The defeat and death of “Shane the Proud” had left Ulster, temporarily, without a military chief competent to make head against the English, and, therefore, the Desmonds were left, practically, without help from the northern province. Notwithstanding, the new Lord Deputy, Perrott, kept his eyes fixed steadily on Ulster, the fighting qualities of whose sons he knew only too well. In Tyrconnel young Hugh Roe, or Red Hugh, O’Donnell, was growing fast to manhood, and his fame as an athlete, a hunter, and hater of the English, spread throughout Ireland. Hugh O’Neill, the son of Matthew, Baron of Dungannon, was enjoying himself at Elizabeth’s court, where he made the acquaintance of Cecil, Essex, Bacon, Marshal Bagnal, Mountjoy, and numerous other celebrities, and basked in the sunshine of the royal favor, which he took particular pains to cultivate. He was a handsome young man, of middle size, rigidly trained to arms, and “shaped in proportion fair.” The queen’s object was to make him an instrument in her hands for the final subjugation of Ireland. He seemed to enter readily into her plans, which his quick intellect at once comprehended, and he met her wiles with a dissimulation as profound as her own. If any man ever outwitted Elizabeth, politically, that man was Hugh O’Neill, whom she finally created Earl of Tyrone—a title which, in his inmost heart, he despised, much preferring his hereditary designation of “The O’Neill.” But it was not Hugh’s immediate purpose to quarrel with Elizabeth about titles, or, in fact, anything else. He was graciously permitted to raise a bodyguard of his own clansmen, and to arm and drill them at his pleasure. Nay, more, the queen allowed him to send from England shiploads of lead wherewith to put a new roof on his castle of Dungannon. And he went to Ireland to look after his interests in person. Soon, rumors reached Elizabeth that O’Neill, when he had sufficiently drilled one batch of clansmen, substituted another; and that enough lead had been shipped by him from England to Tyrone to roof twenty castles. It was further rumored that the clanswomen of Tyrone were employed casting bullets at night, instead of spinning and weaving. O’Neill, learning of these rumors from English friends, repaired to London, and, at once, reassured the queen as to his “burning loyalty and devotion to her person.” So he was permitted to return to Dungannon unmolested. Unlike his fierce kinsman, John the Proud, Hugh cultivated the friendship of all the Ulster chiefs, within reach, and more particularly that of the brave and handsome young Red Hugh O’Donnell. Nor did he confine his friendly relations to the chiefs of Ulster. He also perfected good understandings with many in the other three provinces, and managed to keep on good terms with the English also. Indeed, he did not hesitate to take the field occasionally “in the interest of the queen,” and, on one occasion, during a skirmish in Munster, received a wound in the thigh. How could