obliged to issue a brief on the 18th of July, 1492, commanding these parties under the usual penalties to desist from their iniquitous usurpation. The Pontiff's letter thus begins:—

"Dudum Corkagensi et Clonensi Ecclesiis invicem canonice unitis, tunc certis modis vacantibus, nos illis de persona Ven. fratris nostri Thadei Episcopi Corkagensis et Clonensis, nobis et fratribus nostris, ob suorum exigentiam meritorum, acceptâ, de fratrum eorumdem consilio apostolica duximus auctoritate providendum.... Cum autem, sicut non absque gravi animi displicentia accepimus, nonnulli iniquitatis filii videlicet Mauritius comes de Simonie, ac Willelmus Barri, ac Edmundus Mauritii de Gerardinis et communitas civitatis Corkagiae necnon universitas civitatis Yoghilliae Clonensis Dioecesis ipsorumque comitis et Willelmi ac Edmundi fratres eorumque ac civitatis et universitatis praedictorum subditi, necnon Philippus O'Ronayn, clericus Corkagensis Dioecesis, nescitur quo spiritu ducti, ipsum Thadeum Episcopum, quominus possessionem regiminis et administrationis ac bonorum dictarum Ecclesiarum assequi potuerit atque possit, multipliciter molestare et perturbare, Dei timore postposito non cessaverint", etc. (Mon. Vatic., pag. 506).

The temporalities of Cork and Cloyne were in great part gifts and grants from the various branches of the Geraldine family, and hence it was that these southern chieftains were now unwilling to see them pass into the hands of a stranger. The death of Bishop Thady put an end to the controversy. He himself had been in Rome when the decree of Pope Innocent was made: and on his journey homeward he was seized with a mortal distemper, which, in a few days, hurried him to his grave in the month of October, 1492, in the town of Eporedia, now Ivrea, in Piedmont, where his mortal remains were deposited in the chapel of St. Eusebius. As great miracles were performed by his intercession, he is venerated at Ivrea as Blessed.

His successor's name was Gerald, but we only know of him that he was implicated in the rebellion of Perkin Warbeck, for which he received a pardon from the crown in 1496. He resigned his bishopric in 1499, and John FitzEdmund was next appointed to these sees, by brief of 26th June the same year. During twenty-one eventful years he continued to administer the united dioceses, and on his death we find the following letter addressed from Dublin by the Earl of Surrey, lord deputy, to Cardinal Wolsey, who was at this time at the zenith of his power in the court of King Henry:—

"Pleaseth your Grace to understand that the Bishop of Cork is dead; and great suit is made to me to write for men of this country. Some say it is worth two hundred marks per annum, some say more. My poor advice would be that it should be bestowed on some Englishman. The Bishop of Leighlin, your servant, having both, methinks he might do good service here. I beseech your Grace let none of this country have it, nor none other but such as will dwell thereon, and such as are able and willing to speak and ruffle when need shall be". (State Papers, vol. ii. page 43).

This letter is dated Dublin, 27th August, 1520, and whatever may have been the cause, another recommendation was transmitted in the following month by the same lord deputy in favour of Walter Wellesley. Both these recommendations, however, were without success, and we meet with a Bishop Patrick, whose name sufficiently indicates the land of his birth, holding these sees in the year 1521. His episcopate was short: as Cotton remarks, "he probably sat only for a year or two". In the State Papers Cork is again described as vacant on the 25th of April, 1522: and before the close of that year John Bennett was appointed by the Holy See, successor of Saint Finbarr. He chose for his place of residence the collegiate establishment of Youghal, which had originally been founded by his family, and at his death he too endowed it with a great part of his own paternal property. Brady in his Records has registered several interesting memorials connected with this ancient Collegiate Church of Youghal. The catalogue of its books, drawn up in the year 1490, especially deserves attention, as it reveals to us what was the literary store treasured up in an humble religious house in a country town of our island at a supposed period of ignorance and barbarism. Besides several books of devotion and tracts on the decretals and canon law, there were eight Missals, five of which are described as "missalia pulchra pergameni". There was also the Life of Christ, by Ludolf of Saxony, now so rare, the Letters of St. Jerome, the Works of St. Gregory the Great, the Summa of St. Thomas, and a number of treatises by St. Bonaventure, the Master of Sentences, St. Antoninus, and others. The Sacred Scriptures had a specially prominent place; there were five psalters for the use of the choir, and twelve other copies of the Bible. One of these is entitled "Una Biblia Tripartita, et alia parvae quantitatis": another was the Old and New Testament, with the gloss of Nicholas de Lyra, "in five volumes"; and then there are "quatuor Evangelistae, glossati, in quatuor voluminibus", and "unum volumen in quo continentur parabolae Salomonis, libri Sapientiae, Canticorum, Ecclesiastes, Ecclesiasticus", etc. Some of the works of this little library, if now preserved, would be invaluable for illustrating the antiquities of our island. There was one "antiquum martirologium"; also a volume called "Petrus de Aurora, artis versificatoriae", is described as "mire exauratum": again, "Apparatus Magistri Johannis de Anthon super constitutiones Ottoboni": whilst another small volume was enriched, amongst other things, "cum quibusdam historiis provinciae Hiberniae". An addition was made to this library in 1523, consisting, probably, of the Books of Dr. Bennett. It will suffice to mention two of these works, viz., "Liber meditationum sancti Bonaventurae cum aliis meditationibus et chronicis Geraldinorum", and "Biblia de impressione, in rotunda forma, in manu Joannis Cornelii" (Records, etc., London, 1864, vol. 3, pag. 319, seqq.).

Dr. Bennett died in the year 1535/6, and at his death enriched the chantry of St. Mary's with some ancestral lands in Youghal and its neighbourhood (Ulster Journal of Arch., April, 1854). Henry VIII. appointed Dominick Tirrey to the vacant see, but the reigning Pontiff refused to recognize this nomination, and chose a Franciscan named Lewis MacNamara as successor to Dr. Bennett. The brief of his appointment to Cork and Cloyne is dated 24th September, 1540. This prelate, however, soon after his consecration was summoned to a better world, and on the 5th of November, the same year, another brief was expedited appointing John Hoyeden, (which name is probably a corruption for O'h-Eidhin, i.e. O'Heyne; see O'Donovan, Book of Rights, pag. 109), a canon of Elphin, bishop of the united dioceses. From the consistorial acts we learn that he was impeded by the crown nominee from taking possession of the temporalities of his see, and hence on the 25th February, 1545, he received the administration of his native diocese. The following is the consistorial record:

Die 20º Feb., 1545. "S. Sanctitas providit Ecclesiae Elphinensi de persona Joannis Episcopi Corcagiensis et Clunensis (sic) qui regiminis et administrationis Corcagensis et Clunensis Ecclesiarum invicem unitarum possessionem eo quod a schismaticis et iis qui a Catholica fide defecerunt occupatae detinentur assequi non potuit, nec de proximo assequi speret: ita quod, propter hoc, eisdem Corcagensi et Clunensi Ecclesiis praesse non desinat sed tam Elphinensi quam Corcagensi et Clunensi Ecclesiis hujusmodi ad sex menses a die habitae per eum pacificae possessionis seu quasi regiminis", etc. (sic).

It was probably impossible for Dr. O'Heyne to obtain