[147] Clarendon’s letters of April 17, 20, and 24.
[148] Clarendon to Rochester, April 17, 20, and 24, 1686; to Sunderland, April 24 and 27; to Rochester, May 11 and 15. Sunderland to Clarendon, March 11, May 22. In his diary on January 31, 1686-7, Clarendon says Nagle pretended that he had no wish to be Attorney-General, but ‘I do not believe him in the least, for I am sure he is both a covetous and an ambitious man.’
[149] Clarendon to Rochester, May 1, 1686; Lady Clarendon to Rochester, March 15. Luttrell’s Diary, January 19 and February 24. Evelyn to Clarendon, September 1686, appended to the Diary, iii. 425.
[150] Sheridan MS. Clarendon to Sunderland, May 30, June 1, and July 20, 1686. King’s State of the Protestants, chap. iii. sec. 2. Luttrell’s Diary, June 8. After the Revolution Sunderland thought it wise to disclaim any share in the Irish business: ‘My Lord Tyrconnel has been so absolute there that I never had the credit to make an ensign or to keep one in, nor to preserve some of my friends, for whom I was much concerned, from the least oppression and injustice, though I endeavoured it to the utmost of my power,’ letter in H. Sidney’s Diary, ii. 378. Tyrconnel cashiered about 4000 Protestant soldiers and 300 officers, Fortescue’s History of the British Army, iv. chap. 1.
[151] Clarendon to Rochester, June 8 and July 4. St. John’s Well was at Kilmainham, near where O’Connell Road now crosses the railway, and the name is perpetuated in the intersecting road. A ‘pattern’ fair, which became very disorderly, was held here till about 1835, when the well was swallowed up by builders. See Frazer’s Balder the Beautiful, i. 205 (Golden Bough).
[152] Letters in Clarendon and Rochester Correspondence, vol. i., particularly August 4 and 19, 1686. Ormonde Papers, vols. vi. and vii., particularly Sir W. Stewart to Arran, February 13, 1682-3; Tory Hamilton to W. Ellis, January 2, 1683-4, and Longford’s letters in August 1686. King mentions the murder, chap. i. section 7. In the correspondence of the time Hamilton is generally called a very honest fellow. Ellis Correspondence, i. 166.
[153] Letters in vol. i. of Clarendon and Rochester Correspondence. Aston’s dying declaration is appended to that of June 3. King’s remark is (chap. iii. sec. 2), ‘they might kill whom they pleased without fear of law, as appeared from Captain Nangles’ murdering his disbanded officer in the streets of Dublin; but if any killed or hurt them they were sure to suffer; as Captain Aston found to his cost, who was hanged for killing a Papist upon his abusing the captain’s wife in the street.’
[154] Sheridan MS. Ellis Correspondence, November 30, 1686. Luttrell’s Diary, December 1. Evelyn’s Diary, January 17, 1686-7. Sunderland was considered bribable, see his own statement in Diary of H. Sidney, ii. 379.
[155] The air of ‘Lillibullero,’ originally composed by Purcell for another song, is still whistled in Ulster under the name of ‘Protestant Boys.’ The words have been often reprinted, see Wilkin’s Political Ballads, i. 275, and (with variants) the third part of Revolution Politicks, 1733. Purcell’s music is given in the 1873 edition of Sterne’s Works, i. 93, at the end of Tristram Shandy, 2nd part, chap. iii. See also Croker’s Historical Songs of Ireland, pp. 1-11.
[156] See in particular Clarendon’s letters to the King of October 23, 1686, and of February 6, 1686-7 (in the appendix). Evelyn’s Diary, March 3 and 10.