GLEANINGS ON O'DONNELL HISTORY connell; Rory's son and heir, Hugh; etc. lest he should become discontented. The usual subject-matter of these The Archduke Albert at Brussels le,tters is appeals for military aid for proved a staunch friend of theirs. Ireland or for private financial aid, w·.hen they arrived in Fiande:rs, the and recommendations of various Irish- English ambassador protested at their men for succour or promotion. There prss€nce and the honours they were a!re also memorials on be.half of Red being accorded. He demanded that Hugh, Rory, and other members of the they should be arrested and delivered family, \Yritten by Fr. (afte:i.iwards over to the king of England. The ArchArchibishop) F:l_orence Conry, O,.F.M. duke gave him a firm refusal, ·saying During the war waged against Flanders was a free country, and he En.gland by O'Donnell, O'Neill, and was. not awa:·e that the earls had done Maguire, the Spanish ambassador in anything wrong. The reports of the London and S,pani·sh .agents in En.gland Archduke to the king at this period garnered nEWS items from writteil re- make interesting rf\ading, because they ports and the -rumours that were fly- a.lso desc:-ibe the fu11 retinue that acing around about the progress of the c.ompanied the earls on their flight, Irish . campaign·. arnd sent them back their names, occupation, status, and t.o Spain for the information of the in.t€ntions for the future. .The list inking and his council. Many of these eludes· Tadhg 6 Cianain, who afterAvis.ns, . de Londres can still be read at wards wrote an Irish account of the . . Simancas, but as a n:atter of fact in flight (now preserved in the Francisthe light of the fuller knowledge now can Library, Killiney), Eoghan Rua available to us, we a:·e ahle to disce:·n Mac an Bhaird, the poet, the two that many of them had no more solid noblewomen who acted as wetnur;.;es of basis than the distorted propaganda the infant baron of Doneg&l (the Hugr. a11d the wild, unfounded rumours O'Donnell o.f whom we have treated which are always so p::.·evalent in time in section 1), as well as their two serof war. There were rumours that vants ,who were also in attendance on O'Neil! had sur:rendered, that the Span- the young baron and the husbands of iards had I anded at KiHybegs, even these two women, who were his custhat they had landed in T'yro.ne it~elf. todians and tutors. There a.re a few We can trace the whole sad, tragic diffe!"ent lists, namely, the number who pr.ogress of the earls and their retinue arrived, the number proposing to go frn·m their arrival on the continent to to Spain, the number intending to ·stay their death at Rome, the efforts of the in Flanders. One list contains about king of Spain to keep them fr.om going fifty names. to Spain lest he should offend his There is .frequent referern~e in friend, the king of England, the pope's tho.se d{}cuments to Nuala O'Donnell, proposal that the king of Spain should sister of Ro::.·y and Red Hugh, whose give them a pens.ion, and the king's me:mory has ·been pe:-petuated by proposal that a:s his coffers were empty James Clarence Mangan as 'the: the pope should try to support them. wc.m3.n ·of the piercin.g wail.' She went Finally, the pope housed them and the from ·Lo·uvain to Rome with the earls king of Spain supported them, but they but afterwards made severa1 petitions were sending in constant co.mplaints to th~ king of Spain to be allowed to that the amount aUQfwed them was too return to Flanders where she hoped to niggardly. On one occasion, · when en}oy better health and to be nea:- her O'Neill succeeded in wheedling an ex- nephew, the young Hugh O'Donnell, tra allowance out of the king, he warn- son of Rory, who since Ro.~:y's death ed that O'Donnell shou1d not be told, 1 had become titular earl o.f TirconnelL 468.
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