utterly routing this the last army of any proportions now op posed to them. Soon after this decisive victory, Bruce and O'Neill returned northwards in proud exultation. Already it seemed that the liberation of Ireland was complete. Having arrived at Dundalk, the national army halted, and preparations were commenced for the great ceremonial that was to consummate and commemorate the national deliverance. At

a solemn council of the native princes and chiefs, Edward Bruce was elected king of Ireland; Donald O'Neill, the heart and head of the entire movement, formally resigning by letters patent in favor of Bruce such rights as belonged to him as son of the last acknowledged native sovereign. After the election, the ceremonial of inauguration was carried out in the native Irish forms, with a pomp and splendor such as had not been wit nessed since the reign of Brian the First. This imposing ceremony took place on the hill of Knocknemelan, within a mile of Dundalk; and the formal election and inauguration being over, the king and the assembled princes and chiefs. marched in procession into the town, where the solemn consecration took place in one of the churches. King Edward now established his court in the castle of Northburg, possessing and exercising all the prerogatives, powers, and privileges of royalty, holding courts of justice, and enforcing such regulations as were necessary for the welfare and good order of the country.

XXV. HOW THIS BRIGHT DAY OF INDEPENDENCE WAS TURNED TO GLOOM. HOW THE SEASONS FOUGHT AGAINST IRELAND, AND FAMINE FOR ENGLAND.

HE Anglo-Irish power was almost extinct. It would probably never more have been heard of, and the newly-revived nationality would have lasted long, and prospered, had there not been behind that broken and ruined colony all the resources of a great and powerful nation. The English monarch summoned to a conference with himself in London several of the Anglo-Irish barons, and it was agreed by all that nothing but a compact union amongst themselves, strong reinforcements from England, and the equipment of an army of great magnitude for a new campaign in Ireland, could avert the complete and final extinction of the English power in that country. Preparations

were accordingly made for placing in the field such an army as had never before been assembled by the Anglo-Irish colony. King Edward of Ireland, on the other hand, was fully conscious that the next campaign would be the supreme trial, and both parties, English and Irish, prepared to put forth their utmost strength. True to his promise, king Robert of Scotland arrived to the aid of his brother, bringing with him a small contingent. The royal brothers soon opened the campaign. Marching southwards at the head of thirty-six thousand men, they crossed the Boyne at Slane, and soon were beneath the walls of Castleknock, a powerful Anglo-Norman fortress, barely three miles from the gate of Dublin. Castleknock was assaulted and taken, the governor Hugh Tyrell being made prisoner. The Irish and Scotch kings took up their quarters in the castle, and the Anglo-Normans of Dublin, gazing from the city walls, could see between them and the setting sun. the royal standards of Ireland and Scotland floating proudly side by side! In this extremity the citizens of Dublin exhib

ited a spirit of indomitable courage and determination. Το their action in this emergency-designated by some as the desperation of wild panic, but by others, in my opinion more justly, intrepidity and heroic public spirit-they saved the chief seat of Anglo-Norman authority and power, the loss of which at that moment would have altered the whole fate and fortunes of the ensuing campaign. Led on by the mayor, they exhibited a frantic spirit of resistance, burning down the suburbs of their city, and freely devoting to demolition even their churches and priories outside the walls, lest these should afford shelter or advantage to a besieging army. The Irish army had no sieging materials, and could not just then pause for the tedious operations of reducing a walled and fortified city like Dublin, especially when such a spirit of vehement determination was evinced not merely by the garrison but by the citizens themselves. In fact, the city could not be infested without the coöperation of a powerful fleet to cut off supplies by sea from England. The Irish army, therefore, was compelled to turn away from Dublin, and leave that formidable position intact in their rear. They marched southward as in the previous campaigns, this time reaching as far as Limerick. Again, as before, victory followed their banners. Their course was literally a succession of splendid achievements. The Normans never offered battle that they were not utterly defeated.

The full strength of the English, however, had not yet been available, and a foe more deadly ard more formidable than all the power of England was about to fall upon the Irish army.

By one of those calamitous concurrences which are often to be noted in history, there fell upon Ireland in this year (1317) a famine of dreadful severity. The crops had entirely failed the previous autumn, and now throughout the land the dread consequences were spreading desolation. The brothers Bruce each day found it more and more difficult to provision the army, and soon it became apparent that hunger and privation were destroying and demoralizing the national force. This evil in itself was bad enough, but a worse followed upon it. As privation and hunger loosed the bonds of military discipline, the soldiers spread themselves over the country seeking

food, and soon there sprung up between the Scottish contingent and the Irish troops and inhabitants bitter ill feeling and contention. The Scots-who from the very outset appear to have discriminated nought in plundering castles and churches when the opportunity came fairly in their way-now, throwing off all restraint, broke into churches and broke open and rifled shrines and tombs. The Irish, whose reverence for religion was always so intense and solemn, were horrified at these acts of sacrilege and desecration, and there gradually spread through the country a vague but all-powerful popular belief that the dreadful scourge of famine was a “visitation of heaven" called down upon the country by the presence of the irreverent Scots!

Meanwhile the English were mustering a tremendous force in the rear of the wasted Irish army. The Bruces, on learning the fact, quickly ordered a night retreat, and pushed northwards by forced marches. An Anglo-Irish army of thirty thousand men, well appointed and provisioned, lay across their path; yet such was the terror inspired by vivid recollection of the recent victories of the Irish and the prestige of Bruce's name, that this vast force, as the historian tells us, hung around the camp of the half-starved and diminished Scoto-Irish army, without ever once daring to attack them in a pitched battle! On the 1st of May, after a march full of unexampled suffering, the remnant of the Irish army safely reached Ulster.

The famine now raged with such intensity all over Ireland, that it brought about a suspension of hostilites. Neither party could provision an army in the field. King Robert of Scotland, utterly disheartened, sailed homeward. His own country was not free from suffering, and in any event, the terrible privations of the past few months had filled the Scottish contingent with discontent. King Edward, however, nothing daunted, resolved to stand by the Irish kingdom to the last, and it was arranged that whenever a resumption of hostilities became feasible, Robert should send him another Scottish contingent.

The harvest of the following year (1318) was no sooner gathered in and found to be of comparative abundance, than

both parties sprang to arms. The English commander-inchief John de Birmingham, was quickly across the Boyne at the head of twelve thousand men, intent on striking king Edward before his hourly expected Scottish contingent could arrive. The Irish levies were but slowly coming in, and Edward at this time had barely two or three thousand men at hand. Nevertheless he resolved to meet the English and give them battle. Donald O'Neill and the other native princes saw the madness of this course, and vainly endeavored to dissuade the king from it. They pointed out that the true strategy to be adopted under the circumstances was to gain time, to retire slowly on their northern base, disputing each inch of ground, but risking no pitched battle, until the national levies would have come in, and the Scottish contingent arrived, by which time, moreover, they would have drawn Birmingham away from his base, and would have him in a hostile country. There can be no second opinion about the merits of this scheme. It was the only one for Edward to pursue just then. It was identical with that which had enabled him to overthrow the Red Earl three years before and had won the battle of Connoyre. But the king was immovable. At all times headstrong, self-willed, and impetuous, he now seemed to have been rendered extravagantly over-confident by the singular fact (for fact it was), that never yet had he met the English in battle on Irish soil that he did not defeat them. It is said that some of the Irish princes, fully persuaded of the madness of the course resolved upon, and incensed by the despotic obstinacy of the king, withdrew from the camp. "There remained with the iron-headed king,” says the historian, "the lords Mowbray de Soulis and Stew art, with three brothers of the latter, Mac Roy, Lord of the Isles, and Mac Donald, chief of his clan. The neighborhood of Dundalk, the scene of his triumphs and coronation, was to be the scene of the last act of Bruce's chivalrous and stormy career." From the same authority (M'Gee) I quote the following accounts of that scene:

"On the 14th of October, 1318, at the Hill of Faughard, within a couple of miles of Dundalk, the advance guard of the