mminent, but fixed for the 31st October. Now, who has not heard
at any time within the memory of man of this expected "rising in the
West"? It is the _spectre rouge_, or, to be more accurate as to local
colour, the _spectre vert_ of the Irish alarmist, and a poor, ragged,
out-at-elbows spectre it is, altogether very much the worse for wear.
Flesh and blood could not bear the mention of this shabby, worn-out
old ghost with calmness, and I conveyed to the gentlemen who
volunteered the information my opinion that the _spectre vert_ was, in
American language, "played out." Will it be believed that I was the
only person present who ridiculed the "poor ghost"? I soon perceived
that my scornful remarks were not at all in accordance with the
feeling of the company, who did not see anything impossible in a
"rising in the West," and refused to laugh at the Saxon's remark that
things did not "rise," but "set" in that direction. County Mayo and
parts of county Galway were beyond the law, and could only be cured by
the means successfully employed in Westmeath a few years
ago--coercion. It was of no avail to say that very few people had been
shot in the disaffected counties during the last ten years. The answer
was always the same. The minds of the people were poisoned by
agitators, and they would pay nobody either rent or any other just
debt except on compulsion.

Beyond Athlone the tone of public opinion improved very rapidly, and
in Roscommon, once a disturbed county, I found plenty of people ready
to laugh with me at the _spectre vert_. There was nothing the matter
in that county. A fair price had been obtained for sheep and cattle,
the harvest had been good, everything was going on as well as
possible. There was some talk, it was true, about disturbances in
Mayo, but there was a great deal of imagination and exaggeration, and
the trouble was confined to certain districts of the county, the
centre of disturbance being somewhere about Claremorris, a market
town, on the railway to Westport, and not very far from Knock, the
last new place of pilgrimage. At Claremorris I accordingly halted to
look about me, and was surprised at the extraordinary activity of the
little place. Travellers in agricultural England, either Wessex or
East Anglia, often wonder who drinks all the beer for the distribution
of which such ample facilities are afforded. A church, a public-house,
and a blacksmith's shop constitute an English village; but there is