liberative assembly
should thus, by an act of humanity to Englishmen, have met the merciless
aggressions which the latter had just then commenced against this
country.--_Hist. of Ireland_, p. 169.

[274] _Nesta_.--David Powell, in his notes to the _Itinerary of
Cambria_, states that this lady was a daughter of Rufus, Prince of
Demetia. She was distinguished for her beauty, and infamous for her
gallantries. She had a daughter by Gerald of Windsor, called Augweth,
who was mother to Giraldus Cambrensis. This relationship accounts for
the absurd eulogiums which he has lavished on the Geraldines. Demetia is
the district now called Pembrokeshire, where a colony of Normans
established themselves after the Norman Conquest.--See Thierry's _Norman
Conquest_.

[275] _Men-at-arms_.--_Hibernia Expugnata_, lib. i. c. 16.

[276] _Bargy_.--Our illustration gives a view of the remains of this
ancient castle. It was formerly the residence of Bagenal Harvey, a
Protestant gentleman, who suffered in the rebellion of 1798, for his
adherence to the cause of Ireland.

[277] _Flemings_.--Dr. O'Donovan mentions, in a note to the Four
Masters, that he was particularly struck with the difference between the
personal appearance of the inhabitants of the baronies where they
settled. The Cavanaghs and Murphys are tall and slight; the Flemings and
Codds short and stout. They still retain some peculiarities of language.

[278] _Rule_.--What the rule of this ferocious monster may have been we
can judge from what is related of him by Cambrensis. Three hundred heads
of the slain were piled up before him; and as he leaped and danced with
joy at the ghastly sight, he recognized a man to whom he had a more than
ordinary hatred. He seized the head by the ears, and gratified his
demoniacal rage by biting off the nose and lips of his dead enemy.

[279] _Easterly_.--Cambrensis takes to himself the credit of having
advised the despatch of a letter to Strongbow. He also gives us the
letter, which probably was his own composition, as it is written in the
same strain of bombast as his praises of his family.--_Hib. Expug_. lib.
i. c. 12. It commences thus: "We have watched the storks and swallows;
the summer birds are come and gone," &c. We imagine that Dermod's style,
if he had taken to epistolary correspondence, would have been rather a
contrast.

[280] _Suffolk_.--See Gilbert's _Viceroys of Dublin, passim_. We
recommend this work to our readers. It should