The rest were banditti, whose violence and licentiousness the Government affected to disapprove, but did not really exert itself to suppress.

The Protestants not only were not protected, but were not suffered to protect themselves.

It was determined that they should be left unarmed in the midst of an armed and hostile population.

A day was fixed on which they were to bring all their swords and firelocks to the parish churches; and it was notified that every Protestant house in which, after that day, a weapon should be found should be given up to be sacked by the soldiers.
Bitter complaints were made that any knave might, by hiding a spear head or an old gun barrel in a corner of a mansion, bring utter ruin on the owner, [150] Chief Justice Keating, himself a Protestant, and almost the only Protestant who still held a great place in Ireland, struggled courageously in the cause of justice and order against the united strength of the government and the populace.

At the Wicklow assizes of that spring, he, from the seat of judgment, set forth with great strength of language the miserable state of the country.