During this visit, Whitefield a few times ventured out of the city to Oxmantown-green, then a large open place, situated near the royal barracks, where the Ormond and Liberty boys, two factions among the lowest class of the people, generally assembled on the Sabbath to fight with each other. The congregations at first were very numerous, and deeply affected, nor did any disturbance occur. Thus encouraged, the preacher ventured again, and gave notice of his intention to resume his labors. He went through the barracks, the door of which opened into the green, and pitched his tent near the barrack walls, not doubting of the protection, or at least of the interposition of the officers and soldiers, if there should be occasion for it. The multitude in attendance was indeed vast. After singing and prayer, Whitefield preached without molestation, except that now and then a few stones and clods of dirt were thrown at him. It being war-time, he took occasion to exhort his hearers, as was his usual practice, not only to fear God, but to honor the king; and prayed for the success of the king of Prussia. When the service was over, he thought to return home by the way he came, but, to his great surprise, a passage through the barracks was denied; and he was compelled to pass from one end of the green to the other, through thousands of Roman-catholics. He was unattended; for a soldier and four preachers who came with him had fled from the scene of danger, and he was seriously attacked by the mob. They threw vollies of stones upon him from all quarters, and he reeled backwards and forwards till he was almost breathless and covered with blood. At length, with great difficulty he staggered to the door of a minister's house near the green, which was kindly opened to him. For a while he continued speechless, and panting for breath; but his weeping friends having given him a cordial, and washed his wounds, a coach was procured, in which, amidst the oaths, imprecations, and threatenings of the rabble, he got safe home, and united in a hymn of thanksgiving with his friends. In a letter written to a friend soon after this event, he says, "I received many blows and wounds; one was particularly large, and near my temple: I thought of Stephen, and was in hopes, like him, to go off in this bloody triumph to the immediate presence of my Master." Unpromising, however, as things were in Ireland, the labors of Whitefield, followed as they were by those of the Wesleys, became the foundation of a number of Christian societies that proved vast blessings to Ireland; and some of them grew into large churches, which continue to flourish till this day.