they took up. That, besides meat and drink, they extorted money. from the poor people, where they were cessed; three shillings for every night's lodging for an horseman, and two for a footman, sometimes more. As also certain petty sums for their boys, and attendants, besides victuals; and these soldiers took money, not only for themselves, but likewise for other soldiers absent, which the country called black men, because they were not seen. That in all these cases, when the people had not money, they took forcibly some of their cattle or household stuff, for pawns in lieu thereof; that the officers of the army did the same; that sheriffs did suffer their men and bailiffs and followers, to take both money and victuals from the country. And that the reason the people did not complain to the deputy of these oppressions and extortions, was for fear of being worse used by the soldiers at other times; and because the charges of the complaint would far exceed the damages."78

The "calm" of which Lord Clarendon makes mention in one of the preceding paragraphs, requires some explanation. The statement is incorrect, not to say disingenuous. The words, "The papists enjoyed a great calm," would imply in common parlance, that they were perfectly free from any restraints upon their consciences, or any depredation upon their property; and, were the idea they thus convey, well founded, would warrant the glowing statements given of their situation by this noble writer and the Rev. Ferdinando Warner. But there is a kind of exception in the succeeding sentence-They "were grown only a part of the revenue." This exception at the first blush appears as of too little consequence to ruffle the "great calm" of those halcyon days. But 66 more is meant than meets the ear." The clause is studiedly ambiguous and requires a commentary to render it intelligible even to persons above the common standard of understanding. But when explained, it appears utterly incompatible with the "great calm" which is paraded in the foreground of the picture. The fines levied. on the Roman Catholics for non-attendance at Church and for not taking the oath of supremacy, constituted no small portion of the resources of the state-and it was in this mode, that this oppressed body of people were "ONLY grown a part of the revenue”—and this truly was the "great calm" they enjoyed.

The levying the fine of twelve pence a Sunday on the recusants was a most oppressive grievance, particularly on the poor, as it amounted to probably one-third or one-fourth part of their weekly earnings. Lord Strafford, tyrant as he was, reprobated it, particularly at the time when he was plundering them of their estates by. "the commission for remedying defective titles."

"It were too much," he observes," at once to distemper them, by bringing plantations upon them, and disturbing them in the exercise of their religion, so long as it be without scandal; and so indeed very inconsiderate, as I conceive, to move in this latter, till that former be fully settled, and by that means the protestant party become by much the stronger, which, in truth, as yet I do not conceive it to be."79

"This course alone will never bring them to church, being rather an engine to drain money out of their pockets, than to raise a right belief and faith in their hearts, and so doth not indeed tend to that end it sets forth." 9980

It is very true, that Leland, quoting lord Chichester, asserts that under that lord's administration, "the annual amount of fines imposed in the county of Dublin, did not exceed the sum of fourteen or fifteen pounds!!" This is a monstrous perversion of fact, but is in perfect keeping with the other wonderful errors already detailed. Cases occurred, within this period, in which individuals in a single instance were fined six times the sum, thus confidently and erroneously stated to have been the whole that was extorted during an entire year from all the inhabitants of the entire county!!!! Can deception, fraud, and falsehood proceed to greater lengths? It is impossible. Nine persons were at once fined the enormous sum of seven hundred and fifty pounds for their recusancy, during this lord's administration!!

1605. "The lord deputy, (Chichester,) and council convened before them the aldermen and some of the principal citizens, and endeavoured by persuasions and lenity to draw them to their duty. They also exemplified under the Great Seal, and published the statute of uniformity of the 2d of Eliz. in regard there was found to be some material difference between the original record and the printed copies, that none might pretend ignorance of the original record, and added thereto the king's injunction for the observance of the said statute. But these gentle methods failing to have any effect, sixteen of the most eminent of the city were convened into the court of castle chamber, of whom nine of the chief were censured, and six of the aldermen fined each 100l. and the other three 50l. apiece, and they were all committed prisoners to the castle during the pleasure of the court; and it was ordered that none of the citizens should bear office till they conformed. The week following the rest were censured in the same manner; except alderman Archer, who conformed."2

We cannot tell what was the amount of the fines of those who were "censured in the same manner the week following"-but it was probably half as much-making in the whole about one thousand pounds within one week from a few persons-instead of fourteen or fifteen pounds in one year from a whole county!!! And it is not to be presumed that the persecution was confined to these fifteen persons. Nothing short of idiocy could suppose it. When the rapacious vultures of government have nothing to fear in their career of depreda tion, as was the case with Lord Chichester and his myrmidons, they scarcely ever fail to plunder in their turn all those subject to their tyranny. The more remote from head quarters, the more grievous the oppression. A cotemporary author, a Mr. Rooth, a Catholic priest, states that the fines in the single county of Cavan amounted annually to eight thousand pounds! How enormous therefore must have been the depredation throughout the whole island!

The Roman Catholics were disabled by law from sueing out livery of their lands, without taking the oath of supremacy, which was an

80 Ibid.

Leland, II. 515.

62 Harris, 322.

absolute renunciation of their religion. If they took possession of them, without being thus qualified by compliance with the law, they were sued in the exchequer as intruders on the king's possession, and subject to all the penalties attendant on intrusion. For this shocking grievance, Lord Chichester, the deputy in the early part of the reign of James I. being within the period of Lord Clarendon's Millenium, apologizes thus in his state letters

"By the statute of 2 Eliz. c. 1. in this kingdom, it is ordained, that every person suing livery or ouster le mains, shall, before his livery or ouster le mains sued forth and allowed, take the oath of supremacy. And therefore they being obstinate recusants are not permitted to sue forth their liveries under the Great Seal till they take the oath; and so they continue intruders upon the king's possession; for which intrusion they are justly sued in the exchequer, and the damage they suffer is by their own wilful default and contempt of the law."+

*"Nobody could be preferred to any degree of learning in an university, nor sue livery of his lands, or ouster le main out of the hands of the king, or do him homage in order to have possession of his estate, without first taking the oath [of supremacy.] In consequence thereof, no peer or great man who refused it, could be admitted to the dignity of a privy counsellor, or be advanced to any office of state that might give him any share in the government of the kingdom. Nobody could legally act as a mayor or magistrate in a corporation, without previously qualifying himself for those charges, by the taking of this oath."83

"The recusants made considerable offers in case they might sue out their liveries without taking the oath of supremacy, and might have some other favours granted to those of their religion; particularly the abolishing of the extravagant surplice-fees of the clergy, and the extraordinary warrants of assistance for levying them."84

66

+ This single oppression would, of itself, if it stood alone, unsupported by any other, set the seal of unqualified condemnation on those histories which depict in such glowing colours, the " undisturbed exercise of their religion," and the calm and tranquillity" enjoyed by the Irish. It appears that to every heir of real estate in the kingdom, was presented, if he did not renounce his religion, the painful alternative of abandoning his estate-or else entering on the possession as an intruder at the mercy of the government, exposed to ruinous exchequer process, or exposed to the rapine of those harpies, who appear to live only to prey on the honest and defenceless part of the community, and to take every advantage afforded by any law, how base or wicked soever. Ireland was at that period, from the nature of its government, a hot-bed for such characters. When one portion of the community is thus exposed, tied hand and foot, to the mercy of another, it is easy to conceive what fraud and depredation take place on one side, and what suffering and ruin on the other. This grievance was in full operation under lord Chichester, and con

"The recusant lawyers, a powerful body of men, were angry that they could not take degrees in law, be made judges, or regularly admitted by any court to plead at the bar, without taking the oath of supremacy; though they probably gained as much by their private advice and chamber practice, with less trouble to themselves, and less hazard to their reputation, as they could have done by the displaying of their eloquence in public."ss

Lord Strafford set his face most decidedly against the removal of this oppressive system.

"In reason of state, they should not, under favour, be exempted from taking the oath of supremacy, considering it may be a good tacit means to bring them to conformity in religion, when they cannot be admitted to sue forth their liveries, or to take their estates forth of the crown, without it."986

The following extract displays as flagrant a degree of obliquity in inference as any of those errors in point of fact which have already passed in review. The Irish had been from the commencement of the reign of James I. harassed by inquiries into defective titles, and been robbed and plundered by the government and by individuals to a most enormous extent, unparalleled in any other country in the world. They had made a solemn contract with Charles I. in the year 1628, whereby they agreed to pay 150,000l. for some acts of justice, which by a misnomer were styled "graces." They paid the chief part of the sum stipulated-but were by a miserable piece of chicane basely defrauded of the quid pro quo, to the eternal dishonour of Charles. Under the administration of Lord Strafford, in 1633, the subject was resumed, and he, lawless and unprincipled, undertook to refuse several of those " graces:" among the rest, the two principal; of which one was, that sixty years quiet possession should in Ireland, as in England, bar all claims to land, on the part of the crown-the other, that patents for land should be granted to the no

tinued, as appears by the text, to and during the administration of lord Strafford, that is, through the whole of the "forty years" millenium.

It is hardly necessary to point out the absurdity and futility of these opinions, and how desperate must be the cause that is driven to such a defence. Suppose a decree were to pass, that all the lawyers throughout the United States, who are not six feet high, who have dark hair, or grey eyes, or aquiline noses, or fair complexions, were to be prohibited from pleading in our courts of justice-(and these criteria, though rather more whimsical, would be as just and correct as the criterion of religious opinions :)-And let us further suppose, that the complaints they made on the subject were met by the cogent and convincing answer, that "they would probably gain as much by chamber practice and private advice," as at the bar, and with "less hazard to their reputation." What sentence would be pronounced against the man who oracularly delivered this opinion? He would be regarded, and with justice, either as a confirmed knave, or a consummate fool.

bility and gentry in Connaught, for which they had duly paid, but which had not issued merely through the negligence or fraud of the clerks in office. And for the king or his minister to take advantage of this neglect on the part of their own officers, was as fraudulent, and as base a trick, as it would be in a merchant who had received payment for a vessel or cargo, but had not given a receipt for the amount, to endeavour to swindle the honest bona fide purchaser out of the article purchased and honourably paid for. But Strafford, possessed by the most insatiable spirit of rapine, and contemplating that stupendous scheme of depredation, the plantation of Connaught, whereby the landed proprietors of that province were to be despoiled of a third, or a fourth part of their estates, peremptorily rejected the fulfilment of the contract, and took upon himself the whole odium of the infamous measure, asserting a palpable falsehood, that he had not transmitted those articles of the graces over to Charles I. whereas the contrary appears clearly established by his letters now extant. Charles I. with a true Punica fides, rejoiced to be freed from the performance of his contract, and to find his favourite assuming the disgrace of the transaction, of which his Irish subjects were the victims, wrote him with his own hand a letter of the most unqualified approbation.

"Wentworth,

"Before I answer any of your particular letters to me, I must tell you that your late public despatch has given me a great deal of contentment; and especially for keeping off the envy of a necessary negative from me of those unreasonable graces that people expected from me.87

CHARLES R."

For this fraudulent proceeding, Carte presents the following apology :

"They were, indeed, both of them contrary to the intention of the commission then on foot for the remedy of defective titles, and would have raised great difficulties in the execution of it. This was a work the deputy had exceedingly at heart, as well for the improvement and settling of his majesty's revenue, as for securing the estates and quieting the minds of the subjects universaily throughout the kingdom."88

It would be difficult to find a more complete specimen of absurdity and sophistry than is here displayed. The committee for the remedy of defective titles, as appears from the preceding extracts from Leland and Carte, pp. 48, 49, was in its operation a committee for finding flaws in titles, and depredating on the possessors of lands, a system which, I repeat, had been carried to the most oppressive extent for a century, and harassed and plundered half the gentlemen in the kingdom. The chief "grace" in question, was to put an end to this wretched and oppressive system of depredating by antiquated claims, derived from the days of Henry II. or III. or IV. or V. Its object was to bar any claim on the part of the crown of an earlier date than sixty years. And yet Carte believed, or affected to believe, and desired to persuade his readers, that the refusal of so very equitable a 88 Carte, I. 81.

87 Strafford, 1. 331.