United Irish, in order that by the suppression of it, all schemes of Rebellion might be eradicated. In my opinion, to prevent, not raise insurrections, must have been the object of government; the latter being too dangerous a stratagem for any wise politician to design. If the rebels, immediately after the rout of Walpole's army, had advanced to Arklow, they could have taken possession of it without the least resistance; for the garrison fled from it on the morning of the 5th of June, before day, to Wicklow. The insurgents then, of the county of Wicklow, who had with the utmost difficulty been kept in check by major Hardy, the commander in that part, and who had been repulsed in five different actions, neither easily describable, nor of use to be described, must have become far more audacious, and have co-operated with the Wexfordian rebels. The garrison of Wicklow must, like that of Arklow, have abandoned its post, on the approach of the united multitudes, and fallen back on Bray, only ten miles from the capital. The rebels might have proceeded with perpetually encreasing numbers, and seized Bray in like manner; and what in all probability would have been the effect of this motion, when so many thousands in Dublin and the adjacent counties were waiting for such an opportunity to take arms, I am unwilling to state. I am also unable to explain the motive for a piece of

conduct in the officer who commanded in Arklow when the garrison was preparing for flight; orders were issued that no person should be permitted to quit the town until the garrison had marched; so that if the rebels had come, as they were every moment expected, the whole multitude of fugitive women and children of the loyalist party must have fallen into their hands. If this order was intended to prevent the intelligence of Walpole's defeat from being carried northward, it was quite nugatory, as that intelligence was conveyed by several different roads:* and to imagine that the commander proposed to delay the rebels in their pursuit of the garrison, by the incumbrance of this captive multitude, would be to charge him with both cruelty and folly. The condition, however, of the poorer fugitives, was altered greatly for the better by the evacuation of Arklow, where they had been starving. On their way to Wicklow they were unmercifully plundered by the soldiery, but on their arrival there they found a comfortable subsistence, contributed by the charitable inhabitants of that town and neighbourhood.

As major Hardy was ignorant of the great force of the rebels posted at Gorey, he highly

An exaggerated account of this disaster was received by the disaffected in Dublin, before it was known by the members of administration at the castle; for the societies of the conspiracy had an established mode of speedy conveyance by verbal messages from one secretary to another.

disapproved of the evacuation of Arklow, and commanded the garrison instantly to return from Wicklow to their post, without even permission to taste any refreshment. It was augmented on the sixth by the arrival of the Cavan regiment of militia, and at one o'clock on the morning of the 9th by that of the Durham fencibles. The arrival of this regiment, one of the best disciplined in the service of his Britannic majesty, was extremely critical, as it prevented the taking of Arklow by the rebels, the consequences of which would in all probability have been so great and disastrous that I shudder at the thoughts of them. This regiment had been most remarkably active and successful, in the preceding year, in the county of Down, in disarming the United Irish, and thereby preventing rebellion in that part. When ordered southward, on account of the insurrection in Leinster, an ambuscade of seven thousand men was placed in the county of Meath, to the north of Balbriggen, to surround and cut it to pieces on its march; but by the excellent dispositions made by its leader, colonel Skerrett, it passed this formidable ambuscade without loss, and arrived safely in Dublin; whence, after much deliberation, and a delay dangerous at such a crisis, it was sent to Arklow; carriages being wisely procured for the men, in the French republican fashion, that they might be brought unfatigued to the scene of

action. This was fortunate; for their utmost vigour, discipline, and firmness, were soon put to a severe trial.

A few hours after their arrival, one of those ludicrous incidents occurred, which, amid the calamities of war, serve to exhilarate the spirits of military men. Two of the officers of this regiment, passing by the house of Mr. Miles O'Neile, in Arklow, where general Needham was quartered, and where a great breakfast was prepared for the general and his guests, were mistaken by a servant for two of these guests, and informed that breakfast was ready for them and their associates. This intelligence being communicated, the Durham officers came instantly in a body and devoured the whole breakfast. One of them, captain Wallingtun, remaining behind the rest, assembled about him the drivers of the carriages in which the regiment had travelled from Dublin, to pay them severally their dues. The general, at length arriving with his company of hungry guests, was at first astonished when he saw his lodgings occupied with a crowd of wrangling coachmen ; but soon being informed of the fate of his breakfast, he burst into a rage, and drove out the intruders with such fury, that they, with their paymaster, tumbled one over another in the street, in their haste to escape.

More serious objects in some hours more engaged the attention of the troops. The rebels,

who after the defeat of Walpole's army on the 4th of June, had wasted their time in burning the town of Carnew, in trials of prisoners for orange-men, the plundering of houses, and other acts of like nature, at length collected their force at Gorey, and advanced to attack Arklow on the 9th, the only day in which that post had been prepared for defence. Their number probably amounted to twenty-seven thousand, of whom near five thousand were armed with guns, the rest with pikes, which gave them in some points of view the appearance of a moving forest, and they were furnished with three ser→ viceable pieces of artillery. The troops posted for the defence of this, at that time, most impor tant station, consisted of sixteen hundred men, including yeomen, supplementary men, and those of the artillery. The rebels attacked the town on all sides, except that which is washed by the river. The approach of that column, which advanced by the sea shore, was so rapid, that the picket guard of yeoman cavalry, stationed in that quarter, was in extreme danger, a party of the rebels having entered and fired what is called the fishery, a part of the town on that side, composed of thatched cabins, before they could effect their escape, so that they were obliged to gallop through the flames, while the main body of this rebel column was at their heels.

was the terror of this troop of yeomen

So

great

that most