attacked on his way back another ally of Kildare, the O'Connor Faly. Here too he had the aid of domestic treachery, in the person of Cathal Rua, O'Connor's brother. Having demolished O'Connor's castles and plundered his territory, the Lord Justice went into winter quarters, feeling sure that much had been done to serve the cause of his master in Ireland, in paving the way for further conquest.

The progress made towards the subjugation of the Dalcassians did not by any means satisfy Henry. O'Donnell, the most powerful of the Northern princes, had at last, as well as O'Neill, professed allegiance to the English king, when, as the Four Masters apologetically explain, "he saw that the Irish would not yield superiority to any one among themselves, but that friends and blood relations contended against one another." Thomond was still holding out stubbornly; so the opening of the spring of 1537 found the English forces again on the march towards that territory. The Lord Justice had little difficulty in securing the submission of the Ormond chiefs. The castles of Aglish and Birr were surrendered without a blow by the O'Molloys and O'Carrolls; 2 nor did the O'Kennedys, O'Mearas, MacIbrians Ara, or any others east of the Shannon, offer any effective resistance. He reached Limerick in June. This city, inhabited mostly by people of Danish and English blood, freely opened its gates to the representative of the English king. Its mayor-one of the Dalcassian O'Seasnans, but who had adopted the English mode of life, with his name anglicised into Sexton-and the corporation not only swore allegiance to Henry, but also renounced the authority of the Pope, and acknowledged the supremacy of the English king in Church matters. It is falsely asserted that the Bishop of Limerick joined in the recantation. John O'Quin, who then ruled the see, gave too many proofs before and after of his constancy in the Catholic faith, to give any colour to the charge. As a matter of fact, he was compelled to fly later on, and the apostate William Casey was intruded into the see. Though Conor O'Brien presented himself at Limerick, evidently to ward off invasion of his territory, it is not asserted that he swore 1 Four Masters. 2 Memoirs of the O'Briens by O'Donohue, p. 175.

allegiance, either temporal or spiritual. Morogh the Tanist, who held out stoutly, was supported evidently by the MacNamaras, as their castle of Bailecuilean, called in the State Papers Ballycongle, was soon after attacked and captured by the Lord Justice. Conor compromised, by surrendering to the English his rights over Coonagh, east of the Shannon; and, being probably in collusion with Morogh, made, by taking the field against him, such show of willingness to weaken Dalcassian resistance as to secure good terms for the time, and stave off the evil day of absolute submission. The letter of the Lord Deputy1 and Council to Henry, explaining, and in a manner apologising for, the conditions entered into with the Thomond prince, would warrant this belief. To punish Morogh, Lord Grey pushed on to his fortress of Clare Castle. Here, as at Bailecuilean, the garrison made little or no resistance when they saw cannon-the new and to them terrible engine of war-levelled against the fortifications. With this display of force the Lord Deputy was for the time satisfied. His line of march towards Galway lay along the level stretch of the country through which the railway now runs. The O'Deas and O'Quins, being subordinate to Conor O'Brien, offered no opposition. Nevertheless, they watched with jealous eye the first encroachment on their territory since, about three hundred years before, De Clare and his force had been cut to pieces there. He pushed on immediately, without leaving English garrisons in the captured castles. Conor O'Brien's castle of Clonroad, though so near, was left untouched. That had been probably part of the arrangement entered into between him and Lord Grey at Limerick. So it came to pass that he retained the ancient style and dignity of Prince of Thomond till his death, two years after, A.D. 1539. But the thin end of the wedge was driven in; and we shall have to see how henceforward it was slowly but inexorably driven home.

1 State Papers, vol. iii. p. 176.

2 Letters of Lords in Council to Henry VIII., under safeguard of O'Brien State Papers.

CHAPTER XV.

FROM 1540 TO 1559.

Henry VIII. Surrender of O'Brien, MacNamara, O'Grady, and O'Shaughnessy for English Titles Plunder of the Clans Chiefs bribed by Gifts of Suppressed Religious Houses-Struggle to maintain Brehon Law-Battle of Spancil Hill, A.D. 1559.

IN their letter to Henry VIII., the Lords in Council, "Sentleger, Jas. Ormond and Ossory, Wilm. Brabazon, John Travers, Thomas Cusacke," made much of the surrender by the Dalcassian prince of his territory of Coonagh, east of the Shannon. After detailing the tribute imposed upon each of his subordinate chiefs in Ormond, thus in their view substituting allegiance to the English king for the immemorial submission to the elect of the clans,-they conclude with this significant sentence: "And we think the said O'Brien would. hardlie have been brought to this pass, or to put in his pledge as he now hathe done, without open ware, but only that he saw that O'Neill had done the like, whiche was and is a spectacle to him and all other Irishmen." From this it appears plain that the Dalcassian principality was effectually cut in two. The chiefs east of the Shannon had all made submission, and on the accession of the Tanist Morogh, immediately after Conor's death in 1539, he found his sway acknowledged only in Clare. The grave question he had to put to himself and to his subordinate chiefs at the outset, was how long, or if at all, he could hold out, even there, behind the broad and rapid river, against the slow but sure advance of English power. It will be remembered that he was no party to the partial surrender of the late Prince Conor, and we will find him, for some time at least, maintaining the same bold attitude.

A new and disturbing element had been lately introduced into the public life of Ireland. At a Parliament so-called, but consisting merely of the creatures of Henry, held in Dublin on the 1st of May 1537, the King of England was declared henceforth head of the Church, all appeals to Rome forbidden, and officials of every degree bound to take the oath of supremacy. The penalty for opposition to this new departure was death on the charge of high treason. The "black rent," payable by English settlers to the Irish chiefs, was abolished, and fosterage with them again rigidly prohibited. The abbeys and convents were appropriated, with all their possessions, for the king's service. This last iniquitous provision had a far-reaching effect. It enabled the king to bribe with those rich gifts many of the Irish princes into subjection. The view taken of these enactments by the Irish is best understood from the picture given by the Four Masters, writing in the following century. Here are their

"A heresy and a new error sprang up in England through pride, vain glory, avarice, and lust, and through many strange sciences; so that the men of England went into opposition to the Pope and to Rome. They at the same time adopted various opinions, and among others the old law of Moses in imitation of the Jewish people, and they styled the king the chief head of the Church in his own kingdom. New laws and statutes were enacted by the king and Parliament according to their own will. They destroyed the orders to whom it was permitted to have worldly possessions, namely, the monks, canons, nuns, brethren of the cross; and the four poor orders, that is, the order of the minors, the preachers, the Carmelites, and the Augustinians, and the lordships and livings of all these were taken possession of for the king. They broke down the monasteries and sold their roofs and bells. . . . They also appointed archbishops and sub-bishops for themselves; and though great was the persecution of the Roman emperors against the Church, scarcely had there ever come so great a persecution from Rome as this."

These strange enactments stirred up, as well might be expected, active opposition. The Northern princes, O'Neill

and O'Donnell, united their forces, and, marching into the Pale, took and plundered the towns of Navan and Ardee,' but were pursued and defeated at Betahoe, on the confines of Meath and Monaghan, by a hastily summoned but large. army of the English, under the command of the Deputy, Lord Grey. In the following year, 1540, Morogh O'Brien and the Dal-Cas made common cause with the defeated Northerns and O'Connor of Offaly. They all met together at Fore, in Westmeath, with a view to operate against the English. The Lord Justice Brereton, who succeeded Lord Grey, being made aware of this combination, marched an army of eight thousand men, with a train of artillery, with all despatch into Meath,2 and with this formidable force so awed the Irish princes that they retreated each into his own territory, without striking a blow. This collapse paved the way for the final surrender of Dalcassian independence. It became evident that they could not hold out singly against English attack much longer, and so the policy of averting it by timely submission was at last reluctantly adopted.

The Lord Deputy Anthony St. Leger held a Parliament at Limerick in February 1542, with a view to arrange the terms of surrender. As soon as Henry was made aware of this peaceful surrender, he himself, in a letter to the Lord Deputy and Council, had suggested that the ancient dignity of Prince of Thomond should merge into an English title of nobility. This was a bitter pill to Irish pride, but there was no help. for it. Besides, it came to Morogh O'Brien gilt with the gift of "certain abbeyes lately suppressed," and the acknowledgment of ownership of property belonging of right to the clans. Others of the more powerful neighbouring chiefs, notably MacNamara and O'Grady, had also to be conciliated, and so at this Parliament arrangements were entered into 4 which were soon after completed in the king's palace of Greenwich. The policy of bribing the chiefs with the

1 Four Masters.

2 Memoirs of the O'Briens by O'Donohue.

3 State Papers, No. 361, vol. iii. p. 368.

4 Among others, the payment of one hundred pounds, a large sum in those days, to defray expenses of their journey. They were to be free, too, of all charges at court, and for the elaborate ceremony of installation.