of his subjects in Ireland. He installed the great feudal officers of state, each of whom was responsible for his own sphere of government and administration; instituted royal courts of law, and appointed judges and sheriffs to be a check on the nobles in their own territories. These institutions affected his own subjects only; the Irish, of course, still maintained their own laws and customs.

Synod of Cashel Pope Adrian's Bull.-Early in the following year (1172), Henry caused a Synod of the Church to be held at Cashel which was attended by most of the Irish bishops-Gelasius, Archbishop of Armagh, and some other northern bishops being the exceptions. This Synod is said to have been convened in consequence of a famous bull of Pope Adrian IV, regarding which there has been much controversy. That Pope was named Nicholas Brakespear, and was the only Englishman who was ever Pope. The year after Henry became King he represented to Adrian the fearful state of Ireland, and offered to cure her ills. The Pope, knowing him only as the King who had saved England from anarchy, issued a Bull (1155), which purported to make a grant of Ireland to Henry for the purpose of "reforming evil manners, planting virtue, and increasing the Christian religion." For sixteen years Henry did nothing with regard to it, and now he was in danger of being excommunicated for the murder of Becket. The Synod of Cashel was necessary to keep up an appearance of carrying out the objects for which the Bull was granted. Yet, strange to say, no mention of the Bull was made at the Synod, and the decrees which were passed by it related only to formal matters of Church discipline. These decrees, however, were forwarded to the Pope, and three years later at another Synod at Waterford, an acknowledgment of them, and a confirmatory grant from Pope Alexander III, were read. This was the first public announcement of Adrian's Bull.

There has been much controversy regarding the authenticity of this Bull, chiefly based upon the delay in publishing it, and the fact that the original has never been found, but the balance of authority is in favour of its being genuine. Even admitting this, however, and apart from the questions of the authority of the Pope to make the grant and the truth of Henry's representations which secured it, it is evident that the Irish Church had shown sufficient vigour to carry out its own reform. In any case, Henry and his barons were far from being the most edifying instruments for the advancement of religion and morals.

Henry's "Grants" of Irish Territory.-Six months Henry spent in Ireland. He had met with no opposition. On the contrary, his superior position had been more or less definitely acknowledged by most * Such as marriage within certain degrees of kinship, the payment of tithes, etc.

of the country. He had come as protector, and had been received as such. He had carried on no warfare. The fighting had been done by the early adventurers, and it had been chiefly against the Norse townsmen. It was now necessary, on the one hand, to reward those who had prepared the way, and, on the other, to secure his own control. Accordingly, he proceeded to make "grants" of great pieces of Irish territory to his chief followers. Strongbow was confirmed in his Lordship of Leinster. The dissensions of the O Maolachlan family were utilised as an excuse to make a grant to Hugh de Lacy of the ancient patrimony of the Southern Uí Neill as the Lordship of Meath. Other great grants, made either during Henry's visit, or soon after, were those of the Earldom of "Ulster " to De Courcey, and of Connaught to De Burgh. Territories of lesser extent in various parts of the country, in many of which a Norman had not yet been seen, were similarly granted as feudal fiefs. But the towns Henry kept for himself. Dublin (which he made the seat of his viceroy), Wexford, and Waterford were fortified and guarded by strong castles, and placed under the control of governors or "constables" to be nominated by the King. The Norse inhabitants of Dublin were removed to the north side of the Liffey, and their places taken by settlers from Bristol.

Departure of Henry.-Henry was now suddenly summoned before the Papal Legates to account for his share in the murder of Becket. He sailed from Wexford on the 17th April, 1172, and hurried across England to Normandy, where he made an abject submission to the Pope, and afterwards went through a humiliating public penance.

SECTION IV. THE "SUBMISSIONS AND THE GRANTS":

THE FEUDAL SYSTEM

Two Hostile Systems.-Some knowledge of the feudal system is necessary in order to understand the new relations which were created between Henry and the Irish, when on the one hand the chiefs acknowledged the supremacy of the King, and on the other hand he professed to give away large tracts of Irish land to his followers. The "submissions as well as the "grants" were looked upon by both parties from different points of view, and their meaning was interpreted in different ways by the Irish, whose ideas were those of the clan system, and by the Normans, who were governed by the feudal system. Two different conceptions of social and political life were brought into conflict.

Origin of Feudalism.-The feudal system probably had its origin in the conditions under which the " barbarian" tribes led by their Kings had planted themselves on the ruins of the Roman Empire. It had

developed under the Empire of Charlemagne, and now spread over Western Europe, breaking down the early Teutonic and Celtic systems, except amongst the independent Celtic nations of the extreme West. The Normans had carried it into England at the Conquest, and upon it their Kingdom there was based. For many centuries England was governed by it, and it still influences her constitution and laws. It was firstly a system of government, and secondly a system of land tenure.

Feudal Government.-The feudal system of government was that of lord and vassal. The lord protected the vassal, who, for his part, paid homage to the lord and promised him fealty. The relationship was generally, but not always, accompanied by a grant to the vassal of lands belonging to the lord, in return for which the former gave military service to the latter in his wars. There were many gradations, and in most cases the same person might be at the same time both a lord and a vassal. At the head of all was generally the King, who was no man's vassal-except where he paid homage to an emperor (as in Germany), or to some similar over-lord. Under the King were his immediate vassals, his great lords-dukes, counts, earls, great barons, etc. These, in their turn, had their own vassals, lesser barons, knights, etc., and they, again, frequently had "tenants" under them, the owners of single "6 'manors" or or "demesnes." Beneath all were the serfs, who were regarded merely as part of the manor or demesne. The essential principle of feudal government was the exclusive dependence of the vassal upon his lord. Every lord judged, taxed, and commanded, the class next below him."

Allegiance to the King. The duty of the vassal being to his own lord alone, if that lord rebelled against his King the vassal was bound to follow him against the King. For instance, the German Emperors and the Kings of France were engaged for many centuries in wars with their great vassals, and these again with their own tenants. But the Norman Kings had introduced an important change in England by procuring a law that all free holders of land should swear fealty to the King direct, whether they were or were not also vassals of an intermediate lord. This direct allegiance to the Crown was enforced by the custom-largely developed by Henry II himself—of sending the King's sheriffs and judges into every shire to uphold the authority of the King, and to carry out his laws.

Accordingly, when we read of Irish territories being parcelled out into counties, we know that it was for the purpose of sending sheriffs and judges into them to enforce the rule of the Crown of England in the early period against his own too powerful subjects, and at a later stage against the whole Irish people.

Feudal Land Tenure.-The feudal system was, in the second place, a system of ownership of land. According to it, the land of a country was the absolute property of its sovereign lord-generally the King. The King granted it in large fiefs to his great vassals or "tenants in chief," on condition that (amongst other services) they would aid him in his wars with a specified number of knights and men-at-arms. They, in their turn, sub-granted parts of their fiefs to "mesne lords" on similar conditions, and so on. These fiefs, although not at first hereditary, soon became so, but if the owner broke his pledge of fealty, the lands might be resumed by his lord. This system of land tenure was, therefore, similar to the system of government just described, and the two together made the full feudal system. But they were not always combined, and frequently feudal government existed without feudal land tenure, and homage and fealty were often paid without admitting any right of the lord to the lands. In England, however, owing to the circumstances of the Conquest, feudal ownership of land was universal, and the dominion of the King over the lands of his tenants was unquestioned.

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Nature of the Submissions."-It will be seen, therefore, that so far as the submissions made to Henry II by the Irish chiefs were concerned, there was not so much difference between the Irish and feudal conceptions of their meaning. In Ireland, from time immemorial, the chiefs of a tribe or an op-ní acknowledged the supremacy of the ri without sacrificing the internal independence or the possessions of his clan. Nor did the homage paid to the Aro-Ri before the time of Brian confer upon him any right to interfere in the jurisdiction of such of the "provincial Kings" as acknowledged him. The removal of the

provincial Kings" had left the political integrity of the clans unimpaired, although their chiefs now submitted to the High King himself direct. Similar personal submissions conferring no right of interference in internal affairs were well known under feudalism. Henry himself paid homage to the King of France, but had absolute dominion over his duchies of Normandy and Aquitaine and his other possessions, and he was, in fact, at constant war with his liege lord. The dukes and counts who ruled most of what is now France were similarly placed, and so also were the kings, dukes and electors who comprised the Empire of the Germans. Kings of Scotland had frequently paid homage and fealty to English Kings, but they still ruled their own Kingdom.

The acknowledgment of the superior power of Henry was, therefore, at the most an act of personal submission on the part of those Irish chiefs who made it, and conferred, either under feudal or Irish custom, no right or dominion over their clans or territories.

The Irish and the "Grants."-It was in respect of its conception

of land tenure, however, that feudalism came most violently into conflict with Irish ideas. We have seen (page 59) that amongst the Irish, the land of the clan was the common property of the clan. To whatever extent private ownership prevailed, it did not interfere with that essential principle. The chief had no right to alienate any part of his clan's possessions. To people accustomed to such ideas feudal ownership was unintelligible and abhorrent-even immoral. The claim of even a rightful King to deal with the land as his own property was to them impossible; for a foreign King to profess to grant Irish lands to his own followers was an act of injustice and conquest compared with which the piracies of the Norsemen were mere incidental robberies.

The hostility between Irish and feudal ideas of land ownership, affecting, as it did, the very basis of social and political life, lay at the root of the future struggle between the two races. The conflict between the two ideas, begun by the grants of Henry of Anjou, continues to the present day.