IN DONEGAL 81

Amidst chilling discouragements, insurmount*
able obstacles, and endless rebufis, he had
now come to the verge of the grave ; grey he
stood and tempest worn, like one of the
withering oaks on the side of Glen Veagh,
and still he put forth the leaf and struggled
for existence, hoping against hope. T^he
M^Swines, as proprietors of a large portion
of the mountain district of Donegal, had
usually sided with the O^Neils against the
O'Donnels ; and O'Neil's demand of sixty
cows as tribute from O'Donnel, was often
enforced by the assistance of M^Swine ; and
when James I. conquered the O'Donnels,
and escheated their lands, as a reward to
M^Swine for his opposition to this chieftain,
his mountains, perhaps because not worth
confiscating, were left to him in peace, and in
the following reign of Charles, when the
execrable rebellion of 1641, broke out, the
M^Swine for some reason did not join in it ;
there was no proof of massacre or murder
against him, and the Act of Settlement left
him his property as an innocent Papist.
