Note 250 — Chapter XXXVI · END OF THE WAR, AND ITS PRICE

Dean Ker’s statement, dated February 28, 1681-2, was first published by Nalson (ii. 528) in the following year. Nalson says he had the paper from Ormonde, and probably Lord Lanesborough, who had been the Duke’s secretary, procured it for that very purpose. It is reprinted in Contemp. Hist., iii. 368 and Hickson, ii. 370. The spurious commission in Rushworth, iv. 400, dated October 1, 1641, was under the Great Seal of Scotland, which could have no value in Ireland. By it Charles is made to authorise the seizure of all strong places in Ireland ‘except the places, persons and estates of our loving subjects the Scots; and also to arrest and seize the goods, estates, and persons of all the English Protestants’ to his use. Imagination refuses to conceive that he could have used such words. For discussions on this subject see Gardiner’s Hist. of England, x. 7, 92; Burton’s Hist. of Scotland, vi. 347, ed. 1876; Hickson, i. 117. The paper called Antrim’s ‘Information,’ appx. 49 to Cox, really proves nothing, and he was a notoriously loose talker.