He was examined, and said he was a commercial traveller, and that he had only one letter about him, a business letter, addressed to “J. D. Sheehan.”
“Have you any objection to show us that letter?”
“Certainly not,” he replied very coolly, and, taking it out of his pocket, he walked toward a table on which stood a candle, as if to read it. A gentleman who was closely watching him, caught him by the wrist, just as he was putting the letter to the flame, and saved it. It was addressed to J. D. Sheehan, Esq., Killarney [Present], and ran as follows:
“Feb. 12th, Morning.
“MY DEAR SHEEHAN,—I have the honour to introduce to you Captain Mortimer Moriarty. He will be of great assistance to you, and I have told him all that is to be done until I get to your place. The Private Spys are very active this morning. Unless they smell a rat all will be done without any trouble.
“Success to you. Hoping to meet soon,—Yours as ever.
“(Signed) JOHN J. O’CONNOR.”[6]
Despatches were at once sent off to the authorities at different points. They were all transmitted, except to Cahirciveen, the wires to which place were found to have been cut. Mr. Colomb—who had a force of but seventeen men in the town of Killarney—saw the uselessness of trying to communicate with the officer at Cahirciveen, but was so strongly urged by the magistrates that he unwillingly consented to endeavour to do so, and a mounted orderly was sent. Just after this unfortunate officer had passed Glenbehy (the scene of the eviction I have just witnessed) he was shot by some of O’Connor’s party, whom he tried to pass in the dark, and who were marching on Killarney, and fell from his horse, which galloped off. He managed to crawl to a neighbouring cottage, where he was not long after found by ”General O’Connor“ and some of his followers. The wounded man was kindly treated by O’Connor, who had him examined for despatches, but prevented one of his men from shooting him dead, as he lay on the ground, and had his wounds as well attended to as was possible. There was no response in the country to the Kerry rising, such as it was, because the intended seizure of Chester Castle by the Fenians failed, but O’Connor was not captured, though great efforts were made to seize him. How he escaped is not known to this day.
At that time, as always in emergencies, Mr. Colomh says the Constabulary behaved with exemplary coolness, courage, and fidelity. His position gives him a very thorough knowledge of the force, which is almost entirely recruited from the body of the Irish people. Of late years not a few men of family, reduced in fortune, have taken service in it. Among these has been mentioned to me a young Irishman of title, and of an ancient race, who is a sergeant in the force, and who recently declined to accept a commission, as his increased expenses would make it harder for him to support his two sisters. Another constable in the ranks represents a family illustrious in the annals of England four centuries ago.
As to the morale of the force, he cites one eloquent fact. Out of a total of more than 13,000 men, the cases of drunkenness, proved or admitted, average no more than fourteen a week! On many days absolutely no such cases occur. This is really amazing when one thinks how many of the men are isolated on lonely posts all over the island, exposed to all sorts of weather, and cut off from the ordinary resources and amusements of social life.
CORK, Friday, Feb. 24th.—This morning after breakfast I met in the South Mall a charming ecclesiastic, whose acquaintance I made in Rome while I was attending the great celebration there in 1867 of St. Peter’s Day. Father Burke introduced me to him after the Pontifical Mass at San Paolo fuori le Mure; and we had a delightful symposium that afternoon. I walked with him to his lodgings, talking over those ”days long vanished,“ and the friend whose genius made them, like the suppers of Plato, ”a joy for ever.“ He is sorely troubled now by the attitude of a portion of the clergy in his part of Ireland, which is one almost of open hostility, he says, to the moral authority of the Church, and indicates the development of a class of priests moving in the direction of the ”conventional priests,“ by whom the Church was disgraced during the darkest days of the French Revolution of 1793.
Almost more mischievous than these men, he thinks, who must eventually go the way of their kind in times past, are the timid priests, for the most part parish priests, who go in fear of their violent curates, and of the politicians who tyrannise their flocks. He showed me a letter written to him last week by one of these, whose parish is just now in a tempest over the Plan of Campaign. Certainly a most remarkable letter. In it the writer frankly says, ”There is no justification for the Plan of Campaign on this property.
“I assented to putting it in force here,” he goes on, “because I did not at the time know the facts of the case, and took them on trust from persons who, I find, have practised upon my confidence. What am I to do? I am made to appear as a consenting party now, and, indeed, an assisting agent in action, which I certainly was led to believe right and necessary, but which upon the facts I now see involves much injustice to —— (naming the landlord), and I fear positive ruin to worthy men and families of my people. I shall be grateful and glad of your counsel in these most distressing circumstances.”