tended, that there had been 154,000 massacred in Ulster; to which let the reader add what this army might choose to set down for Leinster and Connaught, which would probably be at least 25,000 for each; thus allowing above 200,000 for the rest of the kingdom, and the same number for Munster!!! or 400,000 for the whole, out of 225,000 !!!!

One more case shall close this odious detail. We have seen, even by the account of the lords justices themselves, that, on the 29th of October, six days after the commencement of the insurrection, it was confined to "the mere old Irish in the province of Ulster, and others who adhered to them."* We have likewise seen, from Temple, Leland, and Warner, that at the commencement, the insurgents so far adhered to "the original scheme of the conspiracy," that, "at first, few fell by the sword, except in open war and assault:" and yet Sir Philip Warwick gives us to understand, that in one week there were 100,000 massacred, than which, we may venture to assert, a more consummate and atrocious falsehood never was ushered into the world, for the purposes of deception. Sir Philip is wholly inexcusable; as his work was not published during the convulsions of that period, when there might have been some difficulty in divesting himself of the influence of the raging passions which then convulsed the political elements. It did not appear until

* Supra, 334.

+ Leland, ubi supra.

after the restoration, of which it narrates the

Occurrences.

With what ineffable disgust and abhorrence, then, must every ingenuous mind revolt at such loathsome frauds and impositions!

On the subject of the pretended massacre, some of the observations of Carte are judicious and unanswerable; and would be sufficient, independent of the other evidence we have produced, to put down forever those miserable legends about so many hundreds of thousands of the Protestants cut off in a few weeks, or months, or years, and to stamp on the foreheads of their authors the broad seal of imposture. He states, that the extravagant numbers, asserted to be massacred, were 66 more than there were of English, at that time, in all Ireland. "410

"Sir William Petty," he adds, "computes the British, including therein both English and Scotch, to be, before the rebellion, as 2 to 11 of the Irish; at which rate, there were about 220,000 British in the whole kingdom! Now it is certain, that the great body of the English was settled in Munster and Leinster, where very few murders were committed; and that in Ulster, which was the dismal scene of the massacre, there were above 100,000 Scots, who, before the general plantation of it, had settled in great numbers in the counties of Down and Antrim and new shoals of them had come over, upon the plantation of the six escheated counties: and they were so very powerful therein, that the Irish, either out of fear of their numbers, or some other politic reason, spared those of that nation, making proclamation, on pain of death, that no Scotsman should be molested in body, goods, or lands, whilst they raged with so much fury against the English."411

410 Carte, I. 177.

411 Ibid..

To these facts, he adds the following reflections:

"It cannot therefore reasonably be presumed, that there were at most more than 20,000 English souls, of all ages and sexes, in Ulster at that time: and of these, as appears by the lords justices' letter, there were several thousands got safe to Dublin; besides 6,000 women and children, which captain Mervyn saved in Fermanagh; and others that got safe to Derry, Colerain, and Carrickfergus, and went from these and other parts into England."412

It is obvious, that it is impossible to reconcile the latter part of this quotation with the rest; a case, as we have repeatedly stated, that incessantly occurs in Irish histories. The author informs us, on rational grounds, that there were "not more than 20,000 English in Ulster;" that "several thousands got safe to Dublin," that "6,000 women and children were saved in Fermanagh;" and that "others got safe to Derry, Colerain, and Carrickfergus." These all-important and conclusive facts he connects with a statement of "the extreme cruelty with which the insurgents raged against the English," and with a notice of a “dismal scene of the massacre," the subjects of which massacre are not very easily found, and, at all events, could not have been very numerous: for, let us add together "several thousands," and "6,000," and the "others" who "got safe" into the specified towns, where there were numerous garrisons; where, of course, in a time of violence and commotion, the

412 Carte, I. 177.

inhabitants of the circumjacent country would naturally seek refuge; and where, it is not extravagant to suppose, that "the others," who thus "got safe," might have amounted to some thousands : let us then deduct the aggregate from 20,000, the total number of English, and we shall find a slender remainder. But the plain fact is, that the writers on this subject are so haunted by the idea of a massacre, that although it rests on the sandy foundation of forgery and perjury, as shall be fully proved in the sequel, and although many of their own statements, in the most unequivocal manner, give it the lie direct, their minds cannot be divested of the terrific object. These passages from Carte furnish a strong case in point. The most ardent friend of Ireland could not desire a much more complete proof of the fallacy of the accounts of the pretended massacre, than is here given by this author himself, who, nevertheless, wonderful to tell! appears to resist the evidence of his own facts, and to be blind to the obvious inference to which they inevitably lead.

We have already borne strong testimony to the general correctness of the intentions of Ferdinando Warner, a clergyman of the church of England, as displayed throughout his "History of the Rebellion and Civil War of Ireland," with the remarkable exception of the state of that country, previous to 1641, in which he has fallen into the most egregious errors. He appears to have been the only writer who has gone into any

elaborate investigation of the legendary tales of the pretended massacre; and his views of the subject well deserve the most serious attention of the reader. After stating the uncertainty of the accounts, and the consequent difficulty of making an exact estimate, he pronounces a strong and unequivocal sentence of condemnation on the Munchausen tales we are combating; and avers,

that

"It is easy enough to demonstrate the falsehood of the relation of every Protestant historian of this rebellion."413

He proceeds to render a satisfactory account of the grounds on which this statement rests:

<< To any one who considers how thinly Ireland was at that time peopled by Protestants, and the province of Ulster particularly, where was the chief scene of the massacre, THOSE

RELATIONS UPON THE FACE OF THEM APPEAR INCREDI99414

BLE.

He then enters into an elaborate detail, in confirmation of this opinion, which the reader will find in Chapter I. page 20, and which reduces the number "murdered" to 4,028; and, let it not be forgotten, nearly one-half of even this number rests wholly on "report!!"

He adds, it is true, nearly double that number, who fell victims to ill-usage: thus making an aggregate of about 12,000. But even in this number he himself does not believe: for he closes with a strong and decisive condemnation of the state414 Ibid.

413 Warner, 296.