184 Proceedings of the HoyoJ Trhh Academy. 



in the first half of her reign, and a full snmmary of the proceedings 

 taken by him to reduce the backwoods of Ireland to shire ground. 

 The circTunstances in -which this memoir was written add to its 

 intrinsic value the piquancy of an interesting historical association. 

 Tor the occasion of the narrative was the then approaching marriage 

 of the writer's son, Sir Philip Sidney, the chivalrous author of the 

 " Arcadia," to the daughter of Sir Francis TTalsingham, a lady whose 

 fate it was to be successively the wife of Philip Sidney, of Eobert 

 Devereux, the unfortunate Earl of Essex, and of the third Earl of 

 Clanricarde. The memoir was written primarily as an apology for 

 Sydney's inability to make a sufficient settlement on his son. Sir 

 Henry explained how his expenses as the representative of the Queen 

 in Ireland, and the neglect of the Sovereign to relieve his impoverished 

 fortune, had reduced him to a position of "biting necessity," which 

 prevented him make such provision as he desired for his much-loved 

 son. *' Three times," wrote Sydney to TTalsingham, "her llajesty hath 

 sent me her Deputy into Ireland, and in every of the three times I 

 sustained a great and violent rebellion, every one of which I subdued, 

 and with honourable peace left the country in quiet. I returned from 

 each of those deputations three thousand pounds worse than I went."^ 

 Sydney's contribution to the formation of the Irish counties 

 consisted in the main in the shiring of Connaught. In 1566, in the 

 first of his three Yiceroyalties, he took the first step in this under- 

 taking by providing efficient and permanent means of communication 

 between Dublin and the western province. " I gave order." he writes, 

 "for the making of the bridge of Athlone, which I finished, a piece 

 found serviceable ; I am sure durable it is, and I think memorable." 

 A few years later a bridge over the Suck at Ballinasloe, " being in the 

 common passage to Galway," was constructed by Sir l^icholas ^alby 

 at Sydney's direction. This was the necessary preliminary to any 

 effective assertion of English law in the remoter parts of the country. 

 It was followed by the division of Connaught into four of the five 

 counties of which it now consists, viz : — Sligo, 3Iayo, Galway, and 

 Poscommon, with the addition of Clare. In his " orders to be observed 

 by Sir Nicholas !3Ialby for the better government of the province of 

 Connaught," issued in 1579, Sydney's reasons for this arrangement are 

 thus given: — "Also, we think it convenient that Connaught be 

 restored to the ancient bounds, and that the Government thereof be 



' The accounts of Sydney's provincial joximeys have been printed in the Ulster 

 Archaeological Society's Journal, vol. iii., et seq. 



