t Mountjoy marched to the frontier of the north.
'Among those employed to murder O'Neill in cold blood, were Sir
Geoffry Fenton, Lord Dunsany, and _Henry Oge O'Neill._ Mountjoy bribed
one Walker, an Englishman, and a ruffian calling himself Richard
Combus, to make the attempt, but they all failed.'[1] Finding it
impossible to procure the assassination of 'the sacred person of
O'Neill, who had so many eyes of jealousy about him,' he wrote to
Cecil from Drogheda, that nothing prevented Tyrone from making his
submission but mistrust of his personal safety and guarantee
for maintenance commensurate to his princely rank. The lords of
Elizabeth's privy council empowered Mountjoy to treat with O'Neill on
these terms, and to give him the required securities. Sir Garret Moore
and Sir William Godolphin were entrusted with a commission to effect
this object. But while the lord deputy, with a brilliant retinue,
was feasting at Mellifont, a monastery bestowed by Henry VIII. on an
ancestor of Sir Garret Moore, by whom it was transformed into a 'fair
mansion,' half palace, half fortress, a courier arrived from England,
announcing the death of the queen. Nevertheless the negotiations
were pressed on in her name, the fact of her decease being carefully
concealed from the Irish. Tyrone had already sent his secretary, Henry
O'Hagan, to announce to the lord deputy that he was about to come to
his presence. Accordingly on March 29, he surrendered himself to the
two commissioners at Tougher, within five miles of Dungannon. On the
following evening he reached Mellifont, when, being admitted to the
lord deputy's presence, 'he knelt, as was usual on such occasions;'
and made penitent submission to her majesty. Then, being invited to
come nearer to the deputy, he repeated the ceremony, if we may credit
Fynes Moryson, in the same humiliating attitude, thus:--

'I, Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone, do absolutely submit myself to the
queen's mercy, imploring her gracious commiseration, imploring her
majesty to mitigate her just indignation against me. I do avow that
the first motives of my rebellion were neither malice nor ambition;
but that I was induced by fear of my life, to stand upon my guard. I
do therefore most humbly sue her majesty, that she will vouchsafe
to restore to me my former dignity and living. In which state of
a subject, I vow to continue for ever hereafter loyal, in all true
obedience to her royal person, crown, and prerogatives, an