Note (return) — Chapter III

Shane took charge of the affairs of the Church as well as of the State. The Catholic primate refusing to acknowledge Elizabeth as the head of the Church, the see was declared vacant, and a congé d'élire was sent down for the appointment of 'Mr. Adam Loftus,' an Englishman, who came over as the lord deputy's chaplain. The answer returned and reported by Sussex to the Queen was 'that the chapter there, whereof the greater part were Shane O'Neill's horsemen, were so sparkled and out of order that they could by no means be assembled for the election. In the meantime the lord deputy began to apprehend that O'Neill aspired, not without some hope of success, to the sovereignty of the whole island. It was found that he was in correspondence with the Pope, and the Queen of Scots, and the King of Spain. No greater danger, wrote Sussex, had ever been in Ireland. He implored the Queen not to trifle with it, declaring that he wished some abler general to take the command, not from any want of will, 'for he would spend his last penny and his last drop of blood for her Majesty.' Right and left Shane was crushing the petty chiefs, who implored the protection of the Government. Maguire requested the deputy to write to him in English, not in Latin, because the latter language was well known, and but few of the Irish had any knowledge of the former, in which therefore the secrets of their correspondence would be more safe. Here is a specimen of his English: 'I know well that within these four days the sayed Shan will come to dystroy me contrey except your Lordshypp will sette some remedy in the matter.' He did indeed go down into Fermanagh with 'a great hoste.' As Maguire refused to submit, Shane 'bygan to wax mad, and to cawsse his men to bran all his corn and howsses.' He spared neither church nor sanctuary; three hundred women and children were piteously murdered, and Maguire himself, clean banished, as he described it, took refuge with the remnant of his people in the islands on the lake, whither Shane was making boats to pursue him. 'Help me, your lordship,' the hunted wretch cried, in his despair, to Sussex. 'Ye are lyke to make hym the strongest man of all Erlond, for every man wyll take an exampull by the gratte lostys; take hyd to yourself by thymes, for he is lyke to have all the power from this place thill he come to the wallys of Gallway to rysse against you.'4