That the Irish were determined, as soon as they had rooted out the English from Ireland, to "go to England, and not leave the memorial of the English name under heaven!"* That the Irish killed English cows and sheep, merely because they were English ;t That some of those that fled from Ireland, to seek refuge in England, were so tossed about by storms, that they could not reach any port in the latter island in three months ;‡ That the Irish intended to have penalties imposed on those who should speak English ;§ That they would not leave an English man or woman alive in the kingdom; no, not so much as an English beast, or any of the breed of them ; "The friars exhorted the people with tears to spare none of the English; that the Irish were resolved to destroy them out of the kingdom; that they would devour, as their very word was, the seed of the English out of Ireland; and that when they had rid them there, they would go over into England, and not leave the memorial of the English name under heaven!!!"9838 "The Irish in many places killed English cows and sheep, merely because they were English; in some places they cut off their legs, or took a piece out of their buttocks, and so let them remain, still alive."839 "At the siege of Augher, they would not kill any English beast, and then eat it; but they cut collops out of them, being alive; letting them roar till they had no more flesh upon their backs, so that sometimes a beast would live two or three days together in that torment."840 It is remarkable that this absurd story is copied by Carte, Leland, Warner, Hume, and other writers. War always produces scarcity-and especially a war carried on with such remorseless rage as the government generals displayed. To suppose that the Irish were such idiots, as to destroy their means of subsistence in this manner, to be revenged of the English, requires a degree of cullibility that would qualify its possessor for a seat among the wise men of Gotham. "That which heightened the calamity of the poor English was their flight in the winter, in such a dismal, stormy, tempestuous season, as in the memory of man had never been observed formerly to continue so long together. Yet the terror of the rebels incomparably prevailing beyond the rage of the sea, most of those who could provide themselves of shipping, though at never so excessive rates, deserted the city and such was the violence of the winds, such continuing impetuous storms, as several barques were cast away. Some, in three months after their going from hence, could recover no port in England!"841 §"Some of the Irish would not endure the very sound of that language, but would have penalties inflicted on thein that spake EngFish.842 "Richard Claybrook deposeth, That he heard Luke Toole say, $38 Temple, 78. 889 Idem, 77. 840 Borlace, 133. 811 Temple, 57. 842 Idem, 77. That in the beginning of the insurrection, the English had such confidence in the Irish, that they delivered their goods to them for safe keeping, and even dug up such of their best things as they had hidden under ground to deposit in their custody!!* That many thousands died in two days, in the town of Colerain ; a place not containing, probably, three hundred people ;† That children were compelled to be the executioners of their parents; wives to help to hang their husbands; and mothers to cast their children into the water; That the destruction of the Christians, in any of the heathen persecutions, in any one kingdom, was not greater, in many years, than the destruction of the English by the Irish; in the space of two months!! The task is endless to the writer to point out, and must be irksome that they would not leave an Englishman or English woman in the kingdom; that they would not leave an English beast alive, or any of the breed of them."843 "So confident were the English of their good dealing at first, as many delivered their goods by retail unto them; gave them particular inventories of all they had; nay, digged up such of their best things as they had hidden under ground, to deposit in their custody."844 +"James Redfern deposeth, That in the town of Colerain, since the rebellion began, there died of robbed and stripped people, that fled thither for succour, many hundreds, besides those of the town that anciently dwelt there: and that the mortality there was such and so great, as many thousands died there in two days."845 "Children were enforced to carry their aged parents to the places designed for their slaughter; nay, some children compelled most unnaturally to be the executioners of their own parents; wives to help to hang their husbands; and mothers to cast their own children into the water."9846 "Elizabeth, wife of Thomas Green, in the parish of Dumcres, in the county Armagh, sworn and examined, saith, That she is verily persuaded that the rebels, at several times and places within the county of Armagh, drowned above four thousand Protestants, enforcing the sons and daughters of those very aged people, who were not able to go themselves, to take them out of their beds and houses, and carry them to drowning, especially in the river of Toll, in the parish of Loghall. Jurat. November 10, 1643."9847 "If we shall take a survey of the primitive times, and look into the sufferings of the first Christians that suffered under the tyranny and cruel persecution of those heathenish emperors, we shall not certainly find any one kingdom, though of a far larger continent, where there were more Christians suffered, or more unparalleled cruelties were acted in many years upon them, than were in Ireland, within the space of two months, after the breaking out of this rebellion."848 946 Idem, 91. 843 Temple, 96. $47 Ibid. $44 Idem, 80. 845 Idem, 81. to the reader, to see detailed the atrocious lies of this legendary author, Temple. It is established, by the testimony of Carte, Leland, and Warner, that the rebellion did not extend beyond Ulster, except very partially, before the middle and end of December, that is about two months; and yet this wretched scribbler states that more were destroyed in, that space of time than in many years in the heathen persecutions. That the Irish used to twist withes about the heads of the English, till the blood sprang out of the crowns of their heads!* That a murderer's wife found much fault with her husband's soldiers, for not bringing home the grease of a woman whom they had slain, for the purpose of making candles ;† 66 That the English were such dupes, that they lent their weapons to the Irish. This, truly, is the most ridiculous of all the stories. The Roman Catholics rise in rebellion to destroy the Protestants, who are such dupes and fools, that they give up their arms to secure them from the violence of such of the Irish as were in arms in the next county." I once more repeat, that it is difficult to tell whether we should most abhor the wickedness, or despise the folly of the perjured miscreants who invented such miserable stories. The following extract from Temple's history, with the depositions on which it is grounded, may serve to amuse the reader, and will throw additional light on the mode in which that romance was compiled : "How grievous and insupportable must it needs be to a true Christian soul, to hear a base villain boast, that his hands were so weary with killing and knocking down Protestants into a bog, that he could not lift his arms up to his head ?§ or others to say, that they had kill *"Some they would take and writh withes about their heads, till the blood sprang out of the crown of their heads."849 "Elizabeth Baskervile deposeth, That she heard the wife of Florence Fitz-Patrick, find much fault with her husband's soldiers, because they did not bring along with them the grease of Mrs. Nicholson, whom they had slain, for her to make candles withal. Jurat. April 26, 1643.850 "In several places, the Irish came, under divers pretences, and borrowed such weapons and arms as the English had in their houses ; and no sooner got them into their hands, but they turned them out of their own doors: as they did at Glaslough, in the county of Monoghan, and by the same means they very gently and fairly got into their possession all the English arms in the county of Cavan. The high sheriff there being an Irishman and a Papist, pretending that he took their arms to secure them against the violence of such of the Irish as he understood to be in arms in the next county."851 "Eleanor Fullerton, the relict of William Fullerton, late parson, of Lougall, deposeth, That in lent, 1641, a young roguing cow-boy gave out and affirmed, in this deponent's hearing, that his hands were so weary in killing and knocking down Protestants into a bog-pit, that he could hardly lift his arms to his head. Jurat. Sept. 1642.852 849 Temple, 106. 851 Idem, 37. 852 Idem, 96. 850 Idem, 92. ed so many Englishmen, that the grease or fat which remained on their swords or skeins might have made an Irish candle ?* or to consider that two young cow-boys should have it in their power to murder thirty-six Protestants Pa A new instance of the mental obliquity exhibited by the AngloHibernian writers here presents itself. The spirit of lying and imposture which pervades those depositions, would naturally induce a sane mind to reject them wholly, as undeserving of any attention. But, by a most perverted process of reasoning, Leland ascribes these awful stories to the terrors excited by the horrible cruelties perpetrated by the Irish, which, he supposes, preyed on the imaginations of the English, and terrified them with the idea of lakes and rivers of blood, &c. &c. "They who escaped the utmost fury of the rebels, languished in miseries horrible to be described. Their imaginations were overpowered and disordered by the recollections of torture and butchery. In their distraction," [let us say, rather, in the depraved and loathsome state of the public mind]"every tale of horror was eagerly received, and every suggestion of frenzy and melancholy believed implicitly. Miraculous escapes from death, miraculous judgments on murderers, lakes and rivers of blood, marks of slaughter indelible by every human effort, visions of spirits chaunting hymns, ghosts rising from the rivers and shrieking out revenge; these and such like fancies were received and propagated as incontestible."854 It is difficult to conceive of a stronger proof of the blindest prejudice than is here exhibited by Leland. Whoever has travelled through the depositions in the preceding pages, extracted from Temple, Borlace, and Rushworth, will at once perceive that the object with the perjurers who swore to them, was to render their tales as terrific and horrible as they could, for the purpose of aggravating the abhorrence, and ensuring the ruin, of the oppressed and despoiled Irish. They were quite certain, that in the prevailing spirit of the times, no improbability or impossibility would be a bar to their currency. This is so plain and palpable that it requires only to skim the surface, to perceive it. Instead, therefore, of believing, with Leland, that a man who boldly comes forward, and swears to "lakes and rivers of blood," and "visions of spirits chaunting hymns," acts under the influence of a disordered imagination, in consequence of the horrors he has witnessed, we are warranted, nay constrained to believe, that the whole is the creation not of a disordered, but a corrupted and abominably-lying imagination. Indeed there is no man who will allow his understanding free operation, but will find it impossible to believe *"Elizabeth Champion, late wife of Arthur Champion, in the county of Fermanagh, esquire, saith, That she heard the rebels say, that they had killed so many Englishmen that the grease or fat which remained on their swords and skeins might well serve to make an Irish candle. Jurat. April 14, 1642."7855 853 Temple, 96. 854 Leland, III. 147. $55 Temple, 97. that those terror-inspiring stories could have ever proceeded from any other source than the prince of darkness, the father of lies. I feel that confidence, which truth and a good cause naturally inspire, that the ground here assumed, is perfectly sound and unassailable. This branch of the subject might here be dismissed-but I cannot resist the temptation to add one further proof of the magnitude of the errors that have prevailed on the subject of the universality of the insurrection. This proof rests on authority which the enemies of Ireland will not dare dispute. Sir William Petty states, that before the insurrection there were 3,000 estated Roman Catholics in Ireland: and that, by judicial investigations in the court of claims, held in 1663, it appeared that there were not more than 400 of them* engaged in the glorious but unfortunate struggle for Irish liberty, which, even by the friends and partisans of the English revolution in 1688, the American in 1776, and the French in 1789, is so very erroneously and inconsistently styled a rebellion. And let it be observed, that, notwithstanding the very small proportion of the estated Catholics who were implicated in the insurrection, I have established the fact, that every effort had been used by the lords justices to goad the whole nation into resistance, for the purpose of confiscating the ten millions of acres of the soil, which they and their friends in England had already devoured in imagination. "The number of landed Papists, or freeholders, before the wars, was about 3,000, whereof, as appears by 800 judgments of the court of claims, which sat anno 1663, upon the innocence and effects of the Irish, there were not above one-seventh part, or 400, guilty of the rebellion." 92356 856 Petty, 23. |
