A proclamation issued by the English Lords Justices, in the name of William and Mary, immediately after the fall of Athlone, offered inducements, in the shape of promotion and money, to such officers and soldiers of the Irish army as would desert their colors and accept service with De Ginkel. Very few traitors availed themselves of the offer, but many of those who were indignant with St. Ruth abandoned the camp and joined the irregular forces of the military Hiberno-Spanish adventurer, Baal Dearg O’Donnell, who claimed to be of the noble House of Tyrconnel, and had lately come from Spain, apparently without a settled purpose or principle. Instead of uniting his 7,000 irregulars with the regular Irish army under St. Ruth, who had no French troops whatever with him, O’Donnell assumed the airs of a hereditary Irish prince, affected to despise James as well as William, and established his camp and court in the country between Tuam and Athenry, within two short marches, if made even in ordinary time, of the Irish encampment on Kilcommodan Hill. St. Ruth summoned him to his aid, but the adventurer, whose selfish conduct some Irish writers, notably Mr. Haverty, have sought to explain and excuse, made no reply, and, to this day, he is remembered in Ireland with detestation not unmingled with contempt. His duty, when within sound of the cannon of Aughrim, was to hasten to the field and spare the fate of his gallant countrymen. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER IV De Ginkel Marches After St. Ruth—The Latter Prepares to “Conquer or Die”—His Speech to the Irish Army on the Eve of Fighting