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of it; courage could but little avail them, whilst being mired in the bogs, they were forced to stand still like butts to be shot at. Discipline or conduct were of no use in that place, where it could not be prac- tised ; in short, the English were defeated, and the whole company slain, except some few who were rescued by the horsemen, and amongst the rest. Sir Peter Carew, Colonel Moor, and the valiant Captains Audely and Cosby were killed in this un- fortunate conflict." Lord Grey beat a hasty retreat to Dublin, and the news of the "Spanish landing at Smerwick almost immediately called him south at the head of a small force of about i,ooo men. He invested the fort on 31st October, and obliged the defenders to capitulate on loth November. The officers were reserved for ransom, and next day the garrison, about 600 men, were slaughtered in cold blood, and a few women and a priest amongst them were hung. The bodies, 600 in all, were stripped and laid out on the sands — " as gallant and goodly personages," says Grey,"aseverwere beheld." "To him," says 'Mr. Froude, "it was but the natural and obvious method of disposing of an enemy who had deserved no quarter. His own force amounted to barely 800 men, and he probably could not, if he had wished, have conveyed so large a body of pri- soners in safety across Ireland to Dublin." Sir Walter Raleigh was one of the offi- cers commanding the party who car- ried the Deputy's orders into execution. Further particulars of the war in Munster during hjs tenure of office, will be found under notice of the 15th Earl of Desmond. In the summer of 1582 the war was vir- tually at an end — James FitzMaurice and Sir John and Sir James of Desmond were dead, and the Earl was a hunted fugitive. Mr. Froude says he was recalled at his own request, while Cox gives the following ac- count of the matter : " But this good Deputy by the contrivance of the rebels was re- presented at the court of England as a bloody man, that regarded not the lives of the subjects any more than the lives of dogs, but had tyrannized with that bar- barity, that there was little left for the Queen to reign over but carcasses and ashes. And this false story being believed in England, a general pardon was sent over to such of the rebels as would accept thereof, and the Lord-Deputy in the midst of his victories was recalled, so that in August [1582] he left Ireland to the care of Adam Loftus, Archbishop of Dublin, Lord- Chan- cellor, [and] Sir Henry "Wallop, Treasurer- at-Wars, Lords-Justices." He was subse- quently one of the commissioners that sat
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in judgment on Mary Queen of Scots at Fotheringay, and one of the council of war for the defence of England against the Armada. He died in 1593. 5= 134 140 170 .7« Grierson, Constantia, a woman of uncommon literary abilities, was born at Kilkenny in 1 706. Her maiden name is not mentioned. Her parents were poor, illiterate people. Her friend Mrs. Pil- kington says that she was mistress of Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and French, and had a good knowledge of mathematics. " She received some little instruction from the minister of the parish when she could spare time from her needlework, to which she was closely kept by her mother, . . Her turn was chiefly to philosophical or divine subjects. . . Her piety was not inferior to her learn- ing."^^ At the age of eighteen she came to Dublin to receive instruction in mid- wifery. There her literary acquirements introduced her to society, and she married Mr. Grierson, a printer, to whom Lord Car- teret granted a patent as King's Printer, with her name inserted. She edited a new edition of Tacitris, with a Latin dedica- tion to Lord Carteret; and Terence, to which was prefixed a Greek epigram from her pen. She also wrote poetry. She has been des- cribed as "happy in a fine imagination, a great memory, an excellent imderstanding, and an exact judgment, but had all these crowned by virtue and piety ; she was too learned to be vain, too wise to be conceit- ed, too knowing and too clear-sighted to be in-eligious." Mrs. Grierson died in 1733, at the early age of twenty-seven. Her eldest son, who proved a man of learning, wit, and vivacity, was educated by her. He died in Gennany at the same age as his mother. Johnson once remarked that he possessed more extensive knowledge than any man of his years he had ever known. The Grierson family continued government printers in Ireland for several generations, and after they gave up business some of the government printing was executed un- der their patent until Mr. Thom's ap- pointment as Queen's Printer in 1 876. ^7
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Grif5,n, Gerald, poet and novelist, was born, 12th December 1803, in Lim- erick, where his father was a brewer. Gerald was a remarkably gentle and sus- ceptible lad. His first master wasRichard McEligot, a genius of some celebrity in Limerick. When Gerald was seven years old the family removed to Fairy Lawn, a cot- tage charmingly situated on the Shannon, twenty-eight miles below Limerick. His re- collections of this spot were ever of the most delightful character. The home family then 237
