Slike stranica
PDF
ePub

precious possession bequeathed to them by their forefathers. The mass was rude and uncultivated, prone to sudden deeds of violence and to unthinking panics, cruel as children are cruel, under the sudden gust of passion or impulse. Even victory was certain to bring its own perils. Between the culti

May.

common.

vated gentleman of Norman descent and the rude dispossessed peasant of Ulster there was little in

For a moment they might act together, but there could be little mutual confidence between them.

The peasant's hatred of the English colonists found expression in a large number of men of birth and education, who, either through their own fault or that of others, had fallen from wealth to poverty. Foremost amongst these was Roger More. Roger More. His ancestors had once been in the possession of large estates in Queen's County, which had since been lost to the family. Merging his private grievance in the general grievances of his countrymen, he acquired their confidence by his force of character. "God and our Lady be our assistance, and Roger More," was an expression often to be heard on Irish lips. His attractive force was increased by his blindness to all except the nobler side of the object at stake, and he was able to inspire others with courage because he spoke from his heart of the cause in which he was engaged as one which appealed only to the purest and most elevated sentiments of human nature. It is to his credit that, when he found himself face to face with the grim realities which his own enthusiasm had evoked, he risked his life to put a check upon the foul deeds which clouded the accomplishment of his purpose, and at last stood aside from the conflict rather than win success through a mist of tears and blood.

O'Neill.

Another leader of less commanding ability, but of higher position, was Sir Phelim O'Neill. He was the grandson of Sir Phelin an O'Neill who had taken the side of the English Government after the flight of the Earls, and, now that Tyrone's son had died without issue, he regarded himself as the heir to the chieftainship of the sept.

The patriotism of Lord Maguire, like that of More and O'Neill, was not uninfluenced by personal considerations. He

was a young man overwhelmed by debt, and he had therefore everything to gain by a commotion. He might not.

Lord
Maguire.

only relieve his estate from the burden which weighed heavily upon it, but he might hope to regain the authority which had been exercised by his ancestors in Fermanagh.

The first plan of a

rising.

The first serious plan for rising in vindication of the claims of Irishmen to the soil seems to have been entertained in February. February, though the idea had not been absent from the minds of the natives during many years. The scheme received a strong impulsion from the news brought from Westminster by every post. The English Parliament was evidently bent on treating Catholics with a harshness to which they had long been unaccustomed, and there was no reason to suppose that the Catholics of Ireland would be dealt with more gently than their brethren in England. "Undoubtedly," said More, "the Parliament now in England will suppress the Catholic religion."1

June. Signs of trouble.

The English Government would have had little to fear if it had had only to deal with a few discontented gentlemen. The gravity of the situation arose from the fact that the fears and hopes of these gentlemen were shared by the whole of the native population of the country. When, as had been at first intended, the disbanded army was on the march for the place where it was to have taken ship for foreign service, the soldiers were advised by priests and friars not to leave the country although they lived only on bread and milk, for that there might be use for them here.'2 There can be no doubt that the Irish believed that they were called on to act in self-defence. It cannot have been unknown to them that if the Lords Justices and the Council could have their way they would proceed to a fresh partition of Irish land, and to a fresh attack upon the Catholic clergy.3 Amongst an ignorant

[ocr errors]

1 Carte's Ormond, i. 156. Maguire's Relation, Nalson, ii. 543. 2 Captain Serle's evidence, June 9, S. P. Ireland.

• The Protestant Archbishop of Tuam complained about this time that the titular Archbishop is plentifully maintained, generally respected, feels of the best, and it is a strife betwixt the great ones which shall be happy in being the host of such a guest.' He adds that the country suffered

[blocks in formation]

and impulsive people, it was only too natural that belief should outstrip actual fact. Irishmen were soon firmly convinced that the English Parliament had declared its resolution to extirpate Irish Catholicism, and that the Lords Justices had openly expressed their determination to carry out its orders.

August.

Sir James

Dillon pro

Dublin

Castle.

Lords refuse

In intriguing with the Catholic Lords, Charles was applying a lighted match to a magazine of gunpowder. One day in August Sir James Dillon met Lord Maguire in Dublin, and proposed to him, in the name of the colonels poses to seize of the disbanded army, to seize the Castle with the help of the Catholic Lords. Influential Irishmen would The Catholic at the same time surprise other fortified posts. The to join him. Lords, however, drew back, possibly wishing to act by the King's orders rather than in combination with irresponsible adventurers. Maguire and his immediate friends resolved to take an independent course. They were in correspondence with Owen Roe O'Neill, a brave and active officer in the Spanish service in the Netherlands, and he had promised to send arms for 10,000 men. It was finally arranged that an insurrection in the North should take place on the same day as the seizure of Dublin Castle, and after some hesitation October 23 was fixed on for the attempt.1

[ocr errors]

grievously in having to pay a double clergy. The people, in multitudes, daily resorted to 'the mass-houses.' In Galway mass was said with such publicity that the well-affected English . . . at the daily hearing of the same as they go about their business in the street are much wounded in conscience.' The natives thought it hard to have to pay to the Protestant clergy a less sum than they paid cheerfully to their own priests. S. P. Ireland. It takes some effort now to understand that all this was written with complete seriousness.

1 Maguire's Relation, Nalson, ii. 543. The probability that the Lords held back in order to await instructions from the King, is much increased if we accept the detailed statement in The Mystery of Iniquity (E. 76), by Edward Bowles, that the Irish Committee returned to Ireland 'the same month His Majesty went for Scotland,' namely August, leaving the Lord Dillon who was presently after sent with the Queen's letters, requesting .cr requiring his being made Councillor of Ireland, to His Majesty then at Edinburgh.' If, as seems likely, Lord Dillon was to bring the King's last instructions, of which I shall have something to say later, this would account for the Lords' hesitation. Such evidence as this can only furnish

October.

Multyfarn

Early in October a congress of priests and laymen was held in Westmeath in the Abbey of Multyfarnham. The question was agitated what course was to be taken with the Congress of English and other Protestants. The friars, folham. lowed by many who were present, urged, on every consideration of religion and policy, that there should be no massacre. Treat the English, they said, as the Spaniards treated the Moors, sending them back to their own country with at least some part of their property. Others argued that no way was so safe as a general slaughter. Banished men might come back with swords in their hands. It was evident that, before all

was over, there would be wild work in Ireland.1

Warnings of danger.

Oct. 22. The plot betrayed.

Some vague warnings had reached the Lords Justices from time to time. It was not till the evening of October 22, the day before the intended surprise, that they were roused from their lethargy. On that day .Lord Maguire and Hugh Mac Mahon were in Dublin with eighty men, ready for the next day's work. Amongst these men was a certain Owen O'Conolly, whose name and birth had pointed him out as a fitting instrument for the design. Unluckily for the conspirators, the man was a Protestant in the service of Sir John Clotworthy. Concealing his real opinions, he contrived to escape, made his way to Parsons, and told all that he knew. He had learned, he said,

indications, not proofs. What is remarkable is that they all point in the same direction. Lord Antrim's statement is that the second message from the King was sent from York by Captain Digby, and that in it Charles directed that the disbanded army should be brought together again, 'and that an army should immediately be raised in Ireland that should declare for him against the Parliament of England, and to do what was therein necessary and convenient for his service.' Antrim says that he informed Lord Gormanston, Lord Slane, and others in Leinster, and after going into Ulster he communicated the same to many there, but that 'the fools... well liking the business would not expect our time or manner for ordering the work, but fell upon it without us, and sooner, and otherwise than we should have done, taking to themselves, and in their own way, the managing of the work, and so spoiled it.'-Cox, Hiberni Anglicana, ii. 208.

Jones's Remonstrance, 31.

Weakness of

army.

from Mac Mahon, that the projected seizure of the Castle was but a small part of the enterprise. The next morning every Englishman in Dublin was to be slaughtered. All the Protestants in other towns were to be put to death that very night. There is every reason to believe that this promiscuous massacre did not enter into the plan of the conspirators. O'Conolly, and perhaps Mac Mahon as well, had been drinking heavily.1 Exaggerated or not, the information must have fallen on the Lords Justices like a thunderbolt. To meet the danger they the English had at their disposal only 3,000 men, scattered in small detachments over the whole face of the country. More than twice that number of those soldiers who had been lately disciplined by the King's orders, that they might serve him against his Scottish and, possibly, against his English subjects, were also to be found in Ireland, but they were far more likely to join the rebels than to fight against them. The Government had hardly a shilling to dispose of. The conspirators had chosen a moment when the King's half-yearly rents and dues were still unpaid, and it was now most unlikely that they would ever be paid at all. Of the population of Ireland about nine-elevenths might be reckoned as Catholics by creed, and very nearly as large a proportion as Celtic by race. The city of Dublin had no fortifications, except those of the Castle, and, in deference to the constitutional objections of Parliament, not a single soldier was billeted in the city. It was calculated that in Dublin itself there were fifteen Catholics to one Protestant. The garrison of the Castle consisted of six aged warders and forty halberdiers, maintained for display in ceremonies of State.2

Oct. 23.

The Lords Justices and the Council did all that was in their power. Maguire and Mac Mahon were seized. Seizure of Mac Mahon declared proudly that 'what was that day to be done in other parts of the country, was so far advanced by that time, as it was impossible for the wit of man to prevent it.' "I am now in your hands," he ended

Mac Mahon

and

. Maguire.

1 O'Conolly's examination, Temple's Irish Rebellion, 19.
2 Carte's Ormond, i. 168.

« PrethodnaNastavi »