children, lent a greedy ear to the fair promises of men whom they
deemed wiser than themselves. The tempter's seedtime had arrived, the
ground was ready, and the seed was sown. Day by day, nay, hour by
hour, was the bud of disaffection fostered with the greatest care;
and, day by day, its strength and vitality increased. When, at length,
the people were deemed ripe for action, the mask was thrown off,
treasonable schemes and projects were openly proclaimed by the leaders
of the coming movement, and echoed, from a hundred hills, by vast
multitudes of their deluded followers. Large meetings were daily held
on the neighbouring moors, where bodies of men were openly trained and
armed for active and offensive operations. At length the insurrection,
for such in truth it was, broke forth. Then living torrents of excited
and exasperated men poured down those hillsides; the peaceful and
well-affected were compelled to join the insurgent ranks, busy in the
work of destruction and intimidation; when each evening brought the
work of havoc to a temporary close, they laid them down to rest where
the darkness overtook them. The roads were thus continually blockaded,
and those who, under cover of the night, sought to obtain aid and
assistance from less disturbed districts, were often interrupted and
turned back by bodies of these men. Authority was at an end, and a
large extensive district was completely at the mercy of reckless
multitudes, burning to avenge the sufferings of the past, and bent on
preventing, as they thought, a recurrence of them in future. The very
towns were in their hands; "in an evil hour" a vast body of insurgents
was "admitted" into one of the largest mercantile towns of the
kingdom, where they pillaged and laid waste in every direction. In
another town of the district a fearful riot was put down by force,
some of the leaders of the mob being shot dead while heading a charge
upon the military. The ascendancy of the law was at length asserted;
many arrests took place; the jails were crowded with prisoners; and