' The Glorious Twelfth '

New Zealand Tablet, 16 July 1908, Page 10

' The Glorious Twelfth '

1 The glorious, pious, and immortal memory ' of the Dutchman, William of Orange, was duly celebrated on last Sunday, to the accompaniment of the customary salvoes of oratorical artillery against 'Rome.' To Ireland, and to Scotland, the Dutch monarch has left memories that may be ' immortal,' but can hardly be termed ' glorious 'or ' pious.' The first memory which the Orange anniversaries bring to the minds of the vast majority of the Irish people is that of the broken Treaty of Limerick ; the second is that of the savage penal code. A Scottish pipeband annually heads the celebration in Dunedin. Yet to the Scottish mind, William of Orange is intimately associated with one of the foulest acts of treachery in all the history of ' Caledonia stern and wild '—namely, the massacre of Glencoe.

The Treaty of Limerick, which closed the revolutionary war in Ireland, was signed in 1691 by the Lords Justices of Ireland, on behalf of the Crown, and ratified later on oy William and Mary, under the Great Seal of England. (Lecky, • Ireland in the Eighteenth Century,' vol. i., p. i 39). 'The stipulations of the Irish,' says Lecky, 'in favor of religious liberty were given the very first place in the treaty that was signed ' (ibid). The very first of the ' Civil Articles of Limerick ' guaranteed the Catholics of Ireland the free exercise of their religion and freedom from ' any disturbance on account of their said religion ' (ibid). ' The public faith,' says Lecky, ' was pledged to its (the treaty's) observance' (p. 140). But that treaty, that. 'solemn charter,' was shamelessly violated by ' the imposition upon the Irish Catholics, without any fresh provocation, of a mass of new and penal legislation ' (pp. 139-40). This ' flagrant breach of faith,' says the Protestant historian Walpole, could hardly have been surpassed by ' the perjured Roman Senate, when their army burrendered at the Caudine Pass' (' Kingdom of Ireland,' c. "v., p. 324). Those Williamite laws, says the same author, were 'of a character quite unparalleled, and were in flagrant violation of the Treaty of Limerick' (p. 332). The ferocious Irish penal code (says Lecky) ' began under William ' (' Ireland in the Eighteenth Century,' vol. i., p. 141). " And he ' never offered any serious or determined opposition to the anti-Catholic laws which began in his reign ' (ibid.), even thbugh (says the same author) he possessed ' the royal veto, which could • have arrested any portion of the penal code ' (p. 145). He had evidently" no very •• glorious ' or ' pious ' regard for his royal name" and state when, with his own hand, he signed those savage Acts of confiscation and persecution, in violation of the ' solemn charter ' of religious liberty to which, in 1691, he had appended his sign*manual and pledged the honor of the country under the Great Seal of England.

To Scotland, the annual glorification of the Dutch monarch brings the memory of that dark deed of blood and treachery, the massacre of the Macdonalds of Glencoe on February 13, 1692.

The decree for the massacre was (says Green in his ' History of the English People,' vol. iv., p. 39) ' laid before William, and received the royal signature.' In 1907 the original military manuscript for the massacre (written by Major Duncanson to Captain Robert Campbell, of Glenlyon) was sold by Puttick and Simpson, of London. It runs as follows :—: —

»« r» J!i arC hereb y ord ered to fall upon the rebels, the McDonalds of Glenco, and putt all to the sword under seventy You are to have a speciall care for the old ffox & his sones doe upon no account escape your hands. You are to secure all the avenues that no man escape. This you are to putt in executione at fyve of the clock precisely ; and by that time or verie shortly after it Tie strive to be atl you with a stronecr party. b

4 If I doe not come to you at fyve, you are not to tary for me, butt to fall on. This is by the. King's special command, for the good and safety of the country, that these miscreants be cut off root and branch.

4 See that this be putt in executione without fend or favour, else you may expect Xo be dealt with as one not true to King nor Government, nor a man fitl to cary Commissionc in the King's service. ' Expecting you will not fail in the fulfilling hereof, as you love yourselfe, I subscribe these with my hand att Balicholis, ffeb. 12,- 1692.

' (Sig :) Ro. Duncanson. Ffor thcr Malies Service, To Capt. Robert Campbell, of Glenlyon.'

We may add that the Macdonalds of Glencoe were a Catholic clan. That black deed of treachery, like the violated Treaty of Limerick, must stand for ever to the discredit of the ' glorious,

pious, and immortal memory ' of William of Orange,