146

msior.Y or England.

chap.

XII.

I6S9.

taking some desperate step. And in truth his savage and im-■ perious temper was at first inflamed by the news almost to mad-ness. But, after wreaking his rage, as usual, on his wig, hebecame somewhat calmer. Tidings of a very sobering npturehad just reached him. The Prince of Orange was marchingunopposed to London. Almost every county and every greattown in England had declared for him. James, deserted byhis ablest captains and by his nearest relatives, had sent com-missioners to treat with the invaders, and had issued writs con-voking a Parliament. While the result of the negotiationswhich were pending in England was uncertain, the Viceroycould not venture to take a bloody revenge on the refractoryProtestants of Ireland. He therefore thought it expedient toaffect for a time a clemency and moderation 'which were by nomeans congenial to his disposition. The task of quieting theEnglishry of Ulster was intrusted to William Stewart, ViscountMountjoy. Mountjoy, a brave soldier, an accomplishedscholar, a zealous Protestant, and yet a zealous Tory, was oneof the very few members of the Established Church who stillheld office in Ireland. He was Master of the Ordnance in thatkingdom, and was colonel of a regiment in which an uncom-monly large proportion of the Englishry had been suffered toremain. At Dublin he was the centre of a small circle oflearned and ingenious men who had, under his presidency,formed themselves into a Royal Society, the image, on a smallscale, of the Royal Society of London. In Ulster, with whichhe was peculiarly connected, his name was held in high honourby the colonists.* He hastened with his regiment to London-derry, and was well received there. For it was known that,though he was firmly attached to hereditary monarchy, he was

* As to Mountjoy’s character and position, see Clarendon’s lettersfrom Ireland, particularly that to Lord Dartmouth of Feb. 8., and that toEvelyn of Feb. 14. 168{i. “Bon officier, et hommc d’csprit,” says Avaux.