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BUT birth, his parents returned to Ireland; whither he was brought by his nurse when but three years of age. To the last year of his life he remembered being carried through Bristol on this occasion to take shipping for Ireland. He was often brought to visit the 10th Earl, at Carrick, and ever after distinctly recollected his caresses, and the several circumstances of his long beard, his being blind, and his wearing a George about his neck. Upon the shipwreck and death of his father in 1619, the lad was by courtesy styled Viscount Thurles. The year following that disaster, his mother brought him back to England, and placed him, then nine years of age, at school with a Catholic gentleman at Finchley—this doubtless through the influence of his grandfather, the 11th Earl. It was not long before James I., anxious that the heir of the Butlers should be brought 'up a Protestant, placed him at Lambeth, under the care of the Archbishop of Canterbury. The Ormond estates being under sequestration (as noted in the life of the 11th Earl) the young Lord had but £40 a year for his own and his servant's clothing and expenses. He appears to have been entirely neglected by the Archbishop —"he was not instructed even in humanity, nor so much as taught to understand Latin." When fifteen he went to live with his grandfather (then released from prison) at Drury-lane "who through length of his confinement and his advanced age, was grown very infirm, and never troubled him in matters of religion." Having now more means at command, he entered into all the gaieties of the court and town. At eighteen he went to Portsmouth with his friend the Duke of Buckingham intending to join the expedition for the relief of Rochelle; a project abandoned upon the assassination of the Duke. It was during his London residence that he set himself to learn Irish, a partial knowledge of which language proved most useful to him in after years. About six months after his visit to Portsmouth, he first saw at Court, and fell in love with, his cousin, Elizabeth Preston, only child and heiress of Sir Richard Preston. [See .] The affection between the young people was reciprocal. She was then an orphan, scarcely fourteen. Her father, like his, had been drowned near the Skerries on a passage to England. As the King's ward, she was under the care of Henry, Earl of Holland. The Duke of Buckingham had intended her for a nephew. It was only by a bribe of £15,000 to Lord Holland that Lord Thurles was able to smooth away the many difficulties opposed to his suit. In September 1629, King Charles issued letters patent consenting to the match, on the ground that it would put a "final end to all controversies between Walter, Earl of Ormond, and Elizabeth, daughter of Richard, Earl of Desmond." By the marriage, which took place in London, at Christmas 1629, the lands his ancestor had been obliged to divide with Sir Robert Preston came back to him. He was then but nineteen; his wife (born 25th July 1615) but fourteen. The following year, passed at Acton with her, he devoted to study, making up somewhat for the deficiencies of his education. At the end of 1630 he went over with his lady to Ireland, and resided at Carrick with Earl Walter and his Countess, who had returned some years before. Next year he purchased a troop of horse in England. After Strafford's arrival in Ireland, there was an open breach between them, consequent on Ormond's refusal to comply with Strafford's order that the Lords should attend Parliament without their swords. It was not long, however, before the young lord's abilities were recognised by that astute statesman; and at twenty-four, now for some years entered on the enjoyment of his title and estates, he was made a Privy-Councillor. He endorsed Strafford's Irish policy, and assisted him materially in the House of Lords. In 1638 he was given a regiment of horse, and shortly afterwards made Commander-in-Chief of the Irish army, collected ostensibly for the pacification of Scotland. The difficulties in the way of clothing, arming, and victualling troops in Ireland were then almost insuperable: we are told there was not cloth in the whole kingdom even for the clothing of 1,500 men. Ormond, however, by unceasing activity and the exercise of tact and forbearance, man aged to have, by the middle of August 1640, a well disciplined army of some 8,000 men, including 1,000 Protestant officers and subalterns, at Carrickfergus. Had Strafford's advice been taken, Ormond would at the end of the game year, have been made Lord-Deputy, in place of Lord Wandesford, deceased. One of the last requests Strafford made before execution was that his Garter should be conferred upon Ormond. The jealousy of the English Parliament regarding the Irish army in the command of the Earl was so great, that he was obliged in the early part of 1641 to disband it unpaid, except an allowance of ten shillings to each man for the expenses of returning home. This dispersion of 8,000 discontented, unpaid men, materially contributed to the outbreak of the war a few months later. Charles I. was 56