The Sun.
London, England, 1858-11-23 00:00:00

THE RIBAND CONSPIRACY.

The Leinster Express (moderate Conservative) re-
marks that no stronger or more conclusive evidence
of the existence of the riband conspiracy could be
adduced than the fact that another week has elapsed
and the murderer of Mr. Ely is still, through the
connivance and assistance of the neighbouring
peasantry, enabled to elude the grasp of justice.
The Express adds :—" That the reported assassin
has not yet left the locality is commonly believed,
and his sleeping in one place, and his departure to
another are flippantly reported.. Many must be
aware of these transactions, yet not one can be
fount to give the information necessary to secure
his wrest or rid at once the earth of such a mon-
stcr and the country of a foul stigma that attaches
t 3 hii being harboured among the people. Men
speak with horror of former bloodshedding ex-
ploits ; and, with expressions of the deepest sym-
pathy for his last victim, condemn the atrocious
miscreant ; yet even they confess that a word, a
sign, or the slightest aid towards his capture they
dare not afford to the authorities. The expression
dare not' is a clue to the dreadful system that like
a shadow of death' overawes our present popula-
tion, destroys their finer feelings, and perverts their
sense of justice. We admit that any person, who
would dare to act as a free denizen of a free
country should, in - honestly maintaining the
laws and bringing offenders to justice, do so
with the certainty that his home, his property,
and his life, would be no longer safe, and that ex-
patriation would be the least penalty he would
receive by his contempt of the fiendish conclave
that sits in secret to try all offences against its
rules, and whose savage code knows no lighter sen-
tence than that of death."

In another article the Express gives this warn-
ing to the parties engaged in the conspiracy:—
"Though Mr. Ely has perished by the bullet of
the assassin, his death will not be permitted to pass
without that terrible retribution sanctioned by •the
laws of God and man. Though the murderer is not
yet apprehended, his arrest is but a mere matter of
time ; the police are on his trail. Sir C. Coote has
pledged to visit with immediate removal from his
estate, and the infliction of the severest punishment
the law permits, in each and every case where it
may be satisfactorily proved that any tenant of his
either harboured or succoured Delany (the alleged
assassin), since the night on which Mr. Ely was
shot. Henceforward if any tenant on the venerable
baronet's estates shall countenance persons of bad
or questionable character, be they members of his
own family or otherwise, his tenure becomes for-
feited, and he must seek some other more congenial
locality. The several magistrates of Clandonagh
and the adjoining baronies, who met at Borris-in-
Ossory on Monday last, are determined to follow
this laudable course, and thus effectually guard that
part of the Queen's County from the inroads of
Ribamlism and all its atrocious concomitants."
Meanwhile other denunciations of secret societies
are becoming more frequent. The Kilkenny Mode-
rator is informed that on Sunday last, at the Roman
Catholic Cathedral in that city, the Right Rev. Dr.
Walsh, Roman Catholic bishop,' preached a sermon
cautioning the members of the congregation against
being led. into secret political' societies, and expos-
ing the danger and sinfulness of conspiracies of the
kind, in somewhat similar words to those previously
used by the Rev. Dr. Kieran in Dundalk, and the
Rev. Mr. Salmon, P.P., in Callan.
The Lublin Gazette of last night notifies that the
Lord-Lieutenant and Privy Council have issued a
proclamation to the effect that the Peace Preserva-