[175] Warde to Cecil, Sept. 26 and Oct. 18; Gilbert to same, Oct. 18.
[176] Gilbert to Sidney, Nov. 13 and Dec. 6; Sidney to Cecil, Nov. 25 and Jan. 4, 1570.
[177] MacMahon to the Commissioners for the North, Aug. 23; Fitzwilliam to Cecil, Sept. 12.
CHAPTER XXVII.
1570 AND 1571.
Fitton, President of Connaught.
Pollard’s illness had delayed the formation of a presidential Government in Munster, but Sir Edward Fitton was appointed to Connaught, with Ralph Rokeby for a Chief Justice. When the decadence of the southern rebellion enabled him to begin work, he did not show much talent for government, being an ill-tempered, quarrelsome man, not at all fitted for the delicate duty of turning Irish into English order. The townsmen of Galway he found loyal and peaceable enough, but the people of the province were cold in religion, and inclined to superstition. By way of encouragement he burned the ‘idols’ in the churches. The friars were nominally expelled, really driven into hiding. More praiseworthy were his efforts to make the clergy either put away or marry their female companions—efforts extended to the laity, who, from the Earl of Clanricarde downwards, seem to have held canonical marriage in contempt. Malefactors were executed, a kind of census taken, and a provost-marshal appointed to hang out of hand all who could find no one to answer for them. ‘Such as do come unto us, we cause to cut their glybbes, which we do think the first token of obedience.’ Clanricarde and O’Connor Sligo professed some agreement with Fitton’s course, but O’Rourke held aloof, while Thomond gave every possible opposition, even to the extent of detaining Captain Apsley and his men on their return from Kerry, and of threatening to capture the President himself. Proclamation had been made for holding assizes at Ennis, where the sheriff, Teig O’Brien, made store of provisions for the President. Thomond, who was at Clare close by, refused to attend, and when the assizes were over friendly partisans conducted Fitton through the Burren Mountains, the Earl hanging on his skirts and skirmishing as far as Gort. He was said to be acting under orders from the Duke of Norfolk, and no doubt his conduct had reference to the rising in the North, and to the general attack on those whom Fitzmaurice called Huguenots. Fitton was shut up in Galway, and John Burke, Clanricarde’s rebellious son, rode up to the gate, but refused to enter. Gilbert having departed, Fitzmaurice gathered a new force, entered and spoiled Kilmallock; and there seemed every prospect of a conflagration throughout the West. Sidney resolved to take Ormonde at his word, and to employ him in putting down this fresh disturbance.[178]
Ormonde is reconciled to Sidney,
‘My Lord Deputy and I,’ Ormonde wrote to Cecil, ‘brake our minds at Leighlin last together before some of our trusty friends, and after promising never to call quarrels past to rehearsal, we vowed the renewal of our old friendship. So, for my part, I will bring no matter past to rehearsal.’ Thereupon he begged the intercession of Cecil and other statesmen for his misguided brothers. Edward was still at large.
‘I think,’ said Sidney, ‘God have ordained him a sacrifice for the rest. What honour were it to that house if the Earl would bring in that brother’s head with his own hands? That were indeed a purging sacrifice.’ It was a sacrifice which Ormonde did not feel called upon to offer; but he was willing enough to serve the Queen, and received a commission to reduce his cousin, the Earl of Thomond.