"Never mind, Aunt Graunia," said Delsie, as the old woman bewailed the loss of such fabulous riches. "Sure Bofin wouldn't hold a thousand pounds, do what you could wid it; an' if it hadn't took itsel' off sure it's out to the mainland I'd have had to carry itan' I niver could bear the mainland, as everybody knows! An' what I'm to do wid fifty pounds itsel' the Lord only knows that sent it to me!"

Delsie with her fortune in her apron was cheered and congratulated all round a hundred times, and when the excitement was beginning to wane she set out with the old woman for her cabin.

"Will you be up in the evenin' to see us?" she said, looking back over her shoulder at Murt.

"I don't know, Delsie; ye're not the wan young woman ye were wid the goold in yer skirts."

"But it's the goold that wants ye. If it had been only Delsie she wouldn't have had to make so little o' herself as to ax ye, I hope."

Some time after that Murt and his wife had a cabin and fishing boats and nets of the best; and Delsie had three fine cows of her own which banished for ever the recollection of those other unfriendly animals which had used to annoy her from the mainland. It was some time before the islanders remembered that the return of the mug was testimony to the fact that the Strange Schooner and its crew had been lost. Readers of newspapers learned about that time some account of the picking up of the forlorn crew of a foreign trading vessel which had been wrecked off the western coast of Ireland; but newspapers rarely come to Bofin. However it may have fared with him, Delsie says the rosary every night for the repose of the soul of Jan Dow the Dutchman, who was cut off in his sins; her six children, and the breakers outside the cabin door, crying "Amen" to the prayer.

SONNET.

TO MISS ALICE THOMPSON, AUTHOR OF "PRELUDES."

HOU art not like to others; in thine eyes

TH

There shines a light and sweetness all thine own;

A melody unique is in thy tone,

And in thy touch a mystic magic lies.

With more than woman's wisdom thou art wise;
Nature to thee her very soul hath shown,

And all the hidden mysteries made known

Of birds and flowers, green earth and azure skies;
And thy skilled hand doth tenderly unfold
To us our mother's beauties one by one,-
Her manifold secrets with a pen of gold
Doth write in words that they may read who run.
Thou art my "moon of poets"-and, all told,
I love the moon far better than the sun.

HOW STRAFFORD GOVERNED IRELAND (1632—1641).

IV.

THE first session of the Parliament summoned in 1634 ended on the 2nd of August. The Deputy was not idle during the recess. Knowing well what importance the Irish people were wont to attach to titles and outward show, he petitioned the King to confer on him an Earldom. Affairs were in a prosperous way in Ireland; few other means would improve them so much as the credit vouchsafed by his Majesty to his representative. Much had been done; much more remained to do, greater things than he would dare to propound until he had matured them for his Majesty's judgment. His duties were far above those of his predecessors; it was meet that his dignities should be on a par with his position. He asked that he might obtain this mark of the royal favour before the next meeting of Parliament; it would give proof to all of the approval his conduct in the government of Ireland met with from the King.

In the beginning of his career as a courtier he had been created a Viscount, and made President of the Council of the North," the highest place of honour in those parts." Now he was set to rule a kingdom, to personate the King, to repress a haughty and jealous nobility; surely he might lay claim to all the aids that could be afforded to him to carry out his arduous task, to all the rewards that gratitude could confer on a devoted servant. So certain was he of the success of his petition, that he sent to his friend Coke, the Secretary of State, a letter containing the title he wished to take. After a tedious delay of a month, the King deigned to answer. He began by expressing his great contentment, especially for keeping off the odium of a necessary negative of those "unreasonable graces" that the people expected; he differed from the Deputy's opinion only in the matter of the free exportation of tallow. He was not displeased with the asking of such a favour, but at present he would not grant it; he would do all things a su modo.

The people had shown a readiness to aid the King in his distress; the judges, on their next circuits in the full assizes, were ordered to assure them of his Majesty's good opinion of the faithfulness and loyalty manifested in the last Parliament, and of his desire to show himself gracious to them as occasion should offer. It was a matter of unavoidable necessity for the defence of the country against foreign invasion and intestine rebellion, and for the protection of the vessels trading on the coasts, to call for the yearly contribution of £20,000; but this burden would be soon removed; the tax would cease in December; the subsidies, so generously granted by the Parliament, would be expended solely for the advantage of Ireland. In the next place, they should direct the attention of the people to the unsettled condition of many estates throughout the country, arising from the distempers and disturbances of the late rebellions.

For their benefit, the King had been graciously pleased to issue a Commission of Grace for the confirmation of defective titles, and to give in the last Parliament his royal assent to an act for confirming all estates to be passed in that Commission. The profits arising from it should be employed in defraying the public charges of the kingdom. This, he assured them, was a much more general provision, and a far better security for all who compounded than the law passed in England, which concluded the rights of the crown in three score years' possession; and in due time, after the present Commission had ended, they could have even that law, if they pleased, which they seemed to desire so much. The excessive fees of the officers, both in the temporal and spiritual courts, should be moderated, that all might gather the blessed fruits of justice with as great expedition and as little expense as might be. The Archbishops and Bishops should in future forbear all questioning about clandestine marriages and christenings, which had hitherto been a great burden and charge on the people. Cattle, corn, and other articles, named in the Graces of 1628, could be exported free of charge. A promise was made, too, that a choice of all the best laws enacted for above a hundred years past, for which the subjects of England had paid threescore subsidies at least, and which were not yet in force in Ireland, should now be introduced and enacted. Between the present time and the next session of Parliament, all were to bethink themselves of anything that might tend to their welfare, and make the same known, the good of the kingdom being that which his Majesty principally intended.

Wentworth next drew up a list of the "Graces," fifty-one in number, which had been asked for and promised in Lord Falkland's time. By the side of each he set down, "the humble advice of the Lord Deputy and Council, to be of good use to his Majesty in framing the answer which he would send to the petition of the Lower House." "With some art and difficulty," he obtained from the Council a written adhesion to his own views; but he thought it "the more comely way," that the refusal of the Graces should proceed from those who were interested in obtaining them, and that his " Majesty might be saved from all appearance of declining to grant what would be so prejudicial to the Crown." The list was submitted to the King; and with it the request of the House of Commons presented in 1628, and the instructions issued in reply under the royal signature that had been brought over by the agents. The instructions he now "humbly craved leave to disavise in some parts, as not consisting with the furtherance of the King's service and the good of the kingdom."

The second session of Parliament began on the 4th of November. The first demand of the Commons was that the "Graces" should be confirmed. They had done their part; the bargain struck in Falkland's time had been more than fulfilled; even the most ardent hopes of Wentworth had been surpassed by their generosity. With the Speaker at their head, they asked to be admitted to present their demand to the Deputy. The Lords were not

less earnest.

But Wentworth had his answer ready made. On the 19th of November, he wrote to the Secretary of State, "I am resolved to give them an answer, round and clear, such as, I trust, will stifle them in their replication. I hope to have the Council along with me; howbeit, rather than fail, on I will alone by myself. The course I purpose to hold is, to give my answer in writing, negative or affirmative, as the case requires, without any reason at all, saving that, in the preamble to those I refuse to transmit, as neither fit to pass as laws, or indeed to be once offered to his Majesty, as being, in my judgment, hurtful to the Commonwealth, I will express it in general terms to be done for great and weighty reasons of State and Government. The Graces I will divide into three kinds: the first, of those that are not to be at all granted; and these I will let them know I have not at all transmitted, nor indeed shall, for the reason before expressed; so as they are herewith to rest satisfied, and to look no further after them. The second sort of them may be well granted; and these I will let them know I have transmitted, and his Majesty is graciously pleased they proceed as is desired. The third sort of them may be continued by way of instruction, so long as shall please his Majesty, but not to pass for laws, as they desire. These I will likewise allow to have transmitted over to his Majesty, and that his Majesty is graciously pleased the subject may continue to take the benefit of them, unless his Majesty shall hold it fit for the better government of his people to alter the same. Thus, as I take it, all that is to be denied we take clearly from the King to ourselves, and all that is to be granted we leave it for them wholly to be derived from the bounty and goodness of his Majesty." Such was the return made for the nation's generosity, such the answer to the confidence placed in the King's repeated pledges. No wonder "the Catholic party showed a wayward frowardness. They lost all temper, and broke forth into such a froward sullenness as was strange; to that excess it went, that, had it continued two days in that state, the Deputy was resolved to adjourn the House." The Protestants, who had hitherto given him an unqualified support, now began to absent themselves in such numbers, that the Catholic party had a steady majority of ten, and used it to reject most of the bills that were brought in. Wentworth had boasted that "all the graces prejudicial to the Crown had been so bound asleep, that he was very confident they would never be awakened more." This boast was premature. "I was very much troubled," he wrote to the Secretary of State, "albeit the King had got his reply. I was wondrously unwilling any malevolent tongue should seemingly charge us that, having served the King, we now meanly became careless of what in honour and justice we owed to his people; extremely loth so many good laws should be lost, which might be of excellent use in the future reducement of this kingdom to civility, to a peaceable and sure temper of Government." He summoned the Lords to his presence, and told them" what a shame it was for the Protestant party, that was in number the greater, to suffer their religion to be insensibly transplanted, his Majesty in some degree disregarded, the good ordinances

transmitted for their future peace and good government, to be thus disdainfully trodden under foot by a company of wilful, insolent people, envious both to their religion and fears; and all this for want of a few days' diligent attendance upon the service of the public. He besought those of the Council to speak with all their friends, and show them their great fault, thus to suffer the opposite party to boast and pride themselves in destroying all that the wisdom of his Majesty had provided for the security of themselves and their posterity, and to urge them, in their own name and in his, to attend the House punctually for ten or twelve days, and there do their conscience." The remonstrance had the desired effect; the absentees returned to their duty. The next day, to test the strength of both parties, a motion was made for the expulsion of a member who was obnoxious to the Government; the Protestant party proved to have a majority of sixteen, which, in spite of protests, carried through every measure that was proposed by the Crown.

The cause of all this obstinacy, he asserts, were "the Friars and Jesuits, who, through fear that these laws would conform them to the manners of England, and in time be a means to lead them into a conformity in religion and faith also, oppose and fence up every path leading to so good a purpose." "I see plainly," he adds, "that so long as this kingdom continues popish, they are not a people for the Crown of England to be confident of. Whereas, if they were not still distempered by the infusion of these Friars and Jesuits, I am of belief they would be as good and loyal to their King as any other subjects."

The names of those who had shown most zeal on behalf of the royal interests, and "carried themselves with best affections," were sent to the King, that he might by letter "signify to them his knowledge and acceptance of their good endeavours." Sir Piers Crosby, one of the Privy Council, had not been as blindly obedient as the other members; on one occasion he thought fit to have an opinion of his own, and to give expression to it in the House "against all the rules of sure Government.' He was summarily dismissed from the Council; and when he requested permission to wait on the King and present a petition to be restored, he was told he should have it "in convenient time." Lord Ormond was substituted for him at the Council board; "he had ever expressed very good affections to the Crown and Government; and without him no title could be found for the Crown to Ormond, nor a plantation be established there." A short time before, Ormond had dared to refuse obedience to the Deputy's order. At the opening of Parliament, a proclamation, first issued in Chichester's time, was renewed, forbidding members to enter the Houses with their swords. The usher of the black rod was placed at the entrance of the House of Lords to receive the swords of the peers. Ormond refused to obey; and when the demand was repeated, he replied, that if the officer must receive his sword, it should be in his body. He was allowed to pass; and he sat the whole day in the House with his sword by his side. When the sitting was over, he was summoned before the Council to answer for his