The Irish were obliged to submit to the terms imposed by the conquerors, glad in their destitution to be permitted to occupy their own lands as tenants at will.  The English undertakers, as we have seen, were bound to deal differently with the English settlers; but their obligations resolved themselves into promises of freeholds and leases which were seldom granted, so that many persons threw up their farms in despair, and returned to their own country.

In the border county of Monaghan, we have a good illustration of the manner in which the natives struggled to live under their new masters.  The successors of some of those masters have in modern times taken a strange fancy to the study of Irish antiquities.  Among these is Evelyn P. Shirley, Esq., who has published ’Some Account of the Territory or Dominion of Farney.’  The account is interesting, and, taken in connection with the sequel given to the public by his agent, Mr. W. Steuart Trench, it furnishes an instructive chapter in the history of the land war.  The whole barony of Farney was granted by Queen Elizabeth to Walter Earl of Essex in the year 1576, in reward for the massacres already recorded.  It was then an almost unenclosed plain, consisting chiefly of coarse pasturage, interspersed with low alder-scrub.  When the primitive woods were cut down for fuel, charcoal, or other purposes, the stumps remained in the ground, and from these fresh shoots sprang up thickly.  The clearing out of these stumps was difficult and laborious; but it had to be done before anything, but food for goats, could be got out of the land.  This was ‘the M’Mahons’ country,’ and the tribe was not wholly subdued till 1606, when the power of the Ulster chiefs was finally broken.  The lord deputy, the chancellor, and the lord chief justice passed through Farney on their way to hold assizes for the first time in Derry and Donegal.  They were protected by a guard of ’seven score foot, and fifty or three score horse, which,’ wrote Sir John Davis, ’is an argument of a good time and a confident deputy; for in former times (when the state enjoyed the best peace and security) no lord deputy did ever venture himself into those parts, without an army of 800 or 1000 men.’  At this time Lord Essex had leased the barony of Farney to Evor M’Mahon for a yearly rent of 250 l. payable in Dublin.  After fourteen years the same territory was let to Brian M’Mahon for 1,500 l.  In the year 1636, the property yielded a yearly rent of 2022 l. 18 s. 4 d. paid by thirty-eight tenants.  A map then taken gives the several townlands and denominations nearly as they are at present.  Robert Earl of Essex, dying in 1646, his estates devolved on his sisters, Lady Frances and Lady Dorothy Devereux, the former of whom married Sir W. Seymour, afterwards Marquis of Hertfort, and the latter Sir Henry Shirley, Bart., ancestor of the present proprietor of half the barony.  Ultimately the other half became the property of the Marquis of Bath.  At the division