supplies of food, clothing and medicine, very different in quality from those which Shales had furnished, were sent across Saint George's Channel. A thousand baggage waggons had been made or collected with great expedition; and, during some weeks, the road between London and Chester was covered with them. Great numbers of recruits were sent to fill the chasms which pestilence had made in the English ranks. Fresh regiments from Scotland, Cheshire, Lancashire, and Cumberland had landed in the Bay of Belfast. The uniforms and arms of the new corners clearly indicated the potent influence of the master's eye. With the British battalions were interspersed several hardy bands of German and Scandinavian mercenaries. Before the end of May. the English force in Ulster amounted to thirty thousand fighting men. A few more troops and an immense quantity of military stores were on board of a fleet which lay in the estuary of the Dee, and which was ready to weigh anchor as soon as the King was on board.[1]
James ought to have made an equally good use of the time during which his army had been in winter quarters. Strict discipline and regular drilling might, in the interval between November and May, have turned the athletic and enthusiastic peasants who were assembled under his standard into good soldiers. But the opportunity was lost. The Court of Dublin was, during that season of inaction, busied with dice and claret, love letters and challenges. The aspect of the capital was indeed not very brilliant. The whole number of coaches which could be mustered there, those of the King and of the French Legation included, did not amount to forty.[2] But though there was little splendour there was much dissoluteness. Grave Roman Catholics shook their heads and said that the Castle did not look like the palace of a King who gloried in being the champion of the Church.[3] The military administration was as deplorable as
- ↑ Story's Impartial History; Narcissus Luttrell's Diary.
- ↑ Avaux, Jan. 15/25, 1690.
- ↑ Macariæ Excidium. This most curious work has been recently edited with great care and diligence by Mr. O'Callaghan. I owe so much to his learning and industry that I most readily excuse the national partiality which sometimes, I cannot but think, perverts his judgment. When I quote the Macariæ Excidium, I always quote the Latin text. The English version is, I am convinced, merely a translation from the Latin, and a very careless and imperfect translation.
