distant from Carlow, marched into the town at two o'clock of the morning of the 25th of May, with so little precaution as to alarm the garrison at a quarter of a mile's distance, by the discharge of a gun, in the execution of a man who scrupled to accompany them in their enterprise. Shouting as they rushed into Tullow street, with that vain confidence, which is commonly followed by disappointment, that the town was their own, they received so destructive a fire from the garrison, that they recoiled and endeavoured to retreat;, but finding their flight intercepted, numbers took refuge in the houses, where they found a miserable exit, these being immediately fired by the soldiery. About eight houses were consumed in this conflagration, and for some days the roasted remains of unhappy men were falling down the chimnies in which they had perished. As about half this column of assailants had arrived 'within the town, and few escaped from that situation, their loss can hardly be estimated at less than four hundred; while not a man was even wounded on the side of the loyalists.

After the defeat, executions commenced, as elsewhere in this calamitous period, and about two hundred in a short time were hanged or shot, according to martial law. Among the earliest victims were Sir Edward Crosbie, and one Heydon, a yeoman of Sir Charles Burton's troop. The latter is believed to have been the

leader of the rebel column; to have conducted the assailants into the town, and on their ill success to have abandoned them. He had certainly in that crisis taken his place as a yeoman, and joined in the slaughter of the assailants. Sir Edward, at whose house the rebel column had assembled, but who certainly had not accompanied them in their march, was condemned and hanged as an United Irishman. I can say nothing from my own knowledge of this unfortunate baronet, with whom I had never any acquaintance; but his friends have affirmed with truth, that he fell a sacrifice to the confusion which necessarily attends a trial by military law, in the rage of a rebellion; and that his innocence would be manifest if certain circumstances were made public, which they chose to withhold for a time through respect to administration, then dangerously situated. The whole of his guilt could only have consisted in his having given way to a tide of theoretic politics, which many speculative men had not sufficient clearness of judgment to correct, or duplicity to conceal, though they might utterly abhor the consequences of an attempt to reduce these theories to practice by force of arms.

Since the publication of my first edition, a pamphlet has appeared, stiled, "A Narrative of "the Apprehension, Trial, and Execution of Sir "Edward William Crosbie, Bart; in which the

"Innocence of Sir Edward, and the Iniquity of "the Proceedings against him are indubitably "and clearly proved." This publication records. one atrocious instance, out of a multitude which occurred, of the abuse of power delegated by the members of administration to inferior actors in a time of lamentable distraction. Protestant loyalists, witnesses in favour of the accused, were forcibly prevented by the military from entering the court. Roman catholic prisoners were tortured by repeated floggings, to force them to give evidence against him, and appear to have been promised their lives upon no other condition than that of his conviction. Notwithstanding all these and other violent measures, no charge was proved against him; of which defect of evidence his judges were so sensible, that, in defiance of an act of parliament, a copy of the proceedings was withheld from his widow and family. The court was irregularly constituted and illegal, destitute of a judge advocate. The execution of the sentence, was precipitate, at an unusual hour, and attended with atrocious circumstances, not warranted by the sentence, and reflecting indelible disgrace on the parties concerned. I refer the reader to the pamphlet itself. I insert some papers in the appendix, No. 7.

Sometimes one of those numerous little incidents, which occur in times of civil distraction,

though of no importance in themselves, may assist to give the reader some idea of the state of the country on such occasions. A gentleman named Thomas Elliot, going from Carlow, after the repulse of the rebels, to visit his house, three miles from the town, saw thirty or forty of the peasants, his neighbours, assembled in the road at the end of his avenue, whom he supposed to have met for mutual enquiries about news. He was advancing without apprehension of danger, when observing two guns levelled at him, he wheeled, galloped away, and fortunately escaped both shots. Hearing a shout from them, with a declaration that he might come to them with confidence of safety, he returned, and called to them to meet him without arms. Finding that they declined this proof of pacific intention, he again galloped away and escaped some shots. When he returned soon after with a body of yeomen, the peasants, expecting no mercy, fled to places of concealment; but perceiving that, quite contrary to their expectation, their cabins were not burned, nor any severe punishment intended, they returned to their occupations, and remained perfectly quiet. A contrary conduct in this gentleman would have sent these and others to augment the rebel forces.

The defeats of the rebels at Monasterevan and Hacketstown, in the same morning with that at Carlow, were nearly as bloodless on the side of

the loyalists. The garrison of the former, consisting of eighty-five yeomen, not three weeks embodied, of whom forty-three were cavalry, was assailed by a body of men, perhaps a thousand in number, a little after four o'clock; but such was the spirit and steadiness of this little army, assisted by some volunteers, that the assailants were on every side completely répulsed, though they could not be prevented from setting fire to part of the town. The infantry, under lieutenant George Bagot, had advanced against the main body of the enemy on the bank of the grand canal, where the town is situate; while the cavalry, under Captain Haystead, skirmished with another party in the street. On the return of part of the infantry from the pursuit, a furious attack was made in conjunction with the cavalry, and the rebels were driven from the town with slaughter. Sixty-eight of their dead were said to be collected and buried by the victors; some are supposed to have been carried away by the vanquished, many of whom were doubtless wounded. Of the loyalists, nine were slain, of whom two were of the volunteer class.

The incaution and vain confidence of the insurgents was no where more strongly exemplified than in their attack of Hacketstown, in the county of Carlo, forty-four miles from Dublin. The garrison, which was composed of a detachment of the Antrim militia, under