w dealing with, to send persons for trial
before a jury was but to advertise the weakness of the law.

Two men at Tralee were suspected of having paid their rent to me, and in
spite of their assurances that they were quite innocent and had not paid
a farthing for two years, it was necessary for the police to escort them
after nightfall to their homes about four miles away, and to advise them
not to venture into the town for a long while after.

One of the worst features, however, of all this terrible period was that
helpless girls and women were victims as well as men, I know of a case
where some ruffians entered the house of a family at night, went into
the bedroom of one of the girls, seized her violently, forced her on her
knees, and held her in that position while one of the gang cut off her
hair with shears, and then poured a quantity of hot tar on her head
before entering the bedroom of her sister to do the same.

A similar fate befell two girls named Murphy merely because they were
suspected of speaking to a policeman.

A man named Finlay was boycotted and then shot dead, and the neighbours
jeered and laughed at his wife, when in her agony she was wringing her
hands in grief.

The poor woman went into the street and knelt down crying:--

'The curse of God rest upon Father ---- for being the cause of my
husband's murder.'

The priest had denounced him from the altar on the previous Sunday.

'Carding' has always been a favourite Irish form of physically
insinuating to a man that he is not exactly popular. It consists of a
wooden board with nails in it being drawn down the naked flesh of a
man's face and body. This foul torture was often heard of, and it has
been whispered that women and even girls have been the victims of this
atrocity.

The merciful man is proverbially merciful to his beast, and those who
showed mercy to neither man nor woman had none on the dumb animals owned
by their victims.

A valuable Spanish ass belonging to Mr. M'Cowan of Tralee was saturated
with paraffin, set on fire, and horribly burned.

A farmer named Lambert found the shoulder of a heifer had been smashed
by some blunt instrument like a hammer. I myself had a couple of cows
killed and salted.

Indeed cattle outrages became incidents of nightly occurrence. Tenants
in all disturbed counties, besides having their houses burnt, saw their
cattle so horribly mutilated that the poor dumb creatures had to be
killed to put them