Each of these "Undertakers,"
as they were called, was accompanied to his new home by kinsmen,
friends, and tenants, as Lord Ochiltree, for instance, who is
mentioned as having arrived "accompanied with thirty-three followers,
a minister, some tenants, freeholders, [and] artificers." By the end
of 1612 the emigration from Scotland is estimated to have reached
10,000. Indeed, before the end of this year so rapidly had the traffic
increased between Scotland and Ireland that the passage between the
southwest of Scotland and Ulster "is now become a commoun and are
ordinarie ferrie," the boat-men of which were having a rare time of it
by charging what they pleased for the passage or freight. In the
selection of the settlers measures were carefully taken that they
should be "from the inwards part of Scotland," and that they should be
so located in Ulster that "they may not mix nor intermarry" with "the
mere Irish." For the most part the settlers appear to have been
selected from the shires of Dumbarton, Renfrew, Ayr, Galloway, and
Dumfries. Emigration from Scotland to Ireland appears to have
continued steadily and the English historian Carte estimated, after
diligent documentary study, that by 1641 there were in Ulster 100,000
Scots and 20,000 English settlers. In 1656 it was proposed by the
Irish government that persons "of the Scottish nation desiring to come
into Ireland" should be prohibited from settling in Ulster or County
Louth, but the scheme was not put into effect.
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