"worst armed" (p. 36), "far inferior in their experience and "readiness" to his expectation (p. 42). Instead of sending whole companies with their officers, the States General sent only men of the "broken companies" (p. 42), (that is, the companies latterly turned out of the Queen's pay), Count Maurice presuming that Essex would accept this in good part "seeing he (the Count) hath "need of men, having so mighty an enemy to deal withal” (p. 40). To take the place of the men thus withdrawn, the Queen sent over to Holland twenty companies under the command of Sir Thomas. Knollys. The States General took the men but refused the officers sent with them, who, being thus stranded, all volunteered for service under Essex in Ireland. After considerable difficulties in completing the numbers and making good the defects of this Low Country force (pp. 42, 59), Sir Henry Docwra reached Dublin with it about the last day of February (p. 93). Essex. Turning now from the composition of the army, we pass to its The Earl of commander, and to the consideration of his situation in the face of a task which, in a letter to his cousin (p. 4), he describes as the hardest that any gentleman could be entrusted with, and in a letter to his friend Lord Willoughby (p. 9), as "a breakneck employment." It may be observed that one thing Essex never failed to do: to magnify himself and anything that concerned himself, and (it must be added) to "complain of his tools" and his treatment, and to depreciate his rivals. He writes (p. 4): If you wonder that now in this time of general offerings you hear not from me, you must wonder also that, in the eve of the last year, the Queen having destined me to the hardest task that ever any gentleman was sent about, she has yet (thought] to ease her rebels in Ireland of some labour by breaking my heart. When my soul shall be freed from this [prison] of my body, [she] will then see her wrong to me and her wound given to herself; and the faults of those whom now she [favours] will revenge all my unkindnesses. But this, I protest, doth more afflict me than the hardness or the unworthiness of mine own destiny. For if I might, with my death, either quench the great fire of rebellion in Ireland, or divert those dangers which from foreign enemies are threatened, I should joy to be such a sacrifice. But how much soever her Majesty despiseth me, she shall know she hath lost him who for her sake would have thought danger a sport and death a feast; yea, I know I leave behind me such a company as were fitter to watch by a sick body than to recover a sick State. And all the world shall witness that it is not the breath of me-which is but wind-or the love of the multitude-which burns as tinder-that I hunt after, but either to be valued by her above them that are of no value, or to forget the world and to be forgotten by it. About the same time he unburdens himself to Lord Willoughby (p. 10), whom he accounted his other self, exposing to that friend's eyes alone his "private problems and nightly The response of Lord Tubongely, then Governor of Bervick ad a manner to wailify the most ardent thirst for fanery. At que car in cearen is better than a thread so enter Like ina f youre mag exand for a thousand.. . . I wowy force your baggage in the camp in a horse litter ** ve your arrage master. World God I had so enhanced my government!... You should take all your followers to die "apply with you in Egypt, rather than unhappily leave them to rise in the dearth of Canaan behind you”—this is the kind of wave wrion be wiministers to Esser's wounded and offended spirit. And there is more of a similar sort. "scribbled lamely from Berwick," for example the following p. 35, : When I urn myself to your great work. I am enchanted with your sweet harusny A dwords, admire your forecasts, and bemoan myself to be divided from ven a fortress of fortitude, whereanto I am in mind so morticed as I desire 6 to stand and fall withall. Who flowed so much as could supply to this your projea, might well be held another ocean, whereof our world hath but one. You have made aiready the conquest your own, you have encountered evil itself, windved it to your virtuous self, the other conflicts are but light skirmishes, your trophy is already advanced, and death itself is fallen at your feet. Hanno is wird je alive, Hannibal from the senate throws his trifling enemy to the stairs' foot, Cato his poison ends himself, you, victorious, shall see these new acted. But glory and safety! Though Ireland calls you, satyrs can hear that England enes out for you. Is peril present there in eye? It is here imminent in heart. But must you needs go, yet, noble lord, bestride us down, firm one foot there but reat the other here, that, when you step to us again, it may be without slipping. For fear of it, you are sure to have the hands and hearts of honest men. I, though I be minimus apostolorum, will pray my part, with the widow ever ready pay my mite. Here may be noted the kindly action of another well-wisher, William Harborn, not long returned from his mission as the Queen's resident agent in Turkey, who presents Essex (p. 57) with an Italian History of the World, in four volumes, doubtless obtained on his journey home from Constantinople, to be Essex's companion in Ireland, there, "at times vacant," to recreate his "most heroical mind, wearied with the manifold cares of that "very honourable, great action." As is well known, three months of the year were allowed to elapse before Essex actually started. He himself, the task under י ין taken, was sympathetically remembered in private (p. 41) and public prayers, the "Church of the Strangers" in London being the first to commence in their public services this godly exercise (p. 127), but their pious example being soon followed by the churches generally, for whom a form of prayer was provided by the Archbishop of Canterbury. The overland journey to Beaumaris accomplished, Essex and his suite were detained there for several days, waiting for a favourable wind (p. 134). The passage over was tedious and perilous. When they reached the coast of Ireland, they landed at a point eight miles from Dublin "about one of the "clock after midnight on the thirteenth" of April. The landing was not effected without adventure (p. 134). Some of the party "miscarried" on a rock; "but," writes William Temple to Edward Reynolds (p. 134), "God mercifully preserved our "worthy Lord, who in hasting to reach unto such of us his "helping hand who were like to have been overwhelmed by "means of the rock, fell himself several times upon another "rock, but it pleased God to clear the boat from the same, and "to save us from the other, which turned featly upon its side "before we were free from it." land On the 15th, Essex, as Lord Lieutenant, "took the sword and Essex in Ire "sway of this unsettled kingdom into his hand" in Dublin Cathedral after a "grave sermon" preached by the Bishop of Meath. The ceremonies were of "exceeding magnificence" (p. 144). "The service on St. George's Day passed all the service that "ever I saw done to any prince in Christendom," writes Sir Anthony Standen (p. 144), but he hastens to explain, "all to "her Majesty's honour," moved thereto by the thought that "malice might hew" something sinister out of the circumstances. The papers in this volume relating to the subject are not such as set forth a complete history of Essex's proceedings in Ireland during the next five months, but there is a good deal of information of one kind and another bearing upon it, and many intimations of the views and opinions of people on the spot. It is to be noted that from the first there was no great confidence of success, and, firmly fixed in the minds of those engaged, the sentiment that the difficulties of the task were not properly appreciated in England. Of the journey into Munster, undertaken instead of the more serious campaign against Tyrone in Ulster which was first designed, one of Essex's secretaries writes, ere yet it was commenced (p. 157) :-"We hope the best and you are like to hear *he woren" Is was reported that the number of the rebels * greatly in excess of the troops to be lei against them p. 150, but "my Lord meaneth to leave us in the place or "bully to beat them." The object of this "progress" was 4. 161, #% Ascover the Lamour and intent of the relel, the "affection of the subject, and the country's ability to furnish "prosion and carriages," and to gather some intelligente for the greter and subsequent expedition into Ulster. At its close, toose who took part in it vere pleased enough with what had been accomplished, although the march to Waterford was "purposed” for three weeks and took seven (p. 212), and although the List of casualties which occurred in its course (p. 213) contained names of "the best sort." In July, Essex had to report, in a hasty, confused letter written as his cousin Carey was on the point of embarking, among items of news of a more favourable character, that which had come from Offaly (p. 231), "where," he writes, "there being placed by me 750 men well victualled "and provided for, they have laid still like drones without doing "service, and now have been beaten hard under the fort, and "lost about 50 men, the soldiers showing extreme cowardice, and "the officers neither courage nor judgment." In Leix, however, the garrison, though less in numbers, had done better. As to the condition of things generally in Ireland at this time, Temple tells Reynolds (p. 233), "the rebel is mighty in forces, and strong in "advantages; as also grown to that height of pride and confidence "in his hopes, as he fears he shall rather want a subject wherein "to show his obstinate and malicious resolution, than variety of "means to strengthen his proceedings. There has been opinion in "England of facility to subdue him, and to range the country to "obedience, but the knowledge here, and experience of his courses "and means for lengthening the life of his rebellion, will easily "check that opinion." The next event in chronological order is Essex's ten days' journey into Offaly (p. 263), "so harmful to the rebels, that what with the blows they received, the burning their corn and "taking a thousand milch kine, besides passing their greatest "strengths whereby they bragged the Queen's army durst not "attempt to enter, they are all now come into one humour to resist "no further." And then, late in the season, at last comes the preparation for the northern journey into Ulster, deprecated nevertheless by those in Ireland, on the ground that it must leave 66 Leinster undefended against "these strong rebels which are in "all places much stronger than England imagines them to be." The letter from the Council in Ireland setting forth the reasons against this undertaking, the reply to which is among the State Papers, Ireland, in the Public Record Office, is printed here (pp. 263-267). Here, too, is the story of the achievements of Essex and his army from the 9th of May till the 3rd of August (p. 267), as told, no doubt, to correct the view taken in England that they in Ireland had "done nothing but gone a progress." Far from that, maintains one of Edward Reynolds's correspondents (p. 270)," we have gone thorough paces, we have victualled "forts, we have taken castles, we have set houses on fire, we have placed garrisons, and have made many knights." There is, perhaps, a stroke of irony in the last item of accomplishment; but anyhow, the writer, who is William Cholmley, one of Essex's immediate followers, declared that the critics in England, with whom it always went well "howsoever it go with us in Ireland," if they had been in Ireland, even with 5,000 men, and undergone the same experience, might have "lost their heads." "In England," says he, "there is no rebels spoken of but Terron, but he is like a "tree that to one body hath many branches which is spread over "all Ireland, for there are some that march among us that, where they find opportunity, will as soon cut our throats as the rebels "that fight against us." The erroneous views held at home of the actual facts in Ireland are continually referred to. Robert Osborne, another of Reynolds's correspondents, speaking of “these "strong rebels," tells him (p. 294): "In England they say they "be but naked rogues, but we find them as good men as those "which are sent us, and better. You shall hear of greater killing "than you have." While, as regards the comparative quality of the English soldiery, Captain Robert Constable reports to Reynolds (p. 301), in view of the expected “ journey to the North," that is, to Ulster, in August: "Assure yourself, these troops which "must of necessity join with us will cause (through their "possessed scare) a many throats to be cut; besides, all our "troops are weakened through sickness, our gallants are returned "home, and when we fight, the whole brunt of the danger is like "to lie of [on] the hands of few of us, so much are our ordinary spirits failed, for the supplies which were sent are such, many "lame and so base fellows, that they are not worth their cloth"ing." |