"health of the Trinity, viz. God, the Nuncio, "and Owen Roe, and all who do not drink "this toast to be counted heretics,"-was rewarded with a Deanery;* that in the instructions to the Irish Agents abroad, the Bishops had arrogated to themselves the right of dictating; that they excommunicated or deposed from his functions every Clergyman who dared to write or to speak against their proceedings; and that, at this rate, the Government of the Country could never act with energy against the Parliament.

Unaccustomed to any other language than that of the vilest adulation, and blindest submission to all their censures, and astonished by that christian fortitude, of which Clanricard

• Belling's Preface, p. 18. "Propino verbis salutem Trinitatis, Dei scilicet, Eugenii O'Neil, et D. Nuntii, quam quisquis bibere recusaverit, pro Heretico habendus erit!"

+. They plainly declared in the new Assembly appointed by their faction in 1647, that they would not agree to any instructions to foreign Agents, unless they might frame them to their own mind, and so the instructions were, on Jan. 4, delivered by the Council to the Clergy, who corrected them accordingly." Carte, v. 2, p. 19.

had given such an illustrious example, the Bishops now became sensible of the necessity of keeping measures with the Gentry, who were supported by nearly a thousand of the second order of the Clergy; and therefore, giving way, for a time, to the storm which they themselves had raised, they affected great willingness to co-operate with the Assembly, and now, for the first time, did they issue an excommunication against all who should aid the regicide Generals against their Country. In the mean time however, they held private consultations and conventicles, from which they excluded all but themselves; and they had other designs in contemplation, of which Clanricard was utterly unaware.

Their Private Treaty with the D. of Lorraine.

160. In the course of their foreign negocia tions, they had discovered that Cha. D. of Lorraine, who had married his cousin German,

* Carte's Originals, CC. 5, B B. 233, and his Orm. v. 2, P. 126.

had afterwards fallen in love with Beatrice de Cusance, as Henry VIII. of England had with A. Boleyne, and had married her in 1637, and was sueing out a divorce in the Roman Court, from his wife, in favour of his mistress, and had some plausible reasons, which sycophant Ecclesiastics undertook to maintain, by various publications and memorials at Rome.

Yes-the spirit of intrigue had found its way into the very Sanctuary, and the abomination of desolation was in the holy place. Several years had elapsed, during which the Duke had pressed this matter on the Court of Rome, with all the influence he could, when, hearing of the state of Ireland, he fancied that by engaging in that Catholic cause, he would become so popular in Rome, as to have his bastard son declared legitimate, so as to enable him to succeed to his dominions.

Full of these infamous expectations, he had offered his services to Charles I, in 1645, as appears from Queen Henrietta Maria's letter, in Clanricard's Memoirs; and this, with other

circumstances which they had discovered, induced the Irish Bishops, so far back as in 1648, to depute to him privately French of Ferns, and Will: De Burgo, a Dominican Friar, Prior of the Convent of Athenry, to demand his aid.

In consequence of this, and of other subsequent applications, through the traitor Rochfort, who covered his design with an affectation of pity for his distressed Prince, the Duke sent Oliver Synot, an Irish Colonel then in his service, with Rochfort, on pretence of raising men in Ireland, as was usual with the Catholic continental powers in those days, but really to ascertain whether he could, on paying a stipulated sum of money to the King, obtain possession of Duncannon, Limerick, Galway, or any other strong inlet, through which he hoped, with the help of the Bishops, to make himself master of the kingdom.

Synot and Rochfort arrived in Ireland May

* See their own account in the Hibernia Dominicana, p. 525, from original MSS. in the Irish Dominican Convent of S. Sixtus at Rome,-and again p. 695, ib.

21, 1650, when Ormond was in the greatest distress; they pretended that they had written instructions, but that, having been chased by Parliament frigates, they threw them overboard.-Ormond, who was very suspicious, particularly of Rochfort, wishing to fathom the depth of this affair, told them, that though it was a matter of the highest importance, with respect to which he had no instructions, yet, if they would advance £10,000, he would treat with them and write to the King. Many conferences were held, and many days elapsed, during which, a veil of mystery appeared to hang over the couduct of Rochfort, when the Captain of the vessel who had carried him and Synot into Ireland, and who was to advance the money, sailed unexpectedly out of the harbour, June 25, 1651.

Ormond thought it his duty to send Lord Taafe with an account of these proceedings to the D. of Yorke, then at Jersey; and the Duke, wishing, at all events, to raise money for the service of Ireland, gave Taafe a Letter of Credence to the D. of Lorraine, enabling him to