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CHAP., pravation of morals in the seats of civil violence. XLV. The mind of man seemed brutalized in many in

stances. The worst of the species had room to display à malignity of nature, whose existence might be doubted without the evidence of facts. To some, the tortures of their fellow-creatures were manifestly an amusement. Numbers were flogged without even a pretence of information given against them. To raise the pain to extremity, pepper and salt were sometimes thrown into the cuts during the operation. Prisoners, without trial, were strangled to death by suspension from the shoulders of tall men, who were thence denominated walking gallows. To the debasement of the military character, a commissioned officer was distinguished by this title. By such exhibitions the sense of moral turpitude was blunted. To dwell on the sad propensity to extortion, cheating, pilfering, and robbing, encouraged by a temporary dissolution of civil government; on the practice of perjury and subornation in trials; and of perjury in claims of losses, even by persons who might well be supposed superior to such meanness, without consideration of religious obligations, would be attended with more pain than utility. It was a harvest for the wicked, some of whom made fortunes in various ways, while men of principle sustained heavy losses. Some acquired more by plunder than they had ever been worth, made afterwards exorbitant claims for losses, and where the receipts for money, which had been formerly paid to them

in

in their private dealings were lost, payment was ex- CHAP. acted a second time.

As the affidavits of the clergy, authenticating those of claimants, were indispensably required to be all in their own hand-writing, the labour of some parish ministers was, from various causes, enormous. The pleasure of procuring aid for the deserving, compensated the toil: but when cases occurred, happily few in comparison, where a clergyman was required to swear, that he sincerely believed an affidavit to be true, which appeared to him suspicious, the business was perplexing. To know the real state of the claimant's property and losses he could not pretend: to refuse his sanction, without being able to assign any reason, would be regarded as totally indefensible: and to commit perjury would be intolerable. How far the consciences of some clergymen might be quieted by a practice pursued, - I cannot pretend to say. The clergyman signed his affidavit without swearing, and the magistrate certified it as sworn before him. I believe that very few were capable of signing, in this manner, what they would not swear; hardly any at all, doubtless, in the diocese of Ferns. But a clergyman might have written and signed affidavits, to have them ready for the sanction of his oath after due consideration and enquiry; and these, mean time, might be brought by the claimants to a magistrate, who would certify them without suspicion, whence they might be transmitted to the commissioners without farther enquiry. I hope that such frauds were very VOL. II. Hh

rare.

XLV.

CH A P. rare.
XLV.

Neglect of

govern

inent.

1798.

The commissioners acted their part throughout, with dignified integrity; though they could not always escape deception..

I have somewhat anticipated in marking the evil the French consequences of rebellion in the south of Ireland. A small part of the claims of compensation came from the west, where commotion had been excited by a small invading force. That the government of France was at this time very feebly administered, appears from the neglect of attempting to send assistance to the Irish rebels, while they were in strength. If, according to the advice of lord Edward Fitzgerald, a number of swift vessels had been sent to different parts of the coast, with officers, troops, arms, and ammunition, some of them might have eluded the vigilance of the British cruisers. Such supplies, what they most of all wanted, might have inspirited the insurgents to dangerous enterprizes. What effects might thus have been produced, we may in some degree conjecture from the impression made on the kingdom by a contemptibly small body of French troops, landed after the complete suppression of the rebels, in a part quite remote from the scene of rebellion, among a people who had not exhibited signs of disaffection, and at a time when, by the unremitting attention of Cornwallis, the minds of the disaffected had been every where conciliated in a considerable measure, and the royal troops, who had before too much resembled an armed mob, were reduced into the form of a regular army.

XLV.

Arrange

defence.

This viceroy had completely planned, and, after CHAP. unavoidable delays from the situation in which he had found affairs, was on the point of putting into ments for execution, such an arrangement of the troops, as to enable him to assemble, with great expedition, a respectable force in any part of the kingdom where expediency should require, when intelligence arrived of a French invasion. The chief account of the transactions consequent to that enterprize is a narrative given by Doctor Stock, bishop of Killala, who, with his family, was thirty-two days in the hands of the invaders and their auxiliars. This narrative is valuable and interesting, calculated for the prevention of those errors which, from the want of such authentic and impartial documents, are apt to creep into history, and become established by time. It is extremely honourable to the learned prelate, since it evinces a genuine goodness of heart, and a mind so cultivated, so candid, so elevated above mean prejudices and the servile fear of party, as to discern and publicly acknowledge the virtues of an enemy. Its accuracy is confirmed, if it could require such confirmation, by the testimony of the French officers employed in this expedition, with whom some gentlemen from Ireland have since conversed in France.

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CHAP. XLVI.

XLVI.

French in

Killala

French invasion at Killala-Character of HumbertBattle of Castlebar-Motions of Cornwallis-Mơtions of the French-Plan of Cornwallis-Battle of Coloony Proceedings of the French-Surrendry at Ballynamuck-Insurrection at Granard-Proceedings in the west-Storming of Killala-Prior transactions at Killala-Plans for saving lives and properties-Forbearance of the rebels in the westTreatment of the French officers-Executions— Macguire-Teeling and Tone-Tandy-Second French expedition-Death of Theobald Wolfe Tone -Exertions of Cornwallis.

CHAP. A FRENCH squadron of three frigates, two of forty-four guns each, and one of thirty-eight, which had sailed from Rochelle on the fourth of August, ar1798. rived on the twenty-second of the same month in the bay of Killala, in the county of Mayo, prevented by contrary winds from reaching the coast of Donegal, their place of destination. The troops were immediately debarked, consisting of eleven hundred men, of whom seventy were officers. Humbert, their

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