and they allowed William to take possession without opposition. In Ireland the vast majority of the people were Catholics, who did not want a Protestant king. They stood up for King James, so that William had to fight for Ireland; and thus began the war between the two kings, known as the War of the Revolution; which will be related in the next seven chapters.

CHAPTER XLVIII.

THE SIEGE OF DERRY.-PART I.

A.D. 1688-1689.-William and Mary.

EEING the turn things had taken in England, Tirconnell adopted immediate measures to secure Ireland for King James. He raised a large irregular untrained army of Catholics, and took possession of the most important places all through the country, garrisoning them with Jacobite* troops. In the south, where the Protestants were few, there was little or no resistance; but it was otherwise in Ulster, where the people of two important centres, Derry and Enniskillen, refused to admit his garrisons; and several other towns yielded only through force. Derry was then a small town, nearly in the form of an oblong half a mile in length, standing on a hill rising over the left or Donegal bank of the river Foyle, four miles from its mouth. It was

*The adherents of the Stuarts were known as Jacobites, from Jacobus, the Latin form of James.

encompassed by a wall, and communication was kept up with the opposite or eastern side by a ferry; for there was no bridge. It was, says one of the historians of that period, “a town of small importance, but made famous by the defence it made now, and the consequences which that defence had upon the future operations of the war."

contemporary Plan in Harris's "Life of William III." I, I, I, Irish army.

The excitement among the Protestants of Ireland caused by the proceedings of Tirconnell, as described in

the last chapter, continued to increase. But the terror was brought to a climax by an anonymous letter written by some mischievous person to a Protestant gentleman of the county Down, stating that the Catholics had arranged to fall on the Protestants and kill them, man, woman, and child, on the following Sun

A.D. 1688 day the 9th December.

Copies of this letter were instantly despatched all over the country, which set the poor people in a frenzy ; for in their fright they believed everything, and they thought that the scenes of 1641 were now about to be repeated. Numbers fled on board ships. Many of those in the Leinster counties turned their steps towards Ulster, suffering incredible hardships on the journey; while those who could not leave home barricaded themselves in their houses, expecting in trembling anxiety to be attacked at any moment by their Catholic neighbours. The 9th of December came, and few Protestants in any part of Ireland went to bed on that miserable night. But it passed away without the least disturbance anywhere: even the most unprotected Protestant families experienced nothing but the usual neighbourly intercourse from the Catholics among whom they lived. For the letter was a wicked hoax, and the whole story was a pure invention. But it took several weeks to calm down the fears of the Protestant people.

Let us now see how matters had been going on in Derry during this time of alarm. On the very day— Friday the 7th December-when the contents of the anonymous letter had been made known in the city, word was brought that Alexander Mac Donnell, earl of Antrim, with the Jacobite army, was approaching from Coleraine to demand possession. This news caused immense commotion. The aldermen and magistrates

were in great doubt whether they should open the gates, or embark on a course of resistance that seemed desperate. But the humbler classes were in no doubt at all: they had their minds made up for they believed the whole proceeding was merely a trap to secure their destruction all the more easily on the next day but one: and they clamoured to have the gates shut. At last the army appeared in view at Waterside on the far bank of the river; and a small party, crossing in the ferryboat, presented themselves at the ferry gate and demanded admittance. While the authorities were debating excitedly what was best to be done, a few of the bolder young apprentices, seizing the keys, and arming themselves with swords, slammed and locked the gate and shut out the Jacobite party. They were joined by the crowd, and the authorities, sorely frightened at the grave and dangerous act of rebellion, were forced to yield on which the party recrossed the ferry, and the Jacobite army marched back to Coleraine. Then, in order to make matters doubly safe in Derry for the next Sunday, all the Catholic inhabitants were sent away.

When Sunday had passed by harmlessly the citizens consented to negotiate; and they ultimately agreed, on condition of obtaining pardon for the rebellious shutting of the gates, to admit two companies of the Jacobite army, who, it was stipulated, were to be all Protestants to a man, and who were under the command of Colonel Lundy. Whereupon Lundy was appointed governor. But as Tirconnell continued openly to dismiss and disarm Protestants wherever he could, the Protestant gentry of Ulster began to arm and prepare for resistance. Not long afterwards came news from England, of William's successful progress,

followed by a letter from himself, encouraging the northern people to continue their measures of resistance, and promising to send them help. And now the citizens of Derry, who had closed their gates through terror of being slaughtered, determined once for all to hold the city for William: and they renounced their allegiance to King James, and publicly proclaimed William and Mary as their sovereigns. Lundy took the oath of allegiance to William, with the others, but he did so with evident reluctance and not in public.

When King James heard of Tirconnell's active proceedings, and found that his cause had been taken up in the greater part of the country, he mustered

A.D. 1689 up courage and sailed for Ireland, landing at Kinsale on the 12th March with a number of French officers and Irish refugees, and a supply of money, arms, and ammunition, furnished by King Louis of France: but beyond that, with no army properly so-called. The commander of the expedition was a French general, Marshal Rosen. Among the Irish who accompanied the king, the most distinguished was Patrick Sarsfield, afterwards earl of Lucan: a great soldier and an honourable high-minded gentleman, who was quite as much respected by his opponents as by his own party. He was descended on his father's side from one of those nobles who had come to Ireland with Henry II., and on his mother's from the O'Moores of Leix: and he was at this time about

thirty-eight years of age. His personal appearance corresponded with his character, for he had a noble countenance, and stood over six feet high, straight and well proportioned. (For portrait, see p. 351).

The king arrived in Dublin on the 24th March; and

Y