liberty, the happiness, and the prosperity of “the most unfortunate of nations.” Henry having “graciously” received the submission of Strongbow and his confederates, proceeded, at once—for he was a monarch of great energy—to make a “royal progress” through the partially subdued portions of Munster and Leinster. He took care, in doing this, to show Pope Adrian’s mischievous “bull” to the Irish prelates and princes, some of whom, to their discredit be it confessed, bowed slavishly to the ill-considered mandate of the Pontiff. Many of the princes were even base enough to give Henry “the kiss of peace,” when, instead, they should have rushed to arms to defend the honor and independence of their country. The prelates, trained to ecclesiastical docility, disgusted with the everlasting civil contentions of the country, and fearful of further unavailing bloodshed, had some feeble excuse for their ill-timed acquiescence, but what are we to say of those wretched Irish princes who so weakly and wickedly betrayed their nation to the foreign usurper? They were by no means ignorant men, as times went, but they were ambitious, vain, and jealous of the half-acknowledged authority of High King Roderick, who, poor man, seems to have been the Henry VI of Ireland. Those treasonable princes deserve enduring infamy, and foremost among them were Dermid McCarthy, King of Desmond, and Donald O’Brien, King of Thomond. Both lived to regret most bitterly their cowardice and treason. Henry II was a politic monarch. He flattered the pliable Irish bishops and spoke to them gently about Church reforms, while he palavered the despicable Irish princes, and, at the same time, pretended to favor the common people and affected to check the rapacity of his Norman subjects. Hostilities ceased for a time, except on the borders of Leinster and Connaught, where King Roderick, deserted by many of his allies, and deeply depressed at the absence of national union against the invaders, kept up an unavailing resistance. In this he was encouraged and aided by the patriotic Archbishop of Dublin, St. Lorcan O’Tuhill, who appears to have been the only man among the entire Irish hierarchy who comprehended the iron grip the Normans had on the throat of Ireland. Had all the prelates been like St. Lorcan, and preached a war of extermination against the invaders at the outset, Ireland could, undoubtedly, have thrown off the yoke, because the princes would have been forced by their people, over whom the bishops had great moral sway, to heal their feuds and make common cause for their country. King Roderick, despite his errors, deserves honor for his patriotic spirit. The Ulster princes, too, with few exceptions, stood out manfully against the foreigner, and a long period elapsed before the Anglo-Norman power found a secure footing amid the rugged glens and dense forests of the western and northern portions of the invaded island.