guardians of Roman Catholic children, used to carry out the wishes of
the Roman Catholic relations; Roman Catholic proprietors frequently
handed over their estates to Protestant friends as Trustees, and,
though such Trusts were of course not enforceable at law, there were
very few instances in which they were not faithfully performed. Many
strange stories are told of the evasions of the Acts. On one occasion
whilst it was still illegal for a popish recusant to own a horse of
a greater value than £5, a man met a Roman Catholic gentleman who
was riding a handsome horse; he held out £5 in one hand, and with the
other caught hold of the bridle. The rider, naturally infuriated at
this, struck the man with his whip so heavily that he fell down dead.
When he was tried for murder, the judge decided that as the man had
laid a hand on the bridle, the rider had reason to suppose that he
intended to take it as well as the horse, which would have been
an illegal act; consequently he was justified in defending himself
against highway robbery; and therefore the charge must be dismissed.
Again, a Roman Catholic proprietor found out that an effort was likely
to be made to deprive him of his estate. He rode up to Dublin on a
Saturday; on Sunday he received the Holy Communion at a Protestant
Church; on Monday he executed a deed transferring his estate to a
Protestant friend as Trustee; on Tuesday he was received back into
the Church of Rome; and on Wednesday he rode home again, to enjoy his
estate free from further molestation.

The schools which were founded in order to convert the rising
generation were a strange contrast to the admirably conducted
institutions established in France and Spain for a similar purpose.
They were so disgracefully mismanaged that the pupils who had passed
through them looked back on everything that had been taught them there
with a lifelong disgust.