composed of the soldiers and
adventurers of Cromwell's day, or new English and Scotch capitalists.
In 1695 any tory killing two other tories proclaimed and on their
keeping was entitled to pardon--a measure which put such distrust and
alarm among their bands on finding one of their number so killed,
that it became difficult to kill a second. Therefore, in 1718, it was
declared sufficient qualification for pardon for a tory to kill one
of his fellow-tories. This law was continued in 1755 for twenty-one
years, and only expired in 1776. Tory-hunting and tory-murdering thus
became common pursuits. No wonder, therefore, after so lengthened an
existence, to find traces of the tories in our household words. Few,
however, are now aware that the well-known Irish nursery rhymes have
so truly historical a foundation:--

'Ho! brother Teig, what is your story?'
'I went to the wood and shot a tory:'
'I went to the wood, and shot another;'
'Was it the same, or was it his brother?'

'I hunted him in, and I hunted him out,
Three times through the bog, and about and about;
Till out of a bush I spied his head,
So I levelled my gun and shot him dead.'

After the war of 1688, the tories received fresh accessions, and, a
great part of the kingdom being left waste and desolate, they betook
themselves to these wilds, and greatly discouraged the replanting of
the kingdom by their frequent murders of the new Scotch and English
planters; the Irish 'choosing rather' (so runs the language of
the act) 'to suffer strangers to be robbed and despoiled, than to
apprehend or convict the offenders.' In order, therefore, for the
better encouragement of strangers to plant and inhabit the kingdom,
any persons presented as tories, by the gentlemen of a county, and
proclaimed as such by the lord lieutenant, might be shot as outlaws
and traitors; and any persons harbouring them were to be guilty of
high treason.[1] Rewards were offered for the taking or killing of
them; and the inhabitants of the barony, of the ancient native race,
were to make satisfaction for all robberies and spoils. If persons
were maimed or dismembered by tories, they were to be compensated by
10 l.; and the families of persons murdered were to receive 30 l.'

[Footnote 1: The Cromwellian Settlement, p.163, &c.]

The Restoration at length brought relief and enlargement to the
imprisoned Irish nation. They rushed across the Shannon to see their
old homes; they retur