ing and flattering words to the Queen. It was for her
majesty he was fighting; he was chastising her enemies and breaking
stiff-necked chiefs into her yoke; and he begged that she would not
credit any stories which his ill-willers might spread abroad against
him. On the contrary he hoped she would determine his title and rule
without delay, and grant him, in consideration of his good services,
some augmentation of living in the Pale. Elizabeth, however, excused
his conduct, saying 'we must allow something for his wild bringing-up,
and not expect from him what we should expect from a perfect subject.
If he mean well he shall have all his reasonable requests granted.'

But there was among Elizabeth's advisers a statesman who felt that
this sort of policy would never do. Sir Henry Sidney, on being
requested to take charge of the Government of Ireland, urged the
absolute necessity of a radical change. The power of O'Neill, and such
rulers as he, must be utterly broken, and that by force, at whatever
cost. And this, he argued, would not only be sound policy but true
economy. The condition of Ireland was unexampled; free from foreign
invasion, the sovereignty of the Queen not denied, yet the revenue so
mean and scanty that 'great yearly treasures were carried out of the
realm of England to satisfy the stipends of the officers and soldiers
required for the governance of the same.' He must have 10,000 l.
or 12,000 l. to pay out-standing debts and put the army in proper
condition. As for his own remuneration, the new viceroy, as he could
expect nothing from the Queen, would be content with permission to
export six thousand kerseys and clothes, free of duty.

Sir Henry Sidney struck out the only line of policy by which the
English government of Ireland could be made successful or even
possible. He said: 'To go to work by force will be chargeable, it is
true; but if you will give the people justice and minister law among
them, and exercise the sword of the sovereign, and put away the sword
of the subject, _omnia haec adjicientur vobis_--you shall drive the now
man of war to be an husbandman, and he that now liveth like a lord
to live like a servant, and the money now spent in buying armour, and
horses, and waging of war, shall be bestowed in building of towns and
houses. By ending these incessant wars ere they be aware, you shall
bereave them both of force and beggary, and make them weak and
wealthy. Then you can convert the mili