He was the organiser of outrages for Cork, and his brother held the similar delectable office for Kerry. A good deal of the impunity with which crime was committed was due to the change in the jury laws, by which so low a class of man was summoned into the box, that criminals began to consider conviction impossible. To my mind it was quite worth the consideration of the Cabinet of the time, whether trial by jury ought not to be abolished in Ireland—indeed, even to-day, I can see few reasons for its retention and many for its abolition.
Anyhow in the bad times I am now 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.