isting.

In the year 1603 the great Queen died. That year is, on many accounts,
one of the most important epochs in our history. It was then that both
Scotland and Ireland became parts of the same empire with England. Both
Scotland and Ireland, indeed, had been subjugated by the Plantagenets;
but neither country had been patient under the yoke. Scotland had, with
heroic energy, vindicated her independence, had, from the time of Robert
Bruce, been a separate kingdom, and was now joined to the southern
part of the island in a manner which rather gratified than wounded her
national pride. Ireland had never, since the days of Henry the Second,
been able to expel the foreign invaders; but she had struggled against
them long and fiercely. During the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries
the English power in that island was constantly declining, and in the
days of Henry the Seventh, sank to the lowest point. The Irish dominions
of that prince consisted only of the counties of Dublin and Louth, of
some parts of Meath and Kildare, and of a few seaports scattered along
the coast. A large portion even of Leinster was not yet divided into
counties. Munster, Ulster, and Connaught were ruled by petty sovereigns,
partly Celts, and partly degenerate Normans, who had forgotten their
origin and had adopted the Celtic language and manners. But during the
sixteenth century, the English power had made great progress. The half
savage chieftains who reigned beyond the pale had submitted one after
another to the lieutenants of the Tudors. At length, a few weeks before
the death of Elizabeth, the conquest, which had been begun more than
four hundred years before by Strongbow, was completed by Mountjoy.
Scarcely had James the First mounted the English throne when the last
O'Donnel and O'Neil who have held the rank of independent princes kissed
his hand at Whitehall. Thenceforward his writs ran and his judges held
assizes in every part of Ireland; and the English law superseded the
customs which had prevailed among the aboriginal tribes.

In extent Scotland and Ireland were nearly equal to each other, and were
together nearly equal to England, but were much less thickly
peopled than England, and were very far behind England in wealth and
civilisation. Scotland had been kept back by the sterility of her soil;
and, in the midst of light, the thick darkness of the middle ages still
rested on Ireland.

The population of Scotland, with the exception of