1603. deliver the same, receiving a warrant with two or three more of the chiefest of them that hath to do with the Presidents, under their hands and seals, for their discharges. And those that have the charge of the money there yearly to make their account unto such auditors as shall be appointed, that it may appear what is disbursed, and what doth remain. "And furthermore that order be taken for wood and waste grounds there, that the Presidents and those that chiefly have to do with them under the Lord Deputy there to set, let, and use them to her Majesty's best commodity and profit. 'And in like manner for mineral causes, whereof there is divers sorts in the country, and the presumption great that some are rich, the Presidents and those that be joined with them to take the like order in their precincts, that they may be used to her Majesty's best commodity and profit, for whom they are most fit. For truly I have heard that the Spaniard and others have reported a long time since that, if the Princes of England knew what a jewel Ireland were, they needed not to seek the discovery of foreign countries to inhabit in. And assuredly I am of this mind that strangers would not have such liking to that country (howsoever their further meaning and intent is) but that they judge or know, besides the goodness of the earth there is some other secret mystery that lieth hid in the bowels of the same. "And if it be supposed that the number of the soldiers by this means be too many, to appoint your number less as shall be thought meet. And the inoney thus levied in every parish and otherwise to be in a readiness in the Exchequer there, and the same to be used for divers good purposes, both for the strength of the realm, and for the common wealth of the same. 'And whereas her Majesty hath a great care both of the country and the well-doing of her good and loving subjects there, to win them without effusion of blood, if it may please her so to think it good, to give and grant unto them all free pardon, some few that be notorious rebels and traitors excepted. "And by this means her Majesty may have always in a readiness a company of brave and gallant soldiers, and mariners to serve where occasion shall bid, to the terror of those that meaneth no good unto that country, or otherwise. "I humbly beseech your Honour once again to pardon me for my presumption, if in any respect I have or do omit my duty, and, for my want, to accept in good part my poor goodwill and willing mind, whose care and study hath been, and also is, how I may learn to do some piece of my duty unto my prince and country, and, God willing, shall refuse no peril to do my endeavour to perform the same whilst life remaineth. For truly I judge we are bound by the laws of God and by the laws of nature, that if we can devise by any commendable and lawful means to set our Christian brethren and country 1603. Vol. 616, p. 114. 400. men on work in matters that may be for the glory of God and for the common wealth, every person to put their helping hands to do the same. For assuredly the number of persons is great that may be well spared in this realm, that daily falleth into great decay and misery, and be imprisoned, that hath lived in good case; with many others, I doubt, like to be cut off with shameful death; which I beseech God may be prevented and provided for in time in manner as aforesaid. And undoubtedly covetousness and ambition (in inferior persons), under God, be two chief causes of these great inconveniences. And by this means both garrisons, corporations, and towns may be planted and made in that worthy country, with such royalties and liberties belonging unto them, as shall please her Majesty to grant; which undoubtedly will be a strength unto the realm, and a terror to those that wisheth no good unto the same. i Many other matters I could set down as concerning that noble and worthy country, but for troubling your Honour with tediousness. God preserve your Honour to be a good and noble pillar for this realm." Pp. 20. Endorsed: "A Discourse of Ireland, etc." Co. WATERFORD "Instructions [by the Lord Deputy and Council] for the Commission thereunto annexed, to execute Martial Law within the County of Waterford. "(1.) First, that open proclamation be made in and throughout all that whole county, that no idle person or persons or vagabonds shall repair or haunt within the same county after eight days next after the same proclamation made, upon pain of hanging, unless he have a just cause; and likewise that no such person travel by night, unless he be accompanied with some honest man in English apparel, upon like pain. "(2.) Item, the said Commissioners shall likewise have full power and authority to apprehend and take such person or persons as do willingly aid and support or maintain any outlaw or open thief, murderer, or rebel, and to send them to the Deputy and Council with certificate of their demeanour And shall also seize their goods and chattels, and put the same upon surety, taking inventory thereof, and upon proof that the party is such a malefactor as by the law he ought to forfeit his goods, the two parts thereof to be to the Queen's Majesty's use, and the third part to the use of the such Commissioners, towards. . their pains and charges, as shall seize the same. "(3.) Item, the said Commissioners shall, in the prosecuting of any such malefactor, call for aid or assistance of any of the Queen's Majesty's subjects, and [if] he or they so called to aid refuse so to do, unless he have a lawful cause, or in any case resisteth, the said Commissioners shall certify the 1603. same to the Lord Deputy and Council, who will see him or them so refusing or resisting to be grievously punished, and some recompense to the said Commissioners so grieved of his or their goods so refusing or resisting. "(4.) Item, that after the next eight days next after the same proclamation it shall be lawful to and for her Majesty's Commissioners in the commission hereunto annexed named to apprehend and take such idle persons as they shall find [or] come by; and if they shall find any reasonable or just cause, they shall have liberty to punish them, at their discretion, as well by death or otherwise in causes of death, according as in the said commission is specified. "(5.) Item, wheresoever the said Commissioners shall so travel for the punishment of such malefactors, it shall be lawful for them to take meat and drink for horse and man in reasonable sort, so that they exceed not one night or two, in every barony within the said county; the same to be taken in such indifferent sort as the county be not oppressed therewith and according as in the commission is expressed. "(6.) Item, the same Commissioners so taking any suspect person or persons shall examine him or them before the next gentlemen of worship, or the sovereign or portreeve, or other next head officer of any town or borough next adjoining; and, finding sufficient matters of death, shall and may put such malefactors to death, or otherwise punish them, at their discretions. “(7.) Item, in case the said Commissioners shall in the night find any suspect person or persons not having in his company or theirs some honest man in English apparel, it shall be lawful for the same Commissioners to use them at their discretion. And, if any such person or persons so travelling by night, and so by the said Commissioners taken in the manner of any stealth or robbery or murder, it shall be lawful for them or any of them to hang him at such places as they shall think meet. “(8.) Item, also it [is] agreed and ordered that if any such suspected person shall fail of his sorren, and the same so justified before the said Commissioners, then it shall be lawful to punish the same person by death or otherways, as to their discretions shall seem good. "(9.) Item, we do further authorise our said Commissioners to punish by law martial, with pains of death or otherwise, as by their discretion, according to the nature and quality of the offender and offence or offences, shall seem expedient and requisite, all such persons, soldiers, or pretending to have been soldiers, or others, extortiously cessing themselves, or exacting or taking meat or drink money, or money worth, upon any her Majesty's good subjects. “(10.) Finally, it is ordered by the said Lord Deputy and Council that this authority of death shall not extend to any gentleman or freeholder that may dispend forty shillings land by 1603. the year, or lawfully possesseth the value of ten pounds of his G G 1561. Jan. 24. Vol. 607, p. 213. Proclamation by Thomas Earl of Sussex, Lord Lieutenant, and the Council, at Dublin, 24 January 1560. "Where it is given to understand to us, the Lord Lieutenant and Council, that divers greedy and ill-disposed persons within this realm do in the uttering of their wares, victuals, and other kind of things vendable, indent and bargain afore they make any price of such things as they will sell what kind of coins they will receive for payment; whereby they procure with their unsatiable gain great disquiet and trouble to many of the good subjects of this realm, a great disfurniture of all markets, and, in effect, common and universal disorder. We have thought fit, for redress of such enormities as already do and hereafter might arise by the covetousness of such unbridled appetites, not only to give order and commandment in the Queen's Majesty's name by this proclamation that no man shall from henceforth indent or bargain what kind of coins he will receive for any kind of thing that he shall sell within this realm; but also to give all her Majesty's true and loving subjects to understand that if any greedy persons have heretofore sithence the 20th of October last, at what time the knowledge of the fall of the coins came to us, made sale of anything whatsoever, and have in his bargain indented or agreed to receive payment in any special coin current within this realm, then he who standeth bound by any such bargain or agreement to make payment after any such sort shall and may offer payment in any kind of coin current within this realm, and that all justices of peace, mayors, sheriffs, bailiffs, and all other the principal officers of any corporate town, shall and may force every man within their several precincts, limits, and rules to receive payment in the sort before specified. "And if any man shall hereafter, contrary to this proclamation, indent or bargain what coin he will be paid in for anything that he shall sell, then the foresaid justices of peace, mayors, sheriffs, bailiffs, and other officers of corporate towns within their several precincts, limits, and rules, shall not only force the party so indenting and bargaining to receive payment any kind of coin current within this realm wherein the in * Many of the documents in this Appendix are undated, and their dates were not discovered till it was too late to notice them in the proper places. |