rick, and succeeded in enrolling the requisite number of men. Obstacles still beset him on his return to Madrid, but he declined to relinquish his claim in consideration of an offer of nomination to a bishopric for himself and of the grant of offices to some of his relatives. The desired instrument was issued by Philip IV in March 1639, authorising the establishment, in Lisbon or in its vicinity, of a convent for fifty Irish Dominican nuns. In this document Daly is designated ‘Domingos do Rosario,’ qualificator or censor of the press for the inquisition, and commissary-general of the mission of Ireland. Ecclesiastical sanction for the scheme was given by John de Vasconcellos, head of the Dominicans in Portugal, on condition that all austerities of the order should be strictly observed. The convent, established at Belem, a short distance from Lisbon, on the bank of the Tagus, was placed under the patronage of the Blessed Virgin Mary, with the title of ‘Bom Successo,’ or ‘Good Success,’ and was opened in November 1639. In the following January its chief benefactress, the Countess Atalaya, died, and was buried within its precincts.
In 1640 the people of Portugal freed their country from Spanish dominion, and elected the Duke of Braganza king, under the title of John IV. His queen, Luisa de Gusman, eminent for her courage and prudence, selected Daly as confidential adviser and chief of her confessors. The progress made by the inmates of the college at Lisbon, in theological and philosophical studies, led the general chapter of the order at Rome, in 1644, to grant it the title and privileges of a ‘ Studium Generale,’ or establishment where exercises for degrees were held in public. Daly was sent as envoy by the king of Portugal to Charles I, and was subsequently accredited to Charles II. Towards the close of 1649, Charles II and his mother, Queen Henrietta-Maria, confidentially consulted him at Paris on Irish affairs, and urged him to proceed to Ireland and use his influence there to effect a coalition of the royalists against the parliamentarians. Daly endeavoured to impress upon the king the justice of the claims of the Irish to civil and religious liberty, but was unable to go to Ireland, as his presence was required at Rome. In a letter addressed in 1650 to the Marquis of Ormonde, lord-lieutenant of Ireland, Daly referred to his own relations with Charles I and Charles II, and intimated his readiness to serve the royal cause in Ireland as well as in Spain, so soon as an assurance was received from the king that the Irish should be established as a free nation in direct connection with the crown. Daly appealed to Ormonde, as an Irishman, to aid in obtaining an independent and honourable position for his country.
In 1655 a small volume in Latin, by Daly, was issued at Lisbon by the printer of the king of Portugal, with the title: ‘Initium, incrementum et exitus familiæ Geraldinorum Desmoniæ, Comitum Palatinorum Kyerriæ in Hibernia; ac persecutionis hæreticorum descriptio, ex nonnullis fragmentis collecta, ac Latinitate donata, per Fratrem Dominicum de Rosario O'Daly, Ordinis Prædicatorum, S. Theologiæ Professorem, in Supremo S. Inquisitionis Senatu Censorem, in Lusitaniæ regnis quondam Visitatorem Generalem ac fundatorem Conventuum Hibernorum ejusdem Ordinis in Portugallia.’ The first part of this work consists of an account of the Geraldine earls of Desmond in the south of Ireland, from the establishment of their progenitors there by Henry II to the death of Earl Gerald in the reign of Elizabeth. The second part is devoted to an account of the persecution of Roman catholics in Ireland, after the extinction of the Geraldine earls. Members of the Dominican order who had recently met their death in Ireland are specially noticed. Among them were several connected with the Irish college at Lisbon, including Terence Albert O'Brien, bishop of Emly, who was hanged on the surrender of Limerick to Ireton in 1651. Daly was supplied with information by Dominicans who had come from Ireland to Lisbon and Rome. The book is written in an animated, pathetic, and somewhat declamatory style, and displays a strong sense of religion, morality, and justice. In 1656 Daly was accredited as envoy from Portugal to Louis XIV at Paris, and there negotiated with English royalists as to the employment of Irish troops and the means of procuring contributions for Charles II.
Meanwhile, the community of the Irish Dominican College at Lisbon largely increased, and at the instance of Daly the queen-regent of Portugal conferred upon the order a larger building at her own cost. An elaborate public ceremonial was arranged, and on Sunday, 4 May 1659, the foundation of the new building was laid. The stone bore an inscription recording that the college was founded by Luisa de Gusman, queen-regent of Portugal, for Dominicans of the Irish nation. The important archiepiscopal see of Braga in Portugal was offered to Daly, but he declined it, as well as the see of Goa, with the Portuguese primacy in India. He consented subsequently to accept the wealthy see of Coimbra, with which was associated the presidency of the privy council of Portugal. His intention was to apply the
