But O’Neill’s days of almost unclouded triumph were drawing to a close. He was, at last, about to meet an English commander who, if not as able as himself, was infinitely more cunning and unscrupulous. This was Charles Blount, Earl of Mountjoy, a trained soldier, a veteran diplomat, a fierce Protestant theologian, and a ripe scholar. His motto, on assuming the duties of Lord Deputy in Ireland, would seem to have been “Divide and Conquer.” Mountjoy saw, at once, that steel alone could not now subdue Ireland, and he was determined to resort to other methods, more potent but less manly. About the same time, there also came to Ireland two other famous English generals, Sir George Carew and Sir Henry Dowcra. The new deputy brought with him large reinforcements, so that the English army in Ireland was more powerful than it had ever been before; and Mountjoy’s orders were, in effect, that Ulster, in particular, should be honeycombed with royal garrisons, especially along its coast-line. Although Mountjoy himself was checked, at the outset, by O’Neill’s army, Sir Henry Dowcra, with a powerful force, transported by sea from Carrickfergus, occupied and fortified the hill of Derry, on the Foyle—the ground on which now stands the storied city of Londonderry. Other border garrisons were strengthened by the Lord Deputy, and everything was made ready for a vigorous prosecution of the war. The penal laws against the Irish Catholics were softened, so as, if possible, to detach the Anglo-Irish Catholics from the Celtic Catholic Irish, and also to impress the weak-kneed among the latter with “the friendly intentions of her Majesty’s government”—very much like the court language in use to-day. The bait took, as might have been expected—for every good cause has its Iscariots—and we soon hear of jealous kinsmen of the patriot chiefs “coming over to” the queen’s “interest” and doing their utmost—the heartless scoundrels—to divide and distract the strength of their country, engaged in a deadly struggle for her rights and liberty. These despicable wretches are foul blotches on the pages of Ireland’s history. But for them, she could have finally shaken off the English yoke, which would have saved Ireland centuries of martyrdom and England centuries of shame. And so we find Sir Arthur O’Neill becoming “the queen’s O’Neill”—his branch of the family had long been in the English interest; Connor Roe McGuire becoming “the queen’s McGuire,” and so on _ad nauseam_. These creatures had no love for England or Elizabeth, but simply hoped to further their own selfish ends by disloyalty to their chiefs and treason to their country. We confess that this is a chapter of Irish history from which we would gladly turn in pure disgust did not our duty, as a writer of history, compel us to dwell upon it yet a while longer. Dermot O’Connor, who held a command under O’Neill’s Desmond in Munster, yielded to the seductions of Carew