uring the
insurrection, made them the objects of compassion: yet were the king's
ministers, particularly Sharpe, resolved to take severe vengeance. Ten
were hanged on one gibbet at Edinburgh; thirty-five before their own
doors in different places. These criminals might all have saved their
lives, if they would have renounced the covenant. The executions were
going on, when the king put a stop to them. He said, that blood enough
had already been shed; and he wrote a letter to the privy council, in
which he ordered, that such of the prisoners as should simply promise
to obey the laws for the future, should be set at liberty, and that
the incorrigible should be sent to the plantations.[*] This letter was
brought by Burnet, archbishop of Glasgow; but not being immediately
delivered to the council by Sharpe, the president,[**] one Maccail had
in the interval been put to the torture, under which he expired. He
seemed to die in an ecstasy of joy. "Farewell, sun, moon, and stars;
farewell, world and time; farewell, weak and frail body: welcome,
eternity; welcome, angels and saints; welcome, Savior of the world; and
welcome, God, the Judge of all!" Such were his last words: and these
animated speeches he uttered with an accent and manner which struck all
the bystanders with astonishment.

* Burnet, p 237.

* Wodrow's History, vol. i. p. 255.

The settlement of Ireland, after the restoration, was a work of greater
difficulty than that of England, or even of Scotland. Not only the
power, during the former usurpations, had there been vested in the
king's enemies; the whole property, in a manner, of the kingdom had also
been changed: and it became necessary to redress, but with as little
violence as possible, many grievous hardships and iniquities which were
there complained of.

The Irish Catholics had in 1648 concluded a treaty with Ormond, the
king's lieutenant; in which they had stipulated pardon for their past
rebellion, and had engaged, under certain conditions, to assist the
royal cause: and though the violence of the priests and the bigotry
of the people had prevented, in a great measure, the execution of this
treaty, yet were there many, who, having strictly, at the hazard of
their lives, adhered to it, seemed on that account well entitled to
reap the fruits of their loyalty. Cromwell, having without distinction
expelled all the native Irish from the three provinces of Munster,
Leinster, and Ulster, had confi