In the older vault at Bunnamairge Sorley's children also were interred, some of them being sent prematurely to its silent abode by secret treachery, or cold-blooded massacre. As only one of his daughters is accounted for, the others — whatever may have been their number or names — are supposed to have perished, when comparatively young, in a fiendish massacre perpetrated by the followers of Essex. The expulsion of the Scots was one of this heartless adventurer's crazes, and his movements here were comparatively aimless, except in so far as this object was attempted to be carried out. (See Appendix VI.) His expedition was not only a miserable failure, but it will ever be regarded in Ulster as a deep stain on the government of England. In the summer of 1575, and not long prior to the sudden collapse of Essex's adventure, it became known that he intended to order a raid northward, and Sorley Boy took the precaution of sending part of his own family, together with the wives and families of his leading officers, to the island of Rathlin. Essex soon discovered that the place was crowded with refugees — women, children, and non-combatants — who had carried with them their family-treasures, including plate, and other valuables. And this proud English earl saw nothing dastardly or atrocious in attacking these defenceless people. On the contrary, he chuckled over this opportunity of wreaking a deadly revenge on Sorley Boy and his principle adherents, in return for the defeats and disasters the latter had inflicted on English freebooters in the field. Essex secretly ordered John Norris, then in command of three frigates at Carrickfergus, to make an immediate descent on Rathlin. "And when," says he in a letter to the queen, dated July 31st 1575, — "I had given this direction, to make the Scots less suspicious of any such matter pretended, I withdrew myself towards the Pale," — in other words, he went to Newry, from which place he penned his infamous account of this business to Elizabeth.

Whether Essex was able to take any comfort from the foregoing royal announcements, or whether he understood them at all, it is not now of much importance to inquire. On the same day, however, that he had written to the queen about the massacre at Rathlin, he penned a letter to Walshyngham containing the following ghastly postscript: — "I do now understand this day by a spy coming from Sorley Boy's camp, that upon my late journey made against him (195) he then put most of his plate, most of his children, and the children of most part of the gentlemen with him, and their wives, into the Raghlins, with all his pledges (hostages), which be all taken and executed, as the spy sayeth, and in all to the number of 600. Sorley then also stood upon the mainland of the Glynnes, and saw the taking of the island, and was likely to run mad for sorrow, tearing and tormenting himself, as the spy sayeth, and saying that he then lost all he ever had." This passage gives us an awful glimpse of the scene in Rathlin. The old chieftain's frantic demeanour certainly implied that some members of his family were on the island, and in the clutches of the fiends who followed Norris. When Sorley saw the English frigates approaching Rathlin, he no doubt hastily sought some point on the mainland from which he could observe their movements. From the headlands a little eastward of Ballycastle, and in the vicinity of his own residence of Dunanynie, he was only distant four miles from the scene of the massacre, and could, therefore, easily witness the progress of events on the island. The smoke of guns, the blaze of burning houses, the rushing of little parties in flight across the green fields to take refuge in the caves on the shore, and, especially, the signals of fear and despair which would doubtless be hoisted at various points, could be distinctly seen from the headlands on that part of the coast. (196)

Note 195. Against him.—This movement against Sorley Boy to which Essex more than once refers in his letters as something to be proud of, led to no results further, than two or three days' skirmishing with the Scots on the Bann. The 'fastness' of which Essex speaks in his long letter to the queen on this subject, was the fortified residence of Brian Carragh O'Neill. That part of Ulster," says Dr. Reeves, was known in the sixteenth century as Brian Carragh's country, consisted of a tract on either side of the Bann, of which Portglenone may be taken as the centre. The portion on the Antrim side of the river which consisted of the adjacent part of the parish of Ahoghill, was held by inheritance under O'Neill of Clanaboy; whilst the Londonderry portion, which consisted of the south-east part of Tamlaght-Ocrilly, was wrested by force of arms from O'Cahan, and held in The place which is tradi- adverse possession. tionally pointed out as the site of Brian's abode is a small island in the middle of a marshy basin at Inishrush, called the Green Lough. This spot was really the Inis ruis, Island of the Wood. "Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, vol. vii., pp. 211—217. Essex referring to this fastness, states that it was on the western side of the Bann, although it is added, he, Brian Carragh, manureth and feedeth upon the land on this side the river." For Essex's letter to Elizabeth on this expedition, see Lives of the Devereux, Earls of Essex, vol. i. p. IOS—ill; see also Appendix VI.

Note 196. Of the coast.—ln the eleventh volume of Froude's History of England, the author has a reference to this massacre. His account was severely criticised in the Athenæum by a Mr. Brewer, professor of History in the London University, who asserted that the massacre could not have been witnessed from the mainland, which was distant seven miles from xat m nd that, after all, Sorley Boy was only an audacious and troublesome Scot- tish freebooter! These assertions, however, only prove that the professor is not familiar with the topography of the Antrim coast, and that he must have learned his Scottish history principally from the Carew MSS., which he has been recently assisting Mr. Bullen to calendar. Froude, who knows little of Sorley Boy, and less of the Antrim coast, was unable to meet his critic's pretentious allegations.

In the number of its victims, if not in the deliberate atrocity of its execution, this massacre was very much more appalling than that of Glenco. But yet, so far as we are aware, it called forth no words of grief or indignation from the subjects of "good queen Bess." On the contrary, they were well pleased to hear the news, and no doubt heartily approved of the following letter from Elizabeth to Essex, acknowledging her obligations to Norris, "the executioner," as she appropriately designates him:— "By your letter of 31st July, you advertise us of the taking of the island of Raughlins, the common receipt and harbour of all such Scots as do infest that realme of Ireland, and that your proceeding against Sorley Boy has taken happy success. (197) Give the young gentleman, John Norrice, the executioner of your well-devised enterprise, to understand that we will not be unmindful ofhis good services." (198) (Calendar of Carew MSS., second series, p. 21.) In praising his officers generally to the queen, after this exploit, Essex tells her that "they think themselves happy when they may have any occasion offered them that is to do your highness acceptable service; and as I have had sundry proofs of them, and lately in the service done against the Scots in the fastness, and this now done in the Raghlins, so do I find them full willing to follow it untill they shall have ended what your Majesty intendeth to have done^ (Lives of the Devercux, Earls of Essex, vol. L, p. 117.) Her majesty intended to have the Scots expelled, or exterminated, and these officers were bent, it would appear, on nothing so much as working her will. So early as the 6th of August, she had sent from Chartley the following general expression of her praise and thanks, to sir Peter Carew, the sons of lord Norris, captain Malbie, and captain Barkleye— all of whom were doubtless assisting at the butchery in Rathlin:— "The Earl of Essex greatly commends your diligence and faithful service. We give you our hearty thanks, especially considering that in all services and hard accidents you have continued still with our said cousin when others have left him." See Calendar of Carew Manuscripts, second series, p. 21.

Note 197. Happy success.—This delightful result consisted in the fact, as believed, that every human being in the island, excepting the constable and his family, had been slaughtered! At least one other, however, and probably a few more, were able to conceal themselves from the brutal Sassanachs. In a letter from D. M 'Curdy, Esq., of Wigan, the writer says There is a tradition in our family that the only one left alive by the company of soldiers sent to Essex, and under Norris, in 1575, besides the chief and his family, was a woman named M 'Curdy, who was found still alive, in one of the caves to which the inhabitants fled for shelter; all the others being savagely butchered." The surname of M so prevalent in the Highlands of Scot- land and on the coasts of Ulster, is evidently a contraction of Mac Illurdy, the latter being a corruption of Mac Gillabridghe, the son of Gillabride.' In early chronicles, Somerled or Somhairle, the great thane of Argyle, was always known as Illac Gillabride, to distinguish him from others of the same name Norse chroniclers, between the years 1156 and 1164, often corrupt his name into Sowrdy Diac Illurdy! See Orig. Paroch. Scot., vol. ii.,

Note 198. Good services.— For a notice of the Norris family see Appendix VI. Soon after the massacre in Rathling the queen made good this promise to Norris by appointing him to the lucrative and distinguished office of president of Munster. He was one of six brothers, the sons of sir Henry Norris, created lord Norris of Rycot, groom of the Stole, and executed in 1536, on a charge of alleged adultery with Anna Bullen or Boylen. He is believed to have been innocent of this charge.

We have already mentioned the death of Sorley Boy's favourite son, Alexander, whose tact and bravery so essentially strengthened the old chieftain's hands. If the walls of the vault in Bunnamairge could speak, they would tell how that gallant young soldier had been brought hither to be buried. When the English host under Perrot approached Dunluce, Alexander Macdonnell was foremost in the field to meet them, and with only a handful of men contrived to keep the struggle going on until the arrival of reinforcements, which his father had collected in Argyleshire and the Isles. In 1585, he headed a skirmishing party against captain Meryman or Merriman, and sought an opportunityof challenging that English desperado to single combat. The stratagem by which the latter effected young Macdonnell's destruction was base and dastardlyin no common degree. The following is Cox's account of this affair: — "Alexander M'Sorlie who commanded the Scotts, challenged Merriman to a combate; and a lusty gallowglasse (199) being by, said he was the captaine, and so to the duell they go; the gallowglasse stund the Scotte at the first blow, but he, recovering himselfe, killed the gallowglasse; and thereupon Merriman stept out and fought Alexander a good while with sword and target, and so wounded him in the leg that he was forced to retreat. Thereupon his army being discouraged, was totally routed; and Alexander, being hid under turf in a cabin, was discovered, and his head cut off, and set on a pole in Dublin." One Price, a sergeant in Merriman's troop, was present on this occasion, and wrote an account of the combat and its results, to Walshyngham. "So we killed," says he, "of them aboute three score Scotts, and hurt many of them, and after Alexander MacSorlie had many wounds, he swame over to a lough (an island in a lough) for refuge, and there we found him by great chance, beinge layed in a deepe grave, in the gronde, as though it had been some dead corse, strawed over with green rushes, and on evrie side of the grave six ould calliopes (calliaghs, old women,) weepinge; but in searching the grave, we found a quick corse therein, and in remembrance of Donelus we cried quittance with him, and sent his head to be set on Dublin Castle." The conclusion of this passage is unintelligible. Probably the writer meant that the English force thus murdered Alexander in revenge for some defeat inflicted upon them by his elder brother Donnell, who had been a gallant leader, but who was slain whilst skirmishing near the Bann, a few years prior to 1585. When Sorley, soon after the death of his son Alexander, went to Dublin to make his formal submission, an English official cruelly invited him to look at his son's head, where it had been placed on a spike at the entrance to the castle. The grief-stricken old man, groaning in spirit, proudly replied — "My son hath many heads!" The knowledge of this striking incident is preserved in a Macdonnell manuscript.

Note 199. Gallowglasse. —Dymock, in his Treatice of Ireland, defines Gallowglass to be "picked men, of great and mightie bodies, cruel, without compassion. The greatest force of the battle consisteth in them, chusing rather to die than to yield; so that when it cometh to hardy blows, they are quickly slain, or win the field. They are armed with a shirt of mail, a skul, and a skeine: the weapon they most use is a battle-axe or halbert, six feet long, the blade whereof is somewhat like a shoe- maker's knife, and without a pike; the stroke whereof is deadly where it lighteth, And being thus armed, reckoning to him a man for his harnes bearer, and a boy to carry his provisions, he is named a sparre, of his weapon so called, eighty of which sparres make a battle of Gallowglass."