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James II be repealed. But Tyrconnell, whatever may have been his own sentiments, soon found it impossible to withstand the general voice of his countrymen. In October, 1686, Richard Nagle, an Irish lawyer of eminent professional talents, published, under the name of A Letter from Coventry, an elaborate plea for the restoration of the confiscated estates. With this proposal the government were not yet prepared to comply; but the authorship of the pamphlet, though not formally acknowledged, was sufficiently notorious; and the selection of the writer to fill the important post of Attorney-General, which almost immediately followed, could not fail to give an additional stimulus to the hopes of the deprived gentry.

In the following spring Clarendon was deprived of the Lord Lieutenancy, an office which he had held for little more than a year. From the first he had been out of sympathy with the administration of which he was the nominal head, but, although this circumstance may to some extent have contributed to his downfall, the immediate cause of his recall is to be found in the rupture which had recently taken place between James and his brother Rochester. In spite of the consternation of the Protestant settlers, in spite of the intrigues of the English Catholics, 139