An Irish army to subdue Scotland.
An Irish Parliament, March, 1640.
Before taking leave of the King, Strafford attended a meeting of the Council, where a subscription was opened to meet his Majesty’s most pressing needs, and he headed the list with 20,000l. He left London on March 5 in the Queen’s coach and six, which shows that he had been reconciled to her, and carried with him instructions as to the Irish Parliament. The King enlarged upon the enormities of the Scots, professing himself sure of Ireland, and demanding six subsidies to be paid in three years, but holding out hopes of two being remitted if the misguided faction in North Britain should submit to his just desires. That he did not much expect such submission is clear from his determination to raise 8,000 foot and 1000 horse in Ireland, ‘the better and more speedily to reduce those others in Scotland to their due obedience.’ Strafford was attacked by gout at Beaumaris, but hastened over to Ireland, determined, whatever pain he might have, to be back in time for the opening of Parliament at Westminster—‘I should not fail, though Sir John Eliot were living.’ Halt, lame, or blind, he would be true to the King’s service, and he reflected on what he might be able to do with legs, since he was so brave without them. The Irish Parliament had been summoned for March 16, and the Lord-Lieutenant did not land until two days later. The Lords Justices and Council had already determined to ask for four subsidies, for six had been voted on a former occasion, and they feared an exact repetition lest the taxpayers might take alarm at the prospect of a recurrent charge. Nothing was actually done until Strafford arrived on the 18th, after forty-eight hours tossing in the channel. On the 19th he summoned the Council, and next day opened Parliament in state, and confirmed the election of Sir Maurice Eustace as Speaker of the House of Commons. Eustace made a pompous oration, containing six long quotations from Horace and abundance of other Latin. ‘The Brehon law,’ he said, ‘with her two brats of tanistry and Irish gavelkind, like the children of the bondwoman, are cast out as spurious and adulterate.’ Everyone rejoiced to see that the son of the free woman prevailed, and the King’s subjects should boast that they only had peace, while France, Germany, Spain, and the dominions of the House of Austria were laid waste by war.[244]
Four subsidies voted.
Subservience of Parliament.
Declaration in praise of Strafford.
In his opening speech to Parliament, which the journals say was excellent, Strafford, having heard Wandesford and the rest, ventured slightly to vary the King’s instructions. Instead of demanding six subsidies he allowed four to be moved for, and they were granted with such alacrity that he acknowledged the plan of the Council to be best, and confidently affirmed his belief that the Commons would be ready to give as many subsidies more after the first four had been levied. Some members, indeed, declared themselves ready to give the fee of their estates, if occasion required, and to leave themselves nothing but hose and doublet. The native representatives were loud in their loyalty, and there were no dissentient voices, ‘all expressing even with passion how much they abhorred the Scotch Covenanters.’ Not only were the subsidies voted, but a declaration of the most extreme character was agreed to. Both Houses were ready to give their all for the reduction of the Covenanters, and desired that this should be ‘published in print for a testimony to all the world and succeeding ages that as this kingdom hath the happiness to be governed by the best of kings, so they are desirous to give his Majesty just cause to account of this people amongst the best of his subjects.’ To complete the Lord Lieutenant’s momentary triumph, the preamble of the Subsidy Bill was a panegyric upon that ‘just, wise, vigilant, and profitable governor.’ He was given full credit for the Commission for defective titles, for restoring the Church and reforming the army, for his justice and impartiality, and for his ‘care to relieve and redress the poor and oppressed.’ On March 31 he came down again to the House of Lords in state, and gave the royal assent to the Subsidy and eight other Bills. The declaration had been entered on the Parliament roll, and Strafford took care to have some hundreds of copies printed for distribution by him in England. The clergy taxed themselves very heavily, and so a revenue was provided for some years. Strafford seems actually to have believed that the King was infinitely reverenced in Ireland, and that he himself was quite popular, though some spiteful people had asserted the contrary. ‘God forgive their calumnies,’ he said, ‘and I do.’[245]
FOOTNOTES:
[238] Report by the Lord Deputy, June 21, 1636, State Papers, Ireland; Wentworth to Wandesford, July 25, Strafford Letters, ii. 13-23.
[239] Laud to Wentworth, August 31, September 8 and 26, 1636, Works, vi. 466, vii. 279, 288; Wentworth to the King and to Laud, August 17 and 23; the King to Wentworth, September 3, Strafford Letters, ii. 26, 32; Dorothy, Countess of Leicester, to her husband, November 10 and January 10, 1636-7, Collins’s Sidney Papers, ii. 444, 456.