present. Connell's safety is being looked after by patrols from this
and Spanish Point station."

Three things seem to me specially noteworthy in this tale of cowardly
and malignant tyranny. The victims of this vulgar Vehmgericht are
neither landlords nor agents. They are a poor Irish labourer and his
aged mother. The "crime" for which these poor creatures are thus
persecuted is simply that one of them--the man--chose to obey the law of
the land in which he lives, and to work for his livelihood and that of
his mother. And the priest of the parish, instead of sheltering and
protecting these hunted creatures, is presented as joining in the hunt,
and actually devising a trap to catch the poor frightened man in a
falsehood.

Upon this third point, a correspondence which passed between Father
White and Colonel Turner, after the conviction of the boycotters of Mrs.
Connell, and copies of which the latter has handed to me at my request,
throws an instructive light.

When the report of January 31st reached him, Colonel Turner ordered the
tradespeople implicated in the persecution to be proceeded against. Six
of them were put on their trials on the 3d and 4th of February. All the
shops in Milltown Malbay were closed, by order of the local League,
during the trial, and the police and the soldiers called in were refused
all supplies.

On the 4th, one of the persons arraigned was bound over for
intimidation, and the five others were sentenced to three months'
imprisonment with hard labour.

A week later, February 11th, Colonel Turner addressed the following
letter to Father White, twenty-six publicans of Milltown Malbay having
meanwhile been prosecuted for boycotting the police and the soldiers:--

"DEAR SIR,--I write to you as a clergyman who possesses great
influence with the people in your part of the country, to put it to
you whether it would not be better for the interests of all
concerned if the contemptible system of petty persecution, called
boycotting, were put an end to in and about Milltown Malbay, which
would enable me to drop prosecutions. If it is not put a stop to, I
am determined to stamp it out, and restore to all the ordinary
rights of citizenship.

"But I should very greatly prefer that the people should stop it
themselves, and save me from taking strong measures, which I should
deplore. The story of a number of men combining to persecute a poor
old