Being sent back to England was probably what Desmond really feared, for he afterwards said he had received letters from England hinting at such a thing. He complained of no harsh treatment in Dublin, where he was placed under the Mayor's charge, but not closely confined. Either wishing for or dreading an escape, his gaoler told the Government that the Earl was welcome to his house and table, but that he would no longer answer for his safe keeping. Some say that he was allowed out on parole, which he kept for a fortnight and then broke. Telling the Mayor that he was going out hunting, and that he would return at night, he went to Grangegorman, and thence escaped by dint of riding into Munster. He was escorted through Kildare by Rory Oge O'More and Piers Grace, both noted brigands or guerillas, and received in the Queen's County by 400 O'Mores, and in Limerick by James Fitzmaurice. At Lough Gur the Earl and Countess lost no time about showing themselves in Irish dress, and we cannot doubt that glibbes and rolls at once became fashionable again. All the Geraldines hastened to arms, 'knowing no God, no Prince, but the Earl, no law but his behests.' Desmond promptly gave out that he would allow no sheriffs, thus practically deciding the palatinate question in his own favour; and to all appearances he was soon as powerful as any of his ancestors had been. Fitzwilliam wrote to warn the fugitive that he was in great danger of losing all, but to Burghley he confessed his fear of a great conspiracy. The lawyers were afraid to go circuit in Munster, and not a single councillor could be got to go to Cork, where Perrott had lately done such execution. In a few days Castlemaine and Castlemartyr, which had taken so much pains to reduce, were again in Geraldine hands, and there was soon nothing to show for Perrott's Presidency but the gibbeted corpses of some malefactors, and the tears of 'the poor, the widows, the feeble, and the unwarlike.'[255] [Sidenote: The central district disturbed.]