Arms of the Commonwealth, on the Proclamation of the Lord Deputy and Second Edition, Enlarged. LONDON: LONGMANS, GREEN, READER, AND DYER. 226 i 214. PREFACE. Ir is just five years since the publication of the Cromwellian Settlement of Ireland. In that interval I have had the advantage, as a preparation for the present edition, of spending a considerable part of each year in the study, under a Public Commission, of the great body of historical papers called The Carte Collection, preserved at the Bodleian Library, Oxford.' The Ormonde Papers, which form the most important part of the Carte Collection, comprise the papers, public and private, connected with the government of Ireland during the Duke of Ormonde's engagement in public affairs-an engagement which commenced at the outbreak of the Irish Rebellion in 1641, and continued almost to his death, in 1688, with the exception of the ten years of "Ursurped Power," between 1650 and 1660, when he was in exile with the King. The documents concerning Ireland during the Commonwealth period are, accordingly, few. But from the Restoration The Reverend Dr. Russell, President of Maynooth, was appointed in 1865, by Lord Romilly, Master of the Rolls, my fellowCommissioner, to go through this great collection, and to catalogue for transcription the official documents it might contain. |