For this state of things, Mr. Forster saw only one
simple remedy,—to ask for the power to arrest without evidence the agents of the terror,—agents known to the police, though evidence against them was uuattainable,—the riff-raff and blackguards of the villages who had constituted them- selves the secret police of the Land League. Mr. Forster asked for power, in all proclaimed districts, to arrest and detain such suspected agents of agrarian crime, on the warrant of the Lord-Lieutenant only,—the power to last till the end of September, 1882. Further, the Government ask for power to arrest all persons held, on reasonable suspicion, to be guilty of treason or, treason-felony, in any district in Ireland, whether proclaimed or not. The object is to strike the same terror into the agents of the recent terror that they had struck into law-abiding citizens, and Mr. Forster predicts that after that power had been granted, agrarian crime in Ireland would suddenly subside.
