turned themselves; and that numbers of Englishmen 1569. had been elected, and returned as burgesses for towns, which they had never seen or known, and consequently could not be considered residents, as the law directed. Four days were spent in clamorous altercation; the discontented members protesting, with great firmness, against proceeding on any business. The speaker at tended the lord deputy and council, to explain the objections to the constitution of the house. The judges were consulted, and they declared, that those returned for towns not incorporated, and the magistrates who had returned themselves were incapable of sitting in parliament: but as to the members not resi dent in the towns, for which they were returned, that they were entitled to retain their seats, and that the penalty of returning them should light on the returning officers: a decision, which still left the government that majority of friends, which so much pains had been taken to procure; and which consequently increased the violence of the opposite party. The clamor ceased not until the judges came to the Commons house, and there openly avowed their opinion: Barnewall and his supporters reluctantly acquiesced, and reserved themselves for a vigorous contest against the measures of those whom they regarded as a mere English faction*. Amongst the Englishmen returned to this parliament was Mr. Hookert, member for Athunree; he ment in the

* I have followed Dr. Leland (vol. ii. p. 241) in describing this

early essay of legislating by a packed majority.

+ To him we are indebted for these particulars.

Hooker

raises a fer

house.

1569. had been also a member of the English parliament, and

Improvident and in

of the Irish

acquainted with the order and usage of its proceedings; he affected to be highly scandalized at the tumult and irregularity of the Irish Commons, but was himself most violent in his opposition to Barnewall and his party. He broached some doctrines upon the royal prerogative, which though familiar in England, were yet novelties to the native Irish, who looking up to the ancient constitution were as yet neither dazzled by the splendor of a court, nor terrified by the peremptory decisions of an imperious monarch. It raised a flame so violent, that the assembly was adjourned in confusion, and Hooker retired under protection of a guard to his house. This violence having abated after some days, they proceeded to business.

Had there not been so formidable an opposition, sulting acts more acts would have probably passed to forward the legislature Reformation. Out of several statutes one only concerned religion, by which the governor was empowered to present to all the dignities of Munster and Con naught for ten years. The act for the attainder of Shane O'Neile, and the extinguishment of the name of O'Neile, and the entitling of the Queen's Majestie her heyres and successors, to the county of Tyrone, and to other countries and territories in Ulster seems to have been studiously calculated to insult the feelings of the Irish nation. It enumerates his acts of rebellion in vindictive acrimony, and in order to expose the futility of any. Irish pretences to any sovereignty in

* 11 El. c. 1. sess. 3.

Ireland, affects to deduce the title of the English monarch to the sovereignty of that kingdom as paramount even to the Milesian race of kings*; setting forth a fabulous tale of one King Gurmonde, "son tó the noble King Belan of Great Britain, who was Lord of Bayon in Spain, as many of his successors were to the time of Henry II. who possessed the island afore the comeing of Irishmen into the said lande." This wanton act of legislative insult, offered to the feelings of a people peculiarly sensitive to the pride of national tradition, tended to goad them into rebellion.

1569.

attempts to

Elizabeth was hated by the generality of the Irish, Elizabeth and she detested them. The insurrection of Desmond, levy money Clanricarde, and other chieftains, kept the country in council. a constant state of warfare. The unsuccessful attempts of Sir Thomas Smith, and afterwards of the Queen's favorite the Earl of Essext to establish an English settlement in Ulster upon the forfeited lands, greatly exasperated the Queen. In the indulgence of her resentment she afforded new grounds of disaffection even to her own subjects within the pale. She ordered Sir Henry Sidney, her lieutenant, to impose by the mere authority of council (without the interference

For this abstract of the Queen's title to all the land in Ireland, vide the Appendix to my Historical Review, No. VII. where this burlesque degradation of legislative diguity is set forth.

+ The confidential letter of Essex to the Queen will let us into more light upon the state of the English power in Ireland at this time, than the most elaborate representations of cotemporary, much more of modern authors. For which vide the Appendix to my Historical Review, No. VIII.

1556.

Mary'sgo

vernment

to the Irish.

*

end he caused an act to pass in the same parliament, authorizing the Lord Chancellor, from time to time, to award commissions to such persons as the Lord Deputy should nominate and appoint, to viewe and perambulate those Irish territories; and thereupon to divide and limit the same into such and so manie several counties, as they should thinke meete; which being certified to the lord deputie and approved by him, should bee returned and enrolled in the Chancery, and from thenceforth be of like force and effect, as if it were doone by act of parliament. Thus did the Earl of Sussex lay open a passage for the civil government in the unreformed partes of this kingdome; but himself proceeded no farther than is before declared."

So confident was the English government of the displeasing pacific disposition of the Irish in this reign, that the army was reduced to about 1000 men. The renewed turbulence, however, of some Irish chiefs to each other, and the lawless conduct of the Scottish adventurers, soon rendered it necessary to encrease it with reinforcements from England. Although the Irish were in general gratified by the restoration of the catholic religion to its ancient footing, they were dissatisfied with the civil administration of the power of the crown within the kingdom.

*To show the precarious title of the crown out of the pal:, the preamble of this act particularly recites, that as these territories were known not to be within any shire of the kingdom, no title for the crown could be found, as will be seen at large in the first section of 2 chap. of 3 and 4 of P. and M.

1558.

They were particularly sore at the power vested in the Lord Lieutenant, to dispose of the territories of w Leix and Offaly in royal grants, which defeated the inheritable rights of the native owners of those lands. O'Sullivan says, that notwithstanding Mary's zeal for supporting and promoting the catholic religion, yet was her administration injurious to Ireland *. She died on the 17th of November 1558.

* Qua tametsi Catholicam religionem tueri et amplificare conata est, ejus tamen præfecti et conciliarii injuriam Ibernis inferre non destiterunt. Sull. Cath. Hist. p. 81.