LETTERS 
 
 ON THE CONDITION OF 
 
 THE PEOPLE OF IKELAND, 
 
n'.j 
 
LOWER LIBRAR 
 
 ■-I1ST0RY 
 
 LETTERS 
 
 ON THE CONDITION OF 
 
 ^THE PEOPLE OF IRELAND 
 
 ^ 
 
 BY 
 
 THOMAS CAMPBELL FOSTER, Esq., 
 
 OF THE MIDDLE TEMPLE, BARRISTER-AT-LAW, 
 ("THE TIMES" COMMISSIONER.) 
 
 REPRINTED, BY PERMISSION, WITH ADDITIONS AND COPIOUS 
 NOTES, FROM ''THE TIMES" NEWSPAPER. 
 
 
 ' Haifa word, fixed upon the spot, is worth a cartload of recollections•."-^TH'E,iP<^!^S/.'^67:A''^^ 
 
 SECOND EDITION. 
 
 yl. 
 
 
 LONDON: 
 CHAPMAN AND HALL, 186 STRAND. 
 
 MDCCCXLVII. 
 

 XIO'd' 
 
 4 
 

 PREFACE. 
 
 The letters which form this book were written during a 
 tour of five months over nearly every part of Ireland, and 
 were first published at intervals in The Times newspaper, 
 immediately after they were written, in the period between 
 August, 1845, and January, 1846. 
 
 The letters were originally written in consequence of a 
 commission offered to me, by that great public journal, which 
 I undertook to perform, to lay before the public, in a read- 
 able form, my impressions during a tour through Ireland, 
 and to state what, of the many prevailing opinions and 
 anomalies, on careful observation, appeared to me to be 
 the true condition of the Irish people. 
 
 In undertaking this duty, I was unshackled and undi- 
 rected by any further instructions whatever. In the course 
 of its fulfilment, I conceived it to be desirable, not only 
 to depict the actual condition of the Irish people, but to 
 examine into the causes which led to that condition, and to 
 suggest, as I proceeded, what appeared to me to be the most 
 feasible remedies. ^ ^ ^ 
 
 210o 
 
VI PREFACE. 
 
 I commenced the duty, with an anxious wish to avoid, as 
 much as possible, all personalities, and to make the inquiry 
 a calm and philosophical one. I was anxious rather to deal 
 with facts than with individuals ; but determined, that should 
 it become necessary to particularise individuals, in order 
 to expose any mischievous system which might generally 
 prevail, and form a marked feature in the social condition 
 of the people, not to " break a fly upon the wheel," and 
 mark out those for censure who were powerless to defend 
 themselves ; nor yet to hold up men of insignificant posi- 
 tion as examples worthy to be followed, who, because of 
 their position, would be little regarded. The letters which 
 form this book will show that, as far as was compatible with 
 circumstances, I pursued this course. 
 
 It was natural to expect, from the mode of immediate publi- 
 cation adopted, that I should be liable to immediate criticism, 
 and to instant praise or blame, encouragement or opposition. 
 This very circumstance rendered it difficult to persevere in 
 the original course which I had determined to follow ; and 
 it is a subject of some regret to me that, in one or two 
 instances, I was compelled to abandon the field of philo- 
 sophical inquiry, and, having been forced into personal col- 
 lisions with individuals, to take measures to substantiate 
 previous statements, and to repel attacks. 
 
 It is said by his friends that I unfairly singled out Mr. 
 O'Connell for attack, when there were hundreds of other 
 landlords in Ireland as neglectful, and having as wretched 
 tenants. For three months, under almost weekly, and to me 
 unaccountable, abuse from that gentleman and his party, I 
 never noticed him, save when compelled in defence of my own 
 character to contradict downright false assertions. I was a 
 " scoundrel," a " liar," a " gutter commissioner," an " ugly 
 fellow," and so on for three months, without a single word 
 in reply from me. Finding that this did not alter my course, 
 a letter was attributed to me which I did not write or 
 
PREFACE. Vll 
 
 authorize, and of which I knew nothing whatever ; and 
 the terms of that letter were publicly used as an excuse for 
 unwarrantable personal abuse. It was afterwards also pub- 
 licly stated that I was " kicked" out of a Roman Catholic 
 priest's house. These being pure inventions, without a 
 shadow of foundation, affecting my character, I was com- 
 pelled to answer them. Still I never wrote one word 
 against Mr. O'Connell until, when passing his estate, 
 the wretched hovels of his tenantry were under my nose, 
 and I could not avoid seeing them. Had I any reason 
 to be " mealy mouthed" then, with regard to him ? " Oh ! 
 but why single him out when others are as bad," say his 
 friends. If it is necessary in order to expose a system to 
 single out individuals, you must single some one out. Speak 
 of the abuses of a class, and the class will laugh at you ; it 
 hurts no one of them in particular, and censure falls lightly 
 on the shoulders of so many. But particularise an indivi- 
 dual, and hold him up as a sample of the class, and every one 
 of the class will congratulate himself that he has escaped, and 
 be^in to amend for fear it should, at some future time, be his 
 turn to be singled out. Besides, such a course is more forci- 
 ble, it imperatively challenges contradiction if it can be given 
 by the individual ; if it cannot be given, the truth of such an 
 exposure is made more prominently apparent, and the evils 
 exposed are more likely to be remedied. I had selected 
 individuals for comment — for censure or for praise — before 
 I saw Mr. O'Connell's estate; when I saw that gentle- 
 man's tenants and their neglected wretchedness, were 
 there not many reasons for selecting him as a sample 
 of Kerry landlords? Was he not perpetually reviling 
 other landlords, and holding himself out as " the very 
 pink of perfection?" Was he not a public man, on 
 whom the public eye was fixed, and withal esteemed a 
 " patriot?" And yet the wretched beings then before me 
 were his tenants. Above all, would it not have justly been 
 
Vlll PREFACE. 
 
 said, that I had dared to attack those who were compara- 
 tively helpless and powerless, but that I shrank from attack- 
 ing- and exposing a man whose wretched tenants I saw, — 
 who had as much misery on his estate, the consequence of his 
 neglect, as any landlord or middleman in Ireland, — because 
 he was able to reply to me and to defend himself. I there- 
 fore did not hesitate to state, but without acrimony or per- 
 sonal abuse, the simple truth regarding the condition of Mr. 
 O'Connell's tenantry, as I had done in former instances re- 
 garding tb(e tenantry of others. The course taken by him 
 and his supporters in consequence of that exposure — the per- 
 fect torrent of abuse which was showered upon me from all 
 quarters, compelled me to resort to measures to substantiate 
 the truth of my previous statements, and to return to the 
 neighbourhood of Mr. O'Connell's estate. It was impos- 
 sible for me to avoid the course which I took ; and though I 
 regret the acrimony and personal collision which thus broke 
 in upon a calm inquiry after truth, yet these untoward 
 incidents were forced upon, and not sought for by me. 
 
 It will be seen from a perusal of the following letters, that 
 I do not concur with those who think that Irish distress and 
 Irish misery are to be attributed to the Union of that country 
 with England, or to the " misgovernment" (so called) of 
 Ireland by this country ; nor yet entirely even to the faults 
 of landlords as a class. So great is the fertility of the 
 island, so numerous and diversified are its natural advan- 
 tages, and, compared with this country, with so little diffi- 
 culty, enterprise, capital, and industry, can those great 
 natural advantages be converted into wealth, that I can 
 arrive at no other conclusion — looking at the general absence 
 of all enterprise and all exertion, and at the general want of 
 industry, which are existing facts that all observers have 
 noticed — than that, for the poverty and distress and misery 
 which exist, the -people have themselves to blame. Nor do I think 
 this blame belongs to any one particular class among them- 
 
PREFACE. IX 
 
 The landlords are to blame for their neglect of the country 
 and of the people, and for their want of enterprise ; but 
 the general misery is not to be solely attributed to them, 
 nor, as M. Beaumont in his book on Ireland endeavours 
 to show, to " a bad aristocracy." England is great with 
 or without its aristocracy, and its greatness is in its middle 
 class — in the men who have sprung from the ranks, and 
 urged themselves onwards to wealth and influence by the 
 sole force of their own industry, persevering energy, and 
 talent. These qualities are the true germs of prosperity and 
 greatness. It is because the mass of the people in Ireland 
 do not exhibit these qualities — because they are not industri- 
 ous, because they do not labour loith persevering energy, that 
 they have no middle class springing from the ranks, — that 
 you rarely find in Ireland individuals, in spite of all obsta- 
 cles, (with or without an aristocracy,) with an energy of 
 purpose and an enterprising spirit which cannot be chained 
 down and kept back, pushing their way upwards to wealth 
 and influence, and in their united wealth and prosperity 
 accomplishing tlie prosperity and greatness of their country. 
 It is an unfair conclusion to attribute the evils which afilict 
 Ireland to any influence out of Ireland ; and it is an unfair 
 conclusion to attribute its social evils to any one class. All 
 are to blame. Though authors have differed in their deduc- 
 tions on this subject, most of them agree as to the facts. 
 M. Beaumont, an observing French author, who may be 
 fairly supposed to be removed from prejudice, thus v/rites 
 of the wants of Ireland : — " Capital is wanting ; the terror 
 which reigns in the country drives it farther away. Industry 
 alone could raise from indigence the multitude of cottiers that 
 contend for the land ; and capital, without which no industry 
 is possible, has fled from poor Ireland for ever :"* The ab- 
 
 * M. Beaumont's Ireland, Social, Political, and Religious, Vol. i. p. 312. 
 
X PREFACE. 
 
 sence of industry is pointed out, and to its absence the misery 
 of Ireland is attributed by this author; but he commits the 
 error of mistaking the end for the means, when he speaks of 
 " no industry being possible without capital." Capital is the 
 fruit of industry, and without industry there can be no capi- 
 tal realised ; though it is quite true that, when realised, it 
 rewards, accelerates, and promotes industry. Capital is not 
 a quality which comes into the world without the instru- 
 mentality of man, nor yet is it a fortuitous circumstance. 
 All men at first were equal and without it ; and if some 
 obtain it, it is only by effort and industry. Capital is a power 
 acquired and accumulated by persevering industry, care, and 
 economy. But without industry to create it, there can be no 
 capital. It is also a lamentable fact that this much-needed 
 capital, when occasionally accumulated in Ireland, often 
 flies away from outrages and combinations which peril its 
 existence ; whilst the superabundant capital of England for 
 the same causes keeps aloof. Kohl, a recent German travel- 
 ler in Ireland, has expressed similar views as the result of 
 his observation — " It is," he says, " the English who con- 
 stitute the soul and pith of the British power, and it 
 is to them that the Irish owe it if they are able to par- 
 ticipate in the wide spread commerce of Great Britain 
 and to share in all the opportunities and advantages that 
 stand open to a British subject. The vigorous, speculative, 
 and persevering Anglo-Saxons, force the indolent and unen- 
 ergetic Celts along with them on the road of glory and 
 national greatness ; they pull them forward somewhat 
 rudely perhaps, but they do j)ull them forward."* In other 
 words, it is the industry and persevering energy of England 
 which has accomplished her greatness ; it is the want of 
 these qualities which keeps Ireland poor and steeped in 
 
 * Kohl's Ireland, 1844, p. 40. 
 
PREFACE. XI 
 
 misery. To hide this true reason of Irish poverty, however 
 amiable the motive, is simply to aid in perpetuating Irish 
 poverty. Make apparent the true cause of Irish distress, 
 and the Government will then have some chance of being 
 able to propound measures calculated to lessen that cause, 
 and to drag forward and urge on the people. 
 
 These opinions, however, will be found amply illustrated 
 in the various letters which form this volume, without further 
 detaining the reader on its threshold. 
 
 The vast number of applications which have been made 
 to me to collect the letters in one volume and publish them, 
 have induced me to do so. It was no vain spirit of author- 
 ship, but a compliance with a very generally expressed 
 desire, which led me to collect them together for pub- 
 lication, in the hope that they might, in such a form, 
 be found — (as it has been repeatedly told to me they 
 would be) — of public utility. Generally speaking, the 
 text of the original letters has been preserved without 
 alteration ; but in some instances, where there seemed to me 
 to be a deficiency, I have amplified the text. There 
 are also two original and previously unpublished letters 
 added, " on the payment of the Roman Catholic clergy." 
 In order to increase the value of the book as a work of 
 reference, very copious notes and quotations from approved 
 authorities and authors, on the different subjects treated of in 
 the text, have been added. There is also an Aj)pendix 
 containing the opinions of the press, speeches, evidence, and 
 statistical returns to which allusion has been made in the 
 different letters. To facilitate reference, a copious Index is 
 also supplied. 
 
 In committing these letters in this form to the public, and 
 to a second and perhaps more severe ordeal of public criti- 
 cism, I have only humbly to request that the circumstances 
 under which many of them were written may not be forgot- 
 ten. It should be borne in mind that these letters were 
 
Xn PREFACE. 
 
 written twice a week — that there was, therefore, a limited 
 time for preparation, and even much of the short interven- 
 ing periods was consumed in travelling. It should be recol- 
 lected that they were not written with all the appliances of 
 books of reference at hand, and amidst the calm and con- 
 templative quietude of an accustomed study ; but that they 
 were written at inns and hotels, often amid much discomfort, 
 often amidst noise and interruption, often after the fatigue 
 of travelling, and rarely twice in the same place. If occa- 
 sionally an acrimonious or bitter phrase should provoke 
 criticism and cavil, let not the circumstances under which I 
 wrote be forgotten. There were periods whilst these letters 
 were being written, that I never took up a newspaper, go 
 where I would, without seeing myself abused — not criticised, 
 for that every public writer must expect — but offensively 
 abused. And though the courteous hospitality of the gen- 
 tlemen of Ireland, the good-natured civility of its peasantry, 
 and the encouragement of almost every man whose good 
 opinion was worth having, went far to remove the im- 
 pressions which the unaccountable hostility of (so called) 
 " Irish patriots" and of a great portion of the Irish press 
 created, still it is not to be wondered at that a tart expres- 
 sion should sometimes, almost unconsciously, escape from a 
 writer who often saw himself coarsely designated as a " liar" 
 and " slanderer" for stating the simple and undoubted truth. 
 
 The motives which actuated me througliout this prolonged 
 and most arduous and responsible inquiry, cannot be better 
 expressed than in the words with which the late great and 
 good Dr. Madden (whose opinions will be found frequently 
 quoted in the following pages) committed his invaluable book 
 to his countrymen : — 
 
 " What I fondly wished to show my countrymen," said 
 he, " was chiefly this plain fact, that it is entirely in their 
 own power and choice, by restraining their luxury and 
 increasing their industry, to retrieve their vvietched circum- 
 
PREFACE. XIU 
 
 Stances. If any good comes froni my poor endeavours, all 
 is well ; but if not, and that all that can be said or done by 
 the friends of Ireland to help us must go for nothing with 
 our heedless countrymen, why there is an end of a few idle 
 hopes ; and I can only bid them farewell with this wounding 
 complaint, that I fear we must be miserable, without deserv- 
 ing to be relieved ; and undone, without deserving to be 
 pitied."* 
 
 With these few prefatory observations, and with an 
 earnest wish that the following pages may lead, and urge, 
 and shame on the people of Ireland to turn to profit those 
 great natural advantages which they possess — advantages 
 which far outrun anything which England can boast of, and 
 that in their prosperity the greatness and glory of the united 
 empire may be augmented, this volume is submitted to 
 their consideration by their sincere well-wisher, 
 
 THOMAS CAMPBELL FOSTER. 
 The Temple, March 15, 1846. 
 
 * Re/lections and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, by the 
 late Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, p. 224. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 LETTER I. 
 
 (Cavan, Aug. 14.) 
 
 INTRODUCTORY LKTTEK. 
 
 Inquiry as to the Cause of the Disturbed State of Ireland — The Author's Intro- 
 duction of the object of his Mission — The Disturbances in Cavan . 1 
 
 LETTER II. 
 
 {Cavan, Aug. 21.) 
 
 THE WANT OF EMPLOYMENT THE CAUSE OF DISTURBANCES. 
 
 Disturbances in Ireland do not originate in Religious Causes — The want of 
 Employment the real Origin of Disturbances — The want of Employment 
 shown to exist by Statistical Facts — Produces Starvation and Disturbances — 
 Tiie effect of Ejectments in producing Crime — Definition of "Molly Maguire- 
 ism" — Disputes about Land and Ejectments the chief cause of Crime in 
 Ireland — The Remedy then is, to secure Employment for the People . 10 
 
 LETTER III. 
 
 (Ballinamore, Leitrim, Aug. 22.) 
 
 ON THE CREATION AND ACCUMULATION OF CAPITAL. 
 
 Disturbed State of Leitrim — On the creation of Capital — " Labour is the source 
 of all Wealth" — Causes which prevent the Accumulation of Capital — The 
 ^"ant of Capital confines Industry to the Land — Poverty must therefore 
 increase with Population, unless the Produce of the Land increases in propor- 
 tion — This again the cause of want of Employment and Disturbance — The 
 circle of Evils under which Ireland labours — Religious Differences only 
 embitter the Relations of Life, but do not generally produce Disturbances — 
 Industry pai"alyzed by the want of certainty of Reward, and by an uncertain 
 Tenure of the Land — Refusal of Leases — Tenants not industrious, because 
 not paid for their Improvements, and because their possession of the Land 
 insecure ............ 27 
 
XVI CONTENTS. 
 
 LETTER IV. 
 
 {Enniskillen, Fermanagh, Aug. 23.) 
 
 ON THE CHARACTERISTICS OF RACE, AND THE WANT OP INDUSTRIAL 
 KNOAVLEDGE PREVENTING THE INCREASE OF CAPITAL. 
 
 Different Appearance of Fermanagh and Leitrim — Orangeism and Protestantism, 
 and English or Scotch Descent usually mark the same Individual — Charac- 
 teristics of Race — Of the natural Capabilities of the Country, and of the 
 unimproved and wretched System of Agriculture prevalent — Examples of 
 this — Leads to Poverty, and therefore prevents the Accumulation of Wealth 
 and Capital. 42 
 
 LETTER V. 
 
 {Ballyshannon, Donegal, Aug. 27.) 
 
 ON THE NEGLECT OF THE NATURAL ADVANTAGES OF THE COUNTRY. 
 IF THE SURPLUS PRODUCE BE ABSTRACTED, AND NOT SUFFERED TO 
 ACCUMULATE, THERE CAN BE NO CAPITAL. 
 
 The Irish Tenant not entirely to blame for his wretched mode of Agriculture — 
 The lamentable neglect of Improvement which the Country exhibits — Lough 
 Erne and its neglected Capabilities — The Energy of the People of Belfast 
 winning from the People of the West those advantages which they neglect — 
 The neglected Water-power of Lough Erne — If all Surplus Produce be 
 extracted from the People in the shape of high Rents, and it is not accumu- 
 lated and spent amongst them again in promoting industry, as Capital, the 
 People cannot improve — Instances of Condition of Small Farmers and 
 Labourers ........... 62 
 
 LETTER VI. 
 
 {Donegal, Aug. 30.) 
 
 SKILL AND INDUSTRY THE GREAT WANTS OF IRELAND. 
 
 The Criticisms of the Irish Press — The Station of Lough Derg — Skill and Labour 
 required upon the Land to make it both productive and piofilable — These 
 things are wanted more than Capital, and will create Capital and give Employ- 
 ment — The Profit yielded by cultivating a piece of Land properly, compared 
 with the Profit of the same Land as usually managed in Ireland — Amount of 
 Waste Land in the County of Donegal, which may be cultivated with the like 
 Profit — The great increase of Rent to the Landlords, of Profit to the Fanners, 
 and of Employment to the Labourers which the application of Skill and 
 Industry would effect — These are the " Wants'' of Ireland — Questions to be 
 put to those who stand forward to lead the People — True Patriotism, like 
 " Charity," ought " to begin at home " ...... 80 
 
CONTENTS. XVll 
 
 LETTER YII. 
 
 (Gtveedore, Donegal, Sept. 3.) 
 
 THE MISERY AND WRETCHEDNESS WHICH THE NEGLECT OF AN ABSENTEE 
 LANDLORD PRODUCES. 
 
 The Comfort and Happiness diffused by a Landlord attentive to his Duties, where 
 before there was Misery and Neglect — Not the part of a good Citizen to shield 
 the Abuses consequent on neglectful Landlords — Description of the Town of 
 Donegal — Glenteis — The Condition of the People there — They live on Potatoes 
 and Pepper and Water — Dungloe — Its wretched Inn — The Island of Arran- 
 more — Condition of its People — They live on Potatoes and Sea-weed — 
 Conclusion ........... 98 
 
 LETTER YIII. 
 
 ( Gweedore, Donegal, Sept. 6. ) 
 
 THE IMPROA'EMENT AND HAPPINESS THAT AN ATTENTIVE AND RESI- 
 DENT LANDLORD CAN DIFFUSE. 
 
 The chief Evils which afflict Ireland are Social, which Social Remedies will 
 remove — Opinion of Mr. Nichols on the Condition of the People of Donegal — 
 Former Condition of the People on Lord George HHl's Estate — The injurious 
 effect of the Tenant Right there — The Improvements which Lord George Hill 
 has effected — The Obstacles and Opposition which he had to overcome — The 
 Condition of the People now — The difference of Races — Dr. Kane's Opinion — 
 The effect of a Social Remedy here to change the People . . . 114 
 
 LETTER IX. 
 
 {Dunfanaghy, Sept. 10.) 
 
 ON THE TENANT RIGHT OP ULSTER. 
 
 How far the Opinion is correct that the Prosperity of Ulster depends on the 
 Tenant Right — What the Tenant Right is, and on what the Custom is founded 
 — TMiat are the Common Law Rights of the Landlord to which the Custom is 
 opposed — The Advantages and Disadvantages of Tenant Right — There is 
 Misery and Want, as well as Prosperity, where it exists — The Prosperity of 
 the Northern and Eastern Parts of Ulster to be attributed to other Causes, 
 namely, to the Enterprise £ind Industry of the People — The qualities which 
 distinguish the Race which inhabits that part of Ulster — Those on the West 
 of a different Race, have different qualities, and must be dealt with accord- 
 ingly 129 
 
XVIU CONTENTS. 
 
 LETTER X. 
 
 (^Londonderry, Sept. 13.) 
 
 THE PLANTATION OF ULSTER — INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE WANTED. 
 
 Londonderry and its famous Defence — Inglis's Opinion of Londonderry and its 
 People — The " Plantation" in Ulster, by James I. — Management of the London 
 Companies — Appearance of the Country in the Neighbourhood of Londonderry 
 — Dr. Kane's Opinion that Industrial Knowledge is the great want of Ireland 
 ■ — The Templemoyle Agricultural Academy — The Instruction there given cal- 
 culated to meet the wants of Ireland, and to improve the Country . 147 
 
 LETTER XL 
 
 {Sligo, Sept. 18.) 
 
 SLIGO AND ITS NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES. 
 
 Sligo, its Harbour, and its want of Funds for Enterprise — The neglected Advan- 
 tages of Water-carriage and Water-power which it possesses in its Locality — 
 Its Exports and Imports — The Iron and Coal Mines of its Neighbourhood — 
 Dishonest Tricks in the Butter and Corn Trades — The shifting Sand-hills — 
 Example of what Individual Energy and Industry in a Farmer may accompUsh 
 — The Character of the People ought to be considered in legislating for them — 
 Teach them, stimulate them on, and encourage them .... 157 
 
 LETTER XIL 
 
 {Ballysodore, Sligo, Sept. 20.) 
 
 THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO ; AND ITS WATER-POWER. 
 
 Subdivision of Farms — The Attention of Landlords will secure Comfort and 
 Cleanliness for their Tenants — Failure of Industrial School which depended on 
 support of Tenants — Contentment and Indolence of the Peasantry — The 
 importance of establishing a class of Labourers dependent on Labour, and not 
 on a Potato-field — Instances of Mismanagement on the part of Landlords — 
 Repeal of the Union will not cure Absenteeism — Refutation of the narrow- 
 minded view, that Englishmen strive to have " England only for the English" 
 — On the great Water-power of Ballysodare, and the probability of profitable 
 Manufacturing Investment which it affords, as a means of giving Employment 
 to the People 174 
 
 LETTER XIII. 
 
 {Ballina, Mayo, Sept. 25.) 
 
 THE PEASANTRY OF MAYO LEASES AND ABSENTEES. 
 
 Appearance of Peasants' Cottages — Tlie Criticisms of the Dublin Press — Rundale 
 Villages — Waste Lands — Leases — Their Disadvantages and Advantages — 
 Advocated when containing proper Covenants — Evils of Absenteeism . 199 
 
CONTENTS. XIX 
 
 LETTER XIV. 
 
 {Westport, Mayo, Sept. 29.) 
 
 THE NEGLECTED NATURAL ADVANTAGES OF MAYO ; AND THE POVERTY 
 
 OF THE PEOPLE. 
 
 Description of Westport, and Condition of the Mayo Peasantry — The Capabilities 
 of Improvement, of creating Wealth, and of giving Employment, which Erris 
 affords — Comparative Value of Turf and Coal for Fuel — Lancashire deficient 
 to Erris in Natural Advantages — Neglect of these Advantages, and Poverty of 
 the People — Means of Remedy suggested for bringing Waste Lands into Culti- 
 vation, and employing the People . . . . . . .217 
 
 LETTER XV. 
 
 {Ballinasloe, Galway, Oct, 2.) 
 
 NOTICE OF ATTACK IN CONCILIATION HALL THE ROYAL AGRICULTURAL 
 
 IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY. 
 
 Notice of Attack in Conciliation Hall — Annual Meeting of the Royal Agricultural 
 Improvement Society — The Irish Waste Land Improvement Company — Sub- 
 letting and want of Enterprise — Oppression of one another — Neglected Improve- 
 ments .... 228 
 
 LETTER XVI. 
 
 {Castlerea, Roscommon, Oct. 6.) 
 
 THE CONDITION OF THE PEASANTRY OF ROSCOMMON FROM NEGLECT 
 AND WANT OF EMPLOYMENT. 
 
 Comparison between the Highlander's and the Irishman's Cottage — Effect of 
 Grazing on the Prosperity of the People — Condition of the Tenantry of Ros- 
 common — Necessity of obtaining Con-acre by the poor Cottars — Its Injury to 
 the Land — Effect of Burning on Cultivation — Comparison of English and Irish 
 Landlords in their Dealings with their Tenantry — Necessity of Employment 
 and Instruction in Agriculture being given to the Tenantry — What skilled 
 Agricultural Labour effects in Belgium — What it may effect in Ireland 241 
 
 LETTER XVII. 
 
 {Tuam, Galway, Oct. 7.) 
 
 THE MARQUIS OF CONYNGHAM's ESTATE IN DONEGAL. 
 
 Contradiction of Description of the Marquis of Con3mgham's Estate in Donegal 
 answered from the Evidence before Lord Devon's Commission — Neglect and 
 Absenteeism — FutDity of always dreaming and talking about the Past— Now is 
 the time for Energy and Exertion 256 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 LETTER XVIII. 
 
 [Clifden, Conneniara, Oct. 10.) 
 
 THE CAPABILITIES OF CONNEMARA THE FUTILITY AND MISCHIEFS OP 
 
 EMIGRATION. 
 
 The Picturesque Beauty of Connemara — Its Bogs and neglected Capabilities — 
 Emigration not the Remedy to benefit its Starving Population — Description of 
 the People — Evils of Emigration — Men wanted to Cultivate the Land, and to 
 make the Wastes Fertile — The Profit and Facihties of Cultivating the Waste 
 Bogs — Rather encourage the Industry of the People than drive them to Emi- 
 grate — The one Course vdll Improve, the other keep Waste the Country 268 
 
 LETTER XIX. 
 
 {Galway, Oct. 15.) 
 
 GALAVAY ; ITS NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES, ITS ORIGIN, AND ITS PEOPLE. 
 
 Necessary to Inquire how much of the existing Distress in Ireland is to be attri- 
 buted to the People themselves, as well as how much of that Distress is to be 
 traced to Oppression, in order to apply appropriate Remedies — Comparison of 
 Belfast and Galway — The Contrast — Comparison of Celtic and Saxon Qualities 
 ■ — Origin of Galway and its Population — The " Tribes" or Original Families of 
 Galway — The Cloddergh Fishermen — Irish Rundale Villages — Improvements 
 effected in Galway — Difiiculty of getting the Peasantry to improve — Necessity 
 of Teaching and Leading the People — Enterprise and Industiy the Qualities 
 needed — These will make Ireland great, and not a Repeal of the Union — Letter 
 of Lord Chesterfield 285 
 
 LETTER XX. 
 
 {Ennis, Clare, Oct. 18.) 
 
 AN IRISH ARGUMENT — EFFECT OF LOAN FUNDS. 
 
 The Diffusion of Opinions in favour of a Repeal of the Union — The Roman 
 Catholic Clergy generally the Advocates of Repeal — Specimen of an Irish 
 Argument on this Question — Money-lending — The Irish Character — " Gom- 
 been" Men — Loan Funds, and their effect on the Condition of the People — 
 Ignorance of the Commercial Use of Money — Pawning Bank-notes and 
 Guineas ............ 301 
 
CONTENTS. XXi 
 
 LETTER XXr. 
 
 {Limericli, Oct. 23.) 
 
 LIMERICK AND ITS TRADE TUE PROEITS OF GOOD CULTIVATION. 
 
 Description of Limerick and its Trade — The Women of Limerick — The Profit 
 which Tenants would be certain to derive by exerting themselves to Improve 
 their Cultivation, whether their Rents were raised or not — Calculation showing 
 the Expense and Profit of bringing an Acre of Land into Cultivation, and the 
 Value of the Crops during four years of the usual Unimproved System of 
 Husbandry — The Result of such a System of Cultivation in raising the Peasantry 
 above want . , 316 
 
 LETTER XXII. 
 
 {Thurles, Tqiperary, Oct. 27.) 
 
 TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES STATE OF AGRICULTURE, AND OF THE 
 
 PEOPLE. 
 
 The Anomalies and Inconsistencies which prevail in Tipperary — The former Habits 
 of the Gentry which may have given rise to many of these Anomalies — The 
 System of Outrage and Terrorism which prevails — Appearance of the Country — 
 Backward State of Agriculture — Impossible to get the Tenantry out of their 
 old Habits — The continual Murders — Destitution of the People — Remedies 
 suggested .- _ 330 
 
 LETTER XXIII. 
 
 {Roscrea, Tipperary, Oct, 30.) 
 
 TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. • 
 
 Condition of the County of Tipperary — Report of the Land Commissioners upon 
 it — The System of Terrorism which prevails there — Outrages that disgraced 
 •- the neighbourhoods of Roscrea and Nenagh during my visit to those places — 
 The ruinous absurdity of Labourers, Farmers, and Individuals being protected 
 at their work for months by Policemen — The Necessity of establishing the 
 Supremacy of the Law before there can be any hope of Prosperity . 345 
 
 LETTER XXIV. 
 
 {Limerick, Nov. 3.) 
 
 " THE GOLDEN VALE " CO.MPARATIVE ADVANTAGES OF GRAZING AND 
 
 TILLAGE. 
 
 "The Golden Vale" — Arthur Young's and Wakefield's Opinion of the Richness 
 of the Soil and its miserable Cultivation — The Peasant, without means of 
 Knowledge, cannot follow any better System of Tillage — Middlemen — Graziers 
 
 — Comparative Advantages of Grazing and Tillcige — Holidays and their Evil 
 
 Necessity of Teaching and Directing the People ..... 356 
 
XXII CONTENTS. 
 
 LETTER XXV. 
 
 (Tralee, Kerry, Nov. 6.) 
 
 CONDITION OF THE KERRY PEASANTRY — THE AVASTE AND UNIMPROVED 
 LANDS OF KERRY. 
 
 Tralee — The River Shannon compared with the River Humber — Want of Woods 
 in Ireland — The Condition of the Kerry Peasantry — The Waste Lands capable 
 of cultivation — Neglect of Agricultural Improvements — Bad Treatment of one 
 another by the Peasantry — No encouragement given by the Landlords — Leases 
 alone, without the Attention and Supervision of the Landlord, will not be of 
 Service — Extent of Waste Land — The Land owned by too few persons for the 
 benefit of the country, and those persons generally but Nominal Owners 
 because of Debts — Facilitate the Sale and Transfer of Estates . . 371 
 
 LETTER XXVI. 
 
 {Kenmara, Kerry, Nov. 10.) 
 
 THE PEASANTRY OF KERRY — MR. o'cONNELL AND HIS TENANTRY. 
 
 Killarney — Character and Condition of the Population of Kerry — Oppression of 
 the Labourers by the Farmers — System of Fishing — The Money-pawning 
 habit — Irish Railways — Cahirciveen — Mr. O'Connell and his wretched Tenantry 
 — The propriety of abolishing Tenancies under " Middlemen" by Law — 
 Necessity of instructing the People in Agricultural Knowledge . .387 
 
 LETTER XXVII. 
 
 (Bantry, Cork, Nov. 14.) 
 
 BANTRY AND THE CONDITION OF THE SURROUNDING POPULATION. 
 
 Beauty of the Country near Bantry Bay, and its neglected Capabilities — Bantry 
 Town and its Statistics — The Inn at Bantry, and its Accommodations — Reasons 
 for the poverty of the People of this District — Reasonable claim of the Tenants 
 to be paid for their Improvements — The want of Encouragement and High 
 Rents prevent Improvements — Evidence and Contradictions regarding these 
 Facts — Of the various aspects of Truth in Ireland — What Encouragement and 
 Attention on the part of a Landlord will effect — Their want keeps Ireland in 
 Distress 399 
 
 LETTER XXVIII. 
 
 (Cork, Nov. 20.) 
 
 CORK AND ITS NATURAL ADVANTAGES; ITS NEGLECTED AGRICULTURE, 
 FISHERIES, AND MINERAL WEALTH — COMPARISON BETWEEN CORN- 
 WALL AND CORK. 
 
 Description of Cork — Neglect of Fishing and Cultivation, and the Wealth these 
 Occupations would produce — The Social Remedy— The Mineral Wealth of the 
 
CONTENTS. XXIU 
 
 County of Cork — Comparison between the People of Cornwall and Cork — 
 Enterprise and Industry make the People of one County rich, with few 
 Bounties of Nature ; whilst the People of the latter County are poor and 
 miserable, with every natural advantage, because of theii' deficient Enterprise 
 and Industry ........... 415 
 
 LETTER XXIX. 
 
 {Cork, Nov. 22.) 
 
 THE FISHING AND MINING ADVANTAGES OF CORK REMEDIES SUG- 
 GESTED FOR AVERTING THE FAILURE OF THE POTATO CROP. 
 
 Scull Bay — Its abundance of uncaught Fish — ^The Mineral Wealth of its Coasts — 
 The Cosheen Copper Mine — The Southern and Western Mining Company of 
 Ireland — Condition of the people — Their apathy — WUl not take the trouble to 
 fish — The people being neglected do not improve — High Rents — Want of 
 Enterprise — The failure of the Potato Crop — Remedies suggested for preserving 
 the Potatoes sound, securing Seed, and preventing, as much as possible, the 
 evils of a Famine .......... 430 
 
 LETTER XXX. 
 
 {Malloiv, Cork, Nov. 26.) 
 
 DESCRIPTION OF MALLOW ADMINISTRATION OF THE GRAND JURY 
 
 LAWS. 
 
 Description of Mallow — Its Spa — The Water-power of Quartertown — Adminis- 
 tration of the Grand Jury Laws — The late Rev. Sydney Smith's opinion on 
 this subject — Inglis's opinion — The O'Coiinells, and Road Presentations — 
 Summary of the present Grand Jury Laws — The mode in which jobbing is 
 managed under them — The mischievous system of Applotment — Suggested 
 Remedies 444 
 
 LETTER XXXI. 
 
 {Waterford, Nov. 29.) 
 
 CHALLENGE TO MR. O'CONNELL TO PROVE THE CONDITION OF HIS 
 ESTATE — WATERFORD ; ITS NEGLECTED ADVANTAGES AND CAPA- 
 BILITIES. 
 
 Notice of Mr. O'Connell's defence of his Estate and contradiction of my descrip- 
 tion of it — Challenge to him to prove the description correct before twelve 
 impartial Gentlemen — Tender of issue what shall be proved — Description of the 
 counti-y from MaUow to Waterford — An Irish three-story house — Waterford 
 and its neglected Advantages — Its Exports — Its Politics — The Copper Mines — 
 State of Agriculture — Deposits in the Savings Banks — Recommendation to 
 the Government to cultivate Waste Lands as a means of employment for the 
 people and as a profitable investment of capital 457 
 
XXIV CONTENTS. 
 
 LETTER XXXII. 
 
 {Wexford, Dec. 4.) 
 
 WEXFORD ; ITS APPEARANCE AND ITS PEOPLE. 
 
 Comparison between Wexford and its people and the West of Ireland — Appearance 
 of the county — Cromwell and the three hundred Virgins — The Baronies of 
 Forth and Bargy, and the race which inhabits them — Condition of the People — 
 Irish Patriots — Paying Tenants for Improvements — Embarrassment of Estates 
 — Remedy suggested .......... 472 
 
 LETTER XXXIII. 
 
 {Kilkenny, Dec. 8.) 
 
 KILKENNY AND THE CONDITION OF ITS PEOPLE ; ITS MINES AND CAPA- 
 BILITIES. 
 
 The Huntsmen of Kilkenny — Description of the Town of Kilkenny — Its Trade — 
 Its unfinished Canal and Railway — Irish Jobbing — Appearance of the County 
 — Outrages, and consequent stopping of the working of the Slieveardah Coal- 
 mine — The Mines and Marble of Kilkenny — The Irish Press, and Native 
 Hospitality — Classified return of Depositers in the Wexford Savings Bank — 
 Evidence of the state of the County and of the condition of the People — The 
 benefits that flow from encouraging Landlords, and the mischiefs of Agita- 
 tion 486 
 
 LETTER XXXIV. 
 
 {Kilkenny, Dec. 12.) 
 
 ON THE PAYMENT OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY BY THE STATE, 
 ON THE GROUND OP PRINCIPLE. 
 
 On the Payment of the Roman Catholic Clergy by the State — The right of the 
 Roman Catholics to perfect Equality, and therefore their right, as well as 
 Protestants, to have their Clergy paid by the State — The Reasons why a Clergy 
 paid by the State is desirable — Such a Measure may be advocated or opposed 
 on the grounds of Expediency and of Principle — Its opposition, on the ground 
 of Principle ; first, by the Roman Catholic Clergy ; secondly, by the Protestant 
 Body — Instances where they both acquiesce in this Payment — Advocated on 
 Principle 498 
 
 LETTER XXXV. 
 
 {Kenmare, Kerry, Dec. 14.) 
 
 ON THE PAYMENT OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY BY THE STATE, 
 ON THE GROUNDS OF POLICY AND EXPEDIENCY. 
 
 The Payment of the Priesthood continued — How far such a Measure is desirable, 
 on the grounds of Policy and Expediency, for the interests of Religion, for the 
 
CONTENTS. XXV 
 
 interests of the People, and the welfare of Society, and as calculated to tend to 
 the peace an tranquillity of Ireland, and consequently to the prosperity and 
 strength of the Empire . . . . . . . . .507 
 
 LETTER XXXVI. 
 
 {Killarney, Kerry, Dec. 20.) 
 REVISIT DERRYNANE CONDITION OF MB. o'cONNELL's TENANTRY. 
 
 Revisit Derrynane, accompanied by one of the Reporters of The Times — Re- 
 statement of previous Account of this Place — Relation of the Newspaper abuse, 
 and of the Falsehoods circulated on account of it — Account of our Visit, and 
 minute Description of Mr. O'Connell's Tenantry — The Glass-windows of 
 Derrynane Beg — Mr. O'Connell as a Middleman — Cahirciveen — The Libe- 
 rator's illustrious Pedigree — The Reporter's Description . . .521 
 
 LETTER XXXVIL 
 
 {Dublin, Jan. 1, 1846.) 
 
 MR. o'cONNELL ; HIS DEFENCE AND HIS ILLUSTRIOUS PEDIGREE THE 
 
 WORKING OF THE NEW POOR LAW IN IRELAND. 
 
 The Irish Newspapers and Mr. O'Connell — The Mrs. Gamp of the Irish Press — 
 Mr. O'Connell, and his Speech in Defence of himself in Conciliation Hall — The 
 glass Windows of Derrynane Beg — Mr. O'Connell and his illustrious Pedigree 
 — The New Poor Law in Ireland — Review of its Provisions, and Observations 
 as to its appUcability to Ireland — Absence of any Law of Settlement, and means 
 of putting a stop to Begging in Ireland — The Beggars of Ireland — The Dietary 
 of the Work -houses — Effect of Potato Diet — Repugnance to Cleanliness amongst 
 the People — Advantage of the Union Work-houses in forcing this habit upon 
 those who enter them — Unpopularity of the Poor Law . . . 546 
 
 LETTER XXXVIII. 
 
 {Belfast, Jan. 4) 
 
 BELFAST ; ITS INDUSTRY AND ENTERPRISE, AND ITS CONSEQUENT 
 PROSPERITY AND WEALTH. 
 
 Travelling in Ireland — Bianconi's Cars — Has the Character of the People of the 
 North anything to do with their Prosperity ? — Is Labour the source of all 
 Wealth ? — If the People of the North can thrive under existing Laws and 
 Institutions, it is not the Laws and Institutions which make the People of the 
 rest of Ireland poor — Comparison between Down and Kerry — The comparative 
 Prosperity and Education of the East and West of Ireland shown — The Linen 
 Trade of Belfast — Flax Spinning — The Employment which the Flax Mills 
 give — The growth of Flax — Its profit as a Crop — Improvement in its Manu- 
 facture — Its profitable Cultivation in Mayo — The Manufactures of Belfast — The 
 
XXVI CONTENTS. 
 
 Shipping of Belfast — The Tonnage, Exports, and Imports — Advance in Pro- 
 sperity since the Union with England — Belfast prospered unaided — The Banks 
 of Belfast — Its Institutions — Condition of the People — Their Wages — The 
 Landlords — Tendency of Tenantry to subdivide their Holdings — " The soul of 
 Ireland" — Belfast a better barometer than Conciliation Hall — Newry . 561 
 
 LETTER XXXIX. 
 
 {Dullin, Jan. 6.) 
 
 REVIEAV OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 
 
 Description of Dublin and its People — Review of previous Letters — Remedial 
 Measures — Want of Industry, but partly the fault of the People — Their want of 
 Knowledge and opportunities of Industry the fault of the Higher Classes — No 
 Middle Class in the Country — The Upper Classes embarrassed, or driven out 
 by apprehension of violence — Abolish the class of Middlemen — Raise the tone 
 of Society, and thus prevent gross mismanagement of Estates, which would not 
 then be borne — Facilitate the transfer of encumbered Estates — Compel the sale 
 of Property by Law, when the interest of Mortgages upon it is not paid, instead 
 of appointing Receivers in Chancery — Resolutely put down Outrages and punish 
 Crime — Put a stop to Agitation of every kind — Suppress Trade Combinations 
 — Instances of their evil effects — Their injui-y to the Fishing Trade — Insure a 
 Tenant Payment for his Improvements — Undertake Public Works — Cultivate 
 Wastes, and teach Agriculture by Model Farms — Attend to reasonable Appli- 
 cations for Assistance — Pay the Priesthood — Conclusion . . .587 
 
 LETTER XL. 
 
 {London, Feb. 25.) 
 
 THE PROPOSED MEASURES OF RELIEF FOR IRELAND. 
 
 Grounds of Mr. O'Connell's Motion for relief of Irish Distress — Dissent from 
 them — The People of Ireland not entirely blameless for the extent of that Dis- 
 tress — The People not decreasing in Numbers — Much of Irish Distress owing 
 to neglect and want of Industry — The " Anomaly" of the People of Ireland 
 starving and exporting Food — The same " Anomaly" often seen in England — 
 Irish Exports and Irish Gain by them — The real Evil of Absentees — The 
 Portion of the Irish Population which will really suffer by a failure of Potato 
 Food — Is the construction of Railways the best Remedy to aid this portion of 
 the Irish Population? — Rather encourage permanent Improvements, such as 
 draining and improving Waste Lands and Public Works, which will promote 
 Industry 608 
 
CONTENTS. XXVll 
 
 CONTENTS OF APPENDIX. 
 
 No. Patre 
 
 I. Opinions of the Press as to First and Second Letters . . 629 
 
 II. Ditto as to Third Letter 634 
 
 III. Ditto as to Fourth Letter .... 639 
 
 IV. Lord ^lountcashel's Opinion on the Proportion which Rent should 
 
 bear to the Produce of Land . . . . . .641 
 
 V. Opinions of the Press on Letter from Donegal . . . .645 
 
 VI. Ditto ditto . . . .645 
 
 Vn. Ditto ditto . . . .646 
 
 VIII. Repeal Association, Attack in, ...... 648 
 
 IX. Profit of Bog Cultivation on the Kilkerrin Estate of Irish Waste 
 
 Land Company ......... 653 
 
 IX.* Profit of Green-cropping and House-feeding .... 654 
 
 X. Letter of Mr. Russell regarding the Marquis of Conyngham's 
 
 Donegal Estate 656 
 
 XI. Maurice O'Connell and Dean O'Shaughnessy .... 660 
 XII. Mr. O'Connell's Portrait " i' the act to kick" .... 664 
 
 XIII. His Defence as a Landlord in Conciliation HaU . . . 667 
 Letter of Mr. Twiss on Mr. O'ConneU's Treatment of his Tenantry, 
 
 referred to 693 
 
 Opinions of the Press relative to the Controversy as to the Condi- 
 tion of Mr. O'Connell's Tenantry 701 
 
 XIV. Mr. O'ConneU's illustrious Pedigree . . . . .718 
 XV. Table of unimproved Pasture and Bog-lands in Ireland . . 728 
 
 XVI. Table showing the relative Amounts of cultivated and uncultivated 
 
 Surface in each County ....... 730 
 
 XVII. Table showing the relative Size and Number of Farms and Density 
 
 of Population in different Counties in Ireland . . . 733 
 
 XVIII. Table showing the Extent of each Class of House-accommodation 
 
 in the several Counties in Ireland ..... 734 
 
 XIX. Table showing the comparative Amount of Property in Live Stock 
 
 in each County in Ireland 735 
 
 XX. Opinions of the Press on Letters from Belfast .... 736 
 
 XXI. Return of Number and Ages of Emigrants from Ireland during ten 
 
 years ending 6th June 1841 ...... 740 
 
 XXII. Returns relative to the Growth of Flax in Ireland . . . 742 
 
 XXIII. Abstract of Evidence before Land Commissioners as to the Evils 
 
 created by "Middlemen" ....... 746 
 
 XXIV. Return from the Court of Chancery of Estates on which Receivers 
 
 accounted in 1843 ........ 756 
 
 XXV. Return of Mines in operation in Ireland ..... 758 
 
 XXVI. Opinions of the Press of Concluding Letter .... 760 
 
 INDEX 763 
 
32 
 
 HytiRAVED Bl' smr H.1LL . 
 
 £ntrlis]i Miles. 
 
 5 lO 20 
 
 Jiailway Sf/i/ij»is nitiritfi/ l7ais. 
 
LETTER I. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY LETTER. 
 
 Inquiry as to the Cause of the Disturbed State of Ireland — The Author's Intro- 
 duction of the Object of his Mission — The Disturbances in Cavan. 
 
 Cavan, August 14, 1845. 
 
 There is perhaps no subject which has engaged more 
 attention, which has been more discussed and examined 
 into, than the condition of the Irish people. Society has 
 so long in Ireland been in a state of disorganization that 
 Irish outrages excite no surprise, and have become so much, 
 matters of course, because continually occurring, that they 
 are read of and spoken of as mere ordinary and every- day 
 events. But though thus viewed, from their perpetual 
 recurrence, they have not been treated with indifference. 
 All persons, of every party, admit that they are symptom- 
 atic of social disease, and successive governments have 
 acted on this conviction. There is, perhaps, no country 
 in Europe, certainly no portion of the United Kingdom, 
 in which party spirit runs so high, and so much divides 
 the people. Party flourishes in Ireland with a luxu- 
 riance elsewhere unknown. Amongst the upholders of 
 different religious creeds, by opposing political parti- 
 
INTRODUCTORY LETTER. 
 
 sans — amongst those who have the greatness and the 
 glory of the United Kingdom at heart, as well as by those 
 who confine their patriotism to Irish nationality — different 
 and opposing theories have been propounded and advocated 
 regarding the causes of the social disorders which oppress 
 and ruin Ireland. In their turns, most of those theories 
 have formed the subject of Government inquiries. Com- 
 missions of inquiry have been appointed, committees of 
 both Houses of Parliament have received and investigated 
 evidence on almost every theory that has been advocated, 
 and thousands of pages of evidence have been collected in 
 bulky blue books. " Over population," " subdivision of 
 farms," " tenant-right," " con-acre," " emigration," " the 
 cause of crime," " the necessity of a poor law," " the state 
 of education," " rents," and lastly, " the occupation of land," 
 have, with many other subjects, been inquired into ; and 
 first one and then another has been asserted to be the cause 
 of, or the appropriate remedy for, the nuschief which pre- 
 vails, and which all acknowledge. 
 
 " The knowledge of a disease" is said to be " half its 
 cure," because the appropriate remedy can be applied, and 
 the disease yields to its influence. But if a remedy has been 
 applied, and the disease continues unabated, the logical 
 inference is, that either the disease is not known, or, if 
 known, that the appropriate remedy has not been applied. 
 At one period, Catholic emancipation was urged by the 
 enthusiastic advocates of the equality of civil rights as the 
 remedy which was to put a stop to all the disturbances in 
 Ireland. The ruin of Ireland was jiredicted by those who 
 opposed the just concession of that equality. But Ireland 
 has not been ruined by that act; nor have disturbances 
 ceased because of it. It was not the remedy. An extension 
 of the franchise was urged with equal earnestness, as the one 
 thing needful, and with equal earnestness denied to be the 
 required remedy. Whatever the franchise, the disturbances 
 
INTRODUCTORY LETTER. 3 
 
 have gone on. Over-population was said to be the cause, 
 and emigration was proposed as its remedy. It must be 
 apparent to every thinking man, that no amount of emigra- 
 tion can ever bring down population — if over-population be 
 the cause — apart from its attendant evils, in abstracting the 
 flower and the strength of the population, and leaving the 
 helpless refuse behind. It therefore must be an inefficient 
 remedy, and so it has proved.* " Educate the people," 
 cried another section of well-meaning men, " and they will 
 mend ; they will acquire a distaste for crime." Though true 
 in the abstract, this position must be modified by the con- 
 dition of the men you educate. Education is a weapon in the 
 hands of a desperate man. Education has been tried, but 
 disturbances go on. It is not the remedy. It was surmised 
 that the tenure of land had something to do with the dis- 
 turbed state of Ireland. Much evidence has been collected 
 on this subject ; but the evidence is a dead letter ; it has not 
 been acted upon, and few know it, and the disturbances are 
 left to continue. 
 
 It can scarcely be questioned that in one or other of the 
 numerous blue books which have been compiled, if not in 
 most of them, the true cause of Ireland's distress, of its 
 degradation, its misery, and its consequent outrages, is to 
 be found ; neither can it be questioned that, if the evidence 
 containing the proof of that cause were generally known, 
 the force of public opinion would compel the application of 
 the appropriate remedy ; but hitherto that evidence has been 
 locked up in unreadable and undigested masses, and has 
 been sifted only by partisans for party objects ; and, with 
 few exceptions, only party measures have been engrafted on 
 it ; and, because party measures do not succeed in rendering 
 Ireland like the rest of the United Kingdom, — generally 
 thriving, contented, and peaceable, — it is assumed that the 
 
 * See Letter, post, dated Clifden, Connemara, on this subject. 
 B 2 
 
4 INTRODUCTORY LETTER. 
 
 difficulties of legislating for Ireland are insurmountable; 
 that its condition cannot be improved ; and things are either 
 left alone as they are, or we see such remedies as the endow- 
 ment of colleges applied to prevent starving, and, therefore, 
 desperate and reckless outcasts avenging real or imaginary 
 wrongs by shocking atrocities. 
 
 You have done me the honour to commit to me the 
 responsible and arduous task of endeavouring to sift that 
 evidence, in order to lay it before the public, and in each 
 locality to hear the feelings and views of the people, and, 
 testing them by observation, to make them known to the 
 world through your columns. With almost an oppressive 
 sense of the difficulties which I may have to encounter, I 
 enter upon the duty which you have committed to me, a 
 stranger to Ireland, and wholly devoid of Irish prejudices: 
 with no motive whatever save an earnest desire to ascertain 
 the truth, and to state it with strict impartiality. I shall 
 endeavour as much as possible to deal with questions, and not 
 with individuals. That partisans may oppose the conclusions 
 at which I may arrive, is more than probable. If right, I 
 shall endeavour to convince by argument and by evidence ; 
 if wrong, argument and evidence will be conclusive against 
 me. Those, however, who will blindly oppose* whatever 
 may appear in your columns, because you are the advocate? 
 no matter whether you be right or wrong, are best left 
 unnoticed. 
 
 * The anticipation that there would be so discreditable an opposition was 
 founded on the past experience of the author ; and the truth of the anticipation 
 has been abundantly verified. If the archangel Michael were to visit this earth, 
 and write truth by inspiration, there are some malignant and envious spirits who 
 would revile him. The author, however, relies on the good sense of those who 
 may have read his letters. He feels, from the flattering approval wliich he has 
 every where met with in Ireland, from the gentry of all ranks and parties, as well 
 as from the people, that he can well afford to despise and treat with contempt 
 the venom and malignity of some writers for the press, whose abuse of liim has 
 but recoiled upon themselves. 
 
INTRODUCTORY LETTER. D 
 
 It is matter of notoriety that the county of Cavan has for 
 some time been in an excited and disturbed state, and that 
 several very shocking outrages have been perpetrated in it. 
 On walking through the town of Cavan, the walls are seen 
 to be placarded with the proclamation of his Excellency the 
 Lord-Lieutenant, declaring the country to be in a state of 
 disturbance, and to require additional police force. Armed 
 police and soldiers are everywhere seen about the town. 
 Notices, offering rewards for " private information relative to 
 the secret society commonly called ' Ribandmen,' or ' Molly 
 Maguires,' " and directing the arrest of " all vagrants and 
 suspicious persons" are everywhere stuck up, and sufficiently 
 indicate some social disturbance. The resolutions adopted 
 at a public meeting, held in the town of Cavan, about five 
 weeks ago, are also distributed about, the first of which, 
 proposed by the Marquis of Headfort, Lieutenant of the 
 county of Cavan, seconded by Mr. Robert Burrowes, 
 Deputy-Lieutenant, states : — 
 
 "That we deeply deplore the extensive system of lawless violence 
 which has for some months past prevailed in this county, rendering 
 both life and property insecure. Murders, under the most atrocious 
 circumstances, have been committed in the open day, numerous houses 
 have been robbed of arms and money, and the inmates of several of them 
 have been severely injured ; anonymous threatening notices, couched in 
 the most sanguinary terms, are daily issued to most respectable indivi- 
 duals—and other outrages have been perpetrated — all, up to the present-^ 
 moment, -with perfect impunity." 
 
 It is, then, no matter of speculation that in this county 
 a state of disturbance exists, which has rendered it necessary 
 to call for the interference of the Executive Government. 
 That interference followed on an address to the Lord- 
 Lieutenant from the magistrates of the county, forwarded 
 to the Goverment at the latter end of June, in which they 
 state that a magistrate, resident in the immediate neigh- 
 bourhood of the town of Cavan (Mr. Bell Booth), was shot 
 in open day, whilst returning with his two children, in a 
 
6 INTRODUCTORY LETTER. 
 
 gig, from church. In their address, the magistrates state 
 that the assassin then fled across the country : — 
 
 " A crowd, at least twenty (people who were passing on the road), 
 almost instantly collected around the body ; but, although urged in the 
 strongest manner by a gentleman present, who, from a late accident, was 
 unfortunately unable himself to set the example, would not go in pursuit 
 of the assassin. Such is the state of intimidation to which even most 
 respectable persons are reduced by the scenes daily occuri'ing." 
 
 Disgraceful as this testimony is, it is not a solitary instance 
 of such conduct. It sounds oddly to hear this same com- 
 munity calling upon the Government to send them armed 
 police to protect them, when twenty men in open day allow 
 a single assassin to vralk quietly off, after committing a most 
 shocking murder in the midst of them — to hear them call 
 on Jupiter to help them, when they will not set their 
 shoulders to the wheel. It is clear that they might have 
 apprehended this assassin if they would ; and it follows also 
 clearly that this community is divided, and that one part of 
 it tacitly permits an assassination which the other part of it 
 wants the power to prevent. What can any Government 
 do in such a case as this? That which one half of the 
 community abhors, the other half of the community looks 
 approvingly on. 
 
 It is denied by one party that society is in the state that 
 has been represented ; and it is asserted by them that there 
 is no cause for fear, and that this was an individual act of 
 revenge, executed by a hired stranger.* Unfortunately, 
 these acts are rather common, and, whether there is cause 
 for fear or not, it is a fact, that extensive excitement and 
 apprehension prevail. It is said that the funeral of Mr. 
 Booth was attended by ujiwards of 2,000 armed men ; and 
 
 * See the Letter, post, dated Roscrea, Tipperary, showing the state of that 
 county. It is a monstrous thing to hear of a *' hired assassin ;" yet the author 
 was repeatedly told in Tipperary, that if any man took a dislike to him, plenty of 
 men might be hired for about thirty shillings to s/ioot him ; and from the atrocities 
 occurring there, there was no reason to doubt the statement. 
 
INTRODUCTORY LETTER. / 
 
 that, though his sister-in-law was so near to the villain who 
 fired the shot that she closely observed him, yet she dare not 
 attempt identification.* Some farmers told me that they 
 are under such apprehensions that they come to town 
 armed : and I myself saw several farmers driving home with 
 their cars in clusters, for mutual protection, having upon 
 each car a short gun. What can any government do in 
 such a state of society as this to put down crime, when each 
 half of the community is armed against the other ; when 
 one half the community lives by intimidation, and the other 
 by force ? The remedy is in the community ; the duty of the 
 Government is, to discover what it is, to aid it, and, if 
 necessary, to enforce it. So long as human nature is what 
 it is, a wrong will be retaliated by a wrong ; and those who, 
 in an united community would soon be either banished or 
 extirpated for their crimes, are shielded in the bitterness of 
 estrangement and confl.ict, and escape punishment for atro- 
 cities. Whether there is any reason for this general appre- 
 hension or not, it is a fact that it exists, and it will exist 
 until each party in the community resolves to injiict no 
 wrong, as well as to hear no wrong ; then, and then only, 
 will both unite for the common welfare ; then will the 
 assassin find every man's hand against him, as his is against 
 every man ; and then will society unite in branding with the 
 odium of cowardice those who quietly permit a murderer to 
 walk ofi" unscathed. 
 
 What, however, has produced this unhappy division, 
 which leads to these lamentable results, must form the sub- 
 ject of further communications. 
 
 * This system of intimidation is universal throughout Ireland. Men there bear 
 things and do things contrary to their inclination, iov fear of offending persons, 
 or of becoming unjsopular, or of being threatened to be shot, which no man in 
 England would think of submitting to for a moment, on any consideration. 
 
b INTRODUCTORY LETTER. 
 
 (From The Times of August 21, 1845.) 
 
 We this day introduce to our readers our Iiish Commissioner. What- 
 ever jealousies may be roused by the title or the office, we are not con- 
 scious of any patent we are infringing, or any territory not our own that 
 we are encroaching upon. Certainly there was a commission last year, 
 which has this year jDublished a report — such commissions and such 
 reports there have been almost every other j-ear this century. But 
 they have passed away like an Egyptian dynasty, buried under pyramids, 
 not of stone, but an equally M^asted material,— of printed paper,— under 
 masses of evidence which no political Belzoni now is found to penetrate, 
 and which only show that there have been commissioners. Another 
 commission is now gathered to the sepulchre of its fathers. Tain the 
 attempt to revive or disinter a commission which has once lost the golden 
 opportunity of an immediate parliamentary discussion. Who will care 
 next year to refer to a report published in 1845, but the materials of 
 which were collected and arranged so far back as 1844 ? 
 
 Presumptuous as it may be called, we anticipate more effectual results 
 from the more simple and personal agency of our correspondent. His 
 efficiency will be proved by objectors. Who objects to Lord Devon's 
 report ? Who that found himself ever so unjustly handled would have 
 the singular indiscretion to dig out the calumny ? Man puts up to man. 
 Our Commissioner will have his enemies. Discussion is necessary to the 
 discovery and improvement of the truth. In a nation of offenders, all 
 sinning either one way or another, nearly all more or less compromised 
 either in sudden murder or slow, but not less deadly oppression, " a chiel 
 amang them takin notes" will be a lively provocation. Should there be 
 any feeling as to the invalidity of his warrant, should either landlord or 
 Molly Maguire ask for the sight of his commission, it is not impossible the 
 spontaneous character of the investigation may give a new zest to the 
 controversy. 
 
 Hitherto, the English have had many opportunities of learning the state 
 of Irish society, but too exclusively, as it seems to us, under two heads — 
 under formal reports, and under most informal and irregular travels and 
 tales. The former lack personal and dramatic interest, the latter the 
 severity and impartiality of truth. Our correspondent will be neither 
 of these, and may combine the advantages of both. He may not only 
 tell us of rents, but describe cottages and ways of life. He may not 
 only reckon up paupers, but picture them to our sight and feeling. 
 There are already those who take care to number oflfences, committals, 
 
INTRODUCTORY LETTER. y 
 
 and convictions, who are versed in the lore of calendars, and know the 
 force of the police and the capacity of gaols. Our informant may perhaps 
 make us better acquainted with that mystery of suflFering and crime of 
 which these are the accidental circumstances, or the inadequate preven- 
 tives. We have exports and imports, or may have them if we please. 
 Our friend may send his returns of the Irishman's own cottage larder. 
 This is the difference between a man and a machine on the one hand, and 
 a man and a novel on the other. Whatever the success of our present 
 inquiry, it is an encouragement to think that it has not been tried before, 
 and, at the worst, we have this consolation in store, that every other 
 method has failed. 
 
10 WANT OF EMPLOYMENT THE 
 
 LETTER II. 
 
 THE WANT OF EMPLOYMENT THE CAUSE OF 
 • DISTURBANCES. 
 
 Disturbances in Ireland do not originate in Religious Causes— The Want of 
 Employment the real Origin of Disturbances — The Want of Employment 
 shown to exist by Statistical Facts — Produces Starvation and Disturbances— 
 The effect of Ejectments in producing Crime — Definition of " Molly Magxiire- 
 ism" — Disputes about Land and Ejectments the chief Cause of Crime in 
 Ireland — The Remedy then is, to secure Employment for the People. 
 
 U '. 
 
 Cavan, August 21. 
 It is a position conceded by all parties in Ireland, that want 
 of employment is the cause of much poverty, distress, and 
 mischief. Unhappily, that mischief, too, continually ex- 
 hibits itself under the form of aggravated outrage ; and, as 
 unhappily, the varieties of theories as to the causes of those 
 outrages, whilst they scatter the force of united public 
 opinion, distract men's minds, and prevent the application of 
 the remedies which alone will put a stop to outrage. 
 
 The able author of the " Past and Present Policy of Eng- 
 land towards Ireland,'^ has laboured to show that disturbances 
 in Ireland originate in religious causes ; that the want of 
 a state provision for the Roman Catholic clergy necessi- 
 tates the maintenance of a numerous army in Ireland to 
 maintain tranquillity, and that a concurrent endowment of 
 the Roman Catholic clergy, as a measure of "justice and 
 
CAUSE OF DISTURBANCES. 11 
 
 wisdom," is that which will make Ireland tranquil.* Those 
 who assemble in Exeter-hall to uphold Protestantism, main- 
 tain that the spirit of Protestantism, and the conversion of 
 Roman Catholics will alone tranquillize Ireland. Both the 
 parties whom these opinions represent, attribute to religion 
 " the messenger of peace," the source of all strife. Another 
 large party contends that Irish nationality and a repeal of 
 the Union will stay Irish absenteeism, and secure prosperity 
 and content to Ireland. 
 
 It is the object of my present letter to endeavour to prove, 
 by evidence which it will be difficult to dispute, that the 
 source of all mischief in Ireland, the real origin of every 
 disturbance, and of almost every crime — is the want of em- 
 ployment; that religious differences but exacerbate the irri- 
 tation which this unvarying cause produces ;t and that, as 
 " drowning men catch at straws," the remedy of Irish 
 " nationality " meets with support amongst desperate men, 
 whose circumstances cannot be worse, but who would scout 
 the notion of narrowing their opportunities as a manifest 
 absurdity, were but the soothing influences of constant and 
 remunerative employment to produce among them their 
 necessary consequences — content. 
 
 The commissioners recently appointed to inquire into the 
 occupation of land in Ireland, in their Report, page 11, 
 state, — 
 
 " Whatever difference of opinion may be put forward or entertained 
 upon other points, the testimony given is unfortunately too uniform in 
 representing the unimproved state of extensive districts, the want of 
 
 * From his experience in Ireland, and from many conversations with well- 
 informed men on the subject, the author is convinced that this view is, in a great 
 measure, a sound one. The subject, however, is fully discussed by him, post, in 
 two letters, dated from Kilkenny. 
 
 f Mr. O'Connell, in his examiaation before the Committee of the House of 
 Lords, in March 1825, on the Disturbed State of Ireland, is asked, — " Do you 
 consider the dissensions between Orangemen and CathoUcs, in any considerable 
 degree, instrumental in producing disturbances?" His answer was, — "Yes; if 
 they do not produce, they greatly aggravate, and tend much to continue them." 
 
12 WANT OF EMPLOYMENT THE 
 
 employment., and the consequent poverty and hardships, under which a 
 large portion of the agricultural population continually labour. 
 
 " The obvious remedy for this state of things is to provide remunerative 
 employment which may at once increase the productive powers of the 
 country, and improve the condition of the people."* 
 
 Let us, however, examine, and endeavour to prove to 
 plain reason that this is an incontestible fact, and depends 
 on no opinion. I am in the county of Cavan, and will 
 therefore take the county of Cavan for my data. Distur- 
 bances have arisen here ; let us see if they are to be traced 
 to this cause. 
 
 It is necessary first to see what is the field of occupation 
 which the people have ? — what is the scope for their in- 
 dustry ? — what the outlet for their natural increase ? 
 
 The Report of the Census Commissioners (Ireland) for 
 1841, states that the population of the county of Cavan is 
 employed in the following proportions in each hundred 
 families : f — 
 
 * Dr. Doyle, Bishop of Kildare and Leighlin, in his evidence before the House 
 of Lords, in March 1825, is asked, — " What is the state of the lower order of 
 people in your diocese ? " " The extent and intensity of their distress is greater 
 than any language can describe, and the lives of many hundreds are shortened by 
 it. It enervates their minds and paralyzes their energies, and leaves them 
 incapable of almost any useful exertion." He goes on to describe the want of 
 employment, and the consequent want of food, and says — " It is scarcely imagin- 
 able on what a pittance one of these wretches endeavours to subsist ; in fact, he is 
 almost like a savage of the American deserts. He lies down on a little straw 
 upon the floor, and remaining there motionless nearly all day, gets up in the 
 evening, eats a few potatoes, and then throws himself again upon the earth, where 
 he remains till morning. Thus he drags out an existence which it were better 
 were terminated in any way than continue in the manner it is." Mr. Leslie 
 Foster is asked, on giving his evidence before the same Committee of the House 
 of Lords on the Disturbed State of Ireland, in 1825, — " To what cause do you 
 attribute the frequent occurrence of disturbances in Ireland.'" He answers, — 
 " I think the proximate cause is the extreme physical misery of the peasantry, 
 coupled with their liability to be called on for the payment of different charges 
 which it is often perfectly impossible for them to meet. The immediate cause I 
 conceive to be, the attempt to enforce those demands by the various processes of 
 the law." 
 
 f Page xviii. 
 
CAUSE OF DISTURBANCES. 
 
 13 
 
 PROPORTION OF 100 FAMILIES CHIEFLY EMPLOYED IN 
 
 
 oT 
 
 
 O '-' 
 t< 9 
 
 4M 
 
 u 
 
 
 i 
 
 
 
 
 
 >— M 
 
 o s 
 
 
 
 
 
 - u to 
 
 3 
 •c 
 
 bo 
 
 u 
 
 O 
 
 -icultural 
 rtion of o 
 
 its. 
 
 nufactures 
 2., plus p 
 other pur 
 
 
 
 
 ^-S 
 
 g=8o 
 
 76 
 
 20 
 
 5 
 
 79 
 
 21 
 
 Showing, by comparison with the census of 1831, a slight 
 increase in the manufacturing proportion of 8 per cent, since 
 the census of 1831, chiefly owing to shops or trade, and a 
 relative decrease in the agricultural proportion of occupation. 
 So that here 79 per cent, of the population are employed in 
 agriculture, and 21 per cent, in manufactures and trade. 
 The great outlet, therefore, or means of occupation for the 
 population, as it naturally increases, is in the proportion of 
 4 to 1 in agricultural pursuits. 
 
 We will now examine what is the extent of this means 
 of occupation, or rather how much employment this large 
 proportion of agricultural pursuits can afford to an increas- 
 ing population, or to those who, from ani/ cause, may be 
 thrown out of employment. According to the census of 
 1841* there are 25,641 farms in the county of Cavan, and 
 the number is thus constituted : — 
 
 Above 1 to 5 acres 10,807 
 
 „ 5 to 15 acres 12,208 
 
 „ 15 to 30 acres 1,958 
 
 „ 30 acres 668 
 
 Total . . . 25,641 
 Thus 23,000 out of the 25,600 farms are under 15 acres, 
 or of a size so small that each occupant is capable of culti- 
 vating his farm by himself — they offer no occupation to the 
 
 * Page 455. 
 
14 WANT OF EMPLOYMENT THE 
 
 labourer. It is probable also, that, in many cases, each oc- 
 cupant, with the aid of his family, can, without further assist- 
 ance, cultivate the farms which range from 15 to 30 acres. 
 Then what remains from agriculture as a source of employ- 
 ment for the natural increase of population, and for those who 
 may be divested of employment ? — the labour which 668 
 farms above 30 acres can give in the whole county of 
 Cavan. But these farms are already stocked with labourers. 
 It is almost needless to prove that they do not afford scope 
 for the surplus industry of the unemployed. The census of 
 1841, however, will do it in two lines. Out of the 57,651 
 individuals of the rural population of Ireland, who annually 
 migrate to England in search of harvest work, squeezed 
 out to look for employment, and thereby by competition to 
 reduce to their own condition the poor labourers of England 
 — the county of Cavan sends forth 1,904.* If they could find 
 work at home, they would not go to England to search for it. 
 These few farms, therefore, about and above 30 acres, do not 
 find means of employment for the unemployed. The same 
 observations will apply to the narrow field for employment 
 which trade and manufactures afford. The trades and ma- 
 nufactures, which occupy 21 per cent, of the population, are 
 already supplied with artizans, and chiefly employ women. 
 It is very questionable if this field for employment affords 
 work for the natural increase of those concerned in it. 
 Whilst agricultural occupations employ 56,583 men, and 
 2,111 women in the county, manufactures and trade of 
 every kind employ but 8,498 men, and 31,870 women, out 
 of a population of 243, 1 58.'t- 
 
 I think it must therefore be apparent, that the narrow 
 field of " trade and manufactures " which here exists cannot 
 give employment to the increasing population, and that the 
 wider field of agriculture neither can nor does. 
 
 * Census Report, page xxvii. i 
 
 t Cenaus, page 300 to 304. 
 
CAUSE OF DISTURBANCES. 15 
 
 The field of agriculture, it is true, is capable of extension, 
 both by improvements,* and by increasing the cultivated 
 surface. The Land Commissioners state in their report, that 
 there are 72,000 acres of unimproved land in the county of 
 Cavan, that 20,000 acres are capable of improvement for 
 cultivation, and that 28,000 might be drained for pasture, 
 leaving 24,000 acres on the summits of lofty hills, exceeding 
 1,000 feet in elevation, which may be considered as inca- 
 pable of improvement.'t' But this improvement has yet to 
 be carried out, and the mere unemployed labourer is not the 
 man who can carry it out. This source of employment 
 depends on others, — on those who have the lands and the 
 means — as also does that perhaps wider source of occupation 
 which improvement in the system of agriculture would 
 afford. But I speak of facts as they are : these means of 
 employment exist not now. 
 
 If necessary further to pursue this proof, the general sta- 
 tistical accounts of Ireland lead to the same result. The 
 Census Commissioners of 1841;]: state the natural and uni- 
 form rate of increase of the fixed population to be 12 per 
 cent, in the ten years from 1831 to 1841 ; yet the positive 
 returns show an increase in the resident population of little 
 more than 5 per cent. ; and they account for the remaining 
 increase of 7 per cent, by estimating the draughts from 
 Ireland, driven out to seek employment elsewhere, at 
 572,464 ; and they thus compute this enormous number 
 from their returns — 
 
 * The rude state of agriculture may be judged of by the following evidence : — 
 Three crops of oats m succession is a common thing when the land has been well 
 manured first. (Evidence of Mr, Kenny, Rohulton, near Cavan, before the Land 
 Commissioners, Part ii. p. 107.) Mr. Phillip Smith, of Artina, Stradone, in the 
 county of Cavan, is asked by the Land Commissioners, Part ii, p. 110, — " How 
 many crops of oats do they take after potatoes ? " — " Five or six ; as long as the 
 ground is able to grow, to any extent. The usual course is, potatoes twice and 
 oats three times, but sometimes four or five, or perhaps more, as long as the land 
 is able to grow them." 
 
 t Page 50. % Report, page xi. 
 
16 WANT OF EMPLOYMENT THE 
 
 From 1831 to 1841. 
 Emigration to the colonies 428,471 
 
 „ Great Britain 104,814 
 
 Recruits for the army 34,090 
 
 „ East India Company . . 5,089 
 
 572,464 
 So that we not only have Great Britain finding- employ- 
 ment annually for upwards of 57,000 harvest labourers, but 
 also for an increase of 104,814 labourers, permanently settled 
 in Great Britain in ten years ; and the whole number of 
 persons of Irish birth dwelling in Great Britain, in June, 
 1841, is stated to have been 419,256 * 
 
 So that half a million of the population of Ireland of the 
 present generation is permanently squeezed out of Ireland 
 by want of employment, and driven to search for a livelihood 
 in Great Britain and our colonies, over and above the an- 
 nual swarm that migrates to Great Britain during harvest 
 time. 
 
 As neither trade nor manufactures, nor agricultural labour 
 apart from the occupation of the land can give work to the in- 
 creasing population, and to those out of employment (and 
 with work of course the means of subsistence), and as four- 
 fifths of the amount of existing employment, or 79 per cent., 
 is derived from the occupation of land, for the most part in 
 patches of from one to 15 acres, it necessarily follows that 
 the struggle of the majority of the increasing population will 
 be for the occupation of such a patch of land. As land also 
 does not increase, but the population does, and the occupa- 
 tion of land is nearly the only means of employment, and 
 therefore of subsistence, which the country affords, it follows 
 — that, as no population will starve without desperate efforts 
 to live ; or emigrate, without struggles against this desperate 
 remedy nearly as intense, the obtaining and retaining pos- 
 
 * Census Report, page x. 
 
CAUSE OF DISTURBANCES. 17 
 
 session of such a patch of land are objects which enlist the 
 strongest of human motives — the struggle for existence. It 
 is existence with a patch of land ; it is starvation without 
 it. Every passion — every instinct of the human heart — is 
 roused to obtain and retain possession of the existence 2>atch 
 of land. 
 
 Mr. Nichols, the Poor Law Commissioner, in his first 
 report, in 1838, as to the propriety of establishing Poor 
 Laws in Ireland, thus writes : — 
 
 *' The sub-division of the land into small holdings having destroyed 
 the regular demand for labour, the only protection against actual want, 
 the only means by which a man can procure food for his family, is by 
 getting and retaining possession of a portion of land; for this he has 
 struggled — for this the pleasantry have combined, and burst through all 
 
 the restraints of law and humanity Land to them is the great 
 
 necessary of life. There is no hiring of servants. A man cannot obtain 
 his living as a day labourer. He must get possession of a plot of land, 
 on which to raise potatoes or starve. It need scarcely be said that a man 
 will not starve so long as the means of sustaining life can be obtained by 
 force or fraud, and hence the scenes of violence and bloodshed which have 
 so frequently occurred."* 
 
 In this town from which I write (Cavan) I am informed 
 on the best authority, and from several sources, that the 
 labouring men of the neighbourhood — those without land — 
 are unemployed nine months in the year ; and that there is 
 general employment for them only during the spring, and 
 at harvest time. I am told that, except during these periods, 
 from thirty to fifty men may be seen at the market cross 
 every morning, unemployed, waiting for a job, and that there 
 is no demand for their work. During harvest their wages 
 are I5. a day. During the rest of the year the usual Avages 
 are Stf.f a day, without food, or 4^. a week. They have to 
 
 * Page 8. 
 
 t The rate of wages is 8^., T\d., or 9<7. : 8rf. in the winter and \Qd. in the 
 summer half-year is the usual wages ; in some places lower, but very few higher. 
 (Evidence of Mr. Kenny, farmer, Rohulton, near Cavan, Lord Devon's Com- 
 
 C 
 
18 "WANT OF EMPLOYMENT THE 
 
 p ay 255. to 305. rent for their cottages,* and if they rent a 
 patch of land manured, or " con-acre" for potatoes, they pay 
 SI. an acre for it If The evidence before the Land Commis- 
 sion as to the county of Cavan shows this : — 45. a xueek for 
 three months in the year for a man and his family to subsist 
 upon I 
 
 Can we wonder at the desperate intensity of the struggle 
 for land, — at the passions which are roused at being dispos- 
 sessed, with this only resource of slow starvation — of scarcely 
 animal existence — as the horrible alternative ? From vari- 
 ous motives, the propriety of which I will not now step aside 
 to inquire into, some from the conviction of its absolute 
 necessity ; some from a desire to consolidate farms and im- 
 prove cultivation ; some, it is said, from motives of bigo- 
 try, in order to subsitute tenants of one faith for those of 
 another ; some because they had a turbulent tenantry ; some 
 because they could get no rent, — landlords have continually 
 ejected tenants without providing them a substitute for the 
 means of existence which the patch of land afforded them. 
 What I wish now to confine attention to is the hare fact of 
 an ejectment and its consequences, Avithout reference to any 
 motive whatever which may have caused it. Very many of 
 the landlords, it is true, have given money to the tenants as 
 compensation on their quitting their holdings. The Land 
 
 mission, Part ii. p. 109.) Wages to a man who gets constant employment under 
 a farmer are about 8 (Z. during the year. Those who have not regular employment 
 obtain from 4<Z. to Is. In some seasons they receive higher wages, and in other 
 parts of tlie year they are quite idle." (Evidence of Mr. Phillip Smith, agent 
 and landowner, Artina, near Stradone, Cavan, Ibid. Part ii. p. 112.) 
 
 * The labourers hold their cottages under the farmers, who build and repair 
 them. Mr. Phillip Smith, of Artina, near Cavan, agent and landowner, is asked 
 by the Land Commissioners, — " What rent do they generally pay for them, and 
 how is it paid?" — " It is usually paid by labour; and the usual payment on 
 the average would be £2 a year." 
 
 t Mr. Phillip Smith, of Artina, is asked (Land Commission, Partii. p. 112), — 
 " Does the con-acre system prevail at all.'" *' Yes." — " What do they usually 
 pay for con-acre ?" " From 8/. to 9/. an acre." — " Is that for manured land ? " 
 " Yes." 
 
CAUSE OF DISTURBANCES. 19 
 
 Occupation Commissioners, in their report on this subject, I 
 think, justly conclude that — 
 
 " It is difficult to say what compensation, apart from land, Avill be 
 adequate in a country where land alone affords a permanent security for 
 food. The money is soon spent in the temporary maintenance of the 
 family. They may be willing to labour, but can find no employment." 
 (Report, page 21.) 
 
 The same commissioners quote the evidence of Dr. Doyle 
 before the select committee of 1830, to inquire into the state 
 of Ireland, as to the effect of these ejectments, from what- 
 ever cause they may proceed. It will be found quoted in 
 page 19 of the report of Lord Devon's commission : — 
 
 " It would be impossible for language to convey an idea of the state 
 of distress to which the ejected tenantry have been reduced, or of the 
 disease, misery, and even vice which they have propagated in the towns 
 wherein they have settled ; so that not only they who have been ejected 
 have been rendered miserable, but they have carried Avith them, and 
 propagated that misery. They have increased the stock of labour ; they 
 have rendered the habitations of those who received them more crowded ; 
 they have given occasion to the dissemination of disease ; they have been 
 obliged to resort to theft, and all manner of vice and iniquity, to procure 
 subsistence ; but, what is the most jiainful of all, a vast number of them 
 have perished from want." 
 
 Need we travel into theological strife, or into political 
 crotchets about repeal ; need we examine into the Catholic 
 faith, or into questions about Protestant ascendency — into 
 the necessity of general endowments, in order to seek an 
 elucidation of the cause of outrages in Ireland, with these 
 facts before us ? The exclamation of Shylock starts to 
 memory, and may we not apply it to the condition of the 
 poor ejected Irish tenant — the hopeless outcast — " Hath he 
 not eyes ? Hath he not hands, organs, dimensions, senses, 
 affections, passions? Fed with the same food, hurt with the 
 same weapon, subject to the same diseases, healed by the 
 same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and 
 
 c 2 
 
20 WANT OF EMPLOYMENT THE 
 
 summer, as those more happily circumstanced? If you 
 prick him, does he not bleed ? If you tickle him, does he 
 not laugh ? If you poison him, does he not die ? And if 
 you wrong him, will he not revenge ?" 
 
 Ejected from his land, without other means of living, the 
 Irish tenant is rendered desperate by the prospect of starv- 
 ation. Turn whichever way he will, an impossibility of 
 obtaining subsistence faces him. Need we wonder that 
 outrages and combinations to resist ejectments, even to 
 death, grow up from such seed ? Tell a man thus desperate 
 — reckless — that he owes his present misery and prospective 
 starvation to Protestant ascendency — to a desire to substitute 
 a protestant tenanti'y — to a Saxon Government — or to a 
 harsh landlord — and you lash existing desperation into fury, 
 and give direction to already existing passion. Bitter 
 sectarian hatred, rebellion, and assassinations are the result. 
 But would the foolish and wicked talk about Protestantism, 
 or Popery, or Saxon rule, or harsh landlords, whether true 
 or false, produce such results without the pre-existing, all- 
 exciting cause of mischief — desperation, founded on hopeless 
 starvation ? 
 
 Now, what is the " Molly Maguireism" which has dis- 
 turbed this county ? It is the same as " Ribandism," say 
 the magistrates, in their placards offering rewards for the 
 apprehension of " Molly Maguires." Well, what is " Ri- 
 bandism?" In the evidence taken before a committee of 
 the House of Lords, upon the state of crime in Ireland, in 
 1839, at— 
 
 Question 5006. Major Brown (Commissioner of Dublin 
 Police) says, " ' Ribandism' is of the same nature as 
 ' Whitefootism.' " 
 
 10,236. Mr. Seed (assistant to Mr. Geale, of the home 
 circuit) says, " it is the same as ' Blackfootism.' " 
 
 14,448. Mr. Rathbone (stipendiary magistrate) says, " it 
 is the same as ' Terryaltism.' " 
 
CAUSE OF DISTURBANCES. 21 
 
 9,408. Captain Warburton (stipendiary magistrate) says, 
 " it is the same as ' Rockiteism.' " 
 
 14,539. Sir William Somerville says, " tliat ' Ribandism' 
 in Meatli is a kind of ' Trades'-union.' " 
 
 14,792. Mr. Ford (attorney, of Meath) gives evidence to 
 the same effect. 
 
 8,430, 8,431. Mr. Barrington says, " ' Ribandmen' are 
 the same as ' Whiteboys.' " 
 
 3,611. Captain Vignoles says, "they are the same as 
 ' Peep-o'-day-Boys,' and that he has never been able to 
 discover any distinction between the Riband Society and the 
 others." 
 
 " Molly Maguireism" then, is, in fact, but the emhodyment 
 of the spirit of discontent ; it is an old-existing malady with a 
 new name. We will see, presently — bearing the previous 
 evidence in remembrance — if there has been cause for it in 
 this neighbourhood. 
 
 Now, let us examine what the evidence, given before this 
 committee, in 1839, shows to be the prevailing and almost 
 universal cause of crime in Ireland. 
 
 At question 6,105, Mr. Piers Gale, (for 22 years Crown 
 solicitor for the Irish home circuit) says, — 
 
 " That there are no manufactures in Ireland, and that, consequently, if 
 a poor man is deprived of his land, whether rightfully or wrongfully, or 
 whether he pays his rent or not, he has little to depend on, and is there- 
 fore extremely reluctant to leave the ground, and indignant at any person 
 that takes it over his head.'' 
 
 At question 7,641, Mr. Barrington (for 25 years Crown 
 solicitor of the Munster circuit) says, — 
 
 " That there being no manufacturers in the country, the actual exist- 
 ence of the peasantry depends upon their having land ; there are twenty 
 persons to offer for every farm. The whole disturbances of the country 
 depend upon the desire to keep it. 
 
 7640. " That it does not make a particle of difference whether the person 
 put in is a Catholic or a Protestant ; he is equally the object of their 
 fuT}^, and they would murder him equally." 
 
22 WANT OF EMPLOYMENT THE 
 
 1,266, 1,267, 1,268. Major Warburton (for 22 years on 
 the establishment of the Irish constabulary) says, — 
 
 " That there is a great deal of misery in every shape among the poorer 
 classes, whether they have land or not ; that a poor man, turned out of 
 his land without the means of maintaining his family, will endeavour 
 to get it by crime, if he cannot by other means ; and that such a state of 
 things must necessarily involve people in crime, when they are reduced 
 to destitution by being turned out of their lands without having any 
 means of subsistence." 
 
 At questions 266, 282, 283, 286, 291. Colonel Shaw 
 Kennedy, (late Inspector-General of the Irish constabu- 
 lary,) states, — 
 
 " That the great groundwork of all Whiteboy oiFences is connected 
 with land ; that the increase of crime is attributable more to social than 
 political causes. Political agitation and religious differences appear only 
 to increase crime, by affecting the social condition of the people. What- 
 ever affects the tenancy of land will instantly affect crime." 
 
 7,346, 7,347. Mr. Barrington says,— 
 
 " The general cause of outrages at all times in Ireland is anxiety to 
 possess land; such has been the case since 1761. Whilst I have been 
 Crown solicitor (for twenty-five years), I could trace almost every out- 
 rage to some dispute about land." 
 
 7,728. Mr. Tierney, (Crown solicitor of the Irish north- 
 western circuit for 12 years,) says, — 
 
 " That the prevailing cause of outrages is the letting and possession of 
 land, and the dispossessing of the former tenants and occupiersT 
 
 8,351-2-3-4. Mr. Hickman, (for upwards of 20 years the 
 Crown solicitor of the Connaught circuit,) says — 
 
 " That in Roscommon, Leitrim, and Sligo, the outrages arise from the 
 taking of land." 
 
 9,379, 9,380, 9,421. Captain B. Warburton, (stipendiary 
 magistrate for 15 years,) states, — 
 
 " That the murders and outrages that have happened lately in Galway 
 have arisen from disputes about land, and that the principal and primary 
 object of all associations among the peasaiitry is the taking and keeping of 
 land:' 
 
CAUSE OF DISTURBANCES. 23 
 
 9,746, 9,720. Mr. Tabiteau, (a resident magistrate,) states, — 
 
 " That something about land is the cause of all murders in Ireland ; 
 and that ejectvient is synonimous with reducmg the cottier tenant to des- 
 titution and misery^ 
 
 6,817-18-19. Mr. Kemmis, (Crown solicitor for the Lein- 
 ster circuit, comprising Wicklow, Wexford, Waterford, 
 Kilkenny, and Tipperary,) says, — 
 
 " That on the Leinster circuit outrages are mostly agrarian, committed 
 neither on account of religion nor of politics." 
 
 I might go on quoting much evidence of the same kind, 
 but I think I have quoted enough to establish my position ; 
 and a consideration of the foregoing evidence as to the defi- 
 ciency of employment, must convince every rational man that 
 this evidence, as to crime in Ireland, carries the conviction 
 of its truth along with it ; I now bring this evidence to bear 
 on the " Molly Maguireism" of Cavan, and Longford, and 
 Leitrim. Have there been ejectments in these counties, and 
 tenants turned out to starve, become desperate, reckless, and 
 the instruments of any crime which a struggle for existence 
 might prompt ? I deal not with the assigned cause of any 
 ejectments — I deal with the simple fact. 
 
 In this neighbourhood the commencement of " Molly 
 Maguireism" is traced to Ballynamuck. in the county of 
 Longford. For causes which I shall not now enter upon, a 
 whole village was destroyed, and the population ejected. It 
 is said they were turbulent, bad tenants. The worse mate- 
 rials they were then to eject, and to turn loose on society to 
 starve. It is, however, a fact that they were ejected, and 
 that the tenants who replaced them were all either shot, or 
 they fled from fear. The lands were kept vacant for a period, 
 and finally many of the former tenantry were brought back 
 again. Nearly the same thing may be said of the parish of 
 Clune, in Leitrim, which is said to be tlie head quarters of 
 " Molly." In the appendix to the report of the Land 
 
24 WANT OF EMPLOYMENT THE 
 
 Commissioners, part ii. page 90, Henry Smith, of Kells, 
 near this county,^' swears to ejectments served on twenty- 
 eight families, consisting of 159 people. He swears to seven 
 families being ejected there in 1843, and seventeen families, 
 or sixty-four people, being ejected out of Irishtown, who 
 owed no rent, and received no compensation. " There was a 
 district near Baillieborough, which was in a most disturbed 
 state," says Mr. Reilly, farmer, page 102 of the same 
 volume of evidence, "in consequence of turning out the people 
 to the waves : they were treated in a most barbarous manner. 
 There was some land fell out of lease, and the under-tenants 
 were cast out and banished five or six years ago." The 
 same witness says, further on, — " All the disturbances we 
 ever knew of in the country arose out of land. We all 
 agree in that, with very few exceptions." Charles Reilly, of 
 Curgah, in page 104 of the same volume, swears that the 
 whole inhabitants of the village were ejected by the landlord, 
 because of a murder that took place in it of the son of a new 
 tenant. Ten families were turned out. Mr. Phillip Smith, 
 of Artina, page 112, swears to two or three burnings, and an 
 attempt to shoot the Rev. Marcus Beresford, in this neigh- 
 bourhood, because of ejectments. -f- 
 
 * Kells is ill the county of Meatli, and is about sbc miles from the county of 
 Cavan. In the original letter, as published in the Times, by an accidental error 
 it appeared as " in this county," — i. e., in Cavan. It will scarcely be credited, 
 that the hypercriticism of a Dublin journal — the Evening Packet — fastened upon 
 this local error as a kind of " mare's nest" discovered ; and a London morning 
 journal, its fellow Mrs. Gamp, strung together an accustomed column of drivel 
 and gampish abuse on the wonderful discovery. 
 
 t The Venerable Archdeacon Beresford, in his explanation of this transaction 
 to the Land Commissioners (Appendix B. No. 20, Part 2), says, five tenants were 
 dispossessed — four for arrears of rent, and one for a moral offence. Two 
 attempts were then made to burn the tenants' houses, and soon after an attempt 
 was made to murder him by shooting at him as he went to church. Two persons 
 were brought to justice, and sentenced to be transported for this offence ; and 
 one of them informed him, that the chief conspirators were amongst his own 
 tenantry. He immediately took steps to dispossess the parties so accused, and 
 placed Protestant tenants in their holdings. This is the substance of Archdea- 
 
CAUSE OF DISTURBANCES. 25 
 
 It is a fact the ejectments took place ; I will not now mix 
 up with them, the alleged motives for them. In consequence 
 of being shot at, it is a fact that this gentleman ejected more 
 tenants, as admitted by him (appendix B, No. 20, same 
 volume) ; and it is now a fact, that, under apprehension of his 
 life, he has recently left the country, and gone to reside in 
 England. This gentleman has been compelled for years to 
 go to church and back with an escort of armed servants, and 
 a brace of pistols beside him. It is a fact, also, that there is 
 in this neighbourhood (without intending to cast any invidious 
 reflections on other landlords) a most benevolent and kind- 
 hearted nobleman. Lord Farnham, who owns a large estate, 
 lets his land at reasonable rents, and acts kindly by his ten- 
 ants. He walks about without apprehension, though a Pro- 
 testant, and I believe an anti-Repealer; and I have heard 
 the farmers say, that if a hair of his head were injured by 
 violence, the whole country side would rise to avenge it. 
 
 Surely the evidence I have quoted, from many sources, all 
 bearing out the same view, is enough to convince any thinking 
 and reflecting man that want of employment, and consequent ; 
 want of subsistence, is at the bottom of every mischief under 
 which Ireland labours — that religious strife, political demon- 
 strations, and want of education, though they may embitter 
 and brutalize the population, are not the real causes of out- 
 rage and commotion. In order to stay these mischiefs, 
 statesmen must go to the root — must take measures to secure 
 employment for the people ; and it is worse than folly to 
 deceive themselves and the public by mere surface measures 
 
 con Beresford's answer. Whilst I was in Cavan, I heard that a man had been 
 seen, on two occasions, lying in wait for him ; and it was discovered that that 
 man was armed, and the current rumour was, that Archdeacon Beresford had left 
 for England on account of the entreaties of his family. I mention these facts, 
 simply because Archdeacon Beresford, at the time this letter was first published, 
 wrote a letter to an Irish newspaper, complaining, but in no discourteous terms, 
 that my statement was inaccurate. This letter was headed, in some of the Dub- 
 lin papers, with " Refutation of the Times' Commissioner's Calumnies," and 
 other similar phrases, which the London Mrs. Gamp of course greedily copied. 
 
26 WANT OF EMPLOYMENT. 
 
 about Maynooth and educational colleges, which will not 
 stay one hour any outrage which a starving, and desperate, 
 and hopeless man may be driven to, in blind revenge for a 
 real or fancied wrong. 
 
 The almost unmanageable extent of the subject, must be 
 my apology for the length of this letter. The causes of that 
 want of employment will form the subject of future commu- 
 nications.* 
 
 * For opinions of the press, see^ Appendix 1. 
 
ACCUMULATION OF CAPITAL. 27 
 
 LETTER III. 
 
 ON THE CREATION AND ACCUIVIULATION OF CAPITAL. 
 
 Disturbed State of Leitrim — On the Creation of Capital — "Labour is the Source 
 of all Wealth" — Causes which prevent the Accumulation of Capital — The want 
 of Cajiital confines Industry to the Land — Poverty must therefore increase with 
 Population, unless the Produce of the Land increases in proportion — This again 
 the cause of want of Employment and Disturbance — The circle of EvUs under 
 which Ireland labours — Religious Differences only embitter the Relations of 
 Life, but do not generally produce Disturbances — Industry paralyzed by the want 
 of certainty of Reward, and by an uncertain Tenure of the Land — Refusal of 
 Leases — Tenants not industrious, because not paid for their Improvements, 
 and because their possession of the Land insecure. 
 
 Baixinamore, Leitrim, August 22. 
 This county is in the centre of the " Molly Maguire" distur,- 
 bances. Numerous robberies of arms have taken place, 
 threatening notices have been common, and some very 
 shocking assassinations have been committed in it. In the 
 early part of the year the stipendiary magistrate of the 
 district, Captain M'Leod, was shot dead in his car, close to 
 the lodge of a gentleman's house where he had been dining, 
 near this town. In consequence of these occurrences, a pro- 
 clamation was issued by the Government, declaring the 
 county to be in a state of disturbance, and to require additional 
 police. This, of course, greatly added to the expenditure of 
 the county-rates. The exertions of the police and of the 
 clergy have restored the county to some degree of quiet, and 
 it is hoped to get the proclamation of disturbance withdrawn. 
 The Rev. T. Maguire, better known in the neighbourhood 
 as " Father Tom,"— a gentleman who some years ago obtained 
 much celebrity in a theological discussion with a Protestant 
 
28 ON THE CREATION AND 
 
 clergyman named Pope — has exerted himself among the poor 
 Roman Catholic tenantry, in pointing out to them the futility 
 as well as the crime of the course which they were pursuing, 
 and all the muskets which had been seized by force, save two, 
 have been returned by the peasants to his house : sixteen mus- 
 kets and two or three cases of pistols have thus been returned. 
 
 It is evident that these disturbances originate amongst the 
 body of the people, and that they are not to be attributed 
 to a few worthless individuals. The invariable escape of 
 criminals, who are always sheltered by the community, suf- 
 ficiently proves this. In my last letter I endeavoured to 
 show that nearly all the crimes that are committed in Ire- 
 land are agrarian — that they are the outbreak of a strong 
 pent-up feeling, which is almost universal, because the 
 cause which produces it is almost universal — namely, want 
 of employment and consequent starvation and discontent ; 
 and that this is at the bottom, and is the true cause, of 
 " Ribandism," under whatever name it assumes. 
 • To what is this general want of employment to be traced ? 
 
 There are, no question, many causes combining and react- 
 ing upon each other, which produce inactivity, want of enter- 
 prise, want of improvement, poverty, want of capital, and con- 
 sequent want of employment. I intend, in my letter to-day, 
 to draw attention to what I conceive to be one of the chief 
 causes of this want of employment, and which is also one of 
 the most frequent grounds of comj)laint amongst the tenantry. 
 
 It is a political axiom which cannot be disputed, that pro- 
 ductive labour is the source of all wealth. In proportion, 
 therefore, as the amount of the productive labour of any 
 community, or of any nation, is increased or diminished by 
 any means, must be the proportion of its wealth. Con- 
 sequently, everything which tends to promote productive 
 labour in a community tends to the creation of wealth ; and 
 everything which tends to paralyze productive labour in a 
 community as certainly insures poverty. " The annual 
 
ACCUMULATION OF CAPITAL. 29 
 
 labour of every nation," says Adam Smith, " is the fund 
 which originally sujjplies it with all the necessaries and 
 conveniences of life which it annually consumes, and which 
 consist always either in the immediate produce of that 
 labour, or in what is purchased with that produce from other 
 nations."* — " Labour was the first price, the original pur- 
 chase-money, that was paid for all things."-t' 
 
 In proportion as the produce of the labour of a commu- 
 nity is greater than the consumption of the producers, in the 
 same proportion will wealth, the produce of labour, accu- 
 mulate into capital. Capital again reacts in promoting 
 that industry which was the foundation of its creation. 
 " Every increase or diminution of capital," says the same 
 author, " naturally tends to increase or diminish the real 
 quantity of industry, the number of productive hands, and 
 consequently the exchangeable value of the annual produce 
 of the land and labour of the country — the real wealth and 
 revenue of all its inhabitants." j — " The industry 'of the 
 society can augment only in proportion as its capital aug- 
 ments, and its capital can augment only in proportion to what 
 can be gradually saved out of its revenue."^ 
 
 That amount, however, which can be saved out of the 
 " revenue," or annual produce of a community, is governed 
 by several circumstances. If you paralyze industry by 
 taking away the motive for industry, — reward, — you reduce 
 the productive labour of that community to the amount 
 necessary for mere subsistence. Wealth, then, cannot in- 
 crease, and consequently capital cannot accumulate. The 
 absence of capital insures the absence of demand for labour. 
 If the surplus produce of labour over and above the mere 
 subsistence of the labourer be abstracted from the commu- 
 
 * Adam Smith, page 9, edition 1826. f Ibid, page 35. J Ibid, page 318. 
 
 §Ibid. page 421. — "As the capital of an rndi^-idual can be increased only by 
 what he saves from his annual revenue, or his annual gains, so the capital of a 
 society, which is the same with that of all the individuals who compose it, can be 
 increased only in the same manner." — Adam Smith, page 318. 
 
30 ON THE CREATION AND 
 
 nity, and be in no "svise employed as capital in that com- 
 munity, in pi'omoting industry by finding a market for it, 
 the same results necessarily follow. With the want of the 
 abstracted capital conies the want of employment for indus- 
 try. Again, if " the skill, dexterity, and judgment with 
 which the labour of the community is generally applied" 
 be rude, deficient, and untutored, the labour, however great, 
 may be so unproductive as to afford little beyond mere sub- 
 sistence to the labourers.* From this cause also, if general, 
 capital cannot accumulate, and without capital there will be 
 no demand for labour. It is almost unnecessary to prove 
 this general position, but I will support it by one more quo- 
 tation from Adam Smith : — 
 
 " The demand for those who live by wages," says this high authority, 
 " necessarily increases with the increase of the revenue and stock of every 
 country, and cannot possibly increase mthout it. The increase of revenue 
 and stock is the increase of national wealth. The demand for those who 
 live by wages, therefore, naturally increases with the increase of national 
 wealth, and cannot possibly increase without it."t 
 
 But any one of these means of checking industry, the 
 jDroduce of industry, and national wealth, or all three united, 
 will tend to another evil. The absence of capital tends to 
 confine productive industry to the land. It is a law of 
 nature that population increases ; but the land does not in- 
 crease. The land will yield but a certain amount of pro- 
 duce, which is limited ; but the increase of poj^ulation is 
 unlimited. Being confined to the produce of the land for 
 subsistence, an increasing proportion of that produce must 
 necessarily be consumed as population increases, until, if al- 
 lowed to go on, the whole amount of the limited produce is 
 consumed by the increasing producers. It is manifest that 
 from this cause also, wealth cannot increase, nor capital accu- 
 mulate, to afford other means of employment. This condition, 
 again, insures other evils, which I endeavoured to trace in my 
 
 * Adam Smith, page 9. t It)id. page 71. 
 
 1 
 
ACCUMULATION OF CAPITAL. 31 
 
 last letter — intense competition for land (the only means of 
 subsistence), want'of employment, starvation, discontent, and 
 disturbance. Disturbance carries with it insecurity, and in- 
 security drives away capital from the country — drives away 
 the only remedy for the evil. These appear to me to be 
 the evils — reacting upon, and reproducing each other — under 
 which Ireland has perpetually laboured. It is an unhappy 
 circle of mischief, out of which all political disturbances 
 have arisen. The peasantry have eagerly followed any 
 leader who pointed out to them any one of these evils 
 which oppressed them, and promised them relief from the 
 starvation which it insured. Differences in religious faith 
 acting on a people so circumstanced have embittered every 
 relation of life. Unable to trace the cause of the competi- 
 tion for land which reduced them to starvation, and neces- 
 sarily so reduced some, they have attributed their condition 
 to bigoted prejudices, and, being desj)erate from want, have 
 vented that desperation on their neighbours of a different 
 religious faith. Depend upon it, if there were no tenants to 
 till the land, and to raise and pay a rent for it, the most 
 bigoted and tyrannical landlord in Ireland would be but too 
 glad to get any tenants of any faith to cultivate it and raise 
 a ren.t for him. Sectarian differences, then, but irritate and 
 embitter existing evils ; they do not produce them. 
 
 To each of these causes I intend to draw your attention 
 in their turn, and in each locality to test their existence. 
 
 The first inquiry is, whether productive labour, the first 
 source of all wealth, is paralyzed by the motive for all in- 
 dustry — reward beyond mere subsistence — being taken 
 away? 
 
 The employment for the people here is on the land. If 
 they industriously exert themselves for the improvement of 
 the land, is the reward of that industry — the increased profit 
 of the land — secured to them, or is it taken from them ? 
 
 The general rule throughout the country — there are ex- 
 
32 ON THE CREATION AND 
 
 ceptions, but the general rule — is, not to give either leases 
 or agreements, which, as a protection to both landlord and 
 tenant, are equivalent to leases. Since the great political 
 struggle previously to the passing of the Catholic Emanci- 
 pation Act, — when the landlords were beaten throughout 
 Ireland at the general election, and their tenants polled 
 almost to a man against them in favour of the advocates of 
 Catholic Emancipation, the topic of that day, — the landlords 
 have generally refused leases. But I confine myself now to 
 this county, where this is the fact. For the most part, 
 therefore, the tenants are tenants at will. Point out any 
 slovenliness to any tenant, ask him why he does not keep 
 his farm tidy, and try to improve it, his answer immediately 
 is, " What is the use of improving, to have it valued on me 
 at the rent-day, and be made to j^ay a higher rent for it ?"* 
 It is customary here to burn the surface of the soil of land 
 intended to be cultivated. This has the effect of manuring 
 for a year, but leaves the soil afterwards completely ex- 
 hausted and barren. It will grow nothing for years after- 
 wards but ragweed, till natural grass gradually creeps over 
 it again.-f- 
 
 Ask a tenant why he does not collect manure through the 
 
 * I rather think that an excuse of some kind or other is never wEinting for 
 indolence. It is certain, that if the tenantry would take the trouMe to try to 
 improve their land, although their rent might be raised, yet they would find great 
 " use" in it, by realizing an increased pi'ofit out of the land, over and above the 
 increased rent. It is better for a man to realize a croii worth 8/. or 10^. out of 
 land for which he pays 30*. or 21. an acre, than to realize a crop or profit worth 
 3/. or 'bl. out of this land paying only 10*. an acre. Simply taking the trouble 
 — or, in other words, being industrious — would generally put in the tenant's 
 pocket the difference between 10/. and 5/. increased value of crop, deducting, 
 say 1/. for increased rent. (See first Letter, dated Limerick, jwo*^.) 
 
 t The effect of burning the land is to consume and volatilize all vegetable 
 matter, and to create a stimulating salt. Burning deprives the land of some of 
 its component qualities ; under the effects of the stimulation it will grow a crop, 
 and then is afterwards completely exhausted. Except for deep bog land, where 
 there is an excess of vegetable matter, this system is ruinous. It leaves the land 
 perfectly barren. 
 
ACCUMULATION OP CAPITAL. 33 
 
 winter to manure his land, instead of smoking in his mud- 
 hnt, and burning his shins over his peat-fire, doing nothing, 
 and he tells you, " What is the use of collecting manure to 
 raise a good crop ? for if the agent sees it he says, ' Oh ! 
 that 's good land, you must pay more rent for it,' and the 
 benefit of the manure goes to the landlord, whilst I am, as 
 before, kept down to my dry potato and water."* In fact, 
 he practically acts up to the adage, that " it is better to play 
 for nothing than to work for nothing." I am informed by 
 those who cannot be mistaken, that if a lease falls in here, 
 the agents (for there are no resident landlords here), no 
 matter how deserving the tenant may be, conceive they 
 have but one duty to perform — to get as much rent as they 
 can for their principals. Every motive of self-interest im- 
 pels them to this, for according to the quantum of rent is the 
 quantum of commission they receive. They immediately 
 advertise for proposals, and the land is thus let by tender, 
 generally to the highest bidder. Any stranger from the 
 " black north " (as they call it here), or from the wilds of 
 Connaught, may come in and bid against the former tenant, 
 and outbid the man who made the land. The man who 
 has reclaimed a piece of red bog, or a barren hill-side, 
 whose sons and daughters have often carried blue gravel on 
 their backs to put on land not worth 2s. an acre, and whose 
 industry has made it worth 205. an acre, gets not a farthing- 
 allowed him by his landlord for the improvements effected 
 on his farm ; and, if he wishes to continue on the same land, 
 he must pay the utmost farthing of rent for that which his 
 
 * There is, however, too much truth in this complaiat. It is impossible to 
 have a more improvident management of an estate than this ; and it arises from 
 the landlords being, for the most part, absentees, and trusting the management 
 of their estates to agents, v?ho are not paid salaries for devoting their attention 
 to the management of the estate, but a. per-centage on the rent for collecting it. 
 It is, therefore, the agent's interest to get as high a rent as he can; and very 
 often the agent is a Dublin attorney, and is absent from and cares nothing abou t 
 the estate. 
 
34 ON THE CREATION AND 
 
 industry alone has made worth anything, and must bid 
 more for it than any stranger who chooses to compete 
 against him.* In this way more rent is often offered than 
 the land can possibly pay. If you ask the man why he bid 
 so much for his farm, and more than he knew he could pay, 
 his answer is, " What could I do ? Where was I to go ? I 
 know I cannot pay the rent, but what could I do ? Would 
 you have me go and beg?" In this manner the utmost 
 worth of the land, beyond mere subsistence — I am assured 
 beyond dry potatoes and water — is extracted from the 
 tenants, and the tenants, seeing the inutility of productive 
 labour, so far as they are concerned, seeing that whether 
 they work or play they get little beyond mere subsistence, 
 settle down content with mere subsistence. The value of 
 their labour is not secured to themselves ; they have not the 
 reward of labour; they do not find their stock, over and 
 above paying the rent and the cost of their own consump- 
 tion, increase, no matter what efforts they make. Is it not 
 human nature that those efforts, beyond obtaining mere sub- 
 sistence, which they must and will have, will not, under such 
 circumstances, be great? Well, reverting to the position 
 with which I set out, if their stock, over and above their 
 consumption and expenditure in raising it, does not increase, 
 their wealth as a community cannot increase ; if their wealth 
 does not increase, capital amongst them will not be accumu- 
 lated, and will not therefore employ increasing labourers ; 
 and thus you have from this cause, as certainly as one day 
 follows another, the evils of intense competition for land, of 
 want of employment, starvation, discontent, and disturbance 
 perpetuated. And as certainly as population increases 
 without increasing employment, so certahily will these evils 
 increase. I believe I state the opinion of the most intelligent 
 
 * This is not honest. No one can wonder that any man will refuse to work 
 for another, when he knows that he will not be remunerated for his work. (See, 
 on this su ect, the Letter dated " Bantry," post.) 
 
ACCUMULATION OF CAPITAL. 35 
 
 resident magistracy, " that if something be not done ere long 
 to raise the condition of the people and afford employment, 
 the people cannot be kept quiet, and that property in Ireland 
 will be worth nothing." But what can be done ? This is a 
 social evil, and the remedy must be a social one. The Govern- 
 ment can do little to remedy it. If landlords will, no matter 
 for what reason, thus act contrary to the plainest dictates of 
 common sense, and, with perfect blindness to consequences, 
 refuse to secure to men, by fair leases or mutually protecting 
 agreements, the benefits of their own industry, and screw out 
 of their tenants the utmost shilling beyond mere subsistence, 
 a badly cultivated country and an impoverished and in- 
 different tenantry are the certain growing results which, with 
 population increasing, without general employment-giving 
 wealth increasing, must inevitably end in disturbances, and 
 in rendering " property in Ireland worth nothing." 
 
 I know I shall be met with the assertion that many land- 
 lords are willing to give leases, but the tenants do not care to 
 have them. This is true of some landlords, and to their credit. 
 But the landlord who is willing to give a fair lease is a fair 
 man. The poor tenant puts confidence in such a landlord, 
 and therefore does not care about a lease, for a lease costs 
 him money, which he can ill afford. But ask the tenant at 
 will of a hard landlord if he would like a lease at a Jair rate, 
 and he will eagerly accept it.* 
 
 * It is, however, an extraordinary fact, illustrative of the character of the Irish 
 people, and which is quite contrary to all English experience, that, with leases, 
 the tenants very slowly improve. They then want a spur to industry. They 
 then have a certainty of subsistence before them, and they very often cease 
 making any exertion beyond what is requisite to pay the rent. I have been 
 some scores of times shown farms held on lease the most disgracefully cultivated 
 of any in the neighbourhood. This is what is seen but too often in practice. 
 The theory is altogether the other way ; and it appears but common sense (and 
 in England it is the practice), that a man who is secure of his farm should set to 
 work and improve it, and get as much out of it as he can, certain that he will 
 get the reward of his labour. There are, to be sure, many instances of this in 
 Ireland ; but such a course is far from being universal. 
 
 " The laziness and indolence of our people is another universal habit and custom 
 
 D 2 
 
36 ON THE CREATION AND 
 
 Now, I know quite well that, no matter what I write on 
 this subject, it will be attacked with contradictions. I do not 
 choose, therefore, to rest any of these facts on my own repre- 
 sentation ; I shall therefore conclude my letter of to-day 
 with extracts of evidence taken before Lord Devon's Land 
 Commission, substantiating the position I have endeavoured 
 to illustrate. 
 
 Three farmers, Isaiah Gibson, John Reilly, and Joshua 
 Wanhop, are examined at Cavan (Appendix, Part 2, p. 100). 
 They say,— 
 
 " People are anxious to obtain leases, if they could get them at a fair 
 value." 
 
 Mr. Wanhop says, j9os#, at p. 102, — 
 
 " When grounds are out of lease there is no encouragement given to 
 the tenant ; the arrears are held over him. They remain in-doors, burn- 
 ing their shins over the fire. They say they will do nothing, as they shall 
 he^Jumed out at the end of the lease* There is no encouragement given to 
 them. I think the landlords are the most injudicious men I ever knew." 
 
 Mr. Beilly (ib.),— 
 
 that should be discouraged as much as all the rest. As industry and labour are 
 the great source of riches to all nations, how ruinous must this terrible humour 
 be which infects so many thousand people, even of those (for I leave our beggars 
 for another place) who profess labour, and depend on it for their support ? Many 
 even of these follow their work but from hand to mouth ; and, as if they thought 
 as the Scriptures speak of the Jews — ' their strength was to sit still' — they will 
 wait no longer than the scourge of necessity is held over them. The Chinese say, 
 with some truth as to their policy and trade, that ' all other nations have one eye, 
 but they have two ;' but I fear we must say with more justice of the Irish — and 
 their beloved Spaniards may go along with them — that all other men have two 
 hands, and they but one, and that they often keep in their breast. I remember 
 Montaigne, in making up his account of his yearly expense, sets down, — ' Item, 
 for my indolent humour, 50/.' But I fear at least a million must be charged, on 
 the same account, to Ireland. ... A better way of living and an increase of our 
 people and manufactures, and consequently a higher price for the necessaries and 
 conveniences of life, must be the great cure for this evil, together with the 
 landlord's eye over them to punish the sleepy loiterer, and encourage and employ 
 the industrious." — Reflections and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of 
 Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, p. 25. 
 * Again an excuse for present indolence and want of exertion. 
 
ACCUMULATION OF CAPITAL. 37 
 
 " The rent laid on is so disproportionate to the value of the land, that 
 the farmer is paying beyond his means." 
 
 John M'Manus and James Smith, farmers, of Cormeen, 
 near Oldcastle, Cavan, are examined (ib. p. 105): — 
 
 " 12. Is there a great anxiety for leases on the part of the tenants ? — 
 I do think there is in many districts." 
 
 "13. At the present rate of rents ? — No; I cannot say that; but I 
 know this much, that the tenants would be well pleased to get leases at a 
 fair valuation, or something near it. The lands Avhich have fallen lately 
 into the hands of the landlords are let ver}^ high." 
 
 Michael Kenny, farmer of Ruhulton, near Cavan, ex- 
 amined (ib. p. 108) : — 
 
 "51. Do the people hold generally at will or by lease in this country ? 
 — There are a great many at wUl." 
 
 Mr. Philip Smith, agent and landowner, of Artina, in the 
 county of Cavan, examined (ib. p. Ill) : — 
 
 " 54. Do the tenants hold generally at will, or by lease ? — Generally 
 at will. 
 
 " 60. Is there any anxiety among the different classes of tenants to 
 obtain leases ? — Yes ; there is. 
 
 "61. At their present rent is there an anxiety to take out leases? — 
 Yes ; I think they would be anxious to take leases at their present rents 
 generally. There are some who would not do so. 
 
 "62. Are the landlords in the habit of granting many leases? — Very 
 few latterly. 
 
 " 63. What in your opinion is the reason of it ? — I think it is from 
 some political causes." 
 
 John Cassidy, farmer, of Any, in thecounty of Monaghan, 
 examined (ib. p. 115): — 
 
 " 32. Do the tenants hold generally at will, or by lease ? — Generally 
 at will. 
 
 " 33. What eifect has that mode of tenure upon the condition of the 
 tenant and the improvement of the farms ? — It has not a good effect, 
 because a tenant at will, if his land is too high let, then what he takes 
 off the land is not sufficient to pay the demand of the landlord and the 
 other taxes ; then he gets into arrear, and he will not improve ; but if 
 he improves, in the course of time he is turned out^ as / have seen in our 
 country, or the rent was raised to what they were not able to pay." 
 
38 ON THE CREATION AND 
 
 Mr. Burchell, magistrate and landed proprietor of Drum- 
 shambo, county of Leitrim, examined (ib. p. 246) : — 
 
 " 10. Is the state of agriculture improving or otherwise? and in what 
 particulars ? — It is not improving. Agriculture is much neglected, and 
 the lands want draining : it affords every facility for draining. Potatoes 
 and oats are the general crops. 
 
 "11. What are the manures generally used? — Animal manure and 
 lime are much used on the mountain lands, and also for reclauning the 
 bogs. Burning prevails to a very great extent, and several of the small 
 farmers have no other means of manure, and almost all occupiers burn 
 more or less every year." 
 
 Mr. Robert Lynch, farmer, of Elphin, county of Roscom- 
 mon, is asked (ib. p. 249 ), — 
 
 " 19. Is it usual, when a tenant has improved his farm, when he is 
 turned out to make him an allowance for his improvements? — No; it 
 is not usual." 
 
 Mr. Patrick Mackeon, Poor Law Guardian, Drumshambo, 
 Leitrim, examined (ib. p. 252) : — 
 
 " 8. Do tenants generally hold at will or by lease ? — Generally at 
 will. 
 
 " 9. Is there any anxiety among the tenantry for leases ? — A verj^ great 
 anxiety. 
 
 " 10. What effect in your opinion has the tenancy at -\vill upon the 
 condition of the tenants and the improvement of their farms ? — In the 
 first instance, in my opinion, it prevents the tenant from improving the 
 property; and, in the next instance, there is neither that pursuit of 
 agriculture nor the valuable improvements on the farms that would 
 otherwise be made on those farms, to my knowledge, if there were leases." 
 
 Mr. James Cowan, of Caliirtown, Leitrim, farmer, ex- 
 amined (ib. p. 256): — 
 
 " 29. Do you find that the tenants improve their lands in the way of 
 drainage ? — Where there is tenure given they do uuprove. 
 
 " 45. Do you find that the small tenantry are improving or otherwise 
 in their condition ? — Indeed they are not ; it is the want of tenure. 
 
 " 69. Have you any other suggestions to offer ? — If it was possible to 
 have a fixity of tenure, it would be a great improvement. 
 
 "70. What do you mean by 'fixity of tenure'? — That every tenant 
 should get a lease from his landlord, and that would enhance the value." 
 
ACCUMULATION OF CAPITAL. 39 
 
 Mr. Morgan Crofton, agent to Lord Lorton, Boyle, 
 Leitrim, examined (ib. p. 261) : — 
 
 "31. Small tenements set since 1832 are held at will. 
 
 " 32. Have leases recently been made to small tenants ? — No." 
 
 Mr. Theophilus Jones, of Drumard, Leitrim, examined 
 (ib. p. 260) :— 
 
 "31. Are lands usually held at ^vill or by lease? — At will, I think. 
 There are leases, but generally at ■will. 
 
 " 32. Is there any desire on the jmrt of the people to obtain leases ? — I 
 think they would like leases. 
 
 " 33. Is there any indisposition on the part of landlords to grant them? 
 — I think they do not like to do it. 
 
 " What does that arise from, in your opinion ? — Probably not wishing 
 to let persons vote at elections. They think that they would not go with 
 them, perhaps. I think that is the only reason." 
 
 The Rev. J. W. Evers, parish priest of Mohill (ib. 268), 
 says,— 
 
 " That joint tenancy and want of leases check industry to the greatest 
 extent." 
 
 Mr. John Duke, surgeon, Mohill, Leitrim (ib. p. 270), 
 examined : — 
 
 " Is there any anxiety for leases ? — Yes, the greatest possible anxiety. 
 Farmers have offered to build slated houries if they got leases. 
 
 " 36. Even at their present rents ? — Yes, and anything, rather than be 
 without land. 
 
 " 37. By whom are the permanent improvements made ; by the land- 
 lord or tenant, or jointly ? — None by the landlords here. 
 
 " 66. The tenants at will are trying to deteriorate the appearance of 
 their farms, lest a valuator should be sent out, which they are frequently 
 threatened with." 
 
 Without, however, repeating masses of evidence of the 
 same kind, I will briefly quote evidence to show to what 
 condition this system has brought the country and the people. 
 
 Mr. Burchell, the magistrate of Drumshambo, Leitrim 
 
 (ib. 248), says,— 
 
 " That neither the small tenantry nor the labourers are improving in 
 their means." 
 
40 ON THE CREATION AND 
 
 Mr. Patrick Mackeon, of Drumshambo (p. 253), says, — 
 
 " That neither the condition of the large farmers nor of the small 
 tenantry is improving. The labourers have not more than 5d. or 6a?. 
 a day, and are half the year unemployed." 
 
 Mr. Ireland, of Drumsa, Leitrim, leaseholder (p. 258), 
 says,— 
 
 " The tenantry are not improving in their condition, and the labourers 
 have not employment." 
 
 Mr. Duke, surgeon, Mohill, Leitrim (p. 270), says, — 
 
 " 30. There are very fev7 large farmers. 
 
 "45. Are the small tenantry improving in their condition or otherwise? 
 — They are 50 per cent, worse than they were twenty years ago. 
 
 "46. Are the labourers improving? — Quite the reverse; nothing can 
 be more wretched. 
 
 " 47. What is the cause of their being so wretched ? — The value of 
 the commodity (labour) is so reduced in price, they are not able to pay 
 their rents, and they are lying naked, and in such a state it would hardly 
 be believed. I am obliged to visit the people, being a medical man, 
 and go in where no gentleman would go in. They have no bedstead ; 
 they are lying on a small quantity of straw — sometimes rushes ; they 
 have no covering over them, or one blanket among six. When fever sets 
 in in any particular case, the whole family generally take it. 
 
 " With respect to food what is their condition ? — It is never better than 
 potatoes and milk in summer, and in winter they have not the milk. 
 Sometimes they get a herring, or stirabout is considered wholesome food ; 
 but latterly they have not been able to get that." 
 
 The Rev. G. Gearty, parish priest at Annaduff, Leitrim, 
 is asked (p. 277), — 
 
 " 34. With respect to the farming population, do you think that the 
 farmers holding large farms are improving in their worldly condition, 
 or the reverse ? — I think they are growing worse. 
 
 " 35. Are the small tenantry improving in their circumstances ? — 
 They cannot be worse off than they are." 
 
 " 36. What should you say about the class of labourers ? — I think they 
 cannot be worse off in any country in the world than they are at present ; 
 there is no employment for them, except this year the improvement of the 
 Shannon has given them some employment, but quite partially. 
 
 " 39. What is their general diet ? — Potatoes; and that of the very worst 
 
ACCUMULATION OF CAPITAL. 41 
 
 description. They are not able to raise the better kind of potatoes, and 
 consequently they live upon lumpers, which are the very worst." 
 
 I shall here stop, vrithout fatiguing you with a repetition 
 of evidence of a similar kind, satisfied that I have quoted 
 enough to bear out every position which I have advanced. 
 
 Here, then, we see the secret of the political monster 
 demonstrations raised by Mr. O'Connell. He talked to the 
 people about " fixity of tenure," and told them Repeal would 
 secure it. The people believed him ; and groaning under 
 the evils they bear without it, they were ready to support any 
 measure which they were told would secure it. Protect 
 them in the possession of their tenures at a fair rate, — secure 
 to the people the reward of their industry, and Repeal will 
 have lost the charm of " fixity of tenure," and must look out 
 for another handmaiden. At the same time the country will 
 have advanced one step towards the acquisition of wealth ; 
 and in that acquisition none will be so much benefited as the 
 landlords who give the leases. 
 
 I shall leave to future letters the illustration of the other 
 branches of my argument.* 
 
 * For opinions of the press on this Letter, see Appendix 2. 
 
42 ON THE CHARACTERISTICS OF RACE, 
 
 LETTER IV. 
 
 ON THE CHARACTERISTICS OF RACE ; AND THE WANT 
 OF INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE PREVENTING THE IN- 
 CREASE OF CAPITAL. 
 
 Different Appearance of Fermanagh and Leitrim — Orangeism and Protestantism, 
 and English or Scotch Descent usually mark the same Individual — Charac- 
 teristics of Race — Of the natural Capabilities of the Country, and of the 
 unimproved and wretched System of Agriculture prevalent — Examples of this 
 —Leads to Poverty, and therefore prevents the Accumulation of Wealth and 
 Capital. 
 
 Enniskillen, Fermanagh, August 23. 
 I ADDRESS my present letter to you from one of the most 
 Orange and Protestant districts in Ireland. The town is 
 well built and clean, the population orderly and industrious ; 
 the country in the neighbourhood tolerably cultivated, and 
 extremely fertile and beautiful ; and the small farm-houses, as 
 you approach the town from Leitrim, neat and cleanly-look- 
 ing, generally whitewashed over, and having a well-trimmed 
 thatch. Inglis, in his Journey through Ireland, thus speaks 
 of the town of Enniskillen : — 
 
 " I found it one of the most respectable-looking towns I had seen in 
 Ireland; and its population by far the most respectable-looking that I had 
 anywhere yet seen. I speak, of course, of the lower classes ; and I make 
 no exception of either Dublin, or Cork, or Limerick, or any other place. 
 I saw a population — the first I had yet seen — without rags ; I saw scarcely 
 a bare foot even among the girls ; there was a neat tidy look among the 
 women, who had not, as in other places, their uncombed hair hanging 
 
AND WANT OF INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE. 43 
 
 about their ears ; and the men appeared to me to have a decent farmer- 
 like appearance." 
 
 The same author, in describing the roads from Ballina- 
 more to this town, which route I came the other day, thus 
 speaks of the country near Ballinamore, and thence to 
 Enniskillen. At Ballinamore — 
 
 " There is a poverty look about everything. The country is but half 
 cultivated ; and it supports a needy gentry, crushed farmers, and a mise- 
 rable peasantry. After passing Swanlinbar, things improve. Improve- 
 ment is visible in the aspect of the country, and a decided improvement 
 in the appearance of the houses and their inhabitants." 
 
 To the general accuracy of this description I can fully 
 bear testimony. Swanlinbar is on the borders of Ulster and 
 Connaught ; on one side of it is the county of Leitrim, in 
 Connaught ; on the other the county of Fermanagh, in 
 Ulster. Orangemen and Protestants in this country, with 
 more zeal than observation, and very well-meaning English 
 Protestants, but often very weak-minded men, on the plat- 
 form of Exeter-hall, are in the habit of attributing this 
 visible improvement in the province of Ulster to the effect 
 of Orange politics and the Protestant religion. It so hap- 
 pens that in Ireland generally Orangeism and Protestanism, 
 and English or Scotch descent, may be used as synonimous 
 terms, for they are usually embodied in the same individual 
 — at any rate, this is so in the province of Ulster. If there 
 be one characteristic which more than another distinguishes 
 the lower class of the Celtic population, it is that they are 
 content to live hardly and upon little : and if there is any 
 one quality which distinguishes the lower class of the Saxon 
 race more than another, it is this, that, however hard they 
 may be content to work, they will live comfortably and 
 well.* 
 
 * An able writer of a series of articles in The Monthly Chronicle, of 1840, 
 on " The State of Ireland," says, truly enough, — "The English peasant is 
 considered to have descended to the very zero of his physical discomfort when hia 
 
44 ON THE CHARACTERISTICS OF RACE, 
 
 It is because the poor Celt is content to put up with bad 
 fare, and worse clothing and shelter, that he is made to put 
 up with them. It is because the man of Saxon descent will 
 live comfortably and well, or, if his exertions cannot accom- 
 plish this, make his grumblings heard and felt, that he does 
 live comfortably and Avell. Let any man of observation 
 travel through the Celtic population of the county of Leitrim 
 into the adjoining mixed population of the county of Fer- 
 managh, and I think he must be convinced that race has 
 more to do with the distinguishing characteristics of Ulster 
 than either politics or religion. At any rate, until it is proved 
 that Orangeism and Protestantism will add six inches to the 
 average height and proportionate bulk to the men, and tall 
 figures and good looks to the women, as well as better dress, 
 I shall continue of ojjinion that these great differences in the 
 appearance of the people themselves, as well as the difference 
 which may be observed in their dress, and in their houses 
 and mode of living, must chiefly be attributed to the charac- 
 teristics of the race.* 
 
 loaf has become so dear or so small, or his income so scanty, that for a while he 
 is obliged to suspend the use of bread, and live one day or more in the week 
 upon potatoes. The Irish peasant, upon the other hand, never eats a morsel of 
 wheaten bread in his life ; except, perhaps, at a market, where he may happen to 
 buy a halfpenny-worth of it as a curiosity, just as a little girl buys a gingerbread 
 husband in the same place. The pig which he rears, and which occupies the most 
 comfortable portion of the cabin, is invariably disposed of for the landlord; and 
 the peasant would as soon think of eating the landlord himself as of eating the pig. 
 Beef is a matter of which he hears, as the man who sweeps the crossings at the 
 Mansion-house, in London, hears of the calipash which forms part of the Lord 
 Mayor's dinner ; and, with regard to mutton, it seems, according to the last 
 accounts from Ireland, that the Poor Law Commissioners have placed it under 
 the head of Materia Medica, whilst one of them has actually and officially pro- 
 mulgated the fact, that meat of any kind, and even broth, is such a stranger to 
 the constitution of the Irish peasant, that the accidental or unadvised administration 
 of either produces very serious complaints of the bowels. . . . The bold Britain 
 d — s his eyes, and those of every one else, whenever he is obliged to take an 
 occasional meal in which potatoes are substituted for bread. The poor Hibernian 
 would consider himself as happy as a prince if he had only potatoes enough all the 
 days of his life." 
 * If there is one qualification which, more than another, distinguishes the Celtic 
 
AND WANT OF INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE. 45 
 
 In my last letter to you, I endeavoured to show that the 
 wealth of a community subsisting by the cultivation of land 
 cannot be expected to accumulate into capital, and thereby 
 
 race wherever they may be found, it is that of excessive vanity. The Welshman 
 will boast to you of the bravery and courage of his ancestors. They may have 
 been brave and courageous, and, in masses, no doubt are — or rather, they then 
 become rash and impetuous. They, however, had the misfortune — which, in 
 those days, was not much disgrace, as they shared it with many nations — to be 
 thoroughly well beaten by the Romans. When the Romans left them, they had 
 the disgrace to be thoroughly well beaten by the Picts and Scots, a more 
 barbarous nation. Unable to protect themselves, they called in the aid of two 
 Saxon chieftains, Hengist and Horsa, to help them. These latter chieftains, 
 having beaten off the Picts and Scots, and driven them back again to the 
 north, the helpless ancient Britons said, — " Gentlemen — We are very much 
 obhged to you for fighting for us and helping us : you may now depart." " Oh, 
 no !" said Hengist and Horsa, " we like our quarters very well ; we wUl stay 
 where we are." On which being said, the ancient Britons made a show of 
 fighting ; again, however, unfortunately, getting thrashed, and driven from the 
 fertile plains into the hills. In fact, the ancient British gradually retreated as 
 the Saxon and Norman and Dane advanced. Yet we hear the brave deeds of 
 their warriors sung to the harp, in bardic triads, to this day. The pride of the 
 
 Welsh is not the less remarkable. As there is little of talent, not much wealth, 
 
 not much, in fact, in any way, to distinguish any of them, — their pride shows 
 itself in vaunting an ancient lineage. There is a story told of a bishop who, 
 having been promoted to his high office because of his talents, was asked by, I 
 think, George the Fourth, with a sneer, — " From what family, my lord, are you 
 descended ?" His answer was : " Sire, Noah had three sons — Shera, Ham, and 
 Japhet. From one of these my father descended ; but from which, I cannot 
 inform your Majesty." A genuine Welsh squire, however, esteems liimself 
 meritorious in proportion to the number of "aps" that he can ascend in the 
 scale of his ancestry. Pride is but another description of vanity. The ancient 
 British are of Celtic origin. We see them in England driven to the hUls of 
 Wales, and, to this day, shrinking and retreating before the Saxon, who is driving 
 his enterprise further and further into their country. The Highlanders of Scot- 
 land, in the same manner, are brave and impetuous in masses ; but they retreat 
 before the Saxon Lowlanders. They have a national song, too, which describes 
 whilst speaking in courteous terms of the Lowlanders, their own convictions of 
 this truth. In Scotland, to the north, " bonnie" and " pretty" not only mean 
 good looking, but athletic, and brave in fight. Thus a "pretty man" or a 
 ' ' bonnie lad ' ' means a brave stout fellow. The song begins with — 
 " The Highland lads are bonnie lads ; 
 The Lowland lads axe prettier," — 
 And so on ; but this is sufficient to quote. 
 
 We see the Highlanders also driven into the lulls, and, like the Celts of Wales, 
 living in wretched huts. They are kindly -hearted and faithful creatures ; but their 
 apathy and indolence cannot resist the active energy of the Lowlander. Like 
 the Welsh, theirs is not the tone of emulation, or of resolute maintenance of 
 
46 ON THE CHARACTERISTICS OF RACE, 
 
 to afford employment to an increasing population, if you 
 take away all security from the tenant that he shall reap the 
 reward of his industry bestowed on the land in improving 
 
 right ; it is the tone of resistless complaint — of helplessness. Yet you see the 
 same vanity and the same pride of lineage which mark the Celts of Wales 
 amono- these Highland Celts. You see the same wretchedness, the same retreating 
 before the Saxon to the hUls, the same complainmg helplessness. The Celtic 
 Welsh are nearly universally stififish built, small men. Their average height 
 varies from five feet four inches to five feet seven inches, with here and there a tall 
 man as an exception. The Celtic Highlanders are generally thua, spare, small men, 
 averaging from five feet four inches to five feet eight inches, with occasionally a 
 tall man amongst them. The French are of Celtic extraction. It is needless 
 to say anything about their boasting vanity ; and it is unnecessary to prove that, 
 as a nation, they are small men. We come now to the Irish — I mean, the Celtic 
 Irish. I know of no ground for speaking of them in different terms to the Celtic 
 Welsh, and Highland Scotch, and French. They certainly are as vain, and boast 
 as much of their prowess ; and it is an historical fact, that they have not been 
 able to stand against the Saxon any more than the British, the Highland Scotch, 
 or the French. The history of the conquest of Ireland by the Anglo-Saxons and 
 Normans (who are, in fact, Northmen, or Saxons), is not very dissimilar to the 
 history of the conquest of Britam by the Saxons. Dermot M'Murrough, King of 
 Leinster, having got himself thoroughly well thrashed for his viUainy by the Prince 
 of Meath and Roderick O'Connor, King of Connaught, applied to Strongbow, 
 Earl of Pembroke, an Anglo-Saxon lord, to come and help him. " Here I am," 
 said Strongbow, " ready to fight your battles, with sixty knights and three 
 hundred archers, and I have two hundred and ten knights coming to join me, 
 with one hundred and seventy archers ; and with these I have no doubt I shall 
 thrash the Prince of Meath and the King of Connaught." And so" he did. 
 Dermot M'Murrough then said, — " I am much obliged to you, my lord, for 
 thrashing my enemies ; you and your men may now depart back to England." 
 " Oh, no ! " said Strongbow ; " I like my quarters very well, and will stay where 
 I am." "Then if you won't go, I wiU make you," said Dermot. " If you 
 try to do that," said Strongbow, " then I must just thrash you, too." And so he 
 did. Thus Ireland was first conquered ; and the native Irish, like the Welsh and 
 Highlanders, were driven into their hills. I speak from observation of the 
 unmixed Celtic Irish, as I have seen them in Donegal, Leitrim, Mayo, parts of 
 Galway, and Clare, and Kerry, and parts of Cork, Cavan, and Roscommon ; and 
 I assert it as a fact, that all the characteristics of the Welsh and of the Highlanders 
 are observable amongst them. They are small men. I do not think their average 
 height in Leitrim, Cavan, and Mayo, is five feet five inches. They are excessively 
 vain and vain-glorious, and their pride is not the less remarkable. They are, 
 beyond question, very indolent. The Rev. Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin 
 Society, in a book entitled " Reflections and Resolutions proper for the Gentle- 
 men of Ireland," written and published in 1739, inveighs against " their indolence 
 and fooUsh pride." He says, that "formerly they often sokl their butter and 
 yarn by night, and as privately as possible, thinking it disgraceful to make a 
 profit of the industry of their wives ; and I have known reproaches and thence 
 
AND WANT OF INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE. 47 
 
 and rendering his farm more valuable — if, in fact, you do not 
 give him the power of securing to himself the reward of such 
 improvements. The uncertainty of benefiting by such addi- 
 
 quarrels on this matter." It is an historical fact, too, that some seven hundred 
 to nine hundred Englishmen, in the reign of Henry the Second, achieved the 
 conquest of Ireland. 
 
 I have written thus fully on this subject, because the Irish national vanity 
 appears to have been exceedingly wounded by the observations about race in this 
 and a subsequent letter from Gweedore. Mr. John O'Connell made himself 
 supremely ridiculous in Conciliation Hall by boasting about the superior force 
 of a Kerryman's kick over any Saxon's. I was twice through Kerry, and all 
 round the county, and certainly their " kicking" prowess did not at all alarm 
 me ; and, judging from the appearance of the men, I do not think their prowess 
 in that line can be at all remarkable. On my second visit into Kerry, whilst at 
 Kemnare it was market day, and great numbers of country people, with their 
 cows and pigs, were before the inn. An Irish gentleman who was with me 
 happened to be talking on this subject, and expressed his opinion that the 
 country people in the market were fine men. They did not strike me as 
 remarkable in any way. They are a good looking peasantry, and certainly 
 much finer men than the Leitrim, and Cavan, and Mayo peasantry. I differed, 
 however, with him in opinion that they were fine men, and the question was 
 decided by a friendly bet between us. It was agreed by both, that my own 
 height as an Englishman was but of the middle size. He thought I was rather 
 little. My own height is five feet nine inches. The bet was to be decided by 
 my walking across the road, through the crowd of country people, to the post- 
 office, and placing myself close to as many people in my way as I could, that he 
 might compare my height with theirs, and form a judgment. I did so, and he 
 told me that there was only one man in the market as tall as myself, and that 
 I was a much taller and bigger man than most of the peasantry. That was 
 certainly my own impression in walking amongst them. But in an English 
 fair the reverse is my impression, for there I have a feeling approaching to 
 insignificance from moving about amongst bigger and taller men than myself. 
 
 Letters without end, and contradictions and controversies, have been excited by 
 this letter. It is, however, I think, fooUsh to be quoting old authors to try and 
 prove the Irish to be a race of giants. They are not so. Let any man who 
 thinks this in Ireland (except in Tipperary and Limei-ick, and the eastern and 
 northern counties, where you have a mixed, and not a pure Celtic race), look 
 around him, and I am sure he will begin to speak of some other district than that 
 where he is, as the place where the big men are to be found. In Tijiperary the 
 men are fine men ; and in many parts of the eastern counties there are fine men. 
 In Galway and Limerick there are fine men. But the race in aU these counties 
 is a mixed one. It has given great national offence, again, to state this. I really 
 don't know why it should. It is a fact, and one depending on natural causes. 
 All mixed races are fine races. Man, so far as the procreation of his race goes, 
 is but an animal, and subject to the same laws as any other animal. If a farmer 
 wants fine cattle, he crosses his breed. He might breed a pure breed of Kerry 
 cattle till doomsday, and he would never get a large animal. One Leicestershire, 
 
48 ON THE CHARACTERISTICS OF RACE, 
 
 tional labour and expenditure (which to him, indeed, is but 
 another name for labour ; for labour is the only source from 
 which he derives his means) will necessarily prevent him 
 
 or Aberdeen, or Durham ox, is equal, in weight and size, to any two Kerry oxen. 
 The prize Kerry bull at the last Ballinasloe fair was only some three feet six 
 inches high ; no higher or bigger, in fact, than a good-sized jackass. But cross 
 your Kerry and Leicestershire cattle, and you will have a fine breed of cattle. 
 The existence of this law of nature in the human race is seen in aU our border 
 counties in England. The biggest men in England are those living in the border 
 counties, where the races have been mLxed. Thus in Chester and Herefordshire, 
 bordering on Wales ; in Lancashire, bordering on Wales and Ireland ; in Cumber- 
 land and Northumberland, bordering on Scotland, — the biggest men in England 
 are found. I saw two men not long ago wrestling at Carlisle in Cumberland for 
 the champion's belt — one of them six feet two inches, and the other sLx feet eight 
 inches high, and both enormously powerful men ; and these men, though large 
 men, were not considered as being very remarkable for stature there, nor did they 
 appear remarkable when walking in the crowd. But such men as those would be 
 giants in Leitrim. 
 
 Again, it is said, you should consider the effect of bad food and difference in 
 feeding. This certainly has an effect, but I think more is attributed to it than 
 it deserves ; for the big Tipperary or Connemara man is every bit as much 
 potato fed as the Leitrim, or Cavan, or Mayo man. The real cause of the 
 difference is, that you have in one case a pure race, and in the other a mixed one. 
 In Suffolk, for instance, in England " Suffolk men shoi-t" is an expression when 
 speaking of the men. They are short, stiff men, about five feet seven or eight 
 inches high ; and they are nearly a pure Saxon race. A little more admixture 
 with the Norman or the British would have made them bigger men. I by no 
 means wish to " rundown" the Irish or the Celtic race. The Irish peasantry are, 
 for the most part, a bright, intelligent, good-natured people ; blended sometimes with 
 characteristics of a very opposite character (depending, perhaps, on an excitable 
 temperament and on poverty) ; they are kindly hearted and generous ; and, generally, 
 they are naturally courteous. I simply state, above, the result of observation. What 
 I state, I have seen in Wales, in the Highlands, in France, and in Ireland. It is a 
 condition existing at this moment, and any one may test my accuracy. It is nonsense 
 writing bombastic stuff which has no foundation ; for all the boasting in the world 
 will not make Kerry, Mayo, Leitrim, Cavan, Donegal, or Sligo men, big men. 
 There they are, an existing small race. 
 
 I wish also to state, that, on the sentence in the letter, — " Until it is proved that 
 Orangeism and Protestantism will add six inches to the average height and pro- 
 portionate bulk to the men, and tall jif/ures and good looks to the tvonien," &c., — 
 Mr. O'Connell had the audacity, in Conciliation Hall and elsewhere, in order to 
 excite a feeling against me, repeatedly to sr^y, that I " accused the women of 
 Ireland of being ugly." Upon this assertion he burst into a rhapsody, — " Oh, how 
 ugly they are !" amidst great groanings and execrations at my supposed slander. 
 That he should state tliis or anything else that will serve his present purpose, 
 surprises no one ; but what can you say of a peoj)le who will permit themselves, 
 in every matter, from the most important to the most trivial, to be thus deceived ? 
 
AND WANT OF INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE. 49 
 
 from endeavouring to improve, and make him rest satisfied 
 with the mere subsistence over and above the rent which he 
 derives from the land as it is ; and that this is one reason 
 why capital does not accumulate in Ireland. 
 
 I intend in my present letter to endeavour to apply an- 
 other proposition laid down in my last communication, that 
 " if the skill, dexterity, and judgment with which the labour 
 of a community is generally applied be rude, deficient, and 
 untutored, the labour, however great, may be so unproduc- 
 tive as to afford little beyond mere subsistence to the labour- 
 ers ;" and that this is another reason why capital cannot 
 accumulate and create a demand for labour. It is scarcely 
 necessary to illustrate this as a general proposition ; let us 
 therefore simply examine if it be applicable to Ireland. 
 
 I have been over every part of Great Britain ; I have had 
 occasion to direct my attention to the natural capabilities, to 
 the mode of cultivation, and to the produce of many parts of 
 it : this very year I have traversed the country from the 
 " Land's-end," in Cornwall, to " John-o'-Groat's," in Caith- 
 ness ; but in no part of it have I seen the natural capabilities 
 of the soil and climate surpass those of Ireland, and in no part 
 of it have I seen those natural capabilities more neglected, 
 more uncultivated, more wasted, than in Ireland. It is now 
 the middle of the hay harvest in Ireland. The meadows for 
 the most part are wholly unmanured, and yield simply a 
 natural crop of grass. I speak with confidence when I say 
 that the quantity of hay cut appears to the eye to be, in pro- 
 portion to the land, nearly double the amount which ordinary 
 land in England well-manured produces ; and it is certainly 
 one-fourth more than the very best land in England yields. 
 But this is the produce of the unassisted soil and climate. I 
 have seen such crops of potatoes growing as I never saw before. 
 I have scarcely seen any wheat ; the oat crops generally are 
 poor, and the turnips, such as I have seen, are wretched. 
 Whatever the natural capabilities of the soil and climate can 
 
 £ 
 
60 ON THE CHARACTERISTICS OF RACE, 
 
 do, nature does admirably ; whatever requires the aid of the 
 native man, that aid the native man seems ignorant how to 
 afford. 
 
 Spencer, who is said by Hallam to have given the most 
 full and authentic account of what was the actual state of 
 Ireland at the period when he wrote, thus speaks of the 
 capabilities of the country : — 
 
 " And sure Ireland is yet a most sweet and beautiful country as any is 
 under Heaven, being stored throughout with many goodly rivers, 
 replenished with all sorts of fish most abundantly, sprinkled with many 
 very sweet islands and goodly lakes, like little inland seas, that will carry 
 even shippes upon their waters ; adorned with goodly woods even fit for 
 building of houses and shippes so commodiously as that, if some princes of 
 the world had them, they would soon hope to be lords of all the seas, 
 and, ere long, of all the world ; also full of very good ports and havens 
 opening upon England, as inviting us to come unto them to see what 
 excellent commodities that country can afford ; besides the soyle itself 
 most fertile, fit to yielde all kinde of fruit that shall be committed there- 
 unto. And, lastly, the heavens most mild and temperate, though some- 
 what more moist than the parts towards the east." 
 
 Lord Bacon has written in terms no less high of " the many 
 dowries of nature with which this island is endowed." 
 
 Mr. Weale of the office of woods and forests says (Evid. 
 1830. No. 1576-8),— 
 
 " There is the finest possible field in Ireland for the exertion of skill 
 and the employment of capital. Upon an Irish estate there would be a 
 power of investing additional capital with incomparably greater profit 
 than upon property in England." 
 
 Such are the natural capabilities of the country. 
 
 In many parts of Ireland this year, and for some years 
 past, the rot has prevailed in the potato crops. The stem 
 appears to grow luxuriantly, but the root is rotten. It has, 
 however, been found by experience that draining tends to 
 prevent this evil ; and that it never exists in a crop grown on 
 virgin soil, or which has not before recently borne a potato 
 
AND WANT OF INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE. 61 
 
 crop.* Still draining is rarely resorted to by the generality 
 of farmers ; and the same patch of land is laid down year 
 after year in potatoes till it will grow them no longer ; it is 
 then sown with oats, till it will grow oats no longer ; and it 
 is then left almost perfectly barren, with barely a covering of 
 grass growing over it, but a plentiful crop of rushes, spring- 
 ing up in regular rows where the potato trenches have 
 been, till the hand of time recovers it. In six or seven years 
 it begins to come round, and to afford a little pasturage ; 
 it is then grazed for a few years ; then turned into meadow ; 
 and when the land has recovered itself, without any artificial 
 aid from manure, it is again laid down in potatoes and oats, 
 to go through the same rotation again. Such is the general 
 state of agriculture in this part of Ireland. Some agricul- 
 tural readers may be curious to know how such fine crops of 
 potatoes are produced in this country, — crops so great that 
 the poor cottiers can afford, and positively pay, as much as 8?. 
 to lOl an Irish acre rent for potatoes in con-acre. The Eng- 
 lish acre, as compared with the Irish acre, is as S^to 5 in ex- 
 tent ; and in letting con-acre the land is let manured with farm- 
 yard manure. A piece of grass land being spread with manure, 
 is marked out into four-foot broad beds, and a trench a foot 
 wide and about a foot deep is dug out between the beds, the 
 earth dug out being thrown over the manure on the surface 
 of the grass and carefully spread over it, affording about 
 three inches in thickness of loose soil on the bed. The trench 
 dug serves the double purpose of a drain to the land, and 
 affords loose soil to cover the potatoes. The seed potato is 
 either first simply laid on the manured grass and spread 
 over with the loose soil out of the trench, or is dropped into 
 a hole made by a stick in the loose soil, and covered over. 
 This is the whole of the rude cultivation given to the potato 
 
 * The potato rot now, however, is generally believed to have been caused by a 
 blight, from its universal prevalence. 
 
 e2 
 
52 ON THE CHARACTERISTICS OF RACE, 
 
 crop. As the whole of the land has to be dug up in order to 
 get at the first crop of potatoes, and has the benefit of the 
 digging for a second crop, the following year it is usually set 
 without any manure. English farmers who dig, or plough 
 and harrow, and clean, and stone, and hoe in manure, and 
 afterwards, carefully weed every yard of their potato land, 
 would stare at this rude mode of cultivation, and still more so 
 at the enormous crops which an excellent soil and climate 
 nevertheless often yield. Had the poor Irish peasant but the 
 knowledge of the intelligent English farmer how to cultivate 
 his land, he would nearly double the amount of his produce. 
 The whole knowledge of the Irish peasant, however, seems 
 only to extend to throwing the seed on the land, with some 
 loose soil over it, and manure, if he has it ; the rest he leaves 
 to nature.* There is a great deal of rain here, and the land 
 
 * "It is our shame and reproach, as absolutely necessary as tillage is to our 
 well-being, we have been as careless about it as if, like the Jews, we expected 
 manna from heaven to feed us ; or trusted like the old Irish to the gathering 
 muscles and cockles on the shore, or the hips and haws and acorns of the woods 
 to feed us. While other nations labour to plough and enrich even their 
 poorest grounds, we can hardly be persuaded to break up our richest plains, which 
 nature seems peculiarly to have designed for tillage, by not harbouring a mole in 
 them ; where often all manure is useless, and half labour would produce double 
 the crops which our neighbours purchase with so much expense and toil. And, 
 indeed, it is miserable to consider how industriously the Svrissers plough the naked 
 sides of their mountains, and our poor neighbours, as I may call them, the Welsh, 
 struggle to force a crop from their barren rocks, while many of our people leave 
 hogs and rabbits the first original ploughers of the earth to turn up some of the 
 richest grounds in the kingdom. When the Poles were once endeavouring to raise 
 the price unreasonably of their corn on the Dutch, the States ordered their am- 
 bassador to propose to the Czar, that if he would put his subjects on tillage, they 
 would not only buy their grain from them, but they would send over skilful 
 husbandmen to instruct them completely in agriculture. This proposal so alarmed 
 the Poles, that to break off the treaty they lowered the market, and so kept the 
 Dutch their chapmen ever since. But I have often wished that both the Poles and 
 the Czar had refused to deal with them and that they would make such a bargain 
 with us, in order to tempt us to get a little more skill and profit by plougliing our 
 pastures, which would yield as well as the rich ground did in our Saviour's parable. 
 Tlie earth, indeed, has done her part, but to as little purpose as the silk worms 
 make their webs in Asia, where the indolent Turks will not put forth a hand to gatlier 
 them, and much less to spin and weave them, but choose to buy their fine wrought 
 
AND WANT OF INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE. 63 
 
 is therefore often too wet. Its very undulating surface, how- 
 ever, makes it almost naturally drain itself. On the borders 
 of the county of Leitrim I have often seen what this undula- 
 ting surface of the land would almost of itself effect, in drain- 
 ing off the superabundant moisture, thwarted by the ignorance 
 of the peasant. I have repeatedly seen the potato beds laid 
 across the side of a hill, or winding round its slope, each 
 trench acting as a drain to the bed above it, and holding the 
 water to soak through the bed below it ; and yet the poor 
 peasant will complain that his crop is half destroyed with the 
 rot and that he cannot pay his rent. When the land will 
 grow no more potatoes, then oats are sown. The first year 
 the crop is usually a very good one ; but it is repeated year 
 aftei'' year, till at length you may almost count the stalks, and 
 the land will grow oats no longer. The land is then left to 
 recover itself by time, and usually lies fallow six or seven 
 years, and is of no possible use. It is clear, that knowledge 
 
 silks from foreigners." — Reflections and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen 
 of Ireland, by Dr. Madden, p. 101. 
 
 " As this great mismanagement proceeds from several obstructions to our tillage 
 which we have long laboured under, I shall mention some of them, and then lay 
 down a few methods in order to remove them. The first is a sort of natural 
 aversion to the plough in our native Irish. One would think they had occasionally 
 been yoked to it, and drawn it with their bodies as the poor Indians used to do in 
 Peru ; but the truth is, they have got this humour from their good friends the 
 Spaniards, whose pride and sloth they are too apt to admire and copy. I find 
 most travellers agree in' censuring the people of Spain, that they plough veiy 
 little, and generally but for a mile or two, near their great towns ; and, between 
 want of rain and labour, are every third year stai-ving for want of bread, and 
 begging their corn-merchants, the Dutch, to save their lives and take their 
 money." .... 
 
 "But there is another obstruction to our tillage in Ireland, which is harder to be 
 accounted for, and that is the fondness of our Protestant gentlemen to large 
 herds of cattle and pasturage. This humour has spread so generally through the 
 nation that, though it eats up our people like a plague, and lays our country 
 waste, we seem every day to do all in our power to increase this epidemical evil 
 of overrunning vast tracts of land with such prodigious herds of cattle, that our 
 stock-masters in some counties will soon be able to match the famous M'Surly 
 Boy, in Queen Elizabeth's time, who is said to have kept fifty thousand head of 
 cattle to his own share." — Ibid. p. 103. 
 
54 ON THE CHARACTERISTICS OF RACE, 
 
 in the art of cultivation would fully double the produce which 
 tenants who follow such a plan as this derive from the land. 
 One witness in this neighbourhood says, before Lord Devon's 
 commission, that " half the land lies fallow."* However high 
 
 * In the north, they call it " letting the lands lie out to cool." Dr. Madden, of 
 the Royal Dublin Society, in his book called " Reflections and Resolutions proper 
 for the Gentlemen of Ireland," which was published in 1739 — about a century 
 ago — thus describes the state of agriculture in Ireland as it then existed : — 
 
 " There was not a due proportion of the land in tillage to bear corn sufficient 
 for the support of the inhabitants ; but, on the contrary, although the population 
 of Ireland at that time little exceeded two millions, ' yet they were obliged to buy 
 com and flour from the Dutch for home consumption. 
 
 " Instead of having different kinds of ploughs, we shift off all our business with 
 one, and that so ill- contrived and ordered, the Dutch would not wish us worse, 
 and, what is as bad as all the rest, it is often not drawn by oxen (as it were 
 to be wished our laws obliged us), but by horses, or garrons, as we call them, 
 of different sizes, which also many of the poorest Irish draw by the tail. . . . 
 But we work our ploughs as ill as we make them, for we generally leave much of 
 our soil entirely unstirred, and the furrows bare, broad, and unfruitful. Even 
 our richest lands are by no means wrought to a sufficient fineness. Thus, after a 
 great deal of injudicious and superfluous labour, we rather drown or bury our 
 grain than sow it." ^ He goes on to say, that from ignorance of the inherent 
 properties of manure, and of the proper seed time, and want of fit culture and due 
 care, " our crops are so ordinary that our neighbours in England, with much 
 higher charges of all sorts, are able to undersell us in our own markets. Many 
 of our lower people are also as lazy as they are ignorant, and yet have as bad tools 
 as they have hands ; numbers of the harrows of our poor farmers (I speak what I 
 see and know) have their harrow-pins made of wood, and the tackle for them and 
 the plough also of twisted gads and wretched taggs cut out of the liides of horses 
 they have killed probably by unskilful under-feeding and over-labouring. But even 
 our best iron-pinned harrows are ill-contrived, both for the draught of the cattle 
 and the breaking of the clods. They are generally too light, and the pins too 
 short, thin, and weak, and not right placed to answer each other, and, therefore, 
 can never sufficiently raise and break the mould, which is the main point to make 
 a light, open, warm bed and coverlet, if I may so speak, for the grain. . . . Thus 
 we just scratch the ground only, as Mr. Frazer says the Indians do in Chili ; and 
 when we have done, we neither manure our land sufficiently, nor steep the seed in 
 proper liquors to enrich it, nor use rollers to smooth and flatten the mould. Nay, 
 we do not even mow the crop with scythes when it is ripened, but rich and poor 
 cut it down with hooks, what grain soever it be ; and some of the less improved 
 Irish, instead of thrashing, do often burn the straw as the quickest and easiest 
 
 ' "2,010,222." 
 
 * The condition of agriculture in Mayo, Donegal, Sligo, Clare, Galway, Kerry, 
 and parts of Cork, at the present day, is not very dissimilar to this. 
 
AND WANT OF INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE. 55 
 
 rents may be now, it also follows that if tenants doubled their 
 produce by proper cultivation, as they can live now, unless 
 their rents were increased in proportion (which they could 
 
 way to get out the grain. ^ This is indeed a terrible account of our husbandry, 
 and, I must own, in many particulars, is only applicable to the poorest and less 
 civilized part of the Irish natives." 
 
 * "Having some time since mentioned these facts to a friend, he expressed 
 a doubt as to their authenticity ; and, lest any one should have a doubt on the 
 subject, I have transcribed the preambles to two Acts of Parliament, passed in 
 the reign of Charles I." 
 
 " * An Act against Ploughing by the Tail, and pulling the Wool off Living 
 Sheep. Ch. 15 0/ 10 .^ 11 Year (1634-5) of Charles I. 
 
 " ' "WTiereas in many places of this kingdom there hath been a long time used 
 a barbarous custom of ploughing, harrowing, dravsing, and working with horses, 
 mares, geldings, garrans, and colts, by the taile, whereby (besides the cruelty 
 used to the beasts) the breed of horses is much impaired in this kingdome, to the 
 great prejudice thereof: and whereas also, divers have and yet do use the like 
 barbarous custom of pulling off the wool yearly from living sheep, instead of 
 clipping or shearing them ; be it therefore, &c. Punishment, fine, and imprison- 
 ment.' 
 
 " ' An Act to Prevent the unprofitable Custom of Burning of Corn in the Straw. 
 10 .Sf 11 Charles I., Ch. 17. 
 
 ' ' ' Whereas there is in the remote parts of this kingdome of Ireland, commonly 
 a great dearth of cattell yearly, which for the most part happeneth by reason of 
 the ill husbandrie and improvident care of the owners, that neither provide fodder 
 nor stover for them in winter, nor houses to put them in extremitie of stormy 
 cold weather, but a natural lazie disposition possessing them, that will not build 
 bames to house and thrash their corn in, or houses to keep their cattell from 
 the violence of such weather,* but the better to enable them to be flitting from 
 their lands, and to deceive his Majestic of such debts as they may be owing at any 
 time, and their landlords of their rents, doe for a great part instead of thrashing, 
 bum their com in the straw, thereby consuming the straw, which might reUeve 
 their cattell in winter, and afford materials towards the covering or thatching their 
 houses ; and spoiling the corn, making it black, loathsome, and filthy ; for 
 prevention of which unprofitable and unciviUe custome, be it enacted, &c. 
 
 " ' Penalty. Ten days' imprisonment for the first offence, and to pay the 
 charges. 
 
 " ' Second offence. Imprisonment for a month, without bail or mainprise, 
 and to pay the charges as aforesaid. 
 
 " ' Third offence. Fine of forty shillings, and to be bound to good behaviour, 
 and to pay the charges as aforesaid." 
 
 * This is literally true now of parts of Mayo, Sligo, Galway, Donegal, and 
 Kerry, near Ballina. I repeatedly saw the peasants thrashing their com on flue 
 
56 ON THE CHARACTERISTICS OF RACE, 
 
 not be if the tenants had agreements or leases, — at least until 
 their termination), they must he enabled by such increased 
 production to live more comfortably, and perhaps to save 
 
 days, in the middle of the hiffh road. When the road is dry they simply sweep 
 the loose dust and stones off it, and then spread their com upon the road and 
 thrash it out. I have had repeatedly to drive over their com thus spread across 
 the high road with my horse and car, and of course every waggon, coach, or car, 
 which was on the road must have done the same. This makes the corn dusty and 
 gritty ; and I was informed by a corn-merchant in Sligo, that it is quoted at 2d. to 
 4d. less in the markets of Liverpool in consequence. After being thus thrashed 
 out, the women usually spread a sheet on the road-side, on a windy day, and, 
 standing with their bare feet on the middle of the sheet, winnow the com from the 
 chaff, by holding both up in a bowl or sieve, as high as they can, and then, gra- 
 dually emptying the sieve, the wind blows away the chaff over the edges of the 
 spread-out sheet, the corn falling upon it owmg to its greater gravity. I have 
 seen the women thus standing with their naked legs, nearly knee deep in the com. 
 Nothing can be more wasteful than this. In the first place, the value of the com 
 is deteriorated ; and in the second place, if the wind is high, much of the com is 
 scattered and blown away with the chaff. Generally the sheet used is taken y>-o»» 
 off" the bed ; and so utterly unprovided with every farming requisite are these 
 ■poor farmers, that frequently the same sheet is sewn up into a bag to form a sack 
 in which to carry the corn to market. I have seen this scores of times in Mayo, 
 Sligo, and Galway. This, of course, besides its dirtyness, tears the sheet to pieces, 
 as it was not manufactured for any such purpose, and is thus again wasteful. If 
 the farmer does not sell his corn when he takes it to market, and should there be 
 any rain in the course of the day, which is generally the case, the sheet-sack wUl 
 not keep out the wet, and the corn is damped, and injured, and deteriorated in 
 value. This is again waste. If he carries back his corn from market unsold, 
 he has no place to keep it in but the hut in which he lives, which being always 
 full of turf smoke, this flavours and again deteriorates the com in value. 
 Then, again, the farmer who only calculated on being a day or two without his 
 bed-clothes, as he has none other and cannot well do without them, is forced to 
 sell his threished wheat, no matter what the price may be in the market, in order 
 to get back his night covering. Thus we see these poor Irish farmers, who 
 can ill afford to lose anything, by their bad and improvident management u-aste 
 great part of their substance. I often asked why a village could not join at a 
 barn and build it for common use, using it in turns, as each farmer could not 
 manage to erect his own barn ? Their usual answer was, " they never thought 
 about it, and did without." When we remember, however, that a farmer will 
 often build the house in which he lives in eight days, at a cost of about 30#. for tim- 
 bers for the roof, wood for a door, and straw for a thatch (see " Kennedy's book"), 
 one cannot conceive the building of a sufficient bam to be too great an accom- 
 plishment for any one of them, provided a little exertion were used ; and it would 
 save its cost in one year to them, be a means of comfort, serve for a store for their 
 potatoes, and keep their turf dry, as well as house their corn. But it would take 
 
AND WANT OF INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE. 57 
 
 money. But the mere ability to live more comfortably 
 implies increased ability of consumption ; and there cannot 
 be increased consummation without increased employment 
 being afforded. 
 
 The population of Ireland is 8,000,000, but about two-thirds 
 of it never wear shoes; and a tenant-farmer never thinks of 
 getting a coat oftener than once in seven years, or indeed of 
 parting with a coat until it is so ragged and tattered that it 
 is a marvel how it holds together. Increase the comforts, or 
 rather, the capability of living in increased comfort, of this 
 vast population — enable them simply to wear shoes and 
 stockings, a clean shirt once a week, and clothes that are not 
 in rags, like the labourers of England, and see what an 
 amount of employment you necessitate, simply to provide 
 them with clothes. And in that employment how much 
 capital is created, again to be laid out in employment ; and 
 how much other branches of industry are stimulated, till the 
 improvement again reaches the poor peasant, who is uncon- 
 scious that his being able to wear shoes and stockings and a 
 decent coat has raised the price of his wool for clothing, of 
 the hides of his cattle for leather, and his beef and corn for 
 food, whilst the emjaloyment he has contributed to give to 
 the population has decreased the competition for his land, 
 and kept down the rent of his farm. 
 
 It is very far from my wish to write a tirade against the 
 class of landlords. Besides, it would be unjust ; because, as 
 in every large class of men, there are good and bad amongst 
 
 trouble to build a bam, and bams are not therefore built. In Tipperary and 
 Limerick they have likewise frequently no barns. There, however, the custom is 
 to thrash the com on a sheet spread in a field. This is certainly cleaner, and 
 therefore better, and less wasteful in one respect than thrashing out the corn on a 
 dusty high road. It is, however, wasteful in another respect, namely, in labour ; 
 for as there is not a hard bottom for the flail to fall on, thrashing out the com 
 must be much more tedious and slow. I need not say that it is customary to have 
 the pigs and cattle in the houses ; for this filthy custom is universal in the west 
 of Ireland. 
 
68 ON THE CHARACTERISTICS OF RACE, 
 
 them. But, whether good or bad, it is their most fortunate 
 position to he placed as leaders amongst the people. I would 
 not take from them one atom of their " rights," but I would 
 not have them unmindful of their " duties." What can the 
 poor ignorant peasant do ? He already does his best,* and 
 if his condition can thus be improved by knowledge which he 
 has not, who is to teach him, to encourage him, and to guide 
 him by example, but his natural guardians, — those who live 
 by his toil, and those who by his toil have the means and the 
 leisure to acquire that knowledge. This is the duty of every 
 landlord, and it is a duty which, perhaps more than any 
 other, carries its own blessing with it, in benefitting the 
 landlord individually who fulfils it. How sickening must it 
 be to a statesman to hear an absentee landlord, who never 
 gave a thought about his tenantry, except how he could ex- 
 tract the most rent from them, and make them pay the per- 
 centage of his agent for collecting it — who never afforded 
 them either precept or example for their good, prate in 
 Parliament about the evils which afflict Ireland, and chide 
 the minister for not being willing to vote large sums, wrung 
 from the industry of the rest of the empire, in support of 
 some scheme for the employment of the poor in Ireland ; or 
 for resorting to precautions for the preservation of the public 
 peace ; either of which measures the neglect of the manifest 
 duties of such absentee-landlord has contributed to render 
 necessary.f To their honour, however, be it said, there are 
 
 * I am inclined to qualify this opinion. He might do better if he were more 
 industrious. He perhaps does his best to the extent of his knowledge what to do. 
 
 •f- " But, alas ! the truth is, that most of our landlords have no other view or 
 care as to their fortunes but to rack them as high as they can, and then spend the 
 rent on their pleasures, diversions, and luxurious living, and leave their wretched 
 tenants to shift for themselves, entirely forgot and disregarded. This is both the 
 greatest inhumanity and also the greatest imprudence ; for at last, by the breaking 
 of the poor people, who fall in arrear, and are unable to pay such high rents, we 
 lose more than we gain, and pay a dear fine for our cruelty and avarice, and 
 neglecting to take due care of our tenants, and the directing, assisting, and 
 improving them every way. Whereas if, even for our own sakes, we would watch 
 
AND WANT OF INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE. 59 
 
 many landlords in Ireland who do not forget the duties of 
 their position ; and there are several in this neighbourhood 
 who take every means to have the poor peasant taught how 
 to improve. Were but such examples common, it is imposs- 
 ible to suppose that Ireland could present, as it does, the 
 anomaly of being the most fertile, and the worst cultivated, 
 and least productive portion of the empire. 
 
 I shall conclude this letter (as I shall continue to prefer 
 doing) by quoting extracts from evidence taken under the au- 
 thority of the Government, in support of the opinions which 
 I have broached. 
 
 Mr. Richard Mayne, magistrate of Newbliss, in the county 
 of Monaghan, is asked by the " Land Commissioners" (page 
 121, Appendix, part 11): — 
 
 "What is your opinion of agricultural instruction? — It is the best 
 thing ever introduced into Ireland; in my opinion, it is of the greatest 
 advantage. The principal thing we want is instruction in the improving 
 of our land. I think we do not know what our land is as yet." 
 
 'Mi. George Shehog, grazier, of Munelly, in the county of Monaghan 
 (ib., p. 124), thinks "tenancy at will injurious to both landlord and 
 tenant ;" and that " leases at a fair value would induce people with 
 small capital to lay it out and improve the land for their own sakes." 
 He thinks farmers at " a stand-stUl," " small tenants going back," and 
 the condition of the labouring classes deteriorating, " because the popula- 
 tion is increasing, and there is not a demand for labour increasing iu 
 proportion." Labourers generally pay 30s. to 21. rent for their cottages, 
 with only a garden attached; lOrf. a-day is the common rate of wages 
 from March to November, and 8c?. from November to March. The 
 con-acre system prevails, and 8/. an acre is the average. Iu the Clones 
 Union there is a vast district of land improvable from the county of 
 Monaghan to Lisnaskea, in the county of Tyrone, for 12 or 14 miles ; 
 and he thinks " the people might be employed that way. The landlords 
 
 over the wants or defects of our poor people, to supply them, and would both set 
 them good bargains, and help, advise, and befriend them in all the points we have 
 been speaking of, we should improve our own fortunes as well as their circum- 
 stances, and, at the same time, become fathers to the poor and patiiots to our 
 country." — Rejections and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, by 
 Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, p. 30. 
 
60 ON THE CHARACTERISTICS OF RACE, 
 
 will not do it, but the Government might rent those mountains at a 
 low rate, and employ the people. He knows of his own knowledge that 
 those lands might be profitably reclaimed. The tenants have not capital 
 to do it, and the landlords will not go to the expense." 
 
 ISIr. Thomas Bailey, guardian of the Clones Union, of Mullyduff, 
 county of Fermanagh (p. 126), thinks that district might be remuneratively 
 improved by draining, but none of it is going on. 
 
 Mr. John Pearce Hamilton, magistrate, of Oakfield, county of Fer- 
 managh (p. 129), says that agriculture is improving in the district from 
 the effects of a farming society and encouragement ; more ground has 
 been brought into cultivation by it, and there is a greater demand for 
 labour in consequence. And he thinks, also, that the condition of the 
 farmer is improved by it. 
 
 Mr. Andrew Mair and JVIr. William Milne, Scotch farmers, employed by 
 Lord Erne, in Fermanagh, to teach his tenants agriculture, state (p. 133) 
 that, four years ago, when they came into the country, there was " no rota- 
 tion of crops whatever," and that " the practice was just to crop the land 
 until it would bear no more,"' and when it was exhausted, " just to let it 
 lie out six or seven years," and that that practice prevails on other estates 
 at this time. (P. 134.) The country is in much need of draining, and 
 there is every facility for it. The soil of the country is capable of very 
 great improvement by it, and its produce of being greatly increased. 
 (P. 135.) They think the expense of draming Avould be soon 
 repaid to the farmer. They think land of the same quality in Scot- 
 land would fetch near 41. the Irish acre. "78. You think that the 
 Scotch farmer could afford to pay 41. an acre for land corresponding 
 •with this under the Scotch system? — Yes, if he had the advantage of the 
 Scotch markets here." Both concur in this opinion, the Scotch farmers 
 paying all the burdens on the land. The expense of thorough draining 
 and subsoiling the land would be 6/. 13*. the acre, and they estimate that 
 land thus improved would produce two quarters of oats more than if in 
 its natural state, or 21. in value ; and that it would take the whole of the 
 labourers to farm the land properly, if the farmers would employ them. 
 One of these witnesses says (question 94), that "the labourers merely 
 scratch the land ;" and that the " Scotch labourer is cheaper at 1*. a-day 
 and his meat, than the Irish labourer at G^. and his meat ;" and that in 
 Scotland " farmers Avould not have them at all unless they did better than 
 they do here." The rent of land now in the country is 25*. or 30*. 
 an acre ; and con-acre is let at 8^. by the farmers. Guano has never been 
 tried here. Con -acre yields about forty barrels of potatoes the acre, worth 
 from 6*. to 10*. the barrel. There is no con-acre system in Scotland. 
 
AND WANT OF INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE. 61 
 
 Captain E. Archdall, of Riversdale, Deputy-Lieutenant and magistrate 
 of the county of Fermanagh, says (p. 140), that the rent paid for con-acre 
 is " from eight to ten guineas an acre." 
 
 There is a great deal more evidence to the same effect, 
 which it would be mere repetition to quote. I think I have 
 quoted enough to bear out the position I have attempted to 
 illustrate, and to show that there is ample scope for improve- 
 ments, which, if effected, would benefit alike landlord, tenant 
 and labourer. Yet, with this plain and incontrovertible fact 
 before them, Irishmen will leave the improvements uneffect- 
 ed, and call upon the Government to come forward and do 
 something for the benefit of Ireland, with English money, 
 the produce of English enterprise and English industry ! 
 Because such applications are generally unattended to, then 
 Irish members complain that Irish questions are treated with 
 disrespect in the House of Commons. When Irishmen, as 
 a nation, learn that true spirit of independence which looks 
 for help to no man, and which does not lie in blustering, but 
 in the quiet evidence of self-supporting strength, then, and 
 not till then, they and their concerns will command respect, 
 and will ha\re every attention.* 
 
 For opinions of the press on this Letter, see Appendix, No. 3. 
 
62 NEGLECT OP THE NATURAL 
 
 LETTER V. 
 
 ON THE NEGLECT OF THE NATURAL ADVANTAGES OF 
 THE COUNTRY. IF THE SURPLUS PRODUCE BE AB- 
 STRACTED, AND NOT SUFFERED TO ACCUMULATE, 
 THERE CAN BE NO CAPITAL. 
 
 The Irish Tenant not entirely to blame for his wretched mode of Agriculture — 
 The lamentable neglect of Improvement which the Country exhibits — Lough 
 Erne and its neglected capabilities — The energy of the People of Belfast winning 
 from the people of the West those Advantages which they neglect — The ne- 
 glected Water Power of Lough Erne — If all Surplus Produce be extracted from 
 the People in the shape of High Rents, and it is not accumulated and spent 
 amongst them again in promoting Industry, as Capital, the People cannot im- 
 prove — Instances of Condition of small Farmers and Labourers. 
 
 Ballyshannon, Donegal, August 27. 
 In my last two letters I have endeavoured to show how much 
 the want of security to the tenant of lands in Ireland that he 
 shall receive the fair reward of his industry, and his want of 
 skill in the improvement and cultivation of his land, tend to 
 his perpetual poverty, and to prevent wealth and capital 
 accumulating in the community and affording employment 
 to the people, the want of which is the curse of Ireland, and 
 is at the bottom of all the disturbances which have ever arisen 
 in it. 
 
 The land only in Ireland generally affords means of em- 
 ployment ; and want of security in the tenure of his land is 
 not so much the fault of the tenant, as of his short-sighted 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE COUNTRY. 63 
 
 and impolitic landlord.* Neither can the poor tenant be 
 blamed for his want of skill and knowledge in the cultivation 
 of his land, when he has often no opportunity of learning 
 better, and no better example set to himf . Nor can his 
 positive dislike to improve be much wondered at, coupled as 
 it is with a suspicion, too often the result of past experience, 
 that the first step towards an improvement is the sure road 
 to an advance of rent. 
 
 Every Englishman, fresh from his own country, where 
 almost every yard of it, through the length and breadth of 
 the land, bears evidence of capital invested and of the appli- 
 cation of intelligent industry, can scarcely avoid being filled 
 with regret at seeing, as he traverses Ireland, so fine a coun- 
 try, so full of opportuities of improvement, so lamentably 
 neglected. The road from Enniskillen to this tOAvn passes 
 along the borders of Lough Erne — a magnificent sheet of 
 water, extending on either side of Enniskillen, on the one 
 hand, nearly as far as the middle of Cavan, in the centre of 
 the island ; and on the other hand to Ballyshannon, in Do- 
 negal, to within four miles of the sea, and navigable the 
 
 * " I hold some fields from year to year, and I should consider myself a fool 
 were I to lay out any thing on them." {A. Nixon.) Evidence taken before the 
 Commissioners of Poor Inquiry {Ireland), 1836, barony of Dromahair, county 
 Leitrim, Appendix (F), p. 145. 
 
 •f How can you blame a poor Kerryman, for instance, or such poor neglected 
 creatures as I found on Mr. O'Connell's estate on my visit into Keny, for not 
 draining his land ; growing green crops for his cattle ; keeping his fences up and 
 his ditches clean and open; for letting the rain soak through his manure-heap, and 
 wash out all its strength ; for permitting the liquid manure of his dung-heap to 
 run waste into the road ; for letting his cattle wander about dropping the manure, 
 which ought to grow him green crops to house feed them ; for, in fact, Uving in 
 dirt, and laziness, and wasteful helplessness, when his father or his neighbours 
 can teach him nothing better — when he never either saw or can conceive any thing 
 better, and where there is no school, or agriculturist, or agricultural society, 
 through the medium of which he may learn how to farm his land properly — and 
 when his landlord, as in the case with Mr. O'Connell, looks only for his rent, and 
 totally neglects the condition of his tenantry. And this, I am sorry to say, is 
 but too frequently the case in Ireland, though there are many honourable excep- 
 tions. 
 
64 NEGLECT OF THE NATURAL 
 
 whole distance. Yet this magnificent lake, this natural high 
 road for the conveyance of the produce of one district to 
 another, is almost useless. Scarcely a boat is to be seen 
 upon it ; yet, in many parts of it, it is fully equal to Win- 
 dermere in beauty, and, as a lake, is a finer expanse of water. 
 At Ballyshannon to-day I saw a foreign brig unloading tim- 
 ber at the foot of a fall of water, an outlet from this lake, 
 navigable for fifty miles into the interior. A canal, four 
 miles in length, would open the navigation of this lake to the 
 sea, and render Enniskillen, in Fermanagh, or Belturbet, in 
 Cavan, capable of becoming ports of export and import. Yet 
 no canal is attempted. It would require capital, which 
 nobody will spend.* I must, however, in justice to Colonel 
 Conolly, M.P., one of the resident landlords of this district, 
 state that he has done much and spent much to forward this 
 object, in endeavouring to make a good harbour on the sea 
 coast. I am told that some forty years ago a canal from the 
 lake for this short distance to the sea was commenced, and 
 
 * " If we would make our rivers navigable, and ojien great cuts through many of 
 our vast bogs, we might join the most distant parts of the kingdom, and bring 
 the produce of their fields or their looms to our best towns and sea-ports. This 
 would spread industry through every corner, beget business, and enliven trade in 
 every remoter village in our provinces, and, by circulating our coin, make it as 
 useful as if it were actually increased by this domestic traffic, as carriage is the 
 great and mighty clog to trade in many of our counties. This would reduce the 
 high price of transporting our goods from one part of the country to the other ; 
 and, until this is done, we must be content to see our lands lie untilled for want 
 of roads and rivers to carry out our grain, and our best soils neglected, or just 
 grazed with cattle that require no carriage, but can go with their own beef and 
 tallow to the market." — Dr. Madden's Reflections and Resolutions projyer for 
 the Gentlemen of Ireland, p. 181. 
 
 "The navigation of the Shannon, if it were once vigorously and effectually 
 carried on, and the cutting a canal from Lough Erne to the sea-port of Bally- 
 shannon, would be two undertakings of vast advantage to our inland commerce ; 
 and, indeed, the last would be so feasible, and have such effects on that part of the 
 kingdom, that it cannot long be overlooked." — Ibid. p. 182. Though this 
 wise observation was written more than a century ago, the canal remains unmade 
 yet, and with every prospect — if the cutting of this four miles of canal is to be left 
 to the enterprize of the inhabitants about Ballyshannon — of still remaining unmade 
 for a century to come. 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE COUNTRY. 65 
 
 given up for want of capital to carry it through. This 
 apathy and want of spirit of enterprise and improvement 
 have been taken advantage of by the Scotchmen and enter- 
 prising inhabitants of Belfast, who, having made a water 
 communication to Lough Neagh, have cut a canal (the 
 Ulster canal) from Lough Neagh across the counties of Ty- 
 rone and Monaghan to the upper part of Lough Erne ; there 
 is, therefore, a means of water carriage across the whole 
 island except at the four miles from the termination of Lough 
 Erne to the sea on the west coast, and Belfast has secured 
 to itself all the advantages and profits of being the port 
 for all this internal communication. Yesterday Lord Erne 
 navigated a private steam-boat to Belleeck, the lowest point 
 of the lake, for the first time. This steamer came from Bel- 
 fast by the Ulster Canal the whole distance through this 
 water communication, and was thus within three miles of 
 the sea on the west coast. There is about 12 feet water 
 over the bar at the mouth of the river which falls from 
 this lake, and it forms a fine harbour when entered. In 
 the three miles from the lake to the sea, into which the 
 lake empties itself, there is a continual succession of fine 
 falls of water, and an immense water power, which the inex- 
 haustible supply of the lake affords. With the exception 
 of a small wheel for grinding malt for a distillery, this ex- 
 haustless power has never been put to any use.* We have 
 
 * As to the value of water power, and its great economy when comjiared with 
 steam-power, t;i<fe Letter, post, dated Ballysodare, Sligo. There is a saving of 
 about 30^. per horse power, per annum, in water power, as compared with the 
 cost of steam power. There are a succession of falls, varying from five to fifteen 
 feet, in the fine salmon stream which runs from Lough Erne at Belleeck to the sea, 
 a distance of upwards of three miles, and which, running from so vast a lake as 
 Lough Erne, is of unfailing and equable force. This stream is capable of affording 
 half the miU power of Manchester, yet it is wholly and disgracefully neglected, 
 with a sea-port, too, close to it. How can you hope for a people to prosper who 
 thus have not the mind to help themselves, and to use those natural advantages 
 which are lavishly bestowed upon them. Belfast, on the opposite coast, has no 
 natural advantages to compare with those of Ballyshannon and its neighbourhood. 
 
 F 
 
66 NEGLECT OF THE NATURAL 
 
 here tlien a good natural harbour, with always fresh water 
 enough in it to float a vessel of 250 tons burthen, the sea 
 on one hand, natural water carriage into the centre of the 
 country on the other, exhaustless power for any kind of 
 machinery — means of creating and of earning wealth which, 
 if in England, vf ould set the competition of steam machinery 
 and canal or land carriage at defiance, and lead to the accu- 
 mulation of a succession of fortunes — all neglected and value- 
 less to the people, because (as they say) they have got no 
 capital, either to cut canals, to commence manufactures, to 
 make money, or to give employment in any way. 
 
 But the country is fertile, most fertile — wealth-producing. 
 It produces abundantly, far more than is requisite to pay 
 amply for the raising of the produce — in other words, far 
 more than iS requisite to support those who raise the pro- 
 duce. But what becomes of the surplus ? The surplus, or the 
 value of it, which is the same thing, is wealth ; and wealth 
 accumulated is capital. What becomes of the capital ? This 
 brings me to the consideration of a third position pointed out 
 in one of my former letters, that 
 
 " If the surplus produce of labour, over and above the mere sub- 
 sistence of the labourer, be abstracted from the community in the shape 
 of rent, and be in no wise employed as capital in that community in 
 promoting industry, in creating markets for the produce of industry, and 
 in affording employment by those innumerable modes by Avhich the 
 investment of capital in improvements and in enterprise gives employ- 
 ment, then wealth cannot accumulate ua that community mto capital, but 
 all must continue poor ; and without capital to give employment, as 
 population increases, there must be many wanting employment, and 
 therefore many in distress and discontent ; hence perpetual disturbances 
 and insecurity.'' 
 
 Yet Belfast, from the exertions of its Scotch and English inhabitants, is the 
 wealthiest and most important town in Irehmd, so far as manufacturing prosperity 
 goes, whilst Ballyshannon is a wretched little town, depending for existence on its 
 neighbourhood to a watering place for sea-bathing, and on its salmon fishery, 
 now leased by a lady named Shiel. 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE COUNTRY. 
 
 67 
 
 The object of my present letter is to show you that such 
 rents are extracted from the people, considering the low state 
 of agricultural improvement, as do leave those who produce 
 the rents with little beyond bare subsistence. The law of 
 entail and settlement charges on property often so cripple 
 the landowners that they are frequently, as compared with 
 their nominal property, poor men ; extravagant habits, family 
 pride to live befitting the nominal income, load the estates of 
 such men with incumbrances, until at length the dernier res- 
 sort of an Irish landlord is taken : he flies to Florence and 
 lives at an hotel, where at the table cVhote he can boast of his 
 Irish acres — or he resides in London, in lodgings, and in ob- 
 scurity. In either case there is no capital for the benefit of 
 Ireland. In the one case capital can never be created, in the 
 other case it is sunk and wasted.* The land is left to the 
 
 * " We should think ourselves obliged, as good Irishmen, to confine our 
 expenses within the bounds of an honest and rational frugality, not only that we 
 may keep ourselves and our dependents above the scorn of a base and mercenary 
 world, but that we may not leave them, as too many do, a race of beggars, and a 
 rent charge and burden on a country already sufficiently impoverished. We should 
 therefore try to imitate the thrifty Dutch, who live on two-thirds of their income, 
 and lay up the other for a provision for their children. This alone would make 
 them rich, without the help of their beneficial and extensive trade, and would be 
 no ill remedy to us, who lose every year, by the commodities imported for our 
 luxuiy, what we gain by those we export, by pinching the backs and the bellies 
 of our starved and naked people. I cannot say how this frugal method may be 
 relished by those of our countrymen who generally follow different courses, and 
 are not content vdth spending their income, unless they contract large debts 
 besides, many of which (that they may be as honest as they are wise) they never 
 pay, though their creditors and their famiUes are undone by trusting them. I am 
 sure our country would find the benefit of it if it were followed by all." — Reflec- 
 tions and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, by the late Rev. Dr. 
 Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, p. 33. 
 
 " To speak plainly : to hear a nation bawling out misery and beggary, and to 
 see such numbers of her wise and good children fluttering about the world in 
 splendour and magnificence, seems, at first sight, an irreconcileable contradiction. 
 People that have common sense, humanity, and honesty themselves, will be apt 
 to suppose them in others, and can hardly believe that so many noblemen and 
 gentlemen of Ireland can riot and blaze abroad while some thousands of 'their 
 fellow-citizens are starving for want of their help at home, and their native country 
 is reduced to beggary and a deadly consumption. 
 
 " Even dogs, they say, when sick, know then- own physic, and take it effectaa 
 
 F 2 
 
68 THE SURPLUS PRODUCE EXTRACTED 
 
 management of agents, or it gets into the hands of receivers 
 in Chancery — in either of which «ases there is but one object 
 — to extract as much rent as possible and to expend as little 
 upon the estate as possible. With such a state of things, the 
 want of employment, the distress and misery, and the dis- 
 turbances of Ireland, under whatever name, are not difficult 
 to be accounted for. 
 
 It is necessary, on entering on this discussion, to clear its 
 consideration of some of those habitual mystifications which 
 are thrown about it. Rent is that which is paid for the use 
 of the land by the occupier of the land. Whatever is the 
 rent of the land to the occupier is the rent which is paid for 
 it. How that rent is to be divided, — how much of it is to 
 go to the farmer, who lets part of his land in con-acre to the 
 cottier, — and how much is to go to the land-jobber or middle- 
 man, who lets the land to the farmer and cottier, — and how 
 much is to go to the landowner, who leases it to the middle- 
 man, who lets it to the farmer, who divides it out in con-acre 
 to the cottier, — is not the question. The landlord who leases 
 his land at a fair rent ought not to bear the odium of extract- 
 ing the extreme rents which are often paid for that land, 
 however blameable he may be for permitting his land to 
 be so dealt with.* In the province of Ulster, too, another 
 
 and I therefore heartily wish many of our people at hdnie and abroad may, for 
 the future, give us such proofs of their having some share in this natural instinct 
 as may make us full amends for the want of all rational management of themselves 
 and their substance, to prevent our ruin." — Preface to Dr. Madden' s work, 
 ^^ Rpflections and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland,'' published 
 in 1738. 
 
 * It has long been the fashion to abuse Irish landlords for everything, and to 
 accuse them of exacting the most enormous rents. If, by the term landlord, is 
 meant the landowner, this accusation is most unjust and unmerited when made 
 against landowners as a class. It is true that the i-ents exacted fi-om the occupier 
 are often enormous. But the occupier is very often the sub-tenant of a small 
 farmer, holding, perhaps, half an acre of con-acre land, and paying 3/., 4/., or 5/., 
 rent for it. This is an enormous rent to the poor occupier ; but who is his land- 
 lord ? Pro h&c vice, the farmer is his landlord. Again, perhaps, the farmer 
 pays 21. an acre for the land unJrained, without fences, or buildings, or ofTices 
 
IN THE SHAPE OF HIGH RENTS. 69 
 
 matter has to be taken into consideration in estimating the 
 amount of rent paid for land, — and that is, the tenant-right. 
 In a future letter, I shall take the opportunity of more fully 
 explaining what the tenant-right is, — what its advantages, 
 and what its disadvantages.* At present it is sufficient to 
 explain that the tenant-right is a binding custom which is 
 permitted and prevails more or less throughout Ulster, and 
 it is partly founded on the custom of the tenant making all 
 of what are termed " the improvements" on his farm ; that 
 is, he builds his house and offices, and makes fences and 
 drains. For these " improvements" he claims, amongst other 
 things (which I need not now stay to notice), what is called 
 the " good-will," compensation from the incoming tenant, or 
 they descend to his son, who, in like manner, claims as his 
 inherited right, to sell the " improvements" and " goodwill" 
 of his farm, if he should have to leave it. This " tenant- 
 right" is often sold for 10/., 15Z., and even 20/. the acre ; in 
 fact, often for as much as four-fifths of the value of the fee- 
 simple of the land itself. Now, it is clear, as the landlord 
 has not, as in England, built the tenant's house and made the 
 " improvements," and the tenant is compelled either to make 
 them or pay for them, that, whatever sum is thus expended 
 
 upon it, to some Dublin gentleman, or absent lawyer or doctor, who, as a middle- 
 man, sublets it to him. Well, 21. an acre for land in such condition is an 
 extortionate rent. But who is the farmer's laiidlord ? Not the landowner, but 
 the middleman — the lawyer, or doctor, or shopkeeper, who rents the land of the 
 landowner, and sublets it to the farmer. Pro hdc vice, the middleman is the 
 farmer's landlord. The superior landlord — the landowner — who gets all the 
 blame of all the extortion practised with regard to his land, very probably does 
 not get 10s. an acre for it, and, having let it on lease, cannot help the extortion. 
 It is true that the landowner or his forefathers have been much to blame for their 
 lax management of their estate ; but to heap all the obloquy and abuse upon him 
 — which the extortionate rents, exacted by others for the land which he owns, 
 perhaps deserve — is most unjust. This abuse has been used as a political " clap- 
 trap," without at all defining what the term "landlord" in Ireland means. A 
 very large proportion of the lawyers, doctors, shopkeepers, and farmers of Ireland 
 are, in this obnoxious sense of the term, landlords — in fact, middlemen, 
 * See the Letter, dated Dunfanaghy, Donegal, post. 
 
70 THE SURPLUS PRODUCE EXTRACTED 
 
 by the tenant, the interest of it stands as an equivalent for 
 rent. Thus, where tenant-right exists, for ten acres of land 
 let at IZ. an acre, and for which the tenant has paid 10/. an 
 acre tenant-right, the rent will not be lOZ., but 15Z., or 305. 
 an acre ; that is 10/. for the landlord's rent, and 5/. for the 
 interest of 100/. sunk in purchasing the tenant-right of the 
 ten acres. 
 
 A great deal of the land of this country is let by the large 
 proprietors on leases renewable for ever on payment of a 
 fine, and at a low rent. The leaseholders in these cases 
 rarely cultivate the land themselves ; generally they sublet 
 the whole in patches to farmers and cottiers at a much higher 
 rent, and become what are termed " middlemen." Some- 
 times these middlemen underlet the whole at an increased 
 rent to one man, who again underlets to farmers and cottiers 
 at a further increased rent ; and this second middleman, as 
 he usually extracts a most extortionate rent, employs himself 
 in watching his tenants, and pouncing on every shilling they 
 make ; and sometimes the farmers, in such a case, to enable 
 them to pay these high rents, let out fragments of land ma- 
 nured to cottiers, in what is termed " con-acre," for which the 
 general price is 8/. to 10/. the acre.* Often not only the 
 
 * " A remarkable instance of the various interests jjossessed in the same estate 
 was detailed respecting a large piece of land in the barony of Kilconnel, county 
 Galway. The proprietor in fee is Mr. Alderman Harty, who purchased from an 
 individual in whose favour it had been confiscated after the battle of Aughrim, in 
 the revolution of 1G88. Alderman Harty receives 9d. per acre from Major War- 
 burton, the first lessee ; Mr. Handy pays under an old lease, 2s. Od. an acre to 
 Major Warburton ; John North holds under Mr. Handy, and pays 6s. an acre ; 
 John North has sublet to several small tenants, and receives from them on an 
 average of \l. 7s. an acre. The above particulars were I'ead aloud to the meeting, 
 and it was replied that they were correct." (Poor Inquiry, Ireland, 183G. 
 Appendix' F. par/e 142.) 
 
 The same evidence regarding the barony of Kilconnel, in Galway, states, further 
 on, " Some of the richest tenants in the county will con-acre their lands during 
 the last few years of their lease, for the purpose of taking as much value as pos- 
 sible before their ejection, and thus exhaust the land, or they will threaten to do 
 so, and frighten the landlord into buying up their interest at a high rate. Latoon 
 farm, consisting of 42G acres Irish measure, with a large tract of bog, was leased 
 
IN THE SHAPE OF HIGH RENTS. 71 
 
 original" landowner, but the first leaseholder, or middleman, 
 are absentees. These two, of course, extract the bulk of the 
 rent, which, as absentees, they do not employ as capital in 
 finding" a market for, and employing industry on their 
 estates.* The second middleman is a non-producing man, 
 subsisting on the increased rent ; he is, therefore, supported 
 by the industry of the rest of the community, and helps to 
 
 many years ago, by Lord Clonbrock to Lewis Ward, at an annual rent of 295/. 
 Lewis Ward's representatives let the greatest part of some of it to very small 
 tenants, about thirty in number. Lord Clonbrock, in order to prevent any more 
 subletting or con-acreing, which the representatives of Lewis Ward threatened on 
 a large scale, bought the lease at the cost of 1,700/. The original lease was 
 for three lives, and of those two at the age of 75 and upwards remained at the 
 time of buying up ; yet such was the injury which might have been inflicted 
 during their term that the money was paid to save the estate from total destruc- 
 tion ; no covenants had been inserted, nor, if they had, would they have been 
 of any avaU. Of this farm the profit rent of Lord Clonbrock will be about 200/. 
 a year, and he will spend about 500/. more to buy out the small tenants, and to 
 get them quietly to his mountain- estate, or to remove wherever they please. If 
 these lands had been con-acred they would in five years pay double the purchase- 
 money. {Mr. Birmingham.) — It luoulcl be most desitnible for all parties that 
 the landlord should be compelled to take all improvements at a fair valuation, 
 and the tenant to pay damages for proved ivilful neglect ; sevei'al small farmers 
 exclaimed, that ' hundreds would readily improve if they were sure that they them- 
 selves and not their landlords should have the benefit of the money laid out.' " 
 
 " All who have not the fee-simple, and have tenants under them, are called 
 'middlemen.'" ****** 
 
 " The reduction of rent from 21. (the sum paid to the middleman) to 1/. Is. \d. 
 made by Lord Clonbrock when he had come into possession of part of his estates, 
 proves sufficiently that the absence of interest in the permanent good of the land 
 induces the middleman to press the occupier more than the proprietor finds 
 to be to his tr^ie interest. The proprietor could not make a reduction of rent in order 
 that the occupier might keep the farm in heart, with any certainty that each 
 middleman would make an equal allowance to the other, and the last to 
 the occupier. It would only make the middleman better. — Mr. Filgate, Ibid. 
 page 143. 
 
 * In the evidence taken before the Commissioners of Poor Inquiry (Ireland), 
 in 1836, in the barony of Dromahair, county Leitrira, the Rev. Mr. Montgomery 
 states, that, " the only proprietors of land residing in the barony are Mr. Fawcett, 
 who occupies about fifty acres of land, and Mr. Cullen, who holds about ten, and 
 whose estates do not exceed five-hundred acres respectively." Mr. Nixon says, — 
 " You may say that nineteen-twentieths of this barony are owned by absentees." 
 — Appmdix (F), page 144. I only quote this as an average sample of the evidence 
 on this subject. The blue book is full of similar evidence. 
 
72 THE SURPLUS PRODUCE EXTRACTED 
 
 consume capital, and not to create it. I am now speaking 
 generally, and not with reference to this immediate neigh- 
 bourhood. It will, I think, be conceded by those who know 
 Ireland, that if I had wanted to make a case against landlords 
 for extracting high rents, I should not have come into the 
 province of Ulster ; and, with regard to this immediate neigh- 
 bourhood, the landlords are reputed generally to be good 
 landlords, residing chiefly on their estates, who encourage 
 improvements, and discourage middlemen and subletting. 
 
 I shall now proceed to give one or two instances of the 
 amount of income which a tenant and labourer have under 
 the favourable circumstances of this neighbourhood, and also 
 under the less favourable circumstances of the adjoining 
 county of Leitrim. Not taking town-lands as any criterion, 
 because they rent high from being accommodation-lands, 
 and near this town average from 37. to ol. an acre, land 
 generally is let in this neighbourhood at \l. to 30^. an acre. 
 To this is to be added the interest of the tenant-right, which 
 exists in this county, and rates at 4/. to 61. the acre. In the 
 adjoining county of Leitrim there is much poor grazing land, 
 as well as much very good land, and rents run from \6s. 
 to Zbs. and 21. an acre. The tenant-right is not general 
 there. Now, taking Adam Smith's definition of rent, which 
 is generally conceded to be accurate, and from which Senior, 
 Ricardo, M'Culloch, and other political economists do not 
 materially differ, — "The rent of an estate above ground 
 commonly amounts to what is supposed to be a third of the 
 gross produce ; and it is generally a rent certain and inde- 
 pendent of the occasional variations in the crop," — we will 
 proceed to examine how far the rent usually extracted is a 
 third of the gross produce.* The remaining two-thirds are 
 
 * " Political economists divide the entire produce of the earth into three parts, 
 called wages, profit, and rent."— -Senior, Enci/clopcedia Metropolitana, page 165. 
 
 Modern writers on political economy, however, say that rent ought to be a 
 fourth of the gross produce only, owing to the increase of taxes and other charges 
 
IN THE SHAPE OF HIGH RENTS. 73 
 
 distributed thus by the same author: — one-third for the pay- 
 ment of labour, the cost of seed, and keeping up the stock 
 and implements of husbandry of the farm ; and the remain- 
 ing third as the remuneration and profit of the farmer for the 
 exercise of his care, skill, diligence, and trouble. Every 
 enlightened landlord, therefore, who knoivs his business as a 
 landlord, and who knows that this division is but a fair remu- 
 neration for the farmer, strives by every means to help him 
 to increase the produce, because in so doing he increases his 
 third proportion and becomes entitled to a higher rent. In 
 helping the farmer, therefore, by encouragement, by leases, 
 by making improvements, by draining, and even by lending 
 him capital, the enlightened landlord is pursuing the course 
 of every enlightened merchant and clever tradesman— taking 
 the surest method to increase the value of the commodity in 
 which he deals, and to increase his profit from it. A con- 
 trary course is suicidal to the landlords themselves. The 
 common size of farms in this country is five or six acres ; ten 
 acres is thought to be a good farm. I have ascertained that 
 in this part of the county of Donegal, where rents are 
 reasonable and the landlords fair, the following is the produce 
 and cost of cultivation of a ten- acre farm at the fair rent of 
 \l. an acre. Two-thirds of such a farm will be under culti- 
 vation, the rest fallow, or " grazing," as it is here called. 
 The whole produce of such a farm has been estimated to me 
 by an experienced agent and practical farmer at 30/. The 
 rent is therefore fair. The farm, however, is so small that 
 the farmer is but a superior kind of labourer, rather better 
 paid : — <■ 
 
 since the time that Adam Smith wrote. On this subject the Earl of Mountcashel 
 gave some valuable evidence before Lord Devon's Commission (Evidence Part 3, 
 page 148,) which will be found in the Appendix, No. 4. 
 
74 
 
 THE SURPLUS PRODUCE EXTRACTED 
 
 The seed Avill cost, at least . 
 County-cess, at 5s. an acre . 
 Poor-rates, at 1.?. an acre 
 
 ISTo tithe here 
 
 The farmer labours himself, and estimating 
 
 his labour at the usual wages of a labourer 
 Tenant-right of ten acres at 41. an acre, 40/. 
 
 interest of 40/. at 51. per cent. . 
 Rent of the land .... 
 
 Profit of the farmer for his care, skill, and 
 
 diligence 
 
 £ 
 
 s. 
 
 d. 
 
 4 
 
 
 
 
 
 2 
 
 10 
 
 
 
 
 
 10 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 10 
 
 2 
 
 
 
 10 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 £30 
 
 This farmer, therefore, holding an average-sized farm, is 
 merely a labourer paid at the rate of 1/. a year higher wages 
 than a common labourer. Still he has a house to live in, 
 and potatoes for his family the year round, and is therefore 
 tolerably comfortable, though his ]30sitive remuneration is 
 only some 5d. a week more than a labourer receives. 
 
 Take the case of the labourer m this neighbourhood. He 
 pays 305. rent for his cottage, and if he can get it, 305. for a 
 rood of con-acre, at the rate of 61. an acre, which he manures 
 himself with sea- weed. He therefore lives at 3/. rent. On 
 this rood of land he will grow with a fair crop ten barrels of 
 potatoes at eighty stone the barrel, or five tons. This gives 
 about thirty-two pounds of potatoes per day for the year. He 
 also keeps a pig, which he sells when fatted for 41. He 
 usually gets employment at \s. a day for half the year, under 
 favourable circumstances ; these wages at Qs. a week amount 
 to 11. 16.9. His means of subsistence, then, stand thus : — 
 
 Amount of wages 
 Value of pig 
 
 Deduct rent 
 
 Means of living £8 IG 
 
 £ s. 
 
 d. 
 
 . 7 16 
 
 
 
 . 4 
 
 
 
 £11 1() 
 
 
 
 . 3 
 
 
 
IN THE SHAPE OF HIGH RENTS. 75 
 
 together with thirty-two pounds of potatoes a day.* I have 
 ascertained from the union poor-house here, that the diet 
 given to paupers in the house who do no work is half a 
 pound of meal for breakfast, and one gill of milk ; for dinner, 
 three pounds and a half of potatoes. This is all they are 
 allowed, and the men who thus live complain that they are 
 starved ; but they do no work, and do not require so much 
 food as a labouring man. I am assured that eight pounds of 
 potatoes per day is but a small allowance for a labouring man. 
 The quantity seems extraordinary to English habits ; but I 
 am assured by an eminent surgeon here, that nature accom- 
 modates herself to this kind of food, and that it is a physio- 
 logical fact, that as he requires a larger amount of this poor 
 food to extract from it the necessary quantity of nutriment to 
 support life, so the stomach of a man who thus lives has a 
 proportionate increased capacity. However, be this as it 
 may, I am informed on good authority that a labouring man 
 requires eight pounds of potatoes per day when they form the 
 sole diet.f Taking an average family — a wife and four chil- 
 
 * This is rather higher than the average rate of remuneration. A great number 
 of instances of labourers' earnings and expenditure are collected in the evidence 
 taken by the Commissioners of Poor Inquiry (Irelamd), Appendix (D), page 92 ; 
 but they vary so much in the items and amounts that it is difficult to pick out an 
 average case. Instances of earnings by labourers are given, varying from 3/. 10*. 
 to 8/. per annum, and instances of their total incomes are given varying from 71. 
 to 14/. Deducting, however, rents of con-acre, cottage, cost of pig, and neces- 
 sary outlays, most of these instances leave only from IO5. to 1/. a year for *' con- 
 tingencies," clothes, tobacco, "kitchin," and so forth, over and above the sub- 
 sistence of the family. 
 
 fin the evidence taken by the Commissioners of Poor Inquiry (Ireland), Ap- 
 pendix (E) , page 3 1 , the following statements will be found. ' ' A labourer ' s family- 
 has usually three meals per day. It is stated that about three stones of fourteen 
 pounds each of potatoes per day are requisite for the consvimption of a labourer, his 
 wife, and three or four young children, in order to keep them in health and 
 strength." " A stone and a half of potatoes for a day would be a fair allowance 
 for a man, his wife, and four children ; but if the children be grown up they 
 would require more." (Ibid, page 7.) "A stone of potatoes is the usual 
 allowance for a labouring man's daily food." — Ibid. 
 
 It will therefore be seen that I am under the mark in my calculation, and 
 by no means put an extreme case, which, indeed, I have always on aU occasions 
 carefully avoided. 
 
76 THE SURPLUS PRODUCE EXTRACTED 
 
 dren, and allowing the wife six pounds and the children three 
 pounds each of potatoes per day — we have a consumption of 
 twenty-six pounds of potatoes per day, leaving the refuse and 
 six pounds of potatoes per day for the pig. But a middling- 
 sized pig Avill require, I am informed, about twenty pounds 
 of potatoes per day to feed it. There is, therefore, a defi- 
 ciency of potatoes, which the labourer so jolaced has 81. I6s., 
 or about 3^. 4c/. a week in money, to enable him to provide, 
 together with other requisites for his family. Here, also, we 
 see the labourer has subsistence for his family under ordinary 
 circumstances. If he cannot get any con-acre, or employment, 
 he is then badly off, and destitute great part of the year. 
 
 Both farmer and labourer here, therefore, can manage to 
 subsist in ordinary cases ; but here we have got good land- 
 lords, and I pray you mark, here we have no " Moll^ Ma- 
 guireism." 
 
 I will take now the adjoining county of Leitrim, where the 
 landlords are not in great repute, and where the rents are 
 high. There, land at \l. an acre is grazing land of not very 
 good quality. There is no tenant-right. A ten- acre farm 
 of such land will, I am informed, support four cows, the 
 whole value of the produce of which is \2l. in butter, 4Z. for 
 four calves fed on milk for six months, and a pig 4Z., — or 20/. 
 The value of a cow is 11. The cost of the stock, therefore, is 
 about 30Z. This farmer's account will then stand thus : — 
 
 £ s. d. 
 Interest of money, and keeping up value of 
 
 stock, at 10 per cent 3 
 
 County-cess, at 6*. an acre . . . .300 
 Tithes and poor-rates, 2*. ditto, which the 
 
 tenant is made to pay . . . .10 
 The farmer's labour, at the usual good 
 
 labourer's wages 9 
 
 Rent 10 
 
 £26 
 
IN THE SHAPE OF HIGH RENTS. 77 
 
 The rent of land here is more than one-third of the gross 
 produce, -which is 20Z. ; and this calculation, which is drawn 
 from facts, shows that, as much as it is above one-third, it is 
 more than the farmer can afford to pay. Here the farmer 
 pays 21. too much rent, which, deducted from the amount set 
 down for his wages as a labourer, leaves him but 11. as 
 remuneration for his year's labour, care, skill, and diligence, 
 over and above potatoes and milk. 
 
 Now take the case of the labourer in Leitrim. At Ballina- 
 more wages are Qd. a day. The rent of a labourer's cottage 
 is there 21. IO5., and con-acre is let at 10/. the acre ; one rood 
 would, therefore, be 21. \0s. The labourer, therefore, sits at 
 5/. rent. Taking the same calculation as in the former case, 
 that he is employed half the year at Qd. a day (this is too 
 favourable) his wages will be 3/. 185. 
 
 £ s. d. 
 
 Amount of wages 3 18 
 
 Value of pig 4 
 
 £7 18 
 Deduct rent 5 
 
 £2 18 
 
 And there remains but 21. I85. over and above an insufficient 
 supply of potatoes, or about 1,?. per week, to provide family 
 requisites and help out the potatoes. If he cannot get con- 
 acre, or employment, he starves. 
 
 Both farmer and labourer here, then, are badly off — their 
 rents are exorbitant ; here there are, for the most part, 
 absentee and indifferent landlords, and here, I pray you mark 
 it, is the centre of " Molly Maguireism.'' 
 
 Mr. Griffiths, the Government Commissioner for the 
 General Valuation of Land in Ireland, in his evidence 
 before the Land Commissioners, Appendix, part 1. p. 26, 
 deposes that his valuation is the true value of the land accord- 
 
78 THE SURPLUS PRODUCE EXTRACTED 
 
 ing to the scale of prices contained in the act giving him 
 authority. That act was passed in 1837, when the price of 
 produce was not lower than it is now. This gentleman 
 deposes (p. 25), that, — 
 
 " Generally speaking, in the north of Ireland, indeed I may say 
 throughout Ireland, the amount of my valuation very nearly corresponds 
 with the rent of the large landed proprietors; but it <V 25 per cent, below 
 what may be considered the high letting rents of the country, particularly 
 those of small proprietors and the larger farmers." 
 
 This evidence says nothing ahout the middlemen ; but 
 wherever the large landed proprietors have let on lease to 
 middlemen at a fair rent, it is below the mark to say that 
 the rent is set to the occupying tenant at 25 per cent, above 
 its value. 
 
 Without boring you with quotations from the evidence in 
 support of this position, I will merely state, that, the whole 
 of the three volumes of evidence taken before the Land Com- 
 mission teem with complaints about the high rents ; and 
 wherever I have yet been, it has generally been the first com- 
 plaint made to me. 
 
 I think the examples I have placed before you sufficiently 
 show that such rents keej) the farmer and labourer in poverty 
 and want — that they cannot accumulate wealth into capital 
 to employ labour, and, coupled with absenteeism and the 
 wasting of the capital elsewhere, the country must continue 
 poor. The examples I think, too, show, that with a fair 
 rent and resident landlords you have no disturbances ; with 
 high rents and absentee landlords you are in the midst of 
 outrages ; and if this system be continued, coupled with 
 evils which in former letters I have pointed out, such 
 must ever be the case. Neither college bills, nor education 
 bills, nor Catholic emancipation bills, nor repeal bills, can 
 effect any remedy of this social disorder. The remedy is in 
 the community itself. And until Irishmen act justly and 
 
IN THE SHAPE OF HIGH RENTS. 79 
 
 fairly by one another, help one another, and cease wasting in 
 extravagance, and folly, and idleness, the capital which is 
 wrung from the peasantry, often with harshness and injustice, 
 Ireland will ever continue to be what she ever has been, — 
 a perpetual scene of tumult and distress.* 
 
 * " It is a known maxim in the civil law, ^Interest republicm ut quilibet re 
 sud bene utatur' — (it is of importance to every country that men manage their 
 fortunes well) ; and certainly one of the first leading laws of every nation should be, 
 to regulate^men's conduct, in this great point, to the welfare and general good of the 
 whole. Could we hope for such laws as would effectually restrain our luxury, or 
 force us to frugality and labour, and to increase our trade, — I mean, our useful 
 trade, — ^we should expect to see a happy change in our affairs. But as that is not 
 to be expected immediately, we have no other hazard for "deUverance from our 
 present poverty and misery but what must take its rise from the weak foundation 
 of our own resolution and \Trtue." — Reflections and Resolutions proper for the 
 Gentlemen of Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, 
 p. 4. 
 
80 SKILL AND INDUSTRY THE 
 
 LETTER VI. 
 
 SKILL AND INDUSTRY THE GREAT WANTS OF 
 IRELAND. 
 
 The Criticisms of the Irish Press— The Station of Lough Derg— Skill and Labour 
 required upon the Land to make it both Productive and Profitable — These 
 things are wanted more than Capital, and will create Capital and give Employ- 
 ment — The Profit yielded by cultivating a piece of Land properly, compared 
 with the Profit of the same Land as usually managed in Ireland — Amount of 
 Waste Land in the County of Donegal, which may be cultivated with the like 
 Profit. The great increase of Rent to the Landlords, of Profit to the Farmers, 
 and of Employment to the Labourers which the application of Skill and Industry 
 would effect. These are the " Wants" of Ireland — Questions to be put to those 
 who stand forward to lead the People — True Patriotism, like " Charity," ought 
 " to begin at home." 
 
 DoNEGAi, August 30. 
 Since my last letter to you I have had the opportunity of 
 reading several criticisms of the local papers on my com- 
 munications. Some of them have amused me ; others have 
 excited my regret. Some say, " Oh, we knew that before ; 
 it needed no ghost to tell us that ; but there are other diffi- 
 culties envelojiing the condition of the people of Ireland, — 
 how will you compass them?" Others say, " Oh, The Times 
 holds certain views on the question of landlord and tenant, 
 and therefore its commissioner, it must be fairly concluded, 
 reflects those views, and commences his task as a partisan 
 and a party-writer." To the first class of objectors I may 
 
GREAT WANTS OF IRELAND. 81 
 
 be permitted to say, that though they knew a fact before, 
 the fact is none the weaker for being brought prominently 
 forward, and established as a fact beyond all cavil. They 
 must also remember the adage that " Rome was not built in 
 a day ;" and they will be much mistaken if they anticipate 
 that I shall attempt to grasp the whole question of Irish 
 difficulties at once, and reach per saltiim the top step of 
 the ladder of elucidation. I shall endeavour, so far as I am 
 able, to go step by step, and to establish each step as I go. 
 To the second class of objectors I must beg to express my 
 unfeigned regret at reading this evidence of that party-spirit 
 which blinds the eyes, perverts the judgment, and is the 
 bane of Ireland. To these gentlemen I will at once openly 
 state, that I came here as no partisan, either political or re- 
 ligious. It is ungenerous of you, and it is narrow-minded 
 to suppose it. I came here unfettered by any instruction 
 whatever from you, save this — to use my own judgment to 
 the best of my ability, and to state that which I believe to be 
 the truth from observation and inquiry. This, gentlemen, 
 is va.y party ; these are my "partisan" views; and to these 
 views I shall adhere.* 
 
 On leaving Ballyshannon I went round inland by Pettigo, 
 in order to witness some agricultural improvements which I 
 heard had been effected there, and to have the opportunity 
 of conversing with the very intelligent agent, Mr. Hamilton, 
 of Pettigo, under whose superintendence as an agriculturist 
 the improvements had been carried out. Pettigo is in the 
 immediate neighbourhood of Lough Derg, long celebrated as 
 (what is termed) a " station." To an island in the centre of 
 this lake some 20,000 lloman Catholics from all parts of 
 Ireland annually make a pilgrimage, to undergo a kind of 
 
 * I do not fear to have this assertion of a simple fact, thus early made, put to 
 the test by the most rigid examination of any of these letters. Indeed they have 
 stood the test of examination, of criticism, both friendly and unfriendly, and have 
 sui-vived and overcome flat and abusive contradictions. 
 
82 SKILL AND INDUSTRY THE 
 
 discipline which their church enjoins. This large lake, 
 surrounded with gloomy-looking and barren hills, with a 
 small low island in its centre, completely covered with 
 chapels and lodging-houses, which look in the distance as 
 if standing on the lake — the associations connected with it, 
 and the stories told of it, would afford food for cui-ious 
 reflections ; hut they are here out of place.* The character 
 
 * Some further description of this "station" may, however, not be uninteresting. 
 A " station" is a place to which persons of the Roman CathoHc faith are required 
 to make a pilgrimage as a kind of penance. Lough Derg is about six miles from 
 Pettigo. The first three miles are on the high road, and then a narrow bad road — 
 which it has been worth while to make, owing to the number of pilgrims who resort, 
 to the place — branches over the most dreary looking moor and bog to the edge of 
 the lake, where there is a ferry-boat kept at a rude kind of quay, to ferry the pil- 
 grims to the island in the centre of the lake. The lake itself is about four miles in 
 diameter each way. It is surrounded by perfectly barren hills, and anything 
 more dreary and gloomy it is impossible to conceive. The " station" contmues 
 about a month, and, during its holding, pilgrims flock there from all jiarts. As 
 I drove down the road to the lake, some children ran out of two or three peasants' 
 huts on the road-side, with handfuls of rudely carved little wooden crucifixes, to 
 offer me for sale. These are sold to the pilgrims on their way to the "station," and 
 are afterwards preserved by them, with the greatest devotion, as proofs or trophies 
 of their pilgrimage. I bought a child's handful of these crucifixes for a shilling. 
 On the way down, the carman called at the boatman's cottage to tell him to ferry 
 me over to the island, which he did in a most crazy old boat. The island itself is 
 about two miles from the shore. For the right of ferrying across, the ferryman 
 pays a yearly rent of 160/. ; and such is the enormous number of pilgrims who 
 flock to the island, that he realizes 400/. a year from the ferry, his charge bemg 
 sixpence for each person. At the time I visited it — the latter end of August— the 
 " station" had been over about ten days. 
 
 The island is about fifty yards long by fifteen yards in breadth ; in fact, 
 extremely small. It is also very low, the highest part of it not being more 
 than two yards above the surface of the water. In the centre of it grows a solitary 
 sycamore tree, which is carefully preserved. On this small space are crowded a 
 priory — where the prior and the priests who officiate live during the continuance 
 of the station — seven lodging-houses, and two chapels. These buildings, with the 
 exception of a small space in the centre of the island round the tree, cover almost 
 every foot of it to the water's edge ; and, as you approach it, the buildings ajipear 
 as though standing on the water. The first thing that struck my attention on 
 landing was a large and excellent boat, hauled on shore close to the landing-place, 
 and bottom upwards, to preserve it till next "station." It was as large as a 
 herring fishing-boat, and capable of conveying thirty or forty people across the 
 ferry. The first building is the prior's house. I ought to premise, that the old 
 boatman and his son who went with me wereveiy communicative, and readily told 
 
GREAT WANTS OF IRELAND. 83 
 
 of the country generally is that of a succession of swelling 
 hills, which, as they are uncultivated for the most part, look 
 barren. They are covered with heather, the sombre appear- 
 
 me everything I asked them. From ten to fifteen priests are usually engaged 
 during the " station," and lodge in the prior's house. No person was now living 
 on the island, and all the houses were closed. On looking through the windows 
 of the priory, the accommodation of the priests appeared to he of the rudest 
 description, — unpainted white wood chairs, tables, and bedsteads, and sawdusty 
 floors. Each of the seven lodging-houses accommodates from twelve to twenty 
 persons in a simDar rough way. To the poorest pilgrims, twopence a night is 
 charged for the use of a chafF-bed ; for those better off, threepence a night for the 
 use of a feather-bed. The lodging-house-keepers also sell the ^pilgrims oaten 
 bread, which, with water, is the only diet they are allowed to take whilst on the 
 island. The continuance of the pilgrims on the island is from three to nine days, 
 according to the penance they are ordered to perform. The two chapels are large 
 and roomy. They contained only very rude forms for seats. One of them is 
 used for divine service, the other for prayers (fasting and praying), and for con- 
 fessions.' On the pilgrims"first landing' in the island, they pay a toU^of sixpence 
 halfpenny each to' the prior for the right to land. Tliey are then taken to a corner 
 of the island, where a roughly made 'stone-cross, with some almost obliterated 
 figures carved upon it is elevated. Round this cross is a pathway of small 
 sharp stones, which seemed tracked by being continually walked "over. Round 
 this cross, the pilgrims are made to walk barefoot nine times, repeating a number 
 of prayers. Tliey are then ushered into the largest chapel, which' is called the 
 " prison," where they must fast and pray through the whole of the first night of 
 their landing. They are warned against falling asleep, as they are taught that to 
 do so will bring on them the displeasure of God, and will be punished by purgatoiy. 
 In order to keep themselves awake, each formful of people appoints a watchman 
 — (and they take this office in turns each hour throughout the night), — whose 
 duty it is, with a small stick, if necessary, to give a smart rap to the poor exhausted 
 creature who may be dozing off to sleep. Many of these poor creatures, after, 
 perhaps, a long pilgrimage, have walked that day a dozen miles, and have been 
 kept waiting, perhaps for hours,'without food, before their turn came to be ferried 
 across ; and they are not permitted to taste food the first night of their arrival on 
 the island, — they must "fast and pray." Physically exhausted, too, by their 
 own religious enthusiasm and fenour, and perhaps with sore feet, cut by the 
 sharp stones they have been made to walk over, it is no wonder that they should 
 be in danger of sleeping. 
 
 I was informed that as many as five hundred or six hundred people will often 
 be on this island at once, going through the various stages of their penances. 
 
 The morning after the pilgrims' arrival, after a night thus spent, he or she has 
 to confess to one of the priests. In this larger chapel, there are eight or ten wood 
 confession-boxes, like watchmen's boxes, in which the priests sit, closed up, except 
 a small window in front. At the side of these boxes is a small square hole, through 
 which the kneeling penitent confesses his or her sins into the ear of the priest 
 
 G 2 
 
84 SKILL AND INDUSTRY THE 
 
 ance of which is only varied by a green cultivated spot here 
 and there, or, where the ground has been cut for turf, by a 
 black bog. I was assui-ed by Mr. Hamilton that the greater 
 
 inside. The priest then orders a certain amount of penance or discipline to be 
 gone through proportioned to the enormity of the offences of which the pilgiim 
 has been guilty. A shilling fee is charged for the confession, though often more 
 is given. 
 
 Then comes the performance of the penances. To effect this object, there are 
 six low, roughly-made, little circular erections of stones, with a doorway or 
 entrance into the inside of the circular erection. Tlie stones are formed into a 
 kind of low circular wall. Within each of these inclosures, in the centre, is 
 erected a stone cross, rudely cai-ved, and green over with the weather. Round 
 each cross, within the circular wall, is a pathway of small sharp stones ; and round 
 the outside of the circular wall is another pathway of sharp stones of a larger 
 description — big stones, placed edge-ways and corner-ways ujJj without regularity, 
 and up and down quite uneven. These little circular erections are about three 
 yards in diameter. There are six of these, all of the same kind. The pilgrims, 
 for one penance, are made to walk nine times round the pathway round the cross 
 bare-footed over the sharp stones ; and, according to their penance, they are made 
 to walk or crawl a certain number of times on their hare knees — men and 
 women — round the outside of the circular erection of stones. Great offenders ai'e 
 com]ielled to walk or crawl the same number of times round a sunilar pathway 
 made round each chapel. The greater distance to go, of course, increases their 
 suffering. They are made to repeat a certain number of prayers as they walk, 
 following each other as closely as they can go. After going through their stated 
 penance, they obtain absolution, and depart from the island to make room for 
 others. In this manner, three or four hundred fresh people come and go each 
 day that the station contuiues. The wonder is, where they can all be stowed away 
 on fco small an island. 
 
 At another corner of the island, a large iron boiler is built up in brick work, 
 with a fireplace underneath it for boiling the water of the lake. This the priests 
 bless, and it is given out to the people as hot as they can drink it, and is called 
 " wine." They say they derive much benefit from it ; and, being given to them 
 scalding hot, no doubt it does exhilarate their exhausted frames. 
 
 On looking into one of the lodging-house-windows, I saw a large printed bill 
 stuck with wafers against the opposite wall. There was a large crucifix printed 
 on it, and over it the words, — " The sacred beauty of Jesse." 
 
 On one of the stone crosses, I saw, rudely engraved, a cross, with the words, 
 almost obliterated by time,—" St. Bios, St. Peter— pray for us." 
 
 This protracted and severe discipline vei7 often occasions death amongst 
 delicate pilgrims. Those who thus die are conceived to be sujiremely happy. 
 They are buried on an adjacent island, which is called " Holy Island." I visited 
 this island. It is larger than the station island, with a few bushes on it. I saw a 
 number of graves there ; some of persons who were drowned in crossing the ferry — 
 for when it blows hard the lake is very rough, and the boats are so over-crowded 
 
GREAT -WANTS OF IRELAND. 85 
 
 part of these dismal, thougli not iinpicturesque-looking hills, 
 might be made almost as fertile and as smiling with the 
 evidences of quiet plenty as a garden. 
 
 with anxious pilgrims, that, on one or two occasions, the boat has been swamped 
 in crossing. 
 
 Whilst on Station Island, a party of four peasants came to it in a boat. They 
 were not farmers, and I did net know what to make of them at first. I confess I 
 did not relish their joining my boatman, and at once going with me, and following 
 me familiarly, as it was getting dusk, and I was alone on this island with them, 
 my carman being two mUes off on the mainland. On leaving the island, they 
 asked me to get into their boat, as it was a better one than the boatman's. Though 
 civil I did not Uke this either ; but esteeming it impoUtic to show distrust, I imme- 
 diately and boldly assented, taking care, however, to put myself in a position in 
 the boat where I could defend myself, if necessarj', and also to be on my guard. I 
 had not been long in the boat before they asked me if I had ever seen a " still" at 
 M'ork ? I said, ' ' No. ' ' * ' Would you like to see one, sir ? ' ' said they. I again answered, 
 readily, — " If it is not much out of the way, I have no objections." They 
 immediately pulled to another small low island in the lake, which they pointed 
 out, and from which a " smoke" was rising, and there I saw twenty gallons of 
 wort in tubs, hid amongst bushes, and a still and worm in full work. I asked 
 them, — " Are you not afraid of the revenue police .' — they are stationed within a 
 few miles of you." " Oh, no, sir ! " replied they ; " we have two or three watches 
 set on the hills round the lake, who would give us a signal. We should see any 
 boat coming to us, and, before it could reach us, we would sink our tubs, knock 
 off the head of the worm, and carry off our wort and whiskey in the boat to the 
 other side of the lake before they got to the island." To please them, by showing 
 confidence in them, I landed and tasted their wort, and they showed me their 
 process of making whiskey, and a rudely made kiln for drying malt on the island. 
 They then landed me safely, when it was neai-ly dark, and I returned with my 
 car to Pettigo. All these men and the boatmen concurred in telhng me the same 
 story of what was done on " Station" Island ; and, to my repeated questions, 
 they all assured me that they had often seen the pUgrims going round and round 
 the circular walls on their bare knees, and with bare feet, over the rough and 
 sharp pathways. Mr. Hamilton at the Inn at Pettigo, told me the same thing. 
 
 I state the facts so far as I saw them, and I had no reason to doubt what was 
 told me, corroborated, as it was, by what I saw. I came away with certainly no 
 very exalted idea of the Roman Catholic faith, which could thus degrade the 
 intellect of man into the belief that personal torture changes the heart, or that cut 
 feet and bleeding knees are acceptable sacrifices with God. It was a curious 
 reflection, too, to have thus associated together this island of smugglers with the 
 island of penance. Far be it from me, however, to ridicule the Roman Catholics 
 for their faith. We must remember our own glass-houses. The Dissenters have 
 their "jumpers" in chorus in a circle, whilst they implore our Saviour to come 
 amongst them. And even we of the Church of England have those amongst us 
 who think that preaching in a white surpUce and praying with our faces to an altar 
 
86 SKILL AND INDUSTRY THE 
 
 Let US now bear in mind that the want most prominently 
 and frequently put forward in Ireland, is the want of capital^ 
 and that the want most felt by its poor is the want ofemjjloy- 
 ment ; and I will proceed to put you in possession of Mr. 
 Hamilton's experience, the practical effect of acting upon 
 which I saw . 
 
 Mr. Hamilton rents a farm, for which he pays I85. an 
 acre rent. Some of it is tolerably good land ; other parts of 
 it are miserably poor. The surface of the soil is of a thin, 
 sandy character ; the subsoil is composed partly of blue 
 gravel mixed with a large portion of blue clay, and partly 
 of red gravel. 
 
 Close to the town is a field on a steep hill-side, which 
 three years ago was perfectly barren, and which is 1 acre 
 and 18 perches in extent. It grew ragweed, rushes, and 
 thistles, had a fine crop of stone on its surface, and was not 
 worth 2s. Qd. a year rent ; in fact, it was worth nothing — a 
 perfect waste, over which the pigs wandered to pick up what 
 they could find, and which might occasionally serve the pur- 
 pose of drying linen. This piece of land, from its wretched 
 appearance, went in the village by the nicknames of " Clover 
 Field," and " Whistle Bare." This field it was determined 
 to reclaim by a process Avhich Mr. Hamilton had before 
 
 are the only sure roads to salvation. These, however, are formalities (to call them 
 by no worse name) which originate in weak or excited minds, and which have in 
 them little of the vital spirit of Christianity — of that something beyond this world, 
 in fact, which the intellect of man soars to and wants, and which, as beings pos- 
 sessed of intellect — no matter of what faith — we shall do well to dispense with. 
 
 Inglis, in his " Journey through Ireland," gives an account of Lough Dergand 
 its station, which will be found in page 295. 
 
 The amount of money thus realized by the priesthood, from about 20,000 
 pilgrims yearly, may be easily estimated. 
 
 No doubt, the obtainment of money is the chief reason for the continuance of 
 these degrading penances. But how can you blame the priesthood for thus working 
 on the fanaticism and ignorance of their flocks, in order to obtain money, if you 
 give tliem no other means of living. Those who opi)Ose a state endowment of the 
 priesthood — wholly apart from other considerations — take the most effectual means 
 for continuing these practices. 
 
GREAT WANTS OF IRELAND. 87 
 
 adopted with success, and which I will endeavour to explain. 
 The strata of which land is formed, are termed hj agricul- 
 turists "surface-soil" and "subsoil." The upper part of the 
 subsoil, immediately below the surface-soil, to a depth of two 
 or three inches, is called " active subsoil," and is of use when 
 mixed with the surface-soil in promoting vegetation. These 
 strata of soil are generally in irregular layers, and are easily 
 discernible on digging into the land. Though the surface- 
 soil is even and level on its surface, from cultivation or from 
 the effect of the weather, no matter what the inclination of 
 the surface may be, yet the subsoil is always found to be full 
 of indentations and to be uneven on its upper surface, so that 
 the surface-soil spread over it, and which is even and level, 
 is necessarily often only a few inches thick in some places, 
 and in others will be one or two feet in thickness. The 
 upper crust of the subsoil — the active subsoil — is almost 
 always impervious to wet ; if it is of clay formation, it holds 
 the water ; and even if of sand formation, there is a kind of 
 crystallization of its surface which makes it almost impene- 
 trable to water.* The rain-water which falls on the surface 
 
 * The Irish term this upper crust of the subsoil the lack leagh, or " grey flag." 
 It is from an eighth to a quarter of an inch m thickness, and contains a consider- 
 able proportion of the oxide of iron, which gives it the colour and appearance of 
 rusty iron. In all cases, this lach leagh retains the water in its cups and indenta- 
 tions, and prevents the water which filters through the bog or surface-soil from 
 filtering through the earth beneath it. It seems to be a crystallized deposit — the 
 accumulation of ages — and when broken up and exposed to the surface, it quickly 
 dissolves, and then forms a most active manure. It gives back, in fact, to the 
 sou an ingredient which has washed out of and settled through it. 
 
 This lach leagh is one of the chief obstacles to the permanent reclamation of 
 deep bog. It is foixnd immediately under bog in the same manner as under the 
 surface-soil ; and, in the same manner, there retains the surface-water which filters 
 through the bog. This water, from the spongy nature of bog, is again attracted 
 upwards by capillary attraction. So that, however much deep bog may be 
 drained and cultivated, unless it is supplied with fresh gravel and calcareous 
 matter each year, it has a tendency to run back into bog. Capillary attraction 
 from below keeps the surface-earth always cold emd moist, and rushes and aquatic 
 plants show themselves, and no draining can efficiently remedy this evil. It is a 
 great object, therefore, to get down to this lach leagh, and break it up, either by 
 
88 SKILL AND INDUSTRY THE 
 
 of the ground, and filters through the surface-soil, is retained 
 on reaching the active subsoil, or very slowly filters through 
 it, or evaporates by the heat of the sun through the surface- 
 soil. These facts are known well enough to agriculturists, 
 v/ho, by draining, endeavour to draw off this water from the 
 subsoil where it is retained. Mr. Hamilton, hoAvever, con- 
 ceived that, as the surface of the subsoil is full of indenta- 
 tions, and is very irregular and uneven, the mere effect of 
 
 burning or cutting away the bog — first, because drainage will then be effective, and 
 that surface-water, which filters through the surface-soil, will not be retained 
 there, but filter away through the porous substratum ; and, secondly, because the 
 lach leagh, or active subsoil, is in itself a most valuable manure. I saw evidence 
 of the truth of this theory on the estate of Colonel Knox Gore, near Ballma, in 
 Mayo, a gentleman of very considerable scientific attainments, to whom I had the 
 honour to be introduced. He informs me, that, by adopting this plan of culti- 
 vating bog, " all the expense of labour, hire, manure, &c., is amply paid by the 
 two first [crops of potatoes. You are secure of a splendid crop of oats, with 
 meadow the year after, and herbage fit to feed cattle or sheep for the future, and 
 the land improving with each rotation of tillage. Sheep I invariably put on such 
 lands. They feed to the highest perfection ; and such land is so wholesome for 
 sheep that they never get the rot. This is perhaps from the astringent property 
 of the bog, which forms so great a part of the soil." I saw many evidences of 
 the truth of this on this gentleman's beautifully cultivated farm. It is pitiable to 
 see the hundreds of thousands of acres of bog in Ireland, which may thus be 
 profitably reclaimed by the application of skill and industry, producing nothing. 
 
 * " The best and richest soil," say Boate and Molyneaux, iu their " Natural 
 History of Ireland," published in 1726 — a book which is considered as high 
 authority — " if but half a foot or a foot deep, and if lying upon a stiffy clay or 
 hard stone, is not so fertile as a leaner soil of greater depth, and lying upon sand 
 or gravel, through which the superfluous moisture may descend ; and not standing 
 still, as upon the clay or stone, make cold the roots of the grass, of corn, and so 
 hurt the tvhole. 
 
 " Neither com nor grass will grow kindly where the ground, though otherwise 
 good, is not deep enough, as also where it hath a lad crust underneath ; from 
 whence it cometh, that in many places where the grass doth grow very thick and 
 high, the same, nevertheless, is so unfit for the food of beasts, that cows and sheep 
 will hardly ^touch it (especially if they have been kept in better pastures first), 
 except that, by extreme famine, they be compelled thereto, and that^by reason of 
 the coarseness and sourness of the grass, caused by the standing still of the water ; 
 the which, through the unfitness of the nether crust, finding not a free passage 
 downwards, maketh cold the good mould, and the crop and grass degenerate 
 from its natural goodness." — Boate and Molyneaux's Natural History of 
 Ireland, p. 49. 
 
GREAT WANTS OF IRELAND. 
 
 89 
 
 gravity would cause the water which filtered through the 
 surface-soil to run into and fill these numerous cups and 
 indentations, which would still retain much water in spite of 
 draining by the usual method. He therefore conceived the 
 plan of levelling the surface of the subsoil and rendering it 
 even, first taking ofi" the surface-soil, concluding that this 
 would render fewer drains necessary, and make the drain- 
 ing more beneficial. The efiect of water being held in the 
 numerous cups and indentations on the surface of the subsoil 
 is to perish and starve the roots of whatever may be planted 
 in the surface-soil. In order to accomplish this end, he 
 adopted the following plan : — It is usual to commence 
 reclaiming land by marking out potato-beds and draining 
 between the beds. These, I believe, are called by farmers 
 " lazy-beds ;" and a field is laid out in them like the follow- 
 ing diagram, which will make the explanation easy : — 
 
 1 
 
 2 
 
 3 
 
 
 4 
 
 
 5 
 
 
 6 
 
 
 7 
 
 
 8 
 
 
 9 
 
 
 
 The broad patches marked " 1" and " 2" &c. are the beds; 
 the narrow patches are where the drains are to be. The 
 beds are four feet broad ; the drains one foot. The surface- 
 soil on patch " 1 " was completely removed to one side of the 
 field, after having been dug, and shovelled off together with 
 the upper part of the subsoil, or " active subsoil." The 
 subsoil was then made perfectly even on its surface, and, if 
 possible, an inclination was given to it to drain ofi" the water. 
 The patch or bed marked " 2" was then commenced, and 
 the surface-soil and active subsoil in like manner dug and 
 shovelled ofi" it, and placed upon the bed marked " 1 " which 
 had now the subsoil made even and ready to receive it. In 
 
90 
 
 SKILL AND INDUSTRY THE 
 
 this manner all the beds were gone through, and the " sur- 
 face-soil" was again evenly spread, being mixed with " active 
 subsoil," upon the " subsoil," levelled and made even, and 
 with an inclination to run off the water. The earth which 
 had been removed off the lazy-bed marked "1," to one side of 
 the field, was then wheeled on to the last lazy-bed, when the 
 subsoil was levelled and prepared to receive it. The stones 
 picked out of the land were laid where the drains are, and 
 afterwards broken and used in forming a deep permanent 
 drain every thirty feet apart. The advantages of this plan are 
 these : — the water having a tendency to drain itself off the 
 inclined and even surface of the subsoil, fewer expensive 
 permanent drains are therefore needed ; there are no longer 
 any indentations on the surface of the subsoil to hold and 
 retain water, which drains cannot affect, and which might 
 render the draining imperfect; the active subsoil is well 
 mixed with the surface-soil, and the surface-soil is thereby 
 increased and improved in quality; and, lastly, the surface- 
 soil is spread an even thickness, insuring an even crop. 
 
 I will now give you the expenditure of reclaiming and 
 sowing with a first crop this field of 1 acre and 1 8 perches, 
 which was not worth 2s. 6d. a year, and the results which 
 have been produced by it. The following was the expen- 
 diture : — 
 
 36 men digging, &c., at 8d. a day . 
 9 boys dropping potatoes, at 3d. a day 
 Manuring . . . . , 
 Average rent not worth 2s. 6d 
 18 men, at 8d. a-day, shovelling potatoes 
 36 men digging potatoes, at 8d. a day 
 36 boys, as gatherers, at Sd. a day 
 Expenses of re-forming the ground 
 
 County- cess 
 
 Total cost of reclaiming, rent, manuring, 
 
 and setting . . . . £18 
 
 £ 
 
 s. 
 
 d. 
 
 1 
 
 4 
 
 
 
 
 
 2 
 
 3 
 
 8 
 
 2 
 
 
 
 
 
 18 
 
 
 
 
 
 12 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 4 
 
 
 
 
 
 9 
 
 
 
 5 
 
 7 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 2 
 
 G 
 
 10 
 
GREAT WANTS OF IRELAND. 91 
 
 The produce was 52 barrels of potatoes, at 60 stone the 
 barrel, — which, at the low price of 75. 6d. a barrel, 
 
 £ s. d. 
 Amounts to . . ... 19 10 
 
 Cost of reclaiming and first crop . . . 18 10 
 
 Profit the first year . . . . £19 2 
 
 The second year the crop was laid down in oats and 
 grasses. The produce was 10 score and 8 stocks of straw, 
 covering- the cost of rent, seed, labour, and all expenses ; and 
 15 sacks and 8 stones of oats at 24 stone the sack — which, 
 at \%s. a sack (the then selling price), left a clear profit the 
 second year of 13/. 16^. This year, which is the third year, 
 there have been 4 tons 17 cwt. of hay grown by this field, 
 which, 
 
 £ s. d. 
 Attwo guineas atou, amounts to . . 10 3 8 
 
 Deduct rent and county-cess . . . 110 
 
 Leaving clear profit . . . . £9 2 8 
 
 The after-grass pays the labour of cutting and making the 
 hay. 
 
 I walked over this field — there was on it a thick crop of 
 
 after-grass. The adjoining field had been thus reclaimed 
 
 two years, and was growing a splendid crop of oats and 
 
 clover as its second crop. At the other side of the hedge, 
 
 Mr. Hamilton led me into a field, well lying on the top of 
 
 the hill, the land of which he said was worth 205. an acre 
 
 rent. Two years ago it gave a crop of potatoes, followed 
 
 last year by a crop of oats. It was not then laid down 
 
 in grass, nor is it drained, but cultivated after the manner 
 
 which prevails in Ireland. This, its third year, it is growing 
 
 a very thick crop of ragweed, mixed with rushes, a few 
 
 windle straws here and there, some thistles, half the ground 
 
 black without any verdure upon it, and the rest natural grass, 
 
 and, according to the estimation of the farmer with me, not 
 
92 SKILL AND INDUSTRY THE 
 
 worth 25. 6cL an acre this year. The farmers in the neigh- 
 bourhood see, by example, the advantage of following this 
 plan of improvement, and of cultivating their land with skill 
 and labour, and under the wise encouragement of the land- 
 lord, w^ho grants them 1 /, an acre for reclaiming their barren 
 land under the superintendence of Mr. Hamilton his agent 
 and agriculturist, 20 acres were reclaimed two years ago, 50 
 acres last year, and it is anticipated, from what the farmers 
 say, that 150 acres will be reclaimed this year. 
 
 Agriculture is not my profession, but I have taken the 
 pains to master these facts, and to understand what I have 
 been endeavouring to explain, I hope, with the clearness 
 which will make the explanation intelligible ; and now I 
 will bring them to bear on the object which I have in view. 
 
 We have here a patch of land — nicknamed " Whistle- 
 bare," because of its sterility and rugged appearance — not 
 worth 2^. 6d. an acre rent, and which, estimating its utility 
 as a drying-ground or play-ground, or waste for pigs to pick 
 up roots in, at the most extravagant rate, could not be worth 
 one guinea a year in value to the farmer. But take it at 
 this value, which exactly covers the average rent of 18^. 
 an acre and the county-cess, and we have it in three years 
 yielding no profit, but say worth 31. 3s. After being re- 
 claimed, we have this same piece of land, in the last three 
 years, yielding — 
 
 £ s. d. 
 1st year, over and above every cost . . 19 2 
 
 2nd ditto, ditto ditto . . . . 13 16 
 3rd ditto, ditto ditto . . . . 9 2 8 
 
 Clear profit over and above rent and cul- 
 
 tivation, in three years . . £24 7 10 
 
 Now, just cast your eye over the amount of labour shewn 
 to have been employed in reclaiming this piece of land in the 
 first year alone, in the account of the expense of it which I 
 have above aiven. 
 
GREAT WANTS OF IRELAND. 93 
 
 I am informed by Mr. Hamilton, tlie agent, and the farmer, 
 that this piece of land of 1 acre and 18 perches, thus im- 
 proved, will yield on the average from 8/. to 10/. profit a year 
 to the farmer ; will give employment for 40 days' labour 
 a year ; and it is now worth two guineas a year rent. 
 
 But there are thousands of acres of such land in Donegal, 
 which might be reclaimed with equal profit and advantage 
 to all parties. I will not, however, speak wildly, but by the 
 book. The following is what the Occupation of Land Com- 
 missioners say in their report regarding this county (page 
 49): — 
 
 " County of Donegal. — The waste lands of this county are more ex- 
 tensive than any other in Ireland, Avith the exception of ]Mayo ; and, 
 owing to the wetness of climate and nature of the subsoil, they are, pro- 
 bably, the least improvable. There -can be no doubt, hoAvever, that vast 
 tracts may be easily reclauned by the expenditure of a moderate capital 
 and the introduction of additional labourers. From a careful examination, 
 it Avould appear that Donegal contains about 760,000 acres of unimproved 
 and uncultivated land, 253,000 acres of which are situate at elevations 
 which exceed 800 feet above the level of the sea ; and, in such a climate, 
 unless in favoured and sheltered spots, cultivation should not be 
 attempted at elevations exceeding 800 feet. ... It is probable that 
 within the limits of the county of Donegal there are about 150,000 acres 
 which might be improved for cultivation; 250,000 acres might be 
 drained, and thus rendered available for the rearing of j^oung cattle ; and 
 369,000 acres of mountain-land, which it is probable would not repay 
 the expense of draining." 
 
 This is adopted by the Commissioners of Inquiry into the 
 Occupation of Land in Ireland, from a return made to them 
 by Mr. Griffiths, the General Valuation Commissioner, and 
 therefore is the best authority on the subject. 
 
 Now, let us simply take the 150,000 waste acres in this 
 county " which might be improved for cultivation," and 
 apply the means of calculation which the produce of 
 " Whistle-bare" field affords, and what an enormous result 
 does it give ! Instead of two guineas rent, take one guinea 
 
94 SKILL AND INDUSTRY THE 
 
 for land now worth nothing, and you have an increase of 
 rent to the landlords of 150,000 guineas a year in this county : 
 instead of a produce worth 8/. or lOl. per acre a year on the 
 average, put it at 51., and you have an increase of wealth 
 among the tenant farmers of 750,000/. a year ; and instead 
 of forty days' labour a year provided for labourers, take 
 twenty days' labour, and you have given 2,000,000 day 
 labour a year, or, at six days a week, constant employment 
 every working day in the year for 6,390 labourers in this 
 county alone. Yet this is but one-half the result which the 
 proper cultivation of " Whistle-bare" field exhibits. 
 
 There stands a fact regarding this county, as an example 
 of what Ireland is capable of becoming ; what it is, is but 
 too well known. And yet you will find Irishmen by the 
 score declaim about the want of capital, and the wa7it of em- 
 ployment, in Ireland ! Why, here is a perfect mine of capital, 
 vraiting to be realized ; and more employment for the 
 people than there are people for the eraj^loyment. But 
 Ireland is disturbed, because its people want employment, 
 and consequently bread ; and therefore they are ready to 
 listen to any wild chimera which promises them relief, or to 
 enter into any combination or commit any outrage which 
 they mistakingly imagine will procure them relief. Oh, 
 how exquisitely absurd appear college bills, and Repeal 
 demonstrations, and Orange demonstrations, to obtain 
 peace, and order, and prosperity to Ireland, after contem- 
 plating such a palpable and straightforward means as this 
 for insuring plenty, and occupation, and wealth, and conse- 
 quent contentment and peace ! 
 
 Yet the remedy is a social one ; a Government can do 
 little here. If Irish gentlemen and Irishmen will not put to 
 use those means of prosperity and greatness which are 
 abundantly given to them, it is difficult to conceive with 
 what face they can ask Englishmen to help them. Why 
 whine about " English capital," when you have capital at 
 
GREAT WANTS OF IRELAND. 95 
 
 your very doors ■whenever you choose to win it ? It was 
 not thus that Englishmen won their capital. Had, however, 
 the Government proposed a grant of equal amount to that 
 which has this year been given (apparently but to ex- 
 asperate Ireland, in wounding her religious prejudices) to 
 be spent in promoting the reclamation of waste lands in 
 Ireland, in bonuses of IZ. an acre to the farmers, and in 
 salaries to intelligent agriculturists to direct the people and 
 certify that the bonuses were deserved, as is now done by 
 a private landowner at Pettigo, though the relief would have 
 been but trifling as compared with the extent of the mis- 
 chief, yet it would at least have had this much in its favour 
 — it could have offended no sensible man in Ireland. lu 
 increasing the wealth and means of comfort of the tenant- 
 farmers (even though they paid treble rent), and* in afford- 
 ing employment to labourers, the capability of consumption 
 of large masses of people would have been much increased, 
 and so many tax-paying commodities would have been 
 consumed, that (what cannot be said of the present grant) a 
 considerable portion of the sum granted would have found 
 its way back into the Exchequer in the shape of increased 
 Customs and Excise duties ; and according to the increased 
 
 * It is, however, \evj difficult to convince an Irish farmer that he gains more 
 by well cultivating his land, even though a higher rent is demanded for it, than 
 by neglecting his land and paying a low rent. It is a positive fact that an Irish 
 farmer feels better satisfied to pay 10*. an acre rent for neglected land, the 
 produce of which does not realize 21., than to pay 30*. an acre for land well 
 cultivated, the produce of which realizes bl. It is clear that, in the one case, he 
 gains only 30s. profit above the rent, whilst, in the other case, he gains a profit of 
 3/. 10s. above the rent. This, however, seems to be a remote calculation beyond 
 his comprehension. Besides, it has that great "bugbear" to an Irish farmer, 
 something of uncertainty about it, and the benefit, to his mind, is remote ; 
 whereas the difference between 10*. rent and 30*. rent is palpable, certain, imme- 
 diate. He therefore invariably, absurd as it may appear, i^refers to keep his land 
 half cultivated for fear of a rise in his rent, though, for every shilling additional 
 rent that he would have to pay his landlord for well cultivating his land, he 
 would, of necessity, put 3*. into his own pocket. (See the first Letter, dated 
 Limerick, ^oat, proving this to be the fact in the county of Clare.) 
 
96 SKILL AND INDUSTRY THE 
 
 comfort would have been the prohabihty of increased 
 tranquillity. It is, however, the landowners of Ireland 
 alone who can work out this remedy efficiently. 
 
 If I might be permitted, I would suggest to sensible 
 Irishmen, before they allow themselves to be led away after 
 wild projects and into foolish " demonstrations" (whether at 
 the beck of men who throw up their hats and cry 
 " Hurrah for Repeal," or of men who set the drums 
 agoing as Orange arguments, to prove how Ireland is to 
 be tranquillized and made prosperous and liap23y), to pro- 
 pose one of two questions to their leaders, on whichever side 
 they may happen to be : — 
 
 First. — " Have you any stake in the country ?" 
 
 If the gentleman to whom this question is addressed 
 answers " No ;" however much you may esteem his talents 
 and individual worth, tell him plainly, that as he has nothing 
 to lose by a commotion he may possibly be a rash and in- 
 cautious leader ; and as he may gain by a commotion, he 
 may possibly not be a disinterested leader, and beg him 
 to retire, for you will not follow him. 
 
 If he answer " Yes," or you know him to be a man of 
 station and landed property, then ask him this : — 
 
 Second. — " Have you, sir, cultivated and improved every 
 acre of your own estate as much as it is capable of being- 
 improved, and let it at a fair rent to your tenant ?" 
 
 The probability is, if he answer truly (and an Irish 
 gentleman of course will answer truly), that he will rejily 
 " He is sorry to say (from some cause or other), that he has 
 unimproved land." 
 
 Then say to him, " Go home, sir, and first do your duty 
 to yourself, to your countrymen, and to your country, before 
 you stand forward to lead us and to teach us our duty." 
 
 Look at the field nicknamed " Whistle-bare," and look at 
 the results which its proper cultivation produced. If he has 
 cultivated and improved every acre of his land as much as it 
 
GREAT WANT OF IRELAND. 97 
 
 is capable of being improved, like that field, his rents, if 
 fair, will be well paid ; his tenants will be comfortably off, 
 and growing rich ; the labourers on his estate all employed, 
 and his estate improving. What more would the man have ? 
 What has he then got to complain of as to the condition of the 
 country or of its people ? Depend upon it, that amongst 
 landlords who thus do their duty in their station, you 
 will not find many leaders for a mischievous purpose ; and 
 such landlords who thus do their duty will deserve to be 
 trusted by you as your leaders, if you have any real griev- 
 ances which your own exertions cannot remedy to complain 
 about.* 
 
 * For opinions of the press, see Appendix 5. 
 
98 MISERY AND WRETCHEDNESS 
 
 LETTER VII. 
 
 THE MISERY AND WRETCHEDNESS WHICH THE NEGLECT 
 OF AN ABSENTEE LANDLORD PRODUCES. 
 
 The Comfort and Happiness diffused by a Landlord attentive to his Duties, where 
 before there was Misery and Neglect — Not the part of a good Citizen to shield 
 the Abuses consequent on neglectful Landlords — Descrii^tion of the Town of 
 Donegal — Glenteis — The Condition of the People there — They live on Potatoes 
 and Pepper and Water — Dungloe — Its wretched Inn — The Island of Arranmore 
 —Condition of its People — They live on Potatoes and Sea-weed — Conclusion. 
 
 GwEEDORE, DoNEGAi-, September 3. 
 I DATE my letter fom the centre of the hills in the north 
 of Donegal, where, ten years ago, there was not a 
 road, — where scarcely^ anything but bogs and heather 
 and rocks were to be seen for miles,* — where the people 
 held the land in rundale, and did as they liked,t — paid no 
 
 * " Large tracts in the interior are neglected and lying waste from the popula- 
 tion thronging the shore for the benefit of sea-rack and manure." — Facts from 
 Gweedore, with Useful Hints to Donegal Tourists, by Lord George Hill, 
 p. 15. 
 
 -j- " The wretched system of Rundale being here in full force and operation, all 
 this district of country is held under what is known by that term, and which may 
 be thus described : — In some instances, a tenant having any part of a town-land 
 (no matter how small), had his proportion in thirty or forty different places, and 
 without fences between them, it being utterly impossible to have any, as the 
 proportions were so very numerous, and frequently so small, that not more than 
 half a stone of oats was required to sow one of such divisions. 
 
 " Thus every tenant considers himself entitled to a portion of each various 
 quality of land in his town-land, and the man who had some good land at one 
 
 I 
 
CAUSED BY ABSExVTEEISM. 99 
 
 rent,* and lived on potatoes and the produce of illicit dis- 
 tillation. f I write from the centre of an estate where the 
 subdivision of farms had gone on to such an extent, that 
 
 extremity was sure to have some had at the other, and a hit of middling in the 
 centre, and bits of other quality in odd corners, each bounded by his neighbour's 
 property, and^ without any fence or ditch between them. 
 
 " Under such circumstances as these, could any one wonder at the desperation 
 of a poor man, who, having his inheritance in thirty-two different places, aban- 
 doned them in utter despair of ever being able to make them out ? 
 
 "Fights, trespasses, confusion, disputes, and assaults, were the natural and 
 unavoidable consequences of this system. These evils, in their various forms, 
 were endless, and caused great loss of time and expense to the people attending 
 petty sessions, and, of course, continued disunion amongst neighbours was 
 perpetuated. 
 
 *' The system, too, was a complete bar to any attempt at improvement, as, on 
 a certain day, all the cattle belonging to the town-land were brought from the 
 mountains, and allowed to run indiscriminately over the arable-land, and any that 
 had not their potatoes dug, or other crops off the ground, were much injured. 
 Neither could any one man venture to grow turnips, clover, or other green crops, 
 for nothing short of a seven feet wall would keep out the mountain sheep. 
 
 " To add to this, no one would attempt to manure better, or otherwise improve 
 his proportion, as his neighbour's cattle only would have the benefit ; and in 
 spring no individual occupier of the division would let or sow, or labour in the 
 fields, before a certain day, when the cattle were again sent to the hills until 
 after harvest ; and should any one of them, more industrious or enterprising than 
 another, reclaim a portion of the bog or mountain, it would be taken from him as 
 soon as he had taken one crop of it, and it would forthwith be divided among all 
 the tenants of the town-land, in proportion to the rent each paid." — Facts from 
 Gtceedore, p. 14. 
 
 * " Rents were very small — almost nominal — and there was no regularity as 
 to collecting them. Trifling sums were taken at fairs, or whenever or wherever 
 they could be got. Often no receipt was given, no accurate accounts kept ; 
 consequently the greatest confusion prevailed as to what was due upon the 
 properties. 
 
 *' There were arrears of eight, ten, and even twenty years' standing; some of 
 the tenants not having paid rent for that period, and many lived on the estates 
 who were quite unknown. A part of one estate, of the value of 201. per annum, 
 appeared not to be known at all to the person who sold the property to Lord 
 George Hill when he purchased. 
 
 The manner, too, in which the rents were collected, was strange and unsatis- 
 
 •f " The general system was to make the grain into whiskey, which was certain 
 of paying a remimerating price ; besides, that this mode of trading was more 
 agreeable, and congenial to a people fond of excitement and an irregular life ; 
 though, of course, the practice was sure to lead to idleness and dissolute habits." 
 — Facts from Gweedore, p. 19. 
 
 H 2 
 
100 MISERY AND WRETCHEDNESS 
 
 about seven years ago it was sold to its present owner, 
 Lord George Hill, on the advice of the then agent of the 
 late owner, who was my informant as to this fact, because 
 the rents were so small and numerous and difficult to col- 
 lect that they were not worth the expense and trouble of 
 collecting. Yet I now write from an inn as comfortable 
 as any in England, — comforts the value of which you 
 learn doubly to appreciate from the miseries you endure 
 before you arrive here from Donegal, should you be com- 
 
 factory, as may be gathered from an incident. The agent to one of the small 
 properties came, on a particular day, a distance of about fourteen miles, with a 
 view of receiving the rents. Having mentioned his errand to a gentleman by 
 whom he was met, he added, ' that he must return, as the day was too bad to 
 attempt collecting them ! This observation caused some surprise ; and the 
 gentleman, not exactly comprehending how rain had to do with rents, or that 
 money could not be received on any sort of day, anxiously inquired ; when the 
 agent solved the difficulty by replying, ' that he had to go from house to house 
 through the mountains, in order to pick the rent up, having thus to take whatever 
 the tenants were pleased to offer.' As to coercing the people, it was never thought 
 of or feared. 
 
 " It will serve as a specimen of the way in which these estates were managed by 
 the agents to whom they were formerly intrusted, to give the two following 
 original notes, which will also show that the tenants ' made' or fixed the rent 
 themselves, and paid what they pleased. The notes are the reply from one of 
 those agents to an inquiry which was made of him by letter, in consequence of 
 tenants refusing to pay the amount of rent as returned in the rental, and are as 
 follows : — 
 
 " No. 1. ' A. B. made the rent himself, and never paid me more than 1/. 10s. 
 yearly. C. done the same, and never paid me more than \l. 12*. yearly. D. E. 
 paid the same yearly, 1/. 126-. F. returned what I returned to you to Mr. G. 
 Mr. H. never got more from them than what I returned to you now, but he 
 wanted to make the rent-roll look large in Mr. G.'s eyes.' 
 
 £ s. d. 
 
 " No. 2. ' A. B. shoemaker 185 
 
 C. D. black 18 5 
 
 E. F 19 
 
 C.'s mother 006 
 
 £4: 5 4 
 
 "They have five one-third cows' grass among the tribe; let them show you 
 that they have not this quantity. They made the rent themselves, and C. D. 
 would never pay for the old woman's part, although he had the benefit." — Facts 
 from Gweedore, p. 10. 
 
CAUSED BY ABSENTEEISM. 101 
 
 pelled to stop a night on the road. Luxuriant crops surround 
 the inn ; industry and cleanliness begin to mark the people ; 
 each man has his own squared farm and a decent cottage, 
 and there are good roads. All this is to be attributed to the 
 public spirit and liberality, and to the individual and personal 
 exertions, of the present noble owner and his able agent. In 
 fact, a good landlord has effected all this social improvement, 
 and has made glad this " wilderness and solitai-y place." It 
 will be the chief object of my letter to-day to show what 
 landlords of an opposite kind effect ; what men who extract 
 as much rent as they can, and never spend a shilling on their 
 estates, — who make no efforts to improve either their tenants 
 or their land, — accomplish in the misery and barbarity of 
 their countrymen, and in the waste of the capabilities of 
 their country. 
 
 Let no political partisan — because I will not hesitate to 
 state the truth — take it into his head that I come here to 
 write a tirade against landlords. I intend to give them 
 every credit for all that they may do for the benefit of their 
 estates and of their tenants, whenever I see such examples. 
 I do not think it is the part of a good citizen, or of an 
 honest man, to shield the misdeeds of those who so use their 
 property that they are a curse to their country, and to whom 
 are to be attributed all the social evils under which Ireland 
 groans. 
 
 I intend giving you to-day a sketch of my journey from 
 Donegal to this place, — the accuracy of which may be tested 
 by any one who pleases to take the same course. My mo- 
 tive for taking this route was, because I heard in Donegal, 
 and read in the evidence of the Land Commission, that the 
 total neglect and bad management of large tracts of land 
 between this place and Donegal had led to an extent of sub- 
 division of farms and of misery almost unparalleled."* 
 
 * The farms were frequently, at the death of the parents, reduced to atoms at 
 once, being then divided among all the children. In such cases, when the farm 
 
102 MISERY AND WRETCHEDNESS 
 
 The town of Donegal itself exhibits another of those 
 numerous examples of neglect with which Ireland abounds. 
 The bay of Donegal, dotted with green islands, — with the 
 Atlantic Ocean on one side, and the town nestling at the foot 
 of a range of magnificent hills, which rise in the background 
 abruptly behind it, on the other, affords scenery of the most 
 exquisite natural beauty. 
 
 There is sea-bathing, and a mineral spa of precisely the 
 same quality as the Harrowgate water, and baths, close to 
 the town. In the town is the ruin of a fine old castle of the 
 once powerful clan of the O'Donnells, which adds much to 
 its'picturesque beauty. The whole of this part of the country 
 was formerly subjected to the O'Neils, to whom tribute was 
 paid, till the O'Donnells became so powerful as to dispute 
 the right. A story is told of the chief of the O'Neils 
 writing to the chief of the O'Donnells, residing at his castle 
 at Donegal. 
 
 " Says O'Xeil to O'Donnell, if you don't pay your tribute " 
 
 «' O'Neil." 
 
 Which was answered in a similar significant and laconic 
 style : — 
 
 " Says O'Donnell to O'Neil, I owe you no tribute, and if I did " 
 
 " O'Donnell." 
 
 There are also pleasant walks formed along the shore of 
 the river for the use of the inhabitants, by the liberality of 
 Lord Arran, who has a small property in the neighbourhood 
 of the town. 
 
 Were all the advantages of scenery, locality, bathing, and 
 cheapness of living, which this town possesses connected 
 with any English town, it would not be long before it was a 
 second Brighton, or Bath, or Cheltenham. There is, liow- 
 ever, but one resident landlord or gentleman in the neigh- 
 was small, it left to each a mere ' skibherlin' (a shred off a coat) ; and, by this 
 simple process, the next generation were beggars." — Facts from Gweedore.\> 16. 
 
CAUSED BY ABSENTEEISM. 103 
 
 bourhood, — Mr. Hamilton, — who has built himself a beauti- 
 ful house on one of the islands in the bay ; and the town 
 remains neglected and poor. 
 
 From this town I proceeded to Glenties, a village which 
 is the property of the Marquis of Conyngham, whose chief 
 managing agent is Mr. Benbow, M.P. for Dudley. The 
 whole of the country for many miles in the direction of 
 Dungloe, and beyond that town — in fact, almost the whole 
 barony of Boylagh — belongs to this nobleman, together with 
 the island of Arran, or Arranmore, on the west coast. Once 
 in the course of his life — two years ago — the marquis of 
 Conyngham visited this estate for a few days. His chief 
 agent, Mr. Benbow, usually comes once a year, and the sub- 
 agents visit the tenants every half year to collect their rents. 
 At short periods of a few years, the farms are visited to see 
 what increased rent they will bear, and this is the extent of 
 the acquaintance of the Marquis of Conyngham with his 
 tenants. This nobleman, himself, bears the character of a 
 kind-hearted, generous man — fond of yachting and amuse- 
 ment, and having an excessive distaste for every kind of 
 business or trouble. From one end of his large estate 
 here to the other, nothing is to be found but poverty, 
 misery, wretched cultivation, and infinite subdivision of land. 
 There are no gentry, no middle class, — all are poor — 
 wretchedly poor. Every shilling the tenants can raise from 
 their half-cultivated land is paid in rent, whilst the people 
 subsist for the most part on potatoes and water. They are 
 untaught, — they know not how to improve, — they have no 
 examples before them of a better state of things, — the year 
 left to themselves. As they increase in numbers, as not a 
 shilling of the rent is ever spent among them in the shape 
 of capital, in giving them any kind of employment, they are 
 driven to the land for support, till they infinitely subdivide 
 it, and their poverty and wretchedness necessarily increase 
 as their means lessen. Every rude effort that they make 
 
104 MISERY AND WRETCHEDNESS 
 
 to increase the amouut of the produce is followed imrae- 
 diately by raising their rents in projDortion — as it were, to 
 punish them for improving ; they are, naturally enough, as 
 discontented and full of complaints as they are wretched in 
 their condition. 
 
 Now, this is not hearsay or imagination. I walked a 
 couple of miles from Glenties amongst the farmers' cottages, 
 with a guide, — the Vice-President of the Poor Law Union 
 there, — and I will shortly describe to you the condition of 
 the farmers, as I had it from their own lips, and noted it 
 down at the time. 
 
 The land is not let by the acre, but by what is termed 
 a " cow's grass" — so many " cows' grass" to a farm. A 
 " cow's grass" is a measure of land ; usually it means as 
 much mountain grazing-land as will keep a cow during the 
 summer, and as much arable-land as will keep the cow-house 
 in fodder during the winter.* The size of the farms varies 
 from six to twenty acres, and larger, by the measurement of 
 acres. The rent of arable-land is about 30^. an acre. It 
 is sandy soil and bog mixed, on a granite rock foundation. 
 The grazing mountain-land is let at about 25. 6d. an acre. 
 The farmer pays his rent and rates by disposing of his butter, 
 pigs, eggs, beef, hay, and oats, — and milk, when he can sell 
 it. He usually sells the whole of his produce, except potatoes, 
 and in dear seasons even part of his stock of potatoes, and 
 buys meal on credit, in order to pay his rent and the county- 
 
 * " The land is never let, sold, or devised, by the acre, but by ' a cow's grass.' 
 This is a complement of land well understood by the people, beu)g, in fact, the 
 general standard ; and they judge of the dimensions of a holdmg by its being to 
 the extent, as the case may be, of one, two, or three ' cows' grass ; ' although a 
 cow's grass, as it varies according to the quality of the land, comprises, for this 
 reason, a rather indefinite quantity. Thus the town-lands are all divided into so 
 many cows' grass, which, of course, have been cut up ad infinitum. By this rude 
 anatomy, they have been divided not only into the fovrth part of a cow's grass, 
 called ' a foot,' but into the eighth part of a cow's grass, or half a foot, denomi- 
 nated ' a cleet.' " — Facts from Giveedore, p. IG. 
 
CAUSED BY ABSENTEEISM. 105 
 
 cess. If the tenant lives near a town where he can sell his 
 milk he sells that also, and the common drink to their pota- 
 toes then is an infusion of pepper — pepper and icater, as being 
 more tasty than water. Sometimes they are so hard pushed 
 for their rent that they will buy a heifer on credit at 67. or 
 11., much above the market price, and sell it again for 3/, or 
 4/., to be able to pay the rent ; or buy meal on credit of 
 local usurers (giving a promissory note) at 20^. a barrel, and 
 sell it again to the same usurer at the market price for ready 
 money at 9^. or \0s. a barrel. If a farmer is so well off as 
 to have milk to his potatoes, or to be able to buy a few 
 sprats, he is what they term here " thokey" — that is, in 
 independent circumstances. The farmer who gave me this 
 information pays 16/. rent, holds seven cows' grass, and I 
 was informed was the most " thokey" farmer in the district. 
 The grazing is so poor that last year these seven cows pro- 
 duced only two firkins of butter, which he sold for 6Z. ; he 
 sold two pigs for 5Z., and he could hardly tell how he scraped 
 up the rest of the rent from the sale of his oats and some 
 potatoes. This farmer assured me that for the half of this 
 year, whilst his cows gave no milk, he had to subsist on 
 pepper and water and potatoes. He could not afford to eat 
 butter. " Not a bit of bread have I eaten since I was born," 
 said this man ; " we must sell the corn and the butter to 
 give to the landlord. I have the largest farm in the district ; 
 some don't pay more than 3/. to bl. rent, and I am as well off 
 as any in the country." This man gave me his name, but 
 did not wish it to be published, as it might do him an injury 
 with the agent. This man also assured me that many of the 
 tenants have no beds, and lie on a " shake-down" of straw 
 or hay on the ground in their cottages, with but a blanket 
 or a rug to cover five or six of the family. " The people," 
 he said, " do what they can to improve, but the landlord does 
 nothing, and they have not the ability to improve. They are 
 tenants at will ; and if they improve their rent is raised 
 
106 MISERY AND WRETCHEDNESS 
 
 accordingly at the next valuation. The only good thing we 
 have is plenty of turf to keep us warm. We never taste 
 meat of any kind, or hacon, unless a pig chances to die of 
 some disorder and we cannot sell it, and we would not taste 
 that if we could sell it." I asked him if he would show me 
 the cottage of any small farmer who lived in the way he had 
 described. He took me immediately to the cottages of John 
 and Charles M'Cabe, who lived across a field close by. I 
 state this case to you because it is a sample of the subdivi- 
 sion which is permitted to go on. The father rented four 
 cows' grass, for which he paid 5/. lOs. rent. He was so 
 pressed by poverty and distress in 1842 that he sold the 
 tenant-right of half his farm for 15Z. to another man, who 
 came in, built a cottage, and occupied it as tenant.* His 
 son had married, and having a family growing up, he divided 
 the half of his remaining farm with his son, and father and 
 son are now subsisting with their families on a cow's grass 
 of land each. Into these cottages I entered. They were 
 stone-built, and well roofed — but the mud-floor was uneven, 
 damp, and filthy. In one corner was a place for the pig, 
 with a drain from it through the wall to carry off the liquid 
 manure, like a stable. Two chairs, a bedstead of the rudest 
 description, a cradle, a spinning-wheel, and an iron-pot con- 
 stituted the whole furniture. An inner room contained an- 
 other rude bedstead ; the mud-floor was quite damp. In 
 this room six children slept on loose hay, with one dirty 
 blanket to cover them. The father, mother, and an infant 
 slept in the first room, also on loose hay, and with but one 
 blanket on the bed. The children were running about as 
 nearly naked as possible, dressed in the cast-off" rags of the 
 
 *^" They made a habit of trafficking in their land, and would sell smtdl portions 
 of it, as they wanted money, either for ever or for a term of years, or mortgage it 
 as interest on money borrowed until the sum was repaid, which very often proved 
 equivalent to a lease for nine hundred and ninety-nine years." — Facts from 
 Gweedore, p. 16. 
 
CAUSED BY ABSENTEEISM. 107 
 
 father and mother ; the father could not buy them clothes. 
 They had not been to mass for a twelvemonth for want of 
 decent clothes to go in. Both these men assured me that 
 their whole food was potatoes, and if they had a penny to 
 spare they bought salt or a few sprats, but very seldom these. 
 Instead of buying salt they sometimes bought pepper and 
 mixed it with the water they drank. This they called " kit- 
 chin" — it gave a flavour to their food. Both cottages were 
 in the same wretched condition, and the rent of the farm had 
 been twice raised ; last time from 485. to 5Z. lOs. If their 
 rent was not punctually paid, their cattle and everything 
 they had was immediately distrained. From these men I 
 went to another small farmer's house. He was mowing. 
 His name is Manus M'Ginty. He has two cows' grass, for 
 which he pays 3/. 85. There has been no improvement on 
 his farm for the last twenty years ; but his rent was recently 
 raised from 21. 5s. He had potatoes and milk that day for 
 mowing for a farmer. His usual diet was potatoes and 
 pepper-water. He lived in precisely the same wretched con- 
 dition as that which I have just described. I give you these 
 as examples, without any kind of selection, of the universal 
 condition of the tenantry around on this estate. 
 
 From this place I proceeded to Dungloe, a village sixteen 
 miles further, direct north — the whole of it in the same pro- 
 perty. Near one or two villages which I passed, a good deal 
 of land was brought into cultivation, and bore heavy crops 
 of oats and potatoes ; but a mile beyond these villages 
 nothing but bog and heather is to be seen. Excepting here 
 and there a small patch of potatoes growing, the only sign of 
 industry I saw was a couple of men on a hill-side boring the 
 bog with an iron-rod and searching for timber. I entered 
 several cottages on the road-side, but they were all alike 
 filthy and wretched. Sometimes a calf as well as a pig 
 would be inside them ; sometimes three or four ducks in 
 addition, dabbling in a pool of dirty water in a hole in the 
 
108 MISERY AND WRETCHEDNESS 
 
 mud-floor. If you point out this filthy condition to the 
 women in the cottages they generally laugh at it. In fact, 
 they know no better ; they don't know how to live diffe- 
 rently, and they never had a better example set to them. 
 There is everything to depress them, nothing to elevate 
 them ; and the wonder is that, half savage and uncivilized, 
 they are so quiet and tractable as they are. 
 
 At Dungloe I was told I should find an inn and accom- 
 modation where I could sleep. Stay there I must, for there 
 was no other place within a dozen Irish miles off, and it was 
 getting late. The look of the inn was most unpromising. 
 A pile of lime and sand, for building a wall adjoining, 
 blocked up the doorway, but a bright peat-fire and a 
 boarded and sanded floor — a luxury not to be met with 
 everywhere in Ireland — made me hope for a comfortable 
 rest. The brightness of the fire gilded over the discomfort 
 of the room. It was perfectly Irish. Two large and appa- 
 rently much-frequented rat-holes in the floor showed no 
 want of company of that kind. The table was propped ; 
 its cover torn and dirty ; one of the windows had before it 
 a broken looking-glass to dress by, a corner of which still 
 remained in the frame ; the whitewashed walls were marked 
 round with candle-smokes, where candles had been stuck 
 with their own tallow ; and two beds at one side of the 
 room had a most unpromising appearance. Sundry women's 
 caps were stuck under the testers for readiness, and under 
 each bed was a pile of dirt and sand, the sweepings of the 
 floor from a remote antiquity. After making a tolerable 
 supper on eggs — that only support of travellers in parts of 
 Ireland, the bread being sour, the butter abominable, the 
 appearance of the salt forbidding its use, and the tea an 
 infusion of some unknown herb, — I went to bed thoroughly 
 tired, hojung to sleep. But the " doAvny pinions" of what 
 the poet Young describes as " tired nature's sweet restorer" 
 fled from me ; and every moment I remained there I began 
 
CAUSED BY ABSENTEEISM. 109 
 
 to have a more and more lively impression of the applica- 
 bility of the chorus of an old song I once heard : — 
 
 " These cursed fleas ! — 
 At first they came by twos and threes, 
 But now they come by swarms." 
 
 At length the weary night passed over in listening to the 
 gambols of the rats, making the most of their opportunity 
 at the bread-loaf, until the quacking and cackling of some 
 ducks and hens in the next room assured me morning was 
 breaking. 
 
 But I do not blame the people. They gave me the best 
 they had ; and they never saw, and cannot conceive, anything 
 better. And with a non-resident landlord, a non-resident 
 agent, no capital spent amongst them, no encouragement 
 given to them, and no one to teach them anything, either by 
 precept or example, how are they likely to improve ? The 
 politeness and hospitality of a gentleman some five miles 
 oflp saved me the infliction of the breakfast. 
 
 Next morning I took a boat and guide — a coast-guard 
 man, who could speak Irish— and went over to the island of 
 Arran, which is also the property of the Marquis of Conyng- 
 ham. This island is about fifteen miles in circumference, 
 with a lofty hill in its centre, and a gradual declivity down 
 to the sea. It contains eleven villages, each having from nine 
 to fifty cottages, and has a population of about 1,500 people ; 
 it yields a rental of from 300/. to 400/. a year to the Mar- 
 quis of Conyngham, and is three-quarters of an hour's sail 
 from the mainland. 
 
 The rents here are much the same as those on the main- 
 land, from 20s. to 305. being paid for a cow's grass ; but 
 the land is let in rundale. 
 
 I must explain the meaning of this form of letting to your 
 readers. This form of occupation seems to have arisen from 
 a small community equally dividing a portion of arable-land 
 for their potatoes, and holding the surrounding land in com- 
 
110 MISERY AND WRETCHEDNESS 
 
 mon. As the population increased, the patch of cultivated 
 land being- found insufficient to provide them with potatoes, 
 some individual of the community was obliged to bring a 
 patch of the grazing land held in common under cultivation, 
 and the following year each member of the community 
 claims the right of dividing this land, made arable out of 
 commonable land, into equal shares. The consequence of 
 this mode of occupation has been, that a tenant will hold a 
 dozen small patches of land in different places, and almost 
 every potato bed or ridge of oats belongs to a different 
 tenant.* 
 
 I landed at a village called Labgarroo, containing twenty- 
 four cottages, and almost the whole of its shockingly 
 destitute and half-naked shoeless population immediately 
 swarmed out and surrounded me, begging me to go into 
 their cottages — such of them, at least, as could speak Eng- 
 lish — and look at their misery. Some thrust scraps of 
 paper into my hands with petitions written on them, praying 
 for assistance to keep them from starving, for medical assist- 
 ance, to have their rents reduced, and so on : such an 
 assemblage of wretched beggar-like human beings I never 
 saw.f Picture to yourself the beggars who sometimes on 
 Sundays lie about the pavements in the streets of London, 
 dressed up to excite commiseration, and who write with a 
 piece of chalk on the flags " I'm starving," and then lay 
 themselves down beside this scrawl crouched up in a violent 
 shivering fit as the people pass them from church, and 
 you have an exact facsimile of the kind of looking people 
 around me — the tenants of the Marquis of Conyngham ! I 
 
 * See note t> ante, p. 98. 
 
 t These scraps of paper or petitions were ready written, and some of them 
 seemed old and worn. They appeared to me to be intended to be ready to present 
 to any stranger who might by chance, during the summer, visit the island. It is 
 impossible that they could have been written purposely to present to nie (as was 
 subsequently alleged), as I only determined and arranged to go to the island that 
 morning, after ascertaining that I could get boatmen and an interpreter. 
 
CAUSED BY ABSENTEEISM. Ill 
 
 asked one man — a cobbler — who spoke English, to show me 
 into one or two of the cottages near. I entered that of 
 Nelly Gallagher ; she pays 305. rent for one cow's grass. 
 She was preparing her dinner of potatoes, and — what, think 
 you ? — sea-weed. They gather, I was told by some twenty of 
 them (and I saw them using it), a kind of sea-weed called 
 " dillisk," which they dry, and boil as " kitchin" with their 
 potatoes. It boils down to a kind of gluten with the pota- 
 toes, and the salt in it, they say, makes the potatoes more 
 palatable. In winter they gather the common sea-weed, — 
 the sea-rack which grows on the rocks, — and which they call 
 " dhoolaman," in Irish, and cutting off the thin leaves at 
 the extremities of the weed, boil these when they cannot ^et 
 " dillisk," which is a better kind of sea-weed. They showed 
 me how they used it, and above a dozen of them told me 
 the same story ; in fact, every one that I asked about it con- 
 firmed it. My guide, the coast-guard man, and a respect- 
 able seaman, assured me that the tenants on the mainland 
 in the same manner lived on sea- weed part of the year, and 
 that they used it, as he called it, as " kitchin," to make their 
 potatoes more palatable, and in aid of their potato food. 
 Some of these tenants had quantities of land as small as the 
 fourth part of a cow's grass. Their cottages are stone-built, 
 with mud-floors, no chimneys, rarely any furniture in them, 
 usually hay on the floor for a bed, with a rug or old clothes 
 for bed coverins:. I walked over the whole island and saw 
 many such, and rarely any in the least degree better. There 
 is a Roman Catholic chapel on the island, and a school is 
 talked of being built, but there is not one at present. Some 
 kelp-burning is going on noAV, and this has helped the people 
 a good deal. At times I was informed, and I can well 
 believe it from what I saw, that their destitution is horrible. 
 They are, however, but a degree worse than the tenants on 
 the mainland opposite. 
 
 I left the island, and, on landing, came to this place. Be- 
 
112 MISERY AND WRETCHEDNESS 
 
 fore leaving this estate, the high road crosses a strand at 
 Anagary, over which the tide flows ten feet deep. This 
 strand is one mile across, and the water was up to the axle 
 of the gig I was in when my guide attempted it. It was 
 quite dusk, and I assure you it was perfectly frightful to a 
 stranger to be in the middle of this sheet of water, the land 
 every way at least half a mile off, and not knowing whether 
 the next step might not be into deep water. The Board 
 of Works offered to make a road, to avoid this strand ; the 
 Marquis of Conyngham's agent, in the name of his princi- 
 pal, opposes this, and will not permit the road to be made 
 through his waste bog-land ; and the public must, therefore, 
 submit to the delay and inconvenience and danger of this 
 strand. But what must this be to a poor man or woman 
 who has no horse or gig, and who is thus compelled often 
 to wait hours for the tide, and then to wade a mile in water 
 a yard deep ? 
 
 Here, however, I leave the Marquis of Conyngham's 
 estate, with its thousands of acres of land capable of profit- 
 able cultivation, and its everywhere apparent neglect, mis- 
 management, and misery. His rents are probably not high, 
 considering the capabilities of the land, but they are high 
 considering their actual state of cultivation. The tenants 
 are not helped or put in the way of improving, and it is 
 evident that every shilling beyond bare subsistence is ex- 
 tracted from them and spent elsewhere. It is not a capital 
 realized which ever benefits them. Some may say that the 
 Marquis of Conyngham has a right to do as he likes with 
 his property. Grant that he has, but he has no right to 
 anybody's approval if tliis is what he likes ; and the empire 
 has a right to complain, if he so manages his large estate 
 that he produces general destitution, and misery, and discon- 
 tent — if, in fact, he helps to make Ireland that scene of 
 poverty and wretchedness and disturbance which makes it 
 a shame and a source of weakness, instead of its being a 
 
CAUSED BY ABSENTEEISM. 113 
 
 pride and a source of strength to the empire. It is pos- 
 sible that the Marquis of Conyngham may be ignorant of 
 the condition of his Irish tenants ; but " qui facit per alium, 
 facit ■per se ;" to him who permits it, the odium of having 
 such a tenantry and an estate so managed rightly attaches. 
 
 I had sought out some extracts in the second volume of 
 the evidence taken before Lord Devon's Commission, from 
 pages 150 to 170, bearing out and confirming what I have 
 above stated from personal observation ; but the length of 
 my letter precludes my copying them. They simply confirm 
 what I state as to complaints about high rents and absentee- 
 ism — as to the wretchedness of the jDeople, their living on 
 sea-weed, and the total neglect which everything- shows. I 
 have given the pages for your reference, and if necessary 
 this evidence can be quoted at a future time.* 
 
 I am now on an estate far differently managed, and which 
 is alike a credit to its noble owner, and a benefit to the 
 community and to the country ; but I must leave its descrij)- 
 tion to my next letter.f 
 
 * The facts contained in this letter were subsequently contradicted by ]\Ir. 
 Russell, the sub-agent of Mr. Benbow, who resides on the estate. The contra- 
 diction is given in the Appendix, and the answer to that contradiction — containing 
 the extracts above alluded to, from the evidence given before Lord Devon's 
 Commission — will be found in the Letter dated from Tuam, post. 
 
 t For opinions of the press, see Appendix, No. 6. 
 
114 IMPROVEMENT AND HAPPINESS 
 
 LETTER VIII. 
 
 THE IMPROVEMENT AND HAPPINESS THAT AN ATTEN- 
 TIVE AND RESIDENT LANDLORD CAN DIFFUSE. 
 
 The Chief Evils which afflict Ireland are Social, which Social Remedies will remove 
 — Opinion of Mr. NichoUs on the Condition of the People of Donegal — Former 
 Condition of the People on Lord George Hill's Estate — The injurious effect of 
 the Tenant Right there — The Improvements which Lord George Hill has 
 effected — The Obstacles and Ojiposition which he had to overcome — The Con- 
 dition of the People now — The difference of Races — Dr. Kane's Opinion — The 
 effect of a Social Remedy here to change the People. 
 
 GwEEDORE, Donegal, September 6. 
 In my last letter to you I endeavoured to describe the 
 wretched and depressed condition of the people in the dis- 
 trict from Glenties to this place, and their utter ignorance of 
 the comforts and almost of the decencies of life ; and attempted 
 to show these facts to be attributable to the manner in which 
 the peasantry are left utterly neglected, to the absence of 
 everything like example, and to the system of extracting from 
 them, in the shape of rent, every morsel beyond mere subsist- 
 ence which their rude cultivation can obtain from the land. 
 
 To-day I intend describing to you what was and what is 
 now the condition of the people of the district from which I 
 write. 
 
 My object in doing this is to attempt to prove, by these 
 patent examples, that the evils which have afflicted this part 
 of Ireland, at least, and which still continue to depress per- 
 
CAUSED BY RESIDENCE. 115 
 
 tions of this country, are purely social; and that when a 
 social remedy has been applied those evils have vanished. 
 
 That I may avoid even the suspicion of prejudice in laying 
 bare a subject so painful, let me quote the opinion of Mr. 
 Nicholls, the Poor Law Commissioner, as to the general con- 
 dition of the Irish peasantry, and, also, as to their condition 
 in the county of Donegal. That gentleman in his first report 
 to Lord John Russell, in 1836, says : — 
 
 " During my progress through the country, it was impossible not to 
 notice the depression of feeling, morally and personally, of the Irish 
 peasantry, and this to an extent which a stranger could not witness with- 
 out very painful emotions. It shows itself in their mode of living, in 
 their habitations, in the dress of their children, and in their general 
 economy and conduct. They seem to feel no pride, no emulation; to be 
 heedless of the present, and reckless of the future. They do not (speak- 
 ing of the peasantry as a whole) strive to improve their appearance, or 
 add to their comforts. Their cabins still continue slovenly, smoky, filthy, 
 almost without furniture, or any article of conveniency or decency. 
 On entering a cottage, the woman and children are often seen seated on 
 the floor, surrounded by pigs and poultry, in the midst of filth — the man 
 lounging at the door, to approach which it is necessary to wade through 
 mud ; yet he is too indolent to make a dry approach to his dwelling, 
 although there are materials fit for the purpose close at hand ; his wife is 
 too slatternly to sweep the place in which they live, or remove the dirt 
 and offal, however offensive, from the floor. If you point out these 
 circumstances to the peasantry themselves, and endeavour to reason with 
 and show them how easily they might improve their condition and in- 
 crease their comforts, you are invariably met with excuses as to their 
 poverty. Are a woman and her children, and her cabin filthy — whilst a 
 stream of water runs gurgling at the very door ? — the answer invariably 
 is, — ' Sure, how can we help it ? we are so poor !' With the man it is 
 the same ; you find him idly basking in the sun or seated by the fire, 
 whilst his cabin is surroimded by mud, and scarcely approachable from 
 the accumulation of every kind of filth ; and he, too, will exclaim, ' Sure, 
 how can we help it ! we are so poor !' Whilst, at the very same time, he 
 is smoking tobacco, and has probably not denied himself the enjoyment of 
 whiskey." 
 
 Such was the description of their condition in 1836, and I 
 am assured by gentlemen, and by the Roman Catholic priests 
 
 I 2 
 
116 IMPROVEMENT AND HAPPINESS 
 
 in this neighbourhood, that that description was literally ac- 
 curate. In his second report, made in 1837, Mr. Nicholls 
 thus writes of Donegal : — 
 
 " Nothing can exceed the miserable appearance of the cottages in 
 Donegal, or the desolate aspect of a cluster of these hovels, always teem- 
 ing with an excessive population. Yet, if you enter their cabins and 
 converse with them frankly and kindly, you will find the people intelli- 
 gent and communicative, quick to comprehend, and ready to impart Avhat 
 they know. 
 
 " Small holdings an d» minute subdivisions of land prevail in Donegal to 
 a greater extent than I have found in any other part of Ireland ; and the 
 consequent growth of jiopulation has been there so great as to press 
 hard upon the productive powers of the soil, and to depress the condition 
 of the people to nearly the lowest point in the social scale, exposing them, 
 under the not unfrequent contingency of an imfavourable season or a 
 partial failure of the potato crop, to the most dreadful privations. . . . 
 Yet, with all this suffering, no disturbance or act of violence has occurred 
 in Donegal. . . . When numbers were actually in want of sustenance, 
 there was no dishonesty, no plunder : the people starved, but they would 
 not steal."* 
 
 In the year 1838, Lord G. A. Hill purchased several small 
 properties in this neighbourhood, which, in the aggregate, 
 amounted to upwards of 23,000 acres. This large estate 
 borders on the north-west coast or corner of Ireland, and 
 
 * To the accuracy of this statement I can bear my humble testimony, and I 
 quoted it because I was both assured that it was, and it appeared to me to be, 
 accurate. Yet Mr. John O'Connell, in a speech at the time made in Conciliation 
 Hall, discovered, that the only object of my mission to Ireland was to damage the 
 whigs, and that for that reason I had attacked the Marquis of Conyngham, and 
 that, if I wished "to insult" the people of Ireland, I should quote Mr. NichoU's 
 reports. Having quoted Mr. NichoU's reports, anything that I had written about 
 the Marquis of Conyngham's estate ought not to be credited. The logic of this is 
 too recondite for any audience but that of Conciliation Hall. Subsequently, the 
 same great authority discovered, that " the only object of my visit to Ireland was 
 to attack the tenant-right;" and, still later, he and his father found out and 
 stated, that "the only object of my visit to Ireland" was to attack the elder 
 O'Connell. Which of the " only objects" was the right " only object" the reader 
 will probably form an opinion ; and it is not unlikely that the opinion the reader 
 may form will be, that not one of these was the " only object of my visit to 
 Ireland," or indeed the " object" at all. 
 
CAUSED BY RESIDENCE. 117 
 
 through it runs a small river, the Gweedore, which empties 
 itself into the sea, and which can be entered at its mouth by 
 vessels of 200 tons burden. The neighbourhood abounds 
 with] wild and magnificent mountain scenery ; and at the 
 period in question, though thickly peopled in patches, was 
 almost wholly uncultivated. Vast tracts of land capable of 
 improvement and profitable cultivation were mere bog wastes, 
 like many other portions of this county. 
 
 In 1837, Patrick M'Kye, the schoolmaster of the district, 
 memorialized the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland in the fol- 
 loAving terms : — 
 
 " That the parishioners of this parish of West Tullaghabegley, in the 
 barony of Kihnacrennan, and county of Donegal, are in the most needy, 
 hungry, and naked condition of any people that ever came within the 
 precincts of my knowledge, although I have travelled a part of nine 
 counties in Ireland, also a part of England and Scotland, together with a 
 part of British America; I have likewise perambulated 2,253 miles 
 through seven of the United States, and never mtnessed the tenth part of 
 such hunger, hardships, and nakedness.'' 
 
 This schoolmaster then proceeds to describe the whole 
 stock and furniture of the population, which by the census of 
 1831 was 9,049. They had among them but one cart and 
 one plough, 20 shovels, 32 rakes, 2 feather beds, and 8 chaff 
 beds. They had no clocks ; there was not a looking-glass in 
 the whole parish above 3d. in price ; they had no garden 
 vegetables or fruits of any kind, but potatoes and cabbage. 
 He goes on to say, — 
 
 " None of their married or unmarried women can afford more than one 
 shift, and some cannot afford any ; more than one-half of both men and 
 women cannot afford shoes to their feet, nor can many of them afford a 
 second bed, but whole families of sons and daughters of matui'e age in- 
 discriminately lie together with their parents. 
 
 " They have no means of harrowing their land but with meadow rakes 
 Their farms are so small that from four to ten farms can be harrowed in 
 a day Avith one rake. 
 
 " Their beds are straw, green and dried rushes, or mountain bent . 
 their bed-clothes are either coarse sheets, or no sheets, and ragged filthy 
 
118 IMPROVEMENT AND HAPPINESS 
 
 blankets; and, worse than all I have mentioned, there is a general 
 prospect of starvation." 
 
 He says further on : — 
 
 " If any gentleman is sent to investigate this, I will go with him from 
 house to house, where his eyes will fully satisfy and convince him, and 
 where I can show him about 140 children bare naked, who were so 
 during winter, and some hundreds only covered with filthy rags most 
 disgusting to look at. Also men and beast housed together, i. e., the 
 families in one end of the house, and the cattle in the other end of the 
 kitchen. 
 
 " Some houses have within their walls from 1 cwt. to 30 cwt. of dung, 
 others having from 10 to 15 tons weight of dung, and only cleaned out 
 once a year!"'* 
 
 The effect of this memorial, which appeared in some of 
 the English newspapers, was to cause a large collection of 
 money in England, which was distributed amongst these 
 people. In fact, " famine was periodical among them, 
 with fever as its attendant, and wretchedness pervaded the 
 district.''^ 
 
 " Such a lamentable condition of a people," says Lord 
 George Hill, in a short account which he has published re- 
 garding this part of Donegal, under the title of ' Facts from 
 Gweedore,' " is scarcely, in fairness, to be attributed to indivi- 
 dual neglect or apathy. It is rather the result of a system 
 which for ages has held its sway, and which no proprietor 
 could grapple with or obviate unless he was prepared, reso- 
 lutely, patiently, and expensively, to introduce and work out 
 a counter system." J But it was because no individuals were 
 found to do this that the system continued. 
 
 The rents were very small. Amongst 80 tenants on one 
 of the properties purchased by this nobleman, IO5. was the 
 highest rent paid, and almost all the rents were in arrear 
 and had to be collected in trifling payments at fairs. The 
 
 * Facts from Gweedore, Vy Lord George Hill, p. 7. 
 f Ibid. p. 1. 
 % Ibid. p. 9. 
 
CAUSED BY RESIDENCE. 119 
 
 land was held in rundale, the nature of which I have before 
 described to you; and in some instances a tenant holding 
 but this small portion of land had his proportion in 30 or 40 
 different places ; and these proportions were often so small, 
 that not more than half a stone of oats would be required to 
 sow them. There were no fences between these small 
 patches of land, belonging to different tenants, and " fights, 
 trespasses, confusion, disputes, assaults, and litigation, were 
 the natural and unavoidable consequences of this system."* 
 Their horses and cows, such as they had, were often held in 
 the same way ; and I will quote an amusing instance of this 
 from the work I have already named : — 
 
 " In an adjacent island, belonging to this estate, three men were con- 
 cerned in one horse; but the poor brute Avas rendered useless, as the 
 unfortunate foot of the supernumerary leg remained imshod, none of 
 them being -willing to acknowledge its dependency, and accordingly it 
 became quite lame. There were many intestine rows on the subject ; at 
 length one of the ' company' came to the mainland and called on a 
 magistrate for advice, stating that the animal was entirely useless now ; 
 that he had not only kept up, decently, his proper hoof, at his own 
 expense, but had shod this fourth foot twice to boot ; yet the other two 
 proprietors resolutely refused to shoe more than their oicn footP^ 
 
 The same book gives an instance of the extent of the sub- 
 division : — " A small field of about half an acre was held by 
 26 people ! From varied and perpetual depression it could 
 scarcely be considered an exaggeration to declare that their 
 very minds had become so far degenerated below the human 
 standard that they seemed even reconciled to such habits 
 and wretchedness.^ The tenant-right prevailed among them 
 to such an extent that it often was three times in amount 
 more than the value of the fee simple of the land. One of 
 the former proprietors wished to erect a lodge ; the " cow's 
 grass" of land on which he wished to build was let for 65. 8(/. 
 
 * See notes to last Letter, ante, pages, 98, 99, 101, et seq. 
 t Facts from Gweedore, page 14. 
 X Ibid, page 16. 
 
120 IMPROVEMENT AND HAPPINESS 
 
 rent, and lie was compelled to pay the tenant 241. for tlie 
 tenant-riglit, there being nothing on it but a turf hut and a 
 patch of potatoes. On 1,300 acres of moorland, the tenant- 
 right of which the present proprietor wished to purchase, in 
 order to its cultivation and improvement, and that there 
 might be no complaints of any kind, and for which 13 
 guineas rent were paid, it was calculated that it would re- 
 quire from 500Z. to 600Z. to pay the tenants for what they 
 conceived to be their tenant-right! They had never used the 
 land, excepting for their ponies to run over it, and had never 
 put a spade into it. 
 
 There was no inn, no. road, and no market within a dozen 
 miles. The people, therefore, could not sell their produce, 
 if disposed to do so, for its value, and their only alternative 
 was to distil their grain into whiskey.* Their corn thus 
 became consumed before their new potatoes came in, and 
 annually they were on the verge of starvation, and compelled 
 to obtain meal on credit from extortioners at exorbitant 
 prices. 
 
 This was the condition of the estate and of the people 
 when Lord George Hill jaurchased it in 1837. 
 
 That nobleman determined upon reclaiming it, and, if pos- 
 sible, to put the people in a better way. The people here 
 are for the most part the aboriginal Irish, and speak the 
 Erse language. Lord George Hill learned their language, 
 mixed among them, and taught them by example to do what 
 he told them. Near the mouth of the river he built a corn 
 store to receive all their produce, if they wished to sell it. 
 
 * " The nearest market towns being nine, sixteen, and twenty-eight miles 
 distant, they had thus far to go in order to purchase the smallest or commonest 
 articles, such as iron to shoe [a horse, boards and nails for a coffin, &c. ; and a 
 man going such a distance, with a horse-load of oats {i, e., a sackful strung 
 across its back), would accept any price which might be offered rather than bring 
 it back. Advantage was consequently taken of this very circumstance by the 
 traders. . . . The general system or alternative, therefore, was to make the grain 
 into whisky." — Fads from Gweedore, p. 19. 
 
CAUSED BY RESIDENCE. 121 
 
 To meet their numerous wants, and to save tliem from ex- 
 tortion, he built a shojj at the store, and the people, having 
 sold their corn at one side can obtain at the other any article 
 of crockery, grocery, saddlery, ironmongery, timber, iron, 
 ropes, meal, leather, woollen goods, or useful medicines, 
 which they may require, at the market prices of London- 
 derry. This is the only market for their goods, and the only 
 shop at which they can purchase anything for twenty miles 
 round.* A dispensary was also built, and a sessions-house 
 erected. A quay was made for vessels to unload at the store, 
 and a corn-mill erected. Then followed a school, in which 
 I yesterday saw some 30 as neatly-dressed and elcan-looking 
 children as can be seen in England. 
 
 The land of the tenants was squared into 10-acre farms, 
 and they were required each to build his house on his farm. 
 In this they were assisted. Premiums were offered for the 
 neatest and cleanest cottages ; for the best crop of turnips ; 
 for the greatest quantity of land brought into cultivation ; 
 for the best drained farm ; for the best fences ; for the best 
 made stockings, and so on. Roads were made ; an inn has 
 been built, which rivals in comfort an English hotel, and 
 large tracts of the bog moor have been brought into culti- 
 vation. 
 
 Though these improvements are thus trippingly related, 
 nothing but the most persevering determination accom- 
 plished them. The people, utterly ignorant and both men- 
 tally and jDhysically degraded, resolutely opposed every step 
 to improvement. 
 
 *' They were not disposed to abandon the rundale system," says the 
 book on these improvements ah'eady quoted, " and did not seem to have 
 a taste for simple plain dealmg, or that matters should be put straight 
 
 * " So great was the difficulty of getting even a coffin made, that to secure the 
 services of a carpenter, such as the district afforded, many of the people gave him 
 annually, by way of a retaining fee, sheaves of oats, on the express condition of 
 Vfiakiny their coffin when they died !" — Facts from Gweedore, p. 25. 
 
122 IMPROVEMENT AND HAPPINESS 
 
 or made easy of apprehension." " The first year not a single individual 
 could be induced to compete for the premiums, the people thinking it all 
 a hoax, and that it was only an attempt to ' humb ug' them, being 
 convinced that no gentleman would be so great a fool as to give his 
 money merely to benefit others."* 
 
 They suspected everything that was attempted, and op- 
 posed it, thinking it was intended for their injury and the 
 landlord's benefit ; and by harassing and vexatious oppo- 
 sition hoped, as they expressed it, " in the end to tire out 
 Lord George Hill, prevent the divisions from being occu- 
 pied, and thus defeat the new plans altogether." \ Nothing 
 would tempt them to make the fences of the new farms, 
 though they were offered to be well paid for it ; and when 
 at length a stranger was got to begin the ditching, to set 
 them an example, they attempted " to frighten him from his 
 work by throwing sods at him." When he had completed 
 the first fence, the people assembled at night and destroyed 
 it. J Whilst they were thus engaged, a prisoner was taken 
 by the police, and they were so frightened at this that the 
 improvements were allowed to proceed quietly. Scarcely a 
 man among them knew how to handle a spade, or could or 
 would work.§ When the foundation of the hotel in which 
 
 * Facts from Gweedore, p. 31. 
 
 t Ibid. p. 29. 
 
 X " After he had been at work about a week, and had made some progress in 
 the fence, the wheelwright, returning home one night, met a person on the road, 
 who told him that as many men had gone over to the new ditch as would soon 
 settle it." — Facts from Gweedore, p. 20. 
 
 § " The people being totally ignorant of agriculture, some of them — (there are 
 many such instances) — take much trouble in ivashing the shells and sand out of 
 the sea-weed before venturing to put it on the land, ' lest it should injure the 
 bog.' " — Facts from Gweedore, p. 12. 
 
 " The style of their farming imjjlements and ajipointments was of a piece with 
 their ignorance and errors ; these things remaining in a state of much simplicity, 
 particularly in the article of harness, as the land has been seen to be harrowed 
 with the harrow made fast to the pony^s tail." 
 
 " This custom of harrowing from the horse's tail prevailed in Erin, county 
 Mayo. A gentleman, in giving evidence before the Land Commissioners, says, — 
 ' Harrowing by the horse's tail was practised there until I put an end to it. I 
 
CAUSED BY RESIDENCE. 123 
 
 I am writing was commenced, one of the peasantry, who was 
 absolutely starving, was induced by the offer of wages to 
 begin it. A wheelbarrow, a pickaxe, and spade, were pro- 
 vided for him, as he had no tools, and the people were so 
 enraged at him that his tools were all stolen that night. 
 The agent, Mr. Forster, determinedly persevered. He went 
 with the man next day into one of their best fields, and began 
 marking out with his own hand the foundation for the hotel. 
 The people came to him in a great fright to know what he 
 was about to do on their best land. He coolly told them 
 that " as they had stolen his man's tools, so that he could 
 not quarry stones for the hotel, he was going to build it there, 
 as there were plenty of stones in their ditches." They pro- 
 mised him, if he would not build there, the tools should be 
 found ; next morning they were left at the labourer's door. 
 At length example prevailed, and two or three of them came 
 and offered to work ; and finally, all eagerly sought work. 
 But they could not come to work till 10 in the morning, 
 after breakfast, as " they wern't used to work before break- 
 fast, and didn't like it."* When they began to feel the 
 benefits of employment, they were told that they must begin 
 
 had a great deal of trouble in effecting that object, for I was obliged to make an 
 experiment upon one of the counti^ymen, by getting him to draw a weight after 
 himself by the skirts of his coat. That man is stiU Uvmg upon whom I performed 
 the experiment. You might see the poor horse with the rope fastened to his 
 tail, and then to the harrow ; or if the hair of the tail was long, it was fastened by 
 a peg into a hole in the harrow ; and when thus harnessed, they mounted upon 
 him, and drove over the field.' " And see note ante page 55. 
 
 " Their sheep, too, it may be remarked, are subjected to a general shearing not 
 only once a year, but also to repeated though partial * cUppings,' at all seasons. 
 Thus, if a woman was making up stockings for an approaching fair, and became 
 short of wool, she would just catch her sheep or lamb, and cut off just * quantum 
 sufficit.' This gave the poor animal a very strange and ridiculous, yet pitiable, 
 appearance." — Facts from Ghveedore, pp. 13 and 14. 
 
 * " They seldom go out to labour upon their farms till after ten o'clock, when 
 they have had their breakfast ; and the spring and harvest time are the only periods 
 at which they exert themselves, and then they work very hard. For the remainder 
 of the year they are idle." — Facts from Gweedore, p. 24. 
 
124 IMPROVEMENT AND HAPPINESS 
 
 Tvork at 6 o'clock in the morning ; some two or three only 
 came. The rest, after being warned, when they again ne- 
 glected to come to work at that hour, were quietly paid off, 
 and told, that " as they had occupation at home, they had 
 better stay away, as there were plenty willing to work." 
 This gradually had the desired effect ; and they began to 
 work like other labourers. The land all round the hotel 
 was then trenched, drained, and gravelled, and sown with 
 potatoes. The labourers, as they did the work under the 
 agent's superintendence, laughed at him ; saying, " they did 
 not care about working, as they were paid for it, but it was 
 the greatest folly in the world, as nothing would ever grow 
 there." The hotel is now surrounded with a broad belt of 
 potatoes and oats as fine as any I have seen in Ireland. 
 The tenants, seeing this, have begun (urged on by the pre- 
 miums) to gravel and drain their own lands in the same way, 
 and every where patches of well-cultivated land, and plen- 
 tiful crops are to be seen. 
 
 In 1840 some of the tenants, seeing that every promise 
 to them was strictly fulfilled, thought they would at least try 
 for the premiums, and there were 36 competitors, and pre- 
 miums amounting to 40Z. were so fairly aAvarded by the 
 judges that they caused general satisfaction. Last year the 
 number of competitors had increased to 239, and the pre- 
 miums to 60/. I yesterday went through some of the cot- 
 tages the tenants of which had won premiums for them. 
 There was no dirt, no filth. They were well built and 
 whitewashed. The crockery (they never had anything be- 
 yond an iron pot before) was neatly arranged ; there was no 
 smoke in the houses; and, what was worth more than all, the 
 women showed their houses with pride, and were delighted 
 at the commendations they received, and the men seemed 
 no less proud of their little farms, and showed their crops 
 of turnips, oats, and improvements, with evident pleasure* 
 Two years and a half ago 500/. worth of oats were sold by 
 
CAUSED BY RESIDENCE. 125 
 
 the tenants at the market price at the store ; last year 1,300?. 
 worth was sold ; and this year there is a vastly increased 
 produce. Large quantities of kelp have also been hought 
 from them to encourage their industry. 
 
 From the 1st of March, 1844, tothe 1st of March, 1845 
 (I have it from the agent's hooks), 16,590 days' employment 
 have been given to labourers on the estate. The wages 
 given are 8c?. and 10c?. a day. Taking the average at 9c?. 
 6261. 9s. have been paid among them in wages. Working 
 at six days in the week, throughout the year, this would 
 give employment to 53 men and 11 days over. In reality, 
 however, this great amount of labour has been spread over 
 a much larger number of men, and perhaps 100 men may 
 be taken as the number generally employed ; though this, 
 I am informed, is below the mark, as it does not include 
 men engaged in making the roads on the estate, who were 
 paid by the piece. 
 
 At the river-side facing the hotel I saw about 30 men at 
 work, lowering the bed of the river. The men, generally, 
 are small in stature; but I never saw more diligent labourers. 
 These men, who, four years ago, did not know how to use a 
 spade, and neither could nor would work except in their own 
 way, and who were annually starving, are now working well, 
 doing their best, and receiving good wages. 
 
 I am glad of this opportunity so to sjjeak of them ; for, 
 much to my regret, I have seen that some observations in 
 my letter from Enniskillen, relative to the marked difference 
 in the populations of Leitrim and Fermanagh, have been 
 misunderstood, and in some degree misrepresented. I am 
 spoken of as " ludicrously extolling the physical strength of 
 the Saxon race over the Celtic," and it is retorted, on the 
 reputed authority of Scotch and French philosophers, that 
 " the Irish Celts are, in strength and stature, far away the 
 first of European men ;" and that the difference I observed 
 in that pojjulation is to be traced to the tenant-right existing 
 
126 IMPROVEMBNT AND HAPPINESS 
 
 in Fermanagh, and not in Leitrim, — which I am supposed to 
 have overlooked. Let no foohsh jealousy of " races" be 
 mixed up in an inquiry like this. Neither race can be ex- 
 terminated ; there they are, and we must make the best of 
 them. But what I stated was a simple fact, — that the dif- 
 ference in the appearance of the people themselves in Leitrim 
 and Fermanagh is as remarkable as the difference in dress 
 and houses, and in the appearance of the country. At Bal- 
 linamore, in Leitrim, at a fair, — with at least 10,000 men 
 present, amongst whom I walked, and to whom I spoke, I 
 scarcely saw a man above 5 feet 4 inches in stature, and I 
 do not think I saw a dozen men in the whole fair so tall as 
 myself. In the streets of Enniskillen every third man I met 
 was a bigger man than myself. Dr, Kane, of the Royal 
 Dublin Society (page 400), has collected the observations of 
 the Scotch and French philosophers, on whose authority, I 
 jDresume, the opinion of the comparative strength and stature 
 of the Irish Celts is founded. I will simply quote the data 
 on which these calculations were based : — " Professor Forbes 
 instituted an extensive series of observations on the size and 
 strength of the students attending the University of Edin- 
 burgh, who may be fairly considered as representing the 
 middle classes of their respective countries." Professor 
 Quetelet, in like manner, tested the strength and stature 
 of the students at the University of Brussels; and from these 
 data Dr. Kane comes to the conclusion that " the Irish are 
 the tallest, strongest, and heaviest of the four races." I 
 wrote of the Irish peasant and Celtic population of Leitrim 
 as I saw them. Do " Irish students attending the Uni- 
 versity of Edinburgh" (no doubt as fine men as can be 
 found) represent the Celtic peasants of Leitrim ? They are 
 the sons of the gentry of Ireland, for the most part. Are 
 the gentry of Ireland for the most part Celtic? Are the 
 gentry of any country the type of the peasantry of the 
 country? The value of such authority melts away on ex- 
 
CAUSED BY RESIDENCE. 127 
 
 amination. The idea that the " tenant-right" accounts for 
 the difference, and makes men bigger and taller, is too 
 foolish to need refutation. What does the same Dr. Kane 
 say (page 397) of Irish labourers? — 
 
 " A wretched man who can earn by his exertions but 4*. or 5s. a 
 week on which to support his family, and pay the rent of a sort of 
 habitation, must be so ill fed and depressed in mind, that to work as a 
 man should work is beyond his power. Hence there are often seen 
 about employments, in this country, a number of hands double what 
 would be required to do the same work in the same time with British 
 labourers. The latter would probably be paid at least twice as much 
 money per day, but in the end the work would not cost the employer 
 
 more When I say that men thus employed at low wages do so 
 
 much less real work, I do not mean that they are intentionally idle, or 
 that they reflect that as they receive so little they should give little 
 value ; on the contrary, iheT/ do their best honestly to earn their wages, 
 but supplied only with the lowest description of food, and perhaps in in- 
 sufficient quantity, they have not the physical ability for labour, and, 
 being without any direct prospect of advancement, they are not excited 
 by that laudable ambition to any display of superior energy." 
 
 These are the peasantry of Ireland ; of these I wrote, and 
 not of the sons of Irish gentlemen at the Edinburgh Uni- 
 versity : and this testimony is the truth, as any impartial 
 man may convince himself who will use his eyesight.* 
 
 Let me not, however, forget, after this digression, the con- 
 clusion I would wish to draw. 
 
 Of the nature of " tenant-right " I shall take a future 
 opportvmity of writing, and respecting it now I do not wish 
 even to hint an opinion. But was it the "tenant-right" 
 which converted this former desert and bleak wilderness — 
 this example of barbarism and starvation, into fertile corn 
 fields, the seat of industry and content, and into a humanized 
 abode ? In this instance at least it is a fact that the existence 
 of the custom of tenant-right was the greatest possible ob- 
 stacle to improvement. For every squared farm there were 
 
 * See, on this subject, note to the Letter, dated from Enniskillen, ante, p, 44. 
 
128 IMPROVEMENT CAUSED BY RESIDENCE. 
 
 20 claimants for compensation, though each tenant got a 
 squared farm to himself in place of his former rundale frag- 
 ments of land ; and the opposition, and discontents, and 
 arbitrations, on this score were enough to have conquered 
 patience. Did converting this Roman Catholic population 
 to Protestantism effect this change ? They are Roman 
 Catholics yet. Did Saxonizing them and making them 
 Orangemen effect it ? They are all Celts. Did the getting 
 up of monster meetings and talking nonsense about " repeal" 
 effect it ? No. The remedy was a social one. The people 
 were justly dealt with, taught, shown by example, encou- 
 raged, employed. A community the most hopeless and 
 desperate in condition and circumstances, has by these 
 means been reclaimed, and smiling content and the rewards 
 of industry are everywhere to be seen. A barren waste has 
 been converted into a fine property, which will eventually 
 amply reward its present owner for his great exertions. A 
 starving, and desperate, and degraded peasantry are rapidly 
 becoming comfortable small farmers. The country is im- 
 proved, and that district, the people of which formerly 
 depended on the charity of England to save them from 
 starvation, now adds to the wealth of the empire by its 
 productiveness. This is the work of one man ; and that 
 man is one of the resident landlords of Ireland.* 
 
 * For opinions of the press, see Appendix, No. 7. 
 
ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 129 
 
 LETTER IX. 
 
 ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTEE. 
 
 How far the Opinion is correct that the Prosperity of Ulster depends on the 
 Tenant Right — ^WTiat the Tenant Right is, and on what the Custom is founded 
 — What are the Common Law Rights of the Landlord to which the Custom is 
 opposed — The Advantages and Disadvantages of Tenant Right — There is Misery 
 and Want, as well as Prosperity, where it exists — The Prosperity of the Northern 
 and Eastern parts of Ulster to be attributed to other Causes, namely, to the 
 Enterprise and Industry of the People — The qualities which distinguish the 
 Race which inhabits that part of Ulster — Those on the West of a different 
 Race, have different qualities, and must be dealt with accordingly. 
 
 DuNFANAGHT, DoNEGAx, September 10. 
 In some of my letters allusion lias necessarily been frequently 
 made to the custom of" tenant-right" which prevails through ^ 
 out the province of Ulster, and which indeed is a peculiarity 
 ••attaching to the tenure of land to be found existing nowhere 
 else in the United Kingdom. By some writers it has been 
 attempted to trace the greater prosperity of this province over 
 other parts of Ireland to the existence in it of the tenant- 
 right; and they have therefore advocated its extension to the 
 rest of Ireland. I shall endeavour to-day to examine how 
 far that opinion is well founded, by comparing the general 
 prosperity of Ulster with the general prosperity of other parts 
 of the United Kingdom where no such right is known, and by 
 comparing Ulster with itself — Ulster on the east, and Ulster 
 on the west — Ulster in the county of Down, where the 
 
 K 
 
130 ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 
 
 greatest prosperity of Ireland is to be seen, and Ulster in the 
 county of Donegal, where misery but one remove from 
 starvation and nakedness has ever been found, the tenant- 
 right existing in both. 
 
 If it be found on examination that the prosperity of parts 
 of Ulster exists rather in spite of, than in consequence of the 
 tenant-right, then it will be impolitic to advocate its exten- 
 sion ; to some other cause the prosperity of Ulster must be 
 attributed. 
 
 This is, however, a subject of deep importance, interesting 
 almost to every individual in the province, wli ether landlord 
 or tenant; it is one also of considerable complexity and 
 extent. In order, therefore, to a clear apprehension of the 
 whole subject, I propose to consider — 
 
 1. What the tenant-right is, and on what the custom is 
 founded ? 
 
 2. What are the common-law rights of the landlord to 
 which this custom is opposed? 
 
 3. Its advantages and disadvantages ; 
 
 And, lastly, is the prosperity of parts of Ulster to be traced 
 to its existence ? 
 
 I enter on this inquiry with perfect impartiality — for I 
 have no possible interest in upholding an opinion either one 
 way or the other, and only seek the conclusion to which 
 common sense points. 
 
 First, What is the "tenant-right," and on what is it founded? 
 
 In parts of Ulster to the east, it is founded chiefly on im- 
 provements made by the tenant on his farm, which the out- 
 going tenant claims the right to sell. About the centre of 
 Ulster it is founded chiefly on the competition value of the 
 land over and above the rent demanded. To the west of 
 Ulster it is founded chiefly on the right of possession, or 
 peaceable possession, or on the " good-will" of the farm, as it 
 is termed. In various parts of Ulster it is affected by the 
 character of the landlord, and by the amount of rent exacted ; 
 
ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 131 
 
 it also depends in amoant on agricultural prosperity, on a 
 supposed interest on the soil, and on locality. But more or 
 less in all parts it has some foundation on each of these con- 
 siderations. I shall, however, give you an authority for each 
 of these views, as it is very probable that most of them will 
 be contradicted. 
 
 Mr, Senior, Assistant Poor Law Commissioner, in his 
 evidence before a select committee of the House of Commons 
 on the town-land valuation of Ireland, in 1844, says- — (1,090), 
 on a farm, the rent being the same, but the buildings and 
 drainage being bad when a tenant enters, and good when he 
 leaves, he will obtain a larger tenant-right than he paid. And 
 (1,093) he will obtain an increased amount for tenant right 
 for the capital vested in improvements, rents being the same. 
 
 The same gentleman says further on (1,134) : — 
 
 " Tenant-right will result from either of two causes ; first, low rents, 
 with reference to value ; second, extensive improvements. If land worth 
 21. an acre is let for 11. an acre, the difference between the two will be 
 given by the incoming tenant, whether that has been from the original 
 state of the soil, or whether that difference of 1/. an acre has been pro- 
 duced by drainage or other agricultural improvements." 
 
 At question 1,071 he says, — 
 
 " My view of tenant-right is, that it is the difference between the rent 
 actually charged by the landlord according to the custom of the country 
 and the utmost competition value." 
 
 At question 1,079 he says, — 
 
 " Tenant-right is a very old custom ; it can only exist where lands are 
 comparatively let low; but I do not think it is the cause of their being let 
 low, but the result." 
 
 At question 1,117 he says, — 
 
 " I before defined tenant-right to be the difference between the fair 
 letting value and the competition value." 
 
 " Competition value" and the " value of improvements 
 effected by the tenant" are, however, very distinct things. 
 The tenant-right is attributed to each by Mr. Senior. One 
 is perfectly equitable ; the other is a robbery of the landlord. 
 
 K 2 
 
132 ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 
 
 Mr. Senior, however, has several other definitions. At 
 question 1,091 he says, — 
 
 "An outgoing tenant in a mountain district would receive tenant-right, 
 who had not expended anything upon the land." 
 
 It depends on the price of agricultural produce, for Mr. 
 Senior says (1,115), "it fell during the late agricultural 
 distress." It depends also, he says, on the amount of rent, 
 for (1087), "as the rent rises, the tenant-right unquestionably 
 falls in amount." It depends also on a supposed interest in 
 the soil, for he says (1,135), " I can understand that a certain 
 interest in the soil may have belonged to the tenant at the 
 period of the first colonization under James I." (1,141.) " I 
 do not feel myself at all sure that tenant-right may not have 
 existed previous to almost any improvements beyond the 
 mere mud dwelling of the occui^ier." (1,142.) "The early 
 settlers were stationed in a hostile country, and could only 
 tempt their retainers to come over, or to remain, by granting 
 permanent advantages in return for the protection they 
 afforded the first chief occupiers. It may, in fact, have been 
 a species of feudal tenure." This latter view entirely gets 
 rid either of " improvements" or " competition value" as its 
 foundation, and attempts to found it on a customary tenure, 
 like the copyholds of England. But that tenure in England 
 depends on record — on the roll of the manor, in the custody 
 of the steward of the manor, in which is recorded every 
 change of hands to which the property has been subjected, 
 and which is an unquestionable legal title. But there is no 
 record here ; nor is the custom of sufficient antiquity to give 
 it the validity of a common law right. In fact, in a legal 
 view this is no title ; it is worthless. Nay, it is against the 
 policy of the law to jierpetuate such a claim, supposing it to 
 exist, unfounded as it is on any record or common law 
 custom ; and the lapse of time, as in the case of any 
 honorary debt or adverse possession, operates as a complete 
 bar to it. 
 
 I 
 
ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 133 
 
 Sir R. A. Ferguson, before the same Committee (481), in 
 the same manner accounts for the origin of the custom, as 
 at first a " feudal dependency ;" " but, as at present, it is a 
 payment made for the possession of the ground, whether the 
 man has improved the houses, or not, whether the land is 
 improved or not." (484.) " It is the possession of the land 
 that sells ; in districts of the country you will find the tenant- 
 right running up to 8Z., 10/., or 15Z. an acre, where the land- 
 lord cannot raise his rent \s" The same witness says (492), 
 — " The value of the tenant-right depends a good deal upon 
 the character of the individual proprietors." 
 
 Mr. Hancock (agent to Lord Lurgan, and a magistrate of 
 three northern counties), in his evidence before the Land 
 Commissioners (part i. page 483), says, — " It depends to a 
 considerable extent on improvements made by the former 
 tenant." " It is the sum of money which the new occupier 
 must pay to the old one for the peaceable enjoyment of his 
 holding" or what is called " good-will." It depends on a 
 kind of feudal tenure, " the strong claims on their landlord 
 and leader" which the original tenants possessed. Further 
 on he says, " The state of the farm and buildings at the 
 time of sale has considerable influence in determining the 
 amount, but locality and the number of competitors have a still 
 greater effect." " Tenant-right varies in value from bl. to 
 18Z. the English acre." "The tenant-right, on an average 
 farm out of lease, at 255. per acre rent, would bring 12/, per 
 acre, or nine and a half years' purchase." " The purchase is 
 made subject to the rent to be imposed." He gives an 
 instance of a sale of land to the Ulster Railway Company, in 
 which Lord Lurgan got 2,358/, for the fee-simple of fifty- 
 eight acres of land, and the tenants 2,227/. for their tenant- 
 right. 
 
 Mr. Griffith, the Valuation Commissioner, in his evidence 
 before the Town-land Valuation (Ireland) Committee, says 
 (84), " A man will give 20/. an acre for the tenant-right, 
 
134 ON THE TENANT-BIGHT OF ULSTER. 
 
 where the land has been let from year to year, though the 
 land may be nearly let at its true value." 
 
 Such are the alleged foundations of the tenant-right, and 
 such are the values for which it sells. 
 
 So far as this right has been made the foundation of 
 bargains between man and man, which have been assented 
 to and connived at by the landlords, and as far as it is founded 
 on improvements effected on the lands by a tenant or by his 
 ancestor, there can be no question of its equity. It would be 
 the height of injustice to put the law in force in order to take 
 from men the capital which they or their fathers have in- 
 vested in the land, on the faith of this custom, whether by 
 purchase or in improvements. Beyond this, however, the 
 tenant-right has no shadow of foundation, either in law or in 
 equity ; and every shilling which is paid beyond this for it, 
 whether because of competition value over the rent, on 
 account of the character of the landlord, the locality, the 
 right to the possession, or for any other cause, is either a 
 robbery of the landlord or an imposition on the incoming 
 tenant. Do not, however, let me be misunderstood ; custom 
 sanctions the practice, and those who sell the tenant-right 
 thus founded do not at all conceive that they are either 
 robbing the landlords or imposing on the tenants who buy 
 it. Except as above stated, however, the tenant-right has 
 no foundation in justice. There is clearly no equitable claim 
 to it, and the absence of all legal claim will be best shown by 
 considering, 
 
 Secondly, what are the common law rights of the owner 
 of the land ; which will be found indeed to upset even those 
 tenant-right claims which are founded in equity. 
 
 " Land," says Sir Edward Coke (1 Inst., G), " compreliendoth in its legal 
 signification any ground, soil, or earth -whatsoever, as arable, meadows, 
 pastures, woods, moors, waters, marshes, furze, and heath. It especially 
 includcth also, all castles, houses, and other buildings, for they consist of two 
 things, — land, which is the foundation, and structure thereupon ; so that, 
 
ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 136 
 
 if I convey the land or ground, the structure or buildmg passeth there- 
 with," 
 
 In considering the just and equitable claims of the tenant, 
 we must not lose sight of that which is just to the landlord. 
 The purchaser of the fee simple of every estate in purchasing 
 the land purchases the erections upon it, gives money for 
 them, and there is no question as to his legal title to them. 
 But, in admitting the equitable claim of the tenant to 
 the value of improvements made or purchased by himself 
 or his fathers under this custom, against the legal, and often 
 also the equitable claim of the landlord, in the case of a 
 recent purchase, we surely in justice go far enough, without 
 giving to the tenant part of those advantages which really in 
 justice as well as in law and equity belong to the landlord, 
 as the advantages of " locality," " competition value," " agri- 
 cultural prosperity," affecting the price of land, " peaceable 
 possession," and so on. 
 
 Blackstone, in the second volume of his Commentaries 
 (p. 17), thus defines the rights of the owner of the land : — 
 
 " Land hath in its legal signification an indefinite extent, upwards as 
 well as doAvnwards. Cujus est solum, ejus est usque ad caelum, is the 
 maxim of the law. Upwards, therefore, no man may erect any buildings, 
 or the like to overhang another's land ; and doAvnwards, whatever is in a 
 direct line between the surface of any land and the centre of the 
 earth belongs to the owner of the surface, as is every day's experience 
 in the minin g countries. So that the word 'land' includes not only the 
 face of the earth, but everything under it or over it.'^ 
 
 The legal rights of the landlord are, however, too plain to 
 require further notice, and I therefore pass on to consider 
 
 Thirdly, the advantages and disadvantages of the tenant- 
 right. 
 
 Perhaps the greatest advantage that can be urged on its 
 behalf is, that it promotes improvements in the land where 
 landlords will not improve ; because the tenant feels secure 
 of obtaining the value of his improvements. But this ad- 
 
136 ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 
 
 vantage wholly depends on the hypothesis that landlords 
 will not do their duty, in which case the tenant-right becomes 
 a substitute for their neglect. But, even then, its value is 
 qualified by a want of ability, and the owners of the tenant- 
 right axe, in most instances, as the witty Sidney Smith 
 expressed it, but " playing at soldiers ;" they may wish to 
 improve, feeling secure of repayment, but they have not the 
 capital to effect improvements, for that is all sunk in very 
 many cases — in fact, generally — in the purchase of the tenant- 
 right, and the occupier has reduced himself thereby from a 
 small capitalist to a mere labourer. 
 
 It is an ingredient of rent, or a value of land, and pro rata 
 it escapes local taxation ; it pays no poor-rates, tithes, or 
 county-cess. This is certainly an advantage ; but, taking a 
 statesmanlike view of it, this does not benefit the community 
 at large, and is nothing in its praise. 
 
 By its means the tenant not only reaps the benefit of his 
 improvements, but is also paid for them in the increased 
 value of his tenant-right ; it therefore encourages improve- 
 ments ; that is, provided none of the ingredients of which 
 tenant-right is composed change to his disadvantage, for 
 instance, that the rent is not raised ; that prices keep up ; 
 that he continues to have a good landlord, and so on. But 
 in this respect, in what does it differ in advantage from an 
 improving lease? The forbearance of a portion of rent for 
 twenty-one years by the landlord in consideration of improve- 
 ments to be effected, in like manner pays the tenant for the 
 improvements, and secures their benefit to him till the end of 
 the lease. 
 
 " The tenure, in my opinion, best suited to this district," 
 says Mr. Hancock, in his evidence before the Land Com- 
 mission, part 1, p. 483, — 
 
 " Is that of twenty-one years certain. It is siiflficiently long to afford a 
 man a fair remuneration for capital laid out on his farm, and yet not so 
 long but that every man expects to outlive it. A guarantee is thereby 
 
ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 137 
 
 secured that every man will enjoy his own improvements, and a stimulus 
 to exertion is offered, for he knows well enough that unless he improves 
 the condition of his farm during the first period of twenty-one years he 
 will have hut little chance of a renewal of the term." . The tenant-right 
 is " uncertain ;" and " the tenants are, therefore, deterred from the expen- 
 diture of capital to the same extent as under a lease." 
 
 It establishes security in the possession of lan^^j^^ySiT^JI^ 
 
 mere fallacy. Without a lease the tenant is but ; 
 
 will, and his landlord may eject him if he 
 
 security the tenant has is the security of getting th&v(^e^2i^^ 
 
 the possess (0)1 if he is ejected. But he has paid that^ "^dfltr^"^*^^^ 
 
 and only gets it back again. If his money were in the BatiK|^;^^ 
 
 or in the funds, instead of being locked up in the la51k|^j^'_^ 
 
 whether ejected or not, he would equally be able ^VfV^iJ|W^ 
 
 It is conducive to the peace of the community, because the 
 tenant has a stake in the community. — So he would have if 
 his capital were vested in improvements under a lease, and 
 amply repaying him, instead of being vested in the purchase 
 of the right of possession. 
 
 It induces the tenant to keep the ground in good heart for 
 his own sake. — The covenants of a lease would compel him 
 to do this by law, if he neglected to do so, and his own 
 interest did not induce him to do it. 
 
 It is a security to the landlord for his rent ; as he gets his 
 arrears paid out of the tenant-right. — The landlords have 
 taken pretty good care of themselves in this respect ; they 
 don't need the security. There is the remedy by distress, 
 which takes every thing on the land for the rent. If the 
 tenant has nothing on the land, there is the action of 
 debt for rent, or, " civil bill process," as it is called here, for 
 " use and occupation," to compel him to pay, or to imjjrison 
 him if he cannot. Or there is the remedy by ejectment if he 
 cannot or will not pay ; and the sooner such a tenant is got 
 rid of the better for all parties. 
 
 I think I have stated all the arguments which are urged 
 in its defence. 
 
138 ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 
 
 Of its disadvantages, tlie first which presents itself is, that 
 the tenant's capital is sunk in the purchase of the possession 
 of his farm, and he often has not a shilling to invest on it in 
 the most obvious improvements. I have repeatedly in this 
 county pointed out to farmers the wet and springy nature of 
 their land, and told them to look at similar land which had 
 been drained, which produced double their crops. The in- 
 variable answer to me has been, " The landlord will do 
 nothing, and we have not the means to drain." The very 
 men who have told me this have paid lOZ. an acre for their 
 tenant-right.* If half the money were spent in draining, it 
 would double their produce ; and a twenty-one years' lease 
 would secure to them the return of their outlay twice over. 
 Consider for a moment the benefit of this. The increased 
 produce is pro tanto increased wealth ; and what an amount 
 of capital now locked up in land would be freed for general 
 improvement and employment, under a system of remunera- 
 ting leases, the tenant-right being equitably got rid of! 
 
 Its next great disadvantage is, that it entirely neutralizes 
 the benefit of a good landlord. Take two landlords ; one a 
 good and liberal man, who lets his farms at a low rent — at 
 
 * The "good-will" or tenant right of a farm is generally very high, often 
 amoimting to forty or fifty years' purchase. 
 
 Land being the thing most coveted (as indeed it was the only means of subsist- 
 ence, employment being uncertain, and at that time no support being provided 
 for the poor), every penny was carefully put by, with a view of being one day 
 employed in the purchase of " a bit of land." 
 
 This took all then- little capital, and very often left them in debt to some money- 
 lender, who had made up the required sum, and at an enormous rate of interest. 
 It has been so high as five shillings a pound per annum, paid in advance on 
 receiving it. 
 
 By this means, nothing was left for the purchaser of cattle or seed, and many 
 never contemplate anything beyond potatoes sufficient to feed their families for 
 the greater part of the year ; five or six half-starved miserable sheep to supply 
 them with clothing, and furnish a few pairs of socks for sale, to buy tobacco or 
 pay the county cess ; the little corn grown being ample to meet the demands of 
 the landlord, which varied from 3». to 30*. ^>er annum. — Facts from Gweedore, 
 p. 14. 
 
ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 139 
 
 II. an acre ; his neiglibour for the same quality of land screws 
 the utmost value of 305. an acre out of his tenants. The 
 evidence shows that the value of the tenant-right dej^ends on 
 the rent, and the character of the landlord. Suppose a 
 tenant of ten acres of land gives for a farm under the first 
 landlord lOZ. an acre for the tenant-right, or 100/. The 
 interest on 100/. at 5/. per cent, is 51. per annum, which in 
 Ireland the farmer could at least obtain for the use of his 
 money. He therefore sacrifices 51. a year interest, which 
 added to his rent of lOZ. makes him pay 15Z. a year for the 
 use of his land. But 1 51. a year is just 305. an acre, the 
 amount which the hard landlord screws out of his tenants ; 
 but under the hard landlord the tenant-right is, perhaps, 
 worth little or nothing ; thus the tenant-right tends to 
 equalize the position of the tenants to that condition which the 
 hardest landlord imposes on them. A good landlord, there- 
 fore, sees it is of no use to have low rents, for the tenant- 
 right equalizes the rents ; and he is induced to increase his 
 rents, to keep down the value of the tenant-right, which con- 
 sumes the capital of his tenants to no advantage. It must 
 also be borne in mind that there are two sides to every bar- 
 gain ; and, though it may be very pleasant to the outgoing 
 tenant to receive a high value for his tenant-right, it is just 
 ruin to the incoming tenant, who, perhaps, borrows money to 
 pay it, and who is consequently steeped in poverty for the 
 rest of his life.* 
 
 Another disadvantage is, that it takes away all induce- 
 ment from the landlord to improve his estate, because all 
 control is taken from him. He becomes a mere receiver of 
 the rent at a fixed and unimproving rate ; and this palpable 
 injustice is inflicted on him, that while every kind of pro- 
 perty in the country is improving, his estate or property in 
 the soil does not. The control of the estate being taken 
 
 * See last note. 
 
140 ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 
 
 from him, it is out of his power to carry out an enlightened 
 system of improvement, if he wishes it. 
 
 Without running- through a list of disadvantages which 
 must be apparent from the certain effect of the tenant-right 
 in impoverishing that part of the community which cannot 
 afford to he impoverished, and which the anomaly of a whole 
 class of men of small capital, sinking their capital in the 
 purchase of land without turning it to profit, must have, it 
 is evident, that, as a question of political economy, it is pre- 
 cisely the same thing as increasing the rental by the amount 
 of interest of the capital invested. It is a loss to the indi- 
 viduals, and to the community, by so much as the value of 
 the increased produce which the investment of that capital 
 in improved cultivation would insure over and above that 
 interest or increased rental ; and the general employment 
 which that capital would give if so invested, and which, when 
 sunk in the purchase of tenant-right it does not give, is a 
 loss still greater to the community at large. 
 
 For these reasons it would appear conclusive, that as it is 
 equitable and just to acknowledge hy laio the validity of the 
 tenant-right, so far only as it is founded on improvements 
 effected, or on an equitable purchase, by the owners or their 
 fathers, so it is necessary that the value ought to be ascer- 
 tained and fixed. And it would also seem beneficial to the 
 community, that that value should be purchased by the land- 
 lords, if possible, as they are generally capitalists who can 
 afford to lay out the money, and so increase their rent al by 
 the interest of the money thus expended. This is necessarily 
 precisely the same thing to the incoming tenant as losing the 
 interest of his money in purchasing the tenant-right ; but 
 the tenant would be in this better position by having his 
 capital — he would have the power in his own hands to cul- 
 tivate his land to the best advantage, and with a 21 years' 
 lease, he Avould have his tenure secure so long as he paid his 
 rent and used his land in a fair manner, and would be sure 
 
ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 141 
 
 of realizing out of the land the full Value of his improve- 
 ments. 
 
 It will be wise, then, to urge on the Legislature to encou- 
 rage leases by taking off or greatly lowering the stamp duties 
 on leases which the tenants have to pay ; and to facilitate 
 the means of enforcing the due performance of covenants in 
 leases at slight expense in the local courts, as this will en- 
 courage landlords to give leases. If the tenant will not im- 
 prove under a lease, then at any rate the landlord is not to 
 blame, and has done his part. It is contrary to those mo- 
 tives and principles which usually actuate human nature, to 
 suppose that the tenant will not, under these circumstances, 
 in most cases do his. If, as is asserted, the landlords will 
 not give leases because they create votes, and favour the 
 objects of political agitators against the landlord's interest, 
 I cannot understand such a reason. In the first place, the 
 landlords have no right to debar tenants from the exercise 
 of civil rights, if they wish for them, and are entitled to them. 
 If tenants are justly dealt with by their landlords, on what 
 ground is it assumed that they will use their political j^rivi- 
 leges to the injury of those landlords? The very opposite 
 would be their probable course. But if the landlords are 
 afraid of political agitators, why give them a hold by keep- 
 ing up this food for agitation l Take away the greatest cause 
 of agitation ; give leases, and act fairly by the tenant, and 
 the agitator's occupation is almost gone. This argument 
 can only be comprehended on the assumption, which I 
 should be loth to make against the landlords, that they knoiv 
 they do not act fairly hy the tenants, and therefore they will 
 strive to withhold from them a power which may be so 
 wielded as to make them act fairly.* 
 
 * The greatest unfairness of landlords to tenants appears to me to be that care- 
 less negligence on their part with which, to save themselves trouble, they give up 
 the occupying tenants to the tyranny and greedy exactions of a middleman, who 
 becomes their landlord, and exacts from them two rents — the rent he himself pays, 
 
142 ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 
 
 If, however, landlords will be so blind to their own inte- 
 rests as not to grant leases and give tenants a fair security 
 that they shall get back the money they may invest in 
 improving the land, then, as the next best thing, I cannot 
 wonder that the tenants cling to the tenant-right with that 
 tenacity and strong feeling which they are said to do. With 
 all its injustice and impolicy, if a man has capital and can 
 afford to spend it on the land, it does insure to him, by a 
 kind of mob law, that he shall have his outlay, under ordi- 
 nary circumstances, returned to him ; and it is absurd to 
 suppose that any man will lay out money in improving the 
 land, or in building, as a mere tenant-at-will, without any 
 security of being repaid. 
 
 There still remains another point to consider, which I 
 must very briefly allude to : — is the prosperity of parts of 
 Ulster to be attributed to the tenant-right ? 
 
 Mr. Senior in his evidence before the Town-lands Valu- 
 ation Committee (1,089) says : — 
 
 " 1 attribute almost entirely to the custom of tenant-right both the 
 absence of agrarian outrage in the north, as well as a much higher culti- 
 vation in that part of the country." 
 
 Is this opinion well-founded? The best cultivated part 
 of the north of Ireland is the county of Down ; but the 
 best that can be said of that county is only that it equals 
 England and Scotland in cultivation, where no such thing 
 as tenant-right was ever known. They have prospered 
 without it ; and the tenant-right is therefore not necessary 
 to prosperity. But the tenant-right exists in this county 
 and in the wretched place where I now write, and is as 
 high in this county as in any part of Ulster. Instances are 
 common of its being three times the value of the fee simple 
 
 and the profit rent on which he lives. The tenants are thus oppressed by one 
 having a temporary interest ; they are severed from the head landlord, and tliis is 
 at the bottom of much of the outcry against landlords. 
 
ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 143 
 
 of the land. I gave you an instance in my last letter from 
 Gweedore of 1,300 acres of moorland being let for thirteen 
 guineas, the tenant-right of which, without a spade ever 
 having been put in the land by the tenants, was valued at 
 between 500Z, and 600/. Land in Donegal is not worth 
 more than twenty years' purchase, so that here the tenant- 
 right was estimated at about double the value of the fee 
 simple.* Well, with this right existing here in full force, a 
 more ill-fed, ill-clothed, badly housed population, or more 
 waste land capable of cultivation, and badly cultivated farms, 
 are not to be found in all Ireland. f The people have starved 
 and gone on here unimproved with it ; the tenant-right, 
 therefore, does not prevent these evils. In fact, the tenant- 
 right has nothing on earth to do with the matter. It is a 
 fact that Ulster is more prosperous, and thriving, and im- 
 proved, towards the east and north, than any other part of 
 Ireland ; but there are other causes for it. 
 
 Against the authority of Mr. Senior, I will quote that of 
 Mr. Griffith, the Government valuator of Ireland ; and on 
 this subject he is the highest authority. He says, before the 
 Town-lands Committee (question 59) : — 
 
 " The system of agriculture which prevails in the counties of Derry, 
 Antrim, and Down, and other northern counties, is so superior to that 
 which prevails in the west as to amount to full 50. per cent, difference in 
 the value of the land." ' 
 
 * See note, ante, p. 138. 
 
 t Except in Kerry. In Lord George Hill's description of the conditiongof his 
 estate when he bought it, in his book entitled Facts from Gweedore, he says (p. 1), 
 — " The social condition of the peasantry, previously to the purchase, was more 
 deplorable than can well be conceived. Famine was periodical, and fever its 
 attendent. Wretchedness pervaded the district." The schoolmaster of one of 
 the parishes in the barony of Kilmacrennan, on this property, in a memorial to 
 the Lord Lieutenant, describes the people as " in the most needy, hungry, and 
 naked condition he ever saw in the United Kingdom, over which he had travelled." 
 And yet, in the same book, it is stated afterwards (page 14), that " the ' good- 
 will' or tenant-right" prevailed there, and " often amounted to forty or fifty years' 
 purchase." 
 
144 ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 
 
 " 60. There is, owing to the difference in the state of agriculture, full 
 50 per cent, difference in the produce between the north and the west." 
 
 " 62. In the county of Down, where the people pay 50 per cent, more 
 rent than in the west of Ireland, the people live better." 
 
 " 78. Under a good system of farming, do you believe that the farmers 
 in Ireland might not only pay much higher rents, but live much better 
 than they do ? Certainly." 
 
 "102. Are you prepared to say that in three-fourths of Ireland it is 
 the pressure of rent which renders the people poor ? That question is 
 compounded of so many subjects that it is difficult to answer. The 
 people, if they exerted themselves, could pay the rent extremely well ; but 
 they do not." 
 
 " 104. Mr. CoLQUHOuN. — When you said before that the rent in 
 many cases is unreasonably high, you meant, considering the want of 
 industry, and the indolent and bad cultivation of the tenant? — I did 
 certainly^ 
 
 "105. It would be quite reasonable to exact that, or even a higher rent, 
 if without capital the tenant were to apply his industry to the cultivation ? 
 — Yes. I am certain that the tenants on the eastern coast of Ireland, 
 who pay 50 per cent, higher rent, the quality of land being taken into 
 consideration, are far better off than the people in the west." 
 
 " 106. Viscount Jocelyn. — Owing to the industrious habits of the 
 people ? — Certainly y 
 
 Here we have a valid reason for prosperity, and also a 
 valid reason for the want of it. Old habits still clinging to 
 a people remarkable for their adhesion to old habits — the 
 want of any continuous means of employment, the want of 
 sufficient inducement to exertion, and the hereditary effects 
 of the oppression of the Irish penal laws, which it is unac- 
 countable how any people on earth were content to live 
 und^ and to submit to, no doubt in a great degree account 
 for that want of industry. But, considering the causes of 
 this failing, the people must be gradually led into a better 
 way. 
 
 Now, I know right well that I write on tender ground, 
 and that I lay myself open to the charge of " national 
 prejudice" if I write a syllable in favour of the population 
 of the north-east of Iceland. But I do not come to bandv 
 
ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 145 
 
 compliments, but to ascertain facts and to state tliem. It is 
 the nature of the men on the east coast of Ireland, by their 
 activity, their enterprise, then* intelligence, and their industry, 
 to rise to wealth and to prosperity — to j3ush themselves — to 
 accomplish greatness. It is their history in every quarter 
 of the known world where they have been placed. It is the 
 nature of the men on the west coast to cling with strong 
 affection and prejudice to old habits, to their land, to their 
 kindred. Enterprise is forced upon them ; they do not seek 
 it as one of the pleasures of existence. The middle classes 
 live by subletting, and subletting, and again subletting the 
 land at increased rentals. This is the extent of their enter- 
 prise. My letter is already too long, or I would quote 
 several amusing instances of this.* The poorer classes, who 
 have to pay all these rentals, cling to the land, and to one 
 another. As they increase, they divide and subdivide the 
 patch of land they possess ; they submit to live on poorer 
 and poorer food ; still they cling to the land, and subdivide 
 it with their children till rent no longer exists, the land 
 will not keep them, and all starve together. Their highest 
 ambition and enterprise is to obtain " a blanket and a shelter 
 for Sally," and potatoes for themselves and children. f This 
 
 * See note to Letter, dated Ballyshannon, ante, p. 70. 
 
 '* Lastly, that I may not grow tedious, I shall throw several ai-ticles together 
 which, I conceive, may also assist this great design ; as, namely, laws to restrain 
 and punish idlers, and oblige those who get their bread by husbandry to a regular, 
 constant course of work and industry ; laws against stock -jobbing lands and 
 leases, to prevent the racking and oppressing of under-tenants by those farmers 
 who grind the face of the poor by taking large tracts of ground and cheap bargains, 
 merely to set them at a severe rent to others ; and (to add no more) laws to increase, 
 or rather create, an industrious, substantial yeomanry amongst us, instead of the 
 unfed and unclothed beggars, that keep our land as poor as themselves." — 
 Reflections and Resolutions j^roper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, by the late 
 Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, p. 136. 
 
 t In the evidence taken by the Commissioners of Poor Inquiry (Ireland), 
 Appendix (D), p. 75, on "The Condition of Cottier Tenants," a witness named 
 " Connor," in the parish of Aughrim, in the county of Galway, states in his e\-i- 
 
146 ON THE TENANT-RIGHT OF ULSTER. 
 
 was positively the fact at Tanniwilly, near Killybegs, in this 
 county, on a property belonging to the Board of Education. 
 The people being left to themselves, subdivided their land 
 till they could pay no rent, and at length it would not keep 
 them, and they were found a year or two ago by the Poor 
 Law Commissioners lying in their huts, without food or 
 clothes, all starving together in the most frightful state of 
 destitution. There are numerous instances of the same result 
 when the inhabitants of the west coast are left to themselves ; 
 leave the people on the east coast to themselves, and they 
 are sure to prosper. They only want leaving alone, and 
 they will fight their own way. Not so those on the west. 
 Now, is it or is it not more statesmanlike to face these facts 
 than to shirk them ? By facing them we may hope to know 
 how to apply help and guidance where they are needed. By 
 shirking them we have Ireland that mass of " difficulties" 
 which it has always been. I am far from praising one race 
 of people or blaming the other for that which is their nature, 
 and which they cannot help. This is not the j^art either of 
 honesty or wisdom. Knowing the qualities of the men on 
 the east, we may safely leave them to take care of them- 
 selves ; they can run alone. It is the men on the west who, 
 when we find them and ourselves no longer deceived by 
 ill-judging friends, will require our aid, our instruction, our 
 guidance, our example — who will require to be urged on, 
 praised on, shamed on, led on, and, if necessary, forced 
 on. Unfortunately for them, and for the country, the very 
 opposite course has been taken — they have been oppressed, 
 kept back, and left to themselves, and — they starve.* 
 
 dence, — " If I had a blanket to cover her I would marry the woman I liked ; and if 
 I could get potatoes enough to put into my children's mouths, I would be as happy 
 and content as any man, and think myself as happy off as my Lord Dunlo." 
 
 * The comments of the press on this letter were so numerous, that I gave up 
 the task of extracting them. The praise and abuse with which it was received 
 were about equal. 
 
THE PLANTATION OF ULSTEK. 147 
 
 LETTER X. 
 
 THE PLANTATION OF ULSTER. — INDUSTRIAL 
 KNOWLEDGE WANTED. 
 
 Londonderry and its famous Defence — Inglis's Opinion of Londonderry and its 
 People — The " Plantation" in Ulster by James I. — Management of the London 
 Companies — Appearance of the Country in the Neighbourhood of Londonderry 
 — Dr. Kane's Opinion that Industrial Knowledge is the great Want of Ireland — 
 The Templemoyle Agricultural Academy — The Instruction there given calcu- 
 lated to meet the Wants of Ireland, and to improve the Country. 
 
 LoNDONDEKRT, September 13. 
 There are few towns in Ireland of more historical celebrity 
 than Londonderry, or in the prosperity and progress of 
 which Englishmen have a more direct interest and influence. 
 Its rise and colonization, or " plantation," I shall have occa- 
 sion to notice. Its renowned defence at the period of the 
 revolution, and the bravery of its " apprentices," urged on 
 and supported through all the horrors of a protracted siege 
 by the indefatigable zeal and devotion of a Yorkshire clergy- 
 man, whose statue is now the pride of the city, are matters 
 of history. The effects which British habits of persevering 
 industry, and the application of industrial knowledge backed 
 by capital, have had in assimilating the country around in 
 prosperity and appearance to the best parts of Great Britain, 
 will be the object of my letter to-day. 
 
 L 2 
 
148 THE PLANTATION OF ULSTER. 
 
 Inglis has thus well described the site and appearance of 
 the town : — * 
 
 " The situation of Londonderry is the finest, I think, of any town or 
 city in Ireland. Indeed, with the exception of Edinburgh, I do not know 
 any to\vn of the United Kingdom so well situated. The city stands upon 
 a mount, from all sides of which there is a rapid descent. The river 
 Foyle, a fine broad river, makes a noble sweep on one side of the town, 
 and expands immediately below it into a wide estuary, which terminates 
 in the broad waters of Loch Foyle. On all sides of the town is seen a 
 succession of deep valleys, and corresponding heights, exhibiting every 
 attraction w^hich wood and cultivation can bestow. Up the river 
 and down the estuary on both sides, the slopes and heights are adorned 
 by handsome villas : and in fact I do not know anything that is wanting 
 to render the situation of Londonderry finer, or its environs more at- 
 tractive." 
 
 The same author thus accounts for the improved appear- 
 ance of everything- and everybody which is observable in the 
 north, as you approach the eastern coast : — 
 
 " There cannot be found throughout the north any of that improvi- 
 dence which is so detrimental to the condition of society in the south and 
 west. The landlord is not a distressed man, and therefore does not grasp 
 at such exorbitant rents. The farmer can save a little money, and is 
 therefore able to give some employment. The competition for land is 
 less, because there is more employment and more resources for the 
 lower orders. The manufacturer and merchant are not men of expense, 
 extravagance, and display ; they mind their business, accumulate capital, 
 employ it in wholesome enterprise and give employment." 
 
 " This distinction," he says, " is not to be attributed to 
 * Protestantism,' but to the character of the people. "f 
 
 The city of Londonderry owes its origin to the resolution of 
 James I. to colonize the north of Ireland (large portions of 
 which, during that unsettled period, had become escheated to 
 the Crown), in order (to quote the language of the Privy 
 Council in 1608) to promote " the public peace and welfare 
 of that kingdom, by the civil plantation of those unreformed 
 
 * Page 311. t Pages 322, 323. 
 
THE PLANTATION OF ULSTER. 149 
 
 and waste countries ;" with that view he was " pleased to dis- 
 tribute the said lands to such of his subjects as, being of 
 merit and ability, shall seek the same with a mind not only 
 to benefit themselves, but also to do service to tlie Crown 
 and commonwealth." In a publication entitled " A concise 
 View of the Orir/in, Constitution, and Proceedings of the Hon. 
 the Irish Society," it is related that a number of settlers having 
 gone over to Ulster from Scotland and England, " the 
 Court ordained that, for the purpose of conducting the 
 said plantation, a company should be constituted and estab- 
 lished within the city of London, which should consist of one 
 governor, one deputy-governor, and twenty-four assistants ; 
 and that the governor and five of the said assistants should be 
 aldermen of the city of London ; and Mr. Recorder of the 
 city should likewise be one of the same assistants ; and the 
 deputy and the rest of the assistants should be commoners of 
 the same city ;" twelve of whom should be elected and chosen 
 annually by the Common Council, in the place of twelve re- 
 tiring assistants. On the 29th of March, 1613, this company 
 was incorporated by charter, and styled " The Society of the 
 Governor and Assistants of London of the New Plantation in 
 Ulster, within the realm of Ireland," This company then 
 came to the resolution, that " the city of Derry upon the 
 Foyle, and one other place, at or near the Castle of Cole- 
 raine upon the Bann, do seem to be the fittest places for the 
 city of London to plant." The twelve chief companies of 
 London having subscribed 40,000/. in order to carry out this 
 " plantation," it appears, according to the charter granted 
 to the society by Charles II., that " the said society did 
 grant unto the twelve chief companies of the city of London 
 (which had taken upon themselves the greater part of the 
 burden of the said plantation), divers great portions of the 
 said lands, &c., according to their several disbursements, 
 and did retain in their own hands such part of the tene- 
 ments and hereditaments as were not properly divisible for 
 
150 THE PLANTATION OF ULSTER. 
 
 defraying the charge of the operation of the said plantation." 
 With the exception of the city of Londonderry and tlie town 
 of Coleraine, their contiguous lands, and the woods, ferries, 
 and fisheries, the management of which were retained by the 
 Irish Society, and their profits accounted for to the twelve 
 companies, each of the companies undertook the separate 
 management of the estates thus conveyed to them ; though 
 " such estates were still to be considered under the para- 
 mount jurisdiction of the Irish Society, and liable to contri- 
 butions, if necessary, in common with the indivisible estates 
 in the society's hands, towards supporting the civil govern- 
 ment of the city of Derry, &c., and generally for the exe- 
 cution of such measures as tend to promote and improve the 
 civil and religious interests of the tenantry." A recent de- 
 cision in a long litigated case between the Skinner's Com- 
 pany and this society has decided that the society is the 
 trustee of the funds it receives for the general benefit of the 
 community, and not for the divisional use of the twelve 
 companies. 
 
 It will therefore be seen that almost the whole of the 
 county of Londonderry is the property of the Irish Society and 
 the twelve London companies, who are the landlords, and 
 who hold these lands, for the general benefit of the com- 
 munity, and " not only to benefit themselves, but also to do 
 service to the Crown and commonwealth." 
 
 So far as the Irish Society — the landlords of this city — 
 are concerned, they are very far from having won popularity 
 by their management. The towns-people complained, in a 
 petition to the House of Commons some few years ago, that 
 the members of the society, being merchants and tradesmen 
 of the city of London, and residing there, are " ignorant of 
 the local circumstances and wants of the inhabitants ;" and, 
 that being in office only two years, " they cannot acquire the 
 requisite information to qualify them for the due discharge 
 of their duties ;" and they are accused of not profitably man- 
 
THE PLANTATION OF ULSTER. 151 
 
 aging the estate, to the detriment of the interests of the 
 town ; and of wasting much of its revenues in litigation. In 
 support of this charge a table is published, showing an ex- 
 penditure in law charges of 18,000Z. in the last eight years. 
 To this charge the society answers, generally, that it is ob- 
 vious that their management has been practically beneficial, 
 and they point to the general orderly and prosperous state 
 of the county to prove it. Without, however, entering into 
 purely local matters, it is a fact that the society has given 
 largely to all the local charities out of its means, whatever may 
 be the foundation of the charge against it of not improving 
 those means to the extent of which they are capable, by 
 granting judicious leases. ^It appears that in the eight years, 
 from 1836 to 1843, the society has given 27,000/. in grants 
 for schools and other charitable objects. Since the govern- 
 ing body were chosen from the Common Council generally, 
 it has given much greater satisfaction, and it is hoped that 
 the recent decision will add to its utility. 
 
 The companies, by managing the greater part of the 
 country around by intelligent agents — along with the gentry, 
 who are mostly here resident, and vie with them — have com- 
 pletely changed the aspect of everything, as compared with 
 more western districts. Good farm-houses, large squared 
 fields, good fences, and abundant crops, exhibit ample 
 evidence of the benefits derivable from the application of 
 capital and enlightened industry. 
 
 I had the opportunity, on Thursday, of passing through a 
 large district of country, the greater part of which is the 
 property of the Grocers' Company. About seven miles 
 from this town that company has erected a well-built village 
 called Mufi". Everything about it had the peaceful, in- 
 dustrious, well-cultivated, and cleanly aspect, which distin- 
 guishes the better parts of England. Nothing could be 
 more luxuriant and beautiful than the crops of wheat, just 
 ripe for the sickle. This estate is managed by Mr. Wig- 
 
152 THE PLANTATION OF ULSTER. 
 
 gins, an Englishman, who is the agent of the company. 
 The Drapers' Company have also a very well managed 
 estate, which is superintended by Mr. Miller, an Irishman. 
 The Fishmongers' Company are also equally well spoken of 
 in their management ; and several of the companies are fol- 
 lowing their example. Many of the resident gentry are in 
 no degree behind them. 
 
 How clearly does all this indicate that the evils which 
 oppress other parts of Ireland — which convert its fertile 
 lands into deserts, and its people into starving and turbulent 
 men — are sociall The thriving population and the generally 
 high state of cultivation of the county of Derry, arising from 
 the well-directed application of the capital of the landlords, 
 and of the intelligent industry of the people, exist under the 
 same laws with, and not many miles apart from — the star- 
 vation and wretchedness and waste lands of the Rosses and 
 the Island of Arran, in Donegal. 
 
 Dr. Kane, of Dublin, in his book on the Industrial Re- 
 sources of Ireland (page 412), asks — 
 
 " Why is it that our people are unemployed, or are driven to seek the 
 means of living by periodical emigration to fulfil the lowest offices in 
 another land ? Why is it that our harbours are bare of ships, our rivers 
 undisturbed by the bustle of industry and intercourse, our fields pro- 
 ducing but a third of what they might supply?— that where activity 
 exists, or that progress is now being made, it is to be traced, with but few 
 exceptions, to the introduction of the natives of the sister kingdom, into 
 whose possession there thus pass the most valuable domains of enterprise 
 which this country offers, whilst the Irish population rests in the lowest 
 grade, and but rarely manifests the qualities which the time requires ? 
 
 " The fault is not in the countrj/, but in ourselves ; the absence of suc- 
 cessful enterprise is owing to the fact that we do not know liow to 
 succeed ; we do not want activity ; we are not deficient in mental power, 
 but we want special industrial knowledge. England which, in absolute 
 education and in general morality is below us, notwithstanding our 
 criminal violence, is flir above us in industrial knowledge. Tlic man who 
 knows not how to read or write, who has never been at church," who 
 never taught his child to reverence the name of his Creator, will be a 
 
INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE WANTED. 153 
 
 perfect master of his trade. The machine he constructs, or the products 
 he elaborates, will be most perfect in their parts, most suited to their 
 purpose, and most economical in their cost ; from the task which he 
 undertakes nothing will turn him aside ; he knoAvs that time as well as 
 labour is required for an industrial result ; he invests his time as he in- 
 vests his money, as regularly and as extensively ; his steadiness and 
 perseverance in his pursuits are thus part of his industrial knowledge ; 
 his acquaintance with the probabilities of his trade prepares him for 
 difficulties, and hence enables him to surmount them. Such things he 
 knows must be in ordinary course, and thus he works constantly on. 
 
 " In this [industrial knowledge we are deficient. An Irishman takes 
 up a branch of trade ; after a time he finds it requires more capital than 
 he expected, and he becomes involved. He finds that the profits are less 
 than he had hoped, or he discovers that for a long time he can make no 
 profit, and he is discouraged. Circumstances arise which he is not pre- 
 pared to meet ; the conditions of the branch of industry may have 
 changed since he first entered into it, and finally he loses perhaps all that 
 he had embarked in trade, simply becavise he did not know his trade 
 well enough. An eminent Belgian minister, M. Briavionne, having 
 occasion to describe the importance of attendmg to the education of the 
 working and commercial classes in that country, drew his examples of 
 the consequences of neglect and of attention to it from the existing 
 position of the British islands. He asks, ' What has produced the 
 difference between the rich and floui-ishing condition of England and the 
 poverty and weakness of Ireland ? Industrial knowledge.' He strenuously 
 urges on the Belgian Legislature the necessity of attending to industrial 
 education, lest Belgium should become like Ireland." 
 
 Without stopping to question the " notions" of this author 
 as to the relative " morality" and " education" of the two 
 parts of the empire, at which both well-informed Englishmen 
 and Irishmen who have had the opportunities of forming an 
 accurate judgment will smile, I will proceed briefly to notice 
 those means of affording industrial knowledge which the 
 town and neighbourhood of Londonderry possess. 
 
 In the town, besides the usual seminaries, there has re- 
 cently been erected a very handsome school called the 
 " Glynn School," founded on the munificent bequest of a 
 gentleman of the name of Glynn, who left 50,000/. for its 
 
154 INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE WANTED. 
 
 establishment. 100 boys are here educated and taught some 
 trade. They are afterwards apprenticed, and, until their 
 apprenticeship has ceased, a care and supervision is exer- 
 cised over them. This establishment has since its founda- 
 tion been attended with the most beneficial results to the 
 community. 
 
 In 1826 a number of the gentry of the neighbourhood 
 established an Agricultural Seminary at Templemoyle, the 
 object of which was to give a substantially good English 
 education to the sons of farmers, and also to instruct them 
 in the scientific and practical knowledge of farming pur- 
 suits. The Grocers' Company contributed 1,500Z. towards 
 the establishment of this institution, the Irish Society 200Z., 
 and other large sums were subscribed by the gentry and 
 other companies. A commodious and well-planned school 
 was built on a farm of 172 acres of poor land rented from 
 the Grocers' Company. Each subscriber to the funds to a 
 certain amount has the privilege of nominating a pupil, the 
 whole cost of whose education to his parents is but 10/. 
 a year. One half the day the pupils are instructed in the 
 school ; the other half they are practically taught farming 
 by a Scotch farmer, and made to labour on the land. The 
 sphere of the society is confined to no district ; pupils are 
 received from every part of Ireland, and indeed from all 
 parts of the kingdom. Its object is to train up young men 
 as agriculturists — to fit them to become either clever prac- 
 tical agents or skilful farmers. The system pursued neces- 
 sarily inculcates in them habits of great cleanliness and 
 order, as well as practical and scientific knowledge ; and 
 there cannot be a doubt but that such habits, carried home 
 by these young men to the dwellings from which many of 
 them come, must have the most beneficial effect. This has 
 been found to be the case in practice. The great bulk of the 
 young men taught at this establishment settle down at home 
 in agricultural pursuits, and by their superior knowledge of 
 
INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE WANTED. 155 
 
 agriculture succeed well in. life, and set a valuable example 
 to their neighbours. Many become surveyors, clerks, and 
 agents, and not a few emigrate. Sir Robert A. Ferguson, M.P., 
 Sir Robert Bateson, of Castruse, and many of the gentry of 
 the neighbourhood, deserve much credit for their exertions in 
 getting up and supporting this institution. I had an oppor- 
 tunity of being present at its anniversary on Thursday. The 
 seventy young men who there receive agricultural instruction 
 went through a very creditable examination in the different 
 branches of their studies, and had afterwards a lecture de- 
 livered to them by Mr, Johnson, Professor of Chemistry to 
 the Durham University. The Bishop of Derry and his 
 family, Sir E. M'Naughten, and most of the gentry of the 
 neighbourhood were present, and stamped the ceremony 
 with importance in the eyes of the pupils.) 
 
 The object, however, which I have in drawing attention 
 to these seminaries, and to similar institutions, is to mark 
 the effect which the industrial knowledge they inculcate pro- 
 duces. 
 
 It is this knowledge, backed by the capital of the land- 
 lords of Derry, which has made this county like one of the 
 best districts of England. Apply the same means of instruc- 
 tion, and support the industrious application of those means 
 in the same manner, by the capital which the country pro- 
 duces, in the other provinces of Ireland, and what reason is 
 there that they should not prosper like Ulster ? * It is diffi- 
 cult, however, to say how this common sense social remedy 
 can be enforced. Its benefits are obvious. Heinous crimes 
 are comparatively rare. There is scarcely a soldier or an 
 armed policeman to be seen. The community is a peaceable 
 
 * ' ' The want of capital is often talked of as the cause of defective farming 
 amongst the occupying tenants in Ireland, but what would capital avail them 
 without the knowledge of its application ? — whereas personal instruction and 
 encouragement would make their present capital — their labour — ^produce four- 
 fold." — Visit to the Gleneask Estate of the Irish Waste Land Improvement 
 Society ; hy Major Ludlow Beamish, of Cork. 
 
156 INDUSTRIAL KNOWLEDGE WANTED. 
 
 and prosperous one. Yet the Union exists, and Catholics 
 as well as Protestants partake of the prosperity. The effect 
 of public opinion, and reflection on facts brought before 
 them, may however do something- in other parts of Ireland 
 — may teach the peasant that more is to be gained by dig- 
 ging and draining his land than by walking a dozen miles 
 to a " demonstration," — may teach the landlord that the 
 performance of the "duties" of his position is both more pro- 
 fitable and more praiseworthy than the ^^ vox et prmterea nihiV 
 of talking about " Justice to Ireland," but forgetting to do 
 iustice to Ireland.* 
 
 * "It is not more certain that we are a poor, distressed, and unfortunate 
 nation, than that the worst evils we labour under proceed from the great causes 
 I have just now mentioned — our own extravagance and laziness, and an equal want 
 of common care of ourselves and regard for our country. It is therefore plain 
 and obvious, that the remedy must also come from ourselves, by our growing 
 better economists, and universally resolving on a steady course of frugality and 
 industry, using and encouraging our manufactures. If we would grow rich and 
 easy, it must not be at the expense of our neighbours, but on our ov^^i bottom, by 
 labouring to help ourselves ; and, as the famous Balzac said, — ' He never expected 
 to be made an abbot unless he built and endowed the abbey himself,' — so we must 
 search for wealth by our own efforts entirely, and not by begging and bawling for 
 the charity of others. Had we acted with common sense or providence — had we 
 attended either to our private or our public interests — had we watched over the 
 management of our own fortunes, or the condition, and substance, and industry 
 of our tenants and tradesmen — we had never fallen thus miserably low." — 
 Preface to Refiections and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, by 
 the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society. 
 
SLIGO AND ITS NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES. 157 
 
 LETTER XL 
 
 SLIGO AND ITS NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES. 
 
 Sligo, its Harbour and its want of Funds for Enterprise — The neglected Advantages 
 of Water Carriage and Water Power which it possesses in its Locality — Its 
 Exports and Imports — The Iron and Coal Mines of its Neighhourhood — 
 Dishonest Tricks in the Butter and Corn Trades — The shifting Sand-hills — 
 Example of what individual Energy and Industry in a Farmer may accomplish 
 — the Character of the People ought to be considered in legislating for them — 
 Teach them, stimulate them on, and encourage them. 
 
 Sligo, September 18. 
 
 The town of Sligo forms the chief export market for the 
 produce of five of the adjoining- interior counties. It pos- 
 sesses a fine harbour, capable of being made first-rate, hav- 
 ing 25 feet of water over the bar at high water. It is, how- 
 ever, stricken with the prevailing want, under which every 
 object of public utility in Ireland languishes —a want of funds 
 to make its natural capabilities available. 
 
 This town is built on the borders of the river Garogue, 
 which empties itself into the bay of Sligo. This river takes 
 its rise in Lough Gill, a lake of considerable extent, about 
 two miles from Sligo, and which is navigable to Dromahair, 
 a village about six miles from Sligo. A glance at the map 
 will show you that Dromahair is but 10 English miles from 
 Lough Allen, which is the source of the river Shannon. 
 
158 SLIGO AND ITS 
 
 Thence the Shannon is navigable to its mouth, for upwards 
 of 200 miles through the heart of the country to below the 
 county of Clare, and by canal communication from Long- 
 ford, through which this magnificent river flows, to Dublin, 
 by the Royal Canal. 
 
 At Drumshambo, on the borders of Lough Allen, 20 miles 
 from Sligo, there are extensive limekilns, where lime is burned 
 for agricultural purposes, and sold at 6d. per barrel. The 
 cost of lime at Sligo is 1^. per barrel, because of the expense 
 of land carriage. At Arigna, on the borders of Lough Allen, 
 17 miles from Sligo, there are extensive coal-mines, now in 
 full work ; there are also iron-mines there, which were for- 
 merly extensively worked, and copper-ore has been found in 
 the mountains. The joopulous town of Sligo, containing 
 15,000 inhabitants, is, however, shut out from nearly all 
 these natural advantages from the want of energy and the 
 want of enterprise of the people. The 10 miles of land 
 between Lough Allen and Lough Gill has been an obstacle 
 so great, such a " lion in the way" to the inhabitants of the 
 counties of Sligo, Leitrim, and Roscommon, that they could 
 not overcome it ; and the town of Sligo is positively, at this 
 moment, supplied with coals from England and Scotland, 
 with a fine coal-mine within 20 miles of it, 10 only of 
 which are land-carriage. Nearly every cask^ of butter 
 exported from Sligo — and 50,000 are annually exported — 
 costs the farmers four times as much in land- carriage to 
 the town as it would by water ; and the cost of land-car- 
 riage is so great that all light goods required by the inhabi- 
 tants, even to the borders of Lough Allen, within 20 miles 
 of the seaport town of Sligo, come by Dublin and the Royal 
 Canal into the Shannon, and thence to Lough Allen, across 
 the whole country by water-carriage, at less cost. The 
 superior energy and enterprise of the inhabitants of Dublin 
 have secured them this advantage. It is, indeed, almost 
 inconceivable that a large and populous seaport town should 
 
NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES. 169 
 
 have hitherto permitted 10 miles of land-carriage to shut out 
 the interior in a great measure from the advantages of its 
 port, and its port from the advantages of the interior. There 
 is, however, a rather Irish sort of project now on foot to 
 connect these two loughs (Lough Gill and Lough Allen) by 
 a railroad — the Sligo and Shannon Railway, for which, it is 
 said, good gradients have been obtained. This, no doubt, 
 will be of great advantage, though a canal would seem to be 
 a more feasible connecting link.* A small steam-boat has 
 also recently been placed on Lough Gill, by Mr. George 
 Lane Fox of Yorkshire (I was informed), who is the pro- 
 prietor of an estate here, which plies between Sligo and the 
 extremity of Lough Gill, and which has very considerably 
 increased the export of pigs and other produce by the facili- 
 ties of carriage which it affords. The water-communication 
 from Lough Allen to Longford, down the Shannon, is chiefly 
 through a line of lakes, into which that river expands, which 
 are shallow at the margin, and horse-power, therefore, can- 
 not be applied to the navigation ; the boats which ply on this 
 part of the navigation are punted along with poles by men 
 on board. This mode of navigation is slow, dangerous, and 
 expensive, six or eight men to each boat being required ; 
 and the advantages of this natural high road to the greater 
 part of the counties of Leitrim and Roscommon are thus 
 lost. The obvious remedy is a steam-tug or steam^ vessels ; 
 but it would require energy and enterprise to set these 
 going, and these qualities are not very common in the west 
 of Ireland, and the want of capital stands in the way. There 
 are, therefore, no steam-boats on this part of the Shannon. 
 
 * It is proposed, I understand, that the raikoad should run into a kind of dock 
 or slip in one lough, and that vessels, without unloading them, should be floated 
 on to carriages, and be conveyed bodily, cargo and all together, to the navigable 
 water of the other lough. If, however, good gradients for a railway can be 
 obtained, it would appear to be equally possible to get good gradients for a canal, 
 which would seem to be the more feasible mode of communication. 
 
160 SLIGO AND ITS 
 
 Notwithstanding, however, the neglect of these many natu- 
 ral advantages, there is a very considerable export trade 
 from Sligo. The exports from Sligo average annually 
 about — 
 
 60,000 pigs, slaughtered, value . . £200,000 
 
 6,000 cattle 60,000 
 
 50,000 firkins of butter 125,000 
 
 22,000 tons of oats 132,000 
 
 12,000 tons of meal 132,000 
 
 £649,000 
 
 Besides poultry, eggs, and salmon. 
 
 The average annual imports are — 
 
 16,000 barrels of herrings. 
 10,000 tons of timber and deals. 
 15,000 tons of coals. 
 
 4,000 tons of iron. 
 
 5,000 tons of slates. 
 
 And there is a steamer plying weekly to Liverpool, Glasgow, 
 Donegal, and Mayo. 
 
 I have already drawn attention to the import of coals, 
 owing; to the want of communication with a fine mine of 
 coals within 20 miles of the town ; you will see, by the im- 
 ports above, that iron is imported. 
 
 Some 10 years ago, the iron mines at Arigna, on the bor- 
 ders of Lough Allen, were extensively worked by an English 
 Company, under the superintendence of an English manager. 
 Great numbers of people found employment at them. Every 
 man who chose to labour could find work, and those who had 
 horses and carts found plenty of employment for them. This 
 gentleman was reputed to be a kind-hearted, good man. 
 His house, however, one night was surrounded by a gang 
 of ruffians, whose object, it seems, was to plunder it of the 
 money intended to pay the labourers, and he was shot dead 
 on putting his head out of the window. Since then the 
 
NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES. 161 
 
 iron works have been at a stand-still, and there is no em- 
 ployment to be got. 
 
 There is immense water-power in the neighbourhood of 
 Sligo, which has been applied, to some extent, to meal and 
 flour mills ; but there are no other manufactories. At Col- 
 loony, a few miles from Sligo, there is water to the extent 
 of 1,000 horse-power, and a fall of 30 to 40 feet; at Bally- 
 sodare, also, in the immediate neighbourhood, there is still 
 greater water-power, and a fall of 80 feet in about 500 yards. 
 There is also extensive water-power at Dromahair. Most, 
 if not all, of these natural advantages are neglected. 
 
 The country-people complain a good deal about the way 
 in which the butter sales are conducted. A weighing- master 
 and inspector are appointed to weigh the butter, and brand 
 its quality, as 1st, 2d, 3d, &c., and the butter was formerly 
 sold according to the brand of these officers. The brand is 
 still retained, but under an act of Parliament passed in 1830 
 the trade is thrown open, and it is optional to individuals to 
 adopt the regulations of the market or not. Under this 
 system, the weighing-master's brand is regularly altered, 
 and inferior butter is sold as first quality butter. This, it is 
 said, tends to injure the character of the market, and to pro- 
 mote the production of an inferior article. The brand of the 
 officer has ceased to be of any value, and each cask has to 
 be examined and tested by the purchaser. In this manner 
 the farmers are often imposed upon ; they cannot sell their 
 butter by the market j)i'ice of the brand ; the dealers test it 
 with their augers, and bid what they choose for it less than 
 the branded value. The farmers are generally dissatisfied 
 with this price, and hawk their butter about from one dealer 
 to another, till it gets so bored into as to become deteriorated 
 in value, and they are then compelled to sell it for less than 
 its worth. It would seem advisable either to resort strictly 
 to the old law, and make the officers' brand the test of the 
 quality of the butter, protected by penalties, or to do away 
 
 M 
 
162 SLIGO AND ITS 
 
 with the brands altogether, as they are now merely decep- 
 tive. * 
 
 On the coast of Sligo, near the bay, large districts of 
 
 * Mr. William Christian, the deputy weigh-master of the town of Sligo, in his 
 evidence before the Land Commissioners (Appendix, Part 2, p. 219), says, — 
 " The present state of the butter trade is this : a man brings a cask of butter into 
 the market for sale ; he lays it down for inspection ; the inspector examines the 
 butter, and puts on it a mark to denote its quality ; the man goes to the crane and 
 gets it weighed ; and he then sells his cask of butter, by the weigh-master's ticket, 
 to the merchant, a duplicate of which is kept by the weigh-master, that reference 
 may be had to it hereafter. The merchant buys it, and marks the price on the 
 ticket — say 70*. — the man goes with the butter to the merchant's store to deliver 
 it; the merchant then takes his own auger to try the butter, and examines it 
 himself; after it has undergone the operation of the public officer, he finds fault 
 with the butter, and says, — 'I will not take this butter at the quality that is 
 marked on it ; I must get a reduction.' The seller says, — ' No, I will not allow 
 of any reductions ; I have had it regularly inspected by the public officer.' The 
 merchant says, — ' I will not give you the price for that quality.' The seller then takes 
 away the butter, and gets back his ticket. He goes to another merchant to see if 
 he can get a better price. The merchant sees the mark on the ticket of the first 
 buyer, and says, — ' I will not take it at all ; it has been rejected.' The seller 
 goes to a third, a fourth, or fifth merchant, in succession, and they all say they 
 will not take it. He then has to go to the first man to whom he sold it, and to 
 sacrifice 4*. or 5s. in the price. If a man has a lot of butter, and brings it into a 
 merchant's store, he selects the good qualities, and throws back the inferior ones. 
 The object of doing this by the merchant is that he may change the qualities 
 marked by the insi^ector. They often make the second quality first, and some- 
 times the third quality first. I have even seen fourths made first ; and he ships 
 them in that state as if he had bought them originally of those qualities. This 
 system is now carried to such an extent that, with the exception of one or two 
 shippers, scarcely a cask of butter leaves this port witli the original market-brands 
 upon it." 
 
 " Do you know, of your own knowledge, that the merchant falsifies the 
 inspector's marks?" "Yes, it came under my own knowledge this day, as it 
 continually does. Tliere has been a great deal rejected this day in the market by 
 the purchasers. The object they have in doing it is to substitute one quality for 
 another. The established rule of the market was to make a reduction of 6s. 
 between a first and second quality ; 8a'. between second and third ; 10*. between 
 third and fourth ; and 10*. between fourth and fifth. . . . They rank second 
 quality butter as the first quality by their own forgeries in their private stores. 
 The effect of this practice is, to deteriorate the character of the butter, and thereby 
 injure the producer." 
 
 Thus it is that the natural mind of the people of the west of Ireland mistakes 
 cunnivrj for unsdom. By this piece of roguery they of course lose their trade. 
 I was informed there that the country people near Sligo prefer carrying their 
 
NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES. 163 
 
 country, and some of the finest lands of tlie county, have 
 been destroyed by the drifting of sea-sand. The sand blows 
 with the north-west wind from Rathlye-point, and from 
 
 butter all the way to Enniskillen market, because they are more fairly dealt with 
 there. It was by practices like these that the Irish nearly ruined their export 
 trade in flax. They twisted up pebbles in the knots of flax, which, being sold by 
 weight, the purchaser bought pebbles at the rate of 40/. or 50/. a ton. As soon 
 as he found it out, he would either not buy Irish flax at ciny price, or, if he did 
 buy it, he bought it at a price below its value, calculating so much loss by roguery 
 in pebbles. The cunning of the Irish mind delights in overreaching a neighbour ; 
 but it is not wise enough to foresee that the neighbour, though overreached once, 
 may not be a fool, may find out the deception, and^refuse afterwards to have 
 dealings with dishonesty. 
 
 The same system of unfair dealing is carried out in other things. They cheat 
 one another, and therefore suspect one another ; and mutual want of confidence 
 and want of enterprise ai'e the result. The same witness says, lq the next page, 
 speaking of the com trade, — " A great deal of the oats brought into this market 
 are drawn in by carmen for hire. \Mien these men come into the town with the 
 oats, they will not weigh at the public scale, the oats not being their own ; but 
 they sell them, probably to customers they are in the habit of selling them to. I 
 have known a carman to get two hundredweight of salt, or two or three bars of 
 iron, and I have knowTi him get 5«. ; and he brings home to the owner of the oats 
 the merchant's ticket, and pays him accordingly. There is a great deal of that 
 kind of system carried on in the country. The poor people cannot come in 
 themselves, and they send the com in by carmen ; and in every case where that 
 is done, and the merchant knows it is not weighed in the market, he mulcts the 
 owner of the corn." 
 
 " By means of a bribe to the carrier ? " " Yes. I have seen a cai'-load of oats 
 brought into the market, first sold in the public yard, and then weighed at the 
 crane ; and there was a man there, kept by a merchant, to carry messages, to 
 point out to him every sack of oats that might be weighed in the market, which 
 his man would buy. He would run away when he saw a sack of oats with his 
 master's mark on it weighed in the market, and give notice in the store, that they 
 might know how to treat it ; but any sack that was not weighed he (the seller) 
 was sure of being mulcted in. ... It is impossible to get the country people who 
 do accompany their own com to weigh at the public crane. They think that you 
 have some design or some interest in it." 
 
 " \Yhen a merchant buys com from a man who brings it in, does he weigh it 
 in the yard, or at the top of the store in the loft .' " "In the yard below ; and if 
 the man selling to him is an ingenious fellow, who does not Uke to be cheated, he 
 stands at the crane to see them weigh it. They have what they caU a lever, to 
 hook up the scale which has the weights in it upon the crane ; and they are so 
 trained to it that they put the top of the crook on the end of the beam, and while 
 the owner is looking at the scale the craner pulls it down and raises up the other 
 end of the beam." 
 
 M 2 
 
164 SLIGO AND ITS 
 
 Knocklain-hill, to the neighbourhood of Bally mullary. Up- 
 wards of 1,000 acres of arable land have in this manner been 
 covered with sand. Above 100 acres of land have thus been 
 destroyed by the sand from Knocklain-hill during the last 
 two years. The cottages of the small farmers are often 
 covered up with sand, and they are obliged to shovel it away 
 to creejD down to their doorways. They are frequently 
 obliged to shovel the sand from the thatch of their houses, 
 to prevent its weight breaking through the roof. Lord Pal- 
 merston is one of the owners of this district of country, and 
 
 " Are you aware that those frauds are punishable by law?" " If the party 
 discovers the fraud, money is given to him, and we hear no more about it. If a 
 man happens to see the crook, he says, — ' You are cheating me.' The man at 
 the crane calls out the weight to the clerk inside, and he puts down a less weight ; 
 and yet the countryman will come next time to the same man with his oats, 
 because he gets 6d. a sack more. He will say to me, — ' I will watch him ; he 
 cheated me last time, but he shall not do it now.' But he cheats him still to a 
 great extent. I am sorry to say we have not many respectable merchants in the 
 trade." 
 
 " What plan would you propose as a remedy to that system ?" " The only 
 remedy would be to make it imperative to weigh at the public scales. We make 
 no charge for it. We do it gratis for the people, and yet we cannot get them to 
 do it. If the com which is sold at the market were all weighed at the public 
 beam, it would save the countryman an immensity of money, and he would get 
 the fair value for his corn. But, under the present system, I cannot describe the 
 extent to which they are robbed at the private scales ; and it is the same with 
 pork and everything else." 
 
 These are pitiable examples of littleness, chicane, and low cunning. Minds 
 capable of such tricks as these are incapable of enterprise, or of wisely striving to 
 realize a great trade by fair dealing. They are not wise enough to see the value 
 of a ffood name ; and they lose the wealth and the greatness which honest industry 
 would realize, by peddling tricks, and trying to cheat in halfpence. 
 
 Dr. Madden, who wrote a century ago, says, — " How often have we slaughtered 
 ill-conditioned cattle, as well as under-aged, in despite of our laws, and sent both 
 them and our butter, so pickled, salted, and packed, that the very slaves in the 
 Indies would not eat them, and in casks as faulty as the victuals that were 
 barrelled up in them, to the loss of our credit and the ruin of our trade. While 
 there is business in the world, the fair dealer will never fail of being employed to 
 his advantage in it ; but if the world was starving and naked, they would be as 
 unwilling to send for our provisions or linens, while we cheat and defraud them, 
 as one would be to employ noted thieves to (piench the flames or remove the goods 
 when a house is on fire." — Reflections and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen 
 of Ireland, by the late Rev. Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, p. 154. 
 
NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES. 165 
 
 has clone much to prevent this evil. He has planted about 
 1,000 acres of bent — a coarse kind of tall grass — in a line 
 with the sea-shore; and this has been found to have the effect 
 of arresting the blowing of the sand. Fine grass then grows 
 under the bent, and affords good pasture. Many of the land- 
 lords, however, have not taken this necessary precaution, and 
 the i-esult is, that the sand is gradually creeping over and 
 destroying their lands; and it is of little use for one landlord 
 to plant bent, unless he has a very large extent of country, if 
 another will not. 
 
 Mr. Francis Barber, in his evidence before the Land Com- 
 missioners (Appendix, part 2, p. 206), says, — 
 
 " That part of the country would fully remunerate the landlords for 
 fixing the sand ; it is a valuable part of the countfy, and many of the 
 inhabitants are starving for want of provisions ; it is a very fine land, 
 and there are many inhabitants living on the sand. You may be walk- 
 ing over the top of good land and not know it. At another time it may 
 be blown off; but it is advancing, and I should not be surprised if it 
 covered 1,000 acres more. 
 
 It is, however, seen that a little energy and the outlay of 
 some capital will stop it. 
 
 The landlords generally have the character here of being 
 fair landlords. The evidence of Mr. Kincaid before the 
 Land Commissioners (part 1, p. 30), shows that Lord Pal- 
 merston has greatly improved his estate in this country. 
 The rundale system of cultivation has been abolished by 
 him, and a most numerous and subdivided tenantrv have 
 each been placed on squared farms, whilst no tenant has 
 been removed. 
 
 In former letters I have shown to you what the energy 
 and persevering attention of good landlords is capable of 
 accomplishing in benefiting themselves, the people, and 
 their country. I have also endeavoured to show that the 
 prevailing wants or failings of the population of the west 
 coast of Ireland are want of energy and want of enterprise ; 
 
166 SLIGO AND ITS 
 
 and that these wants must he ???e^— that it is the duty of the 
 Government, if satisfied that this is the case, to encourage 
 the people — to train them — to urge them on and lead them 
 on — to spur them into the attainment of these qualities. 
 The description of Sligo and its neglected natural advan- 
 tages are evidence more than enough to prove how little 
 enterprise and energy are to be found here. Do not, how- 
 ever, let it be supposed that it is the middle and upper classes 
 alone who want these qualities. Their want is universal. 
 
 It is quite true, that during periods of excitement the 
 energy of the people is enormous ; but this fact is quite com- 
 patible with habitual and long periods of inaction. The 
 small gentry, or " squireens," as they are called — men of 
 300/. or 400/. a year, strengthen these failings by the most 
 ridiculous pride. Such men are too proud to send their sons 
 into the counting-houses of merchants, to learn some business 
 and fight their own way as good citizens, and they are too 
 poor to bring them up to professions; but they will raise 
 heaven and earth in patronage-hunting to get a son into the 
 Post-office, at 80/. to 100/. a year. Their pride is sufficient 
 to prevent their seeking independence by praiseworthy and 
 honest industry and enterprise, but it is not sufficient to pre- 
 vent them becoming the slaves and sycophants of every 
 " great man" for the most paltry advantages. 
 
 The small farmers and labouring classes in everything 
 about them exhibit this habitual want of energy and enter- 
 prise, though at certain periods capable of great exertions. 
 An hour's labour of the wife with a needle and thread would 
 prevent the man's torn coat hanging in shreds about him. 
 An hour's labour of the man would fill up the puddlehole at 
 his door, through which his children paddle, every day, in 
 and out of his cottage, rendering it and themselves filthy. 
 I intend, in my letter to-day, to show what may be effected 
 by persevering energy and industry by the labouring classes 
 themselves. 
 
NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES. 167 
 
 In reading tlirough the evidence taken before the Land 
 Commissioners, I was struck with that given by Francis 
 Barber, a small farmer near Sligo. As it carries out the 
 object of my letter to-day, I shall quote portions of it. It 
 will be found at page 203, Appendix, part 2. 
 
 This farmer, after saying that " he had improved his land 
 so that an acre was equal to an acre and a half of the land 
 about him," and that " he had laid out 1,300?. of his own 
 cash in the improvement of the land in draining," and, " as 
 it paid him as he went on, he laid out the money as cheer- 
 fully as it came in," says, question 31, — 
 
 " I have been set going with not 5s. worth of capital when I started ; 
 the thing was just left in my hands. My father left me the property, but 
 it was embarrassed greatly; and I laid out and went on impro\nng it, 
 and never got any allowance from the landlord. I made everything pay 
 me as I went on, from all the sources of industry I could apply myself to." 
 
 His industry was seen and appreciated by his landlord, 
 and because he went to the expense in improvements which 
 he did, his rent was reduced, and he had a larger farm given 
 to him, and that encouraged him to go on still more vigo- 
 rously. The witness says, question 35, — 
 
 " I was greatly disheartened by the people round me, who said my 
 landlord would take advantage of me ; but he has abated my rent. He 
 is satisfied, and I am happy to be under such a landlord ; and I think it 
 would be the best thing that could be done for us all to let the landlords 
 give every assistance. There are some gentlemen taking a very active 
 part in improving their property, and others are not. If the landlords 
 would put their shoulders to it, and assist in making the improvements, 
 and give a portion of it, all would go on well ; but the landlord takes a 
 portion and puts it into his pocket, and the tenant takes his part and 
 expends it, so that the farm goes to the bad. If the people would go on 
 improving, two acres of land would be more than three acres in its pre- 
 sent condition." 
 
 After describing the great improvements which have been 
 efifected on the estate of Sir Robert Gore Booth he is asked 
 (question 49), — 
 
168 SLIGO AND ITS 
 
 " Do you perceive the tenantry much improved in their condition 
 since ? — Yes, I do ; but I thinli that the people loillfall away again if they 
 are not kept to it. They have not a spirit of industry about them : they 
 require a person to keep them as a spur to it.'* 
 
 The Irish, however, can v\'ork and do work well, if they 
 see the prospect of immediate advantage before them, but if 
 the advantage be remote or doubtful, or if it be only the 
 probability of increased comfort, then they appear to want 
 energy, or, as this witness terms it, " the spirit of industry," 
 to strive for it ; they must be " spurred to it." 
 
 I determined to see this farmer, for this reason, — that 
 there is more to be learned from one energetic industrious 
 man, of any class, than from fifty common-place individuals 
 of any class. I found him precisely what I had anticipated, 
 — a clever, shrewd, active, respectable man. He detailed to 
 me his history; as it forwards the object of my letter, and 
 may give encouragement to farmers to follow his example, I 
 shall relate it just as he told it to me. His father occupied a 
 farm of twenty-seven acres, under Sir Robert Gore Booth, for 
 which he paid 40Z. rent. His father died before he was four- 
 teen years of age, leaving his mother and ten children de- 
 pending on the farm, and himself as a mere boy to manage 
 it. His father was 183Z. in debt, and his whole stock was 
 two cows, a heifer, and two horses ; two-thirds of the farm 
 were in wretched condition, growing little beyond thistles 
 and weeds. The first year he expended 21. \bs. in draining a 
 field : the following year he expended 41. on another field. 
 Finding the benefit he derived from these improvements, 
 the third year he spent 10/. in draining. The following year 
 he was about to carry out more extensive improvements in 
 draining and trenching, but the people of the country and 
 his neighbours went to his mother and advised her to pre- 
 vent him laying out more money on the farm, as they said 
 " he would destroy the family." His mother, in conse- 
 quence, took the charge of the farm out of his hands. He 
 
NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES. 169 
 
 begged for half an acre of rough land to manage for him- 
 self, and pursued the same plan on this half acre, the pro- 
 duce of which he sold the following year for a profit of 4/, 
 His mother then let him have another acre of waste land 
 unfit for anything else. On this he expended 10?. in 
 draining and trenching. He had but his 4L, and borrowed 
 51, and got credit for IZ. worth of labour, from a neighbour 
 who helped him, thus making up the sum. His half-acre 
 again left a profit of 41., and the crop on the acre of land 
 sokl for 71. He had thus cleared himself and had got an acre 
 and a half of good land. His mother seeing that he suc- 
 ceeded let him have two more acres of waste land. On 
 these two acres he laid out 161. in draining and trenching, 
 borrowing part of the money, and the neighbours helped 
 him, and he sold the whole produce of his three acres and 
 a half for 15Z. profit the following year, over and above the 
 cost of bringing in the two acres. His mother then, finding 
 that he had gained so much by the improvements, gave him 
 back the charge of the farm. He then continued improving 
 to a greater extent, according to his ability, and he found 
 the farm paid him for all his expenditure as he went on. 
 The agent, taking notice of his improvements and perse- 
 verance, said he was entitled to have a larger farm, and 
 added fifty acres to the extent of his farm. He continued 
 improving the remainder of the farm, and having laid out a 
 large sum of money upon it, his landlord gave him a lease 
 at a reduced rent of 4^. 6d. an acre. He continued this 
 course, and his landlord became so pleased with him that he 
 extended his farm to 160 acres. The whole of this land he 
 has improved, and has laid out upon it no less a sum than 
 1,300/., every shilling of which was created by his own in- 
 dustry. He has paid ofi" his father's debt, supported his 
 mother and her family, and, according to the custom of the 
 country here, has given portions befitting their station, as 
 farmer's daughters, to six of his sisters. As first one and 
 
170 SLIGO AND ITS 
 
 then another of his sisters married off, he was often left with- 
 out a shilling, in order to pay them their portions. From 
 having a small farm at will, much of it swamp, and feeding 
 snipe and wild duck, he has now got a large well-cultivated 
 farm on lease, which will amply repay him all his outlay, 
 and is a substantial farmer. The same spirit of energy has 
 induced this farmer to contract for making the sewers 
 through the town. In making these sewers he has unex- 
 pectedly come upon an extensive foundation of solid rock, 
 through which it is necessary to blast. Instead of throwing 
 up his contract as a losing concern, he is persevering 
 through it, to the admiration of everybody, and there can be 
 no doubt that the gentlemen of the county and the grand 
 jury will not permit him to lose by it. 
 
 It is also proper to add, that he was fortunate in having a 
 good landlord. Had he been badly treated, and had his 
 rent been raised in proportion to his exertions, the result 
 would have been disheartening to himself, and the example 
 of his treatment would have had a most injurious tendency, 
 instead of being beneficial to the neighbourhood. 
 
 Now, what has effected all this beyond individual energy? 
 No man could commence under more disheartening circum- 
 stances- Yet what this farmer has accomplished is in the 
 power of every farmer to attempt, and in most cases to ac- 
 complish also. 
 
 It may be said that this example of energy subverts my 
 own theory as to the general want of it. The build and 
 appearance of Mr. Barber induced me to ask him the 
 question, and he informed me that he is of English descent, 
 as his name also would indicate. It would, however, be 
 very unjust to conclude that there are no examples of 
 energy and enterprise here. I wish only to show the fact 
 that these qualities are not common, and that the want of 
 them accounts for much of the poverty and misery that 
 prevail. That this is a fact I think any man of any obser- 
 
NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES. 171 
 
 yation may convince himself. Taking it as a fact, I now 
 come to the object I have in view in pointing it out. So 
 long as the government of Ireland is carried on upon the 
 assumption that the whole island is peopled with an ener- 
 getic and enterprising population — a population of one cha- 
 racter — and measures are passed under which only such a 
 population can prosper, so long will Ireland present " diffi- 
 culties." The energetic population of the north and the 
 east will thrive, be English partisans, and triumphant 
 Orangemen, while the patient and much enduring, but un- 
 enterjDrising and unenergetic population of the west, will be 
 steeped in poverty and discontent, and be violent Repealers. 
 
 How is this difficulty to be met? The people of the west 
 are small farmers, and live almost entirely by the land. 
 From a bad and ignorant system of cultivation, then* land is, 
 much of it, unimproved, and does not produce one-half of 
 what it is capable, whilst the people starve for want. They 
 have no energy to set about improvement. Meet these cir- 
 cumstances as they exist. The establishment of a number 
 of agricultural schools, combined with model farms, similar 
 to the college at Templemoyle, would do much to urge on, 
 encourage, and improve the people. Such establishments 
 having land enough attached to them to support them, on 
 which the youth of the country could be shown how to im- 
 prove, and be taught the advantages of such improvements, 
 whilst at the same time they were trained in-doors in habits 
 of order, industry, and cleanliness, would, in a few years, ma- 
 terially change the habits of the people. Each establish- 
 ment might also give small government premiums, to be 
 awarded by competent parties, to encourage and urge on the 
 peasantry to habits of cleanliness and persevering industry ; 
 for, to repeat the words of Mr. Barber, " the people require 
 a spur, or they will fall away again." I avoid, however, 
 matters of mere detail. 
 
 Some may be disposed to ridicule this proposition. To 
 
172 SLIGO AND ITS 
 
 such persons, however, I will simply put the plain question, 
 — is it not wise for a father to discover the character of his 
 children before he governs them ? One son requires encour- 
 agement and urging on ; another restraint. One horse 
 requires a " spur," another the rein. Seek out, then, first 
 the character of the people of Ireland, and, having found it, 
 urge on, teach by example, and encourage those who need 
 this treatment. Those who prosper without it may be left 
 to themselves.* 
 
 Before closing my letter, I would wish to say one word to 
 the poor farmers on the example set to them by Mr. Bar- 
 
 * ' ' There is no principle in political economy more universally admitted than 
 this — namely, that capital will always find means for its profitable occupation, as 
 far as it is possible to accomplish it. Now, the small farmer, being a man of 
 limited education, has generally no other means of emplojdng any savings he may 
 accumulate except by laying them out in the increase of his farm ; and in confor- 
 mity with this, it is notorious that, as his circumstances improve, every opportunity 
 to enlarge his farm is attentively watched and laid hold of with avidity. If a 
 landlord, therefore, wishes to have large farms, let him endeavour to better the 
 circumstances of his tenants, and, as their capital increases, the enlargement will 
 proceed therewith pari passu, without his adopting any violent measures to effect 
 the change. 
 
 " The question then comes to this : — How can a tenantry that is poor be most 
 readUy made rich ? The true answer to which most plainly and undeniably is, 
 hy stimulating their industry, and teaching them to make that industry pro- 
 ductive to the greatest possible extent. And how can this be more reasonably 
 and practically set about than by teaching them how to cultivate their farms, and 
 lending them a little assistance when wanted ? If, by so doing, the possessor of 
 a small farm can obtain triple the produce without increasing his rent, the road to 
 advancement is opened to his view, and his exertions increase with the increase of 
 his crop. And what is the final result ? It is this : when his capital has, in this 
 way, been augmented, the small farmer, finding himself possessed of the means of 
 purchasing and occupying more land — being the only method he is acquainted 
 with of turning his accumulations to profitable account — immediately endea- 
 vours to enlarge his farm ; and if he cannot do this where he is, he removes to 
 where he can ; and thus, in accomplishing his own wishes, he affords an opportunity 
 for the neighbour he leaves behind to accomplish his wishes also, by annexing to 
 his own the farm quitted, which is thus brought into the market by the plan 
 herein recommended, which would perhaps never have been the case without its 
 adoption, and the work of consolidation proceeds fropi natural causes, without 
 violence, ill-will, or inconvenience to any party concerned." — Preface to Mr. 
 Slacker's Essay on the Im2)rovement of Small Farms, p. 10. 
 
NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES. 173 
 
 ber. Opposite the hotel in which I write is the Repeal 
 meeting-room, in which some three hundred frieze-coated 
 farmers are assembled, and cheering some orator who is 
 addressing them as " the bone and sinew of Ireland." 
 This is as true of your horses and heifers as it is of you. 
 Strive for a more elevated character; strive to improve; 
 and to be distinguished rather as the intelligent, the indus- 
 trious, and the thriving people of Ireland. This is within 
 your power, for Mr. Barber, one of yourselves, has accom- 
 plished it. But he did not accomplish it by going to 
 Repeal meetings to receive compliments on his " bone and 
 sinew." I would not wish to prevent you freely expressing 
 and acting upon your political views, but don't waste your 
 time listening to such rubbish as these " bone and sinew" 
 addresses, nor permit your minds to be unsettled by them. 
 As long as there is anything whatever that you can do, 
 either on your farms or in your houses, it is a loss to you to 
 attend these meetings ; and you may depend upon it, that so 
 long as you employ yourselves on your farms you will have 
 plenty to engage your thoughts, without being made the 
 dupes of others, in shouting on political subjects, which your 
 occupations prevent you thoroughly understanding. I have 
 had many opportunities of observation, and I earnestly assure 
 you that I never yet saw a man run after politics and poli- 
 tical meetings, to the neglect of his business, — waste his 
 time in bothering his head about the concerns of the nation, 
 instead of about his own, — who did not come to a ragged 
 coat and to want. I have seen many a stupid man with j ust 
 sense enough to mind his business thrive — because he 
 minded his business ; whilst his neighbour, possessing the 
 advantages of intelligence and acquirements, but who would 
 mind anybody's concerns but his own, has " gone to the 
 dogs." Follow Mr. Barber's example ; each man strive to 
 im^^rove ; and, like Mr. Barber, you will imj)rove and 
 prosper, and, in your aggregate prosperity, the nation will 
 prosper also. 
 
174 THE PEASANTRY OF SUGO. 
 
 LETTER XII. 
 
 THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO ; AND ITS WATER-POWER. 
 
 Subdivision of Farms — The Attention of Landlords will secure Comfort and 
 Cleanliness for their Tenants — Failure of Industrial School which depended 
 on support of Tenants — Contentment and Indolence of the Peasantry — The 
 importance of establishing a class of Labourers dependent on Labour, and not 
 on a Potato Field — Instances of Mismanagement on the part of Landlords — 
 Repeal of the Union wiU not cure Absenteeism — Refutation of the narrow- 
 minded view, that Englishmen strive to have " England only for the English" 
 — On the great Water-power of Ballysodare, and the probability of Profitable 
 Manufacturing Investment which it affords, as a means of giving Employment 
 to the People. 
 
 Ballysodare, Sligo, September 20. 
 
 Since my last letter from Sligo, I have had the opportunity 
 of seeing a large portion of this beautiful county. I liave 
 already stated to you that the majority of the landlords in 
 the neighbourhood of Sligo are resident and improving land- 
 lords, and the effect of their supervision and attention is 
 everywhere observable. Lord Palmerston, one of the largest 
 landowners, though from his public position necessarily an 
 absentee, expends large sums liberally on the improvement 
 of his estate and of his tenantry. So great, however, was 
 found to be the subdivision on parts of his estate, on the 
 expiration of some old leases, that with the wish not to 
 remove any tenant, but to give each a squared farm, the 
 holdings of many of his tenants are extremely small, and they 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 175 
 
 are consequently very poor.* Mr. Wynne, of Hazlewood, 
 whose domain is on the borders of Lough Gill — perhaps one 
 of the most beautiful lakes in Ireland — has taken great 
 
 * Mr. Joseph Kincaid, land-agent, Dublin, in his evidence before the Land 
 Commissioners at Sligo (Appendix, Part 1, pp. 30, 31, 32, 33), says, — " On 
 looking over my papers this morning, I took a memorandum of six leases, which 
 had been granted, about sixty years ago, upon Lord Palmerston's estate, for 
 three lives or thirty-one years. These six leases all expired about the years 1837 
 and 1838, by the death of the last cestui que vies ; the years were gone before. 
 WilUam IV. was a life in a good many of them ; the late Mr. Wynne was a life in 
 one. The lives died within a year or two of each other ; but the first of them 
 expired by the death of William IV. In the lands comprised within those leases, 
 when they expired, we found two hundred and eighty occupying tenants." 
 
 14. " Can you state the extent of the ground ?" "I myself rent the land to 
 those two hundred and eighty tenants. I did not turn out a single tenant ; and 
 the average of the size of the holding was under five acres, comprising altogether 
 about one thousand four hundi'ed acres." 
 
 32. " In letting those two hundred and eighty pieces of land, was any uniform 
 system pursued as to any improvement by building or draining, or was the land 
 let to the tenants to do the best they could ? " "In the first place, the land was 
 all squared, and roads were laid out in straight lines through the town-lands." 
 
 33. "At whose expense were those roads made ?" " They were laid out by 
 me, as the agent, or under my superintendence ; and the agriculturist or steward 
 upon the estate fixed the price to be paid for forming and making the road and 
 side fences and planting the hedgerows. Tlie tenants were each allotted a certain 
 number of perches of that road, and they were allowed half the sum which had 
 been so settled by the steward." 
 
 34. " The other half being given by the tenants in the shape of labour, for the 
 advantage they derived from the roads?" "Yes; and I hold in my hand a 
 tabular statement of the improvements efi"ected upon the Sligo estate of Lord 
 Palmerston, for the three years previous to June, 1841, chiefly upon those holdings. 
 There were 94 new houses buUt, 56 houses were then in progress, and 19,000 
 Irish perches of ditches and fences were made, 1660 Irish perches of new roads 
 were made, and 523 perches were then in progress — all of which have been 
 long since finished — 17,000 forest trees and 660,000 quicks had been given out to 
 the tenants. The general average expense of those roads was Ss. per Irish perch, 
 of which Lord Palmerston paid one-half. . . . Lord Palmerston allowed us to offer 
 premiums for improved systems of agriculture. We give out seeds to the tenantg 
 every year on credit, and we give about 30/. a year among the small tenants for green 
 crops, &c., and we have effected some improvement in the growth of green crops 
 and the regular rotation of crops ; I should say, upon an estate on which there are 
 nearly eight hundred tenants, the progress is not at all equal to the expenditure 
 which Lord Palmerston has made upon the estate. I should state, however, that, 
 owing to the abundance of sea-manure, it is not the custom to take a number of 
 white crops in succession. After manure they generally take one crop of potatoes, 
 
176 THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 
 
 pains, by personally visiting and encouraging the tenants 
 and labourers on his estate, and building them better cot- 
 tages, to lead them into habits of neatness. I was in the 
 cottages of several of his labourers. They are two-story, 
 well built slated cottages, with red brick floors — a kitchen or 
 house-room, and dairy on the ground-floor, and bed-rooms 
 above. Each of these cottages was as clean and orderly as 
 any in England, and each had a neat vegetable garden 
 attached to it. The cottagers' wives seemed to be most 
 s:rateful to their landlord for their state of comfort. So 
 contrary to the notions of the people, however, were these 
 cottages when first erected, that the neighbours nicknamed 
 them the " golden knockers ;" their notion being that for a 
 labourer to live in a two-story cottage, and in a state of 
 cleanliness and comfort, was something so out of the way 
 
 and then a crop of oats, and then manure again ; so that the ground is not so 
 much exhausted as it would be in other places : and, though the land is moun- 
 tainous and poor, the oats are considered of good quality, and the potatoes are 
 abundant." 
 
 53. " There has been a considerable expenditure by Lord Palmerston in the 
 improvement of the harbour there .'" " Yes." 
 
 54. " Has that enabled a great number of the tenants to obtain a livelihood by 
 fishing.'" "I should think it has enabled a great number of the tenants to 
 obtain a livelihood ; but it was by means of the expenditure upon the harbour, 
 which has been about 15,000/. The fishing is also increased." 
 
 56. "Were the peasantiy in a very pauperized condition when the leases 
 expired in 1838 .' — were their houses very bad ? " "Yes ; I found them living in 
 villages, and occupying a few acres in several different spots. It was to remedy 
 that evil, which had grown to such an extent that it became neces.«ary to square 
 and consolidate the holdings ; and of course it was necessary to throw down the 
 houses in those villages, and make the tenants build new houses on the road-side 
 on the sites pointed out to them. I would not say, however, that the tenants 
 were pauperized." 
 
 57. "Did you find any objections to the new arrangement you proposed to 
 make?" "Not generally. There was on some town-lands a good deal of 
 opposition, but it was more as to the square which fell to the lot of the individual 
 than any general opposition." 
 
 58. " Was there a full understanding among the tenantry that no one should 
 be dispossessed ? " " Lord Palmerston's distinct orders were, that no man should 
 be dispossessed unless he chose to go, and then he was to have assistance to enable 
 him to go to America or elsewhere." 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 177 
 
 and absurd, that he only wanted a " golden knocker" to his 
 door to cap the climax. The constant supervision of their 
 landlord compelled them to be clean, until they began to 
 appreciate that luxury which has been termed " next to 
 godliness." Mr. Charles King O'Hara is another resident 
 landlord, who is universally well spoken of. The system of 
 this gentleman appears to be to let his land at its full value, 
 and to pay his tenants for all the improvements of which he 
 approves, whilst his personal supervision and advice encou- 
 rage them in their efforts. The effect has been greatly to 
 encourage a spirit of order, cleanliness, and industry among 
 them. Mr. Coo23er, of Markree Castle, near to this place, 
 the chief landowner in this neighbourhood, at his own 
 expense established an industrial school for the purpose of 
 teaching trades to the sons of his tenantry, and thus pro- 
 viding a means of livelihood for the increasing population. 
 Masters of trades — tailors, carpenters, blacksmiths, &c. — 
 were engaged to teach the boys, and it was expected that 
 work would be found for them by the tenantry, for the 
 benefit of whose sons the school was built. The tenantry 
 were loud in their praises, and sent their sons willingly and 
 in great numbers to the school ; but, after expending upwards 
 of 1,000/., this gentleman had the mortification of finding the 
 project totally fail for want of the support of the tenants : 
 they brought no work to the school to be done.* This is 
 
 * Examination of the Rev. Lewis Potter, before the Land Commissioners at 
 S'%0, Appendix, Part II. p. 199. 
 
 1. WTiere do you reside ? — I am rector of Drumard, in this county, and I 
 reside there. 
 
 2. Have you prepared any statement relative to the transactions of Mr. Cooper, 
 in endeavouring to establish industrial schools upon his jiroperty ? — Yes. At the 
 special desii-e of Edward Joshua Cooper, Esq. of Markree Castle, county of Sligo, 
 I beg leave to submit to you the following statement, relative to the schools of 
 trades established by him (for the benefit of his tenantry and their sons) on his 
 property at Collooney, in this county. My object in domg so on his behalf, is to 
 enable you to form a judgment of the difficulties which have attended liim as a 
 landlord in carrjring out his plans in this matter for the advantage of the people 
 
178 THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 
 
 one of the many instances which are to be met with here of 
 the necessity of studying the Irish character before anything 
 is attempted either for the benefit or guidance of the people. 
 
 intrusted to his care. Although the institution in its establishment appears to have 
 been hailed by the tenants as a great boon and advantage to the rising generation, 
 still I am very sorry to be obliged, in the commencement of this statement, to ob- 
 serve that the failure of Mr. Cooper's object can scarcely be traced to any other cause 
 han a want of encouragement and co-operation, generally, on the part of those whom 
 he conceives should have been foremost in upholding and supporting an institution 
 where their work could have been well executed, at the usual charges of the country : 
 and where, at the same time, their sons and dependants, who required instruction 
 in the several trades, could be properly taught. Mr. Cooper feels that the case 
 should be concisely and satisfactorily stated to you, as members of this commission, 
 in order that, through you, an opportunity may be afforded to those in authority, as 
 also to the public generally, to form an opinion of the discouragement that a land- 
 lord is subjected to, when induced, by a high sense of duty, to put mto operation 
 a plan of this kind for the amelioration of his tenantry. I must, however, observe 
 that I have only to deal with facts in making this communication. It is no part of 
 my purpose to undertake the invidious task of tracing to any particular motives 
 the line of conduct adopted by those from whom Mr. Cooper had good reason to 
 expect active assistance in this undertaking. It is quite sufficient to show that, 
 under the most promising appearances of kindliness on the part of the whole body 
 of his tenantry, his project has not only not succeeded, but has most signally failed, 
 with very considerable loss to him. The schools are now closed ; the several 
 masters are discharged ; the apprentices are being transferred to other masters ; 
 and the whole concern, which was intended by its generous founder to be the 
 nursery of industry, improvement, and morals, stands only as a spectre — the 
 monument of disappointed hope. It would, however, be comparatively less 
 distressing, if the history of one of these schools of trade (the tailors) did not 
 afford a melancholy example of the evil disposition of some wicked ones, who are 
 to be found in so many instances the abettors and perpetrators of crime. In the 
 month of June, 1843, the workshop of this school was set fire to, either on Sunday 
 night or on Monday morning, and the entire of the goods contained therein was 
 consumed or damaged ; and so persuaded were the grand jury of the county that 
 the act was a malicious one, that they granted a presentment, amounting to over 
 66/. for the injury done to the property in this school ; and not only this, so 
 convinced were the same gentlemen that this act was not perpetrated by i)eople 
 coming from a distance, that they assessed the entire sum on the inhabitants of 
 the town of Collooney. Before I enter into a statement of the expenses incurred 
 by Mr. Cooper in establishing and supporting these schools of trades, I will refer 
 the members of this commission to the several documents connected with them. 
 The first of these documents to which I would call attention, is the copy of a 
 letter from Mr. Cooper, which is printed and dated Brighton, December 10, 
 1840, and addressed to the tenantry on the Markree estates : — 
 
 My Friends — An anxiety has long been strongly felt by me, to endeavour to 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 179 
 
 They must be encouraged and spurred on by a superior 
 energy to do everything, or every project that depends on 
 themselves will fail. This gentleman some years ago had a 
 
 open some new sources of employment for your children, the number of whom is 
 far too numerous to admit of their earning a comfortable liveliliood as farmers, 
 from the subdivision of land. It has, consequently, occurred to me to estabUsh a 
 school of trades in CoUooney, where certain of your children may learn, at my 
 expense, to become carpenters, smiths, tailors, or shoemakers. The masters shall 
 (if I can obtain them sufficiently qualified) be selected from among yourselves. A 
 model farm will also be shortly laid out, near the same town, with a view of 
 instructing others of your children in the best mode of tillage, &c. &c., to enable 
 them to become efficient farmers, should they hereafter become tenants, or to 
 quaUfy them for the situation of stewards. I estimate that about twenty pupils 
 may be always employed, and that about three years' tuition will be, in most 
 cases, sufficient. The accounts of the expenditure and produce of the model farm 
 will be regularly kept, and submitted to the examination of the tenantry, for their 
 instruction and encouragement. 
 
 The conditions required to be observed by the candidates for entrance into any 
 of the schools, wUl be as follow : — 
 
 The boys must have attended some school either wholly or partially supported 
 by me. 
 
 They must be recommended by their clergyman for good conduct, as well as by 
 the visitor to, and master of the school they have attended, and they must pass a 
 general examination as to their proficiency. 
 
 Their parent or parents must have testimonials as to their general good moral 
 character, industry, and punctuaUty in observing their engagements with their 
 landlord. 
 
 The boys must be bound by indenture, at the age of sixteen, for five years, but 
 will be discharged from the agricultural and trades' school as soon as they are 
 considered to be sufficiently instructed. The parents will be expected to provide 
 their children, while learning their trades, in diet and lodging, and to procure for 
 them decent clothing, as no fees will be charged for their indentures. 
 
 The boys in the agricultural school wiU be lodged, and under the entire control 
 of the superintendent, with whom their parents must make an arrangement for their 
 diet and clothing. 
 
 No boy, in any of the schools, to be permitted to absent himself, except upon 
 illness or special leave. A premium will be given to the best conducted and most 
 advanced of each trade, at the end of the third year of apprenticeship. 
 
 As it it is expected that the schools will be ready for pupils about the 1st of 
 May next, the parents of children may now make application for their admission. 
 
 Edward Cooper. 
 
 I would next beg of the members of this commission to read the account of a 
 meeting of the above tenants, which was held at CoUooney, on Monday, the 18th 
 of January, 1841, the proceedings of which meeting were published as an adver- 
 
 N 2 
 
180 THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 
 
 village of small tenants close to his domain. The inhabi- 
 tants were in the most Avretched poverty ; they rarely paid 
 rent, lived in mud huts, held but three or four acres of badly 
 
 tiseinent in the Sligo Journal, on Friday, the 22nd January, 1841, and from which 
 paper I take the following copy : 
 
 At a meeting of the Markree tenantry, held in the town of Collooney, on 
 Monday, the 18th of January, 1841, — 
 
 It was moved by Mr. C. W. Armstrong, seconded by Mr. Thoniias Tyghe, and 
 resolved unanimously — Tliat Mr John Benson do take the chair. 
 
 Moved by Mr. George Barker, seconded by Mr. John Mitchell, and resolved 
 unanimously— That a respectful and thankful address be presented to our most 
 excellent landlord, Edward Joshua Cooper, Esq. M.P., in reply to his kind letter 
 addressed to the tenantry on the Markree estates, on the subject of the schools of 
 trades, and model farm, to be established at his sole expense, in and near the town 
 of Collooney, for the benefit of the sons of his tenantry. 
 
 Moved by Mr. A. Busby, seconded by Mr. William M' Shine, and resolved 
 unanimously — That the address now read by the Rev. Mr. Potter, be adopted as 
 the address of this meeting. 
 
 Moved by Mr. C. W. Armstrong, and seconded by Mr. Andrew Buchanan, 
 and resolved unanimously — That the warmest thanks of this meeting be and are 
 hereby tendered to the Rev. Mr. Potter, for his lively interest in our welfare, and 
 the kind share he has taken in our proceedings this day, and that he be requested 
 to transmit to Mr. Cooper our address, with a copy of the resolutions adopted 
 by us. 
 
 Moved by Mr. Peter Durham, seconded by Mr. James Benson, and resolved 
 unanimously — That these resolutions be published in the Sligo papers. 
 
 Moved by Mr. Joshua Woodland, seconded by Mr. William Morrison, and 
 resolved unanimously — that Mr. John Benson do leave the chair, and that Mr. 
 Peter Durham be called thereto. 
 
 Moved by Mr. George Simpson, seconded by Mr. Thomas Newburn, and 
 resolved unanimously — That the best thanks of this meeting are hereby given to 
 Mr. John Benson, for his very proper conduct in the chair. 
 
 (Signed.) Peter Durham, Chairman. 
 
 The following is the reply to Mr. Cooper's address : — 
 
 Collooney, Jannary \%th, 1841. 
 Honoured Sir, — Permit us most respectfully to assure you that your kind 
 address to the tenantry on the Markree estates has been read by us with great 
 pleasure and sincere gratitude to you, as our benevolent and liberal landlord. It 
 is an addition to the many pledges we have received, from time to time, at your 
 hands, that not only our welfare, but the best interests of the rising generation 
 among us, is an object very near to your heart. You have been the conciliating 
 arbiter of our differences (when such have occasionally existed) — the faithful coun- 
 sellor in our difficulties — the ingenious friend in our trials — the generous benefactor 
 of the distressed — the kind protector of the orphan and widow— the unbounded 
 dispenser of clothing to the naked, and of food to the hungry ; this is only a just 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 181 
 
 cultivated land each, and were nearly starving, getting work 
 occasionally to support themselves when their potatoes failed. 
 They were, in fact, labourers without the usual incentives to 
 
 expression of what we experience and witness, and we place it before you, not in 
 the spirit of flattery and adulation, but as a testimony which justice demands from 
 us. In addressing you on this occasion, we most thankfully and unreservedly 
 accept your letter as a further pledge of the interest you take in us and in our con- 
 cerns, and we consider the conditions set forth by you as most useful in detail ; but 
 we most specially notice with our approval, that one which makes it necessary that 
 all candidates for admission into the school of trades, &c. , should be educated at some 
 school either entirely or partially supported by you ; while this will secure to them 
 advancement in all useful knowledge suited to then- station, it is gratifying to us 
 to feel that their moral and religious instruction will be advanced. We, therefore, 
 fully admit the value of this condition, and rejoice to acknowledge that, at your 
 hands, the children on the Markree estates have the privilege of attending schools 
 established on the basis of Christian principles. That your proposed plan (under 
 God's providence) will prosper, we believe ; and while we acknowledge His goodness 
 in causing our lot to be cast under a landlord whom we have every reason to regard 
 and respect, we hope we shall, by our conduct and demeanour, continue to deserve 
 the kindness and affection of you, our landlord and friend. Praying that God's 
 blessing may ever be vouchsafed to you, your valuable lady, and family. 
 
 We have the honour to remain, honoured sir, your faithful and attached ser- 
 vants, John Benson, Chairman. 
 IHere follow the signatures.'] 
 
 To Edward J. Cooper, Esq., M.P. 
 
 All things thus having promised so well, Mr. Cooper, accordingly, gave directions 
 to have a large house suitably fitted up for the school trades about to be instituted. 
 This was accomplished at an expense to him of about 400/. Forms of application 
 and indentures were also provided ; and, in the course of the year 1841, the whole 
 machinery was supplied ; masters were provided with every requisite, and twelve 
 apprentices were admitted to be taught the several trades to which they were bound, 
 their applications being approved. The additional rules for the regulation of the 
 schools, a copy of which has been given to each master, are as follow : — 
 
 1st. As it is the chief object of the founder of this school to afford instruction 
 to those apprentices admitted which may enable them to contribute to their o^vn 
 support, and thereby render them as far as possible independent, it must be 
 distinctly understood that they cannot be permitted to remain in the institution 
 should they prove incapable or unwilling to receive instruction, or in any other 
 respect appear unfit. 
 
 2nd. The school to be opened at six, a.m., from the 1st of April to the 1st of 
 October, and at eight, a.m., from the 1st of October to the 1st of April ; half an 
 hour to be allowed to the apprentices for breakfast, and one hour for dinner. The 
 
182 
 
 THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 
 
 labour — constant dependence upon labour. They became, 
 therefore, notwithstanding their poverty, indolent and inac- 
 tive. As long as the potato-field lasted each man would 
 prop up his door-way with his shoulders, and, with a spirit 
 of contentment as happy as it was unfortunate, exclaim, 
 " Sure my father before me lived on praties and buttermilk, 
 and praties and buttermilk will do very well for me." Mr. 
 Cooper conceived that the only way to improve them was to 
 make them labourers, and, in order to accomplish this, to make 
 them dependent on labour. He built for each man a good 
 slated cottage, each having two acres of land attached to it, 
 and offered these tenants constant labour on his domain. 
 
 actual time of work of the apprentices is not to exceed twelve hours of the twenty- 
 four in each day and night. 
 
 3rd. The master will be held accountable for his watchfulness over and care of 
 the apprentices under his charge, and must report any misconduct. 
 
 4th. The four masters employed in the institution are expected to superintend 
 in rotation, weekly, the dormitory, to see that the apprentices are in bed every 
 night at ten o'clock, at the latest ; and to lock the doors of the building at that 
 hour. 
 
 5th. Where persons bring materials to be worked up by the trade, they must 
 "be examined by the master, and approved of by him as being of sufficiently good 
 quality, before he engages to do the work desired. 
 
 6th. The master must be accountable for the preservation and proper usage of 
 the tools provided for the school. 
 
 Having laid before you all the documents connected with the establishment and 
 management of these schools, I now beg to state, that, independent of the sum of 
 400/. already alluded to as having been expended on the repairs and fitting-up of 
 the house, there was an additional outlay of 1 ,774/. 4*. bd. by Mr. Cooper, in the 
 purchase of tools, the erection of fixtures, the payment of masters, the allowances 
 to apprentices for work done by them, and the purchase of goods and stock ; on 
 the whole of which a loss was sustained by him amounting to no less a sum than 
 about 600/. This added to the 400/. makes 1,000/. thus expended and lost in a 
 period not exceeding two years and nine months. No course was left, under all 
 these circumstances, but to close a concern which, if continued, must have 
 resulted only in the waste of property, loss of time, and an abuse of that charity 
 which led its founder not only to establish it, but to exercise very great patience 
 in continuing it so long under such disheartening and vexatious disappointments. I 
 need scarcely add, in conclusion, how much greater pleasure it would afford me to 
 have it in my power to report the favourable success instead of the signal failure 
 that has attended Mr. Cooper in this his benevolent undertaking. 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 183 
 
 He took on himself all the taxes payable, to save them from 
 that very frequent source of distress — the enforcement of 
 small payments which they are not prepared to meet — and 
 let them their cottages and land at the land rent. In order 
 that they might have the opportunity of working at their 
 own land, and yet not lose their time as labourers, he fixed 
 their wages at Id. the hour, being at the usual rate of 
 payment per day, thus giving an industrious labourer the 
 opportunity (on giving notice the day before that he wished 
 to be absent on his own land half a day), of labouring for 
 wages the remainder of it. These tenants, however, as they 
 were to have less land than they held before, absolutely 
 refused to come into the arrangement. Their landlord, 
 however, was firm, and after in vain attempting to convince 
 them that it was for their own benefit to have constant 
 work enough to keep them, and some land besides, rather 
 than to starve on a patch of land, working only occasionally ; 
 at length forced them into the arrangement, by offering them 
 either the two acres or an ejectment. The unpopularity 
 and ill-will he brought on himself by this measure were 
 unbounded. He, however, persevered ; instead of starving 
 tenants in the position of labourers, these men are all now 
 labourers comfortably off. Their rent is deducted from what 
 they earn ; they have, therefore, nothing to pay in money, 
 and everything they earn over and above their rent, together 
 with the produce of their land, is clear gain to them. These 
 men are now most grateful for the change, and not one of 
 them would return to his former condition. The habits of 
 industry and prudence thus forced on these cottagers have 
 led to their being far more prosperous and comfortable than 
 the small tenants in their neighbourhood.* 
 
 * Charles K. O'Hara, Esquire, one of the principal landed proprietors of 
 Sligo, in his evidence before the Land Commissioners (Part II. p. 194), says, — 
 " The condition of the small farmers and labourers — for they can scarcely be 
 separated — is improved by increased industry; viz., in their houses, dress, 
 
184 THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 
 
 These examples are striking proofs of the advantages 
 •which result from the exertion and supervision of a resident 
 landlord, and of efficient agents. There are, however, cases 
 of an opposite complexion. Mr. Bere, an extensive land- 
 agent of this and other counties, in his evidence before the 
 Land Commissioners,* states that an absentee landlord of 
 Sligo, by his neglect and mismanagement, permits the 
 driver, or bailiff of his estate, to do just as he likes, and 
 this man, whenever he pleases, " can go out at any time 
 when he wants 8/. or 1 OZ., and drive the whole of the estate, 
 and get his 10/., and let the cattle out again and not care 
 about the rent," pocketing the money he thus gets himself, 
 the tenants not daring to complain. This gentleman further 
 says, — " I know many cases of that kind. Even -with some 
 of the gentry living in Ireland, the drivers take these liber- 
 ties and plunder the tenants." Mr. O'Hara, the gentleman 
 before alluded to, in his evidence before the Land Commis- 
 sioners,-)- attributes " to good or bad agency much of the 
 improvement and prosperity, and many of the existing 
 evils." He says, " Relations, creditors, ignorant, inexpe- 
 rienced young men, have too often been intrusted with 
 the very important office of land-agent, to the great injury 
 of landlord and tenant, and of the peace and prosperity of 
 the country. I am sure that the peace is repeatedly broken 
 from the bad management of agents and underlings, forcing 
 on the rent in the quickest and easiest manner through the 
 
 education of tlieir children, and in general comforts. The mcreased demand for 
 and value of land and want of other employments, has made them more prudent, 
 intelligent, and industrious. Capital bears no proportion to extent of holding. 
 A man without capital is often most eager to get jiossession of land, whilst a 
 labourer with a cabin and garden only, often, by the industry of hin family, 
 acquires capital, grazes and con-acres the land of another, and ultimately 
 purchases the interest thereof. I have often found that the case, thereby proving, 
 that not to the extent or cheapness of the holding, but solely to the industry 
 
 AND PRUDENCE OF THE INDIVIDUAL, IS PROSPERITY TO BE ASCRIBED." 
 
 * Appendix, Part I. p. 274. 
 t Appendix, Part II. p. 194. 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 185 
 
 means of underlings, pocketing the salary or per-centage, 
 and utterly indifferent as to the state or condition of the 
 tenants."* Thei'e can be no doubt as to the truth of this 
 description from abundant examples, whilst the advantages 
 of proper care and supervision of his tenants on the part of 
 the landlord are as apparent. It is, in fact, but a reiteration 
 in other words of what I have already repeatedly stated — 
 that the evils which oppress Ireland are, for the most part, 
 social ; and that when a social remedy is applied in the 
 proper care and attention of the landlord, either personally 
 or by an able and resident agent, they disappear. It is 
 difficult to conceive by what perversity of judgment or 
 obliquity of vision the evils of Ireland can be attributed to 
 English connexion. The examples of good landlords exist- 
 ing with that connexion are a sufficient refutation of such an 
 opinion. The evil or the good is in the landlords them- 
 selves, and in the people themselves. A repeal of the Union 
 will alter neither the landlords nor the people. A Parlia- 
 
 * " The embarrassments under which gentlemen of landed property in Ireland 
 too generally labour, may, in most cases, be traced to the improper selection of 
 their agents. Upon the holders of this important ofEce most commonly devolves, 
 not merely the manaigement of the estates, but also of the private concerns of the 
 owners. Too indolent to mind their own affairs, and too fond of pleasure and 
 amusement to attend to the details of business, it might at least have been expected 
 that men of fortune would hav« been at some pains to select proper persons to 
 attend to those matters which they found too irksome to attend to themselves, 
 and that, being unwilling to take this burden on their own shoulders, they would 
 have felt the necessity of finding others properly qualified to relieve them from 
 such important duties. But, however reasonably such expectations might have 
 been formed, the very contrary seems to have been the fact ; and, imtil of late 
 years, the importance of the appointment, however apparent it might be, seems to 
 have been almost universally overlooked ; and without reference to any particular 
 qualification or fitness for the office, men have been too often chosen to fill it from 
 relationship or private regard, as little capable of attending to its details as their 
 employers. These things being left to take their own course, it is not very difficult 
 to imderstand how that wasteful and expensive habits should arise, debts accumu- 
 late, creditors become clamorous ; and, finally, that the man of fortune, from 
 being at first too indolent, should soon become unwilling, and at last afraid, to 
 look into his affairs." — Prize Essay on the Management of Landed Property in 
 Ireland, by William Blacker, Esq. 
 
186 THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 
 
 ment in College-green will not even make landlords resident. 
 By how much a year will the Sligo tenant be benefited by 
 his landlord living six months in Dublin instead of in 
 London — that is, supposing him to have Parliamentary 
 duties? Out of the whole number of the landlords of 
 Ireland, supposing every Irish member of Parliament to be 
 a landlord, and to have no profession or estate in England 
 requiring his residence there (which is not the case), only 
 105 are required to be absent at the House of Commons, 
 and twenty-eight peers in attendance in the House of Lords, 
 or, on an average, four landlords out of each of the thirty- 
 two counties in Ireland. Without going into the question 
 of how many of these gentlemen would be absentees from 
 their estates whether the Parliament were in London or 
 Dublin, let any Irishman ask himself what proportion four 
 landlords bear to the number of landlords of any one county, 
 and how many landlords are absentees who have no Parlia- 
 mentary duties whatever ? Yet well-meaning men, without 
 sufficient reflection, will expect all the benefits which resident 
 and good landlords can effect to flow from a repeal of the 
 Union ! It is, however, a waste of space to notice such an 
 argument ; and did it not occupy men's attention in the place 
 of more common-sense views, it would be utterly unworthy 
 of notice. 
 
 The course pursued by one of the above gentlemen, Mr. 
 Cooper, is suggestive to me of the subject of my present 
 letter. With its great, and frequently almost starving popu- 
 lation, Ireland presents the anomaly of being almost without 
 a labouring class. The great bulk of the population of 
 England consists of labourers, mechanics, artisans — of men 
 who have not a yard of land, but who subsist entirely by 
 labour. An entire dependence upon the fruits of labour is 
 the strongest incentive to industry that can exist : it makes 
 the great body of the people industrious ; they must he so or 
 starve ; and it is the aggregate amount of their industry 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 187 
 
 which creates the wealth of England. In Ireland, in the 
 west and south, the great bulk of the population are small 
 tenants, with from two to five acres of land. They can just 
 exist on the potatoes they grow ; they therefore depend on 
 their potato crop, and their industry is generally limited to 
 its production. As I heard it well expressed the other day 
 by one of the best resident landlords of this district, who 
 may be presumed to have some knowledge of the truth, 
 " the peasantry are occupied one half the year hiding their 
 potatoes, and the other half of the year in looking for them." 
 Setting a crop of potatoes and digging it up, and sowing and 
 reaping a few oats, is the year's work of very many of them. 
 If 61. must be earned by some means beyond the value of 
 their patch of oats to pay the rent, many of them migrate to 
 England as harvest labourers for two months. For that 
 short period they work like horses, come back with the 5/., 
 and the necessity being met, beyond digging up their pota- 
 toes, reaping their oats, and setting another crop, they will 
 not do a single thing till harvest time comes again, when the 
 same routine is gone through. Their patch of land grows 
 them potatoes enough to live upon, and they are satisfied.* 
 The very virtues of the poor peasants, their quiet contentment 
 with the poorest fare, are their ruin. The want of steady 
 and continuous productive industry on the part of the great 
 bulk of the population, accounts for the absence of wealth, 
 and for the presence of general poverty in Ireland. What- 
 ever, however, may be the character and disposition of the 
 people, we must not leave out of consideration the process 
 of education they undergo. Man has been called " a bundle 
 of habits." If you habituate a man from his youth upwards 
 to long periods of inactivity, and to only occasional demands 
 
 * With his potato-heap for food and his turf-stack cut out of an adjoining 
 hog for fuel, the Irish cotter and farmer hves through the winter in his hut with- 
 out a desire for anything better, and without either incentive or inclination for 
 exertion. 
 
188 
 
 THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 
 
 for severe exertion, can you expect liim to exhibit habits of 
 steady industry ? But the small tenantry system — a patch 
 of land just enough to find a man in potatoes, requiring only 
 some six weeks hard work at harvesting to pay the rent — 
 inevitably rears a man to habits of indolence. It is scarcely 
 necessary to prove this self-evident truth. It may, however, 
 strengthen this view to quote the opinion of Mr. Otway, in 
 his " Report on the state of the hand-loom weavers as a class 
 in Ireland," page 594 : — 
 
 " Periodical seasons of a total want of work, and a sudden demand for 
 the most active work, operate fatally on tbe industrious habits of the 
 Irish labourer, destroy industry, and encourage sloth. The habits of 
 idleness thus engendered are by no means inconsistent with occasional 
 active and laborious exertion of the most extraordinary kind. Under 
 strong excitmg circumstances, the Irish peasant will work harder than 
 the labourer of any other country ; but his toil is neither steady nor 
 continuous. The season of total inactivity comes as regular as the season 
 of violent exertion, and the character of the peasant is rendered all the 
 worse by the striking magnitude of the vicissitude." 
 
 It would not, perhaps, be difficult to trace many of those 
 scenes of combination and violence which continually dis- 
 grace Ireland to these habits of listless inactivity. Men 
 usually get into mischief when they have nothing to do. 
 
 But how are you to create a class of labourers when there 
 is no labour to give to them ? It is an admitted fact, that 
 to increase the size of the farms of the small tenants would 
 greatly tend to the improvement of cultivation, to the increase 
 of produce, and consequently add to the wealth and comforts 
 of the people. But how are you to increase the size of farms 
 without turning out and ruining many poor peasants, when 
 nearly the whole of the land is let in five or six acre farms ? 
 It is manifest that you can only bring about the benefits 
 which larger farms will secure by giving employment to a 
 large body of the people as labourers or mechanics ; for to 
 turn people out of their land without giving them employ- 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF SLIGO. 189 
 
 ment on which to live, is as cruel as it is impolitic and 
 impossible. 
 
 Instead, then, of " talking nonsense" about repealing the 
 Union as the panacea for all Irish grievances, let us talk 
 common sense, and consider how we can give the people employ- 
 ment. 
 
 I have before me the letter of a very M^ell-meaning gentle- 
 man—a Roman Catholic priest. He fully concurs in the 
 view taken in one of my first letters to you — that want of 
 employment is the bane of Ireland. He then asks, " Will I 
 have the candour and the courage to recommend the proper 
 remedy ? England is a commercial and manufacturing coun- 
 try, England, therefore, will neither encourage nor recom- 
 mend what will clash with her national interests in either of 
 these respects." Is it possible that England and her every- 
 day history are so little understood in Ireland ? This 
 gentleman must pardon me for saying that any view so 
 narrow-minded and so huckstering as England for the 
 English is in theory despised by Englishmen, and the very 
 contrary is their every-day practice. Is it not a fact noto- 
 rious that very many of the manufactories in Belgium belong 
 to Englishmen, are worked by English capital, and directed 
 by English skill, for the very purpose of couq^eting with the 
 manufactures of England by means of the lower wages and 
 cheaper food of Belgium ? Is it not a fact that English 
 capital has formed the railroads and canals of America — nay, 
 is at this moment constructing the railroads of France, our 
 greatest rival, with English engineers and English labourers ? 
 Nay, are not the very war-steamers of France, which boast- 
 ingly threaten our shores, fitted with machinery made from 
 English models, or made in England, and worked by Eng- 
 lish engineers ? Is there a manufactory in Europe, having 
 any pretensions to excellence, whether opposed to the com- 
 mercial interests of England or not, which is not fitted with 
 English machinery ? And, to finish the picture, do we not, 
 
190 WATER-POWER OF SLIGO. 
 
 to the prejudice of our own often badly paid artisans and 
 labourers, give employment in England to half a million of 
 the population of Ireland ? Yet, with all this existing as an 
 every-day notorious fact, we are seriously asked if we should 
 not, on the score o^ jealousy of Ireland, from a national pre- 
 judice of " England for the English," refuse to recommend 
 manufactures and commerce as the means of employing the 
 Irish people !* 
 
 I will answer such a challenge, not by appealing to the 
 capitalists of Ireland to establish manufactories and to create 
 employment, for such an appeal might possibly fail ; but by 
 appealing to the plain, straightforward, business-like, and 
 intelligent capitalists of Manchester, in the way in which 
 they like to be appealed to — by a simple statement of facts. 
 
 The village from which I now write is built close to a 
 river containing about twice the volume of water of the river 
 Irwell, which runs through Manchester. Within a distance 
 of 500 yards close to this village there are a succession of 
 falls in this river amounting to 75 feet. These falls afford 
 six sites for water-power mills on each side the river. An 
 extensive miller — Mr. Culbertson — has erected very large 
 mills for the manufacture of oatmeal on one of these sites. 
 He uses, therefore, one-twelfth of the power of the river. 
 With putting only one-half of this power in requisition, he 
 can grind into meal 500 tons of oats in a week. On one side 
 of the river a perpendicular fall of water can be obtained of 
 from 75 to 80 feet, and a constant and equable volume of 
 water, equal to 1,000 horse power, can be made available at 
 a very trifling expense. The bed of the river and the banks 
 
 * " Labour is like a perishable commodity ; the smallest over-stock is sure to 
 lower the market in an undue proportion. Take away but the trifling surplus, 
 and a fair remuneration will be obtained. Even the employment of the Irish jjoor 
 at home would produce an immediate effect upon the demand for English labour, 
 which it is difficult duly to estimate ; and thus the good of both countries seems 
 to invite in encouraging a trial to be made." — Prize Essay on the Management 
 of Landed Property in Ireland, by William Blacker, Esq. p. 38. 
 
WATER-POWER OF 8LIGO. 191 
 
 are composed of shelving rocks of fine limestone in large 
 blocks fit for any building purpose, and in the greatest 
 abundance at the very foundation where mills might be 
 built. The port of Sligo is five English miles off", and vessels 
 of 100 tons can get up this river into a basin made by the 
 lowest fall, where there is 20 feet water. The river empties 
 itself into the sea within three miles from this place. Wages 
 are 8d. and \0d. a day, and provisions as cheap as they are 
 to be found anywhere in Ireland. Supposing that wages 
 would be a little raised by employment, I take Dr. Kane on 
 The Industrial Resources of Ireland (page 68) as my authority 
 for stating, that " the average wages at a spinning and 
 cotton-weaving manufactory on the east coast of Ireland are 
 65. 9d. per week. The average in Lancashire is IO5. 6d" 
 The export trade from Sligo is very much greater than the 
 import trade ; vessels have consequently to come there in 
 ballast : rather than sail there in ballast, they would accept 
 very low freights, and cotton could be brought here at 45. 
 to 5s. per ton from Liverpool. The steam freight for goods 
 from Sligo to Liverpool is now lOs. to 125. per ton ; in 
 winter 155. per ton. The port of Sligo is twenty-six hours' 
 sail from Liverpool and twenty from Glasgow. 
 
 I will now point out the relative cost of steam and water- 
 power. Dr. Kane (page 107) states the cost of steam- 
 power to be 30Z. per horse-power, and the cost of water- 
 power to be 31. per horse-power on the Upper Bann, in 
 Ireland.* In Glasgow, he says, — " It is customary to pro- 
 
 * "Water-power is certainly much cheaper than steam-power, not merely in 
 Ireland, but in all places where it is available. An eminent manufacturer in 
 Leeds said to me, that ' water-power is cheaper than steam at the mouth of this 
 coalpit.' All evidence bears this out. In Mr. Fairbum's report and Mr. 
 Bateman's letter this point is decided as regards the Upper Bann. Even at 
 present it may be taken at 3^. per annum per horse-power, steam costing from 
 201. to 30/. It may thus be averaged at one-eighth. But Mr. Bateman considers, 
 that ' when the reservoir system is worked out, the horse-power will be had for 20s. 
 per year, not one-twentieth of the cost of steam.' Here, however, no reservoir is 
 
192 WATER-POWER OP SLIGO. 
 
 vide a house for the manufacture, with the steam-engine, 
 great gearing, and steam-pipes, and keep the engine going 
 tweve hours a day, and heat the work, for 50/., for each 
 horse power." After going through the items of the cost of 
 erecting a steam factory in Glasgow, and calculating the 
 rent at 8 per cent, on the cost of everything except the 
 steam-power, and deducting this sum from the rent joaid for 
 the factory, including the steam-power, he estimates the cost 
 of each horse-power at 36Z. annually. The M^liole cost of 
 water-power for one horse-power in Greenock, including 
 interest on the cost of the water-wheel, arc " trows," &c., 
 he estimates at 51. 6s. 6d., or 30/. 135. 7d. less than the cost 
 of one horse-power by steam at Glasgow. From various 
 calculations. Dr. Kane estimates the expense of water- 
 power at " not more than one-tenth of the cost of steam." 
 Takino-, however, the example of Glasgow and Greenock, 
 for the people pride themselves on managing things as 
 economically there as anywhere, the difference, in round 
 numbers, is a saving of 30/. per horse-power in favour of 
 water-power. Apply this calculation to the existing cir- 
 cumstances here. 1,000 horse-power and a perpendicular 
 fall of 75 feet can be easily obtained here at trifling cost, 
 without any reservoirs or viaducts, as at Greenock, re- 
 quiring large outlay. The height of fall will render appli- 
 cable the overshot water-wheel, the most steady, econo- 
 mical, and best description of water-power ; and a thousand 
 horse-power thus secured will give a saving in the manu- 
 facturing power alone of 30,000/. per annum over the cost 
 of the same amount of steam-power. Another advantage 
 is, that water-power is found to be more steady and ]-egular 
 than steam-power, and more fit for delicate work. Dr. j|^ 
 
 needed, the supply of water being constant and equable."— Dr. Kane's Industrial 
 Resources of Ireland, p. 107. 
 
 " Mr. Thorn of Glasgow esthnates the cost of steam-power at 30/. each horse- 
 power." — Ibid. 
 
/ 
 
 WATER-POWER OF SLIGO. 193 
 
 Kane (page 110) states that — " cotton spun by water-power 
 bears, and has always borne, a higher price than cotton 
 spun by steam-power," on this account.* 
 
 I am, however, informed by a most intelligent gentleman, 
 who has practically considered the matter, that it is doubtful 
 whether a manufactory established here by a resident indi- 
 vidual could be worked to his advantage. The payment of 
 commissions for the purchase of the raw cotton, and after- 
 wards the payment of commissions on the sale of his manu- 
 factured stuffs, and the risk of his article not suiting the 
 market, in a great measure would do away with the advan- 
 
 * " The total mill-power inspected in Lancashire consists of — 
 
 Steam, 32,123 horse-power. 
 
 Water, 4,323 ditto. 
 In order to estimate how far water-power is valued in Lancashire, where coals are 
 so cheap, we must learn not merely how much is used, but how much is left 
 unused. Now I have endeavoured to calculate, on the same principles as I adopted 
 for the surface of Ireland, the theoretical water-power of Lancashire. I have found 
 that it is represented by 72,600 horse-power, taken as working continuously. Now 
 the 4323 horse-power economized makes six per cent, of the entire ; and as there 
 are in Ireland a million and a quarter of such horse-power, it follows that, if we 
 economized our water all over Ireland, in the same degree as water-power is 
 actually economized in Lancashire, we should have at work a force of seventy-five 
 horse-power ; that is to say, almost equal to the mill-power of England returned 
 by the factory inspectors. This shows how water-power is valued in Lancashire. 
 In fact, advantage is taken of every possible situation. The river Irwell, which 
 passes by Bolton and Manchester, and washes the heart of the factory districts, is 
 the hardest worked stream probably in the world. It has, from its first mill at 
 Bacun to Prestolee near Bolton, a fall of nine hundred feet, of which eight 
 hundred are actually economized by mills. I do not know another example of 
 such complete application of water-power as in that place, where coal is on all 
 sides available. We may therefore pass away from this question, of whether 
 water-power answers for mechanical purposes, which I should not have at all 
 noticed, but that the pubUc often receives a bold statement from a public man 
 without troubling themselves to examine whether it be likely that he understands 
 what he talks about. 
 
 " Contrast with this the actual economy of water-power m Ireland. By the 
 returns of 1839, there are employed in Ireland — 
 
 Steam, 1503 horse-power. 
 Water, 2147 ditto." 
 
 — Dr. Kane's Industrial Resources of Ireland, p. 111. 
 
 O 
 
194 WATER-POWER OF SLIGO. 
 
 tages of the water-power, low wages, and cheap provisions. 
 In his opinion, a manufactory here could be worked to the 
 greatest advantage by a Manchester house making it a 
 branch of their establishment. The raw cotton could be 
 brought here from Liverpool at a cost of 4s. to 55. per ton, 
 or less (from the fact, already mentioned, of a large pro- 
 portion of vessels trading to Sligo coming there in ballast), 
 and therefore as cheaply as it could be conveyed to Man- 
 chester. A few hands and superintendents from the parent 
 establishment would insure the accurate execution of orders, 
 which miffht be received in Manchester and executed and 
 shipped from here. 
 
 This plan is really worth the consideration of Manchester 
 capitalists and manufacturers. I have taken every pains to 
 become acquainted with the facts, and believe I state them 
 accurately. If, then, there is no hidden source of loss, which 
 from want of manufacturing knowledge I may have omitted, 
 it is clear that on the first cost of 1,000 horse water-power 
 alone (and more than double that may be had here), there 
 would be an annual gain, all other things being equal, of 
 30,0007. 
 
 One of the falls is magnificent ; but I have no space now 
 to dilate on fine scenery.* 
 
 * Immediately adjacent to the waterfall, and overlooking it, are the ruins of an 
 old abbey or church, around which is the Roman Catholic burial-ground of the 
 district. Perhaps no place could be found more invitive of contemplation, more 
 fitting to lead men " to ponder with their own hearts," or to calm the rufflings of 
 spirit which the turmoils of the world are calculated to excite. The ruins of the 
 abbey overlook, and are built within thirty yards of the waterfall. The only 
 feelings, however, which can arise in the mind of any visitor to this abbey church- 
 yard are those of pain and disgust. When I entered the church-yard, I saw 
 several jiarts of coffins strewn about on the grass ; some with only their lids off — 
 some with the sides broken in. Human bones were scattered about ; some of 
 them scarcely denuded of their covering of corruption. Against the ruins of the 
 church, amongst the stones, numbers of human skulls were piled and thrown, and 
 strewn about on the grass without order or care ; and two or three pigs, which 
 appeared to have free access to this church-yard, were rolling about and snuffing, 
 and rooting up these last relics of mortality. Every grave looked as though it 
 
WATER-POWER OF SLIGO. 195 
 
 But what will the Repealers say to this, — the gentlemen 
 who " talk nonsense" about Repeal as the " cure-all" for 
 every disease of Ireland ? Pray, in the name of common 
 
 had been made, and the corpse tumbled in, and the earth covered over it in a 
 hurry. Such as had tombstones over them had the stones rarely set square, 
 generally with one corner sunk and another raised up. Big stones from the ruin 
 were thrown about and strewn amongst the rank grass ; all had the appearance of 
 irreverence and neglect. It was a painful and disgusting sight. Until my visit 
 to Ireland, I had been inclined to think that the Celtic races, amongst other 
 virtues of strong attachment to kindred, excelled us in respect for the remains of 
 the dead. Those who have travelled in France, and have visited the cemeteries 
 there, cannot but have remarked the clinging remembrance of those who have 
 departed which their graves exhibit. In the Pere la Chaise at Paris little chapels 
 over each grave are as common as monuments. In these is often seen a chair 
 and a lamp burning, and surviving relatives resort to them for prayer. Most of 
 them, too, are decked with garlands. In Wales, nothing is more common than 
 to find flowers growing, carefully reared and watered, over the graves of the poorest 
 peasants. I remember, on one occasion, giving great offence to a peasant in 
 Wales, who came up to me in high excitement, and asked me why I had dared 
 to walk over his son's grave, which I had just done, perfectly unconscious of 
 hurting his or any one's feelings. In the cathedral at Llandaff, some three years 
 ago, I saw a tombstone in the church over an old lady who had been buried /or^y 
 years, strewn with fresh flowers. I asked the verger who had done this. He 
 told me that the servant of the old lady had strewn flowers over her mistress's 
 grave as long as she lived, and that on her death her (the servant's) daughter still 
 continued to do so regularly every week. I remember mentioning this to 
 Dr. Reece — an old and most respectable inhabitant of Cardiff — soon after I had 
 seen it. The old man was silent for a moment, and then said to me, in a tone of 
 strong emotion, — ' ' Yes ; and for ten years after my mother died, the choicest 
 flower in ray father's garden was laid by me every Sunday morning on her grave." 
 Evidences of feeling like this one cannot but respect ; and I confess that I was 
 disposed to look on the cold decencies of Christian burial common in England as 
 denoting less of feeling, or, at any rate, more transient feeling for departed 
 relations than our Celtic neighbours exhibit. Ireland, however, has dispelled this 
 illusion. We respect the remains of the dead, and give them a decent, though 
 frequently a coldly formal burial ; and if those decencies are ever discovered to 
 be infringed upon, general indignation is sure to arrest the outrage. But in 
 Ireland, in the west, the dead are tumbled into a hole like dogs, and seem, as they 
 have departed this life, to be forgotten. Their remains are unprotected, and the 
 church-yards are frequently the disgusting resort of pigs. 
 
 On this subject, however, I cannot do better than quote an extract from a 
 published letter of Mr. Eneas M'Donnell of London, a gentleman who took a 
 warm interest in the passing of the Cathohc Emancipation Act, and who is 
 interested in the county of Mayo : — 
 
 " Burial and burial-places reform. — It is impossible that anything short of an 
 obdurate usage could reconcile the Irish peasantry to the absence, generally, of 
 
 o 2 
 
196 WATER-POWER OF SLIGO. 
 
 sense, say no more about it ; but strive, by every means in 
 your power, thus to cement, closer and closer, your union 
 with the industry and skill and capital of England. Seek 
 
 their pastors from the interment of the poor, and their attendance, as generally, 
 at the interment of the rich. The known doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church 
 respecting prayers for the dead, and its most interesting rites, should secure to the 
 departed its benefits, and to the surviving its consolations. But, for some reason 
 or other, it is not so in Ireland, so far as the poor are concerned. Too often the 
 poor man's grave is neglected, at the same time that the factious meeting is 
 attended, and the mourning relative or friend is left to indulge in the reflection, 
 that a Catholic minister would be more profitably, more decently, and more 
 suitably occupied in commending the souls of the deceased to heavenly peace than 
 in exciting the hearts of the living to uncharitable strife. I am persuaded that 
 the remains of 130,000 poor Irish Roman Catholics are annually consigned to 
 earth, unattended by a clergyman. I believe that, in the county of Mayo alone, 
 the number so bereft of Christian burial is not less than 7000 in each year. 
 
 " How general and how just would be the outcry of the clergy and the poor 
 were this grievance enforced by the British Parliament ! How inconsistent it is 
 to reproach others with slandering the Irish peasantry as uncivilized and unchris- 
 tian, and yet to treat them, at the same time, as if they were such ! In truth, it 
 will be difficult, in future ages, to explain how it had come to pass that a Christian 
 and civilized people endured or tolerated a practice opposed to the word and the 
 will of our God and our Church, and not required by penal laws, or enforced by 
 the strong arm of hostile authority. Desertion of the poor and devotion to the 
 rich form no part of the great Christian system, but are oifensive to its principles 
 and obnoxious to its primary policy. Those ministers of religion who labour to 
 excite the Irish Catholic peasantry to complain that they are not admitted to the 
 enjoyment of equal benefits and privileges with their British fellow -subjects, and 
 who most loudly demand ' equal justice for Ireland,' are bound, by all the 
 obligations of honourable consistency, to aid in promoting a reform of this bad 
 practice ; for they well know that the poorest Protestant peasant of England dies 
 in the consoling certainty of a Christian burial, while the Catholic peasant of 
 Ireland, who, on account of his faith, estimates the value thereof far more highly, 
 dies in the desponding fear, nay, generally in the disheartening certainty of being 
 excluded therefrom ; and that, too, for no fault on his part, but because he is 
 poor. Certainly, this is not a practice that ought to be retained. Bitter and 
 numerous enough. Heaven knows, are the miseries attendant upon poverty during 
 life ; and it is too bad that the poor Irish peasant should be reminded of the odious 
 distinction of his condition at the hour of death. The curse of poverty which had 
 afflicted his life should end, at least, with that life ; and it would be monstrous, 
 and cruel, and unchristian, to hold out to him, in his last moments, the prospect 
 of its continuance at his grave. 
 
 " Many of the burial places in Ireland present spectacles truly revolting. Often 
 have I seen graves turned up by swine, and grave-yards unprotected by any en- 
 closure whatsoever. I have recently solicited that eminently useful public officer, 
 the county surveyor of Mayo, Mr. Brett, to favour me with a return, in tabular 
 
TVATER-POWER OF SLIGO. 
 
 197 
 
 to amalgamate yourselves with her, — to equal her, — to rival 
 her, — to join v>'ith her, — and to partake in the glories, whe- 
 ther of peace or war, of one unrivalled empire. 
 
 form, of the number and condition of the burial-places within that county, together 
 with an estimate of the probable cost of erecting or repairing enclosures thereof, as 
 occasion may require, and adding houses or cottages for the residence of watch- 
 men, and the accommodation of officiating clergymen. 
 
 " I find, by it, that there are 143 burial-places in Mayo, making an average of 1 
 to 3,000 of the population. The following summary shows the number and con- 
 dition thereof in each of the nine districts, called Baronies, into which that county 
 is divided, as also the funds necessary for enclosures, repairs, and small houses ; 
 to which I add a column setting forth the amount levied on each barony by the 
 grand jury within the last year ; for which information I am indebted to the re- 
 spectable authority of an esteemed private local friend, viz. : — 
 
 Name of Barony. 
 
 Enclos'd 
 Buriul 
 Places. 
 
 Without 
 any En- 
 closure. 
 
 Par- 
 tially 
 Enclos'd 
 
 Total 
 
 Number in 
 
 each 
 
 Barony. 
 
 Funds 
 
 requisite for 
 
 enclosures, 
 
 Repairs, and 
 
 Houses. 
 
 Grand Jury 
 Cess, for ihe 
 Year 1810. 
 
 Burrishoole .... 
 
 2 
 4 
 
 2 
 
 1 
 2 
 4 
 2 
 
 1 
 
 3 
 3 
 6 
 
 
 7 
 3 
 1 
 2 
 4 
 
 8 
 12 
 
 4 
 U 
 12 
 17 
 
 6 
 
 7 
 13 
 
 13 
 19 
 10 
 19 
 20 
 22 
 11 
 11 
 18 
 
 £ 
 118 
 223 
 123 
 
 156 
 185 
 
 187 
 59 
 77 
 
 132 
 
 £ 
 3,140 
 4,281 
 3,931 
 5,546 
 2,797 
 4,749 
 5,982 
 2,147 
 6,814 
 
 Clanmorris . . . . 
 
 Costello 
 
 Erris 
 
 Gallen 
 
 Kilmain 
 
 Murrisk 
 
 Tyrawley 
 
 Total 
 
 18 
 
 29 
 
 96 
 
 143 
 
 1,260 
 
 39,387 
 
 " Here, in a single district of a Christian land, we see that of 143 burial-places 
 there are not more than 18 enclosed, and 96 even partially enclosed, with no less 
 than 29 without any enclosure whatsoever ; in all of which the poor have been 
 generally interred without the benefit of Christian burial : and it may be truly 
 added that this district illustrates the present condition of by far the greater por- 
 tion of Ireland. The grand jury cess of Mayo for a single year (1840), leaded 
 chiefly from the peasantry, and amounting nearly to 40,000/., is 31 times larger 
 than the sum required to erect or repair all those burial-places, together with 
 houses for the residence of a gatekeeper or sexton, and the accommodation of 
 officiating clergymen. The cess in one barony (Tyrawley) is 50 times, and that 
 in another (Kilmain) 100 times larger than the sum so required in each of those 
 baronies. I cannot say whether the present grand jury laws would warrant the 
 levy and outlay of public money for such uses. If not, they could, and I, for one, 
 think, should be amended with that view. If, on the other hand, a collection 
 should be approved, it would, surely, be more worthy of the patronage and favour 
 
198 WATER-POWER OF 8LIGO. 
 
 But, " talk nonsense" about Repeal, — excite the people, — 
 plant hatred in their breasts against the Saxons, and against 
 England, — make it dangerous, or, at any rate, not pleasant 
 for Englishmen to reside among you, — and what sane Eng- 
 lishman, with capital to go where he likes, will come here 
 and spend his thousands at the risk of being shot for his 
 folly ? I will simply put these facts before sensible Irish- 
 men, and I feel satisfied that there is no sensible Irishman 
 who, after calmly reflecting upon them, will not come to the 
 conclusion, whatever may have been his previous opinions, 
 that it is not wise, either for the welfare of Ireland or of 
 Irishmen, to perpetuate agitation and disturbance, whether 
 for Repeal or for any other object, and thus to drive away 
 capital and skill, which alone can give eynj^loyment to the 
 people. 
 
 of the Roman Catholic prelates and clergy of Ireland, than those political and 
 unavailing pecuniary levies on the poor now so prevalent ; particularly when, 
 contrasting the required sum of 1,2G0/. with the number of Catholic inhabitants 
 in Mayo, it would appear that the contribution of a single penny from each would 
 more than suffice to complete the necessary funds. 
 
 ' ' Knowing as I well know, and fondly prizing the warm sympathies of my poor 
 countrymen and countrywomen, I feel assured that no measure of " reform" could 
 be devised more agreeable to them than that which would secure, for the future, 
 the decent Christian burial of deceased relatives, and neighbours of all degrees, 
 poor as well as rich, attended by their pastors for the administration of the reli- 
 gious rites of their Church ; nor could any subject be named more deserving of 
 the early attention of the prelates and clergy, at their meetings, called ' Con- 
 ferences.' The disedifying scenes which sometimes occurred at burials were 
 generally owing to the intemperance of individuals, and the absence of the priest. 
 The people have remedied the intemperance, and it would well become the prelates 
 and clergy to remedy the absence of the priest. In truth, no more suitable com- 
 panion for the present Temperance Reform could be found than this Christian 
 Burial Reform." 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF MAYO. 199 
 
 LETTER XIII. 
 
 THE PEASANTRY OF MAYO. — LEASES AND ABSENTEES. 
 
 Appearance of Peasants' Cottages — The Criticisms of the Dublin Press — Rundale 
 Villages — Waste Lands — Leases — Their Disadvantages and Advantages^ 
 Advocated when containing proper Covenants — Evils of Absenteeism. 
 
 Ballina, Mayo, September 25. 
 The chief features of tlie country which strike a stranger 
 entering the county of Mayo from Sligo, are the wretched 
 and filthy cottages of the peasantry, denoting a state of great 
 debasement and poverty ; and the vast tracts of level unre- 
 claimed bog-land, capable of producing wealth, and giving 
 the means of comfort to the wretched-looking and squalid 
 peasantry that live on its borders. Each cottage has its 
 dunghill and filthy cesspool close to the door, rendering 
 cleanliness impossible, and generating fever and disease. 
 The pig routs up the dunghill, and the ducks dabble in the 
 cesspool, and run in and out of the cottage at pleasure. The 
 children roll about on the mud floor, made damp and filthy 
 by the feet of the ducks and pigs, and nothing can exceed 
 their ragged, dirty, and lost appearance, unless it be the 
 forlorn aspect of their bare-footed mother. There are ex- 
 ceptions to this condition of the people ; here and there a 
 whitewashed cottage, cleanly and orderly within, and the 
 dunghill out of sight, show progressing improvement ; and, 
 
200 THE PEASANTRY OF MAYO. 
 
 generally, the jDeople are said to be much better off than 
 they were, owing- to the more remunerating prices for pro- 
 visions, which the small farmers have obtained during the 
 last three years. 
 
 It will be the object of my letter to-day to show the causes 
 both of that improvement and of the general neglect which 
 the country exhibits. I shall prefer doing this chiefly from 
 evidence which has already been ascertained on authority. 
 It will then be for reflecting men to form an opinion, on 
 unquestionable data, how much of this condition is to be 
 traced to bad or good legislation, and how much of it is to 
 be attributed to the conduct of individuals in their social 
 cajaacity. 
 
 I have had the opportunity of seeing the Dublin papers at 
 the news-room here, and their inveterate partisanship, right 
 or wrong, has not a little amused me. Considering the spirit 
 in which each is conducted, it was consolatory to find each, 
 in speaking of my letter on the tenant-right, no matter what 
 might be its party views, " hint a fault and hesitate dislike," 
 yet each on different grounds ; for this assured me that I 
 had not taken a party view, and strengthened my conviction 
 of the accuracy of the view I had taken. The Freemans 
 Journal, of Repeal politics, " deplores the course into which 
 I seem unhappily diverging," as one not likely to " effect 
 much good" for the people. The Pilot, a Repeal paper, is 
 of opinion that all my conclusions are based on an opinion 
 that " absenteeism" is the monster grievance of Ireland, and 
 that anything I may write about that evil is mere " moon- 
 shine," unless I trace the cause of it (which it attributes to 
 the attractions of London society), and show its remedy, 
 which it indicates to be a repeal of the Union.* The Mail, 
 which is a high Tory and Orange paper, writes in a pouting 
 
 * That is, a repeal of the Union will put an end to the attractions of London 
 society ! Such is Irish logic. 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF MAYO. 201 
 
 tone about " research in blue books," and says, I "might have 
 found all my conclusions without trouble or care, many times 
 during the last two or three years, in the columns of the 
 Mail," and then funnily terms that which I " might have 
 found" " twaddle."^' It then wishes to direct my attention 
 to the subject of " leases," which it indicates to have been 
 the cause of that " subdivision of land, and its baneful con- 
 sequences," which my letters to you have described. 
 
 My letter of to-day will, perhaps, show the value that is to 
 be attached to these three different ojjinions. I am much 
 mistaken if the evidence, fairly put, will not prove that 
 wherever the landlords have been resident, and have attend- 
 ed to the duties of their position, there has been improve- 
 ment; and that the injury which has resulted from leases, 
 has been owing to their total neglect, either of inserting 
 proper covenants in them, or of not enforcing them if in- 
 serted. That the repeal of the Union will lessen the attrac- 
 tions of London, to those who' prefer them to attention to 
 their duties at home, may well be doubted ; and with or with- 
 out resorting to the desperate remedy of Repeal, the question 
 will still remain the same — by what means can legislation 
 deal with the evil of absenteeism? The sifting of these ques- 
 tions may, perhaps, " effect much good" for the people. 
 
 Each of these subjects, however, in their order. 
 
 I have had the opportunity of riding over the estate of 
 Mr. Vaughan Jackson, of Carramore, in the neighbourhood 
 of this town. Some years ago, when he undertook the 
 management of his estate, many parts of it were held in 
 rundale, or joint-tenancy. This mode of tenure w^as for- 
 
 * The Mail, too, in criticising the letter, speaks with an air of amusing supe- 
 riority about there being much unnecessary show of "Schoolboy learning" 
 relative to the rights of real property. I should say he " was a fine loy of his 
 age," who knew much about the second volume of Blackstone on " The Rights of 
 Things." And then, Coke vpon Littleton laughed at as " Schoolboy learning !" 
 How amusing people are when they get out of their depths ! 
 
202 THE PEASANTRY OF MAYO. 
 
 merly common. Some half dozen or more tenants took a 
 portion of land on lease, and jointly and severally bound 
 themselves to pay the rent. This was their only obligation. 
 As long as they paid the rent they were left to themselves to 
 do as they liked. As their numbers increased and their 
 children grew up, they subdivided this land with their chil- 
 dren, and built their cottages in a cluster, without the slight- 
 est attempt at regularity, and without street or lane, crooked 
 passages in and out between the cottages being the only 
 means of communication with one another; the only unifor- 
 mity observed being that each cottage had a filthy cesspool 
 and dunghill close to its door. I rode on horseback through 
 two of these villages yesterday, still held in joint-tenancy, — 
 one named Carrowbeggin, belonging to a gentleman named 
 Atkinson, and another named Balderig, still held on rundale 
 lease from Mr. Jackson. There was just room, with care 
 to ride my horse on the crooked j)athway between the dung- 
 hills and cesspools. I went into one of these cottages. It 
 had one room, no chimney, and a turf fire on the mud floor. 
 Its furniture consisted of a bedstead with some hay on it, 
 and one blanket, a deal box, and an iron pot. There were 
 five children in it, so ragged that they were nearly naked, 
 and two pigs, begrimed with the soil from the cesspool at 
 the door. The mother was scarcely clad, and barefooted. 
 Cottage, children, pigs, and mother, were all equally dirty. 
 No description can convey an idea of such a collection of 
 dunghills and filthy hovels. The people were all alike, 
 wretchedly poor, and many of them had but an acre and a 
 half of land to subsist themselves and families upon. They 
 are perpetually quarrelling and fighting with one another 
 about their ducks and pigs, and about trespassing on one 
 another's lands. Mr. Jackson, on coming to his estate as a 
 resident landlord, devoted his time to remedy this deplorable 
 condition of his tenantry. He drained a lake of consider- 
 able extent; made main drains through his bog-land, that 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF MAYO. 203 
 
 his tenants might run their drains into them ; put each man 
 on a squared farm of from 5 to 10 acres (which they call 
 here " stripping" the land) on the land thus recovered; gave 
 them a plan on which to build their houses, in the centre of 
 their farms ; superintended their execution, and engaged 
 himself to pay the tenants the value of such improvements 
 as he approved of. Formerly his rents were never paid ; 
 now they are paid with the greatest punctuality, there is an 
 absence of all quarrelling, they have got into habits of com- 
 parative cleanliness and order, and their industry has been 
 remarkably increased, every portion of their land now being 
 cultivated.* To effect this, however, has been a work of 
 time, patience, and diligent attention. The land is let at 
 25.9. an acre rent, and many of the tenants have constant 
 work given to them at Qd. a day in jobbing about and effect- 
 ing improvements in draining. In this manner about fifty 
 men are employed. 
 
 Lord Arran has thus remodelled the whole of his estate in 
 this county from the rundale system, and has established a 
 model farm. Colonel Knox Gore, Mr. Howley, Mr. Knox, 
 of Mount Falcon, Mr. Knox, of Netley, and other gentle- 
 men, have given great means of employment to the labourers 
 by building and carrying out similar improvements. But 
 these gentlemen have attended to the duties of their station, 
 and the result has invariably been to beautify and improve the 
 country, to increase produce, and to benefit both landlord and 
 tenant. Some idea of the progress made may be formed 
 from the fact that from 4,000/. to 5,000/. worth of manure is 
 annually sold in Ballina, chiefly sea- weed. This year 150/. 
 worth of guano was purchased, the most part by the small 
 tenants. On the other hand, to use a common phrase in 
 
 * A large portion of their time and means, when living in rundale villages, 
 was consumed in attending petty sessions on charges of assaults and trespass, and 
 in paying lawyers' bills. That state of things has ceased where the rundale 
 system of holding has been got rid of. 
 
204 THE PEASANTRY OF MAYO. 
 
 Ireland, " tliere is great room for improvement." Mr. 
 Griffiths, the General Valuation Commissioner, in his returns 
 of waste lands in each county in Ireland, says, that much of 
 the loAv-lying bog and moor-land on the road between Sligo 
 and Ballina — 
 
 " Offers great facility for improvement, inasmticli as there is abundance 
 of clay and gravel immediately beneath the bogs, which are frequently 
 shallo\v, and in consequence the surface when drained can be easily and 
 cheaply coated with the subsoil." 
 
 The land is, however, icaiting to be improved. The same 
 gentleman estimates that there are — 
 
 " 152,000 acres of unimproved bog and coarse pasture-land, about 
 30,000 of which may be advantageously drained and cultivated, and 
 60,000 acres may be drained for pastm-e." 
 
 Speaking of the county of Mayo, he says — 
 
 " This county contains a greater extent of unimproved waste lands than 
 any other in Ireland, yet a large portion of it presents unusual facilities 
 for reclamation and cultivation." There are " 800,000 acres of unim- 
 proved land, of which about 170,000 acres might be improved for culti- 
 vation, and 300,000 might be drained for pasture."* 
 
 The neglect of improving these wastes, and the poverty- 
 stricken condition of the people may, in a very great mea- 
 sure, be attributed to the absenteeism of many of the more 
 wealthy landlords who totally neglect their estates, on the 
 one hand, and on the other to the very general want of 
 judicious leases. 
 
 First, with regard to the question of leases ; and I will 
 state the disadvantages which have resulted from them before 
 we consider their advantages. In the present consideration 
 I confine myself to the terminable leases of tenants. 
 
 I have already stated the evils which have arisen from a 
 lease to a community in joint- tenancy. The people under it 
 subdivide in rundale, and come to certain starvation. A 
 
 * Land Commissioners' Report, p. 51. 
 
LEASES AND ABSENTEES. 205 
 
 lease, however, is a mutually binding bargain, or agreement, 
 made on certain terms. If the terms of the lease merely 
 bargain for a certain rent in return for permission to live on 
 the land for a stated period, and the land is ill-used and 
 covered with paupers under such a lease, is this the fault of 
 the principle of a lease, or of the landlord who makes such 
 a lease ? Such, however, were the rundale leases. 
 
 In the evidence taken before Lord Devon (Appendix, 
 Part I.), it is urged by Mr. Henry Kennedy (p. 12) that a 
 tenant has more opportunities of being litigious under a 
 lease, and that — 
 
 " The landlord has not the command over the possession of the land 
 which he would have if the tenant had no lease." 
 
 Of course not. What is the object of a lease but to take 
 away that power from the landlord, on certain terms, and to 
 give greater security of possession to the tenant ? The land- 
 lord, however, who looks after his estate, while he gives 
 encouragement and security to his tenants by leases, will 
 take care to have such judicious covenants inserted in his 
 leases as will guard against subdivision and subletting, and 
 will insure a proper system of cultivation. He will then 
 have complete power to eject the tenant whenever he breaks 
 his bargain in any one of these respects ; and he surely 
 retains as much command over the possession of the land as 
 is compatible with any beneficial arrangement between land- 
 lord and tenant. 
 
 Mr. Kincaid, the agent of Lord Palmerston's estates in 
 Sligo, mentions (Appendix, Part I. page 30) six leases 
 granted for three lives, or 61 years, which terminated in 1838. 
 The lessees appear to have become middlemen, and imme- 
 diately to have sublet, and when the leases terminated 280 
 pauperized tenants were found on the leased lands.* This 
 
 * See first note to last Letter, p. 175. 
 
206 LEASES AND ABSENTEES. 
 
 is certainly a monstrous evil for the landlord. But was this 
 to be attributed to the principle of leases ? Considering the 
 character of the Irish people, such a lease as this was most 
 injudicious. Had the leases contained covenants against 
 subletting and subdivision, and had those covenants been 
 enforced, this abuse could not have arisen. On one of these 
 leases, of the town-land of Mullaghmore, there were 201 
 Irish acres, and when the lease fell in, there were upon it 135 
 tenants. There cannot, of course, be a greater evil to the 
 country and to the community than a lease which permits 
 such a state of things as this, and prevents the interference 
 of the landlord. But it was most gross neglect and mis- 
 management on the part of those who gave such a lease. 
 Instances of this kind, however, are very numerous in the 
 evidence. 
 
 " The first thing a man does when he gets a lease is to get 
 under-tenants"* says Mr. Mayne, of Monaghan. 
 
 Mr. Taylor, of Fermanagh,f thinks tenants-at-will — ■ 
 
 " Improve just as much, and sometimes more than those who have 
 leases." 
 
 The tenant-right is a kind of substitute for leases here. 
 The tenants are paid for their improvements. 
 
 Mr. Wray, of Ardnamona, near Donegal (p. 167), 
 
 thinks — 
 
 " The improvement is greater on farms held at will than hy lease ; 
 the tenant's interest who holds hy lease hcing considered sufficient en- 
 couragement for him to make permanent impi'ovements on his land, he 
 seldom receives the same assistance from his landlord." 
 
 " In this district," says Mr. O'Hara, of Annahmore, an 
 extensive landowner, near Sligo (p. 192), — 
 
 * Appendix, Part II. p. 129. 
 t Ibid. p. 111. 
 
LEASES AND ABSENTEES. 207 
 
 " Long leases have proved injurious to the condition of the tenants 
 and to the improvement of the land. The tenant having secured a long 
 term, procrastinates, gets into lazy habits, neglects his business, alienates 
 portions of his farm to meet his rent or engagements, or provide for his 
 family; goes on con-acring and impoverishing until his land is ex- 
 hausted and himself a pauper, or his land is covered with paupers — him- 
 self the greatest. Four marked cases now present themselves on my 
 property in proof of the bad effects of long leases. First by the termination 
 of a lease made in 1773, to one tenant of eighty acres at 9.?. per acre ; the 
 original tenant sold his interest to the present occupier, who is in the 
 worst condition, and no improvement whatever is made : the land is 
 con-acred to exhaustion, and three sub-tenants on it. I know this myself. 
 The second is a farm leased in 1772 to one tenant (by whose death it 
 terminated), of 70 acres at 5s. per acre. The tenant had only 16 acres iu 
 his possession at his death, having sublet the remainder. I believe there 
 are about fifteen families upon it. The third case is 368 acres, leased in 
 1784 to one tenant, of excellent land, in the best condition, at 10*. per 
 acre for 256 acres of upland, with 112 acres of bottom and bog not 
 charged for. This farm is now occupied by the four sons of the lessee, 
 holding in common, they have no division, and all the buildings, walls, 
 and fences, and drains are decayed or destroyed, the land lying, unfenced 
 and exhausted and covered with weeds ; and I will venture to say that if 
 now surveyed, I shall not be able to find the number of acres of upland 
 that was leased to them. They have let some of the lower part go back 
 to bog. The term of the original lease was for three lives. The fourth 
 case is 208 acres, leased in the year 1784 to one tenant, at 5s. per acre : 
 the lessee apportioned it auiong his three sons ; they among six, and it now 
 has twenty-four families upon it. Each of these farms should have made the 
 fortune of the tenant, had he been possessed of common industry. I could 
 state several similar instances ; but these have occurred within the last 
 few weeks. There was one case of a farm about the same size, leased by 
 my father to one tenant. The lease lasted for many years. I found the 
 son on it with 30 tenants, and himself the poorest man of the whole. The 
 tenants admitted that they had been in the habit of contributing to his 
 support. That was from drink." 
 
 It is true that these instances indicate lamentable indo- 
 lence and absence of exertion so soon as a sufficiency of 
 potatoes are secured. But these leases appear to have been 
 made without any covenants to protect the landlord, and 
 
208 LEASES AND ABSENTEES. 
 
 were therefore, under any circumstances, injudicious, and in 
 Ireland were certain to produce such results. 
 
 Mr. Burchell, of Drumshambo, near Leitrim (p. 1247), says, 
 the land is generally held under middlemen under determin- 
 able leases. 
 
 " Wherever there are leases the land is always subdivided." But that 
 " the clauses against subletting, or setting, or selling, are seldom enforced.^'' 
 
 Mr. Jackson, of Carramore, near Ballina, says (p. 398), — 
 
 " In cases where they have old leases at low rents, the better class of 
 farmers almost all go to ruin." 
 
 I have now stated every opinion against leases which I 
 could find in the evidence. With regard to what Mr. Maync, 
 of Monaghan, and other witnesses state, proper covenants in 
 a lease enforced would jjrevent subletting, by taking a man's 
 farm from him if he attempted to sublet. If, considering 
 the Irish character, long leases are not found to be bene- 
 ficial, then do not give long leases. But the alienation and 
 impoverishment of land of which Mr. O'Hara speaks, could 
 not take place if proper covenants were strictly enforced. 
 There must, however, whether Avith or Avithout leases, be 
 strict attention to the management of an estate, or, like 
 every other thing, it will go to ruin from neglect. But with 
 proper attention and good management, it is common sense 
 and human nature that a man who feels certain that he shall 
 reap the rewards of extra industry on his land, will strive 
 more to improve his farm than the man who has no such 
 certainty,* and avIio is served Avith a notice to quit from year 
 to year (as is often the case), in order that he may be treated 
 as a trespasser, and be turned out at any time. That this is 
 the fact, I Avill noAV proceed to show from the evidence. 
 
 * A witness named Nixon, in giving evidence at Dromahair, Leitrim, before 
 the Commissioners of Poor Inquiry, Ireland (Appendix F, p. 115), says, — " I 
 hold some fields from year to year, and I should consider myself a fool were I to 
 lay out anything on them." 
 
LEASES AND ABSENTEES. 209 
 
 Mr. George Shegog, grazier, of Cloves, Monaghan (Ap- 
 pendix, Part II. J). 124), — 
 
 " Thinks tenancy-at-will injurious to botli landlord and tenant." 
 Mr. James Walker, farmer, of Ballyloughan, Donegal 
 
 (p. 157), says,— 
 
 " The mode of tenure-at-will prevents all improvements, and, therefore, 
 keeps the tenant in poverty ; it promotes sub-division, for the tenant caa- 
 not be worse off thereby, and it acts detrimentally on the rent." 
 
 Mr. James M'Gowan, merchant, of Ballyshannon, Done- 
 gal (p. 175), says,— 
 
 " The tenant holding at will has no encouragement to improve his 
 farm, and if he did expend money to improve his land, and the landlord 
 was a covetous man, he would take advantage of it, and charge him a 
 higher rent, Avhich I have known to be the case in this town, even in im- 
 provements on tenements, and charging them quadruple what they paid 
 before." 
 
 Mr. George Beattie, farmer, of Finnod, county of Sligo 
 (p. 184), thinks,— 
 
 " The tenants Avould be inclined to improve more if they held under a 
 lease." 
 
 Mr. John Brett, land-agent, of Tubbercurry, Sligo (p. 1 89), 
 
 says, — 
 
 " If leases were granted, the tenants would not require any aid ; I am 
 satisfied they would make improvements themselves." 
 
 Mr. Andrew Baker, grazier, near Boyle (p. 197), says, — 
 
 " There is very great anxiety for leases ; and I think they would in- 
 sure to the landlord his rent. If the tenants had leases, it would give 
 them an interest in the land." 
 
 Mr. Martin Garrety, land-surveyor, Sligo (p. 208), says, — 
 
 " The tenants mostly being at will, they improve very little until they 
 get a lease, and then they do what they can." 
 
 Mr. Thomas Fibbs, grazier, of Collooney, Sligo (p. 211), 
 says,— 
 
 "There is great anxiety on the part of the tenants for leases; with 
 leases they would make permanent improvements that would be benefi.- 
 
 P 
 
210 
 
 LEASES AND ABSENTEES. 
 
 cial to them, which, as tenants-at-will, the greater part of them will 
 not do." 
 
 Mr. William Clarke, land-surveyor, of Calry, near Sligo 
 (p. 216), says,— 
 
 " I think there could be a great deal of improvement made in the 
 country, if there were leases upon proper footings granted." 
 
 Mr. James M'Gan, of Sheepwalk, Roscommon, farmer, 
 grazier, and land-agent (p. 228), says, — 
 
 " Holding by lease has a good effect upon the improvements of the 
 farms and the tenants." 
 
 Further on he says (p. 232), — 
 
 " The tenants should get leases binding them to follow up a system of 
 green crops, house feeding, and manuring, and also not to divide their 
 holdings. If this were done, and proper attention paid from the commence- 
 ment to enforce the clauses in the leases, I am of opinion that all would 
 go on well. For instance, take a town-land with twenty tenants ; you 
 could calculate on eighteen of those doing what you required out of the 
 twenty ; then, in that case, it would be considered no hardship at all to 
 turn out the two defaulters ; you would have eighteen to two with you, 
 and you would hunt the others down. To do this well, the landlord should 
 look a little after his own bxmness. Schools should be established to edu- 
 cate the children in reading, writing &c., as well as agriculture. If lite 
 soyis of small farmers were better taught, they loould never calculate en 
 getting one-half of a miserable farm from their parents, thereby maJdng 
 paupers of themselves, as loellas the remaining 2^ortion of the family ; they 
 would assist to till the land in such a way that grazing would be upset in 
 this country." 
 
 Speaking afterwards of some tenants who had their rents 
 increased for making improvements, he says (p. 233), — 
 
 " When I asked the people ' "What is the reason you do not go on with 
 the improvements ?' they all came forward and said, ' By so and so, since 
 we were charged that money, I never dirtied my shovel in the gravel ;' — 
 that was the expression made use of." 
 
 Mr. J. Duckworth, magistrate, farmer, and delegate Poor 
 Law guardian, Mount Erris, near Boyle, says (p. 238), — 
 
 " Those who have leases appear tome to improve their lands more than 
 those who are tenants-at-will." 
 
LEASES AND ABSENTEES. 211 
 
 Captain K. Lloyd, magistrate, private gentleman, small 
 proprietor, and land-agent, Corradoey, Sligo, says (p. 243), — 
 
 " I am satisfied tenancy-at-will has a most injurious iufluence in check- 
 ing improYements." 
 
 Mr. Patrick Mackeon, of Drumshambo, Leitrim, farmer, 
 
 says (p. 252),— 
 
 " In his opinion tenancy-at-will prevents the tenant improving the 
 property as much as he would do if he had a lease." 
 
 Mr. James Cowan, of Caliirtown, Leitrim, farmer, says 
 
 (p. 257),- 
 
 " Where there is tenure given the tenants improve." 
 
 Mr. James Duke, surgeon, of Mohill, says (p. 270), — 
 
 " There is the greatest possible anxiety to get leases. Farmers have 
 offered to build slated houses if they got leases." 
 
 He says afterwards (p. 271), — 
 
 " The tenants-at-will are trying to deteriorate the appearance of their 
 farms lest a valuator should be sent out, which they are frequently 
 threatened with." 
 
 The Rev. George Gearty, parish priest of AnnadufF, 
 Leitrim, says (p. 278), — 
 
 " He considers a twenty-one years' lease a reasonable tenure to encou- 
 rage improvements. Thirty-one years is what would be considered a good 
 lease." 
 
 I think it is unnecessary to give any further quotations on 
 the subject. It is clear that general opinion accords with, 
 common sense, that men are more likely to imj)rove if they 
 are sure they will profit by it than if they are in doubt, and 
 when the probability is that their rents will be raised im- 
 mediately if they do improve. 
 
 It would seem, then, to be a correct opinion that it is 
 advisable in all cases to give leases, provided " the landlord 
 looks a little after his oicn business /' and what else has he to 
 to do? 
 
 This question leads to the consideration of the subject of 
 
 p 2 
 
212 LEASES AND ABSENTEES. 
 
 " absenteeism ;" for the fact that " absenteeism" exists to 
 an enormous extent in Ireland proves that they find some- 
 thing else to do. I have not space in my present letter 
 to copy a number of quotations I had marked, showing the 
 evils which result from absenteeism. In the words of one 
 witness, " It is the ruin of the country^ This, however, I 
 think, will scarcely be disputed : — There must be dearth of 
 employment where there is no resident gentry ; and there 
 must be the loss of moral influence and example in im- 
 proving and teaching the people.* 
 
 * The following evidence on this subject is taken at random from a vast number 
 of similar statements. Mr. Isaiah Gibson, farmer of Drumlun, near Balliborough, 
 in the county of Cavan, in his evidence before the Land Commissioners (Part II. 
 p. 100), says, — " We have not a resident landlord within ten miles of us. Though 
 there is between 50,000/. and 60,000/. a year taken out of the neighbourhood, we 
 do not get 100/. of it returned." 
 
 The same witness says, further on {Ibid. p. 104), — "There is one sug- 
 gestion I would make as to agricultural societies. If there could be a possibility 
 of forcing non-resident landlords to pay something to support agricultural 
 societies, it would be a noble institution. We have not a resident landlord within 
 twelve miles of us (Mr. Ruly, farmer). The landlords only sent us 21. towards 
 our society. An absentee tax would be a good thing for us." 
 
 Mr. John Cassidy of Any, in the county of Monaghan, farmer {Ibid. p. IIG) 
 says, — " There is about two thousand acres of land subject to the flood. I would 
 suggest that, if the tenants were all under the immediate landlord, it would be 
 better for them all ; and if a landlord is resident in the country the tenant lives 
 more comfortably than when he is away from it." 
 
 Mr. William Patterson of Gotmore, near Fivemile-town, in the county of 
 Tyrone, land-agent {Ibid. p. 119), is asked, — " Is there any difference between 
 the management of estates where the proprietors are residents, as contradis- 
 tinguished from those where the proprietors are absentees?" "We have no 
 absentees at this moment. I may say there is a manifest improvement in the 
 management of the properties. I am happy to say that the landed ijroprietors 
 are paying more attention to it, and encouraging their tenantry." 
 
 John Pearce Hamilton, Esq. of Oakfield, in the county of Fermanagh, agent 
 {Ibid. p. 132), is asked, — " Is there any difference in the management of 
 the estates of absentee proprietors ? " " No, I do not know that there is. Where 
 there is a resident proprietor they are generally looked after better. He is an 
 eye-witness how things are going on." 
 
 Mr. James Donleavy of Glenties, in the county of Donegal, landholder {Ibid. 
 p. 153), says, — " We are under the agents and bailiffs, who have no feeling for 
 the people, our landlord being an absentee nobleman. He never comes near us 
 to see if we are oppressed or tyrannised over. We should have some hopes if our 
 
LEASES AND ABSENTEES. 213 
 
 It may be conceded that you cannot by direct legislation 
 force any landed proprietor to reside on his estate ; it vvoukl 
 be an arbitrary interference with his Uberty which is not 
 
 landlord would visit us once a year, as other landlords do, that vre should have 
 some redress." 
 
 Mr. James Walker, of Ballysloughan, in the parish of Killaghtee, in the county 
 of Donegal, farmer {Ibid. p. 158), is asked, — "Is there much difference in the 
 management of estates of different proprietors ?" " The tenants of middlemen 
 and absentee landlords are much worse managed, especially when the agent is a 
 non-resident. As far as I can see, the agent's duties consist in getting the rent 
 by any means." 
 
 Mr. John Crommer, of Drumrush, farmer {Ibid. p. 159), says, — " The landlord 
 and agent are both absentees, and it is a great loss to the tenantry upon a large 
 estate when it happens so. I think it would be better if one or both of them were 
 Kving upon the estate." 
 
 The same witness, further on, says, — " I see estates where landlords are resident, 
 and I think the tenants are better off, though they pay a high rent. They have 
 some advantages in that case. There is a great deal of money laid out, and more 
 labour given, and many other things." 
 
 Mr. George Cecil Wray, of Ardnemona, near Donegal, farmer {Ibid. p. 169), 
 is asked, — "Is there any difference in the management of estates of different 
 classes ? — for example, the estates of large or small, or absentee or resident 
 proprietors ? " " There is a very marked difference in the management of the 
 estates of absentee and resident proprietors : on the estates of absentees the tenants 
 do not receive the same encouragement as from resident proprietors ; and the waste 
 Icmds, possessing great natural advantages, are totally neglected. On one of the 
 largest estates in this district, even the agent is not a resident, seldom visiting the 
 property except once a year, when he comes to collect rent in the depth of winter. 
 An agent should reside on the property under his management ; he should perfectly 
 understand the value of land ; should also possess a thoiough knowledge of farming, 
 otherwise he cannot correct abuses in the management of the land, nor can he other- 
 wise appreciate the exertions of an industrious tenant. By his residing on the pro- 
 perty he can settle all the disputes among the tenantry ; he can acquire a knowledge 
 of the local advantages possessed by different farms, that a non-resident, merely 
 visiting the property occasionally, could never possibly know anything of. The 
 resident agent can, by timely assistance, often save a sinking but deserving 
 tenant from ruin. There is no limit to the good that may be done by a proper 
 agent who is constantly among the people. The evil effects arising from non- 
 residence are but too evident." 
 
 There are a greatnumber of similar statements, which it is unnecessary to repeat. 
 These are taken from the first hundred and fifty pages of one of the Land Com- 
 mission blue books, and are sufficient to bear out the text. 
 
 The effect of personal instruction and encouragement on the part of the landlord 
 is strongly exemplified in the case of Sir Richard O'Donnell's management of his 
 smaller tenantry in the county of Mayo, — ' ' a system of dealing, ' ' says ^Ir. Smith of 
 Deanston, " which, if followed over two-thirds of Ireland, would go far to remove 
 
214 LEASES AND ABSENTEES. 
 
 pursued in regard to any other class of society, and would 
 not be submitted to even if such a law could be passed. It 
 really requires no arguments to prove that a repeal of the 
 Union would not make any difference in this respect. Those 
 landlords who are absent on Parliamentary duty are ne- 
 cessarily away only about six months in the year, and, peers 
 and commoners together, they only amount to four land- 
 lords for each county.* They would be also equally ab- 
 sentees for that period from their estates were the Parlia- 
 ment sitting in Dublin. But it is not these gentlemen, who 
 
 many of the depressing causes which have hitherto borne upon the nation like an 
 incubus. It is simply tJie presence of the landlord, with a liberal view to intro- 
 duce the knowledge of the way, and to furnish the means of accomplishing improve- 
 ments, and with a kindly disposition exercising a kindly method of enticing the 
 small tenants to lay aside sloth and disorder, and to adopt methods of industry 
 which are sure to lead to success and advancement, and to the exchange of want 
 and discontent for plenty, comfort, and peace." — See Smith of Deanston' s Report 
 on Thorough Draining in Ireland. 
 
 The following is one of the resolutions advocated by the late Rev. Dr. Madden, 
 as a means of remedying the evils under which Ireland labours : — "That, as 
 landlords in this poor kingdom, we will do our utmost in our little spheres to 
 remove the defects and difficulties which we find our people and country, and 
 particularly our own estates and tenants, lie under." 
 
 " It is but too evident, that the constant absence of so many of our gentlemen 
 is the great source of all the distress and poverty which so many of our people 
 groan under ; and how men of such probity and honour, as many of them are, can 
 relish pleasures which are purchased at the expense of such a crowd of miserable 
 creatures, is a little unaccountable." — Reflections and Resohitio7is proper for the 
 Gentlemen of Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society. 
 
 "An estate suffers as much by the abseiice of the landlord as a ship does by 
 the want of a captain, when the crew is left to themselves." — Ibid. p. 10. 
 
 " Besides, a gentleman who lives on his estate, and spends a large share of his 
 rents there, does not only, like a great tree, necessarily improve the soil it grows 
 on by the leaves and mast that fall from it, but also by the warmth, and shade, 
 and shelter which it casts around. This method would necessarily produce so 
 many advantages where men consult either their own or their tenants' interests, 
 that I have often wished we had a law to oblige every gentleman to build and keep 
 in repair one mansion-house in some part of his estate, of such and such dimen- 
 sions, suitable to his income ; and if this extended even to freeholds of 20/. jier 
 annum, it would not only greatly prevent a non-residence extremely hurtful to life 
 and manners, but would be productive of many excellent effects." — Ibid. p. 9. 
 * See last letter, p. 186. 
 
LEASES AND ABSENTEES. 215 
 
 have some public duty to perform, who are complained of 
 as absentees ; it is the men who have nothing to do, and 
 who do nothing but amuse themselves in Avasting their time 
 and often their means also, away from their estates. How 
 can you reach them ? If their own interests and the calls of 
 duty will not prevail upon them to reside, you can only 
 reach them by legislation to compel them to reside, whether 
 there be a repeal of the Union or not. It is conceded that 
 you cannot reach this evil by direct legislation, but you may 
 perhaps by indirect legislation.* Where would be the in- 
 justice of imposing a tax of 20 per cent, upon every absentee 
 landlord, defining an absentee to be a landowner who did 
 not reside four months in the year on his estate. Appro- 
 priate the sum thus raised towards the payment of the 
 county cess of the district where his estate is situated, and 
 to that extent relieve the tenants from the burden of the 
 county cess. This would enable him to pass seven months 
 of the year in London, attending to his parliamentary duties, 
 if he had any, and to spend a month on the continent where 
 he pleased. Surely this is scope enough for any man. 
 Even this, which appears to me to be the only feasible plan, 
 has its mischiefs. There would still be absentees who would 
 neither reside nor pay the tax, but who would coolly write 
 down to their agents to impose the 20 per cent, on their 
 tenants in increased rent. Such is the intense competition 
 for land, that the tenants would pay this, or promise to do so. 
 This would more than neutralize the relief the tenants would 
 get in the county cess in many cases, and increase the 
 misery of the tenant, until at last that misery became so 
 great as to begin to effectuate its own relief, as it has done 
 in parts of Ireland, by the invention of " good-will," " tenant 
 
 * Absenteeism was made the subject of complaint in the reign of Edward I., 
 was taxed by Richard II., and threatenened to be punished with forfeiture by 
 Henry VIII. 
 
216 LEASES AND ABSENTEES. 
 
 right," and other contrivances for cheating the landlord and 
 one another. 
 
 It is clear, however, that the time is fast approaching 
 ■when landlords who neglect their duties will be compelled 
 by some means to perform them. It is but justice that they 
 should be so comjoelled. The clergyman neglects his duties 
 at the risk of losing his benefice ; the barrister loses his 
 clients, the physician his patients, the tradesman his busi- 
 ness, as the certain punishment of neglect. On what possible 
 pretext, therefore, can any landlord complain that he also 
 should be compelled to fulfil the duties of his station? There 
 exists not a more useful member of society than a good 
 landlord. He is the example, teacher, arbitrator, helper, 
 friend of the poor, and the patron of every good work. Can 
 there be a prouder position ? Yet there are landlords proud 
 of doing nothing — proud of being useless beings in creation — 
 proud of cheating their country out of every good thing, and 
 giving nothing in return. The lowest artisan does some- 
 thing for his country. Devoid of every advantage of birth, 
 of education, and of wealth, he yet returns to his country an 
 equivalent for all that he receives from it. He creates some- 
 thing — does something by his own exertion — to benefit the 
 community. But the absentee, idle, spendthrift landlord, 
 born with every advantage, deriving benefits from every- 
 body, cheats everybody, by doing, creating, effecting nothing 
 in return. He is proud of being less useful to his country 
 than the lowest artisan, — proud of being a nonentity. What 
 right thinhmr/ man hut from his heart despises the idle, useless, 
 absentee landlord. 
 
NEGLECTED ADVANTAGES OF MAYO. 217 
 
 LETTER XIV. 
 
 THE NEGLECTED NATURAL ADVANTAGES OF ]SLiYO; 
 AND THE POVERTY OF THE PEOPLE. 
 
 Description of Westport, and Condition of the Mayo Peasantry — The Capabilities 
 of Improvement, of creating Wealth, and of giving Employment, which Erris 
 affords — Comparative Value of Turf and Coal for Fuel — Lancashire deficient 
 to Erris in Natural Advantages — Neglect of these Advantages, and Poverty of 
 the People — Means of Remedy suggested for bringing Waste Lands into Culti- 
 vation, and employing the People. 
 
 Westport, jSL\.to, September 29. 
 The town of Westport lacks few of those advantages which 
 nature has so liberally bestowed on almost every part of Ire- 
 land. So far as the town itself is concerned, it is tolerably 
 well built, and it has in its neighbourhood some very pictu- 
 resque and beautiful scenery. The mansion of Lord Sligo is 
 close to the town, and the rich hanging woods of his domain 
 are a great ornament to the place. Clew- bay, dotted over 
 with a vast number of islands, lies at its foot, and the mag- 
 nificent pyramidical mountain, Croagh Patrick, or as it is 
 called here " The Reek," is within a few miles of it. From 
 this hill the view of Clew-bay and its 365 islands is joerhaps 
 one of the finest sights of Ireland.* The neighbourhood of 
 
 * I was told there, that the son of a cook in Roscommon, on ascending this 
 hill with some friends, and seeing the vast number of islands in the bay, and their 
 picturesque beauty, characteristically gave expression to his admiration by 
 exclaiming, — " Oh, what a number of beautiful little islands ! sure they are 
 scattered about like peas on a flooded trencher ! " 
 
218 NEGLECTED ADVANTAGES OF MAYO; 
 
 Westport, however, exhibits as Qiuch of squalid poverty and 
 wretchedness as is anywhere to he seen in the country. It 
 is a singular fact that the further you travel westward in 
 Ireland, the more bountiful does nature appear to have been 
 in heajjing upon the country natural resources, and the less 
 has been done by the hand of man to use and improve them. 
 I speak advisedly when I say that there is no part of Eng- 
 land which possesses one-tenth of the means of creating 
 wealth and prosperity which are to be found in this very 
 county of Mayo, which in the best of times exhibits a degree 
 of degraded wretchedness, such as will be in vain sought for 
 in any part of England ; whilst in time of need and bad har- 
 vests, England — less favoured England — has stepped forward 
 to save the population of Mayo from starvation. I propose 
 to-day to glance at those advantages, and at their neglect : 
 the investigation may suggest means of profiting by them. 
 
 In the Sixth Annual Report of the Board of Public 
 Works in Ireland (page 6), is a description of the half barony 
 of En-is, which lies a few miles to the north of this town, 
 and embraces the north-west portion of the county of Mayo. 
 " This district is 29 by 23 miles in extent, and contains 230,016 
 acres; 34,664 acres are under tillage and pasture; 184,013 
 acres mountain and bog, all capable of being highly im- 
 proved ; the remainder lakes and high mountainous tracts." 
 It is " so deeply indented by bays, creeks, and inlets, that no 
 point in it is more than six miles from the sea ;" and " it is 
 intersected by several rivers and streams, the available water- 
 power of ivhich, though sufficient to work the machinery q/"250 
 mills, even in the driest season, flows uselessly to the ocean." 
 The deep sea fishing banks off Erris, " swarm with fish of 
 every kind, especially cod and ling." There is anchorage 
 in the different creeks and bays covering " a space of 84 
 square miles." The report goes on : — " It is much to be 
 deplored that this inexhaustible source of national wealth is 
 almost entirely neglected ; at this time there is not a single 
 
AND POVERTY OF THE PEOPLE. 219 
 
 wherry or fishing smack in the entire barony ; and all the 
 fish taken by small boats and curraghs scarcely suffices for 
 domestic consumption. The soil of Erris with ordinary cul- 
 tivation yields excellent crops ; its oats bring an advance of 
 2d. to 4c?. in the 451bs. in the English and Scotch markets, 
 and its beef and mutton are greatly prized." The report 
 goes on to attribute the want of improvement to " high 
 rents," and the " lack of enterprise" of the people. 
 
 In a former letter I have shown you that water-power is 
 30/. a year per horse-power cheaper than steam-power for 
 manufacturing purposes. Not only, however, is there this 
 immense water-power, but there are vast tracts of bog. 
 These very bogs, instead of being, as now, wild, bleak, and 
 unprofitable wastes, would, if managed with industry and 
 enterprise, be sources of wealth, vieing with the coal-fields 
 of Lancashire. Dr. Kane, in his work on the Industrial 
 Resources of Ireland (p. 39), says, that " Turf is peculiarly 
 useful in its application to boilers, as there is no liability to 
 that burning away of the metal, which may arise from the 
 local intensity of the heat of coke or coal." He says, further 
 on (p. 59), that "the effect of turf is one-third of that of ave- 
 rage coal," by measure or by weight, in getting up steam- 
 power ; but, from its greater cheapness, the comparative 
 cost of turf in working the same amount of steam-power is 
 one-half less than coal. In 1843 the Shannon Company's 
 steam-boats consumed 7,000 tons of turf at 3^. Qd. a ton, 
 costing about 1,200/.; the equivalent quantity of coal for 
 performing the same work would have cost 1,800/. (p. 58). 
 In the evidence of Mr. Bald, in the first and second Rej)orts 
 on Public Works in Ireland (1835, p. 214), that gentleman 
 says, from experiments in Scotland, " that ton for ton of 
 compressed peat has been found, as compared with coal, to 
 give as much heat." He further says, — " Carbonized peat or 
 bog would also serve to make excellent malleable iron. The 
 iron of Sweden owes its high value and good qualities to its 
 
220 NEGLECTED ADVANTAGES OF MAYO ; 
 
 being manufactured by pine charcoal. The sulphur in the 
 coal deteriorates the iron manufactured in Britain. The 
 malleable iron manufactured by carbonized heat would be 
 unequalled for making chains for bridges of suspension, 
 cables for ships, &;c." 
 
 Now, what advantages have the bleak hills and mountains 
 of Lancashire compared with these? They have got coal. 
 That is their sole advantage. With that advantage its po- 
 pulation has created manufactories which clothe the world, 
 and their enterprise and industry are rewarded by the daily 
 acquisition of enormous wealth. But here you have the 
 proof that compressed peat " is ton for ton equal to coal" 
 in caloric, whilst it is cheaper in cost. The Lancashire 
 people could not get at their coal without sinking expensive 
 mines and employing costly machinery. The turf of Mayo 
 lies exposed, and inviting industry to use it ; and the only 
 machinery required to win it is the "loy" or spade of the 
 labourer. The Mayo people have left their tui-f neglected, 
 save to warm the wretched hovels of the peasantry. The 
 river Mersey, the only outlet to the sea which Lancashire 
 possesses, has been made by its j^eople the second port in 
 the United Kingdom. On its marshy banks, where wild 
 fowl and a few fishermen some century and a half ago were 
 the only inhabitants, they have raised a Liverpool, with its 
 miles of docks and its hundreds of thousands of tons of ship- 
 ping. But the bays and creeks and natural harbours facing 
 the Atlantic, which abound in Erris, have not " a single 
 wherry or fishing-smack" floating in them. With all this 
 waste land capable of improvement, the land is left unim- 
 proved and almost in a state of nature. In the evidence 
 relative to this district, taken before the Land Commission, 
 all the witnesses concur in saying that " there is great room 
 for improvement." Mr. Garvey, a landed proprietor and 
 magistrate, residing at Murrisk, in his evidence (Appendix, 
 Part II. p. 413), says, he does not know of any case of land- 
 
AND POVERTY OF THE PEOPLE. 221 
 
 lords either improving themselves, or assisting their tenants to 
 improve; nor is he " aware of any encouragement being given 
 by the Landlords to the tenants to improve." He tried to im- 
 prove fifteen acres of mountain land near Murrisk, and had 
 a very good crop on it. The only machinery put in motion, 
 by this immense water-power, capable of working 250 mills 
 (I again quote from the Sixth Report of the Commissioners 
 of Public Works), is " a rude and solitary tuck-mill on the 
 Owen-more, and a still more wretched contrivance for bruis- 
 ing illicit malt on a stream in Ballycroy." 
 
 Notwithstanding that it will grow superior and high-priced 
 oats, if brought into cultivation, five-sixths of the soil are 
 uncultivated ; and Mr. George Glendining, agent to the 
 Marquis of Sligo and Sir R. O'Uonnell (who are both im 
 proving landlords), in his evidence before the Land Com 
 missioners (page 418), says, " The small tenantry are getting 
 poorer and poorer, owing to the subdivision of land." Mr. 
 Garvey, the gentleman before quoted, says in his evidence 
 (page 414), " I would suggest to the Commissioners that 
 employment would be a great advantage to the population 
 of the country, if it could he obtained P' Mr. Bland, a con- 
 siderable farmer, holding land under both the Marquis of 
 Sligo and Sir R. O'Donnell, says in his evidence {Ibid, page 
 420), " There is plenty of land, sufficient to give food for 
 man and horse, and the whole country is crying out against 
 the people for doing nothing." But we have not done yet ; 
 the coast " swarms with fish of every kind." Do the people 
 look after that means of wealth and comfort ? Mr. Garvey 
 is asked the question, — " Is the fishery carried on with any 
 spirit on this coast ? — There are a good number of fishermen, 
 but it is not half fished r It is a positive fact that the herrings 
 caught on the coast of Scotland are sold to the people here, 
 and there is at this moment a vessel loaded with Scotch her- 
 rings discharging her cargo at the port of Galway. There 
 is an uncertain summer fishery here, the principal fishing 
 
222 KEGLECTED ADVANTAGES OF MAYO ; 
 
 season being in February. Fish-curers used to come from 
 Dublin ; when the season was bad they lost money, and 
 there were hundreds of men seeking employment. When 
 the season was good, and they had the means of repaying 
 themselves, the fishermen combined for high wages, and 
 neutralized their benefit ; they therefore do not prosecute 
 the fishing.* There is but one feature wanting to finish the 
 picture, as the result of indolence, neglect of opportunities 
 showered upon the people, and want of energy — and that 
 feature is starvation and beggary. In 1831 there was a 
 partial failure of the potato crop. As there were just enough 
 oats sown to pay the rent, which the landlords took care to 
 get, and just enough potatoes put into the ground to feed 
 the people, and 7io more, the natural consequence was a kind 
 of famine, and the most frightful destitution. Through the 
 benevolent exertions of Mr. Eneas M'Donnell, a gentleman 
 interested in this district, the then starving condition of the 
 people was fully laid before the people of England, and the 
 people of England at once subscribed upwards of 50,000Z. 
 for their relief; of which sum upwards of 30,000/. were dis- 
 tributed in food to the people of this county, and the rest to 
 the people of Galway. I say " the people" of Mayo and Gal- 
 way, for nearly all classes received it. I am informed, on 
 the best authority here, that the majority of the landlords 
 of the starving peasantry refused to subscribe one shilling 
 towards their relief, and exacted their rents. The vessels 
 which brought out meal and potatoes from England to the 
 coast of Mayo, met vessels going from this coast freighted 
 with oats, sold by the tenantry of Mayo to England to raise 
 money to pay their rents. The people Avould have consumed 
 their rents sooner than they would have starved ; so that in 
 
 * The fishermen here, however, complain much of the risks they run from the 
 want of safety harbours, and that they dare not go out to fisli in consequence, if 
 the weather is at all changeable. As to the evil effects of combinations, see the 
 last Letter, dated Dublin. 
 
AND POVERTY OF THE PEOPLE. 223 
 
 reality the landed gentry of Mayo and Gal way, so far forgot 
 all decent pride (whatever other pride they might possess) as 
 to subsist on the charity of England. Could a more perfect 
 exemplification be found of that game at which children 
 play — " open your mouth and shut your eyes, and see what 
 God will send you?" Now, I put it to the plain common 
 sense of Englishmen to judge of what is here wanted. I 
 have stated facts, and I challenge their denial. Do you 
 think Maynooth College has anything to do with it, or the 
 theology of Dens ? Or do you think Repeal would work a 
 wonderful change in all this ? Or do you not rather think 
 that it is that " SAveat of the brow" which is wanted, by 
 which only shall man "eat bread?" But you will see 
 nothing of this in the Dublin papers, and in the columns of 
 Irish news, copied into the English journals. No ; there 
 the evils of Ireland are enveloped in a mist of words about 
 the dismissal of magistrates, Orange tyranny, Repeal de- 
 monstrations, and bloody murders. If you read the weekly 
 speeches of Irish patriots delivered in that building in Dublin 
 nicknamed " Conciliation-hall," you will meet with many 
 rhapsodies about "justice to Ireland;" about " misgovern- 
 ment," and about everything but the right thing — " De omni- 
 bus rebus et quibusdam aliis." The last thing discovered there 
 by one learned pandit, I see is, that " with one-sided par- 
 tiality I had gone many miles out of my way to have a fling 
 at a nobleman of Liberal tendencies, whilst I had passed over 
 thousands of Tory landlords every jot as culpable ;" and that 
 " the only object of my mission to Ireland was to damage the 
 tenant-right." Till this gentleman informed me of the fact, 
 I must confess to that great fault in Irish minds, of being 
 quite ignorant of the tendencies, whether Liberal or Con- 
 servative, of the nobleman alluded to ; nor did the thought 
 ever cross my mind of making a circumstance so utterly 
 beside the question a subject of inquiry. I must also plead 
 guilty to never having either heard or dreamt of such a cus- 
 
224 NEGLECTED ADVANTAGES OF MAYO; 
 
 torn as tenant-right before I entered Ireland. Much is to 
 be hoped, but I am afraid little to be expected, from legis- 
 lators so bound by the trammels of party. Would that 
 Irishmen would do "justice" to Ireland. The closer do we 
 examine her wants, the more do we become convinced that 
 the " misgovernment" of which she complains is the mis- 
 government of her own sons. The landlords, for the most 
 part, so misgovern their estates, that their tenantry are dis- 
 heartened ; and the tenanti'y almost universally so mis- 
 govern their farms, that they do not produce one-third of the 
 produce of which they are capable ; while all unite in so mis- 
 governing the natural capabilities of the country, that instead 
 of being, as she might be, and as she ought to be, the richest 
 and most prosperous, she is about the poorest and most ne- 
 glected country in Europe. 
 
 I do not, however, probe her wounds for my own amuse- 
 ment, still less from any narrow-minded prejudice. The 
 more prosperous and happy is Ireland rendered, as an 
 integral portion of the British empire, the more prosperous 
 and happy will be the British empire ; therefore would I 
 rather strive for her prosperity and happiness. Many land- 
 lords are willing to improve their wastes, and to afford 
 employment, but they have not the means. The improve- 
 ment of those wastes and the employment of the people are 
 the things absolutely required to lead Ireland towards pro- 
 sperity ; and if the landlords cannot accomplish this, or will 
 not, it is the duty of the Government to do it for them. I 
 am not a Conciliation-hall legislator, called in to prescribe, 
 and can therefore only humbly suggest remedies. A remedy 
 for individuals to adopt, Avhich would in many cases be 
 efficacious, I take from the example of Mr. Keogh, of Mount 
 Jerome, near Dublin, who has an estate between Boyle and 
 Sligo, at a place called Gcevagli. His plan is to let portions 
 of waste land at a fair rent, along with arable land, to each 
 tenant. He exacts payment of the rent of his arable land, 
 
AND POVERTY OF THE PEOPLE. 225 
 
 but the rent of his waste lands he terms a labour rent. His 
 steward marks out on each man's portion an amount of 
 draining, fencing, gravelling, and liming equal to the rent, 
 which, if done, the tenant gets a receipt for this rent. If he 
 does not choose to do it, payment is exacted, and a labourer 
 is paid with the money to do it. By this means and steady 
 perseverance, wastes which were unproductive and good for 
 nothing have been brought into profitable cultivation without 
 cost to the landlord, and in reality without cost to the tenants, 
 as they have no other call for their labour. This, however, 
 will only be partially beneficial, because it will only suit 
 certain localities, and certain individuals only will pursue it. 
 
 Another plan for individuals is that adopted now on the 
 estates of the Waste Land Company — to portion out five 
 acres of waste bog bringing half an acre of it into cultivation, 
 so that it will grow potatoes, and to build a cottage on it- 
 There is then a house and food for a tenant ; and he is left to 
 bring the rest of his five acres into cultivation. This requires 
 some outlay of capital, and will not, therefore, be very 
 generally followed, though it is a sensible working plan.* 
 
 A Government plan might be such an one as was adopted 
 by Napoleon Bonaparte to bring into cultivation the marshes 
 of France. Commissioners were appointed, and a general 
 
 * ' ' The outlay of capital by the Waste Land Company has repaid them seven 
 per cent." — Major Ludloio Beamish' s Visit to the Kilkerrin Estate of the Irish 
 Waste Land Company. 
 
 "For the comparatively small outlay of 25,000/., the Irish Waste Land 
 Improvement Society have placed under a system of progressive culture 18,000 
 acres of waste lands, and have given constant employment to two thousand 
 persons." — Ibid. p. 4. 
 
 Dr. Kane says, " It has been calculated, that of the land at present waste, 
 4,600,000 acres are really available for agriculture; and from my own investiga- 
 tions, I am inclined to consider that estimate as certainly not exaggerated." 
 
 Industrial Resources of Ireland, p. 244. 
 
 Surely here is ample means of profitable employment for a people starving for 
 want of it. The Census Commissioners state, that out of 8,175,124 persons (the 
 population of Ireland in 1841), 2,385,000 were absolute paupers, and this with 
 400,000,000 acres of reclaimable waste ! 
 
 Q 
 
226 NEGLECTED ADVANTAGES OF MAYO ; 
 
 survey of the marshes was ordered at the expense of the 
 Government. The boundaries of each jDroprietor were 
 distinctly marked upon the face of the maps or plans, describ- 
 ing the number of acres, and annexed to the map was a 
 valuation by the Commissioners, prior to any drainage. The 
 Government then undertook the drainage at its own expense, 
 and the lands were afterwards ojBTered to the respective 
 proprietors at the expense of drainage which the Govern- 
 ment had been put to. If they chose to redeem the property, 
 they paid the money ; those who did not choose to do so had 
 their part sold by public auction, and the balance over and 
 above the cost of drainage was handed over to the proprietor, 
 from whom the land had been taken. This was an arbitrary 
 proceeding which would not perhaps accord well with our 
 notions of freedom. There is no question, however, that it 
 would effect great good in reclaiming the wastes, bringing 
 in small capitalists as purchasers, increasing produce, giving 
 employment, and in reality inj uring no one. Another jilan for 
 the Government to pursue I submit with greater diffidence, for 
 I cannot quote precedent for it. It is this : — The majority 
 of Irish estates are burdened with mortgages and settlements 
 to such an extent that frequently the nominal owner is in a state 
 of the greatest narrowness of means, and he finds it impos- 
 sible to afford anything towards improvements, or to be able 
 to do otherwise than exact the highest rent. His estate 
 therefore deteriorates, his tenants are starving, and he 
 himself is in a hopeless state of poverty. He cannot sell any 
 part of his estate to free himself from his difficulties, because 
 the mortgages and settlements are charges upon every part 
 of it, and he cannot make a title for a purchaser; all this 
 time he is paying 5 or 6 per cent, on these encumbrances. I 
 would suggest that the Government should pass an Act of 
 Parliament, enabling any landed pi'oprietor to offer a portion 
 of his estate equal in value to the encumbrances upon it, at 
 a fair valuation, to be properly ascertained and agreed upon 
 
AND POVERTY OP THE PEOPLE. 227 
 
 by both parties, and giving- a clear title to the Government 
 as the jiurchaser of such portion ; the Government, with the 
 purchase-money to pay off at once the mortgagees, or younger 
 children having settlement claims, or to offer them funded 
 securities as they might prefer. The Government then to 
 offer in the market the portion of the estate purchased, with 
 a clear title founded on the act of Parliament. There would 
 be no want of small capitalists to purchase ; and every such 
 capitalist who bought such an estate would set to work to 
 improve it, and spend money upon it. The original owner 
 would hold the remainder of his estate clear of encumbrances, 
 and, if anxious to improve, would then be able to do so. 
 Fresh capital and energy would be let into the country. 
 Vast and badly managed estates would be broken up into 
 smaller and more manageable bulks, and a great amount of 
 employment would be afforded to the people, whilst the 
 immediate prospect of gain, and competition, would urge them 
 on to improve, and into habits of steady industry. If Irish 
 members of Parliament would turn their attention to some 
 feasible project of this kind, and endeavour to secure a cheap 
 jurisdiction by the barristers of local courts over leases below a 
 certain amount of rent — say lOZ. or 201. a year, so as to insure 
 that a lease shall be a binding agreement on both sides, then 
 landlords would no longer be embarrassed, except by their 
 own fault ; they would be induced to give leases, tenants 
 would be encouraged to improve, and the people would have 
 employment, and live in consequent comfort and content. 
 If, however, they must have Repeal first, or Protestantise the 
 whole country first, they will find that the chances of obtain- 
 ing either object are about equidistant : they will have ample 
 opportunities of judging " how profitable is talk," but they 
 will not remedy the evils of Ireland. 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 NOTICE OF ATTACK 
 
 LETTER XV. 
 
 NOTICE OF ATTACK IN CONCILIATION HALL. — THE 
 EOYAL AGKICULTURAL IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY. 
 
 Notice of Attack in Conciliation Hall — Annual Meeting of the Royal Agricultural 
 Improvement Society — The Irish Waste Land Improvement Company — Sub- 
 letting and want of Enterprise — Oppression of one another — Neglected Improve- 
 ments. 
 
 Baxunasloe, Gaxwat, October 2. 
 
 The course which I have hitherto pursued, in describing 
 facts simply as I have found them, — in telling the people of 
 England that which they are most anxious to learn — the 
 truth — regarding Ireland, unbiassed by the violences and 
 absurdities of party, — appears to have excited the most 
 virulent dislike in a quarter where such a feeling least might 
 have been expected. That the peasantry of Ireland arc, in 
 many parts of it, living in a condition of misery and wretch- 
 edness degrading to human nature is too true. There exists 
 a party which has never ceased to picture forth that wretch- 
 edness, and to call for the application of a peculiar remedy. 
 Honesty of purpose, in any party, courts investigation ; and, 
 if that purpose be the amelioration of the condition of the 
 people, it will gladly accept that end, obtained by whatever 
 means, and will aid investigation, in order that the best means 
 may be ascertained. The political quack, on the contrary, 
 like every other quack, has his nostrum for everything ; 
 
IN CONCILIATION HALL. 229 
 
 the cure of social evils is with him a secondary consideration 
 to the adoption of his nostrum ; inquiry — the investigation of 
 truth — the fair consideration of facts with a view to point 
 attention to remedies fitted to the facts — he shrinks from, 
 because hisj nostrum is endangered ; he therefore " shuns the 
 light," will wheedle, abuse, or vilify to save his nostrum from 
 disgrace, because it is by his nostrum that he lives. 
 
 The latter course seems to be the one which the leaders of 
 the Repeal party in Dublin are taking with regard to the 
 investigation which you have intrusted to me. If their 
 remedy be dictated by an honest purpose, why do they fear 
 inquiry ? Why do they resort to the quack's game, of first 
 wheedling, then abusing, and at last attempting to vilify, 
 hoping to damage the investigation of truth ? It is because 
 their nostrum is in danger. 
 
 I feel most unwillingly compelled to notice some recent 
 proceedings at a Repeal meeting held in a building termed 
 " Conciliation-hall " in Dublin. On Monday last Mr. John 
 O'Connell, M.P., read the following letter at a j)ublic 
 meeting held at the above place, which he said he had 
 received : — 
 
 " Halesworth, September 24, 1845. 
 
 " Sir, — I liave this moment read in The Times of yesterday j'our dirty 
 and unmanly remarks concerning The Times' Commissioner, and T do not 
 lose one moment to tell you that you are a liar and a blackguard." 
 
 This letter has a signature to it similar to my own name, 
 and is, as you see, dated from England. It is unnecessary 
 for me to tell you that I never either wrote, or authorized to 
 be written, any such letter, nor would I for a moment 
 countenance such a letter being written on my behalf. 
 
 Now, this letter is either a forgery got up by these very 
 parties, for the purpose of making it the subject of the 
 speeches which were made upon it, or, if genuine, and from 
 England, as Mr. John O'Connell in his speech says it is, he 
 had the opportunity of knowing well — nay, he did know — 
 
230 NOTICE OF ATTACK 
 
 that it could not have been written by me ; first, because it is 
 notorious enough tliat I am in Ireland, and not in England ; 
 and secondly, because it does not bear my signature or name. 
 The course which Mr. John O'Connell thought befitting him 
 to take was, however, without hesitation, to attribute this 
 letter to me. 
 
 Upon this letter he founds a speech, the character of which 
 I need not describe to you, and in the depth of his distress 
 for something to talk about, and amidst cheers and approving 
 laughter from the audience he was addressing, defends his 
 nostrum by calling me " ugly."* 
 
 He is followed by Mr. Daniel O'Connell on the same 
 subject. I extract his speech from the Freeman s Journal, 
 which I hope you will insert, for your readers to inform 
 themselves of the character of a Dublin Repeal meeting. 
 After this, Englishmen will know how to estimate the value 
 that is to be attached to Repeal meetings in Ireland. 
 
 " The LiBERATOK. — This letter is such a splendid sample of English 
 politeness that, for the benefit and edification of the Irish people, I move 
 that it be inserted in the minutes. (Cheers and laughter.) It would be 
 a great pity — but as I see two or three respectable English jiersons on the 
 gallery looking intently at me, I withdraw the term ' English politeness,' 
 and admit this blackguardism is peculiar to the person himself. (Cheers.) 
 But it would be a great pity not to give the man his proper name. 
 Formerly, when elections were carried by force of money — and you and 
 I, Mr. Chairman, are old enough to remember it, — there were every sort 
 of agents, from the laAV agents down to the gutter agent. It so happens 
 also, that we have every sort of commissioners, from the commissioner of 
 the great seal down to a gutter commissioner. No-\v, I hope I have 
 influence enough with the press to have this fellow called in future the 
 gutter commissioner. (Loud laughter.) Do you know what he says ? 
 That the Irish women are ugly — he really does. (Loud cries of ' He 's a 
 liar.') Oh ! how ugly they are ! (Cheers.) I was beginning to wish 
 that the fellow was here, but may he never have the happiness of seeing 
 
 * The whole of the proceedings in Conciliation Hall regarding this Letter will 
 be found in the Appendix, No. 8. They are sufficiently absurd and contemjjtible 
 to disarm animosity. It is, however, melancholy to think that men should waste 
 their time by giying countenance and support to such exhibitions. 
 
IN CONCILIATION HALL. 231 
 
 such a sight. (Laughter.) I think we have done with this gutter com- 
 missioner, and I move, therefore, that the letter be inserted on the mmutes. 
 (Cheers.) 
 
 " Captain Bkoderick seconded the resohition, which was unanimously 
 adojjted." 
 
 The press of Ireland are at liberty to designate me as tliey 
 please. If tliey think there is sense and wisdom in calling 
 names, probably they will follow Mr. O'Connell's advice. I 
 fancy, however, I see the lips of every Englishman, and of 
 every sensible Irishman, curl with contempt as he reads this 
 rubbish. That a parcel of scolds or old washerwomen should 
 begin to call names and accuse one another of being " ugly" 
 might not excite surprise ; but to find grown men thus 
 seriously demeaning themselves, is at once an indication of 
 their utter unfitness for that office which they would assume, 
 — the government of Ireland, — and of the desperate shifts to 
 which they are compelled to resort. The best excuse per- 
 haps for the gentleman who delivered this precious speech 
 is, that he is growing old. 
 
 One word, however, to the gentlemen who choose to jjur- 
 sue this course. If you imagine that you will either sway 
 me, or divert me from my object, of thoroughly ascertaining 
 what is the condition of the Irish people, and the cause of 
 that condition, and of impartially publishing what I find to 
 be the fact, by such tomfooleries as these, it may save you 
 some trouble to tell you at once, that you have mistaken your 
 man. You may copy old washerwomen week after week, 
 call names, and comment on one another's " ugliness," as 
 much as you please ; I shall steadily pursue the course I 
 have marked out for myself. 
 
 I regret to have occupied your space with such stuff as I 
 have been compelled to notice, but now pass from it, with 
 the indifference of contempt, to the object of my letter. 
 
 This town is the seat of an annual great fair — by far the 
 greatest in Ireland — and the Royal Agricultm'al Improve- 
 
232 THE ROYAL AGRICULTURAL 
 
 ment Society of Ireland also hold here this j'ear their annual 
 show during the present week. As may be supposed, it is a 
 centre for the gentry to flock to from every district. 
 
 The society itself is but of recent origin, and is supported 
 by annual subscriptions and contributions amounting to 
 about 3,000/. a year. This sum is distributed in prizes for 
 the best cattle, sheep-, horses, pigs, poultry, flax, clotli, &c., 
 and, under the effect of these premiums, a very fair show of 
 all these kinds of stock and produce has been obtained. 
 
 Its great value, of coarse, is in the encouragement to im- 
 provement which it affords, and in the knowledge which it 
 conveys to the farmers who may visit the annual shows.* 
 
 * I could not, however, but remark the apathy of the working farmers — the 
 men to derive benefit from the operations of such a society — to its proceedings. 
 The first day, or grand show-day — a half-crown admission-day — the yard of the 
 society was crowded with gentry, their ladies, and fashionable parties. There 
 were no farmers. The second day, or shilling admission-day, was the farmers' 
 day, but scarcely a frieze-coated farmer seemed to think it worth a sliilling to go 
 and see improved breeds of stock, specimens of agricultural implements, new 
 agricultural inventions, and samples of fine produce, with accounts of their means 
 of growth. So far as frieze-coated farmers were concerned, the show-yard the 
 second day was nearly without them, and was thronged only by people of other 
 grades of society and avocations. It would seem that the calibre of the peasant 
 farmers' mind is scarcely reached by such means. There is much of truth in the 
 following observations of Major Ludlow Beamish of Cork, in his pamphlet, 
 " A Remedy for the Impending Scarcity : " — " The steward of a wealthy member 
 of an agricultural association, by means of forcing, watching, and Uquid manuring 
 the sunny portion of a favoured field, produces twelve gigantic roots of mangel 
 wurzel, for which his lord, sitting, perhaps, leisurely in his study, is awarded 
 the first prize. The owner's health is toasted at the agricultural dinner, where 
 the heroes of mangel and turnip reciprocate laudations ujion their respective merits, 
 and science crowns their triumph with an exposition of the several portions of 
 nitrogen, ammonia, gluten, albumen, et hoc genus omne, which they have uncon- 
 sciously called into action. The praises of green crops and stall-feeding are duly 
 sung — the visitors separate — the prizes are recorded — the speeches figure in print; 
 but in vain do we look for the eflects upon the holdmg of the working farmer. 
 Perhaps, even in the close vicinity of those whose skill and science have been tlius 
 rewarded, the very tenants of the victor may be found ignorantly or obstinately 
 pursuing the most unjirofitable mode of culture. And why .' Because the 
 exertions of the proi)rietor have terminated with his speech, or are, at most, 
 extended to the limits of his own farm. 
 
 " If the agricultural reader consider this picture too highly coloured, I would 
 
IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY. 
 
 233 
 
 As examples of what may be done in the way of improve- 
 ment in this country, a sample of Hopetoun oats was shown 
 — the straw at least six feet high and very strong, the grain 
 large, full, and heavy, grown by Mr. H. J. Potts, on a 
 thorough-drained bog loith 20 feet of turf under. On the flax- 
 stall were many bundles of flax out of Mayo and Down. 
 Some of the flax from the county of Down, owing to the 
 improvements in its manufacture, was of beautiful texture, 
 and was said to be worth 120Z. the ton ; whilst some brought 
 from Mayo for competition was so rudely manufactured as 
 not to be worth 287. the ton ; the poor peasants who brought 
 
 invite him to travel the mail-coach road from Cork to Bantry — a district favoured 
 by the presence of no less than three Agricultural Societies. I would request his 
 candid opinion of the condition of the land held by working farmers on each side 
 of the road, and I would abide by the result. 
 
 " The ordinary Irish farmer is not easily turned away from the beaten track, 
 in which he has followed from boyhood those who have gone before him. He has 
 grown two or more white crops in succession, with a return that satisfies himself ; 
 his manure for potato-land has been allowed to bask in the sunshine before 
 planting, without injury, as he believes, to his crop ; his pig has fattened without 
 a sty ; his childi'en have been bred and born in the atmosphere of a dungheap ; 
 his cow has thriven without turnips ; his potatoes have been raised, and abun- 
 dantly, without drill husbandry ; weeds have grown up, and shed their seed, and 
 grown again, without altogether covering his land ; the liquid manure has run 
 waste into the neighbouring brook, without his being sensible of the loss ; draining, 
 he thinks, would never pay — subsoiling he carmot comprehend. To make the 
 cottier tenant alive to these radical defects in the mode of culture which he 
 ignorantly pursues, requires something very different from the ordinary operations 
 of agricultural societies, and can only be effected by a course of personal super- 
 intendence, instruction, and encouragement, similar to that which has been so 
 successfully practised on the estates of the Irish Waste Land Improvement 
 Societj\ The main feature of this system is the control of resident agricul- 
 turists upon each estate, who, by means of coaxing, persuading, threatening, 
 encouraging, or, if necessary, coercing, effect the adoption of a prescribed course 
 of tillage, and otherwise instil into the minds of the tenants higher notions of 
 social comfort. This is the most important part of the machinery of the "Waste 
 Land Society ; it is also the most expensive part, but one upon which the whole 
 fabric depends ; and there can be little doubt that any landed proprietor in Ireland 
 adopting the same system would be amply repaid by the improved condition of 
 his tenantry, the more certain payment of his rent, the improvement of his land, 
 and the mental satisfaction which would be afforded him, by the establishment 
 upon his property of order, cleanliness, civilization, and peace." 
 
234 THE ROYAL AGRICULTURAL 
 
 it in looked at the fine flax in despair, and appeared to be 
 most anxious to learn how to manage their flax properly. 
 The society has sent over men to Belgium to learn the cul- 
 ture and manufacture of flax, and it was under the manage- 
 ment of these agriculturists that the fine flax was manufac- 
 tured. A crop thus managed, from the estate of Sir Richard 
 O'Donnell, gained the second prize, and presented a curious 
 contrast to another grown near it by the untaught peasants. 
 Skill and knowledge here, therefore, showed a difference of 
 about 90/. a ton in the value of the produce of a flax-field. 
 Ten years ago fine mill-spun yarn of 14 hanks to the pound 
 was imported by the weavers of Belfast from France and 
 Belgium, as their own coarse badly-manufactured flax would 
 not spin so fine a thread. Now the spinners of the north of 
 Ireland are able to undersell the French and Belgians in this 
 yarn, spun from their own home-grown flax. 
 
 At the Council dinner of the Society, the speeches of most 
 interest were those of Mr. Sharman Crawford, M.P., and of 
 the Earl of Devon relative to the improvements effected by 
 the Irish Waste Land Improvement Company. Mr, Craw- 
 ford quoted the evidence of Colonel Robinson before the 
 Land Commission, to show the benefits which have been 
 effected by that company. It appears from that evidence, 
 that two estates were purchased in the county of Galway, 
 the tenants on which were " miserably poor, dwelling in turf 
 hovels," and that " green crops, and the value of manure 
 and hay were unknown." There was no such thing as hay 
 made on these estates, and so absurdly ignorant were the 
 peasantry as to getting in a hay crop, that (to quote the evi- 
 dence of Mr. Robinson) " they actually asked four guineas 
 an acre for mowing hay." At the estate of Gleneaske, pur- 
 chased by the company, Mr. Robinson says, " It was with 
 the greatest difliculty we induced the tenants to forego tlic 
 cultivation of potatoes and adopt the cultivation of turnips, 
 or mangold wurzel, or other green crops." An idea of the 
 
IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY. 23S 
 
 difficulty of leading the tenants may be gathered from the 
 following fact : — On one of these estates Colonel Robinson 
 was applied to by a tenant for a farm, which he agreed to let 
 to him on condition of his fulfilling the rules of the com- 
 pany, and cultivating his land on the system laid down. 
 The tenant scratching his head said, " Sure, your honour, if 
 I pay you the rent, mayn't I cultivate the farm as I like ?" 
 Colonel Robinson told him he could not have the farm on 
 such terms, and endeavoured to reason with the man that it 
 was for his own interest to cultivate it on a system of green 
 crops and rotation. The man's answer to this was, " Sure, 
 if I 'm satisfied with praties and buthermilk, you may be the 
 same wid the rent." Colonel Robinson tried again, endea- 
 voured to convince the peasant that his system of cultivation 
 was an ignorant and unprofitable one, and put to him this 
 question, " If you did not know your road, and wanted a 
 guide, would you follow this gentleman (pointing to a gen- 
 tleman beside him) with a bandage over his eyes, or me with 
 the full use of my eyesight?" "Sure, and I'd follow the 
 gentleman," was the Irishman's answer. " Why so?" " Be- 
 case he couldn't see to lead me asthray." Such is their pre- 
 judice to old habits and their suspicion of every attempt at 
 improvement.* We must bear in mind, however, the influ- 
 
 * Major Ludlow Beamish, of Cork, in a pamphlet desci'ibing a visit to the 
 Gleneaske estate of the Irish Waste Land Improvement Society, in the county of 
 Mayo, says (p. 12), — " I doubt much whether any oration or dissertation can supply 
 the absence of that personal superintendence which is absolutely necessary in order 
 to make the ignorant Irish cottier-tenant take the pi'oper steps to ensure a good crop. 
 ' When I insisted on the turnip-plants being thinned out to nine inches distance,' 
 said Mr. Lermont, the steward, ' and showed them the distance by pulling up a 
 few myself, it was like pulhng the hairs out of their heads ; some actually cried ! ' 
 And then the waste of liquid manure by allowing the rain to sweep it from the 
 dung-heap down the slope of the hill — the increase of weeds from allowing them 
 to stand and shed their seed — the indispensable necessity of cleanliness, and the 
 absence of all extraneous lumber in the dairy, to say nothing of the filthiness of 
 keeping animals in the dwelling-house, — all these points are strongly impressed 
 upon the minds of the tenants by the managing director and the ever-watchful 
 
236 THE ROYAL AGRICULTURAL 
 
 ence which long habit and early training have upon men, 
 and not hastily blame the peasant for exhibiting suspicion, 
 who has but too often been deceived, and who from his youth 
 upwards has been neglected and left untaught. Persevering 
 attention and instruction, however, will do much. By fol- 
 lowing out this course steadily, Colonel Robinson says the 
 peasants are becoming more cleanly in their habits and more 
 comfortable ; and that now, generally speaking, they are 
 " orderly, sober, and industrious." The same gentleman, in 
 his evidence (Appendix, Part II. page 5), says, — 
 
 " The first four years of the tenant's term is the period of his greatest 
 difficulties on new mountain farms ; but by carefully watching over all 
 matters of detail, and by steady perseverance in established principles on 
 the part of the society, and habitual industry and economy, Avith tolerable 
 attention to good examples and instruction, on the part of the tenants, it 
 is morally certain they will prosper, of Avhich the actual progress of those 
 now on the estates affords abundant testimony,* and, if extension was 
 given to the operations of the society, a large number of the destitute pea- 
 santry might be employed in reclaiming the waste lands of Ireland with 
 great benefit to the country, themselves, and their employers. The fol- 
 lowing obstacles have greatly impeded the progress of the society, and 
 narrowed its sphere of usefulness : — The very high rents and onerous 
 terms demanded for the waste lands, hy which a large part of the capital 
 has been~abso7-bed, which would otherwise have been invested in improve- 
 ments. The shareholders have been discouraged, and the directors deterred 
 from taking other estates. From the society's act of incorporation having 
 no protective clause against assessments for a term of years, as in similar 
 English acts, we are absolutely called on to pay the cess and all species of 
 
 steward. But they are obliged to repeat the same directions over and over again, 
 and almost employ coercion, or at least refuse all participation in the annual 
 prizes to those who fail to comply with the directions of the steward. These prizes 
 are given annually for draining, green crops, cattle, cleanliness, &c., to which the 
 proprietors in fee contribute liberally, and great emulation is created amongst the 
 tenantry." 
 
 * .See Appendix, No. 9. Statement of outlay and returns for three years on 
 one plantation-acre of bog or mountain-land on the Kilkerrin estate, Galway, of 
 the Irish M^aste Land Improvement Society. 
 
IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY. 237 
 
 local taxation ■when we are not receiving ourselves the slightest pecu- 
 niary return. 
 
 " If the landlords would be content to let fair" reclaimable waste lands 
 on moderate terms, to receive an increase of rent at fixed periods, in pro- 
 portion to the progress of the improvements, the capital required to be 
 invested would be small with respect to the number of acres to be re- 
 claimed ; and tenants being admitted at low rents for the first few years 
 to rise progressively afterwards, would (aided by the instruction and allow- 
 ances they receive) find it to their advantage to hold farms under the 
 society ; and, by the rapid increase in the extent and value of their im- 
 provements and property, become gradually and certainly in a condition to 
 pay, with ease to themselves, such rents for their lands as would insure 
 a good return for the society's investment, and a considerable augmenta- 
 tion of income to the head landlord." 
 
 It appears also, by the evidence of this gentleman (page 7), 
 that the company, by an expenditure of 9,5007. in reclaiming, 
 have realized an annual income of 1,262/.* 
 
 The high rents injudiciously demanded by the landowners 
 for waste lands, is a feature the mischief of which was ably 
 pointed out by the Earl of Devon to the meeting. Some 
 landlords have neither the enterprise nor the cajaital them- 
 selves to improve, and they are so fearful lest any one pos- 
 sessing those requisites should gain any advantage, though 
 it must eventually benefit themselves, that they impose terms 
 too greedy to be complied with. This greediness of gain, 
 and timidity of venturing a shilling, is another mesh of the 
 network of difficulties which deters the advance of Ireland. 
 
 * Major Ludlow Beamish, of Cork, in a pamphlet recently published by him 
 relative to the improvements on the Kilkerrin estate of the Irish Waste Land 
 Company, entitled a "Remedy for the Impending Scarcity" (p. 12), says, — 
 " The model farm of this estate, containing ten Irish or sixteen statute acres, 
 which are laid out in a four-course rotation, now present the most luxuriant crops 
 of mangels, turnips, potatoes, oats, and clover. Four years since this land was a 
 swamp, and last year it produced a nett profit of 21. 10*. per acre. If any fault 
 can be found with the crops, it is that the oats are too heavy, and consequently 
 have been a good deal laid by the late rains." 
 
238 THE ROYAL AGRICULTURAL 
 
 The same disposition exists in the middleman, to whom he 
 lets his land. The middleman of 100 acres is no farmer, as 
 in England, who invests his capital, and skill, and industry 
 in the land, and looks for a fair profit. His laziness makes 
 him prefer doing nothing ; his greediness and necessities 
 make him resort to subletting at exorbitant rents to poor 
 tenants, whilst he lives an idle, useless extortioner on the 
 profit rent. The small tenant is his copy in this ; he lets an 
 acre, out of his farm of six acres, in con-acre to some wretched 
 labourer, who for the potatoes grown on this land is perhaps 
 compelled to work for the farmer the whole year. If the 
 petty farmer saves 20/,, he does not seek to improve his 
 house, or his farm, or his system of cultivation, or his stock, 
 but sticks the money in a hole in his thatch, or turns what is 
 called " gombeen" man, and, with the greediness of an 
 usurer, sells meal and potatoes to the poor in their necessity, 
 at the most exorbitant and rascally interest. An instance 
 was mentioned to me to-day of one of these men having 
 charged 50 per cent, interest per month to a labourer for the 
 loan of IZ., or 600 per cent, per annum ! It is this very 
 spirit of extortion which sickens and drives away English 
 capitalists from among them. It is a fact, which has often 
 been pointed out to me, and which I was slow to believe, 
 that the peasantry often practise the most amazing extor- 
 tions on one another. They are often badly treated by their 
 landlords, and worse by the middlemen, but it is the bailiff 
 and driver, tlie man of their own class, who worst uses them, 
 next to the atrocious mode in which, as petty usurers, and as 
 the subletters of cottages and con-acre patches of land, tliey 
 extort from and tyrannize over one another. The poor 
 people we may excuse on the score of ignorance, and strive 
 to teach them better ; but there is no apology for men in the 
 class of landlords exhibiting this narrow-minded, and, eventu- 
 ally to themselves, most unprofitable over-greediness of gain ; 
 
IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY. 239 
 
 whilst at the same time they show the most unaccountable 
 apathy to the most manifest advantages, which it requires 
 only a little exertion to realize. From Galway to Tuam 
 there is a tract of 25 miles of fine alluvial soil. This land is 
 now covered with water six months in the year, and is sub- 
 ject to floods in autumn, to the frequent destruction of the 
 crops. Sheejj cannot be put upon it because they become 
 liable to the rot. A preliminary survey was made of this 
 land by the Drainage Commissionei's, and they reported that 
 if drained it would yield 10 per cent, profit, and that nearly 
 3,000 acres of land might be reclaimed. A detailed survey 
 then became necessary in order to the drainage, but not a 
 landed pi'oprietor would subscribe a single penny towards 
 the expense of it ; and meantime the labourei's on this 25 
 miles of country have barely any employment, though this 
 drainage would fully employ them. Apathy, want of enter- 
 prise, and suspicion, keep the landowners generally from 
 either improving themselves or trusting any one who will 
 show them how to improve ; and an excessive greediness 
 will not let them sufier the Waste Land Company or any one 
 else to undertake the improvements for them on terms which 
 will realize a ]3rofit. There are, however, some honourable 
 exceptions. Lord Clancarty has done much in improving 
 this neighbourhood by draining and encouraging his tenantry. 
 Lord Wallscourt has done the same in the neighbourhood 
 of Galway, and there are others of equal merit. 
 
 My letter is getting too long to be further extended on 
 this subject, but surely enough has been shown to prove 
 what advantages may be derived by the tenant-farmer from 
 agricultural institutions and model schools, which Avill teach 
 him to improve his present wretched mode of agriculture ; 
 and how much is in the poAver of the landlords to aid im- 
 provement and to promote civilization and prosperity, which 
 they now utterly neglect. It is indeed but another evidence 
 
240 ROYAL AGRICULTURAL IMPROVEMENT SOCIETY. 
 
 that the wants of Ireland, and the remedies for her pre- 
 sent depressed state, are for the most part social, and not 
 political. 
 
 At the fair held in this town there are usually from 
 60,000 to 80,000 sheep sold, and from 10,000 to 15,000 
 cattle, and 500,000/. to 600,000/. of stock and horses often 
 chanae hands. 
 
PEASANTRY OF ROSCOMMON. 241 
 
 LETTER XVI. 
 
 THE CONDITION" OF THE PEASANTRY OF ROSCOMMON, 
 FROM NEGLECT AND WANT OF EMPLOYMENT. 
 
 Comparison between the Highlander's and the Irishman's Cottage — Effect of 
 Grazing on the Prosperity of the People — Condition of the Tenantry of Ros- 
 common — Necessity of obtaining Con-acre by the poor Cotters ; its Injury to 
 the Land — Effect of Burning on Cultivation — Comparison of English and Irish 
 Landlords in their Dealings with their Tenantry — Necessity of Employment 
 and Insti-uction in Agriculture being given to the Tenantry — What skilled 
 Agricultural Labour effects in Belgium — What it may effect in Ireland. 
 
 Castlerea, Roscommon, October 6. 
 In my journey from Ballinasloe to tliis place, I have passed 
 through the greater part of the county of Roscommon. Un- 
 til this journey I had come to the conclusion, that, wretched 
 as were the cottier hovels of Connaught, they were exceeded 
 in wretchedness by the mud cabins of the west coast of Su- 
 therlandshire and Ross-shire, in Scotland. The only superi- 
 ority of the poor Highlander's cottage is in its greater clean- 
 liness — or rather in its superior comparative cleanliness, for 
 clean they are not ; the mud cabins themselves are in every 
 respect worse than those generally met with in Ireland. In Ros- 
 common, however, the desolate misery of the Highlander's hut 
 is rivalled ; in filthiness and dirt the Irishman's hut distances 
 all competition.* It is a curious coincidence that this simi- 
 
 * " To our shame, we must confess, that in Ireland our tenants (I speak of the 
 poorest and greatest part of them) have rather huts than houses, and those of our 
 
242 CONDITION OF THE 
 
 larity of wretchedness in their dwellings between the poor 
 Highlander of West Sutherland and Ross should be accom- 
 panied not only by a similarity of race in its origin, but also 
 by a similarity in the mode of agriculture pursued. From 
 Sutherlandshire the brave Highlander has been banished, 
 and the glens and braes for which his fathers fought no 
 longer afford him a home ; the shepherd is the solitary in- 
 habitant ; there is now " not a smoke" in the once populous 
 valleys ; heather and moss have grown over his hearth, for 
 sheep are found more profitable than men. The Highlander 
 himself is driven out to live as he can on some bleak shore, 
 or to exist on the bog which he laboriously reclaims. In 
 Roscommon, the same course, though with much less of 
 atrocity, has been pursued. It is chiefly a grazing county. 
 The beast fattens on the best land; Avhilst the man is driven 
 to the poor lands and to the bog, to starve out a miserable 
 existence.* Untaught, uncivilized, he knows not how to 
 
 cotters are built, like birds' nests, of dirt wrought together, and a few sticks and 
 some straw, and, like them, are generally i-emoved once a year, and consequently 
 as migratory and not so durable as the carts and waggons of the wandering Tartars. 
 Numbers of them have no chimney, either for want of wood or skill to build one, 
 but vent the smoke like those of the Hottentots ; and if we had a market, as 
 Mr. Beauplon says, the Cossacks have, for wooden chimneys ready made, our poor 
 people have not a penny to buy one. 
 
 " As miserable as they look on the outside, the family within are full as 
 wretched, half-starved, and half-clad, so that there is an absolute necessity to 
 lodge them better, and use them to warmer cottages and clothing, and a cleanlier 
 way of feeding and living, if we would have them cultivate their lands or manu- 
 factures to any purpose. The flax they spin is generally sooted and blacked with 
 the smoke, and sells at much the worse price for that reason, and no trade or 
 business can be carried on, nor even the butter and cheese made, or drink brewed, 
 or life itself sustained, with any ease or comfort in them. We should therefore 
 improve their buildings as well as our own houses, and see them more snug, warm, 
 and decent, to give them a taste and desire for the reasonable satisfactions of life, 
 and this will be the best way to spur them on to industry and labour,/or the more 
 they upend the more they must earn ; but if they keep in the present sleepy sloth, 
 dirt, and rags, they will never labour, but prefer the dog's life, ease and hunger." 
 — Reflections and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, hy the late 
 Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, p. 11. 
 
 * Mr. Joseph Sandford, farmer in Roscommon, is asked in his evidence 
 
PEASANTRY OF ROSCOMMON. 243 
 
 improve ; and in his desperate struggle for food it would 
 seem to be his evil genius, his sad misfortune, to do mischief, 
 to deteriorate, to mark his path with barrenness and wretch- 
 edness. 
 
 The rule here appears to be to have a non-resident pro- 
 prietary. 
 
 " There is 100,000Z. a year absentee property without any 
 return, in a circuit of fourteen miles," says Mr. Kelly, a large 
 farmer at Castlerea* — and very generally the agent is an 
 absentee also, coming only twice a year to receive the rent. 
 It is thus on Lord Essex's estate here.^f- Often the estates 
 are jDlaced under receivers of the Court of Chancery for 
 mortgage debts of the proprietors, and the receivers have no 
 duty to perform but to collect the rents twice a year. " The 
 receiver is merely receiver; he has no personal interest in the 
 
 (p. 362), — " In case of new letting a farm, upon which there may be a number of 
 tenants, what is the course usually adopted ? " — " They generally pick the best 
 tenant ; and if there is a waste to the farm, or anything of that kind, they put" 
 those that they caimot accommodate on the waste land, and give them the edges' 
 of bogs, and so on. The country people term it transporting them ; they are 
 banished to some corner of the bog." 
 
 Dr. Madden wrote thus on this subject in his time : — " WTiat stni aggravates 
 our calamity is, that we have utterly overlooked the only resource for our mis- 
 fortunes or mismanagement by neglecting those methods and means of gain which 
 might hare borne the burthen of our other follies, having kept our poor as lazy 
 and ignorant as we found them, and stupidly employed the best part of them and 
 our lands, just as the Spaniards do the Indians and the vast savannahs of America, 
 to feed great droves of cattle. 
 
 " By this means we have laid waste and almost depopulated some of the finest 
 counties in the kingdom, and instead of turning them to those great fountains of 
 wealth, a gainful trade, handicraft, arts, manufactures, and fisheries, we have made 
 them and ourselves little better than contemptible drovers and butchers for wiser 
 nations." — Reflections and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, bij 
 the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, p. 3. 
 * Lord Devon's Commission, Appendix, Part II. p. 370. 
 •f Mr. John Robert Malone, under sheriff of the county of Roscommon, in his 
 evidence (Part II. p. 358), is asked, — " To whom does the property in Roscommon,, 
 from which you were ejected, belong ?" — " Lord Essex is the head landlord." 
 
 10. " Does he reside here ?" — " No." 
 
 11. " Does his agent reside here ?" — " No, he resides in the north, and comes- 
 twice a year to receive the rent — an absentee landlord and an absentee agent." 
 
 R 2 
 
244 CONDITION OF THE 
 
 condition of the tenantry ; lie merely comes down to get his 
 money, and away he goes."* In the words of Mr. Domi- 
 nick Corr, the agent to Lord De Freyne,t the agents of 
 many small properties, and receivers " come down once or 
 twice a year, and they know no more of the state of the 
 tenants than they do of the longitude." To save themselves 
 trouble the agents and receivers have been in the habit of 
 letting the lands by tender, or " proposal," as they term it, 
 to the highest bidder. " Generally the large farms are let 
 by proposal," j and the landlords " generally will hold out 
 for the highest." " There is no system of valuation as to the 
 small tenants ; whatever rent is demanded from them they 
 must pay it ;" and " a higher rent is generally put upon 
 them than upon the large farmers." " They agree to any 
 rent to get into the lands, and then they do not pay the rent 
 till they are made to pay it. They are eager to get the land 
 in order to get into possession, there are so many bidding 
 for it."§ Sometimes tracts of land have been thus let to 
 men having no intention to use the land, but to sublet it 
 at an increased rent. These men exact enormous rents. 
 " Almost all the outcry and vexation you meet with is where 
 land is held under a middleman." |1 " The middleman is the 
 ruination of the country."^ The small tenants are placed 
 on the bogs skirting the good land let to the large farmers. 
 These tenants of three or four acres of bad land cannot exist 
 and pay their high rents without hiring con-acre land — that 
 is, good land — for the purpose of setting potatoes or oats, 
 for which an enormous rent is often paid. " It is the actual 
 
 * Statement of Mr, Kelly, magistrate and deputy -lieutenant, Lord Devon's 
 Commission, AppendLx, Part II. p. 342. 
 t Ibid. p. 376. 
 
 % Mr. Hughes's Evidence, ibid. p. 340. 
 § Evidence of Mr. John Mahon, land-agent, ibid. p. 356. 
 II Mr. Kelly's Evidence, ibid. p. 341. 
 ^ Ibid. p. 354. 
 
PEASANTRY OF ROSCOMMON. 245 
 
 existence of a large portion of the small holders ; they have 
 no mode of getting food but by sowing con-acre." * The 
 grass farmers, in order the better to enable them to pay their 
 high rents, Avhich they have agreed to give under this system 
 of tender, let off parts of their farms as con-acre, and thus far 
 meet the necessities of the small tenants. In doino- this the 
 farmer of course calculates his ultimate profit on the land. 
 By the wretched system of cultivation pursued, the con- 
 acre tenants have, however, bit by bit completely destroyed 
 the land ; and the farmers, finding that they ^vere compelled 
 to break up fresh portions of their farms for con-acre, whilst 
 the land they got back was completely barren and useless, 
 began to be restricted by their landlords, and to refuse to let 
 con-acre. These small tenants have no manure for the land ; 
 they therefore cut the sod off" the surface in what they call 
 " screws," rear them up till they dry, and burn them on the 
 surface of the land ; and the ashes of the burnt earth and 
 consuined vegetation form an alkaline manure. The effect 
 of the burning is to destroy and volatilize the vegetable 
 organization of the soil.f They get a crop of potatoes from 
 this land, and, if it is very good land, sometimes two. They 
 then sov/ oats on the land for as many years as it will grow 
 anything, until at length it will not return the seed, and 
 becomes completely exhausted. It is then often subjected 
 to another burning, the stubble being burnt ; and it is put 
 through the same course again as long as it will produce 
 anything, no other manure being used. The land, when 
 thus exhausted, is left unsown, and very often not even level- 
 led, to gather the seeds which the wind may blow upon it. 
 In a few years it gets gradually overgrown with weeds, and 
 by degrees gets what is termed " a skin" of grass. Land 
 which has been exhausted in this manner will not fatten 
 
 * Mr. Kelly's Evidence, ibid. p. 344. 
 t See note, ante, p. 32. 
 
246 CONDITION OF THE 
 
 cattle for twenty years. Lord Crofton, in his evidence before 
 the Land Commissioners (page 350), says, — 
 
 " One landlord permits burning, another does not. The one who does 
 permit it is of course liked ; and the man who does not permit it is held 
 up as a great Tartar ; and unquestionably it is the ruin of the land. There 
 is one district that, from constant burning and the repetition of crops, is 
 not worth the public cess, which I remember ten years ago able to feed a 
 heifer to an acre, and, indeed, the very neighbourmg part is feeding a heifer 
 at this very moment to the acre ; and that is purely from burning, and the 
 repetition of crops." 
 
 The poor tenant know^s no better. His cow and pig go 
 wandering about the road sides and bogs, wasting the ma- 
 nure which, with a proper system of house-feeding, would 
 enrich his land. The high price of beef and mutton has 
 made the grazing farmer anxious to preserve his land for 
 grazing purposes, unless the profit he obtained for con-acre 
 was greater. But on getting his land back in this perfectly 
 ruined state from the small tenants, not worth anything, and 
 for which he himself has to pay a high rent, he has raised 
 the price of con-acre to cover himself; and in some instances 
 the landlord has stepped in and refused to permit him to 
 break up his land for con-acre, to have it ruined in this man- 
 ner. Con-acre, therefore, which the small tenants must have 
 in order to live, has got more and more scarce, and has risen 
 to enormous prices. Mr. Joseph Sandford, farmer, of Ros- 
 common, in his evidence (page 362), says, — 
 
 " I have known farmers charge 7/., 8/., or 9/., up to 13/. I know of 
 proprietors charging 13/. an acre for con-acre." 
 
 Instances have been mentioned to me of 14/. an acre 
 having been charged. The sum charged varies with the 
 quality of the land ; as it becomes exhausted the price falls 
 to 41. and 3/. an acre, when it will scarcely return the seed. 
 The tenants have been often unable to pay these high prices, 
 and their crops have been detained and sold, and they have 
 lost the cost of their seed and labour, and often many of 
 them, besides, have been " processed" for the balance which 
 
PEASANTRY OF ROSCOMMON. 247 
 
 might still be owing after the sale of the crop. The farmers, 
 when they could not get paid, have often refused to let con- 
 acre at all; this has made it still scarcer; until at length the 
 dense population, crowded round the rich grazing lands on 
 which cattle were fattening, recently rose in large bodies, 
 and said they would not starve, that they must and would 
 have con-acre land, for which they were willing to pay a fair 
 rent. The tide of population, which had been driven into 
 corners, as its density increased, began to flow back again 
 over the fields which had been cleared for grazing purposes, 
 and the people by force broke up, during the present sjiring, 
 large tracts of land for con-acre. They usually appointed a 
 leader, who named the rent and set it to them, and in many 
 cases the " earnest" money to bind the bargain was left 
 on the land for the farmer or herd, to take it if he chose. 
 Where the land was still refused, threatening notices were 
 sent, or the land was rendered unfit for anything by breaking 
 it up in patches here and there ; and threats were held out 
 to sow the land with pins and needles if it were not set to 
 them, in order to destroy the cattle. Some of the land- 
 holders, under the effect of this kind of intimidation, agreed 
 to break up some land for con-acre, and thus the parties stand 
 at present. 
 
 The small tenants copy those above them, and sublet their 
 fragments of land to one another, at exorbitant rents. As 
 their children grow up, they follow the custom of the country 
 and give them portions; as they have generally no means to 
 do this, they subdivide their farms with their children till 
 they have a mere patch sometimes of but half a rood, and 
 their condition is rendered still more wretched.* The land- 
 
 * "The definition which some one gives of custom, that it is the plague of wise 
 men and the idol of fools, agrees with no people on the earth so well as my 
 countrymen, for they seem to have adopted some of the most pernicious ones to 
 their own wellbeing that they could have thought of, and to retain them as fondly 
 as if they judged it a mark of freedom and independency to reject those of the 
 English, and ruin themselves their own way. However, it is certain this proceeds 
 
248 CONDITION OF THE 
 
 lord who endeavours to prevent this subdivision, in fact, to 
 prevent the peoj)le from ruining both themselves and his 
 estate, becomes most unpopular. One cannot, however, but 
 pity the poor people ; for what on earth, left in ignorance 
 and without means of employment, can they do ? Their 
 course is absurd ; sure destruction to themselves ; but what 
 can they do? They know no better, and are helpless. Their 
 condition is most wretched; as one witness* says, "They 
 are very wretched — aye, beyond anything you can calcu- 
 late." I am assured that were the people not watched and 
 restrained by their respective clergy, there would be no end 
 to the outrages to which they would be driven. And here I 
 do not hesitate to state from much observation, however 
 strange it may sound to English ears, that a more quiet, and 
 tractable, and easily led population I never saw. Treat them 
 well, in fact, manage them with common sense, and do not 
 neglect them and leave them to ruin themselves with their 
 ignorant prejudices, and a more grateful and easily led peo- 
 ple, when they find you are sincere, and mean them well, 
 cannot be found. But they find no sympathy; there is no 
 tie generally between them and those above them ; they are 
 neglected and despised because they exhibit the consequences 
 of neglect. The chief association in their minds regarding 
 the landlord is, that he never employs them ; but that he 
 forgets not to drive their cattle for the rent. 
 
 What a different scene generally is the rent day of a great 
 landed proprietor in England and in Ireland. In England 
 
 chiefly from the little care that lias been taken to wean them from them ; for as 
 the exami)le of the gentry is the great source of acting in all countries, so it is 
 remarkably true in Ireland, that they imitate and copy after those that are above 
 them more than other nations. The worst customs they have are all derived from 
 their old chiefs and heads of clans, and had their rise from their poverty, mis- 
 fortune, and want of conveniences and opportunities to learn better." — Rejiections 
 and Renolutions proper for the Gentlemen, of Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, 
 of the Royal Dublin Society, p. 22. 
 
 * Mr. Walter Burke, Land Commission, Part II. p. 359. 
 
PEASANTRY OF ROSCOMMON. 249 
 
 it brings with it the associations of cordial greetings, of kind 
 words reciprocated, of a jovial dinner, and a happy day. 
 The bells of the village church ring on the morning of the 
 rent day, and greet the arrival of the agent, sometimes 
 accompanied by the landlord. The tenants dressed in their 
 holiday clothes, flock to the pay room, and receive an invi- 
 tation to dine with their landlord, with their receipt ; and if 
 they have any arrangement to make with the agent, fix a 
 time next day for that purpose. From the tenant of 500Z. 
 a year down to the tenant of 5Z., all are invited to dine 
 with their landlord. The poor cotters and widows receive 
 usually an order for a quart of ale and tobacco, which they may 
 either drink in a room appropriated to them, or carry home. 
 At dinner the landlord, or, if absent, his steward takes the chair, 
 and good roast beef and plum-pudding open men's hearts to 
 one another. Great is the pride with which the oldest tenant, 
 in whatever station he may be, rises to propose his landlord's 
 health, nor less is the honest satisfaction with which the good 
 landlord responds to the burst of enthusiasm with which it 
 is received. There is genuine good feeling reciprocated. I 
 am describing no imaginative scene. I have seen precisely 
 what I have related, half a dozen times, on the late Lord 
 Egremont's estates, in Yorkshire. How different is the pic- 
 ture in Ireland. The tenants there frequently " don't know 
 their landlord ; they have never seen him." An agent or re- 
 ceiver from a distance comes on two stated days in the year to 
 receive the rents. He receives the rents of those who pay 
 him, leaves orders with his resident driver to enforce pay- 
 ment from those who are in arrear, or to serve them with 
 notice of ejectment, and departs from the town, unknown to 
 any one but the landlord of the hotel where he stops. 
 
 In Ireland generally there is no community of feeling or 
 interest expressed or shown about the tenants, except that 
 created by the receipt of the rent ; and is it to be wondered 
 that the tenant views his landlord, and everything he does. 
 
260 CONDITION OF THE 
 
 with suspicion, and with a brooding, distant, ill-feehng, 
 which almost renders hopeless any attemjjt to improve him ? 
 Of late years, however, this state of things is modified, and 
 the attention of several landlords is directed to the im- 
 provement of their property and tenantry. 
 
 What remedy do I propose for this ? Give employment ; 
 give knowledge. It is the duty of the landlord to improve 
 his waste lands and give employment, and not to let his 
 tenants devour one another in corners of the land ; it is not 
 only his duty, but it is the most profitable thing which he 
 can do for his own benefit.* If the landlord will not do this, 
 it becomes the duty of the Government to compel it to be 
 done. It is the duty of the landlord to see that his tenants 
 are instructed how to farm, to see that they are taught their 
 business ; it is not only his duty, but it is the most profitable 
 thing for himself that he can do. He will then get increased 
 rents, and get them well j)aid.-t- If the landlord will not do 
 this, it then becomes the duty of the Government to take 
 
 * " Indeed, if gentlemen could once be persuaded to build little towns on their 
 lands, and undertake setting up large manufactories and bleach-yards themselves, 
 and by degrees spread the linen business through the whole of their tenants, they 
 would, in the best manner possible, improve the circumstances of their own 
 fortune and that of the public. It is plain as to setting up such little colonies, 
 that whatever loss there may be at the first, the gains in time will largely make 
 amends for it. Cooteliill, Lurgan, Monaghan, and a number of our towns in the 
 north, are evident proofs of this, where, by the loss of a small sum compared with 
 the future profit, the lands, for some miles round, have risen to triple the value ; and 
 in a little time, I hope, many other places in the three southern provinces will, by 
 the care of judicious and provident landlords, be as remarkable jiroofs of this 
 matter to the world." — Reflections and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of 
 Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, p. 19. 
 
 + " It would be of singular service if we had schools and masters of agriculture 
 settled in several of the great towns of Ireland, with competent allowances to 
 instruct our young gentlemen and rich farmers' sons in the several arts and 
 branches of that useful mystery which so many practise and so few understand. 
 The consequences hereof would reach far and sink deep, and make a wonderful 
 change among us, as it would influence and direct those who must necessarily lead 
 the way to the crowd in all great reforms whatever." — Reflections and Resolutions 
 proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, p. 132. 
 
PEASANTRY OF ROSCOMMON. 251 
 
 care that that necessary instruction for the people is provided. 
 It is a fact that the great bulk of the people of Ireland make 
 it their business to farm, and do not know their business — 
 nay, are ignorant of the first rudiments of it. With proper 
 management there is abundance for everybody, and wealth 
 for many ; yet they so manage things that the majority are 
 existing on potatoes — living on roots ; and the crow must fly 
 far before it passes over a wealthy man in Ireland.* 
 
 It appears, from Mr. Griffith's return to the Land Com- 
 mission, f that 
 
 " This county contains 180,000 acres of bog and unimproved land; of 
 Avliich about 40,000 acres may be reclaimed for "cultivation ; 80,000 acres 
 may be reclaimed for pasture, and 10,000 acres may be considered vm- 
 suitable for improvement." 
 
 Mr. Patrick O'Connor, of Dundermot, Roscommon, Poor 
 Law guardian, magistrate, and landowner, says in his 
 evidence,^ 
 
 " It is melancholy to see the state of the land and the poor people ; the 
 richest land with two or three feet of water over it." 
 
 * The steps most necessary to be taken to instruct the peasantry in farming, 
 are thus stated by Mr. Blacker : — " A statement of the existing errors in the 
 present mode of cultivation practised by the generality of small farmers, circulated 
 among them to direct their attention to the subject : an active intelligent agricul- 
 turist, to give the necessary instructions, and practically teach a better : a land- 
 lord who will advance the necessary quantity of Ume to render those instructions 
 available : and an agent wilUng to take the trouble of seeing the experiment fairly 
 tried. The first shows the necessity of a change. The second supplies the neces- 
 sary skill to correct what is amiss. The third affords the capital wanted, and 
 provides an additional inducement by the known gain arising from the crop which 
 follows it ; and the lime being only granted on the certificate of the agriculturist, 
 this gives him the power of insisting on the ground being drained and properly 
 cleaned to which it is to be applied. And lastly, the influence and personal atten- 
 tion of the agent keeps up the spirits and energy of the tenantry, and makes all 
 thino-s work together and'co-operate towards the successful issue of the under- 
 taking." — Prize Essay on the Management of Irish Estates, by William BlacJcer, 
 Esq., p. 13. 
 
 -j- Report, p. 51. 
 
 X Land Commission, Part II. p. 373. 
 
252 CONDITION OF THE 
 
 Another witness, Mr. Dominick Corr, agent to Lord de 
 Freyne, says, — * 
 
 " There are A-ast tracts of pasturable mountain and bogs capable of 
 improvement, with the best description of manure that I know of, perma- 
 nent manures, limestone gravel." " The land abounds with it ; every 
 part of it has it in its bosom.'' 
 
 This witness suggests also that the Government should 
 reclaim the bogs, and compel the landlords to pay off the 
 expense ; and thus give employment for the people, and 
 afford them a greater extent of land, " instead of having them 
 impoverished and starved in their miserable small holdings." 
 This witness further on says, — 
 
 " I know of land which now produces as good crops as any in Ireland, 
 upon which I myself have shot grouse, reclaimed by draining." 
 
 Draining, then, would give employment, and would 
 benefit all jDarties — the tenant, who would have better 
 opportunities of living ; the landlord, who Avould get valuable 
 land for that which is now worthless ; and the country, 
 which Avould be enriched in increased produce. 
 
 Now, let us examine what increased knowledge will do for 
 the tenants. Mr. Nicholls, in his third report relative to the 
 Irish poor, and comparing their condition with Belgium, 
 says,— t 
 
 " The small farms of from five to ten acres which abound in many 
 parts of Belgium closely resemble the small holdings in Ireland, but the 
 small Irish cultivator exists in a state of miserable privation of the com- 
 mon comforts and conveniences of civilized life, whilst the Belgian peasant 
 farmer enjoys a large portion of those comforts. The houses of the 
 small cultivators in Belgium are generally substantially built, and in 
 good repair; they have commonly a sleeping room in the attic, and closets 
 for beds connected with the lower apartment, which is convenient in size ; 
 a small cellarage for the dairy, and store for the grain, as well as an oven, 
 and an out-house for the potatoes, with a roomy cattle-stall, piggery, and 
 poultry loft. The house generally contains decent furniture, the bedding 
 
 * Land Commission, Part II. p. 373. f I*. 1G4. 
 
PEASANTRY OF ROSCOMMON. 263 
 
 suflScient in quantity, and an air of comfort and propriety pervades the 
 whole establishment. In the cow-house the cattle are supplied with straw 
 for bedding ; the dung and urine are carefully collected in the tank ; the 
 ditches are scoured to collect materials for manure ; the dry leaves, po- 
 tato-tops, &c., had been collected in a moist ditch to undergo the process 
 of fermentation, and heaps of compost were in course of preparation." 
 " The family were decently clad ; none of them were ragged or slovenly, 
 even when their dress consisted of the coarsest material." " The pro- 
 ductive powers of the soil are cerlainly inferior to the general soil of 
 Ireland, and the climate does not appear to be superior. To the soil and 
 climate, therefore, the Belgian does not owe his superiority in comfort and 
 position over the Irish cultivator. The difference is rather to be found in 
 the system of cidtivation pursued by the small farmers of Belgium, and in 
 the habits of economy and forethought of the people. The cultivation of 
 the small farms in Belgium diflfers from the Irish — 1st, in the quantity of 
 stall-fed stock, which is kept, and by which a supply of manure is regu- 
 larly secured; 2nd, in the strict attention paid to the collecting of manure, 
 which is most skilfully managed; 3rd, by the adoption of a system of 
 rotation of five, six, or seven successive crops, even on the smallest farms, 
 which is in striking contrast with the plan of cropping and fallowing the 
 land prevalent in Ireland. The cows are altogether stall-fed, on straw, 
 turnips, clover, rye, vetches, carrots, potatoes, and a kind of soup made by 
 boiling up potatoes, peas, beans, bran, cut hay, &c., into one mess, and 
 which being given warm, is said to be very wholesome, and to promote 
 the secretion of milk." 
 
 The Belgian farmer pays the greatest attention to saving 
 the manure of his cattle, which is absolutely necessary to 
 secure him a crop ; — 
 
 " The labour of the field, the management of the cattle, the prepara- 
 tion of manure, the regulating the rotation of crops, and the necessity 
 of carrying a certain portion of the produce to market, call for the con- 
 stant exercise of industry, skill, and foresight among the Belgian peasant 
 farmers ; and to these qualities they add a rigid economy, habitual 
 sobriety, and a contented spirit, which finds its chief gratification beneath 
 the domestic roof, from which the father of the family rarely wanders in 
 search of excitement abroad. 
 
 How different this from the Irish peasant — the "wake"* 
 
 * " This vile fashion occasions more beggars than any of the many bad ones 
 they have, and it also breeds up the whole of the people with a relish and love of 
 
254 CONDITION OF THE 
 
 hunting, fair-hunting, race-hunting Irish peasant ! The true 
 reason of the difference is, the Belgian's home is comfortable ; 
 the Irishman's is miserable. But proper knowledge and 
 attention to the manag-ement of his farm makes the Belo'ian 
 comfortable. Ignorance and mismanagement of his farm, 
 burning and destroying his land, instead of enriching it with 
 the manure of his cattle carefully preserved, brings the Irish 
 peasant to wretched poverty. 
 
 I have before me now a statement furnished by Mr. 
 Wilson, of Belvoir, county of Clare, showing the difference 
 in the milking of a house-fed cow, on green crops, and the 
 same cow half-starved and suffered to run about. Before 
 home-feeding she yielded one quart and six naggins of milk 
 per day. On the twelfth day after being home-fed, she 
 yielded three quarts night and morning, or six quarts a day ; 
 her milk increased gradually to nine [quarts a day, which 
 quantity she regularly gave. The manure of the cow grew 
 the green crops which fed her ; and she left a large profit. 
 It was the application of knowledge which pro/iuced the 
 difference.* 
 
 How it must make good and sensible men regret to see 
 the many advantages which Ireland possesses thus lost for 
 
 the beastly vice, drunkenness ; which is not only the ruin of many tradesmen, but 
 of trade itself: it destroys their time, their substance, their health and strength, 
 and understandings. Nor is it only at funerals, but at marriages and christenings, 
 they are as guilty of the same excess to as great a degree ; so that it would be 
 impossible for the natives to be able to bear such extraordinary taxes on these 
 common accidents of human life, if they did not live without the common neces- 
 saries of it the rest of their days." — Reflections and Resolutions proper for the 
 Gentlemen of Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society. 
 
 " Drinking at funerals was reckoned so barbarous by the virtuous Romans, that 
 it was forbidden by one of the laws of the twelve tables, but here it is aggravated 
 with the guilt of sacrificing the living to the dead. It is surely a shocking sight 
 at any funeral to see how many hundreds of idlers are by this vile fashion brought 
 together to the loss of their families and farms that want their work, and the great 
 damage which the kingdom suffers thereby." — Jbid. p. 23. 
 
 * The full particulars of the produce and feeding of this cow will be found in 
 the Appendix, No. 9. 
 
PEASANTRY OF ROSCOMMON. 255 
 
 want of proper remedies, whilst her people starve. But, oh ! 
 how it raises the indignation of such men to see the people 
 gulled, and humbugged, and deceived by so-called "patriots," 
 — taught to run after every unattainable " will-o'-the-wisp" 
 which the fertile brain of deceit can coin, whilst those plain 
 remedies which would render the peasant comfortable — as 
 comfortable as the less favoured Belgian — he is taught to 
 neglect. 
 
 The ignis fatuus of Repeal is held out to him. Let him 
 not deceive himself. I tell him what I believe is the calm 
 and settled determination of Englishmen, that so long as 
 England has an arm to fight (if necessary), she will never 
 suffer the dismemberment of the empire, nor see its glory 
 dimmed ; nor will she ever suffer Ireland — a part of the 
 kingdom — to sink by her own folly into the comparative in- 
 significance of a colony. 
 
 It is acting the part of a sincere friend to impress this 
 upon him : — " waste not your time and your energies in the 
 pursuit of unattainable objects, which will never benefit 
 you, but seek rather those means of bettering your condi- 
 tion which are feasible, and in which England will as gladly 
 aid you as her own sons." 
 
256 THE MAKQUIS OF CONY>'GHAM's 
 
 LETTER XVII. 
 
 THE MARQUIS OF CONYNGHAJ^I'S ESTATE IN DONEGAL. 
 
 Contradiction of Description of the Marquis of Conyngham's Estate in Donegal 
 answered from the Evidence before Lord Devon's Commission — Neglect and 
 Absenteeism — Futility of always dreaming and talking about the Past — Now is 
 the time for Energy and Exertion. 
 
 TuAM, Galway, October 7. 
 The greatest misfortune that can happen to any man is to 
 have injudicious friends during a period of difficulty. If 
 hitherto he has escaped a hobble, they are pretty certain to 
 lug him into one ; if he has had the ill luck to get into one, 
 they are sure to assist in overwhelming him. 
 
 It is the misfortune of the Marquis of Conyngham to be 
 beset with injudicious friends. He committed the fault of 
 being an absentee and a neglectful landlord. As an indi- 
 vidual, there is, by common report, no kinder-hearted man ; 
 but his fault has insured the misery and degraded wretched- 
 ness of a numerous tenantry. His fault was exposed, as 
 faults nowadays often are; and his most injudicious friends 
 seem determined to overwhelm him with further exposure. 
 
 Mr. Robert Russell, the local sub-agent, or head bailiff of 
 the Marquis of Conyngham, by the desire of Mr. Benbow, 
 M.P., the chief agent of his lordship, has transmitted to you 
 an apparently explicit contradiction of my letter to you from 
 Donegal relative to the Marquis of Conyngham's estate.* 
 
 * This letter will be found in the Appendix, No. 10. 
 
ESTATE IX DONEGAL. 257 
 
 Being a kind of defence of liimself, he deserves some forbear- 
 ance ; at the same time, it must be borne in mind that he has 
 the strongest interest for making every statement which, 
 unfortunately for the Marquis of Conyngham's reputation, 
 he has been induced to make. 
 
 And now, without further parley, as this gentleman 
 chooses to enter on the slippery path of contradiction, I shall 
 proceed first to examine one by one his contradictions, and to 
 upset them by the sworn evidence of witnesses before Lord 
 Devon's commission ; and I shall then examine what he has 
 omitted to contradict, or in other words w'hat he has admitted. 
 If the examination damages Mr. Russell and is unfortunate 
 for the Marquis of Conyngham, do not let them blame me. 
 The Marquis of Conyngham is not the first man who has had 
 to exclaim " save me from my friends." 
 
 Mr. Benbow is by profession an attorney, and at the same 
 time a shrewd tactician. He introduces Mr. Russell as " a 
 magistrate of the county of Donegal and the Marquis of 
 Conyngham's local agent." Mr. Benbow knows the value 
 of " a good address." Let us, however, keep all square as 
 we proceed. It is very creditable to Mr. Russell tliat he 
 has risen to this position. But a magistrate in the wilds of 
 Donegal is sometimes just the best man you can get above 
 a six-acre farmer. It is notorious on Lord Conyngham's 
 e&tate that this Mr. Russell formerly filled a very humble 
 OiEce, and it is no disparagement to him to say that he was 
 raised to be Lord Conyngham's sub-agent because he was 
 thought qualified for the office. 
 
 This gentleman (he now holds the Queen's commission) 
 commences his contradictions by casting reflections on Mr. 
 Forster, — the son of the former agent of the Marquis of 
 Conyngham, who is also a magistrate, but a gentleman of 
 old family and landed property, and at present the agent 
 of Lord George Hill, — for having permitted sub-division of 
 lands to take place, to the injury of the estate, which Mr. 
 
 s 
 
258 THE MARQUIS OF CONYNGHAm's 
 
 Russell was called in to remedy ; and that, notwithstanding 
 this evil, the estate is now " rapidly progressing in improve- 
 ment." 
 
 We will see about this. In my letter I gave an instance 
 of sub-division in 1842.* John M'Cabe, a tenant of 5/. 10s. 
 rent, sold the tenant-right of half his farm for 15Z. to Peter 
 Gallagher, and divided the remainder with his son. These 
 three have therefore been living on one farm since 1842. 
 Their farms are two miles from Glenties, facing the court- 
 house over the hill, by the high road. Mr. Russell has not 
 denied this. In his evidence before the Land Commissioners 
 (Appendix, Part II,, p. 164) this same Mr. Russell says, — 
 
 " The subdivision of farms among the children of the original tenant 
 frequently takes flaces in defiance of the most rigid care aiid u-i$h to the 
 contrary " 
 
 This is true, no doubt ; but why does Mr. Russell insidi- 
 ously attempt to insinuate his own cleverness at the expense 
 of another, when this is the fact, — that that other could not 
 prevent sub-division any more than himself? for here is 
 an instance of sub-division which has recently taken place 
 under Mr. Russell's " local sub-agency." Mr. Russell, too, 
 suggests that the " private malevolence " of Mr. Foster 
 originated the attack on the Marquis of Conyngham. In 
 justice to that gentleman, I am bound to say that his only 
 communication to me respecting the Marquis of Conyngham 
 was to express his appreciation of an act of liberality to his 
 family highly creditable to the Marquis, and, with regard to 
 Mr. Russell, to point out a fine crop of mangold-AVurzel that 
 gentleman has succeeded in raising. As to the " rapid 
 progress in improvement" on the estate now under Mr. 
 Russell's sub-management, which he says has existed for 
 " twelve years," Mr. James Swan, surgeon, in his evidence 
 before the Land Commissioners (page 160), says : — 
 
 * The statement will be found, a)ite, p. 106, dated from Gwecdore. 
 
 S 
 
ESTATE IN DONEGAL. 259 
 
 *' I practise as surgeon and physician for thirty miles, but have not an 
 accurate knowledge of the ■whole extent. I have a general knowledge of 
 the parishes round Donegal." (Glenties is a parish about fifteen miles 
 from Donegal.) " I have been resident here twenty years, and T see very 
 little improvement ." " Mr. John Hamilton and Colonel Conolly seem 
 to encourage the Farming Society, but with that exception I do not know 
 of any other landlords who do it." 
 
 Mr. Russell proceeds — " It seems to be understood tliat 
 there is no local agent on the estate," and then proceeds to 
 .state his residence. The only person who " seems to under- 
 stand" this is Mr. Russell himself, in order that he may 
 suggest the fact, for there is not a syllable about it in my 
 letter. 
 
 Mr. Russell goes on — 
 
 " Nothing can be more erroneous than the assertion that the tenants 
 are visited half-yearly for the purpose of collecting their rents at such 
 periods, without giving them the time to make available their resources, 
 and using at the same time the most rigorous means for enforcing pay- 
 ment." 
 
 I prefer answering this by the sworn evidence. 
 Mr. James Donleavy is asked (p. 150), speaking of the 
 Marquis of Conyngham's estate, — 
 
 " How does the agent recover the rent from you ? — If we have any 
 beasts, or any effects, to auction or impound, he drives them ; if not, he 
 turns us out. 
 
 " When is the rent usually demanded ? — There is a running half-year : 
 the May rent we pay at the beginning of Noveniber or December. I 
 often know of the tenants being compelled to get cattle on trust at an ex- 
 traordinary price, and to sell them at a low price, in order to pay the laud- 
 lord's rent. 
 
 " What loss have you kiiown a man sustain upon a beast bought in that 
 way ? — They generally buy them at from 51. to 6/. on trust, and sell them 
 at from 4/. to 4^. 10s. I likewise know of people getting trust meal at 15s. 
 a cwt., and selling it at 9.s'. 6(/." 
 
 Mr. Donleavy further on (p. 153) says — 
 
 " Sometimes they impound for the trust meal." 
 
 " Who gives them trust meal ? — Mr. Russell, or his servants. 
 
 s 2 
 
260 THE MARQUIS OF CONYNGHAIM's 
 
 " You spoke about the bailiif driving cattle for the money due for 
 meal; do you know a case where that occurred of your own knowledge ? 
 — Edward I\l'Denuott says that in 1842 he got trust meal from the 
 agent, and that in the ensuing Xovember, when paying his rent, he so- 
 licited and obtained a few days' indulgence for the price of the trust meal, 
 but that ou the next day the bailiff impounded his cow for that sum, 
 though the agent promised him time. That the charge was 1/. a CAvt. 
 and that IQs. was the general price for meal: and the man is ready to 
 swear that his cow was impounded for the price of the meal, though he 
 got the indulgence of the agent." 
 
 " The fai-ms are never visited for the purpose of seeing wliat increased 
 rent they Avill bear," saj^s ilr. Eusscll. 
 
 Again, I will simply quote the evidence tefore the Land 
 Commissioners, after taking Mr. Russell's own admission 
 further on. Mr. Russell says, at the death of the late King 
 (in 1837) a large tract of country fell out of lease, which 
 "vras reset. 
 
 " This was not entirely completed until 1839, when the new lettings 
 were completed ; and since that j^eriod no new valuation or increase in rent 
 has taJxen jjlace in this district. ^^ 
 
 Well, 1839 is just six years ago. In my letter to you I 
 mentioned a farmer with seven cows' grass, at 16Z. a year 
 rent. This farmer is named Thomas Gallagher, and he lives 
 two miles over the hill facing tlie court-house. His rent was 
 raised at the death of the late King from 9Z. to 16/. ; this he 
 told me himself and it is on my notes. If Mr. Russell refers 
 to the rent-hook, he will easily find that this is true. 
 
 Mr. James Donleavy in his evidence says (page 151), — 
 
 " At the time the rent v/as raised in 1 830, I went to the agent, and told 
 him I would not possibly be able to pay the rent. lie told me to leave the 
 farm. I asked him to send four persons, differing from myself in religion, 
 and, whatever they said it was worth, I would never say a word against 
 it; and as long as I had a shirt or a coat on my back, I would pay it. 
 
 " Was there a general increase of rent at the time you have mentioned? 
 Yes, the rent was doubled." 
 
 The rent doubled in 1830, and acain in 1839 ! How often 
 
ESTATE IN DONEGAL. 261 
 
 would this Scotch agent double the rent, and think the 
 people forget it ? 
 
 " Nor is it correct," saj-s Mr. Russell, " that their rude eiiorts to im- 
 prove are followed immediately by raising their rents." 
 
 Again, I will quote the evidence of Mr. Donleavy (p. 150), — 
 
 " The Marquis of Conyngham is my landlord, and the estate would be 
 capable of remuuerati^'e improvements if the people had any means ; but 
 the people have no capital ; and the little they have if they lay it out, 
 and run a year or two without being able to pay the rent, then, no matter 
 what the improvement is, you must pay the rent, or quit the land. 
 
 " Does the landlord afford the tenants any facilities for making im- 
 provements? — No; but, on the contrary, if the tenant goes beyond his 
 capabilities in improving it, whenever there is a valuation coming rounds 
 in. proportion as he lias improved, the rent is increased^ 
 
 " It is equally incorrect," says Mr. Russell, " that no 
 capital is spent among them ; — within the last year upwards 
 of 1,0007. has been spent by his Lordship on the Glenties 
 estate alone, in the opening of new roads, the building of 
 ujDwards of one hundred houses, and other solid and sub- 
 stantial improvements." It is quite sa,fe, of course, for Mr* 
 Russell to state this. But what says the evidence 1 Mr. 
 John O'Donnell, Vice-Chairraan of the Board of Guardians 
 of the Glenties Union, speaking of this district, says (page 
 148),- 
 
 " In general it is the tenant who effects the improvements ; there are 
 very few instances in which the landlord assists in any one thing. — Is 
 there any system of assistance given by the landlord ? — 
 
 " No, 7ione that I knoiv of in our part." 
 
 Mr. Russell has now finished his contradictions and goes 
 into excursive subjects. He says — 
 
 " That I have not been able to convert this remote and wild district 
 into fine cultivated land is not the fixult of his Lordship or myself." 
 
 I will not take his word for it, but again resort to the 
 evidence : — 
 
 " I could not say," says Mr. Donleavy (page 150,) " the cultivation is 
 improving, the people arc so much oppressed, having no means and no 
 capital. There are tio agricultural schools." 
 
262 THE MARQUIS OF CONYNGHAm's 
 
 Further on (page 151) he says,— 
 
 " I would maintain that on the Bojlagh estate (the Marquis of Co- 
 njTigham's) there could be sustenance obtained for four times the number, 
 if the people had the means of reclaiming the barren lands that lie waste. 
 I would assert that there would be plenty of provisions raised for four 
 times the number of people, had they the means of doing it." 
 
 Mr. James Swan, sui-geon, is asked (p. 161), — 
 
 " From the nature of the soil, is it capable of being much improved ? 
 Yes, very much so. I know if the surface was drained, and they adopted 
 a proper rotation of crops, tlie land is capable of being improved to such 
 an extent as to produce three times its present crop. 
 
 " Is there a disposition on the part of the people to improve, if they 
 were properly instructed and furnished with the means ? — They have not 
 the means: but I am satisfied, if the landlord teas to surface-drain the 
 land, and to have a right to claim from the tenants, in small payments, the 
 expense of doing so, the tenants would be satisfied. Here we have a proof 
 of it, upon Mr. John Hamilton's propert}' and Colonel Conelly's ; the 
 tenants are well satisfied.^'' 
 
 Mr. E^ussell then finds fault with me for passing through 
 Glenties, past an hotel built by the Marquis of Conyngliara, 
 to an inferior inn. I imagine I had a right to do as I pleased 
 in that respect. But the simple truth was, the landlord of 
 the inferior inn is postmaster, clerk to the magistrates, and 
 clerk to the Poor Law Union, and I had a letter to him as 
 a well-informed person, and also to his brother, a Roman 
 Catholic priest in the neighbourhood, and, for my own con- 
 venience, I chose to go to his inn. I found I was not 
 singular in that determination, for the stipendiary magistrate, 
 then holding petty sessions in the town, was also at this inn. 
 I had a very good luncheon, and a fresh car provided for 
 me, which was all I required, and I was perfectly satisfied 
 with the civility I received, and did not give to your English 
 readers a single syllable about this " Irish inn," — nor was 
 that my object in going to it, as Mr. Russell supposes. 
 
ESTATi2 IN DONEGAL. 263 
 
 Mr. Russell then says that " It is utterly untrue that 16/. 
 is paid for seven cows' grass, and that 5/. would be much 
 nearer the sum." Thomas Gallaghar pays it now ; before 
 his rent was nearly doubled in 1837 he paid 9/. His farm 
 is within two miles of Glenties. I have given Mr. Russell 
 name, amount, and place, and I am quite sure the farmer 
 did not tell me a lie, for several of his neighbours were round 
 him, and appeared to know his rent quite well, and the Vice- 
 Chairman of the Poor Law Union was with me and knew 
 the amount he was rated at. 
 
 Mr. Russell then speaks of Arranmore, and takes credit 
 for no charge ever being made to the people for sea-weed for 
 the manufacture of kelp. The people go out some distance 
 from land in their curraghs, and with long hooks pull the 
 sea-weed from the bottom of the sea, the water being about 
 10 or 12 feet deep, with a white sandy bottom, which enables 
 them to see the weed. The landlord therefoi-e has no j^ro- 
 perty whatever in the sea-weed which they thus obtain by 
 their own exertions, and has no right to charge them, for, as 
 every school-boy knows, the landlord's property in the shore 
 does not extend beyond low water-mark. 
 
 The frightful strand covered with water which every one 
 has to cross going to Gweedore, Mr. Russell wishes to charge 
 the cess-payers of the barony with continuing as a road. Mr. 
 Russell must know, if on the grand jury, that he is talking- 
 nonsense. The cess-payers have nothing to do with the 
 matter. But every one in the country attributes its con- 
 tinuance to Mr. Russell's opposition, because he had not the 
 credit of proposing the better road. 
 
 Mr. Russell satisfies himself with saying, " my descrip- 
 tions of the poverty of the people are grossly over-charged." 
 This is modest, after his previous bold contradictions. What ! 
 not one word in denial of the pepper and water and potatoes 
 on which the people there live, and of which I gave specific 
 instances, or of the common sea-rack which the people of 
 
264 THE MARQUIS OF CONYNGHAm's 
 
 Arranmore gather for food ! Shocking- as the statement is, 
 it cannot be denied. But I shall again meet Mr. Russell's 
 general assertion by sworn evidence : — 
 Mr. James Donleavy says (p. 133), — 
 
 " With respect to the state of the people, I can state that I know a 
 family of five or six people lying on one bed for want of bed clothes, or 
 means to provide them. 
 
 " Are these people holding land? Yes, and paying rent; their children 
 are uneducated, not having common clothes that would decently bring 
 them to mass on Sunday. 
 
 " Is there any want of e:)iploynient among the people ? — Yes, very 
 great." 
 
 Mr. James Swan, resident surgeon for twenty years, says 
 (p. 161) - 
 
 " I should say that the small farmers in point of comfort in general are 
 worse off than the common day labourer who has constant employment : 
 they are generally in great distress in this country, those that have to live 
 entirely by their farms, but many of them combine farming with fishing 
 and live moie comfortably. 
 
 " You think that a small farmer of five or six acres is worse off than a 
 common labourer ? — Yes, I do. They have the greatest difficulty in 
 paying the public rates. 
 
 " "What is the usual food ? — Potatoes ; and sometimes they get ^^hat 
 they call a split, or sprat, or salt fish. I am intimately acquainted with 
 their diet, and it is a fruitful source of chronic disease. Very few of that 
 class are able to get milk ; thcij are steeped in povertij ; and, though many 
 of them go to market icitli their outside garme7itsgood, their under garments 
 are bundles of rags."" 
 
 After I had written my letter relative to the Marquis of 
 Conyngham's estate, I had the opportunity of a conversation 
 with tlie surgeon who lias Arranmore under his care. He 
 assured me that there is scarcely an individual out of the 
 1,500 on the ibiund v.ho is not aillicted with boils or some 
 other chronic disease, the consequence of poor and insuffi- 
 cient diet. 
 
 As proof that tlie peojjle are not " so miserable and 
 oppressed," INIr. liussell says, " they have in various in- 
 
ESTATE IN DONEGAL. 265 
 
 stances obtained and been alloived to accept from twenty to 
 twenty-five years' purchase on the present rents for their 
 tenant-right." What proof is this 1 That poverty at last 
 compelled them to sell their wretched means of livelihood, 
 which others were eager to get at any price they could 
 borrow or raise ; and as to " being allowed to accept," Mr. 
 Russell knows well enough it is the custom of the country, 
 and is insisted on as a right. 
 
 Mr. Russell then concludes his letter, much to his own 
 apparent satisfaction, by expressing his conviction that " after 
 so much misconception you will consider it an act of justice 
 to make his explanation public." I imagine this Scotch 
 agent has, by this time, discovered that he has efi'ectually, as 
 the phrase is, " jDut his foot in it." He was warned in my 
 letter that the above evidence " could, if necessary, be quoted 
 at a future time." He has thought fit to neglect that warn- 
 ing, and to expose himself and his principal to deserved 
 obloquy. In the first instance, I did not even allude to this 
 Mr. Russell ; I sought higher game. If, however, he is not 
 fully satisfied with the present exposure, by all means let 
 him try again, and he may find that in " the lowest depths" 
 of disgrace there is yet " a lower deep." 
 
 Having, however, waded through the tediousness of these 
 contradictions, I am anxious to " improve the occasion." 
 What is at the bottom of all this misery? — Neglect and 
 absenteeisvi. 
 
 Mr. Donleavy is asked (page 153), — 
 
 " Does the Marquis of Conyngliam visit his property ? I never knew 
 him visit his property since he became heir but once ; and that was in 
 Kovember last. 
 
 " Have the tenants any opportunity of making their complaints known 
 to him ? — No ; he never ansivered any documents or complaints that tcere 
 sent to him. We are under the agents and the bailiffs, who have no feeling 
 for the people, our landlord being an absentee noblemayi. He never comes 
 near us, to see if we are oppressed or tyrannized over. We should have 
 some hojjes if our landlord would visit us once a year, as other landlords 
 do, that we should have some redress." 
 
266 THE MARQUIS OF CONYNGHAm's 
 
 Furtlier on he is asked, — 
 
 " Is there any considerable difFerencc in the condition of the people on 
 the diifercnt jiroperties ? — Yes, there is. A landlord convenient to this 
 town (Donegal) that holds land below our place — JMr. Hamilton, — he 
 attends to lii-s own tenantry^ and goes and visits them regularly. There 
 may be an individual case where the rent may be higher than the rest 
 of the tenants, but I consider that his tenantry live here hafpy under himP 
 
 On the one hand, then, in the same district, we have 
 misery and wretchedness and discontent nnder a neglectful 
 and absentee landlord ; and, on the other, a contented and 
 "happy" tenantry nnder a landlord who minds his business 
 and attends to the duties of his position. 
 
 Some Irish gentleman, who signs himself " A Member of 
 the Legislature," has done me the honour to address a letter 
 to me in the Dublin Evening Mail, in which he ably points 
 out the evils of absenteeism. The historical research of the 
 letter proves the writer to be a gentleman of education ; the 
 tenacity with which he clings to the memory of the past 
 denotes him to be what he terms himself — an Irishman. He 
 attributes the backwardness of Ireland in every improvement 
 to past oppressions of England. Why dwell on the past ? 
 Grant that it is all true ; what boots it now to dwell on the 
 periods of Henry II. and Elizabeth, and Cromwell ? Let us 
 face things as they are. No doubt those were melancholy 
 periods for Ireland, and may have originated many of the 
 jjrejudices which now retard her progress. But let us be 
 men. Let us not sit down with dreamers, and in the language 
 of Ossian sing of the glories of departed Fingal, nor yet 
 anticipate and fear evils to come, if we would expect to 
 triumph over difficulties. Your men that talk of yesterdai/,\\ke 
 the men who fear and procrastinate until to-morroio, are not 
 now-a-days the men that succeed. To-day is what we have 
 to do with. Let us grapple with the mischief and put it 
 down, and leave sighs for the past and fears for the future, 
 in a worldly sense, to old women. Who is it among us that 
 
ESTATE IN DONEGAL. 267 
 
 succeeds? — A Watt, an Arkwright, a Napier, a Stephenson, 
 and a thousand others indicate to us our course. With 
 individual energy they grappled wdth the difficulties which 
 met them, and a splendid success was the reward of each. 
 Let us do the same ; cease fruitless repinings over the past ; 
 leave future difficulties to future exertion, and, with deter- 
 mination to overcome, apply ourselves to the evils which 
 exist. If absenteeism is ruin, let us prevent the evil. This 
 is the feeling which will raise Ireland to rank in equality in 
 everything with the rest of the empire ; it will banish her 
 supineness, and change " the weakness of complaint" into the 
 self-reliance of well-assured and confident strength, with 
 prosperity in its wake. 
 
268 CAPABILITIES OF CONNEMARA. 
 
 LETTER XVIII. 
 
 THE CAPABILITIES OF CONNEMARA.— THE FUTILITY 
 AND MISCHIEFS OF EMIGRATION. 
 
 The Picturesque Beauty of Connemara — Its Bogs and neglected Capabilities — 
 Emigration not the Remedy to benefit its Starving Population — Description of 
 the People — Evils of Emigration — Men wanted to Cultivate the Land, and to 
 make the Wastes Fertile — The Profit and Facilities of Cultivating the Waste 
 Bogs — Rather encourage the Industry of the People than drive them to Emi- 
 grate — The one Course will Improve, the other keep Waste the Country. 
 
 Clifden, Connemara, October 10. 
 It is almost unnecessary to inform your readers that Conne- 
 mara is the wildest portion of the county of Galway ; that it 
 is the district to the extreme west of that county, and inclu- 
 ding what is called Joyce's country, is about forty miles by 
 thirty in extent, the greater part of it abutting upon the 
 Atlantic, and indented with numerous bays. Its name 
 " Connemara" is derived from the many bays and inlets 
 which are found on its western coast, the meaning of 
 the word in Irish being " bays of the sea." This part of 
 the country has long been noted for its bold and picturesque 
 scenery. In a minor degree as compared with Killarney, it 
 is the resort of tourists ; and if their taste lie in contem- 
 plating the bold and magnificent outline of lofty barren hills, 
 and numerous lakes so shut in by surrounding mountains 
 that the wind can scarcely ruffle their glassy surfaces, reflect- 
 ing the face of the steep crags which abut upon them, 
 nowhere will they be more gratified. Here and there, as 
 
CAPABILITIES OF COXNEMARA. 269 
 
 eacli ascent is gained, the distant views of almost innumerable 
 lakes, dotted with islands, and bounded by abrupt and well- 
 defined hills, open out prospects of surpassing magnificence.* 
 Beautiful as is the hill and lake-scenery of the western high- 
 lands of Scotland, in the neighbourhood of Oban, it is rivalled 
 here. Nature has been all bountiful. The eye, however, 
 searches in vain for a resting-place on any object the 
 accomplishment of man. Miles and miles of red bogs, 
 inclined so as to be capable of easy drainage, and having 
 below them the limestone gravel which would render them 
 fertile, lie neglected and waste, unable even to afford pastur- 
 age for sheep ; whilst the steep hill-sides which require no 
 draining, and which have scarcely a covering of earth on their 
 rocky formation, are scratched into potato-beds, or sown with 
 oats by the poverty-stricken population. The poor peasants 
 struggle to live on the scanty crops which these steep hill- 
 sides will yield ; whilst they have neither capital, nor know- 
 ledge, nor encouragement to drain and improve from their 
 existing state of swamp the slopes and plains, which would 
 abundantly repay cultivation.^ A few barelegged half-clad 
 
 * " I do not hesitate for a moment to say, that the scenery, in passing from 
 Clifden to the Killeries and Leenane, is the finest in Ireland. In boldness of 
 character, nothing at Killarney comes at all near to it ; and although the deficiency 
 of wood excludes the possibility of a competition with Killarney in picturesque 
 beauty, I am certainly of opinion that the scenery of this part of Connemara — 
 including especially the Killeries, which is Joyce's country — is entitled to rank 
 higher than the most praised, because better known scenery of Killarney." — 
 Inglis's Tour through Ireland, p. 244. 
 
 •f- "As to the removing the obstruction which our tillage meets with from our 
 ignorance, it must proceed from time and practice, and the example of those of 
 distinction and fortune among us. 
 
 ' ' If skilful EngUsh husbandmen were in\-ited over by our gentry, by good wages 
 or farms, to be their overseers or their tenants, it would go a great way in this 
 matter. This would bring us into right methods, and introduce, among other 
 things, the steeping our seed grain in different wines and liquors ; the enriching 
 different soils with their proper manure ; and, in short, the changing many of our 
 barbarous customs for such as are more useful and profitable." — Reflections and 
 Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, ly the late Dr. Madden of the 
 Royal Dublin Society, p. 103. 
 
270 THE FUTILITY AND 
 
 women, loading themselves with pamiiers of turf to convey 
 to their wretched hovels, alone find employment on miles of 
 waste bogs which with a little capital and enterprise and 
 knowledge would afford constant and profitable employment 
 to hundreds of men. Yet, with these facts so apparent, there 
 are sublettings, overcrowdings of lands, clearances, and 
 emigrations going on ; and want of employment, with con- 
 sequent destitution and wretchedness is the complaint of the 
 majority of the inhabitants. 
 
 It would be easy for me to describe the charms of bold and 
 magnificent scenery — to picture amidst it misery and distress 
 — to contrast the soul-elevating grandeur of the mountain 
 and the precipice, and the rushing waterfall, with the 
 debasing hovel of the native — to compare the purity of the 
 glassy lake on the borders of which he lives with the cesspool 
 at his door — to indulge in vague declamation against extra- 
 vagant, and poverty-stricken, and neglectful, and apathetic 
 landlords, and grinding agents— all this I might do, with 
 truth, and with little labour ; it might amuse, it might interest, 
 but would it convince? I have a higher object. I believe 
 it to be your wish to exhibit the capabilities of Ireland to 
 plain, practical common sense — to jaoint out tlie neglect of 
 those capabilities — to show where the fault lies ; and, whilst 
 painting the undeniable destitution of the people, to urge the 
 natural remedy which those capabilities will afford if used 
 and improved. Let these things be convincingly shown to 
 the English people, and the wants of Ireland, and those 
 measures which will do her "justice," will be made plain. 
 There will then be hope for the future prosperity of Ireland, 
 and the doom of pernicious agitation will be sealed. 
 
 In my letter of to day I intend drawing your attention to 
 lh,c inefficacy of a measure of alleviation which has con- 
 tinually been advised in all periods of distress, and which has 
 been acted on frequently in Ireland — I mean extensive cmi- 
 
MISCHIEFS OF EMIGRATION. 271 
 
 gration. I intend, then, to show what are the neglected 
 capabilities of this district of country, and what is required to 
 render those capabilities available. I think the conclusion, 
 from undeniable evidence, will then be drawn, that exten- 
 sive emigration, for Ireland at least, is the very last mea- 
 sure which ought to be advised, or to which a Government 
 ought to resort. Taking it, then, to be conceded, that 
 something must be done to remedy an extensive state of 
 wretchedness which is alike disgraceful and dangerous to the 
 empire, if we find that emigration ought not to be that 
 " something," we shall have cleared the way of one ingredient 
 of confusion and mistake ; and the concentration of attention 
 on measures the necessity and advantage of which are almost 
 self-evident, may eventually compel legislation according to 
 rules of common sense, and enforce a straightforward instead 
 of a crooked and shifty policy. 
 
 The argument though strongly applicable to Connemara, 
 is equally so to almost every part of Ireland. The people 
 here are a much finer race than are to be found in the interior 
 of Connaught. The men generally arc tall, stout, handsome 
 fellows ; the women well clad, buxom, and good looking. 
 The county of Galway, indeed, is throughout peopled 
 generally by a fine race. The dress of the women is better 
 than is seen elsewhere, and is peculiar. Their red worsted 
 petticoats and blue cloth cloaks wrapped round them, are at 
 once comfortable looking and becoming. In this neighbour- 
 hood great numbers of Cromwell's soldiers are said to have 
 settled, and Spanish blood is also said to be general among 
 the peojDle. It is certain, however, whatever the race, that 
 very many of the names are English. In walking through 
 the town yesterday the names over the shop-doors struck 
 me ; there are Corbetts, Milletts, Owen, King, Kean, 
 Joyce, Needham, Carr, Parsons, Prendergast, &c. all of 
 which are English, Scotch, or Welsh names ; whilst tlic 
 
272 THE FUTILITY AND 
 
 old Irisli names to be met with are not nearly so 
 numerous.* The physiognomy of the people is as dissimilar 
 as possible from that of the people of Cavan, Leitrim, or 
 Roscommon, neither is it purely English. Whatever mix- 
 ture, however, the race may be, they are here a fine people, 
 and very few of the men of Leitrim or Cavan are either so 
 tall or so stout as the generality of the women of Connemara. 
 They are generally Avell and neatly clad, and seem an indus- 
 trious, frugal, good-natured, and honest people. Yet with 
 all this the greatest poverty exists among them. Inglis, in 
 his Journey Through Ireland, says — 
 
 " Many persons were so miserably off" wlicn I visited Oucliterard, that 
 the parish priest had been obliged to become security for the price of a 
 little meal to prevent them from starving." 
 
 This was in 1834, eleven years ago. In 1844, the Rev. 
 John Griffin, parish priest of Ballinakill, in this neighbour- 
 
 * " On looking over the list of names this morning in Mr. Hazel's book, I 
 was much struck by the novelty and aristocratic appearance of many of them. 
 As may be expected in any part of Connemara, there is a large projiortioa of 
 Flaherties, Donoghues, and Joyces ; but the following, not usual among the 
 working classes in Ireland, are also to be found in the Society's list: — Dundas, 
 King, Cooke, Lee, Powell, Cosgrave, Lyden, Ridge, liernon, and one whose 
 sirname is Nee rejoices in the classical prefix of Festus." — Vinit to the Kilkerrin 
 Estate, Galicaj/, of the Irish Waste Land Tmjn'ovement Societij, hy Major Lud- 
 low Beamish, 1816, p. 35. 
 
 " Joyce. — This old Galway family is of ancient and honourable English descent, 
 and was allied to the Welsh and British prince... Thomas Joyes, the first of the 
 name that came to Ireland, sailed from Wales in the reign of Edward I., and 
 arrived with his fleet at Thomond in Munster, where he married Norah O'Brien, 
 daughter of the chief of that district. From thence putting to sea, he directed his 
 course to the western part of Connaught, where he acquired considerable tracts of 
 territory, which his posterity still inhabit. While on the voyage, his wife was 
 delivered of a son, whom he named M'Mara, " son of the sea." He extended 
 his father's actiuisitions, and from him descended the sept of the Joyces, a race of 
 men remarkable for their extraordinary stature, who, for centuries past, inliabitjd 
 the mountainous district in Jar, Connaught, called from them Dutlmidh Sheo- 
 dhoigh, or Joyce's Country, now forming the barony of Ross in the county of 
 Galway, and for which they were formerly tributary to the O' Flaherties." — 
 Hardiman's History of Galway. 
 
MISCHIEFS OF EMIGRATION. 273 
 
 hood, gave evidence before Lord Devon's Commission* 
 and was asked, — 
 
 " With respect to the condition of the farmers, do yon consider that the 
 large farmers are improving in their worldly means ? — There are no large 
 farmers, but the small farmers are very poor generally. 
 
 " Is there a class of labourers as contradistinguished from the small 
 farmers ? — Yes. 
 
 " What is their condition ? — JNIiserable." He describes further on 
 their diet, as " potatoes, with, in some cases, milk, not generally ;" and 
 those who hold " not more than three acres of land" have " bedsteads ia 
 their houses, but no beds." " They may have straw, and blankets mi- 
 serably filthy." 
 
 " The condition of the people," says the Rev. W. Flannelly, the 
 Roman Catholic curate of Ballinakill,t " can scarcely be described, they 
 they are so wretchedly poor. Their poverty, indeed, is indescribable.' ' 
 He attributes this poverty in some cases to the banishing of some of the 
 people from their holdings ; " from some districts entire villages have 
 been thrown on the world. In other cases, I attribute it to paying high 
 and enormous rents for their lands ; for instance, paying 50*. an acre for 
 some portion of the land; that has been on account of their relative 
 position by the sea, being a fishing country, and where they have been 
 depending upon the fishing, which has failed for the last three years prin- 
 cipally. They pay the same rent, 50*. per acre, for what is considered 
 arable-land of a very bad description ; in some places 30*., and in others 
 20*., which are still exacted. Then, as a consequence of that, as the rent 
 must be paid, they must have recourse to vt^hat is considered in the country 
 as a great evil, that is, the loan funds and the usurers. In some cases the 
 usurers demand as much as 8*. for the use of 1/., I believe, for half a year, 
 and indeed it may be for a quarter of a year." Further on this witness 
 says — " It is dreadful to witness such extreme poverty ; I have not been 
 here more than eight months, and it is dreadful." " We cannot get a 
 stool or a chair to sit on in the discharge of our duties, or a jug to take 
 a drmk of water from ; and as to beds, it is dreadful ; the people are 
 stretched, not on straw, but on heath, the growth of the wild mountain." 
 
 Such then is the condition of the jDeople here, and it fully 
 bears out the description of the general condition of the 
 people of Ireland given by the Commissioners for Inquiry 
 
 * Part II. p. 469. f Ibid, p. 472. 
 
274 THE FUTILITY AND 
 
 into the " Condition of the Poorer Classes in Ireland," in 
 their third report, previous to the establishment of the New 
 Poor Law, that — 
 
 " A great portion of them are insufficiently provided at any time ^vith 
 the commonest necessaries of life. Their habitations are wretched hovels ; 
 several of a family sleep together upon straw, or upon the bare ground, 
 sometimes with a blanket, sometimes even without as much to cover 
 them ; their food commonly consists of dry potatoes, and with these they 
 are at times so scantily supplied as to be obliged to stint themselves to one 
 spare meal in the day. There are even instances of persons being driven 
 by hunger to seek sustenance in wild herbs. They sometimes get a her- 
 ring, or a little milk, but they never get meal, except at Christmas, Easter 
 and Shrovetide." 
 
 As one remedy for this horrible condition these Commis- 
 sioners, in their third report, recommend extensive emigration. 
 I now propose to examine from this report what is the 
 character of the people that emigrate, and the cost to the 
 country of any system of extensive emigration, and the effect 
 produced on those who remain at home. 
 
 In the barony of Kilconnel, county of Galway Ibid. (p. 9, 
 et seq.), — 
 
 " The witnesses enumerated above one hundred individuals, who had 
 emigrated from their barony during the last five years. All of them 
 •were persons of very moderate means ; a few were young men who pos- 
 sessed from 15/. to 20/., but not two could be mentioned who had the 
 command of 100/. All these were persons 'who Avould have stayed at 
 home if they could have got a sufficiency of land. The number of those 
 who have left has not had the slightest effect either in reducing rents or in 
 increasing wages." 
 
 BARONY DROMAIIAIE, COUNTY OF LEITRIM. 
 
 " Considerable numbers have left from this barony for the colonies 
 within the last few years, but they have been in general persons possessed 
 of some substance. Few labourers are to be found among the emigrants. 
 Several witnesses consider that there can be no doubt but that the inwiense 
 competition for land, and the high nominal rents which the poor pea- 
 santry readily undertake, drive the substantial farmers from the country, 
 and prevent their getting land at such a price as would give them a fair 
 
MISCHIEFS OF EMIGRATION. 275 
 
 return for their capital. It would require fully one-third of the able-bodied 
 population of the parish to be withdrawn, that steady employment, at 10c/. 
 a day, might be secured to the remainder." 
 
 This evidence would seem to show that more land is wanted ; 
 that emigration takes off the best of the population, and that 
 one-third of the best of the people must emigrate before any 
 effect is produced upon wages or rents. It is preposterous 
 to' suppose that emigration can ever be carried to this extent; 
 it is useless without it, as a means of good ; and to the 
 extent to which it has been carried it appears to have been a 
 positive evil, in sending off " substantial farmers" and 
 " young men possessed of some substance." Why, then,, 
 recommend emigration? Why not take measures to give 
 " more land ?" There is land enough to give. In this very 
 county there are 708,000 acres of uncultivated land out of 
 1,566,000, or nearly one-half the county is uncultivated bog; 
 and, according to Mr. Griffith's return, about 400,000 acres 
 of this bog and unimproved land might be profitably 
 reclaimed, or, deducting for the space covered by lakes, about 
 one-third of the county. 
 
 But I proceed with the evidence, and it will be seen how 
 these views are borne out. 
 
 BARONY MOHILI., COUNTY OF LEITEIM. 
 
 " Emigration has been very considerable among all classes of late 
 years ; many persons possessed of capital have gone after the expu'ation 
 of old leases of farms held by them at a low rent, and of which they 
 could not expect a renewal on the same profitable terms. All agree in 
 saying that the amount of emigration has not been sufficient to reduce in 
 the least degree the competition for land or employment." 
 
 BARONY MURRISK, COUNTY OF MAYO. 
 
 " Two or three ships have left this port with emigrants annually until 
 this year." Most of those who departed were persons possessing small capi- 
 tal, hardly any destitute persons, inasmuch as they had not the means to 
 pay their passage." " The nimiber of those who have gone has not in 
 the least perceptibly improved the condition of those who 'have remained ; 
 there is just the same competition for land, and just as many looking for 
 labour and unable to find it." 
 
 t2 
 
276 THE FUTILITY AND 
 
 BARONY CABBEREY, COUNTY OF SLIGO. 
 
 " The number of those who have emigrated is very considei'able. 
 Those who left were chiefly persons possessed of some money. The with- 
 drawal of those who have gone has had no perceptible effect on the 
 wages of labour, or the numbers of employers, or on the competition for 
 small holdings." 
 
 BARONY BALROTHERY, COUNTY OF DUBLIN. 
 
 " For some years the emigration of labourers and small farmers has 
 been considerable, but unfortunately for Ireland, thei/ have generally been 
 the most industrious, well behaved^ and in most cases the monied of their 
 class, thus leaving the worst, and all the riff-raff, as an increased burden on 
 the country" 
 
 BARONT GALMOY, COUNTY OF KILKENNY. 
 
 The number of persons who have emigrated from this barony has been 
 considerable, but not sufficiently extensive to reduce the competition for 
 labour and for small holdings. 
 
 " It is estimated by the majority of the witnesses that it would require 
 the removal of at least one-fourth of the able male population to give 
 constant employment to the remauader, at lOrf. a day." 
 
 BARONY CLONLISK, KING's COUNTY. 
 
 " The emigration that has as yet taken place has not had any effect on 
 either wages or rents." 
 
 Precisely the same evidence is given from the baronies of 
 Phillipstown, in King's county, Dunclalk, county of liOuth, 
 Kells and Moybeuragh, county of Meath. 
 
 In the barony of Maryborough, Queen's county, all the 
 witnesses concur, that " small farmers, and the best land of 
 labourers, are the classes of persons from which the principal 
 emigration has taken place," and that " though there has 
 been considerable emigration, it has not been sufficient to 
 reduce the comjoetition for labour and small holdings, and 
 thereby to reduce rents, and raise wages." Precisely similar 
 evidence is given from the barony of Partnahinch, Queen's 
 county, that " small farmers, the best labourers, and agricul- 
 tural and useful mechanics" arc those who have emigrated ; 
 and that the emigration, though " considerable," " has not 
 been sufficient to affect wages or rents." The same evidence 
 
MISCHIEFS OF EMIGRATION. 277 
 
 is given from the barony of Talbotstown, county of Wicklow. 
 In the barony of Corcomroe, county Clare, the witnesses 
 say,— 
 
 " In order to raise the price of labour, it would be necessary to remove 
 nearly one-half the labourers. Nearly every man works his own land, 
 and does not employ mucb labour." 
 
 In the barony of Iveragh, county of Kerry, the same 
 evidence is given. " In most instances, those who emigrated 
 were the better sort of farmers ;" and the emigration has not 
 " raised loages, or loicered rejits, by reducing the competition for 
 employment or small lioldings." 
 
 From the county Limerick, the witnesses say the emigrants 
 were " usually good, industrious men." In Tippciary, 
 Waterford, Armagh, Down, Cavan, Tyrone, evidence of 
 precisely the same character was given. The best men leave 
 the country, leaving the " riff-raff" behind ; whilst the effect 
 of the emigration does not in the slightest degree improve 
 the condition of those who remain. To remove " one-third" 
 or " one-fourth" of the population, as some of the witnesses 
 say it would be necessary to do to produce any beneficial 
 eflPect, is simply impossible. It is, too, but a temporary 
 remedy ; the same pressure of population must soon arise 
 again. It is an unwise remedy, for the evidence is conclu- 
 sive that it deteriorates the population by sifting from it the 
 most industrious and enterprising — in fact, the very men that 
 the country requires to improve it. It is a costly remedy, 
 for it requires at least 10/. to remove a man and his family 
 who has not himself the means of emigrating; and it is 
 diminishing the strength and resources of the country, if those 
 who emigrate can by any means be advantageously employed 
 at home ; because the produce of their labour increases the 
 wealth of the country, and their consumption increases the 
 available market for the produce of the industry of others. 
 
 This naturally brings on the question — Can they be advan- 
 tageously employed at home? Look at this county from 
 
278 THE FUTILITY AND 
 
 which I write. Is it not a disgrace to the proprietors of it 
 that 400,000 acres of its surface capable of profitable cultiva- 
 tion should be left in a state of nature — swamp and bog ; 
 whilst the jjeople, willing to work, and to reclaim it, are 
 starving in idleness, and the best of them forced to emigrate? 
 Is it not a disgrace to any government, to statesmen, that Avith 
 this fact before them they permit it to continue, whilst they 
 listen to projects about emigration? In coming here I 
 passed through the town of Cong, situated between Loughs 
 Mask and Corrib. These two loughs are divided by three 
 miles of land. Lough Corrib communicates with the sea at 
 Galway by a river about three miles long. By about eight 
 miles of canal cutting, according to the survey of Mr. Bald, 
 " a navigation inland of fifty-three miles direct could be 
 secured, available to a district containing 800,000 inhabitants, 
 who now possess none but tlie rudest and most expensive 
 intercourse." These vast lakes, one nearly thirty miles long, 
 and the other upwards of twenty miles, with a mean depth of 
 fourteen feet, are wholly useless to the people. Their apathy 
 is disgraceful. It is equally disgraceful that any government 
 should, amidst the trumpery struggles and triumphs of party, 
 thus neglect the country's advantage, whilst the people 
 starve. No steam-boat for either business or pleasure navi- 
 gates Lough Corrib, and the finest scenery in Ireland, and 
 the greatest advantages for either agriculture or ■commerce 
 are neglected.* Lough Corrib has a fall of fourteen feet, 
 
 * " The scenery of Ma'am, at the head of Lough Corrib, is fine — very fine. 
 If a lake filled the hollow of the mountains, Killarney might tremble for its 
 supremacy ; for the outline of the mountain-range surpasses, in picturesque form, 
 any of the ranges that bound the lakes of Killarney. At Ma'am, one is forcibly 
 struck with the advantages which would be opened up to this district by the 
 extension][of the navigation of Lough Corrib to the sea. Fine slopes of reclaim- 
 able land_border the deep stream that, at the distance of half a mile, flows into 
 Lough Corrib ; and the same boats that would carry to market the produce of the 
 cultivated land, would bring from the Bay of Galway sand, sea- weed, and lime, to 
 be laid upon the yet unimproved wastes." — Inr/lin's Journey through Ireland 
 {Connemara), p. 224. 
 
MISCHIEFS OF EMIGRATIO>f. 279 
 
 Lough Mask a fall of thirty-six feet, and, according to Dr. 
 Kane, in his book on the industrial resources of Ireland, 
 these two lakes have a water-power of 6,850 horses, which 
 nature has provided without cost, ready to employ the people, 
 and which, except a portion of it at Galway,- is almost 
 entirely unused ; and the people starve for want of employ- 
 ment ! At Cong- the lime-stone rocks are shooting up 
 through the bog; the very material which will make the 
 bogs fertile is beside them ; it is unused, the bogs are bogs 
 still, as they have been for centuries, and the people starve ! 
 From Cong to Ma'am, which is at the head of Lough Cor- 
 rib, the bogs incline to the lake, affording the greatest 
 facilities for draining ; they are wholly undrained. As you 
 proceed from Ma'am through Joyce's country to the Kil- 
 leries, you loose the limestone, but there is fine gravel 
 and marl immediately under the bog, the best material for 
 reclaiming it.* The bogs are still, except in small patches, 
 
 * " I question whether much ever will or can be done in cultivating the waste 
 reclaimable lands of Ireland by the proprietors themselves. Capital and enter- 
 prise are alike wanting. This, however, it is — the cultivation of the reclaimable 
 wastes, that can alone provide permanent employment for the people, and effect 
 a real change in their condition." — Inglis^s Tour through Ireland — Clifden, 
 p. 231. 
 
 " Marl is a certain sort of fat and clayish stuff, being as the grease of the earth. 
 It hath from ancient times been greatly used for manuring of land, both in France 
 and England, as ma/ appear out of Pliny, in the sixth, seventh, and eighth 
 chapters of his seventeenth book. The same also is still very usual in sundry- 
 parts of England, being of an incomparable goodness, the which caused the 
 English, who, out of some of those places where marl was used, were come to live 
 in Ireland, to make diligent search for it, and that with good success at last, it 
 having been found out by them, within these few years, in several places — first, in 
 the King's county, not far from the Shannon, where, being of a grey coulour, it 
 is digged out of the bogs ; and in the coimty of Wexford, where the use of it was 
 grown very common before the rebellion, especially in the parts lying near the 
 sea, where it stood then in very good stead, the land of itself being nothing fruit- 
 ful ; for although the ground, for the most part, is a good black earth, yet the 
 same being but one foot deep, and having imderneath a crust of stiff yellow clay 
 of half a foot, is thereby greatly impaired in its own goodness. In this depth of 
 a foot and a half next under the clay Ueth the marl, which reacheth so far down- 
 wards that nowhere they are come to the bottom of it. It is of a blew coulour and 
 
280 THE FUTILITY AND 
 
 for miles and miles unreclaimed. I would for a moment 
 draw your attention to the evidence of General Thompson, a 
 magistrate residing near the Killeries, given before the Land 
 Commission (page 465). He is asked — 
 
 " If the unreclaimed mountain and bog afford opportunities for exten- 
 sive and remunerative improvements? — Certainly, I have tried it myself, 
 and found it answer remarkably well. I have potatoes this year I have 
 grown, ajid the crop at least promises ten tons an acre. It is manured 
 with nothing but coral-sand and sea-weed. Lime is the best thing to 
 apply to it afterwards. The whole cost of the acre of potatoes that I am 
 growing this year — the re-claiming, enclosing, open draining, manuring, 
 and seeds, and everything else — is about 10/. I think I will have them 
 got in for 11/. 10*. the acre, including everything. 
 
 very fat — (which, as in other ground, so in this, is chiefly perceived when it is 
 wet) — but brittle and dusty when it is dry. 
 
 " The marl is laid upon the land in heaps ; by some before it is plowed, by 
 others after— many letting it lye several months ere they plow it again, that the rain 
 may equally divide and mix it ; the sun, moon, and air mellow and encorporate 
 it with the earth. One thousand cart-loads of this goeth to one English acre of 
 ground ; it being very chargeable, for even to those who dig it out of their own 
 ground, so as they are at no other expenses but the hire of the labourers, every 
 acre cometh to stand in three pounds sterling. But these great expenses are 
 sufficiently recompensed by the great fruitfulness which it causeth, being such as 
 may seem incredible ; for the marled land, even the very first year, fully quitteth 
 all the costs bestowed on it. Then, besides, it is sufficient once to marl, whereas 
 the ordinary dunging must be renewed oftentimes. 
 
 " If the marled land be thus used, and by turns kejjt under corn and grass, it 
 keeps its fruitfulness for ever, where, to the contrary, if, year after year, it be 
 sowed till the heart be drawn out, it is quite spoiled, so as afterwards it is not 
 possible to bring it again to any passable condition by any kind of dunging or 
 marling. 
 
 "The province of Connaught, by what has been discovered, is much more 
 plentiful in marl than Leinster, as in other cotmties ; so in those of Ros- 
 common, Sligo, and Galloway, almost in every part of it. It is there of three 
 several coulours, some being white as chalk, others grey, and some black, but none 
 blew, as that in the county of Wexford. It lieth nothing deep under the ujiper 
 ground or surface of the earth, commonly not above half a foot ; but its own depth 
 is so great, that never any body yet digged to the bottom of it. 
 
 " But thus much is known, as well in Connaught as other parts, that those who 
 SOW the marled land until it can bear no more, and be quite out of heart, will find 
 it exceeding difficult, if not altogether impossible, ever to amend or improve the 
 same again by any means whatsoever." — Boate and Molyneux's Nattiral History 
 of Ireland, p. 56, et seq. 
 
MISCHIEFS OF EMIGRATION. 281 
 
 " What is the value of the crop ? Ten tons an acre, at Sd. a stone, 
 would be about 201." 
 
 And yet the people, amidst miles of this unreclaimed land, 
 starve for want of potatoes. Government will give lOZ. to 
 get rid of an industrious man by emigration. That very 
 industry and lOZ. thrown away would bring in an acre of 
 useless bog, the profit of which would keep him and be- 
 nefit the country. The Killeries is an inland bay twenty 
 fathoms deep, and running eight miles inland. There is 
 not a quay on it, and a vessel rarely comes up it. It swarms 
 Avith herrings and mackerel, and it of course affords oppor- 
 tunities of easy and cheap carriage for coral- sand and sea- 
 weed from the coast for agricultural purposes.* Streams 
 and waterfalls are tumbling down the hill-sides from the 
 various lakes into this navigable bay. Not a mill is to 
 be seen, nor is a water-wheel turned by one of them ; and, 
 despite the facilities of obtaining coral-sand, sea-weed, lime, 
 marl, and gravel, and notwithstanding the manifest profit 
 of cultivation, there are miles of unreclaimed bog ; and the 
 
 * ' ' Most encouraging proofs are everj-^vhere to be seen of the capabilities of 
 the bogs of Connemara. On the one hand, I saw heaps of turf newly cut out of 
 the bog, and close by the finest crops of oats, potatoes, barley, and even wheat. 
 There is no crop that cannot be produced by the aid of either limestone, or of 
 other natural products of this neighbourhood — coral-sand and sea-weed. These 
 have an advantage over limestone, inasmuch as they need no quarrying or pre- 
 paration. First-rate crops are here produced the third year. Potatoes are 
 generally taken for the two first crops, and these, by the operation of trenching, 
 drain the land. Oats then follow, and extraordinary crops are produced ; sixteen 
 barrels, two hundred and seven stone to the barrel, is not reckoned an uncommon 
 product of an acre. 
 
 " There is perhaps no part of Ireland so well adapted for experimenting on 
 waste lands and reclaimable bogs as Connemara. No part of Connemara is more 
 than six miles from some sea-bay, or lake having a communication with the sea. 
 If there were good roads in all directions, the length of land-carriage would not 
 be great ; but even this distance would be much diminished by improving and 
 connecting the navigation of the chains of lakes which extend through every part 
 of Connemara. One part of that chain drains into Lough Corrib, and through it 
 to the Bay of Galway ; the other part drains into the western bays. One has but 
 to glance at the map to see how much nature has done for Connemara." — Inglis's 
 Tour through Ireland, p. 235. 
 
282 THE FUTILITY AND 
 
 people starve for want of em-ployment ! And these facilities 
 of advantageous and profitable employment are general 
 through the district. " Ko part of Connemara," says Inglis 
 in his tour, " is more than six miles from a sea bay, or 
 lake, having communication with the sea." 
 
 There are a class of men called " patriots." It would seem 
 now a days that men have only to pander to the worst 
 passions of a mob to earn the title. Flatter poor men, 
 delude them, tell them that they are that which they are not, 
 make them discontented and neglectful of their duties by 
 teaching them that they will obtain by foolish " bone and 
 sinew" demonstrations that which God himself has told them 
 that they shall not have — plenty without industry, and you are 
 straightway dubbed a " patriot." Oh, what an opening is 
 there here for any Irish gentleman really to earn and to 
 deserve the title ! He who will never cease impressing on 
 his countrymen the capabilities which they neglect, and what 
 industry and knowledge, and the encouragement of industry 
 and knoivledge, may effect — who will never cease pointing out 
 to the Government the benefits which the empire allows to 
 be lost, and who shall at length compel attention to the 
 capabilities of the country —will save the poor Irish from 
 starvation and expatriation, bless his countrymen, and enrich 
 the empire — will, in fact, be 2i patriot indeed. 
 
 My letter is too long now to draw attention to local 
 matters. Generally here, however, I may say, proprietors 
 are embarrassed ; the estates of several are under receivers, 
 who exact the highest obtainable rents ; no leases are given, 
 and jhe people, from a feeling of insecurity, are disinclined 
 to improve. This town, however, is an exception. Mr. 
 D' Arcy, the proprietor, gave building leases in perpetuity on 
 its site. The effect of this encouragement has been that this 
 good-sized town has sprung up within the last twenty years. 
 That which before was valueless bog, is now a thriving town. 
 The example, however, has not been followed. With an 
 
MISCHIEFS OF EMIGRATION. 283 
 
 utter ignorance of the character of the people, of the absolute 
 necessity which exists to encourage them by every means, 
 and to urge them on, the rule appears to be to grasp the 
 utmost rent, and to increase a tenant's rent after every 
 improvement.* The effect is precisely what might be 
 expected from a people so constituted — they do not consider 
 the balance of advantage which they themselves derive from 
 the improvement ; they only see this, — that their rent is 
 raised because they improve — that a temporary difficulty is 
 thrown in their way because they improve ; the difficulty is 
 at hand, the balance of advantage is at a distance, and they 
 therefore will not improve.-f- 
 
 * It was this rapacious disposition, this short-sighted folly, which led Lord 
 Byron to pen the following couplet : — 
 
 " Their good, ill, health, wealth, joy, or discontent, 
 Being, end, aim, religion — rent! — rent ! — rent !" 
 
 " I have already mentioned the distressed condition of the landlords as one 
 cause of the poor condition of the lower orders ; but I ought to have added that, in 
 very many cases, landlords have no power of being kind or otherwise, and liave no 
 control over their own property, the management of which is vested in persons 
 acting under legal authority. Such individuals must have rents. Crops are 
 seized, cows driven, and all the results of improvidence amongst the upper classes 
 are visited upon every link in the chain of agriculturists." — Inylis' s Journey 
 through Ireland — Visit to Connemara, p. 221. | 
 
 '. $" It is chiefly for want of care in our landlords that such shoals of our 
 families have gone to the "West Indies, by which the nation loses near thirty pounds 
 a head, valuing them as little better than slaves and negroes, besides the substance 
 and manual arts they carry with them, which will come to much more. Had they 
 any proper encouragement, good usage, or bargains here, they would never run 
 the|hazard of long voyages and shipwrecks, and being starved at sea, or dying by 
 the country disease when they get on shore ; by which at least one-third of them 
 perish, and especially of the poor infants which they sacrifice to their wandering 
 humour. They would never go to live with transported felons, and thieves, and 
 ofF-scourings of the earth, where there is no worship paid to God or regard to 
 man — where they can neither see their old friends, acquaintances, nor relations — 
 where all the conveniences of life, as cattle, clothes, furniture, beef, and even 
 Indian flour, are so excessively dear — v/here labour and slaves are so expensive — 
 andVhere they must build their own houses, and stub and grub every acre they 
 get, and thereby pay fully thirty years' purchase for it — and where, at the same time, 
 their lives are every hour in danger from the treacherous assaults, day and night, 
 of the savages, and from open wars of the French £.nd Spaniards, and their goods 
 from private thefts of their neighbouring felons." — Reflections and Resolutions 
 proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal 
 Dublin Society, p. 28. 
 
284 MISCHIEFS OF EMIGRATION. 
 
 The embarrassments of the landlords prevent their being 
 able, if willing-, to do much towards the improvement of the 
 country. But the people starve. Ought, then, the Govern- 
 ment to hesitate about what is their duty ? I think there are 
 Ijut few sensible men who will conclude, after reading the 
 above yacfo, that the duty of the Government lies in paying 
 the most industrious men to emigrate ; but they will probably 
 be of opinion that the greatest advantage in a country which 
 needs so much improvement, is industrious men ; and that the 
 way to secure the advantages which the country possesses is 
 to encourage industry, not to give a premium for its extermi- 
 nation ; in fact, to use the men and means we have, to 
 cultivate the land which Ave possess, and in the doing of that 
 to employ the people, to benefit the proprietors, to enrich the 
 country, and to increase the power and the resources of the 
 empire.* 
 
 * " Crowds of people make land and the produce of it valuable, and without 
 them our best grounds in Ireland would be as worthless and useless as the wide 
 wastes of America." — Reflections and Resolutions projter for the Gentlemen of 
 Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, p. 26. 
 
 "Were our gentlemen in Munster and Connaught half so diligent in sending 
 people and letters to their districts, and bearing their charges to see their lands 
 and proposals, as those from America are, we might soon see these swarms of our 
 little northern hive settle there, and prevent so much of the blood and treasure of 
 the nation running off from us, and then we should in time see those parts of the 
 kingdom well peopled, not only with Protestants, but weavers, spinners, and 
 bleachers, like the north." — Ibid. p. 29. 
 
GALWAY AND ITS NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES. 285 
 
 LETTER XIX. 
 
 GALAVAY; ITS NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES, ITS ORIGIN", 
 AND ITS PEOPLE. 
 
 Necessary to Inquire how much of the existing Distress in Ireland is to be attri- 
 buted to the People themselves, as well as how much of that Distress is to be 
 traced to Oppression, in order to apply appropriate Remedies — Comparison of 
 Belfast and Galway — The Contrast — Comparison of Celtic and Saxon QuaUties 
 — Origin of Galway and its Population — The " Tribes" or Original Families of 
 Galway — The Cloddergh Fishermen — Irish Rundale Villages — Improvements 
 effected in Galway — Difficulty of getting the Peasantry to improve — Necessity 
 of Teaching and Leading the People — Enterprise and Industry the Qualities 
 needed — These will make Ireland great, and not a Repeal of the Union — Letter 
 of Lord Chesterfield. 
 
 Galway, October 15. 
 
 In the most difficult task of endeavouring to account for the 
 acknowledged wretchedness of the Irish peasantry, or, in 
 other words, of the bulk of the Irish peoj)le, it was mani- 
 festly a duty to inquire whether that wretchedness was or 
 was not unavoidable under existing circumstances. A neces- 
 sary part of this inquiry was, how far have the peasantry 
 been beaten down and oppressed, so that they cannot rise to 
 the condition of comfort ? This part of the inquiry I have 
 not hesitated to prosecute. Your columns bear testimony 
 to many descriptions of the impolicy of checking every 
 improvement by an immediate increase of rent ; of the folly 
 of expecting men to exert themselves to improve, if uncertain 
 
286 GALWAY AND ITS 
 
 that they shall reap the full reward of their exertion, and of 
 the necessity, therefore, as well as the policy, of giving leases 
 for the security of the tenant, at the same time enforcing the 
 covenants, for the benefit of both landlord and tenant. 
 
 To have stopped at this point of the inquiry would have 
 been to take a mere one-sided view. There still remained 
 another point to inquire into, and that was, how far is this 
 wretchedness the fault of the people themselves, or, in other 
 words, have they made the most of those advantages which 
 they possess ? If they have not, then, however blameable 
 may be that oppression and want of encouragement, on the 
 one hand, which retards and freezes every attempt at im- 
 provement, and which I have never hesitated to condemn, 
 still, on the other hand, the people themselves are not blame- 
 less ; and it would neither be impartial nor just to attribute 
 their wretchedness, which in a great measure is the fault of 
 their own apathy and indifference, entirely to the fault of the 
 landlords. 
 
 I came not here as a party man — to make out a case, but 
 to state the facts as I found them. I have therefore not 
 hesitated to describe that undeniable apathy which exists 
 among the people of the west of Ireland, under the influence 
 of which they neglect and lose advantages unequalled by any 
 other part of the empire, and which, if profited by — if used 
 by them, would certainly have produced wealth and pro- 
 sperity, in spite of either bad landlords or bad laws, as tlieir 
 almost universal neglect of these advantages has resulted in 
 general poverty and wretchedness, in the accomplishment 
 of which a good or bad landlord is not the most material 
 consideration. 
 
 A still more important question remained to be dealt witli, 
 — how are you to remedy the prevailing state of misery 
 which exists ? So far as that is traceable to the landlords — 
 to their neglect or folly or absenteeism, the landlords must 
 be dealt with ; so far as it is traceable to the people them- 
 
NEGLECTED CAPABILITIES. 287 
 
 selves, the people themselves must be dealt with. I have 
 shirked neither course. In dealing, however, with the 
 people, necessarily, your first step is to inquire, rvhat is the 
 character of the people toith whom you have to deal ? 
 
 In endeavouring to describe the character of the Irish 
 people I have not insulted them by flattery. I have stated 
 the differences of character which exist in different districts 
 — differences so striking, that you must be wilfully blind not 
 to observe them. What more opposite than the character of 
 the two towns of Belfast and Galway on the east and west 
 coasts of Ireland 1 One busy, thriving, wealthy, and im- 
 proving, its manufacturing and shipping flourishing and 
 keeping pace with the best parts of the empire ; the other 
 bearing all the evidences of a decayed town ; without manu- 
 factures, its shipping contemptible, and it would be folly to 
 call it either a very wealthy or a very improving town, 
 although some local improvements have been forced upon 
 it of late years. Yet, compare the natural advantages of the 
 two towns, and the position of Galway, with its bay facing 
 America on one side, the water-power of a vast lake running- 
 through the town, and the facilities of inland traffic and 
 communication which that lake close on the other side of the 
 town affords, and it stands before Belfast beyond all com- 
 petition. The same laws operate here as at Belfast. Money 
 is as easily earned at Galway as at Belfast. How comes it 
 that Belfast puts to use its natural advantages, thrives and 
 prospers, whilst Galway neglects tliose Avhich belong to it, 
 and is poor 1 How comes it that one town improves whilst 
 the other decays ? The advance or the decay must in either 
 case be attributed to the people ; and when the character of 
 the respective populations is evidently widely different — 
 when the energetic and industrious character of one popu- 
 lation insures prosperity, and the apathetic indifference of the 
 other brings about decay, it was but one step further in the 
 inquiry, " How is this ?" to trace it to the acknowledged 
 
288 THE ORIGIN AND 
 
 difference of race, the respective characteristics of each 
 having long been well known. 
 
 I have never concealed the virtues of the Celtic race, 
 which now chiefly populates Galway. Their capacity of 
 long endurance, their easy tractability of disposition, and 
 their contentment with almost any lot, are virtues which 
 the English people have not. The Englishman is patient, 
 forbearing ; but he will not endure, — he is tractable only so 
 long as he is well used, and I never yet met with a contented 
 Englishman. But it is these very qualities of the people, 
 not virtues, which make England what she is. Her people 
 will endure no oppression, no injustice ; treat them ill and 
 they are turbulent, and every man is always striving up the 
 ladder for the step above him, urging on for something he 
 does not possess. And it is the very virtues of the poor 
 Celtic peasant which tend to his deterioration and wretched- 
 ness. He endures oppression, and he has therefore been 
 oppressed and hardly used ; his easy tractability of disposi- 
 tion has been taken advantage of; he has been put upon, 
 screwed down without compunction, because it was found he 
 would bear it. His contentment has made him rest satisfied 
 with shelter and a turf fire, and potatoes and water to live 
 upon. He rests content and satisfied with the very worst 
 house, and clothes, and food, is ha])])y so long as he can get 
 them, and he strives for nothing better. Yet it is his Avorst 
 misfortune to have that contented disposition, which one 
 almost envies, that can make him feel " as happy as a prince 
 if he can get but potatoes and buttermilk." It is impossible 
 for a man so constituted to rise unless he is forced and urged 
 upwards. He has no volition ; he is contented as he is. 
 What contented man ever attempted anything great — any- 
 thing which required labour, exertion, risk, or anxious 
 thought ? Why should he ? Pie is satisfied as he is — he 
 desires nothing better — he has no motive to attempt any- 
 thing. 
 
 I 
 
PEOPLE OF GALWAY. 289 
 
 The elucidation of these views, which I deem imj)ortant, 
 as pointing out the course which ought to be pursued towards 
 the people of the west of Ireland, has offended the preju- 
 dices of some few of the Celtic people. It is a characteristic 
 weakness (if I may use the term without offence) in the 
 Celtic race to be vain. Praise them, extol them, — treat them 
 as one has done who knows their weakness in this respect 
 and trades upon it, — call them " the finest peasantry in the 
 world," and they will love you, though it is an insult to their 
 understandings to tell them so. Tell them, though for their 
 real benefit, an unpalatable truth and their indignant recep- 
 tion of it frequently savours of the ridiculous. It is, how- 
 ever, I am happy to say, but few of them who prominently 
 show this national failing. I feel, however, that I can very 
 well afford to pass without further notice the jjoutings and 
 railings of some who are affronted that I should not esteem 
 them to be the biggest, stoutest, strongest, finest, bravest 
 and cleverest men in all creation. 
 
 Had I picked out a town in all Ireland more calculated io 
 impress on the Government the necessity and the dutij of 
 spurring on, and urging and forcing on the jjublic of the 
 west of Ireland, in order to make them prosperous in spite 
 of themselves, I could not have found one more fitted for the 
 object than Galway. 
 
 A slight review of its origin and of the character of its 
 population may not be nninteresting. It will also tend to 
 dissipate a very common mistake about the Milesian origin 
 of the people, on which Irishmen are apt to pride them- 
 selves ; though what it may be that they can find to be 
 proud of in this respect it is difficult to say. 
 
 According to The History of the Town and County of 
 Galway^ a work of considerable research, published in 1820 
 by Mr. James Hardiman, " Member of the Eoyal Irish 
 Academy, and sub-Commissioner on Public Records," this 
 
 u 
 
290 THE ORIGIN AND 
 
 town is called Galway " from Gaclis or Gailis, ' traffic or 
 
 commerce,' signifying a mercliant, and ihli in Irish, signifying 
 
 tnhes or families, whence Gailibli, tribes of merchants" which 
 
 name was pronounced Gallive, and afterwards corrupted into 
 
 Galiva, Gahia, and finally in 1440 into Galway (pp. 3 
 
 and 4). It was inhabited, previously to the reign of Henry 
 
 II., by a colony of fishermen ; but Lynch, in his " Remarks 
 
 drawn from Antiquity" Vv^ritten in 1661, says — " It was not 
 
 they who gave any name of credit or fame to the town of 
 
 Galway, but the colony next after-mentioned, for until the 
 
 latter came hither, this town was but an ordinary place, with 
 
 only thatched houses and some castles, but it was by the 
 
 new colonies and septs made famous to the world, for their 
 
 trading fait] full}/, discharging their credit, good education, charity 
 
 and hospitality both at home and abroad." These tribes or 
 
 families settled at diiferent times and were thirteen, some 
 
 accounts say fourteen in number, and their names are given 
 
 in the following verse : — 
 
 " Athj', Blake, Bodkin, Browne, Deane, Darcy, Lynch, 
 Joyes, Kirwan, Martin, Morris, Skerrett, and French." 
 
 In the 7tli page of his book, Hardiman enters into a 
 genealogical research into the origin and extraction of these 
 families. Their names ore suflicient proof of this. How- 
 ever, without entering at further length into this enquiry 
 it is perhaps sufficient to say that, with the exception of 
 " Athy," and " Kirwan," whom he traces to be originally 
 of Irish extraction, he shows every one of the others to be 
 either of Norman, or Saxon, or Welsh descent. Several of 
 these came over with Strongbow. " From the earliest 
 periods these trioes were celebrated for commerce, and for 
 several centuries were classed amongst the most consider- 
 able merchants in Europe. Their wealth was consequently 
 great, and the ample landed properties, which they gradually 
 acquired by purchase from the native Irish, throughout the 
 province of Connaught, are now enjoyed by their numerous 
 
PEOPLE OP GALWAY. 291 
 
 and opulent posterity." (Hardiman, p. 20.) They had great 
 commercial intercourse with Spain, and from that intercourse 
 many intermarriages with Spaniards arose, and no doubt 
 this led them to copy much of the dress and architecture 
 of Spain, which the town and the people exhibit to this 
 day. These tribes " avoided all connexion with their sur- 
 rounding neighbours, and continually intermarried with one 
 another." Sir William Pelliam, Lord Justice of Ireland, 
 who arrived in Galway in 1597, states that, — " the townsmen 
 and wemmen present a more civil show of life than other 
 townes in Ireland do ;" and in Sir Olivier St. John's descrip- 
 tion of Connaught in 1614, they are thus described : — " The 
 merchants are rich, and great adventurers at the sea ; their 
 commonaltie is composed of the descendants of the ancient 
 English families of the towne, and rarelie admit any new 
 English among them, and never any of the Irish." (Hardi- 
 man, p. 22.) As they got rich, religious divisions drove the 
 Protestants in disgust to their estates ; and those of them 
 who were Roman Catholics were oppressed by excessive 
 charter duties, and " they by degrees also abandoned the 
 town, and this trifling remnant of its former commercial 
 greatness gradually declined." (Hardiman, p. 183.) In 
 fact the commercial spirit and enterprise of the former 
 English inhabitants had left it, and as the Celtic population 
 began to possess a town already built, with a trade already 
 created, the town became dilapidated and the trade decayed. 
 In walking through the streets hea'e and there magnificent 
 old mansions with coats of arms indicative of former splen- 
 dour, carved in the stone-work over the pointed arches of 
 the entrance-courts, are met with, nearly all of them now in 
 a state of dirt and fi.ltliiness and melancholy dilapidation. 
 
 There is a remarkable tribe of fishermen here, avIio inter- 
 marry among themselves — the Cloddergh fishermen, whom 
 also it has been the fashion to call Spaniards. I walked 
 with two gentlemen through their district, talked with fifty 
 
 u 2 
 
292 THE ORIGIN AND 
 
 of the men and asked them their names, out of curiosity. I 
 never saw a community more like a mixed community of 
 English and Welsh. Nineteen out of every twenty of the 
 men and Avomen have fair hair and blue eyes, with here and 
 there one of quite a different complexion. They are little 
 stiff men, and are evidently not improved l^y their constant 
 intermarriages. But they are orderly and clean. Not one 
 of them had his stockings about his heels and his breeches 
 open at the knees (after the ordinary fashion of Irish 
 peasants), as if he had dressed while his house was on fire ; 
 but they were well and neatly clad. There were no rags 
 about them. Their wives keep their clothes in order, clean 
 their houses and make their nets ; and the men are bold and 
 hardy fishermen. There are many Irish names among them, 
 some Spanish, — there were one or two Costello's — but the 
 majority of their names are Jones, Rogers, Ward, Mullins 
 or Molines, &:c. The John Joneses are unmistakeably of 
 Welsh descent, Rogers is also a Welsh name, and the 
 Wards and Molineses are Saxon and Norman names. Their 
 fair hair and blue eyes j)oint out their i-ace as certainly as 
 their names, and the order of their houses was a no less 
 certain indication of race. Their houses are whitewashed 
 and built in regular streets. Take a real Irish Rundale vil- 
 lage, and the difference cannot be mistaken : " Order," which 
 Pope sets down as " Heaven's first law," you will look for 
 there in vain. The cottages look as if pitchforked to one 
 side ; some are placed sideways, some endways, some corner- 
 ways, there is never a street ; and the crooked 2)assages in 
 and out between the dunghills and irregularly-l)laced cot- 
 tages form the only pathways. Their utter forlornness is 
 pitiable.* 
 
 * There is one of these villages about four miles from Galway, called Menlow, 
 which I visited, and which is a perfect curiosity. It contains about two thousand 
 inhabitants, and their chief subsistence is derived from sujiplying Galway with 
 milk. The inhabitants keep great numbers of cows, which tliey feed principally on 
 
TEOrLE OF GALWAY. 293 
 
 Until after the Union Gal way kept getting worse and 
 Avorse. Like most other parts of Ireland, however, since the 
 Union, it has improved. About twenty years ago some 
 energetic individuals (one of whom it would be an injustice 
 not to name — the Rev. John Darcy, a descendant of one of 
 the original tribes) exerted themselves to rescue the town 
 from its fallen state. After immense opposition it was 
 paved, and its streets rendered passable. A fine dock was 
 constructed, and a gas-house was built, which now cheaply 
 lights the town, and leaves a handsome profit to the share- 
 holders. Much, however, remains to be done, and vast 
 advantages are neglected, from the apathy of the inhabitants. 
 Lough Corrib, a lake 45 English miles long, by from 8 to 
 12 miles wide, is within a mile from the sea, and close to 
 the town ; the lake empties itself by a river through the 
 town. There is a fall of water of 14 feet, and, considering 
 the extent of the lake, this water-power is enormous, and 
 never-failing. A canal was proposed, to open this lake to 
 the sea, Avhicli would afford inland communication for 150 
 miles of coast round the lake. The estimated cost was 
 10,000/., and the purchase of land requisite was valued at 
 2,000/. An Act of Parliament was obtained to enable the 
 commissioners to borrow money and complete the work, 
 
 gi'ains bought in Galway. There is no church or chapel in the village ; no school- 
 master or doctor, and no magistrate, though the population is as large as that of 
 many an English town. The way through the village is the most crooked, as 
 well as the most narrow and dirty lane that can be conceived. There is no row 
 of houses, or anything approaching to a row, but each cottage is stuck indepen- 
 dently by itself, and always at an acute, obtuse, or right angle to the next cottage, 
 as the case may be. The irregularity is curious ; there are no two cottages placed 
 in a line, or of the same size, dimensions, and build. The Irish mind has here, 
 without obstruction or instruction, fully developed itself. As this is the largest 
 village I ever saw, so it is the poorest, the worst built, the most strangely 
 irregular, and the most completely without head or centre, or market or church, 
 or school, of any village I ever was in. It is an overgrown democracy. No 
 man is better or richer than his neighbour in it. It is, in fact, an Irish rundale 
 villas. 
 
294 THE ORIGIN AND 
 
 but, from slieer apathy and neglect, the time mentioned in 
 the Act in which the work was to he completed was suffered 
 to expire, and it was never commenced. There is, there- 
 fore, no canal. The summer level of the lough is much 
 helow the winter level, and in winter upwai-ds of 30,000 
 acres of land are annually flooded, and rendered profitless. 
 Until recently nothing whatever was done to prevent this 
 mischief. Some draining operations are, however, at length 
 commenced, with the view, it is said, of keeping down the 
 lough to the summer level. 
 
 The finest possible harbour might be made, lying in the 
 direct line between London and New York. There is an 
 island, called " Mutton Island," a mile out to sea ; the com- 
 munication to this island is nearly dry at low water ; a mole 
 raised on the bank between this island and the land, the 
 materials for which are on the spot, and a breakwater of a 
 few cables' length, would make this one of the finest harbours 
 ill the kingdom. If Government undertakes the work it 
 will be done ; the people all " call upon Hercules," but will 
 never " put their own shoulders to the Avheel." A magnifi- 
 cent dock is almost formed in the harbour by nature. It is, 
 however, not taken advantage of. 
 
 I had the opportunity the other day of visiting the estate 
 of Lord Wallscourt, near this town, a nobleman who has 
 made great sacrifices and exertions to improve his tenants. 
 Still, with every advantage of nature round him, — abundance 
 of fish of every kind, oysters, and muscles ; manure, sea-weed, 
 calcareous sea-sand, marl, peat, and black mud sea dci)Osit, 
 he complains that he cannot get his tenants to exert them- 
 selves beyond their half-acre of potatoes, and he has the 
 greatest difficulty to prevent them underletting their land in 
 con-acre at 4/. or 5/. the acre, which he lets to them for SO^,, 
 if they have any land beyond what is absolutely necessary 
 for them to grow their potatoes. He built a very neat cot- 
 tage as a model, intending to have similar ones built on his 
 
PEOPLE OF GALWAY. 295 
 
 estate. For five years no tenant would go into it, and the 
 reason assigned was that, " Sure it woukl be mighty cold, 
 and my Lord would be expecting them to keep it too clean." 
 A tenant's son, who had married and had no cottage, applied 
 to him for some land and a cottage, and Lord Wallscourt 
 offered him this neat two-story slated cottage, and the man 
 agreed to live in it at last, because " Sure it was better than 
 nothing at all." I went to see the family in this cottage. 
 An English peasant's wife would have been proud to have it 
 as clean as hands could make it. In one room a pile of turf 
 was in the corner, tlie floor was filthy, the woman was 
 squatted with her children before the fire, and the pig in the 
 middle of them, whilst another room at the back of the 
 house, where the turf and the pig (if it must dwell in the 
 house) might have been put, was empty. The man (and it 
 was the best feature I saw) seemed ashamed of his dirty dis- 
 orderly wife, when Lord AVallscourt, in a tone of mortifica- 
 tion, pointed out these things, for he kicked out the pig. 
 
 How certainly does all this prove that the poor, unedu- 
 cated, contented Irish peasant must not only be taught civil- 
 ized habits, but forced into them : example alone will not 
 do ; nor will teaching alone do. This it is the duty of the 
 landlords to see effected, but above all it is the duty of the 
 Government to insure its beino' effected.* 
 
 * It will scarcely be credited that a newspaper of the locality took on itself the 
 defence of this tenant's dirty habits ; the defence being, that perhaps Lord Walls- 
 court had built no pigstye, and that therefore it was his fault that the pig was in 
 the tenant's house. If there wei'e no pigstye in a whole English village, and every 
 peasant kept twenty pigs, I will venture to say that each pig would be taught 
 sense enough not to put its nose within any cottage door ; for it would most 
 certainly meet there with the broom-handle in the hands of the house-wife, and 
 have that weapon most vigorously applied about its ears. The editor of the Irish 
 newspaper who wrote this was no doubt a " native, and to the manner born." To 
 his mind, of course, it was an impossible achievement for the peasant to set about 
 huilding for himself a pigstye, supposing him not to have one. But that would 
 have betokened exertion and industry, and a desire to improve — ^virtues unknowa 
 in the west of Ireland. 
 
296 
 
 THE ORIGIN AND 
 
 The commissioners appointed to inquire into tlie condition 
 of the poorer classes in Ireland, in their third report, state 
 with truth that, — " Those who are uncivilized cannot civilize 
 themselves ; it requires external aid to enable them to im- 
 prove." They thus speak of the Irish, even when residing 
 in Great Britain : — 
 
 *^ Every thing connected u-'ith the state of the Irinh in Great Britain shows 
 that their mode of life is very slowly and very slightly imjjroved, unless some 
 civilizing influence descends upon them from above — some external moving force 
 independent of their own volition, as of masters, employers, superintendants, 
 education, municipal regulations, «^*c. Wherever they are untouched by any 
 ■influence of this kind, they appear, for the most part, either to remain the 
 same, or even to deteriorate, whatever may be the amount of their earnings." — 
 (P. 33.) 
 
 The italics are not mine, hut the commissioners', and ex- 
 press their conviction of the truth and importance of this 
 sentence. At the hazard of being made the object of the 
 womanish railings of some vanity-wounded and silly Irish 
 " patriot," I would urge my conviction from all I have seen 
 of the truth of this report. 
 
 The people must be taught, and led and encouraged — nay, 
 forced on to do that which will benefit themselves.* A more 
 tractable race, or a harder-working race, where you lead 
 
 * The low place which Connaught holds in the statistics of education, as com- 
 pared with the other three jirovinces of Ireland, will appear from the following 
 tabular statement, extracted from the Commissioners' Report : — 
 
 Provinces. 
 
 Population National 
 1841. Schools. 
 
 Number of 
 
 CliilJrcn 
 
 actually in 
 
 Attendance. 
 
 Ulster 
 
 Munster 
 
 Leinster 
 
 Connaught .... 
 
 Total 
 
 2,386,373 
 2,396,161 
 1,973,731 
 1,418,859 
 
 1,005 
 482 
 642 
 208 
 
 90,531 
 75,191 
 88,092 
 25,897 
 
 8,175,124 
 
 2,337 
 
 279,711 
 
 According to the last census (1841), the proportion of ]iersons in the county 
 of Galway who could neither read nor write was 78.7 per cent., while in Cork it 
 was 68.1, in Cavan 51.9, in Wexford 42.2, in Dublin 37, and in Antrim 23.7. 
 
PEOPLE OF GALWAY. 297 
 
 tliem, put them to work, and offer them an immediate 
 inducement to work, j'ou cannot have. But if you expect 
 from them independent voHtion, Avhere no one has gone 
 before, or enterprise of any kind, you will fail. There is no 
 town in the United Kingdom where energy and enterprise, 
 and attention to any trade whatever would be more certain 
 to realize a fortune. Eleven years ago there was scarcely a 
 pig to be bought in the market at Galway, and no bacon was 
 cured here. An Englishman named Greaves thought there 
 was an opening, and commenced buying pigs and curing 
 them, in connexion Avith his shop in IS^ew-street, Co vent- 
 garden, in London. He established his son here, who, though 
 quite a young man, has created a trade, and now kills and 
 cures 1,000 pigs a week. Any shop well managed, any hotel 
 well managed, any business Avhatever well managed, with 
 the energy and attention which Englishmen commonly devote 
 to their business, would insure to any man a fortune in Gal- 
 way. Yet the majority of the inhabitants are Repealers, and 
 great talkers about misgovernment ;* they abuse and vilify 
 
 * The late celebrated Dr. Madden, however, held a far different opinion, as 
 indeed do most men of sound judgment who have thought on the question. He 
 says, — " There are many advantages which Great Britain might receive from 
 Ireland if she pleased to make use of them ; but I shall pass them by to mention 
 the greatest and most beneficial of them all, which will also include them, and 
 that is, to join us to them by an union. 
 
 " So many of the best English patriots, as well as the best writers and judges 
 in politics, have declared themselves publicly of this opinion, that in all probabi- 
 lity it will be thought of, and in earnest accomplished in due time ; and especially 
 if, by our industry and good management, we would take care to improve our 
 people and country, and enlarge our wealth, and so bring a better portion, to 
 drive on this political match. Nothing but the jilain expediency and benefit of an 
 union could have made Cromwell (who studied to please the people when he hurt not 
 his own interest by it) take such paces, as we all know he did, in this matter ; and 
 surely the day will yet come, when we shall not hang like a dead limb on Great Britain 
 when we might do such good work for it if our bandages were removed entirely. 
 The Saxon heptarchy was hardly a more disjointed heap of states than England, 
 Wales, Scotland, and Ireland seemed, before Wales and Scotland were so happily 
 united to her ; and as Ireland has greatly the advantage of both the last in extent 
 and goodness of soil, trade, and number of people, it is not improbable she will 
 
298 THE ORIGIN AND 
 
 England and English connexion, boast liow mighty well 
 they would manage Irish affairs in a parliament on College- 
 green, and neglect their own business to their hearts' con- 
 tent. Englishmen built them a town, which they have suf- 
 fered to decay ; Englishmen got rich, and purchased estates, 
 where they grow poor : but the English inhabitants attended 
 to their business, were enterprising and industrious ; the 
 present inhabitants of Galway prefer vain-glorious talk about 
 the phantom Repeal, and look on every substantial and fair 
 advantage within their grasp with apathetic indifference. 
 This general fault is the true cause of more than half the 
 misery under which Ireland labours. 
 
 Whilst here, a nobleman in the neighbourhood showed to 
 me an original letter from the great Lord Chesterfield, 
 written a century ago to one of his ancestors, with a copy of 
 which I was politely furnished. It so exactly describes the 
 failings of the Irish people of the present day, and is so true 
 and valuable, because emanating from so shrewd an observer 
 and so eminent a man, and is so applicable to the subject of 
 my present letter, that though I feel the too great trespass 
 on your space, I shall conclude my letter of to-day witli it, 
 in the hope that the truth and wisdom which it contains may 
 not be entirely thrown away : — 
 
 " Sir, — I thank j-ou for the favour of your letter with the inclosed 
 scheme for carrying on the war, which if others approved of as much as I 
 do, and the present situation of the war perniittetl, would be soon put in 
 execution. As you are one of the few in Ireland who always think of 
 the publick, without any mixture of private interest, I don't doubt but 
 that you have already thought of some usefull methods of emplo3nng the 
 King's bounty to the Dublin Society. The late additional tax ujjon glass 
 here, as it must considerably rais-c the price of glass-bottles into Ireland, 
 
 one day have the same happiness and honour.'^ — liejlecdons and Resolutions 
 proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, by Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin 
 Society, p. 94. 
 
PEOPLE OF GALWAY. 299 
 
 seems to point out the manufacturing of 'em there ; which consideration, 
 Avith a small premium added to it, would in my mind set up such a ma- 
 nufacture. Fine writing and printing paper we have often talk'd of to- 
 gether, and the specimen you gave me before I left Dublin proves that 
 nothing but care and industry is wanting to bring that manufacture to 
 such a perfection as to jirevent the importation of it from Holland, and 
 through Holland from France ; nay, I am convinced that j^ou may supply 
 England with a great deal of it if you pleas'd, that is, if you Avould make 
 it, as you could do, both good and cheap. Here is a man that has found 
 out a method of making starch of potatoes, and by the help of an engine 
 of his own invention to make a prodigious quantity of it in a day ; but 
 here is an Act of Parliament which strictly prohibits the making starch of 
 any thing but flour, — have you such an act of Parliament in Lxland? 
 If you have not, and that you import your starch from England, as I take 
 it for granted that you do, for you import every thing that you can, it 
 would be well worth this man's Avhilc to go to Ireland, and advantageous 
 for you that he should, his starch being to my knowledge and experience 
 full as good, and abundantly cheaper, than any other. These are the sort 
 of jobbs that I wish people in Ireland would attend to with as much in- 
 dustry and care as they do to jobbs of a very difterent nature ; these honest 
 arts would solidly increase their fortunes, and improve their estates, upon 
 the only true and permanent foundation, the publick good ; leave us here 
 and your regular forces in Ireland to fight for you ; think of your ma- 
 nufactures at least as much as of your militia, and be as much upon your 
 guard against poverty as against Poperj", — take mj word, you are in 
 more danger of the former than of the latter. I hope my friend the 
 Bishop of Meath goes on prosperously with his Charter schools ; I call 
 them his, for I really think that, without his care and perseverance, they 
 would hardly have existed now ; though their operation is sure, yet being 
 slow it is not suited to the Irish taste of the time present only ; and I 
 cannot help saying that, except in your claret, which you are very soli- 
 citous should be two or three years old, jou think less of two or three 
 years hence than any people under the sun. If they would but wish 
 themselves as well as I wish them, and take as much pains to promote 
 their own true interests as I would do to contribute to it, they wovdd in a 
 few years be in a very different situation from that which they are now 
 in at present ; go on, however, you and our other friends, be not weary of 
 well doing, and, though you cannot do all the good you would, do all the 
 good you can. When you write to the most worthy Bishop of Clojaie, 
 
300 THE ORIGIN AND PEOPLE OF GALWAY. 
 
 pray assure liim of my truest regard and esteem, and remember me to my 
 honest and indefatigable friend in good Avorks, Dr. INIadden ; and be per- 
 suaded yourself that I am, with sincere friendship and regard, 
 
 " Your most faith full humble servant, 
 
 " CHESTERFIELD." 
 
 « London, June 14, 1746. 
 
AN IRISH ARGUMENT. 301 
 
 LETTER XX. 
 
 AN IRISH AEGUMEKT.— EFFECT OF LOAN FUNDS. 
 
 The Diffusion of Opinions in favour of a Repeal of the Union — The Roman 
 Cathohc Clergy generally the Advocates of Repeal — Sjiecimen of an Irish 
 Argument on this Question — Money-lending — The Irish Character — " Gom- 
 been" Men — Loan Funds, and then- eS'ect on the Condition of the People — 
 Ignorance of the Commercial L^se of Money — Pawning Bank-notes and 
 Guineas. 
 
 Ennis, Clare, October 18. 
 
 It is a fact which is to be regretted, that, senseless and inca- 
 ])able of defence by any kind of argument as the agitation 
 for a Repeal of the Union is, tliere yet are many estimable 
 and good men who advocate it, though the great majority of 
 respectable citizens repudiate it. It is a fact also, which I 
 do not pretend to explain, that the most strenuous of its 
 advocates are to be found amongst the clergy of the Roman 
 Catholic church. That ignorant and unreflecting peasants 
 should shout for " Repeal," when they are told that it will 
 remedy the pressure of the distress they feel, is not to be 
 wondered at. It, however, affords food for thought when 
 we find men of education and of habits of reflection takino- 
 up the cry.* Is it possible that these gentlemen really feel 
 
 * " It is certain, bodies politic, like natural ones, are so far strong and great, 
 as all theii' limbs are firmly knit and well united, and equally fed and nourished ; 
 
302 AN IRIStI ARGUMENT. 
 
 ■\vLat tliey assert — that Repeal alone will save the country ? 
 Or is it that they find themselves in the position which 
 Plowden has described (vol. iii. p. 716) — "The peasant will 
 love a revolution, because he feels the weight of poverty, 
 and has not often the sense to perceive that the change of 
 masters may render it heavier. The iwiest must folloio the 
 impulse of the j)opular xoave, or he left behind on the beach to 
 perish," If this be so, it would seem to indicate pretty clearly 
 to the Government the means which would, at any rate, 
 
 and while Ireland stands excluded from the favours, rights, and privileges which 
 her fellow -subjects in England, Wales, and Scotland so happily enjoy, she will 
 naturally languish and pine like an over-shaded branch in a great tree, and perhaps 
 at last die for want of free air. Were we once united, how vastly should we enjoy 
 the wide foundations of England's wealth and power ! And surely there can be no 
 ground for being jealous of our putting in for some proportioned share of it, since 
 there is room enough in the world for five times the commerce we could all carry 
 on, were our stocks and labours joined by such an union. . . . How much better 
 would this prove to the common good of these nations (Great Britain and Ireland) 
 than keeping fellow-subjects and countrymen in so doubtful a state as to govern- 
 ment, liberty, and property, than making Englishmen who go thither (to Ireland) 
 aliens and foreigners, and forfeit their birth-rights, than weaning us from those 
 breasts that nursed us ; and now we are grown up, by sometimes correcting us 
 too severely for children of the family, force us to forsake our natural parents, 
 and fly for help to the aid of strangers, with the poor labour and business W3 can 
 give them. And, indeed, it is amazing how so wise a nation, and so desirous to 
 enlarge her trade, as Great Britain is, should so long let this large afid fertile 
 country lie fallow on her hands without sowing those seeds of arts and manu- 
 factures in it which it is so capable of bearing to great perfection. It has cost 
 Great Britain much blood and treasure to make us fit for such purposes, ami to 
 neglect to make a proper use of us for the increase of their trade, is as imprudent 
 as if a rich merchant should be at tlie charge and trouble of building a ship, and 
 then let her rot in the port rathec than be at the pains of employing her. 
 
 "Whenever we are so happy as to see our superiors think to purpose of such 
 an useful settlement, we may be secure that whatever representatives are allowed 
 us as our just proportion, or whatever limitations or restrictions it may be abso- 
 lutely proper for the common good to tack to it, everything will be managed 
 agreeable to those great princi})k's on which it is bottomed — the general advantage 
 and welfare of the whole ; and possibly we may in time see that the union of the 
 seven provinces has not afl'ectcd the trading v;orld more, in the last century, than 
 the union of these three nations tvould in this." — lirfleclions and Resolutions 
 jjroper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, hy the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal 
 Dublin Socicfij, p. 98. 
 
AN IRISH ARGUMENT. 303 
 
 remove these gentlemen from the influence of the popular 
 cry, which would enlist them among the friends of order and 
 good government, rather than leave them compelled, whe- 
 ther their better judgment may approve or not, to fan into a 
 fury the blind passions of an ignorant and misguided mob."* 
 I have had the opportunity here as elsewhere of meeting 
 some of the Roman Catholic clergy, men who are deservedly 
 respected, and who are estimable in their vocation. I have 
 found them earnest (however sincere) advocates of Repeal. 
 An argument with them on the question is certain — to 
 reason with them on the subject impossible. " The infamy 
 of England in obtaining the union by wholesale bribery and 
 delusion," is dilated upon. Suggest that to every " bribe " 
 there are two parties, the briber and the bribed, and if the 
 
 * Whilst at Ennis, I wrote a note to Dean O'Shauglinessy, a dignitary of the 
 Roman Catholic Church, simply asking if I might have the honour of an interview 
 with him at his leisure. This was a step I very rarely took ; and I did it in this 
 instance for two or three reasons. First, because I knew no one in Ennis ; 
 secondly, because I had heard that Dean O'Shauglinessy was one of the old class 
 of priests, and a gentleman of education and extensive information ; and, thirdly, 
 because I wanted to ascertain something about the effect of loan funds in Ennis, 
 as that was the subject on which I was going to write. The dean sent me a polite 
 note, saying he would be happy to see me at his house ; and I in consequence 
 called upon him in the evening. The dean commenced a very animated conver- 
 sation about the Repeal of the Union, which continued for upwards of an hour, 
 when a gentleman named O'Connell — (a cousin of Mr. Daniel O'ConneU's, whom 
 he styled " The Liberator") — entered the room, and went over again nearly all 
 the topics we had previously discussed. This protracted the conversation another 
 hour, when a priest joined us, and he also re-opened the same subject, which, 
 after a conversation of three hours, promising to be interminable, I rose to depart ; 
 and, on taking my leave. Dean O'Shaughnessy shook hands with me, and was 
 pleased to say, that ' ' though differing with me in opinion on the question of 
 Repeal, he esteemed it a great honour that I had called upon him." My surprise 
 may be imagined when, a week afterwards, while in Tipperary, I read a speech 
 of Mr. Daniel O'ConneU's in Conciliation Hall, stating that Dean O'Shaughnessy 
 had threatened " to kick me out of his house." I, of course, immediately took 
 the proper steps to have this invention exposed. The whole history of the affair 
 will be found, ^;o5#, in the Appendix, No. XI. ; and it is scai'cely possible to 
 imagine a more disgraceful figure than Mr. Daniel O'Cormell cuts in the trans- 
 action. He is certainly not one atom more fortunate in this his second or third 
 attempt to calumniate me than in his " John Foster" letter forgerj*. 
 
304 AN IRISn ARGUMENT. 
 
 briber be infamous, the hrlhed, who sold their country for the 
 bribe, cannot be less so, and the scene is adroitly shifted to 
 "the injustice of England in taxing Ireland to pay her 
 debt." Hint to them that for their dogs, their horses, their 
 carriages, their windows, their servants, they are untaxed, 
 that their Excise duties are comparatively low, and that their 
 incomes are free from taxation, whilst for all these things we 
 in England are dearly taxed, and as we think unjustly 
 taxed, compared with Ireland, and the scene is again 
 adroitly changed ; something Is said about the ability of 
 England to bear all this, and a fierce invective is indulged 
 in against England " for not conceding equal laws." Ask 
 in what is the inequality ? and you are told about unequal 
 representation — about the intelligence and numbers of the 
 Irish people who ought to be represented. Just hint to 
 them an equality with our 10/. householders and 50/. tenants 
 at will, and they fall back on the " poverty of Ireland," 
 which in truth is a fair measure of her intelligence ; tell 
 them that the number of her representatives being few, can- 
 not, in reality, be felt as a grievance, for, whatever their 
 number, the majority of them choose to neglect the duty en- 
 trusted to them, and you are impetuously assailed with the 
 manner In which they are treated in the House of Commons 
 — "neglected and jeered at." Why, what stuff is this? 
 What Irish member ever rose in the House of Commons, and 
 addressed himself with ability and good sense to the question 
 before it, and was not listened to with respect and attention. 
 "Jeered at" they must expect to be, if they give utterance to 
 the personalities and tom-foolerlcs which jiass current for wis- 
 dom and eloquence in Conciliation-hall. Tell tlicm this, and 
 then there is another shift ! " Irish questions arc scouted, and 
 Irish members are out-voted." Prove it as a foct that more 
 than half the time of Parliament is occupied with the discus- 
 sion of Irish questions, and that Irish members vote both 
 ways on every question as well as English members, and there 
 
AN IRISH ARGUMENT. 305 
 
 is anotlier sliift to — " What do we want to do with discuss- 
 ing English questions, or questions about Jamaica, or India, 
 or Australia. It is enough for us to govern Ireland." Tell 
 them that it is unworthy of them to shun participation in the 
 councils of the empire, and to prefer the littleness of a parish 
 vestry — the hubbub of an Irish house of assembly, overridden 
 as it must be by the authority of the British Parliament — to 
 equal participation in that authority, and you arrive at 
 length at that which ends every Irish grievance — a com- 
 plaint at non-participation in Government patronage — in the 
 " loaves and fishes " of sinecures and snug berths. Here the 
 profitless talk has an end; it can get no further. "The 
 murder is out," at last. It ends in a job — an Irish job. 
 The "infamy of England," "justice to Ireland," "equal 
 laws," " equal representation," and all the other hackneyed 
 topics, which are repeated, parrot-like, without a single ar- 
 gument to defend them, all seem founded in this last shift 
 to which we eventually arrive — give us pay. Whatever, how- 
 ever, may be the motives of these leaders, whether they be 
 mercenary, or whether they feel compelled " to follow the 
 impulse of the joopular wave," or not, it is but too true that 
 the mass of the people are existing in a condition which is a 
 good cause of complaint, and upon this fact do the leaders 
 of this absurd Repeal outcry found their influence. In 
 attempting to arrest this pernicious agitation the Government 
 will act wisely first to set about removing the causes of com- 
 plaint which exist, and agitators and agitation will die of in- 
 anition. " I believe it possible," says Burke, " for men to be 
 mutinous and seditious who feel no grievance ; but no man 
 will assert seriously that when people are of a turbulent 
 spirit, the best way to keep them in order is to furnish them 
 with something substantial to complain of." 
 
 Passing, however, from this fruitless topic, I wish to draw 
 attention to a subject about which much evidence has been 
 
 X 
 
306 EFFECT OF LOAN FUNDS. 
 
 given, and about which there appears to be various opinions, 
 — I alkide to the ahnost universal system of money-lending 
 and to the habit of subsisting on credit, wliich prevail amongst 
 the peasantry of this country. No doubt, tlie necessities of the 
 people lead them in many cases to resort to this kind of ex- 
 pensive relief; but the prevailing habit of never thinking of 
 to-morrow so long as they get over to-day — the want of 
 forethought, has more to do with it. A more strange mix- 
 ture than your genuine Irishman it is difficult to conceive. 
 ISTo man will higgle more for 6fZ., will part with money when 
 he has it with less facility, or be more backward to lay out 
 any sum for any useful or profitable object whatever. He 
 is great at a hard bargain ; still greater at a job in which he 
 supposes he has effectually " done" you. He will take as 
 much jjains and resort to as many devices to win 5/. by a 
 job as would win him 50/. by straightforward enterprise 
 and industry. Yet, with all this hardfistedness, lie will 
 blindly agree to pay cent, per cent, for the loan of money, 
 which \fhe pa?/s will bring him to ruin; and, as he is gene- 
 rally compelled to pay, this is a never failing source of liti- 
 gation and heartburnings. 
 
 This fondness of liard bargains and readiness to grasp at 
 present advantages, even at the risk of future ruin, gave 
 rise to a class of extortioners Avho pass by the name of 
 " Gombeen" men, or meal-mongers. The word "Gombeen" 
 simply means usurer or extortioner ; but the sale of meal or 
 'oats Avas the usual medium of evading the usury laws, and 
 of exacting the most enormous interest. Every village had 
 its " Gombeen" man ; for, if a man saved 20/., his fondness 
 for hard bargains and exorbitant gains made him invariably 
 turn usurer, though the 20/. laid out with intelligence and 
 industry on his undrained and wretchedly cultivated farm 
 would render him a more than equal, and far more certain 
 return. The absolute ignorance of the mass of the })eople 
 
EFFECT OF LOAN FUNDS. 307" 
 
 as to the commercial value of monev made them the Avillino^ 
 dupes of any amount of extortion.* 
 
 These " Gombeen" men, however, had their trade in- 
 jured by the competition of private loan societies, which, 
 though charging exorbitant interest, were still more reason- 
 able than the unconscionable usurer. And again, these pri- 
 vate loan societies have been ]nade more reasonable in tlieir 
 charges by the establishment of public loan funds, having 
 for their object the benefit of the poor rather than private 
 interest, although it is very questionable whether, on the 
 whole, they have benefited the poor. 
 
 The private loan funds generally exact \s. in the pound, 
 interest, the money lent being repaid by weekly instalments 
 of Is. in the pound, with fines of 6d. or Is. on non-payment 
 of a week's instalment. Other charges for fees run up the 
 rate of interest to some 30 or 40 per cent, for this accommo- 
 dation, letting alone the loss of time, and injury they inflict. 
 A man would often lose a day a week in paying his instal- 
 ment. 
 
 In some cases, as at Sligo, a much fairer plan of loan fund' 
 has been adopted, and 6d. in the pound interest is charged 
 for money lent upon a stamped promissory note, in which 
 two sureties join, without any fines. This costs the borrower 
 
 * " For example, numerous cases have since become kno»m to me, where a- 
 poor man, from a miss-crop, loss of cattle, health, or any other cause, has been 
 obliged to buy on trust, as they term it. He is then charged from thirty to fort/ 
 per cent, more for the article he wants than the market price. When this payment 
 becomes due, it most commonly happens the debtor has no means of paying. To- 
 remedy this, a new transaction takes place, and he is obliged to buy a cow or a 
 pig, meal, potatoes, or anything the usurer has to dispose of thirty or forty per 
 cent, above the market price a second time, and this he sells for the most he can 
 get, brmging back the produce of the sale to pay his first engagement. And so it 
 goes on, the usurer getting his victim deeper and deeper in debt, whilst, by 
 occasional payments on account, labour work, and often gettmg a portion of his 
 land to crop, he has been himself paid twice over the real value of anything he had 
 sold." — Preface to Mr. Slacker's Essay on the Improvement of Small Farms, 
 p. 6. 
 
 X ? 
 
308 EFFECT OF LOAN FUNDS. 
 
 about 10 or 12 per cent., and realizes 6 per cent, to the 
 lender, whilst a system is adopted of sending a card to mark 
 off the weekly payment, which a cliild may carry. This 
 lessens the evil of loss of time, and in the town is said to 
 have effected good, enabling a poor man to purchase a cow 
 with the loan, the weekly interest of which is paid by the 
 milk she yields, and at the end of twenty weeks the poor 
 man has gained the cow. In tlie country, however, it has 
 worked injuriously, and the farmers' wives, in order to pay 
 the weekly 5s. interest on 51. borrowed, perhaps to pay their 
 rent, are often compelled to sell a lump of butter below its 
 value to some neighbour to raise the 5s. The extent to 
 which this has been carried has given rise to an inferior 
 article in butter, termed " boxy" butter, or butter of various 
 qualities, bought in this way, and made up in firkins. 
 
 The principal loan funds, however, now existing are the 
 Irish Reproductive Loan Fund, and the Central Loan Fund, 
 each of which have many branches. 
 
 The Irish Reproductive Loan Fund takes its rise from an 
 unappropriated charitable fund raised in England in the 
 years 1821 and 1822 to relieve the starving Irish, who were 
 visited with a dreadful fainine from the failure of their potato 
 crop. In those years much reviled England subscribed 
 304,000/. to relieve the tlien starving Irish. About 60,000/. 
 however, remained in the hands of the committee una]ipro- 
 priated, when the ensuing harvest brought abundance, and 
 40,000Z. of this sum was appropriated to the establishment 
 of loan funds in the several counties in which the distress 
 had prevailed. This money is lent to trustees in each 
 county at 2 per cent., who let it out to sub-committees of 
 gentlemen in sums of 100/., to be by tliem re-issued to the 
 peasantry in sums not exceeding 10/., payable by weekly, 
 monthly, or quarterly repayments, witli interest at the rate 
 of 4(1. in tlie pound. In the county of Galvvay, Avhere this 
 fund has been well managed by the gentry, I am assured it 
 
EFFECT OF LOAN FUNDS. 309 
 
 has been productive of much benefit, especially in the towns. 
 — The Central Loan Fund is established in Dublin, by Act 
 of Parliament, under a central board, the object of which 
 was to restrain the almost innumerable private loan funds 
 which existed. The Act of Parliament under which this 
 loan fund was established authorizes persons to lend money 
 on debentures to trustees acting under the central board. 
 The owners of the debentures receive five per cent, for their 
 monej^ which forms a fund to be lent out in small loans, for 
 which 4d. in the pound interest is charged. The amount 
 borrowed is repaid by weekly instalments, and fines for non- 
 payment are authorized, and the money is recoverable on 
 summons before a magistrate, and on a decree is levied by 
 the police. 
 
 In a Vv'ork on this subject, published in 1 839, under the 
 odd title of " A Circular to the Ladies," it is said that there 
 are above six hundred loan societies in Ireland, two hundred 
 of which only have been enrolled by the barrister under the 
 Loan Fund Board. I had the opportunity, through the 
 politeness of Mr. C. Strickland, the secretary, of examining 
 the working of one of these loan funds at Ballagaderreen, 
 near Castlerea, Roscommon. Generally, in the neighbour- 
 hood of the towns, it appeared to have been beneficial. The 
 extent, however, to which the system of borrowing money is 
 carried is almost inconceivable. I have before me the Report 
 of the lietterkenny Loan Fund Society, from which it ap- 
 pears that, " in the village of Conwall there is rather more' 
 than one loan to every family, or one loan to every Jive of the 
 population,'^ whilst, in twelve months, ending 1841, every 
 family in Conwall had lent to it 4/. IO5. Igd., or \Qs. Q^d. to 
 each soul of the population." Several other similar in- 
 stances are given. 
 
 I will now give you a few quotations from the evidence 
 taken before Lord Devon's Land Commission, selected out 
 of a vast number which I have before me of precisely similar 
 
310 EFFECT OF LOAN FUNDS. 
 
 character, from the general hearing of which it will he seen 
 that, on the whole, loan funds are thought to effect more 
 mischief than good. In the country this evidence is remark- 
 ably unanimous ; in the towns opportunities are often 
 afforded of deriving a greater profit from the loan than the 
 interest demanded, and with pi-ndence in the individual these 
 societies have often produced heneficial effects. 
 
 With regard to local usurers, or "Gombeen" men, Mr. 
 Patrick M'Keon, solicitor and attorney, of Drumshambo, 
 Leitrim, says (Appendix, Part 2, page 253), — 
 
 "I consider the local usurers the great curse of the couiitrj'. Suppose 
 a poor farmer required one cwt. of meal when the season got ad\anced, 
 and it was selling for cash in the market at 13*. ; the local usurer wciild 
 require an I O U for 1/. At tlirce months after that he might sue for it, 
 and the unfortunate person who had given it him was obliged to give liini 
 5s. or 6*. interest, and give him another I O U, and so continue till he 
 had paid several pounds. This came before the Court, and I have known 
 other instances where 13.y. Avas given, and 6s. 8d. charged for a half-year 
 for the 13.y., and so on continuing, processing the unfortunate defendant 
 imtil I have known very often 30.v. paid for that ISs." 
 
 Mr. George Cecil Wray, farmer of Ardnamona, near 
 Donegal, says (p. 167), — 
 
 " Much of the poverty and distress in this district, and indeed all the 
 north of Ireland with which I am acquainted, may be attributed to the 
 local usurers and meal sellers, who charge exorbitant interest, never less 
 than 25 per cent., and I have frequently known instances of cent, per 
 cent, being given." 
 
 Mr. James Simpson, farmer of Sligo, says (p. 223), — 
 
 " The system of usury in my county is carried to a very awful extent. 
 I have known hundreds of instances of a person borroAving 4/., and giving 
 a rood of his prime tillage-land, his potato-soil, as interest for the 4/. till 
 it would be repaid : and I have known instances of its running on for ten 
 years before it was paid." 
 
 Mr. John O'Donncll, of Letterhilly, Vice-Chairman of the 
 Board of Guardians, near Glenties, Donegal, says (p. 148), — 
 
EFFECT OF LOAN FUNDS. 311 
 
 " There are no loan funds in the district ; local usurers only. In many 
 instances the rate of mtcrest they charge comes up to 300 per cent." 
 
 Mr. John Davis, of French-park, m the county of Ros- 
 common, says (p. 360), — 
 
 " There is a large farmer in this district ; he brings a hag of corn into 
 the market, and this is the way he carries on his usury : — A man comes 
 to buy his bag of corn ; he charges him 305. for it ; he then takes his 
 I O U for SOs. ; he can recover upon that at any moment, or issue his 
 civil bill upon it. As soon as he gets his note, he buj^s the same bag of 
 corn from the same party at 20*. ; and that same bag of corn Avill go 
 through forty or fifty hands in that way, and that is the way he makes 
 his money." 
 
 Regarding the effect of loan funds generally, Mr. Thomas 
 Bailey, guardian of the Clones Union, Fermanagh, says 
 (Ibid. p. 127),— 
 
 " I am a great advocate for the loan fund; it has been the making of a 
 great number of people. I think it a very useful institution. There are 
 many things which blacken the other side ; but my opinion is, it is most 
 advantageous to the country Avhen properly conducted." 
 
 Mr. J. P. Hamilton, of Oakfield, Fermanagh, says 
 (Ibid. p. 130),— 
 
 " I am not an advocate for loan funds ; they are a good tiling for pru- 
 dent people, but it is difficult to get i^rudcnt people among the lower 
 orders." 
 
 Messrs. M'Manus and James Smith, tenants, are asked by 
 the Land Commissioners at Cavan (App. Part 2, p. 105), — 
 
 " Does the tenant depend upon the loan fund or local usurers for assist- 
 ance in the paying of his rent? — A great number do. It is utterly 
 ruinous to them; it is the only thing that is ruining them." 
 
 Mr. J. E. Taylor, magistrate of Fermanagh and Tyrone, 
 agent for Sir Arthur Brooke's estate, says (Ibid. p. 141), — 
 
 " The under tenants, cottiers, and labourers, resort to the loan funds 
 most extensively, but not the larger tenants. 
 
 " What is your opinion of the system of advance by the loan funds? — 
 I believe it is the curse of the country; the labour of all the under clasres 
 is mortgaged to them, and all the little property they have." 
 
312 EFFECT OF LOAN FUNDS. 
 
 Mr. T. Kernaghan, merchant and landowner of Ennis- 
 killen and Sligo, says (p. 145), — 
 
 " I think the great curse of the whole of this country is this most 
 dreadful loan fund system. If I was to stop here till night, I could not 
 describe to you the injury and harm they have done ; they have nearly 
 ruined the country ; their fines and penalties beat anything." 
 
 Mr. J. M'Gan, farmer of Sheepwalk, Roscommon, says 
 (p. 227),- 
 
 *' I think the sj^stem of loan funds will be the ruin of the countrj', and 
 min the small farmers. They not only pay an interest of twenty per 
 cent., but they lose an immensity of time — several days ; and then they 
 are obliged to pay it back in twenty payments, which must be very inju- 
 rious to them, if they knew the value of their time." 
 
 The Rev. J. Kearney, the parish priest of Kilkenny West, 
 says (p. 331),— 
 
 " I have come to the opinion, and I think it is well-founded, after an 
 observation of fifteen years, that loan funds are destructive to all classes 
 Tvho dabble in them, except the tradesmen in the towns. A very small 
 loan fund in my parish has produced most calamitous effects, in waste of 
 time, and improvident expenditure of Avhat was got at a high rate of in- 
 terest, and which appeared to be treated rather as a gift :* A person 
 comes with two different securities three different days before he gets a 
 loan of 2/. ; then he has the expenses of those persons to pay and to treat 
 them, and tlie loss of his own time too, and it would be 30 or 40 per cent, 
 if all Avas calculated." 
 
 Mr. James Shannon, firmer, of Craggaknock, county of 
 Clare (Ibid. p. 706), gives the following table of costs for 
 borrowinir \L from a loan fund : — 
 
 * Tlie Letterkenny Loan Fund Society, in their fourth Annual Report, state, on 
 the subject of "Repayments:" — "The Committee have, as uSual, continued 
 rigidly to enforce the regulations on this subject ; they have, however, still cause 
 to regret that, in doing so during the past year, they have had occasion to ajiply 
 for one hundred and seven summonses and eighty-nine warrants, for the recovery 
 of 199/. 4.V. Id. ; and although this number, compared with that of the former 
 year, and as contrasted with the greater number and amount of loans for the 
 present year, shows a decided improvement in this resi)ect, yet it falls short of 
 what they hope to see as the result of subsequent years." 
 
EFFECT OF LOAN FUNDS. 313 
 
 1 . An application 
 
 To a day's work, going for ditto 
 
 2. To two sureties and self, three days' work lost 
 
 3. Work to sui'eties, two days to each for being so 
 
 4. To subsistence to self and sureties, when money is got 
 
 5. To twenty messengers, at Id. per ]^day, going to bank 
 
 with money 
 Interest 
 
 s. 
 
 d. 
 
 
 
 2 
 
 
 
 6 
 
 1 
 
 6 
 
 2 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 8 
 
 
 
 6 
 
 7 4 
 
 Oii€ good effect, however, produced by the loan funds 
 generally lias been to decrease and knock up the trade of the 
 local usurers, though very many of these harpies still exist. 
 
 In some instances I have met with great abuse through the 
 instrumentality of the loan funds. Tenants who cannot pay 
 their rents to the day are often urged to go to the loan funds 
 by the smaller landlords and agents. They have, of course, 
 a high rate of interest varying from 10 to 40 per cent., to 
 pay on the amount of their rent, which they borrow ; and, if 
 they cannot pay, then the loan fund officers drive them and 
 force them to pay, whilst the landlord, who has pocketed the 
 money, cunningly escapes the odium of distressing his tenant, 
 which is thrown on the loan fund. In all these cases as the 
 money borrowed is not turned to advantage, the loan funds 
 act most injuriously. Wherever, however, the money 
 borrowed can be turned to advantage, as in towns, and there 
 is ordinary prudence, they seem to be beneficial, in teaching 
 the people the commercial value of money, of which they 
 seem entirely and absurdly ignorant, and in leading them into 
 industrious habits. Very much of the apathy and indifference 
 which mark the Irish labourer in his own country may, I 
 think, be traced to the fact that he rarely handles money. 
 His year's labour is often bought with an acre of con-ac]'e 
 land for his potatoes. For this he will often w^ork a wdiole 
 year for a farmer, " riding the dead horse," and wiping out 
 
314 EFFECT OF LOAN FUNDS. 
 
 his debt. He rarely feels the stimulus of present reward, 
 and he is unused to consider the relative value of money and 
 how it can he best laid out. This may account for the 
 absurd value which he often attaches to the most trumpery 
 article, and for the folly with wdiich he often w^astes money 
 when he has it. In Galway I was assured that so little do 
 the people know the commercial value of money, they are 
 constantly in the habit of pawning it. I Avas so incredulous 
 of this that the gentleman who informed me wished me to go 
 with him to any pawnbroker to assure myself of the fact ; and 
 I Avent with him and another gentleman to a pawnbroker's 
 shop kept by Mr. Murray, in Galway. On asking the 
 question the shopman said it was quite a common thing to 
 have money paAvned, and he produced a drawer containing a 
 lOZ. Bank of Ireland note, pawned six months ago for IO5. ; 
 a 305. note of the National Bank, pawned for IO5. ; a 30^. 
 Bank of Ireland note, pawned for \s.\ a \l. Provincial 
 Bank-note pawned for C5., and a guinea in gold, of the reign 
 of George III., pawned for 155. two months ago. Anything 
 more childishly ignorant and absurd than this it is scarcely 
 possible to conceive. The 10/. bank-note would produce Qs.Q)d. 
 interest in the year if put into the savings-bank, whilst the 
 owner who pledged it for 10s. will have to pay Is. 6d. a year for 
 the lOs., and lose the interest on his 10/. ; in other words, he 
 will pay 90 per cent, through ignorance, for the use of lO*-., 
 which he might have for nothing, and realize besides some 
 5,9. or 6s. for the use of his 9/. 10s. Mr. Murray told me, that 
 often money was sold as a forfeited pledge ; that a man 
 would pawn a guinea for 15s., keep it in pledge till the 
 interest amounted to 3s. or 4s., and then refuse to redeem 
 it.=* 
 
 * Tliis statement, after being thoroughly sifted, and, I have no hesitation in 
 affirming, on its being found to be literally accurate in every particular, was 
 contradicted, in a jocular style, by a Galway newspaper, in this way, that " I was 
 not the man for Galway," and tliat Murray, the j)awnbroker, had famously deceived 
 
EFFECT OF LOAN FUNDS. 315 
 
 Anything whicli will teach people the use of money, and 
 j^revent them wasting their substance in this absurd way, 
 must benefit them. Like children, however, they require 
 protection, and it would be the greatest boon to them for the 
 Legislature to stringently enforce the usury laws, and prevent 
 the more knowing amongst them robbing and imposing on 
 their poorer and more ignorant neighbours. 
 
 me. I need not say that, with the name of the pawnbroker, and every particular, 
 the editor of the Galway paper might have satisfied himself of the veracity of the 
 statement — as I have no doubt he did : but, finding he could hazard no well-founded 
 contradiction, he thus tried to get over the fact. When I state that the rector of 
 Galway and a landed proprietor of the neighbourhood were with me, and saw the 
 notes in jiawn, as I did, I have said enough to establish the fact. It is, however, 
 extraordinary that the press of Ireland seems to imagine that it gains honour by 
 deceiving the public and subverting the truth. I make no doubt but thousands 
 believed that I had been famously gulled. In fact, I was told so on one or two 
 occasions, with an air of as great glee, as if there was something very creditable 
 in such a feat. I merely, however, repeat, that every irord of this statement, 
 absurd as it may seem, is literally true. I was called on subsequently to notice 
 these coptradictions, in the Letter, post, dated Kenmai'e. 
 
316 LIMERICK AND ITS TRADE. 
 
 LETTER XXI. 
 
 LIMERICK AND ITS TRADE. — THE PROFITS OF GOOD 
 CULTIVATION. 
 
 Description of I^imerick and its Trade — The Women of Limerick — The Profit 
 ■which Tenants would be certam to derive by exerting themselves to Improve 
 their Cultivation, whether their Rents were raised or not — Calculation showing 
 the Expense and Profit of brmging an Acre of Land into Cultivation, and the 
 Value of the Crops during four years of the usual Unimproved System of 
 Husbandry — The Result of such a System of Cultivation in raising the Peasantry 
 above want. 
 
 Limerick, October 23. 
 "Without entering- into any lengthened description of the 
 city of Limerick, it will he enough, perhaps, to state, that it 
 is a large, well built, and evidently a thriving town. It 
 possesses wide and straight streets — the first instance I have 
 yet met with of this being the character of any town in the 
 west of Ireland — many handsome public buildings, some 
 manufactories of lace, gloves, and brushes, most extensive 
 flower-mills, and a very large " pig factory," as it is called, 
 at which about 1,000,000 pigs a year are slaughtered. The 
 Shannon, which is here a magnificent river, passes through 
 the town, wdiich is built on either side of its banks. A 
 handsome bridge, designed l^y Nimmo, and several otlier 
 bridges, connect each portion of the town. A good deal of 
 shipping and small craft find sufficient commerce for employ- 
 ment, and the one dock wliich exists is very inadequate for 
 
LIMERICK AND ITS TRADE. 317 
 
 tlie trade. A number of men are seen idling about tlie streets, 
 who might, it is said, obtain work at Is. a day, which they 
 refuse ; still, however, an air of commercial activity and 
 prosperity pervades the place. 
 
 The brush factory employs about 300 men, who receive 
 from 11. to 3O5. a week wages, and many of the brushes are 
 sent to London. When it is considered that 14 lb. of potatoes 
 may be purchased for 2d. or 3d., according to the market, 
 and that this is the chief food, this rate of wages is high^ as 
 compared with that in most English towns. 
 
 The lace factories give employment to about 1,000 girls; 
 the most extensive of these factories — that carried on by 
 Messrs. Greaves — employs 240 girls, who receive on an 
 average 3s. 6d. a week each. Very beautiful lace is made at 
 this factory, on an invention of the proprietors, for which they 
 obtained a prize of a silver medal at the exhibition of Irish 
 manufactures in 1844 ; it is similar in appearance to the 
 finest Brussels lace, and Her Majesty is said to have obtained 
 several specimens of it. 
 
 The " pig factory," and the extensive flour-mills of Messrs. 
 Russell, also give a great amount of emplo3'ment and 
 encouragement to trade. The g-love manufacture is falling 
 
 O o o 
 
 off, from the gloves manufactured not maintaining their 
 former character. 
 
 The town and county of Limerick have also obtained 
 much celebrity for their pretty women. I had the oppor- 
 tunity yesterday of being present at a charitable bazaar 
 held in the town, and certainly the number of handsome 
 women and the female beauty assembled there, maintained 
 this character, and fully equalled in these respects any simi- 
 lar assemblage which I have seen in any part of England. 
 This affords me an opportunity, though it is scarcely worth 
 while, to answer one slander which has been industri- 
 ously propagated on every possible occasion by "the 
 Liberator," as he is fantastically termed by his party, to get 
 
318 THE PROFITS OF 
 
 up a prejudice against me, by asserting that I had accused 
 the women of Ireland of being " ugly." There are those 
 with whom such an assertion may have a certain influence, 
 and therefore it was made. The man, however, who unblush- 
 ingly dared to slander the women of England en masse by 
 accusing them of being unchaste, was the last man, one would 
 have thought, to forget his own glass windows when he threw 
 this stone,* even had I made the broad assertion that "the 
 women of Ireland were ugly," which I need not tell you I 
 never did. In an early letter from Enniskillen I drew a 
 comparison between the appearance of the counties of Fer- 
 managh and Leitrim, and also between the people, of those 
 two counties, the contrast in both respects having forcibly 
 struck me at the time. In one county was dirt, disorder, 
 wretched poverty, rags, and the rudest system of cultivation ; 
 and the people, both men and Avomen, seemed generally under- 
 sized and plain. In Fermanagh the country was infinitely 
 improved — there were generally cleanliness and order, and 
 the people, both men and women, Avere well dressed, tall and 
 good-looking.t It was " not convenient" however, to " the 
 Liberator" to state all this ; but by a process of reasoning, or 
 rather broad unfounded assertion, which tells "mighty well" 
 before the audience at Conciliation-hall, he extracted out of 
 is that I had said, that " the women of Ireland were ugly.";}: 
 
 * It has, however, been wittily remarked that, since the Derrynane Beg 
 exposure (which will be found, pout), it is proved that this gentleman has got no 
 glass windows. 
 t See ante, p. 44. 
 
 J Mr. Joseph Hume (a 2>^'o(ege, by the way, of the " Liberator"), on one 
 elebrated occasion, with that clearness of argument which distinguishes him, 
 volunteered to prove the soundness of his views by expressing his readiness to 
 vote that "black was white." Bishop Whateley, in his Treatise on Logic, has 
 given an exanii)le, under the head of " False Logic," how it may be proved. 
 Thus,— 
 
 " White is a colour; 
 Black is a colour ; therefore, 
 Black is white." 
 
GOOD CULTIVATION. 319 
 
 In my letter of to-day, I wish to draw your attention to an 
 excuse which is ahnost universally made by the tenants for 
 not improving their land and cultivating it properly, and to 
 show to them its folly. In conversing with the tenants in 
 almost every part of Ireland where I have yet been, the 
 usual complaints are against high rents, want of tenure, and 
 want of encouragement on the part of the landlords. If you 
 ask a tenant who is loud in these complaints, and who is evi- 
 dently steeped in poverty, and who therefore apparently has 
 truth to back him, why he leaves one-half of his farm un- 
 drained, iintrenched, unimproved, and in the most wretched 
 state of cultivation, you are quite certain to be met with the 
 reply, " Sure, who should I improve for ? My landlord 
 would raise my rent directly, and if I could not pay it, he 
 would turn me out, and another would get my farm that I 
 had improved. Sure, wouldn't I be ruining myself by im- 
 proving, and be only benefiting the landlord ?" Not only have 
 I continually heard this from the tenants, but scores of times 
 from the Roman Catholic priests, who, surely, ought to know 
 better. Often and often I have tried to convince them in 
 vain of the truth of that common sum in arithmetic, that 
 " three and two make five ;" — that if the tenant, by improv- 
 ing his land, can make it yield a profit of ol. the acre, where 
 it yielded no profit at all before ; and taking them on their 
 
 By the same process of logic, 1 presume, the " Liberator" arrived at his "ugly" 
 conclusion. Thus, — 
 
 " The women of Leitrim, per se, are plain ; 
 
 The women of Leitrim are the women of Ireland ; therefore, 
 
 Tlie women of Ireland are ' ugly.' " 
 
 This is really a vei-y excellent sample of the manner in which this gentleman treats 
 the reason of his auditors. If they like being thus gulled, on the principle which 
 Hudibras has laid down, that — 
 
 " Sure the pleasure is as great 
 In being cheated, as to cheat." 
 
 So long as it is in a harmless matter like this, few will begrudge them the 
 luxury. 
 
320 THE PROFITS OF 
 
 own ground, and supposing the worst, that the landlord did 
 immediately raise their rent from 5s. to 21. an acre ; still, 
 if they put a balance of 31. into their jjockets by the im- 
 provement, it was clearly their advantage to improve, eveu 
 though that which they seem so terribly afraid of should 
 take place, and their hard landlords (assuming them to be 
 such) should increase their rentals, and profit 21. by the im- 
 provement. 
 
 It may be of advantage to point this clearly out, and to 
 prove the fact by figures and evidence. In one of my early 
 letters from Donegal, relating to a piece of land at Pettigo, 
 I showed that a piece of land which before was worthless, on 
 being properly cultivated left a jirofit of 81. per annum on 
 an average of three years. Deduct the most exorbitant rent 
 you please, or which any landlord would have the conscience 
 to impose, from this, say 3^. an acre, still you have the tenant 
 putting 51. a year into his pocket over and above the rent, 
 as the reward of his improvement, from land which before 
 was worth nothing to him. 
 
 In the second part of the evidence given before Lord 
 Devon's Commission, page 168, Mr. G. C. Wray, a large 
 farmer of Ardnamona, near Donegal, says, " I consider that 
 the cost of reclaiming moor-land, where limestone is abun- 
 dant, and a proper fall for drainage exists, icould he repaid in 
 every case hy the second crop" and he gives instances to prove 
 this. 
 
 Mr. Alexander Thompson, a magistrate and landed pro- 
 prietor of Ballynahinch, in Galway, gives an instance of the 
 cost of reclaiming an acre of mountain and deep bog-land, 
 and of the value of the produce, the first year. He says 
 {ihid. page 463) — "The whole cost of an acre of potatoes 
 which I am growing this year, the reclaiming, enclosing, 
 open draining, manuring, and seeds, and everything else, is 
 about 10/. ; I think I will have them got in for IIZ. IO5. the 
 acre, including everything." That acre of land he estimates 
 
GOOD CULTIVATION. [321 
 
 produced ten tons of potatoes, " which at 3d. the stone 
 would be about 20Z." Here, then, was a profit of 8/. lOs. 
 the first year.* Suppose a tenant farmer had done this, and 
 his landlord had put on the most exorbitant rent because of 
 the improvement, say 3Z. an acre, still the tenant would put 
 bl. \0s. into his pocket, even though his landlord did thus 
 raise his rent ; and without the improvement, even thoug^i 
 his rent was but 5s. an acre, he would scarcely realise any 
 profit at all.'f' 
 
 On passing through the county of Clare to this town I had 
 the opportunity of seeing some judicious improvements 
 which have been effected by Mr. David John Wilson, of 
 Belvoir, on his estate, in draining and subsoiling, and in 
 
 * This statement was treated with an air of ridicule by one of the Dublin 
 newspapers — the Freeman's Journal — and it was asked why I did not give tie 
 profit of such land the second year ? It is enough to say that this is a fact deposed 
 to by a respectable witness on oath ; and every man who knows anything of bog 
 cultivation knows that the second crop is always a heavier one than the first, 
 because the soil is pulverized and improved by the mLxing and digging it has 
 obtained. 
 
 f "Adjoining the buildings of the steward on the estate is the model farm, 
 consisting of sixteen statute acres, and where, upon a piece of pure bog only two 
 years reclaimed, we were shown as fine Swedish turnips as could be found in the 
 fertile barony of Cork. Mangels, rape, potatoes, and vetches are also flourishing 
 in the same description of land." — Visit to the Gleneask Estate of the Irish 
 Waste Land Improvement Society, by Major Ludlow Beamish, of Cork. 
 
 After the delivery of Mr. Smith's (of Deanston) lecture on furrow-draining-, 
 during the meeting of the Royal Agricultural Improvement Society of Ireland, at 
 Cork, it was stated by a gentleman who had known Mr. Smith's j^roperty, that 
 though it was noiu worth 4/. an acre, it was not worth more than 2*. 6f?. before the 
 improvements he spoke of, in draining and subsoiling, had been carried into effect. 
 
 " This last winter," says the author of a pamphlet advocating the establishment 
 of a National Land Draining Company, — " I have drained about thirty acres of 
 land, statute measure, the drains three feet deep, and at a distance of one rod, or 
 sixteen and a half feet ; and in order to procure stones to fill the drains, the soil 
 was trenched seventeen inches deep with the spade. The expense of the two 
 operations combined was about 8/. per acre, which I feel certain will be repaid by 
 the two first green crops ; and the land, which had been formerly under the 
 plough, and had been also limed and partially drained, so as to render it worth a 
 rent of 20s. per acre, will be now better worth 32s. dd. to 35.y. per acre ; so that, 
 after all the outlay incurred has been paid back, there will be a permanent addition 
 to the rental effected of seventy or seventy-five per cent." 
 
 Y 
 
322 THE PROFITS OF 
 
 "building for his tenantry a better description of cottage* 
 This gentleman, though spending from 400/. to 500Z. a year 
 in improvements, from 200Z. to 2001. of which is appro- 
 priated to paying his tenants to drain and subsoil their lands 
 at so much per perch, has found the greatest difficulty in in- 
 ducing his tenants to change their old mode of cultivation. 
 Every such step taken by any landlord is viewed with sus- 
 picion by the tenantry ; they look on it only as a means of 
 increasing the rents, and never for a moment consider the 
 benefits which they themselves will derive from it, even 
 though their rents are increased. Mr. Wilson's plan, after 
 thus improving a farm chiefly at his own expense, is to add 
 one-half of the increased value to the original rent agreed 
 on, as a repayment to him for the outlay of his capital, the 
 other half going to the benefit of his tenants. In conse- 
 quence, however, of compelling his tenants to follow an im- 
 proved system of cultivation, this gentleman has already re- 
 ceived one or two notices that he will he shot.*' 
 
 Whilst at Belvoir I obtained a calculation, which was de- 
 rived from the tenantry themselves, as to the cost of im- 
 pi'oving an acre of moorland and thoroughly draining it 
 with 30-inch drains at twenty-one feet apart, and cultivating 
 it for four successive years, in the manner in which the 
 tenantry, according to the best of their knowledge cidtivate 
 it, with potatoes the two first years, and oats the two follow- 
 ing, together with the produce, which, according to their 
 estimation, would be yielded, charging for the price of labour 
 
 * I am informed tliat he has, since my visit to his house, been advised to quit 
 the country for the v.inter for his jiersonal safety, and he has gone to reside in 
 Paris. It was commonly talked of in Galway, that he was certain to be nhot 
 before the winter was over. I drove with him to an evening party some four 
 miles from his house ; and such is the painful state of ajiprchension to which 
 men are continually reduced in parts of Ireland, that he went armed with pistols, 
 though but going to visit his next neighbour. Nor was this an unnecessary 
 precaution. A small landlord in his neighbourhood was shot dead in his gig a 
 short time before. 
 
GOOD CULTIVATION. 323 
 
 and for every expense, and estimating the produce at a low 
 rate. The country around Bel voir is generally thin, poor 
 moorland. My object in obtaining this valuation was to 
 show the folly of the excuse for apathy and want of exertion 
 on the part of the tenants, which I again heard here as else- 
 where — that the rent would be raised if they improved their 
 land, and they would be no better off. I wished also to take 
 their own valuation and estimate of both cost and produce, 
 and their own mode of cultivation (which every agriculturist 
 will see at once is not the best) in order to prove, on their 
 own showing, the inexcusable apathy of not improving, and 
 the absurdity of their excuse. In the following estimate the 
 price of labour is charged at the full rate ; spread over a 
 little time, the tenant and his family would themselves be 
 able to accomplish this labour, so that it loould cost tJiem 
 notJiing, and would in fact leave nothing but the cost of lime 
 and seed to pay for. 
 
 The outside rent of tlie moorland unimproved is, say 55. 
 the Irish acre ; and the tenants agreed that they could 
 barely get this value out of it for rough grazing. I will 
 now show what they agreed it would cost to improve it, and 
 what the produce vfould be, accoi'ding to the general crops.* 
 
 * " When you have once attained to such a degree of prosperity as to be 
 possessed of stock, be assured there is nothing wanting but industry and sobriety 
 to insure your future comfort and independence, and also such a gradual accumu- 
 lation of property as will enable you to provide for your children without applying 
 to the miserable resource of dividing your farm (already, perhaps, too small) 
 among them, thereby making paupers of your entire family ; and let no one be 
 discouraged from commencing to raise gresn crops, if he has the means of doing 
 £0, by the consideration that he has not a cow to get the benefit of them. 
 
 " Supposing he is so poor as to be unable to buy a cow, still there are few who 
 have their health, and are inclined to be industrious, who cannot raise the price of 
 one, two, or three pigs, on which these crops will, in a little time, produce such 
 an improvement that, in the common course of things, before manj"- months, he 
 will be enabled to purchase the cow he was in want of, which he would most 
 likely not have been able to get in any way. Vetches, clover, and cabbage are 
 excellent feeding for growing pigs, and would soon augment their value to the 
 amount required ; and if this plan of getting a cow fail, he will seldom be dis- 
 appointed (whilst the system of farming now in practice continues) in getting the 
 
 Y 2 
 
324 
 
 THE PROFITS OF 
 
 First Year. — Draining, trenching, and bringing in the 
 land, and sowing it with potatoes : — 
 
 Paring and burning, 30 men or days, at 10c?. 
 Digging and spreading ashes, 24 ditto, at lOd. 
 Seed, 180 stone, at 2|c?. per stone 
 Cutting and sticking, 14 women, at 6^, 
 Trenching, &c., 18 men, at lOd. . 
 Digging the potatoes, 36 men, at lOd. 
 Picking ditto, 6 women, at 6d. 
 Lime, 40 barrels, at lOd. 
 Drains, 160 perches, at 6d. . 
 
 First year — Total expense of improving — 
 and cultivating . . . £12 
 
 Produce of first year — 
 
 12 barrels (of 96 stone) of potatoes, at 18* 
 
 £ 
 
 s. 
 
 d. 
 
 1 
 
 5 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 13 
 
 9 
 
 
 
 7 
 
 
 
 
 
 15 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 10 
 
 
 
 
 
 3 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 13 
 
 4 
 
 4 
 
 
 
 
 
 7 1 
 
 10 16 
 
 Loss first year . . . . £ 1 1 1 1 
 
 This is charging for the hibour at the highest rate, 8d. per 
 day being the current wages. Most of the labour the tenant 
 might do himself, as much of his time is unoccupied, and 
 then the expense would only be for lime and seed, or 
 31. lis. 1 <rZ., leaving him a profit on his Jirst year s crop, Xo 
 pay him for his labour, of 7Z. 4^. 11;Z. 
 Second year. — Potatoes sowing — 
 
 Re-digging, 12 men, at lOfZ. per man . 
 Seed, 160 stone, at 1\d. per stone 
 Cutting, &c., 14 women, at Qd. per woman , 
 Trenching, 12 men, at lOd. per man . 
 Second spitting, 12 men, at lOrf. per man 
 Two weedings, 8 women, at Qd. per woman 
 Digging, 40 men, at lOr/. per man 
 Picking, 8 women, at 6^/. per Avoman . 
 
 Total expense 
 
 £ s. 
 
 d. 
 
 . 10 
 
 
 
 1 10 
 
 
 
 7 
 
 
 
 10 
 
 
 
 10 
 
 
 
 4 
 
 
 
 . 1 13 
 
 4 
 
 . 4 
 
 
 
 £5 H 
 
 4 
 
 use of a cow for her keep from those who have not sufficient food for tlieir stock, 
 by which arrangement he will have milk for his family and manure for his farm." 
 — An Essay on the Improvement to be made in the Cultivation of Small Farms, 
 hy William Blacker, Esq. p. 88. 
 
GOOD CULTIVATION. 
 
 325 
 
 Produce of second year — 
 
 18 barrels of potatoes, at IS.y. per barrel 
 Profit second year 
 Third year. — Sowing with oats — 
 
 Seed, 12 stone, at 9d. per stone . 
 Trenching, 12 men, at 10c/. per man . 
 Cutting, 12 men, at lOcl. per man 
 Binding, 6 women, at 6d. per woman . 
 Stacking, &c., 4 men, at lOd. jier man 
 Threshing, 8 men, at lOd. per man 
 Cleansing, &c 
 
 Total expense .... 
 
 Produce of third year — 
 
 120 stone of oats, at 7c?. per stone 
 Straw* 
 
 £ 
 IG 
 
 s. d. 
 4 
 
 £10 15 8 
 
 
 
 9 
 
 
 
 
 
 10 
 
 
 
 
 
 10 
 
 
 
 
 
 3 
 
 
 
 
 
 3 
 
 4 
 
 
 
 6 
 
 8 
 
 
 
 2 
 
 
 
 £2 4 
 
 10 
 10 
 
 £6 
 
 
 4 
 
 Deduct expense 2 
 
 Profit of third year . . . £3 16 
 
 Fourth year — oats — 
 
 Extra expense over third year for digging 
 
 stubbles . 
 For clover and grass seed 
 
 Total expense 
 
 10 
 
 
 £3 14 
 
 * Several of these items were carped at. One gentleman in Limerick made 
 the discovery that tenants never sold their straw; that therefore this item was- 
 wrong, and the whole calculation worthless. It is qviite immaterial to the argu- 
 ment what the tenant does with his straw ; whether he sells it or consumes it on 
 the land. If he sells it, he gets the value for it in money ; if he consumes it, he 
 gets the value for it in another shape — viz., in feeding his cattle, and in manure. 
 But he still gets the value of it, and that value is therefore taken into the calculation. 
 I believe the calculation, in almost every item, to be rather below than above the 
 mark, because it was furnished by the tenants themselves. But suppose a 10*. 
 inaccuracy to be discovered in the calculation (which I do not believe to exist), 
 how far will that interfere with the principle of the argument ? Why, simply to 
 the extent of 10s. 
 
326 
 
 THE TROFITS OF 
 
 Produce of foiirtli year- 
 
 144 stone of oats, at 
 
 Id. per stone 
 
 
 
 £ s. 
 4 4 
 
 d. 
 
 
 Straw 
 
 ' • • 
 
 • 
 
 i 
 
 3 
 
 
 
 
 £7 4 
 
 
 
 Deduct expense . 
 
 year 
 
 
 
 3 14 
 
 
 
 Profit of fourth 
 
 £3 10 
 
 
 
 First year 
 
 EXPENSE. 
 
 £ 
 . 12 
 
 s. 
 
 7 
 
 d. 
 
 1 
 
 
 Second year 
 
 . 
 
 . 5 
 
 8 
 
 4 
 
 
 Third year . 
 
 . 
 
 . 2 
 
 4 
 
 
 
 
 Fourth year 
 
 
 . 3 
 
 14 
 
 
 
 
 Total 
 
 . £23 
 
 13 
 
 5 
 
 
 
 PKODUCE. 
 
 
 
 
 
 First year . 
 
 . 
 
 . 10 
 
 16 
 
 
 
 
 Second year 
 
 . 
 
 . 16 
 
 4 
 
 
 
 
 Third year . 
 
 
 . 6 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Fourth year 
 
 
 . 7 
 
 4 
 
 
 
 
 Total . 
 
 .£40 
 
 4 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 23 
 
 13 
 
 5 
 
 
 Total gain for four years . £16 10 7 
 Or 4/. 2.b'. lid. average profit per acre each year. 
 
 From this profit tliere will be to deduct rent. Now, take 
 the tenant's own argument, and suppose that for the first 
 year he paid only bs. rent for the unimproved moorland, but 
 that the landlord, seeing* the improvement and produce ob- 
 tained, immediately raised the rent. Now, a fourth of the 
 produce is a fair rent (see, on this subject more fully, the 
 evidence of the Earl of Mountcashel before the Land Com- 
 missioners, Appendix, Part III , p. 148,*) therefore this im- 
 proved land would bear to pay U. rent. But suppose the 
 
 * This will be found, post, in the Appendi.v to this volume, No. 4. 
 
GOOD CULTIVATION'. 327 
 
 landlord was, in every respect, a hard landlord, and he 
 raised the rent from 5s. the acre to 305, for the improved 
 land, which is here a very high rent for such land, — in fact 
 not obtained, — then the result would be — 
 
 £ s. d. 
 
 First year's rent 050 
 
 Three following years at 30s 4 10 
 
 County cess, poor-rates, and tithe rentcharge, 
 estimated at As. per year 16 
 
 5 11 
 The account will then stand — 
 
 Total profit for four years 16 10 7 
 
 Deduct landlord's increased rent and charges 5 11 
 
 Leaving clear profit to tenant in fouryears £10 19 7 
 
 Or 2/. 145. lOffZ. each year per improved acre, besides pay- 
 ing him for his labour, and this under the most unfavourable 
 circumstances that the tenant can suppose — namely, that 
 the landlord will put upon hiai an exorbitant rent as soon as 
 he has improved. With proper cultivation and rotation of 
 crops a much greater profit than this might be obtained. 
 
 Now, this is an ordinary and every-day case. The state- 
 ment cannot be disputed ; the w^liole calculation is from the 
 tenants themselves ; the rent is charged high and the pro- 
 duce low, and yet the tenant, after being paid for every day's 
 labour at the highest rate, this unfavourable calculation 
 shows he would i3ocket about 2/. 15s. jjrofit per acre, for im- 
 proving the land, in spite of his bad landlord. But -whilst 
 his land is left unimproved, though he only pays 5s. rent, he 
 pockets nothing at all. Now, simple calculation shows this 
 It is the farmer's business to make these calculations ; the 
 formers and the schoolmaster made this very calculation for 
 me, showing this result ; and yet, with this result of their 
 own showing before them, they were still unconvinced, and 
 kept crying, " Yes, but the landlord would raise the rent. 
 
328 THE PROFITS OF 
 
 and who should we improve for?" The only surprising 
 thing- is, that the priests, as men of education, should not see 
 this, and point it out to the tenants, if they are too stupid to 
 see it themselves. What matters it to the tenants whether 
 the landlord benefits or not by their exertions, so long as they 
 themselves make a profit by it ? 
 
 'Now, let me point out to the tenants what would be 
 another effect of their simply minding their own interests, 
 and endeavouring to get as much produce out of their land 
 as it will bear, and not caring whether the landlord or any- 
 body else also derives a profit as well as themselves. They 
 may depend upon this, that the landlord is more likely to do 
 things for their benefit if he sees them industrious, improving 
 tenants, rather than if he finds them apathetic and indifferent, 
 and seeking only to sublet the land to the injury of his estate, 
 ■which they ought to cultivate and improve. But the above 
 calculation has shown that in the worst case they would 
 reap a profit where they now get nothing. This year, 
 unhappily, their potato crops have generally failed. I am 
 sorry to say that I was to-day informed by the priest of the 
 parish of Clonlea, in the barony of Tulla, the district in Clare 
 about which I have just written, that the potatoes generally 
 are infected with disease. He last week saw eight barrels 
 of potatoes, or about five months' provisions for a family, 
 apparently sound, put into a pit, and sixty barrels put into 
 another pit, which, on being opened to-day, had not a barrel 
 of available potatoes in either ; nearly the whole of the 
 potatoes were found to be diseased and decomposed. His 
 accounts to me are most alarming. On digging the potatoes 
 generally throughout the district they are found in the same 
 manner diseased. A black spot on them spreads under tiie 
 surface of the skin round the potato, and at length goes 
 through to the heart of it, the whole substance becoming 
 black and decomposed. Some of the people have given up 
 digging their potatoes in despair, and it is most alarming to 
 
GOOD CULTIVATION. 329 
 
 contemjDlate what the result may be. It is, however, certain 
 that some steps will be required to be taken to avert the 
 horrors of a famine. This is a subject too immediately 
 pressing and dreadful to work out an argument. But had 
 these poor people cultivated and improved their land as 
 they might have done, without stupidly refusing to improve 
 " because it would benefit their landlords," the extra profit 
 in their pockets, which they would be certain to have made, 
 would be suflacient to avert the severity of the calamity 
 which they now apprehend. 
 
 It is, however, I feel, of little use pointing this out to the 
 people : but little can be done Avith the existing generation, 
 who are without the means of being better taught, and who 
 are prejudiced to old habits. 
 
 It may astonish some English farmers to learn that these 
 tenants told me they were constantly in the habit of getting 
 nine successive crops of oats off this mountain-land, manuring 
 with lime only every third year, till at length it would grow 
 nothing but a few weeds ; and that it is almost impossible, 
 without running the risk of being shot, to get them out of 
 their old habit of cultivation after this fashion. 
 
 This, however, strongly points out the necessity of securing 
 to the rising generation the means of being taught agricul- 
 tural knowledge. That knowledge will dispel their present 
 stupid and prejudiced notions, will, in fact, teach them the 
 trade by which they live, will secure them from periodical 
 famines, and in insuring them comfort and competence will 
 benefit every class in the community. 
 
330 TIPPER ARY AND JTS OUTRAGES 
 
 LETTER XXII. 
 
 TIPPEEAPtY AND ITS OUTRAGES. — STATE OF 
 AGRICULTURE, AND OF THE PEOFLE. 
 
 The Anomalies and Inconsistencies which prevail in Tipperary — The former Habits 
 cf the Gentry which may have given rise to many of these Anomalies — The 
 System of Outrage and Terrorism which prevails — Appearance of the Country — 
 Backward State of Agriculture — Impossible to get the Tenantry out of their 
 old Habits — The continual Murders — Destitution of the People — Remedies 
 suggested. 
 
 TiiUELES, Tipperary, October 27. 
 The county of Tipperary has long possessed the notoriety 
 of being a focus of outrage and disorder — of embodying in 
 itself, in an aggravated form, all the strange anomaly of evils 
 which mark this country generally. 
 
 You have here the richest land and the most extreme 
 poverty. The people complain of high rents, and yet extract 
 but half the profit out of the land which it will yield. They 
 struggle desperately to possess a patch of land, because they 
 have no em2)loyment by which to live, and yet the land is 
 only half cultivated for want of the labour which might be 
 profitably bestowed upon it. They shoot one another in the 
 struggle to possess a patch of land, and leave neglected and 
 waste thousands of acres which would amjily repay their 
 labour and capital. They complain of the want of tenure, 
 and the moment they get a lease they sublet and get rid of 
 
TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 331 
 
 their tenure to anotlier. They complain that landlords and 
 agents in parts of the county will not reside, and they shoot 
 them if they do. 
 
 How strangely do these contradictions jumble together ! 
 How oddly each complaint seems to point out its own 
 remedy ! But not the least strange part of the consideration 
 is, that with the remedy in their own hands they neglect it, 
 and call open-mouthed on the Government to do something 
 to help them, which indeed seems necessary, if any remedy 
 is to be obtained. 
 
 The moving springs of any condition of society rarely 
 ascend from the lower ranks, but proceed from the upper. 
 The direction of intelligence and station will insure harmony 
 and prosperity. If intelligence and station neglect or misuse 
 the advantage of their position, ignorance, and prejudice, and 
 selfish cunning step in, and violence and disorder are the 
 natural results. 
 
 It is a question of some interest to consider how the 
 strangely anomalous condition of this county, as an example 
 of what is the case with much of the rest of Ireland, has 
 been brought about. Has the effect of bygone neglect, and 
 mismanagement, and wrong, generated a self- defensive resort 
 to suspicious obstinacy, and violence, and fraud ? 
 
 What were the usual habits of the gentry of the past 
 generation, and of some of the present? Was it their 
 ambition to live a useful existence, to lead, and guide, and 
 instruct those whom fortune had placed below them ; or did 
 they neglect these duties, ape the manners and the style of 
 living of those above them, use the advantages of fortune as 
 tlie mere instruments for the attainment of short-sighted and 
 selfish ends, and ruin themselves and all depending on them ? 
 An answer to these questions may, perhaps, give an insight 
 into much of the misery which now pervades Ireland, and 
 this county particularly. 
 
 From all I hear, the owner of an estate in former days 
 
332 TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 
 
 kept open house, lived usually in a style far beyond his 
 income, aped the expenditure of men of superior fortune, 
 shot and hunted, and got money as he could, to keep going 
 on. Most of the estates were entailed ; the owners married, 
 and every means was resorted to to raise money. Some- 
 times long leases were granted to men of property in order 
 to obtain fines, who commenced letting out the land at an 
 increased rent as middlemen. The sons of a landowner 
 grew up, hunted and shot with their father, and would have 
 shot any one who suggested to them that they ought to do 
 something to maintain themselves. The sole means of pro- 
 viding for them was to let to them portions of the estate, 
 which, being usually entailed, could only be done at the 
 best improved rent. The younger sons then got a local 
 standing, became " squireens," started shooting or hunting- 
 lodges, sub-let the land, which they never thought of farm- 
 ing themselves, at an increased rent, and so long as their 
 father lived were principally at home. On the death of the 
 father the elder brother came into the estate, and the knives 
 and forks of the younger brothers were no longer regularly 
 set for them. The stables were not always ready for their 
 horses as long as they pleased, and they found out that they 
 had to support themselves. To do this another screw was 
 put upon the sub-tenants, and all kinds of chicanery were 
 resorted to by these needy men to obtain money from those 
 under them. As they could barely live, the usual course 
 was to try and get some Government place, as they could 
 turn to neither business nor profession. To obtain this the 
 member of Parliament for the county was flattered and 
 besieged, and then they began to find out that their tenants 
 might be made 40^. freeholders, and that this was an avail- 
 able means of influence. The unfortunate under-tenants 
 were then compelled to sub-divide their land with their sons, 
 to make voters, in order that at the next election these votes 
 might be bargained for a place. The mischief did not cease 
 
TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 333 
 
 here. This forced sub-division rapidly increased the popu- 
 lation. As there was nothing but the land to live by, the 
 increased population brought competition for the land, and 
 eagerness to get any patch, however small, at increased 
 rents. The people, following their teaching, began them- 
 selves to sub-divide ; and then these " squireens," or needy 
 middlemen, raised their rents proportionately to the in- 
 creased competition for the land which they had themselves 
 brought about. But the increase in population went on ; 
 the absence of any trading or professional knowledge among 
 these small gentry, too proud to do or learn anything, but 
 not too proud to resort to any tricky jobbing to raise money 
 or to get a place, brought with it, of course, the absence of 
 any enterprise or any business undertaking whatever which 
 could aiford other employment for the people than the culti- 
 vation of a patch of land. The people thus got beaten down, 
 and became mere serfs, crushed down to the worst food, and the 
 most miserable clothing and dwellings ; and, being neglected 
 and without knowledge, they were utterly unable to improve 
 themseh'es. As the families of the squireens increased their 
 estates decreased ; not so their expenditure : nor did their 
 attempts to gain a living by any profession or trade increase 
 with their increasing necessities. Their poverty became so 
 great that they were utterly unable to aid their tenants to im- 
 prove ; all this operated on the poor tenant in deteriorating his 
 social position. In England you sometimes hear of landlords 
 compelling their tenants to vote for them ; but in Ireland the 
 tenants' votes were a valuable commodity, not to be given 
 away. They were bargained for places, and I am assured 
 of instances where they have been sold by the landlord for 
 money, which the landlord himself has pocketed. The poor 
 tenants were deprived even of that resource of the vilest in 
 England — they could not even sell their political franchise 
 for a bribe, for their landlord generally sold it for them and 
 
334 TIPPER ARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 
 
 pocketed the amount without consulting them, and com- 
 pelled them to vote as he liked. 
 
 Is it to he -wondered at that such a system should hear 
 sad fruits ? The fruits are now being reaped. Much of 
 this kind of proceeding has, however, been put an end to ; 
 hut you still have young men brought up to live as gentle- 
 men on some 100/. a year; and no trade or enterprise to 
 employ a dense population, because there are none to engage 
 generally in either. Debts and incumbrances are the con- 
 sequence. Estates get into the courts, and receivers are 
 appointed who exact the highest competition rents ; embar- 
 rassed landlords live abroad, or in English towns, and they 
 also exact the highest rents they can. The best tenants who 
 will live in comfort are compelled to emigrate, and the most 
 ignorant and unenterprising tenants remain, without know- 
 ledge or means to im^Drove the land, and striving by endur- 
 ance and poor potato diet to squeeze out the rent. They 
 have no means of employment ; land they must have to 
 live, until the struggle for the patch of land has become so 
 desperate that it is retained by a system of terror and 
 assassination disgraceful to any country.* 
 
 There are many good landlords in this county the reverse 
 of this description ; but with society thus disorganized, from 
 past misconduct, often their best intentions are suspected, the 
 slightest attempt on their parts to interfere M'ith the posses- 
 sion of land is resisted, no matter what the object may be, 
 and a system of assassination, and tlircats of assassination, is 
 resorted to, which in reality often drives the best landlords 
 
 * " What embitters the misery of our calamities is, that we have brought them 
 on ourselves by the wildness of our extravagance of the one side, and the most 
 stujiid want of care and industry of the other ; for betwLst the monstri)us mis- 
 management of the splendour and expense of the rich in foreign countries or 
 commodities, and the idleness and laziness of the jioor, the tradesmen, labourers, 
 and husbandmen (chiefly for want of encouragement), have been ground to ])ieces 
 between the upper and nether millstone." — Preface to JJr. Madden' s book, 
 * Reflections and Jtesohcf ions proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland." 
 
TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 335 
 
 out of the country, and increases the ah'eady existing pov erty 
 and want of employment. As an instance of this, the other 
 day I had the opportunity of visiting the estate of Mr. Car- 
 den, of Bernane, near this town. This gentleman, on the 
 falling in of an old lease, found his land in such a wretched 
 condition, and the tenants upon it so miserable, that he deter- 
 mined to buy them out, and take the land into his own hands. 
 They agreed to take 150/., and to leave the land. It is a 
 hard case for poor men, with no means of employment to 
 fly to, to lose even the most wretched means of subsistence. 
 Though this gentleman was giving much employment in re- 
 siding, and in building a family mansion, this step created 
 a strong feeling against him. His steward paid the out- 
 going tenants the money they had agreed to take, and a 
 fortnight afterwards, in June last year, though an old man 
 much respected, he had two shots fired at him and was 
 wounded in the arm. In the following October another 
 lease of mountain-land fell in, covered with cottier tenants 
 in the most wretched condition. Mr. Garden was anxious 
 to obtain this land, because it was in the centre of his plan- 
 tations. He offered to buy their interest, to provide the 
 tenants with houses, and to give them constant employment 
 on another part of the estate. He employed his wood- 
 ranger to negotiate with them, and this poor fellow was most 
 treacherously and inhumanly murdered.*' A notice was 
 
 * By desire of Mr. Cardan, his wood-ranger, after the steward had been shot 
 at, never went about alone, and was always armed with a double-barrellei gun. 
 He chose for his companion a tenant's son, a fine grown young man of about 
 twenty years of age, to accompany him as a protector. It was proposed to give 
 the tenants 200/. for removing, and it was arranged that the wood-ranger should 
 meet the principal men among them at a cottage on the estate to settle the terms. 
 The wood-ranger accordingly went to the cottage, accompanied by his companion 
 for protection, and having laid his gun on a table, sat down. He had no sooner 
 done so, than a turbulent fellow on the estate, who was there, said, addressing 
 him, — " I thought you would not have come into my company. The wood- 
 ranger, not liking the appearance of things, answered, — " Had I known you were 
 here, perhaps I should not have come ;" and rose from his seat to take his gun 
 
336 TIPPEnARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 
 
 then stuck up on a part of the estate, that if any persons 
 reaped this gentleman's crops, or dug his potatoes, they 
 would be murdered. He offered 55. a day to get his pota- 
 toes dug, but such was the feeling of terror inspired amongst 
 the rest of his tenantry, that no one would attempt it. Being 
 a young man of high spirit and determination, he went to 
 Shinrone, to a Protestant colony, to procure labourers, and 
 a number volunteered to reap his crops. These men nar- 
 rowly escaped being murdered by the people, and had to be 
 protected by the police. During the whole of last winter 
 there was a perfect system of terror established. This gen- 
 tleman, on riding up the avenue of his domain one night, 
 was fired at by four different people, who fortunately missed 
 him. On another occasion shortly afterwards, on driving 
 through his entrance gate, two shots were fired at him, and 
 his horse was shot — a tenant-farmer living within ten yards 
 
 and depart. He had no sooner done so than the young man he had hrought with 
 him to protect him threiv his arms round liim behind, and pinioned him ; a man 
 with a hatchet in his hand sprang from behind the door and dove his skull ; and 
 another stabbed him in the neck with a knife. His lifeless body was then dragged 
 into a field adjoining, and thrown into a ditch, where it was found some days 
 after. These facts were deposed to, on the trial of one of the parties, by the 
 daughter of the tenant in whose cottage the murder was committed, and wlio saw 
 it. On this young woman's testimony, one of the villains was sentenced to be 
 hung. Another, who was subsequently apprehended, was also indicted, and this 
 same young woman was brought forward to give her evidence. A surgeon of a 
 neighbouring town was then put into the witness-box, and he swore that the young 
 woman was in his surgery, several miles off, at the time, and tlie same niglit that 
 she swore the murder was committed. On this testimony, the prisoner was found 
 not guilty, and discharged, and the prisoner under sentence of death was re])rieved. 
 Subsequently, the young woman who was the witness brought another young 
 woman before the magistrates, who deposed that she was at the surgeon's on the 
 night and at the time stated, and not the witness. The surgeon was confronted 
 with the two young women, and acknowledged that he had sworn in error. Thus 
 a known murderer is at large on this gentleman's estate. The man who was 
 convicted was lying in Nenagli gaol at the time I was there ; and tbougli a year 
 had elapsed since the crime was committed, and of wliich he was convicted, lie has 
 been neither hung nor transported. This is the tardy mode in which the majesty 
 of the law is vindicated in Tipperary. 
 
TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 337 
 
 of the spot.* In the three months of last year no less than 
 eight murders were committed in the police district of Bor- 
 risoleigh adjoining, generally shooting from behind hedges, 
 because of dispossessions of land by the tenants amongst one 
 another. How many gentlemen who could afford to live 
 elsewhere would risk their lives by residing in such an un- 
 fortunate community ? It is enough to compel absenteeism. 
 This gentleman is building an agricultural school — is afford- 
 ing much employment — and yet is compelled to walk about 
 his estate, with two men with guns to guard him, to have 
 ball-proof window-shutters to his house, and two armed 
 policemen to guard his steward as he walks about ! This 
 frightful state of society I saw, or could scarcely have cre- 
 dited it. The very men who attempted to shoot him, who 
 shot his steward, and murdered his woodranger, are his own 
 tenants, and at large ! 
 
 In coming to this town I had made a circuit of the south- 
 ern portion of the county, and had the opportunity of seeing 
 the country around Tipperary, Cahir, and Casliel. Gene- 
 rally speaking, cultivation is in a very advanced state to 
 what you see it in Connaught. Most of the fields are well 
 squared and fenced, and there are many well-built and 
 decent-looking farmhouses. The country often spreads out 
 from the foot of fine ranges of hills into vast tracts of level 
 rich soil of extraordinary fertility, nearly all of which is 
 under cultivation. Many of the sloping hill-sides and some 
 bogs are, however, still uncultivated. The southern part of 
 Tipperary is now very quiet, and this may perhaps be attri- 
 butable to the fact that there have been many resident land- 
 lords there for some time, several of whom are highly spoken 
 of as good landlords ; and some of those who are non-resident 
 have good resident agents. I heard Lord Stanley everywhere 
 
 * Having escaped six shots, this gentleman has been named " the wood-cock," 
 by which cognomen he is generally known in the neighbourhood. 
 
338 STATE OF AGRICULTURE, 
 
 spoken of in the neighbourhood of Tipperary, as an excellent 
 landlord, and also Mr. Stafford O'Brien, M.P., who has been a 
 great benefactor to the town. The very men who complained 
 about high rents, which are in that neighbourhood about 
 21. 3s. the Irish acre, and who were violent in declaiming 
 against the general neglect of the landlords as a body, in 
 " not caring a rap about their tenants as long as they got 
 the rents," spoke well of these gentlemen. In the neigh- 
 bourhood of Cahir, Lord Glengall has greatly improved his 
 property and the town by building good houses ; and in the 
 neighbourhood of Shanbarry, further on, Lord Lismore has 
 greatly beautified the country by planting, and has given 
 much employment amongst his tenants as a resident land- 
 lord. From Cahir to Casliel the drive is throu<rh a maorni- 
 ficent arable country. The richness of the land seems to set 
 at defiance the very indifferent system of cultivation . 
 
 Mr. Michael Doheney, barrister, of Cashel, when exa- 
 mined before the Land Commission (Appendix, Part III., 
 p. 209), says, — 
 
 " In this country there is no system pursued by the farming population 
 as to rotation of crops or the improved modes of agriculture." 
 
 The Rev. Patrick Larkin, parish priest of Moyne, near 
 Thurles, is asked (ibid. 308), — 
 
 " If the land might be rendered more productive by improvements ? 
 and answers, ' Oh dear, yes .'' " 
 
 "I [should think," says Mr. Edward Dalton, farmer of Ballj"- griffin, 
 near Golden (tbid., 262), " the small farmer would do very well if he was 
 industrious; and got into a good system of tillage ; but there is a bad 
 sj'stem of tillage in the country now." 
 
 Mr. John Ellis, the agent and steward of Mr. Trant, near 
 Thurles, says (hid. 321),— 
 
 *' Mr. Trant allows half the expense of drains, and if they sow turnips 
 after the drains they are allowed the otiicr third ; but not many have 
 taken advantage of that. Wc have found it difficult to get them even to 
 drain land with that encouragement. They refuse to give up their bad 
 land to let us improve it." 
 
AND OF THE PEOPLE. 339 
 
 " In general they are not an improving class of tenantry," 
 says Mr, Nicholas Maher, the county member (ibid. Part I. 
 p, 100). This gentleman manages an estate of 19,000 acres, 
 and he is asked, — 
 
 " If the occupiers are not prosperous, do you attribute that more to the 
 mismanagement of their farms, rather than to the rate of rents ? — Yes, 
 indeed I do, to their badly fanning the land in many instances." 
 
 The same gentleman says, further on, — 
 
 " He has no doubt the produce of the land might be considerably 
 unproved by a better system of farming." 
 
 The small farmers, however, are so ignorant of every 
 comfort, and of any better system of farming, that they have 
 " no desire or disposition to improve, even when they can 
 afford it." 
 
 " They have no desire for it, and the true reason for my saj^ing they farm 
 badly is this, that they have one sj'stem of farming land. They take a crop 
 or two of potatoes ; they then take a crop of Avheat, and after that a crop 
 of potatoes again, and a crop of wheat again, and that upon land which is 
 not of the best qualit3^ That is tlieir s^'stem, and you cannot get them to 
 change it; and where a tenant has thirty or forty acres of land, if he had 
 one-third of it Avell tilled and properly cultivated, I think it would 
 produce him more than half of what it does at his present mode of farmings 
 " To what do you attribute the want of desu-e to improve ? — It is the 
 system they have got into, and they cannot be persuaded out of it ; no rea- 
 soning, no advice iv ill put them out of it. 
 
 " "When you spoke of two crops of potatoes, do you mean that they 
 commenced with a ley field ? — Yes. 
 
 " First potatoes and then wheat ? — Yes. 
 
 " And then manure ? — No, Avithout manure ; they avUI dig the stubble, 
 and then crop it again with potatoes, and afterwards with wheat or oats. 
 This is almost the only practice. 
 
 " Do the landowners take no steps to endeavour to introduce a better 
 system, such as having a model farm ? No, there is no such thing iji the 
 country. I do not think there is one in the county of Tipperary^ 
 
 Now, is not this lamentable ? Ignorance so complete that 
 they will not even listen to reason, and will not improve ; 
 and no steps taken to shore them what may be done. And 
 
 z 2 
 
340 STATE OF AGRICULTURE, 
 
 while tliey thus waste one-half the subsistence they might 
 get out of the land, the most frightful struggles for subsist- 
 ence are going on ; and atrocities and cowardly assassina- 
 tions are committed which are a disgrace to any country. 
 The bravo of Italy is more than equalled by the cowardly 
 ruffian of Tipperary. 
 
 Mr. Edward Dalton in his evidence (Appendix, Part III. 
 p. 263), says, — 
 
 " It is generally known in the country who instigate the murders. It 
 is generally the aggrieved party and his friends that manage it. The 
 friends of the murdered man will not take much pains to trace out a 
 murder, as they ought to do ; but resort to wild revenge, by retaliationy 
 
 In some cases the murders are committed, as in the case of 
 Mr. Leonard Keeting's steward, because " he was too hard 
 in making the people stick close to their work (ibid. 265), 
 though he did much good." 
 
 This very week, at New Birmingham, near this town, a 
 man named Morris, the overseer of some coal-mines at Bal- 
 lynunty, which are Avorked by a mining company, having 
 made himself obnoxious by the faithful discharge of his duty 
 in putting a check on a system of pilfering, has been shot. 
 
 Mr. Edward Dalton is asked {ibid. p. 263), — 
 
 " In what have the outrages generally arisen ? — From the poverty of 
 the people, — and all about land and good situations, and all those things. 
 If a herdsman goes inside another, there is an outrage ; or if a confi- 
 dential man is displaced. In one word, it is all on account of the po- 
 verty of the people." 
 
 But, generally, the murders are all about the possession of 
 land ; and it matters little what the character of the land- 
 lord may be, — he may give great employment, as in the case 
 of Mr. Scully, or be a most exemplary gentleman, like Mr. 
 Cooper, — if he ventures to turn out a tenant, or his agent on 
 his behalf, they will be murdered — shot in the back, or from 
 behind a wall, if they dare to venture out. 
 Lord Hawarden has ejected many tenants for various 
 
AND OF THE PEOPLE. 341 
 
 causes, and taken their land into his own possession. This 
 has produced great misery among them, and intense hatred. 
 The hfe of Mr. Stuart, his agent, has been repeatedly at- 
 tempted in consequence ; and, according to the evidence of 
 Mr. Doheny {ibid. p. 298), he has, as a means of protection, 
 been — 
 
 " In the habit of taking two boys, one before and one behind him, on 
 the horse, when he would be riding through the country ; so that he 
 could not be killed without one of those boys being shot." 
 
 The horrid distress of the people drives them to commit 
 these atrocities, but they will bear no extenuation. They 
 disgrace the country, and they are as cowardly as they are 
 brutal. But is not this enough to compel many men to be 
 absentees? There can be no worse mischief to an estate 
 than an absentee landlord ; but what man would bear to live 
 in perpetual apprehension of some villain shooting him in 
 the back, or from behind a hedge, unless influenced to re- 
 main by motives of attachment to his estate, or by a strong 
 sense of duty ? The very atrocities which the people resort to 
 in brutal and barbarous ignorance, which make any Chris- 
 tian shudder, heap upon themselves further miseries ; for, as 
 crime, from the sympathy of the people with the criminals, 
 goes unpunished, the men who could give them employment, 
 and who would spend money among them, are driven out to 
 more civilized communities, where their lives will be safe. 
 
 Along the roadsides, as I drove through the country, ad- 
 joining land perhaps the richest in Europe, I continually 
 saw hovels of the most wretched appearance. There is a 
 filth and a squalor about them and their miserable inmates 
 which I cannot describe. 
 
 Amongst jDOor creatures so reduced, the competition for a 
 patch of con-acre land to live upon is " dreadful," says Mr. 
 Bradshaw, a landed proprietor near Tipperary : — 
 
 " It is wretched," says this gentleman (ibid., 270), " to see the state of 
 some of the poor for want of employment. I may say, and I do say it 
 
342 STATE OF AGRICULTURE, 
 
 fearlessly, that they are little better than the brute beasts, for want of em- 
 ployment." 
 
 " They sometimes get employed at the rate of 6c?. or 8d. a day, and 
 their whole object is, by means of their dung-pit, to get a quarter of an 
 acre of ground ; and they get their living through the year from it." 
 (ibid. p. 279, Captain Thomas Bolton's evidence, agent to Lord Stanley.) 
 
 " They have miserable huts," says IVIr. Jordan, land-agent to Baron 
 Pennefather (^ibtd. p. 294), " and it is only wonderful how they have pa- 
 tience to live as they are at all." This gentleman says, further on, — 
 " There were a few shots fired into my own house very lately, but there 
 was nobody shot ; we do not mind these little trifles." 
 
 " Land," says Mr. Doheny (ibid. p. 299), " is their only resource to 
 sustain life with any certainty." 
 
 The competition, therefore, for it is so great and dreadful, 
 that this witness says, in Cashel, — 
 
 " A man would oiFer any amount whatever for a quarter of an acre of 
 land." 
 
 " Agricultural labourers," says IVIr. John Loughnane, of Boytourath, 
 near Cashel (ibid. p. 302), " are the most miserable men upon the face of 
 the earth at the present day. I could not describe the situation of the 
 creatures. They have neither food nor raiment; they have no bed- 
 clothes ; the clothes they wear in the day they must clothe themselves 
 with at night." 
 
 " They are half a year idle for want of employment, and their wives 
 are generally out as paupers in the country," says ]Mr. O'Flynn, farmer 
 of New Birmingham, (ibid. p. 309.) 
 
 " Their huts are very miserable. There are seven, or eight, or nine of 
 them upon one heap of straw, and generally the clothing they have in 
 the day is their night covering. Their is no sheet or blanket, and those 
 who are last in bed must get up, for they have no clothes to keep them 
 warm. I have witnessed that.'' 
 
 Is not this sad story enough to account for the state in 
 which society is here ? The people for the most part here 
 are a fine race. The niajoi-ity of them are stout and of an 
 average size, and you see among them many tall and power- 
 ful men. They are a mixed race, being many of them de- 
 scended from Cromwell's soldiers, who were disbanded in 
 
AND OF THE PEOPLE. 343 
 
 this county, the original debentures and grants of land to 
 whom are still extant. 
 
 Near Nenagh, according to the evidence of Mr. M'Curtin, 
 in the midst of all this distress and misery and shootings 
 about the possession of land, there is " an immense tract of 
 waste land — the finest mountain land in the world — from 
 15,000 to 20,000 acres of wild land." And according to the 
 report of Mr. Griffiths, " it is probable that about 300,000 
 acres of waste land might be reclaimed for cultivation, and 
 60,000 acres might be drained for pasture," in this very 
 county. 
 
 Now, to what conclusions does a review of this evidence 
 lead ? The object of every Government is the prosperity 
 and safety of the people. Neither is accomplished in this 
 county. It is, then, the duty of the Government to see that 
 they shall be accomplished. It is tlie duty of the Government 
 to take measures to compel these waste lands to be brought 
 into cultivation, as an immediate means of affording employment 
 to the people, to save them from starvation and the commis- 
 sion of outrage. It is the duty of the Government to have 
 the peoj)le properly taught their trade of agriculture by 
 example as well as precept — by means of agricultural model 
 schools, so that they shall not, as now, waste one-half the 
 land they have. And, above all, it is the duty of the Govern- 
 ment, with a strong and determined hand, to put down the 
 system of terror and assassination which drives men of pro- 
 perty out of the country, and dejjrives the poor peasants of 
 the employment they would otherwise have.* As a means 
 
 * The dreadful crime of murder, like many of the other evils of Ireland, would, 
 seem to have been fostered and almost created by the impunity with which it was 
 committed. The late Rev. Dr. Madden thus writes on this subject : — " But what ' 
 is yet worse, and, I fear, harder to cure, is that dreadful indulgence which, through 
 the whole kingdom, is shown to fair and honourable murderers of all denomina- 
 tions. As to gentlemen who are guilty of this crime, there is hardly one in a 
 himdred ever condemned ; and as it will be hard to subdue this inveterate trampling 
 on our laws, we should beg of our Legislature that if they cannot be hanged, they 
 
344 STATE OF THE PEOPLE. 
 
 of effecting this, I would suggest a partial return to the ancient 
 constitution of Alfred the Great : divide each barony into dis- 
 tricts, police districts would do, and put a fine on the district 
 for every offence, unless the offender be apprehended and 
 brought to justice. This has been found effective with regard 
 to burnings and houghing of cattle, for which the barony is 
 made to pay; why should it not be so in the protection of 
 human life ? For every murder or attempt at murder, fine 
 the district, say 50Z., unless the murderer be brought to 
 justice, and rigidly enforce the payment. I am much mis- 
 taken in my estimate of Irish character, if a few of these 
 payments exacted would not rapidly turn the tide of popular 
 feeling as strongly against assassins as it is now in their 
 favour and protects them. There is no chimera about any 
 of these measures. They are plainly pointed out as neces- 
 sary for the peace and safety of the country, letting alone its 
 prosperity. Party has nothing to do with them ; and the 
 Government will neglect its obvious duty, in the opinion of 
 every man of plain common sense, if measures having these 
 objects in view are not immediately brought forward. 
 
 may at least be fined for it ; and that the murderer, if acquitted or pardoned, 
 should be liable, without appeal, to pay a proportion of his annual income or 
 substance to the maintenance of the widow and children, or, if there be none such, 
 to the brothers and sisters, or the next heirs of the deceased. This would possibly 
 have a good effect in tying up the honourable hands of men of fortune or family ; 
 and as for inferior people, it were to be wished that the criminal, though acquitted, 
 should always suffer twelve months' close imprisonment. In the mean time, it is 
 certain that, in general, it is safer to kill a man than to steal a slieep or a cow ; 
 and as this is the vilest mark of barbarism, and is not only an imputation on the 
 justice of the nation, but an evidence of the contempt of the laws both of God 
 and man, surely every one that wishes well to Ireland should resolve to do his 
 utmost to enforce our laws, and wipe off such a stain from the honour and justice 
 of his country." — Reflections and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of 
 Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden of the Royal Dublin Society, p. 141. 
 
TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 345 
 
 LETTER XXIII. 
 
 TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 
 
 Condition of the County of Tipperai-y — Report of the Land Commissioners upon 
 it — The System of Terrorism which prevails there — Outrages that disgraced 
 the neighbourhoods of Roscrea and Neuagh during my visit to tliose places — 
 The ruinous absurdity of Labourers, Farmers, and Individuals being protected 
 at their work for months by Policemen — The Necessity of establishing the 
 Supremacy of the Law before there can be any hope of Prosperity. 
 
 Roscrea, Tippekart, October 30. 
 In speaking of this county in their report to the Govern- 
 ment, the Land Commissioners say (page 42), — 
 
 " In Tipperary, for a long time past, and in some other counties more 
 recently, there has prevailed a system of lawless violence, which has led in 
 numerous instances to the pei'petratiou of cold-blooded murders. These 
 are generally acts of revenge for some supposed injury inflicted upon the 
 party who commits or instigates the commission of the outrage. But the 
 notions entertained of injury in such cases are regulated by a standard 
 fixed by the will of the most lawless and unprincipled members of the 
 community. If a tenant is removed, even after repeated warnings, from 
 land which he has neglected or misused, he is looked upon in the districts 
 to which we are now referring as an injured man, and the decree too often 
 goes out for vengeance upon the landlord or the agent, and upon the man 
 who succeeds to the farm ; and at times a large numerical proportion of 
 the neighbourhood look vnih indiflference upon the most atrocious acts of 
 violence, and, by screening the criminal, abet and encoui-age the crime. 
 Miurders are perpetrated at noonday on a public highway, and, whilst the 
 assassm coolly retires, the people look on, and evince no horror at the 
 
346 TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 
 
 bloody deed. The •whole nature of Christian men appears in such cases 
 to be changed, and the one absorbing feeling as to the possession of land 
 stifles all others, and extinguishes the plainest principles of humanity.'* 
 
 This is a shocking testimony, when made by undeniable 
 authority, as to the character of any county. That, however, 
 which was true in 1844 is no less true now; assassinations 
 still continue, the atrocity of which is only equalled by their 
 cowardice. It is horrible to think that men professing to 
 be Christians should, from whatever cause, bear the above 
 character ; and terrible indeed must have been the process 
 which inculcated it in them. 
 
 Men in England, who follow their occupations in peace 
 and security, can form no estimate of circumstances here 
 unless put in possession of facts as they exist. The walls of 
 this town are covered with placards offering rewards for the 
 apprehension of criminals charged with shooting into houses, 
 waylaying, beating, and murdering. One is at this moment 
 being stuck up (a copy of which I send you, with others) 
 offering 100/. reward by the Government for the apprehen- 
 sion of some cowardly villains who last week fired two shots 
 through the back of the overseer of a neighbouring coal- 
 mine.* Men are seen walking about the town followed by 
 a couple of armed policemen to protect them as they transact 
 their business. Threatening notices, which are not mere idle 
 threats, are sent by every post ; crime escapes with com- 
 parative impunity, and in such a state of society what sane 
 man can expect prosperity 1'\- 
 
 * This man, though not killed, was lingering dangerously ill in bed in conse- 
 quence of the wounds he received, when I left Ireland three months afterwards. 
 
 t Geraldus Cambrensis, in his chapter '* De Ilibernia qualiter Gubeniiinda," 
 writes thus of the native Irish : — " Semper insidias sub pacis fuco gens ha;c 
 inimica molitur. Nationis sub dola; longe fortius timenda est ars quam Mars — 
 pax quam fax — mel quam fel — malitia quani militia — proditio quam exjjcditio — 
 amicitia perfucata quam inimicitia defricata." 
 
 There is a curious passage, which shows the antiquity of the Irish shillelah — the 
 country weapon for remedying the evils of Ireland. Geraldus says, — " Ab 
 
TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 347 
 
 I do not, however, admire vague declamation, but prefer 
 giving facts, that Englishmen may form their own judgment 
 of the condition of all classes of people in Ireland. I do not 
 think that it is the starving people who dwell in hovels who 
 alone deserve sympathy here. Nor do these offences all 
 spring from starving people ; many farmers, well to do, are 
 engaged in them. They have for their object a system of 
 terrorism, which shall set the law and the rights of indivi- 
 duals at defiance, and they are directly fostered and increased 
 by the Repeal agitation which is going on. I have it on 
 undoubted authority, and from numerous parties, that the 
 expectation of the small farmer is, that if he gets Repeal he 
 Avill secure the possession of his land without acknowledg- 
 ment or rent to anybody. Under this impression a code of 
 terrorism is encouraged, which resists not only ejectment 
 from land, and the payment of arrears of rent, but which 
 forbids the turning away of a servant, resists the payment 
 of debts, prevents the giving of evidence, and punishes the 
 assertion of every right with the threat of violence or death, 
 which is almost invariably carried out. When this is the 
 case who can wonder that men of capital v/ill not resort 
 here, that landlords who can afford to live elsewhere will 
 not live here, and that the country does not prosper ? 
 
 I saw a respectable-looking man walking about the town 
 guarded by two armed policemen, who followed him wherever 
 he seemed to wish to go. I inquired the reason of this. I 
 was informed by the authorities that he is a schoolmaster 
 named James, whose house was attacked some months ago 
 by three men searching for arms. He made some resistance, 
 and one of the men immediately fired at him and shot him 
 with slugs in the head, some of which are still not extracted. 
 Thus wounded he seized a dirk, and with it killed one of the 
 
 armonim omnium usu arceatur Hibernus. . . . interim autem illud detestabile 
 proditionis instrumentum, quod de antiqua consuetudine semper in manu quasi 
 pro baculo bajulant, pacis nunquamvel loco vel tempore prsesumere gestiant." 
 
34S TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 
 
 parties, and the other two ran away. One of them was 
 afterwards apprehended and transported on his evidence. 
 Instead of his courageous resistance carrying with it the 
 sympathy of the people, their sympathy is with the cowardly 
 ruffians who attacked him, and, if not guarded by the' police, 
 he would be murdered. 
 
 A farmer named Sheedy, of Ballinakill, near this town, 
 some years ago became tenant of about ten acres of land 
 under the Court of Chancery, the former tenant, named 
 Cummins, having been ejected for non-payment of rent. 
 After he had been some time in possession, Cummins took 
 it into his head that he had a right to the land, and Sheedy 
 was threatened with death unless he gave it up. Sheedy 
 applied for protection, and he now ploughs and digs in his 
 fields with two policemen, partly paid by the county and 
 partly by the country, to protect him, and they accompany 
 him wherever he wishes to go. 
 
 A man named Hooley, the tenant of half an acre of land 
 at Ashmere, near this town, wanted to emigrate to America, 
 and sold his " good-will," as they call it, or the right to the 
 peaceable possession of the land, for about 20/., to a small 
 farmer named Jackson, the tenant of a few acres of adjoining- 
 land, Jackson having also to pay a smart rent for it to the 
 landlord. A younger brother of this Hooley took it into his 
 head that he was entitled to the land, and that the elder 
 brother had no right to sell the possession of it, and that 
 Jackson ought to give it up. Without any offer to repay 
 him the money he had paid for it, Jackson was threatened 
 with murder if he did not give the land up, and this man 
 now goes about his labour protected by two armed police- 
 men. Hooley has since been sent to gaol for going about 
 with a loaded pistol in his pocket, which was not registered. 
 
 A farmer, named Tracey, of Gertnaskea, near this town, 
 took a farm formerly held by his own brother, who was 
 ejected for the non-payment of rent. The ejected brother 
 
TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 
 
 had him served with threats of death unless he left the farm, 
 and so frightened him that he Avas compelled to apply for 
 protection, and he now goes about his daily labour, protected 
 by two armed policemen. 
 
 In February last Mr. Henry Bridge, a landowner at Ash- 
 bury, within a mile of this town, dismissed his ploughman, 
 because he was an idle fellow, and took another man into 
 his service. The fresh ploughman has been repeatedly 
 threatened that if he did not give up his employment he 
 would be shot. Last week a party of men visited Mr. 
 Bridge's steward, fired tw^o bullets through his door, and 
 warned both him and the ploughman to leave Mr. Bridge's 
 service. The steward became so intimidated that he was 
 determined to give up his appointment. To avoid losing 
 both his steward and ploughman, Mr. Bridge has been 
 compelled to apply to have them both protected in the 
 discharge of their duties by the police. 
 
 A gentleman named Mason, residing at Clonekenna, four 
 miles from this town, had some property left him there by a 
 relative some time ago. The tenants on the property would 
 not pay any rent for several years, and at length he was 
 compelled to eject them about a year ago. His life was 
 unmediately threatened in a most outrageous manner, and 
 since then to this day two armed policemen, paid partly by 
 the county and partly by the country, accompany him to 
 protect him wherever he goes. 
 
 A man named Jeremiah Wall, of Belnaglass, about four 
 miles from this town, some time ago took four acres of land 
 from a gentleman named Griffith. Wall immediately sub- 
 let it to other tenants under himself at a profit rent. His 
 tenants then threatened his life if he did not give the land 
 up, that they might hold it direct fi-om the landlord, without 
 paying his profit rent. This Jeremiah Wall has in conse- 
 quence been protected in his daily avocations for a year 
 
350 TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 
 
 and a half by two policemen, paid partly by the county and 
 partly by the country. 
 
 A gentleman named Downey, of this town, a surgeon 
 and apothecary, is the manager of a local loan fund. On 
 returning from the post-office one night last week he was 
 knocked down, dreadfully beaten with sticks by a number 
 of men, and his head cut open. Three men have been 
 arrested for this act of violence. His supposed cause of 
 offence is that he either refused to or enforced payment of 
 a loan from some man in the neighbourhood. 
 
 A miller named Fitzpatrick, residing two miles from this 
 town, was returning home last week with money in his 
 pocket to pay for some corn he had bought. He was way- 
 laid and knocked down by a party of men, received seven 
 desperate wounds in the head, and was robbed of 33Z. 
 
 A gentleman named Hone, an English barrister on the 
 Northern Circuit, has recently had a property left to him in 
 the neighbourhood of this town. For the last three months 
 he has been living upon his estate, and report says he has 
 been most kind to his tenants in giving them lime and slates 
 for their houses and land. On the 17th of this month he 
 received the following notice : — 
 
 "Oct. 17, 1845. 
 " Sir, — I take liberty, under Captain Starlight's law, to truly Enform 
 you that I am Bound on my solid oath to keep up to the following law. 
 You are counted a good landlord, and were it not for that, I woukl not 
 put you in possession of what you are going to hear, nor would I expose 
 myself By giving you this, and of course must encounter with you here- 
 after. 
 
 " Notice. 
 
 " There did twelve of us sit on a jury and agreed on, that if you were 
 lift in Old Castle long, that you would be a good man to some, and a very 
 bad man to more of us. We agreed on the above Captain's law to llemove 
 you Either (dead or alive), which we all drew lots with the exception of 
 one, for to know whomb should take your life, and be joined with two 
 more, if necessity requires it. Now the lot fell to me to undergo the task, 
 and what ever two I choose to take with me. 
 
TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 35 
 
 " Et is still in my power to notice you once Before I commit the deed. 
 I therefore Notice you under my authority for to Quit Old Castle with 
 health as you came with it, and is sorry to the heart that we lift you so 
 long as we did, but we must make bad good now. So you must be ac- 
 cessory to your own death if held with opposition, as much as I am for 
 shooting you. 
 
 " I therefore the third time Bid you quit if you like, or Remain there if 
 you dare ; for if you do, I will make you acquainted with small English 
 powder and Irish slugs when you may think you are safest. You know 
 you gave plenty of opportunity to us, but we did not agree on taking 
 your life until this time. Now we are left but a very short time to un- 
 dergo our task, and that we will do faithfully if put to it. I will make 
 you know what a Paddy mouse is, with a Blunderbush in his hand. 
 Perhaps you may laugh at this, and say it Avere some cowardly Blaguard 
 wroted it. Do that if you like or if you dare, 
 
 " Given under our hand 
 
 " Captain STARLIGHT. 
 
 " Captain CLARE, Do. 
 
 " CAPTAIN TO THE POOR. 
 " To Mr, Hone, Old Castle." 
 
 This precious epistle was left at liis house. It is written 
 in a good hand. It has since been under the investigation 
 of the magistrates, and Mr. Hone has left for England. 
 
 Mr. Edward Wall, an extensive grocer in this town, a 
 very respectable man, and the Poor Law clerk of the 
 Roscrea Union, yesterday received the following threatening 
 letter through the post : — 
 
 " This is to take notice that if you don't bring Johannah Hickey safe 
 out of her trial on Board-day, you may expect your coffin, or to leave 
 the Poor-house as soon as you can. 
 
 " To Jtlr. Ed. Wall, Roscrea." 
 
 The same sort of intimidation is going on at Nenagh, 
 which I visited to-day. 
 
 A gentleman named Minnitt, a magistrate near Nenagh, 
 occupies two farms near each other, and last year he wished 
 some of his labourers on one farm to do some work on the 
 other. The men were indisposed to go, and persisted in not 
 
352 TIPPERAKY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 
 
 going to their work till after eiglit o'clock in the morning. 
 Mr. Minnitt went to his farm one morning, between eiglit 
 and nine o'clock, for the purpose of putting a stop to this, 
 and found none of the men at work. He inquired of his 
 steward (named Atkinson) why the men were not at work, 
 and his steward told him they would not come to work 
 before the hour that suited themselves. The men were just 
 then coming to work, and Mr. Minnitt desired his steward 
 to point out any one man in particular who was worse than 
 the rest. The steward pointed out two, who, he said, had 
 laid themselves down on several occasions in the wheat field 
 in the middle of the day, and had refused to get up and 
 work when he spoke to them. Mr. Minnitt immediately 
 discharged these men. On the 10th of October last, on 
 coming home from a fair, the steward was waylaid, beaten, 
 and his skull fractured ; and from circumstances which 
 occurred, and from his having been warned that it would 
 be better for him to get those men back into Mr. Minnitt's 
 service, it is believed by the magistrates that his cause of 
 offence is pointing out the two lazy vagabonds in the field. 
 This morning Mr. Minnitt found the following notice pasted 
 outside his hall-door : — 
 
 " I heer buy Give you notice Robert Minnitt that if you dout disem- 
 ploy Artkison and his too sones a gain the first day of November you 
 will marke tlie consequence. If you thinke more about his life then 
 your own you may keep him. If what Peelers and soldiers were in 
 Limerick around you, you will fall, By Powder and Ball ; and the death 
 of Wallerd was nothing to the death you will get. Sent buy Captain 
 Steel R.ibes. Have your coffin made." 
 
 Here follows a drawing of a coffin and a gun. 
 
 Another similar notice was picked up on the road close to 
 the stcAvard's door, addressed to him, and warning him, if he 
 remains there after the 1st of November, he will be worse 
 served than he was before. Tliis is signed " Captain Rock," 
 and has the figures of a coffin and gun drawn at the foot. 
 
TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 353 
 
 There are twelve policemen entirely occupied in the neigh- 
 bourhood of Nenagli in guarding and protecting men whose 
 lives have been threatened. I am informed if a shopkeeper 
 there gives credit to the country people, and attempts to 
 get in his debts, this is an offence thought deserving of a 
 threatening notice, and to warrant his death, if he should 
 persevere. 
 
 Lord Dunally is the owner of considerable property in 
 the neighbourhood of Nenagh. General report says he is 
 an excellent landlord. I am informed that there are a num- 
 ber of tenants on his estate who for the last seven years have 
 not paid him one farthing of rent, and he is afraid to eject 
 them. 
 
 Now, I have not given you one-half the cases of outrage 
 and defiance of the law which have been mentioned to me 
 by the authorities, and the proofs of which have been laid 
 before me, but have confined myself to the immediate neigh- 
 bourhoods where I happened to be. I have scarcely met a 
 gentleman in the district who has not been armed, and T am 
 informed by the police that most of the respectable farmers 
 carry pistols for protection. 
 
 You will now be able to judge in some measure of the 
 state of society here. I imagine most men in England will 
 come to the conclusion that the man who can afford it is not 
 to blame for leaving this part of the country and going to 
 reside where something like law and order and government 
 are enforced, where life is respected, and where he can walk 
 about without the apprehension of some cowardly ruffian 
 shooting him in the back or from behind a wall. 
 
 In vain need the country hope for prosperity where even 
 decent ploughmen and farmers, and schoolmasters, to say 
 nothing of agents and landlords, are obliged to have their 
 lives protected by policemen whilst following their vocations. 
 The absurdity— the positive ruin to a community — of two 
 well-dressed and well-paid policemen being employed to 
 
 A A 
 
354 TIPPERARY AND ITS OUTRAGES. 
 
 guard one ploughman at lils work — not in one case, but in 
 numerous instances — can be seen nowhere else in Europe.* 
 
 Some gentlemen are getting up agricultural societies and 
 model fjirms to teach the people how to use their land to 
 
 * " If, then, such be the real state of the question — (that there are nearly three 
 millions of acres of waste lands in Ireland which might be profitably reclaimed) — ■ 
 what, it will be demanded, can prevent the population now in existence from 
 seizing upon comforts so completely withm their reach, and applying themselves 
 at once to the cultivation of these immense tracts of improvable land at present 
 lying useless ? The answer to this will lead me to the point I wish to arrive at, 
 and the reply I should give would be, that the chief reason was the want of 
 security for jierson and projjerty which deters the working classes from attempting 
 to settle in any place remote from their own connections, and thereby prevents 
 the population from extending itself to the more uncultivated parts of the country ; 
 and being thus pent up in particular districts, it occasions land to be almost 
 unattainable where there is the greatest wish to cultivate it, and leaves it lying 
 idle where it exists in the greatest abundance. Any one who knows anything of 
 the state of Ireland knows that it is not safe in a farmer to emigrate even to an 
 adjoining parish without paying largely for what is called ' the good-will' of 
 the person to whom he succeeds, which explains fully the reason why a sum of 
 money, nearly equal to the value of the fee-simple of the land, is often given to 
 get into possession of a farm, under a respectable landlord, in a quiet neighbour- 
 hood, although the land may be subject to its full value in rent. But to the want 
 of security for person and property may also be added, the want of skill and 
 capital in the working population, and the consequent incapacity of those who 
 have neither to attempt the business of reclaiming, which requires both; and thus 
 (even where land might be acquired) they cannot proceed without meeting that 
 support and assistance from the landlords which they are, generally speaking, 
 unwilling or unable to afford ; and thus things have been left to take their own 
 course from centuiy to century, the local improvement creeping on by degrees, 
 as it happens to be pushed forward by the advancing tide of population in each 
 particular district, without almost an instance of anything being undertaken upon 
 an extended scale to bring into cultivation the numerous tracts of country which 
 would so well repay the sum that might be judiciously expended upon them, and 
 the land is left waste which alone is capable of affording the necessary employ- 
 ment, and the people are left turbulent, discontented, and disaffected, and will 
 always remain so until employment is provided for them. The existing state of 
 things, therefore, operates as cause and effect. The land lying waste leaves the 
 people lawless and turbulent, and again the lawlessness and turbulence of the 
 people is the cause of the land being left so. 
 
 " From what has been said, it seems in vain to look for amendment, or to expect 
 any beneficial change in the present deplorable state of tilings, until that complete 
 dominion of the law is obtained, and that aljsolute and decided state of security 
 is established, which may open to industry and enterprise the inmost recesses of 
 the kingdom, and guarantee to every man the fruits of his labour. This is what 
 
TIPPERARY AXD ITS OUTRAGES. 355 
 
 profit. A gentleman named Stoney, of Kyle-park, near 
 Nenagli, has recently established one of these schools, and 
 there are other shnilar projects on foot. But all "svill he in 
 vain if there he not security established for life and jDroperty. 
 Capital will fly the country, and it will ever remain what 
 it is. The first duty, then, of the Government is to take 
 measures to bring about that security. What is the use of 
 the Government if it does not? If firm and temperate 
 measures will not do, measures which will compel security 
 ought to be resorted to. The people are to be pitied, aided, 
 and taught ; but they must be made to respect the law. At 
 present a set of ruffians completely intimidate those among 
 the peasantry themselves who are respectable. 
 
 In my last letter I suggested fining each townland or 
 district for every outrage committed in it, unless the offender 
 be brought to justice. Try this. It has succeeded in other 
 cases. It put a stop to illicit distillation, and has put a stop 
 to injuries to property ; why should it not protect life, by 
 making it every man's interest to secure personal safety in 
 his neighbourhood, if he^is devoid of the incentive of com- 
 mon humanity ? 
 
 ]\Iuch, however, as we may pity the people — ignorant, 
 prejudiced, neglected, brutalized — those who pander to their 
 ignorance, who foster their prejudices, who excite their 
 brutality — those who, by a system of sordid agitation, for 
 objects which they know can never be accomplished, excite 
 and keep up the spirit of outrage, are, or ought to be, viewed 
 with execration by every good citizen as the curse and ruin 
 of their country. 
 
 Ireland has never yet enjoyed ; and until it be arrived at, no hope need be enter- 
 tained of seeing the kingdom prosper as it ought to do." — Prize Essay on the 
 Management of Landed Proiierty in Ireland, by William Blacker, Esq. p. 32. 
 
 A A 2 
 
356 " THE GOLDEN VALE.' 
 
 LETTER XXIV. 
 
 "THE GOLDEN VALE."— COMPARATR^E ADVANTAGES 
 OF GRAZING AND TILLAGE. 
 
 ^' The Golden Vale" — Arthur Young's and Wakefield's Opinion of the Richness 
 of the Soil and its miserable Cultivation — The Peasant, without means of 
 Knowledge, cannot follow any better System of Tillage — Middlemen — Graziers 
 — Comparative advantages of Grazing and Tillage — Holidays and their Evil — 
 Necessity of Teaching and Directing the People. 
 
 Limerick, November 3. 
 There is a portion of tlie county of Limerick, extending up 
 to the town of Tipperary, and to the foot of the Galtee moun- 
 tains on the one hand, and on the other sjjreading through 
 the centre of the county of Limerick, which, from its extra- 
 ordinary fertility, is called " the Golden Vale." This tract of 
 land or vale is of vast extent, spreading over ahout 18 l)y 
 14 Irish miles, and is for the most part perfectly level low 
 land, with a i*ich loamy soil; it produces the most extraor- 
 dinary crops when tilled, and as grazing land is unequalled. 
 Arthur Young, who wrote on Ireland some 20 years 
 before the Union, or upwards of CO years ago, when describ- 
 ing this part of Limerick and Tipperary, says, — " It is the 
 richest soil I ever saw, and such as is applicable to every 
 wish. It will fatten the largest bullock and at the same 
 time do equally well for sheep, for tillage, for turnips, for 
 wheat, for beans, and, in a word, for every crop and circum- 
 
" THE GOLDEN VALE." 357 
 
 stance of profitable husbandry." Here, then, the riches of 
 nature are lavishly bestowed. What, in reasonable expecta- 
 tion, should be the condition of a people dvy^elling on land 
 teeming with such fatness in Arthur Young's time, before 
 that great " bugbear," the Union, was discovered by some 
 very disinterested geniuses to be at the bottom of the wretch- 
 edness of the Irish people ? Comfort, independence, smiling 
 prosperity? Arthur Young shall himself ansvv-er : — " You 
 must examine into the soil before you can believe that a 
 country loMch has so heggarly an aj)pearance can he so rich and 
 fertile.'" 
 
 Wakefield, who wrote in 1812, has in a similar strain 
 written about the extraordinary fertility of this district, and 
 speaks of it, and other tracts of land in Roscommon, Galway, 
 Clare, and Meatli, of the same description, in the following 
 terms : — "Where such soil occurs, its fertility is so conspi- 
 cuous that it appears as if nature had determined to coun- 
 teract the bad effects produced by the clumsy system of its 
 cultivators." That which Arthur Young found this district 
 60 or 70 years ago, " beggarly in appearance" with all 
 its richness and fertility, it is yet. Beside a field, the ferti- 
 lity of which is such that for it the con-acre tenant can afford 
 to pay, or at least does pay, 12 guineas an acre rent, and 
 raise potatoes enough to live upon for a twelvemonth, you 
 see a mud hovel, half thatched, without windows or chimney, 
 the walls often tumbling down, and wide cracks in them, 
 through which and the door the smoke from the inside 
 issues : and often a cesspool right before the doorway, with a 
 few stones thrown in it to enable the cottao;er to enter his 
 cottage without getting ankle deep in the filth which he 
 does not choose to remove. It is the same in Roscommon ; 
 by the richest land are the most beggarly hovels. " The 
 clumsy system of cultivation" which, upwards of 30 years 
 ago, Wakefield described, exists still. You will see a field 
 of potatoes, on which the whole subsistence of a cottier and 
 
358 " THE GOLDEN YALE." 
 
 his family depends, completely green with weeds, growing 
 in rank luxuriance, every weed, of course, extracting an 
 amount of nourishment from the soil which, if the land were 
 proi^erly cleaned, would go to increase the bulk of the pota- 
 toes, and give more food or profit to the cottier.* You pity 
 the misery of the cottier as it obtrudes itself upon you on 
 the road-sides, because his complaint is but too true, — he can 
 get no emiJloyment ; but when you look at his field and see its 
 condition, and see the man and his wife and half a dozen 
 children " kippering" themselves in the turf smoke of their 
 wretched hovel, Avatching their potatoes grow and their pig 
 get fat, with nothing on earth to do but to weed their pota- 
 
 * The pastures, too, in many places, not only in this district, but very generally 
 where there is good land in Ireland, are covered with a tall v.eed, bearing a 
 yellow flower called " rag-weed." This weed grows to the height of from one to 
 two feet, and the yellow flowers at the top spread out as large as the crown of a 
 hat. Goats will eat them, but no other animal. I have seen the finest meadow- 
 land covered sometimes so thickly with these weeds that the whole field looked 
 yellow. Yet the peasantry never pull them up, or endeavour to prevent them 
 seeding, though they must greatly impoverish the land. Mr. Blacker, in his 
 Essay on the Improvement of Small Farms, thus notices this weed and its per- 
 mitted luxuriance : — 
 
 " There is another weed which I likewise see doing a great deal of mischief — I 
 mean, rag-ivced. The quantity of nourishment it draws from the ground is 
 shown by this, that it will not grow upon bad land. In regard to it, a most 
 ridiculous notion prevails, which I have frequently found people possessed of who 
 ought to know better — namely, that all the nourishment it has extracted from 
 the soil in its growth is jgain retui-ned to it in its decay ; or, in other words, that 
 after ripening the seed, thfe sap descends and enriches the earth, which is there- 
 fore left nothing the worse. 
 
 " The absurdity of this idea reminds me of having been once very urgent with 
 a man to drain part of his farm, which I saw was actually good for nothing from 
 the neglect of it. And what do you think was the reason assigned for wishing to 
 do so .' It was this, that ' if he made drains in his land, all the fat would run 
 away.' You may perhaps laugh at this man's absurdity ; but the idea that the 
 nourishment extracted by the growth of a plant and the ri])ening of the seed can 
 ever descend through the dry stalk and be discharged again by the roots for the 
 enriching of the soil, is an absurdity fully as great, if not greater, than the notion 
 of the poor man alluded to, who, although you may pity his ignorance, had just 
 as high an opinion of his own judgment in regard to the effect of tlie drain as you 
 can i)ossihly have in regard to the rag-weed." — Essay on the Improvement of 
 Small Farms, by William Blacker, Esq. p. 76. 
 
* THE GOLDEN VALE." 359 
 
 toes, to clean their house, and to mend the thatch, your pity- 
 changes its object. You jjity their misery, but j^ou pity still 
 more that hopeless ignorance and that unfortunate quality 
 of mind which can be satisfied thus to live. 
 
 As the Irish peasant is now as " beggarly" as he was in 
 Arthur Young's time, — as he cultivates as rudely as he did 
 when Wakefield Avrote, — is it not apparent that, trace it to 
 whatever cause you may, if left to himself he does not and 
 cannot improve his condition ? Two generations of men 
 have passed away since Arthur Young's time ; science has 
 made vast strides ; the whole tone of society has changed ; 
 but the Irish peasant remains the same — " beggarly" and 
 wretched, a " clumsy cultivator," half-clad, and living con- 
 tentedly in the midst of filth. Ought not some effort to be 
 made to raise him out of this condition, for he has neither 
 the power nor the knowledge nor the wish to do it himself? 
 The only hope of remedy and change is to be derived from 
 the supervision and guidance and government of a superior 
 class of men. 
 
 het us not, however, blame the poor jDeasant too much for 
 this, but examine the influences which surround him. He 
 was born amidst the same scene, and has lived all his life, 
 perhaps, in the same hut in which he now lives. He knows 
 nothing — desires nothing better than he has — potatoes and 
 his hut. From his boyhood but half occupied, is it wonderful 
 that as a man he should be given to indolent habits ? There 
 is no man to talk to him and instruct him — to make him 
 conscious of self-respect, if he deserve it. The landlord of 
 the estate, if resident, is too far removed above him for inter- 
 course; there is rarely a farmer of intelligence to guide him 
 above his own class ; there is, in fact, no middle class ; and 
 thus the poor Irish peasant who, from character and educa- 
 tion, is the last man that ought to be left to his own volition, 
 is by the force of circumstances thrown on his own unguided, 
 unaided, ignorant efibrts. 
 
360 " THE GOLDEN YALti:." 
 
 If YOU ask, how can you remedy this? you are told it 
 is one of those evils in the state of society in Ireland which 
 you never can overcome. 
 
 The remedy, I own, is difficult, though apparent, for there 
 are prejudices on all sides against it; and prejudice, not 
 reason, holds sway in Ireland. 
 
 It would seem ajiparent to reason, that if for generations 
 the small tenant and cottier system of dividing the land has 
 kept the peasantry of Ireland stationary in misery, their 
 land in wretched cultivation, and has prevented the accumu- 
 lation of capital, it is a system not to be approved of, or to 
 he clung to. Those men who rent large tracts of land, and 
 who in England would be intelligent, active farmers, im- 
 proving the land, and employing the people upon it as 
 labourers, are in Ireland what are called " middlemen" — 
 men too proud, or too lazy (or perhaps a little of both), to 
 do anything, who sublet the land at a profit rent to peasants 
 in the condition and class of labourers. The j^rejudices of 
 the middlemen, and their habit of realizing a profit witliout 
 trouble, must therefore be overcome, or rather the middle- 
 man must be got rid of, where possible, as an useless incubus, 
 and a practical intelligent farmer be obtained in his place. 
 Then comes the chief difficulty — what are you to do with 
 the people? You cannot give a large tract to one man to 
 farm without clearing it of the j^eople who have small hold- 
 ings upon it. This would be cruel in all cases — in many 
 impossible; and you would have here the prejudices of the 
 body of the people against you. Though you convince the 
 majority of them that the additional labour which tlie proper 
 cultivation of the land would require would employ most 
 of them at fair wages, and insure them a more comfortable 
 subsistence than they now have, still naturally theywill cling 
 to their patches of land, as a kind of certainty on which to 
 live and multiply in wretchedness and misery. 
 
 There are, however, a class of men, the majority of whom 
 
" THE GOLDEN VALE." 361 
 
 are men of intelligence and wealth, who might be the means, 
 if their prejudices were overcome, of gradually introducing 
 the system of large tillage farms, which alone can put a stop 
 to the ruinous system of subdivision and waste of the pro- 
 duce of the land which now exist, and at the same time 
 afford employment for the people — I allude to the large 
 grazing farmers. It is difficult, I know, to convince men 
 who have got rich, and who realize annually handsome 
 incomes from grazing farms at little trouble, that it is better 
 to till and green-crop than to graze the land, — first, because 
 it is more profitable ; and, secondly, because it gives employ- 
 ment to the people. The prejudice in favour of grazing, 
 however, once overcome, there remains no further difficulty, 
 for this land is cleared already of people, and is almost 
 alwa.ys of the richest quality of soil.* 
 
 In the Golden Vale there is some land I am informed 
 by both grazing farmers and tillage farmers which it is 
 more profitable to graze. It is liable to be flooded, and til- 
 lage crops would be injured thereby ; and it is of so rich a 
 quality that wheat does not grow well upon it, but runs into 
 
 * " God is peculiarly styled ' the God of the Isles' in Holy Writ ; but though 
 we have such advantages from our situation and numberless other circumstances, 
 we seem to do aU we can to thwart the designs of Providence, and make the ocean 
 that surrounds us and our fine ports perfectly useless, or to serve only to impoverish 
 us by the mismanagement of the greatest part of our trade, which is chiefly taken 
 up in exporting our provisions. It is evident to common sense that this is 
 employing our land and reducing our merchants to the lowest way of profit they 
 can be turned to ; and yet our gentlemen are as well contented and pleased with 
 it as your poor Irish tenants are with their dirt, and rags, and potatoes. Who 
 cannot see that there is vastly more gained by agriculture than pasture to the 
 nation — by manufactures than agriculture — and by merchandize than bare unex- 
 ported manufactures ? Of consequence, therefore, those nations who pastiire most 
 must be poorest ; next to them, those who only till the land, without manufacturing 
 the produce of it ; and those must be the richest who work up and also export their 
 manufactures to others. And yet our landlords are as jealous of tillage of all 
 kinds as if they thought it the blessing of Ireland, as Isaiah says it would be of 
 Judea, that ' their cattle fed in large pastures.' " — Reflections and Resolutions 
 proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal 
 Dublin Society, p. 152. 
 
362 COiMPARATIVE ADVANTAGES OF 
 
 straw, without yielding a profitable crop, and in wet seasons 
 the crops fail. This uncertainty, therefore, renders grazing 
 on part of these lands the more profitable mode of using 
 them. Mr. Gubbins, a gentleman residing on his own estate, 
 and one of the most extensive graziers in the southern part 
 of Limerick, informs me that some of this laud will fatten a 
 sheep and a bullock of any weight to the Irish acre. The 
 average land in the vale will take an acre and a half to do 
 this. The rent of average land is there 50s. an acre ; and 
 the average profit on a bullock and sheep thus fattened is 
 about 61., which, after deducting the rent of an acre and 
 a half of land at 50s., leaves a j^rofit to the grazier of 21. 5s. ^ 
 or 30^. an acre. With good seasons, however, this profit is 
 sometimes doubled ; against which, of course, are to be set 
 occasional losses amongst cattle from disease. Much of this 
 land is also let out in what are called dairy farms. The dairy 
 farmer lets to a dairyman so many cows, which he provides, 
 and grass feeding for them. The usual rate of payment is 
 41. lOs. per cow each year and a hundredweight of butter, 
 worth about 41. 5s. or 81. 1 5s. for the use of the cow and land 
 for a year. Whatever the dairyman can make above this is 
 his profit. Taking into account the rent and deterioration 
 of stock, the profits of the dairy farmer are said to be about 
 3/. the acre, and this is said to be the most j)rofitable mode 
 of grazing. Against these certain profits the grazier is in 
 the habit of contrasting his profits from the land under til- 
 lage, for which he is paid a rent by small farmers, but which 
 he rarely tills himself. The first two years he will get twelve 
 guineas an acre clear rent for breaking up ley land for jiota- 
 toes. He then manures and tills the land for the tenant, and 
 gets 7/. to 10/. an acre for three following years for the oat 
 crop. The land is then exhausted, and will take three years 
 before it will recover to feed stock, and several more years 
 before it will fatten stock as before. lie therefore gets about 
 
GRAZING AND TILLAGE. 363 
 
 507. for five years' tillage rent, and his land rendered of little 
 worth for five years more, or about 5/. clear profit an acre, 
 from which is to be deducted the land-rent of, say 505. an 
 acre, bringing the profit down to about 21. \0s. the acre, or 
 very little, if any, raore than the profit of grazing ; and 
 taking into consideration the losses from small tenants, and 
 the injury Avhich they invariably do to the land, and the 
 difiieulties which getting a pauper population on the land 
 always entails, the grazing farmers generally prefer keeping 
 entirely to grazing. It is however clear, that this is the 
 most unsatisfactory and unprofitable tillage farming Avhich 
 can be resorted to. 
 
 Mr. Christie, a very intelligent Scotch tillage farmer and 
 agriculturist, employed by Lord Dunraven, in the neigh- 
 bourhood of Adare, informs me that for all medium land, — 
 for land which will scarcely pay in grazing, tillage is, beyond 
 question, the most profitable, and will insure a clear profit 
 to the farmer of 1/. an acre over every calculation of expen- 
 diture. He also informs me that he knows land in the 
 Golden Vale, which, twenty years ago, would fatten a bul- 
 lock to the acre, which will now hardly keep a goat, so 
 completely have the cottier farmers exhausted it by their 
 ruinous system of cultivation. From his experience he is 
 convinced that large tillage farms would answer Avell, would 
 give great employment to the people, and the available pro- 
 duce by the proper and skilful cultivation of the land by 
 intelligent large farmers would be greatly increased. 
 
 Mr. C. H. Kennedy, in his evidence before the Land 
 Commission (Part I. p. 977), enters into a lengthened detail 
 to show the relative benefits of grazing and tilling a moun- 
 tain farm in Donegal, the jiroperty of Sir Charles Style, and 
 he states that " the effects there of improved tillage in 
 creating a demand for labour are immense." The same 
 gentleman shows from evidence that tilling this description 
 of land, instead of grazing it, " will, in fact, multiply the 
 
364 ' COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGES OF 
 
 amount of profitable eiiij^loyment by about six, and tlie 
 former gross produce by about ten." * 
 
 Mr. John Quin, of Bray, a landowner and occujiier in the 
 counties of Dublin and Wickiow, in his evidence before the 
 Land Commission (Part III. p. 712), recommends as the 
 best means of improving- the condition of the labouring 
 classes, " the encouragement of agriculture in preference to 
 grazing ; it could be done to the advantage of every one who 
 holds land in this district. Land can be tilled with greater 
 advantage than it can be grazed ; no man is a grazier unless 
 he is a man of large capital ; there are no such things as 
 graziers upon a small scale. And why do they become 
 graziers ? — because they can live at ease, and they are not 
 put to the trouble of tilling. Upon the plains of Roscommon 
 one man has 4,000 sheep, and only two herds attending the 
 flock, and what is the consequence ? The grazier lives at 
 ease, and the poverty of the people in the district is a dis- 
 grace to human nature." f This gentleman then delivered 
 in a paper containing a detailed account of the expenditure 
 
 * " Mr. Dobbs (whom I camiot name but with honour for his essay on our 
 trade) has demonstrated that the least advantage that can be made by tillage above 
 the best kind of pasturage is over three to one — to say nothing of the benefit by 
 the first and the damage by the last to our unhappy country, when tea acres 
 under the plough are sufficient for the maintenance of a large family, and scarce 
 two hundred when kept under sheep or bullocks," — Reflections and Resolutions 
 l^roper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal 
 Dublin Society, p, 104, 
 
 t " The curing our people of their fondness for pasturing their lands must, I 
 fear, have some additional helps, or in time it will prove ruinous to us, and make 
 us, as we observed before, a despicable nation of butchers and drovers. So 
 wretched a condition have we brought ourselves to, that while otlier nations I 
 could name are jealous of taking too many hands to the plough from their more 
 gainful manufactures, and therefore would only have as much corn as would feed 
 themselves, without allowing any for exportation, we cannot be industrious enough 
 to plough as much as will keep us from want and famine at home, and the 
 consequence of them — the extortion of foreign corn-factors — who thus consume 
 our few pence that should keep our trade from perishing." — Rcflectio7is and 
 Resolutions jtroper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, of 
 the Royal Dublin Society, p, 108, 
 
GRAZING AND TILLAGE. 365 
 
 and profit of good tillage-land under a five years' course, and 
 also of good grass-land. It is too long to extract in full, but 
 it may be referred to, and I give you the results. 
 
 Clear profit of tillage of an acre of land on a five course system, deducting 
 every expense of ploughing, manuring, digging, furrowing, shovelling, 
 &c., seed, rent, taxes, and expenses of inij)lements. 
 
 £ s. d. 
 1st year, clover ley prepared for wheat . 12 10 6 
 
 2d year, potato crop 2 4 6 
 
 3d year, for wheat 12 19 6 
 
 4th year, hay crop 8 10 6 
 
 5th year, grazing and depasturing . . . . 1 18 6 
 
 38 3 6 
 Average per year, realized 7 12 8 
 
 It will be here seen that the net profit of grazing per acre, 
 as estimated by Mr. Quin, does not materially differ from 
 the profit realized by grazing per acre in the Golden Vale, 
 which is sometimes more and sometimes less, according to 
 the season. But the average net profit of tillage per acre 
 is 11. \2s. 8d., whilst the net profit of grazing, as shown by 
 the 5th year's profit, is but 11. \8s. 6d., leaving a balance in 
 favour of tillage per acre of 51. I4s. 2d. ; whilst the difference 
 in the increased amount of employment given to the people 
 is estimated by Mr. Kennedy at six to one. And even for 
 the feeding of stock, or dairy farms, Mr. Blacker, in his 
 excellent pamphlet on this subject, has shown that a proper 
 system of green-crop cultivation " will make the ground 
 generally allotted to feed one cow in reality supply food for 
 three.^ 
 
 * " Now, by referring to the experience of all good farmers in all countries 
 and under all circumstances, it is ascertained, beyond dispute, that, by the 
 practice of sowing green crops, such as clover and rye-grass, winter and spring 
 vetches, turnijjs, mangel wurzel, &c., the same ground which, in poor pasture, 
 would scarcely feed one cow in summer, would, under the crops mentioned, 
 feed three, or perhaps four, the whole year round, by keeping the cattle in the 
 
366 COMPARATIVE ADVxVNTAGES OF 
 
 Let it not, liowever, be supposed that I recommend 
 breaking up grazing farms into small tillage farms. The 
 peasantry do not know how to cultivate them, and such is 
 
 house, and bringing the food there to them ; and the manure produced by one of 
 these cows, so fed and well-bedded, with the sti-aw saved by the supply of better 
 food, would be more than equal to that produced by three cows jjasturecl in 
 summer and fed in winter upon dry straw or hay, and hadhj littered. 
 
 " Here, then, are two assertions well worthy your serious attention. First, 
 that three cows may be provided with food in the house all the year from the 
 same quantity of ground wliich would scarcely feed one under pasture for the 
 summer; and, secondly, that one cow so fed in the house will give as much 
 manure as three fed in the field." — An Essay on the Jmprovemeitt of Small 
 Farms, by William Blacker, Esq. p. 38. 
 
 " If there is any truth in arithmetic, one cow fed — as I have calculated on — in 
 the house for the entire twenty-four hours, will yield as much manure as three 
 cows that are only kept in the house for eiyht hours, the quality of the food being 
 supposed the same in both cases ; and this would manifestly prove my assertion, 
 namely, that one cow fed within would give as much manure as three fed without ; 
 and therefore, when three can be kept in the one way, as I have already shown, 
 for one kept in the other, it is as clear as three times three make nine, that the 
 result of the calculation will be just as I have stated — ^namely, that the farmer will 
 obtain, by the change of system, nine times as much manure in the one case as he 
 would have in the other." — Ihid. p. 41. 
 
 " I need only ask you to think what you might do in your farms if you had but 
 six, five, or even four times as much manure as you now have ? — or, let me ask, 
 what is it you might not do if you had such a supply ? Surely you would not, 
 in such a case, let the land lie waste, as you now do, to recover itself, when you 
 had the means of instant recovery in your own hands ; nor would you rely upon 
 one half of your farm to pay the rent of the whole, when you had the means within 
 yourself of making the other half productive." — Ibid. p. 43. 
 
 " You will have more profit on your cows if you feed them on green food, and 
 pay a fair price per acre for it, than if you fed them upon the hay and straw you 
 generally give them, and got the said hay and straw for nothing." 
 
 Mr. Blacker then gives examples of the produce of a tenant's cow fed on 
 green crops and on straw to prove this : — 
 
 s. d. 
 
 " Fourteen quarts of milk produced by rape-feeding a cow belonging to 
 James O'Neill, a tenant of Lord^ Gosford's, who tried the experi- 
 ment, at l^d. a quart, comes to 19 
 
 The price paid for the rape cost only 2d. per day, to which add half 
 a stone of straw, \d. (being at the rate of 1*. 4rf. per 112 lbs., 
 which is above the general price of that article), and the exjiense, 
 daily, comes to 3 
 
 Leaving profit, per day, arising from feeding on rape, of .... 1 G 
 
GRAZING AXD TILLAGE. 367 
 
 the inveterate habit in the country of subletting and sub- 
 dividing, that the fairest lands would soon be ruined by such 
 a system, whilst the peasantry would multiply in inert, 
 unguided ignorance, until they starved and all would be 
 injured. But it does appear a reasonable conclusion to 
 arrive at, that if intelligent men of capital, who understood 
 farming, commenced as large tillage farmers, not only would 
 they do so to profit, but they would vastly benefit the small 
 tenantry by their example ; they would give much employ- 
 ment to labourers ; and the necessity of depending on labour 
 would inculcate into the Irish peasantry those habits of 
 constant industry which they are forced into when they 
 
 " \Mien the cow had been fed on straw, she only gave seven quarts, and very 
 soon would have given still less, the price of which, daily, would be only \0^d. ; 
 therefore, if O'Neill got the straw for nothing, he would only have lO^d. by 
 the cow ; whereas, after paying for the rape, he gained \s. 6d. ; but if he had to 
 pay for the straw, the cow would require three stone, which, at Is. id. a cwt., 
 would be 6d., and deducting this from IQ^d. (the price of the seven quarts of 
 milk) there would only be a profit by the cow of 4^d. a day, in place of the Is. 6^. 
 a day yielded by the rape. The same thing may be proved in regard to turnip 
 feeding in winter. If a cow calves at November, and is fed on turnips, she will 
 keep up her milking, but if fed on straw, she wiU fall off immediately to half the 
 quantity. Now, allowing the acre of turnips to be worth 10/. — which is more 
 than any other crop generally produces — and reckoning the produce at thirty 
 tons (although, by good cultivation, ISIr. IVIitchell had fifty-five tons to the acre 
 last year), the five stone of turnips, which I reckon good daily feeding for a milch 
 
 cow, would cost 2^ 
 
 And a stone of straw would cost, at Is. 4^. a cwt 2 
 
 Total cost per day for turnips and straw 04^ 
 
 \Miereas three stone of straw, which she would require if fed on straw alone, at 
 Is. id. per cwt., comes to 6d. a day ; so that, by the use of turnips in winter, it 
 appears you can feed your cow (after allowing 10/. an acre for the farm) at l^d. 
 a day less than upon straw alone, and you get double the quantity of milk ; so 
 that one cow fed in this way yields you fully as much milk as two would give fed 
 on straw, and the manure is also twice as valuable. This ought to show you ail 
 the error you fall into. When you talk of keeping a cow all the winter upon 
 straw, you merely talk of keeping her alive. But your object should be, to keep 
 her so as to yield jou a. profit ; and this can only be done by keeping her on moist 
 ^ood, which, I have shown you above, it is more profitable for you to do than to 
 feed her on straw, supposing the straw was made a present to you."- — Ibid. p. 48. 
 
368 COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGES OF 
 
 migrate into England.* This mode of skilful farming would 
 greatly increase the available produce, or, in other words, the 
 capital of the farmer ; that capital would re-act in giving 
 employment to the people, whilst increased industry among 
 the people would, with the opportunity to exercise it, insure 
 to most of them comfort. 
 
 With the present system of small cottier tenants — their 
 prejudices and ignorance, their apathy and indifference, and 
 the neglect with which they are suffered to do as they like 
 — hope of amendment is folly, and it is vain to expect that 
 half a century hence they will he better than Arthur Young- 
 described them to be more than half a century ago. It is a 
 melancholy fact that a famine from a failure of the potato 
 crop is to be apprehended. It is known that exposure of 
 the potatoes to the air and sun dries up the diseased sap on 
 their surface, and arrests their decay. It is also known that 
 putting them through quick-lime has the same effect. The 
 people, too, generally, know how to grate the potato into 
 water and save the farina or starch, which, when mixed with 
 flower, or even alone, makes wholesome bread, and will keep 
 for years. The sound part of a diseased j)otato may thus be 
 saved. Unless the disease be arrested, it rapidly destroys 
 the whole potato. Now, with the knowledge of these facts 
 
 * ' ' There is a German colony, that settled in the county of Limerick about the 
 beginning of the last century. The settlers were from the Palatinate, and their 
 descendants are still called Palatinates, though they have lost the language of 
 their fathers. They have not, however, lost the German character for good order 
 and honourable dealing, and are looked on as tlie best farmers in the country." 
 " They are most respectable people," said an Irish lady to me, " and much wealthier 
 and far better off than any of their Irish neighbours." It is a constant subject 
 of discussion in Ireland, between the Irish patriots and the adherents of the 
 English, that is, between the Celtomanes and the Anglomanes, whether the misery 
 and poverty of Ireland ought to be attributed to the tyranny and bad government 
 of the English, or whether the indolence and want of energy of the Irish them- 
 selves be not in a great measure to blame. Now the pro.sperity of tliis German 
 colony, though subject to the same laws and influences as the native Irish, would 
 seem not to decide the question in favour of the friendi of the Celts." — Kohl's 
 Ireland, p. 41. 
 
GRAZING AND TILLAGE. 369 
 
 and with famine before them, it will hardly be conceived in 
 England that Saturday last, a fine, bright, sunshiny day, 
 when the potatoes might have been exposed to the wind and 
 sun and the worst grated into flour, was proclaimed as a 
 holiday (no doubt for some good purpose), and not a man 
 was to be seen at work in the whole county, whilst their 
 potatoes were rotting. Some even will not take the trouble 
 to dig them, because they are diseased, though there is not 
 a question about it but much of them, though rotten, may 
 be saved. The town of Limerick was like a fair. There 
 were thousands of people idling~about in the streets and at 
 night getting up party fights, and they were leaving their 
 food, which in a few months they will be begging from 
 England, to rot for want of exertion, because it loas a holiday ! 
 Here is opportunity enough for comment, but I do not wish 
 to broach the subject.* It is, however, another evidence 
 
 * " Sure I am, however necessary it might have heen in the primitive times to 
 bring over the Gentiles to keep many of our saints' days, by making them times of 
 diversion, it is now most necessary for our Legislature to watch better over the 
 industry of our people, by making it penal to drink or idle on many of their 
 festivals, when it is plainly sporting with the nation's ruin." — Reflections and 
 Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland,'jby the late Dr. 3Iadden, of 
 the Royal Dublin Society, p. 72. 
 
 " Our priests and the Popish religion are also a great occasion of the idleness 
 and poverty of the Irish by the number of foolish holidays which they oblige 
 them to observe. Betwixt this wicked custom (for it deserves no other nanie) and 
 the bad weather of our climate, which so frequently interrupts our labour in these 
 parts of the earth, I verily believe one-third of our time is not only rendered 
 useless, but spent in a lazy, listless way, that makes our people less inclined, and 
 indeed less able to work the rest of the week. Sir William Petty computes that 
 they keep twenty-four days in the year more than the Protestants ; and allowing 
 sLx hundred thousand woi'king Papists to be here, makes the national loss thereby 
 250,000/. per anmun, and proves that the Protestants work a tenth part more 
 yearly than the Papists. Mr. Dobbs, in his ingenious essay on our trade, has 
 computed it much higher, and, I think with reason, makes our loss amount to 
 325,000/, which, as labour and riches are but different names for the same thing, 
 is a mismanagement that cries to Heaven for vengeance on those who thus keep 
 so many poor families stai-ving and idle, and, what is worse, indispose them to 
 labour when the holiday and their loitering or debauchery are over." — Ibid. p. 71. 
 It is said, however, that the hohdays are now reduced in number to sis a year. 
 
 B B 
 
370 GRAZING AND TILLAGE. 
 
 how utterly unfit the peasantry are to be left to themselves 
 to act from independent volition. But guide them, lead 
 them, govern them, keep a strict hand over them, which is 
 only to be done by their acting under large and intelligent 
 tillage farmers and capitalists and resident landlords, and 
 they are capable of anything. The police are drawn from 
 them ; the police are trained and strictly governed. It is 
 impossible to see a finer or more intelligent body of men 
 than the Irish police force. Wherever the people are em- 
 -ployed by others, and directed and managed by others, they 
 exhibit much quickness and talent, are industrious and 
 faithful. I have seen exquisite workmanship executed by 
 them, as at Adare, near here, where Lord Dunraven em- 
 ploys great numbers of them in stone and oak carving for 
 his mansion.* But leave them to themselves, though placed 
 in comfort, — neglect them, and their multiplied pauperism, 
 ruin to the land, non-payment of rent, and odium on the 
 landlord may as surely be predicted in a few years as that 
 the sun will continue to shine. 
 
 * Lady Dunraven has taken great pains to have the children of Adare projierly 
 educated and trained. Her ladyship has established, and takes great interest in, 
 a large school there. Measures like these, — teaching the people, civilizing them, 
 acting kindly towards them, and treating them justly, will effect more in the 
 advancement and improvement of Ireland than all the legislative enactments that 
 have ever been passed relative to that country. 
 
CONDITION OF THE KERRY PEASANTRY. 371 
 
 LETTER XXV. 
 
 COXDITIOX OF THE KERRY PEASANTRY. — THE WASTE 
 AND UNIMPROVED LANDS OF KERRY. 
 
 Tralee — The Rher Shannon compared with the River Humber — ^^^ant ofSVoods 
 in Ireland — The Condition of the Kerry Peasantry — The Waste Lands capable 
 of cultivation — Neglect of Agricultural Improvements — Bad Treatment of one 
 another b)' the Peasantry — No encouragement given by the Landlords — Leases 
 alone, without the Attention and Supervision of the Landlord, will not be of 
 Service — Extent of Waste Land — The Land owned by too few persons for the 
 benefit of the countrj^, and those persons generally but Nominal Owners 
 because of Debts — Facilitate the Sale and Transfer of Estates. 
 
 Tralee, Kerry, November 6. 
 It would not result in much public benefit to occupy your 
 space witli a description of tlie towns which I may visit. It 
 is enough, perhaps, to say that Tralee, like most of the towns 
 in the west of Ireland, is irregularly-built, ill-paved, unlit, 
 and dirty. The river Lee runs through it under an archvv^ay. 
 Neglect has suffered the archway to be partially blocked 
 up with gravel, and Avhenever there is a flood, which now 
 happens to be the case, the river, unable to pass through 
 the archway, passes over the public street and floods the 
 houses. It is now two feet deep in the main street. It has- 
 always done so, and therefore it is j^ermitted to do so. There 
 is a prospect, however, of the town being shortly lighted, 
 through the efforts of some of the inhabitants. 
 
 Wishing to see something of the river Shannon, which ha& 
 
 B B 2 
 
372 CONDITION OF THE 
 
 been so much and so justly extolled by every writer on Ireland, 
 I chose that magnificent natural means of transit as my route 
 into Kerry. The enterprise of the Dublin Steam Navigation 
 Company in placing steam-boats on the Shannon has opened 
 this water-communication. Below Limerick the river rapidly 
 expands, and, though so far inland, soon becomes equal in 
 breadth to the river Humbcr in the neighbourhood of Hull. 
 Here, however, similarity ceases. A vast amount of com- 
 merce from all parts of the world floats up the Humber. 
 Its muddy vraters are the source of wealth to the busy 
 thousands who, with industrial activity and enterprise, profit 
 by the opportunities which it affords. The taste and ex- 
 penditure of those who dwell on its banks have in many 
 places rendered pleasant to the eye and clothed with wood 
 a country by no means picturesque. But the broad stream 
 of the Shannon, navigable from Limerick to the sea (a 
 distance of upwards of eighty miles) by ships of 1,000 tons 
 burden, except by two small steam-boats, and an occasional 
 trader to Limerick, is rarely darkened by the shadow of any 
 vessel beyond a turf-boat ; and nothing can be more unin- 
 teresting than the general aspect of its banks ; the undulat- 
 ing hills of Clare on one side, — bare, bleak, and unwooded, 
 — the low lands of Limerick on the other, with scarcely a 
 hedge-row to break the monotony of the view. Occasion- 
 ally, but many miles apart, you see a gentleman's seat, with 
 a few trees about it, which becomes an object of attraction, 
 generally more from the contrast which it presents to the 
 apparent desolation around it, than from any intrinsic beauty. 
 The almost total absence of woods in Ireland in every 
 part of it is remarkable. The roots which are everywhere 
 found in the bogs, and the fine timber which is occasionally 
 dug out of them, show that the present wastes were formerly 
 heavily timbered. From whatever cause, however, — whether 
 from the neglect or the necessity of the proprietors, scarcely 
 an availaljlc tree for any" purpose, cither of ornament or use, 
 
KERRY PEASANTRY. 373 
 
 is now to be seen, often for a dozen miles together.*' The 
 difficulty which the peasantiy find in obtaining- the requisite 
 timber for their miserable huts, renders it a costly matter to 
 watch and preserve from injury and depredation trees which 
 may be planted. It v.'ould seem as though a heavy retribu- 
 tion hung over the proprietary of the soil for the errors of 
 their predecessors ; for even the best disposed efforts of 
 many of them now are thwarted. They sold their timber, 
 and never planted, as long as there was timber to sell, until 
 timber has now become so scarce, that if they plant it they 
 must watch it, or it is stolen. They subdivided the land, 
 and forced the tenantry to live on 40^. freehold patches to 
 increase their political influence ; the tenants now subdivide 
 in spite of them, and multiply into pauperism, till they 
 consume the whole produce of the soil on which they are 
 placed. They degraded, or by neglect suffered middlemen 
 to degrade and oppress, the people to the lowest pitch of 
 human endurance ; and now, with tastes acquired in sucli 
 a school, if decent cottages are built for them, they share 
 them with their pigs and destroy them. The people were 
 left unaided, uninstructed, and neglected in their rude efforts 
 to cultivate the soil ; and now it is difficult to change their 
 
 * " It is strange, that in a country where, about one hundred years ago, near 
 one-fourth part of the profitable laud was under vast forests, — (it is said that, on3 
 hundred years ago, a squirrel could go from Londonderry to Cork by leaping 
 from bough to bough), — we should now be reduced to a necessity of planting, or 
 lie under an increasing expense of 40,000/. per annum, which we now pay for 
 timber. But this great waste of our woods proceeded from many causes ; for 
 not only England, but foreigners, used to build great numbers of shipping 
 here, as commonly as they now come to our ports to victual them. Not only 
 our English colonies which came over, as is usual in all new settlements, but 
 our armies and garrisons employed themselves chiefly in destroying the great 
 forests, as the main shelter and lurking-places for rebels, thieves, &c. ; and 
 many landlords tied their tenants to burn nothing but wood, and to cut down so 
 many acres a year. This, in process of time, helped to clear the land. Our 
 buildings and spendthrifts with our tanners and our ironworks soon devoured 
 the remainder, and our planting goes on now as slowly as if we still remembered 
 the inconveniences our ancestors suffered from the huge woods in their days." — 
 Reflections and Resolutions irroper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, by the late 
 Dr. Madden, of the Roijal Dublin Society, p. 14. 
 
374 WASTE AND UNIMPROVED 
 
 habits thus acquired and fixed in adversity. With the 
 most enliglitened and jiersevering- efforts, it 'vvill take long 
 to remedy past evils ; but without cfTort at all, which is 
 unhappily too generally the fact, the prospect of equal 
 advancement and prosperity for Ireland with the rest of the 
 United Kingdom is gloomy and disheartening to contemplate. 
 On passing from Tarbert through Listowell to Tralee, 
 and onwards to Dingle, immense tracts of waste land, 
 unimproved bog and moor, are seen. The land generally 
 is not rich, but occasionally there are very line ti-acts of 
 land, as in the neighbourhood of Tralee. For those parts 
 of it which have been brought under cultivation there is the 
 most intense competition, and consequently high rents. " I 
 have known," says Mr. Hurly, of Tralee, in his evidence 
 before the Commissioners (Part II. page 851), " a tenant 
 bid for a farm that I was perfectly well acquainted with, 
 worth oOZ. a year. I saw the competition get up to such 
 an extent that he was declared the tenant at 450/." The 
 houses of most of the people are wi'etched mud-huts, often 
 roofed only with sod ; and their children are running about 
 the roads half naked. With these appearances of wretched- 
 ness, the land on which they live presents the further 
 evidence of deplorable ignorance and neglect. High-rented 
 as it may be, subdivided as it may be into insufficient 
 patches, yet, if properly cultivated, its produce would be 
 so greatly increased as to alleviate, for the most part, the 
 privations of those who subsist on it. But one naturally 
 asks, how comes it that there is such infinite subdivision as 
 is seen about Dingle, and indeed throughout the county, 
 and such an intense struggle for a miserable patch of land, 
 when miles of it are on all sides lying waste and unre- 
 claimed ? Is it ruinous to reclaim land ? Will it not pay I* 
 
 * " It may easily be comprehended, that whoso could drain the water, and for 
 the future prevent the gathering thereof, might reduce most of the bogs in Ireland 
 to firm land, and preserve them in that condition. But this hath never been 
 
LANDS OF KERRY. 375 
 
 Cannot men be got to work it ? Or are wages too high to 
 render such a project feasible? Let us see what the evidence 
 given before the Land Commission says in these respects. 
 
 Mr. Crosby, landed proprietor, of Ardfert Abbey, is asked 
 (Part II. pp. 837, 839),— 
 
 " Does the barony of Claumaurice afTord any opportunity for remu- 
 
 known to the Irish, or, if it was, they never went about it, but, to the contrary, 
 let daily more and more of their good land grow boggy through their carelessness, 
 whereby also most of the bogs at first were caused. . . . This draining of the 
 bogs, as it tendeth not a little to the general good of the whole land, by amending 
 of the air (whereof we shall have occasion to say more in some other place), and 
 otherwise, so it brought great profit unto the authors, for the land or soil of the 
 bogs being, in most places, good of itself, and besides, greatly enriched by the 
 lying still and the soaking in of the water for the space of so many years 
 the same being dried through the draining of the water, is found to be very fit 
 either to have corn sown upon, or to be turned into pasture ; making also excellent 
 meadows, so as those who have tried that do affirm that the meadows gained out of 
 the bogs might be compared with the very best of their other meadows — yea, many 
 times surpassing the same in goodness ; and this took place chiefly in the grassy 
 bogs or shaking bogs, whose fruitfulness in this particular and in the plentiftil 
 production of very sweet and deep grass, after the draining off the water, was 
 very wonderful ; and all this without any other trouble or costs bestowed upon 
 these meadows than that they dunged them the first year, to warm them the better 
 and the sooner, and more thoroughly to amend the remainders of that coldness 
 and rawness contracted through that long and constant continuance of the water 
 upon them ; after which, once dunging, — afterwards, for a good many years, 
 nothing else needed to be done to them. 
 
 " This draining of the bogs was performed in the manner following : — On that 
 side of the bog where the ground was somewhat sloping, they cut a broad deep 
 trench, beginning it in the firm ground, and advancing it into the entrance of the 
 bog, into which trench the water would sink out of the next parts of the bog ia 
 great abundance, and that many times so suddenly as if a great sluice had been 
 opened, so as the labourers were constrained to run out of it with all speed, lest 
 the force of the water should overwhelm and carry them away. Some part of the 
 bog being, by this means, grown reasonably dry within a short space of time, 
 opportunity thereby was ministered to advance the trench further into the bog ; 
 and so, by little and little, they went on with it, until at last they carried it quite 
 across the bog, from the one side to the other ; and having done this they made a 
 great many lesser trenches out of the main one on both sides of the same : the 
 which, bringing the water from all the parts of the bog unto the main trench, did 
 in a little while empty the bog of all its superfluous moisture, and turn it into 
 good and firm ground." — Boate and Molpieaux^s Natural History of Ireland^ 
 p. 03. 
 
376 "WASTE AND UXIMPROVED 
 
 nerative improvements "with respect to \vaste land ? — Yes, if there "was 
 capital. 
 
 " Are there large tracts of property belonging to absentee proprie- 
 tors capable of improvement ? — Yes, very large tracts. 
 
 " Is there anything done upon them ? — Nothing." 
 
 This gentleman lias laid out about 1,500/. in allowances 
 for liouses, ditches, and lime, upon his estate. He is asked 
 (p. 839),- 
 
 " Do you find this a system that renders the gross produce of the land 
 much larger ? — Yes, it has augmented it considerably. I had districts 
 of several hundred acres not ivorth Is. an acre, and they aretoorlh20s. noio. 
 
 " Do you believe, looking at your 0"wn interest, that the allowances 
 you have made have been beneficial to yourself? — Yes, beneficial to 
 myself and immensely so to the peasantry, because it is immediately re- 
 productive. The change from destitution and misery and giving them 
 good houses was instantaneous, but it is diSicult to get them to follow any 
 rotation of crops."* 
 
 * " The incitement to industry arising from a loan of lime not being apparent 
 to those who have not considered the subject, it may not be amiss to state that, 
 in this neighbourhood, twenty shillings will buy at the kiln twenty-sLx or twenty- 
 seven barrels of lime, which is quite sufficient to manure one English acre for a 
 crop of potatoes of the kind called cups. After this, the said acre will yield a 
 crop of wheat, or other gi-ain suited to the soil, to which will succeed the crop of 
 clover that has been sown with it, and, after the clover, another grain crop. 
 These four crops are, upon an average, worth five pounds each — that is, twenty 
 pounds in the whole — which the farmer makes by his industry out of twentij 
 sliillinffs worth of lime lent him, and all upon one acre only of his farm ; which 
 acre most probably M'oiild have been, perhaps for the enfire time, lying out to 
 rest, as it is called, nominally in useless pasture, but really producing nothing. 
 But the plan is not confined to the reclaiming of one acre, nor is the occupier to 
 stand idle whilst these crops are coming round in succession. The loan of lime is 
 still continued, and another and another acre is brought into cultivation, opening 
 to the view a continually increasing return, until the whole farm is finally brought 
 into its most productive state." — An Essay on the Improvement to be made in 
 Small Farms, hy William Blacker, Esq. p. 30. 
 
 "The practice of seeing and rebeving distress, not by unproductive almsgiving, 
 but by affording the means and encouraging the spirit of industry among those 
 whom sickness or misfortune may have depressed and impoverished, would soon 
 create in the landlord that interest in the welfare of his tenants which acts of 
 kindness and benevolence are always sure to excite in the Ijreast of the benefactor 
 towards the Icnefted -, and whoever thinks tliat an Irish tenantry (once con- 
 
LANDS OF KEKRY. 377 
 
 Mr. Wilson Gun, landed proprietor, of Oak-park, near 
 Tralee, is asked (p. 836),— 
 
 " Is the land of a nature that by proper cultivation it could be made 
 more productive than it is? — Yes, if they farmed it better. The only 
 Avay a landlord could improve them would be to have agricultural schools 
 to teach them how to grow green crops and house feed. 
 
 " Is there much land requires draming ? — Yes, a good deal. ISTo 
 draining is going on, or only in a small wa3\" 
 
 Mr. Kerry Supple, land-agent to Mr. Staugliton, of Clan- 
 mauriee, Kerry, is asked (p. 841), — 
 
 " Does the district, in your opinion, afford opportunities for extensive 
 and remunerative improvements ? — It does. 
 
 " Of what nature ? — A better system of farming. I do not think they 
 understand anything about farming and the reclamation of land." 
 
 Mr. Holme, of Gurlienard, near Listowell, agent to Lord 
 Listowell, is asked (p. 847), — 
 
 " Is there any great extent of unreclaimed land upon Lord Listowell's 
 estate? — Ves, there w a great deal of land upon zchich capital miglU be 
 very projitablij employed in thorough draining, which is altogether omitted." 
 
 But not only do the landlords generally neglect to improve, 
 and derive a profit from capital so employed, but the tenants 
 also, who vrould be more than equally benefited by such 
 improvements, are so steeped in ignorance and apathy that 
 they will not improve to save themselves from starvation. 
 This gentleman, Mr. Holme, thorough drained some small 
 fields in the neighbourhood of his house for example as well 
 as profit, and most of the peojjle said " he was throwing 
 away his money very foolishly." When they saw the 
 change effected b}^ draining, and were satisfied that he was 
 more than paid for it, still they did not follow his example 
 except in a very few instances. 
 
 vinced of the friendly disposition of their landlord) -would not repay such proofs 
 of his regard with the most sincere and ardent attachment, knows little of their 
 nature." — Ibid. p. 34. 
 
378 WASTE AND UNIMPROVED 
 
 " The general objection," says Mr. Holme, " they make is this — ' You 
 have plenty of money and we have none.' The maiiual labour and the 
 home labour u\the principal thing required. I do not see anything to 
 prevent one industrious familij tliorough draining an Irish acre in the 
 course of the year.'" 
 
 Mr. John Hurly, Clerk of the Crown at Tralee, says in 
 his evidence (p. 852), — 
 
 " I have a farm, where I reside in the summer, which for nine years 
 never j)aid more than 40/. or 50/. a year, and that was badly paid. I 
 divided it, and left it to the tenants, and set it at the full value of it, but 
 I gave them leases for a mere nominal rent for seven years, and during 
 those seven years they conditioned to burn and lay out limestone, which 
 I had upon another farm, and which I gave them Avithout charge, a7id the 
 farm is now worth 200/. a year, and as good cottier tenants as can be 
 found anywhere. That Avas in consequence of the improvements solely, 
 and by lime. But there are tenants who, if the landlord's eyes are not 
 open, will cheat him, and not lay out what they are allowed for." 
 
 Again we see what attention and enlightened liberal 
 management effect. The very opposite conduct, however, 
 is the general ride. " Don't lay out a sixpence; you rob 
 yourself if you do. Gripe all you can; you are a fool if you 
 don't. Cheat — impose on — deceive — overreach — oppress 
 one another ; it is at once the proof and the reward of 
 ability." Of these qualities the pages of evidence before me 
 give abundant proof; what wonder, then, that the land is 
 exhausted and but half cultivated — that the people are j^oor 
 and destitute, and without opportunity of realizing money, 
 and that they have no confidence in, and suspect and disbe- 
 lieve one another? Mr. Holme, in his evidence, says that 
 in Scotland, as indeed is the case throughout Great Britain, 
 the farmer goes to the market with his samjile-bag of corn 
 in his pocket, and sells it by sample, and docs not thrash it 
 out till he has sold it : — 
 
 " There is a general feeling of confidence in each other. But such a 
 thing is not jjraclised here, and could not be practised." 
 
 And thus, because of this want of confidence, the poor 
 
LANDS OF KERRY. 379 
 
 farmers pay the penalty of their cheating propensities iu 
 being compelled to drag about their corn for miles to market, 
 and, if they should not sell it, to drag it home again, perhaps 
 damaged by wet, until at last they are compelled to sell it 
 for far less than its original worth. The landlords let their 
 lands by proposal to the highest bidder ; they rarely do any- 
 thing for a tenant, and if he improves, his rent is generally 
 raised immediately, and if he will not pay this, his farm is 
 put up to proposal, and he has to outbid the man who will 
 offer the highest for his improved land, in order to retain 
 possession of his farm, though his competitor never laid out a 
 sixpence upon it, and can therefore afford to offer the highest 
 rent. 
 
 Jeremiah O'Connor, farmer of Brandanwell, near Ardfert, 
 is asked (p. 869), — 
 
 " Does the district afford opportunities for extensive and remunerative 
 improvements ? — Yes, it does. 
 
 " Of what kind ? — Drainage and tillage ; first draining, then tilling. 
 
 " Is any encouragement given to the tenants to drain ? — Not the least. 
 
 " Is any encouragement given to the tenants to improve their farm 
 building? — Not the least. 
 
 " Does any landlord encovirage them to do anything ? — Xo. 
 
 " Have you drained any land yourself? — Yes ; and I should have 
 drained more if I was sure of my land. Tlie imj^-esnion upon my mind is, 
 for I have experienced it, that if we improve, the improvements icould go 
 171(0 tlie liands of competitors T 
 
 Mr. W. Pope, farmer, of Causeway, in his evidence, says 
 (p. 844),— 
 
 " If an industrious tenant lays out mojiey in improving, he ivill be 
 charged thirty or forty per cent, more rent than his ■neighbour. I can 
 prove that." 
 
 " There is too little preference shown to the occupying tenant," says 
 Mr. Hurly, of Tralee (p. 800), " and that tends to prevent the proper in- 
 tercourse between the landlord and the tenant in this country. They have 
 not much faith in (heir landlords, in my opinion." 
 
 The same gentleman says, further on, — 
 
380 
 
 V/ASTE AND UNnrPROVED 
 
 " There was one very great road proposed from Abbeyfcale, and one of 
 the most useful roads. It had been advocated in this Grand Jury-room 
 over and over again, and they said if there was a subscription of 1,400/. 
 got they would grant the presentment ; but it has never been got and the 
 road has never been made, though it would have improved the country 
 beyond measure. There would be no claims for compensation of any 
 kind, and the result would be, the opening of an entire tract of country 
 betv/een this and Abbeyfeale : but the subscribers would not comeforwurd, 
 and one of the largest proprietors refused to give one sixpence." 
 
 Mr. J. P. Sullivan, of Killarney, is asked (p. 872), — 
 
 " What is the condition of the labouring population ? — Most miserable. 
 
 " From what, in your opinion, does that arise ? — It arises from the 
 heartlessness of the farmers in exacting the most exorbitant rertts from the 
 labourers ; and I think the landlords have not interposed sufficiently to 
 protect the labourers." 
 
 Mr. John Lynch, solicitor, of Tralee, says of farmers and 
 small middlemen (p. 863), — 
 
 " I have found them more oppressive to each other than the superior 
 landlord is. I know of many cases where a sublessee distrained on his 
 own tenant, w'here he had, at an early period after it became due, that 
 man's money (either bj;- sale of his property or otherwise) in his pocket, 
 although that man has not for months afterwards been called upon to pay- 
 rent to the head landlord." * 
 
 * I was informed by several magistrates, that the chief part of their duties 
 consists in settling complaints against the farmers made by their labourers. It is 
 customary for the labourer to give his labour for three or four days a week for 
 the use of his cottage, and perhaps half an acre of con-acre land, the farmer witli 
 whom he makes the bargain agreeing to plough his land for him, to keep his 
 cottage in repair, to allow him sometimes to have grazing for two sheep for 
 milking, to allow the labourer to collect manure for his potato land, and some- 
 times to pay him at a certain rate of wages, the rent of the cottage and land to be 
 deducted. And the magistrates have daily comjdaints made to them by labourers 
 of breaches of these contracts on the part of the farmers. The farmers often will 
 not plough the poor labourer's potato land for him in time to set his potatoes. 
 This is a great loss to him, as the potatoes then ripen so late that he is compelled 
 to dig them when half grown. The farmers very generally will not keep the 
 labourer's cottage-thatch drop drj'. They will often give the labourer a part of 
 the farm for grazing his sheep (the milk of which partly supports his family) of 
 so worthless a character, that the sheej) can barely live, and Mill aflbrd no milk. 
 Sometimes they will not allow the labourer to collect manure for his potato 
 
LANDS or KERRY. 
 
 381 
 
 " The lower you go," says Mr. Nicholas Maher, M.P. for 
 Tipperary, before the Land Commissioners at Dublin (Part 
 I. p. 103) - 
 
 " In the class of middlemen, the worse you find them ; in fact, I do not 
 understand the English language sufficiently to describe their cruelty and 
 barbarity as they ought to be described." 
 
 Is it in the nature of things that any country can prosper, 
 the inhabitants of which thus use it and one another ? Talk 
 about " misgovernment" ruining Ireland ! First be honest 
 and just to one another, and use ordinary exertion, liberality, 
 and enterprise — this is in the power of every man, and 
 depends on no government ; — and if the exercise of these 
 qualities (of which there is a most lamentable absence) does 
 not make Ireland what nature intended her to be — one of 
 the most prosperous, as she is one of the most fertile, coun- 
 tries on the globe — then see what is amiss with her govern- 
 ment. But, first, let the everlasting talkers about " mis- 
 government" " pluck the beam out of their own eye." 
 
 To return, however, to the question of the capabilities of 
 the waste lands, — Mr. Edward Gorham, collector of poor- 
 rates at Brennan, near Tralee, is asked (p. 867), — 
 
 " In the district over which your collection extends, is there any ex- 
 tensive tract of land that might be reclaimed reaiuneratively ? — Yes, to be 
 sure there is ; there is an immenHilij of improvable land. 
 
 " What prevents it being improved ? — Two or three things. First, 
 short leases ; in the next place, the want of capital among the tenants 
 themselves ; and, I should say, the tenants not being properly encouraged 
 by the landlords. If the tenants got long leases of the land for the /an- 
 value, they would endeavour to improve the land for the advantage of 
 themselves and families." 
 
 This witness says, further on, — 
 
 ground, and very often they dispute and refuse to pay bim the balance of his 
 wao-es. ^\^len it is remembered that these farmers are themselves but a degree 
 above the labourer in condition, and that they must be thoroughly aware of the 
 privations and wants of the labourers, this conduct appears the more heartless. 
 
382 WASTE AND UNHirROVED 
 
 " The distm-bance of the country was caused by the poverty of the 
 people. But if the country could be brought into a state of cultivation, 
 the condition of the people would be much happier . 
 
 " Do you think that the improvements of the land, if undertaken, 
 would afford them sufficient employment to relieve their misery ? — / am 
 quite sure of it ; I am quite positive of it. I am certain that the land is 
 quite sufficient to make the entire population comfortable, if properly man- 
 aged, and sufficient funds were in the hands of proper persons to enable 
 the people to work." 
 
 It is, however, proper to state here, for there is no getting 
 over the overwhehning mass of evidence on this point, that 
 what this witness says would be the effect of leases, and 
 what it is natural to expect should be their effect, toill not he 
 produced by leases alone. There must be the constant super- 
 vision of the landlord, and stringent clauses in the leases, 
 capable of being quickly and at light expense enforced, 
 coupled with agricultural teaching and knowledge, or leases, 
 instead of being an encouragement to improvement and 
 industrv, will be, as they almost invariably have been where 
 there has been neglect, an encouragement to subdivision and 
 laziness, the forerunners of certain misery. Mr. Crosby, in 
 his evidence, speaks of 3,000 or 4,000 acres of land, his 
 property in this county, under lease during his minority. 
 On almost every lease a village had been created by subdi- 
 visions, " the population was in a most dreadful condition, 
 and the state of agriculture was infamous." (P. 839.) 
 
 Mr. Arthur Saunders, landed proprietor, speaks (p. 879) 
 of his father having granted to some tenantry on an estate 
 of his at Macroom, in Cork, " leases for three lives, or 31 
 years ; two of the lives are in existence now ; and in that 
 period," he says, — 
 
 " I have not known tlie tenantry the least improving— in fact, they 
 have only just tilled and sown oats, and tilled again, and tried to take out 
 of the land what they could." 
 
 He speaks of another farm at Castle Island in this county, 
 let by his brother to two men upon two lives, and says, — 
 
LANDS OF KERRV. 383 
 
 " It is as much as they can do to pay the rent. They burnt some of the 
 land, and they are not disposed to improve, more than to pay their rent 
 out of it." 
 
 Mr. J. Leahy, barrister, whose father is agent to Mr. 
 Herbert, of Muckross, speaks of some tenants (page 885) 
 who — 
 
 " So long as they were yearly tenants, and iveve urged by Mr. Herbert, 
 who went about and visited their farms, Avere more inclined to grow 
 green crops and improve their farms than they have been since they got 
 their leases." 
 
 On another estate of Mr. Herbert, called the " Palace" 
 estate, a lease of a farm having " an excellent house, fit for 
 any gentleman," and an orchard upon it, was given to a 
 tenant. On his death his two sons came into possession, 
 allowed the house to go to ruin, sublet the farm at rackrents 
 to cottier tenants, and — 
 
 " At the end of the lease, so far from Mr. Herbert or any one claiming 
 under him then deriving anything from it in the way of profit for im- 
 provements formerly made, the land will come to him nearly in a state of 
 nature ; and corn has been thrashed in the drawing room of the principal 
 house." 
 
 Leases alone, then, will not in Ireland encourage improve- 
 ments. There must be a diffusion of agricultural know- 
 ledge, and a constant supervision of the landlord, with a 
 power reserved to prevent mischief; as one witness ex]3resses 
 it, " a snaffle must be kept in the mouths of the tenants," or 
 leases will do harm.* 
 
 " There is an immense quantity of waste land in the country very little 
 reclaimed, which has been remunerative wherever there was capital em- 
 barked in it," says Mr. Sullivan, of Killarney (p. 871). 
 
 Mr. Leahy says (p. 884), — 
 
 " There is scarcely any part of this county that does not, in my opinion, 
 
 * For more full iaformation on the subject of leases, see Letter, ante, dated 
 Ballina, p. 199. 
 
384 WASTE AND UMMPUOVED 
 
 afford very extensive ground for improvement ; and witli reference to the 
 first and most important consideration, Avhicli I think is drainage, it has 
 licen almost wholly neglected by the farmers in this county up to the 
 present tune." 
 
 Without repeating" much similar evidence, it is enough to 
 quote the evidence of Mr. Griffith, the General Valuation 
 Commissioner, respecting this county, which will be found 
 in the report of the Land Commissioners (p. 52) : — 
 
 " This county contains a vast extent of unimproved pasture land, 
 amounting, in the Avhole, to 727,000 acres, of which it is probable about 
 150,000 acres may be drained and reclaimed, so as to produce corn and 
 green crops, and 250,000 may be drained for the purposes of pasture and 
 coarse meadow." 
 
 I think it is sufficiently apparent that the struggle for 
 land is not because land is scarce ; and that it is profitable 
 to reclaim it. It is almost needless to prove that there are 
 thousands of men without employment, starving for want of 
 support and who are willing to work for most trifling wages. 
 
 " Four months out of the twehe arc as much as the labourers can get 
 coKstant employment at 8d. a day," says Mr. Wilson Gun (p. 836). 
 
 " The labouring population are in the most dreadful state in this 
 county— nothing can be Avorse ; the wages are low, and they never sec 
 mone}' — they are not paid m specie ; they receive a score garden, and it is 
 worked out of them at the rate of 4/. to 71. an acre," says Mr. Crosby 
 (p. 840). 
 
 " The labourers generally cannot get employment. When they can, 
 they get Gel. a day, and their diet, and 8(1. Avhcn they feed themselves," 
 says the Rev. E. O'Sullivan (p. 881.) 
 
 There is then land to reclaim; it is profitable to reclaim 
 it ; and there are men starving and destitute ready to do it 
 at 6d. a day. Well, why do not the landed proprietors set 
 them to work, obtain profit for themselves, and benefit the 
 country and everbody in it ? The truth is, with few excep- 
 tions, the landed proprietors of Kerry are embarrassed and 
 have not the means. I have in a former letter alluded to 
 
LANDS OF KERRY. 385 
 
 the propriety of tlie Government enabling proprietors by- 
 Act of Parliament to sell portions of their wastes or estates 
 at a valuation to the Government, the purchase-money to be 
 appropriated in liquidating debts and encumbrances accord- 
 ing to their priority ; such estates to be then saleable, (with a 
 clear title founded on the Act of Parliament), to capitalists 
 willing to purchase, who would generally be improving land- 
 lords. Is it not evident that some such measure is "abso- 
 lutely necessary? Mr. Pierce Mahony, a landlord of this 
 county, who has carried out some very extensive improve- 
 ments on his estate, in his evidence before the Laud Com- 
 missioners (Part III. p. 759), says, — 
 
 " The greatest evil Ireland labours under is, that the lands are owned 
 in fee by too few persons. I wish to see land as freely dealt with and as 
 generally possessed, in moderate extent, as possible. The principle of 
 monopoly has been already abandoned in trade and commerce ; the sooner 
 it is extended to land, by allowing land to circulate by transfer from hand 
 
 to hand, and thus subdivide itself, the better Give 
 
 facilities for breaking up large estates now encumbered almost to their 
 full value, and only held to gratify the pride^ or ambition of the holders 
 at the expense of the country." 
 
 Measures which would effect this would do more good 
 than 10,000 college bills; would [diffuse independent and 
 enterprising capitalists throughout the country ; would throw 
 upon the capitalist in the back ground the responsibility 
 which he ought to take, and which, when coupled with its 
 honours and rewards, he would generally not refuse to take; 
 would strip from men who now flauntingly wear it, the tinsel 
 garb of a nominal estate, without having either the means or 
 the power to use and improve it; and would, in fact, give a 
 reality to landed property, a strength and a stability to the 
 country. We should no more hear of starving men, beside 
 Avaste acres ; of want of employment on lands where labour 
 might be profitably employed. Profitable employment, and 
 
 c c 
 
386 WASTE LANDS OF KERRY. 
 
 the increase of produce, would create wealth and accumu- 
 late it into capital, and capital invested in developing the 
 resources of the country would render it what it is capable 
 of becoming — powerful and prosperous — the right arm, the 
 proud participator, whether in peace or war, in the glories 
 of the British empire. 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF KERRY. 387 
 
 LETTER XXVI. 
 
 THE PEASANTRY OF KERRY.— I^IR. O'CONNELL AND HIS 
 TENANTRY. 
 
 Killamey — Character and Condition of the Population of Keriy — Oppression of 
 the Labourers by the Farmers — System of Fishing — The Money-pawning 
 habit — Irish Railways — Cahirciveen — Mr. O'Connell and his wretched Tenantry 
 — The propriety of abolishing Tenancies under " Middlemen" by Law- 
 Necessity of instructing the People in Agricultural Knowledge. 
 
 Kenmare, Keert, November 10. 
 The peculiarities of individuals are ever most striking when 
 circumstances have confined them to isolated positions. The 
 attrition of minds and of manners in large congregations of 
 men, smooths and polishes off the prominent peculiarities of 
 each individual to an uniform and common standard. That 
 which is true of individuals is not the less so of a province, 
 The peculiarities and characteristics of its inhabitants will 
 be the more marked the more it is shut out by circumstances 
 from habitual intercourse with the rest of the kingdom. 
 Such is the case with the county of Kerry, westward of Kil- 
 larney. To Killarney the tide of English tourists sets in, to 
 visit its far-famed lakes. The continual want of decencies 
 and comforts has at length secured them ; and but little is to 
 be observed amongst the peojDle there to distinguish them 
 from the inhabitants of every other tourists' resort. There 
 is the same eager pouncing on a stranger as a prize whom 
 
 c c 2 
 
388 THE PEASANTRY OF KERRY. 
 
 is fair game to pluck; the same excess of civility, and not a 
 whit the less of extortionate exaction. These are the excre- 
 scences which luxury and the careless spending of wealth 
 usually create. Westward, however, of Killarney but few 
 visitors journey. There is no commerce, an infinitely sub- 
 divided and pauper tenantry, who (excepting a little butter, 
 which they manufacture to pay their rents) create nothing 
 beyond their consumption. The planting of potatoes and 
 the churning of butter bounds their knowledge ; the selling 
 of a firkin of butter a year to some Cork merchant is the 
 extent of their intercourse with the rest of the world. Here 
 then we may expect to find all the peculiarities of the Irish 
 character strongly marked, and their habits still after their 
 own hearts ; and we do find them. 
 
 I have written to you in former letters much about miser- 
 able hovels in other parts of Ireland ; they are more than 
 equalled in Kerry. I have described the half-naked and 
 potato-fed people I have met with elsewhere. Here their 
 nakedness is not less, and they know no other food. In 
 filthiness and squalid poverty, starving on a rood of land 
 with miles of waste land around him, which the application 
 of knowledge and industry would make teem with plenty, 
 the poor Kerry farmer exists in contented wretchedness. 
 Neglected by his landlord, he knows nothing beyond the 
 growing of potatoes ; oppressed by the hard-fisted middle- 
 man, who lives by squeezing another rent out of his industry, 
 he is steeped in hopeless poverty; cheated and robbed by the 
 bailiffs and drivers, who extort from him his last sixpence 
 for rent, and their fees ; and pounced upon by the middle- 
 man for an increased rent, if he improves an acre of land, 
 he learns cheating and extortion from his betters, and prac- 
 tises both on the wretched being who labours on his farm. 
 In a hovel like a pigsty, in which it is impossible to stand 
 upright, without chimney and without window, with but one 
 room, an iron pot, and a rude bedstead, with some straw 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF KERRY, 389 
 
 litter, as the only furniture, bed, or bed-clotlies, the labourer, 
 in the midst of half a dozen nearly naked children, with his 
 barefooted wife, sits squatted on the mud floor round the 
 peat fire. A garden plot of potatoes is their whole subsist- 
 ence, and for this patch of land, and the hovel which shelters 
 him and his family, his labour is sold to some farmer, who 
 lets him his land and hovel, for a year. 
 
 Mr. Hickson, the agent to the Marquis of Lansdowne, a 
 large landed proprietor in Kerry, when examined before the 
 Land Commissioners, mentions one of the duties of an ag-ent 
 to be, " to protect the labourers as much as possible from 
 oppression." 
 
 " To what oppression do you allude ? Various sorts, such as making 
 demands on him for rent that he does not owe, and keeping his crops 
 sometimes from him. The farmers, imder whom they hold extort, from 
 them." (Appendix, Part IE. p. 912.) 
 
 The Rev. J. Sullivan, the parish priest of Kenmare, gives 
 similar evidence (p. 918). — 
 
 " The labourers are the most wretched people upon the face of the 
 globe. I do not believe that any race on the face of the earth would 
 suffer the privations they do under the farmers." 
 
 The majority of the landlords are non-resident, and very 
 much of the land is let to middlemen on leases. "There are 
 many middlemen, under whom the land is much dearer, and 
 the tenantry are poorer," says Mr. J. M'Lure, farmer, of 
 Castle vien, near Kenmare (p. 969). — The land is thus 
 taken out of the management of the landlord, and the mid- 
 dleman, having no permanent interest in it, covers it with a 
 pauper tenantry, from whom he exacts a competition rent, 
 and at the end of his term renders it up to the landlord to 
 deal with it as he can. The land being generally hilly and 
 rocky, is let by the cow's grass and not by the acre. A 
 tenant can live pretty comfortably on about ten cow's grass. 
 " Land ranges at from 21. to 4/. rent, by the cow's grass. 
 
390 THE PEASANTRY OF KERRY. 
 
 according to the quantity and quality of the pasture." — 
 (Evidence of Mr. Eugene O'Sullivan of Westcove, four 
 miles from Derrynane, p. 913.) The subdivision, however, 
 amongst the tenants, especially near the sea-shore, has gone 
 on to such an extent that most of them have not more than 
 a cow's grass a- piece to live upon. This will give a clue to 
 their poverty. A coav on fair good land in this part of Kerry 
 will yield a firkin and a half of butter a year. A firkin of 
 butter is worth 21. 155. ; a firkin and a half of butter will 
 therefore leave about 4/. a year, and the rent is from 21. to 
 4?. for this cow's grass. A jsatch of the land is manured 
 with sea- weed and shell-sand, which the poor barefooted 
 women carry in hampers on their backs great distances, and 
 on this they raise the potatoes for their year's consumption. 
 The value of the butter barely pays their rent, and the but- 
 termilk and j)otatoes are the only food or means of subsist- 
 ence which the small tenants have. The labourers are worse 
 off; they have not the buttermilk. 
 
 At certain periods of the year there is abundance of fish 
 on the coast, but the people are so utterly ignorant and 
 untaught that they do not know how to fish. " There was 
 a curious system along the coast which struck me as a very 
 absurd one," says Mr. Keane Mahony, of Castlequin, in the 
 barony of Iveragh, in his evidence before the Land Commis- 
 sioners (Part II., p. 898).— 
 
 " They went to a great expense in preparing nets and wailed till the 
 fish came to them instead of following the fish. They Availed in the har- 
 bour till the fish approached, and they had a good place to make a haul ; 
 and the consequence was that in very few instances, and by the merest 
 chance, were they successful. They have adopted a different system in the 
 island of Valencia. They have got a lighter description of seine, and have 
 given up the habit of waiting for the fish ; and now follow the fish." 
 
 Absurd as this appears, it is only another evidence of total 
 ignorance, and of a want of that common " nous" and intel- 
 ligence which are substitutes for knowledge in most other 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF KERRY. 391 
 
 places. The neglected and untaught Irishman, full of 
 impulse, has his sympathies and his passions easily excited ; 
 he is guided with facility when he trusts you ; but of himself 
 he has no sort of contrivance to help himself or better his 
 condition. He simjoly does as he is taught, and follows the 
 steps of his father before him. The natural bent of his 
 mind is not to ingenuity, but to cunning. He is as helpless 
 as a child at a contrivance or a plan which shall drain his 
 land, or aid him in fishing, or improve his cottage, or save 
 his diseased potatoes; but he is great at a contrivance which 
 will palm a bad sixpence upon you ; and the trouble he will 
 take, and the roundabout way he will go to overreach you^ 
 are more amusing than effective. The better educated vulgar 
 among them take a pride even in thmking that they deceive 
 you. Who has not heard Irish-manufactured stories with- 
 out end of the great ability and cleverness with which John 
 Bull is gulled by them. Like most Irish stories, they must 
 be taken cum grano salts. 
 
 When at Galway, I had a conversation with two gentle- 
 men ; one the rector of the town — the Rev. John D'Arcy, a 
 most straightforward and useful man, and a gentleman who 
 is allowed by all parties to have been of vast service in 
 improving the town — the other a landed proprietor in the 
 neighbourhood. The conversation was upon loan funds, 
 and on the utter ignorance of the people of the commercial 
 value of money. Mr. D'Arcy mentioned, as an instance of 
 this, the fact that the poor pawned money to his knowledge 
 to the extent of hundreds every year, in the town of Galway. 
 I laughed at this as an incredulous story. Seeing him 
 serious, I told him I did not doubt his word, but would like 
 to be convinced of the fact by seeing some such pledges 
 myself, otherwise no one would believe me if I mentioned it. 
 He was about politely to show me the town, and we all three 
 walked into the first pawnbroker's shop we met with, which 
 happened to be Mr. Murray's. Mr. Murray was not in, but 
 
392 THE PEASANTRY OF KERRY. 
 
 his shopman was, and Mr. D'Arcy at once explained the 
 ohject of our call, and told him that I doubted that money 
 was ever jjawned. The shopman said he would soon con- 
 Tince me it was a fact, and pulled out a small drawer con- 
 taining several bank-notes with duplicate tickets pinned to 
 them, and also a guinea with a duplicate ticket round it. I 
 unjainned some of these myself, and took the description of 
 the notes down ; the other gentleman who was with me did 
 the same, and read the description of the notes. I thought 
 this so strange a fact of utter and absurd ignorance of the 
 commercial use of money, that I stated it to you in a former 
 letter. In going out we met Mr. Murray, the shopkeeper, 
 nvho seemed anxious to account for the pawning by various 
 surmises, such as the lOZ. note being a daughter's fortune 
 that the poor people did not like to break into, and the 
 guinea being a heir-loom or pocket-piece. In answer to my 
 question, — " Was a guinea ever left unredeemed and sold as 
 a forfeited pledge?" he replied that this had frequently 
 occurred. A Tralee paper, however, has discovered " that I 
 am not the man for Galway, where I have been served in a 
 manner the most laughable, and well worthy of an Irish 
 wag." It then says — Mr. Murray " persuaded" me of what 
 l)oth myself and the gentleman with me had seen and felt, 
 with our own eyes and hands, and that I "jotted down" his 
 information as a " veritable fact." How very clever this is, 
 to be sure. What " waggery " there is in telling a lie, even 
 supposing Mr. Murray to have done so; which he did not.* 
 These poor money-pawning and fish-catching people are 
 such sharp fellows to attempt to deceive any body ! But 
 
 * The Tralee paper afterwards disowned the authorship of this discovery, 
 which, it appeared, had been invented by the Galway Vindicator, or some such 
 creditable authority, which, with the means of ascertaining tlic truth close to its 
 ovm pruiting-office, unblushingly ventured a falsehood in order to cast a slur on 
 an undeniable truth. Such, to a great extent, is Irish Journalism, and such are 
 very many of the sources from which information respecting Ireland is derived. 
 
THE PEASANTRY OF KERRY. 393 
 
 your information is not usually obtained in any sucli slip- 
 slop manner. Let not Galway, however, hold down her 
 head, for the people of Kerry, where the paper that made 
 this bright discovery is published, spread nets and loaitfor the 
 jisli to come into them. I notice this foolish attemjDted contra- 
 diction only to stop it, for I see that that great authority, 
 Mr. Dillon Browne, has plumed himself much upon this 
 assumed " waggery" of the poor ignorant money-pledgers 
 in imposing upon me. 
 
 I will not weary you by repeating the story of the 
 •wretched state of agriculture of the people here, and of the 
 mode in which they exhaust the land. You see here, only 
 more strongly marked, the ignorance of agriculture, which 
 elseAvhere prevails. Their want of enterprise, their content- 
 ment with little, their indisposition to improve of themselves 
 and their suspicion that they wall be robbed if they do im- 
 prove, are here plainly perceptible. They will not leave 
 the place where they are born " as long as they can get a 
 corner in a bog to stick a cabin in and grow potatoes," says 
 Mr. Butler of Waterville {ibid. 895) ; and he attributes this 
 to " the want of a spirit to better their condition," and to 
 their " being easily satisfied in that way." " Where there 
 is scarcely any resident proprietor the people will not ori- 
 ginate any improvements themselves. They must be in- 
 structed," says Mr. Keane Mahony, of Castlequin {ibid. 899). 
 " It is difficult to get them to make improvements ; they are 
 naturally an indolent people, and do not like any innova- 
 tion," says the Rev. Dennis Mahony, of Dromore Castle, 
 near Kenmare {ibid. 917). The Rev. John Sullivan, the 
 parish priest of Kenmare, is asked {ibid. p. 919), — 
 
 " Do you find in your experience that a few instances of persons being 
 removed who have executed improvements creates a general distrust 
 amongst others, and a disiaclination to make improvements ? — Decidedly; 
 it remains in their minds for twenty years. Things that have occurred 
 nine or ten years ago will he given to you as a reply when upbraiding 
 them for not improving their farms." 
 
394 MR. O'CONNELL AND 
 
 All this clearly points to those remedies which will alone 
 avail. They must be taught, and employed, and encouraged; 
 they must be led on, and urged, and forced on. I see no 
 plan more likely eventually to effect great good among them 
 than the establishment of railways. It will drive in among 
 them men of enterprise and capital, who will force them on. 
 It is very problematical whether any railroads in Ireland 
 will pay, beyond one or two trunk lines. I have never yet 
 met an Irishman of intelligence acquainted with the country, 
 that said they would pay. That, however, is another ques- 
 tion. If established, I think it certain that they will effect 
 great good. One is projected from Valencia harbour to 
 Wexford. About 300 men are now employed regularly in 
 Valencia in slate-cutting ; as usual, an English company 
 finds the enterprise and the capital. Near Kenmare, also, 
 there is a cojjper-mine, which employs about 70 people, also 
 worked by an English company. The scenery around the 
 coast of Cahirciveen is magnificent. Beautiful as are the 
 lakes of Killarney, they are eclipsed by Dingle-bay. Were 
 there any means of comfortable travelling and accommoda- 
 tion, there can be doubt that this coast would attract many 
 visitors and much wealth. 
 
 The wretched-looking town of Cahirciveen, with its dirty, 
 unpaved streets, and old hat mended windows, reminds me 
 of another subject. The property of this town is rented to 
 Mr. Daniel O'Connell, who, as a middleman, sublets it to 
 its present tenants, and extracts a profit rent out of it.* In 
 
 * The whole of this statement about Mr. O'Connell's property was afterwards 
 violently and abusively contradicted. Nearly the whole of the Irish press joined 
 in an attempt apparently to hunt me down, and readily gave circulation to the 
 abusive contradictions. It will be seen, from subsequent letters, with what 
 success they were rewarded — or, rather, how disgracefully false were the contra- 
 dictions. Mr. Daniel O'Connell, in Conciliation Hall, denied that he was a 
 " middleman." The fact that he is so in every sense — exacting three times the 
 amount of rent from his sub-tenants that he pays to the head-landlord — will be 
 found conclusively established in a Letter subsequent to this, dated from 
 Killarney. 
 
HIS TENANTRY. 395 
 
 this country they pluck the geese alive for their feathers, and 
 turn the poor pen-feathered and -n'retched birds loose to get 
 over it as they can. This is repeated several times in a year. 
 As if apprehensive of their coming fate, as each goose is 
 caught to go through the plucking operation, the whole 
 flock, after the manner of geese, set up a terrible cackling, 
 and screeching-, and hissing. This habit is not confined to 
 geese of the feathered tribe. Until I came into Kerry, and 
 passed over the estate of Mr. Daniel O'Connell, I never 
 could divine the reason of the hubbub of the O'Connells — 
 of the " screeching, and cackling, and hissing," when the ne- 
 glectful conduct to his tenantry of the Marquis of Conyng- 
 ham was exposed. Why should men, who are eternally 
 prating about absentee landlords and neglectful landlords, 
 and who are ever using the destitution and discontent of the 
 poor tenants as a means of abuse of English legislation, fall 
 foul of me for exposing a marked instance of neglect, whilst, 
 at the same time, I pointed out the benefits which had 
 accrued to tenants from the attention and encouragement 
 bestowed on them by Lord George Hill, a neighbouring 
 landlord ? But my eyes are open now. " The murder is 
 out." It was another instance of what that clever fellow of 
 Tralee calls " waggery." There was an apprehension that 
 the turn to have their decent feathers plucked oJSf might come 
 round to the occupiers of Derrynane, and hence the cackling*, 
 and screeching, and hissing of the flock of O'Connells, and 
 Brodericks, and Brownes. At and in the neighbourhood of 
 Cahirciveen and Derrynane, Mr. Daniel O'Connell pos- 
 sesses an income from land of about 3,0007. a year. A 
 small portion of this is his own fee-simple property ; another 
 small portion he rents on lease renewable for ever, and about 
 two-thirds of the property he holds on terminable leases, 
 under the Dublin college, Mr. Hartop, Mr. Bland, and 
 Lord Cork. He is, in fact, for two-thirds of his property a 
 middleman, living on a profit rent derived from small 
 
396 MR. O'CONNELL AND 
 
 tenants : and we will see presently liow lie manages them. 
 The bulk of this property is held on a lease for his own life. 
 With his private affairs, however, I have nothing to do, nor 
 will I meddle with them, though I had queer stories enough 
 related to me. I have no business with anything but the 
 manner in which, by his treatment of his sub-tenants, he 
 benefits or injures his countrymen and the country. A gen- 
 tleman named Butler, residing at Waterville, mentions a 
 lease of land, let by his father, to the father of Mr. Daniel 
 O'Connell. When old Mr. O'Connell died there were not 
 12 tenants upon it, and in 1841, when the land came out of 
 lease (15 years afterwards) there were 54 tenants upon it. 
 {Ihid. 895.) His general character as a landlord or middle- 
 man is, that any tenant who applies to him may have leave 
 to erect a cabin where he pleases. He permits subdivision 
 to any extent. This wins a certain degree of popularity ; 
 but the land under lease by him is in consequence in 
 the most frightful state of over-population. The competi- 
 tion for land is, therefore, intense, and they will offer almost 
 any rent for the most miserable fragment of land. In this 
 condition they are left in a total state of neglect. They have 
 no agricultural schools ; no encouragement ; none to lead or 
 to guide them, and the poor creatures are left to subdivide 
 their land and to multiply, and to blunder on, until, in the 
 words of Mr. Keane Mahony, " their principal feature is 
 distress." {Ibid. 898.) 
 
 I entered several of the cottages at a place called Derry- 
 nane Beg, within a mile from Derrynane. The distress of 
 the people was horrible. There is not a pane of glass in 
 the parish, nor a window of any kind in half the cottages. 
 Some have got a hole in the wall for light, with a board to 
 stop it up. In not one in a dozen is there a chair to sit 
 upon, or anything whatever in the cottages beyond an iron 
 pot and a rude bedstead with some straw on it; and not 
 always that. In many of them the smoke is coming out of 
 
HIS TENANTRY. 397 
 
 the doorway, for they have no chimneys. In one that I 
 entered the door was taken off the hinges and made a 
 table of, by placing it on two turf-baskets. Unaided, and 
 imguided, the poor creatures are in the lowest degree of 
 squalid poverty I have yet seen, and this within sight of 
 Derrynane-house. As one of the tenants told me " they 
 were eating one another's heads off, and if they did not get 
 some assistance they would starve and the gaols would be 
 full." Wretched as are the tenants on the Marquis of 
 Conyngham's property in Donegal, their condition is fully 
 equalled by the condition of the tenantry of Derrynane.* 
 The " hissing and the screeching" is thus fully accounted 
 for. In future, however, it will be remembered that amongst 
 the most neglectful landlords who are a curse to Ireland, 
 Daniel O'Connell ranks first — that on the estate of Daniel 
 O'Connell are to be found the most wretched tenants that 
 are to be seen in all Ireland. If a middleman is execi'ated, 
 as an useless drone who squeezes the very life's blood out of 
 his miserable tenants, the name of Daniel O'Connell will not 
 be forgotten. Though not the worst among middlemen, he 
 lives by the system. 
 
 Adjoining the cottages on this property are neatly thatched 
 and roomy cottages on the Marquis of Lansdowne's estate, 
 who takes some pains to encourage his tenantry. 
 
 In fact, wherever there is ordinary attention paid by any 
 
 * The Derrynane tenantry, as any one may convince himself who will tq 
 through Derrynane Beg, are worse off than any tenantry in Ireland. They are 
 in a more lost, filthy, wretched, and neglected condition. Badly off as are the 
 Marquis of Conyngham's tenantry, Mr. Daniel O'Connell's are worse off, and 
 for this very obvious reason : the tenantry of the Marquis of Conyngbam hold 
 under the head-landlord, and pay but one rent, whilst the majority of Mr. O'Con- 
 nell's tenantry hold under him as a middleman, and pay two rents — namely, the 
 head-landlord's rent and this middleman's profit-rent — the two united being three 
 times as much as is paid to the head-landlord ; that is, Mr. O'Connell, as a 
 middleman, puts twice as much profit-rent into his pocket, extracted from 
 wretched sub -tenants, as he pays for the same land to the landlord from whom he 
 rents it. 
 
398 MR. O'CONNELL AND HIS TENANTRY. 
 
 landlord to his tenants there are signs of improvement and 
 comfort. Wherever there is a middleman, and utter neglect 
 of the people, and subdivision is allowed, there the misery 
 -which marks the Derrynane property is observable. 
 
 I know the difficulty of interfering with the rights of pro- 
 perty; but a terrible mischief requires measures to meet it. 
 Were all subtenancies of lands in Ireland made void, and 
 the tenant constituted the tenant of the superior landlord, 
 much individual wrong, no doubt, would be done ; but the 
 public good it would effect would be enormous. At present 
 the middleman has no interest in the land, and cares not 
 how it is injured, so that he gets a profit out of it. The 
 landlord cannot improve it, or spend money on it, for if he 
 did the middleman would reap the benefit in an improved 
 rent. You will not, however, hear Mr. O'Connell advocate 
 any such measure. This and instruction of the people in 
 their business of agriculture, by model farms and schools ; 
 and the encouragement of industry by simply improving the 
 lands to the profit of the improvers; or by any means, in 
 fact, which will teach the people how to work profitably, 
 would soon alter the aspect of Ireland, and rapidly put an 
 end to the repeal agitation. 
 
BANTRY AND THE SURROUNDING POPULATION. 399 
 
 LETTER XXVII. 
 
 BANTEY AOT) THE CONDITION OF THE SURROUNDING 
 POPULATION. 
 
 Beauty of the Country near Bantry Bay, and its neglected Capabilities — Bantry 
 Town and its Statistics — The Inn at Bantry, and its Accommodations — Reasons 
 for the poverty of the People of this District — Reasonable claim of the Tenants 
 to be paid for their Improvements — The want of Encouragement and High 
 Rents prevent Improvements — Evidence and Contradictions regarding these 
 Facts — Of the various aspects of Truth in Ireland — ^What Encouragement and 
 Attention on the part of a Landlord will effect — Their want keeps Ireland in 
 Distress. 
 
 Bantey, Coek, November 14. 
 The road from Kenmare into the county of Cork passes for 
 the most part through a barren mountain district. The 
 highest elevation of the road is attained on entering the 
 county of Cork. Prom this point nothing can exceed the 
 grandeur of the mountain scenery, or the beauty of the dis- 
 tant prospect of Bantry Bay, running far inland and dividing 
 itself into many shaped and numberless creeks. Nowhere 
 in Ireland can you turn without being struck with the 
 beauties or the fertility which nature has lavished on this 
 unfortunate country; and yet, go where you will, there 
 seems, as it were, a blight over all things. Man — amidst 
 all this beauty and fertility — man, who elsewhere in Great 
 Britain often beautifies that for which nature has done little, 
 and converts barren wastes into fertile fields, has here done 
 
400 BANTRY AND THE CONDITION OF 
 
 nothing, nay, worse than nothiug. If there be an eyesore in 
 the prospect, be sure it is the work of man^his wretched 
 tumble-down mud hovel, or the boghole which he has carved 
 in the hill-side. You will generally look in vain for a taste- 
 ful cottage, or for a wood, or for a garden, or for a hedge, 
 or for a well squared clean field (unless it be close to some 
 gentleman's domain, and they are indeed " few and far 
 between") ; in fact, for anything which can show the perse- 
 vering application of industry or taste. But you see in 
 many places miles of waste land and bog sloping to the very 
 edge of Bantry Bay ; and the coral-sand and the sea- weed of 
 that bay will reclaim any land, and produce the richest 
 crops with draining and cultivation.* In some of the val- 
 leys and on parts of the land adjoining the bay where these 
 means have been resorted to the heaviest crops are obtained. 
 You see, too, dotted about, cottages so wretched that no 
 description can convey an idea of them, in the very midst of 
 scenery which you would think would exalt and refine the 
 taste of a savage, and in the very centre of land lying waste 
 
 * Major Ludlow Beamish's account of his visit to the Kilkerrin estate of the 
 Irish Waste Land Company contains the following analysis of these sands, as 
 made by Dr. Sullivan of Cork, a pupil of Liebig, and now associated with 
 Professor Kane at the Royal Dublin Society : — 
 
 " CORAL-SAND IN 100 PaRTS. 
 
 " Siliceous sand 2. 3 
 
 Carbonate of lime 90. 
 
 Animal matter 7. 5 
 
 Phosphoric acid trace. 
 
 99. 8 
 " Shell-sand. 
 
 " Grit, or siliceous sand 21. 6 
 
 Carbonate of lime 71. 
 
 Animal matter G. 7 
 
 Phosphoric acid trace. 
 
 Magnesia trace. 
 
 99. 3 
 
 •' From the large supply of ammonia which the animal matter contained in 
 these sands would yield, and their extreme richness in carbonate of lime, they 
 
THE SURROUNDING POPULATION. 401 
 
 with tlie materials for rendering it abundantly fertile, as it 
 were offering themselves temptingly for use. There is some- 
 thing sadly wrong in all this, and it is not wonderful that 
 there should be discontent. 
 
 The town of Bantry is situated at the foot of the bay. 
 ■ There is depth of water for vessels of any tonnage to come 
 to the very doors of the houses, and there are 4,000 inha- 
 bitants in the town, according to the last census. Sprat and 
 herring-fishing and curing, and line-fishing, are carried on 
 in the bay, I am informed, by about 250 heads of families. 
 About 50 heads of families live by pig jobbing, buying hides, 
 as butchers, and slaughter-house attendants. About 50 
 heads of families are shopkeepers. There are about 20 
 nailers, about a dozen gentry, doctors, agents, and heads of 
 police altogether. These, with cobblers, tailors, blacksmiths, 
 masons, washerwomen, sawyers, &c., about make up 50 other 
 heads of families ; and there are about 80 labourers heads of 
 families, or altogether 480 heads of families with apparent 
 means of living. There are 600 inhabited houses, which. 
 
 must necessarily'exercise an important influence upon vegetation, more particularly 
 the coral-sand ; but the effect is gradual, and not immediately apparent. 
 
 " Payen and Boussingault, measuring the manuring powers of different sub- 
 stances by the quantity of nitrogen which they contain, make coral-sand more 
 valuable than farm-yard manure, as appears by the following comparative state- 
 ment of the quantity of nitrogen contained in one hundred parts of each. 
 
 100 lbs. of Coral Sand (Merl) contains . . . 
 
 ,, Farm-yard Manure 
 
 „ SheU Sand (Trez) 
 
 Nitrogen. 
 
 Relative 
 Value. 
 
 0-512 
 0- 40 
 0- 13 
 
 128 
 100 
 32i 
 
 " From the experiments made at Kilkerrin, it would appear that two years at 
 least must elapse before any sensible benefit is produced by the application of 
 either of these sands, more particularly the first named; but their fertilising 
 property is fully manifested upon that part of the shore which has been most 
 exposed to their influence, and where a rich carpet of white clover covers the 
 surface of the ground." 
 
 D D 
 
402 BANTRY AND THE CONDITION OF 
 
 with one family (though many have two) to each house, 
 would require each family to average seven in number to 
 make up the population of 4,000. This leaves 120 families, 
 or some 800 people, without means of living. I am assured 
 that about 50 families live entirely by begging ; the rest get 
 a job to do when they can, and live by a bit of garden and a 
 pig, and by raising coral-sand and sea- weed out of the bay, 
 which they sell. This may account for the apparent wretch- 
 edness of the greater part of the town. Many of these poor 
 people are ejected tenants from the lands of middlemen 
 falling out of lease, who resort to the town to seek a hovel, and 
 such chance-work as they can get. Others of them" squat" 
 themselves on some rocky and uncultivated patch, contrive 
 a wretched cabin to shelter themselves, and on their backs 
 carry bog-earth from some exhausted bog to make a surface 
 on the rock, and grow themselves potatoes on which to exist. 
 The town itself is surrovmded with hills, and affords scenery 
 which our Torquay, in Devonshire, can scarcely rival. But 
 you will look in vain for the handsome villas, for the taste, 
 the diffused wealth, the thriving activity, the order, the com- 
 fort, the cleanliness, which you see there. Excepting the 
 court-house, the church, and the hotel, there is not a decent 
 building in the town. The streets are unpaved, unflagged, 
 and filthy, and not one of them is straight for one hundred 
 yards. Four-fifths of the inhabitants live in mud hovels, 
 such as you see in the country, and which here form the 
 outskirts of the town. Tliese consist usually of a single 
 room, a hole for a window with a board in it, the door 
 generally off the hinges, a wicker-basket with a hole in the 
 bottom, or an old butter-tub, stuck at one corner of the 
 thatch for a chimney, the pig, as a matter of course, inside 
 the cottage, and an extensive manufacture of manure going 
 on on the floor. This is in the streets of Bantry. Surely 
 there is something wrong here ? Still, however, I am in- 
 formed that Bantry is improving. Nay, the very hotel — the 
 
THE SURROUNDING POPULATIOX. 403 
 
 sole hotel in this town of 600 houses — in which I write, is 
 infinitely below any ale-house of the very smallest six-house 
 village in the most out-of-the-way nook in England in ordi- 
 nary comfort and cleanliness. Yet the landlord, who is very 
 civil and obliging, is of necessity making money. My break- 
 fast service this morning was a curiosity. Roasted bean- 
 coffee, in a leaden teapot, the spout a-crooked from a tumble, 
 the broken handle clumsily tied on with a thick cord, and an 
 old cork stuck in a hole in the lid where the knob had once 
 been, and everything else, as the newspaper paragraphists 
 say, " en suite" The dirtiness of the room kept the break- 
 fast service in countenance. These things are so customary 
 here, that I have almost ceased to notice them. In that 
 congregation of wretchedness called Cahirciveen, in Kerry 
 — O'Connell's own town — I was awoke at five in the morn- 
 ing by the incessant bellowings of a bull-calf that wanted its 
 breakfast in the room below vie ; and yet these hotel-keepers 
 are respectable citizens.* The greater part of Bantry Bay is 
 an oyster-bed, and there are shrimps for the catching ; but 
 for neither love nor money will you get either oysters or 
 shrimps in Bantry. Nobody buys them, and therefore no- 
 body gets them ; or perhaps it is as likely nobody gets them, 
 and therefore nobody buys them. In England men make 
 money by spending money, paradoxical as it may appear. 
 The shopkeeper eats oysters, and the oysterman has money,. 
 therefore, to buy goods off the shopkeeper. When a teapot 
 gets dilapidated, the hotel-keeper buys a new one from the' 
 ironmonger, and the ironmonger, thus supported, can afibrd 
 to take his wife and family an occasional trip, and put up at 
 the hotel. By supplying and paying for their mutual wants 
 they create mutual wealth and comfort. In Ireland, how- 
 
 * On my subsequent visit to Cahirciveen (see post, Letter dated from Kil- 
 larney), I found the hotel at Cahirciveen so furbished up in consequence of the 
 notoriety it had obtained that I scarcely knew it. 
 
 D D 2 
 
404 BANTRY AST) THE CONDITION OF 
 
 ever, there are three ways by which this general diffusion of 
 wealth and comfort is lost, — First, a vast number of the 
 people have nothing wherewith to buy anything, and do not 
 therefore think of buying. Their condition is an unhappy one. 
 Secondly, there are a very goodly number of the people who, 
 having nothing wherewith to buy, yet buy very extensively. 
 In these cases the unfortunate shopkeeper who sells does not 
 derive any profit from the transaction. There is here evi- 
 dently the will to spend money without the means. This is 
 a misfortune to all parties. Thirdly, there are those who 
 have the means, but who have not the heart to spend. The 
 number of the latter gentlemen is pretty numerous, and it is 
 questionable which of these three classes of citizens is the 
 most beneficial to society in general — those who cannot buy, 
 those who buy and cannot pay, or those who can but will 
 not buy. 
 
 In the preface to the second edition of his most useful book 
 on the Industrial Besources of Ireland, Dr. Kane truly says, — 
 
 " All that is sound and permanent in England's industrial power grew 
 not out of oratorical elegancies, but from hard-handed, stern, and per- 
 severing -work. By such work alone — work of mind and of body — caa 
 a people hope to advance." 
 
 Alas ! how true is this description as applied to Ireland ! 
 It is by " oratorical elegancies" alone that Ireland seems to 
 struggle to advance. How many rigmarole speeches in 
 Conciliation-hall will manufacture one bale of cloth? — or 
 how many of Dillon Browne's speeches, for instance, will 
 make one steam-engine ? If it needed a demonstration, Adam 
 Smith has given it, — that " Labour is the source of all wealth," 
 It was this which made England wealthy : it is the want of this 
 which makes Ireland wretched.* But if there is no one to 
 pay for work, you cannot expect people to work for the love 
 
 * " It is certain that the property of every nation depends as absolutely on the 
 industry of its people as the safety of a ship on the diligence of the mariners who 
 sail in her ; and therefore it is to the last degree incumbent on us to secure this 
 
THE SURROUNDING POPULATION. 405 
 
 of it. Then comes the reaction : there is not the work for 
 which to pay, and those who want the work, and are ready- 
 to pay for it, if it is not there to be had, resort elsewhere 
 with their money. If there is no demand there will be no 
 supply ; if there is no supply the demand flies to the market 
 where it is. But who is to create the demand in the coun- 
 try ? Surely those who draw from the country the means 
 which naturally ought to create it. And who is to create the 
 supply? The people in ordinary cases would do this (there 
 being a demand) by the operation of natural laws ; but they 
 work for reward — that is their impulse to labour. But if, by 
 an absurd ingenuity, — by a greediness which chokes itself 
 — by a system of " killing the goose which lays the golden 
 eggs," that reward is snatched from the grasp of the labourer, 
 the supply will cease, even though the demand should exist, 
 and the demand must be driven away for want of the supply. 
 It is the curse — the blight of this unfortunate country, that 
 both these evils exist in full force in it. Those who draw 
 from it the means which ought to create a demand in it do 
 not in it create a demand. And the very same men, by 
 refusing to give leases, and by equally refusing to refund to 
 a tenant his expenditure in improving the land, if he should 
 do this without a lease, freeze industry, put a stop to im- 
 provement, banish labour, and stint the supply. 
 
 One or other of these two things a tenant has a right to 
 expect if he improves his land — either that his land shall be 
 secured to him for a term sufficiently long to repay him for 
 
 great point, which we are generally reckoned very defective in." — Dr. Madden' s 
 Reflections and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, p. 203. 
 
 *' If, as Dr. Chamberlain computes, the veiy children of Norwich, from six to 
 sixteen years, do earn 12,000/. per annum more than they spend, what a sum 
 might we raise to the public by the hands of our Irish children, who do nothing. 
 In many parts of the kingdom, where trade and our manufactures have not yet 
 reached, the natives have contracted a sort of natural indisposition to labour, and 
 have an habitual sloth, which nothing can remove but the severest laws." — Ibid. 
 p. 205. 
 
406 BANTRY AND THE CONDITION OF 
 
 the money and labour lie invests in it, or that he shall be 
 paid for the value of the improvements he has effected in 
 the land, if the landlord will not give him a lease, and 
 chooses to terminate his tenancy and increase the rent. 
 This is simjDly common justice ; for he has then invested 
 his labour and money, not on his own land to benefit him- 
 self, but on his landlord's land to the benefit of his landlord. 
 If a merchant employs a tailor to manufacture his bale of 
 cloth into coats, the tailor, if the merchant refuse to pay 
 him for his labour and skill, has his action against the 
 merchant for the value of his work and labour. It is simply 
 just that he should have it. But if a landlord, or a middle- 
 man aping landlord, employs a farmer to manufacture his 
 bog into corn-fields, or permits him to do it under a false 
 pretence of security that he shall repay himself for his 
 labour, and then takes from him the corn-fields so manu- 
 factured without repaying him, then has the tenant no 
 action against his landlord for the value of his work and 
 labour so expended. This constitutes the difference between 
 the law as regards merchants and the law as regards land- 
 lords. The one must pay for permissive labour employed 
 for his benefit with cash down, or a check on his banker ; 
 the other need only wipe off" such little scores with a notice 
 to quit, or an action of ejectment. The latter course has 
 plainly an advantage over the former — that is, for the land- 
 lord. The landlords who have the privilege of making these 
 laws have always had a very clear perception that this was 
 an advantage. But then, as Lord Eklon used to put it, 
 " on the other hand," the farmers are not so stupid as not 
 to see that the scale is not quite even — tliat they peep 
 through the other end of the telescope : through the end 
 the landlords peep through the profits of the system (sup- 
 posing it to proceed) are very considerably magnified to 
 their advantage ; but taking a farmer's peep through the 
 other end shows the profits to them to be infinitesimally 
 
THE SURROUNDING POPULATION. 407' 
 
 small, and the vision of probable advantage so minute, and 
 indistinct, and uncertain, and distant, that the poor farmers 
 in despair cease their manufacture of bogs into corn-fields, 
 and the landlords' bogs remain bogs, and repay both them 
 and their tenants with bog-returns and bog-profits. This 
 is but another elucidation of the adage, that after all, 
 " honesty is the best policy." The simple truth is, that 
 this principle of landlord and tenant-law is not honest ; and 
 its impolicy is seen in the bogs and wastes of Ireland, as 
 w^ell as in the diminished supply and the want of demand. 
 
 I can imagine some of your readers exclaiming, " This is 
 all very well, you know, but this is mere talk." I assure 
 them it is not mere talk, as a perusal of the evidence given, 
 before the Land Commissioners at this town of Bantry 
 would convince them. According to the evidence of Mr. 
 Freeman, the Roman Catholic curate (Part II., p. 924), 38 
 families, comprising 230 individuals, have been ejected from 
 the property of Lord Kenmare in the barony of Bantry since 
 1840. On the other hand, this is flatly contradicted by Mr. 
 Gallwey, the agent. 
 
 Mr. Michael Murphy, miller, of Dunimark, says in his 
 evidence (Part II., p. 930), — 
 
 " I am acquainted witli many cases in Avliich the tenantry on the estate 
 of the Earl of Keimiare have been very hardly, indeed cruelly treated^ 
 and subjected to arbitrary exactions, by a person employed as the under - 
 agent of that nobleman.'' 
 
 He says further on — , 
 
 " The term of letting is generally from year to year." " The effect of 
 this mode of tenure is to make the tenants completely subservient to their 
 landlords, and to place them in subjection to the persons employed under 
 the landlords to a degree scarcely credible to those unacquainted with the 
 fact from actual knowledge and experience. It has also the effect of ren- 
 dering the tenantry utterly careless about improving their condition." 
 
 Mr. Gallwey, the agent, says this evidence springs from 
 a hostile feeling in Mr. Murphy towards him. 
 
408 BANTRY AND THE CONDITION OF 
 
 Further on Mr. Murphy says (p. 932), — 
 
 " I have not the slightest doubt that, if the land was properly cul- 
 tivated, the population would not be too great in the barony if it was three 
 times its present niunber." 
 
 "William Keale, a tenant, swears that his rent under a 
 middleman was increased by Lord Kenmare's agent from 
 18/. 45. to 30/., on the lease falling in ; that he could not 
 pay the rent, and that he was turned out without being 
 allowed anything for the improvements he had made ; 
 moreover, that he was compelled to bribe the driver, or 
 bailiff, by giving him 51., and that the tenantry generally 
 paid him bribes (p. 934). 
 
 Mr. Gallwey, the agent, flatly contradicts each of these 
 statements. 
 
 The Rev. Thomas Barry, the Roman Catholic priest, is 
 asked (p. 941), — 
 
 " Have there been any cases of extensive removals of tenantry in the 
 district with which you are acquainted ? — Yes, the most brutal. I have 
 known an instance where there were persons, of an unexceptionable cha- 
 racter, willing to pay the highest rent which could be put up on land in 
 the country by their industry and exertions, and they have been thrown 
 upon the world. 
 
 " Recently ? — Yes ; there have been some instances within this year. 
 
 " Were those persons tenants who had previously paid their rent re- 
 gularly ? — Yes, and were willing to pay to the last." 
 
 These statements have reference chiefly to Lord Ken- 
 mare's estate. Mr. Gallwey contradicts them, and attributes 
 them to resentment against himself. 
 
 Mr. W. O'Sullivan complains that he was turned out of 
 the land on which he was born, that a higher rent Avas put 
 upon it, and the new tenant was broken in two years. That 
 there is a " regular system of oppression" practised by the 
 driver under Mr. Gallwey, and that " cows, sheep, and 
 money, and everything is given to him" as bribes (p. 946). 
 
 Mr. Gallwey denies the whole of this. 
 
THE SURROUNDING POPULATION. 409 
 
 Timothy Connor complains (p. 946) that he was turned 
 out of his house on the lease falling in because he would not 
 give a bribe of 61. to the driver. 
 
 Mr. Gallwey says he was turned out because he was a 
 quarrelsome tenant, and that the driver is warned against 
 taking bribes. 
 
 Cornelius Connor gives similar evidence (p. 946). 
 
 " Do you remember anything which passed between you and Dennis 
 Sullivan, the driver, about a cow ? — Yes. 
 
 " Whaft was it ? — Sullivan sent a man to me and asked me for a bribe, 
 and, as I could not give a bribe, I offered a cow. This was four years ago." 
 
 The bribe, it appears, was in order to get some land. 
 
 Mr. Gallwey gives the same answer to this witness as to 
 the last. 
 
 Cornelius Henry Donovan complains that he laid out 
 200/. in building a house on some land. He was asked lOZ. 
 more rent, which he refused to pay, and was turned out 
 without any compensation (p. 947). 
 
 Mr. Gallwey says he was turned out because he was 
 obstinate and refused to pay the rent the place was worth. 
 
 I have simply here given you a digest of the evidence on 
 both sides. Do not imagine that I offer an opinion upon it, 
 for one naturally shrinks from meddling with a question in 
 which truth has so many aspects, where gentlemen on the 
 one side are ready to state upon their oaths that " black is 
 black," whilst gentlemen on the other are equally ready to 
 assert, upon their oaths too, that this is all a mistake, for 
 that " black is not black at all, but a lovely white." The 
 reference backwards and forwards to these pros and cons 
 has brought under my eye the immense mass of downright 
 flat contradictions which are to be found in the appendices 
 to each volume of evidence. I had the curiosity to count 
 them, and find 310 ; and there are at least double this 
 number dispersed throughout the evidence on oath. That 
 is to say, in about 1,000 instances the statements made 
 
410 BANTRY AND THE CONDITION OF 
 
 before Lord Devon upon oath have been flatly contradicted 
 upon oath. After this very convincing proof of the variety 
 of aspects which truth assumes in Ireland — for there is not 
 a doubt about it, but that every one of these gentlemen, on 
 both sides, swore to the truth, — I ought to esteem myself 
 most fortunate in having been subjected to only two formal 
 contradictions : one from a reverend gentleman in Cavan, 
 who thought a statement of mine about him not compli- 
 mentary, and explained it away " on the other side" — we 
 were both right, of course ; the other, from an unhappy 
 agent in Donegal, who, in the elucidation of his view of 
 the truth, happened in the conflict to get hold of " the 
 unpleasant end of the stick ;" to be sure, this was not his 
 fault, and therefore he ought to be satisfied.* 
 
 There is other evidence, however, which must be taken, 
 to be unbiassed on either side — the evidence of landowners 
 in the district, which too plainly indicates on whose slioul- 
 
 * Since this letter, however, was written, Mr. O'Connell took upon himself to 
 contradict, in characteristic phraseology, my testimony regarding his property in • 
 Kerry. A reference to the letter dated from Killarney, post, will show that he is 
 the least happy of any of his fellows in exposure ; and, to use the mildest phrase, 
 his conti'adictions have been proved to be most enormous mistakes, wliich it is 
 my firm belief he would give something less than his annual triljute never to have 
 made. It is a kind of law of human nature — or, rather, it is a very common 
 failing of human nature — for men to become sycophantic to every great man, and 
 to every man in a position of influence and power. The reader may take my 
 assurance for fact, that in Ireland this is, at the least, as true as it is in any other 
 part of the United Kingdom. In Ireland, Mr. O'Connell has his sycophants — a 
 swarm of crawling, creeping, cringing, lying reptiles, who live the disgrace of our 
 common nature. From these creatures it may be well conceived that a perfect 
 storm of abuse, contradiction, calumny, and coarse personality, was heaped upon 
 me. They, however, did this good public service — for which they deserve my 
 thanks, which is the only notice I will take of them — that, by their servility to 
 the " Liberator," (so called) — by their calumnies and abuse of myself for stating 
 the truth regarding him — they made the whole facts so known and so much a 
 matter of public comment, that when the true character of the " Liberator" was 
 subsequently proved, his exposure and defeat were the more complete and signal. 
 Henceforth, perhaps, his servile adulators (if any such now there be) will remem- 
 ber the adage, — " Magna est Veritas et 2)ra;valebit." 
 
THE SURROUNDING POPULATION. 411 
 
 ders must rest the blame and the fault of there being 
 uncultivated wastes, wretched cultivation, and misery in 
 this district. 
 
 Mr. John O'Connell, landowner, of Bantry — no relative 
 at all, by the way, of the gentleman whose jDortrait you 
 painted the other day " i' the act to kick,"* — has encouraged 
 his tenants at Skibbereen to grow green crops, and they are 
 beginning to do so. But he says, — 
 
 " The landlords must press the people to do so, and encourage them, 
 and [they must make them allowances, because the high rent of the land 
 will not admit of it, unless the people are remunerated to some extent. . 
 . . . I know that all the land in the country is over-let. The land 
 cannot bear at present what is put upon it. The people -pay too much 
 for their land — that I am ready to admit myself as a landlord. I am 
 sorry to say we expect too much." — (Page 938. )f 
 
 * See Appendix, 12. 
 
 -f " It is of no use to insist on a rent, from the generality of Irish tenants, such 
 as a farmer of si:ill and capital might afford to pay. If such a rent is wanted, he 
 must first be given the skill and the capital required, otherwise it would be Mke 
 the Egyptian order to make bricks without straw. The thing would be totally out 
 of his power ; and the sure consequence must always be, that as the horse which 
 is overburdened will not draw, so the tenant that is so overcharged as to make 
 him lose hope of being able to live by the land instead of paying the exorbitant 
 rent demanded (or even as much of it as he reasonably might), will pay nothing. 
 He will, by every device and pretence that can be resorted to, get everything 
 possible out of the farm, with a view, if he finds he cannot live where he is, to 
 carry off as much as he can, that he may live elsewhere ; and any one who has 
 been employed in the management of estates shortly after the peace of 1814, when 
 the (produce of land declined so much as to make the war-rents more than the 
 tenants could pay from the produce of the land, will be able to bear testimony to the 
 truth of this statement." — Prize Essay on the Management of Estates in Ireland, 
 by William Blacker, Esq. p. 5. 
 
 ' ' On the other hand, the rent ought not to be such as to enable the tenant to 
 pay it without calling forth that exertion and industry which he may be fairly 
 expected to employ. 
 
 " The miserable appearance of some farms, held under old leases at nominal 
 rents, contrasted with the adjoining lands, let at a fair and moderate rate, will 
 suflSciently prove this assertion." — Ibid. p. 6. 
 
 " The landlord in embarrassment will be driven for relief to high rents and 
 harsh measures, under which all those of his tenants must suffer except the few 
 who may be able to take advantage of their landlord's distress, and procure for 
 themselves beneficial bargains by opportunely affording relief in some pressing 
 
412 BAIJTRY AND THE CONDITION OF 
 
 It appears that land is let by tender or proposal, and 
 that such is the competition that " if 40Z. be asked for land 
 worth only lOZ. there will be twenty applicants for it," and 
 the highest bidder is usually accepted. 
 
 This same gentleman says further on (p. 939), in proof of 
 what landlords may effect by looking after the interests of 
 their tenantry,-— 
 
 " I have a property that came into my hands about fifteen years ago ; 
 there were about 700 acres — a fee simple property. They were the 
 most refractory men m the country, prize-fighters, and the head of a 
 faction; they paid no rent — they got into arrear. It was the estate of 
 Lord Riversdale. I bought the property, and sent for them immediately 
 upon buying it, and squared the accounts : they owed four years rent ; I 
 forgave them three and commenced with one year, and thej'^ are paying 
 me one half-year's rent in hand. They are paying the original rent still, 
 and there are not now in this country a more comfortable class of ten- 
 antry; and instead of being in the public-house, and at the fairs and 
 markets fighting, they are well clothed, and every man has a slated house 
 and barn, where there was nothing but poverty and indigence." 
 
 He simply encouraged them in building the houses, and 
 gave them leases. He says afterwards, — 
 
 " I know that those who hold by lease are becoming industrious and 
 making money." 
 
 Mr. Samuel Hutchins, magistrate and landed proprietor, 
 speaks of the great facilities that exist for making improve- 
 ments in the land (p. 942), He is asked, — 
 
 " In any of the other districts you have referred to (Macroom, Carbery, 
 Skibbereen, and Charleville) has any plan been acted upon by the land- 
 
 emergency, or supplying the means of some desired indulgence. These con- 
 tracts, however beneficial to the tenant, are not always of advantage to the estate. 
 From such transactions most commonly arises that injurious class of persons 
 denominated * middlemen,' who, invested thereby with a temporary power over 
 the soil, and unrestrained by those feelings which hereditary property is calculated 
 to create, ' whose own the sheep are not,' oppress to the uttermost the wretched 
 tenantry, whose unhappy lot it is to be brought under their control." — Ibid. 
 p. 2. 
 
THE SURROUNDING POPULATION. 413 
 
 lords to encourage improvements ? — I believe not. Very little effort has 
 been made at improvements in this part of the country. Matters are im- 
 proving generally, but not by any effort on the part of the landlords, or 
 very little." 
 
 Mr. Richard White, a landed proprietor near Bantry, 
 who was educated in England and came over with English 
 habits, and who has managed his own estate for twenty- 
 years, says, — 
 
 " I came into this country determined to pursue a totally different 
 system to any other landlord, which was, to give an encouraging lease for 
 three lives." 
 
 He assisted his tenants, devoted his time to the personal 
 inspection of the tenants and their farms, and the result is, 
 in his own words, — 
 
 " Since I have done so, I have not made a distress upon my estate, nor 
 turned out a man ; and I am perfectly convinced that my estate has not 
 only doubled itself, but trebled itself, in value, in the last eighteen years.''' 
 
 Further on he says, — 
 
 " I flatter myself there is not a better paid estate in the country." 
 " Do you attribute the improved condition of your property and the 
 better payment of the rent to giving leases? — Yes, I do, solely. I am 
 satisfied, if the landlords would give leases to the tenants, and if it was 
 the fashion to do it, there is a great deal of misfortune in the country that 
 would not exist." 
 
 The Rev. Samuel Payne, agent to Lord Berehaven, 
 says (p. 935), — 
 
 " It is certainly a pity that there is not a legislative enactment insuring 
 the advantages of his outlay to the tenant. It is only an act of justice 
 and prudence." ..." Mutual protection ought to be the object." 
 
 Well, but we have seen that it is not. And I have before 
 me the names of ten tenants, all with families, averaging 
 six in a family, six of whom have had actions of ejectment 
 commenced against them within the last three weeks, and 
 the other four received notice to quit last rent-day, not one 
 of whom I am informed owes a fraction of rent. They don't 
 know why they are turned out. This is on Lord Kenmare's 
 
414 BANTRY AND THE SURROUNDING POPULATION. 
 
 property. These men and tlieir families will necessarily 
 resort either to Bantry or to the corner of a bog, and become 
 inhabitants of hovels, and beggars. What are they to do in 
 Bantry ? There is no trade, and no encouragement to trade. 
 They must, therefore, add tlieir mite of starvation to those 
 already starving for want of employment. Lord Kenraare 
 is reputed to be a benevolent man ; and there may be a 
 cause for turning these tenants out, and there is certainly 
 the right to do it. But this is not the way to make Bantry 
 a city of palaces, nor yet to have a thriving and contented 
 people ; for these people must starve, and perhaps do worse. 
 Is it not, then, apparent that neglect and want of encour- 
 agement of the people have had much to do in making the 
 country what it is ? And the neglect has been on the part 
 of those who had nothing else to do but to attend to her 
 interests — whose duty, in fact, tliis was. Where ordinary 
 attention to an estate and to a tenantry has been exhibited, 
 we have seen the value of an estate " trebled in eighteen 
 years," and the people made comfortable and happy. 
 
 Surely the Bantry evidence ought not to be without its 
 lesson to nee-lectful landlords. 
 
CORK AND ITS NATURAL ADVANTAGES. 415 
 
 LETTER XXVIII. 
 
 CORK AND ITS NATURAL ADVANTAGES; ITS NEGLECTED 
 AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES, AND MINERAL WEALTH.— 
 COIklPARISON BETWEEN CORNWALL AND CORK. 
 
 Description of Cork — Neglect of Fishing and Cultivation, and the "Wealth these 
 occupations would produce — The Social Remedy — The Mineral Wealth of the 
 county of Cork — Comparison between the people of Cornwall and Cork — 
 Enterprise and Industi-y make the people of one County rich, with few bounties 
 of Nature ; whilst the people of the latter County are poor and miserable, with 
 every natural advantage, because of their deficient Enterprise and Industry. 
 
 Cork, November 20. 
 
 It is in some degree expected that when you write from a 
 town you will notice its peculiarities and its capabilities — 
 that you will, in fact, localize your letter according to its 
 date. The larger, however, is the town you visit, the more 
 impossible does such a task become, unless, indeed, you give 
 your communication the character of a mere descriptive 
 directory. This, however, is not my object ; I have to deal 
 with the condition of the people more than with the towns in 
 which some of them may dwell. 
 
 It will be enough, then, j)erhaps, on this subject to say 
 that Cork is a very extensive, and, for the most part, a well- 
 built city. It stands in a hollow, surrounded by lofty hills 
 closely impinging upon it, from which fine prospects of the 
 city below are afforded. Many of the streets ascend these 
 
416 CORK AND ITS NATURAL ADVANTAGES. 
 
 hills, and give a degree of picturesque beauty to parts of the 
 city, warranting the title by which Cork-men love to desig- 
 nate it, " that beautiful city, called Cork." A fine river runs 
 through the town into the harbour of Cork, which is eleven 
 miles below the city ; and the quays of the river exhibit 
 much mercantile bustle. About 500 vessels of small tonnage 
 trade to the place, and there are several steamers. The 
 principal trade consists in the export of pigs, live cattle, 
 eggs, corn, butter, and provisions for the English markets. 
 There are twelve good markets in the town to supply the 
 population, which amounts to 100,000 inhabitants. There 
 is a celebrated porter brewery in the town — that of Messrs. 
 Beamish and Crawford — which, before Father Mathews's 
 temperance movement, brewed 100,000 barrels a year. The 
 temperance movement at once reduced the quantity brewed 
 to one-half. Its manufacture, however, has completely ral- 
 lied again. There are many fine public buildings in the 
 town, and the city is the head quarters of the staff* of the 
 southern military district of Ireland. There is also a mili- 
 tary gaol in the barracks, on a plan introduced by Colonel 
 Mansell, of Limerick, with much success, by which solitary 
 confinement and labour are given as punishments to soldiers, 
 under military supervision, and they are punished for offences 
 and reformed without being degraded. There is a Chamber 
 of Commerce here, too, which, by an odd kind of contradic- 
 tion, is, in fact, on all ordinary occasions, a political discus- 
 sion-shop on the question of repeal. Politics and commerce 
 have, it is true, a distant relationship ; but how the extension 
 of commerce, which, it must be presumed, is the object of a 
 chamber of commerce, can be promoted by repealing the 
 union of the country with the most commercial country on 
 the globe, and by shutting up Ireland — one of the least com- 
 mercial countries on the globe — to itself, is a species of Irish, 
 or rather Cork repeal logic, which it is not worth while 
 further to dilate upon. Generally, however, there is percep- 
 
CORK AND ITS NATURAL ADVANTAGES. 417 
 
 tible in Cork an evident spirit of commercial activity, to 
 which they are indebted not a little to the encouragement of 
 their neighbours across the water (whom these repealing 
 gentlemen traduce because they are their best customers), and 
 to the enterprising spirit of commerce and improvement of 
 Englishmen and Scotchmen who have settled amongst them, 
 who conduct and own their most extensive establishments, 
 and whom also it is the fashion of these repealing gentlemen, 
 by way of reproach, but with most questionable taste, to 
 term " foreigners." A raih'oad is in progress of construction 
 from Bandon to Cork which, it is anticipated, will be of 
 great service to the town in opening its markets to a distant 
 district to the west ; and eventually the interior of the coun- 
 try between Cork and Dublin will be connected by railway, 
 the bill authorizing the construction of such a line, in con- 
 nexion with the Dublin and Cashel Railway, having passed 
 last session of Parliament. 
 
 The most remarkable feature which strikes any traveller 
 through Ireland is the uniformity of neglect of natural ad- 
 vantages, and of misery amongst the people, which are 
 everywhere to be seen. Will draining improve and enrich 
 the country — draining is neglected, and the people exist in 
 poverty. Will liming and green-cropping turn bogs into 
 fertile fields, and give plenty to the inhabitants, — liming and 
 green-cropping are unpractised, and the people starve. Will 
 fishing on the coasts, on any persevering and sensible plan, 
 insure comfort and wealth — the people so manage it that 
 they barely live by it, while their neighbours from the oppo- 
 site coast come and take the fish before their eyes, and make 
 money by it. Does the country exhibit mineral wealth 
 easily to be won, and insuring employment and comfort to 
 the whole community, and wealth to the projDrietors — the 
 mineral wealth is left where it has ever been, in the bowels 
 of its native mountains, the people pine for want of employ 
 ment, and the proprietors remain inactive, surrounded by a 
 
 E E 
 
418 NEGLECTED AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES, 
 
 meshwork of financial difficulties. These reflections were 
 strongly impressed upon me in my journey from Bantry to 
 this city, and are lamentably borne out by evidence. Some 
 few miles out of Cork, between Inishannon and Ballyhassig-, 
 you see cottages by the road-side the delapidation and 
 wretchedness of which cannot be surpassed. There is a deep 
 valley extending for several miles in length, and of consider- 
 able width, in which for ages the debris of the surrounding- 
 hills has been deposited. Through the centre of it runs the 
 Carrigaline river, a small sluggish stream, which, for want of 
 deepening, floods the whole valley, and renders it a bog. The 
 valley is called from this " Anabog." I am assured that such 
 portions of the valley as have been drained are the finest lands 
 in the county of Cork, and bear the heaviest crops. Deepen- 
 ing the bed of the river and increasing the fall would afford 
 effectual means of drainage. Yet one of those miserable 
 squabbles in which Irishmen think it a luxury to indulge, pre- 
 vents its drainage, and there, by the high road-side for miles, 
 lies a valley naturally of the richest land, now a profitless 
 swamp, and the people are squatted starving on insufficient 
 garden-plotsbeside it. Mr.Carnegie,ofNorthesk, a gentleman 
 who holds extensive agencies in the county of Cork, and who 
 has exerted himself to improve the state of agriculture, in a 
 letter " on draining," addressed by him to the tenants on two 
 extensive estates — the Massy and Hutchinson estates, in this 
 county — says, "he found the land not yielding one-quarter the 
 produce that it would if regularly drained and subsoiled ;" 
 "the tenants all anxious to get more land, although they had 
 not cultivated or improved the half of what they had, which, 
 if drained, subsoiled, and limed, would give them more than 
 sufficient employment, and treble the crops."* He tried 
 
 * " In England or Scotland, no man without capital would think of farming, 
 any more than he would of setting up an extensive mercantile establishment with- 
 out it but in Ireland we all know that a great jiortion of those who are called 
 farmers have neither skill nor capital. The land which they hold is woi out, 
 
AND MINERAL WEALTH OF CORK. 419 
 
 himself this system of improvement, to set an example to the 
 tenants, and grew " the finest crop of yellow Dantzic wheat, 
 that had been seen in the south of Ireland, on land which no 
 one ever thought of sowing," and which grew only sour 
 grass and rashes before, and where, of course, the people 
 were always poor.* 
 
 " There is scarcely a part of the country that does not re- 
 quire draining," says Mr. Saarsfield, of Doiighcloyne, near 
 Cork, before the Land Commissioners (Part III. p. 1). 
 
 Without, however, quoting a mass of evidence to support 
 this position, it will be sufficient to give you one quotation 
 from the evidence of Mr. Shea, of Reanies, in the barony of 
 
 and cannot be made productive in the hands of such occupiers. Although they 
 have no means to cultivate the land out of which they have dragged the vitals, 
 and made it as poor as themselves, yet, having no other means of existence, they 
 cling to it, and would almost as soon part with their lives as leave it." — Letter to 
 Lord Carherry, by James Carnegie, Esq., Land Agent, Cork. 
 
 "The tenants in the south of Ireland are generally men without sufficient 
 capital for the lands which they hold. A man with a capital of fifty or sixty 
 pounds would take a farm of a hundred or a hundred and fifty acres. No]man 
 in England or Scotland would think of such a thing. But that respectable class 
 of yeomanry which is the strength and pride of England is unknown here." — 
 Ibid. 
 
 * " The land of Ireland is uneven, mountainous, soft, watry, woody, and open 
 to windes and flouds of raine, and so fenny as it hath bogges upon the very tops 
 of mountaines, not bearing man or beast, but dangerous to passe, and such bogs 
 are frequent over all Ireland." — Fgnes Moryson's Itinerary, London, 1617. 
 Part 3, p. 159. 
 
 "The fields are not onelymost apt to feede cattell, but yeeld also great increase 
 of come. I will freely say, that I observed the winter's cold to be far more mild 
 then it is in England, so as the Irish pastures are more greene, and so likewise 
 the gardens al winter time ; but that in summer, by reason of the cloudy ayre and 
 watry soile, the heate of the sunne hath not such power to ripen corne and fruits, 
 so as their harvest is much later then in England. Also I observed that the best 
 sorts of flowers and fruits are much rarer in Ireland then in England, which, 
 notwithstanding, is more to be attributed to the inhabitants then to the ayre." — 
 Ibid. Part 3, p. 159. 
 
 " Ireland yaelds much flax, which the inhabitants work into yarne, and export 
 the same in g.eat quantity ; and, of old, they had such plenty of linnen cloth, as 
 the wild Irish used to weare thirty or forty elles in a shirt, al gathered and 
 wrinckbd and washed in saffron, because they never put them ofi" till they were 
 wome out." — Ibid. Part 3, p. 160. 
 
 E E 2 
 
420 NEGLECTED AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES, 
 
 Kinalea, in this county, which embodies in it the pith of the 
 majority of the evidence on this subject. He says (ibid. Part 
 III. page 26). 
 
 " The district is for the most part bounded on the east and south-east 
 and Avest by the sea-coast." 
 
 That is, there are facilities for fishing, and obtaining sea- 
 weed and sea-sand, for manure, on all sides of it. 
 
 " The soil is not rich, but productive ; the population is entirely de- 
 pendent on the cultivation of the soil for subsistence. The district is very 
 thickly inhabited. The great majority of the people, both farmers and 
 labourers, are very poor, and obliged to live from year's end to year's end 
 on the worst description of potato, without either meat, fish, or milk ; and 
 are very often reduced to a limited quantity of the same, though the 
 district produces a vast supply of the best description of that esculent for 
 the market. The houses are in general of a bad description, being com- 
 posed of mud and covered with straw. There is a considerable quantity 
 of wet land, very capable of being drained and made productive." 
 
 With such poverty and want of employment among a 
 dense population, and " a considerable quantity of wet land, 
 capable of being drained and made productive," beside them, 
 it would seem to require no Solomon to find out a social re- 
 medy, without looking for a remedy in the repeal of the 
 Union for existing distress and poverty, owing to the want of 
 employment. " We want employment ; we have no food," 
 say the people. " Employ labour, guided by intelligence, 
 upon me, and I will produce abundance of food," says the 
 land. " As you are side by side," anybody but a Repealer 
 would say, " then help one another ; and it is evident you 
 will satisfy the wants of each other." " Oh, no," say these 
 great logicians, " it is a Parliament in College-green, and 
 ' Ireland for the Irish,' that are the things wanted to set all 
 to rights." God help you, gentlemen, and send you a happy 
 deliverance into the regions of common sense ! 
 
 The sea around the coast teems with fish. I am assured 
 that in Scull-bay and Crookhaven the mackerel are often 
 
AND MINERAL WEALTH OF CORK. 421 
 
 seen over the whole surface jostling one another, and abso- 
 lutely running on shore to escape the porpoises, which follow 
 them into the bays, and prey upon them. The people often 
 knock them on the head with the oars of their boats, and yet 
 will not exert themselves to net them. Tell the men, " Why 
 don't you get out your nets, and exert yourselves to take the 
 iish, or you deserve to starve?" and you get an answer, 
 " Och, the nets want mending ;" or " Sui'e, we haven't got 
 the nets ready ;" or, as one man thus occupied answered a 
 gentleman who asked this question, " Och, musha, by dad, 
 sir, before we could get the nets out, they would be oflf ;" 
 and these poor exertionless, good-natured, apathetic men, 
 do in reality almost starve, whilst the men of St. Ives, and 
 from the coast of Cornwall, cross the Channel, live and 
 labour in their boats, and, in the sight of these starving- 
 people, realise large sums, and obtain employment and 
 comforts for themselves and families, by catching the fish 
 which swarm on the very shores of these bays.* AVell, most 
 
 * " This trade, before the revolution, we had a particular company engaged in 
 (as Sir William Petty tells us) with great success in the west, though we have 
 shamefully laid it aside ever since. However, as Lieutenant Chaplain has lately 
 undertaken the whale-fishing on our northern coast, and our Parliament hath 
 resolved to encourage that and all our other fisheries, it is to be hoped we shall 
 see them flourish, at least proportionably to the warmth and zeal they espouse 
 them with. And, indeed, as they may prove, in Sir William Temple's words, as 
 rich a mine to us under water as any we have under ground (miless we will excuse 
 our laziness in not taking them, as Busquebius says the Turks did theirs to him, 
 viz., because they runaway when they went to catch them), I cannot see what can 
 prevent our succeeding in a design which, with due care, will not leave us a beggar 
 or an idle hand in the kingdom." — Reflections and Resolutions proper for the 
 Gentlemen of Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden of the Royal Dublin Society, 
 p. 214. 
 
 " Mr. Borrish observes, in his Batavia Illustrata, that their pretended secret 
 of the manner of salting their herrings is a mere chimera, the whole art consisting 
 in an extreme neatness in the materials they use, and in curing the herrings as 
 soon as they are taken, and, as it were, killing them with the very salt with 
 which they are pickled before the air and sun have made any impression on 
 them." — Ibid. p. 213. 
 
 " As this trade is left entirely open to us, and is so convenient to us that the 
 fish come to our very doors to be taken, how faulty and negligent must we have 
 
422 KEGLECTED AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES, 
 
 men would say, " As you are close to one another, as you 
 want fish for food, or money whicli fish will realise with a 
 little labour and enterprise, to obtain you comforts and ne- 
 cessaries, just catch the fish which have come to you to be 
 caught, and that same wealth, and comfort, and indepen- 
 dence, which the Cornish men earn on your shores, you will 
 earn too, and that will remedy your present state of dis- 
 tress." " Oh, dear, no," say the Bepealers, and they bear 
 out what they say by acting accordingly, — " the remedies 
 which are wanted, and Avhich will in fact cure everything, 
 are political discussions in the Cork Chamber of Commerce, 
 Daniel Callaghan for a member to carry out our views, and 
 O'Connell to get up a political agitation to sever us from 
 England : a ' demonstration' is the thing, and, as an earnest 
 of our sincere conviction that these are the only remedies for 
 the starving men of Skibbereen and Scull, we pay tribute to 
 Mr. O'Connell for advocating them." 
 
 The general character of the western part of the county of 
 Cork is mountainous and rocky ; but its rocky mountains 
 show many indications of great mineral wealth, whilst its 
 valleys are fertile, and productive of agricultural riches. On 
 the western coast of Cork metalliferous deposits and mineral 
 indications are everywhere to be seen. Go to the sea-shore 
 and look up at the cliffs, and the veins of copper-ore are 
 staring you in the face. A line drawn from south-east to 
 north-west cuts through the mining districts of Cornwall, 
 crosses the Channel, and then cuts through the south-western 
 portion of Ireland, and, with the exception of tin, similar 
 mines of copper and lead are to be found in the counties of 
 Kerry and Cork that are found in Cornwall, witli this differ- 
 
 been in overlooldng it so long, which might have enriched the nation and employed 
 the poor, and given so comfortable a subsistence to so many different trades, 
 since even women and children — nay, the lume and tlic blind, if they have hands, 
 might get bread by it — as spinners, cordwainers, and nctmakcrs, ike. — throughout 
 the year." — I//id. 
 
AND MINERAL "WEALTH OF CORK. 423 
 
 ence, that the Irish mines are much richer. Limited attempts 
 to work the mines of Cork and Kerry have been made, 
 which, when prosecuted with enterprise, backed by capital, 
 have always been successful. The Berehaven copper-mine, 
 beyond Bantry, which has been worked with enterprise and 
 capital, has realised vast sums as profits ; and the Mining 
 Company of Ireland is beginning- to raise great quantities of 
 copper-ore. A gentleman of much intelligence and enter- 
 prise, Mr. Connell. of Cork, has also recently commenced, 
 several mining undertakings in the west of the county. He 
 commenced the Cosheen Mines, at Scull-harbour, near Skib- 
 bereen, by means of a company, about six years ago, and, 
 although the capital invested in working that mine amounted 
 to only 2,500/., upwards of 18,000/. worth of copper-ore of 
 the richest quality has been raised during that period, and 
 the shares of the company are selling at 180/. premium. 
 This is but an indication of the success which follows almost 
 every effort in Ireland. In Dumanus Bay another copper- 
 mine has been commenced working, called the " Dhurode 
 Mine," and which has been in work about tvro years. There 
 is abundance of ore in view unworked, wanting only capital 
 and enterprise to realise it. On the eastern side of Bantry 
 Bay there is another mine, called the " Gurtavallig Mine," 
 opposite the Berehaven Mine, which was commenced last 
 August, and the shares in which, from its great j)romise, are 
 now selling at 19/. premium. In fact, whichever way you 
 turn to the west of the county there are sui^erficial evidences 
 of great mineral wealth, which the enterprise of one gentle- 
 man — Mr, Connell — has of late years begun to realise, and 
 has shown what may be done. Six years ago not a man 
 would subscribe a single penny to prosecute any miuino- pro- 
 ject. It is a fact which the Swansea sales' list proves, that 
 the copper-ores found in the mines of Cork are amongst the 
 richest in the world. I will prove this, however, by quoting 
 from the last September list before me by taking the hio-hest 
 
424 
 
 COMPARISON BETWEEN 
 
 per-centage of copper in tlie ore of the known mines of every 
 country sold at Swansea, and the price per ton which each 
 description of ore realizes, 
 
 PRICE OF ORE.— SEPTEMBER LIST. 
 
 Name of Mine. 
 
 Highest Produce per Cent, of 
 Metal from the Ore. 
 
 Price 
 
 per 
 
 Ton 
 
 at which the 
 
 Ore sold 
 
 
 £ 
 
 s. 
 
 d. 
 
 18 
 
 3 
 
 6 
 
 12 
 
 14 
 
 6 
 
 16 
 
 2 
 
 
 
 20 
 
 13 
 
 6 
 
 19 
 
 3 
 
 6 
 
 17 
 
 7 
 
 6 
 
 16 
 
 12 
 
 
 
 12 
 
 12 
 
 6 
 
 11 
 
 19 
 
 
 
 Cohre Mine, Cuba . . . 
 
 Santiago Mine, do. . . . 
 
 Cuba Mine, West Indies . . 
 Kapunda Mine, S. Australia 
 Montacute Mine do. 
 
 Godolphin Mine, Cornwall . 
 
 Vivans Ore, Cornwall . . 
 North Roskear, Cornwall 
 
 Tincroft Mine, Cornwall . . 
 
 Cosheen Mine, Cork . . 
 
 22J per cent 
 
 15f per cent 
 
 19f per cent 
 
 23f per cent 
 
 22^ per cent 
 
 f Per-centage of produce not^ 
 <^ given ; but highest price of )■ 
 
 L ore per ton J 
 
 Ditto ditto .... 
 
 Ditto ditto .... 
 
 Ditto ditto .... 
 
 (The price of all other ores of 
 
 Cornish mines is less than those 
 
 quoted, and, therefore, the 
 
 produce less rich.) 
 
 43 per cent 
 
 38 1 6 
 
 The Cornish returns are taken from the Atmospheric Rail- 
 tcay Gazette newspaper; and are the returns of the copper- 
 ores sold at Redruth on November the 6th this year. This, 
 therefore, proves that the richest copper-mine in Cork is 
 nearly twice as rich in the quality of its produce as the richest 
 copper-mines in the world, and more than twice as rich as 
 the richest copper-mine in Cornwall. 
 
 At Ballybunion, in Kerry, you have alum-cliffs unworkcd, 
 of which Dr. Kane has given an account in his book 
 (p. 229) ;* and in both Cork and Kerry, asbestos, and cobalt, 
 
 " * In Dune Bay, the upper stratum of the cliff is composed entirely of very 
 anthracitous alum-slate, in thin laminae, which are divided by parallel and trans- 
 verse veins of chrystallised allum, the same mineral occurring in nodules, efflore- 
 scences, and in loose powder, in the more decomposed beds, often contaminated 
 by shades of yellow and red. In the small cave beyond copper pyrites abounds, 
 accompanied by arsenical iron, and in the cavities another combination of alum 
 and sulphuric acid and a mineral alkali." — Dr. Kane's Industrial Resources of 
 Ireland, p. 229. 
 
CORNWALL AND CORK. 425 
 
 and malachite have been found in great quantities.* So 
 ignorant were the people employed, that in working a 
 copper-mine some years ago, large quantities of cobalt were 
 found near Killarney, and they actually mended the roads 
 with it, till an English miner saw it, and, knowing its value, 
 procured a vessel-load of it under some pretence, which he 
 sold for 6,000Z, As soon as the people found out its value, 
 as they manage everything in this country, they became so 
 stupidly greedy after it, that they worked the mine, though 
 repeatedly warned of the consequences, into one of the lakes 
 of Killarney, and of course drowned it. 
 
 Well, you will ask, what does all this prove beyond this, 
 that they have rich copper-mines in Cork and Kerry ? I will 
 show you. In Cornwall there are no surface indications of 
 any mines whatever. The miner, by his skill and his know- 
 ledge of his craft, guesses where the mine is ; when he has 
 fixed on what he conceives to be a likely spot to commence 
 work, on Bodmin Moor, or some place equally bare and 
 bleak, half a dozen square miles of which will hardly produce 
 food enough for a pony to live on, he has a perpendicular 
 shaft of some hundred fathoms to sink, and at the bottom of 
 this he drives level east and west, without any guide but his 
 own skill, without any encouragement often, beyond his own 
 determined and enterprising perseverance, until he hits upon 
 the mineral vein. In order to do this he must have an 
 expensive steam-engine to raise the earth, to pump out the 
 water, and to force down air for the miners. In Cork the 
 miner has but to look at the crags above him, and he sees 
 the vein of copper, and knows where to work. . He drives a 
 level into it, out of which the water flows into the sea, and he 
 has nothino; to do but to wheel out the ore and rubbish. 
 
 * I obtained some very beautiful specimens of malachite, whilst in Cork, through 
 the politeness of Mr. Connell, the managing director of the Southern and Western 
 Mining Company of Ireland. 
 
426 COMPARISON BETWEEN 
 
 He requires no expensive land-carriage, — no expensive 
 machinery. 
 
 In Cornwall it is known there are mines, because the 
 industry and the skill of the people have searched them out. 
 For three centuries back, despite every difficulty, every dis- 
 heartening circumstance, the Cornish men have bored their 
 barren county like a honeycomb in search of mineral wealth. 
 They come to the shores of Ireland to look for fish ; they 
 depend on the produce of Ireland for food. So barren is their 
 county, that it will not grow corn enough and provision 
 enough for its population, and, to put a converse case to that 
 which it is the fashion of the Repealers often to put, the 
 money for which they labour is sent to Ireland for food. 
 Yet there is not a Cornish labourer whose cottage is without 
 a clock and a bright chest of drawers, with a tea-tray upon it ; 
 which does not exhibit, in fact, every comfort which industry 
 and cleanliness can give. With his cocked-hat meat-pie 
 made for him by his wife, and cooked in his own cottage, 
 and in his own oven, he goes well fed and contented to his 
 daily labour, in which he himself is a speculator. Despite 
 his barren soil, despite the fact that his coasts will not supply 
 him with fish, despite the difficulties and uncertainties which 
 hem him in on every side, he labours with intelligent enter- 
 prise and persevering industry, and he deserves his reward 
 of plenty and comfort ; but in Cork — in a county blessed by 
 every gift of nature — girt with gold — for, realize the fish on its 
 coasts, and they are gold — with gold spread over its surface — 
 for, reap the produce it will yield to intelligent cultivation, and 
 it is gold — with gold appearing from under its surface and 
 staring you in the face, and asking you to take it, for veins of 
 the richest-copper mines in the world openly show themselves, 
 and to win their produce is gold— the people stand by, high 
 and low, and, with their hands in their pockets, cry, " Och, 
 musha, by dad, sir, may be before we got the nets out the 
 fish would be off." " Och, sure, who should we drain and 
 
CORNWALL AND CORK. 427 
 
 improve for, we've no fixity of tenure?" "Sure, wouldn't 
 we be ruined if we jDaid a sixpence to work that vein of 
 copper, when may be it won't pay ?" and, thus satisfying 
 themselves amid teeming wealth of every kind, they starve.* 
 What has the Cornish man by nature, or under the Govern- 
 
 * " Ireland yeelds excellent marble neere Dublin, Kilkenny, and Corke ; and I 
 am of their opinion who dare venture all they are worth, that the mountaines would 
 yeeld abundance of mettals, if this public good were not hindered by the inhabit- 
 ants' barbarousness making them apt to seditions, and so, unwilling to inrich their 
 jirince and country ; and by their slothfulnesse, which is so singular as they hold it 
 baseness to labour, and by their poverty not able to beai'e the charge of such 
 workes ; besides that the wiser sort think their poverty best for the publike good, 
 making them peaceable, as nothing makes them sooner kick against authoritie 
 than riches. Ireland hath, in all parts, pleasant rivers, safe and long havens, and 
 no lesse frequent lakes of great circuit, yeelding great plenty of fish. And the 
 sea on all sides yeelds like plentie of excellent fish, as salmonds, oysters (which 
 are preferred before the English), and shell-fishes, with all other kinds of sea-fish. 
 So as the Irish might in all parts have abundance of excellent sea and fresh-water 
 fish, if the fishei'men were not so possessed with the natural fault of slothfulnesse, 
 as no hope of gaine, scarcely the feare of authoritie, can in many places make 
 them come out of their houses, and put to sea. Hence it is that in many places 
 they use Scots for fishermen, and they, together with the English, make profit of 
 the inhabitants' sluggishnesse. And, no doubt, if the Irish were industrious in 
 fishing, they might export salted and dried fish with great gaine." — Fyne's Mary- 
 son's Itinerary, London, 1617. Part 3, p. 161. 
 
 " I am confident that the nation, being bold and warlike, would no doubt prove 
 brave seamen, if they shall practise navigation, and could possibly be industrious 
 therein. I freely professe that Ireland in generall would yeeld abundance of all 
 things to civill and industrious inhabitants. 
 
 " Touching the Irish dyet, some lords and knights, and gentlemen of the English, 
 Irish, and all the English there abiding, having competent meanes, use the English 
 dyet, but some more, some less cleanly, few or none curiously ; and no doubt they 
 have as great, and, for their part, greater plenty than the English, of flesh, fowle, 
 fish, and all things for food, if they will use Uke art of cookery," — Ibid. Part 3, 
 p. 161. 
 
 "The wilde Irish, in time of greatest peace, impute covetousnesse and base 
 birth to him that hath any come after Christmas, as if it were a point of nobility 
 to consume all within those festival dayes. 
 
 " When they come to any market-town to sell a cow or a horse, they never 
 return home till they have drunk the price in Spanish wine (which they call the 
 King of Spaine's daughter) or in Irish usquebaugh, and till they have outslept 
 two or three dales' drunkennesse. And not onely the common sort, but even the 
 lords and their wives, the more they want this drink at home, the more they 
 
428 
 
 COMPARISON BETWEEN 
 
 iiient, that the Cork man has not? He has a poorer and 
 more sterile country from nature than the Cork man, and the 
 Government taxes his dogs, his horses, his servants, his 
 carriages, his armorial hearings, his windows, his income, 
 and it lets the Cork man off scot-free in all these respects to 
 keep cur dogs in every cottage to hunt when he had better 
 be working, and permits the gentry among them to assume 
 an appearance of wealth when they have it not, free from all 
 taxation. But the Cornish man has comforts and wealth, 
 the Cork man starves in poverty. The Cornish man and 
 the Cornish gentleman alike labour, body and mind, day 
 after day, with untiring perseverance. The Cork gentleman 
 hunts or smokes cigars in the coffee-houses and club-rooms 
 of London or Paris, and the Cork peasant, with his hands in 
 his pockets and his pipe in his mouth, burns his shins in con- 
 tentment over his turf fire, and watches his potatoes boil in a 
 black iron pot, the best and the only piece of furniture in his 
 hovel. "To be sure," say the Repealers, " it is the Union is 
 the cause of this, and which is the bane of Ireland." " Look 
 at Ireland, the richest country in the world in fertility, with 
 unequalled harbours, and capabilities of everj^ kind, with a 
 people industrious, intelligent, brave, and kind, and yet they 
 are starving amid the bounties of nature ; and what crm it be 
 owing to but the Union V says Mr. O'Connell. Oh, Irishmen, 
 
 swallow it when they come to it, till they be as drunk asbeggers." — Ibid. Part 3, 
 p. 163. 
 
 " These wild Irish never set any candles upon tables. What do I speak of 
 tables, since, indeed, they have no tables, but set their mcate upon a bundle of 
 grasse, and use the same grasse for napkins to wipe their hands." — Idid. Part 3, 
 p. 164. 
 
 " Touching the meere or wild Irish, it may truely be said of them what of old 
 was spoken of the Germans — namely, that they wander slovenly and naked, and 
 lodge in the same house (if it may be called a house) with their beasts. ... I say 
 slovenly, because they seldome put off a shirt till it be worae. And these shirts, 
 in our memory, before the last rebellion, were made of some twenty or thirty elles, 
 folded in wrinckles and colured with saffron, to avoid lowsieness incident to the 
 wearing of foule linnen." — Jbid. Part 3, p. 180. 
 
CORNWALL AND CORK 429 
 
 how long will you be deluded ? Proclaim a general fast-day, 
 and pray to God that in His mercy He will vouchsafe to you 
 common sense, and enable you to see how to shun sordid 
 deceivers* and how to realize the wealth which is bountifully 
 thrown at your feet. 
 
 " For I can raise no money by vile means, 
 By heaven, I would rather coin my heart. 
 And drop my blood for drachmas, than to wring, 
 From the hard hands of peasants, their vile trash, 
 By any indirection ! " Brutus. 
 
430 THE FISHING AND MINING 
 
 LETTER XXIX. 
 
 THE FISHING AND MINING ADVANTAGES OF CORK.— 
 REMEDIES SUGGESTED FOR AVERTING THE FAILURE 
 OF THE POTATO CROP. 
 
 Scull Bay — Its abundance of uncaught Fish — The Mineral Wealth of its Coasts — 
 The Cosheen Copper Mine — The Southern and M^estern Mining Company of 
 Ireland — Condition of the people — Their apathy — Will not take the trouble to 
 fish — The people being neglected do not improve — High Rents — Want of 
 Enterprise — The failure of the Potato Crop — Remedies suggested for preserving 
 the Potatoes sound, securing Seed, and preventing, as much as possible, the 
 evils of a Famine. 
 
 Cork, November 22. 
 I HAVE had the opportunity since my last letter to you of 
 visiting the mining districts in the neighbourhood of Scull, 
 and of wandering amongst the hamlets on the rough hills of 
 West Carbery. The Bay of Scull is exactly opposite to the 
 island of Cape Clear, the extreme south-western portion of 
 Cork. The bay itself is well sheltered by hills on three sides, 
 and by islands out to the sea, and, like some dozens of 
 similarly neglected places in Ireland, offers every facility for 
 commerce. It abounds also with fish, if the people chose 
 to catch them. The hills which surround the bay, and which 
 form the country tliere generally, are extremely rugged and 
 rocky in appearance, but seem to abound in mineral wealth. 
 Many of the stones of which the walls and cottages are built 
 
ADVANTAGES OF CORK. 431 
 
 up and down the barony, are coloured over with the green and 
 purple oxides of copper, and some of them have portions of 
 malachite adhering to them. I broke several of these stones, 
 and also portions of rock exhibiting this appearance, and the 
 fragments broken off showed minute shining particles of 
 copper in the body of the stone. These evident appearances 
 of mineral deposit have drawn attention to this district for a 
 considerable period, and several mining projects have been 
 set on foot. With that misfortune, however, which seems to 
 haunt Ireland, some of these "were the projects of mere 
 schemers, and mines were commenced which, from bad and 
 wasteful management and incompetent superintendence, 
 ended in failure and loss, and brought discredit upon this 
 industrial resource of profit and employment in Ireland, 
 where ordinary skill and competency, economy and good 
 management would have insured success. Some, however, 
 are still working, and one at Scull harbour — the Cosheen 
 mine — though the means for working it have been very 
 limited, is paying its way under careful management ; 
 and under the superintendence of Mr. Thomas, an expe- 
 rienced Cornish miner, promises tobecome a valuable property 
 to its proprietors. About three miles of adits have been 
 made into the mountain side, which, opening to the sea-shore, 
 carry off the water from the mine, and the produce is wheeled 
 out ready for washing and shipment, without cost of 
 machinery or land carnage. The produce of copper found 
 has paid the expense of working it hitherto, and some fine 
 lodes of copper have been discovered. I went down one of 
 the shafts, and saw a vein of copper, which the miners were 
 just breaking into, four inches thick, of very fine ore. This 
 mine, during the last six years, has kept about seventy men 
 in constant employment, at wages equalling Is. a day. These 
 men are all of them comfortably off, are peaceable, well- 
 behaved, industrious, and contented. I mention this as an 
 instance of what enterprise in giving employment accom- 
 
432 THE FISHING AND MINING 
 
 plishes. The success of this mine, and its promise, coupled 
 with the wealth produced by the Berehaven mine, have led 
 to the formation of a company — the Southern and Western 
 Mining Company of Ireland — the object of which is to 
 prosecute mining in this district on a more extensive scale. 
 If this company be kept free from jobbers and schemers, and 
 be as carefully and ably managed as the Cosheen mine 
 appears to have been under the direction of Mr. Connell, of 
 Cork, there is every fair expectation of success, and vast 
 benefit to the country must accrue from it. 
 
 Before the establishment of this mine there were no roads, 
 there was no market nearer than Skibbereen, there was no 
 employment for the people, and their condition, living in 
 hovels amongst the rocks, cultivating little patches of land, 
 was indescribably wretched. The limited extent of the mining 
 operations has but partially relieved that distress. It has, 
 however, lessened the competition for land, created a market 
 for produce, and led to the formation of roads. By these 
 means the condition of the whole population has been con- 
 siderably ameliorated. 
 
 There exist, however, still, amongst many of these cottagers 
 in the hills, the most dreadful privations. I entered several 
 of the cottages, and in some of them it was shocking to see 
 the destitution and mode of living of the inmates. One that 
 I entered, — the cottage of a labourer, — was scarcely three 
 yards square. I had to stoop nearly double to enter the door- 
 way, out of which the peat smoke was issuing, there being 
 no chimney. Inside this cottage I could not stand ui^right 
 by a foot. The roof was not drop dry, and this hole, worse 
 than any pigsty, was the only living and sleeping room of 
 the labourer, liis family, and his pig, when lie had one. In 
 another cottage which I entered — the cottage of an old farmer, 
 whose family were grown up, and most of them married, a 
 grown son and daughter only living with him and his wife, — 
 there were two doorways, one on each side the cottage. The 
 
advan'jBl4.ges of cork. 433 
 
 doorway next the wind was stopped up with a straw mat, 
 through which I could see the light in a dozen places ; the 
 other had a wooden door, which was off the hinges, and served, 
 when placed on two props, for the only table. A chair with- 
 out a bottom, a piece of wood to sit on, and an ii-on pot, 
 formed the whole furniture of the room. Some young pigs 
 were asleep in a corner on some straw, and appeared to 
 occupy the only comfortable part of the cottage. The meal 
 of the family, boiled potatoes, was preparing. 
 
 Yet in this exposed and miserable hovel a family of seven 
 stout young men and women had been reared. I asked 
 them if they could not get any fish to their meal, as there 
 was a net hanging up ? The daughter, a healthy-looking 
 young w^oman, who sat by the peat-fire on the mud floor, 
 said, " Yes, they sometimes got fish ; her father and brother 
 went out a fortnight before and caught 1000 herrings in the 
 bay one morning before breakfast, but they had not been 
 out since." The herrings were all consumed, or sold or given 
 away, and they were sitting down contentedly to dry pota- 
 toes, with the bay swarming with fish, not 100 yards from 
 them. I asked why they did not go out again and fish. 
 The answer was, " The weather was too rough." It was 
 certainly not a mild sunshiny day, which would make fish- 
 ing a pleasure and an amusement ; but it was such a day as, 
 I am confident, not a fisherman on the west-coast of Eng- 
 land or Scotland, from Cornwall to Glasgow, would, for a 
 moment, have thought of remaining idle at home. And yet 
 this old man begged money of me, because of his -poverty, 
 when I left his cottage ! In the bay there are swarms of 
 herrings, of mackerel, of lobsters, crabs, oysters, shrimps, 
 turbot, cod, and other fish ; and yet in the town of Skibbe- 
 reen, not ten miles off, a large and populous town, where I 
 stayed, it was impossible to get fish of any kind. I thought 
 I would t^, from curiosity, if this were so ; and after going 
 through the list of fish, — oysters, crabs, lobsters, shrimps, — 
 
 F F 
 
434 THE FISHING AND MINING 
 
 was duly informed after each query by the waiter of the 
 chief hotel, that no such thing was to be had in the town. 
 And yet these poor people complain of living on dry potatoes 
 and of poverty ! 
 
 " If they were encouraged to go out lishing — for all my 
 district is on the sea-coast — it would be a benefit," says the 
 Rev. J. Barry, the parish priest of East Scull.*' 
 
 " Do they follow fishing much in your district ? — Very little. 
 
 " Is the fish abundant? — Yes, as much as upon any other part of the 
 coast of Ireland. 
 
 "What is it prevents them? — Want of means of getting the appa- 
 ratus." f 
 
 The fact of the matter is, it is the disposition of the 
 people, — they will not move of themselves. I am informed 
 on good authority that there is a society with large funds in 
 Dublin, formed for the very purpose of providing fishing- 
 tackle and boats as a loan for fishermen who are too poor to 
 buy them, and it is a fact that the society is rarely ever applied 
 to for assistance. The Rev. Dr. Traill, the rector of Scull, 
 offered his own boat to some men living near the shore, 
 whose excuse for not going out to fish was " that they had 
 
 * Evidence before the Land Commissioners, Pai't II. p. 959. 
 
 \ " Mr. Dobbs has writ so well and so fully on this matter (our fisheries), that 
 I cannot but recommend his essay on our trade, and this branch of it in particular, 
 to the perusal of every Irish gentleman. But, besides this, I have read and con- 
 sidered many tracts that seem to be written with great truth and judgment on this 
 subject, and they give such large accounts of the gain the Dutch make by it, 
 that it is amazing we should not long since have fallen into it, and endeavoured to 
 share it with them. But I have read a proclamation of tlie States -General, 
 prohibiting the exportation of staves for herring-barrels and fishing-nets to 
 foreigners under great penalties, in which they call that brancli of their fishery 
 their chiefest trade and principal gold-mine, which is the greatest confirmation of 
 all the advantages which those authors assign to it, though many of them seem to 
 have writ with a secret envy to tlie Dutch gain by commerce. I shall only 
 observe how greatly we, as well as Great Britain, have neglected it — liow useful it 
 might be to us, and consequently how necessary it is that we should encourage 
 it." — ReflectiouH and Resolutions proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, by the 
 late Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, p. 211. 
 
ADVANTAGES OF CORK. 436 
 
 no boat," but the trouble of running it down the beach and 
 launching it prevented them ever using it. Wherever volun- 
 tary exertion is required, they prefer stinting themselves of 
 food and of comforts to using that exertion to obtain either. 
 Yet, as labourers under direction and compelled to work, they 
 are as good labourers as are to be found. We know they 
 are good labourers in England, but they always labour there 
 under direction — under a master. They are excellent labour- 
 ers in the mines here — under a master ; but let them depend 
 on voluntary exertion and tliey prefer doing nothing. For 
 instance, Michael Sullivan, a labouring man, in the parish 
 of Abbey Strowry, near Skibbereen, is asked by the Land 
 Commissioners {Ibid. p. 964): — 
 
 " Have you a pig ? — Ye3. 
 
 " Have you a pig-liouse ? — No. 
 
 " Where is he kept ? — He must be kept in some part of the house, m 
 a corner. 
 
 " Have you any room for a pigsty outside ? — No; I might make room 
 for the pig if I was sure of the house for a second year, but I do not mean 
 to go to the trouble ; and many the same as me do not do so, not being 
 sure of the house for a second year.''' 
 
 Thus, rather than take a day's " trouble" in building a 
 pigsty with mud or stones, this man, and " many like him," 
 will live with filthy swine in his cottage for a year ! And 
 yet the same man is asked, " Have you constant employ- 
 ment ? — No." The plain truth being, that he would rather 
 be lazy and do nothing if left to his own choice, than exert 
 himself for a day to build a pigsty and increase his comfort 
 for a year ; the " being sure for a second year" being a mere 
 excuse, which, however true, is in fact no excuse. 
 
 But does not this character of the people — for it is their 
 universal character in the west of Ireland, as I have seen it 
 exhibited in hundreds of instances — plainly point out the 
 want of judgment of their management and employment? 
 Here is a people, whose quiet docility and industry, if 
 
 FF 2 
 
436 THE FISHING AND ItflNING 
 
 employed, and directed, and urged on, and superintended by 
 others, cannot be excelled, but who, if left to themselves, 
 become indolent, careless, and unenergetic ; yet, from one end 
 of the country to the other, the great mass of them are left to 
 their own voluntary exertions as petty farmers, and are rarely 
 employed or superintended by others. The result is, as might 
 be expected, improvement rarely ever takes place among 
 them. " As long as I recollect," says Mr. James M'Carthy, 
 iBiddleman, of Goleen, near Crookhaven {ibid. p. 947), 
 " agriculture has been in the very same state." " Rotation 
 of crops there is none," says Mr. T. Townscnd, of AYcst 
 Carbery {ibid. p. 966), " with the exception of potatoes and 
 corn alternately every jeiir,fro}n time immemorial." " Many 
 is the comfortable farmer that has destroyed liimself by sub- 
 dividing his land amongst his children. Scarcely one of 
 them has any idea of putting his children out to trades or 
 sending them abroad to provide for tliemselves, all depend- 
 ing on their bit of land to support the whole."* 
 
 * " It is perhaps owing to the want of education that there is so little spirit of 
 enterprise to be found among tlie great bulk of the agricultural population of tliis 
 country ; at least, it appears that the sjiirit of enterprise exactly corresjjonds with 
 the extent of education throughout the kingdom. 
 
 " In the north-eastern counties, where education most prevails, it is not 
 unccinmon to see a small farmer provide for his sons, by ginng them trades, or 
 putting them apprentices to shopkeepers, or sending them to sea or to America, 
 and thereby preserving his farm unbroken for one of his family. But iiMhe 
 .south and west of the kingdom, where education has made little advance, the 
 people, totally unacquainted with the wants of civilised life, have no other idea of 
 providing for their children than by dividing among them the lauid they possess. 
 Nor have their families ever learned to desire anything which a small piece of land 
 cannot be made to sup])ly ; and, contented with their lot, they support nature as 
 well as they can, living upon their inheritance, without a thonght of bettering 
 their circumstances. The original mansion-Ziouse (as it is not unfrequcntly 
 termed) by degrees extends itself, and a cluster of cabins is formed apound it by 
 those who have issued from its walls, among whom the original farm (which may 
 have been, when granted, of very considerable extent) is found to be divided in 
 the most absurd and inconvenient manner, according to the allotment of those 
 who bequeathed it by will, or as it may have been :u'(juired by purchase. The 
 same individual, holding perhaps his land in scattered fields, remote from his 
 
ADVANTAGES OF CORK. 437 
 
 The general complaint amongst the poor tenants is against 
 " high rents" produced by tlie system of middlemen. The 
 landlord in fee gets perhaps 100/. a year rent for a large 
 tract of country from a tenant, who sublets at a profit rent 
 of 200Z. a year to one or two sub-tenants, who again sublet 
 the land in small patches to the farmers at a further profit 
 rent of other 200/. a year, and the farmers again sublet 
 patches of their worst land at exorbitant rents to their 
 labourers. Under this system the labourers never see a 
 shilling in money, and are always in debt to the farmers; 
 and the farmers, from the high rent which competition com- 
 pels them to pay to the lowest middleman — generally five 
 times the rent paid to the head landlord — are steeped in 
 poverty and never possess capital to invest in improvements 
 if they had the inclination to do it. The lower middlemen, 
 too, in order to exact these high rents, are perpetually giving 
 their sub-tenants notice to quit, to frighten them into paying 
 their rents, till the poor fellows, naturally timid, indolent, 
 and unenterprising, have no heart or means to do anything. 
 You thus have several circumstances in Ireland perpetually all 
 leading to the same lamentable state of poverty and wretched- 
 ness. The high rent the tenant pays his immediate landlord 
 prevents his accumulating capital, so that he cannot improve if 
 
 house and remote from each other. This is such a common case that there is no 
 one at all conversant with Irish estates who must not have seen hundreds of 
 instances of it. The near neighbourhood of the houses is not found to produce a 
 corresponding close intimacy in the occupants. Their children quarrel — their 
 pigs, cattle, and poultry, all at some time or other do mutual injury and create 
 dissension ; so that everything gets into a state the exact reverse of what it ought 
 to be. The dwellings are clustered together which ought to be separate, and the 
 land is scattered which ought to be connected, and the people are made enemies 
 who ought to be friends. To remedy this, a consolidation of their different 
 holdings, and the removal of their dwellings to their respective allotments, becomes 
 absolutely necessary. This naturally leads to a judicious arrangement of the land 
 into new compact farms, equivalent in size to the detached holdings formerly 
 possessed by each, in which straight mearings may be introduced, as far as 'the 
 lay of the land will admit." — Prize Essay on the Management of Irish Estates, 
 by William Blacker, Esq. p. 20. 
 
438 SUGGESTIONS FOR AVERTING 
 
 he would. The general want of any kind of enterprise amongst 
 the middle classes and monied men deprives those of lower 
 station of the opportunity of employment, and thus compels 
 their poverty — for the want of enterprise is by no means 
 confined to the poor tenants and labourers ; and the general 
 want of voluntary exertion in the labourers and small 
 farmers themselves, makes them rest content with dry pota- 
 toes and a filthy hovel. More liberality on the part of land- 
 lords, and a riddance of those lazy drones, the middlemen, 
 who usurp the position of the landlords, without conferring 
 any of the benefits of landlords, would lead to improvement 
 in the condition of the tenantry. More enterprise on the 
 part of monied men and amongst the middle classes would 
 ditfuse employment, and with it increased comforts to the 
 employed ; and more voluntary exertion on the part of the 
 tenants and labourers themselves would insure them many 
 comforts and means of which they are deprived. Any one 
 of these circumstances would insure a better condition for 
 the mass of the people ; all united icould, of necessity ^ insure 
 to the people of Ireland equal tvealth, prosperity^ and comfort 
 with the inhabitants of the rest of the empire. The want of any 
 one of these circumstances limits the opportunities and 
 means of the bulk of the people ; hut the ycjieral want of all 
 of them, ivliich unhappily is the fact, leads to that \cidchj -diffused 
 poverty and ivretchedness xvhich arc everywhere visible in Ireland. 
 These are the true causes of Ireland's poverty, and no repeal 
 of the Union, or other Government measure which does not 
 ameliorate these causes, will ever have the slightest effect in 
 altering its poverty-stricken condition. 
 
 The general topic of conversation everywhere now, is the 
 failure of the potato crop. I have refrained hitherto from 
 referring much to the subject, the statements of failure and 
 of means of cure have been so contradictory. It appears, 
 however, to be generally agreed upon, wherever I have been, 
 that the crop this year, from a larger spread of land having 
 
THE FAILURE OF THE POTATO CROP. 439 
 
 been placed under cultivation, and from the abundance of 
 the produce, has been about one-fifth more than an average 
 crop ; and that in many places the potato disease has de- 
 stroyed one-third of the produce ; and that if the disease 
 could be now arrested, there is still abundance of food in the 
 country to supply the wants of the people. It has also been 
 found that, by whatever means attained, thoroughly drying 
 the potato arrests the disease. Various plans, such as quick 
 lime, layers of ashes, kiln-drying, exposure to the air, and 
 ventilation, have been suggested to attain dryness. Most of 
 these are utterly futile, as beyond the general means and 
 comprehension of the people. A simple plan of ventilation 
 has been proposed, which is, I think, in the power of every 
 peasant. It is to make an air passage under the length of 
 the potato pit, and to have one or two vent-holes or chim- 
 neys on the surface of it. This may be accomplished by 
 simply digging a narrow drain longer than the pit is intended 
 to be, and placing stones or dried turf over it in such a man- 
 ner as to prevent the potatoes and earth falling into it, but 
 sufficiently wide apart to admit air; or, where stones are 
 plentiful (or even turf), by placing them edgeways on the 
 ground and resting against each other, thus A, an air pass- 
 age may be secured under the pit. If the potatoes be 
 piled over this, being round bodies, there will be interstices 
 or spaces between them, which will permit of ventilation 
 through them from the air passage or drain underneath, if 
 there be a chimney for the air to pass out. This may be 
 made by simply placing a broomstick upright in the pota- 
 toes, before the top of the pit is earthed up. After covering 
 up the top of the pit, by simply working this stick round, 
 on taking it out a hole will be left into the body of the pota- 
 toes quite sufficient to serve for a chimney, and for every 
 purpose of ventilation. The next thing to guard against is 
 frost. Frost always descends perpendicularly. This is an 
 ascertained fact, as most persons have seen. Under the 
 
440 SUGGESTIONS FOR AVERTING 
 
 archways of bridges, however wide, and however freely the 
 wind may rush through them, the water is rarely frozen, 
 although on each side the ice may be thick. This then 
 being a fact, the only thing required is simply a sod to place 
 over the vent-hole or chimney-top every night, or when it 
 may be raining hard, to keep the potatoes dry, and free 
 from frosting. Both ends of the drain or air-passage should 
 be kept open. Now, this simple plan is within the reach of 
 every peasant. It has been tried, and has been found to be 
 jperfectly effective. The diseased potatoes have been cured, 
 and the sound ones kept sound by it. It is, however, of no 
 use in the world telling the peasantry this. They are so 
 ignorant and apathetic — so stupidly obstinate in their old 
 ways, that they will persevere in their old plan of closing up 
 the potato-pits with earth, and leaving the diseased potatoes 
 to ferment and communicate their contagion to the sound 
 ones, till the whole pit is one mass of rottenness, though you 
 point out to them for a month the certain consequences of 
 their adhering to their old rude and wasteful plan. They 
 have been preached to, lectured to, instructed by handbills 
 from authority, told by newspapers for the last month 
 methods of preserving their potatoes, and in not one in a 
 hundred instances has any one plan been attended to. The 
 pits in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred (and I saw some 
 hundreds of them yesterday) are made as they always have 
 been. Wherever the pits have been made on the old fashion, 
 on opening them the potatoes have been found rotting. 
 About Christmas the great hulk of these pits icill he almost 
 simultaneously opened, and it is nearly an ascertained cer- 
 tainty that the potatoes so pitted loill then be destroyed. A 
 sudden dismay and general panic will then be the result, 
 unless prompt measures be taken to prevent such a calamity. 
 The Rev. Dr. Traill, of West Carbery, has suggested that 
 the reconstruction of the pits on a plan that will insure ve 
 tilation should be immediately ordered, and, if necessary, 
 
THE FAILURE OF THE POTATO CROP. 441 
 
 made compulsory by the Government. This might be 
 readily accomplished by the clergy, or perhaps better by the 
 magistrates and police of each district being directed to see 
 that these orders were carried out, as a national measure, 
 necessary to prevent a national calamity, one or two men in 
 each district being provided to superintend and instruct the 
 people in the re-formation of the pits. 
 
 Another important matter is to save seed for next year. 
 The decay in the potato begins always at the bottom. The 
 vitality of the potato is at the top, or where the eyes are 
 clustered. This is called the " collar" of the potato. As the 
 potatoes are prepared each day for a meal, by simply cut- 
 ting off this collar, or about a quarter of an inch thick from 
 the top of the potato, and laying these aside in a dry place, 
 perfectly sound seeds will be secured for next year, and the 
 bulk taken from the potatoes will scarcely be missed — will 
 not, in fact, equal one potato each meal. 
 
 Another matter as important is to endeavour to prevent, as 
 much as possible, the horrors, the high prices, and extortion 
 of a famine, if unhappily it should come upon us. A gentle- 
 man of much intelligence in Sligo, an extensive miller and 
 corn-factor, and therefore a practical man, has submitted to 
 me this plan, — that a nominal subscription should be entered 
 into by each county generally for the purpose of relieving, or 
 rather preventing, the distress which may arise from the high 
 price of provisions next summer. That a committee of the 
 leading men of each county should be formed, having at their 
 disposal this subscription, should it be found necessary to call 
 it in. That these committees should each purchase, as they 
 may deem it expedient, say 1,000 tons of oatmeal, at the 
 lowest present price, holding this oatmeal over in stores till 
 the next spring and summer, and that then it should be 
 retailed, under proper superintendence, by a storekeeper,ybr 
 cash, at a moderate profit, merely sufficient to cover the 
 storeage and salary of the storekeeper. That the committee 
 
442 SUGGESTIONS FOR AVERTING THE 
 
 sLould raise money for the purchase of the oatmeal by their 
 joint note, which the banks would at once discount. All 
 sales of the oatmeal to be lodged each day in the bank to 
 account of the promissory notes outstanding. On winding 
 up the transaction, the oatmeal would be, at the least, worth 
 its present value, and, if sold at a small profit, enough to 
 cover the expenses, none of the subscriptions would need to 
 be called for. But should there be a loss on the sale, the 
 proportion to each subscriber according to the amount of his 
 subscription would be trifling. Now, the present price of 
 oatmeal is 14/. per ton : should there be no famine, I am 
 assured from the experience of former years that the price of 
 oatmeal next spring and summer will be thought " dirt cheap" 
 at 16Z. per ton ; but, should thej-e he a famine from the failure 
 of the potatoes, oatmeal — which will be the substitute resorted 
 to — will, as it has done before, rise to 25Z., or even to 30Z., 
 the ton. The good effected by this plan would be, that these 
 stores would regulate the price of oatmeal in the market, and 
 would prevent the ruin of the farmers by extortioners, meal- 
 mongers, and " Gombeen" men, and insure to them if they 
 must unfortunately buy food, that food at a reasonable rate. 
 It will then be time enough to meet those unhappy cases 
 where labourers may have lost their potatoes, and have no 
 means to buy oatmeal, by a special subscription for that 
 purpose ; and this plan will insure to such a special subscrip- 
 tion the purchase of a larger quantity of food for the starving, 
 because it will keep down the price of oatmeal. 
 
 These three plans will, if carried out, I feel assured by all 
 that Ihave seen and heard, insure, first, the arrest of the 
 disease in the potatoes, and the preservation of food for the people ; 
 secgndly, seed for next year ; and lastly, if there should occur 
 the calamity of a famine, there will he a substituted food secured 
 for the people at a reasonable price. 
 
 However, whilst convinced of the easy practicability of all 
 these plans, I am as firmly convinced as that I am now 
 
FAILURE OF THE POTATO CROP. 443 
 
 writing to you, such is the general apathy, want of exer- 
 tion, and feeling of fatality amongst the people — such their 
 general distrust of everybody and suspicion of every pro- 
 ject — such the disunion among the higher classes, with 
 similar apathetic indifference, that unless the Government 
 steps forward to carry out, to order or enforce these or 
 similar plans for the national welfare, not any one of them 
 vnll he generally adopted, and nothing will be done. Christmas 
 is approaching when the potato-pits will most of them be 
 opened ; the poor people will clasp their hands in helpless 
 despair on seeing their six months' provisions a mass of 
 rottenness ; there will be no potatoes for seed next season ; 
 a general panic Avill seize all, and oatmeal for food will 
 be scarcely purchasable by the people at any price. The 
 Government, however, have been teamed — let them act 
 promptly, decisively, and at once, and not depend on the 
 people helping themselves ; for, such is the character of the 
 people, that tJiey will do nothing till starvation faces tliem*' 
 
 * The truth of this prediction, in eveiy particular, is now uiiliappily being 
 verified. The potato-pits, on being opened, are found to be filled with diseased 
 potatoes. Nothing was done to avert the calamity or to prevent the mischief; 
 potatoes are wanting for seed, and a panic is beginning to seize on men's minds, 
 which is being turned to the extraction of money from England to keep the poor 
 of Ireland from starving, whilst not a word is said about the shameful apathy and 
 neglect which permitted such a state of things to come about. I do not hesitate 
 to state my conviction, from what I saw and from what I learned, that for the 
 greater part of the severity of this unhappy calamity, the people of Ireland have 
 themselves to blame, and their O'svn disgraceful apathy and laziness. But the 
 Government ought to know this their character, and ought to have taken measures 
 to d7uve them on, if they were too lazy and apathetic to follow when led. 
 
444 
 
 DESCRIPTION OF MALLOW. 
 
 LETTER XXX. 
 
 DESCRIPTION OF MALLOW.— ADMINISTRATION OF THE 
 GRAND JURY LAWS. 
 
 Description of Mallow — Its Spa — The Water-power of Quartertown — Adminis- 
 tration of the Grand Jury Laws — The late Rev. Sydney Smith's opinion on 
 this subject — Inglis's opinion — The O'Connells, and Road Presentations — 
 Summary of the present Grand Jury Laws — The mode in which jobbing is 
 managed under them — The mischievous system of Applotment — Suggested 
 Remedies. 
 
 Mallow, Cork, November 26. 
 The town of Mallow lias one of the most English looks with 
 it of any town in the south or west of Ireland that I have 
 yet been in. It is situated in a pleasant fertile country ; a 
 fine river — the Blaekwater — runs through it, a very neat 
 church and an old ruin give it a picturesque appearance and 
 the houses are large, well built, and clean looking. Thei*e 
 is a thriving and decent respectable look about it, which is 
 not often seen in the towns of the west of Ireland. This 
 is to be attributed perhaps in some measure to its being 
 a watering-place. Numbers of consumptive and delicate 
 persons resort here for the recovery of their health, the 
 climate being mild and salubrious. Money has thus been 
 spent in the town, and a class of good houses has been pro- 
 vided to accommodate such visitors and residents. The spa 
 which is resorted to resembles the waters of Clifton ; it is 
 
DESCRIPTION OF MALLOW. 445 
 
 tepid, and impreg-nated with magnesia in its passage through 
 the limestone rocks of the district. Another and primary 
 reason for these evidences of comfort and prosperity is, that 
 there are very many resident gentry in the neighbourhood 
 who form a pleasant local society, and who, in spending their 
 incomes, give employment and encouragement to labour. 
 The people are here very quiet and peaceable, and if let 
 alone, and not excited and urged on to mischief by that 
 pernicious system of political agitation which prevails, and 
 which is the greatest curse and bar to all improvement which 
 this country possesses, are well conducted. Sir Denham 
 Norreys Is the chief land-owner in the district, and he is 
 giving much employment by building a handsome mansion 
 in the town. The Cork and Dublin Railway will pass through 
 the town, and will no doubt greatly increase its prosperity. 
 At Quartertown in the neighbourhood, there is a consider- 
 able water-power on the river Clyda, which runs through 
 the property of Mr. Dillon Croker, a gentleman who has 
 very creditably exerted himself on many occasions to improve 
 the condition of the people. There is a fine and unfailing 
 stream of water, to which engineering skill can give a fall of 
 thirty-seven feet, and which has been calculated to afford 
 constant water-power to the extent of 200 horse-power. This 
 stream now works two large flour-mills. On account ot 
 this advantageously situated water-power, a project has been 
 started to erect a cotton manufactory and to commence there 
 the cotton manufacture, and a company has been formed 
 with that object. Should the project succeed, of which there 
 is every prospect, it will be of much benefit in affording 
 employment to a densely populated district. 
 
 There are few questions which form a more general subject 
 of complaint in Ireland than the administration of the Grand 
 Jury laws, and the applotment of the county cess, as it is 
 called, or the apportionment among the occupiers of the soil 
 of the cost of those roads and improvements which the grand 
 
446 ADMINISTRATION OF THE 
 
 juries have presented as necessary to be made. In former 
 days the grand juries were the means of perpetrating the 
 most notorious jobs unblushingly. Since the alteration of 
 the Grand Jury laws, the jobs still go on as before, but with 
 a more intricate contrivance. It would seem as though 
 jobbing were innate among the Irish gentry : it is next to 
 fox-hunting and cock-shooting. It is a peculiar excitement, 
 in which the Irish mind delights. The peasant "jobs" away 
 his daughter with a promise of half his farm to his son-in-law 
 for marrying her. The son-in-law comes to take possession, 
 but finds the land occupied by another, to whom the father 
 had previously given possession, between whom and said 
 son-in-law there is, of course, a fight for the land ; and 
 should the son-in-law get " licked," he passes it on to his 
 wife, or to his father-in-law, for deluding him under false 
 pretences into the silken mesh-Avork of matrimony. So 
 every private gentleman has a plan of a road in his coat- 
 pocket for the peculiar benefit of his own particular estate, 
 which, through the instrumentality of the presentment ses- 
 sions and the grand jury, he intends the public to pay for. 
 Talk of doubling a fox, or marking down a woodcock, what 
 comes up to canvassing and blarneying the associated cess- 
 payers (whom yourself or your particular friend have chosen 
 when on the grand jury) into a promise to support your 
 presentment for a road just past your door, and through the 
 middle of your five miles of bog ? And should your political 
 opponent do this, what equals the delight of a dinner-party 
 to all your friends, who are magistrates of any part of the 
 county, on the day of the barony-road sessions, and of bring- 
 ing them in to vote ex-officio and swamp the votes of the poor 
 subservient associated cess-payers, whom your political ad- 
 versary had spent a year's contrivance in getting appointed, 
 and in canvassing to support his little job ? Oh, it " beats 
 cock-fighting " far away ! 
 
 To give the English reader, however, a clear conception 
 
GRAND JURY LAWS. 447 
 
 of these Hibernian delights, we must review them a little in 
 the order of time. The late celebrated and reverend author 
 of Peter Plimleys Letters to his dear brother Abraham in the 
 country, thus describes grand juries as they managed matters 
 some forty years ago : — 
 
 " The grand juries in Ireland are the great scene of jobbing. They 
 have a power of making a county-rate to a considerable extent ; for roads, 
 bridges, and other objects of general accommodation. ' You suffer the 
 road to be brought through my park, and I will have the bridge con- 
 structed in a situation where it will make a beautiful object to your house. 
 You do my job, and I will do yours.' These are the sweet and interesting 
 subjects which occasionally occupy Milesian gentlemen while they are at- 
 tendant upon this grand inquest of justice." 
 
 To come, however, to a more recent period — to the year 
 when Inglis wrote his book on Ireland, which was in 1834, 
 shortly previous to the passing of the Grand Jury Act — the 
 same hereditary passion (I think we may call it) is by him 
 recorded, and in a quarter, too, where purity of motive it is 
 " rank blasphemy " to suspect. Only think of immaculate 
 Daniel doing a little in grand jury jobbing ! — the " saviour 
 of his country " sweetening his punch out of the profits of 
 grand jury presentments, which poor Paddy had to pay for ! 
 " I am now in O'Connell's country ; here is the property of 
 Daniel O'Connell, Esq., or the ' Liberator,' as the people 
 called him," says Inglis, in his Journey through Ireland, 
 p. 134. 
 
 " Be it known to the reader," he continues, " that O'Connell is less po- 
 pular in his own country than he is elsewhere. If you ask an innkeeper, 
 or an innkeeper's mfe, anywhere in O'Connell's district, what sort^ of a 
 man then- landlord is, ' Och, and sure, he's the best of landlords ! He 
 takes the childer by the hand, and he wouldn't be over proud to dthrink 
 tay with the landlady.' But if you step into a cabin, the owner of which 
 OAvns Daniel O'Connell, Esq. as his landlord, and if you ask the same 
 question, he '11 scratch his head, and say little any way. Shortly before I 
 visited Cahirciveen, there was a road presentation in that neighbourhood, 
 and the ratepayers, who have now a vote in these matters, refused at first 
 
448 ADMINISTRATION OF THE 
 
 to pass it, unless the O'Connells Avould pay two-thirds of the expense, 
 because, said they, '■ (he O'Connells have lived long enough out of road pre- 
 sejitationa ! " 
 
 But no doubt Iiiglls was a base calumniator, an assassin, 
 a blaspheming- bound, a sacrilegious villain — don't believe a 
 word of this testimony, but listen to his next paragraph, 
 which you may safely credit, because it refers to " the boot 
 on the other leg." He says, — 
 
 " I have reason to know, from unquestionable authority, that before the 
 late Grand Jury Bill was enacted — that is, up to the present time — there 
 had been much shameful grand jury jobbing in many of the Irish counties, 
 particularly in Tipperary, Clare, Limerick, Kerry, and Koscommon. A 
 grand juror of Tipperary called one morning previous to the holding of 
 the quarter-sessions upon a brother grand juror — a man, however, of 
 much greater influence than himself— and pulling out and unfolding vo- 
 luminous plans and papers, began to explain the advantages which would 
 accrue to the public from the construction of a certain road through his 
 (the expounder's) property. ' Put your papers in your pocket, man,' said 
 the man of influence, ' say nothing about the public advantage. I '11 just 
 say its a little job of my own ;' and so things were managed." 
 
 This picture, through the medium of a different process, 
 is exactly what transpires now. We have, however, now 
 arrived at the period of the Grand Jury Act, the provisions 
 of which I will endeavour as briefly as ]>ossible to explain, 
 and then show how the " hereditary passion" exhibits itself 
 under it. 
 
 By the 6th and 7th William IV., c. 116, " An act to con- 
 solidate and amend the laws relating to the presentuicnt of 
 public money by grand juries in Ireland," it is enacted in 
 the 4th section, that it " shall be lawful for every justice of 
 the peace for any county to assemble, with the cess-payers 
 associated with them, to hold a sjoecial or presentment 
 sessions, at such times and places as the grand jury shall 
 appoint." And (by section 7) for the purpose of enabling 
 the grand jury to prepare a list of cess-payers, the high- 
 constable, or collector of the money levied by grand jury 
 
GRAND JURY LAWS. 449 
 
 presentment, must deliver to the secretary of the grand jiuy 
 a list of the names of one hundred occupiers in each barony, 
 or county of a town, who may he the highest rate or cess- 
 payers. By section 8 the grand jury may fix on any num- 
 ber of cess-payers, not less than five nor more than twelve, 
 to be associated with the justices at the presentment sessions, 
 according to the circumstances of the barony ; and out of the 
 hundred names given in by the collector the grand jury must 
 make out a list of double the number of associated cess- 
 payers determined upon. By section 9 the majority of the 
 justices present at the presentment sessions must choose a 
 chairman, who must draw out from the list of cess-payers, so 
 given in, the number determined on by the grand jury to be 
 associated with the justices ; and these, with the justices, 
 constitute the presentment sessions. By section 12 all appli- 
 cations for works, the expense whereof it is proposed to levy 
 off the county at large, or off the barony, must be made at 
 the presentment sessions holden for such barony ; and by 
 section 17 such applications shall then be decided upon to 
 be adopted or rejected by a majority of voices. Section 18 
 gives instructions how to proceed if the application be 
 rejected, by a process of appeal to the judge of assize, under 
 which, if the applicant only perseveres, though he may be 
 defeated once or twice, he will be certain ultimately to carry 
 his proposal, as it must pass, unless opposed before a jury 
 with as much pertinacity as he presses it, which is not gene- 
 rally likely to be the case. By section 31 the sheriff must 
 nominate one freeholder of lands above the yearly value of 
 50?., or leaseholder of lands above the yearly value of 100/., 
 to be placed on the grand jury panel for each barony, and 
 complete the panel of 23 by selecting from the list of gentry 
 of the county qualified to act as grand jurors. By section 
 37 the grand jury thus empanelled proceed to decide on the 
 presentments made to them from the presentment sessions, 
 and to adopt or reject them. The cost of these presentments 
 
 G G 
 
450 ADMINISTRATION OF THE 
 
 when allowed as directed by the act, are leviable in propor- 
 tion iijjon each parish or " denomination" in a barony, and 
 the sum tb he paid by each individual occupier is "applotted" 
 by two persons, to be chosen at a public meeting of the land- 
 holders or " inhabitants," who are required (sec, 151), " fairly 
 and justly, according to the relative annual value of the 
 several subdivisions of the lands and tenements therein con- 
 tained," to make the applotments, and to make oath before 
 a justice of the peace for the county " that they have made 
 the said applotment justly." False swearing in this respect 
 is made perjury by section 172. And by section 153 this 
 applotment, or cess, is to be paid by the occupying tenant. 
 
 Such is now the law, and we come now to examine how 
 the " hereditary passion" exhibits itself under it: — 
 
 " Were the landlord and landlord proprietor obliged to contribute 
 their portion according to their interest in the grounds, it "would be the 
 cause of stopping a good deal of jobbing going forward," says Mr. Thomas 
 Townsend, of West Carberry, Cork, (Ibid. c. 967.) " Landlords are con- 
 tinually endeavouring to get new lines of roads through their properties, 
 and in very few instances offering to contribute to any part of the 
 expense. And from the description of rate-payers associated with the 
 magistrates at road sessions, instead of being a c/ieck, they have made things 
 ■much ivorse thunformerbj." 
 
 The first step taken, should a grand juror have " a little 
 job of his own" in his barony, is to tell the grand jury : — 
 " You know I know very well the people in my barony, and 
 I will select the required number of names, if you permit 
 me, from the best of the hundred names sent in by the 
 collector," A request so reasonable is, of course, assented 
 to by the gentlemen from other parts of the county, who 
 expect similar courtesy when the selection comes to their 
 districts. Double the number determined on as associated 
 cess-payers are then carefully selected from his own tenants, 
 and it matters not which of these may be afterwards chosen 
 as associated cess-payers, as there is little fear but they will 
 
GRAND JURY LAWS. 451 
 
 vote for " the job" at tlie presentment sessions ; and he 
 himself will do the rest for it when it comes before the 
 grand jury, by diligent attendance, and canvassing, and 
 speechifying, — 
 
 " The associated cess-payers are alwaj's chosen by the gentlemea who 
 represent the baronj^," says Mr. Richard White, landowner, of Bantry. 
 (Jhid. p. 928.) " Suppose myself, — I put down all the tenants who will 
 support any measure I ■nish to carry" ..." and they are generally 
 in a class of life not fit to be intrusted Avith a vote." 
 
 If, however, he is not a grand juror, then the application 
 must be made in due form to the presentment sessions. To 
 insure its success, the associated cess-payers are, if possible, 
 canvassed, and their support secured before the presentment 
 day. This is usually no very difficult matter from the 
 station of these cess-payers. The country gentleman rides 
 up to the mud hovel of the associated cess-payer, who 
 rejoices in all the pride of station of a six-acre farm ; asks 
 for Pat Murphy inside ; pats on the back the sweet little 
 boy without clothes who is scratching his head and rolling- 
 over the pig ; inquires feelingly after the health of Mrs. 
 Murphy, who " thanks his Honour for a fine gintleman, 
 an' if she could only ^ei buther-milk to her praties she'd 
 do very well ;" tells Pat " to come to his house, and he 
 shall have a rabbit that he (the gentleman) shot yesterday ;" 
 and so far as Pat is concerned " the job" is done, and " his 
 Honour" departs amid the blessings of the assembled family, 
 — " May the Lord give you a safe journey ; maij everything 
 prosper wid you, for a fine good gintleman." A few such 
 visits as these, and an invitation to his friends among the 
 magistrates in any part of the county who have a right to 
 vote in any barony, to come and dine with him, and just 
 vote for " his little job," insures him a road through his 
 estate at the expense of the occupiers of the barony, pro- 
 vided there is not a counter-project of rival jDretensions 
 started by some other influential gentleman of the district, 
 
 G G 2 
 
452 ADMINISTRATION OF THE 
 
 in which case the ex officio votes of the magistrates are 
 sometimes brought to bear to swamp the cess-payers where 
 they cannot be won, and the man of most influence is sure 
 to carry the day. 
 
 " The system of the grand jury cess, and the road jobbing, and the 
 partial way of doing business, are very much to be found fault with," 
 says ]\Ir. Daniel INl'Carthy, vice-chairman of the board of guardians at 
 Skibbereen. {Ibid. p. 959.) " Magistrates go from one barony to another 
 to carry a road that is for the benefit of the owner in fee ; and I should 
 think that they ought to be the persons to pay for it." 
 
 " I do not think that the persons who represent the grand jury are the 
 most competent," says IMr. William O' Sullivan, farmer, of Carrigrass 
 Castle, near Macroom {ibid. p. 945) ; " they do not know the wants of 
 the people, and it is all a jobbing system." 
 
 Should, however, any gentleman, for the sake of the 
 public good, propose a road, who does not happen to be a 
 man of preponderating influence, the cess-payers, to save 
 their pockets, won't vote for it. What do they care for the 
 public ? their landlord has not canvassed them. If such a 
 measure even should be approved of and get into the grand 
 jury, there is none of the excitement of the " hereditary 
 passion" to back it ; it lacks supporters in the grand jury, 
 no one knows anything about it, it is voted a bore and 
 rejected. Then comes the cess-payers' turn to exercise 
 the " hereditary passion." They unfortunately, and most 
 unjustly, have to pay for all these " jobs" thus palmed 
 upon them. A lumping sum is imposed on the town-land 
 or parish, which must be applotted on each occupier. A 
 notice of the meeting to choose applotters must be stuck up 
 on the door of the church, convening " the landholders and 
 inhabitants" to choose applotters. On this choice, according 
 to the preponderance of parties or factions at the meeting, 
 depends the fact whether Pat Murphy shall be applotted 
 by his friend to pay Is. cess, or shall be adjudged by that 
 nameless scamp, his enemy, to pay \0s. cess. A matter 
 of such general importance is, of course, a matter of conse- 
 
GRAND JURY LAWS. 453 
 
 • 
 
 quence. Sometimes it is managed by two men going with 
 the notice — the churchwarden and one in the secret ; the 
 churchwarden posts the notice on the church door, accord- 
 ing to law, and his friend in the secret immediately pulls the 
 notice down. On the day appointed in the notice for the 
 meeting to choose applotters, Pat Murphy " has caught a 
 cowld and can't go and dig praties that day ;" and Dennis 
 O'Sullivan, his neighbour, " has got a pig in the measles, 
 and can't lave it." The meeting is held in due course, the 
 churchwarden in the chair, and Mr. Patrick Murphy and 
 Mr. Dennis O'Sullivan are duly appointed applotters for 
 the town-land by the assembled inhabitants, to the number 
 of four, the said applotters included, and they proceed to 
 make the applotment, which every one else in the village 
 swears he won't pay, because he knew nothing of the 
 meeting, and the matter is at length settled by a satisfactory 
 fight. Do not let your readers imagine that this arises from 
 the love of fighting ; there is generally a very sufficient 
 provocation. 
 
 Mr. Thompson, of Dingle, agent to Lord Ventry, in 
 Kerry, says, before the Land Commissioners (Part II. 
 p. 855) :— 
 
 " The county-cess is at the will of the applotter, who is very often a 
 very corrupt person. I cannot see any rule they go by except the im- 
 agination, or the dishonesty, or the interest of the applotter. Two town- 
 lands of equal value are often applotted, one four times more than the 
 other, with only a ditch between them. There is no certainty about it. 
 A man rated low this year, may be high next year, if there is a new ap- 
 plotter." 
 
 Sometimes, however, when it gets known, the whole 
 parish assembles at the choosing of the applotters — those 
 who pay rates as " landholders," and those who do not as 
 " inhabitants," and a regular row takes place : — 
 
 " Nothing can exceed the disgraceful scenes that occur in this county 
 at the different places where applotments are to be made. There was a 
 
454 ADMINISTRATION OF THE 
 
 1 4 
 
 case brought before the grand jury, at which I was, at the last assizes at 
 Killarney. A day was appointed for appointing applotters, and the 
 church, it appears, was the place allocated for electing them ; and one 
 party, who were anxious for one set of applotters and one arrangement, 
 got mto the church by some back way, while the others were kept waiting 
 outside, and they made their appointment, and subsequently those wha 
 were waiting outside got in and made their appointment. The conse- 
 quence was two applotments were made and two sets of applotters ap- 
 pointed, and the collector got both applotments. He was obliged to go 
 back to the old applotment. He did nof know what to do." — (Evidence 
 of Mr. Denny, landowner of Tralee.) 
 
 To be sure there is the little matter of the " oath" 
 required, with the penalty of perjury attached, " to applot 
 fairly and honestly ;" but, indeed, the less said about that 
 the better, for it appears to be the custom for the applotters, 
 as they are not remunerated by the Act of Parliament, to 
 leave themselves out of the applotment by way of reasonable 
 remuneration for services done. Hence the stimulus to the 
 " hereditary passion" on the part of themselves and friends. 
 
 Peter Thompson, Esq., of Tralee, treasurer of the county 
 of Kerry, is asked, — * 
 
 " Do you know in what manner the sums named in j'our warrant to be 
 levied on the parish is applotted upon the parish, and by whom ? — There 
 is no regular mode of doing it. The applotters are appointed evciy year 
 from among themselves. 
 
 " Is there any appeal from the decision of these people ? I have no 
 experience upon this subject. It has been found that the applotters not 
 being paid men had a right to pay themselves, and they have left them- 
 selves out of the applotment ; and when questioned upon it before the 
 grand jury, they said that they thought that that was the least they 
 could have for their trouble." 
 
 " There are continual conflicts,'' says Mr. Lynch, of Tralee (ibid. 863), 
 " at the meetings for appointing applotters, and nothing generally results, 
 except that the collection of the rate is left almost to the discretion of the 
 collector, and he falls back upon the previous applotment." 
 
 • Land Commissioners, Part II. p. 858. 
 
GRAND JURY LAWS. 455 
 
 He recommends a barony valuator to be appointed by the 
 grand jury, from whose decision there should be the right 
 of appeal. At present he says, — 
 
 " y4)u have no responsible class. The only security is the oath that the 
 parties take, which I have no hesitation in saying advisedly, for I hai^ 
 been often consulted on the subject, is totally disregarded^ 
 
 It is, however, hard and unjust that the occupier should 
 be taxed for the permanent improvements on the landlord's 
 estate, in the shape of roads and bridges, which will, by 
 increased facilities of intercourse, necessarily increase his 
 rents, he paying nothing towards those improvements, whilst 
 his occupying tenant, with a very uncertain and perhaps 
 temporary interest in the land, is made to pay for them. 
 There is much evidence given before the Land Commission 
 setting forth this grievance : — 
 
 " I think it most mischievous," says Mr. Lynch, solicitor of Tralee, 
 (ibid. p. 861), " that the cess should be imposed by the grand jury law, 
 the present as well as the past, upon the occupier, though that occupier 
 should actually have in his pocket a notice to quit from the landlord, by 
 which his tenancy Avas determinable, and that no advantage could arise 
 to him either immediately or remotely. I therefore think, for that reason, 
 that the landlord whose rent is benefited by making roads should be the 
 individual upon whom, in the first instance, this cess ought to be imposed/' 
 
 " I think it unfair to make the tenant at will, who has no certainty of 
 his ground, pay the entire expense of the new roads and other works car- 
 ried on at the baronial charges, and that the landlord, who really derives 
 the benefit of it, pays nothing."— (Evidence of the Eev. James Barry, 
 parish priest of East Scull.) 
 
 It is difficult to suggest an efficient remedy, for the evil 
 is not so much in the law as in the " hereditary passion" of 
 the people. If the cess is imposed equally on the landlords, 
 they will oppose generally the making of all roads ; and 
 roads are one of the surest means of improving the people 
 and the country. To give a fixed salary to the county 
 surveyor, and debar him from the exercise of private busi- 
 ness, compelling him to devote his time to an examination 
 
456 ADMINISTRATION OF THE GRAND JURY LAWS. 
 
 of the plans proposed, and to report upon them, and sug- 
 gest necessary roads ; and to give each barony a power to 
 assess itself for the making of a road in the barony if 
 desired, Avhich it cannot now do, nor get such a road unless 
 some influential person presents it at the sessions, would 
 do much good. The question, hoAvever, is one of those 
 peculiarly Irish ones, not so difficult in itself, but difficult 
 because of the character of the people for whom the law is 
 made, and who, whether from the " hereditary passion" of 
 jobbing, from a perverse ingenuity, or from whatever cause, 
 subvert and render mischievous and nugatory almost any 
 enactment. The mischief, however, is inflicted by them 
 upon one another, and it is the duty of the Government, as 
 far as possible, to prevent them like children from falling 
 into the fire, and, as far as possible, by judicious checks, to 
 render the " hereditary passion" harmless among them. 
 
CHALLENGE TO MR. O'CONNELL. 457 
 
 LETTER XXXI. 
 
 CHALLENGE TO I^IR. O'CONNELL TO PROVE THE CON- 
 DITION OF HIS ESTATE.— WATERFORD; ITS NEGLECTED 
 ADVANTAGES AND CAPABILITIES. 
 
 Notice of Mr. O'Connell's defence of his Estate and contradiction of my descrip- 
 tion of it — Challenge to him to prove the description correct before twelve 
 impartial Gentlemen — Tender of issue what shall be proved — Description of the 
 country from Mallow to Waterford — An Irish three-story house — Waterford 
 and its neglected Advantages — Its Exports — Its Politics — The Copper Mines — 
 State of Agriculture — Deposits in the Savings Banks — Recommendation to 
 the Government to cultivate Waste Lands as a means of employment for the 
 people and as a profitable investment of capital. 
 
 Watekfokd, November 29. 
 Before I enter upon the subject of my letter to-day I 
 think it necessary — due, in fact, to you — that I should 
 briefly advert to the recent defence of Mr. Daniel O'Connell, 
 in Conciliation-hall, Dublin, to my charge against him, and 
 which I now repeat* — " that amongst the most neglectful 
 
 * The defence, briefly, was this : that the town of Cahirciveen was a very 
 improved and good town, and that it owed its improvement to Mr. O'Connell. 
 The place about which I wrote was Derrynane Beg, which is just seventeen miles 
 from Cahirciveen, the two places being as distinct as Killamey and Cork . An y 
 man of lain sense will ask, " What, then, had Cahirciveen to do with Derrynane 
 Beg?" Why, nothing beyond this, that they have one middleman over them 
 in common. That is their common misfortune. But it was possible to say some- 
 thing about Cahirciveen — that it has a nunnery, a market-house, a reading-room, 
 and a Fever Hospital, and, being just two miles from the Valentia slate-quarry, that 
 
458 CHALLENGE TO MR. o'cOXNELL TO 
 
 landlords who are a curse to Ireland Daniel O'Connell 
 ranks first ; that on tlie estates of Daniel O'Connell are to 
 be found the most wretched tenants that are to be seen in 
 all Ireland ;" and that " whenever a ' middleman' is exe- 
 crated his name will not be forgotten." 
 
 Trick and chicane, unblushing impudence, a tongue which 
 falsehood never stayed, are the stock in trade on Avhich this 
 man has long existed ; they have imposed upon an impulsive 
 and unreflecting people, generous to a fault. By the exer- 
 cise of these means he has wound himself round their hearts ; 
 but the time is arriving when the viper whom they have 
 cherished and fed will no longer hide from them his native 
 qualities. 
 
 By a garbled extract from one of my letters he excites 
 the national vanity of his hearers against me ; and, having' 
 thus prepared them to believe anything he might choose to 
 state to my prejudice, he enters upon a lengthened descrip- 
 tion of what he has done for the town of Cahirciveen, and 
 on that rests his defence. His listeners applaud, even his 
 opponents are staggered, and his friends vehemently exclaim, 
 what a " scoundrel," and Heaven knoM's what else I must 
 be, thus to misrepresent him.* 
 
 its houses are slated ; but it was impossible to say a single word in defence of Derry- 
 nana Beg ; — so thejtwo, though seventeen miles apart, were " hocussed-pocussed" 
 together, and it all went do\«i as gospel in Conciliation Hall, that because the 
 houses of Cahirciveen were slated from the quarry close by, crffo, my description 
 of the wretched hovels of Derrynane Beg with their rotten potato-stalk thatches, 
 was monstrously incorrect. Thus thought the logicians of Conciliation Hall, and 
 they absolutely voted that this absurd defence should be printed and circulated. 
 I need hardly say that, because pf the course which I subsequently took, the vote 
 fell still-born, and this cunning ruse was a failure. 
 
 * As a specimen of the manner in which any man is attacked here who dares to 
 state the truth, I cut out the following letter from a paper called the Minister 
 Chronicle, published in this town, and purj)orting to be addressed to the editor of 
 the Freeman's Journal, a Dublin paper : — 
 
 "To THE Editor of the Freeman's Journal. 
 " Sir, — I beg leave, through you, to ask that very self-sufficient personage, 
 The Timen' Commissioner, a single question — one frequently asked by Irish 
 
PROVE THE CONDITION OF HIS ESTATE. 459 
 
 I will pass over the preparatory artifice, and simply quote 
 what I said of Cahirciveen. " Tlie wretched-looking- town 
 of Cahirciveen, its dirty unpaved streets, and old hat-mended 
 windows, reminds me of another subject," namely, that he 
 is the lessee of the town, " and sublets it at a profit rent as 
 a middleman ;" and I proceeded then to describe the con- 
 dition of his tenantry on other parts of his estate. These 
 three lines are positively every syllable that I wrote about 
 Cahirciveen. Refer to my published letter and see. Every 
 syllable of the sentence is literally true. Upon this text 
 he enters into a statement about convent-building, priest- 
 paying, fever hospitals, butter markets, not exacting any 
 rent for a churchyard, the excellence of the inn there, and 
 a vast deal more, all ending in self-laudation. The trick 
 succeeded ; his less acute auditory were driven off the scent. 
 Without entering into a detailed examination of his state- 
 ments, nine-tenths of which are pure moonshine— in fact, 
 utterly false, — what answer, I ask, did he give to the charge 
 of having within a mile of his own house the most wretched 
 and squalid and pauperised tenantry in all Ireland ? Not 
 one word of answer did he give. Brazen as he is, he had 
 not brass enough for that. In fact, he occupied his auditory 
 with every topic but the charge against him. And yet they 
 could not see his evasion. 
 
 I will not, however, stoop to bandy talk with this man. 
 I came not here to humbug the English people, and I shall 
 at once take a course which every Englishman and every 
 
 recruits in answer to impertinent jibes and insults from their English fellow- 
 soldiers — viz., ' I say, Jack, how old was you when your mother was married ?' 
 — I am, &c. &c. 
 
 "J. D. S." 
 I beg to assure this gentleman, that if he will favour me with his name, I will 
 travel to his lodgings to give him a thrashing — a punishment which his " Irish 
 recruit" would be certain to get if he knew no better than to ask such a question, 
 and which the son of every gentlewoman will be ready to favour him with if he is 
 man enough to publish his name. 
 
460 CHALLENGE TO MR. o'cONNELL TO 
 
 honest Irishman will say is a fair course, and offer to appoint 
 six gentlemen, whom I will select from different parts of 
 Ireland ; Mr. O'Connell, if he dare, may do the same ; I 
 will proceed with them, in ten days, or whenever he pleases, 
 to Cahirciveen ; I will show them, and him too, if he chooses 
 to come, its dilapidation — its filth ; I will show them the inn 
 of which he has said so much, and which (because of the 
 civility of its landlord to me) I unwillingly say, that with 
 one exception it is the very worst that I have been in in the 
 United Kingdom ; I will take them to his estate under Mr. 
 Hartop, in the hills behind Waterville, from which, as a 
 middleman, he derives a profit rent of one-third of his income, 
 and about which, in his laboured defence, he has not said 
 one word ; I will show them his tenants living- there in a 
 state of neglected wretchedness such as none would believe 
 who did not see it, in huts not weather-proof, badly roofed, 
 often with sods, without chimneys or windows, and with 
 literally an iron-pot and a turf-basket as their only furniture. 
 The beds, usually a heap of stones, covered with turf and 
 heather ; the tables, the turf-basket bottom upwards ; the 
 mud floor their seat. They shall see the multiplied pauper- 
 ism, the infinite subdivision of land, the utter neglect and 
 misery of the people, left there in a state of nature, untaught, 
 unheeded, to multiply in misery as they list. These poor 
 people must be of necessity removed when the lease is out 
 by Mr. Hartop, who will then get all the odium of the 
 misery which this middleman's neglect has created. They 
 shall hear from the mouths of these poor people — this 
 middleman's tenant-farmers ! — that they are in the habit of 
 migrating to Cork, to Limerick, and to Waterford, in tlie 
 potato season, in order to earn enough at potato-digging, 
 in competition with the poor peasantry of those counties, to 
 pay this middleman's rent. I will take them to Derrynanc 
 Beg, — I will let them look for themselves through the 
 hovels there. They shall for themselves hear the stories 
 
PROVE THE CONDITION OF HIS ESTATE. 461 
 
 about " Old Hunting-cap," as O'Connell's uncle was called, 
 — about whom I do not wish to say one word, and they 
 will judge of the weight to be attached to his brag about 
 his ancestry ! Before " Old Hunting-cap's" time they were 
 " unknown to fame." They shall hear for themselves, too, 
 the stories about his morality, of which he makes so per- 
 petual a boast. They shall hear, too, from a dozen witnesses, 
 who saw his tenant's cattle impounded and sold for rent but 
 a month due, that Serjeant Jackson's charge against him, 
 on whatever testimony founded, was true. They shall hear 
 and see for themselves all this, and if they do not unanimously 
 conclude as I did, that this same Daniel O'Connell is the 
 most unprincipled impostor — the most unblushing — (pardon 
 me ; I will not imitate his foul-mouthed phraseology) fabri- 
 cator that the world ever saw, I will submit to be termed 
 what he pleases. Now, this I challenge him to do, if he 
 dare. Do not let him flatter himself that I shall shrink 
 from the task, hateful as it may be, of fully exposing to the 
 gaze of the world the whole history of his career, the full 
 picture of his tenantry's condition. No glozing over, no 
 cunning, no evasion, no talking about the Cahirciveen con- 
 vent, and churchyard, and the butter market, shall avail 
 him ; in all its appalling wretchedness, the condition of the 
 poor, neglected, peaceful, and intelligent people on his 
 property under Mr. Hartop and under Lord Cork, at 
 Derrynane Beg, shall be exposed. 
 
 I shall set about this task, if he dare accept the challenge, 
 with zeal, because I feel that I am engaged in a good work 
 for Ireland, in thoroughly unkennelling and exposing this 
 impostor. In my whole tour through Ireland I have seen 
 the mischief created by the agitation which he foments, and 
 which is kept up by the most worthless and reckless of the 
 community. The respectable men of his own party, who 
 are estimable men, because they conscientiously entertain 
 the principles they hold, believing them to be for the benefit 
 
462 CHALLENGE TO MR, o'cONNELL TO 
 
 of the country, are constrained by a kind of inolj-law imposed 
 on tliem by the worthless, to support this man in all his 
 vagaries through thick and thin ; and, whilst in their hearts 
 condemning his mischievous course, are obliged to aid him. 
 In Cork I heard of many instances of gentlemen subscribing 
 to his " tribute," as he calls it, to save appearances with the 
 mob, and who do not hesitate in private to express their 
 conviction that the greatest drawback on the j^rosperity and 
 advance of Ireland, in misdirecting the energies of her 
 people, is the political agitation which this man foments. 
 The priesthood, many of whom are highly estimable men, 
 in like manner generally deplore the mischief he causes ; 
 but, dependent upon the good-will of their parishioners, they 
 are often compelled, contrary to their better sense, to bow 
 before the mob outcry got up by the most worthless scamps 
 in their parishes, and to add to the seeming popularity of 
 this schemer. The whole scheming structure is hollow. It 
 only wants one good battering to tumble to pieces. A 
 thorough exposure of this unprincipled mountebank, who 
 one day drinks " the immortal memory of William III." in 
 the waters of the Boyne, and the next, to serve his sordid 
 ends, strives to urge on his countrymen to certain bloodshed, 
 by execrating the English Government, and exciting them 
 against every act of England, would, I am convinced, be a 
 national benefit. Let his trusting and confiding countrymen 
 but once have their eyes opened to the sort of thing that 
 deludes them, and whom they blindly follow, and there is an 
 end to his capacity of mischief, and some hope for Ireland. 
 
 This, too, I beg of English travellers, who next year may 
 visit Killarney, — go to Cahirciveen, the scenery will repay 
 you. On the island of Valentia, the property of the Knight 
 of Kerry, you will find a clean town, a comfortable inn, 
 where you can both eat and sleep in cleanliness. Look at 
 the town of Cahirciveen, and compare it with Valentia ; look 
 at its boasted, wretched inn, and compare it with that a 
 
PROVE THE CONDITION OF HIS ESTATE. 463 
 
 Valentia ; go round by Derrynane and look at tlie houses 
 of the tenants yourselves, — the scenery will repay you for 
 your trouble, and I know that you must remember this 
 man's statements about himself and his estate, when com- 
 pared with the reality, with disgust. 
 
 This man, however, does not constitute Ireland; and, 
 with a feeling of profound contempt for such a person, I 
 turn to subjects more deserving of attention ; merely stating 
 this, that I wait his determination, and I will be ready with 
 my friends any day he pleases to prove him to be what, I 
 have said he is.* 
 
 In my way to this town from Mallow I passed through 
 Mitchelstown, and had an opportunity of witnessing the 
 benefits resulting from resident landlords. Lord Doneraile 
 owns a large estate at Doneraile, on which he resides, and, 
 under the superintendence of an able Scotch steward, and 
 by encouragement, he has enabled the peasantry to live in 
 a better class of houses, and to cultivate their land in an 
 improved style. At Mitchelstown Lord Kingston resides at 
 the castle, one of the most splendid edifices in Ireland, and 
 the kindness and urbanity of his lordship to his tenants, 
 and the pains he takes to have them instructed, and his 
 general courtesy to the gentry of the neighbourhood, not 
 only make his lordship beloved, but have accomplished 
 much in improving the character of the surrounding jjopii- 
 lation. The peasantry, however, are slow to improve, and 
 inveterate in their habits of subdividing and pauperizing the 
 land. It is the custom of his lordship to give leases. There 
 is no doubt, under every ordinary circumstance, of its policy; 
 but he complains, and justly, that his land is subdivided in 
 spite of him, and at the termination of each lease is rendered 
 up to him covered with peojjle, most of whom it becomes 
 necessary to pay to get rid of, in order that some of them 
 
 * See Letter, post, dated Killamey. ;; 
 
464 WATERFORD ; ITS KEGLECTED 
 
 may be enabled to live out of the land. Nothing, in fact, 
 but the progress of education and opportunity of employ- 
 ment will remedy this evil. From Mitchelstown, as you 
 travel eastward, it is a general fact that the houses of the 
 farmers and the style of farming improve. You seem 
 advancing, in fact, towards civilization. Leaving out of the 
 question the fine towns of Limerick and Cork, it is a general 
 fact that the further you get westward, among the pure 
 Irish, the more barbarous, uncivilized, and helpless are the 
 people, the more uncultivated and waste the country, until 
 you get to that Ultima Thule Cahirciveen. It is only in that 
 happy region, which has lately been blown on the wings of 
 fame, that what the Irish peasant terms " a regular three 
 story house" is generally found, which being interpreted into 
 vulgar English, means the pig on the floor under or beside 
 the bed, the unhappy victim of insect persecution on the bed, 
 and a row of cocks and hens roosting on a stick above the 
 bed. To be sure, a family arrangement like this has its 
 advantages ; for the grunting and snoring of the pig soothes 
 poor Paddy into forgetfulness of cutaneous irritation, and the 
 crowing of the cock above his head " at early morn" pre- 
 vents his slumbers being too prolonged. This is what that 
 " broth of a boy" " our son Maurice" terms being " very 
 comfortably off," in a letter about " his babes," to his " fond 
 papa."* 
 
 The town of Waterford is, naturally, perhaps one of the 
 most favoured towns in the kingdom. It is about a dozen 
 miles from the sea, and a magnificent tidal river runs quite 
 through the town, at the quays of each side of which vessels 
 
 * At this time, a letter was going the round of the papers from Mr. Maurice 
 O'Connell to his father — evidently written for publication— in which, after 
 bestowing some O'Connellite epithets uj)on myself, he says the wretched tenantry 
 of Derrynane Beg are " very comfortably off," and concludes with stating that 
 his "babes" are well, and signs himself " your fond son." This from a man of 
 forty years of age savoured not a little of the burlesque. 
 
ADVANTAGES AND CAPABILITIES. 465 
 
 of 1000 tons can discharge. At low water there is a depth of 
 fourteen feet. Into this fine river, the Suir, the river Barrow 
 and other navigable streams discharge themselves, opening 
 a natural water communication to no less than seven adja- 
 cent counties. There is an inexhaustible store of the finest 
 fish on the coast, which, so far as it has been fished and 
 sought after, has amply repaid the speculators. Turbot is 
 sold by contract to the London market at 8c?., and soles at 
 6d., the pound. This means of profitable enterprise and 
 employment might with facility be increased tenfold. This 
 splendid river running through the town gives many fair 
 sites for houses. Much of the town has a very Lower 
 Thames-street appearance, being composed chiefly of stores 
 or warehouses ; but there are one or two good streets, and 
 many public buildings and institutions, which justly make it 
 rank high amongst Irish towns. The population is about 
 30,000. It will, too, in a short time, be the focus and termi- 
 nus of several railways. With all its great natural advan- 
 tages, however — advantages which, I am certain, if possessed 
 by any town in England, would soon lead to a second 
 Liverpool, — as to trade and commerce it is stationary, except 
 in one respect— the export of provisions. A timber vessel 
 or two, and one or two emigration vessels, constitute the 
 amount of its passenger traffic and foreign trade, apart from 
 the steam-boats. In all other respects it is supplied chiefly 
 from Bristol. Its export trade of jjrovisions to England, 
 however, is enormous, as the following table perhaps will 
 best show : — 
 
 H H 
 
466 
 
 WATERFORD ; ITS NEGLECTED 
 
 EXPORTS OF PROVISIONS FROM WATERFORD, FOR THE YEAR 
 ENDING JULY 31, 1845. 
 
 Live pigs exported 
 Pigs manufac- } 
 tured intobacon 5 
 Pigs ditto into ) 
 barrel pork . . ) 
 
 82,021 
 
 248,807 
 
 2,695 
 
 
 333,523 
 
 Butter 
 
 Lard 
 
 Cwt. 
 131,805 
 .30.072 
 
 
 
 161,877 
 
 Wheat 
 
 Oats 
 
 124,179 
 207,147 
 
 7,986 
 693,800 
 
 4,418 
 
 Barley 
 
 Flour 
 
 Oatmeal 
 
 Cwts. 
 Average 2 cwt. each . . 164,042 
 S 497, 613flitches, 721b. 
 I each ' 319,894 
 
 Average 2 cwt. each . . 5,390 
 
 Pigs. 
 
 489,326 
 
 Barrels 2^ cwt. each . 
 Barrels 14 stone each 
 Barrels 16 stone each 
 cw< 
 cwt. 
 
 .t.l 
 .t. j 
 
 311,197 
 
 362,507 
 
 15,974 
 
 698,218 
 
 Tons. Cwt. 
 
 24,466 6 
 
 8,093 17 
 
 15,559 17 
 
 18,125 7 
 
 798 14 
 
 34,910 18 
 
 101,954 19 
 
 The people, however, though they neglect the finest posi- 
 tion that ever town possessed, by no means neglect the very 
 profitable trade of politics. A large majority of the inhabi- 
 tants are Roman Catholics and Repealers, who, for want of 
 a party to fight with, have begun to fight among themselves. 
 The wealthy and respectable among them wish for Repeal, 
 because they have an idea that it will benefit the country ; 
 these form one party, are for the most part estimable citi- 
 zens, and by no means disloyal ; the other party are the 
 out-and-out democrats, who not having themselves a " rap" 
 to lose, are very anxious to have a rap at everbody who has. 
 
 " The whole coast from East to West is rich in mineral 
 treasure," says Mr. Barron, auctioneer, of Waterford, before 
 the Land Commissioners. This mineral treasure has been 
 in part worked at the Knockmahan copper-mines, which 
 are about twelve miles from Waterford. These mines have 
 proved very profitable to the speculators, and emjiloy a great 
 number of people, whose condition tliereby has been raised 
 from one of starvation to one of comfort. At Portlaw, also, 
 
ADVANTAGES AND CAPABILITIES. 467 
 
 near Waterford, an extensive cotton manufactory has been 
 established by a firm of enterprising members of the Society 
 of Friends, named Malcomson, which gives employment to 
 about 2000 persons, and has created a town, and a market 
 for produce for the neighbouring farmers. The same gen- 
 tlemen have established a ship-building yard and patent 
 slip, at Waterford, and also an iron-foundry, successfully. 
 It may be taken as an indisputable fact that wherever 
 enterprise and industry, coupled with prudence, have been 
 embarked in any undertaking whatever in Ireland, it has of 
 necessity succeeded, for there are no competitors. 
 
 With regard to the state of agriculture in the neighbour- 
 hood, though better than in the west, it is still most indif- 
 ferent. Generally speaking, nothing is done for the tenants ; 
 they have no security of their farms, and they will not 
 improve even when they have the means. This arises from 
 two causes — a suspicious want of confidence in their land- 
 lords, and the most complete ignorance of the science of 
 farming. If with good faith and kind treatment they were 
 taught and encouraged, they are naturally grateful, and in 
 time would be led into a better way. It is hard, however, 
 to teach anything to matured ignorance, and many landlords 
 give up the attempt, and many never make the trial. Sir 
 H. W. Barron, in his evidence before the Land Commission 
 here, says, — " They are alarmed at the great expenditure 
 incurred by landed proprietors, who improve," and they very 
 slowly follow instruction. Instead of investing their money 
 in the land to be returned fourfold, they " stick it in the 
 thatch" (Evidence of Rev. T. Flynn). They are afraid to 
 let their landlords know they have money ; and from penu- 
 rious living, and getting their money together by hard 
 saving, they constantly make what is here termed " a poor 
 mouth," without occasion, and impose upon those to whom 
 they owe money. 
 
 " The destructive system of agriculture," says Mr. Piers 
 
 H H 2 
 
468 •WATERFORD ; ITS NEGLECTED 
 
 Q. Barron, before the Land Commissioners (Part III. 
 p. 449),— 
 
 " Is owing in a great measure to the uncertain mode of tenure, to gross 
 ignorance on the part of the farmer, his unwillingness to lay out any 
 capital he may have amassed, in manuring or fertilizing the soil (which I 
 attribute to the fact that the Irish farmer never makes money ; he does 
 not know how, but he scrapes it together by his beggarly mode of living, 
 and hence it is death to him to part with a penny), and the absence of all 
 encouragement to improvement on the part of the landlord." 
 
 The appearance of the majority of the cottages of the 
 tenant-farmers is generally so wretched, they are so devoid 
 of comforts inside, and they live so miserably, that those 
 who never examined below the surface would imagine them 
 all to be in abject poverty. Many of them are so ; but there 
 are very many who are not, and who choose to live in this 
 manner, because they have no other desire. Many of them, 
 apparently half-starving farmers, will give their daughters 
 portions of lOOZ. At the Savings-bank in Cork there were, 
 up to the 20th of this month, 12,356 depositors, depositing 
 the enormous sum of 42 1,676/., or an average of 34/. for each 
 depositor. I am assured by Mr. Craig, the able manager 
 of that bank, that about one-third of these depositors are 
 farmers, that they are the heaviest depositors, and that they 
 have latterly been very much increasing in their deposits. 
 Taking this gentleman's rough estimate to be correct, and I 
 have no reason whatever to doubt its accuracy, this would 
 give nearly 200,000/. deposited by the small farmers twenty 
 miles around Cork — an enormous sum ; and yet their land 
 is not one quarter tilled for want of judicious outlay in drain- 
 ing and subsoiling. The Mallow Savings-bank has 3,000/. 
 lodged in it, one-fourth of which, I am informed by the 
 manager, is lodged by farmers. Being a small bank, how- 
 ever, they are slow to lodge money in it, being suspicious of 
 having it known that they have money. This strongly- 
 marked trait of their character is often laughably exhibited. 
 
ADVANTAGES AND CAPABILITIES. 469 
 
 The cliief clerk of the Cork Savings-bank told me that he 
 has been often called out into the vestibule of the bank by 
 farmers, who come stealthily alone, and, like Moses among 
 the Egyptians, " look this way and that way, and seeing 
 that no one observes" them, whisper in his ear, lest the 
 clerks should hear it, the important secret " Sir, I wish to 
 deposit 10/." I have not been able to get the return from 
 the Waterford Savings-bank. 
 
 Of the state of agriculture itself Mr. Barron, in his evi- 
 dence, says {ibid. p. 446), — 
 
 " The farmers of this county know no more of a proper rotation of 
 crops than they do about the rotation of the planetary system. Lime 
 and sea-manures are those principally in use, and they are often abused 
 from ignorance of their properties. . . . The farms are in tillage 
 principally, and of a system the most admirably calculated to reduce the 
 land to the very maximum of sterility — a constant succession of Avhite 
 crops ; first Avheat where the soil Avill give it, and then a crop or two of 
 oats, then a sprinkling of dirty hay-seed, and then the land let out to 
 rest itself in a sort of pasture that Pharaoh's lean kine would starve upon. 
 They know no more about artificial grasses than they do about roast 
 beef and plum-pudding. Nothing is fed in the houses in this county 
 except the people and the pigs, and, unfortunately, their bill of fare is 
 the same — the very worst description of the lumper potato, because this 
 description is the most prolific." 
 
 Further on he says, — 
 
 " It is my opinion this county would support /Jt;e times i(s present po- 
 pulation were an improved system of agriculture introduced." 
 
 Speaking of the labourer in this county, he says, — 
 
 " He is the most barbarously treated creature on the face of God's earth." 
 
 Further on he says, — 
 
 " The unfortunate Irish labourer lives like the savage, save that he 
 boils the roots which he digs out of the earth. What cares he for edu- 
 cating his children? What can he know of the blessings of education? 
 Tou may build a national school at his door, but the instant the child is 
 able to crawl, the father needs his help ; and when he should be at school 
 he is in all likelihood pilfering a bundle of firewood from some neigh- 
 bours ditch or "rentleiuan's demesne. I have lived amongst them, and 
 
470 WATERFORD ; ITS NEGLECTED 
 
 seen what I describe. The people must be fed before they attend to edu- 
 cational pursuits." 
 
 This testimony, whicli I only quote, instead of describing 
 it as I have seen it, in order that the candid gentlemen I 
 have to deal w^ith here may not have another topic of abuse 
 and contradiction, leads me, in conclusion, to inquire, is 
 there no available remedy by which these poor and much- 
 to-be-pitied people can be raised from so degraded and 
 dreadful a condition ? 
 
 Major Beamish, of Cork, one of the proprietors of the 
 Irish Waste Land Improvement Society, has published a 
 description of his visit to the Gleneask estate, in Galway, 
 and also an account of the other estates belonging to that 
 society, from vrhich it appears that, " by an expenditure of 
 25,000Z., 16,000 English statute acres of reclaimable land 
 have become the property of the society, and been placed in 
 a condition of productive culture." Supposing this vast 
 tract divided into twenty acre farms, on which a tenant 
 could comfortably live, you have here 800 farms, each sup- 
 porting a family, or at the average of six a family, giving 
 comfortable subsistence to nearly 5000 people, and the out- 
 lay yields a return of seven per cent, to the society. Now, 
 in this very county there are 50,000 acres of unimproved 
 land which may be advantageously reclaimed for cultivation 
 and drained for pasture ; and in the province of Munster 
 there are 390,000 acres of unimproved land which may be 
 advantageously reclaimed for cultivation, and 630,000 acres 
 drained for pasture (Griffiths's Report). The Government, 
 or, technically speaking, the Woods and Forests, draws a 
 large rental from Ireland in head rents and quit rents. I 
 have not the returns, but I am informed it is about 75,000Z. 
 a year, of whicli sum, it is said, only 9,000Z. a year is ex- 
 pended in Ireland. The Government, then, is an Irish land- 
 lord, and an Irish absentee landlord, draining Ireland of 
 money in this respect, and spending it elsewhere. It is 
 
ADVANTAGES AND CAPABILITIES. 471 
 
 shown by the reports of the Irish Waste Land Society that 
 their outlay of money in cultivating waste lands returns 
 them 7 per cent. Now, whatever other encumbered and 
 poor or apathetic Irish landed proprietors may do, let the 
 Government follow this example — take measures to obtain 
 waste lands and to bring them under cultivation. 50,000/. 
 a year of their income from lands in Ireland thus spent 
 would comfortably provide for 10,000 persons every year. 
 Agricultural schools, and superintendence to teach the 
 peasantry how to cultivate the land properly, would insure 
 them a continuance of plenty. There would be an outlet 
 for industry, less competition for land, improvement dif- 
 fused, production increased, discontent allayed, and the well 
 employed and contented Irish peasant would treat with con- 
 tempt the sordid miscreants who now lead him to his ruin. 
 This, in reality, would cost less then paying 20,000 soldiers to 
 keep in check a discontented peasantry, supposing it sunk 
 and lost. But it would be capital well invested, for it would 
 return 7 per cent., and create estates out of worthless bogs. 
 Let the Government do this — do that, in fact, which is sen- 
 sible and just, and act fearless of party. Party, let them be 
 assured, they can never please. Everything in Ireland is 
 made a party matter. In Cork, a thief could not steal a 
 silver fork but it was made a party matter, and the thief 
 was, in consequence, acquitted. Even the potato pestilence 
 is converted into a party matter. Cast off party then, act 
 fearlessly and with straightforward honesty of j^urpose. Do 
 that which is right, and never mind trimming to conciliate 
 anybody. Put down crime, arrest agitation ; be assured the 
 bully is a coAvard, and will quail before you; and though the 
 press may frantically shriek at you, it is in reality little 
 regarded because of the violence of its party antipathies. 
 You will rise in the estimation of the good men of every 
 party, and will be what every Government ought to be — a 
 father to the country. 
 
472 THE APPEARANCE AND 
 
 LETTER XXXII. 
 
 WEXFORD ; ITS APPEARANCE AND ITS PEOPLE. 
 
 Comparison between Wexford and its people and the West of Ireland — Appearance 
 of the county — Cromwell and the three hundred Virgins — The Baronies of 
 Forth and Bargy, and the race which inhabits them — Condition of the People — 
 Irish Patriots — Paying Tenants for Improvements — Embarrassment of Estates 
 — Remedy suggested. 
 
 Wexford, December 4. 
 
 I HAVE already pointed out to you the great improvement 
 which is perceptible in the country, in the state of cultivation, 
 in the houses of the peasantry, and in the peojilc, in travelling 
 from the west into Waterford. As you travel further east- 
 ward to Wexford the change becomes more and more striking. 
 In the west I never saw a woman below the rank of a lady, 
 or in towns below that of a shopkeeper's wife, who wore 
 stockings and shoes. The poor creatures are seen, with 
 baskets or "creels" of jootatoes or turf on their backs, carrying 
 loads like beasts of burden, without stockings or shoes, their 
 legs red from exposure to the cold, and paddling barefoot 
 through the mud and wet. In the county of Wexford I 
 have not seen any woman not decently clad with stockings 
 and shoes. In the west I never saw a cottage without a pig 
 walking in and out as it pleased, that had a clean floor, or 
 any kind of decent furniture in it, or a good thatch, or 
 without a dungheap or cesspool close to the door. In the 
 
PEOPLE OF WEXFORD. 473 
 
 county of Wexford I have never seen a cottage without a 
 pigsty outside it, that was not well built, whitewashed inside, 
 and often also on the outside, that had not a thick comfortably 
 thatched roof, the dungheap out of sight, and which inside 
 was not clean and orderly, with plenty of plates ranged in a 
 delf-rack against the wall, and other evidences of comfort. 
 In Wexford the peasant's wife has pots, and pans, and grid- 
 irons for every cooking and household purpose. In the west 
 an iron pot on three legs, or " the biler," as they call it, is 
 positively the only utensil of any kind in the houses of the 
 peasants ; and on a Sunday morning — ^ their only washing day 
 in the week, when the good looks of some of them are made 
 visible from under the week's coating of peat smoke and dust 
 and dirt, you may see the women at the cottage-doors washing 
 their faces in " the biler" which cooks their potatoes and 
 dinners. Filled with brown bog- water, and placed outside 
 the door for light, " the biler" serves Biddy for a looking- 
 glass. It is the pig's porringer, into which the pig thrusts 
 his nose and feeds himself on the waste potatoes allotted to 
 him, for want of any other feeding tub ; it is in fact, the 
 multum in pai-vo of the poor peasant, and in Kerry — that land 
 of goodnatured, shrewd, but neglected and poverty stricken 
 men — his " biler" is the only article of furniture he possesses. 
 The tOAvn of Wexford is an old-fashioned built town, with 
 narrow crooked streets. There is, however, about almost 
 every house an air of comfort and respectability. You have 
 too in Wexford an excellent hotel — one of the few in Ireland 
 in which the luxury of cleanliness can be enjoyed. In other 
 respects Wexford is a thriving town, and the people are active 
 and bustling. There is a fine sea view, but a shifting bar across 
 the mouth of its river is a great " bar" to the increase of its 
 commercial prosperity. The most boasted portions of the 
 county are the baronies of Forth and Bargy. You see in 
 those districts an extremely industrious, well-clad, cleanly, 
 and thriving people. They are quiet and orderly, and out- 
 
474 THE APPEARANCE AND 
 
 rage is unknown amongst them. The land is well manured 
 for every crop, and cultivation has advanced far beyond any- 
 thing that I have seen in the south or west of Ireland. You 
 see comfortable farmhouses, well-thatched and whitewashed, 
 withgood farm-yards behind them, squared fields, hedge-rows, 
 and sufficient wood to be ornamental. The rents are high — 
 higher than in any other part of the south of Ireland, yet 
 they are well paid ; the soil is generally a poor thin soil — 
 a kind of sandy loam. To what can this great difference in 
 the appearance of the country, in the state of cultivation, in 
 the progress of civilization, in comfort, in cleanliness, in order, 
 and good conduct be owing, for this county is in Ireland, and 
 subject to the same laws as every other part of Ireland ? It 
 is not fifty miles from Tipperary, with its fine land and low 
 rents, where dirt, and disorder, and bad cultivation, and 
 savage brutality reign triumphant. It is worth inquiry, and 
 I think the inquiry will show the Wexford men that they 
 have good reason to be proud, as indeed they are, of their 
 descent from the " British barbarians" and" Saxon savages," 
 whom it is the fashion of those in Ireland who have not their 
 good qualities to traduce, and to whom they owe all that 
 distinguishes them in civilization, in cleanliness, in comfort, 
 and in good citizenship.* 
 
 * The town of Wexford has of late been made a prominent topic of discussion, 
 from the fact, that the Fabricator has taken it into his head to fabricate a story 
 respecting it calculated to arouse the passions and dormant antipathies of the mass 
 of the people who dwell in it, if antipathy there can be in a kindred race. The 
 Irish papers have been full of late of stories about " English monsters stabbing 
 three hundred helpless unoffending virgins, one by one, at Wexford. When, 
 however, I name Mr. Daniel O'Connell as the authority for this statement, there 
 is an end of all belief of it. I took some trouble to ascertain if this story had the 
 slightest foundation. I obtained introductions to some very old people in this 
 town, who remembered quite well many conversations with old people when they 
 were children, about the circumstances of Cromwell's entry into Wexford, and 
 who related to me several anecdotes that they had heard, but none of them ever 
 before heard anything about the massacre of three hundred women in the town by 
 Cromwell's soldiers — a circumstance wliich, had it taken jjlace, would hardly have 
 been forgotten, as almost every family must have had some relative thus massacred. 
 
PEOPLE OF WEXFORD. 475 
 
 This, however, is a position first to be proved ; I want 
 nothing that I write to be taken for granted ; for the thousand 
 flat contradictions on oath, of statements made on oath, in 
 Lord Devon's book of evidence, have shown to me the 
 necessity of being prepared with proof, even of such an 
 
 As one old inhabitant told me, " the story had taken them all quite by surprise, 
 and nobody believed it." It is impossible that the memory of such an occur- 
 rence, had it taken place, should not have been handed down by tradition from a 
 period not very remote, for the immediate ancestors of some of my informants — 
 their fathers and grandfathers — carry back tradition to within about fifty years of 
 the occurrence. Wlien we hear stories in Ireland gravely told of Milesian descent 
 some fifteen hundred to two thousand years ago, — for they are not particular to 
 five hundred years, — is it possible to conceive that an event which, had it occurred, 
 must have deprived almost every family in the town of some relative, under 
 circumstances of great atrocity, and which took place in the lifetime of the great- 
 grandfathers of many of the existing generation, should have been forgotten ? 
 An old " Life of Oliver Cromwell" which I have before me, enters into minute 
 particulars of his attack and entry into Wexford, and tells of the streets being 
 " cabled across." It says that all who fought and had arms in their hands were 
 slain, but it says nothing whatever about the " three hundred virgins." Amongst 
 many anecdotes still remembered by old people (though the " three hundred 
 virgins" are forgotten), I heard the following : — " That when the town capitu- 
 lated, Cromwell rode sword in hand into it at the head of his dragoons. The 
 fierce manner of armed men thus riding into a hostile town, so frightened a poor 
 old woman of the barony of Forth, that she rushed into the street, and in a frenzied 
 manner spread her cloak before Cromwell's horse, and cast herself on her knees 
 before him, screaming, with her clasped hands raised to him, — ' Oh, Cromwell, 
 jewel, spill no more blood ! ' Cromwell reined in his horse, ordered his men to 
 sheath their swords, and they rode quietly into the town to the quarters provided 
 for them." Whilst there, I also obtained a copy of an original letter, written by 
 Cromwell to the commander of the garrison, and now in the possession of an old 
 inhabitant, which plainly shows that the temper and disposition of CromweU, 
 however fierce and unscrupulous when opposed, was to fight with armed and 
 fighting men, and not even against capitulating and vanquished men, far less 
 against women. The following is the letter : — 
 
 " Sir, — I have had the patience to peruse yor propositions, to which I might 
 have returned an answeare with some disdaine. But (to be short) I shall give the 
 soulders and non-commissioned officers quarter for life, and leave to goe to 
 theire severall habitasons, with theire wearing cloaths ; they engaginge themselves 
 to Uve quietly there, and toe take upp arms noe more against the Parliament of 
 England. And the commissioned officers quarters for theire lives, but to render 
 themselves prisoners. And as for the inhabitants, I shall ingage myselfe that no 
 violence shall be offred to theire goods, and that I shall protect the towne from 
 plunder. I expect yor positive answeare instantly ; and if you will, upon these 
 
476 THE APPEARANCE AND 
 
 important fact as that the windows of Cahirciveen are mended 
 with old hats, — of which more hereafter. 
 
 The barony of Forth was peopled by the soldiers of Strong- 
 
 tearmes, surrendr and quite in one houre, send forth to me fFoure officers of the 
 qualitie of field-officers, and two aldermen, for the performanse thereof, I shall 
 theareupon forbeare all acts of hostilitie. 
 
 " Yor Servant, 
 
 " O. Cromwell. 
 " October 11, 1649. 
 
 " For ye Commandr in Chief e in ye toivne of JVeaford." 
 
 (Copied from the original verbatim et literatim, 5th May 1830.) 
 
 Beaumont, an intelligent French author, in his recent book on " Ireland, 
 Social, Political, and Religious," says, regarding Cromwell's conduct in Ireland, 
 (p. 78), — " I could refute several other prejudices existing against Cromwell; 
 and if this were the proper place, I could show that his was the first English 
 army in Ireland that ever observed strict discipline, respected the inoffensive 
 inhabitants, scrupulously paid for every article supplied on its march, and showed 
 itself an instrument of order as well as of terror. The very same man who had so 
 coolly commanded the massacres of Wexford and Drogheda, hanged two of his 
 own soldiers for having stolen a couple of chickens from an Irish cabin. I might 
 say, if I had leisure, that Cromwell was the first man before our time who had 
 appreciated the future destiny of Ireland — its union with England. He realised 
 not only the political but the Parliamentary union ; for in his time Ireland sent 
 thirty members to the English Parliament. Finally, I might add, that his son, 
 Henry Cromwell, was the most honest Governor that Ireland had hitherto pos- 
 sessed. So disinterested was his administration, that, at its close, he had not 
 money to defray the expenses of his passage to England." — Ireland, Social, 
 Political, and Religious, by Gustave de Beaumont, p. 78. 
 
 Whilst in Wexford, I heard of some atrocious cruelties practised by the rebels, 
 and many a horrid account of the piking, in cold blood, of seventj'-four of the 
 citizens on the bridge of Wexford during the last rebellion. Such horrors are, 
 however, best buried in obUvion. The Wexford people themselves disown all 
 participation in that atrocity which, they say, was committed by Connaught men. 
 Be this as it may, these are but the natural results of disunion, rebellion, and 
 civil war — curses which many of the so called " Patriots" of Ireland strive night 
 and day to bring upon their country. Every argument, every artifice, every 
 dress which the English language aflbrds, has been resorted to, to influence the 
 people of Ireland against this country. Whilst in Wexford, I saw, in one of the 
 local newspapers, the following rubbishly attempt at alliteration, running up and 
 down the alphabet as an artifice of excitement : — " No, Irishmen ! — the women 
 of Wexford nevkr shall sink before the swords of British barbarians and Saxon 
 savages again ! " Stuff! Yet thus are the poor Irish peasants deceived, inflamed, 
 and led on into acts of folly and violence. They speak of " English Irate." If 
 such a feeling anywhere exists, did " English hate" of the present day ever pen 
 against Ireland so atrocious a paragraph as tliis .' 
 
PEOPLE OF WEXFORD. 477 
 
 bow on the first invasion of Ireland. History says that 
 Strongbow raised his handful of men (about 900 for the 
 conquest of all Ireland !) in the county of Pembroke, in 
 
 In the same newspaper, and apparently by the same pen — for abuse is the one 
 idea, alliteration the one dress — I saw the following paragrajjh about myself. It 
 gave me some amusement, as I dare say it will to the reader. I copy it as an 
 average sample of the style in which I saw myself spoken of by every Repeal 
 newspaper I happened to see ; and because it may show to the reader some of the 
 annoyances and difficulties with which I had to contend. The Tory press 
 generally remained silent, or chuckled at the abuse the Repeal press heaped upon 
 me, and sometimes joined in the same strain. If the reader asks why I was so 
 spoken of by the press of Ireland — for in the pages which he may have read I do 
 not think he will find much to deserve such a comment — my answer is — my fault 
 with the Irish press was in being an Englishman, unswayed by their paltry 
 jealousies and party views, and because I exposed the truth, no matter which 
 party it might serve or damage. It was a part of that exposure regarding the 
 tenantry of Mr. O'Connell, and their wretched and disgracefully neglected con- 
 dition, which no newspaper in Ireland dared to originate, which insured me the 
 abuse of the Repeal press, a sample of which I now quote in the following para- 
 graph :— 
 
 " The Gutter Commissioner ix Wexford. 
 
 " The above libeller of O'Connell has had the audacity to set his contaminated 
 foot within the precincts of our peaceable county, for the jmrpose, I presume, of 
 sending forth to the world, through the columns of the infamous newspaper which 
 he represents, a' libel on the character of the people of this famed county. He 
 left this morning (Friday) for Ross, after having, the previous evening, taken a 
 monstrous feed at John's Town Castle, the seat of Grogan Morgan, Esq. You 
 see that the libelUng O'Connell is a passport for him to every anti-Irishman's 
 table ! He ought to be lashed out of Ireland before his breakfast some fine 
 morning." 
 
 The gentleman thus spoken of as an anti-Irishman is a resident landlord of 
 great wealth, and that wealth is spent in employing the poor, — and this is his 
 reward ! 
 
 At Kilkenny, a newspaper of kindred spirit there, set a feUow to watch me, and 
 boasted that it had taken measures to ascertain every movement I made ! 
 
 Let me not, however, be misapprehended. There are dirty dogs in every 
 profession. It is unfair and imjust to judge of any profession from its worst 
 samples — from those amongst its members whom its members despise. I have 
 every reason to be gratified with the manner in which I have been spoken of by 
 the respectable and able portion of the press of Ireland. 
 
 From the people of Ireland, as distinguished from the press, I received from aU 
 ranks the most gratifying courtesy and hospitaUty. It was indeed their sounder 
 and more honest appreciation of the arduous task I had to fulfil that encouraged 
 me to persevere. 
 
478 THE APPEARANCE AND 
 
 Wales. The Pembroke people to this day style their county 
 "Little England beyond Wales." I have heard "the 
 Women of Little England beyond Wales" drunk as a toast 
 in Pembrokeshire. Pembrokeshire has, in fact, now a Saxon 
 population, and there, as everywhere else where they are, 
 they are a bold fine people, and live well and comfortably. 
 In the adjoining county of Carmarthen they are pure Welsh, 
 and live as miserably as the poor Irish, and it is a fact that 
 in the union workhouse at Narbeth, which is a town on the 
 borders of the two counties and receives paupers from each, 
 the diet found sufficient for the poor Welsh of Carmarthen, 
 who always live on poor diet, starves the men of Pembroke- 
 shire, who are accustomed to live better and are bigger men ; 
 and the dietary in that workhouse has in consequence been 
 compelled to be raised to the English standard. Well, it 
 was by this snug little army, that would stand in a ball-room, 
 raised in this county of Pembroke, many of the men no 
 doubt Welsh, that Ireland was invaded ; and by taking 
 advantage of that " profound barbarism and ignorance " 
 in which Hume says " the Irieh from the beginning 
 of time had been buried," and of those divisions among 
 them which led them, according to the same authority, to 
 " exercise perpetual rapine and violence against each other," 
 this little band mastered the country. Many of them settled 
 in the county of Wexford, in the barony of Forth, and their 
 friends joined them from Pembroke. In this barony till 
 recently a mixed old Saxon and Welsh language was spoken. 
 When Cromwell came over here a large number of his 
 soldiers peopled the barony of Bargy, and spread generally 
 through the county. In the baronies of Forth and Bargy at 
 this day it is difficult to see any marked difference between 
 the appearance of the country or the people, and England, or 
 its population. There are tlie same cleanliness, and order, 
 and neatness. Great industry exists amongst a peaceable and 
 well-disposed people. The stacks in their stackyards are 
 
PEOPLE OF WEXFORD. 479 
 
 trim and neat, and not as though tumbled there by a whirl- 
 wind, as you see them in the west. The houses are clean 
 swept and whitewashed ; the pig is where it ought to be, in 
 its sty in the yard ; and comfort and contentment, the rewards 
 of industry, are everywhere seen. I purpose, however, giving 
 you some evidence of this. 
 
 Mr. C. A. Walker, a magistrate of Belmount, near Wex- 
 ford, after describing the state of agriculture in the inland 
 parts of Wexford to be both backward and slovenly, goes on 
 to speak of the " parish of Carey, which is a sea-coast parish." 
 (Appendix, Part III. p. 475.) 
 
 " It is," he says, " a small one, and since the first English settlement 
 under Strongbow, it has never been known except in a constant course of 
 rotation and production, and it is still as good as the first day." 
 
 Mr. John Nunn, landed proprietor of Silver Spring, in the 
 barony of Forth, says {ibid. p. 480), — 
 
 " That district is peculiarly circumstanced ; they have been always a 
 very industrious class of persons, managing their own bits of land well. 
 
 " Should you say the tenants on five and ten acres were thriving ? — 
 Yes, they are generally ; they are generally a very industrious class of 
 men." 
 
 Further on he says, — 
 
 " The middleman is a class almost unlcnown in the district I speak of.'' 
 " There are no properties under the courts," and " the tenants hold ge- 
 nerally by lease." 
 
 That is, there is industry among the tenants, there is not 
 grasping greediness and laziness and extravagance in the 
 class above them and in their landlords, and the tenants are 
 fairly dealt with. Hence there exist prosperity and comfort. 
 For instance, Mr. Morgan, who is the largest landed pro- 
 prietor in the county, is resident (as are most of the propri- 
 etors), and employs regularly about 400 men in building and 
 beautifying and improving his castle and domain. Some of 
 these men, natives of Wexford, have executed very beautiful 
 carving: work. 
 
480 THE APPEARANCE AND 
 
 Again this witness is asked {ihid. p. 482), — 
 
 " Does the con-acre system prevail much throughout the district ? — Not 
 much ; the farmer is too fond of holding it himself, and having the crop 
 himself. 
 
 " At what rate of wages can employment be obtained ? — The general 
 rate of wages is \0d. a day. 
 
 " Have there been in the district any agrarian outrages ? — ISTo, indeed, 
 not for years. In the barony of Forth it is a thing unknown, and I may 
 say unknown in the barony of Bantry." 
 
 Again, we have the farmer minding his husiness, and 
 giving fair wages to his labourers. We do not see him here 
 living out of con-acre rents, idling at fairs and wakes, and 
 starving his wretched labourer on wages at 6d. a day, and 
 consequently there are " no outrages." 
 
 Mr. Pierce Ryan, farmer, of Davidstown, in the barony of 
 Bantry, is asked {ihid. p. 487), — 
 
 *' Have there been any agrarian outrages in your district ?— No, indeed 
 they are hardly heard talk of." 
 
 Mr. William Warrener, farmer of Fannystown, in the 
 barony of Bargy {ihid. p. 488), is asked, — 
 
 " Have there been any agrarian outrages in the district ?— Not any. I 
 do not know of any instance of it. The people in our district are very 
 quiet." 
 
 It may be set down as a fact which cannot be controverted 
 that wherever there is enterprise, backed by intelligence and 
 capital, success rewards the effort in Ireland; wherever there 
 is ordinary industry and economy among the people, backed 
 by a knowledge of the occupation they are engaged in, 
 whether it be farming, or fishing, or trading, and they are at 
 all dealt fairly by, there are prosperity and comfort, and 
 capital is created. You see this at Wexford in the east, you 
 see it at Londonderry and at Belfast in the north. I gave 
 you instances of it at Sligo and Galway in the west, and I 
 have seen numerous instances of this in the south and 
 generally over Ireland. The outcry about " want of capital" 
 
PEOPLE OF WEXFORD. 481 
 
 is nonsense ; there is capital enougii in the country, if put to 
 use ; the wants are, want of enterprise and wajit of industry. 
 Where you see these qualities common, there yoif invariably 
 find prosperity. But the outcry about "justice to Ireland" 
 is worse than nonsense — it is unmeaning, senseless — nay, it 
 is wicked ; for if it has any meaning, it means " anarchy for 
 Ireland," " plunder for patriots" The late Sir Francis 
 Burdett, in one of his speeches in the House of Commons, 
 alluding to " Irish patriots," said, " They were unlike any 
 other patriots in the world ; for the patriotism of men in other 
 countries generally led to their poverty, but Irish patriots 
 always ' feathered their nests.' " This is true to the letter. 
 In the bosoms of your professing patriots in Ireland — I speak 
 not of the true-hearted lovers of their country, who despise 
 these professions, as much as they do the professors who 
 make them — patriotism and pay are synonymous terms. 
 Look at the examples, from " the Fabricator" downwards, if 
 this is not true. In almost every town in Ireland you see 
 some raggamuffin paid lecturer of sedition, who of course is 
 a flaming patriot, like the "bone and sinew" man of Sligo, 
 living by exciting the poor country people into political 
 discontent, and by teaching them to disregard their true 
 interests— patient industry and minding their business. 
 
 The people, however, as an ingredient requisite to their 
 prosperity, must be dealt fairly by. It is incumbent upon 
 the owners of landed property that as a duty they should look 
 after their j)roperty. " The general complaint with the 
 people," — says Mr. Michael Fui'long, farmer, of Raheen, near 
 Old Ross {ibid. 465),— 
 
 " Is, that they have no one to lay their hardships before. If they apply 
 to the agent he will tell them he has nothing in the world to do with such 
 questions — that he has nothing to do but to receive the rent, that is his em- 
 ployment ; and, as the landlord is an absentee, he is not at home to refer to." 
 
 Mr. Brehon, magistrate, of Newtown, says {ibid. p. 470), — 
 " When the proprietor will take the trouble to receive his own rents 
 
 I I 
 
482 THE APPEARANCE AND 
 
 it affords more general satisfaction than any other course, and, in my 
 opinion, tends more to promote his own interest." 
 
 An efficient agent, who looks after tlie tenants and attends 
 to their wants and encourages them, and whose object is not 
 merely "5 per cent, on the rents twice a year," would, how- 
 ever, be of almost equal benefit. By appointing such men 
 and paying the people for the improvements they effected on 
 the land, in draining and building, either by a lease sufficiently 
 long to insure repayment to the tenant for his outlay, or, if 
 he is a tenant-at-will, by giving him the value of his improve- 
 ments if ejected (which is only honest, and nothing more), 
 the people would be encouraged to labour. 
 
 " The people would labour twice as hard," says Mr. Pierce Ryan, 
 farmer of Davidstown, in the barony of Bantry {ibid. 487), " and be 
 twice as industrious, if they were paid for their improvements." 
 
 " The payment for improvements as regards the tenants 
 would be very important," says Mr. Nunn, landed proprie- 
 tor, of Silver Spring {ibid. p. 484), — 
 
 " That would go a long way to meet those unfortunate agrarian dis- 
 turbances that occur, not happily in our county, but in other parts of 
 Ireland ; because, if a tenant goes in possessed of some capital, but from 
 some unfortunate circumstances he loses it and offends his landlord, all 
 that the landlord requires is that he should have a year's rent, and if he 
 is not able to pay that he turns him out. If a tenant could bring in a 
 till for permanent improvements, and say to his landlord, ' If I go out, 
 you must pay me that,' I think it would be the means of making the land- 
 lord and tenant come to terms, without depriving the unfortunate farmer 
 of his means of subsistence. Besides that, if the tenant were to go out, 
 lie would not go out a reckless member of society, as some of them do, 
 ready to knock any man's brains out." 
 
 This would, too, gradually lead to the English system of 
 the landlord effecting all permanent improvements ; for, if 
 he were compelled to pay his tenants for their improvements 
 he would begin, in preference, to make the improvements 
 himself. Now this equitable arrangement, which is by 
 some called " tenant-riglit," is perfectly fair and just; it 
 
PEOPLE OF WEXFORD. 483 
 
 would not only benefit tlie tenant, but it would vastly 
 increase in value the estate of the landlord. The phrase 
 " tenant-right," however, I do not like adopting, for I have 
 shown you in a former letter that it is quite indistinct in its 
 application. Payment for improvements which benefit the 
 landlord's estate, and which he ought to make, is one thing, 
 but payment for " good will," " the right of possession," and 
 half a dozen other groundless claims, which go under the 
 name of " tenant-right," is another thing altogether. The 
 one is equitable and fair, the other is a robbery and injurious 
 to everybody. In all cases, however, the landlord ought to 
 pay this, and not the incoming tenant. The incoming tenant 
 has little enough capital without being impoverished by such 
 a purchase. We then come to the real difficulty, — the land- 
 lords are too poor to pay. Generally, their estates are either 
 entailed, and burdened with jointures and settlements, or 
 they are deeply mortgaged. In the first case, — if the owner 
 spends his income in improvements, he benefits his eldest 
 son's estate at the expense of his younger children. But his 
 eldest son is provided for by the estate being entailed on him, 
 whilst his younger children are but poorly provided for. 
 He will not, therefore, take from them to benefit his eldest 
 son. The remedy for this would be to enable the present 
 possessor to charge the estate with two-thirds of the per- 
 manent improvements. It would benefit all parties; for the 
 son who would get the benefit of all the improvements would 
 only have to pay two- thirds of their cost; the present pos- 
 sessor would be benefited to the full extent of the improve- 
 ments, and the tenantry would get employment. In the 
 latter case, where estates are deeply mortgaged, it usually 
 happens that the mortgagee's interest not being paid, he 
 applies to the Court of Chancery for the appointment of a 
 receiver of the rents : and in this very common case the 
 receiver pays the interest of the mortgage debt, and hands 
 over a yearly stipend to the landlord. This stipend is 
 
 II 2 
 
484 THE APPEARANCE AND 
 
 generally so small that the landlord can barely live on it. 
 The management of his estate is taken from him. His farms 
 are let by proposal to the highest bidder ; he can grant no 
 allowance for improvements — he is quite powerless. The 
 whole system is hollow. The nominal owner of a large 
 estate has no control over it, and most inadequate funds to 
 keep up his station. The real owner is the mortgagee — some 
 cheese and bacon factor, perhaps, whose mites have changed 
 into sovereigns in some dark shop in a thoroughfare ; but he 
 is not responsible, for the Court of Chancery manages the 
 estate for him and shields him. So long as he gets his interest 
 he cares not. Would it not be wise to stop this hollow and 
 unreal state of things ? If an application be made to the 
 Court by a mortgagee, because his interest is not paid, would 
 it not be far wiser to compel a sale of the estate, or a portion 
 of it, to pay off the mortgagee, rather than to appoint a 
 receiver of rents ? The balance or portion of the estate left 
 would make the nominal owner a real owner of that portion, 
 release him from his embarrassments, and increase his 
 income, though it lessened the extent of his domains. It 
 would, too, make him the master of his own property. Those 
 who purchased would be men of capital able to buy, and they 
 too would be real, and not nominal owners of their estates. 
 In all these cases there would be the ability to make improve- 
 ments, Avhich every part of Ireland needs.* The improve- 
 ments, if made, would give employment, increase the comforts 
 
 * " But, indeed, most of our gentry are observed to be more fondof making 
 new purchases than of improving tlieir old estates — to double the value by planting 
 and making drains and inclosurcs and hedge-rows, with all the arts of good 
 husbandry, though this last and best sort of purchasing can be accomplished by 
 slow degrees and sniall sums, the expenses of trees and ditches being very trivial, 
 and the work done by low wages to one's own poor cottagers and tenants, to the 
 great advancement of the rent, which often costs but four or five years' j)urchase, 
 and no danger from a bad title." — Reflections and Resolnfionx proper for the 
 Gentlemen of Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, 
 p. 15. 
 
PEOPLE OF WEXFORD. 485 
 
 of the people, and quell disturbance ; they would certainly 
 increase the rents and revenues of the landlords, for the 
 tenants would be well able to pay better rents out of the 
 increased produce, and the increased produce would be wealth 
 and capital added to Ireland and to the United Kingdom, 
 
 These are the practical objects which should engage the 
 attention of Irish " patriots," and which do engage the 
 attention of those who seek the good of Ireland, and there 
 are many such among her sons. But the agitator's object is 
 the reverse of all this : it is to occupy men's minds about 
 foolish theories and impossible objects ; to lead them from 
 industrious pursuits into political discussions, and to swell 
 demonstrations; to excite their discontent at the poverty 
 which the neglect of industry causes ; to rouse their animosity 
 against England by lies ; to drive capital away from Ireland, 
 to create and increase anarchy, and by that anarchy to live. 
 This is the " pay of their patriotism." Irishmen, is not this 
 true? Do you not feel that it is true? What good did you ever 
 get by leaving your farms to talk politics, to meddle with elect- 
 ions and swell demonstrations ? Have not these things ruined 
 many of you ? Have they not made you all poorer ? Are 
 you one jot nearer the accomplishment of your dreams than 
 you ever were ? Is it not a fact that you pay to be deceived ; 
 and are you not deceived ? Try these " patriots ;" cease your 
 fay, and they will soon cease to deceive you. But be wise 
 in time ; be guided by the past. Try industry ; keep your 
 money ; and you will find that one day's industry and 
 minding your business will pay you better than yelling for a 
 month at a demonstration, at the exciting fabrications of 
 " the Fabricator^' 
 
486 THE CAPABILITIES OF KILKENNY, 
 
 LETTER XXXIII. 
 
 KILKENNY AND THE CONDITION OF ITS PEOPLE; ITS 
 MINES AND CAPABILITIES. 
 
 The Huntsmen of Kilkenny — Description of the Town of Kilkenny — Its Trade — 
 Its unfinished Canal and Railway — Irish Jobbing — Appearance of the County 
 — Outrages, and consequent stopping of the working of the Slieveardah Coal- 
 mine — The Mines and Marble of Kilkenny — The Irish Press, and Native 
 Hospitality — Classified return of Depositors in the Wexford Savings Bank — 
 Evidence of the state of the County and of the condition of the People — The 
 benefits that flow from encouraging Landlords, and the mischiefs of Agitation. 
 
 KuLKEi^NY, December 8. 
 The town of Kilkenny has been termed the Melton Mow- 
 bray of Ireland. It is the metropolis of a great hunting 
 county. The passion of the Irish gentry for fox-hunting is 
 proverbial. It is, however, chiefly exhibited on the eastern 
 part of the island, where every gentleman hunts as a matter 
 of course, and very often — almost as a matter of course — 
 keeps a small j)ack of his own. At Kilkenny, however, 
 hunting is a business, prosecuted with the greatest ardour ; 
 it is the only thing that holidays don't affect here, for holiday 
 or no holiday the hounds " throw off," though the people 
 are forbidden to labour. To-day happens to be one of those 
 holidays, and the only thing working is the chapel bell next 
 door, Avhich, to the great discomfiture of literary labour, 
 has been incessantly working away since eight o'clock this 
 
AND CONDITION OF ITS PEOPLE. 487 
 
 morning. It certainly impresses those who may have to 
 work more with the head than on the saddle, with the full 
 force of Othello's exclamation — " Silence that dreadful bell 1" 
 However, notwithstanding the holiday, this morning 200 
 scarlet-coats met the hounds near this town. I am informed 
 that from 200 to 500 hunters belonging to strangers are 
 stabled in Kilkenny, their owners regularly turning out in 
 the very best hunting style. A great many of them are 
 extremely fine-looking fellows. The effect of this spirit is 
 to diffuse money among the farmers and in the neighbour- 
 hood ; and by keeping gentlemen in the country, and 
 inducing them to spend their incomes at home, it no doubt 
 does much good. There are, however, mischiefs accom- 
 panying it ; for many of them live " faster" than their 
 pockets can afford : this leads to embarrassments, and 
 disables them from improving their estates ; it also makes 
 some of them needy men, and needy men cannot be liberal 
 landlords. Generally, however, the landlords of Kilkenny 
 are fair landlords, and by no means, as a body, deserve 
 to be blamed for the faults of a few of their number. 
 This will be apparent from the evidence which I shall lay 
 before you. 
 
 The town of Kilkenny itself is a very ancient town 
 picturesquely situated on the banks of a fine river — the 
 Nore. Formerly an Irish Parliament sat in the town, and 
 the statutes of Kilkenny are very celebrated. A consider- 
 able English population settled here, and the town was 
 formerly divided into two, called " the Irish" and " the 
 English" towns, the latter of which still retains its name. 
 Like most old towns it is irregularly built, and many of the 
 streets, which are of considerable extent, are narrow and 
 crooked. The population is about 24,000. There are the 
 usual public buildings, and a handsome Roman Catholic 
 cathedral is in process of erection, built of the native black 
 marble, which when unpolished has a beautiful light gray 
 
488 THE CAPABILITIES OF KILKENNY, 
 
 colour. Tlie chief object of remark, however, is the mag- 
 nificent castle of the Marquis of Ormonde, which gives a 
 style and picturesque effect to that part of the town which 
 it adjoins which cannot be surpassed. 
 
 The trade of the town consists in the manufacture of 
 excellent blankets and friezes, and in an immense market 
 for flour and provisions. The number of pigs killed is 
 enormous, and a great quantity of butter is also sold here. 
 But for that unhappy spirit of jobbing and blundering, and 
 neglect, wdiich prevails very generally in Ireland, Kilkenny 
 would probably have been one of the finest inland towns in 
 the countrj^ The river which runs through the town is a 
 tidal river to Innistioge, about twenty English miles below 
 the town, and navigable by vessels of large tonnage from 
 Waterford harbour. The Irish Parliament many years ago 
 determined to join Kilkenny with the tidal part of the river 
 there by means of a canal, and to open the navigation from 
 Waterford harbour to Kilkenny ; and for that object granted 
 100,000/. of the public money, which was estimated to be 
 amply sufficient. Instead of beginning this work from the 
 tidal part of the river upwards, and opening the country as 
 they proceeded, to this water communication, they began at 
 Kilkenny downwards, and of course the canal could be of 
 no use at all until completely finished. The trustees and 
 undertakers completed about eight miles of this canal — that 
 is, nearly half way — when, by the most notorious jobbing 
 and cheating, the 100,000/., whicli was estimated to be 
 sufficient for the whole work, w^as spent ; no more money was 
 forthcoming, the people were unable to complete the work, 
 and from that day to this, this eight miles of canal, on which 
 100,000/, have been sunk and wasted, has not been of the 
 slightest use beyond forming a handsome walk for the 
 citizens along its banks. About eight years ago a railroad 
 bill for making a railroad between Kilkenny and Dublin 
 was passed through Parliament at great expense. The 
 
AND CONDITION OF ITS PEOPLE. 
 
 489 
 
 depositors, of course, suffered ; the solicitors and agents 
 who worked the bill through Parliament got paid, and 
 then — the result may be anticipated — they took no more 
 trouble in the matter, neglected their opportunity, and let 
 the time for making the railway elapse without doing any- 
 thing ; and they are now endeavouring to obtain another 
 Act of Parliament at great expense, authorising the making 
 of a portion of the old line only, as far as Carlow, which 
 they had full authority before to carry through Carlow and 
 on to Dublin. Thus do they manage things here in Ireland. 
 And now they are getting up competing lines of railway 
 where they neglected one before, with the object, of course, 
 like " tlie Kilkenny cats," of eating each other up. Not- 
 withstanding these drawbacks, however, the town is rapidly 
 improving ; and the new corporation, to their credit, have 
 done much to forward that improvement. The people here 
 are an intelligent, mixed, and fine race, and somewhat 
 notorious for practical jokes and ready wit. 
 
 With regard to the general features of the county, though 
 inferior to Wexford in point of cultivation, and in the com- 
 fort of the houses of the peasantry, yet it is vastly superior 
 to the west of Ireland. The peasants' houses are not all 
 whitewashed, and have not thick trim-looking thatches as 
 in Wexford, but they are tolerably clean and comfortable, 
 and you see evidences of comfort inside them. The land of 
 the county generally is drained by three fine rivers, the 
 Nore, the Barrow, and the Suir, which have the effect of 
 draining nearly the whole county ; so that, except in the 
 northernmost extreme of it, a bog is not to be found. The 
 water-power of these rivers turns a great number of flour- 
 mills, and their banks are studded with gentlemen's seats. 
 
 There have been occasional outrages in the county, which 
 appear at seasons to burst out like an epidemic, and then to 
 subside. One of those periodical fits of violence seems again 
 to be spreading. Last week a poor bailiff, named Costello, 
 
490 THE CAPABILITIES OF KILKENNY, 
 
 who had shortly before distrained some cattle at Tullasbulan, 
 near Fresh ford, was shot dead in his cottage whilst eating 
 his supper with a light on the table before him, some 
 villain having taken deliberate aim at him through his 
 own window.* 
 
 The effect of these periodical visitations of violence is most 
 lamentable to the people themselves. Usually they take 
 their rise from the mischievous agitation Avhich is got up for 
 political and less exceptionable purposes. At present there 
 is little doubt but the party-fight about the potatoes, and the 
 advice given to the people not to pay their rents — an advice 
 exactly suited to their notions of right and wrong — have had 
 much to do with the spreading violence. 
 
 A month ago I sent you an account from Tipperary 
 (amongst other things) of the shooting of the overseer of the 
 coal-mines, at Slieveardah, simjily because he was an honest 
 man and did his duty. Those coal-mines are close to the 
 borders of Tij^perary and Kilkenny, and about ten miles from 
 this town. Since then several threatening notices have been 
 sent to other parties working and directing the mines. The 
 consequence is, the company working these mines have 
 
 1 * Formerly Irish outrages were distinguished by shocking cruelty rather than 
 by murder. Under whatever form, however, Ireland seems to have acquired a 
 prescriptive right to commit outrages, which there, are but the comment of a day, 
 but which, if committed in this country repeatedly, would soon rouse the whole 
 nation to demand a remedy of some kind to put an end to them. Arthur Young, 
 in his Travels (vol. i. p. 82), speaks of one of the usiial Whiteboy punishments 
 being to take people out of their beds, carry them naked in winter on horseback 
 for some distance, and bury them up to their chin in a hole filled with briars, not 
 forgetting to cut off one of their ears. 
 
 In the debate on the Whiteboy Act in 1786, Lord Luttrel related the following 
 anecdote, which there was every reason to believe was true : — 
 
 " A friend of mine, a few days since, after riding tlirough Urlingford early in 
 the morning, overtook beyond that town a person who proved to be a clergyman, 
 riding seemingly in pain, with his head muffled to a monstrous size, and bound 
 over with a napkin. My friend addressed him, being a very compassionate man, 
 and inquired what was the matter ? 'Ah, sir ! ' said he, ' did you see, as you rode 
 through that town, two ears and a cheek nailed to a post ?' 'I did,' said mj 
 friend. ' They were mine,' the clergyman repUed." 
 
AND CONDITION OF ITS PEOPLE. 491 
 
 posted a circular, announcing- tlieir intention to cease ■svork- 
 ing them on the 10th of this month; and the reason they 
 assign for this step is, " because they are unwilling to expose 
 the lives of their faithful officers." The effect of this will be, 
 at this season, when employment is of such value, to throw 
 250 men immediately out of work. This is one of the 
 benefits of agitation. The men will have brought on them- 
 selves the distress they will suffer ; but they have only been 
 acted on by the mischievous advice, the agitation, and the 
 pernicious counsel of leaders whom they follow. 
 
 There are also coal-mines in Kilkenny, which are exten- 
 sively worked. The coal is anthracite, and scarcely fit for 
 domestic purposes. These mines, however, are very ineffi.- 
 ciently worked, without sufficient capital and machinery. 
 One of them, at a place called Clough, was given up some 
 time since as worked out. A north of Ireland ens-ineer, 
 named Aher, happened to see it, and took it at a nominal 
 rent. By expending sufficient capital to erect proper 
 machinery and steam-power, he realised 22,000/. out of this 
 supposed " exhausted mine." At the present moment there 
 is a coal-mine at Bornafaher. Those who are now managing 
 it are just scratching away at the upper vein of culm. It 
 is producing scarcely anything, and there is not enterprise 
 enough to erect proper machinery to enable shafts to be 
 sunk into the veins of coal below^ An English engineer 
 saw it the other day, and was so convinced that there is fine 
 coal below, from the geological strata, that he offered to 
 work the mine under a lease by an English company, and 
 to give the owner half the produce as rent or royalty. The 
 offer was not accepted, but is considered of. I have heard 
 of some dozen of such offers in Ireland, to work coal-mines, 
 copper-mines, slate-quarries, and marble-quarries, by Eng- 
 lish companies, being almost always refused. An Irish 
 proprietor, " poor as a church mouse," who has marble in 
 a mountain, or copper in his crags, which he cannot himself 
 
492 THE CAPABILITIES OF KILKENNY, 
 
 realise, is satisfied to live in debt, Avith the reflection that 
 though he has no pence in his jjocket, yet he has marble in 
 his mountain, or coal under his domain. He dreams of it 
 as a mine of wealth which he possesses ; and though he 
 cannot realise it, yet he will let nobody else tiy, unless they 
 will take all the expense, and all the trouble, and find all 
 the knowledge and all the skill, and give him all the profit. 
 As people are not usually such fools, though disposed to be 
 liberal, the marble, and the copper, and the coal remain 
 ungot, and the Irish proprietor continues, without a pound 
 in his pocket to spare, the fancied owner of a mine of wealth. 
 
 There are also extensive iron-mines and lead-mines 
 unworked in the county. Some iron has been made at 
 Castlecomer, from iron-ore there raised, which was smelted 
 with the native coal. A remarkably fine fire-clay is also 
 obtained at the " seat" of the coal veins ; and quantities of 
 the black marble of Kilkenny are exported to America, for 
 building and ornamental purposes. 
 
 In this county, therefore, as elsewhere in Ireland, nature 
 has been lavish of her gifts, which require simply enterprise 
 and industry to enable the people to profit by them. But 
 these are social qualities, depending* on the people them- 
 selves ; and it does not suit political agitators, and those 
 who live by raising discontent against the Government, to 
 I^oint them out. You will hear such men talk much about 
 " misgovernment," and " repeal," and inflame the peasantry 
 about their " bone and sinew ;" but you will not hear them 
 say a word about what enterprise, and putting their " bone 
 and sinew" to some industrious use, can effect for them, 
 without the interference of Government at all. To be sure 
 not ; because this would be giving sound and useful advice, 
 and would not pay the advisers, and Irish patriots always 
 work for pay. It is for giving such advice, I presume — for 
 striving to urge the poor people to exert themselves to better 
 their condition, to shame bad landlords into acting fairly, 
 
AND CONDITION OF ITS PEOPLE. 493 
 
 and to encourage good ones to persevere by praising them — 
 that I have been held up to universal abuse by all the press 
 of all parties in Ireland. I was a " fellow," a " scoundrel," 
 an " atrocious vagabond," whom it was safe for all parties 
 to abuse as soon as it was discovered that I wrote for no 
 party. Of course, this was great encouragement to proceed ; 
 and had not the good and sensible men of all parties (luliom 
 the press of Ireland does not represent) everywhere received 
 me with the most courteous hospitality, and hundreds of 
 times thanked me and you for the good you were doing to 
 Ireland by this inquiry, and thus encouraged me and urged 
 me to persevere, I would long since have thrown up your 
 commission in disgust, and have left the thankless office of 
 striving to benefit Ireland, and not to rob her, to those who 
 were Quixotic enough to like the task. But, though the 
 newspapers abuse me and you for your generous and disin- 
 terested service to Ireland, I am glad of this opportunity of 
 being able to exculpate the men of Ireland, of all parties, 
 from the peer to the peasant, from the seeming ingratitude. 
 A stranger amongst them, often without introductions, in 
 every town in which I have yet been, from the highest to 
 the lowest, courteous hospitalities and attentions have been 
 heaped upon me. To the gentlemen of the Irish press, 
 therefore, I say, " Pray, gentlemen, proceed as heretofore ; 
 it is a great evidence of your discrimination and good taste, 
 and necessarily tends to make your testimony on all other 
 matters implicitly to be relied on." 
 
 I have already said that the general aspect of the country 
 shows a degree of improvement and comfort not observable 
 in the west of Ireland ; and though not so marked as in 
 Wexford, still there are evidences of comfort and prospering 
 industry among the farmers generally. I have had politely 
 furnished to me the following classified return (called for by 
 the Government in 1841) of the depositors in the Wexford 
 Savings Bank, which is, of course, an unerring indication of 
 the relative prosperity of each class : — 
 
494 THE CAPABILITIES OF KILKENNY, 
 
 Jifumber of depositors in tlie Wexford Savings'-bauk on the 20tli of No- 
 vember, 1841, with the amount of deposits, classified according to their 
 business and profession." 
 
 £ 5. d. 
 660 Farmers 24,908 2 
 
 342 Servants 7,295 18 9 
 
 68 Seafaring men 3,506 18 3 
 
 142 Persons not in any trade or business 8,028 11 6 
 
 14 Clergymen 519 2 6 
 
 21 Teachers 1,243 16 
 
 56 Tiabourers 746 7 
 
 162 Persons in business 8,461 13 
 
 142 Minors 4,182 16 8 
 
 102 Working Tradesmen 3,678 18 4 
 
 5 Doctors 202 14 
 
 26 Constabulary 731 11 2 
 
 2 Mlitary 162 3 
 
 8 Friendly Societies 298 3 
 
 7 Charitable Societies 910 
 
 £64,876 15 2 
 
 The amount of deposits, up to tlie 20tli of JN^ovember this 
 year, for the past year is less, being only 4G,0()0Z. ; but I am 
 informed that the proportion of agricultural deposits is the 
 same. This return, then, shows that the farmers contribute 
 more than one-third of the whole amount of the deposits in 
 Wexford, and lodge in the bank three times as much as any 
 other class of men whatever. This certainly is no indication 
 of poverty. I cannot get a similar return for Kilkenny, but 
 I am informed that the same general results arc applicable 
 to Kilkenny. 
 
 To what, it may be asked, arc the better cultivation, and 
 more decent and comfortable houses of tlie peasantry, and 
 other indications of prosperity in Kilkenny to be attributed ? 
 It is to the fact, that the landlords generally act fairly by 
 their tenants, and the tenants generally are more industrious 
 than in the west of Ireland. They have a better chance of 
 success, which their greater industry leads them to benefit 
 
AND CONDITION OF ITS PEOPLE. 495 
 
 hy ; and their greater industry realizes for them greater 
 comforts and prosperity. The best landlord can but give his 
 tenants opportunities of improvement ; if they will not avail 
 themselves of those opportunities the fault is in the tenants. 
 There are some landlords in the west of Ireland, who do 
 more than this — who urge on their tenants to improve, and 
 their reward is usually unpopularity and danger. I shall, 
 however, give you evidence of the condition of the tenantry 
 here : — 
 
 " The state of agriculture in the county of Kilkenny is improving,'* 
 says Mr. Phelan, farmer and agent. — (Lord Devon's Commission, Part 
 in. p. 353). 
 
 " The middlemen are gradually being cast off'.' — (Ibid. 354), 
 
 " The landlord allows for permanent improvements made, such as 
 building the houses, the landlord gives timber and slates; and for draining 
 and for liming, he pays Sd. a perch for draining ; and they are allowed 
 also for liming, on Lord Ormonde's estate. If we had our proprietors all 
 Lord Ormondes, we should have the country very prosperous. There 
 are several other proprietors who make allowances." — (Ibid. 355.)* 
 
 " We are happily circumstanced in the county of Kilkenny," says Mr. 
 Smithwick, miller, brewer, maltster, farmer, &c., of Kilkenny ; " there 
 are men here whose word is as good as their lease or their bond, and the 
 tenants feel confidence in them." 
 
 Further on he says, — 
 
 " I could instance many cases where the small farmers have amassed 
 sums that would surprise you from their industry." ..." Under all 
 circumstances, the Kilkenny people are extremelj' well conducted." 
 
 Mr. Cornelius Maxwell, of Kilkenny, stationer, printer, 
 proprietor of the Kilkenny Journal, and agent, says (ihld. 
 395),— 
 
 " I think that much of the improvement that is now discernible in the 
 state of the country, has in a great measure sprung from the sober and 
 industrious habits of the people." 
 
 " One of the best things would be to let us alone ; we are getting on 
 
 * In Kilkenny, this nobleman is universally well spoken of as a resident and 
 good landlord. 
 
496 THE CAPABILITIES OF KILKENNY, 
 
 amazingly well. The country, in my view, is thriving fast," saj'S Mr. 
 Reade, of Rosenara." {Ibid. p. 375.) 
 
 " The feeling shown towards the tenantry on the Ormonde estate," 
 says ISIr. INIaxwell (ihid. p. 399), " is a credit to the country." 
 
 " There is one estate that has so improved during the last three years 
 that I scarcely know it now ; and that is Counsellor Cahill's ; and I at- 
 tribute it entirely to his attention to his tenants," says Mr. Richard Cor- 
 mick, farmer, (ibid. p. 391). . . . " He purchased it, and found it 
 in a wretched worn-out state; and by the encouragement he gave his 
 tenants, and the improvements he made himself, it is so altered I scarcely 
 know it to be the same property." 
 
 I have been informed, on good authority, that he laid out 
 900Z. in lending lime and guano to his tenants, and paying 
 for draining, the whole of which has been paid back to him ; 
 and this outlay has considerably increased his rental a year, it 
 has raised the value of the property, and made the tenants 
 comfortable. There were 1500Z. arrears on the estate when 
 he bought it, and now there is not 30Z. arrear of rent due, 
 and the rents are well paid. The former owner was strug- 
 gling with embarrassments, and could do nothing for his 
 tenants — hence the difference. Personal attention, and aiding 
 and encouraging the tenants, have made to prosper a wretched 
 property and tenantry. As an instance alike of the igno- 
 rance and good feeling of the tenantry, the soil being a stiff 
 clay, this gentleman wished to have some of his wheat-fields 
 harrowed in the spring after he had bought the property, 
 and to teach his tenants, asked a tenant to do it. One of 
 his tenants harrowed one ridge and then stopped and refused 
 to do any more, thinking his landlord mad. He was obliged 
 to get his own man to do it, and the tenants gathered round 
 to see the strange novelty, crying " Come, boys, and look 
 at the counsellor tearing up his whate." After some time 
 when they saw it improved and growing luxuriantly, they 
 shook their heads, and said, " The counsellor was right 
 afther all ;" and now every man in the whole country har- 
 rows his wheat in the spring. At first none would use 
 
AND CONDITION OF ITS PEOPLE. 497 
 
 guano. They saw tlie benefit of it, and now tliey come beg- 
 ging to buy. 
 
 We see, then, that attention to their duties by the land- 
 lords, and industry by the tenants, insure prosperity and 
 comfort. 
 
 What, then, does this evidence — what do these facts relat- 
 ing to the county of Kilkenny — teach us ? First, that embar- 
 rassed proprietors make wretched estates. 
 
 Facilitate then the transfer of property from such hands; 
 for property stagnates in the hands of people who cannot 
 improve it. 
 
 Secondly, that encouraging landlords, attentive to the 
 duties of their position, and industrious tenants, make " a 
 happily circumstanced county" — in fact, insure general pro- 
 sperity and good feeling. x4iid, lastly, that agitation insures 
 outrage, and outrage throws men out of employment. Poli- 
 tical agitation indisposes landlords to grant leases ; and the 
 want of leases freezes the industry of the tenants. Surely 
 how popular agitators ought to be ! In time, however — for 
 Irishmen require time to see a truth — agitators will be esti- 
 mated in Ireland at their true worth, as the ruin of the 
 country and the insurers of misery to the people. 
 
 K K 
 
498 ON THE PAYMENT OF THE 
 
 LETTER XXXIV. 
 
 ON THE PAYMENT OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY 
 BY THE STATE, ON THE GROUND OF PRINCIPLE. 
 
 On the Payment of the Roman Catholic Clergy by the State — The rigJit of the 
 Roman Catholics to perfect Equality, and therefore their right, as well as 
 Protestants, to have their Clergy paid by the State — Tlie Reasons why a Clergy 
 paid by the State is desirable — Such a Measure may be advocated or opposed 
 on the groimds of Expediency and of Principle — Its opposition, on the ground 
 of Principle ; first, by the Roman Catholic Clergy ; secondly, by the Protestant 
 Body — Instances where they both acquiesce in this Payment — Advocated on 
 Principle. 
 
 Kilkenny, Dccembei' 12.* 
 There is no question of more grave importance, or, in my 
 belief, more closely allied to the future welfare and peace 
 and harmony of Ireland, or with its continued agitation and 
 discontent, than the manner in which the Roman Catliolic 
 clergy, as a body, shall continue to derive their emoluments. 
 It is a question, the discussion of Avhich I approach with 
 some degree of timidity, for I cannot but be aware of the 
 strong and diverse feelings by which it is hemmed in on 
 every side. On the part of the Roman Catholic clergy as a 
 body, every syllable that I write on such a question will be 
 viewed with suspicion, probably with animosity by some of 
 them. On the part of a vast number of well-disposed people 
 
 * This I;etter lias not before been published. 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY. 499 
 
 in England, it is probable that the view I may take Avill be 
 met with the intense opposition of religious zeal. 
 
 The object of this inquiry, however, is, on a calm, dispas- 
 sionate view, to ascertain what is most calculated, according 
 to all human experience and probability, to allay the dis- 
 tractions which mar the prosperity of this unhappy country, 
 to lead its people to the contemplation of the benefits of 
 domestic industry, and to put down agitation, disturbances, 
 and outrages, which frighten capital from its shores, and. 
 increase the poverty and the discontent of the people. 
 
 I enter on the task, I trust, in the spirit of justice. To 
 the Roman Catholic clergy I say, though differing from you 
 in Christian tenets, I respect those which you conscientiously 
 hold, and believe that they will obtain for you that everlast- 
 ing reward, which (in common with those of the Protestant 
 faith) we all seek, as Christians. To my fellow Protestants 
 in England, accustomed to view the Roman Catholic faith 
 ■with dislike — taught to think of it with abhorrence, I say 
 do you not, in the matter of your religious faith, claim a 
 right to think for yourselves ? In that respect is not your 
 Catholic fellow-subject on a footing of inrfect equality with 
 you? He chooses to worship Cxod as a Roman Catholic; 
 you as a Protestant. The free and equal right of each ia- 
 this matter is undisputed. After a barbarous exclusion,^ 
 revolting to every enlightened mind, the Roman Catholic i&- 
 admitted to an equality of civil privileges with you. Born; 
 in the same country, often of the same blood, called upon 
 equally with you to bear every burden of the State — at your 
 side in war, in your councils in peace — contributing equally 
 with you to the general stock, and capital, and character, 
 and defence of the nation, his labour, his talents, and his 
 valour — in what is it, on any principle of reason or common 
 sense, that you can deny to him the right to have with you 
 a perfect equality ? 
 
 I trust that the Roman Catholic clergy will not quarrel 
 
 K K 2 
 
500 ON THE PAYMENT OF THE 
 
 with an inquiry entered on in tliis spirit, and that they will 
 hear with the detail that it may he necessary to enter into ; 
 and, though they may not all agree in the conclusion to 
 which I shall arrive, yet that they Avill look at this inquiry 
 as a calm discussion, prompted hy no religious or political 
 feeling, but by a conviction that if it shall lead others to 
 form the same opinion, and tend to that opinion's being 
 eventually acted upon, it will have a most beneficial effect 
 upon the country, and add to their status and respect as a 
 body. 
 
 On the ground of the rif/ht of our Roman Catholic fellow- 
 subjects to perfect equality in all things, against which there 
 is no rational argument, I appeal to the zealous Protestants 
 of England — to their sense of fairness, and justice, and pro- 
 priety — to their good sense, and ask them, — " As you think 
 it beneficial that your Church should be endowed, that your 
 clergy should be placed above want, independent of those 
 whom they have to teach, removed from all pretext of selfish 
 agitation of the people, on whom otherwise they Avould have 
 to depend, and that they should have every motive to go 
 calmly on in the sober inculcation of religion, and to dis- 
 countenance all agitation and all disturbance, do not from a 
 blind and mistaken zeal oppose the conclusion to Avhich I 
 shall arrive, but concede that to your Eoman Catholic fel- 
 low-subjects to which they have a right — perfect equality with 
 you : grant them for their clergy that privilege which you 
 think so valuable and necessary for your own, and witli 
 fairness and justice and consistency be ready to accede to the 
 •payment of the Roman Catholic clergy hy the Stated 
 
 There are two grounds on which such a measure may be 
 advocated or opposed ; first, on the ground o^pri?iciple ; and, 
 secondly, on the ground o^ expediency. 
 
 It may be advocated on pj-inciplc : and it may be 0]>posed 
 on principle, and on different grounds, by both the Roman 
 Catholic clergy and by the Protestant clergy and laity. 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY. 501 
 
 The subject is one of extensive inquiry, and I propose in 
 my present letter confining myself to its discussion on tlie 
 ground oi principle— firsts as opposed by the Roman Catholic 
 clergy themselves ; secondhj, as opposed by the Protestants 
 of the United Kingdom. The further discussion of its 
 expediency will form the subject of a future letter. 
 
 It is opposed by the Roman Catholic clergy on the osten- 
 sible ground that they would, by accepting a State provision, 
 lose influence with the people ; and also on the ground that 
 they will bear no interference with the ecclesiastical prefer- 
 ments in their Church by the State, which, they aver, a 
 State provision would lead to. 
 
 But in almost every other country where different religious 
 tenets prevail — nay in our own, they do accept a State 
 provision, and every proper influence over the people is 
 retained by them ; and in several countries the Governments 
 of those countries and the Pope have arranged respecting 
 the bestowing of ecclesiastical preferments. 
 
 In Bavaria, the Roman Catholic, Lutheran, and Calvinistic 
 communions are declared to be on an ecpiality with respect 
 to all rights ; and the Roman Catholic bishops are paid by 
 the state.* 
 
 In France the state supports the Roman Catholic Church 
 by a grant of 33,000,000f. ; and the State nominates to 
 ecclesiastical preferments, and the nominees are canonically 
 instituted by the Pope, unless some special ground for 
 objection is adduced by his Holiness. -f- 
 
 In Saxony the salaries of the Catholic clergy, and all the 
 expenses incidental to the services of the Catholic Church, 
 are paid out of the King's privy purse.;]: 
 
 In Prussia the appointment of Catholic bishops is regu- 
 lated by a Bull, called " De Salute Animarum," granted in 
 
 * " Past and Present Policy of England towards Ireland," p. 234. 
 t Ihld. p. 238. X Ibid. p. 281. 
 
602 ON THE PAYMENT OF THE 
 
 1821, by which the King is possessed of the virtual, though 
 not of the nominal, power of appointment, a brief of Pius VII. 
 obliging the Chapter, which has the right of election, to elect 
 ^^ personam Regi r/ratam" The Crown pays the Catholic 
 dignitaries, and in the Trans-Rhenane provinces it pays a 
 salary to the clergy.* 
 
 In Holland the Catholic clergy are paid by the Govern- 
 ment without any ari'angement about preferments. f 
 
 In all these eases there is an absence of those frightful 
 animosities and religious divisions which Ireland alone, of all 
 the regions of the earth, exhibits in enormous perfection.^ 
 
 In Upper and Lower Canada the Roman Catholic bishops, 
 and a number of the clergy, are paid by the State, and by 
 votes of money from England. The Roman Catholic 
 bishop of Quebec receives 1,000/. a year, as does also the 
 Roman Catholic bishop of Montreal, and thirty Roman 
 Catholic priests receive 50Z. a year each from the State. 
 
 In the Mauritius the Roman Catholic clergy receive 
 2,500Z. from the State. 
 
 In Newfoundland, in British Guiana, in Jamaica, in 
 Trinidad, in St. Lucia, in Gibraltar, in Malta, in the Ionian 
 Islands, in Australia, in Van Diemen's Land, in the East 
 Indies, the Roman Catholic clergy accept pay from the 
 English Government. On the score of principle, then, on 
 their part, as affecting their Church, or their relations with 
 the people, there can consistently be no objection. Nay, as 
 chaplains of the gaols, military hospitals, and poor-houses, 
 they receive pay from the Government in this country. 
 
 If the evidence of Mr. O'Connell be worth anything on 
 ariT/ subject, in his evidence before the House of Commons, 
 Feb. 25, 1825, speaking on this subject, he says, — 
 
 " I think concession, coupled with raishig the qucalification, and a pro- 
 vision for the clergy, would make the mind of Ireland sound, and would 
 
 * Ibid. p. 214. t Ilj'^l V- 218- t Il^id. p. 254. 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY. 503 
 
 enable the Government, by measures of general detail, to give to Ireland 
 the benefit of the natural advantages she possesses." 
 
 In his evidence before the Lords' Committee, on the 11th 
 of March, 1825, he says, — 
 
 " I have not the least doubt upon my mind that the Catholic clergy 
 ■would be quite ready to receive State provision as accompanymg eman- 
 cipation. 
 
 " If there were an equalization of rights and provision made for the 
 Catholic clerg}', do you think that one of the consequences would be, 
 persons better connected — gentlemen, going into the Catholic priesthood ? 
 — I am sure it Avould be one of the consequences ; it is natural it should 
 be so, for at present, with I believe very strong dispositions to bestOAV 
 charity, and abundant opportunities, if they had the means of bestomng 
 it, they are living themselves upon a kind of charity, obtained from very 
 poor persons — a situation extremely painful, and to which the sons of 
 gentlemen will of course very reluctantly, and only from superior enthu- 
 siasm — I will call it — submit." 
 
 We have it then in evidence that a State provision is not 
 incompatible (where there are different sects of religionists in 
 a country) with the office of a Catholic priesthood, nor can 
 it be presumed to impair their efficiency ; and we have it in 
 evidence that " a provision for the Romish clergy would 
 make the mind of Ireland sound," and that it would increase 
 the respectability of their body. On this subject the late 
 Rev. Sidney Smith in his Posthumoits Fragments has justly 
 said, — 
 
 " The objection to a State provision does not really come from the ' 
 clergy, but from agitators and Kepealers. These men see the immense 
 advantages of carrjang the clergy with them in their agitation, and of 
 giving the sanction of religion to poHtical hatred. They know that the 
 clergy, moving in the same direction with the people, have an immense 
 influence over them ; and they are, very wisely, afraid not only of losing 
 their co-operating power, btit of seemg it, by a State provision, arrayed 
 against them. I am fully convinced that a State payment to the Catholic 
 clergy, by leaving to that laborious and useful body of men the exercise 
 of their free judgment^ would be the severest blow that Irish agitation 
 could receive." 
 
504 ON THE PAYMENT OF THE 
 
 Purther on he says, — 
 
 " It is commonly said, if the lloman Catholic i^riests are paid by the 
 State, they will lose their influence over their flocks — not their /a?V in- 
 fluence — not that influence which a Avisc and good man would wish to sec 
 in all religions — not the dependence of humble ignorance upon prudence 
 — only fellowship in faction and fraternity in rebellion. All that will be 
 lost." 
 
 And this, I do not helieve that the "bulk of the Roman 
 Catholic clergy wish to retain. 
 
 Again, with regard to its pecuniary benefits to the peasantry, 
 the Mr. O'Connell before alluded to is asked, in his evidence 
 befoi-e the House of Commons, March 4, 1825, — 
 
 " Would it be felt by the peasantry in Ireland as a relief to them if the 
 provisions for their priests were provided from some other funds ? — I am 
 sure it would ; a "very considerable relief."* 
 
 On wo principle, t\ier\, can I see that the Roman Catholic 
 clergy could refuse to accept a State jirovision if provided for 
 them ; nor do I believe that the bulk of them would or could 
 refuse it long. The Irish peasant would soon begin to 
 grumble at the payment of fees Avhen he knew that the priest 
 might get them, if he chose, at the bank ; and the degrading 
 scenes of begging and exaction to which the priests are now 
 compelled often to resort would be so distasteful to most of 
 them if a legitimate means of escape from them were afforded 
 
 * " And first, then, our people are impoverished by the great sums, which arc 
 paid by them, more punctually than their rents, to the maintenance of so many 
 priests, friars, monasteries, &c., bishops and archbishops. The money spent this 
 way is computed so high, and those who live on it are so numerous, tliat it is a 
 tax sufficient in itself to keep many families in case and plenty. And, indeed, if 
 we consider that at least three-fourths of our i)eople pay subsidies of this kind, we 
 may easily conceive how those torrcnti de pecunice (torrents of money) are raised, 
 which, as Cardinal Palavicmi, in his History of the Council of Trent, (1, 4, c. 5), 
 says, ' are so necessary to support the state and grandeur of the spiritual monarchy 
 of Rome.' " — Reflectionn and Ilcsolutions proper for the Gentlemen of Ireland, 
 by the late Dr. Madden, of the Roijal Dublin ISocietij, p. G'J. 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY. 505 
 
 to them, that they wouhl rarely long refuse to accept the 
 State endowment.* 
 
 It is not requisite to devote much space to the consideration 
 of the grounds of opposition to such a payment on the part of 
 the Protestant laity on principle. When already they assent to 
 the payment of the Roman Catholic clergy by the State in 
 our colonies in every quarter of the globe, and in our gaols 
 and military hospitals and poor-houses at home, all objection 
 to such a payment, on principle on their part, is knocked 
 from under them. Nay, when we pay the " chaplains 
 of Juggernaut," and furnish its chariot, f the less we 
 say about objecting to pay the priests on principle the 
 better. 
 
 But why do I advocate the payment of the priests on 
 principle ? Because I advocate the payment of the Protest- 
 ant clergy in England on principle, as the spiritual leaders 
 and teachers of the majority of the people ; and because it is 
 the duty of the Government, as the head and father of the 
 country, to take care that the majority of the people are not 
 brought up as heathens but as Christians ; and in order to 
 insure that, they must pay for Christian teaching. And I 
 advocate it because (in the w^ords of the late Rev. Sydney 
 Smith, with which I cannot do better than conclude this 
 portion of the inquiry), — 
 
 " I am thoroughly convinced a State payment to the Catholic clergy 
 would remove a thousand causes of hatred between the priest and his 
 
 * Pilgrimages and penances, confessions, absolutions, pardons,, dispensations^ 
 indulgences, do also cost our good Catholics abundance of their money, as well as 
 a good deal of their time, which equally contribute to keep them low-spirited and. 
 indigent, superstitious and idle." — Reflections and Resolutions proper for the 
 Gentlemen of Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society y 
 p. 70. 
 
 t The late Rev. Sydney Smith, in one of his pamphlets on this subject, sur- 
 mises that the chariot of Juggernaut is built in Long Acre. 
 
506 
 
 ON THE PAYMENT OF THE 
 
 flock, and would be as favourable to the increase of his useful authority, 
 as it would be fatal to Im factious injlue^ice over the 2^eople" 
 
 In my next letter I will endeavour to consider how far the 
 payment of the priesthood may he advocated, or opposed, on 
 the ground of expediency. 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY. 507 
 
 LETTER XXXV. 
 
 ON THE PAYMENT OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY 
 BY THE STATE, ON THE GROUNDS OF POLICY AND 
 EXPEDIENCY. 
 
 The Payment of the Priesthood continued — How far such a Measure is desii'able, 
 on the grounds of Policy and Expediency, for the interests of Religion, for the 
 interests of the People, and the welfare of Society, and as calculated to tend to 
 the peace and tranquillity of Ireland, and consequently to the prosperity and 
 strength of the Empire. 
 
 Kenmare, Kerry, December 14.* 
 Of the propriety of the payment of the Roman Catholic 
 clergy by the State, for the benefit alike of that clergy, of 
 the people, and of the country, I am perfectly convinced 
 from all I have heard and seen ; and in my last letter I 
 endeavoured to show, that on the ground of principle it can- 
 not be opposed. 
 
 In my present letter I shall strive to prove how far such 
 a measure is desirable, on the grounds of policy and expe- 
 diency. 
 
 I shall endeavour to show, first, that it is expedient that 
 the priesthood should be paid by the State, for the interests of 
 religion. 
 
 Secondly, that such a measure is expedient for the interests 
 of the people, and for the welfare of society. 
 
 * This also is an original Letter, which has not before been published. 
 
V 
 
 508 ON TEE PAYMENT OF THE 
 
 And, lastly, that such a provision for the priesthood is 
 expedient, as calculated to tend to the peace and tranquillity 
 of Ireland, and consequently to the prosperity and strength 
 of the empire. 
 
 Again, on entering on this discussion, I sincerely hope 
 that my motives will not be mistaken, — that the Roman 
 Catholic clergy will not suppose me to treat with intentional 
 disrespect the tenets and doctrines which they teach. I trust 
 too that the Protestants of England will look on this as a 
 question to be determined by calm reason and judgment, and 
 not by prejudice. I am quite aware that the feeling among 
 many zealous and good Protestants in England, and Pres- 
 byterians in Scotland, with regard to Poman Catholics, 
 cannot be said to be much caricatured by the Rev. Sydney 
 Smith, in his celebrated^ " Peter Plymlcy's Letters," when 
 he says, — 
 
 " In England I solemnly believe, blue and red baboons to be more 
 popular than Catholics and Presbyterians — they are more understood, 
 and there is a greater disposition to do something for them. 
 
 " When a country squire hears of an ape, his first feeling is to give it 
 nuts and apples. When he hears of a dissenter (or Catholic), his im- 
 mediate impulse is to commit it to the county jail — to shave its head — to 
 alter its customary food, and to have it privately whipped.* 
 
 These prejudices, however, are, I hope, rapidly passing 
 away, and the Dissenters and Roman Catholics are beginning 
 to be viewed on those terms o^ perfect equality, which is their 
 unquestionable birthright. 
 
 In commencing the discussion of the first point, I confess 
 with pain, that that which ought to be the strongest ai-gu- 
 iiient in favour of a State-paid clergy, — the example set by 
 the clergy of the Protestant Established Church, appears, 
 from many unhappy instances, to be its weakest. 
 
 In reality, however, it is not so. It pains every good 
 
 * Plymley's Letters, p. 73. 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY. 509 
 
 Protestant to liear of clergymen treating tlie cure of souls as 
 a sinecure. But that is an abuse -vvhicli ought to be reme- 
 died. It is disgraceful to hear of dignitaries in the Church, 
 at Cork, and Limerick, and elsewhere, receiving thousands 
 a year as labourers in Christ's vineyard, who render no labour 
 for their hire. 
 
 The Protestant of Limerick continues to hold the Protest- 
 ant faith not because his bishop looks after his teaching, but 
 in spite of his neglect. But these faults are not to be attri- 
 buted to the payment of the clergy by the State, but to a lax 
 supervision, wdiich does not immediately degrade vice, and 
 supersede incapacity and neglect. The arguments in favour 
 of a clergy paid by the State are untouched by such examples 
 as these. 
 
 Paley, in his " Moral Philosophy" (Vol. ii. p. 302), well 
 puts the general question, — 
 
 " Witli what sincerity," saj's he, " with -what dignity can a preacher 
 dispense the truths of Christianity whose thoughts are perpetually so- 
 licited to the reflection how he may increase his subscription ? Moreover, 
 a little experience of the disposition of the common people will, in every 
 country, inform us that it is one thing to edify them in Christian know- 
 ledge, and another to gratif}- their taste for vehement impassioned oi'atory, 
 and that he, not only whose success, but whose subsistence, depends on 
 collecting and pleasing a crowd must resort to other arts than the argu- 
 ment and communication of sober, profitable instruction. For a preacher 
 to be thus at the mercy of his audience — to be obhged to adapt bis 
 doctrine to the pleasure of a capricious multitude — to live m constant 
 bondage to tyrannical and insolent directors — are circumstances rarely 
 submitted to without a sacrifice of principle and a depravation of cha- 
 racter." 
 
 Can it be for the interests of religion that to every reflect- 
 ing mind it should put on the phasis of a trade ? Is it wise 
 that the thinking portion of the people should perpetually 
 see men baptized and made Christians for 05., confessed and 
 ahsolved for 25. Qd., joined in the holy bonds of matrimony 
 for (say) IZ,, salvation insured by extreme unction for IO5., 
 
510 ON THE PAYMENT OF THE 
 
 their bodies consigned to consecrated ground, and tlieir souls 
 prayed out of purgatory for 21. or 3Z. more — in short, that 
 the spectacle should be an every-day one of a man's whole 
 Christian "■job" being " done" for 5Z. or lOZ. if he can afford 
 no more. God forbid that I should be one to jeer at reli- 
 gion : but religion is one thing, and the way in which its 
 offices are paid for is another. I am convinced that this 
 trading in the holy offices of religion has disgusted many a 
 reflecting mind, and made it careless of all religion — has, in 
 fact, been most injurious to the interests of religion. Presum- 
 ing this view to be correct, and I know no answer to it, is it 
 not, then, wiser to wipe out this blot, and to keep the pure 
 truths of I'eligion free, in their inculcation, from the suspicion 
 even of an interested teaching ? Priests and clergymen 
 are but men ; and, is it not to be feared, if they are left 
 dependent upon payments to be made to them for the per- 
 formance of certain offices of religion, that ceremonies and 
 contrivances will be resorted to for the obtaining of such 
 payments, which may tend to the obscurement of the truth 
 and to the injury of the interests erf religion? Nay, has not 
 this been the result in Ireland 1 For what is the object of 
 the " station" held on Lough Derg island, in Donegal, or 
 on the top of the hill, Croagh Patrick, in Mayo ? The 
 sublime truths of religion are beyond the grasp of the 
 greatest intellect : their study is a feeble attempt of a iinite 
 being to comprehend infinity. Yet the study purifies and 
 ennobles — makes a man conscious of the living soul within 
 liini — conscious of the undying intellect which distinguishes 
 him from the brute. How melancholy, then, is the specta- 
 cle at Lough Derg, to any reflecting mind, to see men sink 
 this intellect, and in place of the ennobling contcm]>lation of 
 the Deity, and " communing with their own hearts," repent- 
 ing of past sins, and humbly hoping for strength to walk in 
 future after His laws, resorting to the degrading exhibition 
 of walking barefoot round a stone-cross on a pathway of 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY. 511 
 
 sharp flints !* " The sacrifices of God," we are taught, " are 
 a broken spirit and a contrite heart,"-^f ^^d not cut feet and 
 bleeding knees. Can any unprejudiced mind think that the 
 interests of religion are forwarded by such exhibitions as these ? 
 But are the priests to be blamed? They are men; you 
 make them depend on fees from the people for the perform- 
 ance of religious offices ; this contrivance brings 20,000 pil- 
 grims annually to the station, the fees are paid, and the 
 priests can live. 
 
 The Rev. Sydney Smith, in his " Posthumous Fragments^' 
 thus describes the exaction of fees by the Roman Catholic 
 priesthood in Ireland : — 
 
 " The mode of exacting dues in Ireland is quite arbitrary and capricious 
 — uniformity is out of the question — everything depends on the dis- 
 position and temper of the clergyman. There are salutary regulations put 
 forth in each diocese respecting Church dues and Church discipline, and 
 put forth by episcopal and synodical authority — specific sums are laid 
 down for mass, marriage, and the administration of the eucharist — these 
 authorized payments are moderate enough, but every priest in spite of 
 these rules makes the most he can of his ministry, and the strangest dis- 
 crepancy prevails among men in the same diocese, in the demands made 
 upon the people. The priest and his flock are continually coming into 
 collision in pecuniary matters. Twice a year, the holy man collects con- 
 fession money under the denomination of Christmas and Easter offerings. 
 He selects in every neighbourhood one or two houses in Avhich he holds 
 stations of confession — very disagreeable scenes take place when additional 
 money is demanded, or when additional time for payment is craved. The 
 first thing done when there is a question of marrying a couple is to make 
 a bargain about the marriage-money. The wary minister watches the 
 palpitations — puts on a shilling for every sigh, and two-pence for every 
 tear, and maddens the impetuousity of the young lovers up to one pound 
 sterling. The remuneration prescribed by the diocesan statutes is never 
 thought of for a moment. The priest makes as hard a bargain as he can 
 *****. Every one present at the marriage is to contribute. In the 
 same manner gossip money is collected at baptisms." 
 
 The reverend gentleman then goes on, — 
 
 * See note, ante, p. 82. f Psalm li. 9. 
 
512 ON THE PAYMENT OF THE 
 
 " But the most jpainful scenes takes place at extreme unction — a cere- 
 mony to •which the common people in Ireland attach the utmost import- 
 ance. ' Pay me. before-hand — this is not enough — I insist upon moi'c — I 
 know you can afford it — I insist upon a larger fee.' And all this before 
 the dying man who feels he has not an hour to live, and believes that sal- 
 vation depends upon the timely application of this sacred grease.""' 
 
 Though I do not much admire the tone in which this quo- 
 tation is written, and something must be allowed in it for 
 " the making of points," still, as a general description, it is 
 accurate — painfully accurate. 
 
 On a question, however, on which much strong feeling 
 prevails, and anxious to wound no religious prejudice, I 
 think it enough on this head to say that the more the sub- 
 ject is examined into, the more inexpedient it appears for the 
 interests of religion that the clergy should be dependent on 
 the people. Every argument which applies in favour of 
 paying the Protestant clergy, applies in favour of paying the 
 Roman Catholic priesthood. They are the teachers of the 
 great _bulk of the Irish people; and, so far as the State is 
 concerned, it permits some six million people who are not 
 Protestants to e'o untauoht in matters of relio-ion altoGfether. 
 They may teach themselves — provide and pay their own 
 teachers, be the teachers Jew, Mahomcdan, or Vishnu ; the 
 State cares not, for it pays no Christian teaclier to instruct 
 them. The argument that there are the Protestant churches 
 for them is futile. There are the Roman Catholic chapels 
 for the Protestants, but what Protestant ever enters them ? 
 Here are the people who will not become Protestants, whom 
 300 years of preaching has not made Protestants, — do you 
 the State take care as far as you can to have them made 
 Christians ? Not a bit of it ; they may themselves pay 
 teachers to teach them what they like ; you, a Christian 
 State, have no hand in teaching them Christianity. 
 
 We will, however, now turn to the second point, that it is 
 
 * Sydney Smith's Posthumous Fragments, p. 22. 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY. 613 
 
 expedient for the interests of the people, and for the icelfare of 
 society, that the priesthood should be paid. 
 
 If there is any evil more prominent than another in the 
 social condition of Ireland, it is the improvident and early 
 marriages which are contracted. It leads to perpetual beg- 
 gary and wretchedness. A lad is no sooner sixteen or seven- 
 teen years of age than he marries some girl of fifteen or 
 sixteen. Of course he cannot have made any provision for 
 a family — he is scarcely yet a member of society. But he 
 has a family growing up about him before he is a man. He 
 must live, and without other employment or knowledge how 
 to live, his father is compelled to subdivide his farm with, 
 him. In England and Scotland, most young men of that 
 age are " beginning life," as it is called, entering upon a 
 business, trade, or profession, in order to learn it, and after- 
 wards to make their livelihood out of it. When the liveli- 
 hood is secured in all fair expectation, then the young man 
 thinks of marrying. In Ireland a man never learns a trade ; 
 the rudest peasant expects at once as much for his untutored 
 services as the best artizan. He does not seek to learn a 
 trade. He is, therefore, not sought for as an artizan in any 
 trade. At the mines in Cork, picking dross out of the ore 
 is an employment for women. Those who know their busi- 
 ness are very expert at it. Those who do not, if put to the 
 work, Avill pick out as much ore as dross, and waste more 
 than their labour is worth. Yet such is the habit of never 
 learning to do anything among the peasantry, that, though 
 three weeks will teach a girl this work, under the superin- 
 tendence of others, during which time all her work has to 
 be gone over by another, they will not labour, or rather 
 learn to labour for three weeks unless they are paid at once 
 full wages, though for the first three weeks their untaught 
 labour is a positive loss to their emjiloyers. This feeling, 
 no doubt, is caused, in a great measure, by the jiressure of 
 immediate necessity, and from the utter absence of all habit 
 
 L L 
 
514 ON THE PAYMENT OF THE 
 
 of going to learn any trade. But the chief cause of both 
 these evils is the early marriages. Before a lad has learned 
 any trade at all he marries. He must then live and keep his 
 wife, and a potato patch is the only prospect he has. This is 
 one of the worst evils, and leads to many of those other evils 
 which beset Ireland. We shall soon see what induces early 
 marrigges. It is the custom in Ireland, at marriages, for a 
 collection to be made and given as a present to the priest. 
 This is a matter of emulation among the people present ; and 
 the extent to which the feeling is carried may be judged of 
 from the fact, that at the marriage of a 10 acre tenant's son, 
 who has not a shilling himself, 201. will often be collected for 
 the priest. A Killarney car-di-iver told me he married at 
 sixteen, and some 21. were collected for the priest, neither he 
 nor his wife having a shilling before hand. A waiter at the 
 hotel at Kilkenny, where I staid, I was told, had a collection 
 of 18/. made at his wedding, for the priest ; and I have heard 
 of instances among respectable farmers of much more extra- 
 vagant sums being given. Now is it human nature to suppose 
 that any priest depending for his livelihood on fees — the mar- 
 riage fee amongst others, will not promote marriages ? I have 
 heard of many instances of their doing so. But don't blame 
 the priests ; blame the system. The priests must live ; they 
 live by fees, for the State gives them nothing, and the best 
 fee they get is at a wedding. Depend upon it that, as long 
 as the priests are thus paid, early marriages, with all their 
 attendant evils and mischiefs and miseries, will continue. 
 
 On this subject, however, I will quote one or two instances, 
 to bear out this statement of the fact of early marriages, and 
 their evils, which I take at random, from the evidence given 
 before Lord Devon's Commission. 
 
 Mr. J. Hickson, of Kenmare (Land Commission Report, 
 Part II. p. 912), says,— 
 
 " If any remedy could be applied to prevent early marriages of paupers 
 it would be of great benefit." 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY. 515 
 
 Mr. Kerry Supple (Poor Law Guardian of Ballyliorgan, 
 Kerry, Vol. II. p. 843), says,— 
 
 " The early and improvident marriages of the people so long as they 
 exist must keep up a state of poverty. 
 
 " Are you prepared to suggest a remedy for that ? Some say that 
 there is a revenue arising to the Roman Catholic clergymen, which is 
 a strong inducement to them not to put any check on it, and there are 
 many points connected with it. JMy own opinion is, that as long as a boy 
 of sixteen will marry a girl of fourteen, without 1*. Od, in their pockets 
 and throw themselves upon the world, it is very hard to benefit the 
 people of Ireland. 
 
 " Do you think the clergy could check the feeling you describe to be 
 so strong ? Yes. I think they could in a great measure if they would 
 take the trouble. They would be acting against themselves. Their re- 
 venue arises from it. But if a clergyman talked rationally to a boy of 
 sixteen or eighteen ' You are going to do what is very imprudent. You 
 ought not to do it. You will be a beggar, and in the poor-house.' It 
 would have as much effect as the other sermons he preaches." 
 
 Mr. J. Hurly, Tralee, in his evidence (Land Commis- 
 sioners' Report, Part II. p. 852), says, — 
 
 " One of the evils that arises here is the early marriages of the po- 
 pulation. The moment a man gets a son gro\\Ti of seventeen or eighteen, 
 he gets him married, and gives him a part of the land." 
 
 The mere money in fees which the poor people pay is a 
 trifling mischief to them, compared with the lasting* misery 
 they bring upon themselves by these imprudent marriages. 
 The payment of these fees, however, impoverishes them. 
 There are " gossipings " at baptisms, and " cantings" at 
 funerals — that is, making the funeral procession go between 
 two men at each side of it, holding a hat ; the money col- 
 lected is ostensibly spent in masses, to get the soul of the 
 departed out of purgatory ; and he who gives most has the 
 honour of being named as the payer for the masses. It 
 may easily be supposed, that the poor men, excited by grief 
 for a departed friend, and taught that he is in purgatory 
 till the priest prays him out, will give as liberally as they 
 
 L L 2 
 
516 ON THE PAYMENT OF THE 
 
 can, to insure his escape from bad company. But is not 
 much of this to be traced to leaving the priest to live by 
 such contrivances ? Let Exeter Hall bigots cease foaming 
 at the mouth about the "damnable doctrines" of priestcraft. 
 Pay the j^riests — enable them to live without resorting to 
 such i^ractices, and they will fall into desuetude. The 
 priest will then only think of teaching Christianity, and not 
 of getting fees. 
 
 But, lastly, it is expedient to pay the priesthood, as cal- 
 culated to tend to the peace and tranquillity of Ireland, and 
 consequently, to the prosj)crity and strenyth of the empire. 
 
 " "We consider," sa3-s Sydnej' Smith, " the Irish clergy as factious and 
 as encouraging the bad anti-British spirit of the people. How can it be 
 otherwise? They live by the people. They have nothing to live upon 
 but the voluntary oblations of the people ; and they must fall into the 
 same spirit as the people, or they must starve to death. No marriage — 
 no mortuary masses — no unctions to the priest, who preached against 
 O'Connell — give the clergy a maintenance separate from the will of the 
 people, and jou will then enable them to oppose the folly and madness of 
 the people." (^Postliumous Fragments.^* 
 
 These are words of common sense and wisdom. "With 
 the people, the priesthood are all-powerful; against them, 
 they are powerless. They therefore are compelled to go 
 with them. The people are led and influenced by reckless 
 enthusiasts, or worse — by sordid demagogues. " When had 
 common sense much influence with the poor dear Irish?" 
 asks Peter Plymley. But uncommon nonsense has a great 
 influence with them, and over them. They like it so well 
 they will pay for it; and as long as they pay for it, they 
 
 * " At present, the Roman Catholic clergyman is entirely dependent on volun- 
 tary contributions, which frequently forces him to succumb to the times, and 
 prevents his being an independent man ; and often he is governed by his j)Hri.sh- 
 ioners when he gets credit for leading them, perhaps in his heart anxious to avoid 
 all political excitement, but finding his very existence depend upon going with 
 the popular stream." — A Few Words on Irish Measures, by S. W. Black- 
 all, D.L.\ 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY. 617 
 
 will liear plenty of it. Well, whatever be the nonsense 
 which influences them the priest must follow, for he lives 
 by them; if he opposes them, he starves. 
 
 Bishop Stock, in a narrative of what passed at Killala in 
 the summer of 1798, gives the following reasons why, in 
 every popular commotion in Ireland, some Catholic priest 
 will probably be concerned. 
 
 " The almost total dependence of the Roman Catholic clergy of* 
 Ireland upon their people for the means of subsistence, is the cause, ac- 
 cording to my best judgment, why, upon every popular commotion, many 
 priests of that communion have been, (and until measures of better policy 
 are adopted always will be,) found in the ranks of sedition and opposition 
 to the established government. The peasant will love a revolution 
 because he feels the weight of poverty, and has not often the sense to per- 
 ceive that the change of masters may render it heavier. The priest must 
 follow the impulse of the popular wave, or be left behind on the beach to 
 perish."* 
 
 The able author of " The Past and Present Policy of 
 England towards Ireland," says, — 
 
 " The great majority of them (the priests,) are hot Eepealers ; it is they 
 who work all the machinery of Eepeal. The great meeting at Clontarf — 
 the last of the monster meetings — was convened upon a requisition signed 
 by twenty-five priests, and not by one layman. It may be very shocking 
 and very wrong that men who ought to be devoted to their religious 
 duties should be thus deeply engaged m agitation of the most mischievous 
 character ; but when the class from which they spring, and their misera- 
 bly defective education are considered, our wonder that they are what 
 we see them gives way to the much greater wonder that we have gone on 
 so long, permitting such a system to flourish in rank luxuriance, and 
 though fully alive to all its practical consequences, have never made the 
 smallest attempt to cure the evils it engenders." f 
 
 Without, however, trespassing further on the reader's 
 patience, I think it must be apparent, that it is not wise 
 and expedient for the peace and tranquillity of Ireland, and 
 
 * Quoted in Plowden, vol. iii. p. 716. 
 
 t Past and Present Policy of England towards Ireland, p. 334. 
 
618 ON THE PAYMENT OF THE 
 
 consequently for the prosperity and strength of the empire, 
 that the clergy of three-fourths of the people of Ireland 
 should thus he left dependent on the people. On every 
 principle of reason and justice, the Roman Catholics, 
 whether priesthood or people, have a right to a perfect 
 equality with Protestants. I should feel ashamed of the 
 Protestant faith, which I hold, if it feared a perfect equahty: 
 I beheve perfect equality will most effectually show its 
 strength. 
 
 " No power in Europe," says Sydney Smith, " but yourselves, has ever 
 thought for these hundred years past of asking whether a bayonet is 
 Catholic, or Presbyterian, or Lutheran, but whether it is sharp and well 
 tempered."* 
 
 Equally indefensible on any ground of reason, is it to ask 
 before the State pays a priest, or before it gives a civil office 
 to a layman — " are you a Protestant or a Catholic?" That 
 with which the State has to do is simply to ask, " Do you 
 teach the people Christianity, and make them good subjects; 
 are you a good citizen, and fit for the office you seek?" 
 Look at the example in England, and in Scotland, of the 
 effects of an unpaid clergy. Though a great number 
 among the very powerful body of dissenters in England 
 are moderate men, is it not a fact that, as a body, they are 
 what may be termed the aggressive or movement party ? 
 Are not the most violent democrats and chartists almost 
 always dissenters, often led on, too, by the dissenting 
 minister? In Scotland, what people were so quiet so long 
 as there were none but paid " moderate " ministers among 
 them ? The minister's wife took tea with the factor's wife. 
 The heritor's praise was on their lips ; — the Government 
 stipend came regularly on every quarter-day, or was secure 
 independently of the people ; — and the minister preached 
 to poor paupers, living on 2d. a week, " patience, meekness, 
 
 * Sydney Smith's " Peter Plymley's Letters," p. 9. 
 
ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY. 519 
 
 longsuffering, respect to constituted authorities, and future 
 rewards," and from Aberdeen to Inverness, from Inverness 
 to John o' Groat's, not a soldier, or a policeman, or a con- 
 stable (except by name), was ever seen or known of. The 
 question of the right to present to livings, created a division 
 in the Scottish Kirk. Six hundred ministers left it, and 
 enrolled themselves as a voluntary Church, dependent upon 
 the people, under the title of the " Free Kirk of Scotland." 
 The factor disapproved of this, and went to the " moderate" 
 Church ; the newly created " Free " minister's wife no 
 longer took tea at his house ; bitter words passed ; the 
 heritors refused sites for new churches ; the people were 
 roused and excited, and fought with soldiers, sent to quell 
 them at Ross. The heritors were retaliated upon by being- 
 made to keep their paupers decently, on the applications 
 got up by Free Ministers, to the Court of Session ; and 
 ranklings, and heart burnings, and recriminations now 
 prevail, where once was profound quiet, and suppression of 
 evil. Why is this? Because when a worthy, but unfor- 
 tunately placed minister has to stir up the people for his 
 dinner, or, in order to pay his rent, it stirs up strife. ■ With 
 these examples before us, is it not patent what should be done 
 to quieten strife in Ireland ? Simply pay the priests.*' It is 
 better to do that, — better to pay three thousand priests, and 
 have an united and peaceful country — strong as one man, 
 as Scotland was, than to be obliged to pay a standing army 
 of twenty-five thousand soldiers, and ten thousand armed 
 police, to awe a discontented and unquiet people, and put 
 down outrage. Pay the priests, and Ireland will be a crutch 
 
 * " It would be very proper to abolish all payment of any dues, offerings, or 
 fees from the poor Papists to their priests, and to settle salaries for them, payable 
 by the Government (as the Protestant ministers in Holland), whose interests and 
 inclinations would thus be closely tied to those of the State, and consequently 
 they might be managed like cannons, whose mouths are still pointed just as they 
 please who fill their bellies." — Reflections and Resolutions proper for the 
 Gentlemen of Ireland, by Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, p. 80. 
 
520 PAYMENT OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY. 
 
 to the empire; at present it is a broken arm. I believe the 
 strongest argument against such a measure is the practical 
 one — "where is the money to come from?" We must 
 remember, however, that keeping in view proper gradations 
 of pay, the priests are single men, and, as such, 100/. or 
 150Z. a year, will provide them in Ireland with every 
 comfort which single men can desire, and some of the 
 luxuries of life. Compared with the benefits which, on 
 almost all hands amongst thinking men in Ireland, it is^con- 
 ceded, would accrue from the payment of the priesthood by 
 the State, the cost of their maintenance is not worthy of 
 being considered, were it much greater in amount than the 
 sum which would be found sufficient. 
 
 However, the time is not yet arrived, when such a measure 
 will find favour : and the chief obstacles which stand in its 
 way will be found amongst the blindly zealous Protestants 
 of England. 
 
EEVISIT DEKRYNANE. 621 
 
 LETTER XXXVI. 
 
 REVISIT DERRYNANE.— CONDITION OF MR. O'CONNELL'S 
 TENANTRY. 
 
 Revisit Derrynane, accompanied by one of the Reporters of Tlie Times — Re- 
 statement of previous Account of this Place — Relation of the Newspaper abuse, 
 and of the Falsehoods circulated on account of it — Account of our Visit, and 
 minute Description of Mr. O'Connell's Tenantry — The Glass-windows of 
 Derrynane Beg — Mr. O'Conney as a Middleman — Cahirciveen — The Libe- 
 rator's illustrious Pedigree — The Reporter's Description. 
 
 KiLLAENET, Kerkt, December 20. 
 It will be remembered that when in Kerry, a month ago, I 
 sent you (amongst other things) an account of the condition 
 of the tenantry on Mr. Daniel O'Connell's estate. I was 
 influenced to do so because that gentleman has perpetually, 
 by himself and by those under his influence, held himself 
 forth as the very pattern of good landlords, and in that 
 character has not spared the most lavish abuse of the 
 landlords of Ireland as a class. It was popular to abuse 
 landlords ; and, therefore, right or wrong, he abused them 
 for the sake of the popularity. I am not going to defend 
 the landlords of Ireland. I have not hesitated to mark out 
 for approval those who deserved it, as I have exposed the 
 evils flowing from the misconduct of bad landlords. For 
 these reasons I sought out Mr. Daniel O'Connell's property. 
 Had I found its management deserving of praise, and the 
 
522 
 
 REVISIT DERRYNANE. 
 
 condition of his tenantry cleanly, comfortable, and such as 
 befits the condition of human beings, I would as unhesitat- 
 ingly have praised him, as I did not shrink from exposing 
 him as a boasting impostor when I found his tenants living 
 in a state of squalid wretchedness and filth, neglected and 
 degraded to the lowest pitch of brutalised existence. I 
 described to you Mr. O'Connell as a middleman " for two- 
 thirds of his property, living on a profit-rent derived from 
 small tenants." And thus I described his general character 
 as a landlord, and the condition of his tenantry (I quote from 
 my former letter) : — 
 
 " His general character as a landlord or middleman is, that any tenant 
 who applies to him may have leave to erect a cabin where he pleases. He 
 permits subdivision to any extent. This wins a certain degree of po- 
 pularity ; but the land under lease by him is in consequence in the most 
 
 frightful state of over-population In this condition they are 
 
 left in a total state of neglect. They have no agricultural schools, no en- 
 couragement, none to lead or guide them ; and the poor creatures are left 
 to subdivide their land, and to multiply, and to blunder on, until, in the 
 words of ]VIr. Keane Mahony, ' their principal feature is distress.' " 
 
 I then proceeded to describe Derrynane Beg, which he 
 sublets as a middleman : — 
 
 " The distress of the people was horrible. There is not a pane of glass 
 in the parish, nor a window of any kind in half the cottages.* Some have 
 got a hole in the wall for light, with a board to stop it up. In not one in 
 a dozen is there a chair to sit upon, or anything whatever in the cottages 
 beyond an iron pot and a rude bedstead, with some straw on it, and not 
 always that. In many of them the smoke is coming out of the doorway, 
 for they have no chimney Unaided and unguided, the 
 
 * Mr. O'Connell got over this fact in a speech made in Conciliation Hall, in 
 contradiction of my previous letter, in a manner very characteristic. After reading 
 the paragraph, he burst out with — " The scoundrel ! if he had as many pains in 
 
 his bowels " A ready roar of laughter interrupted him, and he passed on to 
 
 another subject. This was certainly very ingenious, and admirably adapted for 
 an Irish audience, with whom it passed for argument and contradictory proof. 
 Any other audience would at once have seen that it was an admission of a most 
 discreditable fact, concealed under a joke. 
 
REVISIT DERRYNANE. 523 
 
 poor creatures are in the lowest degree of poverty I have yet seen, and 
 
 this within sight of Derrynane-house." "In future it 
 
 will be remembered that amongst the most neglectful landlords who are a 
 curse to Ireland, Daniel O'Connell ranks first — that on the estate of 
 Daniel O'Connell are to be found the most wretched tenants that are to 
 be seen in all Ireland. If a middleman is execrated as an useless drone 
 who squeezes the ver}'- life's blood out of his miserable tenants, the name 
 of Daniel O'Connell will not be forgotten. Though not the worst 
 among middlemen, he lives by the system." 
 
 I have quoted my former statement, in order tliat it may- 
 be compared with the evidence belovr. For making this 
 statement, every syllable of which, I repeat advisedly, is 
 literally true, I have been assailed with a perfect storm of 
 invective and abuse. Scarcely a newspaper in the country, 
 such is their cringing to the popularity of this man — such 
 their utter ignorance of the subject — has hesitated to brand 
 me as a " liar" for having written this. Letters of all 
 kinds contradicting me have been freely admitted into their 
 columns — letters which the evidence below will show to you 
 were wholly false. My very car-driver was examined ; and 
 his statement of what he imagined I did during a whole day 
 at Waterville, in the very midst of Mr. O'Connell's tenantry, 
 who were within a mile from me on all sides of that town, 
 was at once credited as a fact, though this very driver was 
 the whole day seven miles off, in the kitchen of a gentle- 
 man's house where I was staying, and not with me. 
 
 For obtaining such evidence from this man Mr. O'Connell 
 sent a letter of thanks to a Cork newspaper, and in it honours 
 me with the epithet of " the unhappy wretch." He will now 
 have sfood reason to thank his Cork friend, for it was this 
 step taken by the Cork newspaper and the industrious pro- 
 pagation of the carman's statement, or invented statement, 
 that mainly determined me to return again to Derrynane. 
 
 The Dublin Evening Post inserted a letter from an apothe- 
 cary named Fitzgerald, living at Carrick-on-Suir, in which 
 he says, " of his own knowledge" " there are excellent 
 
524 REVISIT DERRYNANE. 
 
 roads," " new and comfortable houses," " and valuable and 
 thriving plantations," on Mr. O'Connell's estate. On the 
 authority of this letter I was again branded as " a liar." You 
 will see from the evidence below, that, as descriptive of Mr. 
 O'Connell's estate, the letter is a falsehood. 
 
 Another person, named " Edward Carroll," dates a letter 
 from Clifden, Galway, which the editor of the Dublin Evening 
 Packet, in a most obliging " spirit of fair-play" inserts, and 
 vouches for the character and respectability of the gentle- 
 man. In his letter Mr. " Edward Carroll, of Clifden, 
 Galway," says, — 
 
 " I found, in the month of May, mangold-wurzel and Swedish turnips 
 of such a quality, and in such a state of preservation, as would do credit 
 to my practical friends, Kelly, at Portrane \ M'Cormick, at Lord Charle- 
 mont's ; or Skilling, at the National Model-farm. 
 
 Further on he says, — 
 
 " I found on the land a species of cultivation that would do credit to a 
 London market-gardener — all encouraged hy Mr. Maurice O'Connell." 
 
 On the strength of this letter, vouched for by the Duhlir 
 Evening Packet, every Conservative paper joined in the yell 
 against me as a " liar." You will find from the evidence 
 below, on the admission of Mr. Maurice O'Connell himself, 
 that there never ivere either turnips or mangold-wurzel grown 
 on his father's estate — that, in fact, every syllable of the 
 letter is a falsehood. 
 
 Thus met and contradicted in a plain statement of facts, 
 what was I to do ? I did that which every man who felt 
 convinced that he had stated nothing but the simple truth 
 would do. I offered to appoint six gentlemen to meet six of 
 Mr. O'Connell's friends, and to go over the estate and abide 
 by their decision. In England, that land of fair-play and 
 justice, would this challenge have been shrunk from if I 
 were the " liar" Mr. O'Connell and his backers and his 
 cringing, popularity-hunting opponents denounced me to 
 
KEVISIT DERRYNANE. 525 
 
 be ? But in Ireland, the tactique of my accusers was to 
 shrink from the proof, and reiterate the accusation. I wrote 
 to a number of gentlemen in different parts of Ireland, and 
 eight or nine immediately assented to be my umpires, ready 
 to meet the friends of Mr. O'Connell. The letters of those 
 gentlemen I have forwarded to you, that with you at least 
 there might be no question of my sincerity. Mr. O'Connell 
 shrank from the challenge, never alluded to it, but reiterated 
 accusations against me of " liar." I again wrote to my 
 friends, and asked them if they would assent to go with me, 
 and walk over Mr. O'Connell's estate, though he declined 
 to meet me ? Some of my friends thought this would give 
 the inquiry a partisan complexion, and declined to do this ; 
 others of them assented. As, however, there was a disin- 
 clination amongst them generally to be placed in the position 
 of partisans, I thought it unfair to press them to accompany 
 me alone. I was determined, however, that the cunning of 
 the cowardly impostor should not avail him. I therefore 
 wrote to you, requesting you to send down any gentleman 
 you might select from your establishment, and I would 
 accompany him back into Kerry and he should see for 
 himself, and take a note of what he saw in the presence of 
 Mr. O'Connell, or his friends, if they chose to accompany 
 us. I feel greatly obliged to you for acceding to my request ; 
 and the notes of that gentleman thus taken he sends to you, 
 along with this letter. 
 
 Before we arrived at Derrynane it was known there that 
 we were coming — our every movement was watched. We 
 spent three days in walking over the estate ; and, in order 
 that there might not be the suspicion even of party spirit, 
 we went into the cottages on every estate we passed. Your 
 reporter will describe to you the comparative comfort of Mr. 
 O'Connell's tenantry with that of the tenants of other land- 
 lords beside them. The first day we were accompanied by 
 Mr. Atkins, a gentleman of the neighbourhood (to whom I 
 
526 CONDITION OF MR. o'cONNELL's TENANTRY. 
 
 feel deeply indebted for the bold and manly way in which he 
 accompanied us), and by Mr. O'Sullivan, the agent of Mr. 
 Hartop, who went with us over a portion of Mr. O'Connell's 
 lands, held as a middleman under Mr. Hartop, and who 
 certainly left no point untried to say a good word for Mr. 
 O'Connell. It was indeed farcical, after coming out of a 
 wretched cabin and scrambling ankle deep through the 
 dunghill before it, coughing from the effects of the peat 
 smoke inside, dense enough to blind one, on uttering a 
 mingled expression of pity and disgust at the squalor, and 
 filth, and wretchedness within it, to hear him speak of some 
 scarcely passable lane, half a mile off — " Oh ! but the 
 Liberator has done much for this place. Didn't he, Pat 
 Sullivan, give 6s. a perch for making that road towards it ?" 
 To which Pat's ready and expected reply of course followed 
 — " To be sure he did, yer honour." 
 
 The second day we were accompanied from Valentia by 
 Mr. O'Connell's own steward, named Connell, throughout 
 the whole of our inspection. In many cases the poor people 
 durst not speak out before him. Naturally enough, he did 
 all he could to praise his master. Nothing, however, could 
 stand against cottage after cottage of squalor and misery ; 
 and the poor fellow at last gave up the attempt, and professed 
 to know nothing of the existence of a number of tenants on 
 an estate called Tarman's, close to Waterville, which is Mr. 
 O'Connell's fee-simple property, though he is the collector 
 of the rents. Long before night we had given up " picking" 
 our way, and we waded ankle deep through water and mud 
 and filth down a lane to this township of Tarman's, and 
 entered some cottages there, the horrid misery and filth of 
 which I never saw equalled on any other property in the 
 United Kingdom. Your reporter's notes will give you a 
 description of this estate. 
 
 The third day we were accompanied by Mr. Maurice 
 O'Connell himself, and with him inspected his father's 
 
CONDITION OF MR. o'cONNELL's TENANTRY. 527 
 
 estates, from Waterville to Derrynane Beg. At one town- 
 land (Ardcara), the wretchedness of which on my former 
 visit had struck me, at my request we stopped and entered 
 the cottages. This town-land Mr. O'Connell holds on a 
 lease for his own life under Mr. Bland, and sublets it as 
 a middleman. The condition of the huts was perfectly 
 horrible. In one of them, into which we all entered, in 
 the presence of Mr. Maurice O'Connell, I requested your 
 reporter to note down that a broken iron pot was the only 
 furniture of any description in it. The cottage was full of 
 stifling peat smoke, and a woman, clad in rags, with four 
 or five half-naked children about her, was squatted on the 
 mud-floor near some smouldering turf. The excuse here 
 was, that she was a pauper, and paid no rent. Mr. Bland, 
 of course, will get the odium of her condition, and have to 
 remove her eventually at his own cost when this middleman's 
 lease expires.* We entered six or seven cottages here all 
 nearly the same ; in some there was a turf-basket or two, in 
 some a table. This constituted the only difference among 
 them. I remarked, too, that Mr. Maurice O'Connell's 
 huntsman, who was with us, always entered the cottages 
 before us, and spoke three or four words of Irish in an 
 under tone. The effect of this introduction was that it was 
 very rarely that any tenant would speak anything but Irish, 
 and, of course, our questions were asked through him as 
 interpreter. 
 
 We drove on to Derrynane Beg. We entered it by a 
 bridle path for horses. Down this path a mountain stream 
 
 * It is stated that this woman was a beggar-woman, to whom the cottage was 
 given for shelter. It may be so. Her condition, however, was only worse in 
 degree, and that a very slight one, than that of her neighbours around her. She 
 had the same sort of cottage, of turf fire, and of food ; but she was a bench and a 
 coarsely-made wooden bedstead worse off in the articles of furniture. There were 
 cottages close besides this, occupied by tenants in every respect equally miserable. 
 Not, however, even to seem unfair, and at the sacrifice of much space, I have 
 given Mr. O'Connell's defence and reply to this letter in the Appendix, No. 13. 
 
528 COXDITION OF MR. o'cONNELL's TENANTRY. 
 
 was running ankle deep, and by this road we made our way, 
 jumping from stone to stone, and sometimes compelled to 
 wade to the much-reputed Derrynane Beg, The cottages 
 are built in clusters of two and three together — a dung-heap 
 always beside each, over which we had generally to scramble 
 to get into the door. We entered several of these cabins, 
 some inhabited by tenants, and others by labourers. In 
 their general description the cabins are thatched with potato 
 tops, with flat stones and sods piled on the thatches to mend 
 them and keep them down ; the doorways are narrow and 
 about four feet and a half high ; the windows of such 
 cottages as had them are about eight inches by ten, without 
 glass, and stopped up by boards ; many are without any hole 
 for a window at all ; a cow, or a pig, was usually inside, 
 and half a dozen children ; the cottages inside were almost 
 invariably quite dark and filled with smoke, which found its 
 way out of the doorways ; and our inspection was carried on 
 by means of lighted splints of bog timber, lighted at the turf- 
 fire on the mud-floor, the dull red glare of which through 
 the thick smoke on half-naked children, pigs, cows, filth, 
 and mud, was such a picture as I cannot draw. This is the 
 condition of the tenantry of Derrynane Beg, whom Mr. 
 Maurice O'Connell describes as " comfortably off," and to 
 see whom this gentleman had the astounding effronteiy that 
 very morning to invite your reporter, as an " act of justice," 
 because I had " caricatured" them in my former letter about 
 this place.* 
 
 * This letter was received by Mr. Russell (the gentleman sent down by 
 The Times) on the third day after our arrival, and when we were fifteen miles 
 nearer Killarney than at Derrynane Beg. We had already been twice close to 
 Derrynane Beg with friends of Mr. O'Connell ; and it is not improbable that it 
 was surmised we should not return a third time, and go a long way out of our 
 road back again to do so. If we did not accept the invitation of the letter on this 
 ground, then the letter would do admirably to use against us in Conciliation Hall 
 afterwards. I believed this to be the drift and meaning of the letter immediately, 
 as its contents were preposterously untrue, and such as no man could have seriously 
 
CONDITION OF MR. o'cONNELl's TENANTRY. 529 
 
 I have been all over England, Scotland, Wales, and 
 Ireland, and I declare to you solemnly, that in no part of 
 the United Kingdom is such neglected wretchedness — such 
 filth, such squalor, such misery of every kind — to be seen, 
 as I saw that day on Mr. O'Connell's estate, in the presence 
 of Mr. Maurice O'Connell. 
 
 Of the latter gentleman I do not wish to say one discour- 
 teous word. He met me as a gentleman. He parted with 
 ■me as such. 
 
 Repeatedly I asked in Derrynane Beg, where are the 
 much-vaunted glass windows ? With the exception of 
 Derrynane-house, and the steward's house, and one new 
 cottage, which is slate-roofed and building with sashes for 
 glass windows, I repeat my former statement, that there is 
 not a single pane of glass in the whole of Derrynane. The 
 tenants live in dark holes — not lighted houses. Mr. O'Con- 
 nell said that which was false, and knew it, when he gave 
 a sneering denial to this statement : not a tenant on his 
 Derrynane estate has a glass window, or anything but a 
 hole with a board in it to let in the light and wind when the 
 board is down. 
 
 Mr. O'Connell gave a sneering denial to the statement 
 that he is a middleman. When he did so he stated that 
 which was false, and knew it. Mr. O'Sullivan, Mr. Hartop's 
 agent, gave me the following list of town-lands, which he 
 rents under Mr. Hartop, and sublets to small tenants at a 
 profit-rent : — Ightercoa, Ballybrack, Shannacknuch, Coom- 
 naborna, Ballycarnahan, Gortnarmakanee, and Tureens. 
 For these town-lands, which are densely peopled by small 
 tenants and paupers, he pays Mr. Hartop 256/. 135. 4rf. a 
 year rent, and derives a profit-rent from them of about 400/. 
 
 written had he anticipated they would be put to the test. I immediately deter- 
 mined — and Mr. Russell concurred with me — on the propriety of literally 
 ccepting its invitation ; with what result Mr. Russell's report will show. 
 
 M M 
 
530 CONDITION OF MR. o'cONNELl's TENANTRY. 
 
 a year — that is, lie charges his small tenants as a middle- 
 man three times as much rent for the land as it is let for 
 to himself. He also holds the town-lands of Ferraneera, 
 Derrynane, and Conrnatloucane, under Lord Cork ; Cahir- 
 civeen, and other town-lands, under the Dublin College ; 
 and Ardcara, under Mr. Bland ; all of which he sublets as 
 a middleman, and derives a profit-rent from them. His 
 fee-simple property is said to be about 1,200Z. a year ; and 
 his profit-rent from lands which he rents and sublets as a 
 middleman is said to be about 2,O0OZ. a year ; making a 
 total income of about 3,200Z. a year. I heard Mr. Maurice 
 O'Connell state to your reporter that his father's income 
 was 3,400Z. a year. 
 
 And, now, having gone over Mr. O'Connell's estate for 
 three days, accompanied by his son and his servants, with 
 laborious minuteness, I ask, is there a single iota of my 
 former statement about his tenantry which is not in every 
 particular confirmed ? And yet, for making this statement I 
 have been branded by almost every newsjDaper in Ireland as 
 (to quote their phraseology) a " liar." 
 
 I need hardly tell you that I left Derrynane with a feeling 
 of indignation and disgust that I should thus be comiiellcd to 
 prove a patent truth, and that the falsehoods and unblushing- 
 assertions of an impudent impostor should have been trum- 
 peted forth in his praise by a hireling or a cringing, popu- 
 larity-hunting press. That that press will have the honesty 
 to do me justice I do not hope ; and I declare to you such is 
 the opinion I have formed of the greater })art of it, and such 
 is the estimation in which it is generally held, that I am alike 
 careless of its praise or its abuse. If Mr. O'Connell is not 
 yet satisfied, I am willing again to go back, and prove to 
 . any six gentlemen whatever, whom he may himself select, 
 provided only that they are gentlemen and men of honour, 
 that every assertion I have made about his property is strictly 
 true, and that he, as a necessary consequence, is the most 
 
CONDITION OF MR. o'cOXNELL's TENANTRY. 531 
 
 impudent impostor and unhlashing fabricator tbat the world 
 ever saw. 
 
 It remains now only for me to do an act of justice — to 
 thank the gentlemen who offered to accompany me. Though 
 I have not required their services, I am grateful to them for 
 standing by me as a stranger and alone, when to do so was 
 certain exposure to all the vile abuse of an unprincipled 
 press. 
 
 I feel bound also to say, that though Cahirciveen is dirty 
 enough, and has old hat-mended windows enough,* I have 
 seen worse towns in Ireland.^ The innkeeper at Cahirci- 
 veen, too, ought not to suffer for having received me. On 
 
 * TMiilst in this neighbourhood, on my second visit, we slept at the very com- 
 fortable hotel at Valentia, which island is the property of the Knight of Kerry. 
 Hearing that we were there, the Knight of Kerry offered to us the hospitaUties of 
 an Irish gentleman. I was highly amused by a story told us, in the presence of a 
 large dinner party, by INIrs. Fitzgerald, the first night we were at Valentia, and 
 before we had been to Cahirciveen. The wind having broken a pane of glass in 
 the drawing-room, she sent to Cahirciveen for the glazier to mend it, and, as she 
 ■was giving him directions, asked a very common question in the country, — what 
 news there was in Cahirciveen .' " Oh, great news," said the man ; — " The Times' 
 Commissioner has come again with another gentleman, and we expect them to 
 visit the town to-morrow, and we have had the street swept for half a mile out of 
 the town. It is a bad job for me commg here to-day, for I expect orders to mend 
 a lot of the broken windows. It would be a good thing for us if we had a Times' 
 Commissioner once a month among us." Next day, when we visited Cahirciveen, 
 we ascertained that the streets had been swept as the man said ; Mr. Primrose, 
 Mr. O'Connell's agent there, telling us it was only the usual contract sweeping. 
 The town certainly looked both cleaner and more trim than on my first visit ; and 
 in several things which I observed, and in which I could not be mistaken, there 
 had evidently been a preparation for us. 
 
 ■f This is the fact, though it does not say much for Cahirciveen. The Census 
 Commissioners of 1841 will best explain its condition, for they have especially 
 noticed " the barony of Iveragh, in the county of Kerry," in which is the parish 
 of Cahirciveen and the O'Connell property. " The inhabitants of this barony," 
 they say, " are living in a very low state as to household accommodation." To 
 show this, they have classified the houses into four classes. " In the lowest or 
 fourth class, are comprised all mud-cabins (or cabins built of stones and mud, 
 where stones are more plentiful than mud), having only one room ; in the third, a 
 better description of cottage, still built of mud, but varying from two to four 
 rooms, and windows ; in the second, a good farm-house, or in towns, a house in 
 a small street, having from five to nine rooms, and zvindoics ; and in the first, all 
 
 M M 2 
 
532 
 
 CONDITION OF MR. O CONNELL S TENANTRY. 
 
 my visiting- him this time he had certainly made his house 
 look clean and comfortable. There is but one hotel in the 
 town. Formerly there were two — one kept by a cousin of 
 Mr. O'Connell, of the excellence of whose house Mr. O'Con- 
 nell quoted an opinion of some Sportsman, to prove that I 
 " lied" about the inn. This O'Connell, the innkeeper, in 
 consequence of the illness of his wife, has declined receiving 
 travellers for the last twelve months. This Mr. O'Connell 
 knew, and when he quoted the Sportsman in opposition to my 
 account of another inn, he knew that he was stating a false- 
 hood. Subsequently Mr. O'Connell said there were two 
 inns, and I chose " the cheap and nasty" one. When Mr. 
 O'Connell stated this, he kiiew that there was but one inn, 
 and that he was stating a falsehood. 
 
 I have heard much about Mr. O'Connell's father, Morgan 
 Connell, who kept a huckster's shop in Cahirciveen, and of 
 
 houses of a better description than the preceding classes." On turning to page 
 198 of the Census, we find the statistics of the houses of the barony of Iveragh, 
 Cahir parish : — 
 
 Classification of Houses. 
 
 Rural portion .... 
 Cahirciveen town 
 
 First 
 Class. 
 
 Second 
 Class. 
 
 Third 
 Class. 
 
 Fourth 
 Class. 
 
 Tolal. 
 
 4 
 16 
 
 22 
 132 
 
 194 
 38 
 
 634 
 29 
 
 854 
 215 
 
 So that it appears there are 215 houses in Cahirciveen, only 16 of which are first- 
 class or good houses ; 132 of them are of the character " of houses in a small 
 street, with five to nine rooms ; " whilst the remainder of the houses, 07 in number, 
 are in the third and fourth classes — i. e., mud or undressed stone and mud built 
 cabins, with two rooms and one room, the latter ivithout windows. But what 
 a spectacle does the " rural portion" of Cahirciveen parish present, nearly the 
 whole of which is Mr. O'Connell's property, and the boasted portion of it ! Out 
 of 854 houses, 634 are mud and stone built cabins of one room and no windows, 
 and 194 have only two rooms and windotvs ; whilst out of 854 houses, there are 
 but 26 in the first and second class of houses — that is, good farm-houses ! 
 Unblushing effrontery can do much ; but it cannot surpass making a barefaced 
 boast of a district of country which the Census Commissioners show to be in this 
 condition. 
 
 i 
 f 
 
THE reporter's DESCRIPTION. 633 
 
 his pedigree and assumption of the " O" before his name.* 
 I have heard anecdotes of his craven cowardice, and of his 
 disgusting- profligacy. I enclose you proofs of all this to do 
 "with them as you please. I shall decline entering on those 
 subjects, lest it be thought that I am actuated by personal 
 spite against him. I have dealt with him and spoken of him 
 as a public man, and as a public man I cannot conceive any 
 human being more despicable. I have now done with this 
 man ; and, with a feeling of disgust at his impudent lying, 
 I simply refer you to your reporter's account of his visit to 
 Derrynane, which he encloses with my letter. 
 
 KiLLARNET, December 19. 
 
 Having, in compliance with your instructions, visited the property of 
 iMr. D. O'Connell, M.P., for the purpose of ascertaining the condition of 
 his tenantry, in reference to which much dispute has arisen between you 
 and that gentleman, owing to the remarks of your Commissioner, I shall 
 now proceed to state plainly and briefly the results of that visit. In doing 
 so, I may be permitted to say, that the observations I am about to make 
 are mere statements of fact, as plain as the sun in noon-day. I shall not 
 pretend to say that Mr. O'Connell is a good or a bad landlord — whether 
 your Commissioner is right or -wrong ; but describing things as I found 
 them — as they are visible to every eye — I shall leave the public to judge 
 the points at issue, and content myself with assuring you that no person, 
 consistently with the truth, can deny one iota of the statements I am 
 about to make. On Monday night, in company with your Commissioner, 
 I arrived at Waterville, a small village in Ballynaskelligs Bay, not far 
 distant from Derrynane Abbey, and close to some lands held by Mr. 
 
 * I have given in the Appendix Mr. O'Connell's answer in Conciliation Hall 
 to this letter, if eight newspaper columns of name-calling and abuse can be called 
 answer. In it, he denies the huckster's shop story, or rather evades it. I have 
 therefoi'e copied the account of his illustrious pedigree, as it appeared in The Times 
 in 1839, which I find tallies exactly with the statement which I heard whilst in 
 Kerry. It will be found, post, Appendk, No. 13. 
 
634 THE reporter's DESCRIPTION. 
 
 O'Connell. The following morning, ISIr. O'Sullivan, agent to Mr. 
 Hartop (an extensive landed pi-oprietor in this county, under whom Mr. 
 O'Connell rents several large farms), hajipcncd to call in at our hotel, 
 and I gladly availed mj-self of his local knowledge to visit those farms in 
 his company. I may premise here that Mr. O'Sullivan is a warm par- 
 tizan of Mr. O'Connell, and that, on every occasion of my visiting any 
 property of the honourable gentleman's I was attended by one or other of 
 his personal friends or adherents, in whose presence I took every note, 
 and made every observation I shall have to lay before you. In company 
 ■with your Commissioner, a neighbouring gentleman, najned Atkins, and 
 Mr. O'Sullivan, I proceeded to Tghtercoa, which lies a short distance 
 from Waterville, and is held on lease from IMr. narto]> by Mr. O'Connell. 
 The approach to it is by a half- finished road, commenced by the latter 
 gentleman, which winds up a hill -side divided into ragged fields by bank- 
 fences and walls. At either side are scattered^ cottages, the property of 
 Mr. O'Connell, or of Captain O'Connell, his relative. As a general 
 remark, it may be said that the Irish peasant builds his cabin in a hollow, 
 and having in a sort of way paved the ground about it, in a short time 
 procures a pond of mud around his dwelling, which the rains of winter 
 often raise so high as to flood the earthen floor within. This is parti- 
 cularly true of the cabins at Ightercoa, many of vihich are sunk four or 
 five feet below the level of the road. In general they are much dilapi- 
 dated, and give one the impression of dirty cow-houses ; whilst the laud 
 around them is in a very bad state of cultivation. The statements made 
 to us by the tenants (who are, for the most part, ill-clothed and ragged) 
 were made through one of themselves, who acted as our interpreter. 
 
 The first house we entered was that of P. Sullivan. It was nearly des- 
 titute of furniture, except a table, settle, and iron pot, and exhibited an 
 appearance of great neglect and dirt. The owner made several complaints 
 of his condition, which I shall not trouble you with, as he came forward 
 on the Thursday following, before Mr. M. O'Connell, and declared that 
 he had misinformed us. 
 
 James Sullivan, his neighbour and relative, had a similar dwelling. 
 There were no windows in either. The floors were of mud, and the in- 
 terior filled with smoke and children. The widow Sullivan, who rents 
 the grass of eight cows (that being the manner in which land is let in this 
 district), has a very good cottage, clean and well furnished. 
 
 A short way from it Avas a wretched hovel, covered with rotten 
 thatch, kept down by stones, through every chink of which the smoke 
 was issuing. It stood in a pool of mud. The door was so low and narrow 
 
THE reporter's DESCRIPTION. 535 
 
 that it required some dexterity to effect one's entrance. "When inside, the 
 light from a few sods of turf in one corner just sufficed to show the naked 
 walls — a heap of potatoes — an iron pot — a bed of stones covered with 
 straw, and the proprietress of all these — INIrs. Crahau — she was, we were 
 told, a poor widow paying no rent. " How, then, did she live ?' Was the 
 inquiry. " Oh ! she had a small holding of land the neighbours gave 
 her." " Where had she got that heap of potatoes ?" " She had begged 
 them about.'' Of course the cabin was full of children. The dwellings 
 of J. Boyle, the holder of seven cows' grass; of Michael Lynch, labourer, 
 who paid no rent, we were told; of P. Kelly, D. Shaw, D. Doyle, and 
 T. Grahan, exhibited similar scenes, with the exception of the first-named 
 tenants. Whenever we came across any tenement more than usually 
 wretched, we were sui'e to be informed that the occupant was rent free. 
 In every one of them were from four to eight children — whose we could 
 not well ascertain. The walls were of loose stones through which the 
 mnd came as it listed — the smoke found its exit through holes in the 
 roofs — there were no windows. In the cabin of Donnelly, surrounded by 
 turf smoke, and in utter darkness, lay a sick woman. Her bed was at 
 one end of the cabin, half-divided from the other portion of it by a 
 partition. Close to it was a space in the wall, originally intended for a 
 windoAv-frame, but now partially closed with some rough boards, through 
 every crevice of which blew the blasts of winter. We are told that she 
 had been ailing for a long, long time. Spectacles of varying distress and 
 n^lect were more or less visible, in all of those dwellings. Sometimes 
 a little butter, yarn, frieze, or a small quantity of very fine wheat (a 
 shameful proof of what the land could produce, if properly cultivated), 
 evinced some degree of industry and care on behalf of the occupants. 
 The exceptions to those remarks were to be found in the cottages of the 
 widow and of Michael Sullivan (as I before observed), and of Frank 
 Rowan, a retired coast-guard man, hale and hearty, though seventy-seveu 
 years of age, who showed, in the cleanliness and comfort of his dwelling, 
 that the training of his early life had not been lost on him. Those cot- 
 tages had been recently built, were roofed with slates, whitewashed, and 
 looked trim and neat in spite of the heaps of manure around them. 
 There were no mangold- wurzel, nor turnip fields visible ; few windows, 
 and much misery. Such was the farm of Ightercoa. At the other side 
 of the hill lay some land of Mr. Har top's, under the care of Mr. O' Sul- 
 livan, the cottages on which seemed clean, commodious, and well kept, 
 whilst the cultivation of the land seemed in general much better. The 
 most disgraceful of all the cabins I entered this day, were three hovels 
 
536 THE reporter's description. 
 
 on the road side, belonging to Captain O'ConnclI, Avho holds them as sub- 
 lessee from Mr. D. O'Connell, in the town-land of Ballybrack. They were 
 mere piles of loose stones, surrounded by mud and filth, ill-thatched, no 
 ventilation, no windows, and teeming with men, women, and children, 
 who were barely discernible in the darkness and smoke. "We could not 
 ascertain any particulars of the condition of those people. Having con- 
 tinued our inspection till dusk, we returned to Waterville, and thence 
 proceeded to Valentia, a distance of about ten miles. 
 
 , At Valentia, owing to the energy and kindness of the Knight of 
 Kerry, and Mrs. Fitzgerald, there is so much comfort, cleanliness, and 
 industry, that it is scarcely possible to believe one is in Ireland at all — 
 far less in the most western portion of it. The extensive slate-quarries 
 give ample employment to every able-bodied man on the island. Well- 
 built, and roomy cottages are springing up on every side. Mrs. Fitz- 
 gerald employs a number of women in the manufacture of linen table- 
 cloths, napkins, flannel, &c. ; and has succeeded in procuring the estab- 
 lishment of a national school, which is attended daily by nearly 300 
 children. The flax is grown, scutched, spun, woven, and finished in its 
 various forms on the island. Mangold-wurzel and green crops have been 
 successfully grown by the Knight, and are coming into favour with the 
 farmers. 
 
 On Wednesday morning, Mr. John Connell, a collector and book- 
 keeper to Mr. M. O'Connell, M.P., waited on me at the Valentia Hotel, 
 with a letter from that gentleman, in which he demanded, " as an act of 
 justice to his father," the adoption of the very course I was about to take 
 — namely, making a personal inspection of the property at and near 
 Derrynane ; at the same time offering me every facility to arrive at the 
 truth, and denouncing your Commissioner's previous statements re- 
 specting that property as a caricature. Availing ourselves of the local 
 knowledge and information necessarily possessed by Mr. Connell, and of 
 the proffer of his services, we proceeded e?t route to Derrynane, with the 
 intention of examining into the condition of the tenantry under the 
 honourable member for Cork on the various farms held by him along the 
 road. 
 
 The country in this district consists of rugged hills, more or less 
 rocky, surrounding extensive tracts of land, which at present, from the 
 want of the most trifling attention to drainage, produce nothing but turf, 
 but might, by a little outlay of time, labour, and capital, be made to bear 
 the finest green crops. The hill-sides, being drained of tlicir surface 
 water by their natural declination, arc generally selected for the habita- 
 
THE reporter's DESCRIPTION. 537 
 
 tions of the peasantry, [though infinitely less fertile than the valleys 
 and plams beneath. The land is divided into straggling fields, scratched 
 into " lazylbeds" for potatoes. The cottages are generally huddled to- 
 gether in irregular clusters of from five to ten or fifteen. 
 
 Immediately at the sea-shore of the main-land, opposite Valentia 
 Island, lies the town-land of Rynard, containing about fifty families, held 
 by Mr. O'Connell, under Trinity College, on the usual renewable lease. 
 
 Although the great majority of the houses on this property are in a 
 wretched condition — without windows or chimneys, ill-thatched and 
 filthy, surrounded by cess-pools and semi-liquid manure — it is to be 
 observed, that signs of improvement are visible, in the erection of several 
 substantial stone-cottages with slate roofs, &c., by the tenants, who are 
 furnished, according to the usual custom, with lime, slates, and wood, by 
 the landlord. The system of agriculture, as shown by the condition of 
 the fields, seems very bad, although the sea-shore, lying close to the farm, 
 offers great advantages in affording the best manure for the improvement 
 of the land. 
 
 Oughermung, which is college property, contains about thirty-six 
 houses. The cottages of D. Sullivan and D. Currane were the first we 
 entered — a feat requiring no ordinary circumspection and agility by 
 reason of the mounds of mud and manure surrounding them. They were 
 poor, comfortless places, nearly dark inside (as boards blocked up the 
 holes in the walls intended by the^ builder as sites for windows), with a 
 rough deal table, a settle, an iron pot, some few earthen vessels, potato 
 heap, &c., as furnitiure. Yet Daniel Sullivan was a snug farmer, renting 
 six cows' grass, and having the same number of children, who were lying 
 promiscuously along the mud floor of their cottage. 
 
 Currane was not near so well off. He paid 21. a'year for the grass of 
 one cow. His cabin was tumbling to decay; around it was a stagnant 
 pool of mud; inside, in addition to the articles already enumerated, was an, 
 ass, sharing the comforts of the cottage with his master, and propped on 
 a heap of rough stones, covered with a rugged counterpane of unknown 
 colour, was a heap of straw and a drugget, — that master's bed. 
 
 A little apart from these was the house of T. Sullivan, junior, who, 
 with his twelve children, a sick cow, and two pigs, suffering under some 
 grievous malady, occupied the same room. For a dirty cabin, and the 
 grass of four cows and a horse, he paid, he said, 11/. a year to Mr. 
 O'Connell. In answer to our inquiries as to his condition, he replied 
 that the food of himself and family all the year round was potatoes and 
 buttermilk. " "Were the potatoes good ?" " Troth they were not, bad 
 
538 THE reporter's description. 
 
 as could be ;" aud he proved the assertion by cutting open a number of 
 them taken at random from the heap, aud showing us the extent of the 
 disease. " Had he plenty of potatoes?" " Indeed, he had not." " Of 
 milk ?" " Never, nor half enough. Kever had enough for either dinner, 
 nor breakfast. All his children were as badly off as himself, not half 
 enough of potatoes, and often nothing to drink with them, as he could 
 only afford the milk of one stripper for his family. He had no fish, and 
 very little of anything." This was the substance of his storj^, translated 
 to us by an interpreter, ]\Ir. Connell, and yet he was " a large holder," 
 though his bed Avas of straw, his cabin falling to pieces, and the mud 
 outside percolating to the interior, where it was trodden into a filthy 
 adhesive earthy glue by the feet and hoofs of the semi-naked children, 
 pigs, fowl, and cattle. 
 
 L/eaving this scene of wretchedness, we proceeded along tlie main 
 road, until the appearance of two respectable-looking, well-mounted 
 farmers, induced us to stop the carriage, and enter into conversation with 
 them. Their description of the general condition of the peasantry showed 
 that the statements of Tom Sullivan were but too applicable to his class. 
 *' The people," they said, " are very, very, badly off, sir ! The potatoes 
 failing them. The rents are dear, and food is scarce and bad." " I," 
 said one of th*m, " pay 25 Z. a year for the grass of seven coavs, and can get 
 nothing but potatoes and milk all the year round." Here ]\Ir. Connell 
 interposed, and asked, in a tone of great surprise, " Do you mean, to say, 
 Corny, that you never eat beef or bacon?" "Ah, sure you know 
 yourself, John Connell, that I can't kill a cow or a pig for myself — that 
 all goes to the rent." In continuation, our mformant, who seemed an 
 intelligent small farmer, stated " that five praties, and a drop of sour 
 milk" (that is, of sour buttermilk), were the staple diet of his class, " of 
 the best of them," and that all their cows, pigs, extra produce, butter, &c., 
 went to pay their rents. These men were tenants of Mr. J. O'Conncll. 
 
 Kilcoman was the next townland which we inspected. It contains 
 about fourteen houses and ninety inhabitants. The first cottage wc visited 
 was that of M. Kelly, who rented the grass of one cow, for which he paid 
 50*. a year. His dwelling was very misei'able, and the unusual circum- 
 stance of its possessing a glass window served but to reveal the dirt and 
 squalor inside more completely. A settle, an old dresser, and an ii'on pot 
 constituted the furniture. Off the general room Avas an apartment in 
 which 1 was told there Avas a bed. As I stooped to examine into its condi- 
 tion, my foot Avent plash into some Avatcr, and on looking downi I ix;r- 
 ceived that the bedstead was literally propped ou stones, around which 
 was collected a filthy pool. 
 
 1 
 
THE reporter's DESCRIPTION. 539 
 
 M. Kelly, whose cottage was in a state of great dirt and poverty, bad 
 had the grass of four cows, hut had given that of two to his daughter on 
 her marriage. He and his seven children slept on heaps of straw in the 
 same place as his cows, which were placidly cheAving the cud in the centre 
 of the Tootk at the time we entered it. We then paid a visit to his 
 daughter s cottage. The room — the only room it contained — was about 
 eight feet square, and dark as pitch. The thatch was rotting; the cess- 
 pool up to the threshold of the doorway, which it required some eifort to 
 get through. At one end was a feeble fire, round which was seated the 
 usual group of women, old and young, and children of all ages and sizes, 
 barely distinguishable through the smoke which filled it to suffocation. 
 Up and down was placed the furniture, viz., — a bed, the condition of 
 which could not be ascertained, a coarse deal table, an iron pot, some turf 
 baskets — et jorceterea ?u'hil. The proprietress of all these was a young 
 woman eighteen years of age. She seemed at least twenty-eight. Her 
 story was but too common. At fourteen she married a man of thirty. 
 Her father divided his land with her. She was now the mother of four 
 children, with the prospect of having many more, and there, in smoke, 
 filth, rags, and utter poverty, she lived, and would live to the end of her 
 days, rearing up a squaUd progeny to live as their father and mother had 
 lived before them. 
 
 Pat Kelly's was the next cottage we visited, and there, with few modi- 
 fications, was visible the scene already witnessed throughout our inspec- 
 tion. He paid 71. 19s. for four cows' grass. His cottage contained one 
 room, which, at the time we were there, gave shelter to a horse and some 
 of his cows. These were admitted to be fair samples of the remaining 
 houses in this townland. Beyond this lies the property of Mr. Spottis- 
 wood and jMr. Fitzgerald, which presented painful evidence of neglect and 
 mismanagement. Close to the very road-side on the former gentleman's 
 estate were habitations, swarming with human beings, cut out of the bog 
 in which they stood — the roof being composed of the top sods placed on a 
 framework of sticks. One could scarcely credit the fact that even savages 
 could live there, but as the carriage passed along the road, innumerable 
 heads and faces peered out of the holes intended as doorways and surveyed 
 the strangers with a shy curiosity, or, emboldened by hunger, the owners 
 rushed out in pursuit of us, screaming in chorus and in English, " Pray 
 give us a halfpenny." From one house, on Mr. Fitzgerald's property, six 
 children nearly naked, the rags fluttering around them like the streamers 
 of a scarecrow, pursued us for a considerable distance, shouting and 
 begging, " Please, one halfpenny," as loudly as they could. 
 
540 THE reporter's description. 
 
 The aspect of the adjacent farm of Nurrigh, belonging to the Marquis 
 of Lansdowne, was very different. Here, with few exceptions, well slated 
 houses, shining with whitewash, met the eye — the fields looked well cul- 
 tivated, the hedges and potato and cabbage gardens neat and trim, and the 
 exceptions seemed in general rather attributable to the careleftness of the 
 tenant than to the neglect of the landlord. We entered the house of Dan 
 Sullivan; it was roomy, clean outside with whitewash, and tolerably neat 
 within ; well filled with the ordinary furniture of the Kerry peasant, — 
 wooden seats and tables, a dresser, feather bed, &c. A large pot of pota- 
 toes was boiling over the fire, and the farmer's daughter had just removed 
 another containing boiled cabbages for the cows; and yet this man had but 
 two cows' grass, for which he paid 41. 16s. a year. This was a fair sample 
 of his lordship's tenantry on this land, some being better, and some, but 
 very few, being worse. 
 
 We then proceeded to Tarmons, a farm held in fee simple by Mr. 
 O'Connell, containing (according to the census of 1841) sixty-one houses, 
 and a population of 319 persons. 
 
 The first house we entered on this estate was that of a smith, named 
 Murphy. It was newly built of stone and Avell slated, but inside it did 
 not look nearly so neat or comfortable as that of Dan Sullivan, though 
 Murphy, in addition to the profits of his labour as a smith, had the grass 
 of five cows, at a.rent of 6^. Still it was comparatively good, and unusually 
 well furnished. It was, however, surrounded by mud and heaps of 
 manure. A little higher up on the same road was a hovel of the most 
 miserable description. It was built of loose stones, Avithout mortar or 
 cement, and thatched with half-decayed potato stalks and rushes. In the 
 front was an opening, about 3^ feet high by 2^ broad, intended as a door- 
 way, and partially blocked up by a slab of slate to keep the children in 
 and the pigs out. Inside, the darkness was so great that it required a con- 
 siderable time for the eye to discern anything distinctly, and then appeared 
 the naked walls — a heap of stones covered with an old mat, a bed by 
 night, a seat by day, some old turf-baskets, an iron pot, some cocks and 
 hens, awoman crouching over afew sods of turf, and three children sprawl- 
 ing on the heather which was laid on the mud floor to soak up the wet. 
 This woman was the wife of T. Galasan, who Avas " away." She paid 25s. 
 a year for her cottage, to a man named Keatinge, and 40*. a year for con- 
 acre, which Avas her only means of support. At first Mr. Connell said 
 that this was a poor widow who paid no rent, and was allowed to remain 
 there for charity sake ; but on the truth coming out (for the Avoman spoke 
 English), he was forced to declare that he did not know the fact, and most 
 certainly was not aware that she paid rent. 
 
 1 
 
THE reporter's DESCRIPTION. 541 
 
 Keatinge, on being sent for and interrogated by Mr. Connell, admitted 
 that four or five years ago his rent had been reduced by Mr. O'Connell 
 from 7/. 5s. to 51., on the express condition that he did not sublet his hold- 
 ing, or exact rent from those poor creatures who, to the number of three, 
 had become his under-tenants. Yet Mr. O'Comiell's man of business 
 was not aware that this agreement had been annually broken for five 
 years, nor did he know that these persons were in existence at all. 
 
 The condition of Keatinge's other tenants, J. Keatinge and T. Keatinge 
 (his brother), was deplorable in the extreme. The hovel of the former was 
 of the very worst class — dark as night, decayed and damp, destitute of any 
 article of comfort or decency, with a roof of rotten potato stalks, sur- 
 rounded A\ath mud and filth. That of his brother, with whom he divided 
 his holding, was nearly as bad ; but the state of their landlord himself — 
 this middleman m petto — was not much better. With all his expedients 
 to procure money, he and his household were ill clad, his dwelling miser- 
 able and dirty, shared in common with his cows, whilst, as he himself said, 
 his feeding was poor and scarce — potatoes and milk, andjeldom as much 
 of either as he wanted. 
 
 But LjTich's dwelling was as bad as the worst we had inspected, and his 
 condition equally miserable with those of his fellow-sufferers. Having 
 thus gone over several houses in this fee-simple property of !Mr. O'Connell, 
 and having been informed by his collector that they were a fair sample of 
 the rest of them, owing to the lateness of the hour, we Avere compelled to 
 suspend our labours and return to Valentia. 
 
 Starting at an early hour the following morning I arrived at Cahu-ci- 
 veen at 10 o'clock ; I shall leave to your commissioner the description of 
 its aspect by daylight. "WTbilst sitting in the hotel Mr. Trant, a magistrate 
 of the county, entering the room, informed me that Thomas Sullivan, of 
 Oaghermung (whose house I visited on the preceding day, and whose tes- 
 timony I have already given), was outside, and wished to make evidence 
 on oath that he had quite misinformed me as to his condition — in other 
 words, that he was desirous of swearing that he had been telling me lies. 
 Sullivan w^as called in, and as it appeared that he was quite ready to take 
 an affidavit, I took from Mr. Trant, who acted as interpreter, the follow- 
 ing explanation of Sullivan's previous statement :— He imagined that I 
 and yoiu* Commissioner were coming from Government to inquire into the 
 state of the potato crop, and he therefore exaggerated the badness of its 
 condition and the poverty of his cvvn as much as possible. He now wished 
 to say that he was not nearly so badly off as he had stated ; that he had 
 plenty of potatoes and milk ; that he had a bed-tick, which was in the loft 
 
542 
 
 THE REPORTER S DESCRIPTION. 
 
 when Vie inspected his cottage ; and that his rent was only 10/. lOs., instead 
 of 11/., and, having said all this, Sullivan returned homewards with a 
 walk of some seven or eight miles before hun quite satisfied that he had 
 done his duty in proving himself a misrepresenter of facts. 
 
 At 2 o'clock I arrived at Waterville, the property of Mr. Butler, who 
 has made considerable exertions to improve the condition of his property, 
 though there are some wretched hovels on part of his land. Here JVIr. 
 ]M. O'Connell, M.P., was awaiting my arrival, and in company Avith him 
 and your Commissioner I proceeded in his carriage to visit that portion 
 of his father's property in the more immediate neighbourhood of Derry- 
 nane Abbey. Before we left Waterville Mr. O'Connell, addressing two 
 or three persons in the crowd which were about his carriage, asked them 
 several questions, the result of which was the persons addressed declared 
 that Mr. O'Connell was a good easy landlord, and had reduced their rents 
 in the lands of Baslikaun and Inchies. 
 
 Having heard these statements we went on to Ardcara, a farm held 
 tinder Mr. C. Bland by Mr. O'Connell for his life. It is covered with 
 clusters of the most miserable-looking hovels. A lane, or boreen, more 
 like the bed of a watercourse than the thoroughfare to a considerable 
 hamlet, led up to these squalid wigwams. Accompanied by Mr. O'Connell 
 and an interpreter, Patrick Galavan, one of that gentleman's attendants, 
 we entered the first Ave came to, after a great struggle with the mud. It 
 was composed of loose stones covered in with bad straw thatch, and graced 
 with the usual heap of dung before the door. Inside it was quite dark ; 
 the smoke, filling the interior, curled out of the doorway or the chinks in 
 the walls. There were no windows, and the chinmey was stopped up. 
 Sweeny, the occupant, had 51. a year for his holding. Opposite this 
 cabin was the residence of a poor ragged creature named Maurice 
 O'Connell. It was considerably worse than that described above. He 
 had, he said, been ejected from another farm, and had purchased his 
 present dwelling from its former occupant for 32*., but had paid no I'cnt 
 since. 
 
 Mary "Wade, who was, we Averc told, a stray beggar, Ave found living 
 in a sort of outhouse, in utter darkness and indescribable Avretchedncss. 
 A few sods of turf Avere smouldering on the mud floor, and iilling the 
 hovel Avith smoke ; beside them lay a sick child on some straw, and 
 around them Avere two or three more. The sole furniture Avas a broken 
 iron pot, which I was requested by your Commissioner to note down in 
 Mr. O'Connell's presence. 
 
 Next came J. Donoghue's cabin. It Avas scarcely clean enough for an 
 
THE reporter's DESCRIPTION. 543 
 
 English pigstye. He, his wife, and four children slept on a heap of straw. 
 Mr. O'Connell seemed surprised at the existence of himself or his cottage, 
 and asked his wife where she came from. " From her own village, 
 Ardcara," she said. He then inquired hoAV long she had been there? 
 She replied for nine years. We asked her how she and her family lived. 
 " Very, very badly," she said. " Her husband had a little score-ground 
 (con-acre), but they had not half enough of potatoes to eat, and nothing 
 else. Mr. O'Connell only took l.y. a year from them." The only seat in 
 the house was a heap of stones, and a chest sufficed for their table. 
 
 The nest tenant, named Donnelly, was, if possible, in a more de- 
 plorable condition, and seemed equally unknown to Mr. O'Connell, 
 though he had lived in his present hut for four years. There was no 
 window in it — no chair ; some sticks in the corner, an iron pot, and a bed 
 of straw, were all the furniture I could see. At first he could not say 
 whether he paid any rent or not, but at last he remembered that he paid 
 11. a year for the grass of one cow. The doorway, Avhich was surrounded 
 by mud, was about three feet high by two feet broad. Close to this were 
 two hovels, quite as miserable, which with several others that we entered 
 were held by the same class of tenants. Further description would be 
 tedious and useless ; they were all alike. 
 
 On our way from this terrible place Ave observed a mound perched 
 over a mud heap by the road side. It was covered with potato stalks; 
 iu the side was a hole, through which I in vain endeavoured to enter. 
 Inside was a wretched old woman— " the widow Mulcahy." The only 
 furniture I could observe was a vessel and a heap of straw spread on 
 stones ; but Paddy Galavan asserted that there was a bed inside. Mr. 
 O'Connell could not say whether she was a tenant of his or not ; but a 
 bystander (one of his tenants,) said, her " cottage'' and that side of the 
 road belonged to Mr. Butler. 
 
 Lohur, the next farm, was a series of wretched lots, quite as bad or even 
 worse than the last. In reference to some observation made by me, Mr. 
 O'Connell observed that he had never looked at the furniture of his 
 tenants before, and in the course of our visit further remarked, that some 
 of them he had seen for the first time that day. 
 
 On this farm we visited the dwellings of Widow IMacarthy, IMary 
 Sullivan, J. Teehan, &c., who were all in a state bordering on pauperism, 
 though rent payers. 
 
 The tenantry of Kilmacloughan were just as badly off; their cabins, 
 "built of loose stones, cemented with mud, badly thatched, without win- 
 dows, and swarming with men, women, and children. Leaving this 
 
544 THE reporter's description. 
 
 portion of the property, we proceeded towards the Abbey. The road 
 skirted the brow of a lofty chain of hills, beneath which was Adsible a 
 broad plain running down to the sea, and covered with an amazing num- 
 ber of cabins. This was the town-land of Farrenahow, the property of 
 Mr. O'Connell, which was, we were told, in just the same condition as the 
 lands we had inspected, as indeed, was evident enough from the exterior 
 of the cabins. At length we arrived at Derrynane Beg, Avhich is at a short 
 distance from the residence of Mr. O'Connell. The cabins are situated 
 along the margin of a boreen (which was a foot deep in mud and water 
 the day we had the pleasure of treading it), along the declivity of a steep 
 hill, running from the high road down to the sea. They are sixty-two in 
 number, and are certainly the worst, taking them all in all, I have seen. 
 There is one cottage in the course of erection which exhibits a roof of slate. 
 The rest are built of mud and stones, very small and low, wedged together 
 in trenches of filth and liquid nastiness — badly thatched, and for the most 
 part without chimneys. In not one of them did I see a pane of glass, or 
 any substitute for a window but a hole stopped up with boards. The 
 largest tenant on this farm was Pat Brennan, who held the grass of three 
 cows, for which he paid 11. a year. His cabin was filled with smoke, and, 
 as it was too dark to see, a splinter of bog-fir, which is used here for 
 candles, was lighted, and enabled us to discern that it was miserable to a 
 degree, and that two of the cows aforesaid were joint occupants of it with 
 himself and children. Being anxious to see the family bed, I had a tough 
 encounter with the cows to get through to the further end of the cabin, 
 and fear I should have failed but for the assistance of Paddy Galavan, who 
 pulled them by the tails as I shoved, and so enabled me to effect my 
 entrance. Mr. O'Connell assured me that the greater portion of the 
 persons on this farm paid their rents in labour, and that a sum exceeding 
 the rental of that property was sometimes paid over to them. Certainly 
 they were most miserable, yet the " boreen" which passes by their dwel- 
 lings leads by a short cut to the Abbey at the other side of the same hill. 
 
 Having been requested to refer to your Commissioner's statement 
 respecting the condition of the tenantry on Derrynane Beg, I can safely 
 say that it is quite correct, as a description not only of their condition, 
 but generally of all the property I have visited here, with the exception 
 of the farm at Rynard, and Lord Lansdowne's estate. There are no glass 
 Avindows, and the people seem to be in much distress. Tliere is no man- 
 gold-wurzel grown there. As Mr. M. O'Connell said, " they are not 
 come to that yet." There are no green crops visible ; there J are no agri- 
 cultural schools, nor instructors. With the exception of the free school 
 
THE reporter's DESCRIPTION. 545 
 
 at the Abbey, and one at Cahirciveen, I could not discover that there were 
 any means of educating the childixn on the estates of IVIr. O'Connell that 
 I visited. The only plantations I saw were the trees around Derrynane. 
 The people in general seem quite ignorant of the merest rudiments 
 of agriculture ; draining is quite neglected, and subsoiling a thing un- 
 known. The cattle I saw were of a very bad description. 
 
 To use the words of Lord Devon's report, the agricultural labourer 
 on Mr. O'Connell's estate is " badly housed, badly fed, badly clothed, and 
 badly paid," — and the only food of his tenantry is the potato. Their 
 cabins are seldom a protection against the weather ; a bed or a blanket is 
 a rare luxury, and nearly in all their pig and manure-heap constitute 
 their only property. I now close this narrative with the most perfect 
 confidence that not one statement I have made can be disproved, and that 
 no impartial or intelligent witness can on similar careful inspection he- 
 sitate for an instant to concur in !|every observation I have thought it my 
 duty to make, and to confirm in the fullest manner the truth of the de- 
 scription given by your commissioner, for which he has been so violently 
 assailed. 
 
 N N 
 
546 MR. o'connell's defence. 
 
 LETTER XXXVII. 
 
 MR. O'CONNELL, HIS DEFENCE AND HIS ILLUSTRIOUS 
 PEDIGREE.— THE WORKING OF THE NEW POOR LAW 
 IN IRELAND. 
 
 The Irish Newspapers and Mr. O'Connell — The Mrs. Gamp of the Irish Press — 
 Mr. O'Connell, and his Speech in Defence of himself in Conciliation Hall — The 
 glass Windows of Derrynane Beg — Mr. O'Connell and his illustrious Pedigree 
 — The New Poor Law in Ireland — Review of its Provisions, and Observations 
 as to its applicability to Ireland — Absence of any Law of Settlement, and means 
 of putting a stop to Begging in Ireland — The Beggars of Ireland — The Dietary 
 of the Work -houses — Effect of Potato Diet — Repugnance to Cleanliness amongst 
 the People — Advantage of the Union Work-houses in forcing this habit upon 
 those who enter them — Unpopularity of the Poor Law. 
 
 Dublin, Jamiaiy 1, 1846. 
 The Dublin newspapers arc quite full of the history of the 
 recent deserved exposure of " the great middleman" O'Con- 
 nell. The ardent admirers and supporters of that gentleman 
 are very naturally in a great flutter thereat. So long as 
 invective, abuse, perversion of facts, and mis-statements 
 could deceive the Irish people, these weapons were not 
 wanting, but it has completely doubled their flank to exhibit 
 the god of their idolatry in his true colours as a " great 
 middleman," and landlord over a wretched and neglected 
 tenantry. 
 
 One of the newspapers, whose feathers seem rather surpris- 
 ingly ruflled at Mr. O'Conncll's exposure, is called the 
 
MR. o'connell's defence. 547 
 
 Duhliii Evening Packet. This neAvspaper is the Mrs, Gamp 
 of the Irish press. Like Mrs. Gamp of Shoe-lane, she 
 esteems herself to be the Government organ. The Irish 
 Mrs. Gamp is in a very great " fix." As the Government 
 organ, Mrs. Gamp of the Irish press feels hound to condemn 
 Mr. O'Connell ; as a thick and thin supporter of landlords 
 and middlemen, both individually and as a class, Mrs. Gamp 
 feels bound to support a landlord and middleman, and there- 
 fore to support Mr. O'Connell under his recent tribulation, 
 as a kind of " waning-moon." Mrs. Gamp is highly desirous 
 of po]3ularity ; there is nothing of which she stands so much 
 in need. To defend O'Connell is popular — in Conciliation- 
 hall, ergo it is desirable for her to defend O'Connell. The 
 majority of reasons is therefore for Mrs. Gamp to defend 
 O'Connell, which she does to the best of her ability, and is 
 determined, in that respect, not to be out-done by the Repeal 
 journals. In undertaking the task the Irish Mrs. Gamp 
 puts on great dignity — terms you " an infamous journal," and 
 says she is sure that, " personally I am beneath her notice." 
 Altogether, as the railway-share footman of Berkeley-square 
 remarked of her original, she is a most "emusingj^rint," and 
 her perusal very much " emused" me. I do not, however, 
 imagine that you will be greatly troabled at the workings of 
 her wrathful spirit, and for my own part " personally," I 
 should under all circumstances, beg to decline her " notice." 
 She, however, forms a most appropriate " bob-tail" to the 
 " tag-rag" of Concihation-hall. 
 
 In no less a flutter is the impostor O'Connell himself. In 
 a speech, remarkable only for its great length (for it occupies 
 eight columns of the Freeman's Jowmal)^' he flounders away 
 
 * This speech will be found — 
 
 " Like a wounded snake, 
 Dragging its slow length along ' ' — 
 
 in the Appendix, post, No. 13. 
 
 N N 2 
 
548 MR. o'coN Nell's defence. 
 
 and attempts in vain to weaken the force of facts which are 
 incontrovertible, and the disgrace of which will stick to him 
 as long as he continues to he the curse of Ireland, and to mar 
 her prosperity with his sordid agitation. In one of the state 
 prosecutions, during the Chancellorship of Lord Thurlow, it 
 is said that Lord Thurlow was extremely impatient to learn 
 the progress of the trial. When informed that the Attorney- 
 Gen ei'al was still addressing the jury, and had been speaking 
 for eight hours, he gave vent to his mortification at the failure 
 which his acuteness foresaw, and exclaimed, in no very 
 choice terms, " There can be very little treason, then, if it 
 takes the Attorney-General eight hours to convince the jury 
 of it." It may be very fairly assumed that any case is a bad 
 one which requires a practised lawyer and debater to take 
 eight columns of a newspaper to mystify and defend it. 
 
 I shall not, however, wade through his speech, and weaken 
 the force of the exposure he has deservedly drawn upon 
 himself. That exposure remains unanswered, and is un- 
 answerable. He, however, complains tliat one of your 
 Parliamentary reporters should be sent down to accompany 
 me on my re-investigation of the condition of his miserable 
 tenantry. He had the option of twelve Irish gentlemen, if 
 he chose to meet them, and because your reporter, as every 
 man must have done who stated the truth, corroborated the 
 description I gave of his tenantry, he says, " We stand 
 together like the quack doctor and his son. The quack 
 doctor and his son are on the stage together. The child 
 cried out, ' Good people my father is the finest physician in 
 the world.' The father says, ' The child speaks truth.' 
 ' My father (said the son) cures all manner of diseases.' 
 The father again says, ' The child speaks truth.' " Mr. 
 O'Connell is not the first man who has been detected in the 
 position of the Roman soldier on march, who — 
 
 " Sees the wallet of the man before, 
 But marks not that which loads himself behind. " 
 
 i 
 
MR, O CONNELL S DEFENCE. 
 
 549 
 
 For never was there a truer description of himself as the 
 quack with his son Maurice, " heel-tapping" him (as he terms 
 it), than this example, only the instance is reversed, for the 
 father boasts of his virtues as a landlord, and the son " heel- 
 taps" him. Thus — (I quote from the Freeman s report of 
 his speech) — " I stand here the first j^erson who introduced 
 improvements at the landlord's expense in a great district of 
 this country." The audience " heel-tap" him with " hear, 
 hear," and his son Maurice writes, " My father speaks truth." 
 He proceeds — " I stand here the person who was principally 
 instrumental in changing the order of things in that district 
 to such a state as this — that whereas there were but two cars 
 when I commenced my improvements, there are now 1,200 
 to 1,500 cars." Again the audience " heel-tap" him with 
 " hear, hear," and his son Maurice writes, " My father speaks 
 truth." He goes on, " I stand here the person who first 
 introduced the system of landlords paying for the improve- 
 ments of houses." The audience gives him another " heel- 
 tapi^ing ;" and his own son, Maurice, writes, " My father 
 speaks truth." He improves in modesty as he proceeds and 
 goes on — " I stand here also the refuge — I am not flattering 
 myself too much when I say so — of the poor and distressed, 
 because when men are driven by other landlords from their 
 property they find a refuge on mine, wherever I can give it 
 to them at the time." Another " heel-tapping" from his 
 well-informed audience, and Maurice writes, " My father 
 speaks truth." This is the style of the speech and of the 
 authority on which it rests. Its modesty is peculiar — its 
 truth is O'Connellite— the public may very safely believe as 
 much or as little of it as they please. What the father pro- 
 tests, the son avers — what Daniel says, Maurice swears — but 
 beyond their interested assertions there is no evidence. Mr. 
 O'Connell complains that your reporter did not state all he 
 was told by his son and steward and one or two tenants. I 
 think your reporter acted wisely and properly in not doing 
 
550 MR. o'coN Nell's defence. 
 
 so. In tiie first place, the statements of Mr. Maurice O'Con- 
 nell or liis clerk, unless backed by the evidence of facts, were 
 worth nothing ; secondly, what a poor Irish tenant may say 
 about his landlord to a stranger, in that landlord's presence, 
 and in the presence of the rent collector, is not Avorth much, 
 unless backed by the evidence of facts. In all cases the facts 
 showed great misery and neglect, and filthiuess and want of 
 encouragement and instruction ; and, thirdly, the very morn- 
 ing Mr. Maurice O'Connell accompanied us, tAvo tenants 
 came to your reporter to deny the truth of their previous 
 statements to him, and one of them offered to make an 
 affidavit that what he had told him the day before was false. 
 Under these circumstances every one must concede that his 
 only proper course was to believe his own eyesight and 
 nothing else; what he saw was misery in every phase, and 
 he simply described the facts as he saw them. 
 
 Mr. O'Connell complains that we picked out the wretched 
 cottages, and passed by the good ones. This is untrue. But, 
 according to him, there are no wretched cottages ; and if 
 there are not, how could we pick them out ? The truth is, 
 that on each townland of his that we saw, eighteen or nine- 
 teen out of every twenty cottages are most wretched ; the one 
 or two decent cottages on a townland were always picked 
 out for us, and we invariably entered them, and your repor- 
 ter has faithfully described them. Mr. O'Connell says, he 
 will " make me a compliment of the glass windows," which 
 in his peculiar phraseology is acknowledging the fact to be as 
 I stated it — that his " comfortable cottages" have got no 
 windows. I think I may fairly " thank him for nothing" 
 here.* 
 
 * In another part of his speech, Mr. O'Connell alludes to my statement, that 
 his father kept a huckster's shop in Cahirciveen. This he does not deny, but 
 says his father died ten years before Cahirciveen was built as a town, and then 
 says, — " See what a truth-telling gentleman we have to deal with!"' Tliis is 
 
 ' See Appendix, No. 13, ;;o6Y. 
 
MR. o'coxnell's defence. 551 
 
 I have, however, said more than enough about this impos- 
 tor. The whole fabric of deception on which his reputation 
 rests is so hollow and absurd, that when exposed he becomes 
 
 precisely a similar evasion to the one about the panes of glass in Derrynans Beg — ■ 
 wishing " I had as many pains in my bowels." The wish, if realised, could not 
 do me much harm ; but it is just possible that, as he afterwards ' ' made me a compli- 
 ment of the glass wmdows," so he will make me a compliment of the Huckster's 
 shop. As he may perhaps desire particulars, I will give him a few.'^ Wkere 
 Cahirciveen now stands, Mr. O'Conuell's father, Morgan Connell, kept a huck- 
 ster's shop, and dealt in butter, lard, cow-hides, and groceries, and was a licensed 
 dealer in tea, coffee, pepper, tobacco, snuffs, &c. It was also a store-shop for 
 such vessels as called at Valentia harbour. Report speaks of him as having done 
 " a good stroke of work" as a free-trader in tobacco, and as profiting consider- 
 ably by the goods of those who had the misfortune to be wrecked on the coast. 
 When, by these means, he had scraped together a Uttle money, he began to take 
 land as a middleman, to let out to small tenants at a profit-rent. It was in these 
 days of humble money-grubbing that Mr. O' Connell was sent — then plain Daniel 
 Connell — to St. Omer, in France, to be educated as a parish priest. Two years 
 of the youth of Daniel Connell were thus spent. On his return, his uncle Maurice 
 (who also was a middleman at Derrynane) had scraped some money together by 
 rather notorious free-trading. His mode of conducting business — and a very- 
 profitable mode of business it is said to have been — was to pack /ree-^rarfff 
 tobacco in butter firkins, and having buttered up each end, to send them as butter 
 to Cork, where they were disposed of to discreet purchasers. By this means he 
 amassed money, and young Daniel was led to aspire higher than the then humble 
 vocation of a parish priest, and he entered himself for the bar. As Daniel Connelly 
 his name stands on the books of the Law Courts in Dublin. His uncle Maurice, 
 at this period, started " a brace of ugly beagles," dressed himself in dirty leatherns 
 and buttered brown tops, wore a hunting-cap, and became a Magnus Apollo in 
 the district. He looked down on his brother Morgan, and assumed the " O " 
 before his name. It was not in young Daniel's nature to resist copying this piece 
 of humbug — that being the stock in trade, backed by undeniable ability, on which 
 he sought to buUd his future success. He accordingly assumed the " O ;" and 
 an anecdote is told of a witty barrister who went by the name of Jerry Keller, 
 refusing in Court to call him O'ConneU, and persisting in calling him Mr. Connell. 
 Daniel's wrath was excited thereat, and, in an angry tone, he said, — " My name 
 is O'ConneU, sir." "O?" said Jerry Keller; — "yes, I remember 'O' in 
 prosody is ' datur ambigiiis.' "•' Now this, if Mr. O'ConneU desire it, is 
 
 ^ See Letters, extracted from T/ie Times, on this subject, post, Appendix, 
 No. 14. 
 
 ^ See Appendix, No. 14, post, where evidently the same anecdote is differ- 
 ently related. 
 
552 THE WORKING OF THE 
 
 more an object of ridicule and contempt than of serious 
 notice. 
 
 I have abstained hitherto from all allusion to the working 
 of the New Poor Law in Ireland, anxious to hear as many 
 opinions regarding it as possible, and not too hastily to form 
 a judgment of the operation of a law which is yet in its 
 infancy. I need hardly say that it is impossible for any one 
 to kave travelled through the whole country, as I have done, 
 without frequently hearing its merits discussed. 
 
 Until the passing of the Irish New Poor Law Act (the 1st 
 and 2nd Victoria, c. 56) Ireland was without any system of 
 poor laws. Her paupers, her aged and her helpless, depended 
 upon the charity of their neighbours, or led a vagrant life 
 wandering about the country soliciting alms, which, partly 
 from the good feeling of the people (based very much, no 
 doubt, on the conviction that it was a duty to give charity to 
 those who appeared destitute, and were without legal pro- 
 vision), and partly from a superstitious dread of the curse of 
 the poor, were rarely refused. The soliciting of alms had, 
 however, long become a trade of sturdy beggars, and was an 
 intolerable nuisance. 
 
 At the passing of the New Poor Law Act many gentlemen 
 in Ireland held, and still hold, the opinion, that the support 
 
 capable of being substantiated by very good evidence. I should not have named 
 this matter but for his absurd boasting. His son Maurice speaks of his " grand- 
 iincle Count O'Connell," in a letter read by Mr O'Connell in his speech. 
 Perhaps Mr. O'Connell has learned wisdom by this time, and sees that the more 
 you stir a puddle the worse it becomes, and " will make me a compliment" of 
 " the huckster's shop" and the " O," as he did of the glass windows of Derry- 
 nane Beg. As, however, he is fond of giving names and taking titles, he cannot 
 take to himself a more appropriate one than " Derrynane Beg," for the reputa- 
 tion of that interesting locality will stick to him for the rest of his days. The 
 "grand-uncle," too, ought not to be forgotten, and his title may, with much 
 propriety, descend upon his very harmless grand-nephew, who will really grace 
 the title of ^^ Count Maurice O'Connell!" Only think what an effect the 
 announcement will have in Conciliation Hall, — " Count Maurice O'Connell will 
 take the chair !" 
 
NEAV POOR LAW IN IRELAND. 553 
 
 of the destitute should be left to the strong tie of attachment 
 of kindred, which is said to be a marked trait of the Irish 
 character. However generally this feeling may prevail 
 amongst the Irish people, as indeed it does amongst every 
 people, still it is certain that the feeling could not, in all 
 cases, be relied on ; and if it could not, we have the picture 
 presented of a nation providing no legal relief for its destitute 
 members, but suffering them to starve in the midst of its 
 community. Now, it is a moral certainty that no one will 
 starve so long as food can be procured by any means, and 
 that if it cannot be procured by fair means, theft and violence 
 will be resorted to to obtain it. But the nation, by its laws, 
 punishes theft and violence. Without some legal provision, 
 therefore, for the destitute, society commits an injustice in 
 first leaving a destitute person no alternative but to steal to 
 support life, and then in punishing him for stealing. It is 
 manifest, therefore, on every principle of justice and sound 
 policy that some poor law is necessary ; and the question only 
 remains, if the particular poor law, which has been given to 
 Ireland, is applicable to the prejudices and wants of the 
 people. 
 
 On this question I intend to lay before you an impartial 
 review of facts as they exist ; and I think they will prove that 
 mixed with much good in principle, the law is unjust and 
 harsh ; in practice, it is for the most part unsuitable to the 
 wants and habits of the people, and is a dead letter ; and that 
 among all classes it is most unpopular. 
 
 But first as to its injustice and harshness. 
 
 The principle of the law is to compel every man in the 
 community, able to support himself, to contribute towards the 
 support of those few in the community who may become 
 destitute and unable to support themselves. So far the 
 principle is good. It is in fact neither more nor less than a 
 compulsory and universal benefit society. The difficulty of 
 levying these compulsory contributions, or poor-rates, from 
 
554 THE AVORKING OF THE 
 
 k 
 
 the lowest class of tenants, has led to a slight modification of 
 this machinery ; and now, by the Gtli and 7th Victoria, 
 chap. 92, the lessors of property of less value than 4Z. in the 
 country, and 8/, in municipal boroughs, are rated instead of 
 the occupiers. This, howevei*, does not alter the principle of 
 the law, for the rent of the occupier is almost invariably 
 proportionately increased, to cover the amount of poor-rates 
 which have been paid by the lessor on his behalf. 
 
 Now it is manifestly unjust to compel a man by law to 
 contribute to a great benefit society, or, in other w'ords, to a 
 union workhouse to aid in supporting the destitute poor of 
 that union, unless, as in every other benefit society, you give 
 him an equal and equivalent riglit hy law to be supported by 
 that union, should he himself become destitute. But the law 
 gives no such equal right. It says — " I will compel you to con- 
 tribute towards the relief of others, but I will give you no 
 riglit to claim relief should you unfortunately require it." 
 
 The following is the 41st section of the Act (1 and 2 Vic- 
 toria, c. 56), from which this will be seen to be the law. 
 
 " 41. And be it enacted, that when the Commissioners shall have 
 declared any workhouse of any union to be fit for the reception of 
 destitute poor, and not before, it shall be lawful for the guardians at their 
 discreiio7i, but subject in all cases to the orders of the Commissioners to 
 take order for relieving and aellivg to work therein ; in the first place 
 such destitute poor persons as by reason of old age, infirmity, or defect 
 maj^ be unable to support themselves, and destitute children ; and, in the 
 next place, such other persons as the said guardians shall deem to be 
 destitute poor and unable to support themselves by their own industry, or 
 by other lawful means: provided always, that in any case where there 
 may not be sufficient accommodation for the relief of all the persons 
 appl^'ing for relief, whom the guardians shall deem to be destitute poor, 
 the guardians shall relieve such of the said persons as may be resident in 
 the u7iion befoee or in preference to those who may not be so resident.''* 
 
 Therefore a destitute pauper who may liave been made to 
 pay rates to support others for a dozen years has no legal claim 
 to relief; but he is to be relieved or not according to " the 
 
NEW POOR LAW IN IRELAND. 555 
 
 discretion" of the guardians ; and tliis discretion allowed to 
 the sfuardians is defined in the notes of the authorized edition 
 of the Act, to be " a legal discretion ; that is, the exercise of 
 a reasonable discretion, consistent with the giving of effect to 
 the purposes of the Act." 
 
 And the paupers must be relieved xoithin the workhouse, 
 and should they not be " old and infirm," then only after all 
 the old and infirm are relieved icithin the workhouse. So 
 that if the workhouse be full, none but the " old and infirm" 
 can be relieved, even though "deemed destitute;" and 
 should they be "old and infirm," as Avell as be " deemed 
 destitute," and the workhouse be full, then, if they do not 
 reside in the union (or even if they should), they shall be 
 left to starve. Now, is this really just? or is it wise or 
 politic, looking at the primary reason for the establishment of 
 a Poor Law — namely, that the State ought not to allow any 
 man to starve or compel him to resort to the alternative of 
 stealing to support life, and then punish him for stealing ? 
 
 But not only is this the principle of the law, but with an 
 excess of cruelty it has decided that should the guardians 
 abuse the " discretion' which is vested in them, and refuse 
 to " deem" an utterly destitute man " to be destitute ;" or 
 should they in carrying out the law, because the workhouse 
 was full, refuse to relieve a person whom they had " deemed 
 to be destitute," he not being old and infirm ; or should they, 
 as compelled by the Act, because the workhouse was full, 
 refuse to relieve a person both " old and infirm," and whom 
 they had " deemed to be destitute," then in any one of these 
 possible and very probable cases the person so unjustly 
 dealt by, or so crowded out of the workhouse, shall have no 
 remedy and no appeal, but shall be left to starve or to steal. 
 For by the 3rd clause of the Act (1 and 2 Victoria, c. 56) it 
 is provided, 
 
 (After placing the relief of the poor under the dii-ection and control of 
 the Poor Law Commissioners) as follows : — " Provided always that 
 
556 THE WORKING OF THE 
 
 nothing in this act contained shall be construed as eyiabling the Com- 
 missioners, or any of them, to interfere in any individual case for the purpose 
 of order mg relief." 
 
 Surely no one can call this a humane law, or anything but 
 an unjust and a harsh law. I will, however, show you that 
 cases may and do arise, in which these harsh and unjust 
 principles of the law are brought into operation. The Belfast 
 Union workhouse is capable of containing 1000 persons.* 
 On the 27th day of last December (1845) there were remain- 
 ing in the workhouse 936 persons. Trade is now brisk, the 
 winter is mild, and work can be obtained. In fact I was 
 informed that there is not an able-bodied man in Belfast, who 
 chooses to work, but can obtain work. Yet, under such cir- 
 cumstances, and in a large town like Belfast, the fact of 
 sixty-four more persons becoming destitute would stop the 
 possibility of giving further relief to any other persons, for 
 none can be relieved by law except within the workhouse, 
 and the Poor Law Commissioners by law cannot interfere 
 " for the purpose of ordering relief." Should, therefore, a 
 hard winter arise, or a reverse in trade take place, to throw 
 people out of work, as soon as the workhouse is full, there is 
 an end to legal relief, and the destitute must starve or steal. 
 But that is a possible case; I will give you instances of 
 cases which have repeatedly occurred. 
 
 In a case of sudden or urgent necessity there is no power 
 of giving relief, till the guardians, " in their discretion," 
 have " deemed the party destitute," and then only if there 
 be room for him in the workhouse.f In any case of sick- 
 ness, accident, or bodily or mental infirmity, if the party 
 cannot be removed into the workhouse, the guardians have no 
 power to give relief. In the union of Newtownards, near 
 
 * I have been informed, subsequently to the writing of this letter, that since it 
 was built, it has been enlarged so as to enable it to contain twelve hundred. 
 
 ■f By a recent order of the Poor Law Commissioners, I am informed the master 
 may of himself admit any pauper whose case he shall deem urgent, subject to the 
 approval of the Board at their next meeting — that is, if the house be not full. 
 
NEW POOR LAW IN IRELAND. 557 
 
 Belfast, not long^go, a woman, with a sucking child, caught 
 a malignant fever. The woman was sent to the hospital, her 
 infant child had then no one to take care of it or support it ; 
 and it is a fact that the child was sent into the hospital to be 
 suckled by the fevered mother, because there was no power 
 under the New Poor Law to support it out of doors, or in 
 the workhouse, without its mother.* 
 
 The great fault of the Poor Law is its want of adaptability 
 to circumstances. One unvarying rule is followed for town 
 and country, and that law which may be very fairly fitted 
 for the one is wholly unfitted for the other. Thus in towns 
 it is seen that, though great harshness and cruelty may arise 
 under it, yet the people go into the workhouses : it is an 
 operative law. But in the country the reverse is the fact. 
 The people will not go into the workhouses, and the law is 
 inoperative and a dead letter for purposes of relief, though 
 not for the purposes of taxation. Thus at the union work- 
 house at Dunfanaghy, in Donegal, a country district, I was 
 informed the workhouse cost 5000Z., for which sum interest 
 at 5 per cent, was paid, or 2501. a year ; the expenses of sala- 
 ries, management, collecting rate, house expenses, and so 
 forth, amounted to nearly 250/. a year more. To meet this 
 expenditure the property of the union district, estimated at 
 10,000Z., is rated at Is. in the pound, realizing 5001. sl year. 
 At the time that I was at Dunfanaghy — now about three 
 months ago, there was just one pauper in the union work- 
 house, who thus cost 500Z. a year to support him. This 
 must not be attributed to the absence of destitution, for a 
 poorer town than Dunfanaghy is not often met with, but to 
 the positive repugnance and refusal of the people to go into 
 the workhouse. Their friends and neighbours pay the rates, 
 and support them also by charity at home. There being no 
 
 * In this respect, however, the guardians, to their honour, generally break the 
 law, and, in such cases, in practice will support the child separate from the 
 mother. 
 
558 THE WORKING OF THE 
 
 law of settlement in Ireland, there can be no vagrant act ; 
 beggars cannot, therefore, either be driven away or appre- 
 hended ; and they swarm in every part of Ireland. The 
 moment a coach or car stops to take up passengers or 
 change hoi'ses in any street or road in any part of Ireland, it 
 is surrounded by women, children, and old men, thrusting 
 their hands into the windows of the coaches, begging and 
 almost demanding charity. This habit is both degrading 
 and demoralising ; and, what is most painful to an English 
 ear, the name of the Deity is perpetually on their lips, and 
 is used with a thoughtlessness and indifferent habitual care- 
 lessness which excites disgust. Amid the confusion of look- 
 ing after your luggage, and paying the porter and the 
 coachman, you are beset on all sides with cries of " God 
 Almighty bless yer honour — pity the poor;" " Give a copper 
 to a poor woman, for the love of God," and so on. If you 
 ask them, "Why don't you goto the workhouse?" they tell 
 you they are starved in the house, and won't go into it. As 
 to this matter, I ascertained at the union workhouse at Bal- 
 ly shannon, Donegal, whilst there, that the diet of the paupers 
 is ^ lb. of oatmeal for breakfast, and 1 gill of milk; and, for 
 dinner, 3^- lbs. of potatoes. At Belfast, amongst a more 
 mixed race, the diet is obliged to be made better. In the 
 union workhouse there, the diet is, four days in the week, 
 for breakfast, six ounces of meal and tvv'O-thirds of a pint of 
 buttermilk ; dinner, 2 lb. of potatoes and one pint and a half 
 of soup ; supper, 4 ounces of oatmeal and two-thirds of a 
 pint of buttermilk. This diet is slightly varied on the other 
 days in the week, by giving 3 lbs. of potatoes to dinner and 
 two-thirds of a pint of buttermilk instead of soup. At New- 
 townards Union, near Belfast, the dietary is precisely the 
 same. In amount of food this would seem sufficient, birt its 
 quality must be taken into consideration. The Irish peasant, 
 fed on potatoes, has a craving for a large quantity of food. 
 Nature must have a certain amount of nourishment in order 
 
NEW POOR LAW IN IRELAND. 559 
 
 to support tlie functions of life. Potatoes contain very little 
 
 nourishment; to obtain, therefore, the requisite amount of 
 
 nourishment from them as food, a large quantity must be 
 
 taken. By continually living on this large quantity of poor 
 
 food the stomach of the Irish peasant becomes enlarged, and 
 
 craves for the quantity. It is a physiological fact, which 
 
 dissection has established, that a potato-fed peasant has a 
 
 stomach of nearly twice the ordinary size. The evidence 
 
 taken before the Poor Law Commissioners, previously to 
 
 the establishment of the new Poor Law in Ireland, proves 
 
 that 10 lbs., 12 lbs., and even 14 lbs. weight of potatoes are 
 
 usually consumed by an Irish peasant each day.* Living 
 
 on bread and beef, no London coal-whipper, working and 
 
 sweating like a horse all day, and from morning till night 
 
 going at a jog trot on a plank with two hundredweight 
 
 of coals on his back, ever consumes, or can consume, more 
 
 than 4 lbs. or 5 lbs. weight of food per day. When the Irish 
 
 pauper is first admitted into the union workhouse, and 
 
 has breakfasted on half a pound of oatmeal made into 
 
 " thickens," until his stomach has accommodated itself to 
 
 that better diet, he is only half satisfied — he wants stufiing 
 
 out with quantity. 
 
 The chief objection, however, of the paupers against going 
 into the workhouse, or remaining in it is, that they are 
 compelled to wash themselves and keep themselves clean. 
 When a three months' coating of dirt has been removed 
 from their limbs, they go shivering about as if they had lost 
 half their clothing, and no doubt do feel cold from the want 
 of their accustomed covering. They are also forbidden to 
 smoke, which is the greatest hardship to them. 
 
 The union workhouses themselves are all built on one 
 plan, and are generally clean and orderly inside. They are 
 precisely similar to the union workhouses in England, and 
 
 * See note f , ante, p. 75. 
 
560 THE NEW POOR LAW IN IRELAND. 
 
 further clescrijDtlon is unnecessary. The greatest benefit 
 which can result from them, and I think it is one of their 
 chief values, is, that they must tend to instil habits of order 
 and cleanliness amongst the lowest class of the Irish poor. 
 And never did neglected creatures, living their whole lives 
 amidst filth and dirt and untidyness, more require teaching 
 and showing the blessings of order and cleanliness. 
 
 This advantage, however, is not incompatible with a system 
 of local government, capable of adaptability to the circum- 
 stances of each locality. I do not, however, think that such 
 local government should be without some general supervi- 
 sion, and control, and power of appeal. The habit oijohhing 
 is so inveterate in the Irish character, that without some 
 such supervision the greatest abuses would very soon be per- 
 petrated. 
 
 As the law, however, now is, it is unvarying in its applica- 
 tion — it adapts itself to no circumstances of town or country. 
 It is at one time cruel and unjust to the poor ; at another 
 unfair and unjust on the rate-payer ; and I am fully warranted 
 in saying that amongst all classes it is most unpopular, and 
 in many respects I think justly so; and what is a greater 
 evil, it fails in its object. 
 
BELFAST. 561 
 
 LETTER XXXVIII. 
 
 BELFAST; ITS INDUSTRY AND ENTERPRISE, AND ITS 
 CONSEQUENT PROSPERITY AND WEALTH. 
 
 Travelling in Ireland — Bianconi's Cars — Has the Character of the People of the 
 North anything to do with their Prosperity ? — Is Labour the source of aU. 
 Wealth ? — If the People of the North can thrive under existing Laws and 
 Institutions, it is not the Laws and Institutions which make the People of the 
 rest of Ireland poor — Comparison between Down and Kerry — The comparative 
 Prosperity and Education of the East and West of Ireland shown — The Linen 
 Trade of Belfast — Flax Spinning — The Employment which the Flax Mills 
 give — The growth of Flax — Its profit as a Crop — Improvement in its Manu- 
 facture — Its profitable Cultivation in Mayo — The Manufactures of Belfast — The 
 Shipping of Belfast — The Tonnage, Exports, and Imports — Advance in Pro- 
 sperity since the Union with England — Belfast prospered unaided — The Banks 
 of Belfast — Its Institutions — Condition of the People — Their Wages — The 
 Landlords — Tendency of Tenantry to subdivide their Holdings — The soul of 
 Ireland — Belfast a better barometer than Conciliation Hall — Newry, 
 
 Belfast, January 4. 
 After the rapidity witli which you are whirled about in 
 England, from one end of the island to the other, nothing 
 can be more tedious than travelling in Ireland. That 
 tediousness, too, is augmented by the fact that, except on 
 the great lines of road, there are few public conveyances. 
 Off the great lines of road, coaches are unknown, and the 
 cars of Bianconi are the only public vehicles : between many 
 places you do not even find these. The journey, for 
 instance, from Limerick to Belfast, has to be performed by 
 
 o o 
 
562 BELFAST ; ITS INDUSTRY AND ENTERPRISE, 
 
 travellino; over two sides of a triano-le — first to Dublin, then 
 to Belfast. Attempt a direct line, and you have an awful 
 outside-car journey before you, for in the counties of 
 Tipperary, Westmeath, and Cavan, you will find no other 
 vehicles. Even by the roads and means of travelling in 
 Ireland something may be learned of the character of the 
 people. There were no roads between many places of 
 importance, and no public conveyances, and no efforts were 
 made to obtain either till Mr. Anderson, a resident Scotch 
 gentleman, projected roads and mail coaches for Ireland. 
 His great efforts for the public good were rewarded by the 
 Government by the title of Baronet being given to his son, 
 the present Sir James Anderson. His attempt, however, to 
 force on the people a degree of civilisation for which they 
 were not prepared, to give them good roads and public 
 vehicles, ended in the loss of his own fortune, and the 
 services of Mr. Anderson are forgotten. His was not that 
 "patriotism" which is paid for by the people of Ireland. 
 The next man who attempted to supply an evident want 
 was Mr. Bianconi, a clever Italian. By slowly proceeding 
 step by step, and by providing a cheap, though most com- 
 fortless conveyance, but adapted to the wants and habits of 
 the people, this gentleman has realised a large fortune, and 
 is really one of the greatest benefactors the country possesses. 
 To his individual energy and industry Ireland owes, in very 
 many parts of the country, her sole means of inter-com- 
 munication. But is it not strange, that in this common 
 matter Ireland could not help herself, but should be indebted 
 to foreigners? 
 
 My present letter is addressed to you from a town which 
 I have long intended to visit, for many reasons connected 
 with my inquiry. 
 
 In my earlier letters I endeavoured first to find out the 
 character of the Irish people before I ventured to write 
 about what measures were required to ameliorate and 
 
AND CONSEQUENT PROSPERITY AND WEALTH. 563 
 
 advance their condition. I hazarded an unpopular opinion, 
 that the mixed inhabitants, chiefly of Scotch and English 
 descent, in the northern and eastern counties of Ireland, 
 partook so much of the energy and industrious spirit of 
 their fatherland, that they needed but to be left alone to 
 achieve their own prosperity. Bnt that the inhabitants of 
 the great bulk of Ireland, of the midland counties, of the 
 south, and of the west — those of pure Irish extraction, had 
 so much of listless apathy, of indolent indifference, of 
 enduring contentment with any deprivations in their con- 
 stitution, that in order to improve them it was necessary to 
 urge them on, shame them on, lead them on, instruct, and, 
 if necessary, compel them to exert themselves for their own 
 advancement. 
 
 In almost the first letter that I wrote I endeavoured to 
 elucidate the political economist's doctrine, that " labour is 
 the source of all wealth,'' and to apply that doctrine to 
 Ireland. 
 
 I have arrived at length in the very heart of the Scotch 
 and English population of Ireland; we will see if it be 
 true that they can and do prosper, if left to achieve their 
 own advancement by the simple force of their own energy, 
 industry, and enterprise. 
 
 We will examine, too, if " labour is the source of all 
 wealth." If we find that the industry of the people of the 
 north has realised wealth and capital, and that that capital 
 has again promoted employment, fostered that industry 
 which created it, and led to general prosperity, then do we 
 arrive at the unerring conclusion that the perpetual whine 
 about the " want of capital," which is continually heard in 
 the south and west, as an answer for the neglect of every 
 undertaking, is but, in other words, an acknowledgment of 
 the " want of industry." 
 
 As the same laws and constitutions govern, and generally 
 the same opportunities are open to the whole of Ireland, we 
 
 o o 2 
 
564 BELFAST ; ITS INDU.STRY AND ENTERPRISE, 
 
 shall, too, come to this further unerring conclusion, that if 
 the people of the north can prosper, live in comfort, and 
 realise the capital which enables them to rival England in 
 the markets of the world, whilst the people of the south 
 and west are without prosperity, without comfort, and 
 without capital, it is a delusion to tell the country that it is 
 a want of a change in the law and constitution, and the 
 want of opportunity which boM^s it down ; and those who 
 thus deceive the people of Ireland ought rather to be 
 execrated as the worst enemies that Ireland can have, than 
 be held up to public admiration. 
 
 I shall, however, deal in hard facts, and leave them to 
 make their way among sensible Irishmen. 
 
 I came here direct from Kerry in the extreme west of 
 Ireland. In Kerry, on the estates of one of the " patriots " 
 (so called) of Ireland, and indeed, generally, all over the 
 county, I saw wretched hovels, barefooted women, naked 
 unemployed children, and men too lazy, too ignorant, too 
 apathetic, and content with discomfort, to either cultivate 
 their land properly or make themselves dwellings better 
 than cow-houses. There, not a tree, nor a hedge, nor a 
 turnip-field is to be seen ; and the signs of industry are 
 overwhelmed by the evidences of laziness and neglect. 
 Here, in the county of Down, under the same laws in the 
 same country, without a single advantage in climate, soil, or 
 opportunity, the houses are well built, clean, and replete 
 ■with every comfort; the women are well clotlied; every boy 
 and girl is employed and earning money, and every man is 
 fully and profitably occupied. In Kerry, vast undrained 
 bogs are the chief feature — as productiveless as they are 
 unpicturesque.'^ In Down, nearly every portion of the 
 land seems cultivated ; the fields are generally green from 
 
 * See Appendix No. 17, showing the amount of unimjiroveJ pasture and bog 
 lauds in the several counties. 
 
AND CONSEQUENT PROSPERITY AND AVEALTH. 565 
 
 tliorongh draining,* and divided by trim blacktliorn hedges, 
 ■with often trees in the hedge-rows.f The aspect of the 
 country, in fact, is here precisely that of England. Let us 
 examine whether it was " patriotic " talk, or persevering work 
 which earned these advantages for the county of Down. 
 First, however, it will be as well to prove that this contrast 
 exists. The proof will show that the poverty and ignorance 
 of the west is not owing to over-population. 
 
 In the Report of the Census Commissioners of Ireland, 
 for the year 1841, will be found four shaded plates, which at 
 a glance indicate the comparative density of pojjulation 
 in different parts of Ireland, the comparative amount of 
 house accommodation for the population, the comparative 
 amount of education, and the comparative amount of 
 
 * Lieut. Col. W. Blacker, of Carrick, Armagh, is asked by the Land Com- 
 missioners. Part I. p. 457. 
 
 *' 50. With respect to improvements to draining and land, have you any 
 system with reference to that .' No ; the people drain because they find it an 
 improvement to their ground, and it pays itself; they find it so. Generally 
 speaking, would as soon think of paying a man for his coat or his shoes, 'or 
 for anything else, seeing that it is for his own advantage he is doing everything. 
 
 " Supposing the man to have a lease .' Yes." 
 
 "Therefore, the people here without aid drain, because they have sense enough 
 to see that it is for their own advantage, and industry enough to do it. But in the 
 south and west, the cry is ' who should we drain for ? We get no encourage- 
 ment.'" See ante, first letter, dated from Limerick. 
 
 Mr. Wiggins, land surveyor, thus speaks of draining at King William's Town, 
 on the borders of Kerry, before the Land Commissioners. He is asked, — " Did 
 you find the tenants sensible of the advantages of these drains, (some open drains 
 which had been made for them, and for three-fourths of the labour of which they 
 had been paid,) and disposed to imitate them ? They expressed themselves very 
 sensible of the benefits of the drains ; but had not continued or increased them, 
 nor even kept them open, nor did they spread the earth dug out. We saw that 
 they got more bog hay after those drains than before ; but they have taken very 
 little imins. 
 
 ' ' How do you account for their doing so little ? The extreme backwardness of 
 the people in farming ; for they are not apt to make any improvement except 
 what they are allowed for. I think upon another lease, they might be induced 
 to do something for themselves." (Evidence, Part XL ji. 30.) 
 
 t See Appendix, No. 18, showing the relative amounts of cultivated and uncul- 
 tivated surface in each county. 
 
566 BELFAST; ITS INDUSTRY AND ENTERPRISE, 
 
 property in live stock. By tlie first plate, " the darkest 
 shade indicates the most dense population," The counties 
 of Armagh, Monaghan, and Down are by far the darkest 
 on the map ; Donegal, Mayo, Galway, and Kerry by far 
 the lightest. In the evidence of Mr. Sharman Crawford, 
 M.P., before Lord Devon's Commission (Part I. p. 197),* 
 will be found a statistical table, showing that the counties 
 of Armagh and Down have the smallest farms, and the 
 greatest number of them, in proportion to the amount of 
 arable-land, of any county, and far exceed, in these respects, 
 Galway, Cork, Mayo, Tipperary, and Meath. If over- 
 population, therefore, is a cause of distress, Armagh, 
 Monaghan, and Down, ought to exhibit the greatest misery 
 — Donegal, Mayo, Galway, and Kerry the most comfort. 
 The reverse is the fact. By the second plate, " the darkest 
 shade indicates the worst house accommodation." The 
 brightest county in the whole map is the county of Down ; 
 ,after it rank Dublin, Kilkenny, Wexford, Armagh, and 
 Monaghan. The darkest county in the whole map is the 
 county of Kerry — and Derrynane is the darkest spot in it ; 
 after it ranks, in bad house accommodation, Clare, part of 
 Cork, Galway, Mayo and Donegal. f By the third plate, 
 " the darkest shade indicates the worst state of education." 
 The brightest counties on the map are Antrim, Londonderry, 
 Down, Tyrone, Dublin, Wicklow, Wexford, Kildare, Carlow 
 — in fact, the north and east coast of Ireland. The dai'kest 
 counties in the map are Mayo and Kerry — and the darkest 
 spot in Kerry is Derrynane; after these, in deficient 
 education, come Galway, Waterford, and the west of 
 Donegal, Sligo, Clare, and Cork. By the fourth map, 
 " the '^^ darkest shade indicates the greatest abundance of 
 live stock." The darkest counties in the map are Meath, 
 
 * See Appendix, No. 19. 
 
 t See Appendix, No. 20, giving the returns from which this map was drawn. 
 
AND CONSEQUENT PROSPERITY AND WEALTH. 567 
 
 Wexford, and Kildare ; next comes Down in equable 
 darkness — which in this case is the type of equable wealth. 
 The lightest counties, that is to say the poorest, are Donegal, 
 Mayo, Galway, and Kerry — and the lightest spot in Kerry 
 is Derrynane.* These are public documents, and the proof 
 is conclusive. 
 
 The ancient staple trade of Ireland was the linen trade, 
 and under it the north of Ireland long prospered. The 
 people of Belfast say, and truly, " we owe our prosperity 
 to the linen trade." But if we ask further, " to what do 
 they owe the linen trade?" the ouly answer is to their 
 industry, enterprise, and ingenuity; for the linen trade was 
 as free to Cork or Limerick, or Galway, or Sligo, or 
 Donegal, as to Belfast and the north of Ireland. . — \r 
 
 Formerly the flax was hand-spun and woven. The 
 Messrs. Marshall, of Leeds, and other English houses, by 
 the invention of spinning machinery, and by great enter- 
 prise, drove the competition of the Irish spinners out of 
 the market, and the flax trade for a long time languished 
 and deteriorated in Ireland. At length the Messrs. Mul- 
 holland, of Belfast, and Messrs. Murland, of Castlewellan, 
 erected flax-spinning mills, and were enabled to rival and 
 compete with the English spinners successfully, and the 
 linen trade in Ireland rapidly sjjrung up again to prosperity. 
 In 1821, Messrs. Mulholland's was the only flax-spinning 
 mill in Belfast. No sooner was it seen to prosper than, by 
 the enterprise of the people, mills were erected on every 
 side, and there are now in Belfast twenty-eight flax and 
 tow-spinning mills, and several new ones building; and 
 there are in Ireland sixty-two flax and tow-spinning mills, 
 all of which, with the exception of seven, are in the north- 
 east counties of Ulster. 
 
 The mere term " flax-spinning mill," however, conveys 
 
 * See Appendix, No. 21, giving the returns on which this map was founded. 
 
568 BELFAST; ITS INDUSTRY AND ENTERPRISE, 
 
 "but a very inadequate idea of what it really is, and of the 
 employment which it gives. One of Mr. Mulholland's mills, 
 which I visited, cost 75,000Z. There are in it 16,000 spin- 
 dles manufacturing into yarn about 700 tons of flax per 
 annum, worth about 40,000/. and when manufactured 
 worth about 70,0007. In the process of manufacture, 
 to feed the steam-engine 3,000 tons of coals are annually 
 consumed, and about 800 people are employed. The spin- 
 ning mills in Belfast vary in size from 3,000 to 19,000 spin- 
 dles. Every 1,000 spindles give employment in spinning 
 and dressing flax to about fifty people. I was politely 
 shown over the mill of Mr. Charters, which contains 8,400 
 spindles, and gives employment to about 650 people alto- 
 gether. This mill consumes forty tons of coal a week, and 
 works up about 600 tons of flax a year. I saw boys and 
 girls, from the age of thirteen upwards, employed in it, as 
 well as men and women. Boys of thirteen, called " machine- 
 boys," earn from 25. to 4s. per week ; girls of the same age, 
 called " doffers and piecers," from 3^. to 45. 6d. a week. 
 The girls of about eighteen, who are " spinners" and 
 " winders," earn from 55. to 6s. a week. The " heckling" 
 men earn I85. aweek. For the workpeople of Mr. Chartersex- 
 ceedingly comfortable cottages are provided. Compared with 
 their less fortunate countrymen in the west they live in luxury. 
 For a moment let us view the vast amount of employment 
 given and created by the proprietors of one of these mills. 
 Each spindle costs 3/. 85. It is made of turned wood and 
 jjeautifully finished iron, moving in a frame of most ingenious 
 machinery, and moved by a steam-engine of great power. 
 You have woodmen, sawyers, and ship-owners employed to 
 obtain the wood. You have coal miners, iron-miners, and 
 foundrymen employed to obtain the iron and the coal. You 
 have machine-makers, turners, and engineers employed in 
 making the spindles and machinery. You have bricklayers, 
 glaziers, plumbers, builders, stonemasons, slate quarrymen. 
 
AND CONSEQUENT PROSPERITY AND WEALTH. 569 
 
 carpenters, and architects employed in building- the mills, and 
 all this before, and entirely exclusive of, the people employed 
 by the machinery when set going. These are the fruits of 
 enterprise and industry ; and the men who move all this 
 machinery, give all this vast employment, and create all this 
 wealth, are many of them, I am informed, the architects of 
 their own fortunes, and have been tumbled into the world 
 without a shilling to back them. Compared with these men, 
 is it not an antithesis of sublime absurdity to hold up such 
 men as the Tom Steels, the Brodericks, and the Brownes for 
 public admiration as " patriots !" 
 
 The whole of these factories contain about 270,000 spindles, 
 which have cost in buildings and machinery about 1,250,000/., 
 and they give employment to about 15,000 persons. They 
 consume about 120,000 tons of coals per annum, and spin 
 about 18,000 tons of flax yearly, in value nearly 1,000,000/. 
 sterling. Much of this flax (as much as the farmers of 
 Ireland will grow) is cultivated in Ireland ; and thus a source 
 of great wealth and employment is opened to Ireland. The 
 spinners, however, cannot get flax enough in Ireland, and are 
 obliged to purchase large quantities of foreign flax.* 
 
 As an agricultural crop, the flax crop is one of the most 
 
 * The waste stuff of the flax-mills is worked up by three coarse mills into 
 yam for sacking and bale cloth, and by two manufactories of patent felt for 
 rooffing, the latter being principally shipped to England and Scotland. 
 
 To supply the linen trade with the materials used in bleaching, there are four 
 chemical works which manufacture sulphuric and muriatic acids, bleaching 
 powder, &c. They import the sulphur principally from Sicily, but consume also 
 a large quantity of pyrites from the county of Wicklow, which was first introduced 
 in the sulphuric acid manufacture during the embargo laid on by the Sicilian 
 Government, — a striking instance of the mineral wealth of Ireland which lies 
 tmworked until attention is called to it by some fortuitous circumstance. 
 
 There are sis iron-founderies — some of them very extensive — in which are 
 made steam-engines, iron vessels, and all the different descriptions of machinery 
 required in a large and growing manufacturing town. Machinery for scutching 
 flax has been exported to Egypt, Germany, France, and other foreign countries. 
 
 In connection with the products of the soil, there are several starch and potato 
 farina manufactories ; in the former, three thousand tons of wheat are annually 
 
570 BELFAST ; ITS INDUSTRY AND ENTERPRISE, 
 
 profitable that can be grown. For a long period, however, 
 its cultivation and manufacture were of the rudest description 
 in Ireland ; and though the most luxuriant crops of flax were 
 everywhere grown, the flax was spoiled in its preparation for 
 manufacturing purposes. 
 
 To remedy this a society was established in Belfast, called 
 the Flax Improvement Society, which was extensively sup- 
 ported, and which at its own cost sent out young men to 
 Belgium to learn to steep and properly dress the flax and 
 save the reed. These young men have been sent to various 
 parts of Ireland to instruct the people, and now through their 
 instrumentality flax of the finest fibre has been made, out of 
 which cambrics of beautiful texture have been fabricated, and 
 in this article the cambric manufacturers of the north of 
 Ireland now rival the French, from flax of their own growth. 
 Through the exertions of this society, and the active energy 
 of its secretary, Mr. James M'Adam, junior, the crop of 
 Ireland has been increased from 25,000 tons, which was the 
 amount of produce in 1841, to 40,000 tons, which were grown 
 in 1844. This quantity of flax was worth nearly 2,000,000?. 
 sterling, nearly one-half of which was exported to England 
 and Scotland, to the spinners there; and a considerable 
 quantity to France and America. 
 
 As a profitable crop for the agriculturist, flax ranks in 
 the first class. Mr. M'Carten, a member of the Belfast Flax 
 Society, at a meeting of the Society held last month, gave an 
 instance on his own farm of an acre and a half of land, 
 cultivated with flax, having left him a profit of 42/. 10^. I 
 had the advantage of meeting here Sir Richard O'Donnell, of 
 the county of Mayo, a gentleman who deserves every praise 
 for starting out of the apathy which seems to envelope his 
 
 consumed. There are very extensive steam flour-mills, and some oatmeal-mills. 
 The distillery is the largest in Ireland, and there are several ale and porter 
 breweries. 
 
AND CONSEQUENT PROSPERITY AND WEALTH. 571 
 
 unfortunate county ; and of whom, when in Mayo, I heard 
 much, as an improving landlord, anxious to do everything 
 that could forward the interests of his tenantry. He induced 
 several of his tenantry near Newport in Mayo, to cultivate 
 flax last year, and procured the instruction for them of one 
 of the Belfast Flax Society's men. Having grown the flax, 
 however, they came to him, and said, — " Now you induced 
 us to grow it, what are we to do with it ?" To help them 
 over this difliculty, he himself bought it from them at the 
 Belfast market price. He informed me that one of his 
 tenants in Mayo, whom he had thus induced to grow flax, 
 grew eighty stone of flax upon an English acre of land, for 
 which he paid his tenants 6s. a stone, or 241. The land which 
 grew this flax is not any better than the common run of land 
 in that neighbourhood. Another tenant raised 104 stone of 
 flax to the acre (Irish), for which Sir Richard O'Donnell paid 
 him 6s. a stone, or 31/. 4s. The rent of the land was U. 5s. 
 A labourer would dig it for lOs. ; the tenant, however, dug it 
 himself, and afterwards reaped and cleaned the flax by his 
 own family. They manure there with sea-weed, which the 
 tenants get for nothing but the trouble. Deducting, however, 
 the cost of seed, labour and every expense, the profit, to this 
 tenant on this one acre of flax was at least about 25/.* This 
 
 * " The raising of flax is a more vital article than the very bread we have been 
 speaking of, and is to the last degree necessary to our subsistence, as the great 
 source from which, by due industry, we may hope for safety and ease, and perhaps 
 in time for plenty and prosperity. It is our chief staple commodity, and so 
 beneficial that (besides the large encouragements given by the Linen Board), in the 
 common methods of working it up, we reckon an acre of flax will produce 30/. 
 and employ six hands completely ; and if we suppose it spun and wove in the 
 finest hoUands, cambrics, and laces, its value improves to an immense degree. It 
 has also this great advantage, that we can never run too much into it, it bemg 
 certain, that if we could export to the value of a million a year more than we do, 
 we should never want a market for it in Great Britain alone ; to which, by crossing 
 the Channel in a few hours, we import it custom free, when all other nations pay 
 considerable duty, after a tedious navigation. It has made so prodigious a pro- 
 gress among us within these thirty years, that we now, from a trifle, make near 
 
572 BELFAST; ITS INDUSTRY AND ENTERPRISE, 
 
 man, on being paid for his flax crop by his landlord, upon whom 
 he heaped blessings, emigrated to America; in fact, immedi- 
 ately strove to rise from the degraded condition of a Mayo 
 
 500,000/. per annum clear by it, and if it goes on, will provide tolerably for all 
 our poor, and turn the burthen of a large family to a blessing to the parents, by 
 the help and assistance their women and children will afford them. It will there- 
 fore be our interest to push this business as far as we can carry it with all 
 expedition ; for, flourishing as it is, we all know that it and our prosperity every 
 year depends on the caprice of the seas and winds, and the good will of foreigners 
 and rivals too, who, we find by fatal experience, often send us decayed seed. As 
 this makes our condition extremely precarious, and our paying 30,000/. for seed 
 and undressed ilax, makes it still more necessary for us to put ourselves out of so 
 uneasy a state of dependence, we ought at least to endeavour to supply ourselves 
 at home with seed and flax enough for our own consumption. It has been com- 
 puted, that about three thousand acres more would fully supply these two articles ; 
 and when once that is accomplished, and that vast drain to foreigners cut oft', we 
 may consider how we can best extend this manufacture into the west and southern 
 parts of Ireland, where it is thought there are at least one hundred thousand idle 
 hands, chiefly women and children, who may be employed in it to our and their 
 great advantage. About sixteen thousand acres more would answer the great end, 
 and make us a most happy people — a people flourishing by our own industry and 
 the friendship of Great Britain ; and if once Munster and Connaught set their 
 hands to this desirable work, and would employ their rich lands, not only in the 
 hemp, but in raising flax and flax-seed for the north, and by degrees would work 
 up our coarser linens, where less skill and experience is necessary, we need not 
 doubt to see it accomplished. Nay, in time we may hope to furnish linseed to 
 the oil-mills in England, if we do not set up enough of our own ; for as it is known 
 that, at the lowest valuation, an acre of flax will, with the seed, give ten pounds 
 clear of all charges, and will the same season give a crop of clover too, it is very 
 likely that most people will in time cheerfully fall into it, especially in those parts 
 that lie near to the sea or navigable rivers, who can easily export their flax or 
 seed to Dublin or other markets. The truth is, the prosperity of Ireland depends 
 so much on the general spreading of our linen business, that if every person were 
 obliged by law to sow an acre of flax for every hundred or hundred and fifty acres 
 of arable-land he held; and, to go yet farther, if every person who sowed ten acres 
 was allowed five shillings per acre from his landlord, and to pay no tithe for them, 
 I do not see but it would prove of vast service to this kingdom without injuring 
 our clergy." — Reflections and Resolutions yroperfor the Gentlemen of Ireland, 
 hy the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal Dublin Society, p. IIT). 
 
 " In the cultivation of flax, we ought to make use only of our richest, strongest, 
 mellowest loams, and those inclining to clays preferably to all others. We ought 
 to manure, fallow, and labour our grounds for flax with equal care as we do for 
 wheat, if we desire a fine crop. 
 
 " We should sow our seed early in April, rather thin than thick, and on flat 
 
AND CO>fSEQUENT PROSPERITY AND "WEALTH. 573 
 
 peasant. This is an instance of what a good landlord may 
 accomplish. You will hear of no efforts of this kind to instruct 
 and improve, and better the condition of the peasantry at 
 
 ridges, from twenty to sixty feet broad, and with or without trenches, as the 
 ground is moist or dry, and should change both our seed and soil as often as 
 we can. 
 
 " We should choose the shortest, plumpest, thickest, oiliest, heaviest seed, of a 
 bright brown colour, and that which sinks soonest in water, or blazes or crackles 
 in the fire, is the best. We should never pluck it till it is full ripe, and the seed 
 almost shedding, and then not to stack the flax, but ripple and water it without 
 delay. As to the directions of sowing clover some days after the flax-seed as we 
 do after oats, or as to rolling the ground when dry, weeding it carefully, and 
 separating the coarse and fine flax in the pulling and watering it, and several others 
 of the like nature, I choose to omit them, and refer the reader to those curious and 
 useful tracts where they are more fully set forth." — Ibid. p. 116. 
 
 " At the time the flax is taken out of the steep, all the rivulets in the country 
 are strongly impregnated with the contents of the flax holes ; and those through 
 whose lands such ri\nilets pass, would do well to turn the stream, where it can be 
 done, over their after grass, or use it in watering tlieir cabbages, turnips, &c., the 
 advantages of which would soon be perceivable. The richness of flax-water is 
 fully showTi by the growth and colour of the grass where flax has been spread to 
 diy. I have seen a most luxuriant crop of oats upon land, irrigated with flax- 
 water, although a second crop, which shows that, if this manure was preserved, 
 one of the greatest objections to the growth of flax would be removed. All 
 scientific men agree, that the best manure to apply to land is that which contains 
 the ingredients which the crop has taken from the soil ; flax-water, therefore, 
 ought to be applied to flax-ground, and every particle of Hquid should be pre- 
 served as being part of the substance derived from the soil. If the principle here 
 alluded to is correct, how completely does it prove the propriety of the above 
 directions for the management of the manure-heap ; for the farm-yard manure is 
 derived from the hay, straw, grain, and green crop used by the stock, all which 
 have been derived from the soil, and therefore the liquid portion, as well as that 
 which the sun and wiad extract, ought to be taken care of as much as any other 
 portion whatever — and indeed more so, being by much the most valuable part of 
 the manure." — Essay on the Improvement of Small Farms, by William Blacker, 
 Esq. p. 60. 
 
 " The great complaint made against the extensive cultivation of flax is, that it 
 leaves nothing behind in the way of straw for manure ; but I am well convinced, 
 if the practice was adopted of watering the flax-ground vrith the water in which 
 the crop had been steeped, it would enable the land to give any other crop in 
 succession, or would secure a most abundant crop of clover (which should always 
 be sowed with it), and a luxuriant crop of wheat afterwards. This practice being 
 pursued, it might be grown to a very considerable extent without injury to the 
 soil, should any change of circumstances again enhance the price." — Ibid. p. 72. 
 
574 BELFAST. ; ITS INDUSTRY AND ENTERPRISE, 
 
 Derrynane. Yet such is Irish " patriotism," that Sir Richard 
 O'Donnell, and many like him, labour for their couirtrymen 
 like true patriots, unregarded and unnoticed, whilst the 
 Derrynane man without one iota of desert, with a tenantry 
 living neglected like savages, is bepraised usque ad nauseam 
 as " the saviour of his country." 
 
 Belfast is the chief export market for the linens and cam- 
 brics manufactured in Ireland. This trade, though declining 
 some years back, is now in a prosperous state, and from the 
 improvements in the growth of flax, in the machinery for 
 spinning yarn, and in the different pi'ocesses of the manufac- 
 ture of the fibre into cloth, a piece of linen of any description 
 can now be laid down by the Irish manufacturer to compete 
 with any other in the world, in both cheapness and quality. 
 The manufacture of cambric for handkerchiefs is carried on 
 to a great extent in the neighbourhood of Waringstown and 
 Lurgan, within 17 miles of Belfast. This manufacture of 
 cambric is principally for the home market, and the coarser 
 qualities have superseded French goods ; and I am assured 
 that it is a fact that fully three-fourths of the cambrics sold 
 in England as French goods, are the produce of the Irish 
 loom. Damasks for table-cloths, napkins, &c., have also been 
 brought to great perfection, and have nearly supplanted this 
 description of German goods. I had the opportunity of 
 seeing some very beautiful specimens of these at the esta- 
 blishment of Mr. Andrews, of Ardoyne. 
 
 I was politely shown through the warehouses of Messrs. 
 John Curell and Sons, and of Messrs. Sadler, Fenton, and 
 Co., in the White Linen-hall. Every description of linen 
 manufacture was shown to me, made up for export to the 
 markets of Mexico, Peru, China, the West Indies, the East 
 Indies, Italy, &c., as well as for home consumption. This 
 is what Ireland has good reason to be proud of.* By her 
 
 * ' ' Every one knows who has thought at all on the subject, that our exported 
 
AND CONSEQUENT PROSPERITY AND WEALTH. 575 
 
 enterprise, her ingenuity, and her industry, here were the 
 evidences of employment for her sons, paid for by every 
 country. But to whom is the credit due for all this ? To the 
 much-reviled Saxons who people the north, who create this 
 trade. The Saxons can well afford to be reviled by the 
 " patriots" of Conciliation-hall. 
 
 In 1835, about 3,000,000/. worth of linen and flax were 
 exported from Belfast ; and the value of these exports has 
 since much increased. The chief exports are linen, yarn, 
 flax, tow, and provisions.* 
 
 There are also ten cotton-spinning factories in Belfast and 
 its neighbourhood. The yarn spun is partly shipped to the 
 Manchester and Glasgow manufactories, and partly woven 
 by handlooms or powerlooms in the neighbourhood. The 
 women employed in these mills earn from 3^. to 6s. per 
 week. 
 
 manufactures, bring vastly more profit to us, and are infinitely more advantageous 
 to the kingdom, than our beef, tallow, hides, wool, com, &c. ; and as those of our 
 linen are the great stay and support of this island, whoever wishes, or at least 
 deserves to be supported in it, must, even for his own sake and to help his 
 tenants, do his utmost to spread and increase them." — Reflections and Resolu- 
 tions proper for the Gentleinen of Ireland, by the late Dr. Madden, of the Royal 
 Dublin Society, p. 18. 
 
 * The provision trade is a very important branch of the trade of Belfast, there 
 being ten or fifteen large establishments for curing beef and pork, and the value 
 of these articles exported to England and Scotland was, in 1835, 906,587/. ; now 
 it is fully 1 ,200,000/. The bones, sinews, &c. , produced in these and the slaughter- 
 houses, are economised for the useful purposes of being converted into bone-dust 
 and glue. 
 
 The great quantities of limestone-rock which occur under the basaltic forma- 
 tion of this part of Ulster, furnish a valuable manure for the neighbourhood, and 
 for export to the sister countries, and a railway from the Cave-hUl brings about 
 300,000 tons annually to the quays for shipment. Gypsum or sulphate of lime is 
 also found, and there is a steam-mill for converting it into the plaster of Paris, so 
 extensively used for ceilings of houses and for manure. There are three manu- 
 factories of tiles ; and as the clay is peculiarly good for making bricks, an immense 
 quantity of the latter are used for building. There are also two large glass- 
 houses at full work. 
 
 Rope-works, manufactories of canvas, oil-mills, and paint-mills, are all required 
 for the supply of the numerous shipping. 
 
576 BELFAST; ITS INDUSTRY AND ENTERPRISE, 
 
 The port of Belfast has also a very extensive shipping 
 interest, and the trade of the port is rapidly rising into great 
 importance. Industry, we see, creates capital for anything ; 
 it is in fact the germ of wealth. There is both a very large 
 coasting and foreign trade ; in the latter department, Belfast 
 exceeds any of the other Irish ports. In 1844, the number 
 of vessels and their registered tonnage that cleared out of the 
 three principal Irish ports for foreign countries, exclusive of 
 British colonies, were, Belfast 73, tonnage 18,844; Dublin 
 82, tonnage 12,792 ; Cork 30, tonnage 5,245. 
 
 The coasting trade has also steadily increased, as will be 
 seen from the following table : — 
 
 
 INWARDS. 
 
 OUTWARDS. 
 
 
 No. of 
 
 
 No. of 
 
 
 
 Vessels. 
 
 Tonnage. 
 
 Vessels. 
 
 Tonnage. 
 
 1842 
 
 3,671 
 
 345,035 
 
 1,396 
 
 189,800 
 
 1843 
 
 3,757 
 
 363,137 
 
 1,547 
 
 220,421 
 
 1844 
 
 4,385 
 
 434,999 
 
 1,725 
 
 264,220 
 
 Many Belfast vessels are also employed in the carrying 
 trade of England. The comparative increase of the shipping 
 interest of Belfast, as compared with the chief Irish ports, 
 from 1797 (three years before the Union), and since to 1842, 
 is shown by the following table : — 
 
 1797 to 1799. 1824 to 1826. 1833 to 1835. 1840 to 1842. 
 
 
 Tons. 
 
 Tons. 
 
 Tons. 
 
 Tons. 
 
 Belfast . . . 
 
 13,062 
 
 48,511 
 
 81,322 
 
 149,809 
 
 Dublin . . . 
 
 33,485 
 
 54,821 
 
 70,405 
 
 84,742 
 
 Cork . . . . 
 
 13,424 
 
 17,101 
 
 56,751 
 
 101,349 
 
 Waterford . 
 
 8,929 
 
 12,362 
 
 34,345 
 
 60,346 
 
 It will therefore be seen that Belfast has increased the 
 most rapidly, in its shipping, of any Irish port, and that it 
 has now the greatest amount of tonnage of any Irish port.* 
 
 * The following return shows the comparative exports from Belfast and Dublin 
 for the year ending the 1st of August 1815 : — 
 
AND CONSEQUENT PROSPERITY AND AVEALTH. 577 
 
 It may be an instructive lesson, too, for violent Repealers to 
 look at its tonnage before the Union — that " blight to the 
 prosperity of Ireland" (!) and what it is now. It will be seen 
 that the increase in the shipping trade of the four principal 
 ports of Ireland, in a period of forty-seven years, and almost 
 entirely since the Union, has been — from Belfast, 136,747 
 tons; Cork, 87,925 tons; Dublin, 61,257 tons; Waterford, 
 51,417 tons.* In the year 1844 there entered the port of 
 
 From Belfast. From Dublin. 
 
 Pork, tierces 7,906 257 
 
 Pork, barrels 11,430 
 
 Bacon, bales 29,419 1,5G4 
 
 Butter, firkins 41,058 1,187 
 
 Butter, crocks 41,760 
 
 Lard, cwts 27,381 1,027 
 
 Beef, tierces 1.958 3,317 
 
 Hams, hogsheads 4,820 
 
 Wheat, barrels 24,672 5,733 
 
 Oats, barrels 35,362 36,990 
 
 Barley, barrels 3.335 485 
 
 Linen, boxes 44,778 
 
 Flour, sacks 13,529 7,400 
 
 Hay, bales 20,076 
 
 Pigs 3, 690.. 
 
 Cows 7,222 
 
 Whiskey, puncheons 3,734 447 
 
 Potatoes, cwts 69,635 
 
 Oatmeal, sacks 9,050 
 
 Porter, hogsheads 26,247 
 
 Porter, barrels 10,922 
 
 Porter, half barrels 78,678 
 
 * Another remarkable evidence of the increase of civilisation and prosperity in 
 Ireland, since its union with this country, is its increase in post-towns, post-office 
 c^Jnmunication, and improved means of travelUng. 
 
 The number of post-towns in Ii-eland in the year 1742 was . . 118 
 
 1765 . . . .129 
 
 „ „ 1776 ... 141 
 
 „ „ 1778 . . . .193 
 
 1799 ... 253 
 
 ,, ,, ISOl . . . .274 
 
 There are at present (1846) 800 post-offices. In 1776 the average was 4i to 
 
 each county ; it is now 25. Since the Union, the increase on the whole country 
 
 exceeds 500. 
 
 P P 
 
578 
 
 BELFAST; ITS INDUSTRY AND ENTERPRISE, 
 
 Belfast 3,655 vessels, measuring 445,537 tons (nearly equal 
 to Liverpool in 1812), being- an excess over the previous year 
 of 1843 of 285 vessels, and 82,499 tons, say nearly 83,000 
 
 The following is a return of the number of post-offices in the several counties 
 of Ireland in 177G : — 
 
 Louth 
 
 Meath . 
 
 Westmeath 
 
 Dublin 
 
 King's county . 
 
 Queen's county 
 
 Kildare . 
 
 Wicklow 
 
 Carlow 
 
 Wexford 
 
 Kilkenny 
 
 Longford 
 
 Sligo 
 
 Mayo . 
 
 Leitrim . 
 
 Galway 
 
 Roscommon 
 
 Cari'y forward 
 
 Brought forward 
 Antrim 
 
 3 Down 
 2 Derry 
 
 Donegal . 
 Tyrone 
 11 Fermanagh 
 
 4 Monaghan . 
 2 Armagh . 
 
 4 Cavan . 
 
 Clare 
 
 4 Waterford . 
 
 1 Cork 
 
 4 Kerry . 
 
 1 Limerick 
 
 Tipperary 
 
 5 
 
 06 Average, 42. 
 
 66 
 
 . 9 
 
 12 
 
 , 4 
 
 3 
 . 4 
 
 2 
 . 3 
 
 4 
 . 6 
 
 2 
 
 . 3 
 
 12 
 
 . 2 
 
 2 
 . 7 
 
 141 
 
 In an old almanac of 1742, is the following announcement: — "Mr. James 
 Smith's new stage-coach sets out from the Unicorn in Capel-street for Belfast" — 
 (one hundred and one English miles distant) — " every Monday, and from Belfast 
 every Thursday. 
 
 " In winter, it takes three days, and leaves Dublin ai eight and Belfast at seven 
 in the morning. In summer, it will only take two days, and set out from each 
 place about five in the morning. This coach will always run with six able 
 horses." 
 
 Again, in 1788, — " The Drogbeda Balloon post-coach — proprietor, Edward 
 Hammond — from Hammond's, the Boot Inn, No. 2, Bolton-street, Dublin, to 
 Hanton's in Drogbeda" (twenty-eight English miles distant), " sets out at nme 
 o'clock in the morning, summer and winter, on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday ; 
 ffoes throuffh in one day; leaves Drogbeda on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday ; 
 fare for passengers, 7s. O'^d." 
 
 But the post-office expresses in the same year are still more indicative of the 
 slowness of the times : — 
 
 " Expresses. 
 
 "Private expresses may be forwarded from the general post-office, Dublin, to 
 any part of Ireland on paying id. br. per mile, and GrZ. to the horn at each stage, 
 
AND COXSEQUENT PROSPERITY AND WEALTH. 579 
 
 tons of excess in one year. For the last ten years the Cus- 
 toms' duties received at Belfast have averaged uj^wards of 
 360,000/. a year. 
 
 The continual cry in the west and south of Ireland is for 
 the Government to do this and for the Government to do 
 that — to give bounties, to assist, to lend money for every 
 object. In the accomplishment of this vast prosperity, the 
 Government has never advanced to Belfast or to its people 
 one farthing. They have struggled on unaided, and by the 
 force of their own energy, enterprise, and industry, have 
 achieved their own prosperity and importance. The esta- 
 blishment of joint-stock banks has much aided the mer- 
 chants, sj^inners, and manufacturers in their enterprise. The 
 average circulation of the joint-stock banks of Belfast is 
 836,000/., and their subscribed capital is 2,000,000/. 
 
 The savings bank, too, shows in the number and amounts 
 of the deposits an increasing prosperity. There were received 
 from depositors, — 
 
 £ 5. d. 
 
 Li the year ending the 20th of November, 1844. . 42,711 8 1 
 Do. 1845.. 48,685 16 1 
 
 The balance due to — 
 
 5,685 Depositors on 20th November, 1844, was. . 123,883 17 9 
 6,576 Depositors Do. 1845, ..139,986 3 5 
 
 Leaving a total increase of deposits ) j^ , ^ „ „^ _ _ 
 for the year 1845 of \ £16,902 5 8 
 
 The deposits of two-thirds of these depositors do not 
 exceed 20/., and the most numerous class of depositors are 
 female servants. 
 
 I have not space to say much of the town of Belfast. 
 
 •with the usual fees ; and also from Dublin to London for 4/. 18*. Ad. ; to Chester, 
 21. 2s. IQd. ; to Liverpool, 21. I7s. 6d. ; to Glasgow, 51. ; to Edinburgh, 
 5/. 6s. id. 
 
 " Expresses travel at the rate of four miles an hour.''^ 
 
 p p 2 
 
580 BELFAST ; ITS INDUSTRY AND ENTERPRISE, 
 
 Including" the Ballymacanett side of the river, its population 
 is about 100,000. It is a v/ell-built town, and in every 
 respect extremely like one of our best English towns. There 
 is a deaf and dumb institution, a dispensary, a fever hospital, 
 a surgical hospital, a lying-in hospital, a Lancasterian school, 
 a charitable society, a house of industry, a night asylum for 
 the destitute poor, a lunatic asylum, a philosophical society, 
 a literary societj^, a choral society, an academical institution, 
 and various other societies, among its public institutions. 
 The commercial building is a fine building, and the inhabi- 
 tants are justly proud of their botanical garden and brown 
 and white linen halls. 
 
 The country in the neighbourhood of Belfast is wooded, 
 pretty, and well cultivated, and dotted over with the seats 
 of merchants and manufacturers ; and the houses of the 
 peasantry and artisans are everywhere neat and comfortable 
 looking, I have had the opportunity of seeing some tenants' 
 houses on the estates of Mr. Sharman Crawford, M.P., who 
 is everywhere highly spoken of as a landlord ; and also on 
 the estate of Lord Duiferin. At Bangor I visited the cottage 
 of William Gibson, a tenant-farmer of the latter nobleman. 
 This man began life as a farm servant in 1820, with 6s. a 
 week wages, and a house free. He now rents six Cunning- 
 ham acres (eight English statute acres) of land. He has 
 reared four sons and three daughters. One son is foreman 
 to a tailor in Wokingham, another is foreman to a shoemaker 
 in Stafford, a third son is just out of his apprenticeship as 
 a tailor, and, as the mother told me vv^ith pride, they are 
 " making a scholar" of the fourth son. A cleaner cottage I 
 never saw. The three daughters were working in the cottage 
 at embroidering ladies' collars, at Avhich they earn 5s. a 
 week each, and pay their father for their support. The father 
 pays 355. an acre rent, has four cows and a pig, and makes 
 and sells butter. The cows were in excellent outhouses, 
 The cottage had four rooms, a clock, a looking-glass, a sofa, 
 
AKD CONSEQUENT PROSPERITY AND WEALTH. 581 
 
 a table, Avitli an oil-cloth over it ; there was ahundance of 
 crockery, some prints on the walls, a bust of William Pitt 
 on the chimney-piece, and the greatest cleanliness and order. 
 Contrast this with Mr. O'Connell's " comfortably-ofF" six- 
 acre tenantry. I gave the good woman a description of the 
 way in which the peasantry live in Kerry, with the pig and 
 cows in the house, and the " biler" as the only cooking 
 apparatus. " Oh dear !" said she, " I could not live so." It 
 was evident she could not. 
 
 Most of the girls in the district of Bangor, Newtownards, 
 Killileagh, and Downpatrick are employed in embroidering 
 muslin collars. The muslin is sent over from Glasgow in an 
 unbleached state, and stamped with a pattern. It is then 
 distributed by agents among the cottagers, to be embroidered, 
 and is afterwards collected by them and returned to Glasgow. 
 The young women at this Avork earn, on an average, lOd. a 
 day. About WaringstoM^n and Lurgan the girls are employed 
 in hemstitching and weaving cambric pocket-handkerchiefs, 
 and earn about the same rate of wages. We thus see that 
 the people are all thoroughly industrious and employed ; 
 and as the reward of their industry the}^ live in comfort and 
 decency. 
 
 The landlords, too, generally attend to the duties of their 
 position. Sir Robert Bateson, of Belvoir-park, one of the 
 most extensive landlords near Belfast, prevents subdivision, 
 and thus secures a respectable tenantry, who can live in 
 comfort. If there is more than one son the rest go out and 
 learn trades, and work for their livelihoods elsewhere. There 
 is, however, a considerable disposition amongst the tenantry 
 in parts of the county to subdivide their holdings, and sink 
 into the same condition as prevails in the west. This ten- 
 dency is as much as possible prevented by the landlords. Lord 
 Lurgan, the Marquis of Londonderry, and the Marquis of 
 Downshire are all spoken of as good landlords. 
 
 I confess that this is an inadequate view of the condition 
 
582 BELFAST ; ITS INDUSTRY AND ENTERPRISE, 
 
 of the people of tliis district, tliongli, I believe, an accurate one 
 in its chief outlines. Generally speaking there are here no un- 
 employed or idle people, and most of the people live in comfort. 
 
 In that trashy compilation of sketches of the characters of 
 traitors, and bombastic nonsense, Sh' Jonah Barringtons 
 .Rise and Fall of the Irish Nation — one of the many books 
 which I have felt it my duty to vrade through in the progress 
 of this inquiry, there is this truth : — " What," he asks, " sets 
 one nation above another, but the soul that dwells within 
 her ?" What is it but " the soul," the indomitable spirit, the 
 enterprize, the persevering industry of England, which has 
 made her the first among nations ? It is the same " soul" 
 which makes Belfast and the north and east of Ireland tread 
 in her footsteps and rival her in the race of civilization. 
 Here is the real strength and the pride of Ireland. But 
 beyond these few northern and eastern counties, we have to 
 consider before we can state what is " the soul" of the Irish 
 nation ? 
 
 The " soul" of Ireland ! Is it not a lazy and an apathetic 
 soul ; — ^a soul without energy or enterprise ? Is it not a soul 
 which lolls against a door-post, or leans its back against a 
 wall with a pipe in its mouth and its hands in its breeches 
 pockets 1 Is it not a soul which is content to live with a 
 dunghill under its nose and to feed with its pigs ? Is it not a 
 soul which always has a icaiit whicli jn-events it doing any- 
 thing, and whose greatest want is industry ? Is it not a soul 
 which is content to see its hedges down, its land undrained 
 and unproductive, its home a hovel, and which satisfies itself 
 with a complaint ofiooverty ? Is it not a beggarly, a boasting, 
 and a fawning soul ? Oh Irishmen ! drive it out from among 
 you. It is unworthy of your fertile country and of your own 
 abilities. Drive it out. Exert yourselves and you will prosper. 
 Be industrious and independent, and you will be great as a 
 people. 
 
 If taught and urged on, the peoj)lc of Ireland have every 
 
AND CONSEQUENT PROSPERITY AND WEALTH. 583 
 
 qualification for success. But they are like a rich soil uncul- 
 tivated, which gTO^YS hut rank weeds. Partly from apathy, 
 and partly from neglect, a people cajjahle of accomplishing- 
 anything, are sunk in the lowest degradation. Left to them- 
 selves they will remain stationary, as they have ever done. 
 
 In Fynes Mori/son s Itinerari/, an old and scarce book 
 which describes the manners and habits of the Irish people, 
 and which was published in London in 1617, the Irish of that 
 day are thus described: — " Touching the meene or Avild Irish, 
 it may truely be said of them which of old was spoken of the 
 Germans — namely, that they wander slovenly and naked 
 and lodge in the same house (if it may be called a house) 
 with their beasts." (Part iii. p. 180.) This, their condition 
 220 years ago is literally their condition at Derrynane 
 and in the west and south of Ireland generally at this 
 moment. Why? Because they are left neglected, untaught, 
 and unimproved, and of themselves it is not their cha- 
 racter to imjDrove. Should not this be a lesson to the 
 Government, and to every landed proprietor in Ireland, 
 and instruct them what course it is their duty to take 
 towards the debased and neglected Irish peasant? To the 
 honour of many of the Irish gentry, they do make efforts to 
 improve the peasantry. It is such men who deserve to be 
 encouraged, and praised, and supported, and protected; 
 whose suggestions ought to be listened to by the Govern- 
 ment as the barometer (if I may so term them) and true 
 indication of the wants and requirements of the Irish 
 kingdom. Belfast is a better guide than Conciliation-hall. 
 But in the fair field of Ireland, successive Governments 
 seem to attend only to the chirpings of the grasshoppers, 
 and neglect the more important denizens of the pasture. 
 The warnings and entreaties of the magistracy of whole 
 counties are neglected, the suggestions of the real patriots 
 of Ireland — of those Avho strive to advance and improve 
 her are unnoticed; while the yells of a rabble, and the 
 
584 NEWRY. 
 
 sordid and selfish deceptions and boastings of characterless 
 impostors, whose only nse in tlie world is to furnish 
 examples of the truth of Dr. Johnson's definition of 
 " patriotism," as being " the last refuge of scoundrels," are 
 attended to, treated with respect, and dealt with as if 
 representing the feelings of the best and worthiest men in 
 Ireland ! 
 
 The sooner the Government undeceives itself in these 
 respects, tlie sooner will Ireland be tranquil and prosperous.* 
 
 * I have been furnished with the following particulars regarding Newiy — a 
 thriving town on the east coast, and midway between Belfast and Dublin — which 
 I have every reason to believe are correct : — 
 
 " The trade of Newry has very rapidly increased of late years. It has been 
 much kept back by the operation of the late Bank of Ireland charter, which 
 crippled enterprise, and prevented the full expansion of trade. Since the 1st of 
 January 1846, however, two other banks besides the Bank of Ireland — namely, 
 the Provincial Bank of Ireland and the Belfast Banking Company — have opened 
 branches there, and already afford increased monetary accommodation. The town 
 itself has great natural advantages, and is pleasantly situated in the valley of the 
 Kewry-water, five miles from the head of Carlingford-bay, with which it is con- 
 nected by means of the river and a canal. The navigation, to which Government 
 has given large sums, was formerly much impeded, and hitherto vessels of more 
 than two hundred tons burthen could not come up tb the town. But now 
 improvements, under Sir John Rennie and an able resident engineer, Mr. John 
 Ramsay, have been made so as not only to promote largely the commercial 
 interests of Newiy, but to subserve the general purposes of the great inland 
 carrying trade through the richest of the eastern and western parts of Ulster. The 
 present canal terminates at Fathom, one mile and three quarters from Newry ; 
 but the Newry Navigation Company are extending it two miles farther seaward 
 by cutting a new canal from Fathom nearly to Narrow-water, and they propose 
 widening the loch and deepening the present canal, so as to admit steamers of 
 seven hundred tons and vessels of large burthen up to the town. Newry enjoys at 
 present, water-communication by means of the Newry canal, the Blackwater river, 
 Lough Neagh, and the Ulster canal, with Scarva, Portadoun, Moy, Dungannon, 
 Caledon, Monaghan, Roslea, Clones, Lisnaskea, Enniskillen, &c. In addition 
 to these means, the railroads terminating in or passing through the town, for 
 which Acts of Parliament have been obtained, will greatly extend the trade of 
 this rising town, which, with enterprise, may i)robably become a chief shipping 
 port from Ulster to Liverpool and the western j)orts of England, as it is directly 
 facing Liverpool, and within nine hours' sail of the English coast. The Newry 
 and Enniskillen railroad will open up a communication with Sligo and the towns 
 on the western coasts of Ulster and Connauglit, ami, with the projected continua- 
 
NEWRY. 585 
 
 « 
 
 tion of that line from Newry to Carlingford, terminating with capacious docks 
 at Greenore Point, approachable by steamers at every time of tide, will bring 
 Sligo and great part of the western seaboard of Ireland, with all the intermediate 
 towns, Enniskillen, Clones, Monaghan, Armagh, &c., within thirty hours' travelling 
 of London. The Dublin and Belfast Junction, and the projected Armagh and 
 Londonden-y Junction, will connect Newry with the extreme north and the south 
 of Ireland, and will enable the people of Deny, Armagh, Dungannon, Moy, &c., 
 to reach London many hours quicker than by any other route. 
 
 The recent inquiries of Captain Washington, the Tidal-harbour commissioner, 
 have revived a long cherished determination, on the part of the inhabitants of the 
 district, to procure the deepening of the bar at the entrance of the Bay of Car- 
 lingford, and to convert the harbour into a port of refuge, for vessels of every 
 burthen. The expense of this has been estimated by the Admiralty officers at less 
 than 50,000/. 
 
 The manufactories of Newry and the vicinity are cotton-mills, linen-facteries, 
 and spinning-factories, along the river. At Bessbrook, within one mile and a 
 half of Newry, where there is water-power capable of turning all the machinery 
 in Ireland, a large spinning-factory is nearly erected, at a cost (including 
 machinery) of about 35,000/. This will give employment to about one thousand 
 persons. Newry also possesses all the appliances of a very extensive linen trade, 
 being the centre of a large flax-growing country — has brass, iron, and metal 
 foundries, spade and shovel factories, very extensive flour and oatmeal-mills, 
 cordage-works, coach-factories, and appliances for various departments of manu- 
 facture connected with ship -building. Ship -building is now carried on here with 
 spirit. The retail trade is very extensive and flourishing. The sales of dairy and 
 agricultural produce in the town are very large, and command supplies from parts 
 of Louth, from Monaghan, Fermanagh, Tyrone, Armagh, and the southern parts 
 of Down. The sales of butter exceed those of Belfast, and amount to upwards of 
 3,300 tons a year. The sales of agricultural produce in 183-1-5 amounted to 7,710 
 tons of wheat, 3,610 tons of barley, and 23,850 tons of oats. The estimated 
 annual amount of inland carriage to the town consists of 31,800 tons for exporta- 
 tion, 11,000 tons of agricultural produce for local consumption as food, 100 tons 
 of exciseable articles not received by direct importation, and 11,000 tons of stone, 
 lime, turf, and other heavy and cheap articles ; and the carriage from the town 
 consists of 32,300 tons of imported goods, 18,600 tons of coals, &c., and a large 
 quantity of the produce of breweries. The importation of flax-seed is extensive, 
 employs a considerable capital, and has of late years materially increased. The 
 imports of that article this year (1846) from the port of Riga alone is 12,399 
 barrels, and large quantities from Holland, America, and England. In 1835, the 
 exports amounted to upwards of 700,000/., consisting of corn, meal, flour, provi- 
 sions, flax and tow, feathers, tobacco, spirits, hnen, eggs, 3,551 cows and oxen, 
 898 horses, 200 sheep, 15,525 pigs, and miscellaneous articles estimated at 
 20,000/. more. In the same year, the estimated value of imports exceeded 
 800,000/., the chief items of which were coal, culm, iron, lead, tin, slates, oak 
 bark, hops, mahogany, tallow, hides, ashes, cotton, woollen, and linen yarn, sugar, 
 tea, coffee, spices, indigo, herrings, salt, flax-seed, wine, rum, and other British 
 and foreign spirits, cotton and woollen manufactures, haberdashery, hardware, 
 
586 NEWRY. 
 
 glass, earthenware, leather, &c. la 1836, the gross receij^ts at the custom-house 
 were 58,806/. The chief trade of the port is with Liverpool and Glasgow, but a 
 considerable trade is also conducted with the other jiorts of Great Britain, with 
 British America, with the United States, witli the Mediterranean, with Odessa, 
 with Archangel, Riga, Memel, and all the ports of the Baltic, &c. The vessels 
 registered at the port of Newry in December 1843 were 206 sailing vessels, of an 
 aggregate burthen of 11,358 tons, and two large steamers. During 1843, the 
 number of sailing vessels arriving inwards coastwise was 1,265, of 63,854 tons 
 register, and the number of steam-vessels inwards coastwise was 155, of 28,974 
 tons. During the same year, the number of British sailing vessels inwards from 
 the colonies was 43, of 6,945 tons, and from foreign ports 14, of 2,953 tons ; the 
 number of foreign vessels inwards fi-om foreign ports was 8, of 1,913 tons. In 
 1844, the list of foreign shipping arriving and discharging at Newry contained 45 
 vessels of aggregately 12,338 tons register. 
 
 The Savings Bank was established in 1821 for receiving deposits so low as 1*. 
 It has continued to increase steadily till, at the annual settlement on 20th. 
 November 1845, the accounts numbered 2,881, amounting to 98,373/. lis. Id. 
 This large sum is principally due to farmers, labourers, artisans, servants, and 
 persons in the humble ranks of life. The deposits of the domestic servants alone 
 amount to upwards of 4,000/. There has been lately erected a very elegant and 
 commodious house, in which to carry on the business of the bank, at a cost of 
 ujiwards of 2,500/. 
 
 Many of the observations relative to the social and intellectual condition of the 
 people of Belfast are applicable to the inhabitants of Newry, as might indeed be 
 inferred from the geographical relation of the two places. The agriculture of the 
 district lying north-west of the town is creditable, and is to be attributed partly 
 to the greater industry and intelligence of its population, and jiartly to the influence 
 of the examples of such landed-propi-ietors as Earl Gosford and Colonel Close, 
 and to the supervision of such agents as Mr. Blacker, the latter gentleman having 
 obtained great celebrity for successful scientific husbandi-y.* 
 
 * For opinions of the jiress as to this letter, see Appendi.x', No. 22. 
 
REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 687 
 
 LETTER XXXIX. 
 
 REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 
 
 Description of Dublin and its People — Review of previous Letters — Remedial 
 Measures— Want of Industry, but partly the fault of the People— Their want of 
 Knowledge and opportunities of Industry the fault of the Higher Classes — No 
 Middle Class in the Country — The Upper Classes embarrassed, or driven out 
 by apprehension of violence — Abolish the class of Middlemen — Raise the tone 
 of Society, and thus prevent gross mismanagement of Estates, which would not 
 then be borne — FaciUtate the transfer of encumbered Estates — Compel the sale 
 of Property by Law, when the interest of Mortgages upon it is not paid, instead 
 of appomting Receivers in Chancerj' — Resolutely put down Outrages and punish 
 Crime— Put a stop to Agitation of every kind— Suppress Trade Combmations 
 — Instances of their evil effects — Their injury to the Fishmg Trade— Insure a 
 Tenant Payment for his Improvements — Undertake Public Works — Cultivate 
 Wastes, and teach Agriculture by Model Farms — Attend to reasonable Appli- 
 cations for Assistance — Pay the Priesthood — Conclusion. 
 
 Dublin, January 6. 
 
 It M^ould scarcely be comijatible with the object of my 
 letters to give a minutely detailed description of the metro- 
 polis of Ireland. It has most of the features of great 
 cities — many of their advantages and most of their vices ; 
 much of their magnificence, and all their squalid misery 
 and want. A rapid glance at its leading features may not, 
 however, be without interest. Without the pretensions to 
 the natural advantages of position of Edinburgh, Dublin in 
 many respects rivals the Scotch metropolis. Its public 
 buildings are magnificent; the Phoenix-park adjoining it 
 
588 REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 
 
 unrivalled. As a town, for the most part, its streets are 
 wide and regularly built, and its principal streets contain 
 good houses. It possesses, also, some very handsome 
 squares. On the other hand, the worst parts of the town 
 surpass the United Kingdom in misery and wretchedness. 
 There is a district called "The Liberty," compared with 
 which St, Giles' in London is a kind of paradise. The 
 houses there are let in rooms to what are termed " room- 
 holders," and as many as forty, fifty, and even sixty people, 
 — beggars, thieves, and prostitutes, — men, women, and 
 children, have been counted as thus dwelling in one house. 
 
 The character of the people of Dublin, both as it strikes 
 a stranger, and as given by themselves, is one of contented, 
 self-satisfied mediocrity. The first aim of a shopkeeper, as 
 soon as his business will keep him, is to start a horse and 
 car. He enjoys himself; mixes business and pleasure very 
 equally, struggles to keep up his horse and car, and dies 
 poor, leaving his son the same course before him. He 
 rarely rises above his position ; and his shop continues one 
 of mediocre character. In England a shopkeeper minds 
 his business while he is at it, and retires with a fortune to his 
 country-house and his carriage, and leaves his son a wealthy 
 man. He almost invariably rises in the scale of society. 
 In Dublin, the professional man keeps his hunter, and 
 sometimes his beagles. He enjoys life, and leaves it much 
 as he commenced it. In England, the professional man 
 is a slave to his profession ; but he gains reputation, wealth, 
 and a high position. The streets of Dublin have a jaunting- 
 car, pleasure-taking, careless look. The streets of any 
 town in England of similar magnitude have a bustling, 
 business-like, wealthy look. The carriages of Dublin are 
 eminently remarkable for " shabby gentility;" tlic carriages 
 of any similar community in England impress you always 
 either with the character of luxurious wcaltli ^;<?r se, or of 
 unmistakable aristocratic bearing and wealth. As a city, 
 
REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 589 
 
 Dublin possesses many advantages which would seem to 
 mark it out for the residence of men of wealth. It has fine 
 scenery, excellent sea-bathing, good markets, and good 
 houses ; as a residence, however, sought for by this class, it 
 ranks much below Edinburgh. 
 
 The object of my letter to-day, is not, however, to write 
 a dissertation on the city of Dublin, but to endeavour to 
 take a calm review of my five months' tour in Ireland, now 
 drawling to a close. 
 
 I have just finished a careful examination of the numerous 
 letters which I have written to you from Ireland, having 
 entered on that examination anxious to refresh my memory 
 with the impressions which those letters contained, j^rompted 
 by each locality from which they were written. I assure 
 you that I rise from the task depressed by the almost 
 unvarying evidence which they bear of neglected capa- 
 bilities, of want of energy, enterprise and industry — of 
 misery and degradation. To grapple with these monster 
 evils is indeed a terrible task; but these are the evils 
 with which the Government must grapple if it hopes to 
 see Ireland no longer a stumbling-block and a difficulty — 
 alike the weakness and the disgrace of the empire. 
 
 Want of employment is the first superficial want which 
 presents itself. It is, however, a want wdiich is more 
 imaginary than real. Employment abounds ; but there is 
 the want of energy and the want of industry to set about 
 finding employment. 
 
 Want of capital to give employment is the first cry with 
 which you are met.* But it is enterprise and industry 
 
 * " Capital is wanting," says M. Beaumont; " the terror which reigns in the 
 country drives it farther away. Industry alone could ?-aise from indigence the 
 mtdtitude of cottiers that contend for the land ; and capital, without which no 
 industry is possible, has fled from poor Ireland for ever." — Ireland, Social, 
 Political, and Religious, by M. Beaumont, vol. i. p. 312. 
 
 But M. Beaumont has forgot to tell us where capital comes from. It does not 
 drop in bulk from the clouds. With more truth he asks (p. 285), — ' ' What means are 
 
590 REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 
 
 ■which create capital. Capital is wealth accumulated; and 
 wealth can increase only in proportion as the produce of the 
 labour of the community is greater than its consumption. 
 Labour is the first price — the original purchase-money 
 which was paid for all things. " Labour is the source of 
 all wealth,"*' It is then to the icant of industry that we 
 must attribute the want of capital. 
 
 But the statesman will ask, almost in despair, " How can 
 you make a nation industrious which is steeped in apathy 
 and laziness ?" It is the business of a statesman to try : and 
 the task is worthy of a statesman. 
 
 It is at once conceded that the Government cannot find 
 employment for a nation. Employment for the mass of 
 the people must spring from the people. That which 
 the Government can do only, is to aid the people, to 
 stimulate them, to lead them, to protect them in finding 
 employment. 
 
 The question then arises, how are these things to be done? 
 
 I know the appearance of egotism — the seeming presump- 
 tion — of writing to you what may be done to reclaim a 
 people. There are quacks in abundance, each with his 
 nostrum ; I may be esteemed a quack. After, however, 
 having been all over Ireland — after having written on every 
 subject which is talked of in it, and prepared laborious details 
 on every subject — after having had no common advantages, 
 having always had the opportunity of mixing with the best 
 informed society in each town and county, I humbly submit 
 to you the opinions which I have formed. I believe them 
 to be well-founded — test them; if you find them Avorthless, 
 reject them. 
 
 there of becoming rich in a country where commerce and industry are dead?" 
 Industry will create commerce ; both united will create riches and wealth, and 
 wealth accumulated is capital, and capital re-acts in i)romoting the industry which 
 created it. But the first step in this ladder is industry, without which we can 
 advance no further ; and the people of Ireland have little industry. 
 * Adam Smith. 
 
REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 591 
 
 The want of industry of the mass of the people is but 
 partly their fault. It is partly owing to their natural dis- 
 position, and partly to their want of knowledge, and the 
 want of opportunity of being industrious. 
 
 Again, the want of knowledge and the want of opportuni- 
 ties of being industrious are faults which must be laid at the 
 door of the middle and upper classes. It is for them to guide 
 and teach those below them, and find them the opportunities 
 of industry. 
 
 Strictly speaking, there is hardly what can be termed a 
 " middle class" in the country, looking at it as a whole. 
 The middle class man in England is the most useful member 
 of society ; along with considerable physical activity and 
 exertion, he is perpetually striving with all the energies of 
 his mind to accom2)lish some useful object which gives 
 employment and creates wealth. He is either a merchant, 
 a manufacturer, a farmer, or a shopkeeper. Each gives his 
 energies and his skill to make the business in which he is 
 engaged succeed. Excepting parts of the north of Ireland, 
 and two or three of the principal towns, the middle class man 
 in Ireland is what is termed a " middleman" — a perfectly 
 useless drone, apeing the manners and habits of the class 
 above him, living on a profit-rent, which he neither uses skill 
 nor exertion to enable his wretched under-tenants to realise. 
 His superior knowledge never directs them. He is of no 
 use in societ3^* 
 
 * " The absence of a middle class in Ireland has been, and is still, one of the 
 greatest misfortunes of the country . . . \Miat chance has a people of escaping or 
 at least of alleviating oppression, if it remains motionless in its ignorance and its 
 misery; and if men do not arise from its own proper bosom, who, superior by 
 their education, their talent, or their fortune, are capable of taking its cause in 
 hand, and guiding the popular efforts for deliverance? 
 
 " The impossibility of a people, however oppressed, raising itself, when it has 
 not the support of a superior class, was never shown more clearly than during 
 the insurrection of 1798, when there were as many revolts as there were villages, — 
 soldiers in abundance, but no officers. Everything aristocratic that then existed 
 in Ireland wcis hostile to this national movement ; the people could find no 
 
592 REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 
 
 On the upper class man then falls the duty of teaching the 
 mass and finding them opportunites of industry. For the 
 most part the upper classes almost entirely neglect both 
 these duties. And this fault is partly to be attributed to 
 their negligence, partly to their embarrassments, and partly 
 to that unhappily prevailing system of intimidation which 
 drives them out of the country. However well-disposed, 
 the mere nominal owner of an estate has not the power to 
 promote improvements which give opportunities of industry, 
 and without the opportunities of industry the people cannot 
 learn to be industrious. However able and well-disposed, 
 the man who is placed in apprehension of his life will leave 
 to agents the duties of his position, and the door for neglect 
 and abuse is at once opened ; and neglect and abuse but 
 aggravate the evils which prevail. 
 
 What measures, then, would such a state of society dictate 
 to a statesman ? Remember that individual likings and 
 prejudices — nay, that individual interests must give way to 
 the interest of the nation. We cannot expect improvement 
 to spring from the mass — from the common people ; not 
 only is this true of all nations, but in Ireland it is contrary 
 to the national character for the mass of themselves to 
 improve. Tliey are contented with potatoes. Remedial 
 measures must then be directed to the middle and upper 
 classes — must be fitted to meet their peculiar relations and 
 positions, under which now the opportunities of knowledge 
 and employment cannot arise — for from the middle and 
 upper classes must improvement spring. 
 
 Of what use is the " middleman ?" If he usurp the place 
 
 assistance but in a middle class, and such a class did not exist in Ireland. There 
 were some individuals fit to make a part of tliis class, but not enough to constitute 
 it." — M. Beaumont's Ireland, Social, Political and Religions, Vol. ii. p. 109. 
 
 " It is not merely number that is wanting to the middle class in Ireland, it also 
 wants what it does not yet possess, knowledge, experience anil education." — 
 Jhid. P. 120. 
 
REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 693 
 
 of landlord, whilst in reality he is not landlord, give reality 
 to his position ; compel him to become the landlord, or to 
 give up his position. If he take the place of an extortioner, 
 and as an idle drone consumes the surjilus produce — the 
 wealth and capital of the community — extinguish him ; j^ut 
 an end by law to his ability to continue to do so. In fact, 
 create a valuable middle class by prohibiting absolutely all 
 subletting, and thus compel the middleman either to pur- 
 chase the fee, or become, as in England, a working farmer 
 of the lands which he holds, finding capital and intelligence 
 and skill to employ and direct labour on his lands. What 
 would be thought in Suffolk, for instance, of any man who 
 should go there and take a dozen farms, as Mr. O'Connell 
 does in Kerry, and sublet them to small tenants, at three times 
 the rent which he himself paid, he doing nothing but receive 
 the rents ? It would not be borne ; but if borne, it would 
 soon make Suffolk what the farms of Mr. O'Connell are now 
 — an abode of wretchedness and neglect.* 
 
 It is true that the Government cannot well compel the 
 negligent among the upper class to attend to the duties of 
 tiieir position by direct means ; but they may by indirect 
 means. Whatever tends to raise the tone, — the expectations 
 of society, will compel the negligent among the upper class to 
 meet those expectations. Such utter neglect of all the duties 
 of a landlord, such contrivances to insure rent, and such 
 unscrupulous means as are resorted to to realise it, as are 
 sometimes met with in Ireland, society would not bear in 
 England. For instance, it is common in almost all parts of 
 Ireland to let lands in partnership. In the north and west 
 this is called " rundale," or " common," and the tenants 
 occupy in common, and of course the best tenant will take 
 care not to do more than the worst, as he would only be 
 
 * See, post, Appendix, No. 23, abstract of evidence taken before the Land Com- 
 missioners as to the evils created by the class of " middlemen." 
 
 Q Q 
 
594 REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 
 
 working for the benefit of others and not for himself. If he 
 drain and make a piece of land rich for himself one year, 
 another of the rundale tenants gets it in rotation the next 
 year, and reaps the benefit of his labour. This Avould not be 
 endured in England ; but it arose from a landlord's contriv- 
 ance to make a whole batch of tenants jointly liable for each 
 individual's rent. In Tipperary the same system is exten- 
 sively pursued, under the name of " partnership" holdings. 
 There the tenants do not hold in common, but divide their 
 holdings. Half a dozen tenants will take a tract of land, and 
 become jointly and severally liable for the whole of the rent, 
 and divide the land amongst themselves. If one tenant does 
 not pay his portion, the remedy resorted to is not to distrain 
 his stock, for fear of rescue, but to proceed by ejectment ; 
 but, in order to eject him, declarations in ejectment must be 
 served on all the tenants who are joined in partnership with 
 him. It is true that they usually club up the money some- 
 how or other, but is it possible to imagine any management 
 more likely to create disorder than this ? In England society 
 would not suffer it — would compel, in fact, the landlord thus 
 negligent of his duty to alter such a management of his 
 estate. Negligent landlords must improve — must attend to 
 their duties, if the expectations of society are raised. 
 
 But the mass of Irish landlords do not afford opportunities 
 for employment and instruction, because they arc so embar- 
 rassed that they cannot. They have merely nominal estates 
 — the real owners of their lands are mortgagees. No one 
 can doubt the advantages which the upper classes are able 
 to confer on society. Society wants an upper class. But it 
 must have it in realUtj — in substance, not merely in name. Nor 
 does it matter who the individuals are who compose the 
 upper class so long as they are men of education, of honour, 
 and of wealth. What matters it to society whether the lord 
 of 50,000 acres be lineally descended from the treacherous 
 scoundrel Dermot Macraurrough, or from a respectable 
 
REVIEW or REMEDIAL IMEASURES. 595 
 
 cheese and bacon factor of Cork, or yarn-spinner of Belfast, 
 who realised a fortune by his industry half a century ago. 
 It is the man society wants ; and in that man the power of 
 doing good — the wealth to give opportunities of industry, the 
 knowledge to direct those opportunities, the honour to act 
 justly and to set an examjale to all. But if you have a mere 
 nominal landlord — a man over head and ears in debt and 
 embarrassments, you lack in him the first and most needful 
 quality, the ■power of doing good. Take measures then to 
 give to society that which it wants to stimulate it and direct 
 it — a real and not a nominal owner of the land. Facilitate the 
 transfer of lands. Enable an encumbered proprietor to sell 
 a part of his estate to pay off his encumbrances, giving the 
 purchaser a clear title by Act of Parliament, pi-ovided the 
 purchase-money be paid over to the encumbrancers, accord- 
 ing to priority of claim. It is foreign to my object now 
 to go into detail ; but let in the life-blood and energy, and 
 enterprise of capitalists into the lifeless masses of huge, en- 
 cumbered, unimproved, helpless estates.* They will become 
 real owners of the land, will give employment upon it, and" 
 stimulate industry. Employment will bring peace. Industry 
 will bring wealth. 
 
 When an estate gets into such a hopeless condition that it 
 can no longer pay the interest of its mortgage debts and 
 keep the owner, no longer permit a receiver in Chancery to 
 be appointed to receive the rents and hand them over to the 
 mortgagee. The mortgagee has no responsibility, and no 
 honour from the estate ; he cares nothing about it so long 
 as his principle is secure and he gets his interest paid. The 
 nominal owner has no power to do anything, and, however 
 well inclined, the estate goes to ruin under his eyes. We may 
 respect his attachment to his ancestral acres, and his dislike 
 to part with them ; but we must not let his individual likes 
 
 * See ante as to this, p. 226. 
 Q Q 2 
 
596 REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 
 
 and dislikes stand in the way of the public good. If he 
 cannot fulfil the duties of his position it is his misfortune; 
 the state must take care that the community and the country 
 do not suffer because of it. When this is the unhappy 
 condition of an estate, at once compel a sale; let in 
 capitalists, and substitute a real for a nominal owner of the 
 land. That which his good feeling, his inclination, or his 
 good sense prompts, the real owner will have the power to 
 carry into effect.* 
 
 There are, however, many landlords who have both the 
 inclination and the jiower to benefit their tenantry — to give 
 them oj^portunities of employment and to instruct them, but 
 who, owing to the disgraceful system of intimidation that 
 is allowed to prevail, are driven out of the country. It is 
 foolish to hope for improvement if you do not enforce the 
 law— if you do not give the consciousness of security for 
 life and property to every man.f The outrages and shootings 
 
 * See Ajipendix No. 21, post, as to the vast amount of landed property in this 
 deplorable condition, having a receiver in Chancery appointed to receive the rents. 
 
 t It is a strange phenomenon in Ireland, and jjeculiar to the country, that wliilst 
 new fortunes are created, the number of new ich men is not increased in the sama 
 proportion. The reason is, that after the fortune is created, the rich man departs, 
 and this is explained by the social and political state of Ireland. 
 
 The manufacturer, the merchant, and the banker, enriched by their industry in 
 Ireland, would be doubtless tempted to choose that country as their resting place ; 
 but besides the difficulty of obtaining land in Ireland, and finding a secure invest- 
 ment, there are in this country numberless obstacles to quiet possession. 
 
 It often happens, then, that finding no secure asylum in Ireland, those who have 
 acquired wealth, go to seek it in some of the towns of England. We see then how 
 it is, that while many make their fortune in Ireland, an equal number does not re- 
 side there : and nevertheless it is the residence not the fortune made, that must be 
 taken into account. We have not in fact, to consider whether Catholics gain more 
 or less at the bar or in trade, and purchase estates or rent-charges in Ireland with 
 the fruit of their labours ; but whether they live on their estates in Ireliuid, or 
 spend their income in an Irish town : and if, after having issued from the people 
 by their industry and talents they take an intermediate place between the aristoc- 
 racy and the people, and maintain their station." — M. BeauynonVs Ireland, So- 
 cial, Political and Relir/ious. Vo]. ii. p. 120. 
 
 " On one side the agitated state of Ireland prevents the introduction of capital, 
 and when capital is introduced by persons sufficiently bold to brave this agitation, 
 
REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 597 
 
 of Tipperary and some adjacent counties are disgraceful to 
 the nation — they mark the existence amongst the people of 
 the most cowardly and savage brutality. It is folly to 
 apply to such a society tlie humane and moderate provisions 
 of laws adapted only for a peaceful and orderly and inde- 
 pendent community. No man is independent in Tipperary. 
 He dare not act justly for fear of his life. However much 
 he may hate the crime, he must shield the murderer for fear 
 of his life. He dare give no evidence calculated to lead to 
 the punishment of an oflPender for fear of his life. He dare 
 not turn away a servant that robs him for fear of his life. 
 He dare not compel the fulfilment of a contract, or enforce 
 the payment of a debt, for fear of his life. Nay, he dare not 
 express a political opinion adverse to the prevailing mob 
 opinion for fear of his life. For the Lord-Lieutenant to talk 
 of putting in force the laws in such a state of society as this — 
 of summoning juries who will not convict, and subpoenaing 
 witnesses who will not give evidence, is childish. A free 
 and liberal Government — mild and humane laws, which 
 depend as much upon the co-operation and aid of the people, 
 as upon the law or the Government, are only fitted for an 
 
 those brutal and violent passions, which the working classes seem almost to breathe 
 in the atmosphere that surrounds them, raise an almost insurmountable obstacle 
 to the success of their enterprise. 
 
 "We should assign very extravagant national passions to English capitalists, if 
 Belfast and Dublin differed in their eyes from Manchester and Glasgow. Let us 
 state the matter fairly ; the obstacle clearly arises from Ireland being the most 
 miserable and agitated countiy in the whole world : hence an Englishman will in- 
 vest bis capital anywhere rather than in Ireland, and precisely because the country 
 is directly before his eyes, he sees more clearly the danger to which his capital 
 would be exposed if he sent it thither. 
 
 " What must we conclude from the preceding statements ? In the first place, 
 so long as the causes exist which oppose the spontaneous development of Irish in- 
 dustry, it is not from manufactures that we must ask work for those who have it 
 not, and a remedy for the evils of which the idleness of the people is the real or 
 supposed cause : and in the second place, that to render the development of Irish 
 industry possible, it is necessary to begin by removing the causes by which it is 
 now paralysed. These causes are notorious ; they are the anarchy of the country, 
 and the spirit that animates the xvorking classes." — Ibid. p. 154. 
 
598 REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 
 
 eiiliglitened and orderly and just community; they are help- 
 less and mischievous in a cowardly, a savage, a brutalized, 
 and an ignorant one. Such a people will hear and require a 
 more despotic rule. Fine the community for every crime, 
 and enforce the fine. If crime still goes on, send another 
 thousand policemen into the county, and make the county hear 
 the whole expense. Billet the police in the farm-houses, and 
 let them worm out crime in a manner fitted to the cautious 
 and timid character of the people. The man who dare not 
 go to the police-office and give information of a murderer 
 will hint it to the policeman billeted in his house, because 
 he will not be suspected of giving the information. Appoint 
 stipendiary magistrates for every district, and it would be 
 wise to extend their powers, where juries will not convict. 
 If a criminal is sentenced to transportation pack him off at 
 once, do not give him time in gaol to leave behind him 
 amongst his friends a legacy of revenge. Punish every 
 'brutal crime with a fitting punishment. What cares the 
 man who can gloat over revenge, perpetrated or determined 
 ^n, for a three months' imprisonment. Cat-o'-nine-tail him 
 at a cart's tail through the chief town of his neighbourhood 
 — hold him up to the scorn and derision of his neighbours 
 for having been a cowardly brute, with just courage enough 
 to skulk behind a hedge, and try to shoot an unconscious 
 victim, or knock him senseless with a stone from behind. 
 At the termination of his imprisonment give him a repetition 
 of the same dose, and send him home to his friends to doctor his 
 back for him. A few such examples as these would have a 
 thousand times greater effect than all the rewards and pro- 
 clamations in the world. Strive by overwhelming force to 
 make the punishment of crime certain, and make its punish- 
 ment terrible. If an outcry is raised against you by vaga- 
 bonds and the press of the " Vindicator" class, never mind 
 it ; uphold what is good in the community, and the clamour 
 of the worthless will not injure you. 
 
REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 599 
 
 With a firm and determined hand put down agitation, 
 whether that agitation be Orange or Repeal. If necessary, 
 fear not to do it despotically. Remember you are dealing 
 with a people who in the mass are almost uncivilized. 
 Like children they require governing with the hand of 
 power. They require authority, and will bear it. A more 
 enlightened community would not require it, and would not 
 bear it.. 
 
 Rigorously put down all combinations and punish the 
 combinators. It is a remarkable fact that there is scarcely 
 a trade which has prospered in Ireland, save that of brewers 
 and distillers. Almost every other trade has been ruined by 
 combinations.* One brewer and one distiller, with a few 
 unskilled labourers, are sufficient for a brewery or distillery, 
 and there can, therefore, be no combinations of skilled work- 
 men against them. For instance — and I name these only 
 as examples amidst hundreds — a timber merchant of Dublin, 
 Mr. James Fagan, erected saw-mills. The sawyers com- 
 bined against him and, because he persevered, murdered his 
 head sawyer, Hanlon, in open day, in one of the most popu- 
 lous streets in Dublin. Mr. Fagan, however, had sufficient 
 capital to enable him to persevere, and now more " pit" men 
 
 * " Scarcely are the operatives, who at first consented to work for moderate 
 wages, masters of the field, when they combine to obtain higher wages, and 
 applying the White boy principle to manufactures, they arbitrarily fix the price of 
 a day's work ; they enact terrible penalties against the master who should pay, 
 and the journeyman who should consent to i-eceive less wages; and this barbarous 
 code does not contain idle menaces; punishment follows close on offence; and 
 not long since, Dublin was the theatre of horrid murders committed on poor 
 operatives, whose only crime was that they worked for a lower price than that 
 fixed by the " Union of Trades :" unfortunate beings who were murdered because 
 they were satisfied with moderate wages, and who must have starved for want of 
 work, if they asked higher ! And what is the infallible result of these outrages? 
 If the manufacturer yields he is ruined ; if he resists, the operatives refuse to 
 work. In either case, industrial enterprise is destroyed, and the operative who 
 complains, and perhaps not without reason, that he receives too little wages for 
 his work is deprived both of work and wages." — M. Beaumont's Ireland, Social, 
 Political, and Religious. Vol. ii. p. 152. 
 
600 REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 
 
 are employed in his saw-mills, because lie has created a 
 trade, than he employed sawyers before. The same gentle- 
 man leased an useless dock, intending to make it a graving- 
 dock for the repair of vessels, instead of sending them to 
 Glasgow or Liverpool to be repaired. His men combined, 
 and refused to work except on certain terms and at certain 
 times. This he would not submit to, and he procured 
 Scotchmen as ship carpenters. About four months ago, 
 whilst some of these men were working at a ship's side, on 
 a stage suspended by ropes, some of the combinators got on 
 board, cut the ropes, and precipitated the men into 16-feet 
 water. Their lives were with difficulty saved ; a Dublin 
 magisterial Solon, before whom the fellows who attempted 
 to murder these men were brought, satisfied himself and the 
 law by simply binding them over to keep the peace. A Mr. 
 Folds, a printer, about four years ago, rented a magnificent 
 printing establishment in Dublin, and erected steam presses, to 
 enable him to comj^ete with the London printers. No sooner 
 had he got contracts and was beginning to succeed, than his 
 men combined against him and began to dictate terms to him, 
 and the rules on which he should conduct his business. Deter- 
 mined not to submit to this he procured English and Scotch 
 printers. Almost immediately afterwards his printing esta- 
 blishment was set fire to and burnt down, and the grand 
 jury found that it had been done maliciously. This gen- 
 tleman's undertaking, calculated to give employment and 
 benefit to the community, was ruined in consequence. It is 
 only two months ago that the colliers of Slievardah coal- 
 mine, Tipperary, and also of Earl's-hill Colliery, and South 
 Ballinastick Colliery, in the same county, worked by the 
 Mining Company of Ireland, combined to prevent the agents 
 working them in the manner they thought most advanta- 
 geous, and shot one of the agents. The average labourer's 
 wages in that district are 8^?. and lOrf. a day, whilst every 
 collier was earning from 25. to 3^. a day. The company 
 
REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 601 
 
 have been compelled to suspend the working of these mines 
 in consequence, and a large number of men are thus thrown 
 out of employment.* I have before me a report politely fur- 
 nished to me by Mr. Strangman, of Waterford, in which 
 that gentleman details the establishment of a Coast Fishing 
 Company there. There were but few fishermen, earning a 
 precarious subsistence there, and it was said that the fish 
 had deserted the coast ; the trade was declining. Four years 
 ago a fishing company was established there, and a trawler 
 of about 40 tons burden was purchased. I cannot do better 
 than quote his own report of the difficulties every undertak- 
 ing in Ireland has to encounter, first from the most stupid 
 opposition, and eventually from illegal combinations : — 
 
 " First, as our mode of fishing was 7iovel in this quarter, we had to 
 etnplotj Englishmen until some of the natives were instructed ; an outcry im- 
 mediately arose for bringing strangers when so many at home wanted em- 
 floyment. Then, when we told of the profits likely to arise from this mode 
 of fishing, some accused us of boasting, whilst others circulated a report 
 that fishing was merely the nominal object, but that smuggling was the 
 real one. One class found fault with us for sending any fish to England 
 irntn their wants at home were supplied. Others complained of the high 
 prices charged. Another set denounced us for taking the bread from 
 poor men — for that we caught so much we should not leave any for 
 others ; and further, that the market would be so glutted, and the prices 
 depreciated, that even if they did catch as much as they had done pre- 
 viously they would not be remunerated for their labour. This latter was 
 asserted by many who ought to have known better ; and such being the 
 case, it was no wonder that those poor men, who fancied their rights and 
 mode of living Avould be infringed upon, were so excited as to threaten us 
 if we persisted. These threats of course had no effect upon us, further 
 than to endeavour to explain how ill-founded those reports all were ; but 
 it was of no use, and one night a party of them seized a new net, worth 
 about 15/., cut it in pieces, and thrcAv it over the cliffs into the sea. We 
 offered a reward of 50^., and Government 30/., for the discovery of the 
 
 * A reference to the Appendix, No. 2^, post, containing a return of the mines 
 in operation in Ireland, will show that about 300 men were thus thrown out of 
 employment. 
 
602 REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 
 
 perpetrators, but it was no avail ; for though one of the men in our 
 employ knew the parties, yet he stated he would prefer being turned off 
 to giving us information, fearing the consequences to himself. 
 
 " These Avere very discouraging circumstances ; but this Textreme 
 violence brought matters more speedily to a conclusion. An inspector 
 from the Fishery Board came down, and also a stipendiary magistrate. 
 A meeting was held, and an investigation entered into. The Roman 
 Catholic clergy also exhorted their flocks, and after some time peace was 
 restored. Since that time other parties have procured similar boats, and 
 there are now twelve cutters of forty to fifty tons burden, each belonging 
 to this port, regularly engaged in this branch of fishing, besides some- 
 times as many as twenty more from other places, who occasionally visit 
 us. The good wages the men earn has quite altered the current of 
 public opinion, and those who were before hostile to us are now anxious 
 we should get more boats, and thus give more employment. The appre- 
 hension of the fish being all caught has proved^ fallacious ; and so far 
 from this market being glutted, it is found the demand has increased with 
 the supply, fish having become an article of regular diet. The cost of one 
 of these cutters, with her gear, &c., is 500/. ; and the value of the gross 
 produce of the fish taken by each of our boats is about 400/. per annum. 
 If, then, we suppose the other boats have been equally successful, the 
 twelve boats, at 400/., would clear 5,000/. worth of good nutritious food, 
 drawn from the ocean, by this means giving so much wealth to the com- 
 munity ; and there is abundant opening for three times as many boats in 
 this branch alone. The men receive certain proportions of what the fish 
 sells for. The earnings of our skippers or captains average about 25^. 
 per week — the men from 16*. to 21.y., and boys 7*. to \0s. per week ; and, 
 after paying for wear and tear, the owners divide about 20 per cent, per 
 annum. With this pleasing result, I feel no hesitation in stating it as my 
 opinion, that the sea is a rich mine which only requires to be judiciously 
 worked to yield abundant reward for labour and capital — in other words 
 riches. 
 
 " Besides the trawl-fishing, our company were anxious to introduce 
 improvements in other modes ; and we began with lobsters, crabs, and 
 prawns. We procured a suitable boat and apparatus, costing about 40/., 
 and two qualified hands. The summer before last this boat caught 
 upwards of 100/. worth, the men earning 30.y. per week, whilst employed, 
 and the owners dividing 50 per cent. TJie last summer, however, we have 
 met with sad disappointments. Our previous success excited much envy, 
 and several of our pots were destroyed. We otfcred a large reward, but 
 without effect. At first the parties cut the apparatus ; but latterly they 
 
REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 603 
 
 adopted an ingenious mode by ichich they conceive they can ease their con- 
 sciences, as well as escape ptmixhment. The lobster pots are put in deep 
 water about a mile or two from the shore, with a buoy or float on the 
 surface to indicate their position. The plan resorted to is to get a jiiece of 
 cord, about a yard long, with a stone tied to each end. This is dropped 
 accide)itally on purpose, saddle-Avise on the float, which being unequal to 
 sustain the weight is sunk to the bottom, and consequently defies all 
 attempts at recovery. In consequence of these repeated losses I fear we 
 shall be obliged to give up this brayich, although we offered to the parties 
 we have reason to believe were the perpetrators to procure similar 
 apparatus for them at cost price, and instruct them in the proper mode of 
 using them. 
 
 " Last summer we found the sea to be absolutely alive with herrings, 
 mackerel, and pilchards, from one-half mUe to six miles seaward from the 
 coast, but there being no sufficient or suitable boats or nets to take them, 
 owing to the opposition and prejudices of the people, the advantage was 
 entirely lost, with the exception of a very small quantity that came in 
 close to the shore." 
 
 It is melancholy to contemplate a stupidly ignorant oppo- 
 sition to enterprizes like these, from a people, starving for 
 "ivant of employment. 
 
 The Government, then, as a fii*st duty, ought to protect 
 every enterprise by the most stringent and determined 
 enforcement of the law, and secure to the projectors the fair 
 rewards of their enterprise, and with it employment for the 
 people. The people themselves are too apt to mistake cun- 
 ning for wisdom ; and the cunning which delights in the 
 cleverness of ruining a rival, or forcing terms and rules on a 
 speculator which his business will not bear, has not the 
 wisdom to see that in ruining a rival it ruins a trade by 
 which it lives, and that its forced terms have stopped the 
 speculation which was its only livelihood. 
 
 Insure by law payment to a tenant for those improve- 
 ments, which have increased the value of the landlord's 
 land, according: to a fair estimate of the increased value. 
 This is simply honest and fair.* 
 
 * See letter, ante, dated from Bantry, p. 405. 
 
604 REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 
 
 The landlord loses nothing, for he has the increased value 
 for his money, and the tenant will thereby be encouraged to 
 improve. 
 
 These are indirect means of insuring employment and 
 prosperity. But there are other direct means which are in 
 the power of the Government. 
 
 Provide suitable piers and harbours for the accommoda- 
 tion and safety of the fishing craft. This would be a direct 
 encouragement to industi-y, and would leave laziness in sight 
 of abundance of fish without an excuse. On the coast of Erris 
 in Mayo, of parts of Connemara, of Donegal, of Kerry, and of 
 the west of Cork, the sea swarms with fish, which often can- 
 not be taken because there are no harbours of refuge. If a 
 Donegal or Erris man ventures to sea, he does it at his 
 peril, if the weather is at all doubtful, because there is no 
 harbour to which he can run. And yet these people peri- 
 odically starve with swarms of fish beside them, and are 
 fed by the money of England, which would already have 
 twice over built all the piers and harbours they wanted, 
 and have enabled them independently to earn their own 
 food. 
 
 With the revenues of the crown lands, lease, or pur- 
 chase, and promote the draining and cultivation of waste 
 lands.* These would act as public examples to capitalists 
 who might become purchasers; for it is from them that 
 general improvement must come. The Government can 
 only set examj^les, it cannot cultivate the whole country. 
 This would cost nothing, but would on the contrary pay iveU.f 
 
 * See ante, p. 470. 
 
 t From the evidence of Robert Dymond, Esq., land surveyor, before Lord 
 Devon's Commission as to the effect of draining in Devonshire : — " With regard 
 to draining does your experience enable you to say wliether, in the ordinary run of 
 cases, that is an operation which pays well ? — I have no doubt of its being one of 
 the most important improvements that can be made, and one which will give the 
 largest return for the outlay; whilst land which is wet and recjuires draining 
 remains in that state, all manure is thrown away upon it. As a proof of this 
 
REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 605 
 
 Establish in different districts model farms and agricul- 
 tural scbools to teach and instruct the peasantry, by both 
 precept and example, how to cultivate the land, and make 
 the most of those advantages they have.* 
 
 Attend to reasonable applications for assistance made by 
 enterprising portions of the community. This would encou- 
 rage and urge them on. Limerick, for instance, complains 
 that she has no dock ; that her trading- vessels are in danger 
 of being driven against the bridge, and in fact have been 
 thus destroyed ; that the navigation of the Lower Shannon 
 to the sea, which is now dangerous and full of shallows, 
 might be improved at small expense, whilst the liberal grant 
 of 600,000/. by the Parliament of Great Britain is being 
 jobbed away in imj)roving the Upper Shannon, and not one 
 farthing is spent on the Lower Shannon. The citizens of 
 Belfast complain that, with a trade that yields a Customs 
 revenue of 360,000/. a year, the Government will not aid 
 them to build a Custom-house for the convenient transaction 
 of business, and the collection of the Queen's taxes. They 
 complain, also, that their representations about their insuffi- 
 cient Post-office establishment are totally disregarded, and 
 that the enormous commercial undertakings of that city are 
 put to continual losses and inconveniences in consequence. 
 Attention to matters like these are the routine duties of 
 Government and effects much good. Inattention to them 
 excites discontents, and depresses and beats down enterprise. 
 
 Pay the priesthood. Take away from them thereby 
 
 I may mention that, since I examined a large field of wheat a few weeks since, 
 two sides of the field had been drained, and the centre of it had not ; the produce 
 so far as present appearances go I may safely say, will be four times as much 
 upon the two sides as it will be in the centre of the field, although the land is 
 precisely of the same quality, the only difference being that part is drained and the 
 remainder is not. I have no doubt the farmer will, at harvest time, have four 
 times the quantity of wheat upon the sides compared to the centre, although the 
 present is a very dry season." — Evidence, Part II. page 22. 
 
 * See, ante ,p. 154, account of the Agricultural School at Templemoyle. 
 
606 REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 
 
 every motive for agitation, and enlist them among the 
 friends of peace and of order. I have ah-eady dwelt in 
 former letters sufficiently on this subject, and further detail 
 is now unnecessary.* 
 
 Now, every one of these measures is practicable. Every 
 one of them would tend to benefit, to encourage, to stimu- 
 late the people; to excite emulation, enterprise, and industry. 
 Yet every one of them is neglected. Such measures would 
 let capitalists into the country. The efforts of the Govern- 
 ment at improvement and civilisation would urge on those 
 capitalists to imitate the example set to them, and they would 
 have the power to do it. 
 
 The peasantry would be encouraged to be industrious, and 
 would be taught how to be so. Compare any of these 
 measures in probable benefit with the recent college grants. 
 These grants are thanklessly received by the people. The 
 colleges will teach young men Latin and Greek and theology, 
 who had better be learning some honest trade by which to 
 earn a living. Educated young men without means will be 
 thrown upon the world, to fill professions, and to become 
 priests ; and these young men, penniless and disappointed, 
 with cultivated minds, must become the seeds of future agi- 
 tation. 
 
 You complain of the turbulence of Ireland. The means 
 of employment will stop turbulence. The measures Avhicli I 
 have humbly suggested will promote — nay, insure — employ- 
 ment. " Necessity and poverty" said the great Lord Hale, 
 in his plan for a reform of the English poor laws, " and want 
 of due provision for the employment of indigent persons, and 
 the custom of a loose and idle life, daily supply with advan- 
 tage, the number of those who are taken off by the sentence 
 of the law ; and doubtless as the multitude of poor and neces- 
 sitous and uneducated persons increases, the multitude of 
 
 * See ante, p. 498. 
 
REVIEW OF REMEDIAL MEASURES. 607 
 
 malefactors will increase, notwithstanding the examples of 
 severity." " The want," says he, " of a due provision for 
 education and relief of the poor in a loay of industry is that 
 which fills the gaols with malefactors and fills the kingdom 
 with idle and unprofitable persons tliat consume the stock of 
 the kingdom icithout improving it, and that will daily increase 
 even to a desolation in time, and this error, in the first 
 conception, is never remediable but by gibbets and whip- 
 pings; for there must be a sound, prudent, and i-esolved method 
 for an industrious education of the poor, and that will give 
 better remedy against those corruptions than the after gain 
 of penalties can." What Lord Hale wrote of England in 
 his time is true of Ireland now. Give, then, that "industrious 
 education of the poor," and those means of employment 
 which the measures pointed out will insure, and Ireland, 
 unhappy, neglected, agitated Ireland, will no longer prove 
 " the great difficulty " of the English Government. 
 
 I close now the mission with which you have honoured 
 me. I should be ungrateful did I not express my warm 
 estimation of the many courtesies, hospitalities, civilities, 
 and attentions which I have received in the prosecution o 
 my prolonged and most arduous task, in every town in 
 Ireland which I have visited.* 
 
 * For Opinions of the Press, see Appendix, No. 26. 
 
608 THE PROPOSED MEASURES OF 
 
 LETTER XL. 
 
 THE PROPOSED MEASURES OF RELIEF FOR IRELAND.* 
 
 Grounds of Mr. O'Connell's Motion for relief of Irisli Dish-ess — Dissent from 
 them — The People of Ireland not entirely blameless for the extent of that Dis- 
 tress — The People not decreasing in Numbers — Much of Irish Distress owing 
 to neglect and want of Industry — The " Anomaly" of the People of Ireland 
 starving and exporting Food — The same " Anomaly" often seen in England — 
 Irish Exports and Irish Gain by them — The real Evil of Absentees — The 
 Portion of the Irish Population which will really suffer by a failure of Potato 
 Food — Is the construction of Railways the best Remedy to aid this portion of 
 the Irish Population? — Rather encourage permanent Improvements, such as 
 draining and improving Waste Lands and Public Works, which will promote 
 Industry. 
 
 TO THE EDITOR OF " THE TII^IES." 
 
 Sir, — Having so recently returned from the fulfilment of 
 the commission with which you entrusted me in Ireland, I 
 naturally read the recent debate in the House of Commons, 
 on the subject of the ai^prehended famine in Ireland, with 
 considerable interest; and you will perhaps pardon me for 
 intruding on you a few observations respecting it. 
 
 * The following Letter on the " Proposed Measures of Relief for Ireland" was 
 recently written to the editor of The Times, in consequence of a debate in the 
 House of Commons on a motion brought forward by Mr. O'Connell, and was 
 published in The Times of the 2Gth of February. As it refers to the previous 
 Letters written from Ireland, and bears on Irish questions generally, I have added 
 it to the Irish Letters. • 
 
RELIEF POR IRELAND. 
 
 609 
 
 The debate was on the motion of Mr. O'Connell for a 
 committee to consider the state of Ireland, with a view to 
 devise means to relieve the distress of the Irish people. 
 
 In showing grounds for his motion, that honourable and 
 learned member states, that " the calamity Avith which 
 Ireland is threatened is not owing to any default of the 
 people," but to a dispensation of Providence ; " that such is 
 the distress of the Irish people that the population, instead 
 of augmenting, has actually been falling and wasting away ;" 
 that 46 per cent, of the rural population live in dwellings of 
 a single room, such is their destitution ; that Ireland exhibits 
 the strange anomaly of exporting vast quantities of food, 
 whilst her people starve ; and that the people are threatened 
 with a pestilential fever in consequence of their poor diet. 
 Much of all this is attributed to the fault of England, and an 
 appeal is made to the Government to advance large sums for 
 the formation of railroads in Ireland, to give employment 
 and alleviate the threatened distress. 
 
 No doubt, if the people of Ireland are threatened with 
 famine and pestilence in consequence of it, it is the duty of 
 the Government, as far as possible, to adopt means to avert 
 such calamities, and, if there be a proved necessity for it, to 
 send the money for which Englishmen have laboured to 
 rescue their Irish fellow-subjects from such miseries. 
 
 But are the grounds laid for such a measure unquestion- 
 able? Is it a proved necessity that the money for which 
 Englishmen have laboured should be sent to Ireland for such 
 objects ? If it be, let it be freely sent. Are railroads the 
 most fitting objects on which to spend that money to alleviate 
 the distress ? 
 
 Without boasting, I may fairly claim some little knowledge 
 of Ireland, and to many of these positions I entirely demur. 
 
 Without wishing to stay liberality by the statement, I do 
 assert that it is in a great measure the fault of the Irish 
 people themselves that the impending calamity wears so 
 
 R R 
 
610 THE PROPOSED MEASURES OF 
 
 threatening- an aspect. As early as the beginning of last 
 December, in a letter which I -vvrote to you from Cork, I, 
 amongst others, pointed out the certain destruction of the 
 potatoes then pitted, from the mode of pitting them. Drying 
 and ventilation, it was proved, arrested the disease. But it 
 has been the immemorial custom of the Irish to pile their 
 potatoes in a heap, and cover them over a foot thick with 
 earth closely packed on them. This, it was ascertained, 
 caused the diseased potatoes to ferment, and made the whole 
 mass rotten. I warned the Government in that letter that 
 when the pits were o^oened after Christmas such would be 
 found to be the fact, and called on them to use efforts to get 
 the people to reconstruct their pits on a plan that would 
 ventilate the jjotatoes. I told you then the people them- 
 selves would not do it. I also pointed out how seed for next 
 planting might be saved, by simply cutting off the liead or 
 " collar" of the potato. That letter was I'eprinted in various 
 newspapers, and extensively circulated throughout Ireland. 
 Every fact which it predicted has taken place. It was 
 founded on the opinions of men of acknowledged experience 
 and observation, on whom I could rely ; and yet, through 
 sheer apathy and indifference, I will venture to assert, that 
 not a single step was taken to alter the plan of closely pack- 
 ing the potatoes together and covering them up to ferment, 
 or of saving seed, either in consequence of that or any other 
 published information.* 
 
 Great as may be the distress of the people generally, so 
 far from " wasting and falling away" in numbers, they are 
 rapidly increasing. The Irish Census Commissioners state 
 the positive rate of increase in the population in the ten years 
 from 1831 to 1841 to be 5 per cent. (Eeport, page 11), 
 though the natural rate of increase ought to be 12 per cent, 
 (page 50) ; and they compute from ascertained returns that 
 
 * See ante, p. 438. 
 
RELIEF FOR IRELAND. 611 
 
 7 per cent, of increase is draughted out of Ireland, and from 
 tliose returns they show that 572,464 persons (or 7 per cent.) 
 have been draughted out of Ireland in those ten years, 
 upwards of 100,000 of whom have found permanent work in 
 Great Britain.* 
 
 It is too true that 46 per cent, of the rural population live 
 in hovels of a single room : nay, in Kerry, in a part of it 
 with which Mr. O'Connell is well acquainted, for it is rented 
 and sublet by him, it is far worse than this ; for in the barony 
 of Iveragh, in the rural portion of the jjarish of Cahir, or 
 Cahirciveen, out of a total of 854 houses 634 have but one 
 room and are without windows. — (Census 1841, page 198).t 
 But it is the system of middlemen which generates this 
 misery ; and until middlemen are put an end to by law this 
 misery will continue.^ If, as it is to be supposed he does, the 
 head landlord exacts a fair rent for his land, and, as is the 
 fact, the middleman exacts three times that rent — nay, as Mr. 
 O'Connell himself does as a middleman in this identical 
 barony — from these wretched occupants of hovels, how can 
 they be anything but miserable and ready recipients at all 
 times of England's bounty, when their agricultural know- 
 ledge is only just sufficient to enable them to raise this 
 extortionate rent, and to exist on the most wretched food ? 
 Is it not enough to try English patience to hear men talking 
 about distress and want of employment with some 3,000,000 of 
 acres of good land lying waste and capable of cultivation 
 beside them and around them, before and behind them ?± 
 Is it not enough to excite indignation to hear men whining 
 about their distress, with the land they have in cultivation. 
 
 * See ante, p. 15. 
 
 t See note t, ante, p. 531. 
 
 § See ante, p. 593. 
 
 + See notes, ante, pp. 225, 354. The Commissioners of bogs in their fourth 
 Report, calculate the extent of waste land that might be reclaimed at 2,830,000 
 acres. 
 
 R R 2 
 
612 THE PROPOSED MEA8URE8 OF 
 
 througli sheer ignorance and neglect, not producing- one-half 
 of what it is capable of doing? What would be thought of 
 an English labourer with a six-acre allotment of land, for 
 every acre of which he paid rent, cultivating one acre every 
 year for potatoes to live on, and two with oats to pay his 
 rent, and leaving the other three acres for his pig to root up ; 
 and when he had exhausted his first three acres, from never 
 manuring and having a perpetual succession of the same 
 crops, beginning on his other three acres, and letting his 
 first three " lie out to cool," and gradually recover them- 
 selves by years of rest ?* If with such a system the Irish 
 peasant can live, though badly, he would get wealth if taught 
 how to cultivate properly. Whose fault is it that the poor 
 peasants are not taught how to cultivate ? Teach them, and 
 there will be some hope that this continual cry of Irish 
 distress will be put an end to. 
 
 But we are told that Ireland exhibits the strange anomaly 
 of a country exporting food, whilst her people starve. It 
 is only because the manufacture happens to he food, that we 
 think it strange the people should starve who manufacture 
 it. It does not strike us as so strange that people should 
 starve who manufacture cottons, or silks, or stockings. Yet 
 where is the difference in the two cases ? Both are manu- 
 factured by labour, and it is for his labour only that the 
 labourer seeks to be paid. If he be paid for his labour, no 
 matter what the manufacture is, — whether corn, or cattle, or 
 cottons, he can live ; and it can make no earthly difference 
 to the labourer whether his 6.9. or IO5. a week are earned in 
 manufacturing corn or cotton. It is the Qs. he wants, and 
 on the Qs. that he lives. Does Ireland give away that food 
 which she exports ? No, she sells it ; and she sells it for its 
 value. AVell, with the value she can re-purchase the food — 
 or would she have both value and food ? Ireland exports so 
 
 * See note, ante, p. 54. 
 
RELIEF FOR IRELAND. 613 
 
 many quai'ters of grain, and so much stock. These are her 
 manufactures. Manchester exports so many bales of cottons 
 and silks, which are her manufactures. Both want food, 
 and both want clothing ; and both resort to a common 
 medium of exchange — namely, money ; and the manufac- 
 tures of both represent so much labour. The Kerry peasant 
 says, — " My labour has manufactured ten quarters of wheat, 
 worth 50s. a quarter, and ten firkins of butter, worth 80s. 
 the firkin ; give me 25/. for my wheat, and 40/. for my 
 butter, and you pay me for my labour, and I intend to spend 
 the money you give me in paying my rent and purchasing 
 my subsistence." The Manchester manufacturer says, — 
 " My labour and skill have manufactured ten pieces of 
 cotton, worth 505. a piece, and ten pieces of silk, worth 
 80s. a piece ; give me 25/. for my cottons, and 40/. for my 
 silks, and you pay me for my labour and skill, and I intend 
 to spend the money you give me in paying my rent, paying 
 for materials, and purchasing my subsistence." Where is 
 the difierence between the two ? Either of them with the 
 money in his pocket for his manufacture, whatever it may 
 be, has so many quarters of wheat and so many firkins of 
 butter in his pocket, or so many pieces of silks and cottons, as 
 the money stands the representative value for. And as for 
 " anomaly," surely the anomaly is fully as great to see. as 
 is unhappily too often the case, in such a town as Man- 
 chester, for instance, poor creatures half-clothed and perish- 
 ing of cold in the middle of a town which clothes the whole- 
 world. 
 
 Mr. O'Connell quoted the following tabular statement of 
 imports of provisions from Ireland to show what the Irish 
 people have produced ^or our consumption : — 
 
614 
 
 THE PROPOSED MEASURES OF 
 
 Years. 
 
 Wheat. 
 
 Barley. 
 
 Oats. 
 
 "Whoatmeal 
 or Flour. 
 
 Oatmeal. 
 
 
 Quiirters. 
 
 Quarters. 
 
 Quarters. 
 
 Cwts. 
 
 CwU. 
 
 1842 
 
 112,195 
 
 50,287 
 
 1,274,326 
 
 314,311 
 
 1,551,172 
 
 1843 
 
 192,477 
 
 110,440 
 
 1,561,997 
 
 713,463 
 
 1,706,628 
 
 1844 
 
 200,276 
 
 90,656 
 
 1,509,870 
 
 839,567 
 
 1,150,976 
 
 1845 
 
 372,719 
 
 93,096 
 
 1,679,958 
 
 1,422,379 
 
 1,059,185 
 
 The produce, or rather manufacture, of food is certainly- 
 very great. Taking these same figures, and turning them 
 into money value, I will show, on the other hand, how much 
 sterling money we have created to send to Ireland to pay 
 them for this produce. Taking wheat at, say, 505. a quarter, 
 barley at 305., oats at 205., flour at 205. a cwt., and oatmeal 
 at 155. a cwt., which are about the present market prices 
 (for I quote them from the Mark Lane prices of January 26, 
 which I find in a newspaper on my table), merely making 
 the sums even for readier calculation — thus, oats are at 225., 
 and I quote them at 205. ; wheat at 5l5., and I quote it at 
 505., these imports show the following values : — 
 
 Years. 
 
 Wheat. 
 
 A^alue at 
 
 50s. 
 
 Barley. 
 
 Value at 30s. 
 
 per qr. 
 
 Oats. 
 
 Value at 20s. 
 
 per qr. 
 
 Wlieat flour. 
 
 Value at 20s. 
 
 per cwt. 
 
 Oats. 
 
 Value at 15s. 
 
 per cwt. 
 
 Total Values. 
 
 1842 
 
 £ 
 280,397 
 
 £ 
 75,430 
 
 £ 
 
 1,274,326 
 
 £ 
 314,311 
 
 £ 
 1,163,379 
 
 £ 
 3,107,843 
 
 1843 
 
 381,192 
 
 165,673 
 
 1,561,997 
 
 713,463 
 
 1,279,971 
 
 4,102,296 
 
 1844 
 
 500,690 
 
 135,984 
 
 1,509,870 
 
 839,567 
 
 863,232 
 
 3,849,343 
 
 1845 
 
 931,796 
 
 139,644 
 
 1,679,958 
 
 1,422,379 
 
 794,388 
 
 4,968,165 
 
 So tliat poor, miserable, ever-complaining Ireland receives 
 from England from 4,000,000/. to 5,000,000/. sterling yearly 
 in exchange for these articles of produce alone, to say nothing* 
 about pigs, cows, sheep, butter, porter, and flax — vast quan- 
 tities of all which articles England purchases from her.* The 
 
 * See a7ite, pp. 575, 577 n. 
 
RELIEF FOR IRELAND. 615 
 
 simple fact is, that obtain the money — the common medium 
 of exchange — and you obtain whatever money will purchase. 
 Money represents everything ; and it is worse than folly to 
 talk about England consuming the food of Ireland, so long 
 as Ireland takes care to be well paid for it. 
 
 With regard, too, to the money sent to absentees residing 
 in England or elsewhere, there is a very prevalent fallacy, 
 which passes for wisdom, and which is put forth as one of 
 the chief arguments to show the " injustice of England to 
 Ireland." It is said the Irish peasant sends his produce to 
 England, and the money he gets for it he sends also to his 
 landlord in England ; therefore he is deprived of both pro- 
 duce and money. One really feels almost ashamed to find 
 it necessary to expose such a fallacy. The Irish peasant 
 cannot have both his goods and the value of his goods in 
 money ; he therefore cannot lose both. Suppose a resident 
 landlord of an income of (say) 1,000/. a year will require for 
 the consumption of his stables (say) 100/. worth of oats, 
 straw, and hay, and for the consumption of his house (say) 
 150/. worth of corn and butter, and that this 250/. worth of 
 agricultural produce he consumes in Ireland on his estate, 
 and buys it direct from his tenants, what is the fact with 
 regard to this produce which the tenants sell to him ? They 
 part with their 250/. worth of produce to tlieir landlord, who 
 consumes it, and take in exchange for it 250/. ; and they then 
 pay the 260/. to the landlord for their rent. Thus, in the 
 same way, the landlord, to use this silly argument, gets both, 
 their produce and money ; the fact being simply, that he 
 gets so much money for rent, and for that money he gives 
 them the use of so much land, which is worth the rent paid 
 for it. Now, what earthly difierence can it make to these 
 tenants, so far as this 250/. of produce is concerned, whether 
 the landlord's steward pays them 250/. for it at " the castle," 
 or a Liverpool or London agent or buyer pays them the 250/. 
 for it at the next market-town ? In both cases the tenants 
 
616 THE PROPOSED MEASURES OF 
 
 part with their produce for 250Z. ; in both cases the produce 
 is taken from them for consumption ; and whether it is eaten 
 at " the castle," or in England, or goes to the bottom of the 
 sea, it is all the same to the tenants — they have the value of 
 it in their pockets. And inasmuch as the landlord, Avhether 
 a resident or an absentee, expects the rent of his land which 
 he lets to his tenants, and for which they have this 250?. to 
 pay, surely, if they pay it for rent, it is all the same to them, 
 so far as regards this 250Z., whether their landlord is resident 
 or not, for, in either case, having paid it, they are the 250/. 
 poorer. 
 
 The argument in reply to this obvious truth is, — "true, it is 
 all the same to the tenants as to this 250Z., the value of their 
 produce sold, whether they sell it to their resident landlord 
 for this sum, or to a London buyer, and it is all the same to 
 them whether they pay the amount so received for their pro- 
 duce to the landlord, be he resident or absent ; but it is not 
 all the same for tlie nation : for, if the landlord were resident, 
 the whole of his income would be spent in Ireland in fostering 
 native industry by the purchase of Irish produce and manu- 
 factures, and thus give employment to the Irish people to 
 that extent ; whereas, if the tchole is spent out of Ireland, the 
 whole is lost to the Irish nation.'' This loss from the number 
 of absentees is estimated by Mr. John O'Connell at 
 4,500,OOOZ., in a speech made in the House of Commons on 
 the occasion referred to in this letter ; and it is asserted 
 that this sum is such a drain upon the resources of Ireland, 
 that it accounts for her poverty, and that no nation under 
 such circumstances can be rich. It is easy to make flippant 
 assertions like these, but how their value melts away — how 
 transparently foolish they are — when you come to examine 
 them. Suppose a landowner of lOOOZ. a year, resident in 
 Ireland, and, for easy calculation, suppose he consumes, as 
 shown above, one-third of his income in his household and 
 stables, in the purchase of food for his establishment and 
 
RELIEF FOR IRELAND. 617 
 
 horses. This calculation will not be far wrong. Inasmuch as 
 he consumes this amount of produce, the nation, or its people 
 beyond his household, cannot benefit by the outlay of this third 
 portion of his income, further than the peasantry who raised 
 that produce have already done in selling it to him for its 
 value. But the peasantry, it is shown, would benefit to 
 precisely the same extent if they sold the same produce to a 
 London or Liverj^ool buyer for its value at the next market 
 town, which they can always do. As to this third of the 
 landlord's income, therefore, being consumed, beyond the 
 servants of his household the Irish nation does not benefit 
 when the landlord is resident; the Irish nation cannot there- 
 fore be inj ured by his consuming the same amount of produce 
 in England, and paying for it there its equivalent value. On 
 this score, therefore, we may fairly deduct one-third from 
 the alleged injury of the absentee drain, or 1,500,000/. 
 (taking Mr. J. O'Connell's estimate), leaving the alleged 
 injury and drain amounting to 3,000,000/. We come, then, 
 to examine the remaining portion of a resident landlord's 
 exjDcnditure in Ireland, and we shall see how much of that 
 goes to benefit the Irish nation by promoting Irish manufac- 
 tures. How much of his clothing is made in Ireland ? His 
 hat comes from London ; his coat from the west of England; 
 part of his boots from France ; so of his gloves ; his stock- 
 ings from Nottingham ; his watch from England or Geneva. 
 How much of his lady's clothing has been manufactured in 
 Ireland? Her bonnets, shoes, gloves, and silk and satin 
 dresses, most of them are of French manufacture ; her morn- 
 ing dresses the produce of Manchester or Glasgow; her 
 jewellery from every part of the world. How many of the 
 luxuries of life which have become necessaries to him are 
 of Irish manufacture? His wines — his champagne, hock, 
 claret, port, sherry, Madeira — all are the produce of foreign 
 countries. So are his tea, coffee, sugar, spices, and tobacco. 
 How much of his household furniture is the produce of 
 
618 THE PKOPOSED MEASURES OF 
 
 Ireland ? His mahogany and rosewood chairs and tables, 
 their morocco leather seats, their cotton coverings, the chan- 
 deliers of his rooms, the oil and wax he burns, the marble of 
 his chimney-piece, his fire-range, the expensive pictures on 
 his walls, his books — all are the produce of l^nglish or 
 foreign industry, which, resident, just the same as absent, he 
 must and will have, and to pay for which Irish food, that is 
 her viamtfactures, must equally be abstracted. The money 
 annually required for the purchase of these luxuries and 
 necessaries may be fairly set down at one-third more of his 
 income ; and this third, though resident, does not benefit the 
 manufactures of the Irish nation, but encourages the industry 
 of foreigners. It would only do the same if he were an 
 absentee. This third, therefore, of absentee income must 
 also be deducted from the absentee payments, which, it is 
 alleged, drain and impoverish Ireland. We, then, further 
 reduce the 3,000,000/. to 1,500,000/. of injurious absentee 
 drain. We will now examine this remaining sum. There 
 are sons to educate, and daughters to fortune. To educate 
 the sons properly, custom or fashion demands that they 
 should be sent to college in England or abroad. The resi- 
 dent Irish landlord thus educates his son. He could do no 
 more, so far as Ireland is concerned, if an absentee. This 
 takes a portion of his income, which, in either case, resident 
 or absent, would not benefit Ireland. Then he has something 
 to save and lay by for the fortune of his daughter. What- 
 ever sum is thus saved is not spent in encouraging the ma- 
 nufactures of the Irish nation, and this will demand another 
 lar£ie share of the resident landlord's income ; it would do 
 the same if he were an absentee, and no more. Is it an 
 over-calculation to assume that the remaining third of his 
 income is reduced by these calls one-lialf? If it is not, in- 
 asmuch as this reduction must be made from the benefits 
 which a resident landlord's income would dift'use, it must 
 be equally made from the evils which an absentee's drain of 
 
RELIEF FOR IRELAND. 619 
 
 income entails. We then have still further to reduce the re- 
 maining 1,500,000/. of absentee injurious drain to 750,000/,, 
 or one-sixth of the absentee income, which is perhaps about the 
 real amount of support taken away from Irish manufactures, 
 and of benefit lost to the Irish ncLtion. Well, has Ireland no 
 counterbalancing benefit, derived from the English nation, 
 and to the injury of the labourers of the English nation? 
 English money chiefly pays for the support of 20,000 
 soldiers in Ireland, rendered needful by her turbulence. 
 The last Irish census shows that there is a permanently 
 settled Irish population of above 1,000,000 in Great Britain, 
 who have obtained employment there. The complaint against 
 absentees is that they take away employment from Ireland and 
 give it to England; let us see what employment England 
 gives to Ireland in return for that abstraction. Assuming that 
 each Irisli family settled in Great Britain consists of the 
 average of five persons, out of 1 ,000,000 of Irish settled in 
 Great Britain, there will be at least 200,000 men. These 
 men must subsist by their labour, for by law, if they were 
 beggars, or were unable to support themselves, they would 
 be passed back again to Ireland. Assuming that their 
 average vrages throughout the year, earned by the employ- 
 ment given to them, be but os. a week each, which is 
 much below the mark, they would earn, each man, 13Z. a 
 year, or, in the aggregate, 2,600,000/. annually. But assum- 
 ing their wages to be 10^. a week each, which is a far more 
 likely average as the earnings of their families are not at all 
 taken into the account, we have the aggregate amount of 
 employment given by Great Britain to Irishmen permanently 
 settled in Great Britain, amounting to 5,200,000/. But 
 57,000 harvest labourers annually migrate from Ireland to 
 England, and these are all men, and they carry back with 
 them from 3/. to 10/. a man, money earned from the employ- 
 mtnt given to them during harvest in Great Britain. Assuming 
 the average to be 51. each man, we have here again an aggregate 
 
620 THE PROPOSED MEASURES OF 
 
 amount of employment given, and money taken out of Great 
 Britain to Ireland of 285,000/. a year. Adding this to the 
 previous sum given to Irishmen permanently employed in 
 Great Britain, we have 6,485,000/. worth of employment 
 given to Irishmen as a compensation for 750,000/. of real 
 absentee drain and employment taken away from Irishmen, 
 not at all taking into calculation the counterbalancing good 
 of our paying for the maintenance of 20,000 absentee soldiers 
 from England in Ireland. 
 
 What becomes, then, of the injury which the Union is said 
 to be to Ireland, or of the foolish exaggeration about the 
 drain of absenteeism when examined into ? Defend absen- 
 teeism I do not for a moment ; it is one of the greatest pos- 
 sible evils to Ireland ; but its drain on the country is a minor 
 evil compared with the absence of supervision, of encourage- 
 ment, of example, of instruction, which a landlord's presence 
 alone can give. These are the evils and the faults most pro- 
 minent in Ireland. 
 
 The outcry, therefore, in this respect, against absentees is for 
 the most part groundless ; it will not bear examination ; it has 
 neither reason nor argument to back it. No doubt absentee- 
 ism does entail some considerable amount of want of employ- 
 ment which would be otherwise given by indirect as well as 
 by direct means — as in servants, &;c. But the chief evils 
 arising from absenteeism are the absence of the landlord's 
 moral influence and example from his neighbourhood — the 
 absence of a superior mind capable of leading, directing, 
 and instructing. These are great evils, and the evils of 
 absenteeism ; and not the landlord's mere consumption of 
 produce, which will be the same at home, in Dublin, or in 
 London ; and Dublin or London, if he resides in either place, 
 will require so much more of the produce which Ireland can 
 furnish to supply them, and cannot get that supply without 
 paying the farmers for it, who produce it, its full value. Yet, 
 oddly enough, we hear it gravely asserted in the Legislature 
 
RELIEF POR IRELAND. 621 
 
 that the furnishing of produce to England, for xohich Ireland 
 is paid, is an evil to Ireland ; and that the money which 
 purchases that produce, on being returned to absentees in 
 England for rent or value, is pro rata to the damage of 
 Ireland. That is pointed out as the evil of absenteeism, which, 
 when examined into, is a trivial evil; whilst those things which 
 are the real evils of absenteeism — the neglect of social duties, 
 the absence of instruction and example and encouragement 
 to tenants, the absence of a superior intelligence to direct and 
 guide untaug-ht ignorance — are not even hinted at. Such is 
 the mental calibre of the picked Legislators of Ireland. 
 
 But how is produce which will obtain, because it is worth, 
 money, to be got ? Only by labour and enterprise, of both 
 which qualities there is a most lamentable want in Ireland. 
 The man who never labours, if without fortune, must neces- 
 sarily starve. The man who labours only a little must 
 necessarily be in want. The man who half labours must 
 necessarily 1 j ^joor ; and the man who labours hard his 
 whole time must, under ordinary circumstances, be well off. 
 " Labour," says Adam Smith, " is the first price, the original 
 purchase-money, that is paid for all things." 
 
 It is because the people of Ireland generally do not labour^ 
 either physically or mentally, in anything like the proportion 
 that the people of England do, that they are not generally 
 near so wealthy. Nay, it is because they are generally abso- 
 lutely lazy and apathetic — too lazy to weed their land 
 though they have nothing else to do, — too lazy to clean 
 their cottages, with nothing else to do ; or to mend the holes 
 in their cottage roofs, with nothing else to do, — that their 
 land is so wretchedly cultivated, their cottages are so dirty, 
 and their hovels so miserable.* I have repeatedly seen whole 
 untied " loggins" or bundles of straw, in the south of Ireland, 
 
 * "' We are so poor!' is the reply of the Irish peasants, when they are 
 reproached with increasing their misery by neglect ; and they continue in the filtl\ 
 
622 THE PROPOSED MEASURES OF 
 
 laid on the roofs of cottages to keep out the wet or to 
 stop holes ; the owners having- the straw, and being- too lazy 
 to open it out and lay it on the roof properly. "\Ye must 
 also remember that the cry about an Irish " famine" does 
 not proceed from uninterested parties. The Irish peasantry 
 will make a " poor mouth" because they hope to get some 
 of England's bounty, and to escape paying their rent. The 
 Irish landlords generally have no reason to contradict the 
 cry in this country, for if John Bull is persuaded that the 
 Irish are starving, his sympathies will be roused, and what- 
 ever he pays or gives to Ireland will find its way to the 
 landlords' pockets eventually ; at any rate, it will stop a hole 
 in the gap of necessity, which they must fill up themselves' 
 if John Bull does not, for the peasant will consume the rent 
 rather than starve. And lastly, at this juncture, Sir Robert 
 Peel and the Government listen favourably to such an outcry, 
 for it greatly aids the success of their measure regarding the 
 corn laws. 
 
 That the peasantry will suffer a heavy loss by this calamity 
 there can be no doubt. But I do very much doubt that on 
 that account they will starve. The small farmers, wretchedly 
 
 that chokes their hovels, without the slightest wish to keep them cleaa." — M. 
 Beaumont's Ireland, Social, Political, and Religious. Vol. ii. p. 25. 
 
 " The same statistical documents which show that in Ireland nearly 5,000,000 
 of individuals are employed on the land, show that in England and Scotland, out 
 of a population of 16,205,000, not more than 5,000,000 are engaged in agricul- 
 ture ; that is to say, nearly the same number that is so employed in Ireland ; 
 nevertheless, England and Scotland have an extent of 54,000,000 of acres, whilst 
 Ireland has oidy 19,000,000. So that in Ireland the land al)sorbs two-thirds of the 
 population, whilst in the other two countries it does not engage quite one-third ; 
 and it appears that Ireland employs as many labourers to cultivate her soil as 
 England and Scotland, which are double her size. Finally, it appears certain that 
 by the Irish system of tillage the ground produces one-half less than it docs under 
 the management of an English or Scotch farmer ; whence it follows that three 
 Irish agricultural labourers do rather less work than an Englishman or Scotch- 
 man. Even supposmg that the number of English and Scotch labourers is too 
 small, that of the Irish agriculturists is clearly excessive. And the defective cul- 
 tivation of the ground depends precisely on their quantity." — Ibid. p. 143. 
 
RE-LIEF FOR IRELAND. 623 
 
 as they choose to live (for they know no better), have most 
 of them small sums in the savings banks, or elsewhere. At 
 Cork the manager of the savings bank there told me, that 
 the small farmers in a radius of twenty miles round Cork 
 had deposited the enormous sum of nearly 200,000/. in the 
 bank, and that the average of the deposits of these small 
 farmers was 34Z. a head. The cost of a whole year's living to 
 one of these small farmers is not above 30/., so that Jami7ie to 
 them in a period of four or five months is out of the question, 
 I obtained the same information at Mallow, at Wexford, and 
 at Kilkenny.* But it is the labourers and con-acre tenants 
 who will be wretchedly off if their food fails them. This 
 class is always on the verge of starvation, and a failure in 
 their potato crop is a dreadful thing to them. But the class 
 is not alarmingly numerous, for the majority of farms are 
 from five to ten acres, and farms of this size the tenant 
 himself cultivates without labourers ; and it is small farmers 
 of this class that form the bulk of the population in Ir^and. 
 It is true they live on potatoes, and in wretched cabins ; but 
 most of them, by dint of hard saving, have got a little money 
 — some 20Z. or 30Z., either in the savings bank or in a hole 
 in their thatch, or lent out at usury — a fact which they are 
 most careful to conceal.'|- And we ought to pause before we 
 tax the hard-working people of England, who have suffered 
 the same calamity, to relieve these men. 
 
 But, assuming the necessity for relief to Ireland to be 
 proved, it is an immediate necessity. Labour must be given 
 to the people to enable them Avith its price to purchase food. 
 The question then arises, what is the best labour to give ? 
 Can there be a doubt about it ? That labour which shall be 
 continuous — for continuous labour will make the labourer 
 well off — and that labour which is calculated to repay the out- 
 
 * See ante, pp. 4G8, 494. 
 f See anie, pp. 467, 468. 
 
624 THE PROPOSED MEASURES OF 
 
 lay spent upon it, and to open up the resources of the country. 
 Is the making of railways in Ireland that labour 1 I very much 
 doubt it. In the present state of Ireland, with the excejotion 
 of one or two great trunk lines, it is impossible that railways 
 can pay there. Capital would therefore be sunk in them 
 without realising any benefit beyond the labour given in 
 their construction ; and this labour would be but temporary, 
 leaving the labourers at its conclusion in their former misery, 
 to repeat their oft-told tale of Irish distress. But there are 
 3,000,000 of acres of reclaimable waste lands and bogs in 
 Ireland, the reclamation of which would not only give vast 
 employment, but would pay 7 per cent, on the investment of 
 capital, as the Irish Waste Land Improvement Society have 
 proved by their profits.* And the land thus reclaimed would 
 give permanent labour and occupation to all the surplus 
 labour of the country many times over. 
 
 Again, there are great works which would immensely 
 benefit the country, and which the State as a Government 
 ought to see to, as from the want of enterprise and apathy 
 of the people they will never otherwise be completed. A 
 canal of four miles from the lower part of Lough Erne at 
 Belleek to Ballyshannon would open out a navigable water 
 communication from sea to sea across the whole country — 
 from Belfast on one side to Ballyshannon on the other. This 
 would necessarily afford means of getting to markets with 
 produce cheaply, and means of obtaining manure cheaply. 
 This would promote industry, increase the produce of the 
 soil, and necessarily increase wealth, and in doing so tend 
 to remove some subjects of Irish complaints. From Sligo 
 across Lough Gill to Lough Allen, a ten miles canal would 
 open the whole interior of the country to the sea at Sligo 
 at one end, and to the sea at Kerry, at the mouth 
 
 * See note, ante, p. 225. 
 
RELIEF FOR IRELAND. 625 
 
 of the Shannon, at the other, with of course the same 
 benefits.* 
 
 The western coast swarms with fish. If the people catch 
 the fish, it is food and wealth for them. They are timid and 
 lazy fishermen ; but they have an excuse that they dare not 
 put to sea unless the weather is calm. Take away their 
 excuse, and build them places of refuge to run to. This the 
 State ought to do ; and this will at once stop the cries of 
 starvation from Donegal, Mayo, Sligo, Galway, Clare, Kerry, 
 and the west of Cork ; for the people are always the most 
 miserably off on the sea-coasts of those counties. Loughs 
 Neagh, Erne, Mask, Corrib, and Allen, all rise in winter 
 much higher than their summer levels, and in doing so, 
 flood and render many thousand acres of rich land swamp. 
 Scientific drainage would keep them at their summer level, 
 and render their margin swamps productive.f These waste 
 
 * A canal of three miles would also open the navigation of Loughs Corrib and 
 Mask to the sea at Galway, and, in doing so, open the market of Galway and the 
 advantages of its port for fifty miles into the interior of Connemara. See ante, 
 p. 293. 
 
 f " 94. Have you any suggestions of any measures of improvements in the law 
 and practice in respect to the occupation of land in Ireland, and in respect to the 
 county cess and other burdens falling respectively on landlords and occupying 
 tenants, which, having due regard to the rights of property, may be calculated to 
 encourage the cultivation of the soil, to extend a better system of agriculture, and 
 to improve the relation between landlord and tenant ? — No, not much. I have 
 mentioned before, that I think it would be a very great advantage to collect the 
 county cess in one gale, instead of the inconvenient season of summer. With, 
 reference to local matters, one of the greatest things would be to get rid of the 
 inundations you have passed by to-day. Bringing it to your consideration, as 
 connected with a general system of drainage, if we could get Lough Neagh lowered, 
 it would be a vast advantage to this part of the country ; it would throw a great 
 many thousand acres into grain cultivation, many of which are useless entirely, or 
 only fit for indifferent meadow, or,g^ery coarse pasture. I have already mentioned, 
 that distress for rent might be done away with, if you give the setting party a 
 more prompt remedy for getting his own back again. It is hardly credible the 
 instances of chicanery, and all that kind of thing, to which under-tenants in this 
 country resort, in order to baffle the landlord off for half a year, and take the 
 chance, whether, at the end of that they cannot do it again a second time, they 
 are so amazuigly fond of law," — Evidence of Mr. Blacker, Part I. of the Evidence 
 taken before the Land Commissioners, p. 459. 
 
 s s 
 
626 THE PROPOSED MEASURES OF 
 
 acres would give employment and produce wealth, and there 
 would be fewer fevers to complain of. Vast tracts of land 
 in Roscommon are a swamp. Draining would make them 
 rich and fertile lands ; would give employment and produce 
 wealth ; and, if along with this erajiloyment the people were 
 properly instructed in the business whereby they live — in 
 agriculture, — they would double their j^roduce, and, of 
 course, their wealth, and this Avould be another means of 
 putting an end to the Irish cry about distress. 
 
 Measures like these would permanently improve the con- 
 dition of the people. Employment on railways will only put 
 off the evil day, which will again shortly recur, and more 
 hopelessly than ever, because the capital which before aided 
 them will then be locked up and sunk in railways, which at 
 best are uncertain of being successful. 
 
 Pass measures for facilitating the transfer of embarrassed 
 and overgrown estates, and private capitalists will be let into 
 the country, who themselves will confer many of these social 
 benefits, will urge the people on to labour, and will teach 
 them how to labour ; their labour will diffuse wealth, and 
 with that diffused wealth there is an end to Irish distress. 
 But without industry, and knowledge, and enterprise, Ireland 
 will always remain what she has ever been — a miserable 
 country, subject to periodical famines. Industry, and enter- 
 prise, and knowledge, are then the qualities to encourage 
 and to give, to put an end to Irish distress.* 
 
 It is to be hoped that the motion of the honourable and 
 
 * It is said that an amendment of the franchise and increased political liherty 
 will remedy the evils of Ireland. I do not think these questions, however just or 
 expedient in themselves they may or may not^", have anything to do with the 
 matter. M. Beaumont justly observes : — " The poverty of Ireland did not vanish 
 as its liberties were consolidated and increased. On the contrary, it would seem 
 that, as the Irishman acquired political rights, his social misery was increased in 
 the same proportion. It is certain that Irishmen have never been so free as at the 
 present moment ; and it is equally certain that they have never been so miserable." 
 — M. Beaumonfs Irtland, Social, Political, and Religioits. Vol. ii. p. 51. 
 
RELIEF FOR IRELAND. 627 
 
 learned member for Cork will do good by drawing attention 
 to these subjects. No one can in this case doubt his perfect 
 sincerity ; and no man in Ireland has a more unshackled 
 oijportunity of proving that sincerity : for, whether the evil 
 be living in hovels with but one room, whether it be the 
 incubus of middlemen^ whether it be want of knowledge of 
 agriculture, Avhether it be waste lands or unprofitable bogs, 
 or whether it be household dunghills without number, which 
 generate fever — on any, on each, and on all these evils the 
 honourable and learned member may commence amendment 
 on his own estate and middleman-tenure at Derrynane and 
 its neighbourhood. Apologising for the length of this letter, 
 
 I have the honour to remain, sir, faithfully yours, 
 
 YOUE LATE COJ^BIIS SIGNER IN IRELAND. 
 
 The Temple, Feb. 25. 
 
 ss 2 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 Opinions of the Press.* 
 
 Referred to in page 2G. 
 
 (From the Cork Southern Reporter.) 
 
 The Times has sent its Commissioner into Ireland to revive that 
 caput mortuum, the Land Commissioners' report. We augur great 
 utility from the arrival of this Commissioner. We trust he will 
 be rigidly impartial. From what we have seen of The Times' 
 strictures on Irish agricultural affairs, its representative will act with 
 fearless candour, and give a faithful picture of the society into which 
 he enters. The wish we expressed some time ago, when we saw the 
 mismanagement in the Scottish Highlands fully and feelingly laid 
 bare, is gratified. The expositor has come amongst us. lie is one 
 we believe competent for his task. He writes, we perceive, fluently 
 — readably — we give his first specimen. He thinks, if not profoundly, 
 certainly not superficially. He has set about probing our wounds, 
 and will report upon the seat of the disease, suggesting, in due time^ 
 a medicament, or leaving it to The Times to compound one out of 
 the materials he supplies. There is one danger — that he may mislead 
 his employers, because he may be himself misled. There is an old 
 practice in this country of earwigging the stranger. Travellers and 
 tourists have been crammed with marvellous stories. No sooner do 
 they set foot upon our shore than they are smoked. Their guides 
 humbug them, their acquaintances mystify them. Wonderful are 
 the things they are told, and the things they are not told, but see 
 assume a complexion in accordance with the colouring with which 
 the seer's thoughts were tinged. A thousand pitfalls are before 
 
 * These opinions of the Newspaper Press are appended to shew the tone and. 
 general feeling with which the public received the publication of these letters. 
 
630 APPENDIX I. 
 
 The Times' Commissioner. He cannot face to tlic north, or east, or 
 "west, or south without treading among them. Unless he has the cap 
 of Fortunatus, or the ring of Gyges, and can make himself invisible, 
 he will be watched and circumvented. Wc arc bound to suppose 
 he is as qualified as any educated Englishman to search and see — 
 that his eyes are as open and his intellects as sharp — that, in a word, 
 he is no gohemoiiche ; but to do well what he is to do he must be 
 more than ordinarily gifted ; have a lynx's eyes and the heart of 
 Aristidcs. Well, perhaps this is too much to expect from any one. 
 He must, then, at least, be on his guard — eschew landlords 
 and tenants as infallible informants — keep prudently aloof from 
 middlemen — beware of guides and gossips — shun the "leprous 
 distilments" of the Orange squirearchy, and receive aim grano all 
 he hears of the mysterious and immortal Mollys. We presume 
 he has already a lively distrust of the " state of the country" 
 journals. The Times does not swallow all they say, seldom does it 
 afford a niche for the enshrinement of their exquisite little figures, 
 nor, we must allow, does it open a bazaar for manufactured murders, 
 robberies, and burnings. If the Commissioner, therefore, acts as 
 that journal acts in this particular, we can predicate utility from his 
 arrival, and the gathering of some wholesome fruit at the termination 
 of his tour. 
 
 The dropping of a thunderbolt in any given spot causes some 
 commotion — either a mark is left, or the passenger is singed. The 
 Commissioner promises fairly to be the living thunderbolt of the 
 north, not to speak yet of any other point. As sure as fate, he will 
 leave his mark behind him. That 's what he was sent for. He is 
 comme il faiit of course at the work. He will put his soul in it. 
 He has come to test — to sift the blue ledgers whose "ponderosity" 
 has overwhelmed the press, even with the prop of supplements. 
 We shall have new notes and new readings, another ajipendix, and 
 fresh annotations. The Times'" edition of Lord Devon will be the 
 standard work. Wc are heartily glad of the new commentator. 
 The Devon facts, heavy and cold, and clogged together like a snowball, 
 will be separated into flakes, and blown abroad. A puff from The 
 Times has the strength of a nor- wester 
 
 The Commissioner is as safe from harm as if he liad the skin of 
 Achilles. He dreads no personal consequences, and he need not. 
 He will act impartially. His responsibilities alone alarm him. He 
 has an oppressive sense of their weight. Let us give him comfort. 
 
APPENDIX I. 631 
 
 Let him " tell truth, and shame the ." That 's all ho has to do, 
 
 and 'tis just the thing he ought to do. AVill he do it? Oh! 
 certainly. He would not be promoted by The Times if he were not 
 a man of honour and understanding. He dare not compromise the 
 Home-office. He will be cautious of his facts, and prepared to 
 substantiate them all, in Parliament or out. He may anticipate— 
 The Times does for him — desperate objurgation. Already does the 
 "leading journal" hear the buzzing round its ears, and already are 
 denials, letters, plump contradictions — bitter rejoinders dancing up and 
 down before its vision: — " Man puts up to man. Our Commissioner 
 will have his enemies — discussion is necessary to the discovery and 
 improvement of the truth. In a nation of offenders all sinning 
 either one way or the other, nearly all more or less compromised 
 in sudden murder, or slow but no less deadly oppression, a ' chiel 
 amang them taking notes' will be a lively provocation." Not a 
 doubt of it. The Commissioner must thrust his hand into the 
 hornet's nest, and they'll sting it, if 'tis not as hard as horn. 
 Suppose he attempts to deny that the Mollys are desperate rascals — 
 Thugs ; suppose he ventures to blame the landlords, and to say 
 their rents are rather high, and their rule oppressive, won't he "get 
 it" from the Orange organs? They'll be on him in a swarm, and 
 then The Times comes to the rescue. It will be a pretty quarrel, 
 doubtless. What The Times has in strength will be made up in 
 numbers on the other side — the provincial Orange press against the 
 thunderer — the minnows against the Triton — all Lilliput against 
 Gulliver.* , 
 
 From this it may be concluded that we expect the Commissioner 
 will take part with the people. We take it for granted he is resolved 
 to tell the truth — that he will not be hoodwinked or bamboozled. 
 Now, if the case be so, he must be with the people, though his 
 first communication is not symptomatic of any partiality in their 
 favour. 
 
 * The reading of this extract from the Cork Southern Rppnrter lias given me 
 much amusement ; for it forcibly exemplifies the state of Irish partisanship. " Let 
 
 him tell the truth and shame the ," savs this paper. I did so of Mr. O'Connell. 
 
 " He will be cautious of his facts, and prepared to substantiate them," says the 
 paper. I was so ; and did substantiate my facts regarding Mr. O'Connell. But, 
 
 because " I told the truth and shamed the ," this very paper was one of the 
 
 first with a " plump contradiction." It was one of the swarm " that attemi-ted 
 to "stingj" me, though not an Orange swarm ; and " all Lilliput" failed. 
 
632 APPENDIX I. 
 
 (From the Freeman s JownaJ.) 
 
 We republish to-day from The Times the second letter of their 
 Commissioner, deputed to inquire and report for that journal on no 
 
 less a matter than the condition of Ireland, her diseases and their 
 remedies. 
 
 'T were easy to be flippant upon a newspaper undertakinp; a task 
 ■which belongs to a Legislature, and to which the whole power and 
 weight of a Legislature does not seem disproportioned ; but the 
 Legislature to which this matter at present belongs performs its duty 
 in this respect so wofiilly that we know no hands so puny — ^provided 
 only they were tolerably honest — to which the task might not with 
 great advantage to Ireland be transferred. We are, therefore, 
 disposed to view with satisfaction, and with some sense of obhgation, 
 the spirit that has prompted the proprietors of The Times to despatch 
 a special correspondent to study the social condition of this country. 
 The correspondent sent over here is plainly a man of ability. His 
 present letter sufficiently vouches for that. We also fully believe 
 him to be determined to do his duty in all honesty. We have reason 
 to believe that the gentleman now acting for The Times, in Ireland, 
 is the same who acted for that paper, with so much credit to himself 
 and that journal, in Wales and in Scotland. That he will be able to 
 avoid all the pits of false information that will yawn for him hero 
 would be very difficult to expect ; still more hard would it be to 
 hope that, as regards the remedies immediately applicable to our 
 social state, he could wholly divest himself of his stock of ready 
 thoughts derived from the machinery of English society, and be 
 able, in a fev/ months' acquaintance with tins country, to conceive 
 fully and accurately the best, the happiest, and the most congenial 
 means which the existing condition of Irish society furnishes for the 
 promotion of its own regeneration. This is just the thing for which 
 ■we want a native Legislature. j\Iany errors — in fact, many notions 
 —transferred in the lump from England to here, and, therefore, 
 preposterously out of place, we are prepared to meet with in his 
 letters, but from what the public already know of the gentleman 
 who will write them, even at the cost of making it more difficult for 
 ourselves hereafter to controvert his future errors, wo will say that 
 we do expect in the main able work and an honest purpose. 
 
 The present letter docs not, as yet, go far into the subject. It has, 
 in fact, only arrived at the question, " How arc the people to be 
 
APPENDIX I. 633 
 
 employed?" — that is, how is universal hope, Industry, and wealth, 
 to take the place of universal discouragement, lethargy, and poverty ? 
 —for "employment" means all this. The letter does not even glance 
 at the solution : it barely states the problem whicli is needed to be 
 solved. There is slightly apparent in it a disposition to pause in 
 arriving at the announcement of the very simple postulate, that what 
 Ireland wants is employment for her population, and to rest upon 
 this as if some way were already made towards solving the great 
 question as to the mode of her regeneration. , Were this disposition 
 more decidedly evident in the letter, we should cease to hope that The 
 Times Commissioner would succeed even in exciting a useful discussion ; 
 but where there is an able hand and a straightforward purpose at 
 work we have no wish to descry afar off any evidence of ultimate 
 failure. Tliis letter contains many evidences calculated to suggest 
 the opposite hope. It fairly states the present condition of the 
 people with respect to the land. It ably, and with a clearness and 
 amplitude of deduction that cannot fail to carry irresistible weight 
 witli the English people, to which it is submitted, gathers under one 
 general character the whole mass of discontent which from time to 
 time, and from place to place, has broken out in outrage under divers 
 names, but always under the pressure of one necessity — the necessity 
 of cHnging to the only plank that keeps peasant life afloat in Ireland 
 — land. Tlie writer has without passion — for he is a stranger — but 
 with great force, suggested the true moral character of those sweeping 
 "clearings" by which the lives of the unhappy people have been 
 ruthlessly sacrificed, and few thinking men will peruse his letter 
 without deducing from it that the history of the wholesale ejectments 
 and the retaliatory bloodsheddings of Ireland is simply a history 
 of multitudinous manslaughter, partially arrested by occasional 
 murder. 
 
 The great question is. What is the remedy ? It is not answered 
 by saying, " Employ the people," and we hope the Commissioner 
 does not think it is. Tlie question is, How is the employment to be 
 brought about ? Tlie answer ire would give is well known. The 
 Commissioner has arrived at the question, we shall look with much 
 interest to see how he proceeds with the answer. 
 
634 APPENDIX II, 
 
 APPENDIX II. 
 
 Opinions or the Press. 
 
 Referred to in page 41, 
 
 (From the Dullin Pilot.) 
 
 We publish this evening two most vahiable letters from the special 
 correspondent of the London Times, dated from the scene of the late 
 agrarian disturbances. The Monarch of the Press is assuming the 
 functions of the Legislature, and sends its own Commissioner to 
 enlighten the world upon the state of this imfortunate country, lately 
 ■visited by a roving commission, whose ponderous blue book of crime 
 and sorrow is not within the reach of one in 10,000 of the inhabitants 
 of Britain. We had long been in hopes of the advent of an 
 impartial Englishman, who would, without fear or favour, lay before 
 the eyes of the world the miseries of our suffering people. When 
 "we saw legislative measures founded upon the admirable essays upon 
 the state of Wales during the Rebecca Riots published in The Times, 
 and beheld the grinding Llighland laird, and more exalted tyrants, 
 wince beneath the lash of well-told and honest truth, we suggested the 
 expediency of a visit of the same gentleman to our shores. He has 
 come at length ; and, as will be seen from the letters which we insert, 
 lie is pursuing the same bold, manful, honest, and truthful course 
 which directed so much attention to his former communications. 
 We must avow that, much as we detest the jiolitics of The Times, 
 which once, in its harshness, called the Irish people " a filthy and 
 felonious rabble," it deserves honour for thus letting their true con- 
 dition be known to the step-sister country. It has ever stood up 
 for the poor of England and Scotland ; it is now turning its regards 
 towards Ireland, and wo pray it God speed in its noble exertions. 
 We are much mistaken if the able Commissioner of The Times will 
 not prove to demonstration (indeed, he cannot help doing so) that 
 the crimes of the "filthy and felonious" Irish are excited by oppres- 
 sion, and that their consequences lie at the doors of bad landlords 
 and heartless agents, who are the makers of the filth, and the sub- 
 orners of the felony. 
 
 The reclamations of the Irish press against landlord oppression 
 
APPENDIX II. 635 
 
 were comparatively useless, because unheeded and uncopied in the 
 country where their publicity would be calculated to do good. The 
 people of England cannot now plead a -want of knowledge of the 
 dreadful condition of the agricultural population of Ireland, and, if a 
 strong demand for justice do not arise beyond the Channel, we shall 
 at least have the satisfaction of depriving enmity or apathy of the 
 excuse of ignorance, and of showing up our neighbours as regardless 
 of our wrongs. We are happy, then, to bid welcome to this 
 ambassador of benevolence, who is so successfully depriving our rulers 
 of the slightest excuse for not daring to be just to the trampled poor 
 of the United Kingdom. We would wish to see this gentleman 
 in office.* 
 
 (From the Freeman's Journal.') 
 
 We publish to-day, from The Times of Tuesday, the third letter 
 of the Irish "Commissioner" of that journal. We, yesterday, 
 expressed some apprehension lest the Avriter should content himself 
 with the discovery that " the want of employment" was the root of 
 all the social evils of Ireland. It appears we were too sensitive, 
 when we feared that this gentleman was likely to content himself 
 with finding the mare's nest, which has usually proved the ultima 
 Thule of English explorers into the origin of the social evils of 
 Ireland. This gentleman does not stop short, but proceeds to inquire 
 why it is that our labouring people, indeed all classes of our people, 
 languish for want of employment. This investigation is commenced 
 in the present letter. We are bound to say that it is pursued with a 
 perfect freedom from bigotry, national or religious, and there is 
 evinced a fearless honesty of purpose such as we anticipated from the 
 writer of the well-known reports on the condition of the people in 
 the disturbed and distressed districts of Wales and Scotland. There 
 is a ready power, too, in mastering his subject evinced by th.e Com- 
 missioner, which, whatever may be his natural ability, would scarcely 
 
 * It is unnecessary for me to say, as my letters show it, that I don't entirely 
 concur in the opinions of this extract. No newspaper, however, has shown more 
 rancorous hostility to my mission, the moment I began to exhibit one bad landlord 
 in his true colours, and to point out the evils of mischievous agitation, than this 
 same newspaper — The Pilot, 
 
636 APPENDIX II. 
 
 Lave become thus quickly available in a 8tate of society so unfamiliar 
 to Englishmen as that of Ireland, had not his previous labours in 
 "Wales and Scotland familiarised him with the general types of disease 
 ■which might be looked for in our deeply disordered community. 
 Between the condition of society in the parts of Sutherland which 
 the gentleman inspected in the early part of the present year, and the 
 condition of society in Ireland, there exists a similarity with which- 
 we were greatly struck, when we read some weeks ago his reports 
 from that part of Scotland. To this resemblance we may take some 
 future occasion to draw the attention of our readers. We cannot 
 help believing that the familiarity acquired in his Scottish inquiries 
 with evils so much resembling what prevail in this country, has 
 greatly aided the ready conception with which the writer has 
 apprehended the nature of the disease under which the agricultural 
 industry of Ireland perishes. 
 
 We cannot but rejoice that in the columns of a paper of so much 
 influence, and commanding so wide a circulation as The Times^ some 
 •wholesome views of the condition of the Irish peasant farmers are 
 likely to be laid before the English public. The English public has 
 it now on authority much more intelligible, and certainly not less 
 credible, than the blue books of commissioners, that "if these peasant 
 farmers industriously exert themselves for the improvement of their 
 farms, the reward of that industry is not secured to them, but is 
 taken from them" — that such are the relations subsisting between 
 landlord and tenant in Ireland, that industry bears no fruits to the 
 man who is expected to be industrious, and that the agricultural 
 resources of the country are undeveloped, because the landlord makes 
 no improvements, and the tenant having no security — but all the 
 contrary — that if he made them he would be permitted to enjoy the 
 benefit of them, "acts practically up to the adage, 'it is better to play 
 for nothing than to work for nothing.' " 
 
 We commend the present valuable letter to the attention of onr 
 readers. It is a most able exposition of the views it undertakes to 
 enunciate. The commencement of it is elaborate, and to our Irish 
 readers may seem, for a subject which to them is so plain, un- 
 necessarily scientific. But we beg them to read on ; they cannot 
 fail to be gratified with the clearness of the views thus laid open to 
 English readers, in a way that English readers love to get at them ; 
 and they must feel with us the deepest satisfaction that the British 
 public can no longer be at a loss for what we Irish mean by " fixity 
 
APPENDIX II. 637 
 
 of tenure," or wherefore it is that we demand it for the tenantry of 
 our country. We shall expect with great interest the full develop- 
 ment of this writer's views. 
 
 (From the Dullin Warder.) 
 We have read the letters of The Times' Commissioner with attention 
 and with pleasure. Theyexhihit an industrious and accurate command 
 of statistics, which are liandled Avith ease and aptitude — much care 
 and sagacity — and, above all, a hesitation to attribute blame — an 
 absence of all tendency to one-sidedness — of all disposition to make 
 a class report, or to sustain a pre-adopted theory at the expense of 
 fair statement — all which argues a truly liberal and statesmanlike 
 mind, and a spirit of honesty worthy of the solenmity of the under- 
 taking, and which we hold to be the more commendable in The 
 Times, inasmuch as that journal, and at no very distant period, 
 discharged a series of articles against the landlords of Ireland, upon 
 which we felt bound to comment as false in theory, most bitter in 
 execution, and mischievous in effect. In the letters of which we at 
 present speak there is no repetition of such doctrines — not an attempt 
 even to insinuate a sly suggestion in support of the old editorial 
 tirades. The landlords are no more criminated then the priests or 
 the peasantry themselves. 
 
 (From the usual Irish Correspondence of The Times.) 
 You have already had some evidence of the attention which the 
 Irish press has given to the letters of The Times' Commissioner, 
 and of the impression which his communications are making upon 
 the public mind. His labours have, however, attracted notice in 
 other quarters, and were made the subject of a special resolution, 
 which was carried, of course, nem. con. at the last weekly meeting 
 of the Dublin Protestant Association, the Rev. Thresham Dames 
 Gregg and Dr. Hyndman being the mover and seconder. It is to 
 the following effect : — 
 
 "That having heard that a correspondent from The Times has 
 been employed by that journal to communicate through its columns 
 to the public on the subject of the evils of Ireland and their remedies, 
 we hereby record it as our opinion, that no matter how great the 
 talent, learning, or worldly wisdom of an individual may be, he cannot 
 understand the case of Ireland, the true nature of its evils, their cause, 
 and their remedy, if he do not view them in the liglit of Sciipture." 
 
638 APPENDIX II. 
 
 (From The London Satirist, August 31st.) 
 
 Tliis is not tlie first time The Times has done the State some service 
 by the reports of its " Commissioner." Everybody remembers how 
 soon "'Rebecca" was brought to reason when The Times took her in 
 hand ; and how quickly lier tender sympathies and better feelings 
 were awakened when once the grinding nuisance of turnpikes was 
 fairly revealed in tlie columns of the leading journal. 
 
 Much more recently The Times has made the world acquainted 
 with the miseries endured in the Highlands of Scotland. We are 
 now acquainted with the munificent donations of Scotch lairds and 
 heritors towards the support of the poor ; the " clearing process," 
 too, by which vast tracts are depopulated, save and except a few 
 shepherds, with a view to the better breeding of sheep ; mutton 
 being deemed of more consequence than the human stock which 
 might be reared. 
 
 That O'Connell will regard the mission of The Times with much 
 favour we do not anticipate. We are not romantic enough to imagine 
 that the " Commissioner" will become a convert to the necessity of 
 " Repeal;" and if he does not, we can guess what sort of eye will be 
 cast upon him by the despot of Derrynane. Between the Liberator 
 and the "Commissioner" there will be no great love lost. The 
 panacea of O'Connell is very different to anything that will probably 
 be recommended by the ambassador of The Times ; and that vigour 
 of agitation, backed by the extraction of shillings, which is so 
 strenuously urged by the former, is not likely to be included among 
 the curative remedies likely, in the opinion of the '• Commissioner," 
 to regenerate Ireland. 
 
 Now, as to what the "Commissioner" has done. First, however, 
 be it said lie has not made any surprising discovery on the subject of 
 Irish misery. lie broaches no new doctrine, no cardinal remedy for 
 centuries of wrong, no novel means of cure. lie does not seem to 
 think the evil lies with O'Connell, the devil, or the Pope. He 
 indulges in no "young Ireland" poetical flourislies, but plainly and 
 prosaically traces the evil to the want of eniploj'ment ; the lack of 
 employment to the want of a motive for productive labour ; this 
 last, again, to the care taken by middlemen and landlords that the 
 tillers of the soil shall by possibility get nothing beyond a bare and 
 miserable subsistence for their toil. He points out the general 
 refusal of the landlords, chiefly from political motives, to grant leases 
 at fair rents, so as to secure the reward of the tenant for his labour, 
 
APPENDIX III. 639 
 
 as a monster grievance demanding removal — at the same time that 
 the absence of manufactures, and other means of employment, 
 induces a grinding competition for land as the only means, bad as 
 they are, by which the population can live at all. Lastly, he views 
 OTitrages of all kinds, Ribbonism, Whitefeet, and Blackfeet murders, 
 and even repeal itself, as symptoms only of the general disease, and 
 destined to disappear when this is cured, and not till then. 
 
 Such seems to be the substance of the "Commissioner's" con- 
 clusions at present. The discussion of suitable remedies is yet to 
 come — albeit, they are pretty forcibly glanced at in describincr the 
 disease. One principle, indeed, might be laid down as tolerably safe. 
 Undo all that has been done, and it would hardly be possible to 
 make a mistake. Too clear is it that in Ireland whatever is, is 
 wrong. If, therefore, landlords, parsons, priests, magistrates, 
 Orangemen, and Repealers, did just the reverse of what they do 
 now, some hope might be entertained of the nation coming right 
 at last. Everybody seems to have done their worst, as the results 
 show : we should, consequently, gladly see what a total change 
 would effect. But the great fact remains, that nobody has the power 
 to force their neighbours to act better for the future, and they take 
 good care not to begin themselves. 
 
 APPENDIX III. 
 
 Opinions op the Press. 
 
 Referred to in page 61. 
 
 (From the Freemmi's Journal.) 
 
 We publish elsewhere a fourth letter of The Times' Commissioner 
 on the condition of Ireland. The Commissioner has passed from 
 Leitrim into the county of Fermanagli, and is struck by an appear- 
 ance of better cultivation, and a more comfortable peasantry, as he 
 passes into Ulster. He seeks a cause for this. He forgets that 
 abundant cause for it is patent in the principles he liimself has 
 enunciated in his earlier letters, taken in connexion with well-known 
 facts regarding Ulster. With these facts we are sure his head is 
 stored — for he has evidently been studying the evidence taken before 
 
640 APPENDIX III. 
 
 the Land Commissioners. The tenantry of Ulster have a secure 
 tenure of their land. The custom of " tenant right " prevails in that 
 comity of Fermanagh, with whose superior condition the Com- 
 missioner is struck, giving the tenantry something infinitely better 
 even than those '•'■leases" which he has pronounced to be the practical 
 remedy for that insecurity of tenure imder which he has so justly 
 represented industry as perishing in the other parts of the coimtry 
 that he has visited. If the men of Leitrim were industrious, the 
 fruits of their industry would not be their own — the Commissioner 
 has told us so — and he has indicated the true remedy — to secure 
 their industry by giving them leases of their farms. The men of 
 Fermanatrh have this security, and more than this, for their tenant- 
 right is not terminable like a lease, but its nature is to endure for 
 ever.* Is it strange, then, that the Commissioner observes a difference 
 as he passes into a county where his own remedy has been for ages 
 in practical operation. No ; but it is strange, and passing strange, 
 that instead of observing and commenting on this happy working of 
 the remedy whose application he deemed advisable elsewhere, he 
 holts and rides off upon mad national bigotry, for freedom from which 
 we have hitherto been giving him credit. " Here," says the Com- 
 missioner, "we see the operationof the superior breed — the descendants 
 of the Scotch and English settlers of Ulster — vindicate their blood, 
 and tower above the inferior Celtic race !" If the Commissioner 
 has hitherto mortified himself by repressing his national antipathies 
 and conceits, he now seems disposed to make himself ample amends, 
 and take a fling of the most ludicrous indulgence. His national 
 complacency knows no bounds; it extravasates even into boastings 
 of jihysical superiority, and he proclaims that the Saxon race out-top 
 the Celtic by full six inches of stature ! You Scotch and French 
 philosophers, who, by the most extended deductions have found the 
 Irish Celts to be in strength and stature far away the first of 
 European men, hide your diminished heads before this observer of a 
 day? We really regret that the Commissioner has suffered this 
 national delirium to overcome him, just at the moment when his 
 otherwise sound sense might have found tlie strongest confirmation 
 in fact of its previous reasonings. May we hope that the mono- 
 
 * See the letter dated Dunfanaghy, as to tlie system of tenant-right. The 
 tenant-right prevails amongst the native Irish to the west of Donegal ; and no 
 people are more wretched. 
 
APPENDIX IV. 641 
 
 mania of his country will be content with this one outbreak, that 
 reason will take sway again, that he will once more discharge himself 
 of these odious national antipathies, and resume the unclouded 
 feelings, under the influence of which he wrote his earlier letters.* 
 
 APPENDIX lY. 
 
 Referred to in page 73. 
 
 From the evidence of the Right Hon. the Earl of MountcasLel, given at Fermoy, 
 in the county of Cork, before the Land Commissioners of Inquiry (Appendix, 
 Part III. page 148), on the proportion which rent should bear to the produce of 
 the land. 
 
 "20. What proportion, in your opinion, should the rent bear to the 
 produce of the land ? — I am exceedingly glad I have been asked this 
 question, as it enables me to bring before you a plan which I have taken 
 a great deal of trouble about, which I have found to be very useful upon 
 my own property, and which I think is very applicable to the whole of 
 Ii'eland. I will, with your permission, explain my plan. I was long 
 anxious to form some general plan by Avhich land could be fairly valued, 
 so that the landlord would get Avhat I considered his right, and at the 
 same time enable the tenant not to be too hardly pressed ; accordingly, 
 after making a great number of inquiries, not trusting so much to my 
 own opinions, and reflecting upon the subject, I drew out the plan which 
 I hold in my hand. This is a calculation to prove what is the fah" 
 valuation of land in Ireland — the amount of the produce, and the fair 
 price of such produce — for the value of all land must depend upon 
 the amoimt of agricultural produce which the land is capable of giving, 
 and at the same time the average prices which that produce will fetch. 
 Before I state this plan I must, however, say, that it is not applicable to 
 every kind of land, there are some few exceptions, and the exceptions are 
 these : — the value of town fields and building ground is,for obvious reasons, 
 lefl out of this calculation, as also the value of waste and mountain land, 
 which not only depends upon quality but locality, and particularly its 
 
 * This is simplj an ebullition of wounded national vanity, which one may 
 easily bear with. The simple truth is a sufficient answer to it. I thouo-ht it 
 right to copy this extract, as it embodies the feelings of very many of the Irish 
 population. Those feelings I should be sorry either to wound or to ridicule 
 unjustl3^ Writers on Ireland have for tlie most part been Irishmen, and many of 
 them have written such bombastic stuff, and have taken such distorted views of 
 their country, that Irishmen are apt to be offended at that which they know to be 
 the truth only. 
 
 T T 
 
642 APPENDIX IV. 
 
 proximity to manure. Taking tlie average rotation of crops into account, 
 an average value of the produce is thus struck, three-fourths of which 
 ought to belong to the tenant for profit, taxes, and expense of cultivation, 
 and one-fourth is the fair rent a landlord is entitled to receive. Xovr, 
 before I go further, I may be allowed to explain mj^self. I first formed 
 this notion many years ago upon reading Adam Smith's work upon the 
 * Wealth of Nations.' He lays down a rule for ascertaining the value of 
 land, and he divides the value of the produce into three parts ; he says 
 one-third should go for the rent to the landlord, and the other two-thirds 
 to the tenant for his remuneration and expense ; however, more modem 
 writers on political economy have found that this division was not a fair 
 one towards the tenant, because since the time of Adam Smith, the taxes 
 and charges of various kinds have increased materially, and more modern 
 writers have therefore divided the produce into four parts ; they have 
 laid down that one-fourth ought to be the amount which should go 
 to the landlord for rent. I accordingly adopt that plan, as laid down 
 by modern writers on political economy, and the plan I hold in my hand 
 is framed upon that principle. Three-fourths of the produce ought to 
 belong to the tenant for profit, taxes, and expense of cultivation, and 
 one-fourth is the fair rent a landlord is entitled to receive. Xow, 
 having laid this down, I have worked it out, and I have given some 
 examples to show that it will answer the purpose not only for this county or 
 any particular estate, but the whole of Ireland. I suppose that the land 
 will produce a rotation of three crops ; I commence Avith potatoe.^, and 
 have taken wheat for the second year, and for the third year I take oats, 
 I then divide the land into various qualities. I have taken No. 1 as 
 being the very richest of our land, then No. 2 as being something in- 
 ferior, and No. 3 as something inferior to that. I have given six exam- 
 ples ; but the commissioners will recollect that although I have only 
 given six, those six Avill not apply to every quality of land, there will be 
 intermediate qualities of land : but if I pi'ovc the principle to be good, 
 it is very easy to adapt it to any quality of land Avhicli may pi'oduce 
 something more or something less. The whole principle is to ascertain 
 what is an acre of land in the countiy capable of producing for three 
 years in succession, and then taking the average price of such pvodujce, 
 and that is what I have worked out upon this plan. The first year 
 (potatoes) the pi'oduce will be at least sixty barrels, or eight tons eight 
 hundredweight three quarters. I am speaking of the statute acre. There is 
 some land that will produce eighty barrels, but I do not go to that 
 extent. Then I take each barrel (which is our measure here) at an 
 average price of 4.v. per barrel; that would produce at the rate of 
 
APPENDIX IV. 643 
 
 12^. an acre for the first j'ear. Then I take the second year — wheat 
 to follow the potatoes — and I suppose eight barrels to be the produce, 
 which, upon the best inquiry I can make," I have ascertained to be the 
 average produce, which is equal to thirty-seven bushels and twenty pounds; 
 this I take at the average price of 25*. per barrel, which would make the 
 produce of the crop amount to lOi^. I then take the third year, a crop of 
 oats, which I estimate will produce ten barrels or fifty-one bushels and 
 twenty-two pounds, which, taken at the price of 8.s. per barrel, the average 
 price, will make 4^. Then, having got those three years' crops, I add them 
 together, and it makes a total of 26/. in the three years. I divide it by- 
 three in order to get the average amount, which will be 8/. 13.?. 4d. I 
 then divide by four, in order to get the fourth part, and the fourth part 
 ■will be 21. 3s. Ad. And that I sij ought to be the rent for the first class 
 land, leaving three-fourths to the tenant. I then work this in a similar 
 way upon the next quality of land, and bring out as the rent 1/. 186-. Qd. ; 
 for the third quality 1/. 9?.; the fourth quality 1/. 2s. 5\d.\ the fifth qua- 
 lity 13*. Id. ; and the sixth quality 7*. 10a?. per acre. I have stated before 
 that there may be intermediate land, but if the principle is a right one, 
 it is a principle by which you may ascertain the value of any land, and 
 what ought to be paid as a fair rent for it. 
 
 His lordship delivered in the following paper : — 
 
 No. 1. 
 
 £ s. d. 
 
 1 st year, potatoes, 60 barrels (8 tons 8 cwt. 3 qrs.) at 4*. per barrel 12 
 
 2nd year, Avheat, 8 barrels (37 bushels 20 lbs.) at 25s. do. 10 
 
 3rd year, oats, 10 barrels (51 bushels 22 lbs.) at 8*. do. 4 
 
 3) 26 
 
 4) 8 13 4 
 Rent per acre .234 
 
 No, 2. £ s. d. 
 
 lstyear,potatoes, 60barrels(8tons8cwt.3qrs.)at4.s. perbarrel 12 
 
 2nd year, wheat, 6 barrels (28 bushels) at 25*. do. 7 10 0. 
 
 3rd year, oats, 9 barrels (46 bushels 16 lbs.) at 8*. do. 3 12 
 
 3) 23 2 & 
 
 4) 7 14 
 
 Rent per acre . 118 6" 
 r T 2 
 
644 APPENDIX VI. 
 
 No. 3. " £ s. d. 
 
 lstyear,potatoes, 50barrels(7tons2qrs. 14lbs.)at35. 6cf. perbar. 8 15 
 
 2nd year, wheat, 5 barrels (23 bushels 20 lbs. at 25*.) do. 6 5 
 
 3rd year, oats, 6 barrels (30 bushels 36 lbs.) at 8*. do. 2 8 
 
 3) 17 8 
 
 4) 5 16 
 
 Rent per acre .19 
 
 No. 4. £ s. d. 
 
 Istyear,potatoes,40barrels(5tonsl2cwt.2qrs.)at 3A\6rf.perbar. 7 
 
 2nd year, wheat, 4 barrels (18 bushels 40 lbs.) at 23*. do. 4 12 
 
 3rd year, oats, 5 barrels (25 bushels 30 lbs.) at 7*. 6d. do. 117 6 
 
 3) 13 9 6 
 
 4) 4 9 10 
 
 Rent per acre . 12 5^ 
 « No. 5. 
 
 1st 3'ear, potatoes, 30 barrels (4 tons 4 cwt. 1 qr. 14 lbs.) at 3*. 6f/. £ s. d. 
 per barrel . . . . . . . , . .550 
 
 2nd year, oats, 4 barrels (20 bushels 24 lbs.) at 7s. per barrel .18 
 3rd year, grass, to fatten three sheep 110 
 
 Rent per acre 
 No. 6. 
 1st year, potatoes, 20 barrels (2 tons 16cwt.l qr.) at 3.?. per barrel 
 2nd year, oats, 3 barrels (15 bushels 18 lbs.) at 6s. do. 
 
 3rd year, grass, to fatten two sheep .... 
 
 Rent per acre . 7 10 
 I have tried this upon my own estate. J£ a tenant of mine comes to mc 
 and says he has his land too high, I immediately say, "Very well, I shall 
 try it according to my OAvn plan, and if you can show mc thatyoii liavc 
 your land higher than that, and that you have not three-fourths of the 
 produce for yourself, I am willing to lower it ; " and I proceed to try it in 
 that way, and I find I can satisfy the tenant, and I am satisfied myself, 
 and great good results from it, because anything that can satisfy tlie 
 
 3) 
 
 8 3 
 
 
 
 4) 
 
 2 14 
 
 4 
 
 , 
 
 13 
 
 7 
 
 
 £ s. 
 
 d. 
 
 rel 
 
 3 
 
 
 
 
 18 
 
 
 
 • 
 
 16 
 
 
 
 3) 
 
 4 14 
 
 
 
 4) 
 
 1 11 
 
 4 
 
APPENDIX V. 645 
 
 tenant and the landlord, does a great deal of good in Ireland, and takes 
 away a great deal of the cause of that discontent and division which we 
 are desirous of putting an end to." 
 
 APPENDIX y. 
 
 Opinions op the Press. 
 
 Referred to in jjage 97. 
 
 (From the Dublin Evening Packet.) 
 
 Having lately had occasion to speak in terms by no means com- 
 plimentary of the gentleman sent over to Ireland by the proprietors 
 of The Times, — having, in short, exposed his ignorance on certain 
 points with which he ought to have made himself acquainted before 
 he wrote,* — we have now much pleasure in rendering him an act of 
 justice. His last communication, transmitted from Donegal, deals 
 principally with facts, and is, in many respects, an important one, 
 showing what advantages might be derived by the j)easant farmer 
 from a judicious but very simple method of improving the soil. 
 
 The remarks with Avhich the "Commissioner" concludes his letter 
 are so pertinent to the subject under consideration, and contain so 
 much plain but sound sense, that we willingly give them a place, 
 notwithstanding the great pressure on our columns. 
 
 APPENDIX YI. 
 
 Opinions of the Phess. 
 
 Referred to in page 113. 
 
 (From the Belfast Northern Whig,) 
 
 The Times, as our readers are aware, has sent over a " Com- 
 missioner" of its own to report upon the condition of the Irish 
 people ; and he, unlike other commissioners, reports from week 
 to week directly to the pxiblic. He is evidently a gentleman of 
 energy and ability ; and we have no reason to doubt his anxiety to 
 discharge fairly the duty which he has undertaken. There has been 
 a disposition to carp and sneer at this Commissioner : but, for our- 
 selves, we are ready to regard his labours in a far different spirit. 
 
 * These "points'' were stating the town of Kells to be in Cavan, instead of 
 near Cavan, it being- about six miles from that county. See note, ante, page 24. 
 
646 APPENDIX VII. 
 
 Whatever we may think of tlie political character of The Times, it is 
 due to that mighty journal to acknowledge, tliat, as the advocate of 
 the poor, it is deserving of honour. We do not agree at all times 
 with its mode of advocacy ; but it is clearly entitled to the high credit 
 of making the rights of the poor paramount over all other considera- 
 tions. We remember when some of the French journals, wishing to 
 turn aside the force of some statements which it had published, 
 taunted it as the journal of the lowest, the humblest, the poorest 
 classes in England, instead of denying the charge, it very frankly 
 acknowledged the truth of the imputation, and boasted of it. Last 
 year, when the people of Wales were oppressed, T/ie Times sent 
 down its Commissioner ; and it was, we believe, mainly owing to his 
 representations and exposures of the grievances complained of, that 
 the Government were induced to interpose. We are glad that Ire- 
 land is now the scene of his labours. lie may not^be able to produce 
 much that is new ; but it is of no slight importance that the case 
 of Ireland should be brought forward by an able and intelligent man, 
 through a channel which must give the details great prominence and 
 weight before the public. We this day publish an exceedingly 
 interesting letter, in which the Commissioner gives a sketch of the 
 state of the population in a district of the county of Donegal. The 
 picture is one gloomy and distressing in the extreme. He alludes, at 
 the close, to the evidence taken by the Land Commission ; and we 
 have turned to the evidence referred to, some portions of which wc 
 shall briefly notice, in order that the reader may compare them with 
 the statements in the letter. 
 
 APPENDIX VII. 
 
 Opinions of the Press. 
 
 Referred to in jmge 128. 
 
 (From the Leeds Intelligencer.) 
 
 "The Times Commissioner" in Irklanp. — We earnestly call 
 attention to an extract from the report of " The Times Commis- 
 sioner," which will be found in another place. It is a description of 
 the marvels which have been wrought by Loid G. A. Hill, on an 
 
APPENDIX VIl/ 647 
 
 estate purchased by him, only eeven years" ago, in the county of 
 Donegal, on the north-west coast of Ireland, collected partly from a 
 Httle work written by his lordship, entitled Facts from Giceedore^ 
 partly from other documents and the personal observations of the 
 Commissioner himself. The experiment it records is of the highest 
 interest, as having been performed on a portion of the Irish peasantry 
 at their lowest point of depression, and suffering from the evils of 
 their land-tenure, as it exists among them in its most mischievously 
 developed and absurdly extravagant form : it is important, too, as 
 showing what, in spite of the idleness, the wilfulness, the obstinate 
 suspicions, the obstructive habits and customs of a thoroughly ne- 
 glected, lazy, and ignorant population, may be effected by the steady 
 and regenerating energy of a single resolute and high purposed will. 
 The conclusions to be drawn from it are of immense importance, as 
 showing what may be done, and what ouglit to be done for Ireland ; 
 what are her real grievances, and what her real remedies. They are 
 not without their bearing upon England ; for though we have not 
 a rustic population in the same stage of destitution, or grotesque ig- 
 norance, or territorial relations, as that of Gweedore, though we know 
 no agricultural district of 0,000 souls with but " one cart, one plough, 
 tweaty shovels, thirty-two rakes, two feather and eight chaff beds, 
 the people sleeping principally on rushes or mountain bent ;" though 
 we have no instance of three men becoming joint-partners in a 
 horse, and leaving the fourth foot unshod, because neitlier of the 
 three felt himself bound to shoe it ; nor of half an acre held by 
 twenty-six people in separate portions, at an enormous rent : yet we 
 have an agricultural population whose physical condition might be 
 m»eh improved, whose intellectual condition might be much raised, 
 whose productiveness might be much increased by a spirit similar to 
 that which has converted into fertile corn-fields the once " bleak wil- 
 derness" of Gweedore, in the wilds of Donegal. We cannot quit 
 this subject without expressing our sense of the public obligation 
 which The Times Commissioner is conferring ; at first, we confess, 
 we looked upon him with a certain suspicion and distrust, but he 
 appears to be discharging his duty intelligently, honestly, and well. 
 Most cordially do we agree with the reflections suggested to him by 
 what he saw at Gweedore. " Did converting the Roman Catholic 
 population to Protestants," he asks, " effect this change ? They are 
 Roman Catholics yet. Did Saxonizing them and making them 
 Oiai^eniea effect it ? They are all Celts. Did the getting up of 
 
648 APPENDIX VIII. 
 
 monster meetings and talking abont ' Repeal' efiect it ? No. The 
 remedy was a social one. The people were justly dealt with, taught, 
 shown by example, encouraged, and employed." 
 
 APPENDIX VIII. 
 
 Referred to in page 230. 
 No. 1.— REPEAL ASSOCIATION, CONCILIATION HALL, Sept. 29. 
 
 Mr. J. O'Connell said, that he had also to read for them a letter 
 of a different import : — 
 
 " Halesworth, Sept. 25. 
 " Sir, — I have this moment read in The Times of j'esterday your 
 dirty and unmanly remarks concerning The Times Commissioner, and I 
 do not lose one moment to tell you that you are a liar and a blackguard. 
 " I am, Sir, your obedient servant, 
 
 " John Foster." 
 " John O'Connell, Esq., M.P." 
 
 Mr J. O'Connell continued to say, that this was pretty well for 
 his " obedient servant.'' (Laughter.) The letter appeared to be 
 genuine — the handwriting was not forced — the seal contained the 
 initials " J. F." — so they had every reason to consider it genuine, 
 In the first place, with respect to this letter, it was dated 
 from England, and he would wish to know if all his letters to The 
 Times about Ireland were written in England, for if they were 
 to judge by the information on matters of fact contained in them, 
 they mioht well presume he never saw tliis country; also, he would 
 ask what he had done to this civil gentleman, — he would not say 
 handsome gentleman, for in his own country he had got the name of 
 " Ugly always" (laughter), — what had he done to call for such 
 language ? He had accused The Times Commissioner of making an 
 attack on the tenant-right of tlic nortli, and of making that attack 
 in an unfair way. (Hear, hear.) He stated that he liad gone to 
 tVie county of Donegal, where it least prevailed, and he did not go to 
 the eastern parts of Ulster, where the tenant-right miglit be said to 
 flourish. He could discover nothing from his letters, save a design 
 on the part of his employers to strike at that valuable privilege, 
 without obtaining any legislative compensation for its abolition. 
 
APPENDIX VIII. 649 
 
 (Hear, hear.) He (Mr. O'Connell) had accused liim of talking of 
 the want of employment as a great evil, without tracing that evil to 
 its source^ — the imion — the union, which had taken the money of the 
 country out of it — which had lured the rich proprietors away — 
 which had placed their commerce, their trade, and their manu- 
 factures at the mercy of an interested legislature. He had accused 
 him of laying the fault of the miserable condition of the people upon 
 themselves, and not upon the great discouragement given to them 
 by bad laws, and by the impunity afforded to local tyranny. 
 (Hear, hear.) He had done everything in his power in his letters 
 to slander the character of the Irish nation, and not a sentiment 
 appeared approaching to what ought to have been written, if he were 
 honest in his vocation, namely an expose of the real evils of the 
 country, resulting from the absence of resident proprietors, and the 
 want of manufactures and commerce. (Hear, hear.) Instead of 
 writing such letters as that which he had just read for them. The 
 Times " Commissioner" would be better employed in trying to meet 
 some of the charges which he (Mr. O'Connell) had brought forward. 
 He (Mr. O'Connell) had suggested one matter to him which would 
 have saved him a great deal of trouble. One subject appeared to 
 give him a vast deal of trouble — he could not at all relish the idea 
 that the ^Irish were stouter and stronger fellows than the Saxons. 
 He (Mr. O'Connell) had suggested that he should get an Anglo- 
 Saxon and a Milesian, and try which of them could give the 
 strongest kick. (Laughter.) That would set the matter at once at 
 rest. There was another suggestion which the Commissioner might 
 find of advantage to him. In those new infidel colleges it would of 
 course be difficult to find either an Irishman or a Catholic willing to 
 accept a professorship, and he would therefore move that the Com- 
 missioner be appointed professor of politeness in one of them. 
 (Laughter.) He had done with himself and his letters, and would 
 merely add that he was exceedingly glad that, as his countrj' and his 
 countrymen had been attacked, he had been attacked himself also. 
 (Hear, hear.) 
 
 Mr. O'Connell said tlie letter was such a splendid sample of 
 English politeness, that for the benefit and edification of the Irish 
 people, he would move its insertion on the minutes. (" Hear," and 
 laugliter.) As he saw two or three respectable English persons iu 
 the gallery looking intently at him, he w^ould withdraw the term 
 " English politeness," and admit that such blackguardism was 
 
650 APPENDIX VIII, 
 
 peculiar to this person liimself. It would, however, be a pity not to 
 give the man his proper name. Formerly, when elections were 
 carried by force of money, there was every sort of agent, from the 
 law agent down to the gutter agent. It so happened also that they 
 had every sort of commissioner, from the commissioner of the great 
 seal down to a gutter commissioner. Now, he (Mr. O'Connell) 
 hoped that he might have influence enougli with the press to have 
 this fellow called the " gutter commissioner." (Cheers and laughter.) 
 Did they know what he said ? — that the Irish women were ugly. 
 He really did. (Cries of " He 's a liar.") Oh ! (cried the honour- 
 able gentleman, looking round the galleries) how ugly they are I 
 (Cheers.) He was beginning to wish that the fellow was present 
 then ; but he hoped that he might never have the happiness of wit- 
 nessing such a sight. They had done with the " gutter commis- 
 sioner," and he would conclude by moving the insertion of his 
 letter on the minutes. 
 
 The resolution was seconded by Mr. Broderick, and adopted. 
 
 No. 2.— REPEAL ASSOCIATION, Oct. C. 
 
 The usual weekly meeting took place to-day in the Conciliation- 
 hall, Mr. Doyle in the chair. 
 
 The minutes of the previous meeting having been read, — 
 Mr. John O'Connell said, that he had received a letter from his 
 friend The Times Commissioner, Avhich he should read for them. 
 It appeared that the letter which he had read for them on that 
 day week was not written by that individual. The name of The 
 Times Commissioner was Thomas Campbell Foster, and the letter 
 submitted to the meeting on last Monday was signed " John 
 Foster." He (Mr. O'Connell), however, was under the impression 
 that the name of the The Times Commissioner was John Foster, 
 having been so informed some time previously to the receipt of the 
 letter bearing that signature. He should, as an act of justice, read 
 the letter which he had since received from Mr. Foster, together 
 with his (Mr. O'Connell's) answer. They would perceive that he 
 apologized for and retracted the remarks which he had made in 
 consequence of the mistake into which he had fallen, but that he 
 did not apologize for the remarks which he had made in condem- 
 nation of those statements regarding Irish affairs published by Mr. 
 
APPENDIX VIII. 651 
 
 Foster in liis capacity as The Times Commissioner. The letters to 
 which he alluded were as follows : — 
 
 " Ballinasloe, Galwaj, Oct. 2. 
 
 " Sir, — In the Freeman's Journal of the 30th ult., I find that you are 
 reported to have read a letter signed ' John Foster,' which you proceeded 
 to attribute to me. Assuming me to be the author of that letter, you 
 proceeded (in terms which it is not now my object to notice) to attack 
 me publicly because of its contents. 
 
 " I beg id"^ inform you that I am not the author of that letter ; that 
 I never authorized it to be written for me ; nor would I countenance any 
 such letter being written on my behalf. 
 
 " This being the case, I do not very clearly perceive the propriety or 
 the applicability of your public attack upon me because of that letter ; 
 and _^I [have a right to expect from you, as a gentleman, that you will 
 remedy what I am bound to suppose was an inadvertent mistake, in a 
 manner as public as that attack. 
 
 " I have the honour to be, sir, your obedient servant, 
 
 " Thomas Campbell Foster." 
 
 " John O'Connell, Esq., M.P." 
 
 " Kingstown, Dublin, Oct. 4. 
 
 " Sir, — The letter which I read at Conciliation- hall last Monday I beg 
 to enclose, that you may see there was nothing in its outward appearance 
 to lead me to suppose it a forgery. I was the less likely to form that 
 opinion of it, as I had several days previously been informed that your 
 name was precisely as signed in the enclosed. 
 
 " Of course, I shall make it my business to give your disclaimer, and 
 my expression of regret at having been misled, the same publicity as my 
 attack of last Monday. This would be my duty, even were it not my 
 inclination and intention. 
 
 " Reserving my opinions on the public matters in dispute between us, 
 and on your manner of treating them, I fully and entirely retract every 
 personality used by me Avhile under that impression that you had written 
 the certainly rather personal and not very gentle-toned letter which 
 occasioned my mistake. 
 
 " I have the honour to be, sir, your faithful servant, 
 
 "John O'Connell." 
 
 ; " Thomas Campbell Foster, Esq., Ballinasloe." 
 
 The honourable gentleman having moved the insertion of Mr. 
 Foster's letter on the minutes, continued to say, that he had on 
 
652 APPENDIX VIII. 
 
 Monday last fallen into a mistake, -which was natural under the 
 circumstances. He regretted that he had been misled, and tendered 
 to Mr. Foster the most ample apology for the language he had 
 used ; but he did not feel called on to retract the observations he had 
 made in reference to his way of representing the state of the 
 country.* 
 
 * It is unnecessary to do more than to request the reader to compare the two 
 statements. 
 
APPENDIX IX. 
 
 653 
 
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APPENDIX IX 
 
 ,* 
 
 APPENDIX IX*. 
 
 Referred to in page 254. 
 
 ADVANTAGES OF HOUSE-FEEDING, 
 
 Belvoir, August 1, 1845. 
 
 SiR^ — By IMr. Wilson's desire I furnish you with an accurate 
 statement of the manner and effect of house-feeding my cow (a very 
 small one and a poor milker). 
 
 Nov. 7, 1844, I had her milked at 11 o'clock a.m. in the presence of 35 
 of his workmen — the milk measured hy his steward 
 was 1 quart and 3 naggins, and at night her milk was 
 hut 3 naggins. 
 „ 9, J, Milked before the workmen, at 10 o'clock a.m., 1 quart 
 and 1 naggin, and in the evening again before them, 
 3 naggins. 
 ,, 11, ,, I got her in to house-feed, after the following manner : — 
 
 1st feed, 6 o'clock a.m.. Cut straw, hay, and turnips, all boiled together 
 
 (called steamed food). 
 2nd „ 8 „ ,, Raw turnips. 
 
 10 ,, ,, Let out on the field till 12 o'clock. 
 3rd „ 12 „ M., Hay. 
 
 4th „ 3 „ P.M., Steamed food same as in the morning. 
 5th ,, 6 ,, „ Raw turnips or mangel leaves, «S:c. 
 6th „ 8 „ „ Hay. 
 
 The result was an increase from the first day to tlic third, wlicn 
 she milked two quarts in the morning and the same at night ; on the 
 eighth day, two and a half quarts at each milking ; and on the twelfth 
 day after being put in, she milked three quarts at a time, and con- 
 tinued so for four days. 
 
 Being limited in my supply of green food (as I then thought), I 
 curtailed her a little in the diflPerent feeds, consequently she did not 
 increase 
 
APPENDIX IX*. 655 
 
 From the day on which she was got in to house-feed, up to 
 the 1st of April (being 140 days), her milk averaged 5 
 quarts per day, at Ijrf. per quart £4 7 6 
 
 On the 1st of April, the turnips and mangels not being nearly 
 consumed, I increased her feeds'again, when she averaged 
 6 quarts a day for the first fortnight, and 7 quarts during 
 the remainder of the month, being 62 quarts per day for 
 30 days, or 195 quarts, at l^d. per quart . . . .14 4^- 
 
 9tli May. — The vetches were now lit for cutting, and the 
 supply of turnips and mangels continuing up to the 15th of 
 June, she frequently milked 9 quarts a day. Her milk at 
 this date (1st August) is 9 quarts, allowing an average 
 from the 1st of May to the present date (being 92 days) at 
 8 quarts per day, or 736 quarts, at IJc?. per quart . .4120 
 
 Total amount from 11th November to 1st August . £10 3 10^ 
 Deduct the value of 21 cwt. of hay, at 21. per ton . 2 2 
 
 £8 1 lOi 
 
 The quantity of ground under green food was — 
 
 Mangels . . .10^ perches English. 
 Swedish turnips . 21 „ „ 
 
 Aberdeens . . 9| „ „ 
 
 Vetches and rape .15 „ „ 
 
 Hay 21 cwt., Statute 56 = 35 perches Irish. 
 
 An Irish acre of ground bearing crops such as the above, and 
 being turned to the same advantage, would (notwithstanding the 
 cow being such a poor milker) bring in a return of 467. 10s. (minus 
 the price of hay), together with a large quantity of manure, and the 
 cattle well fed. My cow is at present in an excellent condition. 
 Had she not been liouse-fed I would have to buy milk and butter 
 for my family during the winter, and to pay about 30s. for seaweed 
 or guano. — Yours, &c., John Lynch. 
 
 N.B. — I purchased this cow after calving for 51. 2s. Gd., on the 
 22nd of June, 1843; she calved on the 3rd of May, 1844: since 
 then she has not been in calf, it being Mr. Wilson's wisli to have her 
 remain a stripper, in order to show tlie boys and their parents the 
 effect of house-feeding, even on so poor a milker. 
 
656 APPENDIX X. 
 
 APPENDIX X. 
 
 Referred to in page 256. 
 To the Editor of The Times. 
 
 SiR^ — Having been absent in some remote parts of the country, I 
 had not the opportunity of seeing your Commissioner's report re- 
 lative to the estates of the Marquis of Conyngham in Donegal, and 
 your strictures thereon, till the 20th inst. 
 
 After perusing, I transmitted them to Mr. Robert Russell, a magis- 
 trate for the county of Donegal, and his lordship's local agent, and 
 desired that he would immediately furnish me with a reply to them. 
 
 Averse as I am to public discussions of a private or personal na- 
 ture, yet, in justice to Mr. Russell, and indeed to all parties, and 
 more especially to an amiable and highly honourable nobleman, and 
 a kind and considerate landlord, I feel myself bound to send you Mr. 
 Russell's letter, and to request that you will be so obliging as to in- 
 sert it and this letter in your next pubUcation. 
 
 I am, sir, your most humble servant, 
 
 John Benbow. 
 Crogen House, Corwen, North Wales, September 30. 
 
 Lackbeg, Dungloe, Donegal, September 27- 
 
 Dear Sir, — I received your letter of the 20th on my arrival in 
 Dublin, on the 24th instant, enclosing the publications in The Times 
 newspaper, and desiring me to consider the representations therein 
 made and to report to you upon them. I will endeavour to comply 
 with your request, and as briefly as possible (although the topics alluded 
 to are somewhat numerous), with the view of satisfying the mind of the 
 Marquis Conyngham, and, if you think proper, of making my statement 
 known to the public. 
 
 The publication by The Times " Commissioner" contains more unjust 
 charges against a landlord than It Is possible to conceive; as the foUow- 
 inf' plain and unquestionable statement of facts will prove. 
 
 About twelve years ago, when the Marquis Conyngham succeeded to 
 the estates upon the death of the late marquis, I was appointed by you, 
 and sent Into this district, as his lordship's local land-agent, liaving a 
 short time previously come to Ireland from my native country, Scotland. 
 Before this his lordship's estates here had been under the management 
 
APPENDIX X. 667 
 
 of the late and present Mr. Forster, and under it the land had been (I 
 know not under what authority) subdivided into small portions between 
 the families of the original tenants, and the evil consequences of this 
 subdivision (which have been serious obstacles to me) have naturally- 
 arisen. It is not in twelve, it is not in twenty years, that in a remote 
 district like this the state of things thus created can be remedied ; but I 
 fearlessly assert that, notwithstanding these disadvantages, the estate is 
 steadily, and even rapidly, progressing in improvement. 
 
 It is very easy for the Commissioner to expect impossibilities, — to 
 believe, or aflfect to believe, that a landlord has it in his power to make 
 all his tenants happy, and all his land fertile ; it is very easy for a writer 
 in a newspaper to call on him to exterminate or enrich a pauper popu- 
 lation brought on or increased by a minute subdivision of the land. 
 
 It seems to have been understood that there is no local agent on the 
 estate. I have resided, as you know, constantly here in that capacity 
 for the last twelve years. Nothing can be more erroneous than the 
 assertion that the tenants are visited half yearly for the purpose of 
 collecting their rents at such periods, without giving them due time to 
 make available their resources, and using at the same time the most 
 rigorous means for enforcing payment. The facts are otherwise ; the 
 tenant is never called on half yearly for his rents, and it is only when a 
 year and one half s rent becomes due that he is asked to pay one year's 
 rent ; and that too at a period of the year when he shall have disposed 
 of his crops or stock to most advantage. The farms are never visited 
 for the purpose of seeing what increased rent they will bear ; nor is it 
 correct that the rude efforts of the tenants to improve are followed 
 immediately by raising their rents. I defy any informant of the Com- 
 missioner to name an instance of it on the entire estate. It is equally- 
 incorrect that no capital is spent among them. Within the last year 
 upwards of 1,000^. has been spent by his lordship on the Glenties estate 
 alone — in the opening of new roads — the building of upwards of 100 
 houses — and other solid and substantial improvements ; and I have had 
 his lordship's authority to continue an outlay for all useful and bene- 
 ficial purposes. 
 
 In 1837 a very large portion of the estate, containing a population of 
 some thousands, fell out of lease on the death of the late king. This 
 large tract had mostly been held in rundale, or in common ; on the 
 expiry of the leases it was all laid out in distinct farms, with a view, 
 as far as possible, to benefit and support the population, and surveyed 
 and valued accordingly. This was not entirely accomplished until 
 1839, when the new lettings were completed; and since that period no 
 new valuation or advance in rent has taken place in this district. How 
 far, then, can the statement of the Commissioner be reconciled with 
 these facts, which I am perfectly ready to prove to the satisfaction of 
 the public ? 
 
 u u 
 
658 APPENDIX X. 
 
 That I have not been able to convert this remote and wild district into 
 fine cultivated land is not the fault of his lordship or of myself. 
 
 The statements as to the management of the estate, the Commissioner 
 must have received from others. But even where he professes to give 
 the result of actual observation, it is but too plain that he was influenced 
 in a great degree by partial and inaccurate accounts. Had he intimated 
 to me his intention of visiting this part of the country I should have felt 
 happy in giving him every information in my power, and although I 
 would have freely confessed that we were still surrounded by difficulties 
 arising from the habits and condition of the people, which only time 
 and patience, and long and close attention, can remove, I would have 
 shown him districts of his lordship's estate inferior to none in the 
 county for good conduct, comfort, and regularity. The Commissioner 
 unfortunately fell into other hands. 
 
 I was in Glenties when he passed the hotel of that town (an hotel 
 rarely to be surpassed for comfort in a country district, and on the 
 building and furnishing of which his lordship has, for the convenience 
 of the public, expended above 600/.), and put up at a far inferior house, 
 perhaps that he might amuse English readers with an account of an 
 " Irish inn." Here he most conveniently finds a person from another 
 estate, and by him is conducted on a mountainous track to poor habita- 
 tions, the accuracy of his account of which I have no means of testing, 
 as the town- land is not named; but similar instances, if they exist here, 
 I will venture to say will be met with in every mountainous district, 
 either in Ireland or Scotland. 
 
 The Commissioner must have been grossly deceived as to the mode of 
 letting on his lordship's estates. That a person travelling through the 
 district in about twenty-four hours was open to such deception is obvious 
 enough. He states that a person held seven cows' grass for 16/. It is 
 utterly untrue (.hat any such sum is paid in any part of the county for 
 that quantity of ground ; 5/. would be much nearer the sum. The land 
 on his lordship's estate is not let by cows' grasses, but by the acre ; in 
 scarcely any instance does the rent of the best arable land exceed 20*. 
 an Irish, or 12.?. 6d. the statute acre. The mountain is let at from 2d. to 
 Is. 6d. by the Irish acre. 
 
 The Commissioner, on his way to Arranmorc, breakfasted at Mr. 
 Forster's, who, with his father, were the agents to the late Marquis, 
 and on his way from Mr. Forster's passed my door. Of course he could 
 not have been informed by Mr. Forster that I was a constant resident, 
 and it is equally extraordinary that, without any public notice of his 
 approach, the population, as if by inspiration, were found ready prepared 
 with written statements of their grievances, both real and imaginary, all 
 which the Commissioner has at once adopted without any sufficient test 
 of their truth. 
 
APPENDIX X. 659 
 
 Before the Commissioner left Dungloe, he was told that the island 
 was at present held in rundale, but that a surveyor was in the island at 
 the very time of his visit for the purpose of getting a proper division of 
 the land effected ; and I know that at the very time the Commissioner 
 was in the island, every man, woman, and child, capable of working, and 
 who were industrious enough to do so, were employed in the manufac- 
 ture of kelp (a very profitable occupation), which costs them nothing 
 but their labour — no charge being ever made for the sea-weed (as other 
 landlords do make) from which it is manufactured, and to my knowledge 
 many families have received as much as 201. this summer for such kelp. 
 
 The Commissioner does not state that the rent of the land of this 
 island has not been raised for the last forty years, nor does he state that 
 two years ago, when his lordship visited this island, he generously gave 
 to the inhabitants, rent free during his life, a large grazing farm, which 
 had been held for years by his late agent, Mr. Forster. 
 
 The greater part of the country through which the Commissioner 
 passed in going to the Gweedore from Arranmore is held in perpetuity, 
 over which his lordship, as you know, has no control or management. 
 
 The connexion of the road to avoid the strand at Anagry, which the 
 Commissioner mentions, never was opposed by either his lordship or 
 his agents. Neither did the Board of Public Works ever offer to make 
 this road; but an entire new line of road, from Dungloe to the Gwee- 
 dore, a distance of upwards of six Irish miles, was proposed to be made, 
 but it was opposed by all the cess-payers of the barony, on account of 
 the expense which it would have occasioned them, and conceiving that 
 the present line would answer all the purposes. When the part to 
 avoid the strand to which the Commissioner alludes was made, I some 
 time ago undertook on the part of his lordship to pay a moiety of the 
 expense of opening it, although all the land for miles in that neigh- 
 bourhood is held in perpetuity by those who would chiefly be benefited 
 by it. 
 
 To go through all the statements contained in the Commissioner's 
 letter would be to you unnecessary, and to the public superfluous. His 
 descriptions of the poverty of the people are grossly overcharged. To 
 ameliorate the condition of the inhabitants of Arranmore, a large tract 
 of the main-land was bought up to locate a number of them thereon, and 
 encouragements held out to induce them to settle upon it. With refe- 
 rence to many of his statements as to the mode of life of the people, and 
 the mistakes to which a man utterly unacquainted with the habits, the 
 manners, and perhaps even the language of the people from whom he 
 fancied he was deriving information is liable, I will not meddle, but I 
 do trust I have said enough to prove, that the impression which his 
 letter is calculated to produce is, as to his lordship and his agents 
 utterly erroneous. 
 
 u u 2 
 
660 APPENDIX XI. 
 
 It is true, that these tenants hold their land at will, and it is also true 
 that though no leases have been granted, except in the case of Mr. 
 Forster, they have neither been applied for nor refused, and that the 
 tenants of this property, who are represented as so miserable and 
 oppressed, have in various instances obtained and been allowed to 
 accept from twenty to twenty-five years' purchase on the present rents 
 for their tenant-right. Whether such permission was right or wrong is 
 not at present material for us, I think, to inquire or discuss. 
 
 After so much misconception, I think you will consider it an act of 
 justice to his lordship and his agents to make my explanation public* 
 I am, dear Sir, 
 
 Your faithful and obedient humble servant, " 
 
 Robert Russell. 
 John Benbow, Esq., M.P., 
 26, Mecklenburgh-square, London. 
 
 APPENDIX XI. 
 
 Meferred to in page 303. 
 
 In the course of his speech in Conciliation Hall, on October 27, 
 1845, Mr. Daniel O'Connell said, — 
 
 " Repeal alone would restore the ancient equipoise of Queen, Lords 
 and Commons, and it was he who sought to effect it. It would also 
 restore happiness to Ireland, and rescue her from the state in which Lord 
 Devon's commission had proved her to be. By-the-by, that put him in 
 mind of " the gutter commissioner" of The Times. He (Mr. O'Connell) 
 had seen him at Limerick, and he really was not so ugly a fellow as he 
 thought he was. He was going about Avith a Mr. Watson, an amiable 
 person enough in private life, but proprietor of a paper which was well 
 called " The Lie." (Cheers and laughter.) He referred to him in the 
 present instance for the purpose of warning the Roman Catholic clergy 
 
 * I may perhaps here properly state, that, after the publication of Mr. Russell's 
 letter, the tenants of the Marquis of Conyngham sent to me a memorial, which 
 was signed by six chief tenants, containing an account of grievances and oppres- 
 sions on the part of Mr. Russell towards them far worse than anything published 
 by me, and which they offered to state before me on oath if I wished it and 
 would revisit them. I simply advised them to send a copy of their letter to mc 
 to the Marquis of Conyngham. 
 
APPENDIX XI. 661 
 
 against him. They would have cause to he sorry for it, if they did not 
 beware of having anything to say to him. The fellow was going about 
 among them, and lately had called on Dean O'Shaughnessy, a most 
 perfect gentleman, to whom, as he was about leaving, he said that he had 
 seen enough of the Irish people to be sure that they were not worthy of 
 Repeal, nor fit for a more extended franchise (groans) ; whereupon the 
 Dean said to him, " Sir, if you were not in my house I would order the 
 servant to kick you out.'' (Cheers and laughter.) 
 
 In consequence of seeing a report of this speech in Saunders's 
 Neics Letter I wrote the following letter to Dean O'Shaughnessy, 
 and sent a copy of it to the Limerick Chronicle. 
 
 (To the Editor of the Limerick Chronicle.) 
 
 Eoscrea, Tipperary, Oct. 29. 
 Sir,— Mr. O'Connell having thought fit to make a statement in the 
 Conciliation Hall, at Dublin, relative to my visit to Ennis, I have deemed 
 it right to address the following letter to the Very Rev. Dean O'Shaugh- 
 nessy, of Ennis, which sufficiently explains the whole matter, and which 
 I shall feel obliged to you to insert in your next publication, as being the 
 one most read in, and published the nearest to, that locality : — 
 
 My Dear Sir, — On reading Saunders's News Letter to-day, I saw the 
 following sentences makuig part of a speech uttered by Mr. O'Connell 
 at Conciliation Hall, last Monday : — 
 
 " He (the Commissioner) had introduced himself to his (Mr. O'Con- 
 nell's) excellent friend, Dean O'Shaughnessy, of Ennis, who received bun, 
 courteously, and the Commissioner got into conversation with him, and 
 told him before he was done, ' that for his part he had no doubt at all 
 about it, he had seen enough of Ireland to convince him that the Irish 
 were not entitled to Repeal.' ' What,' said the Dean, ' would you not 
 give us more members ?' ' No such thing.' ' Or the franchises ?' ' The 
 people of Ireland are not worthy of them.' ' Sir,' said the Dean, ' I am 
 not in the habit of being discourteous to strangers, but only that it is in 
 my own house, I would order the servant to kick you out,' and off went 
 the Commissioner as fast as he could. (Laughter.)'' 
 
 I am sure you Avill believe me when I state candidly that I was in- 
 fluenced by much respect and reverence for your age and evident 
 attainments. That we had an animated conversation on the question of 
 Repeal and extending the franchise is quite true, and I do not at aU 
 complain of yourself or the other gentlemen who were present, detailing 
 that conversation wth any colouring which you or they might think fit • 
 but I do complain of the latter part of the story — the " kickmg out" part 
 
662 
 
 APPENDIX XI. 
 
 which excited the " laughter" of Conciliation Hall. It is not for me to 
 point out to you what is befitting your own position, but I am sure you 
 must concur with me, from the courtesy with which you bade me adieu, 
 and expressed to me that " you felt it a compliment that I had called 
 upon you," that the whole of this " kicking out " part of the story is (to call 
 it by its right name) an unmitigated fahehood. 
 
 As this matter has been made public, I am sure you will not complain 
 (whatever steps you yourself may be pleased to take) of my using this 
 letter as I may think fit. 
 
 I have the honour to remain, my dear air, 
 Your faithful servant, 
 
 Thomas Campbell Foster. 
 The Very Rev. Dean O'Shaughnessy, Ennis. 
 
 Mr. O'Connell must indeed be driven hard for a fault, when he has to 
 resort to so petty a trick as this. The statement contains its own refutation ; 
 for, except " in his own house," the Dean would have neither the right 
 nor the power to give any such " order ;" and in his own house or any- 
 where else, neither he nor any one else, ever made such a speech to me. 
 I must also do the Dean the credit of saying that, from his courtesy to me, 
 I do not believe the thought even of acting so absurdly, and so unbe- 
 coming his position as a dignitary in the Roman Catholic Church, and as 
 a gentleman, ever crossed his mind. The audience, however, by their 
 approval of the speech, showed how worthy they and the speaker are of 
 one another, and how utterly unworthy both are of either credit or 
 estimation by decent and sensible men. 
 
 I have the honour to remain, sir, 
 
 Your obedient servant, 
 
 " The Times" Commissioner. 
 
 The following answer was received, in course of post, to this letter 
 to which also my reply will be found subjoined. 
 
 "Ennis, Oct. 1845. ' * 
 " Dear Sir, — In acknowledging the receipt of your letter of the 28th 
 inst., from Roscrea, I have to regret its being called for by any reference 
 that may have been made in the Conciliation Hall to the animated con- 
 versation, to use your own words, that we had upon the question of 
 repeal, and extending the franchise and representation. As I neither had 
 any interview with Mr. O'Connell since I saw you, neither did I solicit or 
 authorise any person to communicate witli him upon the subject, I cannot 
 hold myself accountable for the language he may have used. I must refer 
 you to himself in reference to his observations ; and although I must ac- 
 knowledge we parted on those terms that gentlemen may part, who are 
 
APPENDIX XI. 663 
 
 opposed in sentiment and feeling, I must at the same time take leave to 
 remark that, as far as I have read your letter, your references to the body 
 to which I have the honour to belong, are neither fair or courteous. 
 " I have the honour to remain, dear sir, 
 
 . " Your obedient humble servant, 
 
 " T. O'Shaughnesst." 
 " To Thomas Campbell Foster, Esq." 
 
 " Limerick, Nov. 1. 
 
 *' Dear Sir, — I felt satisfied that your reply as a gentleman could only 
 be what it has been, an exposure of the paltry falsehood to which Mr. 
 O'Connell thought fit to resort to obtain a momentary applause. 
 
 " I am, however, quite at a loss to understand to what the concluding 
 part of your letter refers. On no occasion whatever have I shown either 
 ' unfairness' or ' discourtesy' to the Roman Catholic clergy. I know no 
 reason why I should do either. 
 
 " I know, however, that Mr. O'Connell calls you his ' particular friend.' 
 That feeling, from the conversation I had with you, I make no doubt is 
 reciprocated ; and, perhaps, a pardonable anxiety to aid that friend, in 
 an unwilling exposure of his falsehood, led to the spice of mischief 
 thrown into the concluding passage of your letter, which really does 
 appear to me to be completely out of place. 
 
 " I have the honour to remain, dear sir, 
 
 " Yours very faithfully, 
 
 " Thos. Campbell Fostek." 
 
 " To the Very Rev. Dean O'Shaughnessy, Ennis.'' 
 
 The following week Mr. Daniel O'Connell ate pus own words ia 
 Conciliation Hall, in the following characteristic and ungracious 
 fashion : — 
 
 In the course of some desultory remarks connected with the perusal of 
 other letters, the honourable gentleman said that he had seen a letter 
 from that eccentric gentleman, the gutter Commissioner of The Times. 
 He was glad to see the fellow was in a passion. He was very angry, but 
 not wise in his anger. The Commissioner denied that he was threatened 
 to be kicked out by Dean O'Shaughnessy. He said he was not kicked 
 out. All he (Mr. O'Connell) could say was, that he ought to have been. 
 (Loud laughter and cheers.) He would now pass over the Commissioner, 
 about whom so much had been said and written. He wished they would 
 leave him (the Commissioner) to sink into his native insignificance, 
 which God knew was low enough.* 
 
 * See next following Appendix. 
 
664 APPENDIX XII. 
 
 APPENDIX XII. 
 
 Referred to in page 411. 
 
 I must entreat the reader's forbearance for having copied tlie fol- 
 lowing leading article from The Times on the subject of the last 
 Appendix; it deserves perusal because of its ability, and I make no 
 doubt it will as much entertain the reader as it did myself. 
 
 (From The Times, Nov. 5, 1845.) 
 
 In order to master a system it is always necessary to get at its 
 leading idea. Unless you are familiar with the air you cannot enter 
 into the thousand beauties of the overture. Thus expediency is the 
 leading idea of one moralist, authority of anotlier, heroism of a third, 
 and progress of a fourth. The leading ideas of political parties are as 
 specific as they are numerous. Unity of thought and tone is essen- 
 tial to interest as well as to success ; so everybody by a sort of spe- 
 cial instinct takes care always to keep his one point in view, and, in 
 fact, to be saying the same thing perpetually in an infinite number 
 of disguises. In order, then, to understand people, you must ana- 
 lyze them into their simplest element. This done, you have a key to 
 the whole man, and everything that he says and does. You have 
 discovered his characteristic — that which most distinguishes him 
 from the rest of his species. It is the prominent operation of his 
 mind. A clever artist would catch it, and if possible make it the 
 expression of the countenance, and the action of the figure. 
 
 We believe we have hit upon Mr. O'Connell's favourite thought 
 and movement, when we pronounce it to be kicking. Could we dis- 
 cern the emotions that successively struggle for utterance under that 
 brawny exterior, we should find them expressing themselves in an 
 endless series of imaginary kicks. There are hostile movements 
 with which Mr. O'Connell is not spiritually and heartily familiar. 
 Tlie delight of his soul is a kick. To the various species of tlie brute 
 creation nature has given their several hostile appetencies in accordance 
 with the weapons with which she has also supplied them. The 
 anger of some creatures finds vent in their horns, of others in their 
 stings, of others in their teeth, of others in their hoofs. Mr. O'Con- 
 nell comes under the last class. Nature has given him a gift of 
 
APPENDIX XII. 665 
 
 oratory, -svitli more force than grace, fitful, sudden, secret, mis- 
 chievous, and backwards. It is of that sort against which neither 
 friend nor foe can be on his guard. No mortal man can tell in his 
 neighbourhood when he shall not find himself the victim of a despe- 
 rate lunge, which inflicts a broken rib before he is conscious of offence- 
 Should we desire to describe by a type from the animal world a 
 power of rhetorical annoyance so strong, so ugly, and so treacherous, 
 we could not light on so apt a resemblance as the horny extremities of 
 the horse and some inferior quadrupeds. 
 
 In general, of course, it is the kick metaphoric, the kick ideal, that 
 gives force and sting to Mr. O'Connell's eloquence. The letters of 
 our " Commissioner," however, seem to have brought out the type 
 itself. The Agitator cannot mention his name but out there comes a 
 curse and a kick also. In one of the early letters the writer made 
 the comparison which every Englishman with eyes in his head, and 
 ■wits in his brain has always made, and will always make, between 
 the physical characteristics of the Saxon and the Celt. If the Celt 
 is the smaller, the less robust, and less upright of the two, it is his 
 misfortune rather than his fault, and may also serve to excuse his in- 
 ferior habits of life. O'Connell denied the fact. "Well ; that might 
 be the fault of his vision. He went further, however, and proposed 
 a peculiar test, which took its character from the singular mental 
 propensity we have noticed. It was that representatives of the two 
 races should alternately kick the writer of the letters, in order that 
 he might report the comparative force of their efforts. 
 
 To an English taste the idea is strange and grotesque enough. 
 "Whatever O'Connell might desire, no English Saxon would wish his 
 Irish kinsman to give this proof of his sinew. If his speculative 
 curiosity, or his national rivalry, were allied with a less peaceful 
 feeling, he would think rather of a clenched fist and a stand up fight 
 than of Mr. O'Connell's chosen branch of competition. Unques- 
 tionably the Liberator identified himself with the Celt in his imaginary 
 trial of force. In the suggestive region of his wishes and fancies he 
 ■was kicking hard enough— infinitely hard, from Gal way to Nova 
 Scotia, from earth to hell. To a man of O'Connell's mind it was 
 pleasant to imagine the kick, and to realize the imagination by a 
 public expression. Such is the mysterious economy of our nature 
 that to say a thing before a multitude affords a delectation next only 
 to the doing of it. It was not in Mr. O'Connell's power to kick the 
 •writer himself, so in a public harangue he pictured the whole Celtic 
 
666 APPENDIX XII. 
 
 population kicking him in brisk universal competition. We will not 
 ask how far Mr. O'Connell would enjoy a further satisfaction, if the 
 scene he had been at the pains to conjure up should have been un- 
 expectedly realized. 
 
 The scene was not realized either wholly or partly. Neither the 
 Celtic race nor any deputation thereof have put their strength to Mr. 
 O'Connell's proof. His imagination, however, still runs on the 
 thought. After the interval of some weeks, he has returned to it 
 with augmented zest and reality of conception. This time he has 
 clothed it in the form of a threat, and put it into the mouth of a 
 Roman Catiiolic dignitary. Last Monday week, at that abode of 
 the virtues and graces, called, quasi luciis a non lucendo. Conciliation 
 Hall, Mr. O'Connell said,— 
 
 " He (the Commissioner) had introduced himself to his (Mr. O'Con- 
 nell's) excellent friend Dean O'Shaughnessy, of Ennis, who received him 
 courteously, and the Commissioner got into conversation with him, and 
 told him before he was done, ' that, for his part, he had no doubt at all 
 about it ; he had seen enough of Ireland to convince him that the Irish 
 were not entitled to Kepeal.' ' What ! ' said the Dean, ' would you not 
 give us more members ?' ' No such thing.' ' Or the franchises ?' ' The 
 people of Ireland are not worthy of them.' ' Sir,' said the Dean, ' I am 
 not in the habit of being discourteous to strangers, but only that it is in 
 my own house, I would order the servant to kick you out ;' and off went 
 the Commissioner as fast as he could ! (Laughter.)" 
 
 Only the day before yesterday he recurred to the pleasing thought. 
 We insert elsewhere the Commissioner's own reply in a letter to the 
 Limerick Chronicle. In this place therefore it is unnecessary to do 
 more than observe, that Mr. O'Connell's story rests on the same solid 
 foundation as the alleged abusive letter from the Commissioner, and 
 about nineteen-twentieths of all that the Liberator ever said or wrote. 
 It is the pure coinage of his own fertile brain. O'Connell himself is 
 again the hero of his tale. He is ringing the changes on his own toe. 
 On the former occasion he was kicking in the person of the Celts, 
 now he kicks through the person of his very reverend friend the 
 Dean. He knows that the Commissioner had a brisk discussion 
 with Dean O'Shaughnessy at Ennis, so forthwith he falls a-kicking. 
 He passes a kick to the Dean, who is to pass it on to his servant, 
 who is to deliver it in a bodily form to the Commissioner. If, after 
 this, all the deans and parish priests in Ireland that come in the 
 Commissioner's way do not attempt to supply Dean O'Shaughnessy *s 
 omission, they are rather slow at taking a hint. 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 667 
 
 We are quite satisfied to take Mr. O'Connell's o\Yn portrait of 
 himself. He wishes to be drawn kicking. As Mercury is sculptured 
 just leaving the earth " i' the act to rise," Apollo as following with 
 his eye the dragon-piercing arrow, and Hercules as leaning on his 
 club, unquestionably it is Mr. O'Connell's wish to be handed down 
 " i' the act to kick." We will not venture to say how far so hostile 
 a gesture will recommend to the less bellicose genius of English 
 piety the popular leader of the Irish rehgion. We are not a kicking 
 species. Unless in some very uncivilized corner of the island, in 
 some very rare and unfavourable specimen, the trick is obsolete. 
 When we hear any one talk of kicking we involuntarily look to see 
 hoofs. If Nature has not shod Mr. O'Connell's feet with horn, she 
 has done him a great injustice. She has implanted instincts which 
 he cannot fulfil, and which can only be indulged in thought and 
 word to be perpetually thwarted in deed. 
 
 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 Referred to in pages 527, 547. 
 (From the Weekly Freeman s Journal.) 
 
 CONCILIATION HALL, DUBLIN, Dec. 29, 1845. 
 
 The usual weekly meeting was held on Monday the 28th of December at 
 Conciliation Hall, Mr. Thomas Steele, "the Head Pacificator" (as he is 
 called) in the Chair. After the reading of several letters and the handing 
 in of various subscriptions, Mr. O'Connell is reported in the Weekly 
 FreemaTLS Journal to have spoken as follows : — * 
 
 * I feel that an apology is due to the reader for laying this mass of abusive trash 
 before him. I am influenced, however, by motives of fair play, and because this 
 Appendix; will not be without its use in many respects. First, it is fair that 
 Mr. O'Connell should be heard in his defence; and I hope that those who may 
 cavil at what I write will be satisfied with my publishing every word of his and 
 his son's reply. I am satisfied that I could not do anything which would damage 
 him more or me less. Secondly, this reply is referred to in a subsequent letter ; 
 and that letter will be better understood by a reference to this speech. And, 
 thirdly, it is valuable in showing the reader the style of man and opposition that I 
 had to meet, and the kind of audience that must grace Conciliation Hall, when 
 such an address as this is according to its taste. 
 
668 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 Liberator. — I think I may as well say a few words about the worthy gutter 
 Commissioner. (A Voice — Let him go home.) He must fatten on Irish potatoes 
 first — (laughter). T believe I need not tell the people of Ireland, that of all the 
 newspapers in the British dominions, that which has shown the most malignant 
 hatred to the people of Ireland and to the Catholic clergy is The Times newspaper. 
 I believe there is no proposition that is so clearly demonstrated as that. Surpliced 
 ruffians, hooded incendiaries, wicked despots, and I know not what else, were the 
 only words they used towards the Irish Catholic clergy. (A Voice — They are 
 liars.) Why, to be sure, it is not worth your while to tell me that. And if I 
 have fallen under part of their censure, I am only proud of sharing it with such a 
 body as the Catholic clergy of Ireland — (cheers). At this very moment, there is 
 a favourable review in it of a book written by an infidel in France of the name of 
 Michelet, and written for the purpose of traducing and villifying the Catholic 
 clergy all over Europe. It is a most diabolical work ; and if the talent equalled 
 the intention of the party who wrote it, it would be the most mischievous book 
 that ever yet was published. But, like every other effort of the kind, the malig- 
 nity is weakened by the want of sound understanding, which, if it existed, would 
 prevent the man from following that line at all. That work is favourably reviewed 
 in The Times ; The Times praised that work to the skies. I am glad to be 
 persecuted by — shall I call it.' — the supporter of mfidels and the hater of the 
 Catholic clergy — (hear). It is hardly worth my while — and I am half angry with 
 myself for taking up the public time about it ; but there is one thing which I have 
 a right to complain of — the calumnies against me occupy not a line less than six 
 mortal columns of The Times newspaper. Six columns ! Why, you should not 
 have the heart to throw at the dog of your enemy such a violent instrument or 
 weapon as six columns of The Times newspaper — (laughter). Now, should they 
 not do me the kindness, or at least the common justice, to cut uj) those calumnies, 
 and give me at each time but a reasonable share to speak of, and a reasonable 
 quantity to answer. But, mark me, I am not here to reply to this calumny. I 
 am here to make but a few observations on the nature of this calumny, and the 
 futile ground on which it stands — (hear, hear). When I so triumphantly contra- 
 dicted the gutter Commissioner, the first thing he did was to produce a kind of 
 arbitration.* He proposed that a jury of twelve persons should be appointed, 
 and he was to take those twelve gentlemen over my property, to decide upon it 
 acre by acre. But the thing was too ludicrous to be entertained, and it was not 
 intended to be entertained one moment.f But what did my son do .' He wrote 
 
 * The triumphant contradiction was in showing that the town of Cahirciveen 
 had got a convent, a reading-room, a church-yard, and a market-house, and that 
 its houses were covered with slate, in answer to my allegation that Derrynane 
 Beg, a place seventeen miles from Cahirciveen, consisted of wretched hovels of 
 one room, without a pane of glass. If this can be called a triumph, it is the 
 triumph of jockeyism and cunning over a stupid or unreasoning auditory, that 
 could not see that Tenterden Steeple and Goodwin Sands have about as much to 
 do with each other as my accusation and this " triumphant defence." 
 
 t " The Liberator" does not condescend to tell us why it could not be enter- 
 tained. 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 669 
 
 to The Times newspaper when this offer was made. He said, — " This proposal for 
 the appointment of a jury of twelve persons is absurd ; but I '11 tell you what I 
 propose. Let one arbitrator be appointed by The Times Commissioner — I will 
 appoint another ; and, if necessary, they can call in a third person to act as umpire. 
 Let them go over and investigate the state of my father's property, and see 
 whether those statements are false or true" — (hear). This proposition was not 
 accepted. It was fair and reasonable, and they preferred another course. They 
 had one gutter Commissioner in Ireland, and they appointed another gutter 
 Commissioner ; thinking, no doubt, that two would increase the quantity thoug 
 they might not improve the quality — (laughter). For one gutter, we have two 
 gutters — (laughter). The Times appears to have a sort of notion, that a lie 
 obtains circulation like a promissory note, and that, by the name of an indors^r 
 on the back of it, it will have more currency — (hear, hear). Liar the first follows 
 liar the second, the indorser not being a bit better than the original concoctor of 
 the bad security — (cheers). It is singular, too, how this indorsement of the lie 
 results. First, we have three columns of this newspaper taken up by the 
 calumnies of Foster, the first gutter ; and then there are three columns more 
 taken up by the calumnies of Russell, the second gutter — (laughter.) Should 
 they not have come on one at a time ? But they are repeating the same thing, 
 one with more virulence, the other with less ; but the statements of both are 
 equally false. I will show it. I will demonstrate the falsehood of their state- 
 ments, and that, if possible, there is more falsehood in the conduct of Russell 
 and in his assertions, than in the assertions of gutter the first — (hear, hear). 
 There they stand together, something like the quack doctor and his son. The 
 quack doctor and his son are on the stage together. The child cried out, — " Good 
 people, my father is the finest physician in the world." The father says, — "The 
 child speaks truth." " Myfather," said the son, "cures all manner of diseases." 
 The father again says, — " The child speaks truth." Thus stand together the two 
 gutters. Foster teUs the lie; Russell says, — "The child speaks truth." The 
 pretty papa indorses over the lie of the child, and they both perform the quack 
 operation in concert — (laughter and cheers). Let me, before I go on, offer my 
 most sincere thanks to the press of all sides and parties in Ireland — (cheers). I 
 am told, to be sure, that the Limerick Chronicle has not been so honest as the 
 rest of the Irish press ; it will not even inquire into the facts. But I am too 
 proud, for the sake of Ireland, of the conduct of that press, to be too minute in 
 seeing whether one or more should be left out — (hear, hear). They are, to be 
 sure, strongly scolded by the gutter Commissioner, but that scolding will fall very 
 lightly on the shoulders of many of them ; and, at all events, whatever they may 
 do in the future stages of this controversy, they shall never lose my eternal grati- 
 tude — (cheers). 
 
 A Voice. — None of Andrew Watson's breed could be honest — (cheers). 
 
 Liberator. — I shall say nothing of Mr. Watson ; he is dead, and I forgive 
 him — (cheers). The Limerick Chronicle, however, has found out an excuse for 
 the poor gutter Commissioner ; they have joined in the discovery that he is really 
 an Irish patriot — (laughter). I was looking over his letter to the Chronicle, and 
 I find that, after abusing me, his spirit of affection for Ireland is the sole cause 
 
670 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 why he attacks me — (hear, hear).* In his letter to the Chronicle, he says, — 
 " I confess that, after this example of the manner in which things are managed in 
 this country, I have little hope for Ireland." Here is a fellow for you! He, 
 however, is not very delicate towards the Irish females. In his letter from Wex- 
 ford, he says, — " In the west I never saw a woman below the rank of a lady, or 
 in towns below that of a shopkeeper's wife, who wore stockings and shoes." The 
 attack upon me at present is made in two letters — one from Foster and the other 
 from Russell ; Foster being doubly virulent in all parts of his charge, and Russell 
 heel-tapping the entire — scarcely adding to it, but particularising, as it were, on 
 particular occasions. I am really ashamed of myself for taking up this subject as I 
 have done ; but, as I have commenced, I will go through the disgusting task. The 
 first thing I complain of, in the statements of Foster and Russell, are the grossest 
 omissions. They went to four farms of mine ; they went to Augheramong, 
 Kilcoleman, Tarmon, and Arkerra. Those were the particular farms they 
 mentioned ; but they went to several others, though they passed them by and left 
 them out of their account, because they were not what they wanted to find them.f 
 Now, close to Cahirciveen, there is the farm of Garranebane, and they did not 
 report on it at all. Why ? — because there are on it thirty or forty as good houses 
 as are in the occupation of the peasantry in that country — (hear, hear). J The 
 next farm they 4id not report on is Rynard. The houses there are excellent, and 
 roads have been made between them, which have cost me a large sum of money, 
 and which are exceedingly good — (hear, hear). There is a kind of indirect 
 
 * On my return from Kerry, I heard of so many people inquiring after me, as 
 it had become known that I had gone there, and I was thought to have gone on 
 dangerous mission, that on passing through Limerick I wrote a brief account of 
 my visit to the editor of the Limerick Chronicle, to satisfy inquiries on the sub- 
 ject. 
 
 t This is not true. We went to as many places as we possibly could in the day 
 without distinction ; and on two occasions during the day, on his man Connell 
 suggesting that there were capital farm-houses a mile off, though those close to us 
 looked wretched enough, we left the carriage, and walked each time above a mile, 
 through mud and water and rain, with this Connell, to see them. I knew well 
 enough if we did not go, it would be said we refused to go ; and, on both occa- 
 sions, instead of finding the farm-houses as described to us, we found them as 
 wretched as possible, and in no manner differing from those close to the road, 
 except in being, if anything, more wretched. The fact was, Connell, with true 
 Irish cunning, calculated we should not walk through mud and water, ankle-deep, 
 for a mile, to see capital farm-houses he told us of, and therefore he thought he 
 could safely boast of them, and if we did not go, this would serve to accuse us of 
 want of fairness. On every occasion that he spoke of a better farm-house further 
 on, I made a point of telling him at once to show us to it. On every occasion, 
 we found that his statement was incorrect. That this was the tactiqne he was to 
 pursue is evident ; for though it failed, the charge is still falsely made, that we 
 avoided the best farm-houses. 
 
 X This is a very safe assertion. The Census Commissioners have told us what 
 kind of houses those are. See ante, notet, p. 531. 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 671 
 
 admission, to be sure, that the Rynard houses are good ; but it is a very stingy- 
 one. I know the reason they omitted it ; and I also know the reason why they 
 made that concession. I know it as well as if I were looking at the fellows 
 when they agreed together not to report upon it. I have perfectly confidential 
 motives for not stating their reasons.* I therefore give them the benefit of any 
 reasons that could sway creatures of that kind — (hear, hear). Rynard is a capital 
 farm, and it was pointed out to them. They were shown on theii" way several 
 other farms, especially the two Letturs, the Come, the Castlequarter, and the two 
 Killoes. There are several excellent houses there ; but as they saw these farms 
 denoted the prosperity of the tenants, they did not visit any of them. It was 
 impossible for them not to see them ; they lay before them, and they are as fine 
 farms as any in the country. f In point of fact, they visited every wretched 
 habitation they could find, no matter who was the owner ; but they did not go to 
 these farms, because there were some slated houses and other excellent houses 
 upon them. J This is the truth, but it is not worth while complaining of these 
 omissions ; but if these fellows had common honesty or integrity they would not 
 have omitted them — (hear, hear). They came to Augheramong, and I will tell 
 you why. Early in life I made a lease of Augheramong to a relation of mine, 
 Mr. Mahony, for his life. He held it during his life ; he was a much younger 
 man than I was, and I thought he would survive me. He died, and the reversion 
 feU into my hands. The tenants were very poor, but when I got into possession, 
 I encouraged them, and nursed them ever since. They thought they were likely 
 to find the poorest houses on this farm, and therefore they went there. I will 
 now give you a specimen of their integrity: — "Augheramong, which is college 
 property, contains about thirty-six houses. The cottages of D. SulUvan and 
 D. Currane were the first we entered, — a feat requiring no ordinary circum- 
 spection and agility, by reason of the mounds of mud and manure surrounding 
 them. They were poor, comfortless places, nearly dark inside (as boards blocked 
 up the holes in the walls intended by the builder as sites for windows), with a 
 rough deal table, a settle, an iron pot, some few earthen vessels, potato-heap, &c., 
 as furniture. Yet Daniel Sullivan was a snug farmer, renting six cows' grass, 
 and having the same number of children, who were lying promiscuously along the 
 mud floor of their cottage. Currane was not near so well off." Now, I am not 
 here answering this document ; I am here only showing its utter futility. The Times 
 newspaper containing those charges could not have reached my son before yester- 
 day, and of course I could have no answer from him ; but a person who saw those 
 Commissioners' proceedings has written me up a letter on particular parts of their 
 conduct. My son has sent me a long statement, the nature of which I will here- 
 
 * As a point of honour, I never made a single remark to Mr. Russell on the 
 subject, or interfered in his report in any way. I may fairly state, too, that 
 Mr. Russell had, at that time, resigned his appointment on The Tiines, and had 
 no motive whatever to be influenced by me. 
 
 ■f Than which nothing can be worse. 
 
 % This is not true. We went to every farm that lay in our way, and took the 
 houses indiscriminately. But they were all alike wretched, and only differed in 
 the degree of misery. 
 
672 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 after read ; and I have only to caution those who are capable of saying anything, 
 that I am not now going over seriatim the answers to those falsehoods. Now, I 
 will show you what the statement to me — one that is certainly true — contains upon 
 this subject. There is a man named John Connell, whom they state to be an 
 agent of mine. He is no such thing. He is my son's clerk, and a steady, active 
 man.* He is one of Father Mathew's miracles. He used to earn a good deal of 
 money, the entire of which he spent on whisky. He took the pledge, and he is 
 now rich and comfortable. He has a good farm under me, and a good slated 
 house, for which I gave him the timber, lime, and slates — (hear, hear). When I 
 say he is not my agent, but the clerk of my son, I am not repudiating him, but 
 only stating the precise fact. He says, — " They then drove along the main-road, 
 and stopped upon the road. They asked me, was that one of the tenants' houses 
 below the road ? — pointing to one house in particular. I said yes. They and I 
 went down to the house. The man of the house or his wife were not at home, 
 but his mother-in-law and the children. They asked me, after we went into 
 the house, what was his name. I said Denis Sullivan. They asked me how many 
 cows' grass he had. I said five. They asked what rent did he assume. I said 
 eight pounds. They then asked the old woman, through me, how many children 
 he had, and she told them. They then examined the furniture, and went to the 
 room and looked at the bed, and said this man has a feather-bed. I said he was 
 very comfortable, and worth money." Not a tittle of that is in their account; 
 but they disparage this man, and seek to disparage me through his means — (hear, 
 hear).t That is a specimen of the manner in which they have acted throughout 
 this transaction — (hear, hear). Let this, however, be remembered throughout 
 everything I have to say, that not one particle of my case respecting Cahirciveen, 
 or the statements I made, or the improvements I alleged, has been contradicted, 
 or attempted to be contradicted, by those Commissioners — (cheers). The only 
 case they attempt to make is, a case of bad houses in themselves, and badly fur- 
 nished. We will see how that is as we go along ; but that is their only case.* 
 They next go to Kilcoleman. I shall not for the present, but shall hereafter refer 
 to the statements with reference to the houses they entered. But I shall now tell 
 you the real facts respecting the farm of Kilcoleman — (hear, hear). It fell into 
 
 * He stated to us, that he collected the rents on Tarmons and other estates, 
 and acted as the agent under Mr. Maurice O'Connell. It matters little what he 
 is called ; the one name is quite as appropriate as the other. 
 
 -}• We should, indeed, have been clever fellows for this or any duty to have put 
 down all this man Connell told us ! What guarantee had we that lie was telling 
 the truth ? Whatever a tenant said without his influence, and whatever we saw 
 and could believe, was always put down. 
 
 % And a very sufficient case. The town of Cahirciveen had nothing to do with 
 the inquiry. All that was said of it was, that it was dirty and unpavcd, with 
 old hat-mended windows. A small part of it is paved, the rest is literally 
 accurate. The fact was, something could be said about Cahirciveen as a defence, 
 for it has a convent, and school, and market-house; but notliing could be said 
 in defence of any other part of tlic property, and therefore it was cunningly 
 lugged into a discussion with which it had nothing to do. 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 673 
 
 my hands in a dilapidated state, and I built houses upon it. I was the person 
 who first introduced into that part of the country the practice of landlords making 
 houses for their tenants. It was a practice that was never known nor thought of 
 in that part of the country until I began it, and I began it on the farm of Kilcole- 
 man. The houses were placed along the then high-road, at suitable distances, 
 and I paid for the building of all those houses, and they were then such good 
 houses that some of the peasantry used to go two or three miles round to see the 
 capital houses built for the tenants of Kilcoleman by their landlord — (loud cheers). 
 They are certainly now amongst the worst houses on ray property, the other 
 houses are so superior to them ; and I would have changed them from their 
 present site, and got new houses built, but there is a new road made through the 
 land below the former road, and when the land is cultivated down to the new 
 road, the houses will be changed. It is true that I put out a tenant last year. 
 Now, what is the fact ? This tenant held another farm, on which he went to 
 reside, and he turned my land into dairy-land. When I saw so many human 
 beings in want of land, I would not consent that my land should be given to beasts 
 of the field — (loud cheers). I accordingly turned out the dairy farmer, and there 
 are now two tenants in his place. He got 701. as tenant-right, which I paid him 
 out of my pocket ; and that was the first instance of a landlord recognising the 
 tenant-right in that part of the country, and I shall take care that it is followed 
 up on my property — (cheers). Kilcoleman, which is described to be in such a 
 hideous state, is the second farm on which I established the tenant-right. There 
 was a widow in good circumstances livmg there. Her son was an ill-conducted 
 fellow, and, above all, what I most abominate, a pledge-breaker, I would not 
 take him as a tenant, and the woman had another farm, to which I removed her. 
 The incoming-tenant gave me, as a fine for the farm which she held, 40/., which 
 I instantly handed over to the widow — (cheers). And yet I am the man to be 
 assailed by those itinerant tellers of truth, I svippose I shall call them. 
 
 A Voice. — They are blackguards and scoundrels — (cheers). 
 
 Liberator. — I shall give you, I think, another specimen. With respect to 
 a place called Arkarra, here is honest Foster's account : — " The condition of the 
 huts was perfectly horrible. In one of them in which we all entered in the 
 presence of Mr. Maurice O'Connell, I requested your rejiorter to note down, 
 that a broken iron pot was the only furniture of any description in it. The 
 cottage was fall of stifling peat-smoke, and a woman clad in rags, with four or 
 five half-naked children about her, was squatted on the mud-floor near some 
 smouldering turf. The excuse here was, that she was a pauper, and paid no rent. 
 Mr. Bland wiU, of course, get the odium of her condition, and have to remove 
 her eventually at his own cost, when this middleman's lease expires." He must 
 survive me, at all events ; and pity for the Mr. Bland that shall survive me is 
 rather too premature a quality for this worthy man to boast of — (laughter). Now, 
 let me read the fact as stated by my son : — *' They went into another cabin, which 
 was wretched enough, Foster was in great glee, and very witty upon a cracked 
 iron pot (calling it the ' biler'), but was quite silenced when the poor woman who 
 was in the house said that she was a travelUng beggar, and that one of the neigh- 
 bours gave her the use of the house, as she had a sick child, until it recovered ; 
 that the pot was given her by a neighbour, and she was supported by their 
 
 X X 
 
674 
 
 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 charity."* See what an accusation to bring against me ! Was there ever any- 
 thing like it ? A poor widow, with a child, going through the country begging. 
 The child is taken sick ; the people take compassion upon her ; they give her a 
 hovel for shelter ; they give her straw to lie upon ; they administer to the poor 
 creature's wants in every way within their power ; when in comes these two — what 
 
 shall I call them ? 
 
 A Voice. — Scoundrels — (cheers and laughter). 
 
 Liberator. — In they rushed, in great glee at her misery, and became witty at 
 the poor woman's expense ; talked of "bilers," and so forth, until they were at 
 length shamed into silence by an announcement from the woman herself that she 
 was a travelling beggar — (hear, hear). Oh, it is a pleasing fact to dwell upon ! 
 I thank Heaven at this fresh proof of the humanity of my countrymen. I am 
 rejoiced that, amongst my own tenants, the good feeling was evinced — and God 
 bless them for it — of taking in the starving widow and the sick child ; giving them 
 to eat and to drink, and providing for them a shelter from the rain and the storm 
 — (cheers) ; and if there was but one particle of humanity — if there was but one 
 spark of the proper mind — if there was any thing but party-spirit, and the viru- 
 lence which shows itself in The Times, and of course in those that they employ, 
 it would not induce an attack upon me for such a cause, and this fact would not 
 be turned to the improper uses to which it has been turned by Foster and his 
 colleague (cheers). But it appears that all their anxiety is lest Mr. Bland should 
 be hereafter blamed for my transgression (laughter). A great deal has been said 
 throughout these letters of the Marquis of Lansdowne's property, and the 
 commissioners have had the unparalleled impudence to say that they went into 
 several houses on that property. That assertion is made by both, and it is an 
 arrant lie for each (hear, hear, hear). They went into one house, and only one,t 
 and yet though this was the case, Foster takes upon himself to ask in his letters, 
 " Why are not Mr. O'Connell's houses as good as the Marquis of Lansdowne's ? " J 
 Now I will read what happened on the Marquis of Lansdowne's estate : — " They 
 asked me to show them part of the Marquis of Lansdowne's property. I said it 
 was very near us. We then passed Inny Bridge. I said we are now on the 
 
 * The reporter's account had better be referred to as to this case, ante p. 542. 
 If this be true, it was highly creditable to tlicse poor people, for they were all 
 nearly as wretched as this poor creature. One thing is certain — sliegot nothing 
 from the O'Connells; and Mr. Maurice O'Conncll viewed her condition with 
 perfect and apparently habitual indifference. 
 
 t This is a falsehood — I was in three. It is, too, really absurd to talk of 
 going- into these houses. All the cottages of a decent look outside are precisely 
 of one character inside. All that arc wretched-looking outside, liave in the same 
 manner one character inside. After being in a dozen of tliem you become as 
 certain of the contents of the interior of a cottage from a glance at its apj)carance 
 outside, as if you had spent an hour in it. All tlie cottages of one stamp 
 outside are exactly alike within. 
 
 4: There is no comparison in the appearance of the Marquis of Lansdowne's 
 cottages outside (and their insides correspond) with those under Mr. O'Connell. 
 Those on the Marquis of Lansdowne's property are in every way superior. 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 675 
 
 Marquis's property. Ths first house we met was at the right, alongside the 
 road. They came out of the carriage and went into that hou?e. They asked me 
 what was the name of the farm ? I said Murriagh, but that that part was called 
 ScarifF. The son to the man of the house spoke English. They asked him how 
 much land had his father? He said by right that it would not graze more than 
 one cow ; but that they had two cows sometimes on it, and sometimes three. 
 They asked him then what rent did he pay ? He said 4.1. 16s. yearly." I hope 
 it will be recollected that that is the rent charged for the grass of one cow on the 
 Marquis of Lansdowne's property, and the only chance of making that rent is to 
 overstock the land with cattle and render it almost valueless (hear). " They 
 asked him were there better houses than that on the marquis's property in that 
 district .' He said there were some better and some worse. They asked him then 
 which was there more better houses than worse houses ? He said there were not 
 many better houses, but that there were a great many worse. They looked down 
 into the room and asked the daughter had they a feather bed .' She said not. 
 They went out and got into the carriage and drove along until they went opposite 
 the National School-house on the Spooncaune road."* There are the Marquis of 
 Lansdowne's houses which these commissioners describe as first-rate houses. 
 Four pounds sixteen shillings for the grass of one cow, and no feather bed ! 
 And yet my friend ' ' the gutter ' ' asks why are not my cottages as good ? 
 (cheers). — They came next to another farm of mine called Tarmons, where the 
 commissioners have displayed their usual virulence and inattention to facts. Here 
 is the account given by my correspondent of then- doings at Tarmons — "We 
 walked along until we came to the bounds of Tarmons, I showed them a road 
 that was leading down to the houses of the old demesne, and said there is a road 
 Mr. O'Connell has got made lately at his own expense to these houses, and if 
 they went on a little farther I would show them another road he had got made at 
 his own expense to the same houses. f There are many farmers in Tarmons — 
 there is a very large extent of land, and a good many houses, it is a property for 
 ever, subject to no head rents. The first house I came to on the old road to 
 Upper Tarmons was a slate house two story high, with four large glass windows." 
 Not a word of this in The Times report — all is left out, but it appears the worthy 
 " gutters " could not see the glass windows (cheers and laughter)^ — " I said this 
 is the first house of Tarmons ; they went into the house ; I called in the man of 
 the house who was a smith that was working in his forge next door ; he came in ; 
 they asked him his name ; he said Tim Murphy ; they asked him how many cows' 
 grass he had ; he said five ; they Eisked him his yearly rent ; he said six pounds ; 
 I said it would give good grass to four cows, but that he put an additional cow on 
 it; they asked him how many children he had; he told them." Thus this man 
 
 * The report of Mr. Russell as to this visit, written from notes taken down at 
 the time, is better evidence of the facts than this man's interested statement from 
 memory, see ante, p. 540. 
 
 t And such a road I never was on before. Jolin Bunyan must have seen some 
 such place, and have made it the foundation of his allegory of the Slough of 
 Despond. 
 
 t A reference to Mr. Russell's report will show that this is not true. 
 
 X X 2 
 
676 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 had the grass of five cows for 6/., and the Marquis of Lansdowne, whom they 
 boast of and puff off to the utmost, charges 41. lijs. for the grass of one, and 
 notwithstanding this I am denounced as oppressive and a grinding landlord, and 
 the marquis is proclaimed to be the paragon of all perfection (hear, and cheers). 
 I am not blaming the marquis, I am sure he does not exact any amount of rent 
 but that which the land can pay ; but I assert I do not exact as much rent as he 
 does (hear). He is a good man — and his agent is a good man — but, I repeat, he 
 gets his rent to an amount that I do not (cheers). " They asked Murphy had he 
 a feather bed.' He said he had, and showed it to them. They asked him used 
 he eat enough ? He said he used. They asked him did his children eat enough ? 
 He said they did. They asked him then was there any failure in his potatoes ? 
 He said not. There was a cabin next to it on the old road to the east of it ; they 
 asked me who lived there, I said a poor widow that had it for nothing, as she 
 lived in the house those years back (I gave the man 3/. a year reduction to leave 
 the poor widow a cabin) ; they went to the door, and the woman of the house 
 came out, and they asked her if she paid any rent ? she said she did. I asked 
 her to whom did she pay it, as I did not know her, never seeing her before ; 
 I thought it was the poor widow lived there always. They asked her then who 
 did she pay rent to? she said to Tom Keating (one of the tenants). They asked 
 her how much? she said 11.4s. a year. They asked her how she supported 
 herself? she said, taking score ground at 1*. per score (a score is twenty spades in 
 length, and the length of a spade is five and a half feet by eight feet in breadth).* 
 Gentlemen, said I, here is Keating, and let me ask him one question. Wliat was 
 the amount of your gale's rent six years ago — was it 3/. 15s. ? It was, said 
 Keating. Was not your gale's rent reduced to 21. 5*. per gale at that time by 
 giving up your claim on those cabins ? Keating said it was. And is 21. 5s. your 
 gale at the present? It is, said he. How dare you attempt to charge rent for 
 these cabins the Liberator gave for nothing to these creatures sLx years ago, and 
 gave you a reduction of three pounds a year in your rent since ? He said he 
 charged no rent for them since, but found this cabin waste lately, and let it to 
 this woman's husband. I told her not to pay Keating any rent for it. — They 
 then went to the next house : they asked the man of the house what holding he 
 had. He said he had the house and a garden to the rear of it, that used to 
 support him in potatoes, about an acre and a half. They asked him did he pay 
 any rent ? he said he did not these sLx years since it was taken from Keating, 
 There was a small nominal rent put on him last May, in order to acknowledge 
 the tenancy. They asked him how many children he had ? He told them. We 
 proceeded then to the next house they went into (Tom Keating's) ; they asked 
 him how many cows grass he had ? He told them three. They asked him the 
 rent. He said 41. 10s. They looked at a good feather bed he had and his 
 furniture, and asked him how many children ? He told them. Asked him what 
 diet? He said potatoes, milk, and fish. There was a large flock of geese 
 outside the house. They asked him if the geese were his ? He said yes. They 
 
 * ConncU, though the rent-collector, knew nothing about the woman, and 
 very little about any of the tenants. There could not be a stronger proof of 
 neglect. 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 677 
 
 asked him then how would he dispose of them ? He said to eat them. They 
 went into the next house, to John Keating's. They asked his wife how many 
 cow's grass her husband had? She answered the same as his brother Tom 
 Keating, and showed them a feather-bed and furniture." Now, not a word of 
 all this in Russell's report — not a tittle about the featherbeds and furniture.* His 
 only object seemed to be to describe everythmg as his imagination suggested, and 
 to certify that my tenants are as badly off as those described in Lord Devon's 
 report, where it is stated that a bed or a blanket is a rare luxury amongst the 
 agricultural labouring classes. But what is the fact ? They found no feather- 
 bed in the Marquis of Lansdowne's boasted cottages — they found feather-beds 
 and good furniture in each of mine (cheers). f " They went into another cabin 
 which Keating had let to a labourer, asked him what rent he paid Keating, he 
 said 1/. 4*. in labour and cash ; Foster said to Keating, you are a middlemjin 
 under ]\Ir. O'Connell. It was then night fall, we went upon the old road — that 
 is a dirty road said they ; now, Keating, said I, did Mr. Maurice O'Connell allow 
 the tenants of this land last summer one shilling per perch for opening this old 
 road .' Keating said he did ; the gentlemen said to me then, it is too late to go into 
 any more of these houses ; we went into the best, the smith's house, and the 
 Keatings' houses, which are good houses, and that will tell for the rest." That 
 is what the rejjorters told this man, and how different from their published state- 
 ments. J " There is a better slate house, said I, to the east of us that Mr. Maurice 
 O'Connell got built lately ; and 1 said, that the Keating's houses were built 
 a long time, and that all the houses on the rest of Tarmons were new houses, 
 lately built, and far superior. It was then dark, and we went on towards 
 Waterville." Any body who hears that account, and reads the report in The 
 Times must feel astonished at the imf)udent audacity of these persons in making 
 such a statement. The two Keatings' houses are the oldest on the entire farm, 
 and yet, they are in good condition — they are well furnished, and have feather- 
 beds amongst other things. On the rest of the farm the houses are all new, and 
 these the commissioner did not visit. § To be sure it was dark at the time, and 
 that might be received as an excuse ; but that they went to sleep at Waterville, 
 only a short distance off, not half a mile from Tarmons, so that they could have, 
 so disposed, satisfied themselves next morning, and found out the truth ; but 
 they were not so disposed — darkness suited them better — their object was not that 
 of truth or honesty, and the darkness afforded them an opportunity of lying 
 
 * Feather beds and furniture ! A dirty poke, with undressed and stinking 
 feathers thrust into it, and laid upon a pile of stones, or on a rude bedstead, like 
 a wooden-box or a mangle-frame, placed on a filthy mud-floor, is dignified with 
 the appellation of " a feather-bed and furniture ! " But see Mr. Russell's report , 
 ante, p. 341. 
 
 t This is grossly erroneous. See ante, p. 540. 
 
 X We told Connell no such thing as that they were good houses, but that they 
 were the hest to be found there. 
 
 $ Precisely. All we visited we found wretched. All we did not visit and did 
 not see, were, we are told, excellent houses. Why, this Old Bailey trick has'got 
 so stale, that none but the Gobemouches of Conciliation Hall would have swal- 
 lowed it. 
 
678 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 (cheers). Tliere is one thing very curious — Russell divides his peregrinations 
 through my property into three days' inspection — the first day he was accom- 
 panied by Mr. Eugene O'Sullivan, Mr. Hartop's agent, and he appears to be 
 exceedingly angry with the agent for being friendly to me (oh, oh). To be sure 
 it was very offensive to his highness the Commissioner of The Times, that 
 Mr. O'Sullivan should have any regard for me ; but the gist of this first day's 
 report was an examination of five or sLs houses, which he described to be in a 
 most miserable state. I won't say whether they are in such a state or not ; but 
 this I say, no matter what their state, or what their condition, I have no more to 
 do with them than I have with the Castle of Dublin (hear, hear). It is true they 
 are within my property under the lease of Hartop ; but what is the fact ? They 
 are actually in possession of Captain O'Connell, the nephew of the gentleman 
 who sold the property to me. Before he sold it he made a lease of that part of 
 it to Captain O'Connell for 5s. a year, so that in point of fact I have no more to 
 do with the houses thus described than I have with the house of Mr. Butler at the 
 other side of the river (hear, hear). Yet an entire page is taken up with abuse of 
 me, though they must have known all this. I cannot let them off on the assumption 
 of a mistake, for Mr. Eugene O'Sullivan was with them to explain everything, 
 and I am sure the newspaper containing the slander will hardly have reached his 
 post town when I shall have a letter stating that he did explain everything 
 (cheers).* They confined themselves in their first day's vituperation entirely to 
 the houses on Captain O'Connell's land, and did not venture a word disparagingly 
 of the nine other farms (hear, hear). But I will have the full particulars — I will 
 take up Russell and Foster from their first day's investigation on the land with 
 which I had nothing whatever to do, and I pledge myself to exhibit in its true 
 light the temper and spirit in which this investigation was carried on (cheers). 
 And now, let me ask, what is there in The Times report to disparage any i^art of 
 my former statement .' Everything 1 said about Cahirciveen turns out to be 
 true. They were taken through the town — they were shown the convent £md the 
 various public buildings — they were shown everything to bear out my words, and 
 not one tittle have they dared to assert in disparagement of my statements about 
 Cahirciveen (cheers). I stated the extent of my expenditure — I calculated it at 
 some thousand pounds — they have been there a second time, and yet with the 
 malignant eye of enmity they have been unable to detect the slightest mistatement 
 on my part (hear, hear, and cheers). f Is not that a proud and gratifying feeling 
 after such an investigation ? (continued cheers). Again, there was the letter of 
 Mr. Butler, and I ask is there any attempt on Russell's part to disparage the 
 statement of that gentleman ? (hear, hear) Mr. Butler states that I am a kind 
 and indulgent landlord ; he states further, this important fact — that he was a 
 valuator under the tithe composition act in four parishes in which I have estates 
 — the valuation under that act is always as low as it possibly can be — and that, 
 with only one or two exceptions in these four parishes, my lands were the only 
 lands let so low as the valuation (cheers). Do they attempt to answer these 
 
 * How could Mr. O'Connell tell that? Did he send instructions to O'Sullivan 
 to prepare and forward such a letter ? 
 
 t What ! not even aboutthe glass windows ? without going over all the story again. 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 679 
 
 things ? Not one word.* Mr. Butler is living to prove — ^but unwillingly the 
 truth comes out, for when they proceed to show the rent obtained by the Marquis 
 of Lansdowne from his tenants, and that received by me from mine, the amount 
 received by his lordship is one-third, and in many cases two-thirds more than I 
 receive (cheers). f 
 
 Then there was next published the letter of the Rev. Mr. Fitzgerald, and have 
 they attempted to contradict a single word of it (hear). J It is too flattering to me 
 not to make me hesitate before mentioning it, but this is a case in which all deli- 
 cacy must be thrown aside in personal vindication (hear, hear). — And what does 
 the Rev. Mr. Fitzgerald, my parish priest, say of me .' That whenever distress 
 appeared in the country he always relied upon me as a certain resource for assist- 
 ance — that when, in a particular season of distress, he wrote to me, I immediately 
 sent him one hundred pounds for reUef of the people, and desired him not to spare 
 me as long as I had a shilling (cheers). What we suffer for Ireland ! That I 
 should be buffeting with these badgers on account of my property is really ludi- 
 crous (cheers). Remember also that it is not asserted that I ever proceeded against 
 a tenant by ejectment or turned one out of possession (hear, hear).§ I am not 
 charged with evicting — on the contrary, the charge is otherwise. I am found fault 
 with because I do not turn away my tenants — some of them are poor — ^but I don't 
 think poverty a crime — the cruelty is in turning people out to starve — and I have, 
 thanks be to Heaven, 134 lot-holders paying me a nominal rent of from one 
 shQling to a pound, and I have 134 families rescued from starvation by this means 
 (cheers). — Now that is my boast and my pride. Yet these two London rival 
 correspondents, whom I will designate only as vagabonds, set out upon their 
 travels and make the mighty discovery that there are poor people upon my pro- 
 perty (hear, hear). I thank my God that there are, and that they have been saved 
 from a worse fate, and so long as the power is vested in me I will continue to 
 protect and cherish those who, mercilessly evicted from other estates, have found 
 a refuge on mine (hear, hear). I was the first who introduced a system of 
 improvements in that part of the county Kerry, and notwithstanding the mass of 
 vituperation, misrepresentation and calumny that has been heaped upon me, I will 
 continue acting up to it (hear). Even according to the admission of RusseU him- 
 self, which I shall read presently, I have laid the foundation of the tenant-right 
 that will spread through the country, affording protection and security in their 
 holdings to the people, and, consequent on this protection, I have the peculiar 
 gratification of knowing that in the entire ui I-eland there are not so peaceable, 
 tranquil, quiet, and loyal a people as the inhabitants of Kerry. There are no 
 
 * We went there to describe what we saw was the condition of the people, and 
 not to answer Mr. Butler's letters, which we did not see, and which, under the 
 relationships and circumstances in which Mr. Butler stands there in regard to 
 Mr. O'Connell are not worth examining into. 
 
 t We never found it so, and I do not believe it. See ante, as to the fact, p. 540. 
 
 X I have never seen the letter to this day, and do not know what it is about. 
 
 § See instances of ejectment, post, in Mr. Twiss's letter, and in the note 
 appended which I have copied, as Mr. O'Connell chooses to boast. He calcu* 
 lated, of course, because of our forbearance, that nothing was known about his 
 ejectments. 
 
680 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 agrarian riots or disturbances among them. My property has become the recep- 
 tacle for the distressed and destitute tenants of other proprietors. I am their 
 protector. I would be ashamed to think of myself if I had failed to become so, 
 and I thank my Creator that an opportunity was afforded me of acting the part of 
 a protector to the desolate (hear). Those 134 lot-holders, with their families, 
 make upwards of 600 individuals, and that number of human beings who, in any 
 other county in the south might have been left to die of starvation, are on my 
 property alive and well, and I understand part of them, no inconsiderable number 
 either, are prospering. On investigation I have learned that one of those lot- 
 holders obtained no less than 25/. for his tenant-right to his lot. Formerly I was 
 under the impression, and I stated, that 15/. was the sum received, but having since 
 investigated the matter I am now able to assert that 25/. was the amount paid for 
 the right. In order to show that it is not recently I have commenced this system 
 of making allotments I purpose reading extracts from the evidence of Mr. Maurice 
 CoUes, given before the Land Commission, for really this is an attempt on the part 
 of those malicious wretches who have concocted this conspiracy against me to 
 endeavour to extinguish the system of allotment. Foster, in his communications 
 to The Times, has condemned it over and over again ; and, as it has been made 
 to appear that I have really commenced making such allotments, I will read an 
 extract from the evidence of Mr. Colles, an eminent surveyor, engaged by Trinity 
 College. It is to be found in the first volume of the land evidence before Lord 
 Devon's Commission, page 246, queries 71 and 72 : — " When the landlord gives 
 encouragement, or where there is confidence, the tenant will reclaim as readily 
 without a lease as with one ; but where there is no confidence or encouragement 
 the increase in the quantity of arable-land has been very trifling. I have been able 
 to ascertain this accurately from a comparison of surveys made of the College 
 estates in the years 1700 and 1775, with the extent of arable-land shown on the 
 ordnance maps." " I am confident that through the country generally the land 
 that has been reclaimed is by no means in proportion to the increase in the popu- 
 lation. On the College estate, in the barony of Tirhugli, principally on Colonel 
 ConoUy's holding, an extensive tract of coarse land appears to have been reclaimed ; 
 also, on that part of the Kerry iJroperty in possession of Mr. O'Connell. The 
 great increase in the arable in this property I attribute to the number of persons 
 Mr. O'Connell has holding under him, for the last twenty years, at a nominal 
 rent." In order to give you some idea of the spirit in which I carried on improve- 
 ments, and the course of advancement made within a very limited period, I take 
 up the first and second reports of the select committee appointed to inquire into 
 the amount of advances made by the Commissioners of Public Works in Ireland 
 with the minutes of evidence ordered to be printed by the House of Commons in 
 August, 1835 : — " In a report upon a part of Kerry, Mr. Nimmo states, in 1824, 
 that — ' A few years ago there was hardly a plough, car, or carriage of any kind ; 
 butter, the only produce, was carried to Cork on horseback ; there was not one 
 decent public-house, and only one house slated and plastered in the village ; the 
 nearest post-oflSce thirty miles distant. Since the new road was made,* there were 
 built in three years upwards of twenty respectable two-story houses ; a shop with 
 
 * This road was made by a grant of public money. 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 681 
 
 cloth, hardware, and groceries ; a comfortable inn, post-office, bridewell, new- 
 chapel, a quay covered with lime-stone for manure, a salt-work, two stores for 
 oats, and a considerable traffic in linen and yarn.' Upon this subject the follow- 
 ing communication has been made to us by Mr. O'ConneU, a member of the 
 committee : — ' The place referred to by Mr. Nimmo is now called the town of 
 Cahirciveen. At the first period he alludes to there were but one or two ploughs 
 in the barony, or certainly only two cars. The quantity of wheat grown was con- 
 fined to the consumption of a few famiUes amongst the more wealthy classes, not 
 exceeding six ; and oats were grown in but a little larger proportion. Since 1824, 
 the date of Mr. Nimmo's report, the houses of Cahirciveen have increased from 
 20 to upwards of 250. There are several shops, and many persons engaged in the 
 import and export trade. The inhabitants, in 1831, exceeded 1100 ; they are now 
 more than 1300. There are from 10 to 15 new houses being built. A new and 
 enlarged bridewell, with a petty sessions court, has been built. A weU-supported 
 dispensary, and a large and exceedingly well-regulated fever hospital has been built 
 outside the town, affording the greatest advantage to the poorer classes.* There 
 was no medical person resident in 1824 ; there is now a large and exceedingly well 
 supplied apothecary's shop, and a skilful resident physician. The number of cars 
 has multipUed so much that the writer has in a single day met upwards of 1000 
 cars employed in various works in that country, in which he knous there were but 
 two cars a few years ago. A bolting-mill has been erected near Cahirciveen, 
 at an expense of from 4000/. to 5000/. ; and the quantity of wheat grown in the 
 country has multiplied more than two hundred-fold, and of oats more than one 
 thousand-fold. All these advantages, and they are only beginning to develope 
 themselves, have originated in the making of about seventy miles of new road on a 
 level line.' " Now I standby the allotment system. I will continue the system in 
 spite of every species of slander and vituperation that my asscdlants may choose to 
 heap upon me. I have already said that neither Foster nor Russell have attempted to 
 contradict the statements contained in the letter written by Mr. Butler or the Rev. 
 Mr. Fitzgerald (hear, hear). If I may take the Uberty of using the name of 
 George Alexander Hamilton, and I do so with respect and singular gratitude, I 
 can make a similar statement respecting his testimony. I am happy, though we 
 differ in political matters, to have an opportunity of expressing how deeply and 
 sincerely I respect him as a gentleman. Mr. Hamilton it was who, I believe, 
 communicated to the writer for the Evening Mail and The Times commissioner, or 
 his colleague could not falsify that gentleman's statement, that my laud in Kerry 
 was very well managed.* He gave me a high character as a landlord, and to the 
 
 * All this improvement, if correctly stated, is to be attributed to a grant of 
 public money to open roads, and it is very satisfactory to learn that it has effected 
 such an improvement. 
 
 t Neither the statement of Mr. Hamilton nor of any other gentleman can 
 alter the fact, that there is no agricultural instruction given, no agricultural 
 knowledge possessed by the peasantry', no draining, no green crops grown, no 
 hedges, no ditches, the most wretched hovels, and a potato-fed population. If 
 such an estate as this is thought to be very well managed, I should be curious 
 to know the condition of one considered to be badly managed. 
 
682 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 credit of the conductor of the Evening Mail, I announce the fact, that that journal 
 published the communication, thus aflfording the delightful contrast to the conduct 
 pursued by The Times newspaper, and demonstrating that much as Irish journals 
 of a Tory or Conservative caste, differed with me in politics, and much as they had 
 reason to differ with me, for I successfully combated the principles of their- advo- 
 cacy, they could rally round an injured man, and lend their aid in controverting 
 statements respecting my character which they believed were without foundation. 
 There has been, I repeat, no attempt made by Foster or Russell to shake the 
 evidence so promptly and so generously given by Mr. Hamilton, or the other 
 gentleman of whom I have spoken. I am, therefore, well pleased at the new 
 ordeal through which I have had to pass ; and I tell those men, the gutter com- 
 missioner and Russell, who may imagine that they have triumphed over me in the 
 columns of The Times, that they have not heard the last of it yet. As yet no reply 
 to their conjoint fabrications could reach me from Derrynane. The post would 
 not permit such expedition. Indeed, it is highly probable that until the Free- 
 man's Journal of this morning, containing Foster and Russell's letters, reaches 
 my son, Maurice O'Connell, he will not have seen their lying reports. I promise 
 them, however, they shall have information on their pettyfogging, miserable, and 
 malignant misrepresentations connected with the commissioner's letter — there is 
 one comfort.* In saying that he visited the houses of several of my tenants at 
 Derrynane Beg, he told an arrant and unprincipled lie. That is a fact beyo^ the 
 least doubt. When writing to The Times, on the 10th of November, he stated — 
 " I entered several of the cottages, at a place called Derrynane Beg, within a mile 
 from Derrynane. The distress of the people was horrible. There is not a pane 
 of glass in the parish, nor window of any kind in half the cottages. Some have 
 got a hole in the wall for light, with a board to stop it up. In not one in a dozen 
 is there a chair to sit upon." Now, this allegation leads to the belief that Foster 
 was in more than a dozen of my tenants' cottages at Derrynane Beg unprovided 
 with chairs. That statement is a lie. I am not at the present period speaking of 
 his story about the absence of panes of glass. I will make him a compliment of 
 that fabrication, and confine myself to the residue of his allegations. There never 
 was a more complete lie — a more untenable assertion — a more unfounded fabrica- 
 tion, than his alleging that he visited several of the cottages at Deriynane Beg. 
 Foster himself cannot deny it is a lie. I am ready to prove that it is baseless and 
 utterly false. I can prove it so by his own subsequent admission, as I can expose 
 the hollowness of the excuse on which he attempts his justification.t Yet this lie, 
 with all the others, has been endorsed by Russell (hear, hear). Everything Foster 
 has written Russell asserts was right. In nothing does Russell admit was Foster 
 
 * Regarding this vapouring threat, I need only say, that emissaries were sent 
 to sift out all we did, and contradict us if they could, and they failed. 
 
 ■\ The question is not how many cottages I entered, whether five or fifty, but 
 what is the condition of the cottages. It has been proved that my description 
 of Den-ynane Beg was literally accurate. I could hardly liave dreamed literal 
 accuracy, for I never before saw misery like that at Derrynane Beg. It sur- 
 passes alike all imagination or fiction — it is a hideous and almost inconceivable 
 leality. 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 683 
 
 wrong. Russell sides up to Foster's saddle-skirts. They went in couples like 
 any two ugly beagles (hear, hear, and laughter). I do not mean to say that Foster 
 is personally ugly — I am now told his appearance is in his favour ; but mental 
 ugliness is what I charge him with (hear, hear). My son Maurice met those 
 persons on the occasion of Foster's second visit to Derrynane, and I will read the 
 statement he sent me on the subject. — I would not insert it in the newspapers 
 until I laid it before the association, and I have double pleasure in doing so now. 
 " Mr. Russell, the companion of The Times Commissioner, having appointed to 
 meet me at Waterville on Thursday, the 18th December, I proceeded thither on 
 the morning of that day. They arrived about two o'clock, and I had some con- 
 versation with Mr. Russell about indifferent matters in the parlour of Denahy's 
 hotel before Foster came in. When we were speaking, 1 asked Mr. Russell, in 
 Foster's presence, if they had been in Cahirciveen ? he said yes, and had met Mr. 
 Primrose and seen a good deal of the to^vn, and that a man by the name of Sulli- 
 van (Gow), from Aughamong, who had told him a sad story about his potatoes the 
 day before, had come to them offering to make affidavit that what he had told them 
 was false." The fact is, the man mistook Russell and Foster for Government 
 commissioners sent to inquire into the distressed condition of the people with a 
 view to remedial measures, and he was making out a case of distress for their 
 consideration. That is the amount of what Sullivan did, and I make them a 
 present of it.* " Some observations were made about the Cahirciveen hotels, 
 and Foster said that he was sick the night he came in there first, and that his 
 impressions were tinged by the sickness." Tinged with sickness. I will tell you 
 what one of these tinges of sickness was. He stated that there was a bull calf in 
 one of the rooms of the hotel at Cahirciveen under his bed-room, and that is what 
 he calls " being tinged with sickness." " That his object was to tell things as he 
 saw them ; that he had no personal enmities — he wished for correct information. 
 I said that he took a curious method of proving that, for he neither sought nor 
 took information from sources likely to give it correctly when he was before in this 
 district ; that he had singled out an individual to attack, and had described him 
 in the most atrocious colours without a shadow of foundation. He said he had 
 spoken generally. ' Why,' said I, ' you spoke of my father as a greedy and exacting 
 landlord.' ' No,' said he. ' Well,' said I, ' you certainly put the phrase more poetic- 
 ally, for you said he squeezed the life's blood out of his tenantry.' ' Oh ! no,' said 
 he. ' Why I have your letter at Derrynane,' replied I, ' and do you mean to say that 
 that phrase is not applied to my father ?' ' Oh ! no, to middlemen,' said he. ' Of 
 whom you only describe him as the very worst,' said I. ' I beg your pardon,' said 
 he, ' I did not.' ' Why,' said I, ' I have your letter at Derrynane,f but as we are 
 at issue there, let me ask you why did you say you went into several of the houses at 
 Derrynane Beg, when you did not enter one of them ?' 'I.' Oh I' said he, 'when 
 
 * It is a pleasant task sifting out the truth in such a locality. 
 
 t The reader will find what I said, ante, page 397. It will be seen what little 
 reliance is to be placed upon the testimony of this gentleman, when he might 
 even Lave refreshed his memory before he thus sat down to prove his own 
 inaccuracy, and, curiously enough, my accuracy, as a reference to what I did 
 say will show. 
 
684 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 the car was going slowly up the hill I got out of it without Hanloii's knowing, and 
 went down to the houses.' I made no reply, as the answer convicted him ; the 
 road from Devine's to Derrynane Beg being all down a hill to the bridge near 
 Chuanes (Hartop's tenant), the commissioner backing, evidently, his first false- 
 hood with a second." Was there ever such an absurd statement ? The car was 
 going up a lull — Foster got out without the driver's knowledge — went and visited 
 twenty houses, and got back into the car, Hanlon all the time being in ignorance 
 of his movements (laughter).* There is a fellow for you ; there is a worthy 
 colleague for Russell to endorse every word uttered by the gutter commissioner. 
 He says that he weut up all hill, and does not make any allusion to the necessary 
 descent. Foster unquestionably should be hired as a harlequin for one of the 
 Christmas harlequinades (laughter). With wonderful agility he jumped out of a 
 car into twenty houses, and back again into the car, which was all the time going 
 up what he called a hill, but what was m reality a descent of three-quarters of a 
 mUe on the Government made road, where the driver would naturally move along 
 rather rapidly as the horse could drag the vehicle with more ease (hear, hear). Am 
 I not right in saying that this man Foster stands convicted of gross falsehood, 
 and being so convicted how can we have the least confidence in him afterwards ? 
 The road is not hilly ; it is a gentle declivity. That is the way the Ue about his 
 visiting several cottages at Deri-ynane Beg fails him. He had but one leg to stand 
 upon, and that leg now falls from under him : — " We came out of Denahy's to 
 get into the carriage ; outside I saw Denis Sullivan (Cossure), of Ightercore ; I 
 called him over ; I begged Mr. Russell to attend to his answers to the questions I 
 should put. I asked — ' "Where do you live ? ' ' At Ightercore.' ' Whose tenant are 
 you?' ' The Liberator's.' ' Is that Mr. Hartop's property?' 'Yes.' ' What lease has 
 the Liberator ?' ' His own life — long life to him.' ' Have your family any and what 
 lease ? ' ' We have — the same as the Liberator has.' ' What rent do you pay ?' 'I 
 pay 16^. 12s. Ad. yearly ; my brothers' families pay the same.' ' Is that the rent in 
 your lease?' 'No; the Liberator reduced the rent for us.' ' Though you have the 
 same tenure as hiiuself ?' ' Yes.' — [Not one word of this is mentioned by Russell. 
 He avails himself of every opportunity of suggesting falsehood, and studiously 
 avoids stating the truth.] ' Have you a good house, and are you allowed for it ?' 'I 
 have a fine house, finished last year, and you are allowing me for it ; you began this 
 gale.' Mr. Russell then said that he saw the houses on that farm, and that they 
 were very good. [Not one word of this does Russell report. ]t I asked — ' Were 
 your brothers' families allowed for houses?' 'They were.' ' Was there a road 
 
 * In precisely the same manner both Mr. Russell and myself got out of our 
 carriage and walked down towards Derrynane, as wc wont there. The stupid 
 driver drove on for two miles without us — in fact out of sight ; and we had to 
 run till out of breath to overtake him. We might liavc visited all Derrynane 
 Beg and have entered every house — in fact we might have got knocked on the 
 head and the driver would have known nothing of it — for lie was driving away 
 at a jog trot up a hill, when by dint of running and sliouting we got him 
 stopped and came up to him. 
 
 t Mr. Russell went to state what he saw, and not to repeat as fact whatever 
 Mr. Maurice O'Connell might choose to tell him. 
 
APPENDIX XIII. - 685 
 
 made for you, and who paid for it ?' ' There was, at great expense, and the Libera- 
 tor paid for it. Have you and your co-partners been treated in regard to allow- 
 ances, as if the farm was fee-simple ? ' ' We have ; God bless the master for it — we 
 could not expect so much even if it were his estate.' ' Is that the way he deals by 
 his tenants generally ?' 'It is.' " 
 
 I have certainly to explain why it is that I, having but a temporary interest in 
 this portion of my property, make my tenants the same allowances as I do on my 
 fee-simple estate. I may be the cause of the evil, if evil it be, but I am not of 
 harshness. It is not the fault of the occupying tenant that I am not the proprie- 
 tor in fee. That is an accidental circumstance. The tenantry should not be pun- 
 ished for that accident, and therefore I make them the allowances as I do on my 
 fee-simple estate, partly for the sake of the tenantry, and partly for the sake of 
 the reversionary interest. I will not be afraid to appear before my God to account 
 for that conduct. I am happy to be in a condition to show that I deal vrith 
 the property of others precisely as I do with my own. " I then saw James Fen- 
 naghty of Baslien, and called him over. I asked him where he lived ? He said 
 Baslien. 'Whose tenant are you?' 'Mr. Butler's.' 'Whosetenantwereyoubefore?' 
 'I was the Liberator's tenant and his uncle's before him, until the lease of Inchies 
 and Barlicon run out. ' 'How long were your family living under ours ? ' 'I am the 
 fifth generation of my family who were tenants of the O'Connell's'.* ' Were the 
 other tenants of that land long living under our family ?' ' They were, and most of 
 them as long as my family was.' ' Have j'ou a good house, were you allowed for it, 
 and by whom ?' ' I have, I was allowed for it by the Liberator.' ' Did he allow 
 for roads, &c., as much as if that were his estate?' 'He did.' 'Was he ever repaid?' 
 ' No, and I don't know he ever wiU.' Mr. Russell then asked — 'Are you a tenant of 
 Mr. O'Connell's now ?' ' No, but Mr. Maurice gave me a farm for my son last 
 year on the estate as being the son of an old follower.' ' "VMiere do you live ?' ' On 
 Mr. Butler's land.' We then got into my carriage and drove on. — Fennaghty 
 followed us. I asked Russell to make a note of these conversations ; he said he 
 would not forget them" (but he has omitted noting one of them in his letter). 
 " When we came to James Sullivan's (Martin's) house at Inchies, I stopped the 
 carriage, and said, this is the first house on the farm, of which Mr. Foster spoke 
 as having being held under Butler — let us speak to this man. I called out James 
 Martin. I asked him the same questions I asked Fennaghty ; he made the same 
 replies. I further asked him if the tenants on the farm were not in arrear when 
 the Liberator got possession at his uncle's death ? Answer — ' Yes ; they all owed 
 rent, and some a year's, some up to two years', except James Fennaghty and myself, 
 and the arrears were forgiven by the Liberator.' 'Were you allowed anything ?' 
 * Yes ; he gave us a year's rent each as being good tenants ; we had paid up our 
 rent, and never asked or expected anything, but he made us a present of a year's rent 
 out of his own pocket.' ' Were you allowed for the house you live in besides ? ' ' Yes ; 
 I got a year's rent, and I 'd have got more if I wished it.' ' How long were your 
 family living under ours ? ' ' I am either the sixth or seventh generation. ' f 'Did you 
 make money imder the Liberator ? * 'I made money under both his uncle and him ; 
 
 * As to this, see the next following Appendix, which contains a history of Mr. 
 O'Connell's illustrious pedigree. 
 t See last note. 
 
686 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 I made 100/. while I was his tenant, and I have it safe.' — Fennaghty said also that 
 he had made money in the same time. Foster asked James Martin, ' how many 
 cows have you .'' ' I have the grass of six cows' (there is not one word of that in 
 Russell's report) — ' but it keeps eight and a horse well — but I have divided with 
 my son.' Foster — ' MTiose house is that (pointing to a new house opposite to Sul- 
 livan Martin's) ." * My son's widow built it.' ' How long since?' ' It is not quite 
 finished.' 'Is it built in Mr. Butler's time ?' 'Yes.' ' Is it not abetter house than 
 yours ?' ' It's a newer house, but mine is far better.' 'Why, the new house is higher ?' 
 *No, it is not, and it 's not so roomy.' Fennaghty here said that the old house was 
 much better. I proposed that they should examine both, and Russell said the old 
 house was evidently larger and as high as the other, and asked Martin if he had 
 good furniture ; he said he had, and to come in and see. They declined, and we 
 drove on to Alderagh. They asked whose farm that was ? I said my father's, 
 held under Mr. Crump Bland, the lease his own life. Foster, seeing the old houses 
 of Alderhagh close to the road, proposed to examine. I said they were some of 
 the worst houses on the land, being old, but to examine them by all means. We 
 got down ; they went into the house of Edward Swiney, a tenant ; asked his rent, 
 he told them 21. \%s. Id. a gale ; how many cows had he } Three. They exam- 
 ined his furniture ; the house is long and pretty good ; he said he had plenty of 
 potatoes ; lived principally on potatoes and fish, and was comfortable. They 
 then went into the house of a squatter named Reardon ; Foster gave her a shilling 
 to speak English. She told them her husband was a labourer ; had no cow ; never 
 jjaid rent for that house, had no land, and would get score ground for working 
 for the neighbours ; had been told that she was to pay a shilling a year for the 
 house in future, but had never been asked for it ; was living there these many 
 years. They went into another cabin which was wretched enough. Foster was in 
 great glee and very witty upon a cracked iron pot (calling it tlie hiler) but was 
 quite silenced when the poor woman who was in the house said that she was a 
 travelling beggar, and that one of the neighbours gave her the use of the house as 
 she had a sick child, until it recovered ; that the pot was given her by a neigh- 
 bour, and she was supported by their charity. They then went into Humphrey 
 Donnelly's house ; a small old house. I did not go in there as the place was 
 crowded ; but understood the people said they had nothing to complain of ; that 
 they might have a better house if they were industrious ; then into James SuUivan 
 Leigh's house — a large house, but neglected — His answers were, that he was com- 
 fortable. I asked him had he not being allowed for his house ? he said he had — 
 a gale's rent {21. 3«. \Qd). I find on referring to the book, that I allowed him 10s. 
 2d. last September in addition. They then went to examine some houses at tho 
 other side of the road, when Fennaghty came up and said they were on Butler's 
 land, and pointed out the boundary. We then drove on. I pointed out to them 
 the new houses of Ardarah, asked would they examine them .' Russell said it 
 would be too late, and that he would make a note that they were good and com- 
 fortable houses. I remarked that they had examined the worst houses on the farm, 
 and he said he should state that. I pointed out the houses of Lober, along the old 
 road, and said — ' there are the tenants' houses of this farm.' Russell said he saw 
 they were good.'' [I beg of the Association to recollect that Russell has not kept 
 his word in any one of those respects.] " I showed him Mark Duggan's new house, 
 which he remarked as an excellent one." [It is slated, and two stories high.] " I 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 687 
 
 told him what I have stated in my letter to The Times about the lots at Lober, and 
 said that the houses along the new road all belonged to lot-holders. They exam- 
 ined three of these houses, M'Carthy's, Connor's, and Feahon's ; the two former 
 were not very good, th^latter a good house. I pointed out the bounds of each lot 
 to them, and said that Feahon had bought out the former holder of his lot. They 
 asked one of the people in the house what Feahon gave for it ? He said^ye in- 
 calf cows. I remarked that Feahon told me he only gave three, and that the value 
 of an in-calf cow at the time was about sue pounds. Mr. Russell remarked — why 
 this is tenant right. * Yes,' said I, ' and you will observe that this man is only a lot- 
 holder.^ Mahony (the pound keeper) was present. I said, here is another lot- 
 holder. Mahony said he was — that he had a lot of his own, and had bought two 
 others from the former holders, that he paid 21. 16*. for the three ; that he had 
 bought another, but that I had decided that the daughter of the seller and her hus- 
 band had a better right to it, as he had so much land before, and that I had settled 
 that they were to repay him the purchase-money by instalments, which they were 
 doing ; I think Mr. RusseU made notes of aU these matters. [If he did he has 
 avoided publishing them.] AVe then went on to Farineerah, which Foster was 
 constantly enquiring for ; we got out of the carriage and went to some of the 
 houses ; Foster pointed to the first, a very poor-looking house ; we went in ; the 
 owner was an old man, named Donoghue ; he said he got the house and garden 
 rent-free for his life, from the the Liberator (long life to him) — that he had pota- 
 toes enough, and got help from his daughters, who were all comfortably married ; 
 that when he fortuned them off he asked for and got his cabin ; they then went to 
 another house, a labourer of Martin Connell's ; they did not stop there, but went 
 on to old Paddy SuUivan and his son's holding ; the son showed them his house ; 
 said he had plenty of everything, the grass of two cows, plenty of potatoes and fish, 
 and a good ' camp bed,' &c. RusseU asked hadhe a feather bed ? ' No,' said he, 
 ' good straw bed, plenty of clean bed-clothes.' Russell examined the bed. Martin 
 Connell met us here and pointed out his own house ; they said it seemed com- 
 fortable, that they need not examine it ; they asked his rent, he said he had the 
 grass of six cows, but that it reared eight — that he only paid eleven pounds — that 
 his house was good, but that he would soon have a slate house, as his master al- 
 lowed lime, slate, and timber, to whoever wished for a slate house. Foster said, 
 ' you are the principal tenant here?' 'No,' said he, ' I have only a quarter of the 
 land, Gallivan's, WTiite's and M'Carthy's have the rest.' We went then to Darby 
 Gallivan, the carpenter's holding ; they went into his father's house and asked 
 several questions ; there were tailors at work ; Foster attempted to be witty on 
 them as they had one of the doors off the hinges and laid down near the door-way 
 for a shopboard ; I think it was Russell remarked that it was the most convenient 
 one they could have, as they had more light than they would have on a higher 
 board. I said that it was invariably the custom when tailors were at work for 
 the people to take down the door, as they had thus better light and shelter. — 
 Darby Gallivan then took them to see his new house, an excellent slated house with 
 an upper story ; I asked him why he had not it finished, he said the weather pre- 
 vented his finishing it ; it was covered in and lofted ; they asked how much he 
 paid for it ; he replied that all he had to do was to build the walls, and that his 
 master gave him lime, slate, and timber. How much .' asked they. * Two thousand 
 
688 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 sis hundred of slate, and three ton of timber, ' said he, ' and I don't know how much 
 lime, for I drew what I wanted from Derrynane, but I got as much as I wanted 
 of each, and if I wanted more I could get it.' * Who paid the tradesmen ?' asked 
 they. ' The man is a carpenter himself,' said I ; ' the slates were sent from Derry- 
 nane.* They asked was the house between him and his father ? ' no', said he, ' if my 
 father wants a new house he would get it the same way I did.' 
 
 We then came on towards Derrynane Beg. Foster once or twice pointed out 
 houses as we came along through Loher and Arderagh that looked old and not 
 very good. I always offered to go down and show them, but Russell said that 
 the houses looked good but weather beaten, and that he should note that they 
 appeared comfortable. He (Russell) asked me if there was a national school at 
 WatervUle ? I said no, that there was at Spountrane, on the Marquis's property. 
 ' Was there one at Derrynane Parish ?' ' No, but there was a free school founded 
 by our family, and that the master's salary was paid by us.' ' Did we intend put- 
 ting it under the national board ?' I said, ' I was in favour of so doing, but that 
 there were difficulties in the way — that the money was left by my grand-uncle 
 Count O'Connell, and by my grand-uncle at Derrynane, to found the school; 
 and that there were some legal difficulties as I understood, as the board did 
 require the absolute control to be given to them — that my father keeps the 
 school in repair and paid the greater part of the master's salaiy ; that there was 
 also a difficulty as regarded the master who was a long time in office, and a very 
 worthy and competent person, as the board did require that a master of their train- 
 ing should be put in and the present master should go up to Dublin to be trained, 
 and then perhaps would not get back his school, which would be an injury to him, 
 as he wovild not be likely to be so comfortable elsewhere, and we could not do an 
 injustice to an old and faithful servant ; but if there was a vacancy that I thought 
 we should put it under the board ; that the school was well attended and no com- 
 plaints of the master ; that Mr. Hartop was about building a school on his 
 property, but that I understood he had also an objection to giving up the control 
 to the board. Russell asked ' where was the free school ." ' Near the chapel, you will 
 pass it on your way to Kenmare.' ' On whose land ?' * On Ballycomhian, a farm 
 of my father's, held under Mr. Hartop.' ' Is not this parish very populous ? 
 ' Not particularly so ; you see most of the population, as they build near the roads ; 
 but the census of 1841 gives, I think, 600 houses to this parish, which reaches 
 from beyond the White Strand to Waterville Bridge, over twelve or fifteen Irish 
 miles in leno-th, by an average breadth of about six, and that does not show a very 
 great population ; it is de7i.se, as they live in clusters, but not very great.' Fos- 
 ter asked if the peojjle grew any turnips or mangle wurzel .' I said no — that 
 they thought the potatoe a more profitable crop, as they were skilful in the 
 managing thereof and knew little of the others ; that I offered them seed, and 
 would be glad to instruct them, but that they did not like leaving their old ways, 
 and it would take time to effect any changes, and there was no use in trying to force 
 anything upon them." Notwithstanding Foster's statement that no green crops 
 of any kind are grown or cultivated at Derrynane, there is as large a crop of 
 mangle wurzel and turnips on the Derrynane demesne as on any demesne at 
 Munster. ' Do they drain well ?' ' Indeed they do,' said I, ' after their own 
 fashion.'* I remarked to them, when leaving Gallivan's house, that that was the 
 
 * That is, at the wliiskcy bottle. 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 689 
 
 first built under my direction, as I was not long in charge of the property. We 
 drove on to Derrynane Beg ; on the way through Cahir-na-Geehy, Russell remarked 
 a new house near the road ; I told him that the other houses of that farm were 
 similar, as the houses were rebuilt within the last three years, and asked, would 
 he like to see them ; he said he should make a note of the houses being good. 
 As we passed Divine's I said that is my steward's house. They asked his name ; 
 I told them, and that he was a Tralee man. Foster kept constantly saying — 
 there's ' Derrynane Beg ! ' ' No,' said I ; ' I will point you the boundary as soon as 
 we come to it, but you are a long way yet from Derrynane Beg.' He evidently 
 did not know where he was, and seemed afraid of being taken too far. I pointed 
 to the boundary when we came to it, and the first houses as we approached them. 
 It was then getting dark ; we got out at the end of a bohreen leading down to 
 Derrynane Beg ; I said the best houses are along the new road as they are 
 new houses and most of the others a long time built. Russell said he would note 
 that. The first house we came to was Batt Brennan's ; I said that is a tenant's 
 house — we went in — Old Brennan and his wife were within ; it was milking time, 
 and there were four good cows in the house. They asked Brennan their usual 
 questions ; examined his bed and furniture ; RusseU said this man is very com- 
 fortable.' ' Yes,' said I, * he is an industrious man — but why have you the cows 
 here, Brennan ? Have you an out-house ?' ' I have,' said he, ' but it is not large 
 enough.' When we came out Paddy Sullivan (Puch), who was with us as in- 
 terpreter, said the next house beyond is Mick the tailor's. ' Is it as good as this,' 
 asked Russell. ' Much better,' said Paddy. ' Well,' said Russell, ' I '11 make a note 
 of it.' ' You wont see the best houses this way,' said Paddy, ' as the tenants have their 
 houses on their holdings ; and you '11 only see the lot-holders here, and one or two 
 old tenants' houses. ' I '11 note that, 'said Russell. Foster tried to get into one or 
 two cow-houses and out-houses as we came down ; but was told what they were 
 and desisted. There is a small old house belonging to John Sheehan. ' Let us 
 examine this house, there is a light in it,' said Foster. We went in — when they 
 went in the first thing they saw was a large tub of meat, just salted. ' What 's 
 this ?' said Russell. 'iMy pig,' said Sheehan. ' What are you going to do with it ?' 
 ' To eat it to be sure,' was the answer. ' Have you any more .'' ' Two, but I sold 
 them.' ' What land have you ?' ' The grass of a cow.' ' Is this the cow,' touch- 
 ing a very fine cow which was being milked. ' It is.' ' What rent do you pay ?' 
 ' 21. 2s. 6d., but seldom pay anything, for I have a son every day in the work, 
 and the master has to pay me.' They made some remarks on the house. Sheehan 
 said he thought it good enough. That he might have a better if he liked. (Sul- 
 livan was interpreting, as Sheehan speaks no English). Sheehan then said to me 
 that his was a fine cow, but he thought her too large, and that he would exchange 
 her with me for a light, young cow — I said, that he had time enough for that, that I 
 supposed I should have to give him boot, and that that should be settled first. They 
 then went into the house of a lot-holder, named Kelly, and asked his wife where 
 he was .' She said at work at the ' Big house.' ' What rent do you pay .'' ' No 
 rent, but we are well paid — for my husband is employed ' every day' in the year.' 
 They left that at once. When they came out I was speaking to old Daniel Sul- 
 livan. They heard me call him ' Uncle Dan,' a nick-name givea him by the 
 people, and asked who he was ? He said an old tenant." Let me here remark 
 
 y Y 
 
690 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 that Foster has asserted my father kept a huxter shop in Cahiiciveen. Now, my 
 poor father died in 1 808, thirty-six years ago. It is time that he should be left 
 to rest in his grave. I scorn to defend him from the accusations made by Foster 
 — a purer, a better, a more affectionate or charitable spirit was never embodied 
 in tlie human frame. He is now dead. Foster makes him a huxter in Cahir- 
 civeen. He died in 1 808. Now, the commencement of the building of Cahir- 
 civeen was in 1818, ten years subsequent to the death of my father. See what a 
 truth-telling gentleman we have to deal with.* " I asked him was his house far 
 off? (it was by this time very dark) — he said close by, and asked would the 
 gentlemen like to see it ? They asked was it a good one ? It is, said he, and a 
 Tery good one. Russell said it was getting too late, and that he would make a 
 note of it. Foster turned into Tim Shea's house ; they were told he was a lot- 
 holder J his wife said they paid no rent ; that he was always in the work — in 
 charge of a draught bullock and cart, and earning good wages. We then came 
 down the road, and on to the Abbey. As we went along, I asked Russell if they 
 had examined any other properties besides my father's ; he said they had been 
 on the Marquis's, on Spotteswood's, and Mr. Fitzgerald's. — ' Did you see Cnimpe 
 Bland's ?' ' Indeed we did,' said he, ' and such a sight I hope never to see again,' 
 or something to that effect. I then said there is one thing to be said of my 
 father, which I believe no other landlod in Ireland can say, namely — that since 
 he got possession of his paternal property, in the year 1809, to the present day, 
 there has not been a single instance of the sale of a distress for rent. * Have no 
 cattle been distrained ?' asked he. ' Yes,' said I, ' but no sale.' The practice in the 
 South of Ireland is to use the ' pound,' as a species of ' comi)ulsory' process. 
 You will find it stated in Wiggins' Monster Misery of Ireland. It has grown so 
 much into a habit that tenants scarcely believe a landlord or agent is in earnest, 
 unless their cattle are driven. It is an old, almost universal, and vicious prac- 
 tice, which I have set my face against, and I hope to do away with altogether. 
 It strikes me as illegal, said he. Why simply of itself it would be — but there are 
 generally arrears due, which give the right to distrain, and it is used as I tell 
 you. I referred him to Wiggins' book for details of the practice, and then said 
 that Twiss's story was a falsehood — that he alleged he was staying at Butler's at 
 the time, and that Butler was ready to prove that there was no such distress 
 at any time as that Twiss spoke of — that cattle certainly had been sometimes 
 pounded on my father's property, as elsewhere ; but that they were never sold.f 
 I repeated it was a bad practice, and that I discouraged it, and hoped to do away 
 ■with it. When we arrived at the Abbey, Foster called for his car — the man 
 was feeding his horses, and I said I would not let Mr. Russell go until I gave 
 him some documents, and I asked them in; Russell came in at once; Foster 
 hesitated, but came in at last ; I showed them into the parlour, ordered wine and 
 lunch ; Russell took some wine, and sat down to lunch ; Foster declined any 
 refreshment ; I gave Russell a statement of the number of lot-holders (copy of 
 
 * See the next following Appendix. No. 14. 
 
 t Mr. Twiss, of Cork, has written a letter addressed to the editor of Tlie 
 Times, which has been published in The Cork Constitution newspaper regard- 
 ing this statement, proving its falsehood. The letter will be found, ;:>o*^, p. 693. 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 691 
 
 that I sent my father), a statement of his college and fee-simple income, and 
 that from leases for ever, a statement of the sums expended on agricultural labour 
 at Derrynane, between the 1st November, 1844, and 1st November, 1845, and 
 particularly of the portion paid to the tenants and lot-holders at Derrynane 
 Beg.* He asked how many men are employed ? I said, on an average, fifty at 
 constant labour; that is, said he, say for 300 days in the year ; for every work- 
 ing day, said I ; there are broken days and days on which the weather prevents 
 •work. There are also about twenty women and boys constantly employed. They 
 left this about six p.m., for Sneem, on their way to Killarney. Russell appeared 
 pleased with the favourable appearances of what he saw. Foster was as sulky 
 as ' a bear with a sore head,' and is as thorough a specimen of a Cockney as ever 
 clipped the ' Queen's English.'f He appeared very anxious to get away from 
 this. Russell inclined to remain so as to get as much information as possible. 
 As we came out, we met Father Patrick O'Connell, the parish priest. I intro- 
 duced Russell to him, and he was about entering into conversation, when Foster 
 hurried him into the car, and Russell had only time to say, ' I am sorry, sir, our 
 interview is so short.' I omitted above to mention that at Touhmeragh something 
 was said about fishing. I called one of the AVhites, who are good fishermen, and 
 asked him how many boats are there belonging to this farm and Coonacloucone ; 
 he said two, that sixteen men were employed on each. ' What was the cost ?' ' The 
 two boats cost 14Z. ;' he was then calculating the price of the nets. I said that the 
 
 * Mr. O'Counell made use of that statement in a previous speech, in Concilia- 
 tion Hall, by reading his son's letter containing it. It stated that his " tenants" 
 at Derrynane Beg "are comfortable, because they pay their rents in labour at 
 Derrynane, and not in money.'' So does every farmer's wretched labourer in 
 Ireland "pay his rent in labour," and never sees the colour of money, but exists 
 on the potato patch, for which he labours. This is precisely the manner in which 
 I have said his tenants live. He is candid by mistake. He says on the authority of 
 that letter — " I find that 40Z. actual wages for labour were paid to them over 
 and above the amount credited in their rents." By the addenda to the census 
 of Ireland for 1841, it appears that there are in this parish of Derrynane 124 
 inhabited houses and two building ; this is the parish in dispute, of which he is 
 the landlord or middleman. By the ordinary rules of arithmetic, 401. divided 
 amongst 124 tenants would be about 6s. 6d. a year each, or about thi-ee half- 
 pence a week a family ! Happy tenantry to be so well paid ! How luxuriously 
 his labourers must live on three halfpence a iveek over and above the jrroduce of 
 their potato patch, for lohich they give their labour as rent! Mr. O'Connell 
 only wants " rope enough," and he will himself prove all I have said about his 
 wretched tenantry. 
 
 t This paragraph has greatly amused both myself and friends. I do not know 
 that a cockney is not as good a man as any other county man. But it does so 
 happen that I was born in Yorkshire, educated in Yorkshire, and did not leave 
 Yorkshire till I was twenty-one years of age ; and though I have had a resi- 
 dence in London seven years, I have lived a great part of each year out of it. 
 Mr. Maurice O'Connell is unfortunate. His perceptive powers and estima- 
 tion of character are as valueless as his memory is treacherous. 
 
 Y Y 2 
 
692 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 ost w as generally calculated at over 507. for the whole appartus, nets, boats, rope 
 &c. ' Do you take much fish V said Russell ; ' we generally do, but the fishing has 
 been bad these two years back. Salt it and sell some, and eat the rest.' ' Do you 
 have much of it?' 'Plenty generally.' 'The people everywhere said they were com- 
 fortable, had plenty to eat and drink, and if they wanted anything their master 
 would give it to them. The above is the substance of what took place. I may 
 have omitted some trivial matters, but the ' bone and sinew' is preserved. 
 Maurice O'Connell. Derrynane Abbey, December 20th, 1845." 
 
 I have read the entire of this letter (hear). Every word of it was written long 
 before Manrice could have received The Times report, for it was written the very 
 day that the commissioner's letter appeared in The Times in London — so that so 
 far from its being a statement to meet a case, Maurice seemed to have a good 
 opinion of Russell at the time, and Russell appeared to be very well satisfied with 
 everything he had seen (hear, hear). I have now done with them for the pre- 
 sent, and there is not a single charge against me in their report which I shall 
 not be ready to meet seriatim. I throw myself not on the bitter enmity of The 
 levies, but on the good sense and good feeling of the people of Ireland (cheers). 
 I heartily rejoice at the generous manner in which my political enemies have 
 behaved towards me on this occasion. It has made me a grateful, and I trust, 
 a better man. I never shall allow the least exasperation to exist in my mind 
 with respect to any course that may be hereafter taken by my political oppo- 
 nents, and the generous manner in which they have behaved towards me during 
 this controversy, shows how much disposed we are to agree with each other if 
 •we are only let alone (cheers). I call on the people of Ireland to see the gene- 
 rosity, and candour, and justice, which the Orange and Conservative party have 
 manifested towards me. Let it go through the country — let every peasant repeat 
 it to his neighbour, that when the Saxon vilified and calumniated me, the Orange 
 and Conservative press of Ireland stood by me and vindicated my character, as 
 a landlord, although they disliked me as a politician (hear, hear, and cheers^. 
 I stand here the first person who introduced improvements at the landlord's 
 expense, in a great district of this country (hear, hear). I stand here the person 
 who was principally instrumental in changing the order of things in that district 
 to such a state as this — that whereas there were but two cars in the entire barony 
 when I commenced my improvements, there are now 1200 to 1500 cars in it. 
 (hear, hear). I stand here the person who first introduced the system of land- 
 lords paying for the improvements of houses. I began that practice myself, 
 and I continue it at present (cheers). I stand here also the refuge — I am not 
 flattering myself too much when I say so — of the poor and distressed, because 
 when men are driven by other landlords from their property they find a refuge 
 on mine, whenever I can give it to them at the time (hear, hear). I have upwards 
 of 600 persons paying me a nominal rent, who were ejected by their former 
 landlords, and who are now in comparative comfort — all of them having food 
 and shelter. I stand here the protector of those 600 persons, and for this I am 
 subjected to the calumnies of every man who can traduce me, because he may 
 have the use of the public press for that purpose (hear, hear, hear). I stand 
 here the proud advocate of the poor and afflicted. I will say that I stand here 
 the protector of the poor — the refuge of the poor— the support of those who 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 693 
 
 would have perished but for my timely aid, and standing here in this position, I 
 leave ray character to my country and my conduct to my God (tremendous 
 cheers). I have nothing more to say, I was going to fasten tlie lie more closely 
 upon Foster as to what he has said about Derrynane Beg, but I care not for him ; 
 he is self-convicted, and if he cannot feel it, and if his indorser cannot feel it, 
 what is the use of human language as applied to them ? Words have no point 
 for those whose feelings are so blunted as not to see the infamy of supporting a 
 man convicted by his own confession of having propagated a deliberate false- 
 hood (hear, hear). But I thank those who stood by me. I thank my friend, 
 Mr. Butler, though we differ widely in politics, and alas! too widely in religion. 
 I thank my revered pastor who came from a distance to defend me (hear, hear). 
 What kind of warfare is this which is now taking place between the English 
 newspapers and the people of Ireland? An investigation into the transaction* 
 of private life, an inquiry into the management of private property, an investiga- 
 tion into the private dealings between landlord and tenant (hear, hear). I do 
 not complain of this investigation. I invite them to inquire, and I am able to 
 stand the brunt of it. Who ever heard of me turning out a tenant, (loud cries 
 of no one)?* No, I never ejected my tenants, but if I were convicted of that 
 cruelty — if I were convicted of having driven out my tenantry to perish in the 
 fields I would have the support of the English press, as those landlords had who 
 were in the habit of evicting their tenantry ; but I felt the duty which property 
 has imposed on me — I trust that I have discharged it properly — I know that I 
 have done so with the conscientious belief that I was acting for the benefit of 
 my tenantry, and consoling myself with that reflection, I sit down, not triumph- 
 ing over others, but satisfied that in what I have done I have acted for the best. 
 
 The Liberator resumed his seat amid the most enthusiastic demonstrations of 
 applause. 
 
 * See following Letter, as to this. 
 
 MR. O'CONNELL'S TREATMENT OF HIS TENANTRY. 
 
 The following letter has been addressed to the Editor of T/te Tirnes^ 
 by Mr. Geo. Twiss of Cork, and was publislied in the Cork Consti^ 
 tution of Jan. 20th. 
 
 To the Editor of The Times. 
 
 No. 10, Belgrave Place, Cork, Jan. 13, 1846. 
 Sir, — As the eldest son of Mr. Twiss, whose name has been 
 again brought forward by tlie Messrs. O'Connell, and who is still 
 labouring under the eflfects of very serious illness, and which for a 
 time endangered his life, I am compelled, however unpleasant it is to 
 me, to appear before the public on behalf of a parent, now in his 
 seventieth year, who in the year 1802 filled the office of High Sheriff 
 
694 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 for Kerry, his native county, and from that time to the period in which 
 he 'ceased to reside there, in 1821, performed the relative duties of 
 magistrate and grand juror. Since then he has resided in the coun- 
 ties of Tipperary and Cork, and sustained during his whole life the 
 character of a gentleman universally esteemed and respected ; nor 
 was there ever the least attempt to impugn his character until Mr. 
 O'Connell and his son Mr. Maurice O'Connell, in their usual style, 
 charged him with beingacalumniator and conspirator, hoping thereby 
 to divert the public attention from the expose by your Commissioner 
 of the wretched state of his (Mr. O'C.'s) tenantry. On my return 
 from Dublin, where I had been detained some time by business, I 
 proceeded on Thursday last to Watervllle, Mr. Butler's residence (a 
 distance of over one hundred miles from this) to require from him 
 what was his object in introducing my father's name in the following- 
 parenthesis in his letter to Mr. O'Connell ("brother-in-law to Robert 
 Twiss") as it appeared to the public by this remark that he thereby 
 implied it as a reflection on Mr. Twiss, there being no necessity for it 
 to explain who Mr. Atkins was, he being, as Mr. M. O'Connell 
 states, " a sojourner in the country of four years' standing," and was 
 well known to the O'Connells. Mr. Butler at once replied, in the 
 presence of his son, that he had done so inadvertently, without due 
 <!onsideration, and that now, seeing the view it was taken in, he was 
 very sorry for having written it, as he had no such meaning as 
 that attributed, nor would he do anything to injure Robert Twiss. 
 While conversing on the subject he admitted having had a personal 
 interview with Mr. M. O'Connell, and a long letter from Mr. 
 O'Connell before he wrote his letter, from which I conclude it was 
 under their direction my father's name was introduced. I then 
 showed Mr. Butler the following passage in Mr. M. O'Connell's 
 letter — " That it was a pure calumny, can be proved by the evidence 
 of Mr. Butler, at whose house Twiss asserted he was staying at the 
 time," and asked Mr. Butler was that a fact. He at once denied it, 
 and said he never authorized Mr. O'Connell or any otlier person to 
 make such a statement, nor could Mr. M. O'Connell have any grounds 
 for doing so, except from a letter written by Mr. Butler to Mr. 
 Twiss, 29th June, 1841, in reply to two letters of my father's in 
 ■which he strongly urged Mr. B., as a matter of common justice, to 
 corroborate his statement relative to the distress by O'Connell, in 
 ■which reply Mr. Butler pleads " he had no recollection of the cir- 
 cumstance alluded to," Even this reply was not received until after 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 695 
 
 He nad visited Dublin, and communicated with Mr. O'Connell, but 
 the following letters will set the matter at rest, as it appears by them 
 he was not so cautious in a couversation he had with Mr, Twiss's 
 brother on the subject : — 
 
 " Tralee, December 29, 1845. 
 
 " Mt dear James, — Having seen a letter of yours in the Tralee 
 Chronicle of Saturday last to INIr. O'Connell — as you are proverbial for 
 having a very strong memory, I have no doubt but you recollect what I 
 now state to have occurred in the Court-house here during an assizes, 
 when you told me you had two letters from my brother, Robert Twiss, 
 who was annoyed mth you for not verifying a statement made by the 
 present Judge Jackson in the House of Commons, when he was member, 
 in which he mentioned the name of Mr. O'Connell, and gave my brother 
 as his author. You said you could not do so, living so near Derrynane, 
 and the intimacy which always existed between you and every member of 
 the O'Connell family. I said, under the circumstances you mentioned, he 
 ought not to be displeased. You told me that what my brother stated was 
 true, and it was not the first time it occurred to your knowledge. If 
 your letter had not appeared, I should not make this communication, 
 " I remain, dear James, yours faithfully, 
 
 " To James Butler, Esq." " Francis Twiss." 
 
 " Tralee, January 6th, 1846. 
 " Dear James, — I did hope I should have got an answer to my first 
 letter from you, in which I have been disappointed, and trust this will be 
 more fortimate, and that I will receive one to it, particularly as both may 
 be answered in one. Should you not do so, I think it riglit to inform 
 you I shall send copies of both to Robert Twiss to do as he pleases, and 
 have no doubt on my mind but he will pubUsh them, to vindicate himself 
 from the vde calumnies ISIr. O'C. has so repeatedly heaped upon him. 
 " I remain, dear James, yours faithfully, 
 
 " Francis Twiss." 
 " To James Butler, Esq., Waterville." 
 
 Mr. Butler not replying to those letters, especially after the notice 
 oiven him, clearly shows he cannot deny Mr. F. Twiss's statement. 
 
 At the close of my interview with Mr, Butler he stated that, being 
 on intimate terms with my father for over fifty years, and from what 
 he knew of him, he was certain he was not capable of intentionally 
 misstating 7i.\\yi\\\v\g to tlie injury of an individual, and that he (Butler) 
 had so expressed himself to the priest and a number of persons he 
 spoke to on the subject. Tliis, coming from a man circumstanced as 
 
696 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 Mr. Butler is with Mr. O'Connell, and, as I understand, under the 
 strongest personal obligations to him, will exculpate my father from 
 the Messrs. O'Connell's charge of Calumniator; and the fact that he 
 or any member of his immediate family never had, directly or in- 
 directly, any communication with Mr. Foster, must free him from 
 that of Conspirator. Although the statement made by Judge Jack- 
 son in the House of Commons on my father's authority must have 
 luade Mr. O'Connell more cautious in his dealings with his tenantry, 
 still the following facts will substantially/ corroborate that statement, 
 and render Mr. O'C.'s claim to the character of exemplary landlord 
 more than questionable. 
 
 The Rev. Edward Flaherty, Roman Catholic clergyman, held tlie 
 farm of Middle Killoe from Mr. O'Connell, and at his death left it to 
 his relative, Denis Dooling, to whom Mr. O'Connell executed a lease 
 for his (Dooling's) life, dated Sept. 7th, 1840. Dooling died in a few 
 months after, in July, 1841, and left the farm to his son, Edward 
 Dooling, who held it undisturbed until March, 1843, never supposing 
 that any landlord, much less the boasted advocate oijixity of tenure 
 and tenants' right, would take advantage of such a casualty as so 
 sudden and unexpected a termination of a tenure, one life being always 
 considered in this country as equivalent to 21 years, and generally men- 
 tioned in leases one life or 21 years concurrent, but, unfortunately for 
 Dooling, not so in this instance. Dooling is of that class of respect- 
 able yeomen that any landlord would be anxious to have as tenant on 
 his property, being under-agent to, and a large landholder under, 
 Mr. Staughton, and who, except Mr. Butler, had the only crop of 
 turnips I saw in that part of the country, and intending this farm for 
 his eldest son, a young man of about 20 years of age, kept it in his 
 own hands — therefore, this could be no plea of alienation or sublet- 
 ting ; but if report speak truth, Mr. O'Connell, having borrowed a 
 large sum of money from a person named Murphy, wanted to give 
 him this farm as part of the consideration for the loan, and tlierefore 
 required Dooling to give it up without any legal or regular notice. 
 Tliis the man naturally enough refused, and because he dared to dis- 
 obey the order of the Liberator, his cattle were distrained and put 
 into the potmd of Cahirciveen on the Ibth of March, 1843, for the rent 
 due on that day, and it was by the intercession of Mrs. O'Connell, the 
 wife of the then hotel-keeper, the relative of both landlord and 
 tenant, that the stock were liberated until the sale day ; but Dooling, 
 not wishing to leave himself in the po^^ er of this excellent landlord. 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 697 
 
 paid his rent on thejirst of April, 1843, and tliereby freed his cattle 
 from the danger of being sold for rent, due only seven days previously. 
 I send a copy of Dooliug's pass-book for tliat year, taken by myself 
 from the original, in the handwriting of Mr. Primrose, the agent of 
 Mr. O'Connell :— 
 
 
 
 £ 
 
 s. d. 
 
 September 29th, 1842 . 
 
 . a gale due 
 
 . 14 
 
 
 
 25 th March, 1843 . . 
 
 a gale due . 
 
 , 14 
 
 
 
 £28 
 
 January, 1843, by cash 6 
 
 Dr. to Dan Connell 5 
 
 April 1st, 1843 17 
 
 £28 
 J. Pkimrose, April 1st, 1843. 
 
 Dooling, continuing to hold the farm, was served with notice to 
 quit for March 1844, when, finding Mr. O'Connell determined to 
 dispossess him, and exact the pound of flesh, he was obliged to accept 
 the terms Mr. John ^Mahoney of Cork, his butter merchant, who 
 is married to a relative of Mr. O'Connell's, could obtain for him — 
 63/., in lieu of all his improvements and right of a way-going crop ; 
 whereas, if Dooling had got what any other landlord under the cir- 
 cumstances would and ought in justice to have given him, viz., — 
 either his own life or 21 years, he would have got considerably more. 
 He is convinced that^ even this he would not have got, but he 
 threatened to put the entire business in the Conservative papers. 
 Here we have a tenant's stock, and that tenant a most respectable 
 person, who ahvays paid his rent punctually, distrained and im- 
 pounded, by which he was obliged to pay his rent in seven days after 
 it became due. John Sullivan of Tarmans' stock, viz., three cows, an 
 ass, and four sheep, were distrained on the 23rd of May, 1845, for the 
 sum of \l. 185. 4<7. for rent alleged to be due thej^r*^ day of May, 
 1845. He, not owing the rent, although his cattle were distrained, 
 lodged a replevin on the 26th of May, three days after the distress. 
 Here we have another distress made 23 days after Mr. O'Connell 
 alleged the rent was due, but the tenant, denying owing any rent, 
 replevied. Another feature in this case is, that the sum claimed was 
 only ll. IBs. 4d.; yet three cows, an ass, and four sheep \Yere taken. 
 They must of course have been of ^ve times the value of the rent 
 
698 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 claimed, therefore it was oppressive in the extreme. Besides being 
 excessive, it was illegal, as Messrs, O'Connell, being both barristers, 
 must have known. Michael Kelly of Killoe, some time since having 
 been threatened with distress for tlie sum of five shillings due for rent, 
 although he had a load of potatoes ready to take to Cahirciveen to 
 dispose of, and promised to pay when he sold them, was refused this 
 indulgence and obliged to borrow it from a neighbour (my informant), 
 to prevent the distress. Mr. M. O'Connell prides himself on his 
 father not resorting to legal measures for the recovering of his rent. 
 Even this is a statement which they must know is quite devoid of 
 truth, as by the civil bill book for the Quarter Sessions of Cahirci- 
 veen, 31st of March, 18i3, there were no less than six act ions hroug\\t 
 at the suit of Mr. Daniel O'Connell against tenants for rent, and the 
 cases proved by his agent, Mr. Primrose. Again, at the last March 
 Sessions, in the same place, there were two actions brought at his 
 suit against tenants for rent, and the cases proved by John Connell ; 
 and, further, at the Killarney Sessions, 20th June, 1845, there were 
 two actions against tenants, Mr. Primrose, his agent, being witness, 
 and even one of those against Timothy Fogerty, being disputed, was 
 left to the award of Keane Mahony, Esq., who reduced Mr. O'Con- 
 nell's demand nearly one-third ; besides a number of other cases of 
 older dates. So much for the Messrs. O'Connells' denial of oppressive 
 conduct towards their tenants, and resorting to legal tribunals for 
 recovering their rents. Bad as the above cases are, the following is 
 worse, with which I became accidentally acquainted on the day I 
 went to Mr. Butler's, being my only visit to that country, and it 
 will throw additional light on Mr. O'Connell's dealings with his 
 tenantry. John Sullivan (Dreen) and his father, now deceased, held 
 the farm of Cummands South, for over 60 years, up to last May, 
 when he, his wife, eight children and decrepit mother, over 70 years 
 of age, were turned out without a house to go to, and only for the 
 humanity of a respectable tenant on an adjoining property (who, on 
 the circumstance being stated to him, and pitying their destitution, 
 allowed them to occupy part of an empty house), this miserable 
 family of eleven persons would have passed the night near some rock, 
 in the open air, in the month of May last. Sullivan owed no arrear, 
 having paid three shillings, the balance due of his November rent, to 
 John Connell, and offered to pay his May gale, due tliat day, if 
 allowed to keep his farm. This being refused, he was obliged to 
 quit, and all the remuneration he got was the May half-year's rent, 
 
APPENDIX xiir. 699 
 
 three poiinds, for all the trouhle, expense, and labour his father and he 
 had in reclaiming this wild mountain; as, when the father got it 
 from the uncle of Mr. O'Connell, there was not half an acre on it fit 
 for tillage ; he was promised to be paid for building the house on it 
 — even this he has not yet got. My authority for this is Sullivan 
 himself, corroborated by his wife, in the presence of a very respectable 
 person, under circumstances which could leav* no doubt of their 
 veracity, and I saw their wretched old mother, an outcast from the 
 home she lived in for over half a century, availing herself of the 
 shelter which the humanity of a neighbour had aflforded her. In ad- 
 dition to those, I was informed of the summary ejecting from their 
 farms of Daniel M'Glllicuddy (or Gow), James Dennehy, of Upper 
 Tarmans, and others, but supposing those already mentioned sufl&cient, 
 I do not like occupying your columns with them. I did not apply 
 to a single cottier tenant of Mr. O'Connell's, being unwilling, as a 
 greater part hold their farms as tenants-at-will, to involve them Avith 
 their indulgent landlord, on account of the specimen of Sullivan Gow, 
 mentioned by Mr. Foster, who, having told a plain, unvarnished tale, 
 of liow he really was circumstanced, was afterwards obliged to come 
 forward and falsify himself. Satisfied of your anxiety to do justice 
 to Ireland, and vindicate the characters of the caluminated, I will not 
 apologize for the length of this letter. — I remain. Sir, your obliged 
 and obedient servant, George Twiss. 
 
 P.S. — I send you the certified copy, taken from the public records, 
 of John Sullivan's replevin, and of the Civil Bill actions brought by 
 Mr. O'Connell against his tenants. 
 
 George Twiss. 
 
 CERTIFIED COPY. 
 
 [ County of Kerry By the Assistant Barrister at the Sessions for 
 
 to wit. said County. 
 
 John Sullivan of Tarmons The Defendants are hereby required personally 
 in the County of Kerry, to be and appear before the said Assistant Bar- 
 farmer, Plaintiff; rister at Kenmare, on the 17th day of June next, 
 
 *^DeT'nane^Abbe"'Ef • *° ^"'"^'^ *^^ Plaintiff's bill for the sum of 
 
 John ° O'Conndl oV '*^* ^^*' ^^•' sterling, for that the following goods 
 
 Carkan, and Michael ^"^^ chattels, to wit, three Cows, an Ass, and 
 
 Sullivan of Eighter- foiir Sheep, Plaintiff's property, were distrained 
 
 negh, both farmers, on the 23rd day of May, 1845, on the lands of 
 
 and all in the County Tarmons, in the said division, in the said County, 
 
 of Kerry, Defendants, by the Defendants John, and Michael, as Bai- 
 
700 
 
 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 liffs, on behalf of the defendant Maurice O'Connell, Esq., for the sum of 
 1/. 18*. Ad. sterling, alleged to be due to the defendant Maurice O'Con- 
 nell, Esq., aforesaid, for rent of said lands of Tarmons, due and owing on 
 the 1st day of May, 1845 ; and the said John Sullivan doth not owe the 
 said rent or any part thereof, nor is the same or any part thereof due to 
 the said defendant Maurice O'Connell, Esq., and the said plaintiff has 
 sustained damages by reason of such distress having been made. The 
 defendants are therefore required to appear at the time and place above 
 stated, or in default thereof, the said assistant barrister will proceed as to 
 justice shall appertain. 
 
 Dated this 26th day of May, One Thousand Eight Hundred and 
 Forty-five. Signed in behalf of the plaintiflf. 
 
 Copy. 
 
 Morgan Mc Sweeney, Attorney. 
 
 The foregoing is a copy of a replevin process ^lodged in the Peace 
 office, Tralee, County Kerry, which I certify this 9th day of January, 
 
 1846. 
 
 Francis McCarthy, for F. Crosbib, 
 
 Clerk of the Peace, County Kerry. 
 
 CAHIRCIVEEN SESSIONS, 31st March, 1843. 
 
 Daniel O'Connell ^ John Primrose proved case, 
 
 V. ^ Decreed for 21. £is. Od. 
 
 Michael Kirby. juse and occupation. 
 
 Same 
 
 > 
 
 
 V. 
 
 Rickard O'Connell, 
 
 i 
 
 like. 
 
 Same 
 
 7 
 
 
 V. 
 
 Cornelius Leary. 
 
 1 
 
 like, 
 
 Same 
 
 V. 
 
 i 
 
 
 John Galvin. 
 
 i 
 
 like. 
 
 Same 
 
 > 
 
 
 V. 
 
 Michl. Connell. 
 
 ] 
 
 like. 
 
 Same 
 
 V. 
 
 ^ 
 
 
 Mich. Donoohoo. 
 
 3 
 
 like. 
 
 9i. 19*. Od. 
 
 Same proved case. 
 
 81. 5s. Od. 
 
 Same proved case. 
 
 3^. 2s. 6d. 
 
 Same proved case. 
 
 21. Us. lOd. 
 
 Nil. 
 
 Same proved case. 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 701 
 
 CAHIRCIVEEN SESSIONS, 31st March, 1845. 
 
 r»„„ '^^\^r<,^„r,^n / John Connell proved case. 
 
 Dan. O Connell, f j3^_ J5^_ q^_ 
 
 V. 
 
 Michl. Connell. 
 
 Same 
 
 I 
 
 > 
 
 rent. 
 
 V. V 13Z. lbs. Od. 
 
 Same. j rent. 
 
 KILLARNEY SESSIONS, 20th June, 1845. 
 
 D. M' Sweeny, •\ -So John Primrose. 
 
 D.O'Connell.Esq.M.P. ^ S « 9Z. 195. Gel. 
 
 V. t "2^ subject to award of Keane 
 
 Tlmy. Fogerty. J _„„<. g ^ Mahony, Esq. 
 
 Same 
 
 John Crimmeer. j 
 
 GL 105. Od. 
 
 Private 7'emarJcs to exylain. — "M' Sweeny" over the plaintiff's name means 
 his attorney in the case. " Use and occupation" is when there is no lease, the 
 tenant holding as tenant-at-will. "Rent" is when there is a lease; so, in the 
 above list, only four had leases and six had not. 
 
 Opinions of the Irish Press, 
 
 In reference to the preceding controversy regarding the condition of Mr. 
 
 O'Connell's tenantrj\ 
 
 » 
 
 (From the Kerry Evening Post, January 7.) 
 
 "We resume this curious subject with the long and elaborate letter 
 of Mr. Maurice O'Connell to the editor of The Times newspaper, in 
 which lie enters very fully into detail of his father s management of 
 his property or properties ; abuses — " pretty considerably " Messrs. 
 Twiss and Atkins ; offers to submit the whole case to ro-examination, 
 to give free access to books and papers, to attend the enquiry 
 himself ; and, anticipating a triumphant contradiction to the Com- 
 
702 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 missioner's former reports, calls upon the editor, as an honest man, 
 to " drive tlie convicted calumniator and libeller" from his estab- 
 lishment, and give full publication to the vindication of his father's 
 character. Upon the ■whole, a dabbing, free spoken letter, written 
 with a seeming truthfulness, and a proper son-like anxiety for his 
 father's reputation. A son always looks graceful when standing up 
 for his parent, and great allowance is to be made for the feelings 
 which guide his pen or dictate his words on such occasions ; but, oh, 
 Maurice ! Maurice ! ! don't be offended with us, if we compare 
 your letter to The Times, to Lord John Russell's unlucky, ill-timed 
 declaration about the Corn Laws. Could Lord Johnny but have 
 known, when he was making this new bid for popularity, that a 
 Queen's messenger was taking a " first class ticket" to carry him as 
 fast as rail could run, to Edinburgh, thence to summon his lordship 
 to take the reins of Government in hand again, we doubt not he 
 would as soon have cut off his little finger at the first joint, as pub- 
 lished his aforesaid free trade declaration. So in like manner, could 
 you^ Maurice, have divined that when you posted your letter to The 
 Times, the Times was posting to you a new hand, fresh from 
 English cleanliness and comfort, to put your positions to the test 
 — to analyse, with curious eye, the squalid filth of Oughermong, 
 Ardcara, Tarmons, and last, not least, of the redoubted Derrynane 
 Beg ; had you but a ghmpse of this fact, friend Maurice, we do not 
 say you would not have written at all ; but, this we do say, yon 
 would probably have qualified your statements somewhat, and 
 lowered your tone of defiance a note or two.* 
 
 * To my mind, it is difficult honourably to explain the rendering of tliat letter and 
 Mr. Maurice O'Connell's subsequent conduct. It is unnecessary to print the letter, 
 as all its statements are reiterated in Mr. O'Connell's speech — in this Appendix, 
 and all of tliem have been refuted. But when I visited Derrynane with 
 Mr. Maurice O'Connell, that letter had been posted by him a day or two before, 
 and was not then published, and of coui'se I could know nothing about it. But 
 how any man could use such language regarding myself for the purpose of 
 publication, and with the knowledge that he liad done this, and that I could not 
 know of it, could meet me civilly, say nothing about tliis letter, and ask me into 
 Derrynane House with an exhibition of courtesy, shows an amount of duplicity 
 ■which it is difficult to conceive. Though ignorant, however, of the letter, I was 
 not deceived by the man. I had a thorough distrust of him, and on tliat ground 
 I declined his proffered hospitality, or in any way having any communication 
 with him, beyond what was absolutely necessary under the circumstances. It is 
 my belief that even the hospitality was a trap, and that liad I accepted it, it would 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 703 
 
 We have read with attention the fresh report of the second Times 
 Commissioner — very lengthy, as the case required — j^jrecise as to 
 names, minute, truthlike, and, we must add, apparently dispas- 
 sionate in details ; and we here repeat, what local knowledge enables 
 us to do, that while we feel persuaded of its correctness, that while 
 it corroborates the first report, it also tells truly the state of Mr. 
 O'Connell's tenantry, and that they are in fact not better or much 
 worse than those of the estates around them. If Mr. O'Connell and 
 his adherents were content to take their share of blame for the 
 miserably low social state of these people — a state which we believe 
 no eflfbrt of the most attentive landlord could speedily remedy, a 
 state arising from deep-rooted and multifarious evils, which neither 
 grew in a day, nor can be cured in a day — if Mr. O'Connell and his 
 defenders would honestly own this, and oh ! if he would apply his 
 vast influence to the discovery of real remedies for such a state of 
 things, then might better days in earnest be hoped for Ireland ; but, 
 no, Mr. O'Connell has been ever the defamer of the landlords of 
 Ireland — the destroyer of those ties which united them to the 
 occupiers of the soil. He has brought about a state of things ia 
 this country which subjects any man who would seek to remove the 
 peasant's " darling dung-heap" from his threshold, to the charge of 
 being " a Conservative oppressor, or a Tory tyrant ;" and while he 
 has been doing this to others, he has ever ambitioned the reputation 
 of " the best of landlords" himself, which he seems to have obtained 
 at the easy rate of surrounding himself with hordes of " squatters," 
 whose condition, when looked into, exhibits the shocking spectacle 
 now presented to the public in the reports of The Times Commis- 
 sioners, No. 1 and 2. As was fit on the present occasion, Com- 
 missioner No. 1 left to Commissioner No. 2 to make his own 
 report on the facts which came under his knowledge, and confines 
 
 have been used as an argument against me. Though fahit with exhaustion and 
 want of food, as it was then six o'clock at night, and I had breakfasted at eight 
 o'clock in the morning, I preferred telling the driver to pull up on the road at 
 the first cottage out of Denynane with a light in it, and to ask for a potato for 
 me, to having it said, as I am certain it would have been in Conciliation Hall, — 
 *' The scoundrel ! he ate of my bread, drank my wine, partook of my hospitality, 
 and abuses me. That's Saxon conduct for you !'' As it was, the paltry glass of 
 wine which Mr. Russell drank was duly recorded ; but inasmuch as though one 
 of us did partake of the " hospitaUty'' the other did not, no point could be made 
 of it. 
 
704 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 himself to a summary of the perfect sliower of abuse and vilification 
 which has followed him ever since he touched the Liberator's re- 
 putation as the " best of landlords," occasionally introducing some 
 graphic touch on the things passing. Nothing can be richer than 
 his description of Mr. O 'Sullivan " backing up" the Liberator 
 afrainst a whole mass of misery, squalor, filth and wretchedness, by 
 throwing in '■'■ Didn't he, Pat Sullivan, give 6s. a perch for making 
 that road?" to which Pat's ready and expected reply followed, "^o 
 he sure he did, your honour." If The Times Commissioner knew as 
 much of Mr. O'SuUi van's " honour" as we do, he would be better 
 able to estimate his independent testimony. This is the man, if we 
 mistake not, who came up to the hustings, some eight or ten years 
 since, pledged to vote for the Knight of Kerry, and who has ever 
 since been a monument of the power of the Liberator's " cough;" for 
 that honourable friend to freedom of election, sitting in the booth, 
 meiely gave this independent voter a look! cleared his throat 
 slightly, and sent him down after having voted contrary to his in- 
 tentions, to his promise, and to the obligations he owed to his best 
 friend who, to use a common phrase, " had made a man of him." 
 Ever since then there is no manner of doubt that if " the Liberator" 
 declared that Derrynane Beg was an improved copy of the Groves of 
 Blarney, " Mr. O'SuUivan" would echo with him with " Not a 
 doubt of it, your honour," 
 
 Not the least effective part of this picture is " the huntsman !" 
 a dead hand, as we hear, at "running a drag," and who led the 
 way over bog and moor into every cabin, always " speaking three or 
 four words of Irish in an lender tone." According to the Com- 
 missioner's shrewd guess, these meagre words must have been " nil 
 bearlath" (no English), being tlie Irish way of expressing " Open 
 Sesame ;" and no doubt this civil fellow miist have smoothed the 
 difficulties of these " furriners" in getting at the truth amazingly; 
 at all events Mr. M. O'Connell's word of promise was fulfil- 
 led to the letter — " he gave every facility to the proposed exam- 
 ination." 
 
 The poor people themselves must have been completely puzzled, 
 or as their American neighbours say, " most catawompously obfus- 
 ticated" by these domiciliary visits. Very probably no rumour of 
 the " wordy war" raging between " The Master" and The Times 
 Commissioner ever reached their ears, and] therefore no wonder that 
 they sometimes should fail to " catch the cue of a leading question." 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 705 
 
 How naturally, for example, the following comes in between " John 
 Connell," the Liberator's driver — (where 's the great 0?) — and one 
 of the " strong farmers" of the district. " I" says the farmer, " pay 
 j625 a year for the grass of seven cows^ and yet nothing hut potatoes 
 and milk all the year round " Here Mr. Connell interposed, and 
 asked in a tone of great surprise, " Do you mean to say^ Corny, that 
 you never eat heef or bacon ?" The stupid fellow failed to catch the 
 hint, for he replied, " Oh ! sure you hnoio yourself, John Connelly 
 that I can't kill a coio or ajngfor myself — that all goes to the rent.^' 
 This is all capital, and, as we said before, bears the stamp of truth- 
 fulness on the face of it. Not less truth-like is the incident of one 
 of these fellows, who, it appears, had been making what is called " a 
 poor mouth" the day before, under the idea that the enquiry was 
 *' directed by Government to enquire into the state of the potato crop'* 
 — on which supposition he thought it dutiful and patriotic to tell as 
 many lies as he could venture ; but finding out his mistake, and 
 getting, perhaps, a " wigging from the driver" for his unseasonable 
 complaints, actually took a walk of sixteen miles to make himself 
 out a " misrepresenter of facts" before " the magistrate, Mr. Trant." 
 Poor, poor Paddy, under such tutoring and influences as you suffer 
 it is only wonderful that you are not worse morally than you are — 
 worse socially you can scarce well be to exist. 
 
 We shall not analyse the Commissioners' reports further ; but 
 dismiss them by saying, that they will most satisfactorily inform 
 the English public on a point on which they generally express much 
 curiosity — namely, the real position of Mr. O'Connell. — Hitherto, 
 anything like the facts of the case has been set down as Tory pre- 
 judice. The humbug description of Prince Puckler Mascaw — the 
 no less humbug title of " Derrynane Abbey" — the kind of open- 
 house hospitality occasionally practised (paid by other " rent" than 
 Derrynane Beg produced) by O'Connell — all this combined to invest 
 this coarse democrat with an air of demi- feudal pretension, at w hicli 
 old people, who remembered his origin, used to laugh and hold their 
 tongues about matters which the Commissioner has rather freely 
 exposed. Now, however, the truth is spread through the world with- 
 out disguise. Mr. O'Connell has about ],200/. per annum, estate — 
 most of it, we believe, fairly purchased by his respectable and pros- 
 perous uncle — and for all the rest of his property he is a middleman, 
 holding under the neighbouring proprietors by various tenures, 
 chiefly for his own life. There is nothing discreditable in all this — 
 
 z z 
 
706 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 the real discredit lies in the attempt to puflf him into a feudal 
 chieftain, enjoying his long-descended patrimonial estates; when in 
 fact he is a middleman for the chief part of his income, and tchat a 
 middleman ! We must here return to jMr. Maurice O'Connell's 
 letter, and observe, that the grossest cases of misery and wretched- 
 ness, the densest population, the tendency to " squatting," is chiefly 
 observable on those lands which Mr. O'Connell, drawing large 
 profit from them, holds as tenant, and, we might almost say, trustee 
 for others. Take the case of Mr. Hartop's estate, under whom Mr. 
 O'Connell derives from the land a rent of 677/. per annum. On 
 this land exist 600 individuals, liable to increase by "squatting" 
 without limit. On Mr. O'Connell's death this land reverts to the 
 possession of the head-landlord, who thus becomes morally ac- 
 countable for this miserable mass of human beings, whose congre- 
 gating on his property he had no power to prevent. The same 
 remark applies to the property held under Mr. Crumpe Bland. 
 Should Mr. O'Connell's representative apply for a renewal of these 
 leases, what answer should he expect ? We will not suggest this ; 
 but we zc'dl observe, that if Mr. O'Connell's own brother, Mr. James 
 O'Connell, were the landlord in such case, we know what answer he 
 would return to such an application. 
 
 There is one passage in Mr. Maurice O'Connell's letter which, if 
 unqualified by explanation, would speak volumes in his father's 
 favour. " If" he says, " there is an individual hadly housed on my 
 fathers property, it is his own fault; he might have had lime, 
 tlmher, and slate for the as/cinf/." This sounds generous — is 
 generous in the abstract ; but to a tenantry sunk in such social 
 degradation as Mr. O'Connell's are represented to be, such an offer 
 is like telling a starving, penniless beggar that there is abundance of 
 beef in the market. If Mr. O'Connell — lording it over these 
 districts " in a state of nature," as his son described — were the really 
 </ood super-excellent landlord he wishes to be thought, he would use 
 his mighty influence beneficially, by creating a taste for comforts — 
 he would take the lead in improvements — show the people how to 
 make themselves comfortable ; but (and gladly would we say other- 
 wise if we could) instead of performing these duties of his station as 
 a landlord, his life-long employment and endeavour lias been to 
 make or keep the Irish poor man restless, feverish, and discontented, 
 with his thoughts diverted from his rags to Repeal — from improving 
 his condition by industry, to expecting some wild convulsion which 
 
APPENDIX xiir. 707 
 
 is to " make him a man at once." Until the mind of Ireland is 
 allowed rest from unnatural excitement, it is vain to expect an im- 
 provement in its social condition through the only course by which 
 fallen man can ever raise himself from the penalty of the curse, 
 we mean patient industry, and steady energetic labour. 
 
 (From The Northern Whi^.) 
 
 Mr. O'Connell and his Tenantry. — As Mr. O'Connell 
 declined to meet the challenge of T/ie Times Commissioner, 
 the latter requested that the Editor of The Times would send 
 over some gentleman to examine tlie state of the tenants on 
 Mr. O'Connell's estates, and note the facts on the spot. This 
 has been done : for three days, the Commissioner and the other 
 gentleman went over Mr. O'Connell's property, part of the time 
 accompanied by Mr. Maurice O'Connell, and part, also, if not the 
 whole, by Mr. O'Connell's collector ; and we publish the result from 
 The Times received last night. The tale is one of such misery 
 and degradation as to excite mingled feelings of compassion and 
 horror. We are surprised that Mr. O'Connell ventured to raise 
 discussion upon the subject, but we are not now surprised that he 
 was unwilling to meet the Commissioner's challenge. 
 
 (From The Dublin Warder.) 
 
 It is but justice to The Times Commissioner to point especial 
 attention to the letter of that functionary, addressed to the editor of 
 the Limerick Chronicle, as well as to the report of the gentleman 
 despatched from the office of The Times for the purpose of testing by 
 ocular inspection the accuracy of the statements contained in the 
 Commissioner's letter with respect to Mr. O'Connell's property in 
 Derrynane and its neighbourhood. In this corroborative report there 
 is a minuteness of detail and a circumstantial fulness of narration 
 indicative of precision and truth, and the results of which, we are 
 bound to say, were given fairly and without exaggeration in the letters 
 of the Commissioner, and all which go to prove the prevalence of 
 squalor and destitution in their most repulsive and horrible extremes 
 in the average condition of Mr. O'Connell's tenantry. The report is 
 furnished from the notes of the gentlemen despatched by The Times 
 upon Mr. O'Connell's declining to test the truth of the Commissioner's 
 statements by the result of a commission of inquiry, consisting of 
 gentlemen to be appointed by mutual consent, as suggested by Mr. 
 
 z z 2 
 
708 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 Foster. These notes were taken upon the spot, and in the presence 
 among others, of Mr. Maurice O'Connell, who accompanied these 
 gentlemen {The Times Commissioner and reporter) upon their tour 
 of inspection from cabin to cabin ; and we are bound to say, that the 
 detailed account of the scenes of filth and misery which he there 
 visited transcends, in the extremity of degradation which it depicts, 
 any idea which, from an acquaintance with the state of the peasantry 
 of Limerick, Tipperary, and Clare, we could have formed respecting 
 that of Mr. O'Connell's tenantry. In England, we have little doubt 
 the eflfect of the Commissioner's revelations will be to ruin whatever 
 influence Mr. O'Connell may have commanded with the Liberal 
 party there. English society, throughout all its grades and parties, 
 is permeated by a strong sense of right and by habitual independence 
 of judgment, but among the old Popish party of Ireland of whom 
 O'Connell is the type, there exists no such thing as public opinion. 
 Convict O'Connell every day in the year of the vilest baseness 
 and barbarity and he will not be one degree less the idol of the 
 besotted and miserable people, or one hour nearer the end of his 
 political autocracy. 
 
 (From The Belfast Chronicle.) 
 
 "The Times" Commissioner and Mr. O'Connell. — We have 
 given in our preceding columns the reply of Mr. O'Connell to the late 
 letter of The Times Commissioner, and of Mr. Russell, the gentleman 
 deputed to accompany him on his second visit to the Kerry property. 
 We leave the matter now in the hands of our readers, to form such 
 judgment upon it as they may see fit ; but we cannot do so without 
 expressing it as our opinion, that Mr. O'Connell has completely 
 failed in disproving the allegations of the Commissioner. On one or 
 two minor points he makes a tolerably good defence, but on the great 
 and prominent charge — that a large proportion of his tenantry are in 
 a wretchedly pauperized condition, and that no effort has been made 
 to improve their circumstances, he contents himself with launching 
 out into a torrent of abuse, to the uproarious delight of his subservient 
 listeners in Conciliation-hall. The two " rival Correspondents," as 
 he calls Messrs. Foster and Russell, are stigmatized as " vagabonds," 
 their letters as "calumnies not fit to throw at a dog," and almost 
 every sentence is ornatnented with the graceful epithets of "liar," 
 " slanderer," " fellow," and such like elegant figures of speech. There 
 is no replying to arguments of this nature, but they, at all events, 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 709 
 
 serve one good purpose, namely, to show how deeply Mr. O'Connell 
 has been stung by those memorable letters, and how sorely the wound 
 given to his self-love rankles in his breast. 
 
 (From Tlie Londonderry Standard.) 
 "The Timks" Commissioner and Mr, O'Connell. — We sus- 
 pect that even the friends of Mr. O'Connell will admit that it would 
 on his part, have been an act of wisdom, had he passed by The Times 
 Commissioner in silent civility. The truth is, it did not suit Mr. 
 O'Connell's policy to allow the Commissioner to pursue, without 
 molestation, his career of practical amelioration of the state of 
 Ireland. If the abuses of Irish landlordism were effectually removed, 
 whether by means of Government interference or through the ao-ency 
 of public opinion, the peasantry would become tranquillized and con- 
 tented, and political agitation would soon lose its character as an 
 article of profitable speculation. The visit of The Times' Commis- 
 sioner to this country miglit by possibility, have had some indirect 
 relation to a prospective plan of Government arrangement for 
 effecting a permanent improvement in the condition of the aoricul- 
 tural population ; but, at all events, it was sure to bring to a bearino- 
 upon the question all the omnipotence which belongs to public 
 opinion. It revealed to the people of England the mysterious secret 
 of Ireland's discontent, and for the first time in our national history, 
 it promised a practical instead of a merely speculative amendment in 
 the essential relationships of our social system. The gigantic evils 
 of Ireland — the absenteeism of its landed proprietors, and the horribly 
 abusive management to which that absenteeism is immediately con- 
 ducive — were about to be exposed and eradicated, and hence 
 O'Connell and his associates were likely, at no distant period, to be 
 literally sent upon a begging pilgrimage in search of a grievance. 
 This was a calamity not to be endured, and, consequently, every 
 engine of factious malignity was sedulously put into requisition in 
 order to blacken the character of the Commissioner, as well as to 
 defeat the objects with whose fulfilment he had been specially 
 intrusted. The imputation of motives so base to men, who boast of 
 their own patriotic transcendentalism, and who are anxious to go 
 down to futurity with the reputation of disinterested sincerity, may 
 seem to be uncharitable ; but the conduct of Mr. O'Connell and his 
 party, in reference to the present question, has been such as to leave 
 no other rational construction of the motives by which they have been 
 
710 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 covertly actuated. From tlic now corroberated statements of The 
 Times Commissioner there can be no doubt as to tbe amount of 
 ■wretchedness to be found upon Mr. O'Connell's own estates ; and this 
 condemning fact, when viewed in connexion with the mysteriously 
 fierce hatred which he evinced towards the Commissioner, long before 
 the latter had done anything personally offensive towards himself — 
 in fact, when he was exclusively engaged in the exposure of aristo- 
 cratic misrule — is an a priori demonstration that he had, on his own 
 account, something serious to be dreaded. The labours of the Com- 
 missioner were certainly calculated to give to Repeal its quietus by 
 the effectual removal of felt grievances, and it would now appear that 
 Mr. O'Connell had anticipated from the first a visit of inspection to 
 his own mountain dens of popular misery, and hence instinctive 
 sympathy drove him at once into the ranks of those who can see in 
 negligent, and even oppressive landlordism, only one of the diversified 
 phases of that social beauty by which the British constitution is 
 peculiary illustrated. Hence, we suppose, the premature advocacy 
 of Mr. O'Connell by the Eveninfj 3Iail, in whose political creed the 
 landed aristocracy are identified with royalty itself in the same con- 
 venient category of impeccability. The system of society at large is 
 one vast concentration of humbug, and he who can act his part with 
 most adroitness is invariably the greatest character in his own as well 
 as in the world's estimation. It is no wonder that Count Oxenstiern 
 should have sent his son to travel, preparatory to his entering 
 upon public life, for the avowed purpose of seeing " with how little 
 ^Yisdom the world is governed." 
 
 (From the Derry Standard.) 
 
 " The Times" Commissioner and the Irish Press. — We had 
 intended this day to notice in fitting terms, the conduct of a portion 
 of the Irish press, which absurdly calls itself Conservative, towards 
 The Times Commissioner, together with its monstrous advocacy of 
 Mr. O'Connell's landlordism ; but a pressure of temporary matter has 
 compelled us to postpone, for a few days, our observations on this 
 subject. The Dublin Evening Mail and the Etening Packet have, in 
 this department of public honesty, earned for themselves a fame, 
 which their very enemies need not grudge them, and from our own 
 report of the proceedings of the Repeal Association on Monday last, 
 it will be seen, that we have now to add the Netcrg Telegraph to 
 his list of Protestant (!) worthies, who have enrolled tlieuiselves 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 711 
 
 under the banner of Mr. O'Connell. The Telegraphy it will be 
 observed, was most fulsomely bepraised and bespattered over with 
 thanks and caresses, and most cordially do we wish its conductors 
 joy of all their newly acquired honours, which honours, we fervently 
 hope they will endeavour to " wear meekly" like good Christians and 
 sound Protestants as they doubtless are. To ordinary Conservatives, 
 however, the query would naturally suggest itself — what outrageous 
 " evil" had they been engaged in, which had thus brought upon them 
 the infliction of special thanks from Daniel O'Connell and the Repeal 
 Association. 
 
 (From the Coleravne Chronicle.') 
 
 Our readers are familiar with the reports which, for some months 
 past, The Times Commissioner has been laying before the coimtry, 
 regarding the state of Ireland, His unmasking of the Liberator is 
 unquestionably not the least of his achievements. Europe and the 
 world will be amazed at the revelations he has made. Never were 
 tenantry more impoverished, more wretched, more oppressed or rack- 
 rented ; and all the while their landlord pretends to be the personi- 
 fication of freedom, patriotism, and benevolence. He talked and 
 wrote about the liberties of Ireland at the very time that he was ex- 
 ercising a heartless tyranny, and degrading to the lowest condition of 
 serfdom thousands of his countrymen. The disclosures that have 
 been made will provoke the indignation of Europe ; and, unless he 
 has arrived at an invincible insensibility to the opinion of his fellow 
 men, the storm of censure and admonition which it will bring may 
 correct his conduct, and prevent ignominious results. To us there 
 is nothing more revolting than hypocrisy, especially when exhibited 
 on so great a scale ; and if it bring not its appropriate punishment 
 along with it, the moral sense of the country must be extinct. Will 
 Irishmen continue to impoverish themselves to fill the coffers of Re- 
 peal and revolution ? Will oratory, remarkable chiefly for its 
 flowers culled from St. Giles and Billingsgate, have the same 
 tlirilling efi"ect upon the million whom it has duped into the victims of 
 cupidity and ambition ? 
 
 (From the Dror/heda Conservative.) 
 
 We are not amongst those of the Irish press who, through notions 
 of jealousy, behold the work performed by The Times which should 
 have long since been effected by themselves, and, therefore, wish to 
 
7J2 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 mar the operations of the Commissioner. How stands the case ? 
 Did wc, or any other Irish journalist, dare to expose the hard-hearted 
 cruelty and grinding oppression of tyrannical landlords, an action 
 for libel was forthwith instituted, and ruin or retraction became the 
 consequence. Therefore, we look upon the people of Ireland as im- 
 mensely indebted to the spirited proprietors of The Times for sending 
 over their Commissioner, to spread abroad on the wings of the press 
 the praise due to good and resident landlords, and the condemnation 
 and exposure of neglectful ones — and nobly has he performed his 
 duty. We have heard it urged that the " Landlord and Tenant 
 Commissioners' Report" was quite sufficient. True, but this report, 
 from its voluminous extent, is a sealed book to the people. But the 
 report of " T/ie Times Commissioner" is easy of attainment — each 
 letter comprehensive in itself, and discussed with interest by all 
 classes of people from the peer to the peasant. From this commission 
 we augur the happiest results. First, it will reveal to absentee 
 landlords the real condition of their tenantry. Secondly, it will 
 mitigate the cruelty and exaction of the middlemen. Thirdly, it will 
 afford the English people a condensed view of the condition of Ire- 
 land — the evils vinder which she suffers — her advancement in agri- 
 culture, science, and the arts, her vast resources and capabilities. 
 Fourthly, it will tend to call the attention of Parliament to the ab- 
 solute necessity of immediate legislation for her amelioration. 
 
 (From the Kerry Evening Post.) 
 
 The Special Commission at Derrynane Beg. — Our cotempo- 
 rary, the Chronicle, has given us on his last broad sheet four letters 
 respecting the now famous merits or demerits of Mr. O'Connell as a 
 landlord ; had time and space permitted him to add the two other 
 letters, which occupy a full monster page of The Times, we should 
 have had before us at one glance as pretty a specimen as could be 
 selected of the difficulty of coming at truth — Irish truth — on any 
 subject where party or prejudice interfere ; and alas ! what subject 
 can be found in Ireland, from the '" mangold- wurzel crops" (?) on 
 Mr. O'Connell's farms to the Lord Lieutenant's Christmas charities 
 to the beggars of Dublin, with which party will not meddle for its 
 own vile purposes. Wc should be glad to give an opinion on this 
 matter as honest as we can arrive at, and yet, no doubt, prejudice 
 will come in to colour it. We must do the ^>c>c we can, premising 
 that until this " Ugly Commissioner" came lO pry into the pot and 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 713 
 
 glass window statistics of Mr. O'Connell's "manor and hunting- 
 ground" in Iveragh, we had always considered the latter as an easy, 
 indulgent, if not, in strictness of terms, a good or encouraging land- 
 lord. But now to the evidence hefore us. The first letter of the 
 series is a short growl from the Liberator himself : abusive it is, of 
 course. Abuse of any one who crosses his path is become too much 
 a part of old Dan's nature to give rise to a remark ; but from the 
 extra quantum of attention he bestows upon The Times Commis- 
 sioner, returning to him again and again after he had " done with 
 him" for ever, we opine that Daniel feels that it is not so easy to 
 " take the fight out " of this Saxon as he has usually found it with 
 his opponents. There is but one noticeable bit of this letter, where 
 he speaks of " his old friend the Gutter Commissioner stealthily pro- 
 ceeding, with another whelp of the old mother of lies, The Times, to 
 the neighbourhood of Derrynane Abbey." Now, on the face of it, 
 this is an incorrect statement. Give every one his due, even " The 
 Times whelp himself," he has gone back in the open day, like a 
 plucky fellow as he is, to re-open his commission. He has gone his 
 rounds under the inspection of Mr. Maurice O'Connell himself, and 
 within lash of the very huntsman's whip which in ordinary cases is so 
 notable a cure for babbling. It must have been a rich scene to be- 
 hold " the Gutter Commissioner" looking up with unparalleled 
 audacity in Mr. O'Connell's face, while he desired his companion to 
 note down, by the "light of bogdeal splinter," the "no bed" — the 
 " one pot" furniture ! of Mr. O'Connell's tenantry. We should like 
 to have heard the triumphal chuckle with which, in the heart of Der- 
 rynane Beg, " the impudent fellow" demanded to be shown " a sin- 
 gle hovel with a glass window," preparatory to his reiterated asser- 
 tion that "in the sixty-four hovels it contains there was not a single 
 pane of glass." All this was done, not indeed in open day, but^^^in 
 such " darkness visible" as the hovels of Derrynane Beg afforded. 
 No, no, Dan, that same charge of yours will not silence the Com- 
 missioner nor ruin The Times. Whatever objection there may be to 
 this proceeding of " the Commissioner," it is not obnoxious to the 
 charge of " stealthiness." Mr. O'Connell's letter ushers in one from 
 *'my friend James Butler, a rigid Protestant and high (?) Conserva- 
 tive." It is curious to remark, how amazingly fond Mr. O'Connell is 
 of bringing forward a Protestant witness to his sundry and manifold 
 virtues. Poor Tom Steele's spaniel-like fidelity — the thorough de- 
 edness of conviction with which he lauds and applauds the all 
 
714 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 unutterable virtues of his patron and chieftain are well known. Far 
 be it from us to class Mr. Butler's and the " Head Pacificator's" 
 testimony together. Mr. Butler is a gentleman who is, doubtless, 
 as independent of Mr. O'Connell's influence as any Iveraghman can 
 well be, and we have no doubt in essential matters that he is so, but 
 it is no libel or imputation on that gentleman to say, " that he lives 
 on the wrong side of Droumhlll" to take a perfectly unbiassed posi- 
 tion as respects Mr. O'Connell. And then what does his evidence 
 amount to ? A general statement that Mr. O'Connell is " an indul- 
 gent landlord" — " a hospitable entertainer" — " a pleasant compa- 
 nion." In all this, we have no doubt, he speaks the simple truth. 
 We have heard the same from various independent sources ; but we 
 must remark, that while Mr. Butler's is " a general character," the 
 Commissioner's is a " particular description," and that while the 
 former gives his friendly opinion, formed on such grounds as long 
 general knowledge afforded, the latter descends to facts, derived from 
 personal observation, real or pretended. Above all, it never should 
 be forgotten that Mr. Butler, in forming his estimate of Mr. O'Con- 
 nell's qualities as a landlord, measures him by the standard of others 
 about him ; while the Commissioner, on the other hand, coming to 
 judge with probably as much bias against, as Mr. Butler has a na- 
 tural prejudice in favour of, " Dan," subjects him to an unfair com- 
 parison, not to the other landlords in his immediate neighbourhood, 
 but to others of a higher class, and whose duties are performed in a 
 social state altogether different. And this we are disposed to think 
 is the clue to the flat contradictions passing between these parties. 
 Mr. O'Connell is no worse, possibly a shade better, in his dealings with 
 his tenantry than the proprietors around him ; his tenantry are not more 
 miserable than their neiglibours ; but neither are they more com- 
 fortable ; and here it is that his own imprudent boasts, the balderdash 
 defence of his son Maurice, the lick-spittle lies of " an apothecary 
 named Fitzgerald," and of Mr. Edward Carrol, who " found in the 
 Month of May, on Mr. O'Connell's land, mangold-wurzel and Swe- 
 dish turnips which would do credit to the National Model Farm, 
 or a London market gardener!" all encouraged by Mr. Maurice 
 O'Connell : this same Mr. Maurice O'Connell being forced to con- 
 fess that " there never were either mangold wurzel or turnips grown 
 on his father's estate." These are the fabrications, the puffings, the 
 flounderings which, when subjected to the severe and unfriendly in- 
 vestigation of a clever, persevering and " ugly customer" like The 
 
APPENDIX XIII. 715 
 
 Times agent, have now arrived at a result "whlcli may well make 
 Mr. O'Connell exclaim — If flatterers and foolish friends had held 
 their tongues and kept their pens out of ink, I might have kept a 
 tolerable character as a Jandlord still. We must reserve for 
 another publication our remarks on JNIr, Maurice O'Connell's letter, 
 which his father was sure The Times would not print, which, how- 
 ever, T/ie Times did print, and which, with the two letters from the 
 Commissioner and his companion, will furnish ample matter for 
 another notice. 
 
 Opinions of the English Press. 
 
 (From the Neiccastle Journal.^ 
 
 " The Times" Commissioner. — In the social economy of Ireland, 
 as in the tales of its novelists, from the pure page and instructive 
 lessons of Miss Edgeworth, to the light, humorous, and dashing 
 scenes of Harry Lorrequer, there is no character painted in such dark 
 colours, no creature described in such hateful terms, as the rack- 
 renting, upstart, and bloated Middleman. Look through Baynim's 
 gloomy pictures of rapine, whiteboyism, and murder, or linger over 
 Griffin's sad and sweet tales, or, with Carleton, (as he was, not as 
 he is), dive into the recesses of the Irishman's heart, and hold con- 
 verse with him at wake or wedding, at fair or faction fight, by his 
 own fireside, heroically devoting himself to labour for the widow 
 and the orphans, or in some dark den planning deeds of blood, and 
 in some part of one and all these varying phases of Irish life, you 
 will meet with the repulsive figure and swollen features of the mid- 
 dleman. If there be anything of peculiar heartlessness to be done — 
 any broken-hearted father of a family to be flung out of house and 
 home — any son's vengeful arm to be provoked, you will be sure to 
 encounter the cunning leer and loathsome carcase of the middleman. 
 And truly those best acquainted with Ireland are, and have been, 
 the first to recognize the fidelity of the picture thus presented ; for, 
 if there be any truth in connection with the working of the social ma- 
 chine in that country better established than another, it is this, that 
 middlemen have been the bane and curse of Ireland. Standing between 
 the owner and the occupier of the soil, they cheated the one and op- 
 pressed the other, and kept both at enmity with, or in ignorance of, 
 each other. Such was the character, such the conduct of the mid- 
 dleman. And here let us pause ; for, who three months ago could 
 have supposed, that with all his other blemishes, failings, and oflfences, 
 the great Repeal chief should have turned out to be one of that class— 
 
716 APPENDIX XIII. 
 
 and nothing less. The British empire owes the discovery, or rather 
 the promulgation of that important fact, to The Times Commissioner, 
 and, imdoiibtedly, it will help us much to a proper appreciation of 
 Mr. Daniel O'Connell's real character to know that we are dealing 
 "with a huge, overgrown middleman, who has as miserable and pau- 
 perized a set of under-tenants as any grinding land-jobber that ever 
 provoked the novelist's pen, or the assassin's pistol. Strenuously 
 did he and his sons labour to lessen the damning weight of the 
 facts so industriously collected, and so fairly related by The Times 
 Commissioner ; but, as truth was not to be gainsayed by abuse, or 
 put down by bullying and falsehood, the more the O'Connell brood 
 shouted and vituperated, the clearer and the more convincing be- 
 came the statements of the Commissioner, supported and confirmed 
 as they subsequently have been, by a special reporter, deputed to 
 the spot for the purpose of seeing, with his own eyes, the state 
 of Mr. O'Connell's tenantry. But it suffices for us to know that 
 he is a middleman to be assured that his tenants are as wretched and 
 as badly off as the gentlemen from The Times office found them. 
 
 (From the Sheffield Mercury.') 
 
 " The Times" Commissioner. — Mr. O'Connell has got himself into 
 an awkward quarrel with a gentleman who is pretty well known 
 to newspaper readers as " The Times Commissioner." The latter 
 is a writer of considerable force and clearness, and if he fall into 
 some minor errors in describing the people and the places he visits for 
 the first time, he will only do just what every traveller has done, 
 however honest his intentions. The " Commissioner" has visited 
 parts of the United Kingdom to make personal observations on the 
 peculiar condition of the people. He was in Wales during the Re- 
 becca riots — in Scotland more recently, whence he sent some not 
 very flattering descriptions of the Highland cotters, and he is now 
 "pursuing his vocation" in the Green Isle. The descriptions of the 
 misery and wretchedness of the poor in the agricultural parts of Ire- 
 land are most vivid. These are to the mind's eye cabinet pictures 
 of wretchedness; and there is a truthfulness about them that renders 
 them almost appalhng to look upon. In one thing at least " fact is 
 more strange than fiction," and that is in the chronicles of human 
 wretchedness in Ireland. Well, " our Commissioner" — as The Times 
 designates the gentleman in question — visited the estates of Mr. 
 Daniel O'Connell at and in the neighbourhood of Derrynane, and 
 
APPENDIX XIII, 717 
 
 described what he found there. The descriptions would not be tho 
 less forcible because the conduct of Mr. O'Connell at home was the 
 reverse of his pretensions when discoursing upon the finest peasantry 
 in the world. In Derrynane where they boast about the comfortable 
 condition of the poor, and at which place he had been taught to ex- 
 pect much, the condition of the people was one scene of squalor and 
 wretchedness, and there was not a pane of glass in any cabin in the 
 whole parish. In short he had not seen, in the same extent of popu- 
 lation, so much physical degradation in all Ireland as he found ou 
 the estates of Daniel O'Connell. What he saw he described, and 
 The Times gave publicity to his communication. As might be ex- 
 pected, this act of moral courage, in a country where Dan plays the 
 despot more than any absolute monarch in Europe, brought upon 
 " oiir Commissioner" the whole pack of repeal beagles, with Daniel 
 at their head. The neatest epithet that they could invent was 
 "liar," and with this he was pelted on all sides so fiercely that he 
 must either proceed to exculpate himself or stand convicted of the 
 most shameless mendacity. It would appear that not only as a 
 landlord was Mr. O'Connell below the average of Irish landlords, 
 but in other respects his conduct squared very oddly with his public 
 life. He delights to vilify that class of whom he is himself an inferior 
 sample, look at him in whatever light you will. He denounces 
 wholesale that he may not be suspected. He is in society what a 
 king's evidence — so called— is in a gang of thieves, but he stands a 
 fair chance of having his heartless hypocrisy and his moral deformity 
 exposed. For years has Mr. O'Connell denounced the landlords of 
 Ireland, and when examined he is one of the worst of bad landlords. 
 For years he has denounced the middleman, and the sublettino- sys- 
 tem. He is himself a middleman, and sublets to such a frirrhtful 
 extent, that the poor wretches on his estates pay him three times the 
 rent for their patches that he pays the proprietor. The consequence 
 is that the land, the cabins, and the poor people, are alike wretched. 
 Perhaps " our Commissioner" was surprised at this, but he had no 
 right to be so. There are no oppressors equal to your pretenders to 
 liberalism, no knaves so thoroughly incurable as your patriotic knaves, 
 who are for the good of the people. There may be exceptions, but 
 this is the rule, and Daniel O'Connell is a disgusting illustration of 
 it. As we stated, " our Commissioner" was placed between the 
 horns of a dilemma. He must cast back again the imputation flung 
 at him by all the cringing knaves who live upon the rent, or he 
 
718 APPENDIX XIV. 
 
 must come home branded as a " liar" of the first magnitude. He 
 set about the matter like a man who had truth on his side. He 
 proposed to appoint six gentlemen, who should, with six of Mr. 
 O'Connell's friends, walk over the estates, and he would abide by 
 their award. Mr. O'Counell skulked from the investigation, and 
 reiterated his charge of " liar." " Our Commissioner" subsequently 
 suggested that The Times should send down a gentleman to go over 
 the estates leased and sublet by Mr. O'Connell, and report thereon. 
 The suggestion was adopted, and the parties were three days inves- 
 tigating the facts stated in The Times^ and as flatly contradicted by 
 Mr. O'Connell. One day they were accompanied by one of Mr. 
 O'Connell's friends, another by Mr, O'Connell's bailiffs, and on a 
 third by Mr. O'Connell's son — Mr. Maurice O'Connell, and his 
 huntsman. The mass of evidence there brought together, and pub- 
 lished in The Times of Thursday last, more than establishes the 
 statements previously vouched for, and raises Mr. O'Connell to the 
 dignity of being one of the most lieartless of oppressors of the poor, 
 and one of the vilest of impostors the world ever saw. 
 
 APPENDIX XIV. 
 
 {Referred to in page 551.) 
 
 MR. O'CONNELL'S ILLUSTRIOUS PEDIGREE. —ADDRESSED TO 
 MR. O'CONNELL. 
 
 {From a Letter signed "ikf. Burke,'^ addressed to Mr. O'Comiell, and 
 published in The Times of May 26, 1836.) 
 
 " The English think that you are descended from some noble and 
 ancient Irish family ; nor do they dream that your name, instead of 
 being O'Connell, is simply ConncU, and that you are the son of one 
 of the beautiful peasantry."*** 
 
 How was Derrynane Abbey got ? How was all the rest of the 
 property acquired ? Was it not got by exhibiting for sale spade- 
 trees, quarters of soap, penny candles, salt-herrings, pipes, and half- 
 penny worths of tobacco, which your noble ancestors kept in their 
 hucksters shops." Tlic writer then states that bog deal lights were 
 held out on the coast to cause the wreck of vessels, and that the 
 Connells were " the sole purchasers of the plunder." 
 
APPENDIX XIV. 719 
 
 GENEALOGY OF DANIEL OCONNELL, ESQ. OF DERRYNANE * 
 
 (From The Times, Jan. 22, 1839.) 
 
 TO THE EDITOR OF " THE TIMES." 
 
 Sir, — One of those Billingsgate philippics of Mr. O'Connell against 
 Lord OxmantoAvn, quite in the style of that learned gentleman, hav- 
 ing appeared in The Times of the ISth inst., it a^ipears surprising 
 that Mr. O'Connell should continue the hardihood of casting publicly 
 in the teeth of his opponents those detractions upon which he is him- 
 self so vulnerable. He has been heard to upbraid Sir Francis 
 Burdett in the House of Commons with his age and dandyism : Sir 
 Francis is the younger man of the two, and no dandy. Sir Francis 
 has all his life been used to the offices of a fashionable tailor, and has 
 always dressed himself as a plain country gentleman ; not so Mr. 
 Daniel O'Connell, for when he first came to London as a Catholic 
 delegate, his appearance, as far as dress and figure went, was like that 
 of an Irish parish priest ; and he hastened to a fashionable tailor and 
 hatter in Bond-street to get himself done as expeditiously as possible 
 into the appearance of a gentleman ; and since that time he has as- 
 sumed a peculiar dandyism in wearing an Italian mantle, lined with 
 ermine, and a particular shaped hat : but hopeless pursuit ! all the 
 fashioners in London would not make him look like a gentleman. 
 Mr. O'Connell is not, according to the common acceptation of that 
 word, a gentleman, either in dress, address, look, manners, thoughts, 
 or acts ; nor is he, except in public, in the habit of associating with 
 gentlemen ; and that he is not a gentleman by birth this letter will 
 prove. 
 
 Lord Oxmantown he attacks upon the parvenuism of his family. 
 He asks, who is he, or what is he ? Who were his ancestors, or how 
 did he get his property ? Gracious powders ! can this man so forget 
 his own rise and progress as to ask those questions which may be so 
 forcibly asked of himself ? 
 
 If he had not provoked the inquiry by such unmeasured insolence, 
 we should never have descended so low as to drag any man's genealogy 
 before the pvxbhc, for such a proceeding we look upon to be the most 
 
 * I heard the whole of these facts in Kerry whilst there ; but finding them 
 already published in a convenient form, I simply reprint them. I am also 
 acquainted with the name of the gentleman who wrote this letter. He is a 
 magistrate of Kerry, but I have no authority to name him. 
 
720 APPENDIX XIV. 
 
 blackguard, and in the worst of bad taste ; but, as he has provoked 
 it, the public shall know who, at least, Mr. O'Connell was. His 
 father's name was Morgan Connel, who lived in the little village of 
 Cahirciveen, in a bay on the west coast of Ireland, and therein kept 
 a small huckster's shop, wherein he sold pennyworths of tobacco, 
 snufF, soap, candles, ounces of tea, tape, spades, shovels, reaping- 
 hooks, thread, needles, &c. JMorgan was a portly, sleek -headed man, 
 with his hair combed flat upon his forehead, with small, cunning, 
 twinkling eyes, and a constant leer in them, like his son Dan's. He 
 was a pains-taking man, and wore a gray frieze coat, corduroy breeches, 
 yarn stockings, and hob-nailed shoes — what in Ireland are called 
 brogues. Towards the latter part of his life, when rising in the world, 
 he ascended to top-boots, well greased with a bit of fresh butter, as 
 an appendant to the corduroys. Morgan was educated at a hedge 
 school, where among the accomplishments the boys picked up a smat- 
 terino- of "the Latin tongue" and a knowledge of backgammon in their 
 " hours of idleness." An old servant, a native of Cahirciveen, who 
 lived with the grandfather of a gentleman of my acquaintance, told 
 me that he was a fellow schoolboy with Morgan, and that he after- 
 wards often saw the young Liberator running about the bogs with 
 his feet unconscious of shoes or stockings. Morgan had an elder 
 brother named Dan of Derrynane, who went by the name of O'Connel 
 — why, I cannot say. He always wore a hunting cap, and was 
 called Hunting-cap O'Connel. Old Hunting-cap in those days of no 
 coast-guard took advantage of what by the beautiful waves of the great 
 Western Atlantic was shed in Ballinskilly Bay, in the shape of wrecks, 
 and what they generously bore upon their bosom in the shape of 
 tobacco,* brandy, gin, &c., all which were transported up the country 
 through Hunting-cap's kind aid, and sold to his jovial countrymen 
 at anything but an ad valorem price, Whether Morgan joined in 
 these speculations we cannot positively say, but he certainly was get- 
 ting on little by little ; taking small farms and growing comfortable 
 until he came to the boots. He was tenant for one of these farms to 
 the late Lord Glendore, and went one very rainy day to Ardfort 
 Abbey in the corduroys and boots to pay tlie rent to his Lordship. 
 The weather being very tem])cstuous he was aked to stop to dinner, 
 and Lady Glendore, who was very fond of play, and knew that 
 backgammon was a favourite amusement with the peasantry of the 
 
 * The feats of Old Hunting Cap in the tobacco trade and in conveying tobacco 
 into Cork in butter firkins, with a layer of butter at each end, are still related. 
 
APPENDIX XIV. 721 
 
 county of Kerry, asked Mr. O'Connell if he knew the game of back- 
 gammon ; to whicli he repUed, " A little, my laidy." Wlien the 
 evening was ended Morgan returned for the night to his public-house, 
 •with the rent in his breeches' pocket, folded up in Lord Glendore's 
 receipt for it. It was before tliis period that the aspiring Liberator 
 Avas sent to France to be educated for a priest, whence he was obliged 
 to return unpriested ; and being a smart intelligent youth, Hunting- 
 cap, who was a bachelor, became his patron, and sent him to tlie bar. 
 Dan's rise at the bar was rapid. He was an excellent nisi pr ins 
 lawyer, indefatigable and diligent, and abstemious from wine. He 
 was a favourite with the bar for his broad humour and Irisli wit. 
 Soon after this he took up the cause of emancipation, which he never 
 abandoned either through " evil or good rej^ort." He used to hold 
 his great meetings at assize times in the chapels of the different towns 
 tlirough which he went the Southern circuit, and at this time was 
 always funny and good-humoured, and never indulged in that gross 
 Billingsgate which he has since so liberally adopted. No ; he was 
 then all flattery, blarney, and conciliation, and when his " quick eye 
 in frenzy rolling" caught sight of an unlucky Protestant who went 
 from mere curiosity to his meeting, he bespattered the unhappy culprit 
 witli the most fulsome adulation. I believe when he first joined the 
 bar he did not take the name of O'Connell ; which gave rise to a 
 witty equivoque of Jerry Keller, a brother barrister. Jerry hated 
 Dan's politics, and, being chairman at the bar dinner, called out, 
 " Connell, will you drink a glass of wine?" To this there was no 
 answer, upon which Jerry repeated the invitation in a loud bawl. 
 " Sir," said Dan, " if you are addressing me, my name is O'Connell." 
 " By J — s, my dear fellow, you just put me in mind of my prosody," 
 replies Jerry — " ' datur amhiguis;' and if I had my will, you should 
 have the other part of the sentence executed upon your head — ^jrrisci 
 breviare solebant.' " Old Hunting-cap lived for many years, and by 
 successful enterprises from the sea and land (for he was a farmer and 
 
 maker of butter as well as a s r), and frugality, became possessed 
 
 of Derrynane under a lease for a term of years, and which he 
 bequeathed to his favourite nephew, the great emancipator, who has 
 swelled the humble dwelling of his uncle into a great, small- windowed, 
 square- walled, manufactory-looking edifice, without taste or fashion, 
 wherein, if you are caught by the present proprietor, you will find 
 yourself encumbered with hospitality, priests, and whisky punch. 
 The O'Connells of the county of Clare deny any relationship or 
 
 3 A 
 
722 APPENDIX XIV. 
 
 consanguinity with those of Cahircivecn or Derrynane ; they are an 
 old and respectable family. I have said nothing of Mr. O'ConneU's 
 mother, for of whom little is known little can be said. She was a 
 good strong lump of a common personage, of the common i)casantry, 
 who reared a fine strong set of healthy children, which children after- 
 wards rose into notice, and married into respectable families of their 
 own persuasion, and hence comes the best blood which dignifies j\Ir. 
 Daniel O'Connell. The unblushing eftrontery of this inimitable 
 ruffian, in attacking the hereditary respectability of a distinguished 
 nobleman, and wearing supporters upon the panels of his carriage as 
 large as the panels themselves, may be judged of from the foregoing 
 true sketch of the family and origin of that ostentatious demagogue. 
 
 A FuiEXD OF THE People. 
 
 (From The Times, Jan. 31, 1839.) 
 
 To the Editor of The Times. 
 
 Sir. — The account given in your paper of this morning of the 
 descent of the notorious Connell, alias O'Connell, is perfectly correct. 
 Any member of Lincolns-inn can inform you, on reference to the 
 books for the year 1794', that he was entered of that society as 
 " Connell, Daniel," though it is also certain that he was called to 
 the Irish biir as Daniel O'Connell in 179^. It is also quite true 
 that the mendacious mendicant is in no way connected with 
 the O'Connells of Clare. The late Mr. Connell O'Connell, solicitor 
 of Dublin, Avho was a junior branch of that family, and who died 
 only about three years ago, never either in speech or in writing 
 addressed O'Connell otherwise than as " Daniel Connell." There is 
 not a peasant in Kerry Avho does not know that Council, alias 
 O'Connell, does not possess a foot of fee- simple property.* He 
 is tenant to the college of Dublin, to JMr. Serjeant Goold, and, if 
 I mistake not, to Mr. R. Day, formerly one of the justices of the 
 King's Bench in Ireland. It is also notorious that Lakeview, the 
 residence of James Connell, alias O'Connell, the agitator's brother, 
 is a residence rented on lease, and though John Connell, alias 
 O'Connell, another brother, is possessed of some fee-simple property, 
 yet he has it "ywrc uxoris." There is now resident in England 
 a gentleman who remembers Derrynane Ahheyl (God bless the 
 
 * This is not the case now. Mr. O'Connell is possessed of a small fee-simple 
 property by acquisition and purchase. Sec ante, p. 530. 
 
APPENDIX XIV. 723 
 
 nlarli!) a thatched farmhouse within a period so recent as forty 
 years. All this were unimportant and trivial touching the history 
 of any well-conducted man, who had risen by his own honest 
 exertions to fame and fortune — nay, it were illiberal and unjust to 
 reflect on the humble birth of such a character; but when a fellow, 
 whose origin is not only mean but ignominious, dares to asperse the 
 first men in the country, it is fitting that his own pretensions should 
 be sifted. There was a time when he had a purpose to serve, when 
 Daniel Connell (alias O'Connell) used to recommend his cousin 
 Jeremiah M'Carthy, tailor of Dawson Street, Dublin, to public 
 patronage ; but now we hear no more of this relationship, as Daniel 
 wishes to be taken for a modish and well-born person. In Tralee, 
 however, they know better. About ten years ago the article which 
 I send you was published in a newspaper in that town. It was 
 to-day handed to me by a near relative of the writer, a gentleman 
 of one of the most ancient families of Kerry, who I believe could 
 bring witnesses on oath to prove all, or nearly all, the allegations 
 contained in it. I pray you to give it your readers in extenso, and 
 oblige your constant reader, A "West Briton. 
 
 " o'connell's family history. 
 
 " The account given of the Counsellor and his parents in the N^eto 
 Monthly is in many instances inaccurate, and in some parts quite 
 deficient ; to correct the one or supply the other would occupy more 
 time than I am willing to devote to it, and even did I enter upon 
 the task, " the thing," to use an expression of his Malajidus Achates, 
 Cobbett, would be still incomplete. I therefore think it the more 
 eligible plan to give to you, and through you, sir, to the public, 
 such recollections of Dan's early life and tliat of his parents as may 
 from time to time flit across my memory. To commence in the usual 
 
 style — a place called Ca , situate on a small creek on an arm of 
 
 the sea, near the village of Cahirciveen, in the semi-barbarous and 
 barren district of Iveragh, and the county of Kerry (I like to be 
 precise when treating on an important subject), had the honour of 
 aivino- birth to Daniel Connell. His parents, with some account of 
 one of whom I purpose filling this letter, were Morgan and Mauneen 
 Connell, for such was the name the latter was known by in the 
 country. The only particulars I can remember about her are, that 
 she spoke her vernacular tongue, the ' Gaelic,' in its native purity, 
 had a most invincible contempt for the ' Sassenachs,' or English, so 
 
 3a2 
 
724 APPENDIX XIV. 
 
 much so tliat she was never known to litter a syllable of their 
 language, and seconded the experimental exertions of her helpmate 
 in realizing an ' unconfiscated property ' in the most indefatigable and 
 spirited manner. Morgan, the sire (for he must not be called father), 
 was, as I recollect him in my boyish 3'ears, a smart, bustling, 
 intelligent chap, holding that amphibious place in society which may 
 be conceived but not drawn, and which can only be described by 
 a series of negatives. lie was not a gentleman, nor a farmer, nor 
 a mechanic, nor a wholesale merchant, nor a retail dealer, nor a 
 peasant, nor of any one of these classes per se. You may then 
 perhaps ask me what was he? He was, in fact, a compound of all 
 these, and such as at the present day yon may happen to meet with 
 in some parts of North America, but in no other part of the 
 habitable globe. His son has happily hit him off in his very 
 classical and gentlemanly description of her Majesty's Ministers, 
 whom he speaks of as being neither ' fish, flesh, nor good red- 
 herring,' but a kind of ' oUa podrida,' or ' toss-up of the whole.' 
 To the casual observer the countenance of old Morgan presented an 
 honesty of expression whicli might lead to the supposition that its 
 possessor was at least simple if not absolutely idiotic, but should he 
 have had the occasion to engage in any intercourse with him, deeply 
 would he feel his own sim])licity in coming to so hasty a conclusion ; 
 for, though uncouth and vulgar in his manners, * Morgan had that 
 within which passetli show,' and the shrewd physiognomist at once 
 perceived a certain cut of visage, and a Machiavelian arrangement of 
 features, which expressed, as plainly as could the bumps and pro- 
 minences of the celebrated Doctors Gall and Spnrzheim, the intriguing 
 and money-getting propensities of their possessor. Often have I seen 
 him sitting on a small rudely-formed chair, at the end of the bridge 
 
 of Ca , near the road leading into the village, clothed in what 
 
 the fashionables of modern life call a Waterloo-coloured suit of frieze, 
 with an ink-bottle appended to his button-hole and a goose-quill 
 betwixt his finger and thumb, taking orders from the peasantry for 
 the various contents of the store (for such was the high-sounding 
 name bestowed upon a quondam stable), bo it a bit of soap, a yard of 
 tape, a naggin of whisky, a metal button, a pound of iron for the 
 spade or horse-shoo, or any other little article, almost from an anchor 
 to a needle — old Morgan could accommodate all, and at all times, 
 from the various and chaotic articles with which his repository 
 abounded ; his only charge was the moderate profit of cent, per 
 
APPENDIX XIV. 725 
 
 cent, on tlie first cost, and, should the purchaser not have the specie 
 at hand, why he was ready to adopt the bartering principle of the 
 early ages, and take either the firkin of butter or porkeen pig in 
 lieu thereof. But enough of his appearance and primitive mode o 
 doing business ; his employments were as numerous as they were 
 diversified, and some of them of so contradictory a nature as to 
 puzzle the mind of an ordinary man to reconcile them; but Morgan 
 was not an ordinary man; he was in truth a most extraordinary 
 character, and much I fear the village of Cahirciveen ' ne'er shall 
 look upon his like again.' Cahirciveen considered him as its Caleb 
 Quotem, and though he may not have drawn the teeth of its inha- 
 bitants, they all admit that he shaved them closely, bled them 
 profusely, and critically filled all the ordinary functions with which 
 that dramatic personage is usually invested. Though his ambition 
 ■was rather of an encroaching kind, I never yet heard that he allowed 
 it to take such possession of his faculties as to lead him to tlie 
 imagination of his being of feudal or princely descent ; nor even have 
 I heard it whispered that he supposed there was any connexion 
 between him and the visionary monarchs of Iveragh. His good 
 sense may, perhaps, have prevented the assumption of the theoretical 
 part of royalty, but the same good sense it was, no doubt, if we can 
 believe ' common fame' (who is frequently deemed a common liar, 
 and which from my own knowledge I will not take upon myself 
 to say she is not in the present instance), which dictated to him the 
 exclusive exercise of one of royalty's most valuable prerogatives — 
 the importation of his goods duty free. This prerogative he and his 
 brother Maurice, better known by the name of ' Ilunting-cap' (if 
 the assertions of that romancing damsel I have before alluded to are 
 to be depended on), carried to the greatest extent, and to this, and 
 the principle of free trade, which these ' Adelphi' brought into so 
 early and extensive operation — that to them I believe, and not to 
 Messrs. Canning and Huskisson, we must give the credit of its 
 invention — is Daniel indebted for that ' unconfiscated property' 
 which he spoke of in his evidence before the House of Peers as 
 being solely in his possession.? His assertion at the time, I know, 
 puzzled many ; but it may so happen that, with the clue which I 
 have now furnished, the learned gentleman's evidence will not appear 
 so problematical, and any doubt they may have entertained will be 
 removed ; for if, by a form logicians call concession, we only substi- 
 tute the means whereby a thing is procured for the thing procured, 
 
726 APPENDIX XIV. 
 
 then Daniel's testimony is quite reconcilable, and lie really 13 in 
 possession of property that never yet was confiscated. In the eager 
 pursuit of his favourite theory, that of free trade, the principles of 
 which he had not, at the time I am about to speak of, fully tested 
 by such extensive experiments as at a subsequent period, old IMorgan 
 did not quite overlook those accomplishments whicli refine the human 
 mind, and elegantly dissipate the ennui which will at times beset 
 even the most industrious of mortals. No man in the country round 
 could handle a ' dock of cards' with more dexterity than old Morgan, 
 and few persons, if any, could calculate with a nicer accuracy, not 
 even Counsellor L k of gambling notoriety, and Morgan's coun- 
 tryman, the proper moment to lay down the ace of hearts, the five 
 fingers, or jack of trumps. An instance of the height of perfection to 
 which he attained in this accomplishment it may not be inopportune 
 to give you, especially as to it, and the sound discretion he then 
 used, his after accumulation of wealth, and consequent power of 
 performing those experiments I liave before alluded to, is mainly 
 attributable. Old Morgan held in early life a farm from tlie late 
 Earl of G — n — e, and on tlis gale-day Avent to that nobleman's 
 residence at A-d-rt abbey, in order to pay his rent. After its pay- 
 ment and getting a receipt, a ceremony he never overlooked, ' fast 
 bind, fast find,' being his favourite aphorism, he was about proceed- 
 ing homeward, when the day turning out extremely wet, his noble 
 landlord, with his usual condescension, requested him to remain. 
 
 Morgan hesitated, but at length Lord G being seconded by liis 
 
 fascinating countess, he succeeded in detaining him. It is almost 
 unnecessary to observe, that everything was done to make liis visit 
 comfortable, and render him quite at home. A difficult task you, 
 sir, will admit, when there exists so great a disparity of rank, and 
 a lively feeling of insignificance on the part of the guest ; their 
 •endeavours, however, were crowned with success, and after dinner, 
 his noble hostess, still anxious to add to tlie tenant's amusement, 
 asked him if lie played cards ? Morgan then, in a hesitating manner, 
 and as if afraid to refuse, replied, ' A little, my lady,' and a game 
 was selected, such as was considered would best suit itself to the 
 extent of his acquirements in that polite accomplishment. Tlie 
 event, however, was not that which her ladyship anticipated, and 
 the game terminated with Morgan having won the entire sum which 
 
 he had paid that morning as rent. Lady G , like other losing 
 
 gamesters, attributed her ill luck to an unfavouralile run of the cards, 
 
APPENDIX XIV. 727 
 
 and not to old Morgan's sui^erior experience, and requested him, in 
 expectation of retrieving lier loss, to change the game. Morgan was 
 all complaisance, at the same time prefacing each successive change 
 ■with a profession of his ' knowing but little of any game, my lady.' 
 Not to detain you too long, suffice it to say, that almost every game, 
 from one end of Hoyle to the other, was gone through, and old 
 Morgan proving successful in all, won so large a sum of money as 
 left him rent free on his lordship's property for many years after- 
 wards. But if he was successful, he was by no means importunate, 
 and on the settlement of the night's accounts, he signified to her 
 ladyship, that as in all probability the largeness of the sum he had 
 won might make its immediate payment inconvenient, he would feel 
 himself fully satisfied, and indeed thankful, by his lordship's giving 
 him receipts in advance for the growing rent. Her ladyship thanked 
 him for his kind consideration, the arrangement proposed was at once 
 entered into, and old Morgiin rode home the next day, chuckling in 
 his sleeve, and exclaiming at the interval of every three or four miles, 
 * a little, my lady.' 
 
 " I remain, sir, your obedient servant, 
 
 " A Kerryman." 
 
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736 APPENDIX XX. 
 
 APPENDIX XX. 
 
 Referred to in page 586, as No. 22. 
 
 Opinions of the Press. 
 (From the Belfast Northern Whig.') 
 
 Condition of Ireland and Irish Parties. — We publish to-day, 
 The Times Commissioner's impressions with respect to Belfast and its 
 neighbourhood. His statements are sufficiently precise ; and his re- 
 marks are offered with calmness and candour. His estimate of this town 
 and district is favourable ; and we presume we are entitled to say, without 
 incurring any risk of being charged with partiality, that it could not in 
 fairness have been otherwise. There may be much to be improved, and 
 which we hope will be improved; but, when we compare this part of 
 Ireland with any other, we are satisfied that Ave have cause to indulge a 
 feeling of pride. 
 
 We must not forget — and " the Commissioner" should have remembered 
 — that the Irish people have had to contend against great difficulties. The 
 long dreary ages of political servitude and tyranny under which the great 
 mass of the population had to groan stood in the way of improvement ; 
 and traces of this injustice have been left behind which it may require 
 ages altogether to efface. But the causes of these evils having ceased, it 
 is now for the people to assume something of the dignity of independent en- 
 terprize. — We shall not undertake to say, whether differences of race have 
 anything to do with present differences of condition. This Ave knoAv, that 
 the Repeal orators claim for the Celtic stock natural superiority OA^er the 
 Scotch and English, the despised " Saxons." Now, in this they may, for 
 aught Ave care to contend, be perfectly right; and if they be, it only 
 behoves them the more to prove their superiority by their deeds. If it 
 could be demonstrated, that we have an unfavourable soil and climate, and 
 that our people are, by an irresistible law of Nature, Avcak of body or 
 feeble of mind, then Avould Ave be avcII entitled to extraordinary aids, and 
 to the sympathies and compassions of our felloAV-citizcns. But if, instead 
 of alleging any such thing, we plume ourselves upon our wist superiority 
 in race and soil, Avith Avhat face can Ave hold up our miseries, as beggars 
 expose their sores, craving for the relief of others, Avithout making an 
 effort to benefit ourselves ? We may be entitled — and we are— to CA^ery 
 facility Avhich the Government and the Legislature can afford us for 
 exerting our energies most profitably for ourselves; but beyond this avc 
 do not know that Ave have much to demand, or any right to receiA^e. 
 
APPENDIX XX. 737 
 
 Political claims we are bound to make, wherever we can do so justly, and 
 we have a right to demand for the industrious, whether he be manufac- 
 turer or labourer, every fair security, that he will be enabled to enjoy the 
 fruits of his honest industry. The farmer is entitled to " protection" — 
 not that which is commonly and falsely so called — but protection in the 
 quiet possession of his farm, and in the permanent enjoyment of the 
 improvements which he may create. After this, and with these securities, 
 every man must lay his shoulder to the wheel and do his own work. 
 
 What advantages, we would be glad to learn, have we, in this part of 
 Ireland above all others ? We live in the " Black North," with an un- 
 genial climate ; and, as far as Belfast is concerned, there has been a not 
 favourable port. Nor have we obtained extraordinary assistance from the 
 Government. On the contrary, though they draw large revenues from 
 us, they will not give us a decent Custom House; and they refuse to 
 provide any house, good or bad, for a Post -office ! Lately, it was pro- 
 posed to improve our harbour, and the Government were expected to at 
 least lend the requisite funds, at a moderate rate of interest ; but they 
 refused to do so, agreeing to lend only half, and that on terms so unfavour- 
 able, that the port authorities found it more advantageous to borrow from 
 private individuals, and throw back the contemptible and huckstering 
 offer of the Government. 
 
 How different has been the case in Dublin, where they have got their 
 pubh'c buildings erected, and their harbours made, out of the public funds! 
 And yet, the sounds of beggarly wailing from Dublin patriots are con- 
 stantly ringing in our ears. Here, we make little of all Government 
 relief. We go upon the plan of facing difficulties ourselves, and we 
 succeed. Nor do we claim for the people of Belfast any intellectual 
 superiority over their neighbours. Out of their own departments in 
 business, they are, in general, far from distinguished by shinmg abilities : 
 but, in business, they do their work, as becomes business men ; they act 
 with integrity and energy ; and they thus rise into unassuming prosperity, 
 whilst a set of Dublin men are perhaps spouting, or exhibiting their little 
 property, and waiting on Providence to cast pearls before them, or send 
 them Repeal. 
 
 Though the Northern agriculturists have yet much to learn and to do, 
 they, too, afford examples which the Southerns would do well to imitate. 
 " The Commissioner" refers to the linen trade and the growth of flax, and 
 the subject is one of the utmost interest. Most people are well aware, 
 that flax is an unprotected article. Our Irish flax has come into competi- 
 tion with the flax of all other countries, there being only a nominal duty 
 of a penny per hundred weight upon foreign flax when imported. 
 
 We have, in Ireland, two parties, whose labours are peculiarly well 
 calculated to divert the minds of a large portion of the people from 
 advancing their own interests, by attending to their various duties. At 
 the head of one is Lord Koden. 
 
 3 B 
 
738 APPENDIX XX. 
 
 The other party are the Repealers. We would thank any one to point 
 out Mr. O'Connell's labour for the practical amelioration of his country. 
 He has not done it. He cannot afford time to do it, and does not seem 
 inclined : — it would interfere with " the agitation," and with something 
 else which renders the agitation so fascinating. If the Repealers be deter- 
 mined to prosecute their vain work, let them at least advise the people to 
 endeavour to improve their condition, in the mean time. As it is not very 
 likely that Repeal will come upon us in haste, the people should be told 
 to set about improving their cottages, cultivating their lands better and so 
 forth. As they can do much for themselves, without Repeal, they should 
 be exhorted to do what they can, until Repeal comes. We are making 
 advances in the North, and will, we hope, go on advancing ; and we taunt 
 and treat with scorn those who, from indolence, or other causes, continue 
 to clamour about their difficulties, and look for external aid, whilst they 
 have themselves the power to improve their condition, but Avould rather 
 agitate and lament and play the parts of beggarly patriots, than exert that 
 power, like honest and independent-minded men. 
 
 (From the Belfast Chronicle.') 
 
 "The Times'' Commissioner. — We have given in our preceding 
 columns, from The Times of Saturday, the letter of this gentleman, in 
 reference to his late visit to Belfast. We were prepared to expect that his 
 impressions of its character, intelligence, and business importance, would be 
 of a favourable nature ; and we are gratified to find that our anticipations 
 are correct. He does us, we are bound to say, full justice; and, however 
 much we should have liked to have seen him urging upon the Govern- 
 ment the importance of those local improvements which, as in the case of 
 the Post-office and Custom-house, are absolutely necessarj', we must at the 
 same time, admit that they were beyond the range of his inquiry, if not 
 altogether foreign to the great object of his mission. The Commissioner 
 seems to have made good use of his time while here, and to have seen 
 everything for himself. He trusts nothing to others, but forms his 
 opinions and collects his facts from personal observation, and is thereby 
 enabled to bring together a body of practical information, which is alike 
 creditable to his discrimination and his spirit of painstaking inquiry. He 
 may depend upon it, too, that he has hit the nail on the head when he 
 affirms that the prosperity of the North is mainly owing to the " Saxon " 
 population. They have been, and are, its life-blood, the sources of its 
 industrial energy, the workers-out of its commercial success, the persever- 
 ing creators of its wealth and greatness, and they are, above all, and before 
 all, the staunch, steady, and loyal subjects of a constitutional (iovernmcnt, 
 and the firm friends of a Protestant State. They have made Ulster what 
 she is — an enterprising, intelligent, and prosperous province ; and we say 
 it advisedly, in despite of the frothy verbiage and silly declamations of the 
 
APPENDIX XX. 739 
 
 orators of Conciliation-hall, that there is more real patriotism, in the 
 genuine sense of the word, in the province of Ulster than in the other 
 three put together. We have no vrish whatever to underrate the Celtic 
 population, nor to speak lightly of their talents, kindly dispositions, and 
 moral qualities — far from it— but when we look to the north and see what 
 it has done and is doing, to the south, east, and west, and see what they 
 are not doing and are capable of, we cannot wish them a better wish than 
 that they should have a large infusion of that " Saxon" blood which has 
 worked such wonders in the least naturally-favoured portion of the 
 country. With these few observations we beg to refer our readers to the 
 very interesting letter of The Times Commissioner. 
 
 (From the Jersey Times.) 
 
 Condition of the People of Ireland. — The last letter of " The 
 Times Commissioner" contams an interesting sketch of the state of trade 
 in the sister countrj'. It is dated from Belfast, in many respects by far 
 the most valuable portion of our Irish empire. Belfast is the great 
 stronghold of Irish Protestantism. The province of Ulster may be styled 
 the complete nucleus of the Scotch and English population of Ireland. 
 Partaking to a large extent of the energy and industrious spirits of their 
 fatherland, while most Irish towns in situations equally favourable for 
 prosperity have remained stationary, the mixed races of the north in the 
 course of half a century have raised Belfast to a pitch of amazing 
 prosperitj^ The inhabitants of the great bulk of Ireland of the midland 
 counties of the south and of the west — those of pure Irish extraction, 
 have hitherto had so much of listless apathy, of indolent indifference, of 
 endurmg contentment with any deprivations in their constitution, that in 
 order to improve them it has been necessary to urge them on, shame them 
 on, instruct, and, if necessary, compel them to exert themselves for their 
 own advancement. The case has been different with the mixed in- 
 habitants of Scotch and English descent in the northern and eastern 
 counties of Ireland. Partaking of the energy and industrious spirit of 
 the country from which they sprang, they have required but to be left 
 alone to achieve their ownjprosperity. We extract the description of the 
 trade of Belfast from " The Times Commissioner's" communication of 
 Saturday last. 
 
 3 B 2 
 
APPENDIX, 
 
 Return showing the Number and Ages of Persons who Emigrated direct from 
 
 From Census of 
 
 Ports op 
 Embarka- 
 tion. 
 
 YEARS. 
 
 1832. 
 
 1833. 
 
 1884. 
 
 1835. 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 Total. 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 Total. 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 Total. 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 Total. 
 
 Dublin 
 
 5,049 
 
 8,995 
 
 9,044 
 
 2,724 
 
 2,053 
 
 4,777 
 
 3,891 
 
 2,832 
 
 6,723 
 
 655 
 
 459 
 
 1,114 
 
 Drogheda . 
 
 74 
 
 36 
 
 110 
 
 44 
 
 22 
 
 66 
 
 131 
 
 89 
 
 220 
 
 
 
 .. 
 
 Ross . 
 
 .. 
 
 
 
 • • 
 
 •• 
 
 
 
 •• 
 
 
 • • 
 
 .. 
 
 
 Wexford . 
 
 98 
 
 62 
 
 160 
 
 14 
 
 12 
 
 26 
 
 .. 
 
 .. 
 
 • • 
 
 
 
 .. 
 
 Cork . 
 
 1,978 
 
 1,218 
 
 3,196 
 
 1,404 
 
 926 
 
 2,330 
 
 3,585 
 
 a,324 
 
 5,909 
 
 884 
 
 693 
 
 1,582 
 
 Limerick . 
 
 1,3.52 
 
 1,020 
 
 2,372 
 
 539 
 
 391 
 
 930 1,291 
 
 911 
 
 2,202 
 
 891 
 
 289 
 
 680 
 
 Tralee 
 
 82 
 
 38 
 
 120 
 
 35 
 
 16 
 
 51 99 
 
 61 
 
 160 
 
 126 
 
 93 
 
 219 
 
 Waterford 
 
 1,296 
 
 752 
 
 2,048 
 
 525 
 
 339 
 
 864 i 1,181 
 
 717 
 
 1,848 
 
 463 
 
 243 
 
 706 
 
 Youghall . 
 
 231 
 
 116 
 
 347 
 
 207 
 
 103 
 
 310 101 
 
 46 
 
 147 
 
 .. 
 
 .. 
 
 .. 
 
 Belfast 
 
 5,065 
 
 3,695 
 
 8,760 
 
 2.844 
 
 2,194 
 
 5,038 2,604 
 
 1 
 
 2,234 
 
 4,838 
 
 1,460 
 
 1,222 
 
 2,682 
 
 Londonderry 
 
 100 
 
 52 
 
 152 
 
 2,026 
 
 1,585 
 
 3,561 1 2,182 
 
 1,567 
 
 3,749 
 
 722 
 
 557 
 
 1,279 
 
 Newry 
 
 768 
 
 534 
 
 1,302 
 
 342 
 
 329 
 
 671 1 302 
 
 58 
 
 360 
 
 280 
 
 235 
 
 515 
 
 Galway 
 
 456 
 
 270 
 
 726 
 
 251 
 
 78 
 
 324 244 
 
 162 
 
 406 
 
 126 
 
 90 
 
 216 
 
 Sligo . 
 
 2,169 
 
 1,808 
 
 3,977 
 
 784 
 
 685 
 
 1,469 1,737 
 
 1,426 
 
 3,163 
 
 621 
 
 565 
 
 1,188 
 
 Westport . 
 Total . 
 
 427 
 
 266 
 
 693 
 
 •• 
 
 •• 
 
 264 
 
 176 
 
 440 
 
 87 
 
 49 
 
 136 
 
 19,145 
 
 13,862 
 
 33,007 
 
 n,739 
 
 8,678 
 
 20,417 17,562 
 
 12,603 
 
 30,165 
 
 5,815 
 
 4,500 
 
 10,315 
 
 
 AGES. 
 
 
 
 
 Under 10. 
 
 10 to 30. 
 
 31 to 50. 
 
 Above 50. 
 
 Ages 
 unknown. 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 Total. 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 Total. 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 Total. 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 Total. 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 2,494 
 
 2,266 
 
 4,760 
 
 11,341 
 
 9,377 
 
 20,718 
 
 4,918 
 
 2,580 
 
 7,498 
 
 475 
 
 291 
 
 706 
 
 
 
 30 
 
 26 
 
 56 
 
 166 
 
 05 
 
 261 
 
 48 
 
 22 
 
 70 
 
 5 
 
 4 
 
 9 
 
 
 
 54 
 
 54 
 
 108 
 
 140 
 
 123 
 
 263 
 
 105 
 
 49 
 
 154 
 
 4 
 
 3 
 
 7 
 
 
 
 37 
 
 20 
 
 63 
 
 54 
 
 44 
 
 98 
 
 92 
 
 52 
 
 144 
 
 2 
 
 .. 
 
 2 
 
 
 
 8,275 
 
 3,092 
 
 6,357 
 
 1.5,159 
 
 10,3.50 
 
 25,509 
 
 4,912 
 
 2,492 
 
 7,404 
 
 226 
 
 148 
 
 374 
 
 
 
 1,600 
 
 1,538 
 
 3,1.38 
 
 6,034 
 
 4,285 
 
 10,319 
 
 1,243 
 
 777 
 
 2,020 
 
 48 
 
 52 
 
 100 
 
 
 
 149 
 
 158 
 
 305 
 
 690 
 
 477 
 
 1,167 
 
 125 
 
 71 
 
 196 
 
 111 
 
 6 
 
 17 
 
 
 
 739 
 
 703 
 
 1,442 
 
 5,697 
 
 3,505 
 
 0,202 
 
 985 
 
 489 
 
 1,474 
 
 87 
 
 70 
 
 157 
 
 581 
 
 284 
 
 5,169 
 
 4,708 
 
 9,877 
 
 10,730 
 
 8,868 
 
 19,508 
 
 6,254 
 
 4,704 
 
 10,058 
 
 602 
 
 563 
 
 1,165 
 
 
 
 3,353 
 
 3,203 
 
 6,556 
 
 7,416 
 
 6,283 
 
 13,699 
 
 4,907 
 
 4,001 
 
 8,968 
 
 729 
 
 611 
 
 1,340 
 
 
 
 39.3 
 
 293 
 
 686 
 
 1,184 
 
 842 
 
 1,900 
 
 848 
 
 526 
 
 1,374 
 
 39S 
 
 323 
 
 718 
 
 
 
 15.-, 
 
 133 
 
 283 
 
 1,099 
 
 716 
 
 1,815 
 
 478 
 
 150 
 
 628 
 
 62 
 
 30 
 
 fiS 
 
 
 
 1,00-. 
 
 I '767 
 
 3,672 
 
 80,11 
 
 8,257 
 
 17,168 
 
 3,021 
 
 2,082 
 
 5,103 
 
 133 
 
 125 
 
 308 
 
 
 
 aro 
 
 19,023 
 
 237 
 
 507 
 
 1,246 
 
 773 
 
 2,019 
 
 306 
 
 165 
 
 401 
 
 35 
 
 23 
 
 58 
 
 
 
 18,192 
 
 37,815 
 
 69,807 
 
 53,995 
 
 123,802 
 
 28,243 
 
 18.210 
 
 46,452 
 
 2,864 
 
 2,249 
 
 6,113 
 
 581 
 
 284 
 
No. XXI. 
 
 Ireland to Colonies and Foreign Countries during the ten years ending 6th June 1841. 
 Ireland, 1841, 
 
 YEARS. > 
 
 1836. 
 
 1837. 
 
 1838. 
 
 1839. 
 
 1840. 
 
 1841. '; 
 
 3' 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 Total. 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 Total. 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 Total. 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 Total. 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 Total. 
 
 M. 
 
 F. 
 
 Totalt 
 
 2,131 
 
 1,396 
 
 3,527 
 
 1,898 
 
 1,389 
 
 3,287 
 
 •• 
 
 
 
 335 
 
 291 
 
 626 
 
 1,447 
 
 47 
 
 1,237 
 29 
 
 2,684 
 76 
 
 1,098 
 
 303 
 26 
 
 862 
 
 229 
 9 
 
 1,96C 
 
 ■J 
 
 3,165 
 
 2,181 
 
 5,346 
 
 5,076 
 
 2,832 
 
 7,908 
 
 124 
 
 122 
 
 246 
 
 1,016 
 
 757 
 
 1,773 
 
 3,137 
 
 2,356 
 
 5,493 
 
 3,203 
 
 2,658 
 
 S,86^i 
 
 554 
 
 327 
 
 881 
 
 1,008 
 
 693 
 
 1,701 
 
 230 
 
 234 
 
 464 
 
 420 
 
 366 
 
 786 
 
 1,496 
 
 1,107 
 
 2,603 
 
 1,644 
 
 1,314 
 
 ».»! 
 
 isy 
 
 108 
 
 241 
 
 1C3 
 
 84 
 
 247 
 
 4 
 
 12 
 
 16 
 
 52 
 
 41 
 
 93 
 
 64 
 
 53 
 
 117 
 
 217 
 
 204 
 
 Hi 
 
 1,81SS| 
 
 940 
 
 620 
 
 1,360 
 
 1,090 
 
 713 
 
 1,803 
 
 156 
 
 113 
 
 269 
 
 214 
 
 148 
 
 362 
 
 912 
 
 588 
 
 1,500 
 
 781 
 
 534 
 
 .. 
 
 .. 
 
 
 .. 
 
 .. 
 
 
 
 
 .. 
 
 .. 
 
 .. 
 
 .. 
 
 .. 
 
 .. 
 
 .. 
 
 42 
 
 19 
 
 OH 
 
 1,492 
 
 1,216 
 
 2,708 
 
 1,932 
 
 1,531 
 
 3,463 
 
 562 
 
 499 
 
 1,061 
 
 1,292 
 
 1,132 
 
 2,424 
 
 2,325 
 
 2,145 
 
 4,470 
 
 3,179 
 
 2,975 
 
 6,154) 
 
 1.734 
 
 1,247 
 
 2,981 
 
 2,071 
 
 1,646 
 
 3,717 
 
 851 
 
 781 
 
 1,632 
 
 1,839 
 
 1,818 
 
 3,657 
 
 2,436 
 
 2,327 
 
 4,763 
 
 2,444 
 
 2,628 
 
 ^.074 
 582|| 
 
 286 
 
 287 
 
 573 
 
 20 
 
 45 
 
 65 
 
 
 
 
 78 
 
 30 
 
 108 
 
 300 
 
 268 
 
 568 
 
 384 
 
 198 
 
 253 
 
 130 
 
 383 
 
 110 
 
 51 
 
 161 
 
 .. 
 
 
 .. 
 
 
 
 
 122 
 
 99 
 
 221 
 
 232 
 
 154 
 
 ssej 
 
 1,420 
 
 105 
 
 2,525 
 
 1,559 
 
 1,162 
 
 2,721 
 
 351 
 
 385 
 
 736 
 
 1,026 
 
 971 
 
 1,997 
 
 2,622 
 
 2,363 
 
 4,985 
 
 1,731 
 
 1,761 
 
 3,492i: 
 
 53 
 
 22 
 
 75 
 
 186 
 
 123 
 
 309 
 
 •• 
 
 •• 
 
 •• 
 
 5 
 
 4 
 
 9 
 
 418 
 
 250 
 
 668 
 
 417 
 
 298 
 
 7m; 
 
 12,161 
 
 8,639 
 
 20,800 
 
 15,113 
 
 10,269 
 
 25,382 
 
 2,278 
 
 2,146 
 
 4,424 
 
 6,277 
 
 5,558 
 
 11,835 
 
 15,326 
 
 12,822 
 
 28,148 
 
 15,701 
 
 13,853 
 
 29,55^ 
 
 1 
 
 TO WHAT COUNTRIES. 
 
 British America. 
 
 United States. 
 
 Australian Colonies. 
 
 West Indies. 
 
 Other 
 Countries. 
 
 Total. 
 
 General^ I 
 TotaL?i 
 
 1' 
 
 M. 
 
 18,253 
 
 249 
 
 303 
 
 138 
 
 21,769 
 
 8,539 
 
 975 
 
 7,353 
 
 581 
 
 17 924 
 
 12,206 
 
 2,563 
 
 1,569 
 
 13,695 
 
 1,675 
 
 107,792 
 
 13,712 
 147 
 
 229 
 
 93 
 
 14,646 
 
 6,272 
 
 710 
 
 4,625 
 
 284 
 
 15,075 
 
 9,857 
 
 1,906 
 
 915 
 
 11,881 
 
 1,081 
 
 81,433 
 
 31,965 
 
 896 
 
 532 
 
 231 
 
 36,415 
 
 14,811 
 
 1,685 
 
 11,978 
 
 865 
 
 32,999 
 
 22,063 
 
 4,469 
 
 2,484 
 
 25,576 
 
 2,756 
 
 189,225 
 
 M. 
 613 
 
 47 
 
 998 
 
 64 
 
 4,363 
 3,682 
 197 
 225 
 325 
 182 
 
 10,725 
 
 29 
 630 
 52 
 
 3,368 
 3,827 
 78 
 114 
 850 
 107 
 
 9,050 
 
 Tolal. 
 1,095 
 
 76 
 
 1,628 
 
 116 
 
 805 
 249 
 
 7,731 
 7,509 
 275 
 339 
 675 
 289 
 
 19,775 
 
 252 
 
 509 
 
 2.300 
 
 Total. 
 
 M. F. Total 
 
 796 
 267 
 
 269 
 474 
 
 2,253 
 
 1,601 
 516 
 
 521 
 
 983 
 
 4,553 
 
 M. 
 
 19,228 
 
 249 
 
 303 
 
 185 
 
 23,572 
 
 8,925 
 
 975 
 
 7,508 
 
 581 
 
 i 22,755 
 
 16,405 
 
 2,760 
 
 1,794 
 
 14,020 
 
 1,857 
 
 121,117 
 
 F. 
 
 14,514 
 147 
 
 229 
 
 122 
 
 16,072 
 
 6,652 
 
 710 
 
 4,767 
 
 284 
 
 18,843 
 
 14,158 
 
 1,984 
 
 1,029 
 
 12,231 
 
 1,188 
 
 92,930 
 
 33,743' 
 396 
 532 
 
 307 
 39,644 
 15,577 
 1,685|' . 
 12,2765; 
 865^1 
 41,598' 
 30,563'' 
 4,744 
 2,82S!> 
 26,251 1' 
 
 3,045 ;i 
 
 k 
 
 214,047' 
 
742 APPENDIX XXII. 
 
 APPENDIX XXII. 
 
 liTEURNS RELATIVE TO THE GROWTH OF FLAX IN IRELAND. 
 
 I'":xtracts from the 5th Annual Report of the Irish Flax Improvement Society, 
 — Paper presented to the House of Commons by command of Her Majesty. 
 1846. 
 
 The Society estimate the quantity of this year's flax crop in Ireland 
 " at about one-fourth less than last year, say 28,000 tons. Although 
 there has thus been a considerable deficit in the quantity, the value of 
 the crop being greatly enhanced by the scarcity of the produce, both 
 here and on the continent, is about equal to that of last year. At 451. 
 per ton, average, the value of the crop of 1844 was taken at 1,782, 495^. 
 Calculating the advanced price of all qualities of flax at 12^. per ton. 
 average, the value of the crop of 1S45 would be 1,590,000/. ; and adding 
 the value of the seed saved for all purposes, the entire amount realized 
 in Ireland, for the flax crop of the present year, may be estimated at 
 1,750,000/., being about the same amount as last year." 
 
 This deficiency in the crop the Society attribute to a deficiency of 
 good seed, and to the fraudulent sale to the Irish farmers of inferior 
 seed. 
 
 With regard to the saving of seed, the Report states that " the saving 
 of flax-seed for feeding cattle, or to be sold for the oil mills, has always 
 been recommended by the Society, as enabling the farmer to realize an 
 additional 3/. to 41. per acre, which was formerly, and even yet is, in 
 many instances, thrown away. Under the instruction of the agricul- 
 turists, this practice has been yearly gaining ground ; and a very large 
 quantity of the flax-seed crop is now saved." And the Society regarding 
 this home-grown seed, reports that " they can now fairly say, that ex- 
 cellent crops of flax may be grown from the seed which has been saved, 
 in this country, by the Courtrai method, from the growth of foreign 
 flax-seed. As soon as the result of the present crop confirmed them in 
 this opinion, they circulated, extensively, full instructions, recommend- 
 ing every farmer to save a portion of his crop, in this way, and thus 
 secure, for the following year, fresh and genuine seed. * * * 
 If this plan were fully carried out, it would be only necessary to 
 import, annually from the continent, the quantity required to rear seed 
 for the following year's sowing. One-sixth of the present importation 
 would thus suffice, and a saving to the country be cflected of 150,000/. 
 to 160,000/. per annum, now expended in foreign flax-seed, besides the 
 
APPENDIX XXII. 743 
 
 very important advantages of being rendered almost independent of 
 foreigners for the extent of our crop of flax, and of being secured from 
 any chance of the failure of that crop from the use of spurious or 
 inferior seed." 
 
 With regard to the advantages of cultivating flax, the Society reports 
 that " they have no hesitation in recording their opinion that, great as 
 have been the benefits resulting from the culture of the flax-crop in 
 Ulster, these benefits will be greatly enhanced in the poorer districts 
 of the other provinces, whose soil and climate are generally much supe- 
 rior, and the rate of wages considerably less. The introduction of a 
 crop into the farmer's rotation, which is so highly profitable, and 
 which, succeeding best when grown after grain, does not interfere with 
 that staple product, and produces, in the seed, a rapst nutritive food for 
 all kinds of stock, will be justly estimated ; while the people, having no 
 old prejudices to overcome, will receive, with full benefit, the agricul- 
 turists' instructions, and will commence at once the management of the 
 crop on the most approved system." 
 
 The Society reports that " there is little question that the future 
 increase and prosperity of the linen trade will be regulated, to a great 
 extent, by the quantity of flax which may be grown in Ireland. It is 
 now candidly acknowledged by the spinning trade of the United King- 
 dom, that Irish flax, for the great majority of fabrics, is of very superior 
 quality to that of foreign growth; and that, therefore, the yarn made 
 from that flax, and the linen woven from that yarn, cannot be excelled, 
 for appearance and durability, in any market in the world. * * 
 
 Independently, then, of the claims which flax culture has, on the 
 ground of profit to the farmer and employment to the labourer, it has 
 to add the very important one of mainly contributing to uphold and 
 increase a manufacture which employs thousands of hands in its prose- 
 cution, has distributed wealth wherever it has settled, and is, in fact, 
 the most flourishing and important of the industrial resources of 
 Ireland." 
 
 In conclusion, the Society justly say, " It would not then be too 
 much to expect, that a wonderful increase of the linen trade would 
 result, and that the manufacture of linen might stand in the same 
 relation to Ireland which the manufacture of cotton has done to Eng- 
 land ; with this important diff'erence, that, whereas, in the latter case, 
 millions are expended in foreign countries for a raw material, which our 
 climate does not permit us to grow ; in the former, these millions 
 would be expended at home, for the produce of Irish soil, the labour of 
 Irish hands, and wealth and industry spread happiness and comfort 
 through the land." 
 
 "An account of the quantity of foreign flax imported in 1843 and 
 1844, and in the first nine months of the present year (1845) : — 
 
744 APPENDIX XXII. 
 
 Quantities Imported into the Uyiited Kingdon\ — Flax and Tow, or 
 Codilla of Flax. 
 
 Cwts. 
 Year 1843 .... 1,437,150 
 1844 . . . . 1,588,494 
 
 Nine months ended 10th Oct., 1845 . 1,049,121 
 
 "The imports of flax during the last six years are as follow, respec- 
 tively : — 
 
 1841 
 
 67,368 do. 
 
 1842 
 
 55,113 do. 
 
 1843 
 
 71,857 do. 
 
 1844 
 
 79,424 do. 
 
 1845 to 10th Oct. . 
 
 52,456 do. 
 
 Total quantity in six years, 388,867 tons,iworth £19,443,350 
 
 " The consumption of another part of the flax crop is very great — 
 viz., the seed, and the oil cake which is manufactured from it, Loth of 
 which are nsed most extensively for fattening cattle, in Great Britain.^ 
 
 " The following returns of the quantities imported of these articles, 
 are furnished in a statement from the Board of Trade, hearing date 
 24th Nov., 1845 :— 
 
 Statement of the Qicantities of Flax-seed, and of Oil Cakes, Imported into 
 the United Kingdom, in each of the Years 1843 end 1844, cmd also in 
 the Nine Months ended lOth October, 1845. 
 
 
 Flax-seed. 
 
 Oil Cakes 
 
 
 Qrs. 
 
 Tons. 
 
 1843 
 
 470,539 
 
 63,267 
 
 1844 
 
 616,947 
 
 85,890 
 
 1845 to 10th Oct. 
 
 428,292 
 
 Returns not yet received. 
 
 " From these tables may be learned the value of the difTcrent pro- 
 ducts of the flax crop annually imported from foreign countries: — 
 
 1843. 
 
 71,857 tons flax, at £50 . . £3,592,850 
 
 470,539 qrs. seed, at 2 5 . . 1,058,713 
 
 63,267 tons oil cakes, at 7 10 . . 474,622 
 
 £5,126,185 
 
 1844. . 
 
 79,424 tons flax, at £50 0.. £3,971,200 
 
 616,947 qrs. seed, at 2 5 . . 1,388,131 
 
 85,890 tons oil cakes, at 7 10 . . 644,175 
 
 £6,003,506 
 
APPENDIX XXII. 745 
 
 " Thus we find that from five to six millions sterling are annually 
 drained out of the country to pay foreign nations for the produce of a 
 crop which can be grown at home, with profit to the farmer, afibrding 
 great employment to the labourer, and benefiting the community at 
 large." 
 
 Value of Well-Managed Flax. 
 
 " The following instance will show the value that may be realized on 
 flax, by judicious treatment : — 
 
 ''Model Farm, Caledon, Nov. 29th, 1845. 
 
 " Sir, — In answer to yours of the 24th, I have much pleasure in fur- 
 nishing you with an account of the flax crop, and expenses thereon, 
 grown on the Earl of Caledon's model farm. Crop, 1845. 
 
 Produce of 1 acre 1 rood 39 perches, sold at 
 
 11*. 9rf. per stone . . . .£55 19 7^ 
 
 Tow 8 
 
 130 bushels bows, which I consider well worth 
 8d. per bushel . . . . .468 
 
 
 
 £60 14 3i 
 
 Expenses of Crop. 
 
 
 
 5 bushels seed 
 
 £3 16 
 
 6 
 
 Weeding 
 
 10 
 
 
 
 Pulling, rippling, and steeping 
 Taking out of steep — spreading 
 Lifting and tying 
 Scutching 
 
 4 3 
 2 1 
 1 2 
 4 9 
 
 8 
 4 
 
 8 
 
 4h 
 
 16 3 6' 
 
 
 
 
 Leaving a balance of . . £44 10 9 
 
 " Or at the rate of 29^. 13*. lOd. per acre, after deducting all 
 expenses. 
 
 " It is but fair to add, that we had to carry the flax to and from the 
 steep, on barrows, eight perches, as the steep was in a bog, and the 
 carts could not get near it — consequently, had the carts got close to the 
 steep, there would have been at least 1/. 10*. saved. 
 
 " I am. Sir, your most obedient servant, 
 
 *J. MacAdam,ju7i., £sq." "John Barr, Manager. 
 
•iC) APPENDIX XXIII. 
 
 APPENDIX XXIII. 
 
 Referred to in page 593. 
 
 Abstract of Evidence taken before tlie Land Commissioners as to the evils created 
 by tlie class of ' Middlemen.' 
 
 Richard Samuel Guinness, Esq. land-agent of Dublin, in his evidence 
 before the land commissioners, Part. I. p. 46, is asked, — 
 
 " 219. Is tluTc a great proportion of the property in the county of Tipperary 
 in the hands of middlemen ? More, I should say, than in most other counties. 
 
 " 220. From your own observation, is the treatment of the tenants by middle- 
 men, generally speaking, different from that of the head landlord, where the 
 tenants are immediately under his control ? Yes, my opinion is, that they are 
 much more severe landlords than the owners of the soil would be. 
 
 " 221. Do they generally exact higher rents? Yes, they generally exact higher 
 rents. 
 
 " 224. Have you had occasion, in your capacity of agent, to eject middlemen 
 for non-payment of rent ? Yes. 
 
 " 225. Has that happened in those cases where the occupiers of the land have 
 paid the rents, for which you have been obliged to eject the middlemen ? Yes ; 
 that is a case which has occurred frequently. I know many cases of that sort." 
 
 Joseph Kincaid, Esq. land-agent of Dublin, in his evidence before the 
 land commissioners, Part I. j). 66, is asked, — 
 
 " 86. Has it occurred to you in your experience in different counties, to 
 see cases in which the middleman has managed to reserve to himself the last 
 year of the term, so that he might set up a claim as tenant in possession to a 
 renewal ? There are several cases of that kind, where the tenant reserved a year ; 
 and there are also cases where the middleman having a lease, and his tenant not 
 having a lease, he has taken steps for getting rid of some of the occupying tenants, 
 so as to be in the possession of a part of the land himself at the expiration of the 
 lease." 
 
 James Lennox William Napcr, Esq. of Meath, in his evidence before 
 the land commissioners. Part I. p. 124, is asked, — 
 
 " 75. Do you find that the system of middlemen has operated against the 
 introduction of a system of drainage 1 Yes ; it has destroyed the whole property 
 ■where the middleman has introduced a large body of tenantry, or has found it 
 introduced ; he has sometimes nothing left but to take the highest rent he can, 
 and the landlord cannot renew with him. He could not turn off the tenantry- 
 he is a mere annuitant at a rack-rent, and it is his interest to be so." 
 
APPENDIX XXIII. 747 
 
 Mr. Robert Brown Kildrum, near Ballymena, in the county of Antrim, 
 farmer, in his evidence before the land commissioners, Part I. p. 565, is 
 asked, — 
 
 " 42. Which of the tenants are best off? There is scarcely a question on the 
 subject ; those holding under the chief landlord are best off, and those holding 
 under the others are in the height of misery. 
 
 " 53. I do not allude to gentlemen holding to\vn-lands in perpetuity, and 
 setting them out again ; we find such persons as good as the chief landlords ; but 
 then there is another class who will, perhaps, hold forty or fifty acres at will 
 under the chief landlord, and sub-let to poor people in five or six acres, charging 
 them 50 or 75 or 100 per cent, profit. This is contrary to the feeling of the chief 
 landlord generally, but so it is. It is well known that our chief landlords like as 
 little interference with their tenantry as possible, and they would rather look 
 over it than notice it, but such things do exist, very injuriously to the poor 
 people ; and I know that many who hold under middlemen, hold at an exorbi- 
 tant rent : and that they are deterred from making any improvements, knowing 
 they have no tenant-right in their little holdings, and knowing if they make any 
 improvements they will be taken advantage of by the man they immediately hold 
 under, and that checks them from actually improving the land, and benefiting 
 themselves. 
 
 " 54. I hold a field under a middleman convenient to myself; it was a barren 
 moor, you might call it ; but I held it as convenient to my own house, and I 
 knew as well then as I do now, that it was in great need of being drained, dug, 
 and cultivated ; but such was my feeling, believing that if I would improve it, 
 that upon the first opportunity this middleman would pounce upon me and 
 charge an extra rent, I neither did the one nor the other, but kept it for my 
 ducks and geese, and kept it in that way till I bought the tenant-right ; and now 
 I hold under the head landlord that same field, and I have drained it and dug it 
 at an expense of from 81. to 91. per acre, and had a splendid crop of turnips off 
 it last year; and had I been holding it now under the middleman, I would 
 neither have dug it nor drained it, nor had such a crop of turnips. 
 
 " 60. Docs that middleman who refuses to acknowledge the tenant-right of the 
 person holding under him consider he has a tenant-right under the landlord? 
 Indeed he docs, and would think it a veiy great hardship any person saying he 
 had not ; and I have been tickled a good deal with the two-sided stories I have 
 heard middlemen make use of, if Lord Mountcashel will not allow them the 
 tenant-right, they are loud in their complaints, tliough they do not admit it at all.' ' 
 
 Edward Houston Caulfield, Esq. of Drumkan, Stewartstown, in the 
 county of Tyrone, in his evidence before the land commissioners, Part I. 
 p. 654, says, — 
 
 " 6. Those who hold under the large landlords have nothing to complain of 
 in this country ; but wherever a farmer has land to dispose of he lets it at a 
 most immoderate rent. All the small occupiers, with a very few exceptions, 
 have their land at a very high rent. 
 
 " 7. Do you mean tenants holding under middlemen ? — Yes, under middle- 
 men ; but if holding under the large proprietors, they have nothing to complain 
 of, and, as a proof of it, they never require leases " 
 
748 APPENDIX XXIIl. 
 
 Andrew Spoteswood, Esq. of Millbrook, in the county of Londonderry, 
 magistrate, in his evidence before the land commissioners, Part I. p. 666. 
 is asked, — 
 
 "3. Do the tenants hold generally through the country immediately under the 
 proprietor or under a middleman, and what is the relative condition of the tenants 
 under each class ? — They hold very much under both, but those under the large 
 proprietors are much better off in every respect than under the middleman. 
 Upon the Bellaghy estate they hold under the middleman, and they are in great 
 poverty.'' 
 
 Thomas Douglas Bateson, Esq. of Linsford House, near Buncana, in 
 the county of Donegal, land-agent, in his evidence before the land com- 
 missioners. Part I. p. 720, says, — 
 
 ' 14. I consider the tenants in a far worse condition under middlemen than if 
 they were under the direct landlord." 
 
 John Stratton, Esq. Dundalk, in the county of Louth, land-agent, in 
 his evidence before the land commissioners. Part I. p. 869, is asked, — 
 
 "30. What is the state of the tenantry under the middlemen compared with 
 those holding under the head landlords? — The tenants holding under middlemen 
 are in great poverty and misery generally. 
 
 " 54. I think no man in the rank of a landed proprietor would put the law of 
 distress into force in such a way as I have seen it. I have seen the bed taken 
 from under the wife and children, and great harshness used by middlemen." 
 
 Mr. Patrick Corfield, of Farravathy, Monaghan, farmer, in his evidence 
 before the land commissioners, Part I. p. 875, says, — 
 
 18. The middlemen are the greatest curse the country has." 
 
 Charles Horatio Kennedy, Esq. of Henrietta Street, Dublin, estate-agent, 
 in his evidence before the land commissioners, Part I. p. 979, says, — 
 
 "21. Tenants under the courts or under middlemen are subjected to many 
 and grievous disadvantages as compared with those who hold immediately under 
 the proprietor of the soil; as, for example, in the case of a middleman, it would 
 not be worth his while, in most instances, to take the responsibility, and burden 
 himself with the collection of the rents of his under tenants, and the risk of de- 
 fault in their payments, had he not a profit rent sufficient to remunerate him for 
 doing so ; and it is reasonable to suppose that he himself pays to the proprietor 
 the equitable value of the land which he underlets. Thus the under tenants 
 must necessarily be liable to him for an exorbitant rent.'' 
 
 Thomas Gerrard, Esq. Liscarton Castle, Meath, in his evidence before 
 the land commissioners, Part II. p. 60, says, — 
 
 "7. In certain parts of the district there are numerous small holdings, origi- 
 nally sub-let by former middlemen, but from the lease having expired they are 
 now immediately under the proprietor. The object the middlemen had hereto- 
 fore in view was, that of taking a tract at a reasonable rent, and, by subletting 
 
APPENDIX XXIII. 749 
 
 it in small portions to needy persons, thereby to make a considerable profit (as it 
 would not be given without it). The general effect of this was the destruction 
 of the gi'ound and ruin of the occupier, from his inability to improve or even 
 pay the rent, unless through the assistance of partial labour. The system is not 
 countenanced by landlords, and is practised contrary to agreement, at the same 
 time it is seldom that any course is adopted to prevent it. The effects of the 
 above system are the great increase of population and pauperism and no intro- 
 duction of capital." 
 
 Pierce Crosby, Esq. of BuUyheige Castle, Kerry, in his evidence before 
 the land commissioners, is asked, — 
 
 " 8. Do the tenants hold in common ? — Mostly ; very much, indeed. The 
 whole extent of my property is under very old leases, made by my grandfather, 
 and there is an amazing number of tenantry brought in. It is sub-divided to a 
 dreadful extent. At the death of every parent, all the children get an acre or 
 two, and there is no possibility of stopping it. 
 
 " 9. Are there any covenants in those leases against it ?— No, not in those. 
 Any of those made by my father or myself have covenants against it ; but it is 
 almost impossible to enforce them. 
 
 " 10. Ai-e the occupiers in those cases you have referred to generally tenants 
 at will under the middlemen ? — Yes, generally speaking. 
 
 " Does he interfere in any way to prevent sub-division ?— iVb, he encourages it, 
 decidedly.*— (Evidence, Part XII. p. 837.) 
 
 David John Wilson, of Belvoir, near Sixmilebridge, Clare, in his evi- 
 dence before the land commissioners, is asked, — 
 
 "7. Do the tenants hold immediately under the landlord, or are there many 
 middlemen in this district ? — The tenure is derived in various ways, but, gene- 
 rally speaking, so little attention has hitherto been paid by landlords (myself 
 among the number) to the state of their tenantry, that but little difference is 
 perceptible in the state of their houses or farms. Persons deriving immediately 
 under the landlord, however, do not pay such high rents as those deriving under 
 middlemen and sub-middlemen, for I have almost invariably found that as the 
 grades descend the rents increase. They have also the advantage of having no 
 more than one person to claim rent from them. I have known tenants dis- 
 trained, and their stock (in three or four instances) impounded by five several 
 claimants within the course of ten or fifteen days." {Evidence, Part II. p. 752). 
 
 Thomas Hughes Grayden, Esq. of Ardcarn, near Galway, land-agent, 
 in his evidence before the land commissioners. Part II. p. 503, is asked, — 
 
 " 25. Do the tenants hold immediately under the proprietor, the middlemen, 
 or under the courts, and what is the relative condition of the tenants under each 
 class? — Those holding under the proprietor are in far better condition than those 
 either under the courts or middlemen. In some cases those under the courts 
 
 * Is not this precisely the course taken] by Mr. O'Connell as a middleman, 
 and by him plausibly taken credit for? 
 
750 APPENDIX XXIII. 
 
 are in a very wretched state, from their rents being at a rack rate, in order td 
 increase the rental to raise money on, previous to its going into the courts, and 
 the want of power to re-let or reduce their rents ; those under the middleman 
 are in a similar state, as he invariably extorts the highest rent that can by pos- 
 sibility be got." 
 
 Mr. Huo-h Porter, of Clubbock, near Ballyjames, Cavan, farmer, in his 
 evidence before the land commissioners, Part II. p. 98, is asked, — 
 
 " 30. Which tenantry are the best off, those under the proprietors or under 
 the middlemen? — Under the proprietors. The middlemen grind them to 
 powder; they only care to get all they can." 
 
 Arthur John Vesey Lindsey Burchell, Esq. of Blackrock House, Drum- 
 shambo, in the county of Leitrim, magistrate, in his evidence before the 
 land commissioners, Part II. p. 247, is asked, — 
 
 " Are there many middlemen ? — There are. 
 ■ " What is the state and condition of the tenants under them compared to the 
 tenants holding under landlords in fee ? — They pay higher rents generally, and 
 they are greatly harassed in general." 
 
 Eobert Bowen, Esq. of Graham, near Hollymount, in the county of 
 Mayo, magistrate, in his evidence before the land commissioners. Part II. 
 p. 464, is asked, — 
 
 " 30. Do the tenants hold generally under the proprietors, or are there many 
 middlemen ? — Yes ; a great many. 
 
 "31. What is the condition of the tenants holding under them? — Most 
 wretched, in many instances." 
 
 Robert D'Arcy, of Woodville, county of Galway, farmer and agent, in 
 his evidence before the land commissioners, Part II. p. 554, says, — 
 
 " The middlemen, we found, destroyed everything they had to do with. They 
 were not satisfied with the profit from farming, but they covered the land with 
 poor tenants ; and it is easy to explain to any one acquainted with the country 
 the desire they have to sub-divide. Every man who has twenty acres of land, if 
 he has a good house, and a barn, and a cow-house, and stable, the first thing he 
 does is to put his son into the barn. The son says, " I am not satisfied to live 
 in that manner with you, and I will put up a chimney in the stable; and they 
 never stop till they cover the little farm that was once a comfortable thing, and 
 bring the greatest possible misery upon themselves." 
 
 John Moylan, of Redwood, in the county of Tipperary, land-holder, in 
 his evidence before the land commissioners, Part II, p. 582, is asked, — 
 
 " 38. Are there any middlemen in your part of the country ? — Yes. 
 
 " 39. Is the rent paid to the middlemen larger than the rent paid to the land- 
 lord ? — It is larger. 
 
 " 41. Do you hear any complaints of the middlemen for seting their land too 
 high?— Yes." 
 
APPENDIX XXIII. 751 
 
 James Molony, Esq. of Kiltanon, near TuUagh, in the county of Clare, 
 magistrate, in his evidence before the land commissioners, Part 11. p. 662, 
 says,— 
 
 " 13. The tenants who hold immediately under the proprietors are better off 
 than those who hold under middlemen." 
 
 William Monsell, Esq. of Tervoe, in the county of Limerick, landed 
 proprietor and magistrate, in his evidence before the land commissioners, 
 Part II. p. 738, is asked, — 
 
 "11. Have you found it desirable and practicable to have the labourers hold- 
 ing tlieir ground immediately from you ? . .Yes, decidedly. There was a curious 
 instance occurred at the Petty Sessions, at Patrick's Well, on Friday last ;~There 
 was a man who appeared before us, and it happened to come out in the course 
 of his examination, that he paid tliirty days' work for four perches of ground, 
 and he built a house upon tire ground. The person he held from held eight acres 
 and a half, and he paid dl. 8s. 5d. an acre, the outside value of the land being 
 about 21, an acre. He held it from a middleman, that middleman held from 
 another, and he held again from the head landlord ; and I should say that such 
 cases are not rare." 
 
 Mr. John Patrick Sullivan, of Killarney, Kerry, reporter for The 
 Tralee Chronicle, in his evidence before the land commissioners, Part II. 
 p. 871, is asked, — 
 
 *' 8. What is the usual rent of average land of good quality? — If let by the 
 acre, about from 1?. to 30*. I consider that rents are not too high, under re- 
 spectable proprietors, if the occupiers had intelligence and capital ; but, under 
 middlemen, the rents are disproportionably high; it is principally a lump rent. 
 Middlemen set at enormously high rents, and they seem to be regardless of any- 
 thing but the collection of the rent." 
 
 Mr. James McLure, Castlevien, about five miles west of Kenmare, in 
 the county of Kerry, farmer, in his evidence before the land commis- 
 sioners. Part II. p. 909, is asked, — 
 
 " 29, What is the difference in the condition of the tenants? — The land is 
 much dearer under the middlemen. 
 
 " 30. What is the state of the tenantry? — They are poorer under the middle- 
 men." 
 
 William Henry Herrick, Esq. of Shippool, near Innishannon, county of 
 Cork, magistrate, in his evidence before the land commissioners. Part II. 
 p. 986, is asked, — 
 
 " 34. Wliat is the condition of the tenantry under the middleman, compared 
 with the tenants under the head landlord? — Those town-lands held under the 
 middlemen are occupied by the greatest paupers, and the most wretched tenantry. 
 I have two town-lands on my own estate, held by long leases, under middlemen^ 
 and they are the worst part, the most pauperised, and worst tilled.'* 
 
752 APPENDIX XXIII. 
 
 Christopher Galway, Esq, of Killarney, land-agent, in his evidence before 
 t he Land Commissioners, is asked, — 
 
 " 1. You reside in Killarney? — Yes. 
 
 " 2. Are you land-agent to the Earl of Kenmare, for his estates in the neigh- 
 bourhood of Bantry, in the county of Cork ? I am, and have acted as such for 
 nearly forty years past. 
 
 " 3. What, in general, is the state of cultivation, and the condition of the 
 t enantry, on these estates ? — In general, the agriculture is in a very backward 
 state, for the most part. The lands are impoverished, and badly fenced ; drain- 
 ing and green crops are unknown ; the tenantry are badly housed, ill fed, and 
 i 1 1 clothed ; and there are either no roads through the farms, or such as are im- 
 passable for the greater part of the year. 
 
 " 4. To what do you attribute this state of things ? — To the middlemen's system. 
 For the greater portion of the time during which I have acted as his Lordship's 
 agent, and up to the year 1835, all his Lordship's estates in the barony of Bantry 
 were held by middlemen, at a very low rent, and yielding to them a very large 
 beneficial interest. Those middlemen or mesne landlords, as a class, are men of 
 education and birth, and generally dependent on the profits of the lands they hold 
 on lease for the support of their position in society. The habits of these gentle- 
 men are, in general, those of men of independent income ; and the profits of 
 the lands, which were intended by the head landlord as the provision for the per- 
 manent improvement of the soil, have, in most instances, been devoted to the 
 supply of the middlemen's extravagance. If, therefore, the farms are now with- 
 out roads ; if agriculture is backward, the soil impoverished, and the resident 
 tenantry ill clothed and ill housed ; if the want of punctuality in the payment 
 of rent has become a habit with them, and the accumulation of arrears deprives 
 them of independence, I may justly attribute such evils to the conduct of those 
 middlemen who, deriving a large profit from the lands, returned no part of that 
 profit to the renovation or increase of its resources." {Evidence, Part III., p. 
 735.) 
 
 The Rev. Daniel Kavanagh, of Carnew, Wicklow, Roman Catholic 
 curate, in his evidence before the Land Commissioners, says, — 
 
 " Another cause of the sinking state of the land-holders in this country, is the 
 class of middle landlords; and a great proportion of the lands in or about 
 Carnew is in the hands of middlemen, who have, in my opinion, though I can- 
 not give an accurate account of it, nearly double profits. These men, from their 
 situation in life, aspire to be above the middling order of the people ; they 
 aspire to stand amongst the gentry of the land, and they deprive themselves of 
 the means of working the land in their own possession, and so rack-rent their 
 tenantry, that they are in a situation that it is impossible for men, with the pre- 
 sent prices, to meet the rents with the calls upon them ; therefore the land is 
 deteriorating, and the capital of the tenantry sinking. And the under-tenants 
 I consider, as far as my knowledge goes, and on my oath, are in a most de- 
 plorable state ; and was it not that our hopes are excited by this commission for 
 the good of the people, and other political changes, and the salutary advice they 
 receive from those placed over them (their clergy), I think it would be almost 
 
APPENDIX XXIII. 753 
 
 Impossible to keep the people quiet and in order. At present they wait, in 
 breathless anxiety, to see what can be done for them ; but their condition is de- 
 plorable, and the lower order of people are famishing^. I do not think that a 
 great number of those, who hold small farms under middlemen, can afford them- 
 selves more than two meals in each day constantly, and without milk, or any 
 other nourishment but their potatoes ; and those potatoes are often sent a mile or 
 two, and they eat them cold, and in the ditches. It is dreadful to consider the 
 starvation they are subject to." {Evidence, Part III., p. 543.) 
 
 Henry Creery, Esq. of Kilkenny, in his evidence before the land com- 
 missioners, is asked, — 
 
 " 15. What is generally the condition of the tenants under the middlemen ? 
 They are rack-rented, and they are obliged to pay the rent punctually to the day. 
 
 " 16. Is much of the rent paid in labour ? Part of it, but much more in 
 money. They have bailiffs always watching, and, when the crop is ripe, they 
 have it seized, and taken away for the rent, immediately." {Evidence, Part 
 III., p. 394.) 
 
 James Carnegie, Esq., Northesk, near Cork, in his evidence before the 
 land commissioners, is asked, — 
 
 " 51. Are there any middlemen in the district? Yes, there are. 
 
 " 52. What is the state of the tenantry under them ? Very miserable. In 
 fact, the tenantry in this part of the country have no business with land at all. 
 They would be much better as labourers. They have no capital to cultivate the 
 ground." {Evidence, Part III., p. 62.) 
 
 Daniel Leahy, Esq. of Shannakiel House, near Cork, land-agent, 
 in his evidence before the land commissioners. Part III. p. 11, is 
 asked, — 
 
 " 36. What generally is the state in which you find the tenantry under a 
 middleman at the expiration of a lease ? Very often in a very indifferent state. 
 One of the landlord's great grievances, in my opinion, is, that he lets his farm 
 for a term very usual in this country, of three lives ; he lets to a tenant he con- 
 siders a vei-y industrious man, who goes to live upon it, and at the end of tliose 
 lives, which may run to sixty years, he finds it covered with a pauper population, 
 and if the fixity of tenure was carried out there would be nothing left for the 
 landlord in a short time, in my opinion." 
 
 Mr. John Keeffe, of Mongariff, Tipperary, land-agent and farmer, iu 
 his evidence before the land commissioners, Part III p. 221, is asked, — 
 
 " 67. Was there much diflSculty in getting the rent from the middlemen ? 
 Generally the agent or the landlord was obliged to have recourse to the land. 
 
 " 68. Did it frequently happen that the tenants upon the land had previously 
 paid their rent to the middleman ? Generally the agent notices the occupiers to 
 take care not to pay their rents to the middlemen, for fear they should have t» 
 pay it over again." 
 
 Charles Arthur "Walker, Esq. of Belmont, near Wexford, magistrate, ia 
 his evidence before the land commissioners, Part III. p. 477, is asked, 
 
 3 c 
 
754 APPENDIX XXIII. 
 
 " 12. Do the tenants hold in general under the proprietors, or are there xnany 
 middlemen in the district? Most of this district is held immediately under the 
 head proprietor, which accounts for the superior comforts of the inhabitants, and 
 the universal harmony, peace, and good feeling which exist between landlord and 
 tenant, and among all classes in it. Wiiere the occupier is immediately under 
 the head proprietor he has, in nine cases out of ten, a good interest in his land. 
 If he does not thrive it is not the amount of rent which causes it ; and, as a proof 
 of this, there is no tenant so circumstanced that would not readily get a large 
 sum of money for his interest. I could give instances, if necessary, of the amount. 
 Then as to middlemen — wherever the occupier holds under a middleman, and 
 there are some cases in this district, he is screwed up severely, and without mercy, 
 in his rent. When those middlemen's leases expire it is well for the occupier ; 
 he almost invariably becomes the immediate tenant of the proprietor, at a reduced 
 and fair rent." 
 
 Joseph Fishbourne, Esq. of Hallymount, in Queen's County, farmer, in 
 I if evidence before the land commissioners, Part III. p. 564, — 
 
 " 23. Is there much property under the courts ? No, not much ; there is 
 some. 
 
 " 24. 'What is the relative condition of the tenants under the courts compared 
 to those under the proprietors ? Those under the courts and those under the 
 proprietors are relatively equal in condition. Those under the middlemen, 
 generally speaking, are greatly distressed." 
 
APPENDIX XXIV. 
 
 Referred to in page 596. 
 
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760 APPENDIX XXVI. 
 
 APPENDIX XXVI. 
 
 Referred to in page 607. 
 Opinions of the Pkess. 
 
 From the Bristol Mercury. 
 
 The " Times Commissioner." — The " Times Commissioner" has 
 brought his arduous and valuable labours to a close— labours which have 
 had the effect of diffusing a larger amount of information respecting 
 Ireland than all the reports of all the Government Commissioners for the 
 last half century. With regard to the able, important, and thorough-going 
 manner in which the " Commissioner" has executed his task, we should 
 think that in this country there can scarcely be two opinions. It was a 
 task requiring a combination of moral and intellectual qualities of no 
 common order. From the state of feeling and parties in the sister 
 island, the " Commissioner" was foredoomed to misrepresentation before 
 ever he put pen to paper ; and from this nothing could have saved him 
 except insignificance. Had he written tame, puling, talentless epistles, he 
 might have escaped with a passing sneer ; but grappling as he did with 
 giant abuses, and laying bare the sources of existing evils, he was pretty 
 sure of reaping a handsome crop of villification. This was amongst the 
 surest evidence of his usefulness. As soon as the orators of Conciliation- 
 hall commenced giving vent to their spite, by hurling at him low, black- 
 guard epithets, the public began to feel assured that the " Commissioner" 
 was doing his work well ; and when some of the Irish Tory papers joined 
 in censuring him, the conviction became general that he was pursuing an 
 honest and independent course. The criminal indifference of landlords — 
 the apathy of the peasantry— the ruinous mode of letting and sub-letting 
 the land — the want of industrial enterprize — the moral and physical 
 blight produced by grasping middlemen, and by hollow, spouting, pseudo- 
 patriots — were all exposed by him in a fearless and masterly style; at the 
 same time that evidence was adduced as to the capabilities of the country 
 for improvement, and of the progress that had been made wherever 
 landlords, fulfilling the duties of their high station, had set to work in 
 earnest to instruct and encourage the peasantry. Amongst the very best 
 of the good deeds of the " Commissioner" was his thorough and complete 
 exposure of the state of affairs on the O'Connell property. The blow 
 told home. Then, indeed, the partially-restrained torrent of virulence 
 and abuse broke forth in all its fury. " Liar !" "blackguard!" " gutter- 
 commissioner!" and we know not what number of congenial epithets 
 
APPENDIX XXVI. 761 
 
 were hurled at the man who had exhibited to the world the not-to-he- 
 forgotten spectacle of the great " Liberator," in the combined character of 
 middleman and landlord of the most wretched tenantry in all Ireland. 
 The " Commissioner" was assailed in every possible way by " Liberator" 
 O'Connell, and family, and their tools and toadies of every variety and 
 degree. But he was not to be baffled. He returned to the attack ; piled 
 fact upon fact, and did not quit his work until he had drawn a full and 
 faithful picture of the felicities of Derryuane Beg. That exposure has 
 produced, is producing, and will continue to produce a marked change in 
 public sentiment. Another thing demonstrated by the " Commissioner," 
 is the fact that the misery subsisting in Ireland cannot be owing to the 
 much-abused union; and for the excellent reason that large portions of 
 Ireland are in the most flourishing condition under this very union, such 
 portions being governed by precisely the same laws as the distressed 
 districts. " Like causes produce the like effects;" therefore, the union 
 cannot be held answerable for producing the most opposite effects. The 
 misery of Kerry, and the prosperity of DoAvn have their roots elsewhere. 
 In expressing our satisfaction at the labours of the " Commissioner," we 
 do not feel bound to accept all his conclusions ; and think that some of his 
 recommendations savour too much of the high hand. Some irritating 
 expressions, too, might have been better avoided ; but still, all things 
 conadered, it can scarcely be denied that he has discharged difiicult and 
 important duties, with energy, ability, and impartiality ; and, in short, in 
 such a manner as to have succeeded in making a strong unpression on the 
 public mind. An opinion has been created that the grand panacea for 
 Ireland is " less talk and more work ;" and it remains to be seen what 
 measures will be devised by Government to alter the present wretched 
 state of things pi'evailing in one of the finest islands under the sun. But 
 whatever may be the determhiation of Government the English public 
 owe a debt of gratitude to " 2'he Times Commissioner" (and to the pow- 
 ei'ful journal for which he has throughout acted), for having placed 
 before it a mass of interesting, valuable, and trust-worthy information 
 respecting the actual state of Ireland. Public opinion once fairly aroused 
 in this country seldom slumbers ; and we sincerely trust that England 
 will never remain tranquil or satisfied until real and effectual measures 
 shall have been promulgated and carried out for the benefit of Ii-eland. 
 
 (From The Times, Jan. 21, 1846.) 
 
 I have at the commencement of my letters quoted the introduction 
 of my commission to the public, given by The Times, and have thought it 
 not inappropriate now at the conclusion of that commission to quote also 
 their opinion of the manner of its fulfilment. 
 
 After quoting a portion of my last letter relative to the suppression of 
 outrage and crune in Ireland, a leading article in llie Times of the 21st 
 
762 APPENDIX xxvr. 
 
 of January thus speaks of the conclusion of the commission I had under- 
 taken for them. 
 
 " And now, after quoting this part of his last letter, it remains for us 
 to express a feeling of regret that it is his last. It would be out of place 
 for us to talk of our own obligations to him for his long and most inter- 
 esting communications. But we think that, -without vanity, we may 
 claim for him no slight amount of public gratitude. He has accomplished 
 a mission of delicacy, and difficulty, and not wholly free from danger, with 
 courage, fidelity, and honesty. He has observed, with scrupulous exact- 
 ness, his faith not only to us, his employers, but to the public. A more 
 honest witness it would be impossible to find. He has stated things 
 exactly as he found them. He has given names, dates, positions, colours, 
 every fact which met his own observant eye, or could provoke the 
 analysis of the most searching critic. He has ever kept his facts and his 
 theories separate ; he has never fashioned the one to suit the other; and 
 we believe that he has done more than any one person to fix the atten- 
 tion of the English people on the state of Ireland, and to bring home 
 to their knowledge its real wants and its real grievances. Higher testi- 
 mony than this cannot be desired ; if he look for it, he will find it in the 
 foul-mouthed calumnies, ribald abuse, and tortuous explanations of those 
 Irishmen who have always regarded their country as the prey of their 
 conflicting factions, and its miseries as the food which kept those factions 
 alive." 
 
INDEX. 
 
 A. 
 
 Absenteeism, 67. 71 n. 243.265 
 
 evils which result from, 212. 481 
 
 Absentees, impose a tax on, 215 
 
 money sent to, 615 
 
 Acre, size of Irish compared with En- 
 glish, 51 
 
 Agents, improperly appointed, 184 
 
 evils of, 185 
 
 ' efficient required, 482 
 
 Agitation, put down, 599 
 
 Agriculture, unimproving state of, 38 
 
 condition of, 51. 53 
 
 '■ neglect of, 52 n. 
 
 instruction, advantage of, 59. 
 
 172 n. 
 
 want of it the landlords' fault, 63 
 
 comparative state of in the north 
 
 and west, 144 
 
 associations, as a means of 
 
 teaching farmers agriculture, 232 n. 
 
 ' schools and model farms, estab- 
 lishment of, 605 
 
 Alum cliff's at Ballybunnion, 424 
 
 at Dune bay, 424 n. 
 
 Annagary, frightful strand of, 112 
 
 Anderson, Mr.,establislied mail coaches, 
 562 
 
 Applotment of grand jury cess, 452. 
 453 
 
 Arranmore, island of, condition of peo- 
 ple of. 109 
 
 Arran, Lord, as a landlord, 203 
 
 Ardnamora, usurers at, 310 
 
 Ardcara, Kerry, its wretchedness, 527 
 
 reporter's description of, 542 
 
 Arigna, coal mines, 158 
 
 ■ iron mines, 160 
 
 murder of the manager and 
 
 stoppage of the works, 160 
 
 Associated cess payers, description of, 
 
 450. 451 
 Author's mission, object of, 4. 8. 81 
 Augheramong, Kerry, reporter's descrip- 
 tion of, 537 
 
 B. 
 
 Bacon, Lord, opinion of the capabilities 
 of Ireland, 50 
 
 Ballinamore, description of, 43 
 
 Ballyshannon, advantage of its position, 
 64 
 
 Ballinasloe fair, 232. 240 
 
 Ballybunnion, Kerry, alum cliffs of, 424 
 
 Banks of Belfast, 579 
 
 Bantry Bay, description of, 399 
 
 Bantry, description of, 401 
 
 the hotel at, 402 
 
 Barber, Francis, Sligo, what his indus- 
 try as a farmer accomplished, 167 
 
 Bateson, Sir Robert, of Belvoir Park, as 
 a landlord, 581 
 
 Bateson, Sir Robert, of Castruse, exer- 
 tions of in support of the Temple- 
 moyle academy, 155 
 
 Beggars, 558 
 
 Bell Booth, Mr., murder of, 5 
 
 Belleek, Donegal, and its water-power, 
 65 n. 
 
 Belfast and its flax-mills, 567 
 
 founderies and means of em- 
 ployment, 569 
 
 its linen trade, 574 
 
 • its damasks, 574 
 
 its j)rovision trade, 575 n. 
 
 its limestone, 575 n. 
 
 its cotton factories, 575 
 
 wages of artizans and labourers. 
 
 568. 575 
 
764 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Belfast, its shipping, 576 
 
 its coasting trade, 576 
 
 tonnage of vessels to, 578 
 
 • institutions of, 580 
 
 population of, 580 
 
 country, appearance of, 580 
 
 houses of peasantry and artizans, 
 
 condition of, 580 
 ■ a better guide than Conciliation 
 
 Hall, 583 
 
 custom house of, 605 
 
 post office of, 605 
 
 Berehaven, copper-mines, 423 
 Beresford, Rev. Marcus, apprehensions 
 
 of his family from slate of country, 
 
 25 
 Eianconi, Mr., his cars, 562 
 Bog, piofit of cultivating, 280 
 
 ■ draining of, 374 n. 
 
 " Bone and sinew" of Ireland, 173 
 
 Bounties, call for, 479 
 
 Bribery of bailiffs, 408 
 
 Burning the land, 32. 38. 245, 246 
 
 Butter Vrade, frauds in, 161 
 
 Cahirciveen, description of, 394. 531 
 the hotel at, 403 
 
 ■ three-story house at, 464 
 
 ■ census commissioners' classifi- 
 cation of houses at, 531 n. t, 611 
 Cahill, Mr., Kilkenny, as a landlord, 
 
 496 
 Cambrics, manufacture of, 574, 581 
 Capabilities of the soil and climate, 49 
 Capital of no avail without knowledge, 
 155 
 
 ■ created by improved cultivation, 
 92. 94 
 
 • waste and abstraction of, 66 
 
 • want of. 589 
 
 ■ driven out of the country by in- 
 
 timidation, 596 
 
 Carden, Mr., the intimidation to which 
 subjected, 335 
 
 Cavan, disturbed stale of, 5 
 
 proportion of agiicultural and 
 
 manuCactunng employtnent in, 13, 14 
 
 size of farms in, 13 
 
 land capable of cultivation in, 
 
 15 
 
 condition of agriculture in, 15 
 
 rate of wages in, 17 
 
 con-acre rent in, 18 
 
 ejectment of tenants in, 18 
 
 commencement and origin of 
 
 Molly Maguireism in, 22 
 usurers at, 311 
 
 Celtic population, characteristics of, 43, 
 
 44 n. 288 
 Central loan fund, 308 
 Chaiacter of the Irish people, 287. 563 
 Chesterfield, Lord, his letter, 298 
 Church-yards of Ireland, 195 
 Cheating propensities, 378 
 Clancarty, Lord, as a landlord, 239 
 Clew Bay and its 365 islands, 217 
 Clifden and its scenery, 269 n. 
 Cloddergh fishermen, 291 
 Coal-mines at Arigna, 158 
 
 at Kilkenny, 491 
 
 stopped by combinations, 600 
 
 Coasting trade of Belfast, 576 
 Cobalt found near Killarney, 425 
 Comparison between the people of the 
 
 north, east, and west, 1 45 
 by Inglis between the people of 
 
 the north and south, 148 
 
 between the hovelsof Connaught 
 
 and the Highlands of Scotland, 241 
 between a rent day in Ireland 
 
 and in England, 248 
 
 between the scenery of Conne- 
 
 mara and the Highlands of Scotland, 
 269 
 
 between Belfast and Galway, 
 
 287 
 
 between the Shannon and the 
 Humber, 372 
 between Cornwall and Cork, 
 
 425 
 
 between Wexford on lh«; east 
 and Kerry on the west, 472 
 between Kilkenny and the west 
 
 of Ireland, 489 
 
 between Down and Kerry, 564 
 
 — between cottages of ditto, 581 
 
 between Dublin and Edinburgh, 
 
 587 
 
 Comparative cost of steam and water- 
 power, 191 
 
 advantages of Lancashire and 
 
 Mayo, 220 
 
 richness of copper ores, 424 
 
 exports from Belfast and Dub- 
 
 lin. 577 n. 
 Combinations, evil of, 599 
 
 put down, 599 
 
 Competition for land, 374. 412 
 Con-acre rents, 18. 61.246 
 
 tenants, 245 
 
 Conciliation Hall, notice of attack in, 
 
 228 
 ConoUy, Col., as a landlord, 64 
 Conyngham, Matquis of, management 
 
 of his estate, 103, 256 
 Cooper, Mr., of AlarUree Castle, as a 
 
 landlord, 177 
 
INDEX. 
 
 76b 
 
 Copper-ore found at Arigna, 158 
 
 mines of Kenmare, 394 
 
 superficial evidences of in Cork, 
 
 422 
 
 mines of Coslieen, 423. 431 
 
 Connemara, description of, 268 
 
 people of, "271 
 
 Contradictions as to matters of fact, 409 
 Cow's grass, definition of, as a measure 
 
 of land, 104 
 Coral sand, component parts of, 400 
 Cork, description of, 415 
 general character of county of, 
 
 422 
 
 mines of, 423 
 
 savings bank deposits in, 468 
 
 shipping of, 576 
 
 Corn, thrashed on the high road, 55 n. 
 mode of bringing it to market 
 
 and housing it, 56 n. 
 Cosheen, mines at Scull, 423. 431 
 Country, description of, 427 n. 
 Crawford, Mr. Sharman, M.P., as a 
 
 landlord, 580 
 Crime, prevailing cause of, 21 
 make punishnnent of certain, 
 
 598 
 Criticisms of the press, 80, 200 
 Croagh, Patrick Hill, of, 217 
 Cromwell, original letter from, 475 n. 
 Crops, luxuriant, 49 
 
 number of white taken, 329 
 
 want of rotation of, 436. 469 
 
 Crown lands, revenue of, 470 
 Custom, description of, 247 n. 
 
 D. 
 
 Damasks, manufacture of, 574 
 Derrynane Beg, its description, 396. 
 527 
 
 revisit to, 521 
 
 reporter's description of, 544 
 
 its glass windows, 529 
 
 Difference in the law as regards mer- 
 chants and landlords, 406 
 Doyle, Dr., his description of the mis- 
 
 eiable condition of the people, 12 
 Donegal, waste lands in, 93 
 
 description of, 102 
 
 Doneraile, Lord, as a landlord, 463 
 Downshire, Marquis of, as a landlord, 
 
 581 
 Draining, neglect of, 50 
 
 profit of, 377. 604 n. 
 
 advantage of, 625, 626 
 
 want of near Galway, 239 
 
 ia RoscommoD, 252 
 
 Draining effected by the people of the 
 north, but not by those of the south, 
 565 n. 
 
 Draper's Company, estates at London- 
 derry, 152 
 
 Drifting sands near Sligo, 163 
 
 Drumshambo lime kilns, 158 
 
 local usurers at, 310 
 
 Dublin, shipping of, 576 
 
 description of, 587 
 
 cliaracier of people of, 588 
 
 Dunijloe, Donegal, its wretched inn, 
 107, 108 
 
 Dunally, Lord, as a landlord, 353 
 
 Dunraven, Lord, employment given by 
 him, 370 
 
 E. 
 
 Education, state of, in Connaught, 
 296 n. 
 
 • low state of one reason of the 
 
 want of enterprise, 436 n. 
 
 Ejectment of tenants, 18. 413 
 
 Embroidery of muslin, 581 
 
 Emigrati"n, amount of, 16 
 
 evils of, 271 
 
 as a remedy for distress, 274 
 
 Employment, want of, produces dis- 
 turbances, 11 
 
 given by improved cultivation, 
 
 93,94 
 
 125 
 
 given by flax mills, 568 
 
 by a landlord's improvements, 
 
 want of, 589 
 
 Energy, want of amongst the popula- 
 tion, 171 
 
 England for the English, 189 
 
 EnniskilJen, description of, 42 
 
 Enterprise, want of, 438 
 
 Erris, description of, 218 
 
 Estates, facilitate sale of through me- 
 dium of government, 226. 595. 626 
 
 Exports from Waterford, 466 
 
 from Belfast and Dublin, 577 n. 
 
 from Sligo, 160 
 
 Expresses, former rate of, 578 n. 
 
 Famine, measures to guard against, 441 
 Farmers, have insuflScient capital, 419 n. 
 Farnham, Lord, as a landlord, 25 
 Ferguson, Sir Robert, his opinion of 
 
 tenant-right, 132 
 exertions of, in support of Tern- 
 
 plemoyle academy, 155 
 
766 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Fertility of the land, 419 n. 
 
 Fishmongers' Company, estates of, at 
 Londonderry, 152 
 
 Fishing, mode of, in Kerry. 390 
 
 Fish, abundance of, on the south and 
 west coast, 420 
 
 people, too lazy to, 421 
 
 Fishino Company establisliment of, at 
 Waterford, 601 
 
 Fine, inflict for outrages, in order to 
 suppress them, 344 
 
 Flax, improvement in, by proper culti- 
 vation, 233 
 
 , as a profitable crop, 570 
 
 improvement in manufacture of, 
 
 570 
 
 improvement society, 570 
 water, as a manure, 573 n. 
 
 Food, exporting, 612 
 Forth, barony of, 476 
 Frauds in the butter trade, 161 
 
 . flax trade, 163 n. 
 
 — corn trade, 163 n. 
 
 provision trade, 164 
 
 French Park, usurers at, 311 
 Fynes, Moryson's description of Ireland, 
 419 n. 427 n. 583 
 
 G. 
 
 Galwav, people of, 271. 289 
 
 _ waste land in, 275 
 
 . its means of emigration, 278 
 
 Gamp, Mrs., of the Irish press, 547 
 
 Geese, habit of plucking. 395 
 
 Gibson, William, tenant farmer, good 
 
 example of, 580 
 Glenties, misery of, the population, 
 
 103, 104 
 
 . its inn, 262 
 
 usurers at, 310 
 
 Gleneask estate, Galway, 470 
 Glengall, Lord, his improvements, 338 
 Glynn school, at Londonderry, 153 
 '< Golden Knockers" of Sligo, 176 
 <• Golden Vale," 356 
 .' Gombeen" men, 238. 306. 442 
 Government cannot find employment 
 
 for a nation, 590 
 Grazing, social evils of, 243 n. 364 
 prejudices in favour of, o61 
 
 — profits of, 362 
 
 Grand jury laws, administration of, 445 
 
 acts, abstract of, 448 
 
 , cess, 452 
 
 Greediness of gain and laziness, 237 
 
 Green, cropping advantage of, 254. 
 365 n. 
 
 Griffith, Mr , his opinion of tenant- 
 right, 133 
 
 Grocers' Company, estates at London* 
 
 derry, 151 
 Gurtavallig copper mine, 423 
 G weedore, its comfortable inn, 98 
 river, 117 
 
 H. 
 
 Hallam's opinion of the natural capabi* 
 lilies of Ireland, 50 
 
 Hale, Lord, his opinion as to the indus- 
 trial education of the poor, 607 
 
 Hamilton, Mr., of Pettigo, his improve- 
 menis, 81 
 
 Hancock, Mr., his opinion on tenant- 
 right, 133 
 
 Harrowing by the horses' tail, 122 n. 
 
 Haibours of lefuge. Government ought 
 to provide, 604 
 
 Hawarden, Lord, as a landlord, 340 
 
 Hemstitching pocket handkerchiefs, 581 
 
 Hill, Lord George, his improvements, 
 100. 120 
 
 his opinion as to former condi- 
 tion of the peasantry, 118 
 
 Holidays, evil of, 369 
 
 Ightercoa, reporter's description of, 596 
 Ignorance of the peasantry and indispo- 
 sition to change, 122. 467 
 
 ■ and indisposition to lay out 
 
 money, 467, 468 
 
 and neglect, half cultivation 
 
 owing to, 612 
 Improvements not allowed for, 38 
 
 landlord ought to pay for, 71 n. 
 
 482 
 
 378 
 
 neglect of, 376 
 
 eff"t;ct of landlords encouraging, 
 
 • charge estates for permanent, 
 
 483 
 
 pay tenant for, 603 
 
 Improved cultivation, profit of, 90. 
 
 236 n. 
 would support five times the 
 
 population, 469 
 Improve, duty of landlord to, 250 
 Improving landlord, threatened to be 
 
 shot, 322 
 Industrial knowledge, want of, Dr. 
 
 Kane's opinion, 152 
 Industrial school, failure of, 177 
 Industry procures comfort, 183 n. 338 
 "want of, Mr. Otway's opinion, 
 
 188. 438 
 
 the property of every nation de- 
 
 pends upon it, 404 n. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 767 
 
 Industry, creates capital, 480 
 Indolence and dislike of innovation of 
 
 the people, 393 
 Intimidation diives capital out of the 
 
 country, 596 
 Irish society, foundation of, 150 
 Irish hovels, 241 n. 
 people in Great Britain, 16. 
 
 296. 619 
 
 argument, 303 
 
 reproductive loan fund, 308 
 
 patriots, 481. 485 
 
 J. 
 
 Jactson, Mr. T. Vaughan, of Curra- 
 
 more, as a landlord, 201 
 Jealousy by England of Ireland! 189 
 Jobbing:, hereditary passion of, 446 
 Joint Slock Banks, effect of, 579 
 Joyce, origin of the family of, 272 n. 
 
 K. 
 
 Kane, Dr., his opinion as to industrial 
 
 knowledge, 152 
 Kenmare, Earl of, as a landlord, 407 
 Kenmare, and its copper mines, 394 
 Killeries, its fish and coral sand, 281 
 Killarney and its lakes, 387 
 Kilkenny, description of, 486 
 
 jobbing at, 488 
 
 Its unfinished canal, 488 
 
 occasional outrages in, 489 
 
 coal-mines in, 491 
 
 iron and lead-mines in, 492 
 
 ■ fire-clay in, 492 
 
 black marble of, 492 
 
 middlemen in, decreasing, 495 
 
 Kilcoman, Kerry, reporter's descrip- 
 tion of, 538 
 Kilmacloughan Kerry, 543 
 Kingston, Lord, as a landlord, 463 
 Knight of Kerry, as a landlord, 536 
 Knockmahan copper-mines, 466 
 Knowledtje of agriculture, advantage 
 
 of, 172. 210 
 what it effects in Belgium, 252 
 
 L. 
 
 Labour, the source of all wealth, with- 
 out which there can be no capital, 29 
 
 Labour, the stock of, 190 n. 
 
 immaterial on what manufac- 
 ture employed so long as it is paid 
 for, 612 
 
 is it the source of w ealth 1 563 
 
 Labour, the first price of all things, 621 
 Labourer, income of, 74. 77 
 Labouring population, condition of, 380. 
 
 389 
 Labourers agricultural, three Irish do. 
 
 less than one British, 622 n. 
 Lace factories at Limerick, 317 
 " Lach Leagh," ox greujiag, 87 
 Lands, " lying out to cool," 54 n. 612 
 
 owned, by too few people, 386 
 
 ■ • let by proposal or tender, 412 
 
 Landlords, duty of, to teach tlie pea- 
 santry, 58 
 
 value of good resident, 216 
 
 sale of tenants votes by, 333 
 
 effect of encouragement and at- 
 tention by, 413 
 Landowner, common law rights of, 134 
 Lansdowne, Marquis of, as a landlord, 
 
 397. 540 
 Laziness of the people, opinion of Dr. 
 Madden regarding, 35. 46 n. 
 
 opinion ofMr.Griffiihs, ditto,! 44 
 
 and ignorance of people, 54 n. 
 
 123. 435. 
 
 and extravagance, the chief 
 
 cause of misery, 156 n. 
 
 and greediness of gain, 238 
 
 Leitiira, state of, 27 
 
 Leases, facts and opinions regarding, 35 
 
 evidence as to anxiety for, 37 
 
 will not do without supervi- 
 sion, 382. 463 
 
 reason why not given, 39 
 
 their advantages and disadvan- 
 tages, 204 
 Letterkenny, and the system of borrow- 
 ing, 309 
 Limerick, description of, 316 
 Lime, effect of, as a manure, 378 
 Linen trade of Ireland, 567 
 Lismore, Lord, as a landlord, 338 
 Loan funds and money lending, 306'. 
 
 311.312 
 Lohur, Kerry, reporter's description of, 
 
 543 
 Londonderry, Marquis of, as a land- 
 lord, 581 
 
 description of, 147 
 
 origin of, 148 
 
 Lough Erne, and its navigation, 63 
 
 Neagh, and its navigation, 65 
 
 draining of to Summer level, 
 
 625 n. 
 
 Derg '• station," 81 
 
 Gill, 157. 175 
 
 Allen, 158 
 
 Mask and Corrib, 278. 625 n. 
 
 Corrib, 293 
 
 Lurgan, Lord, as a landlord, 581 
 
768 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 M. 
 
 McLeod, captain, murder of, 27 
 
 McKye, Patrick, liis description of the 
 Donegal peasantry, 117 
 
 Ma'am, its scenery, 278 n. 
 
 INIaguire, Rev., Father Tom, 27 
 
 Mahony, Mr. Pierce, as a landlord, 386 
 
 Malachite, found in Cork, 425 
 
 Mallow, description of, 444 
 
 savings bank, deposits in, 468 
 
 Manufactures, facility of establishing at 
 Ballysodare, 194 
 
 Marl, as a manure, 279 n. 
 
 jMarriages, improvident early, 513 
 
 Mayo, appearance of, 199 
 
 waste lands in, 204 
 
 its means of wealth and pros- 
 perity, 218 
 
 disgraceful neglect of its natural 
 
 advantages, 221 
 
 relief of the people by English 
 
 subscrijition, 222 
 
 Menlow, its description, 292 n. 
 
 Melton Mowbray, of Ireland, 486 
 
 Middlemen, evils of, 70. 243. 360.381. 
 389.437. 591.593. 611 
 
 origin of, 411 n. 
 
 Middle class, does not exist, 591 
 
 Model schools, advantage of, 239 
 
 Molly Maguires, 5 
 
 definition of name, 20 
 
 cause of, 76, 77. 
 
 Money lending and loan funds, 306 
 
 pawning, 314, 391 
 
 " stuck in the thatch," 467 
 
 value of produce exported, 614 
 
 sent to abs8ntees, 6 15 
 
 Morgan, Mr., Johnstovv-n Castle, em- 
 ployment given by, 479 
 
 Muslin, embroidery of, 581 
 
 N. 
 
 Newry, description of trade of, 584 n. 
 
 New poor law in Ireland, 552 
 
 " its provisions, 553 
 
 Newspaper abuse, 458. 477. 493. 523 
 
 Nichols, Mr., his description of the 
 struggle for land, 17 
 
 condition of peasantry of Done- 
 gal, 115. 116 
 
 Norreys, Sir Denham, employment 
 given by, 445 
 
 Nurrigh, Kerry, reporter's description 
 of, 540 
 
 o. 
 
 O'Brien, Mr. Stafford, as a landlord, 338 
 O'Connell, Mr., his opinion of religious 
 dissensions, 11 n. 
 
 as a middleman, 394, 529 
 
 reason ot his abuse, 395 
 
 his character as a landlord, 396 
 
 and road presentations, 447 
 
 challenge to, to prove the wretch- 
 ed condition of his tenantry, 459 
 
 tribute, subscribed to bv com- 
 
 pulsion to save appearances, 462 
 
 revisit his estate, 521 
 
 reporter's description of, 533 
 
 his pedigree, 533. 550 n. 
 
 his defence as a landlord, 547 
 
 O'Hara, Mr. C. K., of Sligo, as a land- 
 lord. 177 
 
 Ormonde, Marquis of, as a landlord, 495 
 
 Orangeism, Protestantism, and British 
 descent, circumstances usually united 
 in one individual, 43 
 
 Oratoiical elegancies not the source of 
 industrial power, 404 
 
 O'Shaughnessy, Dean, 303 n. 
 
 Oughermung, Kerry, reporter's descrip- 
 tion of, 537 
 
 Outrages, effect of, 490 
 
 P. 
 
 Palatinates, 368 
 
 Palmerston, Lord, as a landlord, 165. 
 
 174 
 Payment of Roman Catholic clergy on 
 
 principle, 498 
 on the ground of expediency, 
 
 507. 605 
 Patriotism, Dr. Johnson's definition of, 
 
 584 
 Party spirit in Ireland, 1 
 Pasturage, injury of, when extensive, 
 
 53 n 
 Pawning money, 314. 391 
 Peculiarities of individuals, 387 
 Pembrokeshire, inhabitants of Weiford, 
 
 478 
 People, condition of not improving, 40 
 miserable condition of, 248. 273. 
 
 342. 358. 388. 420. 469 
 
 make land valuable, 284 n. 
 
 condition of 220 years ago, 583 
 
 Pepper and water, drink of the peasantry 
 
 of Donegal, 105 
 Personal superintendence of, landlords 
 
 and agents advantage of, 235 n. 251 n. 
 Pettigo, improved cultivation at, 81 
 Plantation of Ulster, 149 
 
INDEX. 
 
 769 
 
 Plough, aversion to, 53 n. 
 Ploughing by the horse's tail, 55 n. 
 Pocket handkerchiefs weaving and hem- 
 stitching, 531 
 Political views of landlords, not an 
 
 object of this enquiry, 223 
 Population, rate of increase of, 15. 610 
 
 tractable and easily led, 248 
 
 Portlaw, cotton factory at, 467 
 
 Post office communication, increase of, 
 
 577 n. 
 Potato, mode of cultivating the, 51 
 
 diet, amount of, requisite for a 
 
 labourer's food, 75. 558 
 
 • crop, failure in, 438 
 
 remedies for disease in, 439 
 
 saving of seed of, 441 
 
 negleciof precautionary remedies 
 
 respecting, 610 
 
 Poverty the result of the laziness of the 
 people, 433 
 
 Press, cirticisms of, 80. 200 
 
 Pride of Squireens, 166 
 
 Profit of cultivating bog, 280 
 
 to the tenantry from industry and 
 
 improving land, 320 
 
 Provisions, export of, 160. 466. 577 n. 
 
 Public works should be promoted, 624 
 
 Purchases, more frequent than improve- 
 ments, 484 n. 
 
 Q. 
 
 Questions suggested to be put to politi- 
 cal agitators of ail parties, 96 
 
 R. 
 
 Race, difference of accounts for many 
 dissimilarities observable, 44 
 
 characteristics of Celtic and Saxon, 
 
 44 n. 
 
 in Connemara, 271 
 
 comparative size and strength of 
 
 Saxon and Celtic, 125 
 
 Rag-weed, cultivation of, 358 n. 
 
 Railways in Ireland not the best invest- 
 ment lor labour, 624 
 
 Receivers in the Court of Chancery, 
 243. 595 
 
 Religious dissensions, Mr. O'Counell's 
 opinion of, 11 n. 
 
 Rents, division of, 69 
 
 ■ definition of, 72. 283 n. 
 
 hio-her than value of land, 78. 
 
 411. 437 
 
 raised because of improvements. 
 
 379 
 
 Repeal of the Union would not cure 
 absenteeism, 186 
 
 opinions regarding, 301 
 
 Review of remedial measures, 589 
 Roman Catholic clergy and repeal, 303 
 
 payment of, on principle, 498 
 
 payment of, on ground of ex- 
 pediency, 507 
 
 right to perfect equality, 500 
 
 dependence of, on people, 517 
 
 Roscommon, 241 
 
 waste lands in, 261 
 
 Royal Asrricultural Improvement So- 
 ciety, 232 
 RundaJe tenure, 98. 202 
 
 horse held in, 119 
 
 villages, 292 
 
 Rynard, Kerry, Reporter's description 
 of, 537 
 
 S. 
 
 Savings Bank at Cork, deposits in, 468 
 
 at Mallow, deposits in, 468 
 
 at Wexford, deposits in, 494 
 
 at Belfast, deposits in, 579 
 
 Saxon population, characteristics of, 43. 
 
 44 n. 
 Scull, mines at, 423, 430 
 
 bay and its fish, 430, 433 
 
 Sea-weed used for food by the peasantry 
 
 of Arranrnore, 111 
 Senior Mr., his opinion on tenant right, 
 
 131, 142 
 Shoes, two-thirds of population never 
 
 wear, 57 
 The Shannon and its navigation, 372 
 Shannon improvements, 605 
 Shipping of Belfast, Cork, Dublin, and 
 
 Waterford, .576 
 Skibbereen, 432, 433 
 Sligo, description of, 157 
 
 exports and imports of, 160 
 
 usurers at, 310 
 
 "The soul of a nation," 582 
 
 Society, raise expectations of regarding 
 
 landlords, 593 
 " Station'' at Lough Derg, 82 n. 
 Stanley, Lord, as a landlord, 337 
 Starvation of the people, opinion respect- 
 ing, 622 
 Strongbow and his invasion, 477 
 Subletting, mode of, 70. 145 
 Subsoil, benefit of breaking up and 
 
 levelling, 87 
 Subdivision, instance of, in Donegal, 
 
 119.145 
 on Lord Pulmerston's estate in 
 
 Sligo, 175 n. 
 
 O D 
 
770 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Subdivision in Kerry, 390 
 tendency to, ia Down, 581 
 
 T. 
 
 Tarraons, Kerry, reporter's descriptionof, 
 540 
 
 Templemoyle Agricultural school, 154 
 
 Tenure, security of, necessary to the ac- 
 cumulation of capital, 45 
 
 Tenancy from year to year, imuolicy of, 
 63 
 
 Tenant ought to be paid for his improve- 
 ments, 406 
 
 Tenant-right increases rent to tenant, 
 69 
 
 price of, 120 
 
 ■ disadvantage of, 127 
 
 examination of its advantages 
 
 and what it is, 129 
 
 Tenant farmer, income of, 74. 76 
 
 Threatening notices, 350 
 
 A "Three story house" in Kerry, 464 
 
 Tillage, profits of, 363 
 
 employment given by, 363 
 
 Tipperary and its outrages, 330. 345 
 
 A Tipperary landlord in former days- 
 332 
 
 Tipperary and its system of terror, 336 
 
 refusalof tenantry in, to improve, 
 
 338 
 
 people in, resort to revenge, 340 
 
 waste larids in, 343 
 
 intimidation in, 597 
 
 Tonnage of vessels to Belfast, 578 
 
 " To-day'' the time for exertion, 266 
 
 Tralee, description of, 371 
 
 Travelling in Ireland, 561 
 
 " J'rouble'' of doing anything in, 435 
 
 Turf fuel, economy of, for steam-boilers, 
 219 
 
 U. 
 
 The Union, advantage of, 297 n. 
 Upper classes, generally neglect the 
 
 duties of their position, 592 
 
 reason of this, 592 
 
 wanted in reality, not merely in 
 
 name, 594 
 Usurers amongst the peasantry, 238 
 
 Valentia its slate quarry and projected 
 
 railroad, 394, 536 
 Variotis aspects of truth, 410 
 
 W. 
 
 Wages, average of, on the east coast, 
 191 
 
 in Lancashire, 191 
 
 Wallscouit, Lord, as a landlord, 239, 
 294 
 
 Wakes, 253 n. 
 
 Wakefield's opinion of " The Golden 
 vale," 357 
 
 Want of industry, the reason of the want 
 of capital, 590 
 
 Waste lands, plan of cultivating, 224 
 
 Waste land company's mode of cultiva- 
 tion, 225 
 
 profits, 225 n, 471 
 
 Waste land, available for cultivation, 
 225 n. 354 n. 611 
 
 Waste laud company's improvements, 
 234. 470 
 
 Waste land, high rents asked for, 236 
 
 in Kerry, 374. 381. 384 
 
 Government ought to promote 
 
 drainage and rultivation of, 604 
 
 Water communication, facility of mak- 
 ing, at Ballyshannon, 64 
 
 from Sligo through Lough Allen, 
 
 159 
 
 Water-power at Bally shannon neglected, 
 65 
 
 at Coloony, 161 
 
 at Ballysodare, 161. 190 
 
 at Dromahair, 161 
 
 compared in cost with steam- 
 power, 191 
 
 superiority of, in steadiness of 
 
 motion, 193 
 
 of Lancashire, economy of, 193 n. 
 
 \'akntia, description of, 536 
 Inn at, 463 
 
 of Ireland, economy of, 193 n. 
 
 of Erris, 218 
 
 of Galway, 279. 281. 293 
 
 of Quariertown, 445 
 
 Waterford, description of, 464 
 exports from, 466 
 
 shipping of, 576 
 
 fishmg company at, 601 
 
 Waterville, Kerry, reporter's description 
 
 of, 542 
 Weal, Mr., his opinion of capabilities 
 
 of Ireland, 50 
 Weaving cambric pocket-handkerchiefs, 
 
 581 
 Wcstport, description of, 217 
 Wexfotd, description of the pcoptf, 472 
 
 of the town, 473 
 
INDEX. 
 
 771 
 
 Wexford, the slaughter of the 300 virgins 
 
 of, 474 n. 
 
 ■ industry of the people of, 479 
 — improved social condition of, 
 
 479 
 
 tenants hold by lease, 479 
 
 —— — middlemen in, unknown, 479 
 — — — con-acre does not prevail in, 480 
 
 no outrages in, 480 
 
 savings hank, deposits at, 494 
 
 Wilson, Mr., of Belvoir, Clare, as a 
 landlord, 254 
 
 Women of Ireland, invented accusation 
 of their ugliness, 48, 318 
 
 Woods, absence of, 372 
 
 Woods and forests, rental of, 470 
 
 Workhouses, diet in, 558 
 
 Wynne, Mr., of Hazlewood, as a land- 
 lord, 175 
 
 Young, Arthur, his opinion of 
 Golden Vale," 356 
 
 The 
 
 *^* For Contents of Appendix, see end of Contents of book, p. xxvii. 
 
London : 
 
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