The mission of Sir Redvers Buller to the South of
Ireland is already producing fruit. He has found the organisation of the police, both for preventive and detective purposes, extremely defective, and has rearranged it. This, in its turn, has encouraged the police, who know fairly well where their system fails, and already two gangs of " moonlighters " have been arrested, and evidence of expected outrages is coming to Sir Reds-era Boller. That is the real use of successful attacks on the terrorists. Their victims, who in most countries would either assist the police or defend themselves, in Ireland are too terrified even to complain ; and the police, even if they get infor- mation, know that they cannot rely on the witnesses appear- ing. The right-minded Irish, who are much more numerous than is believed, require help from the State as much as Frenchmen, and, like Frenchmen, cannot believe that authority exists unless it makes itself audible and visible. The native Irish Prefect, when he arrives, and has decided that anarchy does not pay, will be all bustle and proclamations, and hit cruelly hard besides. Irishmen are brave, but so little self- reliant that no single Irishman will face an organised society unless he has another organised society behind him.
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