§ MR. CRILLY (Mayo, N.)asked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether Mr. Edward O'Reilly, who is Petty Sessions Clerk of Ballaghadereen, County Mayo, asserted that he had been fired at in the townland of Barnaboy on the 18th of December last; whether, in consequence of this assertion, two respectable young men, named John Stenson and Michael Towey, were forced out of their beds on the morning of the 19th of December, and conveyed as prisoners into the town of Ballaghadereen; whether, upon this case being heard at the Petty Sessions Court, in Ballaghadereen, the magistrates dismissed it; and, whether, in view of this false charge made against these two innocent young men, and the subsequent refusal of O'Reilly to appear and sustain in Ballyhaunis other criminal charges brought by him against the people in the neighbourhood of Ballaghadereen, the Government will retain him in the office of Petty Sessions Clerk for Ballaghadereen?
§ THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDER SECRETARY (Colonel KING-HARMAN) (Kent, Isle of Thanet)(who replied) said, it appeared that Mr. O'Reilly did say that he had been fired at by the men named in the Question. They were arrested on the 19th of December and brought before a magistrate, who admitted them to bail. They were then tried at the Petty Sessions, when the men admitted having fired shots as Mr. O'Reilly passed, but that they did not fire at him. The magistrates, after hearing the case, refused informations. The matter had been fully inquired into by the Registrar of Petty Sessions clerks, and he had not found that there was any ground for charging Mr. 1088 O'Reilly with perjury. As regarded the last paragraph, it appeared that Mr. O'Reilly was prevented from prosecuting at the last Ballyhaunis Presentment Sessions a claim for malicious injury to his cattle, owing to the fact that his claim was not lodged in sufficient time. He, however, intended to appear at the Presentment Sessions in May.