as uncertain as the tenure of the Celt. The jury found for the king; and, as a reward, the foreman, Sir Lucas Dillon, was graciously permitted to retain a portion of his own lands. Lowther, chief justice of the Common Pleas, got four shillings in the pound of the first year's rent raised under the commission of 'defective titles.' The juries of Mayo and Sligo were equally complacent; but there was stern resistance made in Galway, and stern reprisals were made for the resistance. The jurors were fined 4,000l. each and were imprisoned, and their estates seized until that sum was paid. The sheriff was fined 1,000l., and, being unable to pay that sum, he died in prison.

The property of the earl of Ormonde was next attacked, but he made a prudent compromise, and was too powerful to be resisted. A Court of Wards was now established to have all heirs to estates brought up in the Protestant religion; and a High Commission Court was instituted, which rivalled the exactions of the English Star Chamber.

In 1641 Wentworth fell a victim himself to the Puritan interest, and a new insurrection was formed in Ireland soon after his execution, headed by Sir Phelim O'Neill, and assisted by the Irish who had been exiled to the Continent after the flight of the earls. O'Neill assumed the title of 'Lord General of the Catholic army in Ulster;' and this was, in fact, the inauguration of the celebrated Confederation of Kilkenny.

CHAPTER XX.

A.D. 1642 To A.D. 1689.

THE CONFEDERATION OF KILKENNY.-THE BANISHMENT TO CONNAUGHT.

CONTEMPORARY EVENTS: Execution of Charles I.-Protectorate of Cromwell-Charles X. king of Sweden-Capture of Dunkirk-Restoration of Charies II.-Titus Oates's plot-The names of Whig and Tory applied to political parties-English revolution-Landing of William of Orange at Torbay, and flight of James II.

ON

SECTION I. The Confederation of Kilkenny.

N March 22, 1641, the archbishop of Armagh convened a provincial synod at Kells, which pronounced the war undertaken by the Catholics of Ireland lawful and pious, but at the same time denounced murders and usurpations. Arrangements were then made for a national synod to be held at Kilkenny the following year. This synod met at Kilkenny, on May 10, 1642. It was attended by the archbishops of Armagh, Cashel, and Tuam, and the bishops of Ossory, Elphin, Waterford and Lismore, Kildare, Clonfert, and Down and Connor. Proctors attended for the archbishop of Dublin, and for the bishops of Limerick, Emly, and Killaloe. There were present, also, sixteen other dignitaries and heads of religious orders. They issued a manifesto explaining their conduct, and, forming a provisional government, concluded their labours, after three days spent in careful deliberation.

Owen Roe O'Neill and Colonel Preston arrived in Ireland in July 1642, accompanied by a hundred officers, and well supplied with arms and ammunition. Sir Phelim O'Neill