Their efforts were
completely futile. Neither any of the constabulary nor any of the well-to-
do persons who sided with them, could ever get an inkling of the location
of the outlaws' various camps nor was any of them ever able to be really
sure that bandits were actually within a few miles. For the whole body of
yeomanry, peasants and slaves, even the slaves of those proprietors
keenest on the scent of the brigands and most eager to nab them, were
leagued to bamboozle, thwart and oppose their masters and betters, and to
aid the outlaws, to keep them posted on everything said and proposed by
the loyal inhabitants, and to assist them in outwitting the authorities,
the constabulary and all persons who sided with them. In this they were
notably successful.
It is my keen recollection of this condition of things which determines me
to omit from this part of my narrative all names of persons and places.
The generality of the population made a sort of religion out of their
complicity with the outlaws. They took an almost religious pride in
cooperating with them and in antagonizing their adversaries. They hated
all the adversaries of the outlaws, whether landowners, constabulary or
inspectors. But, above all, they loathed, abhorred, abominated and
detested with a white-hot animosity any yeoman, peasant or slave who
failed to do all in his power to foster the interests of the outlaws;
regarding such persons, male or female, as traitors to the cause of the
populace.
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