They had orders of protection from the lords justices; and he should proceed at once, with four or five witnesses, to lay the matter before the general at Dublin, and demand the punishment of the offenders.
But if the party took the law into their own hands, and meted out the punishment the fellows deserved, the facts of the case would be lost sight of.

There would be a cry of vengeance for the murder, as it would be called, of a party of soldiers, and it would serve as an excuse for harrying the whole district with fire and sword.
"Having at last persuaded the angry tenants and peasantry to lay aside their project of vengeance, my father went to the soldiers, who, tied hand and foot, were expecting nothing short of death.

He ordered all their pistols and ammunition to be taken away, and their bonds to be loosed; then told them that their escape had been a narrow one, and that, with great difficulty, he had persuaded those who had captured them while engaged in deeds of outrage and plunder to spare them; but that a complaint would at once be made before the military authorities, and the law would deal with them.

Finally, they were permitted to mount and ride off, after having been closely examined to see that they were taking with them none of the plunder of the house.
"Everything was then carefully replaced as they had found it; and my father at once rode off, with six of the leading tenants--three Protestants and three Catholics--and laid a complaint before the general.
The latter professed himself much shocked, and lamented the impossibility of keeping strict discipline among the various regiments stationed in the towns.

However, he went down with them at once to the barracks of the regiment, ordered them to be formed up, and asked my father if he could identify the culprits.
"My father and those with him picked out fifteen, including the two sergeants, as having formed part of the body of plunderers; and the general had the whole tied up and flogged severely, then and there, and declared that, the next time an outrage upon persons who had received letters of protection came to his ears, he would shoot every man who was proved to have been concerned in it.