[Sidenote: Perrott cannot pay his soldiers. A mutiny.] There were rumours of a second invasion of Scots from Connaught, but they did not come, and Perrott was left free to follow those already in his province. The indefatigable man made such preparations as he could for a grand attack on Aherlow with the help of the two Butlers, and he set out from Kilmallock in advance of his army. When he had gone a few miles the captains overtook him in hot haste to say that their men had mutinied and had returned to Kilmallock. The Irish auxiliaries were not bound to serve without English soldiers, and they immediately deserted the President, glad enough, no doubt, of the excuse. A few of the gentlemen remained, and Perrott retraced his steps to find his soldiers still under arms, clamouring for the Queen's pay, and complaining of the endless and thankless toil to which they were condemned. He reminded them that he had already offered some money on account, that more was on the way, that they had but slender excuse for their insubordination, and that he had a mind to hang the ringleaders. The men answered firmly but respectfully that if he hanged one they would all swing together for company, and in the end he was forced to temporise. Crippled as a general, the President went off to hold assizes at Cork, where he found the people willing to prosecute and the juries ready to convict, so that the pleasures of hanging were not altogether denied him. The garrison of Kilmallock, in a fit of repentance, or persuaded by their officers, made a raid into Aherlow and killed some thirty of Fitzmaurice's men sleeping in their cabins. 'I am ashamed to write of so few,' said the Lord President, 'but considering their cowardliness and the continual watch which they use to keep, it is accounted as much here to have the lives of so few, as 1,000 in some other country. If I might have but one trusty gentleman of the Irishry I would not doubt I should in short time bring the country to good quiet.' That one trusty gentleman was not to be had, but Ormonde's brothers did what they could to prove that they were not, and, in spite of recent transgressions, never had been Irishry. Without any help from Perrott they attacked Fitzmaurice in his camp near Tipperary, and killed 100 of his men. That was the last important success of the campaign, which had proved beyond doubt that the rebels had no chance in the field against English soldiers or even against the Butler gallowglasses; but it had also proved that they could not be followed with advantage, and that the problem of Irish government was as far from solution as ever.[227] [Sidenote: Stratagems of Fitzmaurice.]