Under such disadvantages, we are not surprised to learn that O’Neill adopted a policy of his own, at once bold and original. He temporized with the Parliamentarians, and actually entered into a three months’ truce with General George Monck, who had succeeded to the unlucky Monroe’s command in the North. The distrust and hatred of Ormond, whose military power waned immediately after his crushing defeat by General Jones, already mentioned, were so great that both Galway and Limerick refused to admit his garrisons. He and his wretched ally, Inchiquin, became utterly discredited with the Old Irish party, and soon fled the kingdom their infamies had cursed. Ormond returned to England after the Restoration and was one of Charles II’s intimates. It can hardly be wondered at, therefore, that, to use McGee’s language, “the singular spectacle was exhibited of Monck forwarding supplies to O’Neill to be used against Ormond and Inchiquin, and O’Neill coming to the rescue of Coote and raising for him the siege of Derry.” It was unfortunate that all of the Parliamentary generals were not possessed of the chivalric qualities of Monck and that hard fortune again compelled Owen Roe to draw the sword for the cause of the ingrate Stuarts. As for the Anglo-Irish, whether of the Church of Rome or the Church of England, they clung to the fortunes, or rather the misfortunes, of Charles II as faithfully and vehemently as to those of his infatuated father. This was all the more noteworthy, as the younger Charles had even less to recommend him to public estimation than his sire. He lived to be a disgrace to even the throne of England, which has been filled too often by monarchs of degraded and dissolute character. The second Charles of England was destitute of every virtue, except physical courage. He had, in a high degree, that superficial good nature which distinguished his race, but he was a libertine, an ingrate, and a despicable time-server. But Ireland did not learn these truths about his character until long after the period of his checkered career here dealt with. It must be borne in mind, however, that in the middle of the seventeenth century the divinity which is alleged to hedge a king was much more apparent to the masses of the people than it is in our own generation, when the microscopic eye of an educated public opinion is turned upon the throne and detects the slightest flaw, in the “fierce light” which beats upon it. The Old Irish party cared little for Charles, but when it came to a choice between him and Cromwell, there was nothing left them but to throw their swords into the scale for the youthful monarch, who was not nearly as “merry” then as he became in after days, when he quite forgot the friends of his adversity. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER VIII