"Mr. P. forgot to inform his reader that Queen Elizabeth, A. D. 1592, in the 35th year of her reign, founded and endowed the College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity, near Dublin; Adam Loftus, Archbishop of Dublin, was the first Provost.

"Queen Elizabeth in the first fifteen years of her reign expended in Ireland the sum of 490,7791. 78. 6d. though the whole produce of the Irish revenue during that period was but 120,000l.-Ware, chap. xv.

"In her reign during the government of Lord Sussex, the first clock was set up in Dublin in the Castle, which, says Ware, being a novelty, was very pleasing to the common people.-Chap. iii.

"In the 13th year of her reign also, the Irish characters for printing were first brought into Ireland by Nicholas Walsh, Chancellor of St. St. Patrick's, Dublin.-Chap. xv. Ware.

"The first book ever printed in Ireland was the Liturgy, in the year 1550, printed by Humphry Powell.-Annals of Dublin.

"In the 30th year of her reign, Lilly's English Grammar was or. dered by an Act of Council to be taught in Ireland.-Ware, chap. xxx. "And in her reign in the year 1565, John Hawkins, from Santa Fe in New Spain, originally introduced potatoes into Ireland, the first brought into Europe; they did not become the general food of the Irish until after the Revolution: Sir W. Temple and Sir J. Dalrymple seem to consider (with good reason) the idleness of the lower Irish to arise in some measure, from the ease with which potatoes are cultivated, and from their being satisfied with such food.

"Whiskey was in use in Ireland from a much earlier period, some of the earliest acts in the Irish statute book, are two or three prohibiting the making and using of aqua vitæ made from grain.

"Vol. i. Irish Statutes.

"As to that unparalleled system of confiscation and depopulation which,' Mr. Plowden says, began in this reign; and which, being in its nature so diametrically opposite to union, pointedly marks the evils which so long afflicted Ireland for want of this salutary measure ;'--I beg leave, in answer, to observe, that this writer seems to have forgotten, that confiscation of property, in consequence of treason, was formerly, and still is, the law of England as well as of Ireland; nor has the act of Union repealed this statute; and as to the depopulation of which he complains, it arose from the inevitable consequences of the insurrections of the Irish, who were then (as I fear many of them still are) only to be taught lessons of obedience in the field of battle. The lands of Ire land were forfeited for rebellion. That they have been forfeited over and over again, I admit; and this is easily accounted for, because the history of that country is little more than the history of a series of rebellions. When, therefore, this writer condemns this system of confiscation, he condemns the laws of our country, which, in spite of the sensibilities of modern philosophers, and the practices of modern reformers, will, I trust, be immortal.

"To expose all the misrepresentations and erroneous conclusions to be found in this author's review of the reign of Elizabeth, it would be necessary to write a chapter longer than his own. I shall only therefore detain my readers by laying before them an extract from the Earl of Essex's Letter to the Queen, given in Mr. Plowden's Appendix; and to

which, in p. 81 of the first volume, he seems so triumphantly to refer. I trespass thus on my readers, because, although the picture was drawn for the natives in Queen Elizabeth's time, I am sorry to be obliged to observe, that some traces of the resemblance, may be found among their descendants of a much later period.

In their affection,' says Essex, they love nothing but idleness; in their rebellion they have no other end but 10 shake off the yoake of obedience to your Majestie, and to rout out all remembrance of the English na→ tion in this kingdom. I say, I say this of the people in general, for I find not only a great part thus affected, but that it is a general quarrel of the Irish; and they who do not profess it are either so few or so false, that there is no account to be made of them. The Irish nobility and Lords of Counties do not only affect this plausible quarrel, and are divided from us in religion, but have an especial quarrel against the English government, because it limiteth and tieth them, who have ever been, and ever would be, as absolute tyrants as any under the sun.

"It is plain, therefore, who it was that oppressed the common people of Ireland in the reign of Elizabeth; and who endeavoured to restrain those oppressions."

We shall now proceed to make some strictures on the ill-founded observations of Mr. Plowden, on that bright æra of our history.

There were three great rebellions in Ireland during the reign of Elizabeth. The first was raised by Shane, or John O'Neil, though his father had been created Earl of Tyrone by Henry VIII. and had received many solid favours, and flattering marks of distinction; his son Shane renounced his allegiance to Elizabeth, declared himself the Pope's champion, and raised a rebellion which desolated a great part of the north.

This monster, in his father's life time, murdered his brother Matthew, who had been created Baron Dungannon, usurped the sovereignty of the province of Ulster, put to death many Irish chieftains, some of them with excruciating torture, seized their property, and ravished their wives. The Irish annalists represent him as actuated by brutal passions, and guilty of the most intemperate excesses; and they delineate with horror the number and atrocity of his crimes; and yet, with profane dissimulation, he professed the most dutiful and loyal intentions towards the crown. It would exceed our circumscribed limits to state how often he made submissions, and took oaths of allegiance, which he never failed to violate. After repeated acts of perjury and treason, he made the most dutiful submission at the foot of the throne, and he so wrought on the Queen, by the fervour and solemnity of his assurances, that she confirmed his title and estate to him, and dismissed him with presents and promises of favour. After this he kindled a very general rebellion, and sent ambassadors to Spain and Rome for assistance against the English government, whom he called the common enemy. At last his career of guilt and infamy terminated in his assassination by a party of Scotch invaders, whom he solicited to join him in his vindictive and traiterous designs. Mr. Plowden,

Plowden, with that intemperate zeal which he manifests through the whole of his work, to palliate the crimes of the Popish rebels, and to condemn the conduct of the English government in Ireland, laments that the act of attainder of Shane O'Neil, and the forfeiture to the Queen of the county of Tyrone, and other territories in Ulster, "seem to have been pointedly calculated to insult the feelings of the Irish nation, and consequently to inflame their animosity and rancour;" and the reasons which he assigns are," that it enumerates all his acts of outrage and rebellion, in a style of vindictive acrimony, and it affects to deduce the title of the English monarch to the absolute sovereignty of the whole kingdom of Ireland, as paramount to the Milesian race of kings." Mr. Plowden makes the following absurd and ridiculous remark to palliate the dreadful rebellions of Shane O'Neil. "This was a most wanton act of violence offered to the feelings of a people, singularly proud of their royal lineage and ancestry, and by public institution scrupulously chaste as to the fidelity of their national traditions. Nothing short of a wish to goad them into rebellion, could have so effectually spirited them up to it, as thus kindling the flame of patriotism by a collision with their national honour." Mr. Plowden shews a constant propensity, to abuse the English government; but finding no substantial reason for censuring Queen Elizabeth's, he selects this trifling one; and he endeavours to ascribe the various instances of Popish treason which occurred during her reign, to irritation. It was very politic to set forth the various crimes committed by this monster, and the punishment which followed them, in order to deter others from perpetrating such; for had they not been so well substantiated, writers of Mr. Plowden's cast would have denied the guilt of O'Neil, and would have imputed the Act of Parliament for his attainder and the confiscation of his estates, to motives of tyranny and avidity in the English government. The next great rebellion which took place in Ireland, was that raised in the year 1569, by James Fitzmaurice Fitzgerald, and John Fitzgerald, brothers of the Earl of Desmond, and in which the Earl himself afterwards took an open and active part. Preparatory to it, in the year 1568, they and their confederates implored the aid of the Pope and the King of Spain, through their ambassadors, the titular bishops of Emily and Cashel. That degree of fanatical hatred which the Popish clergy in Ireland never cease to infuse into their votaries against a Protestant state, and their Protestant fellow, subjects, was raised to an extraordinary pitch of enthusiasm by various papal bulls, fulminated against Queen Elizabeth, in which she was excommunicated as an heretical usurper, and her subjects were called upon to rise in arms against her, may be considered as the source of this general and dreadful rebellion, which began in the province of Munster, and ultimately involved in its vortex most of the chieftains both of English and Irish blood. It is remarkable, that though the Butlers bore an implacable hatred to the Fitzgeralds, the hereditary enemies of their family, the false zeal of Romish superstition, and

their deep-rooted hatred to the Protestant state, formed a strong bond of union between them; but much to the honour of the Earl of Ormond, he remained loyal. During this dreadful rebellion, frequent and successful applications were made to the Pope, and the King of Spain, for assistance; and the latter, to whom his Holiness had given the Queen's dominions, sent Juan Mendoza, an ecclesiastic, as. his agent to Ireland, where he contributed very much to foment the rebellion; in consequence of which no less than three Spanish armies invaded Ireland. One of them landed at Smerwick, in the county of Kerry, where they were joined by great numbers of the Irish, to which they were incited by a Papal bull, addressed to the prelates princes, nobles, and people of Ireland; and such of them as assisted Fitzmaurice in recovering their liberties, and in defending the holy church, were promised plenary indulgence, and a full absolution from their sins; and they received a consecrated banner from the Pope.Saunders and Allen, two Jesuits, who were the leading incendiaries in this rebellion, hallowed the place where the Spaniards encamped, and gave them assurance of success in defence of the holy church.Sir Nicholas Malby attacked them, and their Irish adherents, at a place called Monaster Neva, where they were drawn up with the Papal standard displayed. Previous to the engagement, which ended in their defeat with great slaughter, Allen, like father Murphy at the battle of Arklow in 1798, went through the ranks, exhorting them, distributing his benedictions, and assuring them of success against the enemies of their holy faith. The body of this pious hero was found among the slain, and in his baggage several papers, containing the most convincing proof that the Earl of Desmond was principally concerned in exciting this rebellion; and yet such was his dissimulation, that he wrote a letter of congratulation to Sir Nicholas Malby on his victory, in which he advised him to change his position. Instead of proceeding to extremities against him, Sir Nicholas endeavoured to persuade him to return to his allegiance, reminded him of the many promises and engagements which he had made and violated to the Queen, and exhorted him to prevent the total ruin of his ancient and noble family. Sir Wm. Pelham, afterwards Lord Deputy, did the like, and even employed the Earl of Ormond to dissuade him from his treasonable designs. But his generous applications were answered by complaints of ideal grievances and injuries, and accompanied with threats of involving the whole kingdom in confusion. Saunders the Jesuit, his ghostly adviser and constant attendant, prevented him from availing himself of the royal mercy, by assuring him that his pious exertions for the extirpation of heresy, would, with the divine assistance, ba

* We have been circumstantial in delineating this invasion, as the incidents attending it, resemble strongly those which took place on the descent of the French under Humbert.

finally

finally crowned with success; and the delusive suggestions of this fanatical incendiary, operating on his superstitious credulity, occasioned the total extinction of his illustrious House, and the confiscation of his immense property. The Fitzgeralds, the Butlers, the Fitzmaurices, the Barrys, the Roches, the M'Carthys of Munster, the O'Briens, O'Moores, Cavanaghs, O'Tooles, and the O'Byrns of Leinster, the De Burghes and O'Donnels of Connaught, and the O'Neals of Ulster, and their vassals, tenants and relations, were engaged in this extensive rebellion, which laid waste and depopulated a great part of Ireland. The following extract from the edict of James M. Fitzgerald, its chief leader and instigator, proves that it was founded in religious bigotry; and this title is prefixed to it" Edictum illustrissimi domini Jacobi F. de justitia ejus belli, quod pro fide gerit." After announcing that it was undertaken "for the glory of God, and of the Catholic church, the extirpation of heresy, and the establishment of the Pope's supremacy," it states-" and as Christ gave the keys of heaven to St. Peter, Prince of the Apostles, Gregory the 13th, his lawful successor, chose me Captain-general of this war, as sufficiently appears by his letters; and the more, as his predecessor, Pius V. had deprived Elizabeth, the patroness of those heresies, of all royal power and dominion, of which his sentence against her affords abundant testimony."

The province of Munster was so depopulated and laid waste in the course of this rebellion by the sword, famine, and the diseases incident to warfare, that Spencer, secretary to Lord Grey observes, "there was little left Queen Elizabeth to reign over, but miserable carcasses, and the ashes of sacked and destroyed towns." Near 150 gentlemen were attainted by Act of Parliament.

Moryson observes, "Upon the attainder of the said Earl of Desmond and his confederates, the lands falling to the Crown were, in acres of English measure, about 574,628. Hereof great part was restored to the offenders, as to Patrick Condon his territory, to the White Knight his territory, to some of the Geraldines, and to other their confederates no small portions. The rest was divided into seignories, granted by letters patent to certain knights and esquires, which upon this gift, and the conditions whereunto they were tied, had the common name of undertakers *.'

Such was the lenity of Government, that the whole was restored to repentant rebels, except 237,670 acres.†

It is much to be lamented, that in the settlement of Munster, on this occasion, the wise system embraced by James I. in colonizing the North with English Protestants, was not adopted; for in consequence of it, many parts of the province of Ulster are not inferior to England in social order, and in active and useful industry, whilst the three other provinces exhibit a most woeful contrast to it. The

Pages 4, 5.

+ Ibid.

following