Art. 6.-STRAFFORD IN IRELAND.

Strafford and Ireland; The History of his Vice-Royalty with an account of his Trial. By Hugh O'Grady Litt.D. Two vols. Dublin: Hodges Figgis, 1923. HITHERTO, in Ireland the name of Strafford has bee held only second in execration to that of Cromwell. 4 last, the wheel has gone full circle; and an Irishman, D Hugh O'Grady, has arisen who endeavours not merely reverse the verdict passed on 'Black Tom Tyrant,' b further to prove that it was under his rule that the di tressful country enjoyed her sole, her brief, golden ag Seldom have the slow mills of God ground so extreme small as in Dr O'Grady's 'Strafford,' though whether will prove his case to his countrymen is another story

Macaulay is responsible for the opinions of th average reader, and Strafford was the incarnation of that he most abominated, for in Strafford, Macaulay a his school saw the protagonist of autocracy vers Parliamentary Government. When Macaulay wrote the worship of Parliamentary institutions was at height, every true-born Briton regarding a constituti as the heaven-sent panacea for the woes of every count and every race. Since Macaulay's day, constitutio

have been showered on mankind from China to Pe. Nevertheless, the millennium is not yet in sight, and tr jury system, and Parliamentary representation are haps no longer the irreducible minimum of the Engli man's political prescription. The atmosphere is, the e fore, more favourable for a revision of the verdict the Great Proconsul, though where Mr S. R. Gardid and Mr Bagwell have failed to affect that verdict, O'Grady may not be more fortunate. For, carefu sifted as is their evidence, it is ill pitting these writt against the whirlwind eloquence of the most brilli of historians. Yet Mr Bagwell is undoubtedly ri when he remarks: The Puritans were satisfied to t Strafford an apostate, and the Whigs followed the But he never really belonged to the popular party 8 he sought office from the first not only from ambit but from a love of efficient government.'"

'Ireland under the Stuarts,' by R. Bagwell, vol. I, 130.

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The fact is that although Thomas Wentworth goes own to history as the champion of Stuart rule, in his ental make-up he was more nearly akin to the Elizathan era which saw his birth. Indeed, it was by a atural evolution that the school-boy diligently inscribing horow' in his copy-books, came to dream of realising andry of the Tudor visions when he grew to man's tate. The flame-like energy, that talent for organisaon which approaches the creator's genius, an impatience theories, only equalled by a passionate faith in actical remedies, all designate Thomas Wentworth a survival from the generation which had known the ern necessities of a struggle for national existence. ictory had crowned that struggle. The menace of e foreigner withdrawn, opinion no longer demanded he subordination of individual beliefs to the behest the Governor, who alone could ride out the storm. oreover, though her Stuart successors made their anoply of Elizabeth's prerogative, they were nickened by her spirit. A deep gulf had, therefore, arted the world of Strafford's manhood from that of childhood, though he himself, by early associations, traditions and by temperament, was steeled against nversion to the new ideals. Heredity and circumences too had contributed no little to the moulding of is champion of the divine right. On his father's side, lomas Wentworth came of the class who were the ry backbone of rural life; the country gentlemen, rn and trained to command and responsibility; many them permeated by the scholarship of the Renaisce, yet in close touch with the actualities of everyy country existence; the squire and knights, baronets d landowners, whose fine probity was unstained by atact with the Court. As these gentlemen had been gland's living bulwark during the perils of Elizabeth's , so in opposing camps they were to impart a racter of highmindedness never approached in any ler popular revolution. Of this stock, for good or ill, ne Wentworth, yet with every quality and affinity tched to a higher level. Richelieu was not far wrong en he hailed Strafford-Oliver Cromwell being yet known to fame as the outstanding, governing, and apelling spirit of his generation in England. The

English are so foolish,' said the Cardinal, that they will not let their wisest head stand on its own shoulders.'

Born in 1593, married in 1611, Thomas Wentworth though already a member of Parliament, was barely o age when his father's death in 1614 made him the hea of his house, the guardian of his brothers and sister and the possessor of a rent-roll equal to a modern incom of 40,000l. a year. These early responsibilities, which h took seriously, left their stamp on his character, just a his travels on the Continent, and association with dipl mats like Sir Henry Wotton, gave him a firsthan knowledge of foreign affairs, which was bound to confli with the prejudices of Puritan faddists. Wentwort indeed, had the gift of utilising personal experienc No grist came amiss to his mill, and he was too big man to fear criticism. Once made up, his mind w impervious to doubt; but in the process of acquaintin himself with a subject, he courted information, an irritable as he undoubtedly was, nerves overstraine and body racked by gout, he not only encouraged th utmost plain speaking from those he trusted, but su mitted to their rebukes even on such tender points his cholerick disposition.'

As President of the North, Wentworth had served apprenticeship of Government which had not been whol pacific, since he had been obliged to bring up guns bombard Lord Eure's house at Malton, before he cou compel obedience to a Chancery decree. Neverthele a man who in 1633-the year of Wentworth's appoin ment as Deputy-crossed from England to Ireland, le a country ordered on lines faintly approaching o modern notions of civilisation for one described by eminent Roman Catholic prelate as the land of licen and liberty.'

To reduce the island to order, Wentworth could n hope for assistance from his executive, who, to quote I O'Grady, consisted rather of 'great brigands than gre public servants':

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For forty years a powerful independent oligarchy, Irish chiefs, the Anglo-Irish lords, and the great State officia had ruled Ireland, reinforced by, and intermarried with, t merchant class, English and Irish, who, either as undertaker purchasers, or mortgagers, were spreading over the country

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ing submerged in the aristocracy. . . . Behind this comne lay the vast welter of social discontent, the landless sations of clandom and feudalism, and the outcome of the ansition period from the old to the new tenures. These nstituted a menace to the country. Dependent on their ds, with nothing to lose, they were the inflammable terial which any Irish lord could let loose at any time t he felt so disposed' (1, p. 16).

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As almost invariably happens when the body politic sick, the financial means to meet the most pressing eds were lacking. The Treasury was on the verge of nkruptcy, the final subsidy of 20,000l. well-nigh exusted, and without money to pay the army, the judges, the guardships, it was something of a problem to ow how to run the machine of State. Yet by combination of astuteness and authority, highly aracteristic of the new Governor, the apparently oluble problem was solved in a comparatively short me. The fact is that before he landed in Ireland, rough the medium of Toby Matthews, the unofficial art jester, whose japes and verses camouflaged talent hich nowadays would be utilised in a secret Intelligence epartment, Wentworth had been feeling the pulse of Roman Catholic community. He was consequently are that to avoid the imposition of recusancy taxes, vocated by Lord Cork and the Protestant wing of the uncil, the Romanists of Ireland were prepared to vote merous subsidies. Moreover, the promise of a Parliaent to confirm the many dubious patents and grants land, was a lure to Protestant and Roman Catholic ike, and between hopes and fears the renewal of conibutions was guaranteed for another year. In that ar, before he met Parliament, Wentworth set himself drilling the army, the force which discharged the ad given over to anarchy. Mounted on a splendid actions of our modern police, the arm of the law in a arger, with a black plume floating from his helmet, Deputy was to be seen day after day schooling his Ten the difference of age and numbers, ultimately ry indifferent warriors into a state of efficiency, which, alled the contemptible little army' of 1914. Of all miracles that Strafford's iron determination brought pass in five short years, the transformation of the

army was not the least. What it was before his advent we know full well from contemporary letters and official *** reports. Hungry, naked, and mutinous, the soldier were described by their own officers; and their conduc justified the refusal of the Dublin citizens to alloy them within the walls. Since both officers and pay wer conspicuous by their absence, it was scarcely surprisin that the privates made a practice of pawning the weapons to get food and drink in public-houses, borro ing arms from the good-natured 'natives' when a para could no longer be evaded—though a parade must hap been a rarity, since in the first six months of his reig Wentworth only succeeded in ferreting out six captai not on leave.' And those six captains must have be men of considerably diplomatic talent, since, owing the condition of vendetta prevailing in the public service if an officer was on good terms with the Lords Justice in it followed that the Vice-Treasurer would refuse hi pay for himself and his troop. Naturally, since m must live somehow, plundering the inhabitants w winked at, if not actually encouraged, by the officers.

The sister service, if such a pompous title cand bestowed on the 'Whelps,' the guardships supposed to protect Irish commerce, was no less inefficient than th Army. Pirates and privateers, rather than the Kin Fleet, held the seas. Though the Deputy contrived escape the pirates on his arrival, they captured his lin and stores-a success they must have subsequently th gretted since if anything was needed to strength Wentworth's resolution to annihilate the corsairs, was this direct affront to the King's representative. was, however, a resolution which might easily ha remained a pious aspiration. The Galway mercha who should have been their natural enemies, on the c trary, welcomed the pirates as more remunerative buy and sellers than the genuine merchantmen; while Cork gentry found through them the easiest means evading the Customs. Not that the excisemen w impervious to financial argument. They were rea enough, being ill-paid, to bargain with smugglers pirates who 'paid them cash, while the State only pl paper.'

The pirate of our early story-books is generally a l