RESULTS OF WENTWORTH'S LORD DEPUTYSHIP 113
and there condemned to death. His sentence was not carried
out, but he was imprisoned from time to time and deprived of
his offices. For the alleged failure to pay a marriage settlement
promised fifteen years before, the octogenarian Chancellor Loftus
was suddenly charged and committed, and not released until
he had made over his property to trustees who were friends of
Wentworth's. A third victim was the earl of Cork, who wrote
that he, thought no man living had suffered so much injustice
from Wentworth as himself and that the lord deputy had taken
from him by his prerogative alone, without any suit at law,
.£40,000 of his personal estate and £1,200 a year of his income,
together with '£4,200 within this five years for subsidies which
might have ransomed me if I had been prisoner with the Turks.'1
At Stafford's trial, the earl of Cork had his revenge, for he tes-
tified that the lord deputy had said: 'Call in your writs, or if you
will not, I will clap you in the Castle; for I tell you, I will not
have my orders disputed by law nor lawyers.'2
When Wentworth left Ireland for the last time, in 1640, he
thought the Irish were cas fully satisfied and as well affected to
his Majesty's person and service, as can possibly be wished
for'.3 Superficially this boast seemed justified. Ireland certainly
appeared more prosperous and more peaceful than it had been,
probably, at any other time in its history. Unfortunately for his
reputation as a statesman, his system of Thorough depended
upon the strong right arm of the lord deputy and signally failed
to secure the support of protestant or catholic, English interest
or Ulstermen, or 'mere' Irish. Beneath the surface all detested
Wentworth, though their divisions prevented their making a
united stand against his tyranny. The result was that Thorough
collapsed in Ireland as easily and as completely as Laudian
episcopalianism in Scotland.
The year and a half that followed his departure are noteworthy
for the reviving independence of the Irish parliament. During
the early months of 1641 the Roman catholics had a majority,
which they employed to submit twenty-two queries to the judges
on the legality of many of Stafford's acts. Taken together,
these queries form an impressive indictment of Thorough. When
1 Bagwell, I 269; Dorothea Townshend, The Life and Letters of the Great Earl of
Cork (1904.), p. 287.
a John Rush worth, The Tryal of Thomas Earl ofStrafford (1680), p. 175.
3 Straforders Letters, ii. 403.
3730.9 i