"But a proclamation imposed no check on the outrages of men who now deserved, from the openness of their attacks, the name of insurgents. In the County of Westmeath, a body of two hundred of them assaulted and attempted to disarm a sergeant's guard, and a party of police stationed within a mile of a considerable town. In the County of Donegal, they marched about in military array, armed with guns, scythes, and pikes, compelling landlords to sign obligations to reduce their rents, and to pay no tithe. In Kilkenny, their deeds were even still more atrocious. They not only made domiciliary visits to compel the surrender of arms, but accompanied their lawlessness with unrelenting personal violence, and they perpetrated these enormities in the open face of day. A large body divided itself into smaller detachments. The latter took different directions to search the houses of farmers and proprietors; and, when their work was finished, they again united, at the sound of their horn, to renew their labours on the following day. "In one instance they cruelly abused a farmer and his wife, because they would not give up their daughter. They then searched the house, found the young woman, who had concealed herself, and carried her off. A farm had been standing unoccupied because, on account of some unpopularity attached to its owner, no tenant would venture to take it. A tenant at last had entered upon it; a new house was built for him. He was immediately visited by these Irish legislators, and compelled, on pain of death, to give up his farm and his house. A farmer having refused to surrender a pair of pistols to a body of these wretches, they dragged him to the hearth, raked down the fire upon his feet, and continued this torture until their object was accomplished. "An end was put, not merely to the payment of tithe, but to the payment of rent. A tenant ejected for non-payment was sure to have his revenge. If a new tenant entered, he had only to expect that his property would be committed to the flames, or he himself shot. The terror which was thus universally propagated went far to secure immunity to the offenders. To be connected with any attempt to execute the law against murderers, incendiaries, or robbers, was itself a high crime. To betray any activity in preserving order, was to become a marked man; to become a marked man was to be made the victim of open violence or hidden assassination.