with views of self-aggrandisement; and never to have once contemplated the detestable enormities that stained the cause. It is said that when he beheld so woful a tragedy, which he found it impossible to check, his spirit sank under it. He, from his station in life, acted in a subordinate capacity to Sir Phelim O'Neil, but from his talents, enterprise, and address, he was virtually the main-spring of the conspiracy; and it was he who first undertook to bring over the old English of the pale *.

Whether

the king en

the insurrec

Of the committee from the Irish parliament, the majority were papists, and it is alleged that they were amongst the most active promoters of rebellion. But it can scarcely be credited, that while the king and queen were caballing with couraged officers of the British army, in regard to the Irish tion? army, and with Montrose, &c. as evinced in the army-plot, the incident, &c. should entirely neglect the Irish commissioners, and accordingly they are both accused, on strong presumptions, of having intrigued also with them. The violence with which this question has been viewed on both sides, has arisen from the execrable massacre which ensued; but though we were to assume that he incited some of the conspirators to attempt their pre-conceived scheme of an insurrection, it by no means follows that he contemplated the horrid massacre which accompanied it. In order to estimate the presumptions for and against the idea

* Carte's Ormonde, vol. i. p. 156.

of his being accessory to the insurrection, it is necessary to have a correct view of the real posture of affairs at the juncture, as well as of the royal intentions as to the sacrifice in regard to power which had been already made in Scotland, and which was ready to be demanded of him in England. The grand points on which he formally split with the English parliament, and ever refused accommodation, were the abolishment of episcopacy, and the surrender of his power over the militia by sea and land. The first had been early aimed at by the parliament; but, before there was any motion towards the latter, there had been two successive plots for turning the English army against the two houses, independently of the intrigues with Montrose's faction in Scotland. The result of these was the bill by Hazlerig, to vest in the two houses the power over the militia by sea and land, as well as the appointments to civil offices; and the late bill, in favour of Essex, was really an advance towards that object. Hazlerig's bill had been only once read; but the object was not, on that account, abandoned; and the late concessions in Scotland of the same kind encouraged the English to persist in their purpose. The Scots had a pretext for their demand, as to the militia and civil offices, and Charles an excuse for granting it, in the residence of their sovereign in a foreign country, and the probability of his being misled by those foreign counsels regarding the interests of Scotland, as well as in the ancient practice of his native country in respect also to the presbyterian

system of church government, they could plead the established law of that kingdom. But, while he knew how to avail himself of this apology for making concessions to the Scots, which he was determined not to grant to the English, he, in the Incident, afforded a melancholy proof of his purpose to take the first opportunity to retract his concessions, and overwhelm, by military force, as well as by stratagem against their leaders, the great body of the people who had the spirit to demand them: The treachery of the Incident, too, was the more odious, from the profound dissimulation with which the monarch had conducted himself. It had just been remarked by a courtier, that Henderson, the presbyterian pastor, had become a greater favourite than ever Canterbury was, and was never from him night or day *.

In these plots, as well as in his anxious endeavour to keep up the lately raised Irish army, and his last attempt to debauch the English troops, we have the most incontestable evidence of his intention to crush the parliaments of both kingdoms by force; and therefore a conclusive answer to Mr. Hume's argument against his being concerned in the Irish insurrection-founded on his not having intended to make war upon the parliament. Besides, it will not be forgotten that he had now the very same motive for hostilities that he ever had afterwards-and which, in spite of his most solemn protestations to the contrary, accompanied with

Carte's Original Letters, vol. i. p. 14; date 25th September. The letter is addressed to the Earl of Ormonde.

appeals to heaven for his sincerity, led to many intrigues for the introduction of foreign troops, as well as secret treaties with those very Irish for an army, after they were stained with every enormity, and consequently must have been expected to act over again in Britain the scenes of inexpressibly brutal cruelty which had been displayed in Ireland. Now that, amid all the late plots and intrigues, the Irish committee, of whom the majority were Catholics, and became eminent in the rebellion, should never have been applied to, is inconceivable; and the presumption arising out of the nature of things is confirmed by testimony *. But, in order to understand this subject, it is necessary to attend to the progress of events, and to ascertain what were the views of the popish members of the Irish committee, who were from the old English of the Pale.

It will be remembered that the committee came over to assist in the prosecution of Strafforde, whose trial began on the 22d of March, and for whose life neither Charles nor himself was then apprehensive. The committee, as they had every reason, pursued him keenly; and indeed matters had arrived at that crisis, that their safety, and his return to Ireland as lieutenant, were incompatible. It was the interest of Strafforde, and the purpose of his master, to preserve the Irish army for future services in England, and the plot with the English

* Rush. vol. v. p. 346, et seq. Scott's Sommers' Tracts, vol. v. p. 573, et seq. Antrim's Information in Appendix to Clarendon's History of the Irish Rebellion.

army, with hopes from France, promised to restore the powers with which Charles was resolved not to part without a struggle. At this time, however, the native Irish, unknown, as it would appear, to the old English of the pale, were secretly concerting an insurrection for the purpose of expelling the invaders. Strafforde had formerly got notice of their motions, and had adopted precautions to quell them. The late resort of old soldiers and priests out of foreign parts awakened afresh the suspicion of the English government, which doubtless had been previously excited by the lieutenant; and in the posture of things, at that time, nothing could be more baneful to the interest of the monarch and his devoted minister than a rebellion. Whether the Irish popish army joined the insurgents, which it most probably would, or were employed against them, or were disbanded or sent out of the country, as would have been insisted on for the common security, if it did not join the insurgents, it would have been in all these cases lost to the crown, whose distresses would have been augmented: the English army would have, in all probability, been dispatched to Ireland; and then the Scots, who would not have moved, would have been masters of England in conjunction with the parliament, while the latter would have been enabled to insist on the power over the English army being devolved upon them. Hence, as well as, it must be presumed, from better motives,