Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 7.djvu/179

 1563.] SHAN a NEIL. t $9 expected that lie would have been gladly sacrificed as an evidence of Elizabeth's evenhandedness, and Shan per haps did not care for the punishment of a subordinate if he could not reach the principal. He used the occasion however to grasp once more at the great object of his ambition, and to obtain with it if possible a refined revenge on Sussex. Seeing Elizabeth anxious, whether honestly or from motives of policy, to atone for the attempt to murder him, he renewed his suit to her for an English wife. The M'llams, relations of the Countess of Argyle, had offered him a thousand pounds to let her go ; and Elizabeth half promising if the Countess were restored to her friends to consider his prayer, he fixed on Sussex's sister, who had been em- ployed as the bait to catch him; so to humble the haughty English Earl into the very dust and dirt. Elizabeth's desire to conciliate however stopped short of ignominy. Lord Sussex deserved no better, nor his sister if she had been a party to her brother's plot ; but Cecil did not even venture ' to move the matter to the Queen, fearing how she might take it ; ' and Shan, lay- ing by his resentment, contented himself with the sub- stantial results of his many successes. M'Gfuyre had to fly from his islands ; O'Donnell's castles were surren- dered ; the Armagh garrison was withdrawn at last. Over lake and river, bog and mountain, Shan was un- r disputed Lord of Ulster save only on the Antrim shore where the Scots maintained a precarious independence. So absolute was he that with contemptuous pity he opened the doors of the Callogh's prison. The aged and