of Ulster; but this the king peremptorily refused, expressing his wonder that O'Neill, who had so often and grieviously offended, should think of asking the name and honour of Ulster, one of the great earldoms of Christendom, and the king's proper inheritance. The accession of O'Donnell to the ranks of the loyal was hailed with welcome by the government; and, even before the adhesion of O'Neill, we find Cusacke, the speaker of the Irish house of commons, proudly boasting that, as long as O'Brian, O'Donnell, Mac William, and the earl of Desmond, were true to the king, there was nothing to be feared from all the rest of Ireland. A few particulars respecting O'Donnell, which occur in a letter from the lord deputy, would lead us to conclude that, in point of civilization, he was somewhat advanced beyond the generality of his brother chiefs. In recommending that parliament robes should be bestowed upon him, Sentleger adds that in other apparel he is better furnished than any other Irishman; and then proceeds to describe his dress:-a coat of crimson velvet with aiglets of gold, twenty or thirty pair; over that, a great double cloak of crimson satin bordered with black velvet, and in his bonnet a feather set full of aiglets of gold. He was attended by his chaplain, a learned young man, brought up in France, for whom Sentleger, in the year 1544, asked and obtained of the king, the presentation to the bishopric of Elphin. O'Donnell's wish was to be made earl of Sligo or of Tyrconnel; and the latter was the title granted, but not until the year 1603. To indulge farther in this sort of detail, respecting the numerous other objects of royal favour, who were selected for promotion and ennoblement from among the ancient lords of the land, would, however interesting, even in an historical point of view, usurp more space than the prescribed limits of this work allow. I shall therefore enumerate briefly the names of the other chiefs and lords who were now selected as the primary materials of an Anglo-Irish Peerage. Morough O'Brian, whose constant encroachments on the country eastward of the Shannon had kept the government of the Pale in continual alarm, was created earl of Thomond for life, with the dignity of baron of Inchiquin descendible to his heirs male; while Donough, his nephew, as a reward for his unvarying 1543. attachment to the English, was made baron of Ibrackan, and, after the decease of his uncle, earl of Thomond, for life. On another equally active chief, O'Connor, there had been, as early as the year 1537, some intention of bestowing the title of baron of Offaley. But, though, at a later period, the king gave formally his assent to this grant, it was never carried into effect. A. D. Mac William Eighter, of Clanricarde, the captain of the Anglo-Irish clan of the De Burghs, had, on the deposition of the former Mac William by lord Leonard Gray, been raised to that name and seigniory, in his place. This lord was, by the natives, called Negan, or the beheader, from his having constructed a mound of the heads of men slain in battle, and then covered it over with earth. On making his submission, early in the year 1541, he had petitioned the crown for a grant, or rather restoration, of the earldom heretofore enjoyed by his family; and also a confirmation, by letters patent, of all the possessions which had descended to him by inheritance. It was supposed that he had himself counted upon being made earl of Connaught; but against this the council strongly gave their advice, reminding his majesty that the province of Connaught formed a fifth part of his Irish dominions. It was therefore fixed that he was to be created earl of Clanricarde, and baron of Dunkellin, while his fellow-chieftain and relative, Mac Gill Patrick, was to be made baron of Upper Ossory. A. D. Meanwhile O'Neill, who, although the last to tender his allegiance, was the very first to hasten to avail himself of its fruits, had set sail, accompanied by Hugh O'Cervallan, bishop of Clogher, for England; and waiting upon the king at Greenwich, 1542. made a surrender to him of all his territory, and agreed to renounce the name of O'Neill. A few days after, both name and estates were regranted to him, by letters patent, together with the title of earl of Tyrone.* 1543. In the following year, in the queen's closet at Greenwich, which was "richly hung with cloth of arras, and well strewed with rushes," for the occasion, took place the A. D. ceremony of creating O'Brian earl of Thomond, and conferring upon Mac William-or, as he had been styled since his submission, lord Fitz William-the name and honour of earl of Clanricarde. At the same time, Donough O'Brian, who was attended, as were probably all the other lords, by an interpreter, was made baron of *Henry VIII. to the Lord Deputy and Council. After announcing this creation, the king adds:-" And for his reward, We gave unto him a chayne of threescore poundes and odde, We payed for his robes, and the charges of his creation, threescore and fyve poundes tenne shillinges two pens, and We gave him in redy money oon hundreth poundes sterling.-S. P. CCCLXXXI. Ibrackan. By a very thoughtful act of munificence, the king granted also to each of these noblemen a house and lands, near Dublin, for the keeping of their retinues and horses, whenever they resorted thither to attend parliaments and councils.* There being, at the time of their visit to England, an almost total want of sterling money in Ireland, the lord deputy in providing them with the means of defraying their expenses, lent to O'Brian the sum of 1007. in half groats. A similar loan, attended by circumstances yet more homely, was advanced to the lord of Tyrone. This chief, being likewise in want of money, to defray the charges of his visit to court, was provided by Sentleger, who had himself borrowed the sum from merchants of Dublin, with 200 marks sterling; the debt to be repaid, according to the fashion of primitive times, in cattle to that amount.f In allowing full credit to the English monarch for the mild and tolerant character of his policy towards Ireland, it must, at the same time, be recollected, that the facility with which all the great Irish leaders agreed to reject the pope's supremacy, and acknowledge the king their spiritual head, removed all grounds for any such sanguinary persecution as raged at the same period on the other side of the Channel. Not content with his formal renouncement of Rome, O'Brian, in a paper entitled "The Irishmen's Requests," demanded that "there should be sent over some well-learned Irishmen, brought up in the universities of Oxford and Cambridge, not being infected with the poison of the bishop of Rome, and that having been first approved by the king's majesty, they should then be sent to preach the word of God in Ireland." The Irish lords, too, following the example of the more cultivated grandees of England, readily allowed themselves to be consoled for whatever sacrifice they had made in deserting their ancient faith, by the rich share they gained of the plunder which the confiscation of its venerable establishments afforded.§ One of the requests made by O'Brian, previously to visiting the English court, was, that the grant he had received from the Irish council, of certain abbeys, lately suppressed, should be confirmed to him by the king, with the addition also of a grant of the house of Observants, at Ennis. To Donough O'Brian was given the abbey of Ellenegrane, a small island in the mouth of the Shannon, together with the moiety of the abbey of Clare; and among the rewards of Mac Gill Patrick's new loyalty, were the house of the late friars of Haghevo and the suppressed monastery of Hagmacarte.|| But, whatever may be thought of the conduct and motives of those individual chiefs who were now so readily converted from rebels into apostates and courtiers, the wise policy of the government, in thus diverting into a safe and legitimate channel the wild ambition of such powerful subjects, and producing, by conciliation, a state of peace which force and repression had vainly for ages endeavoured to effect, cannot be too highly praised, whether for its immediate effects, or the lasting and salutary example it left behind. Although to Henry himself, not merely as the source of all administrative authority, but as ever ready to afford his sanction to the liberal policy pursued in Ireland, no small share of the honour of that policy is due, undoubtedly to Sentleger belongs the far higher praise of originating this system of government, and continuing manfully, and even importunately, to press the adoption of it upon the king. So much was he aware indeed, of the extent to which he presumed on the royal patience, that, after soliciting in one of his letters some favour for Mac Gill Patrick, he adds,-"Thus do I always move your majesty to give. I most humbly beseech you of pardon, for I verily trust that your highness shall win more obedience with these small gifts, than perchance hath been won before this time, with 10,000l. spent." The king himself, though yielding to most of these requests with a degree of ductility and thoughtfulness not observable in any other acts of his later years, yet deemed it necessary to restrain a little the liberality of his deputy; and thus, in answering one of his letters, reproves the too ready ear lent by him to all sorts of suitors:-"Farther you shall understand, that we much marvel to see so many letters written from you in the recommendation of every man's suit that will desire "We have granted unto every of them, and their heires masles, summe house and pece of lande nere Dublyn, for the keping of their horses and traynes, at their repayre to our parlyaments and counsailles."— Henry VIII. to the Lord Deputy and Council, S. P. CCCXCVI. † He hath promysed I shall have kiene for the same, and for that have sente his sonne and dyverse of your retynewe here to levie the same.-S. P. CCCLXXCIV. State Papers, CCCXCIII. On the subject of the destruction of the religious houses, there are many, of all creeds, who would now join with the excellent Lord Herbert in "complaining of the loss of so many stately churches, dedicated to God's service;" for "although," he adds, " they may have abused the veil of religion, yet was that monastical life instituted according to the pious example of ancient Fathers, that they who found themselves unfit for the execution of worldly affairs (as many such there are) might in such voluntary retirement spend their days in divine writings or meditations.-Hist. of the Life and Reign of Henry VIII. Henry VIII. to the Lord Deputy, S. P. CCCXCVI. the same. It shall be well done that, ere you write, you examine whether it be expedient for us to grant the suit or not." A. D. Preparations being now on foot for a grand campaign in France, orders were sent by the king to the earl of Ormond, to furnish him speedily with a small troop of kerns, or Irish light infantry, to assist in the sieges of Boulogne or Montreuil. Shortly 1544. before, this earl had been commanded by his majesty to raise and equip a force of 3000 of these troops, whereof 1000 were to be sent immediately to the west marches of England, as well for the defence of the English borders as for the annoyance of the Scots; while the remaining 2000 were to be kept in such readiness, as, "upon short warning," to attend his royal person into France.* On considering, however, the danger of leaving Ireland to the risk of invasion, without an adequate number of troops for her defence, the king countermanded a part of this force, and desired that 1000 only should be sent; of which one half was to be forthwith despatched to the Pile of Fowdray, while the remainder were all to be in readiness to join him at an hour's notice. The kerns destined to serve in France were placed under the command of two nephews of the earl of Ormond,tlord Poer and Piers Butler; the latter the second brother of the baron of Dunboyne. According to the custom of the country, every two kerns were attended by a page or boy, to bear their mantles, weapons, and victuals. The praises bestowed on the gallant behaviour of this Irish corps, at the siege of Boulogne, may safely be credited, even though we should reject some of those marvellous stories with which the chronicler of this part of our history has laboured to enliven his task. According to this authority, such were the wild feats of courage performed by these kerns, that the French, astonished, sent an ambassador to inquire of Henry "whether he had brought with him men or devils." A. D. 1545. It was not till the following year that the services of the Irish were required in the war against Scotland. A large army having been then collected on the Scottish borders, under the command of the earl of Hertford, it was intended that, while this nobleman invaded Scotland by land, there should be, at the same time, a naval descent on the western coast. To attain this latter object, the earl of Lennox, who had lately deserted the cause of his own country, and joined the English banner, entered into negotiations with Donald, the lord of the Isles; and this insular prince, agreeing readily to the terms proposed to him, passed over to Knockfergus, with a fleet of 180 galleys, having on board 4000 men. Lennox himself, however, was still absent with the English army in Scotland; nor was it till late in the present year, that, seeing some hopes of being able to recover the castle of Dumbarton, he hastened to Ireland to take the command of the force provided for that object. Constant rumours of the return of Gerald, with foreign aid, had diffused excitement throughout the kingdom, and kept the government in a state of watchfulness and alarm. In the month of May, it was generally reported that Gerald was coming with a large army, from the coast of Britany, and meant to land among the Mac Carthys. Some time after, the rumour ran that an expedition was then preparing at Brest, to convey the young Geraldine, with a force of 15,000 men, to the country of his kinsman, O'Donnell. T But an alarm, at a later period, to which even Sentleger attached some importance, represented Scotland as the quarter from whence this invasion was to be attempted.** In the month of November, the squadron destined for the attack on Dumbarton set sail from Dublin, under the joint command of Lennox and Ormond; and how new was such an effort to the Irish authorities may be judged from the language in which Sentleger speaks of it:-"The thing is so rare, that there lacketh men of experience to set forth the same; for we think, this 200 years, so many men were not embarked and victualled here for so long time."It All we know of the farther course of this costly armament is, that the object for which it sailed had been wholly frustrated, before its arrival on the coast of Scotland, by the gross treachery of Stirling, the constable.‡‡ How soon, or to what port, it returned, neither the Scottish nor Irish records inform us. *The Privy Council of England to the Lord Justice and Council of Ireland, S. P. CCCCIII. Sons of James, titular Lord Dunboyne, by Lady Joan Butler, daughter of Piers, Earl of Ormond. The Lord Justice and Council to King Henry VIII., S. P. CCCCVII. Same to Same, S. P. CCCCVIII. ** Sentleger to the Council of England, S. P. CCCCXI. tt The Lord Deputy and Council to King Henry VIII.. S. P. CCCCXXVII. 1 Tytler, Hist. of Scotland, vol. v. chap. 5. Murray's Encyclopædia of Geography, BROUGHT UP TO 1842. PUBLISHED BY SUBSCRIPTION. THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF GEOGRAPHY: COMPRISING A COMPLETE DESCRIPTION OF THE EARTH. PHYSICAL, STATISTICAL, COMMERCIAL, AND POLITICAL; EXHIBITING ITS RELATION TO THE HEAVENLY BODIES-ITS PHYSICAL STRUCTURE -THE NATURAL HISTORY OF EACH COUNTRY; AND THE INDUSTRY, COMMERCE, POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS, AND BY HUGH MURRAY F.R.S.E. ASSISTED IN ASTRONOMY, &c. BY PROF. WALLACE, | BOTANY, &c. BY PROF. HOOKER, GEOLOGY, &c. BY PROF. JAMESON, ZOOLOGY, &c. BY W. SWAINSON. 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