The times were so much "out of joint" that it was no easy matter to find well-to-do citizens willing to undertake an office which had become so unenviable, and many paid fines varying in amount from £400 to £1,000 rather than serve.(945) By paying a fine for not taking upon himself the duties of an alderman a man could generally, upon petition, be relieved from serving as sheriff.(946) (M483) Meanwhile the continued presence of the soldiers of Fairfax in the city was becoming more and more burdensome. Scarcely a day passed without some disturbance arising between the soldiers and the civil guardians of the peace. Occasionally there was bloodshed, and twice within a very few days appeal had to be made to the general himself to restrain the plundering and roystering habits of his men.(947) It is not surprising if, bearing in mind the horrors that the military occupation of the city had recently brought upon the inhabitants, the Common Council rejected a proposal (17 April) that the custody of the Tower should be placed in the hands of a national guard in preference to the city’s own trained bands.(948) (M484) A series of royalist successes in Ireland now engaged the attention of Cromwell, recently appointed (15 March) lord-lieutenant of that country, but nothing could be done without money. More than a year ago (16 Feb., 1648) an ordinance had been passed for raising money for Ireland, but in the city it had been almost treated as a dead letter—"in divers wards no assessment at all, and in most very little paid in." The civic authorities had recently (22 March, 1649) been reminded of their remissness in this respect by a letter from the Council of State, who threatened to enforce their ordinance if the City could not be brought to execute it from a sense of duty.(949) (M485) Three weeks later (12 April) a deputation from parliament, including Cromwell himself, appeared before the Common Council and desired a loan of £120,000 upon the security of the Act for assessment of £90,000 per month and the Act for sale of fee-farm rents. The security was not liked, nevertheless the council nominated a committee to confer with parliament as to the best means of raising the money.(950) (M486)