e unprotected even within the pale.]

This latter method, therefore, found most favour in London. Irish
noblemen were glad to accept the office of deputy, and to discharge it
at a low salary or none; but it was in order to abuse their authority
for their personal advantage. They indemnified themselves for their
exertions to keep order, which was not kept, by the extortion which they
practised in the name of the government which they represented; and thus
deservedly made the English rule more than ever detested. Instead of
receiving payment, they were allowed while deputies what was called
"coyne and livery"; that is to say, they were allowed to levy military
service, and to quarter their followers on the farmers and poor
gentlemen of the pale; or else to raise fines in composition, under
pretence that they were engaged in the service of the crown. The entire
cost of this system was estimated at the enormous sum of a hundred
pounds a day.[296] The exactions might have been tolerated if the people
had been repaid by protection; but forced as they were to pay black
mail at the same time to the Irish borderers, the double burdens had the
effect of driving every energetic settler out of the pale, and his place
was filled by some poor Irishman whom use had made acquainted with
misery.[297]

[Sidenote: The Geraldines of Kildare, from their position, the natural
deputies.]

[Sidenote: The policy of the Geraldines to make the government
impossible except to themselves.]

Nor was extortion the only advantage which the Irish deputies obtained
from their office. They prosecuted their private feuds with the revenues
of the state. They connived at the crimes of any chieftain who would
join their faction. Every conceivable abuse in the administration of the
government attended the possession of power by the Geraldines of
Kildare, and yet by the Geraldines it was almost inevitable that the
power should be held. The choice lay between the Kildares and the
Ormonds. No other nobleman could pretend to compete with these two. The
Earls of Desmond only could take rank as their equals; and the lordships
of Desmond were at the opposite extremity of the island. The services of
the Earls of Ormond were almost equally unavailable. When an Earl of
Ormond was residing at Dublin as deputy, he was separated from his clan
by fifty miles of dangerous road. The policy of the Geraldines was to
secure the government for themselves by making it impossi