d, when they usually received a couple of hundred
pounds, blood-money, as it was called, with which they took themselves
away to America or Australia--their lives being only secured while they
remained, by the shelter afforded them in the magistrate's own house.
And so it happened that, constantly there numbered from ten to twelve of
these wretches, inmates of his family, each of whom had the burden of
participation in one murder at least, waiting for an opportunity to leave
the country, unnoticed and unwatched.

Such a frightful and unnatural state of things, can hardly be conceived;
and yet, shocking as it was, it was a relief to that which led to it. I
have dwelt, perhaps too long upon this painful subject; but let my reader
now accompany me a little farther, and the scene shall be changed. Does
he see that long, low, white house, with a tall, steep roof, perforated
with innumerable narrow windows. There are a few straggling beech trees,
upon a low, bleak-looking field before the house, which is called, par
excellence, the lawn; a pig or two, some geese, and a tethered goat are,
here and there musing over the state of Ireland, while some rosy
curly-headed noisy and bare-legged urchins are gamboling before the
door. This is the dwelling of the worshipful justice, to which myself
and my party were now approaching, with that degree of activity which
attends on most marches of twenty miles, under the oppressive closeness
of a day in autumn. Fatigued and tired as I was, yet I could not enter
the little enclosure before the house, without stopping for a moment to
admire the view before me. A large tract of rich country, undulating on
every side, and teeming with corn fields, in all the yellow gold of
ripeness; here and there, almost hid by small clumps of ash and alder,
were scattered some cottages, from which the blue smoke rose in a
curling column into the calm evening's sky. All was graceful, and
beautifully tranquil; and you might have selected the picture as
emblematic of that happiness and repose we so constantly associate with
our ideas of the country; and yet, before that sun had even set, which
now gilded the landscape, its glories would be replaced by the lurid
glare of nightly incendiarism, and--but here, fortunately for my reader,
and perhaps myself, I am interrupted in my meditations by a rich,
mellifluous accent saying, in the true Doric of the south--

"Mr. Loorequer! you're welcome to Curryglass, sir