Catalogue description HENRY HOVENDEN to the EARL OF TYRONE.

"Upon receipt of a letter from O'Donnell importing somewhat touching the cause of this business unto your Lp., I conferred with him. He told me that the case wherein you and O'Donnell are is sufficiently known beyond seas, though not by any means which yourselves sent. He told me also that through cross fortune he was constrained to shift away his letters, reserving only a bare copy of them in a broken paper. Whereupon I said unto him, that albeit his speeches might carry a great possibility of truth in that behalf, yet it behoved him, coming to men of such calling as your Honour and O'Donnell are of, to be of such calling himself and place of credit as might bring with it cause of believing his errand; and therefore I demanded what he was, in which demand he hath satisfied me, and so he will your Lp. He passeth in his journey for a man of Galway, and so I pray you let him be accompted there; otherwise, in his return to the place from whence he came, it may be he will be intercepted, as the rest were that your Lp. despatched from thence. After you have seen what is required of you and O'Donnell, you may determine what course to handle. If England fear no foreign invasion it is the likelier to go hard with you; and also if your stay depend on the assistance of those that you cannot convoy a letter unto, the same yieldeth no show of present help unto you. And if you agree to the articles which Henry Warren moved to you, whereof I have sent you a copy, I do not see how such a peace can stand with your good. Neither is the lingering and delay of the State intended any way to serve your turn. Therefore I wish your Lp. to procure a thorough peace, or else to labour that help betimes, which at length you must be driven to if the wars endure. If it please your Lp., O'Donnell would meet you at Strabane, to perfect what you will touching this cause. If old O'Caban's son do solicit your Lp. for the fine which Tierlogh O'Quine's sons have, you may not assent to him, for that your fines here are my gain so long as I am toiled with supplying your Lp's. room."

20 March 1596. ["Stilo novo," according to Carew.]

Copy.

Calendar of the Carew Manuscripts preserved in the Archiepiscopal Library at Lambeth, ed. J. S. Brewer & W. Bullen (6 vols., 1867-73), vol. III, document 236.