Sarsfield
King on February 20th says nakedly, "Your affairs in Ireland seem to me now in so ill a posture," that, in brief, the Lords Justices should be replaced by a single ruler.
The gist of all this evidence is that the success at Limerick, though counterbalanced by the loss of Cork and Kinsale, was real and far-reaching; insomuch that terms of composition had now to be recommended excessively painful to those who recommended them. An example is afforded by Coningsby's letter cited above, in which the Lord Justice labouriously exculpates himself from the suspicion of any desire to show leniency to the Irish. But there is another side to the picture. When the armies on either side went into winter quarters, Lauzun determined to return to France (taking with him the field train of artillery); and Tyrconnell accompanied him. These two men had persistently underrated to Louis and to James the force of the Irish resistance. Finding them gone, Sarsfield and the chief men of the Irish party attempted to make it impossible for Tyrconnell to return, and requested the Duke of Berwick to assume the Viceroyalty. They urged that the arrangement made by Tyrconnell for government in his absence was wholly illegal, Tyrconnell having delegated military affairs to a council of twelve officers, and civil affairs to
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