This volume reminds one of the latest twist in the East Timor tragedy. As Britain went to war with France, Dublin Castle enrolled a yeomanry force to crush the Irish revolutionary threat. Furthermore, "an anti-United Irish association called Orangemen" were "to be ready to receive arms from government, and resist foreign and domestic enemies".

Indonesia, faced with the loss of its "27th province", is arming integrationist militias in East Timor. Even the ritualistic brutality of counter-revolutionary terror is reminiscent of the pitch cap.

William Drennan, the father of constitutional Irish republicanism, wrote from Dublin in March 1798 - two months before the rising: "No tune is now played by the military and yeomanry but that of Croppies Lie Down." As martial law was extended, a troop of Ancient Britons seized two suspects near Delgany, Co Wicklow. The captain "caused the punishment of picketing to be inflicted upon one of them who was deepest in the plot, to compel him to confess, which he endured for a time" before disclosing information. This torture entailed placing the victim's bare foot on a sharp spike while forcing him to support his own weight by means of a pulley mechanism. The Britons had already lynched six men who would not "sing" and sabred the clothes off women wearing green.

This is the book of Ruan O'Donnell's weekly column in The Irish Times last year. It presents much valuable, original research in readable form (although this writer found the narrative cluttered with too many dates). 1798 Diary is a handsomely produced chronicle, with few pretensions to analysis or conclusion.

History used to be written by the victors. The official reports of engagements with rebels (appendix II) contain graphic writing (which will be a mine for school projects). For instance, Lord Camden reported breathlessly from Dublin Castle to the Duke of Portland the day after the butchery on the Hill of Tara. Three hundred and fifty rebels had been found dead. "Many more were killed and wounded. Some horses were taken, and great quantities of arms. The loss on the part of the king's troops was nine killed and 16 wounded."

In his trial speech on November 10th, Wolfe Tone deplored not only the outcome but the course of the insurrection. Committed to uniting Catholic and Dissenter, he had envisaged "a fair and open war" of liberation, rather than "a system of assassination, massacre and plunder". Our blood-soaked century might add: c'est la guerre.

Incidentally, the author is disingenuous regarding Tone's death: whether, by cutting his own throat, he had intended to commit suicide or sought only to delay his execution in hopes of a commutation "is a matter of debate". Professor Thomas Bartlett concludes it must remain an open question.

This book is recommended to all who wish to know what the year of blood-letting was like; it records the drama and the barbarities committed mainly, but not exclusively, by counter-insurgency forces and the courage and ill-fate of the rebels, some 30,000 of whom were slaughtered.

Brendan O Cathaoir's Famine Diary was published recently by Irish Academic Press