Shaftesbury used the plot for all it was worth. As to Ireland, he said, ‘I am credibly informed that the papists have their arms restored, and the Protestants are not, many of them, yet recovered from being the suspected party. The sea-towns, as well as the inland, are full of papists. That kingdom cannot long continue in the English hands if some better care is not taken of it.’ That this was a reflection on Ormonde no candid reader will deny. And the speech as spoken may have been a good deal stronger than the version published by Shaftesbury. But he afterwards declared that his real object was to attack Lauderdale, and that much more was said about Scotland. Ossory, however, who was an old antagonist, took up the cudgels in what Achitophel’s apologists call a violent manner. His answer was at once printed in Holland, and William of Orange admired it greatly. Ossory was wrong in saying that Shaftesbury advised the stop of the Exchequer, but he said nothing against it, and he was Lord Chancellor at the time. The most faithful of biographers could not deny the delenda est Carthago speech. But Ossory’s language, though in the main justified by facts, was not opportune, and both Arlington and Southwell advised his father to write in an apologetic or at least pacific strain. He did so, very much against the grain, congratulating Shaftesbury upon becoming President of the Council. He regretted Ossory’s speech, but could not be ‘much offended at the mistake or transport of a near relation, who might imagine I was glanced at, in which of all things in the world he knew I was most tender in, and valued myself most upon, and I take the liberty to believe that supposing the case your own, your lordship would have the same indulgence for a son of yours.’ This was all, he told Southwell, he could ‘obtain of himself to say.’ Shaftesbury took no notice of the letter, but he received it, and Christie found the original among his papers nearly two hundred years later.[122]
Intrigues about the viceroyalty.
Sir William Temple’s attempt to bridle the House of Commons with a Privy Council of thirty is well known. It was to consist half of official and half of independent members, and there was to be no cabinet. The landed property of this body of magnates would nearly equal that held by the Lower House in the aggregate. Barillon saw at once that the plan would not work. The new Council was too large for an executive and could not have the authority of a legislative body. Having with great difficulty been induced to admit Halifax, the King, much to Temple’s disgust, brought in Shaftesbury and made him President. The result was that a cabinet was almost immediately formed consisting of Temple himself, Sunderland, Secretary of State; Essex, First Lord of the Treasury; and Halifax, who was soon afterwards made an Earl. Shaftesbury was surrounded by another little knot of advanced exclusionists, and intrigue was the order of the day. It was again reported that Halifax would be Lord Lieutenant. He refused the offer, though some of his friends thought that he had been appointed. Essex, on the contrary, was most anxious to return to Ireland, both the emoluments and the position being to his taste. He kept up an interest in the country by supporting Sir James Shaen and the revenue farmers who gave Ormonde so much trouble and prevented him from having leave to hold a Parliament. In the following year his designs on the viceroyalty were clearly visible. ‘My Lord,’ said Shaftesbury, ‘if you will come in to us never trouble yourself, we will make you Lieutenant of Ireland.’ Temple calls these shameless words, but they had no direct result. It does not appear that the King had any idea of superseding Ormonde.[123]
‘The Plot’ in Ireland.
No evidence bearing upon Oates’ plot had been discovered in Ireland, but Shaftesbury did not neglect that fertile field. There was a scheme to remodel the Irish Government without Ormonde, his place being filled by Orrery, Conway, or Granard. That cowardly villain, Lord Howard of Escrick, was thought of for Chancellor, and the Council was to be filled with the most extreme men of the Protestant party. But the King would have nothing to say to this precious plan, and it came to naught. Under orders from England, Ormonde sought for witnesses, but their stories did not fit in with those that had been told in London. The first Irish case of any importance was that of Richard, Earl of Tyrone, whose professed Protestantism was perhaps naturally doubted, since he became a Roman Catholic at the beginning of the next reign. He declared, however, that he was ready to sacrifice himself for the Protestant religion in which he had brought up his two sons. He had committed one Hubert Bourke, an attorney, for an assault upon a smith named MacDaniel, and Bourke, being a man of bad character, was unable to get bail. While in Waterford gaol he made charges against Tyrone, who was summoned to Dublin and examined by the Council. Nothing of importance appeared, but the Earl was indicted at Waterford Assizes, in August 1679, for conspiring to bring in the French. The Grand Jury ignored the bill, and Bourke’s evidence of treasonable talks was not believed. A further indictment in the following March had the same fate, Chief Justice Keating presiding on both occasions. Another informer, a Limerick gentleman named David Fitzgerald, made similar charges against Lord Brittas and others, whom he accused of a comprehensive scheme to massacre the Protestants and bring in the French. Some of the accused were bailed for want of evidence, and in other cases bills were ignored by the Limerick Grand Jury. Oates’ patrons in Parliament found it necessary to take other measures, and the hatching of an Irish plot was entrusted to a sub-committee consisting of Shaftesbury, Essex, Burlington, and Falconberg. A Mr. Hetherington, apparently a person of some education, acted as agent and stage-manager for Shaftesbury.[124]
Abortive charges of treason.
Tyrone was married to Anglesey’s daughter, and an attempt was made to implicate the latter, but it was too absurd to have any success. He was himself confined for some time in the Gatehouse, and the Lords declared themselves fully satisfied that there was and long had been ‘a horrid and treasonable plot and conspiracy, contrived and carried on by those of the Popish religion in Ireland for massacring the English, and subverting the Protestant religion, and the ancient established government of that kingdom.’ They desired the concurrence of the Commons, about which there was no difficulty, but Capel, Hampden, and Russell were determined to involve James, and it was added to the Lords’ vote ‘that the Duke of York’s being a Papist, and the expectation of his coming to the Crown, hath given the greatest countenance and concurrence thereto as well as to the horrid Popish Plot in this kingdom of England.’ According to the Maguire precedent Tyrone could be tried as a commoner in England, but the House preferred to resolve unanimously that he should be impeached of high treason. The charge came to nothing, for Parliament was dissolved a few days later. For the same reasons the proceedings against Thomas Sheridan were dropped, and he played an important part in Ireland during the next reign. He was a son of Dennis Sheridan, who befriended Bedell and others in 1641, his brother was Dean of Down and became a bishop next year. Being imprisoned by the House of Commons on vague and almost unintelligible charges, he sued out his Habeas Corpus, and when other judges shirked the task Baron Weston had the courage to grant it. The impeachment of Weston had also been voted for something he said at the Kingston Assizes. Sheridan told the House that he had defended the Protestant faith against the Jesuits and against friars of every order, that he had communicated yearly since he was seventeen, and that he had taken the oath of supremacy eleven times.[125]
Spies and false witnesses.
Oliver Plunket accused.
To expose once more the perjuries of Oates and his imitators is but to slay the slain. Charles never believed in the plot, but he took no steps to check the panic, and there was a golden time for spies and informers. On returning from Kilkenny in October 1679, Ormonde found Archbishop Talbot a close prisoner in Dublin Castle. He had been long living openly and unmolested in his brother Richard’s house. Archbishop Plunket had been quiet in his province since the departure of Essex, but came to Dublin in November 1679 to attend the deathbed of his relative, the aged Bishop of Meath. A few days later he was arrested by a party to whom Hetherington acted as guide. For a few weeks his imprisonment was close, but there was nothing against him, and the rule was soon relaxed. He was a prisoner only because he had not left Ireland under the late proclamation, but a case of high treason was gradually trumped up. The witnesses were instructed in London, and Ormonde, rejecting their application for a postponement, had the venue laid at Dundalk, where both they and the prisoner were known. The result was that no evidence was offered and no Bill found. This was in July, and the case was then adjourned to Dublin, where the witnesses were in less danger of being arrested as thieves and Tories. The Archbishop petitioned that he might be tried by a Louth jury, for even a jury of Protestants who knew him and his accusers were not to be feared. Before this point was finally settled, orders came that he should be sent to London for trial, and he was lodged in Newgate before the end of October 1680. Neither Ormonde nor his son Arran thought the witnesses deserving of credit, but the latter foresaw that they would be believed in England and that the Archbishop’s fate was certain.[126]