Stephens and MacManus led off the remainder of their party, without being pursued or molested.
After a short consultation, they determined to separate.

Mr.Stephens proposed to go on to Urlingford, where a large force was collecting, and MacManus accepted the duty of bearing to us the intelligence of the disaster, and taking chance with us for the future.

He came up with Mr.
Meagher, Mr.O'Donohoe, and Mr.Leyne, who were then on their way to the Comeragh mountains, but changed their purpose on hearing this sad intelligence.

They remained that night at the house of a man named Hanrahan, near Nine-mile House, a small village on the high road from Kilkenny to Cork.
I was all this time ignorant of what occurred.

After Mr.Reilly had left me, and I was joined by the young friend already mentioned, I summoned as many of the farmers of the neighbourhood as I could collect, and it was agreed that ten of them, who would represent each one hundred men, should meet me next day, after divine service, at the wood of Keilavalla, situate near the western base of Slievenamon.