332 Timehri. 
when he empanelled a jury in Donegal in 1613 thirteen out of the fifteen could 
speak Latin fluently ; yet most of the gentlemen of that land were abroad at 
the time. About the same date the same county struck off the head of its 
first surveyor, but this, I submit, was politics and not any more primitive 
form of barbarism. Petitions of Right had a hard practical side in those 
days. We hear little of the numerous -inter-marriages of the chieftainry 
with the proudest of the English and Scots nobility or of the Gaelic with the 
Norman stock ; yet the wife of the High Burke was the widowed Countess of 
Essex, daughter of Walsingham; Tyrone’s son married Argyle’s daughter ; 
his daughter was wife of Lord Mountgarret ; Red Hugh O’Donnell’s mother 
was daughter of the Lord of the Isles; Lady Tyrconnell, his brother’s wife, 
was a daughter of the Earl of Kildare and O’Dogherty’s wife was a 
Preston of Gormanston: a hundred more could easily be named. Only 
in the case of the remnants of the older plebeian tribes, the unfree and non- 
fighting population, could any degree of uncivilization be alleged. Whether 
their condition was in any way degraded or whether this idea, too, does not 
belong to the ‘‘ woodkerne”’ legend, I hope incidentally to show. 
In the Prado in Madrid hangs one of the most famous paintings of Velasquez. 
the Surrender of Breda. Some of my listeners have seen the original and to 
others it is well known in reproductions. Its artistic value is priceless. Histori- 
cal students have lingered lovingly over its details and have expounded their 
meaning. The great blockade has lasted eleven months and all the efforts of 
Maurice of Nassau, Prince of Orange, have failed to break from the outside the 
ring of Spanish steel which Spinola has drawn round the little Dutch city. 
Maurice has died in the attempt. The garrison’s supply of food has given 
out and the end has come. It is one of the last few good days of old Spain. 
In the background the spires of Breda rise from a typical landscape of 
the Netherlands. In front the Dutch Governor, identified as Justin 
of Nassau, advancing on foot at the head of some of his guard, bends 
low with Batavian grace as he offers the key of the town to the victor. 
He wears’ his sword and his companions still carry their short Dutch 
pikes and halberds. Spinola is depicted as standing with his staff in front of 
a well-ordered troop whose long Spanish lances rise against the watery sky. 
He and his officers are uncovered. Tall, lean, and soldierly in his damascened 
coat-armour, with features of grave dignity, his left hand grasping his leading 
staff and plumed hat, he leans forward in a kindly attitude to clasp his beaten 
enemy encouragingly on the shoulder with his right hand and to raise him up. 
It is clear that he has refused to accept the sword and is complimenting Justin 
on his stubborn defence. One notices that, although his provisions are ex- 
hausted, the Hollander is still plump, but this may be constitutional. Even 
inthe Siege of Derry there was one fat man, who, not being of the house of 
Orange Nassau, was in danger of his life from his suspicious and hungry fellow- 
citizens. 
The time is 1625 and the fight of the Netherlands for freedom from the 
Spanish yoke has lasted fifty-seven years, except for a truce of twelve. After 
all the bitter memories of racial and religious war, of slaughter and reprisals, 
of Alva, Egmont, William, and Van Hoorn, these stately warrior courtesies 
