Immediately after the arrival of the new Lord Justice, a quarrel sprung up between him and FitzGerald, Baron of Offaly.  They both appeared before the Council; and if Hollinshed’s account may be credited, they used language which would scarcely be tolerated in Billingsgate.  FitzGerald proposed an appeal to arms, which was accepted by his adversary.  Edward summoned both parties to Westminster.  FitzGerald came duly equipped for the encounter, but De Vesci had fled the country.  He was, however, acquitted by Parliament, on the ground of informality, and the affair was referred to the royal decision.  According to Hollinshed’s account, the King observed, that “although de Vesci had conveyed his person to France, he had left his land behind him in Ireland;” and bestowed the lordships of Kildare and Rathangan on his adversary.

Wogan was Viceroy during the close of this century, and had ample occupation pacifying the Geraldines and Burkes—­an occupation in which he was not always successful.  Thomas FitzMaurice, “of the ape,” father of the first Earl of Desmond, had preceded him in the office of Justiciary.  This nobleman obtained his cognomen from the circumstances of having been carried, when a child, by a tame ape round the walls of a castle, and then restored to his cradle without the slightest injury.

The English possessions in Ireland at the close of this century consisted of the “Liberties” and ten counties—­Dublin, Louth, Kildare, Waterford, Tipperary, Cork, Limerick, Kerry, Roscommon, and part of Connaught.  The “Liberties” were those of Connaught and Ulster, under De Burgo; Meath, divided between De Mortimer and De Verdun; Wexford, Carlow, and Kilkenny, under the jurisdiction of the respective representatives of the Marshal heiresses; Thomond, claimed by De Clare; and Desmond, partly controlled by the FitzGeralds.  Sir William Davies says:  “These absolute palatines made barons and knights; did exercise high justice in all points within their territories; erected courts for criminal and civil cases, and for their own revenues, in the same forms as the King’s courts were established at Dublin; made their own judges, sheriffs, coroners, and escheators, so as the King’s writ did not run in these counties (which took up more than two parts of the English colonies), but only in the church-lands lying within the same, which were called the ‘Cross,’ wherein the King made a sheriff; and so in each of these counties-palatine there were two sheriffs, one of the Liberty, and another of the Cross.  These undertakers were not tied to any form of plantation, but all was left to their discretion and pleasure; and although they builded castles and made freeholds, yet there were no tenures or services reserved to the crown, but the lords drew all the respect and dependency of the common people unto themselves.”  Hence the strong objection which the said lords had to the introduction of English law; for had this been accomplished, it would have proved a serious check