James refuted these pamphlets far more effectually than all the ablest and most eloquent Whig writers united could have done.

Every week came the news that he had passed some new Act for robbing or murdering Protestants.

Every colonist who succeeded in stealing across the sea from Leinster to Holyhead or Bristol, brought fearful reports of the tyranny under which his brethren groaned.

What impression these reports made on the Protestants of our island may be easily inferred from the fact that they moved the indignation of Ronquillo, a Spaniard and a bigoted member of the Church of Rome.

He informed his Court that, though the English laws against Popery might seem severe, they were so much mitigated by the prudence and humanity of the Government, that they caused no annoyance to quiet people; and he took upon himself to assure the Holy See that what a Roman Catholic suffered in London was nothing when compared with what a Protestant suffered in Ireland, [238] The fugitive Englishry found in England warm sympathy and munificent relief.