Footnote 1:
Irish potentates were then as plenty “as Munster potatoes.” “Ils se
coudoyoient,” as in the _salle des rois_ of Napoleon. Irish saints
were equally numerous; but, if the scandalous chronicles of the times
be worthy of credit, the social order of that day was not the better
for the circumstance. While King Mac Murrogh was running away with
Queen O’Rourke, wife of O’Rory, King of Breffny, who was on a
pilgrimage to St. Patrick’s purgatory, his son was undergoing the
operation of having those eyes put out, which had looked too tenderly
on the Queen of Ossory. The gallantries of these Macs and O’s from the
earliest ages to the present day, recall the answer of the French
Silvester Daggerwood to his manager, who asked his line of parts,
“_Chacun s’en tienne au metier de ses pères; je sais que dans notre
famille, nous sommes tous amoureux de père en fils_.”
Footnote 2:
King Mac Turtell was King of Dublin, and held his kingdom by tribute
from the King of Leinster. “Not far from Dublin,” says the admirable
Maurice Regan, historiographer to Mac Murrogh,--“not far from Dublin
there lived an Irish king named Gillemohalmoghe.” Of the territories
of this prince, Michael’s lane in Dublin formed a part. It is called
in the black book of Christchurch, Gillemohalmoghe. As there is some
reason to suppose that the kingdom extended as far as Swords, Sir
Compton Domville may be regarded as the modern representative of the
Gillemohalmoghe dynasty.
Footnote 3:
Child’s Discourse upon Trade.--“No inconsiderable portion of the
entire of Ireland has been confiscated twice, and perhaps thrice, in
the course of a century.”--_Lord Clare’s Speech on the Union._
The causes of absenteeship are, in fact, coeval with the first steps
of English power in this country. “Those that were adventurers,” says
Temple, “in the first conquests, and such others of the English nation
as came over afterwards, took possession by former grants of the whole
kingdom, and _drove the Irish_ in a manner out of all habitable parts
of it, and settled themselves in all the plains and fertile places of
the country, especially in the chief towns, ports, and sea-coasts. It
was no capital offence to kill any of the rest of the Irish; the law
did neither protect their life nor revenge their death.”--_History of
Irish Rebellion._ Here is the starting-post of absenteeism, pointed
out by an English minister and historian.
Footnote 4:
The signatures of Magna Charta evince that the nobility of those
times, like Pierrot in the farce, were “_un peu brouillés avec
l’Alphabet_;” but the spirit which founded that great arch of British
freedom, was well worth all the namby-pamby acquirements of all the
modern nobles who ever presided over archæology, (or, as Walpole calls
it, “old woman’s logic,”) flirted with the muses, and combined to give
tracts to England, or rose-trees to the starving peasantry of
Connaught and Munster.
Footnote 5:
Henry II. obliged the Earl Strongbow to return to Ireland, “being
likely for his own wealth and assurance to procure all possible means
of bridling and annoying the Irish.” In the time of Edward III.
military emigration seems to have been considerable. The Irish robbers
did good service at Cressy.
Footnote 6:
The Irish were always ready for a little commotion at home or abroad;
“Great was the credit of the Geraldines ever when the House of York
prospered, and likewise the Butlers thryved under the bloud of
Lancaster.” It was this disposition towards the House of York, which
caused the temporary success of Perkin Warbeck in Ireland. The
unfortunate Duke of Clarence, who was drowned in a butt of Malmsey,
was born in Ireland during the lieutenancy of his father, the Duke of
York. His godfathers were the Earls of Ormond and Desmond. Whether
this Irish origin will serve to explain the peculiarity of his
destiny, I cannot say; but the residence of a York in Dublin may in
part account for the popularity of the faction in that city.
Shakspeare probably alludes to this personage in Henry VI.
“Please it your grace to be advertised
The Duke of York is newly come from Ireland,
And with a puissant and mighty power
Of Gallowglasses and stout Kernes
Is marching hitherward in proud array.”
Footnote 7:
The English reader is not to suppose that these _blanc-mangers_ of the
poor Irish were such as are to be had at the Verys or Beauvilliers.
The Irish white meates were curds and whey, the only provisions which
men whose lives were “in wandering spent and care” could obtain. The
Irish then lived like Arabs, a prey of cattle being the subject of
their fiercest contests.
Footnote 8:
Had they made the country endurable to live in, they would have done
what all the penal laws that ever have been framed can never
affect--they would have kept the Irish at home. At the time when Henry
VIII. was framing his “act of absencie” for preventing the increase of
the absentees the state of the country in which they _were by law_
obliged to live, is thus described by Spenser;--“Notwithstanding that
the same was a most rich and plentiful country, full of corn and
cattle, (Munster more particularly is here speken of,) yet in one year
and a half (during the war carried on against the Earl of Desmond for
the purpose of forfeiting his estates) the natives were brought to
such wretchedness, as that any stoney heart would rue the same. Out of
every corner of the woods and glyns they came creeping forth upon
their hands, for their legs could not bear them, they looked like
anatomies of death, they shoke like ghosts crying out of their graves,
they did eat the dead carrion, happy when they could find them; yea,
and one another soon after, inasmuch as the very carcasses they spared
not to scrape out of their graves; and if they found a plot of
water-cresses or shamrocks, there they flocked as to a feast for the
time, yet not able to continue them withal, that in short space there
was none almost left; and a most populous and plentiful country
suddenly left void of man and beast.”--_State of Ireland_, 1581.
Footnote 9:
English antiquaries have been much puzzled to determine the identity
of this “more than celestial Geraldine.” “Who she was,” says Walpole,
“we are not directly told.” Surrey himself mentions some particulars
of her, but not her name. The editor of the last edition of Surrey’s
Poems, in some short notes on his life, says, “that she was the
greatest beauty of her time, and maid of honour to Queen Catharine;
but I think I have very nearly discovered who this fair person was,
&c. &c. &c. I am inclined to think her poetical appellation was her
real name, as every one of the circumstances tally.” The elegant
antiquary then devotes three pages to prove the probability that Lady
Elizabeth, daughter of the Earl of Kildare, was the Geraldine of Lord
Surrey. Warton adopts this supposition, and compliments the biographer
on having, with the most happy segacity, solved the difficulties of
“this little enigmatical ode.”--_History of English Poets._ There was,
however, a much shorter way of solving the difficulties, namely, the
consultation of Irish authors for an historical incident respecting
one of the most illustrious Irish families. Campion, who had probably
many a time and oft seen the “fair Geraldine,” with his usual quaint
simplicity says, “The Fitzgerald family is touched in the Sonnet of
Surrey made upon Kildare’s sister, now Lady Clinton;”
From Tuscane came my ladyes worthy race,
Faire Florence was sometime her ancient seate;
The western isle, whose plaisant shore doth face
Wilde Cambre’s cliffes, did give her lively heate.”