most trivial, but groundless occasions. It was inflicted without mercy on every age and every condition: the child, to betray the safety of the parent; the wife, the partner of her conjugal affection; and the friend and brother have expired under the lash, when the generous heart scorned to betray the defenceless brother or friend."

Whether it might have been dreaded by the Northerns, that the suppression of the insurrection in the South would leave the government perfectly unembarrassed, and then, that their well-known disaffection would be visited with sweeping penalties-or, that the decision of the few overcame the disinclination of the many, the Down and Antrim rebels resolved to take the field, and a local occurrence precipitated the rising.

The governor of the county, Lord O'Neil, having received information that the northern insurrection was postponed, but not abandoned, determined to counteract the plans of the rebel leaders, and for that purpose convened a meeting of the magistrates to be holden at Antrim, on the 7th of June. His lordship, en route from Dublin, slept at Hillsborough on the night of the 6th, and reached the appointed place, at noon, next day. The meeting being called by public notice, was, of course, a matter of notoriety-and the seizure of the magistrates, and possession of the arms which had been surrendered from time to time, and had not been removed to Belfast, at once struck the rebel leaders as expedient. Orders were accordingly issued to the disaffected-and the long-dreaded rising took place.

CHAPTER XX.

OUTBREAK IN ULSTER-BATTLES OF ANTRIM, SAINTFIELD, AND BALLYNAHINCH. THE sudden determination of the northern leaders to unfurl the banner of rebellion and risk an appeal to arms, was attended with the usual results consequent upon hasty and inconsiderate decisions. The order for rising was obeyed-but when the disaffected were actually in the field, it was found that Down was without a leader. Russell, on whom that dangerous distinction had been conferred, some time before, had been arrested and imprisoned-and Steele Dickson, a presbyterian minister, and a fierce and uncompromising revolutionist, was elected to the chief command; but before he could assume it, he too, was arrested and lodged in prison. Finally, the leading of the insurrection was intrusted to a cotton-manufacturer, named McCracken.

The folly of precipitating into action tumultuary masses of men, under chiefs incompetent to direct their movements, will be best understood from the narrative of Charles Teeling; and the detail of the northern rising proves, that although the insurrectionary elements were abundant, the power of direction was imbecile beyond contempt: "Antrim had determined to act in conjunction with Down, and by dividing the attention of the enemy, these counties would have been an overmatch for the British troops which garrisoned both. The period of action had been previously arranged, and the respective duties assigned; but Antrim being prepared for the field, could not be induced to wait the appointment of a new commander for Down. To supply the place of Dickson was not an easy task, nor to restore that confidence to the minds of his countrymen which his arrest had sensibly weakened. Down urged the necessity of delay, but Antrim was resolved was already committed. Her military chiefs had assembled in council; numbers had quitted their homes for the field; they had bidden an affectionate, and some an eternal adieu to the objects of their tenderest regard. All waited orders from the first in command, when, to their inexpressible astonishment, his formal resignation was announced.

"There was now no safety in return-no encouraging hope in advance; the secession of the chief communicated doubt and alarm to others; mutual suspicion and mutual fears were excited in the breasts of all: the council wavered in their decisions, they ordered and counter-ordered, and eventually retired to deliberate anew. In the meantime, intelligence arrived that the British troops were on their march, and their advanced guard of cavalry within one mile of the seat of deliberation."

The possession of Antrim was certainly an important object with the conspirators. Equidistant from the two great military stations→→

Belfast, and the camp at Blaris-it opened a communication with Derry and Donegal, both counties, seriously disaffected, and from which extensive assistance might be expected. Antrim, was consequently selected as the first object of insurgent operation, and on the 7th of June, the rebel columns directed their march upon the town.

The decision of their ill-directed councils had immediately transpired-and General Nugent, who commanded the north-east district, promptly adopted measures to defeat the intended attack. The second light brigade was directed to make a forced march from Blaris camp on Antrim-and two hundred and fifty of the Monaghan, a troop of the 22nd light dragoons, the Belfast yeomanry cavalry, under the command of Colonel Durham, marched to support the garrison by the line of Carmony and Templepatrick. Major Seddon, the commandant at Antrim, had been made acquainted with the intended movement,† and assured that he should be reinforced, and enabled to repel the attack of the insurgents.

It is hard to determine whether Antrim offered to the assailants or defenders the greater advantage. The town is nearly a mile long, and that space from the Scots' quarter to the market-house, about twothirds of its length, and nearly a straight line. The main street is a continuation of the Scots' quarter, and at right angles with the wall of Lord Massareen's garden, which is about forty yards from the markethouse, and lies nearly in the centre of the street. The wall of the garden completely commands the street, and the entrance to the market-house, which is a square building, supported by stone pillars, and very difficult to set fire to. The guard-house was there, and a number of prisoners confined in it. There was a second wall at right angles with the garden, which flanks it, and commands Bow-lane. The two walls are joined with each other by one part of an old fortification. The wall is about fifteen feet high towards the street-and being but four feet high on the garden side, it forms an excellent breast-work. The church is about half-way between the market-house and the end of Scots' quarter, built on a rising ground, and surrounded by a wall, which is about eight feet high towards the street and four on the inside. The church is nearly in a line with the houses on one side of

*It comprised the 64th regiment light companies of the Armagh, Monaghan, Dublin, Kerry, and Tipperary militia; one hundred and fifty 22nd light dragoons, two light six-pounders and two howitzers, the whole under the command of Colonel Clavering.

"The orderlies arrived at Antrim at nine o'clock, but did not perceive any extraordinary movement in the country, or any indication of insurrection. However, the drums immediately beat to arms, the yeomanry assembled in a short time, and the inhabitants of the town were called on to turn out in its defence. In sending the summonses through the town, it was discovered that all the notorious United Irishmen had left it early in the morning, which convinced Major Seddon that General Nugent's information was well founded. Of four hundred men capable of bearing arms, two hundred turned out on the occasion; but they could be supplied with no more than eighty stand of arms, as there were no more serviceable; and there was so great a scarcity of ammunition, that after borrowing eight hundred rounds from Major Seddon, the yeomanry had but twelve rounds a man, and those who volunteered but five."-Musgrave.

the Scots' quarter, and part of the wall is parallel to the houses at the opposite side, and the distance between it and the houses about twelve yards.*

The plan of the rebel attack was simply, a combined effort by superior numbers, simultaneously made at three separate points. The insurgents moved towards Antrim in four heavy columns-two advancing by the Belfast and Carrickfergus roads, united at the junction of these roads at the Scotch quarter; a third was to attack by Paty'slane; the fourth, commanded by a brother of the celebrated William Orr, from Dunolty, Randalstown, and Shane's Castle, was directed to push through Bow-lane immediately after the united columns, under McCracken, had commenced their attack.

By a singular coincidence in time, the assailants and part of the reinforcements from Blaris camp entered the town together in opposite directions the rebel columns debouching by the Scotch quarter, as the advanced guard of the light brigade crossed the Massareen bridge, and formed in the main street. The 22nd light dragoons, under Colonel Lumley, drew up in the rear of two six-pounders, which opened on the rebels with case-shot, and as the insurgent attack was made in close column, the service of the royal guns was very destructive.

The customary system of placing their musketry at the head of the column supported by pikemen, was observed by the rebel leaders, and having advanced one of the six-pounders † which they brought into action, they returned the fire of the royalist guns for a round or two with some effect; but from the clumsy manner in which it was mounted, the gun was disabled by its own recoil. Their street-firing was more successful-and while the pikemen were detached across the fields, to take the royalists in the rear, the musketeers pressed boldly forward, and seized the churchyard. That important post once occupied, it became necessary to retire the guns. The order was given to limber up, and the guns retreated to another and safer position, covered by a very daring charge of cavalry led gallantly by Colonel Lumley.

As was too frequently the case, the charge of the 22nd dragoons was brilliant as it was indiscreet. The enemy held the churchyard, and directly under the parapet its wall afforded to the rebel musketry, the charge was made. To launch cavalry at a body in close column, with an unbroken front and flanks secure, is almost invariably fatal. About eighty men charged, returned, and cut their way through the column they had broken. What was the result? In two minutes

* Musgrave.

"They brought this gun from Templepatrick, where they had it and another brass six-pounder, concealed under one of the seats of the dissenting meeting-house. They cut a tree, of which they made a trail, and mounted the gun on the wheels of Mr. M'Vickar's carriage, Lord Templeton's agent, and had wedges to elevate and depress it. It was formerly attached to the Belfast volunteers, but lay concealed for six years. They had originally eight, which also lay concealed, but six of them were discovered by General Nugent about a week before."—Musgrave.

they had five officers, forty-seven rank and file, and forty horse hors de combat.

The guns, which had been retired under the garden wall of Lord Massareen's domain, were served for a time with considerable effect, but they were finally abandoned, Colonel Lumley retreating by the Blaris road, by which he knew the light brigade was advancing.* In endeavouring to follow the cavalry, Lord O'Neil's horse became restive. A pikeman dragged his lordship from the saddle-and although directly under the fire of the yeomanry who held the castle garden, this excellent and gallant nobleman was killed by a pike-wound.

"On the retreat of the dragoons, the rebels, flushed with success, rushed on with a horrid yell, and seized the curricle guns, but every man of that party was killed by the yeomen, and the remainder retreated into the houses and by-lanes of the town. On that Mr. John

Macartney, of the Antrim yeomanry, assisted by his brother, Mr. Arthur Macartney, a lieutenant in the royal Irish artillery, who volunteered on the occasion, made a sally from the garden, with twenty of the Antrim corps, and drew up, in the midst of the rebel fire, the guns and the ammunition-cart; and having planted them on the garden wall, they dislodged the rebels by a few discharges."+

Within a mile of the town the retreating cavalry perceived the light brigade in march from Blaris camp, and a mounted yeoman brought intelligence that the reinforcement from Belfast was rapidly approaching. The town was immediately re-entered, and while the royalists returned with renewed strength and spirit to the contest, the coward leader of the fourth rebel column, frightened at a burning cabin, or the appearance of a few retreating horsemen, left his comrades to their fate, and retreated without having even ventured into the presence of the enemy.

That the rebels fought with great determination at Antrim is not to be denied and that they were not successful, from their overwhelming

"Two errors appear to have been committed by Colonel Lumley at Antrim. The first, in making his attack before the infantry had come near the town; for had he permitted the rebels to enter it, as they were doing, they would have been cut off. Secondly, his attempting to charge back into the town, when the rebels had secured themselves in houses and inside the walls of the churchyard. His first charge must be considered a successful one, a number of the rebels being regularly cut up; and had he even then been contented to have awaited the arrival of the infantry, the rebels must have felt uneasy at his being in possession of that outlet by which numbers of them afterwards escaped. Both these errors in judgment, however, are pardonable, as they originated in the chivalrous confidence of a young dragoon."-MS. Journal of a Field Officer.

† Musgrave.

"About one o'clock, and before the rebels arrived, several pikes were discovered in a garden in the Scots' quarter: in consequence of which the house to which the garden belonged was set on fire, and the flames communicated to seven more, which were consumed. The rebels having perceived the fire as they were marching towards the town, halted for near half an hour, doubtful if they should make the attack, not knowing the real cause of the fire. During that delay, there arose a dispute among the Roman Catholics and Protestants of Orr's column; the former insisting on putting the Orangemen in Antrim to death, but were opposed by the latter, who declared they would not consent to any act of cruelty."-Musgrave.