CHAP. been formerly disappointed of an imaginary` proXXXII. fessorship in the university of Dublin, was now

Persecution

testants.

presented to the governors, with a mandamus to be admitted to the office of a senior fellow. Destitute of the means of subsistence, except the sale of their remaining plate, and exposed to the vengeance of ferocious troops, the governors yet with inflexible courage refused obedience, and pleaded their cause before Sir Richard Nagle, urging the incapacity of Green, the false allegations of his petition, and, above all, the sanctity of their oaths which must be violated by his admission. The fellows and scholars were forcibly ejected by the soldiery; all private and public property seized; the chapel converted into a magazine, the chambers into prisons; but by the intercession of the bishop of Meath, the members obtained their liberty on the express condition that three of them should not meet together on pain of death; and happily one Moor, a Romish ecclesiastic, a man of letters and liberal sentiments, nominated provost by the king, preserved, with the assistance of another of his order, named Macarthy, the library, books, and manuscripts from the ravages of a barbarous army.

The protestant clergy were almost destitute of subof the pro- sistence, as by late acts they were entitled to tythes from none but persons of their own communion, while the Romish incumbents exacted them from all parties. The protestants in this calamitous period, as is usual with mankind in times of oppression, crowded with unusual fervour to their places

XXXII.,

places of worship, a fervour offensive, perhaps CII A P. alarming, to the Romish government, who prohibited them by proclamation from attending any churches not situate within their respective parishes. Not content with a prohibition which precluded numbers from their worship, since in many places one church only served the purpose in common of two or three parishes, the Romish clergy, with the sanction of magisterial authority, seized protestant churches for their own use, not only in the country, but also in the capital, among which was Christ Church. As James had pledged his promise for the protection of the protestants, he issued, on their remonstrance, a proclamation, commanding the restitution of their churches. But the authority of a sovereign, attached with stupid zeal to a religion which exalts the sacerdotal above the regal power, was despised in this case by the priests of that religion; insomuch that, though he made earnest exertions to enforce his commands, he was completely foiled in the attempt. With the deprivation of churches were other most serious afflictions sustained by the protestants. When they attempted to purchase provisions with the base coin, these were instantly seized for the king's use, and themselves imprisoned, on a feigned supposition of their intending to send supplies to the enemy. That to starve half of them to death and hang the rest, was the plan of the catholics, was declared by some of this party, who at the same time asserted, that matters could never be right until this should have been accom

XXXII.

CHAP. plished. Conformably to such a design, when an order was issued in the name of the governor of Dublin, that not more than five protestants should meet together, under pain of death, even in church, affairs were so arranged, that a person of this persuasion could not get a bit of bread, and hardly a drop of drink, in all this capital; for at the door of every bake-house was placed a party of soldiers, who suffered none of this description to approach. "Such representations," says the impartial Leland,

Delay of

succour.

are sometimes derided as the fictions of an enflamed party but, however improbable these instances of senseless tyranny may appear, they are confirmed by undoubted traditions, received from the sufferers, and transmitted with every circumstance of credibility." Of the truth of this I have had complete conviction from genuine traditions and original writings of persons who sustained hunger during two or three days together.

An uninterrupted perseverance in the execution of this plan must have soon accomplished its object in places under the power of the catholics, but, beside their want of success against the men of Derry and Enniskillen, they were alarmed by the news of an invasion from England. This invasion had been long delayed, as William, surrounded by a multitude of embarrassments, occasioned by faction, treachery, domestic insurrection, and war with France, had been unable to take vigorous measures for the service of Ireland. A strong squadron from France under Chateau Renault, convoying transports with

arms,

XXXII.,

arms, ammunition, and money to James, had arrived CHAP. in the bay of Bantry, and obtained the advantage in a battle, in the beginning of May, over an inferior fleet of twelve English ships of the line commanded by admiral Herbert. The naval force of the enemy, thus rendered formidable, made the sending of troops to Ireland appear more difficult; and an insurrection in Scotland, conducted by Graham, Vis-' count Dundee, who defeated an English army, under general Mackay, with great slaughter, at Killycrankie, engaged for some time in that quarter the attention of the government and military force. At length new levies, consisting of eighteen regiments of infantry and five of horse, completed for the service of Ireland, were placed under the command of two foreign officers, duke Schomberg and count Solmes, of whom the latter was second in authority. Unacquainted with the crooked intrigues of cabinets, and impatient of delay, Schomberg, who had received no encouraging answer to his proposal for transporting the troops, by the shortest passage, from Port-Patrick in Scotland, arrived on the twentieth of July at Chester to hasten the embarkation from that port; but was unable, from the want of necessaries, to sail till the twelfth of August, and even then with only ten thousand of his troops and a part of his artillery. Unopposed by the Irish garrisons, who might Progress of have much impeded his debarkation, Schomberg, arriving in the bay of Carrickfergus on the thirteenth of July, and landing at Bangor in the county of Down, sent detachments to take possession of Belfast

I 4

Schomberg.

CHAP. Belfast and Antrim, abandoned by the enemy, and

XXXII.

laid siege to Carrickfergus with the main body of his forces. A defence of some length might have been made by this town, environed with a wall and moat, but destitute of a covered way, strengthened with bastions, and defended by a castle with two round towers, built on a precipitous rock, which rises near forty feet from the sea, but on the land side not more than twenty. The garrison, having parleyed at the first approach of the besiegers, but meeting with a scornful refusal of the terms demanded, resisted for a few days the operations of a formal siege, and the fire of six vessels which battered the town; and were permitted in the end to march with their arms and some baggage to the next Irish post. Enraged at the cruelties committed by catholic troops, the Scots of Ulster, without regard to the faith of capitulation, rushed furiously on the garrison, wrested their arms from the men, plundered many of them, and were prevented from slaughter only by the vigorous interposition of the general. Schomberg, reinforced by the arrival of the rest of his forces, ordered his artillery to be carried to Carlingford by sea, as the horses belonging to it had not yet been brought, while he directed his march by Lisburne, Hillsborough, and Dromore to Loughbrickland, through a country desolated by the desertion of its inhabitants, since the protestants had fled on former alarms, and the catholics now with their cattle and effects from the English forces.

The