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Those who listened on Friday night last to his picturesque account of the Elizabethan and Cromwellian attempts to pacify Ireland, must have felt in their bones that in spite of the cheers which greeted some of his own more eloquent and some of his bolder passages, and in particular his dauntless way of dealing with the Drogheda Massacre his political philosophy was not one which the average American could be got to carry home with him and ponder and embrace.
The vigorous Inchiquin had little difficulty in dealing with such an antagonist; Cashel was taken without a blow in its defence, and a slaughter unparalleled till the days of Drogheda and Wexford, deluged its streets and churches.
But the spirit of the Irish people rose quickly from their despair, and the duke's landing roused the whole nation to a fresh enthusiasm. The ranks of the Irish army were filled up at once, and James was able to face the duke at Drogheda with a force double that of his opponent.
Others discovered in the attempt were tried and hanged, and others, still suspected of similar designs, were marched down to Carlingford, and shipped for England. In November, James returned from Drogheda to Dublin, much elated that Duke Schomberg, whose fatal camp at Dundalk he had in vain attempted to raise, had shrunk from meeting him in the field.
"She says that Andy is comin' over here to make money enough to bring her over after a while, sure. It kind o' makes my heart jump up, miss, to think of seein' anybody from Drogheda, and more'n all to see Andy again, that always played with me, and But I despise him too, miss, fer bein' so changeable. But then, Dora she makes fools out of all of them with her purty face and her coaxin' ways, miss.
"And thus ends the last day of our bachelorhood!" said Lady Drogheda, upon a sudden. "You have played long enough La, William, you have led the fashion for ten years, you have written four merry comedies, and you have laughed as much as any man alive, but you have pulled down all that nature raised in you, I think. Was it worth while?"
A strongly walled town as Drogheda was, well manned, and easily accessible from the sea, cannot be carried without guns and engineers by any amount of physical courage.
I think I see them standing there in the golden light of a closing October day, with their sombre brown doublets and slouched hats, and their heavy matchlocks, such men as Ireton fronted death with on the battle-field of Naseby, or those who stalked with Cromwell over the broken wall of Drogheda, smiting, "in the name of the Lord," old and young, "both maid, and little children."
On the way southward he made an unsuccessful attack upon Lisburn, where he lost heavily; on the 24th of November he took possession of Mellifont Abbey, from whose gate the aged Tyrone had departed in tears, twenty-five years before. From Mellifont he proceeded to invest Drogheda; Colonel Plunkett, with the title of General, being the sole experienced officer as yet engaged in his ranks.
The commissioners appointed by parliament to examine these particulars, were Annesley, Trenchard, Hamilton, Langford, the earl of Drogheda, sir Francis Brewster, and sir Richard Leving. The first four were actuated by all the virulence of faction; the other three were secretly guided by ministerial influence.
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