Meanwhile William had attempted to enter into negotiations with Tyrconnel. For this purpose he had employed as his agent Richard Hamilton, who had once held a commission in James's army, but who now professed to have changed his allegiance. Hamilton pledged his word that, if he failed in his commission, he would come back in three weeks; but, forfeiting his promise, he returned to his old allegiance, and became a chief leader on the side of James. But the character of the quarrel was already changing, the real object of Tyrconnel, in common with the greater part of the Irish Catholics, was to uphold neither James nor William, but to destroy for ever the English supremacy. For this purpose he was willing to use the name of James, trusting in fact to the assistance of Louis, to whom he opened his real design. He succeeded in ridding himself of Mountjoy, whose loyal influence was likely to thwart his plans, by sending him on a mission to St. Germains, where James now held his Court, and where he was at once apprehended. He then summoned the Irish to arms. An army of 50,000 Papists was collected, and many thousands more took arms on their own behalf, and ravaged the Protestant settlements around them. To complete the Irish supremacy, Tyrconnel ordered the Protestants to be disarmed. The destruction wrought is inconceivable. Property which has been estimated at £5,000,000 was destroyed. Whole herds of cattle were killed and left to rot in the fields; 50,000 are said to have been thus killed in six weeks, while about 400,000 sheep were similarly slain. Unable to withstand this general movement, the Protestants in the south and west were overpowered, or retreated if possible to the strongholds of Londonderry and Enniskillen. In those two places the flower of the English settlers stood at bay, surrounded on all sides by hordes of liberated serfs now in mutiny against their former masters. An army was ordered to march northwards under the traitor Richard Hamilton. The Protestants fled before it; 30,000 of them collected as a last asylum behind the walls of Londonderry. [Sidenote: He gets James over.] The country was in this condition when James, in answer to the messages which Tyrconnel had sent him, determined, with the assent of Louis, and with considerable assistance in officers and arms, himself to visit Ireland. He landed at Cork, and soon appeared in the capital, while William, unable to act with energy on account of the difficulties which surrounded him, was assailed by unthinking men with violent abuse for not taking stronger measures to prevent those disasters which he was really watching with the greatest dismay. [Sidenote: Character of Irish Jacobites.]