case, courts-martial were held, before which unwilling witnesses were tried on charge of treason, and some actually put to death. Archer, one of the number, had his flesh burned with red-hot iron, and was placed on a gridiron over a charcoal fire till he offered to testify anything that was necessary. Yet on evidence so obtained, whole counties and towns were declared forfeited to the crown.” (_Ibid._) Is it any wonder, therefore, that a people so scourged, plundered, and degraded should cherish in their hearts fierce thoughts of reprisal when opportunity offered? These wholesale land robberies were not confined to the Celtic Irish alone, but were practiced on all Irishmen, of whatever descent, who professed the Catholic faith. Add to these the bitter memories of the murder and persecution of many bishops and innumerable priests and communicants of that faith, and the only wonder is that the Irish Catholic people of the seventeenth, and most of the succeeding, century, retained any of the milder and nobler characteristics of the human family. They were stripped of their property, education, civil rights, and, in short, of all that makes life worth living, including freedom of conscience—that dearest privilege of a people naturally idealistic and devotional. The idea of religious toleration never seems to have entered into the minds of what may be called the “professional Protestant” ascendency, except, as we have seen, for purposes of diplomacy which tended to weaken and divide Irish national opposition to foreign rule. In addition to the grievances we have enumerated, the office of Master of Wards was bestowed upon Sir William Parsons, and thus “the minor heirs of all the Catholic proprietors were placed, both as to, person and property, at the absolute disposal of one of the most intense anti-Catholic bigots that ever appeared on the scene of Irish affairs.” (McGee.) This was one of the pernicious influences that, not for conscience’ sake, but for sordid gain, changed the religion of so many of the ancient families of Ireland from the old to the new form of belief; and no English policy was more bitterly resented and vengefully remembered by the Irish Catholic masses. And because of this dishonest system of proselytizing, carried on by one process or another from the period of the Reformation to the reign of Victoria, the Irish Catholic peasant has associated “conversion” of any of his neighbors to the Protestant belief with personal degradation. The Irish Catholic peasant has no feeling but that of utter contempt and aversion for a “turn-coat” Catholic; but he is most liberal in his feelings toward all Protestants “to the manor born,” as has been frequently and emphatically manifested by his choice of Protestant leaders, from Grattan to Parnell. Whatever of religious bigotry may linger in the warm heart of the Catholic peasant may be justly charged to outrageous misgovernment, not to his