IX. BOOK waiting for the civil magistrate, and of his opinion of the advantage of resorting to the civil power, with which political remarks it is unnecessary that I should trouble you.'1 1798. April. Camden could no longer have desired to retain a Commander-in-Chief on whom he could rely so little as General Abercrombie. He did, however, once more, though to no purpose, invite him to remain. When he refused he was pressed no further; and after having enormously aggravated every element of danger in the country, he left Ireland, and the command devolved on General Lake. 'Sir Ralph's delay and long notice has done nothing but mischief,' Camden wrote, as soon as he was gone. It has cooled the ardour of the well-affected country gentlemen. No arms have been brought in, and now the general officers in command are themselves hesitating. At the assizes in Kildare the juries in general did their duty, but there appeared no good disposition among the Catholics, and the juries which did not act with propriety were of that persuasion. The appearance is of the contest becoming a religious one. All means shall be used to avert this danger, but the alarms of the Protestants are so great, and the hopes of the Catholics are so strong, that it is difficult to repress the violence of the first or make any impression on the latter.' 2 1 Camden to Portland, April 20.' S. P. O. 2 Camden to Portland, April 23.' S. P. O. SECTION V. STUDENTS of later Irish history are familiar with the CHAP. 1798. April, BOOK IX. 1798. April. the outward eye. The officers were younger brothers, professional men, adventurers, more or less educated, claiming the status of gentlemen, some of them men of fortune, and even of noble family. The rank-and-file were persons pursuing externally their quiet callings as tradesmen, artisans, clerks, farmers, or labourers. They had concealed depôts of arms ready to be snatched at a moment's notice, whether the object was to murder a magistrate or to take the field against the army of the Sovereign. The long forbearance of the Government had shaken the confidence of the troops and of the respectable inhabitants, who believed themselves deserted. Subtle influences were at work poisoning the loyalty of the soldiers. Things had come to such a point that there was scarce a country-house in any corner of Ireland where a Protestant family could go to rest without a sense that before morning they might be awakened by the yells of assassins. The servants who waited on them at table, the labourers who worked in their fields or gardens, might, for all they could tell, be in secret league for their destruction. Well-disposed at heart they might be, but their wills were under the spell of the general terror; and any magistrate whose loyalty was conspicuous knew that he was doing his duty to his country at the risk of his own and children's lives. The Irish gentry were looking upon themselves as doomed. The English press was ringing with execrations against them. They saw peers and statesmen going into the witness-box, to claim identity of opinion with the avowed advocate of assassination. The responsible governor of Ireland would have shown a craven shrinking from the first elements of III. 1798. April. his obligations if at such a moment he had allowed CHAP. an impression to go abroad that he dared not grapple with the deadly organisation which was thus openly setting law at defiance. The ten days weakly granted by Abercrombie were allowed to expire, and then, as not a pike had been surrendered, General Lake set about his work. He had to deal with a temper of which the natural stubbornness was encouraged by the impression that the Castle Government would not be supported by the power of England. Of British troops he had but a handful. The force on which he had to rely to carry out his orders consisted mainly of the loyal Irish Yeomanry, men whose friends had been murdered, who had themselves been marked for murder, whose hands had for years been tied by a law which gave them no protection, while to their enemies it was a convenient shield. There was little cause of surprise if now at last, when they were permitted to show a people who had laughed at courts of justice that there were other modes by which they could be compelled into obedience, the poison-fangs were not drawn with the gentlest hand. It is true that during three weeks regiments were sent to live at free quarters in districts where the inhabitants combined to resist the disarmament. It is true that when other means failed the lash was freely used to compel disclosures, though only where sure and certain information had led the officers to know that there was something to be disclosed. It is true, also, that the lash proved the most efficacious of persuasives, that under its pressure the labours of the Revolutionary Committee were rendered futile, that the army of insurrection was deprived of half its means of injury, that BOOK IX. 1798. April. the rebellion when it broke out was confined to dis- his The United Irishmen had affected the fashion of short hair. The loyalists called them Croppies, and if a Croppy prisoner stood silent when it was certain that he could confess with effect, paper or linen caps smeared with pitch were forced upon head to bring him to his senses. Such things ought not to have been, and such things would not have been had General Lake been supplied with English troops; but assassins and their accomplices will not always be delicately handled by those whose lives they have threatened. Occasionally, not often, men suffered who were innocent, so far as no definite guilt could be proved against them. At such times, however, those who are not actively loyal lie in the border-land of just suspicion. Jurymen who would not convict on clear evidence, peasants who had looked on upon murder, yet in court found their memory fail them, those who knew of intended outrages yet spoke no word of warning, are not innocent. Society demands the active help of all its members to prevent or discover crimes, and men who leave these duties unfulfilled are confounded naturally with the actively guilty, when society thus treated falls in pieces and military severity is compulsorily substituted for law. |