education, I have offended your Majesty and your laws, for the which I have required and obtained your Majesty’s pardon.  And for that I most humbly, from the bottom of my heart, thank your Majesty, and still do with all humbleness require the continuance of the same; and I faithfully promise here before Almighty God and your Majesty, and in presence of all these your nobles, that I intend, by God’s grace, to live hereafter in the obedience of your Majesty as a subject of your land of Ireland.

’And because this my speech, being Irish, is not well understanded, I have caused this my submission to be written in English and Irish, and thereto have set my hand and seal; and to these gentlemen, my kinsmen and friends, I most humbly beseech your Majesty to be merciful and gracious.’

Camden remarks that the bare-headed galloglasse, with long dishevelled hair, crocus-dyed shirts, wide sleeves, short jackets, shaggy cloaks, &c., were objects of great wonder to the Londoners; while the hauteur of the Irish prince excited the merriment of the courtiers, who styled him ’O’Neill the Great, cousin to St. Patrick, friend to the Queen of England, enemy to all the world besides.’  Notwithstanding Shane’s precautions with respect to the safe-conduct, English artifice outdid Irish cunning.  With all their horror of the Jesuits, Elizabeth’s ministers in this case practised mental reservation.  True, the Government had promised to permit him to return to Ireland, but then the time of his stay had not been specified.  Various pretexts were invented to detain him.  He must be recognised as his father’s heir; the cause must be pleaded before the English judges; the young Baron of Dungannon must come over and be heard on the other side.  O’Neill was told that he had been sent for, while Cecil wrote privately to Fitzwilliam to keep him safe in Ireland.  While the prince was thus humoured with vain excuses, he was occupied in pleading his own cause by flattering communications to the Queen, ’whose fame was spoken of throughout the world.’  He wished to study the wisdom of her government, that he might know better how to order himself in civil polity.  He was most urgent that her Majesty would give him ’some noble English lady for a wife, with augmentation of living suitable.’  If she would give him his father’s earldom, he would make her the undisputed sovereign of willing subjects in Ulster; he would drive away all her enemies, save her from all further expense, and secure for her a great increase of revenue.  He begged in the meantime, that he might be allowed to attend her favourite, Lord Robert Cecil, in order to learn ’to ride after the English fashion, to run at the tilt, to hawk, to shoot, and use such other good exercises as the said good lord was most apt unto.’  Thus month after month passed away, and Shane was still virtually a prisoner.  ‘At length,’ says Mr. Froude, ’the false dealing produced its cruel fruit, the murder of the boy who was used as the pretext for the delay.  Sent for to England, yet prevented from obeying the command, the young Baron of Dungannon was waylaid at the beginning of April in a wood near Carlingford by Turlogh O’Neill.  He fled for his life, with the murderers behind him, till he reached the bank of a deep river, which he could not swim, and there he was killed.’