ing to the deputy, was taken
prisoner on his way from Carrickfergus to Toome, and he was compelled
to pay to his captors a ransom of 30 l. For this the lord deputy
assessed 60 l. on the county, and appointed one-half of it to be taken
from O'Neil's tenants, being of another county, and at least twelve
miles distant from the scene of the outrage, perpetrated by a
wood-kerne, 'and themselves being daily killed and spoiled by the said
wood-kerne, and never no redress had to them.' Several outrages and
murders perpetrated by the soldiers are enumerated; but they were such
as might have been expected in a state bordering on civil war, which
was then the condition of the province. If, however, Tyrone is to be
believed, the rulers themselves set the example of disorder. Sir
Henry Folliott, governor of Ballyshannon, in the second year of his
majesty's reign, came with force of arms, and drove away 200 cows from
the earl's tenants, 'and killed a good gentleman, with many other poor
men, women, and children; and besides that, there died of them above
100 persons with very famine, for want of their goods; whereof the
earl never had redress, although the said Sir Henry could show no
reasonable cause for doing the same.'

Finally the earl saw that the lord deputy was very earnest to
aggravate and search out matters against him, touching the staining
of his honour and dignity, scheming to come upon him with some forged
treason, and thereby to bereave him of both his life and living. The
better to compass this he placed his 'whispering companion,' Captain
Leigh, as sheriff in the county, 'so as to be lurking after the earl,
to spy if he might have any hole in his coat.' Seeing then that the
lord deputy, who should be indifferent, not only to him but to
the whole realm, having the rod in his own power, did seek his
destruction, he esteemed it a strife against the stream for him to
seek to live secure in that kingdom, and therefore of both evils
he did choose the least, and thought it better rather to forego
his country and lands, till he had further known his majesty's
pleasure--to make an honourable escape with his life and liberty only,
than by staying with dishonour and indignation to lose both life,
liberty, and country, which much in very deed he feared. Indeed the
many abuses 'offered' him by Sir John Davis, 'a man more fit to be a
stage player than a counsel,' and other inferior officers, might be
sufficient causes to provoke a