"There is a tree near Denis Browne's house that used to be used for
hanging men in the time of '98, he being a great man in that time, and
High Sheriff of Mayo, and it is likely the gentlemen were afeared, and
that there was bad work at nights. But one night Denis Browne was lying
in his bed, and the Lord put it in his mind that there might be false
information given against some that were innocent. So he went out and he
brought out one of his horses into the lawn before the house, and he
shot it dead and left it there. In the morning one of the butlers came
up to him and said, 'Did you see that one of your horses was shot in the
night?' 'How would I see that?' says he, 'and I not rose up or dressed?'
So when he went out they showed him the horse, and he bade the men to
bury it, and it wasn't two hours after before two of them came to him.
'We can tell you who it was shot the horse,' they said. 'It was such a
one and such a one in the village, that were often heard to speak bad of
you. And besides that,' they said, 'we saw them shooting it ourselves.'
So the two that gave that false witness were the last two Denis Browne
ever hung. He rose out of it after, and washed his hands of it all. And
his big house is turned into a convent, and the tree is growing there
yet. It is in the time of '98 that happened, a hundred years ago."