HISTORY OF ENGLAND.

Accordingly several Roman Catholics were sworn of thePrivy Council; and orders were sent to corporations to admitRoman Catholics to municipal advantages.* Many officersof the army were arbitrarily deprived of their commissionsand of their bread. It was to no purpose that the Lord Lieute-nant pleaded the cause of some whom he knew to be goodsoldiers and loyal subjects. Among them wore old Cavaliers,who had fought bravely for monarchy, and who bore themarks of honourable wounds. Their places were supplied bymen who had no recommendation but their religion. Of thenew Captains and Lieutenants, it was said, some had beencow-herds, some footmen, some noted marauders; some hadbeen so used to wear brogues that they stumbled and shuffledabout strangely in their military jack boots. Not a few of theofficers who were discarded took refuge in the Dutch service,and enjoyed, four years later, the pleasure of driving theirsuccessors before them in ignominious rout through the watersof the Boyne.**

The distress and alarm of Clarendon were increased bynews which reached him through private channels. Withouthis approbation, without his knowledge, preparations weremaking for arming and drilling the whole Celtic population ofthe country of which he was the nominal governor. Tyr-connel from London directed the design; and the prelates ofhis Church were his agents. Every priest had been instructedto prepare an exact list of all his male pai'ishioners capable ofbearing arms, and to forward it to his Bishop.***

It had already been rumoured that Tyrconnel would soonreturn to Dublin armed with extraordinary and independent

'Sunderland to Clarendon, May 22. 1686; Clarendon to Ormond,May 30. i Clarendon to Sunderland, July 6.11.

** Clarendon to Rochester and Sunderland, June 1. 1686; to Ro-chester, June 12.; King’s State of the Protestants of Ireland, chap. ii.sec. 6, 7.; Apology for the Protestants of Ireland, 168!).

**• Clarendon to Rochester, May 15.1686.