sufficient guaranty for the very severest reflections on the spirit of the government, is expressed significantly in the terms, used habitually by Roman Catholic gentlemen, in prudential exculpation of themselves, when threatened with inquiry for their conduct during these times of agitation. "I thank my God that no man can charge me justly with having saved the life of any Protestant, or his house from pillage, by my intercession with the rebel chiefs." How! Did men boast of collusion with violence and the spirit of massacre ! What did that mean? It meant this: Some Roman Catholics had pleaded, and pleaded truly, as a reason for special indulgence to themselves, that any influence which might belong to them, on the score of religion or of private friendship, with the rebel authorities, had been used by them on behalf of persecuted Protestants, either in delivering them altogether, or in softening their doom. But, to the surprise of every body, this plea was so far from being entertained favorably by the courts of inquiry, that, on the contrary, an argument was built upon it, dangerous in the last degree to the pleader. "You admit, then," it was retorted, "having had this very considerable influence upon the rebel councils; your influence extended to the saving of lives; in that case we must suppose you to have been known privately as their friend and supporter." Thus to have delivered an innocent man from murder, argued that the deliverer must have been an accomplice of the murderous party. Readily it may be supposed that few would be disposed to urge such a vindication, when it became known in what way it was likely to operate. The government itself had made it perilous to profess humanity; and every man henceforward gloried publicly in his callousness and insensibility, as the one best safeguard to himself on a path so closely beset with rocks. CHAPTER X. FRENCH INVASION OF IRELAND, AND SECOND THE decisive battle of Vinegar Hill took place at mid· summer; and with that battle terminated the First Rebellion. Two months later, a French force, not making fully a thousand men, under the command of General Humbert, landed on the west coast of Ireland, and again roused the Irish peasantry to insurrection. This latter insurrection, and the invasion which aroused it, naturally had a peculiar interest for Lord Westport and myself, who, in our present abode of Westport House, were living in its local centre. I, in particular, was led, by hearing on every side the conversation reverting to the dangers and tragic incidents. of the era, separated from us by not quite two years, to make inquiries of every body who had personally participated in the commotions. Records there were on every side, and memorials even in our bed rooms, of this French visit; for, at one time, they had occupied Westport House in some strength. The largest town in our neighborhood was Castlebar, distant about eleven Irish miles. To this it was that the French addressed their very earliest efforts. Advancing rapidly, and with their usual style of theatrical confidence, they had obtained at first a degree of success which was almost surprising to their own insolent vanity, and which, long afterwards, became a subject of bitter mortification to our own army. Had there been at this point any energy at all corresponding to that of the enemy, or commensurate to the intrinsic superiority of our own troops in steadiness, the French would have been compelled to lay down their arms. The experience of those days, however, showed how deficient is the finest composition of an army, unless where its martial qualities have been developed by practice; and how liable is all courage, when utterly inexperienced to sudden panics. This gasconading advance, which would have foundered utterly against a single battalion of the troops which fought in 1812-13 amongst the Pyrenees, was here for the moment successful. The bishop of this see, Dr. Stock, with his whole household, and, indeed, his whole pastoral charge, became, on this occasion, prisoners to the enemy. The republican head quarters were fixed for a time in the episcopal palace; and there it was that General Humbert and his staff lived in familiar intercourse with the bishop, who thus became well qualified to record (which he soon afterwards did in an anonymous pamphlet) the leading circumstances of the French incursion, and the consequent insurrection in Connaught, as well as the most striking features in the character and deportment of the republican officers. Riding over the scene of these transactions daily for some months, in company with Dr. Peter Browne, the Dean of Ferns, (an illegitimate son of the late Lord Altamont, and, therefore, half brother to the present,) whose sacred character had not prevented him from taking that military part which seemed, in those difficult moments, a duty of elementary patriotism laid upon all alike, I enjoyed many opportunities for checking the statements of the bishop. The small body of French troops which undertook this remote service had been detached in one half from the army of the Rhine; the other half had served under Napoleon in his first foreign campaign, viz., the Italian campaign of 1796, which accomplished the conquest of Northern Italy. Those from Germany showed, by their looks and their meagre condition, how much they had suffered; and some of them, in describing their hardships, told their Irish. acquaintance that, during the seige of Metz, which had occurred in the previous winter of 1797, they had slept in holes made four feet below the surface of the snow. One officer declared solemnly that he had not once undressed, further than by taking off his coat, for a period of twelve months. The private soldiers had all the essential qualities fitting them for a difficult and trying service: "intelligence, activity, temperance, patience to a surprising degree, together with the exactest discipline." This is the statement of their candid and upright enemy. Yet," says the bishop, "with all these martial qualities, if you except the diers, they had nothing to catch the eye. Their stature, for the most part, was low, their complexion pale and yellow, their clothes much the worse for wear: to a superficial observer, they would have appeared incapable of enduring any hardship. These were the men, however, of whom it was presently observed, that they could be well content to live on bread or potatoes, to drink water, to make the stones of the street their bed, and to sleep in their clothes, with no covering but the canopy of heaven.' "How vast," says Cicero, "is the revenue of Parsimony!" and, by a thousand degrees more striking, how celestial is the strength that descends upon the feeble through Temperance! 66 grena It may well be imagined in what terror the families of Killala heard of a French invasion, and the necessity of immediately receiving a republican army. As sans culottes these men, all over Europe, had the reputation of pursuing a ferocious marauding policy; in fact, they were held little better than sanguinary brigands. In candor, it must be admitted that their conduct at Killala belied these reports; though, on the other hand, an obvious interest obliged them to a more pacific demeanor in a land which they saluted as friendly, and designed to raise into extensive insurrection. The French army, so much dreaded, at length arrived. The general and his staff entered the palace; and the first act of one officer, on coming into the dining room, was to advance to the sideboard, sweep all the plate into a basket, and deliver it to the bishop's butler, with a charge to carry it off to a place of security.* The French officers, with the detachment left under their orders by the commander-in-chief, staid about one month at Killala. This period allowed opportunities enough for observing individual differences of character and the general tone of their manners. These opportunities were not thrown away upon the bishop; he noticed with a critical eye, and he recorded on the spot, whatever fell within his own experience. Had he, however, happened to be a political or courtier bishop, his record would, perhaps, have been suppressed; and, at any rate, it would have been colored by prejudice. As it was, I believe it to have * As this happened to be the truth, the bishop did right to report it. Otherwise, his lordship does not seem to have had much acquaintance with the French scenical mode of arranging their public acts for purposes of effect. Cynical people (like myself, when looking back to this anecdote from the year 1833) were too apt to remark that this plate and that basket were carefully numbered; that the episcopal butler (like Pharaoh's) was liable, alas! to be hanged in case the plate were not forthcoming on a summons from head quarters; and that the Killala "place of security" was kindly strengthened, under the maternal anxiety of the French republic, by doubling the French sentries. |