preserve himself from being questioned, he had endeavoured to subvert the fundamental rights of parliament.

Such was the substance of the twenty-eight ar ticles, in which were enumerated the various acts of tyranny on which each charge was founded: As that his commission for the council of York had been, contrary to form and precedents as well as law, altogether unlimited: That all prohibitions had been rejected by him, and that he had fined, disinherited, imprisoned, &c. at discretion; while he had even declared that "some were all for law, and nothing but law would please them; but that they should find the king's little finger of prerogative was heavier than the lovers of the law" That in Ireland he had declared the island to be a conquered country, and the charters of Dublin discretionary grants from the crown : That the Earl of Cork had sued out a process for the recovery of his lands, from which he had been ousted by the accused and the council-table, upon a paper petition, without any legal proceeding; and that Strafforde threatened to imprison him for adopting this legal course, declaring that he would neither have law nor lawyers to question his orders: That, on another occasion, he had likewise denied justice to this earl, and openly said, that he would have him and all Ireland know, that so long as he held the government there, any act of council already made, or which should be thereafter, should be no less obligatory than an act of parliament. He was likewise accused of having, on many other

occasions, arrogated power above the laws and the established government. The proceedings against Lord Mountnorris, formed other articles. This peer had been hurried before a court-martial without the slightest suspicion of such an event, on a charge of some words loosely spoken at the chancellor's table several months before-words which he denied having ever uttered; and was, by the unjust influence of Strafforde, capitally condemned. It was also charged against Strafforde that he had thrust this nobleman out of the manor of Timour, in the county of Armagh, which he had quietly possessed upon an undisputed title for eighteen years, by an order of the council-table merely, upon a paper petition of one Richard Ralston. It was charged that Lord Dillon had been thrust out of his possession in consequence of an extrajudicial opinion extorted from the judges: That the Earl of Kildare, for refusing to submit, his title and lordship of Castleleigh, to the council-table, was imprisoned, and not even liberated when he had obtained his majesty's letters of enlargement: That a lady of the name of Hib. betts, had also been obliged to submit her rights to the council, and had been denied even the benefit of the regular proceedings of that tribunal; for that though the majority voted in her favour, Strafforde commanded an order to be entered against her, and threatened that if she refused to submit he would imprison her, and amerce her of L.500; and that, if she continued obstinate, he would double the fine every month. The lady, however, perceiv

ed too well the folly of resistance to contend with him. There were many similar instances enumerated; but the most detestable, for it apparently sprang from the most odious motive, was the case of Chancellor Lord Loftus, who had held the seals of Ireland for twenty years with high reputation. The accused, it would appear, had formed an illicit attachment to this noble judge's daughter-in-law; and as she, though false to her husband's bed, was yet true enough to his pecuniary interest, or rather to her own, she prevailed with her paramour to force her father-in-law into concessions to the son; and because the chancellor refused obedience to an ini. quitous award of the council-table, on a paper petition, he was by Strafforde not only deprived of the seals, but imprisoned *. He was accused of having delegated the arbitrary power which he had assumed, to the Bishop of Down and Conner, and his chancellor, with their several officers, empowering them to attach and imprison the poorer sort who refused obedience to their decrees; of having enhanced the rate of the customs † from a twentieth of the value of the article, to a fourth, and sometimes a third; of having restrained the

*Clar. vol. i. p. 222, Warwick's Mem. p. 116-7. Clarendon informs us, that Letters of great affection and familiarity, which were found in her cabinet at her death, were exposed to public view, and we cannot doubt their existence, considering the authority; but he is mistaken so far, for the commons did not insist on the charge regarding the chancellor-a clear proof that they did not search after scandal. See Rush. and Baillie.

+ He farmed the customs himself.

exportation of staples, and then granted a licence for money; of having procured to himself a monopoly of tobacco, and then having prohibited the importation of the commodity without a licence, under the most terrible penalties. The goods of the contraveners were ordered to be seized, themselves subjected to a discretionary fine, imprisonment, and even to the pillory. In this way, he is alleged to have amassed the enormous sum of a hundred thousand pounds. Flax was a staple of Ireland, and it was charged against Strafforde, that, having raised a vast quantity on his own lands, and otherwise engrossed an immense stock, he had prohibited the manufacturing of wool, and then insisted upon the natives spinning the flax in a particular manner, whereby he, in a short time, got a monopoly in his own person, at an infinite expence to the inhabitants: That he had imposed illegal oaths upon shipmasters and others; had exacted taxes by troops of soldiers; and, wherever his orders were resisted, he had quartered a party of soldiers till his commands were fulfilled That, in the same way, he had driven many families from their possessions: That he had obtained authority from the king to prevent the complaints of the injured from reaching the royal ear, by a proclamation that none should quit the limits of his government, without a licence from himself, and had fined and imprisoned all who had dared to disobey his proclamation: That he had said his majesty was so well pleased with the army in Ireland, that he meant to make it a pattern for England: That he had encouraged pa

pists, and raised an army of 8000 from that body: That he had imposed an illegal oath upon the Scots in Ireland, and exacted enormous fines of those who refused to take it: That on his late departure from Ireland, he pronounced the Scots all traitors, and declared that, if he returned, he would drive them out root and branch: That he had stirred up war betwixt England and Scotland; and, though he had advised a parliament, he had assured his majesty at the same time, that he would assist him in extraordinary ways, if it proved refractory; and had for that purpose, confederated with Sir George Ratcliffe to bring over the Irish army: That he afterwards advised the king to dissolve the parliament, and declared to him, that he was now absolved from all rules of government: That he advised the king to go on vigorously with levying ship-money; and had recommended the prosecution of sheriffs in the star-chamber for not pursuing measures to raise that illegal tax: That a loan of L.100,000 having been demanded of the city of London, and the citizens having declined to advance the money, the names of the principal refusers were demanded; and when the mayor and alderinan had resisted this iniquitous demand, he told them that no good could ever be expected till the mayor and some of the aldermen were hanged: That, by his advice, the bullion in the tower had been seized, and the measure to debase the coin projected; and when the officers of the mint represented to him the consequences of a debasement of the coin, he answered, that the French