government loved gain and plunder better than peace, and this good lord returned to England disgusted and disheartened, for he saw that it was determined, and connived at, as sound policy, to stir up the rebels occasionally, and "let them destroy one another;" for should they succeed in reducing the country to good order and civility, they would acquire power and riches, and then become alienated from England. "Let us rather connive at their disorders." This authority is no less than Leland and "Hibernia Parata," from Sir George Carew.

Let the patchings and botchings, the shutting up in workhouses, piling up broken stores mountain high by the starved labourers testify that any thing and every thing but justice and opportunity for a respectable standing among the nations of the earth must suffice; rather than give them equal rights and power, better daub them with temporary kindness when actually starving, than pull down their mud cabins, and send them to die like beasts upon the mountains. This is actually the condition of the wretched inhabitants in the Christian era of 1850. Thomas Perrot would have gladly averted these calamities, but had not power.

In Ulster Hugh O'Neil was restored to his estates, but jealousies were raised that protestantism was in danger, and what was wished that he should do, was attempted to provoke him to do, and the desire was accomplished. Sir John Norris and Lord Burgh prosecuted a vigorous war without success; De Burgh was slain near Armagh. Sir Henry Bagnal then undertook to subdue O'Neil; the armies met near the same place, 1500 of the royal army was slain, Bagnal fell, and much property in arms and ammunition, and great hopes were entertained that full emancipation was at hand for the Irish. O'Neil with much cunning management united many of the rival chiefs to combine and resist England; he then applied to Spain, and was encouraged with assistance, and all looked like sunshine to the hopeful Irish.

The ever wakeful Elizabeth was upon the alert. Essex was furnished with 20,000 men, and sent to meet

the bold O'Neil, who was not in the least intimidated; but Essex took another route through the desolate land of Munster, and there met with nothing but a "plucking of feathers" from his gay army by the wild Irish, and the place is now known as the "Pass of the Plumes." He next marched against O'Neil; but the chief, by gallantry and cunning, established a truce. The queen was incensed. Essex returned in disgrace, and Mountjoy, more skilled in war, with a well-disciplined army, was substituted. O'Neil would not at first be drawn into an engagement. Spain sent him 2000 men with an imbecile leader, Don Juan d'Aquila; he landed in the south, and was blockaded by Mountjoy. O'Neil hurried to the rescue, and blockaded Mountjoy, who thus lay between both armies; but the unwise Spaniards determined to attack them by night; spies revealed the project to the English, who defeated the Spaniards, and O'Neil retreated to his quarters in the north.

Mountjoy pursued the same course with the north as had been done in Munster, destroying everything that fell in his way, and the state of the country drove the inhabitants to such fearful straits, that children fed on the flesh of their parents, and some old women were taken and executed for catching little girls, who were sent to drive out cattle in cold mornings, and killing and eating them. Morrison, who mentions this in his History of Ireland, says that Captain Trevor sent his soldiers to ascertain the facts, and the children's skulls and bones were found near the spot.

O'Neil struggled long, but his army was wasted by famine; many were bribed by the English, and he at last was forced to terms of accommodation with the English. Mountjoy had the honour to grant him the benefits of his own estates, and the exercise of the catholic religion.

To detail the horrors of the reign of Queen Elizabeth would be disgusting and needless. She has done her work, and left an impress that can never be effaced; while a shepherd boy lives among the rocks and wilds of that stricken country, the name of “ Elizabeth" will

be held in hated remembrance. Here she hung and quartered a priest-there the nails of another were pulled out and he cut open; some were hanged, beheaded, and then drawn in quarters. One bishop in 1593 had his legs immersed in jack-boots filled with quicklime and water, to force him to take the oath of supremacy, and then executed on the gallows. Now all this was done under the pretence of honour to the religion of Christ; this butchering by wholesale under any and every pretence continued till this sanguinary woman had laid waste nearly the whole of that beautiful island. She went on from " conquering to conquer;" when her ravenous soldiers had won a battle, the terms of peace were demolishing churches, forcing the oath of supremacy upon the people, or putting to death by the most cruel tortures. The most dishonourable means were used to kill and destroy all that remained of what was hostile to her faith. People were invited to feasts, and such too as had been peaceable belonging to the gentry, and then every one murdered. They went with assurances of protection, and were "cut to pieces, and not a single one escaped." This was in Rathmore, where in answer to a kind proclamation of the queen, given to all the well-affected of the Irish, they had assembled, when lines of English "horse and foot surrounded these well-disposed credulous visitors, and destroyed with ruthless barbarity every one.

Bryan O'Neil was invited with his friends to another entertainment, and feasted three days, then an army surprised them, and men, women, and children were massacred. O'Neil, his brother and wife, were sent to Dublin and cut in quarters. We are answered frequently, when these facts are stated, that they are old stories, long since past-that Elizabeth is dead, and these things should be forgotten; forgiven they should be, but how can they be forgotten. The type of oppression is often a stereotyped one, and must always be, so long as the causes of these oppressions remain unmoved. But look at Ireland now. Stale as the story may be, it must be reiterated till her wrongs are redressed-till that "bright

spot in the ocean" may look out in all the primitive beauty in which she was adorned before the hand of tyranny grasped her-yes, grating as the sound may be to refined ears, it has been oppression that has brought her to wring the last dregs of bitterness she is now tasting; and humiliating as the statement must be, it is an oppression of so-called Bible christianity-this parcelling out of lands to rapacious officers and soldiers, who would kill and quarter the most effectually, was the handiwork of those who tell you that their creed is based on the law of love-of doing to others as they would that others should do unto them; and were I obliged to answer impartially what is the great, the monster evil of Ireland, I would say holding the truth in unrighteousness, planting the protestant faith by the sword, upon gardens and fields which they had ruthlessly plundered, and watering these fields by the blood of the slain, and then sanctimoniously crying out "idolatry, idolatry, priestcraft and worshipping of saints," is the grand evil of Ireland. It is idolatry, it is the worshipping of so-called saints that is the bane of Ireland-this mammon worship of the world, this taking from the original inhabitants the soil where they drew their first breath, and this cringing adherence to living images in the shape of kings, queens, and lord deputies, that have proved the temporal as well as spiritual evil of Ireland.

66

Why should I read your blackguard book," said a shrewd Irishman, "when it tells you to tear down churches, take away lands from the poor, and put them to fadin' on the scrawl of a root that the vagabond of a Raleigh brought into the land."

Coarse as this expression may be, it is full of sound politics and theology; it throws you upon the broad basis of truth, and nails you there; dispute it who can, reflect upon it who will.

Go back to first principles, if you would find a truth, or eradicate an error, all else is putting a new piece into an old garment-"the rent is made worse."

Elizabeth reigned fifty years, and her footsteps are marked with cruelty and blood; these footsteps were not

made in the sand, and it would seem that her successors, most of them, have been careful that the engraving should not be effaced-they have garnished the sepulchres which she built, and now they cry out persecution, idolatry, to all who will not admire and worship their pretty golgotha.

CHAPTER V.

"As your fathers did, so do ye."

WE now come to James. Elizabeth had "pacified" Ireland by racks, gibbets, dungeons, and the gallows; she had expended £3,000,000. sterling on this work, had drenched the soil with the blood of her own sons and the "wild Irish," and as she was told had " carcases and ashes" to reign over in the end. But protestantism was established, and it was left for James to put this protestantism into full play. Penal laws were in force, and his first work was to liberate all from prisons, except murderers and papists, and he boldly declared that he would grant no toleration to catholics, and would leave an everlasting curse on his posterity if they did not follow in his wake. The penal laws had prohibited that the catholics should hold any public worship, and compelled them to assist in protestant worship on Sundays and holidays; spies were set, who were called inquisitors, to report of any absentees, and the delinquents were imprisoned and fined. A few in Leinster and Munster, who had ventured to hold public worship, were pounced upon by an army under Mountjoy, Cork was besieged and yielded, Waterford, Clonmel, and Cashel retracted, peace was restored, and protestant worship triumphant, and James issued a proclamation, which, though it has been often copied, it may do well to read again :"Whereas his majesty is informed that his subjects of Ireland have been deceived by false report, that his