THEIR HEIGHT, FORM, AND STRENGTH. 61 



says : " The Catholics had been completely pros- 

 trated by the battle of the Boyne and by the sur- 

 render of Limerick. They had stipulated, indeed, 

 for religious liberty, but the Treaty of Limerick was 

 soon shamefully violated, and it found no avengers. 

 Sarsfield and his brave companions had abandoned a 

 countiy where defeat left no opening for their 

 talents, and had joined the Irish Brigade which had 

 been formed in the service of France. They carried 

 with them something of the religious fervour of the 

 old covenanters, combined with the military enthu- 

 siasm so characteristic of Ireland, and they repaid 

 the hospitality of the French by an unflinching and 

 devoted zeal. In the campaign of Savoy, on the 

 walls of Cremona, on the plains of Almanza and of 

 Landen, their courage shone conspicuously. Even 

 at Ramilies and at Blenheim they gained laurels 

 amid the disasters of their friends, while at Fonte- 

 noy their charge shattered the victorious column of 

 the English, and is said to have wrung from the 

 English Monarch : ' Cursed be the laws that deprive 

 me of such subjects.' " 



45. In 1738, the Rev. Dr. Samuel Madden, of 

 Trinity College, in his Reflections proper for the 

 Gentlemen of Ireland, says: "It must be owned 

 that the native Irish, in their persons, are extremely 

 well bodied and limbed, and as to their tempers, 



