“I knew I was right,” said the dragoon.  “Mr. Reilly, you are our prisoner on many charges, not the least of which is your robbery of the sheriff this night.  You must come with us to Sir Robert Whitecraft; so must this other person who seems your companion.”

“Not a foot I’ll go to Sir Eobert Whitecraft’s to-night,” replied the priest.  “I have made my mind up against such a stretch at such an hour as this; and, with the help of God, I’ll stick to my resolution.”

“Why do you refuse to go?” asked the man, a good deal surprised at such language.

“Just for a reason I have:  as for that fellow being Willy Reilly, he’s no more Willy Reilly than I am; whatever he is, however, he’s a good man and true, but must be guided by wiser heads than his own; and I now tell him—­ay, and you too—­that he won’t see Sir Robert Whitecraft’s treacherous face to-night, no more than myself.”

“Come,” said one of them, “drag the idolatrous old rebel along.  Come, my old couple-beggar, there’s a noose before you.”

He had scarcely uttered the words when twenty men, armed with strong pikes, jumped out on the road before them, and about the same number, with similar weapons, behind them.  In fact, they were completely hemmed in; and, as the road was narrow and the ditches high, they were not at all in a capacity to make resistance.

“Surrender your prisoners,” said a huge man in a voice of thunder—­“surrender your prisoners—­here are we ten to one against you; or if you don’t, I swear there won’t be a living man amongst you in two minutes’ time.  Mark us well—­we are every man of us armed—­and I will not ask you a second time.”

As to numbers and weapons the man spoke truth, and the military party saw at once that their prisoners must be given up.

“Let us have full revenge on them now, boys,” exclaimed several voices; “down with the tyrannical villains that are parse-cuting and murdherin’ the country out of a face.  This night closes their black work;” and as the words were uttered, the military felt themselves environed and pressed in upon by upwards of five-and-twenty sharp and bristling pikes.

“It is true, you may murder us,” replied the dragoon; “but we are soldiers, and to die is a soldier’s duty.  Stand back,” said he, “for, by all that’s sacred, if you approach another step, William Reilly and that rebel priest will fall dead at your feet.  We may die then; but we will sell our lives dearly.  Cover the priest, Robinson.”

[Illustration:  PAGE 65a—­I entreat you, to show these men mercy now]

“Boys,” said the priest, addressing the insurgent party, “hold back, for God’s sake, and for mine.  Remember that these men are only doing their duty, and that whoever is to be blamed, it is not they—­no, but the wicked men and cruel laws that set them upon us.  Why, now, if these; men, out of compassion and a feeling of kindness to poor persecuted creatures, as we are, took it into