[Sidenote a:  A.D. 1649.  Oct 12.]

with indignation, O’Neil accepted the offers of Ormond, and marched from Londonderry to join the royal army; but his progress was retarded by sickness, and he died at Clocknacter in Cavan.  His officers, however, fulfilled his intentions; the arrival of the men of Ulster revived the courage of their associates; and the English general was successively foiled in his attempts upon Duncannon and Waterford.  His forces already began to suffer from the inclemency of the season, when Lord Broghill, who had lately returned from England, debauched the fidelity of the regiments under Lord Inchiquin.  The garrisons of Cork, Youghal, Bandon, and Kinsale declared for the parliament, and Cromwell seized the opportunity to close the campaign and place his followers in winter quarters.[1]

But inactivity suited not his policy or inclination.  After seven weeks of repose he again summoned them into the field;[a] and at the head of twenty thousand men, well appointed and disciplined, confidently anticipated the entire conquest of Ireland.  The royalists were destitute of money, arms, and ammunition; a pestilential disease, introduced with the cargo of a ship from Spain, ravaged their quarters; in the north, Charlemont alone acknowledged the royal authority; in Leinster and Munster, almost every place of importance had been wrested from them by force or perfidy; and even in Connaught, their last refuge, internal dissension prevented that union which alone could save them from utter destruction.  Their misfortunes called into

[Footnote 1:  Phil.  Iren. i. 231.  Carte’s Ormond, ii. 102.  Desid.  Curios.  Hib. ii. 521.]

[Sidenote a:  A.D. 1650.  Jan. 29.]

action the factions which had lain dormant since the departure of the nuncio.  The recent treachery of Inchiquin’s forces had engendered feelings of jealousy and suspicion; and many contended that it was better to submit at once to the conqueror than to depend on the doubtful fidelity of the lord lieutenant.  Cromwell met with little resistance:  wherever he came, he held out the promise of life and liberty of conscience;[1] but the rejection of the offer, though it were afterwards accepted, was punished with the blood of the officers; and, if the place were taken by force, with indiscriminate slaughter.[2] Proceeding on this plan, one day granting quarter, another putting the leaders only to the sword, and on the next immolating the whole garrison, hundreds of human beings at a time, he quickly reduced most of the towns and castles in the three counties of Limerick, Tipperary, and Kilkenny.  But this bloody policy at length recoiled upon its author.  Men, with no alternative but victory or death, learned to fight with the energy of despair.  At the siege of Kilkenny the assailants, though twice repulsed from the breach, were, by the timidity of some of the inhabitants,

[Footnote 1:  Liberty of conscience he explained to mean liberty of internal belief, not of external worship.—­See his letter in Phil.  Iren. i. 270.]