According to the man's account, given in a disjointed manner under severe cross-questioning, he had gone to bed on Monday last, when somebody tapped at his door and called to him to open. Thinking the visit was from the police, who occasionally looked in upon him, he got up, and huddling on some clothes as he went, made for the door. As he was on the point of opening it, a voice called out to him to "make haste," for the speaker was "starved with the cold;" then he knew the voice was not that of the policeman, and he would fain have closed the just opening door, but a gun was thrust through the opening, the door was pushed open, and a dozen men with blackened faces and armed to the teeth burst into the room.
The ringleader then proceeded to go through some form akin to a trial, and asked his companions what should be done with Laurence Griffin, who had disregarded the notices served on him, and persevered in his villanous calling. It was suggested that death alone would meet the case. "Shoot 'um, says they," said Griffin to me. At this his wife sprang out of bed shrieking, and his children collected round him. Almost out of his wits with terror, the poor fellow declared that he had obeyed the notice, that he had relinquished his office, and that he was out of work, and full of trouble in consequence.
After some little consultation the chiefs of the Blackfaces consented to swear Griffin as to the truth of his statement, and while guns were held to his breast and to each side of his head, he swore solemnly that he had obeyed the notice, that he was no longer watching Sullivan's farm, and that he would never offend in such wise again.
When an end was made of swearing him, poor Griffin, more dead than alive, was marched out alone between his guards into the road, where he found himself among a score more of men, all with blackened faces. Then, so far as I could understand Griffin, the leader of the men outside displayed some dissatisfaction at the way in which things had passed off, and expressed his determination that the unhappy caretaker should not go scot free.
"What did we come out for to-night?" growled the chief; "did we come out for nothing?" Muffled groans followed this appeal, and encouraged the spokesman to add, "Shall we go back as we came, boys?" the answer to which was a decided negative. Then the unlucky man, Griffin, saw something glitter in the chief's hand, and while he was kept steady by gun barrels pressing against each side of his head, he felt a sharp pain in his left ear, and the blood running down his neck.
As to what followed he was very incoherent; but it seems that the Blackfaces departed, leaving him with his wife and children nearly frightened to death, and with the top of his ear cut clean off.
I may add, as an indication of the state of Kerry, that a gentleman invited to meet me last night postponed the meeting till daylight, on the ground that night air is not good for landlords. Not a single person directly or indirectly connected with land ventures out unarmed even in broad daylight. It is needless to say that no money would hire a man to watch Sullivan's farm.