The bishops order Ormonde out of Ireland.
His adherents excommunicated.
Another fruitless conference.
Ormonde predicts increased confusion.
The Jamestown congregation met as announced, and after three or four days’ deliberation they despatched Bishop Darcy of Dromore and Charles Kelly, Dean of Tuam, to Ormonde with full powers to explain their views. They had observed with ‘grief and admiration’ that he threw some of the blame upon them, showed to their own satisfaction that they were not in fault, and left it to their emissaries to declare what they believed to be the only possible means of preserving the country. Ormonde prudently required the plenipotentiaries to put their message upon paper; and the result was a peremptory notice to him to quit Ireland forthwith. The writers plainly said that he was of no use there, but that his great position and experience might avail something if he was by the King’s side. In the meantime, he was to leave the viceregal authority in the hands of someone ‘trusty to the nation, and such as the affection and confidence of the people will follow.’ On the day before this message was delivered the assembled prelates had actually excommunicated all who adhered to the Lord Lieutenant, so that there was little sincerity in sending the Bishop of Dromore and his colleague at all. The excommunication, with the declaration prefixed, though dated August 12, was withheld from publication until September 15, so that Ormonde’s answer might be first received. The Commissioners of Trust persuaded him to summon the bishops to another conference at Loughrea on August 26, and he went there himself; but they only sent the Bishops of Cork and Clonfert, with no instructions except to demand an answer to their order for his leaving the kingdom. In giving this, Ormonde pointed out that he had returned to Ireland from a sense of duty, that he had been prepared in April last to make room for a Roman Catholic viceroy, but that many of the prelates themselves had then begged him to stay; and that he waited now because the King’s position in Scotland was hopeful and orders might come which he would be sorry should arrive in his absence. ‘We plainly observe,’ he added, ‘that though the division is great in the nation under our government, yet it will be greater upon our removal; for which in a free conference we should have given such pregnant evidence as we hold not fit this way to declare.’ The best chance of prevailing upon Charles to send supplies was to be able to tell him how obedient and dutiful the people were. A majority of the Commissioners of Trust, all Roman Catholics, wrote in much the same strain, urging that disloyalty on the part of the clergy would reflect upon the nation at large, and could only result in general ruin.[189]
Charles II. repudiates the ‘bloody Irish rebels,’ Aug. 16.
The King’s mother idolatrous.
And Ormonde’s peace exceeding sinful.
Commissions to Cavaliers revoked.
Opinions of Clarendon, Carte, and Walker.