All Ireland was in flames; three-fourths of Kildare County and the greater part of Meath was burned; thousands of innocent people died of starvation and thousands in battle before the rebellion was suppressed. Finally Kildare, who was then but twenty-four, surrendered upon a promise that he should receive full pardon when he arrived in London and renewed his allegiance personally to the king. This pledge was shamefully violated. Henry VIII. refused to receive him, and sent him to the Tower, where for eighteen months he lay neglected and in great misery. He wrote an old servant asking money for clothes, saying: "I have gone shirtless and barefoot and bare-legged divers times, and so I should have done still but that poor prisoners of their gentleness hath sometimes given me old hosen and shirts and shoes." Five of his uncles, although it was well known that three of them had remained stanch adherents of the crown, were hanged, drawn, and quartered at Tyburn, Feb. 8, 1537, and orders went forth from Henry VIII. that the house of Kildare should be exterminated. Gerald, the baby heir, the only survivor of his race, was wrapped in warm flannels by Thomas Leverus, afterward Bishop of Kildare, carried across bog and mountain, and committed to the protection of the O'Brians, who by sending the infant from place to place were able to save its life. The O'Brians passed the child over to the MacCarthys, and Lady Eleanor MacCarthy, a widow, disguised as a peasant, conveyed him to St. Mels, France, upon a fishing boat. Even there he was pursued from one place of refuge to another, by detectives and adventurers in hopes of the great reward, until finally he obtained a safe retreat in Rome, where Cardinal Pole, a distant relative, protected and educated him. When he grew to manhood he entered the service of Cosmo de Medicis, the great Duke of Florence, with whom he remained until Henry VIII., the vindictive enemy of his family, was dead. He could then return in safety to his native country, and Queen Mary soon after pardoned him and restored his hereditary titles and estates. Fourteen generations of Kildares have passed across the stage since then, and the present Duke of Leinster represents a family that has had more exciting experiences than any other in the United Kingdom. XI DROGHEDA, AND THE VALLEY OF THE BOYNE