Ormonde's character has sufficiently appeared in the course of these volumes. His patience was boundless. Burnet, who had not much in common with him, says he was 'firm to the Protestant religion, and so far firm to the laws that he always gave good advices: but even when bad ones were followed, he was not for complaining too much of them.' His distinguishing principle was loyalty to the person of the sovereign and to the Crown as an institution. Thus, he fought for Charles I. as long as he had any party, and then he surrendered Dublin to the Parliament rather than damage the value of the reversion. Having begun by repressing the Irish rebels, he joined them when they were fain to call themselves royalists. During the interregnum he followed Charles II., and even risked his life in London when Cromwell was at the height of his power. During his three years of retirement after the accession of James, he continued to give good advice, and followed the King as long as he was able to go about. In Ireland he was undoubtedly popular, though an offence to extreme men on either side. Those who were ruined by the Act of Settlement thought he did not do enough for them. The Settlement, however, was not specially his work, but the result of the political situation, and for many he was able to secure special terms. By the Roman ecclesiastics he was, of course, hated, but they had done him all the harm they could in their day of power, and he made no secret of his wish to divide them. Most of his relations were Roman Catholics, but he stood staunchly by the Church of England. For persecution he had no taste, and he did much to soften the action of the English House of Commons. He did not neglect his own interests, though he might have had much more than he got, but some critics forgot that he had been in dire poverty during several years of exile. He, or rather his Duchess, was extravagant, as when 2000_l._ was spent on Charles II.'s supper, but his own tastes were very simple, and a boiled leg of mutton was all he insisted on. As a soldier he distinguished himself in the early part of the Civil War, but the disaster at Rathmines damaged his military reputation. He had a very bad army there, and Michael Jones had a very good one. His whole career is a comment on Wellington's question--How is the King's government to be carried on? The sovereigns whom he served were unworthy of such loyalty, but both England and Ireland profited by it.[174] [Sidenote: Disturbed state of Leinster.] [Sidenote: Price's case.]