Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 5.djvu/96

76 than 900 English men-at-arms, and 500 light Irish horse; and it is enough to say for him, that with this small force he accomplished his task. The State Paper Office contains many of his letters, notes, and loose memoranda. The handwriting and the spelling are alike frightful; but the meaning, when at last arrived at, conveys an impression of resolute strength, unequalled in any other despatches of the time; and the respect becomes intelligible with which his name was ever mentioned even by the Irish themselves.

For two years he governed. In that time he cut roads through forests, and made bogs passable. Castles rose as if by magic in the dangerous districts. The harbours were cleared, the outlaws banished, the chiefs not driven by cruelty, but drawn with a hand which they could not resist, into peace. O'Connor and O'More, two of the most troublesome, were caught, tried for treason, and their lands taken from them. But when Bellmgham had made them feel that he was stronger than they, he restored O'Connor to liberty and his estates. The laws which interfered with the marriages of English and Irish, and forbade the inheritance of half-breeds, were relaxed or abolished; while mere robbery, as distinct from political conspiracy, was inexorably punished. A party of high-born marauders, who had committed an outrage in the Pale, took refuge in Thomond. O'Brien applied for their pardon, and O'Brien was one of the strongest of the Irish nobles.

Bellingham answered him thus:

'Your assured friend warns you, if you list so to