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HISTORY OF ENGLAND.

chap, was Clarendon aware of what had happened till he saw a Ro-1686 . man Catholic, whose face was quite unknown to him, escort-ing the state coach.* The change was not confined to theofficers alone. The ranks were completely broken up andrecomposed. Four or five hundred soldiers were turned outof a single regiment chiefly on the ground that they were be-low the proper stature. Yet the most unpractised eye at onceperceived that they were taller and better made men thantheir successors, whose wild and squalid appearance disgustedthe beholders.** Orders were given to the new officers thatno man of the Protestant religion was to be suffered to enlist.The recruiting parties, instead of beating their drums forvolunteers at fairs and markets, as had been the old practice,repaired to places to which the Roman Catholics were in thehabit of making pilgrimages for purposes of devotion. In afew weeks the General had introduced more than two thou-sand natives into the ranks; and the people about him con-fidently affirmed that by Christmas day not a man of Englishrace would be left in tHe whole army.***

On all questions which arose in the Privy Council, Tyr-connel showed similar violence and partiality. John Keating,Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, a man distinguished byability, integrity, and loyalty, represented with great mild-ness that perfect equality was all that the General could rea-sonably ask for his own Church. The King, he said, evidentlymeant that no man fit for public trust should be excludedbecause he was a Roman Catholic, and that no man unfit forpublic trust should be admitted because he was a Protestant.Tyrconnel immediately began to curse and swear. “I do notknow what to say to that; I would have all Catholics in.”f

* Secret Consults of the Romish Party in Ireland.

** Clarendon to Rochester, June 20. and July 4. 1080; Apology for theProtestants of Ireland, 1089.

'** Clarendon to Rochester, July 4, 22.1080; to Sunderland, July 6.;to the King, Aug. 14.

+ Clarendon to Rochester, June 19.1086.