More negotiations.
When the Queen at last consented to hear Chief Justice Gardiner’s account of his proceedings in the North, she expressed great displeasure. The demand for liberty of conscience, she said, was a mere pretext, the result of disloyal conspiracy, and put forward as an excuse for past rebellion more than from any desire to do better in future. Tyrone and the rest had no persecutor to complain of, and what they asked was in reality ‘liberty to break laws, which her Majesty will never grant to any subject of any degree’—a pronouncement which might well have been quoted by the foes of the dispensing power ninety years later. And, as if it were intended to strike Russell obliquely, a new commission was ordered to be issued to Norris and Fenton. They were to meet the rebels during the truce, and to ‘proceed with them to some final end, either according to their submissions to yield them pardons, with such conditions as are contained in our instructions; or if they shall refuse the reasonable offers therein contained, or seek former delays, to leave any further treaty with them.’ And at the same time there was to be a general inquiry into all alleged malpractices in government which might cause men to rebel. Some of the directions to the new commissioners were rather puzzling; but the Lord Deputy and Council refused to suggest any explanation, for that they were ‘left no authority to add, diminish, or alter.’
Russell indeed gave out that he would go to the North himself, and Norris was in despair. ‘The mere bruit,’ he says, ‘will cross us, and I am sure to meet as many other blocks in my way as any invention can find out. I know the Deputy will not spare to do anything that might bring me in disgrace, and remove me from troubling his conscience here.’ Russell, on the other hand, complained that Burghley was his enemy and sought out all his faults. ‘I wish,’ said the old Treasurer, ‘they did not deserve to be sought out.’[253]
Captain Thomas Lee.
Tyrone must have been an agreeable, or at least a persuasive man, for he often made friends of those Englishmen who came under his personal influence. Such a one was Captain Thomas Lee, who at this juncture made an effort in his favour; saying that he would be loyal ‘if drawn apart from these rogues that he is now persuaded by.’ He would go to England or to the Deputy if he had a safe-conduct straight from the Queen, and Essex and Buckhurst might write to him for his better assurance, since he believed Burghley to be his bitter enemy. Lee confessed that he had not seen Tyrone for some time, and that he founded his opinion upon old conversations; but he was ready to stake his credit, and begged to be employed against the Earl should he fail to justify such an estimate. For having ventured to address the Queen when in England without first consulting Burghley, Lee humbly apologised, and hinted, perhaps not very diplomatically, that a contrary course might have preserved the peace. The Cecils had little faith in Lee’s plausibilities, and it was reserved for Essex to employ him as a serious political agent.[254]
Norris and Fenton go to Dundalk.
A hollow peace follows.
Fenton foresaw that Tyrone and O’Donnell would probably ‘stand upon their barbarous custom to commune with us in the wild fields.’ And so it proved. They refused to come into any town, and proposed a meeting-place near Dundalk, with a river, a thicket, and a high mountain close at hand. This was rejected, and they then suggested that the commissioners should come on to the outer arch of a broken bridge, and back across the water, while they themselves stayed on dry land. This was considered undignified, and indeed the proposal looks like studied impertinence; and in the end it was decided that Captains St. Leger and Warren should act as intermediaries. Tyrone at once waived the claim to liberty of conscience, ‘save only that he will not apprehend any spiritual man that cometh into the country for his conscience’ sake.’ While protesting against the continuance of a garrison at Armagh, he agreed not to interrupt the communications, and in the end he received a pardon upon the basis of the existing state of affairs. The gaol and the shrievalty were left in abeyance during the stay of the garrison; but the Queen made no objection to Armagh and Tyrone being treated as one county, or to the demand that the sheriff should be a native. The Earl disclaimed all authority to the east of the Bann and of Lough Neogh, and, while renouncing foreign aid, promised to declare how far he had dealt with any foreigner. He refused to give up one of his sons, but surrendered his nephew and another O’Neill as pledges, on condition that they should be exchanged at the end of three months. The Queen, upon whom the cost of the great Cadiz expedition weighed heavily, professed herself satisfied except on one point. Tyrone had promised some time before to pay a fine either of 20,000l. or of 20,000 cows, but he now maintained that the figure had been mentioned for show, and that it was an understood thing that it should not really be paid. The promise had been made to Russell, and Norris had left the matter in doubt. But it must be acknowledged that the Lord Deputy saw the real state of the case more clearly than his sovereign, and he maintained that the rebels were only gaining time till help came from Spain, and that Norris was overreached by ‘these knaves.’ The peace was a feigned one, the pledges were of no account, and there was no safety for the English in Ireland but in keeping up the army.
Russell’s strictures on Norris.
Tyrone and O’Donnell had not met the commissioners at all, and O’Rourke had run away immediately after signing the articles. On the other hand, Norris and Fenton could report that Maguire, with several chiefs of scarcely less importance, had come into Dundalk and made humble submission on their knees. Russell acknowledged that the Queen was put to great expense in Ireland, and that there was very little to show for it, ‘which,’ he urged, ‘is not to be laid to my charge, but unto his who being sent specially to manage the war, and for that cause remaining here about a twelvemonth, hath in that time spent nine months at the least in cessations and treaties of peace, either by his own device contrary to my liking, as ever doubting the end would prove but treacherous, or else by directions from thence.’[255]