If a tenant—­who generally had some money—­was evicted, a notice was served on the relieving officer to provide him with a conveyance, in which he was taken to the poorhouse; but if a farmer evicted a labourer—­who had, perhaps, nothing but the suit of clothes in which he stood up—­he was allowed to walk to the poorhouse as best he might, and, when he got there, he obtained no special relief.

It is true that the passing of the Habeas Corpus Suspension Act offered another opportunity to the Government for striking a severe blow, but it was frittered away, although, before it became law, many of the leaders of disorder left the country, dreading its provisions.

Instead, the isolated arrests revealed that the criminals were provided with special accommodation and superior fare.

A district officer, asked by Lord Spencer for his views on the Coercion Act, replied:—­

’The only coercion I can perceive, your Excellency, is that people accustomed to live on potatoes and milk are forced to feed on salmon and wine.’

The last outrage I intend to mention in this chapter was a very remarkable one.

There was a contest for the chairmanship of the Tralee Board of Guardians.  The Land League put forward a candidate who was at the time an inmate of Kilmainham gaol.  The landlords, who at this earlier stage still had some power, conceived that the residence of the Home Ruler would not facilitate his control over the Board, and chose a candidate whose abode was not only more adjacent, but whose movements were unfettered.

The voting was even, until Mr. A.E.  Herbert came into the room and gave his casting vote against the involuntary tenant of the Kilmainham hostelry.  For this he was murdered three days later, and by the crime they hoped to ensure that on the next occasion the landlords would abstain from voting at all.

That murder of Mr. Arthur Herbert on his return from Petty Sessions at Castleisland was one of the worst, and as an exhibition of infernal hatred and vengeance it transcended the murders of Lord Mountmorres and Lord Leitrim.  It cannot be denied that Mr. Herbert committed acts of a harsh and overbearing character.  He was a turbulent, headstrong man, brave to rashness and foolhardiness, and too fond of proclaiming his contempt for the people by whom he was surrounded.  As a magistrate, sitting at Brosna Petty Sessions, he expressed his regret that he was not in command of a force when a riot occurred in that village, when he would have ‘skivered the people with buckshot,’ language brought under the notice of the Lord Chancellor and the House of Commons.

He was the son of a clergyman, and lived at Killeentierna House with his mother, a venerable old lady over eighty, he being himself forty-five.  His income was estimated at about four hundred a year, and as his relations with tenantry were not harmonious, he never went out without a six-chambered revolver in his pocket.  Physically he was very robust—­over five feet ten in height, and very corpulent.  In his own neighbourhood he always was known as ‘Mr. Arthur.’