Now, had this triumphant detachment (twenty thousand strong it was) marched straight on Arklow, then on Wicklow, both would certainly have given way without an effort, and Father Murphy's ambition might have been gratified of sleeping in my lord Camden's bed. But as the elements fought for England, so did the unstable Irish nature combat on the side of the Executive. There was a panic, of course, in Dublin. The Senate tore up Dame Street to the Castle, begging, with tears, that their valuable lives might not be placed in jeopardy. And the Privy Council, perceiving that things might be going just a little too far, graciously acceded to the humble petition of the faithful Lords and Commons, and despatched reinforcements southwards.
At this moment the position of the insurgents was by no means a despicable one, despite the weakness of their leaders. The failure at New Ross had compelled them for the time to abandon their attack on Waterford. But they held Enniscorthy and its river, and Wexford with its noble harbour; while, for a base of operations, nothing could have been better than Vinegar Hill. To the north, too, they held Gorey, which was almost, from their point of view, the key of the capital itself. The hedges along the Dublin road were alive with disaffected peasants, who were longing for an opportunity of joining the advancing host. Arklow was half garrisoned, Wicklow scarcely garrisoned at all. If the rebel host had, ignoring whisky, marched straight northward, the march would have been an exultant progress of heroes, swelled as it proceeded by a torrent of exhilarated patriots.
But now the mice had played enough. They had nibbled the cheese and made unpleasant holes in it. It was time for the cat to pounce, and to pounce with a will. How dared these arrogant mice make holes in his Majesty's cheese? Arklow would be the next point--of course it would--so soon as the victors of Gorey could tear themselves away from alcohol. Five days of constant intoxication is trying to the most vigorous frame. Five days of cessation of hostilities is eminently convenient to an enemy who desires to act unflurried. Dublin was frightened out of its wits; the heads of the Catholic clergy were indignant and ashamed. Those lords and gentlemen who did not happen to be slaves of Lord Clare, or pensioners of England, shut themselves up in their country mansions to brood over their grief. Erin was in the convulsions which precede dissolution. The Executive--calculating spectators of the agony--deemed it time to come to her succour, provided she would swear an oath to behave herself for ever and ever more. The Executive shook its wig and declared that to stop so awful a scandal any means were permissible. Instead of dribbling reinforcements by two or three hundred at a time, and so feeding the hopes of the rebels with sham victories, the Privy Council promised that the whole military strength at their command should be put in motion to punish the iniquitous with a severe and righteous sternness. Lord Clare assumed a picturesque attitude, in which sorrow was elegantly blended with anger--like that aggressive angel who never sinned, and who, glorying in the fact, postured with his waving sword at the gates of Eden. Lord Camden mumbled, as usual, that the whole affair was 'really too awful;' that he was glad her ladyship was safe; that he ought to be elevated to at least a dukedom as a reward for his prodigious services. The Protestant inhabitants of Wexford, whose lives for the last week or so had resembled those of the chosen people by the waters of Babylon, must instantly be relieved, he gurgled. Enniscorthy must be retaken; the camp at Vinegar Hill, and the hill itself, if necessary, must be blown into smithereens. Small men had been good enough for small work. Now General Lake himself, Commander of the Forces pro tem., must head the Royal troops; the loyal Lords and Commons had no need to knock their knees together, their precious, honourable lives were in no real danger--never had been. General Lake and his men would set matters straight in a trice.
Having torn them at last from the whisky-bottle of Capua, Father Murphy led his forces against Arklow. His men were dispirited, unnerved by excessive carousing. Their heads ached; they felt unwell. Murphy and some other warrior-priests said mass for them as they stood bareheaded in the June sunlight, with nature smiling around.
'It was a holy war,' Murphy said. 'They had been guilty of backsliding; but man is weak and temptation is great; he would pray to the Holy Mother for them, that the cause might not suffer through their sin. He who addressed them, was, as they knew, invulnerable. These myriad bullets which he held in his hand had passed through his coat' ('See, boys, the holes!'), 'but could not hurt his skin. 'Twas the Holy Mother who watched over him and them. He would lead the van. Sure they would follow their priest--their pastor--their friend--their gineral!'
With howls of ecstatic and repentant fervour they cried out that they would. He had always led them to victory, their doughty priest! One more, two more successes, and Dublin would be theirs; then the whole country would unite; the Sassenagh would be driven into the sea; the object of the crusade would be accomplished--and through them, miserable sinners though they were.
They marched against Arklow on the 9th, and were repulsed thence with awful slaughter. The Royalists lost sixty men, the rebels left a thousand corpses stark upon the grass--amongst them, Murphy the invulnerable. With dismay and despair they beheld his body roasted by the enlightened foe; in the gloaming they saw devils, in the guise of yeomen, dancing round the steaming corpse; fiends cleaning their boots with the fat that dripped from it. With howls of superstitious horror now they scurried away in the darkness, over field and hedge and fosse, through dyke and brake, in an agony of desperate fear quite different from a battle-panic, and arrived at length at the rendezvous like madmen, panting, incoherent, to tell their fearsome story.
Orders were issued to the Royalist forces to hold themselves in readiness. They had been ready for months past. A grand combined attack was to be made upon the rebel base, at Vinegar Hill, on the 21st of June. Lock, stock, and barrel, these insolent varlets were to be stamped out of existence, without parleying, as a warning to all traitors. Eight generals (no less) and twenty thousand soldiers were to take part in this glorious field-day. Why had this force lain idle hitherto? Why were driblets despatched to contend with myriads? It was now the 10th. With a cunning steadiness of purpose, almost too wicked even for humankind, ten days were permitted to elapse before the final blow was struck. Ten days of inaction--ten days of rumination over the awful future--ten days wherein to become utterly disorganised, and to commit such deeds as a carefully-fanned flame of accumulated hate and the hopelessness of unutterable despair should dictate. The insurgents saw themselves on the eve of destruction, taught by a bitter past that there was no hope or chance of mercy. Flung out of the pale of humanity, they were to be hunted down like vermin--like vermin then they would fly at the throats of the hunters, and do all the harm they could ere they received the coup de grace. A scene of horror commenced at Wexford, and endured during these ten days, over which we will draw a veil. Those who know aught of this spasm in Irish history will have been already sickened by the deeds on Wexford Bridge, and will be glad to be spared a new recital of them. Suffice it, that if General Lake had started immediately after the repulse of Arklow, these deeds would never have been committed. The desperate wretches would never have entered on their carnival of carnage; would never have been guilty of the crimes which, like Scullabogue and other nightmares, must all lie at good Farmer George's door.
The eight generals and the twenty thousand soldiers set off at last. Lake's plan was committed to paper in the clearest black and white. A simultaneous attack was to be made on Wexford and Enniscorthy, while the main body directed its attention to Vinegar Hill, which was to be carefully surrounded in order that no vermin might escape. If this delectable plan had been successfully carried out, the rebels would have been netted and slaughtered by thousands; but that Providence which had slept so long, which had been so blind to human wrongs, so deaf to human prayers, awoke at last and prevented this wicked thing. At the critical moment two brigades were missing, the circle was incomplete, and, after a feeble cannonade, the rebel masses retired through the gap left by the missing links, to spread terror in the streets of Enniscorthy. Lake was furious. All that ingenuity could suggest had been brought to bear upon his plan. It is provoking when accident upsets our craftiest calculations. He had the mortification to perceive that he had not crushed the rebellion so completely as he had wished--by driving all the malcontents off the face of the earth. He abused his generals, but they showed that the fault was none of theirs; a higher power had checked their movements. Moore had met accidentally with a small detachment of rebels, who engaged him at Foulke's Mill; Needham, with a vivid remembrance of the disaster at Tubberneering, had moved through gorges with caution, delayed now and again by the errors of disaffected guides, the sulky inaction of impressed drivers. Lake might swear, but these were the facts. It was a pity; for, with the exception of the two missing links, the Royalist columns behaved admirably. They arrived at their posts in the nick of time. The rebels, in spite of their strong position, did little damage, for they aimed, as usual, too high. The priestly warriors acted with undaunted bravery, exhorting their men, horsewhipping them, even pistolling some who were endeavouring to seek safety in flight.
Father Roche was everywhere at once, clad in his vestments, with a brass helmet on his head. Father Clinch, of Enniscorthy, a man of huge stature, was conspicuous upon the hill; his broad cross-belts and large white horse were constantly looming through the smoke; his hat, with a crucifix stuck in it, was visible in six places at a time.