erate. The Munster colonists had gone over almost to a man to the
enemy. The "panther Inchiquin" had taken another bound in the same
direction. The quarrels between Ormond and the old Irish party had grown
bitterer than ever The hatred of the extreme Catholic party towards him
appears to have been if anything rather deeper than their hatred to
Cromwell, and all the recent disasters were charged by them to his want
of generalship. The young king had been announced at one moment to be
upon the point of arriving in person in Ireland. "One must go and die
there, for it is shameful to live elsewhere!" he is reported to have
cried, with a depth of feeling very unlike his usual utterances. He got
as far as Jersey, but there paused. Ireland under Cromwell's rule was
not exactly a pleasant royal residence, and, on the whole, he appears to
have thought it wiser to go no further.

His signature, a year later, of the Covenant, in return for the Scotch
allegiance, brought about a final collapse of the always thinly cemented
pact in Ireland. The old Catholic party thereupon broke wholly away from
Ormond, and after a short struggle he was again driven into exile. From
this time forward, there was no longer a royal party of any sort left in
the country.

Under Hugh O'Neill, a cousin of Owen Roe, who--fortunately, perhaps, for
himself--had died shortly after Cromwell's arrival, the struggle was
carried on for some time longer. As in later times, Limerick was one of
the last places to yield. Despite the evident hopelessness of the
struggle, Hugh O'Neill and his half-starved men held it with a courage
which awoke admiration even amongst the Cromwellians. When it was
surrendered the Irish officers received permission to take service
abroad. Galway, with a few other towns and castles, which still held
out, now surrendered. The eight years' civil war was at last over, and
nothing remained for the victors to do but to stamp out the last sparks,
and call upon the survivors to pay the forfeit.

[Illustration: ST. COLUMBA'S ORATORY, KELLS.]

XL.

CROMWELL'S METHODS.

The total loss of life during-those weary eight years of war and anarchy
has been estimated at no less than six hundred thousand lives, and there
seems to be no reason to think that these figures are exaggerated.
Whereas in 1641 the population of Ireland was nearly one and a half
millions, at the end of 1649 it was considerably under one. More than a
third, therefore, of