lord Castleconnell, Oliver Stephenson, Sir Ed. Fitz Harris, and Dominick Fanning, mayor of Limerick.

It was a strange sight to behold men of the highest rank and wealth in arms against the authorities representing their sovereign; but it was the necessary consequence of a train of circumstances of which I give the barest outline.

Henry VIII. commenced a series of changes destined to fundamentally affect the people, customs, and laws of Ireland.

When he began to reign, a small district around Dublin known as the Pale was inhabited by people of English descent, governed by laws evolved from the feudal and Saxon systems, and with a legislature and procedure very similar to England.

The remainder of the country was inhabited almost entirely by Celtic tribes or powerful Anglo-Irish families. The Celtic tribes, with their own congenial customs, were devotedly attached to their chiefs, who governed them by the Brehon laws. The Anglo-Irish families, sometimes described as "degenerate English," intermarried with the Celts, used their laws and customs to a great extent in preference to the English, were in close alliance and sympathy with the Celts, and far from friendly to the orthodox English.

Less than a hundred years changed all this. The Celtic tribal system was broken up, the Brehon laws abolished, the country formed into counties, with sheriffs, judges on circuit administering law practically English, and the entire machinery of law and government framed on English lines. The Protestant religion was by law established; there was a considerable number of Protestants in the country; and the times had dealt severely with the anti-English Celt and his Anglo-Irish friend. Two great questions then, as at other times, were considered of paramount importance-viz., the ownership of land, and religion.

Henry VIII. was resolved to pursue the policy of anglicising the Irish nation. He endeavoured to substitute English laws, customs, and social life for those existing in Ireland outside the Pale; and he was equally determined to carry out his views on religion.

In order to accomplish this, he commenced by granting titles to the principal Celtic and Anglo-Irish chiefs; and many of them received grants of the tribal lands on consenting to hold them according to the

REFERENCES TO OPPOSITE PAGE.

Facsimile of Map of Limerick taken from Speed's Map of Munster, 1610; reproduced in Pacata Hibernia, Dublin, 1810. The following are the references :

conditions and incidents of English tenure. He also granted them on like tenure some of the lands which had previously belonged to the monasteries which he had suppressed.

However, he was averse to any attempt to colonise the country.

If

a powerful Celtic chief or Anglo-Irish proprietor, by rebellion or otherwise, incurred the penalty of forfeiture, he got rid of the delinquent, and generally appointed a kinsman as substitute; the subordinate inhabitants were not cleared out, and there was no attempt to bring in English or Scotch colonists to replace them. His daughters and James I. had no such objection, and the cruel system of colonising Ireland was practised by them to a great extent.

In the reign of Queen Mary, Leix and Offaley were distributed to English settlers, who were very active in exterminating the O'Mores and O'Conors.

Rebellions or quasi-rebellions in the reigns of Queen Elizabeth and James I. brought on huge confiscations. English and Scotch settlers were systematically planted on the forfeited lands, and a determined attempt was made to root out the Celtic and Anglo-Irish proprietors and inhabitants. Nearly all Ulster was planted in this manner, and immense tracts in Munster and Leinster likewise.

At the same time pressure was brought to bear on such Celtic chiefs or Anglo-Irish proprietors as did not incur the penalty of forfeiture to surrender the tribe lands to the Crown, and receive them back subject to the incidents and conditions of English tenure. In order to limit the power of the grantees, and establish independent freeholders, very substantial reservations were made in these grants.

When Charles I. began to reign, English tenure had been everywhere substituted for tanistry, and English laws for the Brehon laws. Many English and Scotch settlers, mainly of the Protestant religion, owned and occupied immense tracts of land previously owned by Celtic and Anglo-Irish chiefs and inhabitants.

The Celtic chiefs who had become feudal tenants were divested of most of their former power. Previously the chief had uncontrolled power within his borders, appointed his own officers, and received the most devoted service from them and his tribesmen. Venerated by the entire elan, nobody questioned his will, authority, or acts, and everybody ministered to his pleasure.

When he ceased to be a chief, and became a feudal tenant, the tribal system was broken up, English laws were administered in his district by officers over whom he had no authority, and he was as liable to prosecution for breach of these laws as the meanest man in the locality. Freeholders, practically independent, were set up around him; over a great portion of the tribe lands he was merely a rent-charger; he was liable to taxes, feudal impositions, and legal duties previously unknown, and his influence was sadly diminished. Naturally, he was full of regrets.

Early in the reign of Charles I. the Catholics, by advice of the Viceroy, made an offer of £120,000 to the king for certain concessions known as the "graces." They referred to security of title in land, free trade, and the substitution of the oath of allegiance for that of supremacy. The king granted them by proclamation, and they understood the Irish Parliament would confirm them, and make them valid. This was not done. They were similarly duped by Strafford.

Strafford's arbitrary measures to raise money, and his bold attempts to quash the titles of the vast number of landed proprietors in order to legally rob them, spread dismay and discontent in all directions. His attempts to "settle" titles were rightly looked on as dishonest methods of extracting money from the grantees, and imposing higher rents. The landed proprietors, whether Celt, Anglo-Irish, or Colonist, Catholic, Protestant, or Presbyterian, all became uneasy and discontented, and were apprehensive of the future. Religious disabilities were a further source of extreme annoyance to the Catholics and Presbyterians.

This hundred years had been a bad time for the Celts. Many of them had gone down in the struggle, and those who emerged best from the turmoil and disasters had come off badly. Their ancestors had an existence perfectly congenial. Their chiefs, like the heads of the clans. in Scotland, were petty kings, whose followers served them with a love the most powerful English noble could never command. Their occupations were mainly connected with war or the chase; rude plenty flowed in from the clansmen, and bards and shanachies ministered to their amusement and pride.

A few of the descendants of those powerful chiefs succeeded in retaining the tribe lands; others possessed only a fraction of them, while the great number, through forfeiture or neglect, had completely lost them. O'Neill, O'Donnell, and scores of others were gone, and the

colonists filled their places.

A like fate had fallen on the Anglo-Irish, who had been more Irish than the Irish themselves. Desmond, Eustace, and kindred nobles and gentlemen had found an unhappy destiny.

Furthermore, both Celt and Anglo-Irish had found the executive very irritating, the new social system extremely distasteful; and, to make matters worse, King James and King Charles I. allowed the Irish to take service with the continental powers, especially Spain, and licences were issued to recruit large bodies of men for foreign service.

Several members of the best families emigrated in this way, displayed military talent, and rose to eminence. Many returned home that were trained soldiers, and, naturally hostile to the existing system, were a source of grave danger in any popular movement.

Rory O'More, whose warlike ancestors had long bravely struggled to hold their territory of Leix, first conceived the idea of a rebellion. He was much impressed by the terms the Scots had obtained from

Charles I. English and Scotch politics foreshadowed a period of trouble, during which Ireland would have to shift for herself without aid or interference from the predominant partner.

The Irish Government was extremely weak and unpopular, and the army of 8000 foot and 1000 horse collected at Carrickfergus, on their way to aid the king's troops in crushing the Covenanters, were to be disbanded.

O'More's affairs were in a desperate condition, and he thought that the weakness of the king and the Irish Government should be turned to account. On every side he saw the descendants of powerful chiefs and captains possessing fragments only of the lands owned by their ancestors, while British undertakers and servitors enjoyed the vast bulk of the remainder. Nearly all Ulster had been planted, and there were plantations on a smaller scale in Cork, Kerry, Leitrim, Limerick, Longford, Wexford, Wicklow, &c. The undertakers had been several years in lawful possession, and nothing but a revolution could dislodge them.

Many were drawn to his views by the hopes of recovering their ancient estates and grandeur; several were inflamed by the idea that their religion was to be extirpated by Scotch Covenanters and English Puritans.

He held out substantial hopes of success. The king and Irish Government were both weak. A great portion of the army to be disbanded would join them and instruct them. A great number of Irishmen, or men of Irish descent, who had acquired great military experience in the service of Spain and France, would flock to their standard; he had been in correspondence with the Earl of Tyrone and others, and had every assurance of men and arms from abroad. Cardinal Richelieu would aid any considerable movement.

The old Irish Catholics in Ulster were first approached with the greatest secrecy. A vast number was drawn into a conspiracy, which eulminated in a revolt on the 23rd October, 1641, and within a week all Ulster, except a few fortresses, was in the hands of the insurgents.

The army had been disbanded during the summer, and the country was full of the disbanded soldiers. In the previous May it was resolved to pay off this army, disband it, putting eight several captains each over 1000 men, and licence their departure for foreign parts, so that Ireland would be relieved of them. Subsequently the Irish Parliament put obstacles in the way. Eight officers petitioned the king that orders should be sent to the Council and Parliament directing that the men should be allowed to embark. The king was anxious to grant their petition, and actually sent directions to the Lords Justices to instruct

1 The "Calendars of State Papers,” Ireland, Addenda, 1625-1660, p. 228, and for the years 1633-1647, pp. 210, 281, 330, 331, 350, 357, give full information concerning the disbanded soldiers.