Note 507 — Chapter XVIII · ON THE CONSTITUTION OF IRELAND

Leland gives several instances of breach of faith in the government. A little tract, called a "Brief Declaration of the Government of Ireland," written by Captain Lee in 1594, and published in Desiderata Curiosa Hibernica, vol. i., censures the two last deputies (Grey and Fitzwilliams) for their ill usage of the Irish, and unfolds the despotic character of the English government. "The cause they (the lords of the north) have to stand upon those terms, and to seek for better assurance, is the harsh practices used against others, by those who have been placed in authority to protect men for your majesty's service, which they have greatly abused in this sort. They have drawn unto them by protection three or four hundred of the country people, under colour to do your majesty service, and brought them to a place of meeting, where your garrison soldiers were appointed to be, who have there most dishonourably put them all to the sword; and this hath been by the consent and practice of the lord deputy for the time being. If this be a good course to draw those savage people to the state to do your majesty service, and not rather to enforce them to stand on their guard, I leave to your majesty."—P. 90. He goes on to enumerate more cases of hardship and tyranny; many being arraigned and convicted of treason on slight evidence; many assaulted and killed by the sheriffs on commissions of rebellion; others imprisoned and kept in irons; among others, a youth, the heir of a great estate. He certainly praises Tyrone more than, from subsequent events, we should think just, which may be thought to throw some suspicion on his own loyalty; yet he seems to have been a protestant, and in 1594 the views of Tyrone were ambiguous, so that Captain Lee may have been deceived.