substitute English manners for Irish customs, fixed payments for arbitrary exactions, and estates of inheritance for tribal chiefries. Many existing statutes were unknown, because they had never been printed, and Sidney was directed to send exemplifications of such as appeared fit to be published and observed.103
The finances were to be reformed, if possible, without further charge to the Queen, and with greater ease to the subject, an impossible task, which Sidney well knew that he could never perform. Many of the rules laid down were, however, very good, and it was clearly seen that much of the financial confusion arose from private jobbing, and from a faulty system of public accounts. What Elizabeth would not as yet see was that the first and greatest irregularity consisted in leaving soldiers unpaid, and in fixing salaries at rates which would not support the incumbents. In order to keep the reforming spirit alive, the Lord Deputy and Council were ordered to read their instructions over every three months, and to report progress to the Queen. ‘How strange a thing it may seem to be,’ says her Majesty in Council, ‘that such a realm as that is, where no just cause is to fear invasion of any other prince, where any person dwelling in that land has never directly or indirectly denied the sovereignty of that Crown to belong to the Crown of England, yet nevertheless to remain so chargeable to the Crown of England for the governance thereof only, and the revenues thereof to be so mean as the like burden and charge is not found in any place of Christendom, where commonly though the countries be subject to titles of other princes, or full of rebellions even for the sovereignties, yet the same do contribute sufficiently to the charge for their own government.’104
Besides the public instructions, Sidney received others for his own use only. Elizabeth had evidently still some hope of Shane, and desired to temporise with him, and with the Scots; in the meantime extending the rule of Carrickfergus as far as possible, and perhaps fortifying Carlingford and other coast towns. Shane’s claims were to be strictly scrutinised in Parliament, and Sidney was to confer personally with him, and to give him a safe-conduct if he demanded it. If still undutiful, he was to be left to his fate, which could not but overtake him at last.105
O’Donnell was to go back to Ireland, to be supported by the Government in Dublin, and restored, if possible, by policy and not by war. Yet war would be preferred to Shane’s holding Tyrconnel. The O’Reillys were to be persuaded into holding their lands of the Crown, and into making their country as obedient to law as those of Desmond and Ormonde were supposed to be, but were not. Sir John of Desmond was to be sent to England as a sort of hostage for his brother’s performance of promises lately made.106
Even more interesting than these private instructions is a letter which Elizabeth herself wrote to Sidney. It is in her usual involved style, and must be read over and over before it yields its full meaning. The Queen’s chief object seems to have been to make Sidney take a view favourable to Ormonde in his controversy with Desmond. Too many, she said, were partial to the latter. ‘If I did not see the balances held awry, I had never myself come into the weighhouse.’ ‘Make some difference,’ she said, ‘between tried, just, and false friends. Let the good service of well deservers be never rewarded with loss. Let their thank be such as may encourage more strivers for the like. Suffer not that Desmond’s "denyinge dedes," far wide from promised work, make you trust to other pledge than either himself or John for gage; he hath so well performed his English vows, that I warn you trust him no longer than you see one of them. Prometheus let me be, and Prometheus hath been mine too long … then are we ever knitting a knot never tied, yea, and if our web be framed with rotten hurdles, when our loom is well-nigh done, our work is new to begin… Let this memorial be only committed to Vulcan’s base keeping without any longer abode than the leisure of the reading thereof, yea, and with no mention made thereof to any other wight. I charge you as I may command you. Seem not to have had but secretaries’ letters from me.’ The letter nevertheless was kept safely at Penshurst, where Arthur Collins found it in the reign of George II.107
Like many who have tried their hands at the Irish problem, Sir Nicholas Arnold began with great professions, and after much disturbing men’s minds showed that he was no cleverer than those who had gone before him. Great as his failure had been in dealing with Shane, Sussex had at least kept tolerable order in the districts which paid some regard to law. Arnold was accused of caring little whether there was war or peace. His harsh treatment of the O’Connors has been already noticed, and the O’Reillys were handled in much the same way. They had plundered on the border of the Pale, and Shane O’Neill, anxious to assert his power, offered to compel restitution. Arnold preferred to make Kildare the instrument of punishment. A parley was first held, and promise of restitution made by old Malachias O’Reilly and his sons, Hugh and Edmund. Cahir O’Reilly, the chief offender, was to be punished. It soon appeared that Cahir was out of reach in Shane’s country, and that some of the hostages demanded were also there. The camp was the scene of much confusion, Kildare’s men threatening and even throwing stones at Sir George Stanley, the Marshal, and raising the ominous cries of ‘Cromaboo!’ and ‘Down with the English churls!’ The Earl with difficulty pacified his men, but Arnold, who all along showed the most extraordinary subservience to Kildare, and was on the worst terms with Stanley, declined to notice the outrage.108
A remarkable conversation took place between Arnold and Hugh O’Reilly, whom he urged to take the government of the country on himself. Hugh answered that O’Donnell was evil spoken of for assuming the government while his father lived, and that he saw not those punished who killed the Queen’s subjects. Shane O’Neill murdered his father, and procured the murder of his brother, who was five times as valuable to the Crown as any O’Reilly could be. The politicians of the Pale would maintain his half brother against him, and perhaps seek his life. If O’Neill ceased to protect Cahir, ‘then,’ said Hugh, ‘I say for O’Reilly, your prisoner, and for his eldest son, if any of them receive men or meat from O’Reilly’s country, I will die but they shall be delivered to your governor, or all their hurts past be paid for presently.’ He was quite willing to give hostages, but not to undertake to give those beyond his reach. According to Fitzwilliam Hugh meant well, and in any case the original aggressor was not Cahir O’Reilly but Kildare himself. Any damage done to the Pale had been more than paid for already. ‘Arnold,’ he said, ‘means well, but Ireland, in my opinion, though it be brute and rude, is not known to every man for a year or two’s trial.’109
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