At the time that this very man lay under the censure of a law which, in his own country, made him subject to transportation or death, from religious distinctions, and at the time that a prince of his own religion threatened this country with an invasion, this respectable character took up his pen and, unsolicited and without a motive but that of real patriotism, urged his own communion to peace, and to support the law which had sentenced himself to transportation.[647] Nepean and Orde suggested certain inquiries which O'Leary was to make; but who can tell at what point of these inquiries the practised casuist may have meant to draw the line? A hundred pounds a year, which Nepean says he named, seems marvellously small for the magnitude and risk of the service expected. Orde writes on September 8, 1784, expressing satisfaction that Nepean, in London, had 'settled matters with O'Leary, who can get to the bottom of all secrets in which the Catholics are concerned, and they are certainly the chief promoters of our present disquietude.' A fortnight later, after an interview with the priest at Dublin Castle, he adds, (September 24, 1784): 'O'Leary has it in his power, _if we can depend upon him_, to discover to us the real designs of the Catholics, from which quarter, after all, the real mischief is to spring.' O'Leary must have known that, in 1784, _no_ treasonable designs were harboured by the Catholics, and probably felt that he would be safe in making the inquiries prescribed. Mr. Lecky, a most patient historic investigator, a man who has searched more secret sources of sound information than any other writer of Irish history, while he considers that the letters just quoted prove O'Leary a spy (p. 369), yet, in describing this very time, doubts whether the Catholics themselves took any considerable part in these agitations. For a long period an almost death-like torpor hung over the body, and, though they formed the great majority of the Irish people, they hardly counted even in movements of opinion. Even when they were enrolled in volunteer corps there were no traces of Catholic leaders. There was, it is true, still a Catholic Committee which watched over Catholic interests; Lord Kenmare and a few other leading Catholics were in frequent communication with the Government; two or three Catholic bishops at this time did good service in repressing Whiteboyism; and Dr. Troy, who was then Bishop of Ossory, received the warm thanks of the Lord-Lieutenant;[648] but for the most part the Catholics stood wholly apart from political agitation. I do not like repetitions; but they are sometimes a necessity, as in judicial summing-up. Twelve days after O'Leary had been set to work, the Chief Secretary at Dublin Castle seems quite dissatisfied with him. The tone in which our humourist's reports were pitched may be guessed from the following passage in a later pamphlet from his pen[649]:--