"appeared to want animal courage, for they "flocked together to meet danger whenever it

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was expected. Had it pleased Heaven to be "as liberal to them of brains as of hands, it is "not easy to say to what length of mischief "they might have proceeded; but they were all "along unprovided with leaders of any ability."* What most surprises me is, that these peasants, after having been so long drilled under the inspection of French officers, should yet not know how to take aim at an enemy. In his account of the retaking of Killala, the narrator says, "we kept our eyes on the rebels, who seemed "to be posted with so much advantage behind "the stone walls that lined the road. They "levelled their pieces, fired very deliberately "from each side on the advancing enemy; yet, "strange to tell! were able only to kill one

man, a corporal, and wound one common "soldier. Their shot in general went over the "heads of their opponents." The Wexfordian insurgents, without any superintendance of French officers, learned, by experience of combat, in a shorter time, to level their guns with more fatal effect.

Beside religious bigotry and the expectation of spoil, the narrator of Killala assigns other motives as inciting the rustics of his neighbour

* Narrative, &c. p. 127.

+ Idem, p. 149.

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hood to assume those arms, of which they made so ineffectual a use. Among these was their eagerness for the gaudy trappings of the French military dress, and for what was to them luxurious living; objects doubtless of no small inducement to men unused to the comfort of even shoes and stockings, and to the relish of animal food; such being the wretched condition of the peasantry in the west of Ireland! "It is a debt "due to justice, however," says the narrator, "to observe, that if the first who joined the

enemy were enticed by hope to a foreign "standard, very many took the same road after"wards merely through fear. Great pains were "employed by the early insurgents to frighten "their neighbours into the same inclosure of "peril with themselves, partly by the most horrid "menaces in case of refusal to join the common

cause, and partly by spreading lies of the pro"testants, whom they represented as orange

men, universally bent on the excision of the "catholics.

"When the united weight of so many temptations is duly estimated, operating besides on a body of peasantry already estranged from their protestant neighbours by difference of religion, "language, and education, it will rather be "matter of surprise that so little mischief was "the result of the insurrection in Connaught, " and that we had not the same horrid scenes of

"cruelty and religious intollerance to mourn over, as had lately stamped indelible disgrace "on the eastern province.. It is a circumstance "worthy of particular notice, that during the "whole time of this civil commotion, not a drop of blood was shed by the Connaught rebels,

except in the field of war. It is true, the example and influence of the French went a great way to prevent sanguinary excesses. "But it will not be deemed fair to ascribe to "this cause alone the forbearance of which we "were witnesses, when it is considered what a

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range of country lay at the mercy of the rebels "for several days after the French power was

"known to be at an end.

"These reflections are offered to the public as "an apology for the opinion of certain persons "who became advocates for lenity, when, on "the suppression of the rebellion, the treatment

due to the insurgents was the subject of dis"cussion. Fire and sword was the language of

t

gentlemen, whose loss by the war, though 'grievous and highly provoking, was only the loss "of property. Milder sentiments may reason

ably be allowed to have place in bosoms which "had throbbed with the apprehension of a greater "mischief than spoilation. Experience had

ce

taught them that life is the first of worldly possessions; and having saved that blessing "themselves, they could not be in haste to

"ravish it from others. Indeed where there had "appeared all along so few traces of rancour in "these poor country folk, it was impossible for "a spectator of their actions not to pity them "for their very simplicity."*

To account in some degree for the small portion of rancour in the western comparatively with the south-eastern insurgents, we are to observe, that in the territories of the former those rigorous measures had not been practised, which government had been forced elsewhere to authorise for the disorganization of the united conspiracy; for surely the free-quartering of soldiers, the burning of houses, and the infliction of torture to extort confession, together with the unauthorised insults committed by mistaken or pretended zealots for loyalty, as croppings, pitchcappings, and half-hangings, must, whether necessary or not, whether deserved or not, be expected to kindle a spirit of revenge in the sufferers and their party. The bitter sufferings, however, attendant on rebellion, of which these western peasants had before been ignorant, they were now by their folly doomed to experience in a considerable degree. More they might have experienced, if the weather had permitted the troops to keep the field; but the winter approached. "General Trench therefore made

* Narrative, &c. p. 26–30.

"haste to clear the wild districts of the Laggan "and Erris, by pushing detachments into each, "who were able to do little more than to burn "anumber of cabins ; for the people had too many hiding places to be easily overtaken. Enough "however was effected to impress upon the minds "of the sufferers a conviction, that joining with "the enemies of their country against their "lawful sovereign was not a matter of so little

moment, as they had ignorantly imagined; "and probably the memory of what they have "now endured will not be effaced for years. "There are, I know," adds the candid narrator, "who think differently, who say these moun"taineers will be always ripe for insurrection, "and who urge in proof the mischief they have e "done very lately by robbing, and houghing of "cattle. Yet surely our common nature will "incline us to make some concession to the "feelings of men driven, though by their

own fault, from their farms and their dwellings; "wretched dwellings to be sure, but to them— (that poor fellow's lesson to the bishop is "worth remembering!) to them as valuable as

to the grandee his palace. Let a man look "round from the summit of one of those moun"tains that guard our island against the incur"sions of the Atlantic, and say what he should

See page 324 of this work.