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  THE
  IRISH CRISIS.




  THE
  IRISH CRISIS.


  BY
  C. E. TREVELYAN, ESQ.


  REPRINTED FROM THE “EDINBURGH REVIEW.”
  _No._ CLXXV., _January, 1848_.


  LONDON:
  LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN & LONGMANS.
  1848.




THE IRISH CRISIS.


The time has not yet arrived at which any man can with confidence
say, that he fully appreciates the nature and the bearings of that
great event which will long be inseparably associated with the year
just departed. Yet we think that we may render some service to the
public by attempting thus early to review, with the calm temper of a
future generation, the history of the great Irish famine of 1847[1].
Unless we are much deceived, posterity will trace up to that famine
the commencement of a salutary revolution in the habits of a nation
long singularly unfortunate, and will acknowledge that on this, as on
many other occasions, Supreme Wisdom has educed permanent good out of
transient evil.

If, a few months ago, an enlightened man had been asked what he thought
the most discouraging circumstance in the state of Ireland, we do not
imagine that he would have pitched upon Absenteeism, or Protestant
bigotry, or Roman Catholic bigotry, or Orangeism, or Ribbandism, or
the Repeal cry, or even the system of threatening notices and midday
assassinations. These things, he would have said, are evils; but some
of them are curable; and others are merely symptomatic. They do not
make the case desperate. But what hope is there for a nation which
lives on potatoes?

The consequences of depending upon the potato as the principal article
of popular food, had long been foreseen by thinking persons; and the
following observations extracted from a paper on the native country of
the wild potato[2], published in the Transactions of the Horticultural
Society of London for the year 1822, are a fair specimen of the
opinions which prevailed on the subject previously to the great failure
of 1845.

    “The increased growth of the potato, not only in these
    kingdoms, but almost in every civilised part of the globe, has
    so added to its importance, that any information respecting
    it has become valuable. With the exception of wheat and
    rice, it is now certainly the vegetable most employed as the
    food of man; and it is probable that the period is at no
    great distance, when its extensive use will even place it
    before those which have hitherto been considered the chief
    staples of life. The effect of the unlimited extent to which
    its cultivation may be carried, on the human race, must be
    a subject of deep interest to the political economist. The
    extension of population will be as unbounded as the production
    of food, which is capable of being produced in very small
    space, and with great facility; and the increased number of
    inhabitants of the earth will necessarily induce changes,
    not only in the political systems, but in all the artificial
    relations of civilised life. How far such changes may conduce
    to or increase the happiness of mankind, is very problematical,
    more especially when it is considered, that since the potato,
    when in cultivation, is very liable to injury from casualties
    of season, and that it is not at present known how to keep it
    in store for use beyond a few months, a general failure of the
    year’s crop, whenever it shall have become the chief or sole
    support of a country, must inevitably lead to all the misery of
    famine, more dreadful in proportion to the numbers exposed to
    its ravages.”

The important influence which has been exercised by this root over
the destinies of the human race, arises from the fact that it yields
an unusually abundant produce as compared with the extent of ground
cultivated, and with the labour, capital, and skill bestowed upon its
cultivation. The same land, which when laid down to corn, will maintain
a given number of persons, will support three times that number when
used for raising potatoes. “A family in the West of Ireland, once
located on from one to three or four acres of land, was provided
for; a cabin could be raised in a few days without the expense of a
sixpence; the potatoes, at the cost of a very little labour, supplied
them with a sufficiency of food, with which, from habit, they were
perfectly content; and a pig, or with some, a cow, or donkey, or pony,
and occasional labour at a very low rate of wages, gave them what was
necessary to pay a rent, and for such clothing and other articles as
were absolutely necessary, and which, with a great proportion, were
on the lowest scale of human existence. The foundation of the whole,
however, was the possession of the bit of land; it was the one, and the
only one thing absolutely necessary; the rent consequently was high,
and generally well paid, being the first demand on all money received,
in order to secure that essential tenure; and only what remained
became applicable to other objects. Although of the lowest grade, it
was an easy mode of subsistence, and led to the encouragement of early
marriages, large families, and a rapidly-increasing population, and at
the same time afforded the proprietor very good return of profit for
his land[3].”

The relations of employer and employed, which knit together the
framework of society, and establish a mutual dependence and good-will,
have no existence in the potato system. The Irish small holder lives
in a state of isolation, the type of which is to be sought for in
the islands of the South Sea, rather than in the great civilized
communities of the ancient world. A fortnight for planting, a week
or ten days for digging, and another fortnight for turf-cutting,
suffice for his subsistence; and during the rest of the year, he is
at leisure to follow his own inclinations, without even the safeguard
of those intellectual tastes and legitimate objects of ambition which
only imperfectly obviate the evils of leisure in the higher ranks of
society. The excessive competition for land maintained rents at a
level which left the Irish peasant the bare means of subsistence; and
poverty, discontent, and idleness, acting on his excitable nature,
produced that state of popular feeling which furnishes the material
for every description of illegal association and misdirected political
agitation. That agrarian code which is at perpetual war with the
laws of God and man, is more especially the offspring of this state
of society, the primary object being to secure the possession of the
plots of land, which, in the absence of wages, are the sole means of
subsistence.

There is a gradation even in potatoes. Those generally used by the
people of Ireland were of the coarsest and most prolific kind, called
“Lumpers,” or “Horse Potatoes,” from their size, and they were, for
the most part, cultivated, not in furrows, but in the slovenly mode
popularly known as “lazy beds;” so that the principle of seeking the
cheapest description of food at the smallest expense of labour, was
maintained in all its force. To the universal dependence on the potato,
and to the absence of farmers of a superior class, it was owing that
agriculture of every description was carried on in a negligent,
imperfect manner[4]. The domestic habits arising out of this mode of
subsistence were of the lowest and most degrading kind. The pigs and
poultry, which share the food of the peasant’s family, became, in
course, inmates of the cabin also. The habit of exclusively living on
this root produced an entire ignorance of every other food and of the
means of preparing it; and there is scarcely a woman of the peasant
class in the West of Ireland, whose culinary art exceeds the boiling of
a potato. Bread is scarcely ever seen, and an oven is unknown.

The first step to improvement was wanting to this state of things. The
people had no incitement to be industrious to procure comforts which
were utterly beyond their reach, and which many of them perhaps had
never seen. Their ordinary food being of the cheapest and commonest
description, and having no value in the market, it gave them no command
of butcher’s meat, manufactures, colonial produce, or any other article
of comfort or enjoyment. To those who subsist chiefly on corn, other
articles of equal value are available, which can be substituted for it
at their discretion; or if they please, they can, by the adoption of a
less expensive diet, accumulate a small capital by which their future
condition may be improved and secured; but the only hope for those who
lived upon potatoes was in some great intervention of Providence to
bring back the potato to its original use and intention as an adjunct,
and not as a principal article of national food; and by compelling the
people of Ireland to recur to other more nutritious means of aliment,
to restore the energy and the vast industrial capabilities of that
country.

A population, whose ordinary food is wheat and beef, and whose ordinary
drink is porter and ale, can retrench in periods of scarcity, and
resort to cheaper kinds of food, such as barley, oats, rice, and
potatoes. But those who are habitually and entirely fed on potatoes,
live upon the extreme verge of human subsistence, and when they are
deprived of their accustomed food, there is nothing cheaper to which
they can resort. They have already reached the lowest point in the
descending scale, and there is nothing beyond but starvation or
beggary. Several circumstances aggravate the hazard of this position.
The produce of the potato is more precarious than that of wheat or
any other grain. Besides many other proofs of the uncertainty of this
crop, there is no instance on record of any such failure of the crops
of corn, as occurred in the case of potatoes in 1821, 1845, 1846,
and 1847; showing that this root can no longer be depended upon as a
staple article of human food. The potato cannot be stored so that the
scarcity of one year may be alleviated by bringing forward the reserves
of former years, as is always done in corn-feeding countries. Every
year is thus left to provide subsistence for itself. When the crop
is luxuriant, the surplus must be given to the pigs; and when it is
deficient, famine and disease necessarily prevail. Lastly, the bulk
of potatoes is such, that they can with difficulty be conveyed from
place to place to supply local deficiencies, and it has often happened
that severe scarcity has prevailed in districts within fifty miles of
which potatoes were to be had in abundance. If a man use two pounds
of meal a-day (which is twice the amount of the ration found to be
sufficient during the late relief operations), a hundredweight of meal
will last him for fifty-six days; whereas a hundredweight of potatoes
will not last more than eight days; and when it was proposed to provide
seed-potatoes for those who had lost their stock in the failure of
1845-6, the plan was found impracticable, because nearly a ton an acre
would have been required for the purpose.

The potato does not, in fact, last even a single year. The old crop
becomes unfit for use in July, and the new crop, as raised by the
inferior husbandry of the poor, does not come into consumption until
September. Hence, July and August are called the “meal months,” from
the necessity the people are under of living upon meal at that period.
This is always a season of great distress and trial for the poorer
peasants; and in the districts in which the potato system has been
carried to the greatest extent, as, for instance, in the barony of
Erris in the county of Mayo, there has been an annual dearth in the
summer months for many years past. Every now and then a “meal year”
occurs, and then masses of the population become a prey to famine and
fever, except so far as they may be relieved by charity.

In 1739 an early and severe frost destroyed the potatoes in the ground,
and the helplessness and despair of the people having led to a great
falling off of tillage in 1740, the calamity was prolonged to the
ensuing year, 1741, which was long known as the _bliadhain an air_, or
year of slaughter. The ordinary burial-grounds were not large enough
to contain those who died by the roadside, or who were taken from the
deserted cabins. The “bloody flux” and “malignant fever,” having begun
among the poor, spread to the rich, and numerous individuals occupying
prominent positions in society, including one of the judges (Mr.
Baron Wainwright), and the Mayor of Limerick (Joseph Roche, Esq.), and
many others of the corporation, fell victims. Measures were adopted
at Dublin on the principle of the English Poor Law, some of the most
essential provisions of which appear to have been well understood
in the great towns of Ireland in that day; and it was “hoped, since
such provision is made for the poor, the inhabitants of the city will
discourage all vagrant beggars, and give their assistance that they
may be sent to Bridewell to hard labour, and thereby free themselves
from a set of idlers who are a scandal and a reproach to the nation.”
Soup-kitchens and other modes of relief were established in different
parts of the country, in which Primate Boulter and the Society of
Friends took the lead; and numerous cargoes of corn were procured on
mercantile account from the North American Colonies, the arrival of
which was looked for with great anxiety. In only one point is there
any decided difference between what then took place in Ireland and the
painful events which have just occurred, after the lapse of upwards
of a century. The famine of 1741 was not regarded with any active
interest either in England or in any foreign country, and the subject
is scarcely alluded to in the literature of the day. No measures were
adopted either by the Executive or the Legislature for the purpose of
relieving the distress caused by this famine. There is no mention of
grants or loans; but an Act was passed by the Irish Parliament in 1741
(15 Geo. II, cap. 8), “For the more effectual securing the payment of
Rents, and preventing frauds by Tenants[5].”

The failure of 1822, in the provinces of Munster and Connaught, was
owing to a continued and excessive humidity, which caused the potatoes
to rot after they had been stored in the pits, so that the deficiency
of food was not discovered till late in the season. On the 7th May,
1822, a public meeting was held in London which was attended by the
Archbishop of Canterbury and the most eminent persons of the day,
when a committee of no less than 109 of the nobility and gentry was
formed, and a subscription was entered into, amounting, with the aid
of a king’s letter, to 311,081ℓ. 5s., 7d., of which 44,177ℓ. 9s. was
raised in Ireland. Many excellent principles were laid down for the
distribution of this large sum; and after reserving what was required
for immediate relief, the balance, amounting to 87,667ℓ., was granted
to various societies which had been established for the future and
permanent benefit of the Irish peasantry[6]. A committee also sat at
the Mansion House at Dublin, which collected 31,260ℓ. from various
quarters, independently of the grants it received from the London
Committee. Central Committees were established in each county town
in the distressed districts, and Sub-Committees in each parish. The
western portion of Ireland was also divided into three districts,
to each of which a civil engineer was appointed for the purpose of
employing the destitute in making roads, and the following sums were
voted by Parliament for carrying on these and other Public Works set on
foot with the same object of relieving the distress[7]:

On 24 June, 1822, £100,000,

    “for the employment of the poor in Ireland, and other purposes
    relating thereto as the exigency of affairs may require.”

On 23 July, 1822, £200,000,

    “to enable His Majesty to take such measures as the exigency of
    affairs may require.”

And on the 24 June, 1823, £15,000 was voted,

    “to facilitate emigration from the south of Ireland to the Cape
    of Good Hope.”

In 1831 another failure of the potato crop occurred in the counties
of Galway, Mayo, and Donegal, upon which another meeting was held in
the City of London, and one committee was established at the Mansion
House, and another at the West End. Great exertions were made to raise
subscriptions; a bazaar was held at the Hanover Square Rooms by many
of the ladies of the nobility, presided over by the Queen in person;
and there was a ball at Drury Lane Theatre, which was honoured by
the presence of the King and Queen. The whole amount collected was
74,410ℓ.; and besides this 40,000ℓ. was granted by Parliament, part of
which was expended on relief works, and part in the actual distribution
of food. Besides these London Committees, two other Committees were
formed at Dublin, through one of which (the Mansion House Committee[8])
8,569ℓ. was collected, and through the other (the Sackville Street
Committee) 21,526ℓ.

In each of the years 1835, 1836, and 1837, the potato crop failed
in one or other of the districts in the West of Ireland, and sums
amounting in the aggregate to 7,572ℓ. were expended from Civil
Contingencies in relieving the distress thereby occasioned, to which
was added the sum of 4,306ℓ. remaining from the English and Irish
subscriptions of 1831.

In 1839 another failure occurred; and in all the Western and Midland
Counties, the average price of potatoes in July and August was 7d. a
stone, and of oatmeal 18s. or 19s. a cwt.; the former double, and the
latter one-third more than the usual price at that time of the year.
On this occasion Captain Chads, R.N., was deputed by the Government
to assist the landlords in employing the destitute in constructing
roads and other useful public works; and it appears from a report
addressed by him to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, dated the 22nd
of August, 1839, that 5,441ℓ. was expended in this way, of which
1840ℓ. was contributed by the Government, besides 1478ℓ. disbursed
through other channels. Towards the conclusion of his report Captain
Chads made the following remarks:--“A recurrence of these seasons of
distress, which have been almost periodical hitherto, must, I fear,
be necessarily expected, so long as the present condition of the poor
continues, and whilst they subsist on that species of food, which in
a year of plenty cannot be stored up for the next, which may be one
of scarcity. A very great alleviation, however, of this evil is most
confidently expected from the Poor Law now being established. I have
conversed on this subject with persons of every class of society, from
one end of the country to the other, and it is universally regarded
as the promise of a great blessing:--to the poor by inducing more
provident and industrious habits; and by making it the interest of the
landlords to give them employment; and to all other classes, comfort
and contentment, from the knowledge that the really distressed are
provided for, and that the country is generally improving by the
extension of employment.”

After this, urgent representations of distress were made in each year
to the Irish Government and to the Poor Law Commissioners, until the
summer of 1842, which was more than usually wet and unfavourable to
vegetation, and it therefore again became necessary to have recourse to
extensive measures of relief. On this occasion 3,448ℓ. was distributed
in aid of local subscriptions, in 121 separate districts; the aggregate
sums raised in each case being expended, partly in public works on
Captain Chads’ plan, and partly in giving gratuitous relief[9].

Besides the grants above enumerated, made for the immediate relief
of the Irish poor, when failures of the potato crop caused unusual
distress, large sums of money have been advanced or granted from the
Imperial Treasury from time to time since the Union, for various
purposes supposed to be conducive to the tranquillity and improvement
of the country, and to the removal of the causes of permanent distress,
as will be seen from the following specimens taken principally from a
return to an order of the House of Commons of the 12th February, 1847,
made on the motion of Mr. John O’Connell[10].

  Works for Special Purposes under the Act 57
    Geo. III., cap. 34                            496,000
  Do. for the Employment and Relief of the
    Poor, under the 1 & 2 Wm. IV., cap. 33,
    and previous Acts                           1,339,146
  Grants in aid of Public Works under various
    Acts of Parliament                            125,000
  Advanced by the London Loan Commissioners
    for sundry Works between 1826 and 1833        322,500
  Do. do. for Poor Law Union Workhouses         1,145,800
  Kingstown Harbour                             1,124,586
  Improvement of the River Shannon                533,359
  Wide Street Commissioners, Dublin               267,778
  Improving Post Roads                            515,541
  Gaols and Bridewells                            713,005
  Asylums for Lunatic Poor                        710,850
  Valuation of Lands and Tenements                172,774
  Royal Dublin Society                            285,438
  Farming Society, Dublin                          87,132
  Linen Board, Dublin                             537,656
  Tithe (Relief of Clergy who did not receive
    Tithes of 1831)                                50,916
  Tithe Relief (Million Act)                      918,863
  Tithe Relief Commissioners (establishing
    Composition for Tithes)                       279,217
  Relief of Trade                                 178,070
  Boards and Officers of Health (Cholera)         196,575
  Police Purposes (Proclaimed Districts)        4,693,871
  Police Purposes (Constabulary Police)         1,748,712

Other causes concurred with the natural tendency of every people to
have recourse to the cheapest description of food, in encouraging the
growth of a large population depending for its subsistence on the
potato. Ireland was essentially a grazing country until the artificial
enhancement of prices caused by the Acts of the Irish Parliament
passed in 1783 and 1784, for granting a bounty on the exportation,
and restricting the importation of corn, occasioned an immediate and
extraordinary increase of cultivation; and as, owing to the general
want of capital, it was impossible to find tenants for large tillage
farms, the stimulus intended to act exclusively on agriculture, had a
still more powerful effect in causing the subdivision of farms. The new
occupiers also, being, for the most part, exceedingly poor, instead of
paying their labourers in money, allowed them the use of small pieces
of ground whereon they might erect cabins and raise potatoes, and their
labour was set off, at so much a-day, against the annual rent. The plan
of dividing and subdividing for the purpose of making freeholders,
was carried to a great extent after 1792, when the elective franchise
was restored to the Roman Catholics; and although the practice was far
from being general, yet in some parts of the country, where particular
families made it their object to contest or secure the county, it
was carried to a very pernicious extent. Another powerful cause is
that the emoluments of the Roman Catholic priesthood, including the
bishops, depend not only on the extent of the population, but also on
its continual increase; and if the parish priests object to emigration
and the consolidation of small holdings, and look with favour on
early marriages, it is only what any other body of men, in their
circumstances, would equally do. Lastly, the small holding and potato
system offered the inducement of large rents, obtained at the smallest
possible amount of cost and trouble. The embarrassed and improvident
landlord, and the leaseholder whose only object it was to make the
most of his short tenure, equally found their account in this state of
things, and the result in both cases was, that the farms were covered
with hovels and miserable cottiers, in order, through them, to create
profit-rents. When the failure of the potato forced all the “squatters”
and “mock tenants” into notice, the owner of many a neglected estate
was surprised by the apparition of hundreds of miserable beings, who
had grown up on his property without his knowledge, and now claimed the
means of support at his hands. The subsistence of the tenant was at
the minimum; the rent was at the maximum; and the interval between the
ignorant excitable peasantry and the proprietor in chief, was filled
only by the middleman, whose business it was to exact rents and not to
employ labourers. The base and the capital of the column were there,
but the shaft was almost entirely wanting.

The extent to which the welfare of the agricultural population,
and through them of the rest of the community, is affected by the
conditions upon which landed property is held, has become fearfully
apparent during the present social crisis. The dependence for good
and evil of workman on master manufacturer, of subject on Government,
of child on father, is less absolute than that of the Irish peasant
upon the lord of the soil from which he derives his subsistence. This
is a subject to which, if we would save ourselves and our country,
it behoves us to give our most earnest and careful attention at
the present time. We cannot give landed proprietors the will and
disposition (where it is wanting) to fulfil the important part they
have to perform in the scheme of society, but we have it in our power
to strike off the fetters which at present impede every step of their
progress in the performance of the duty they owe to themselves and to
those dependent on them.

One half of the surface of Ireland is said to be let off in perpetuity
leases, with derivative and subderivative interests in an endless
chain, so as to obtain profit-rents at each stage; and these leases
are often open to the additional objection that they are unnecessarily
burthensome or uncertain from the particular mode in which they are
made; such as “leases for lives renewable for ever by the insertion
of other lives when the first-named are dead,” “for three lives _or_
thirty-one years,” and “for three lives _and_ thirty-one years.” Many
proposals have at different times been made for the redemption of these
various interests; but an arbitrary interference with the rights of
property is to be avoided, and our object should rather be to give
every prudent facility for the voluntary transfer of land and of
the various interests connected with it, which must lead, by a safe
but certain gradation, to that degree of improvement of the existing
tenures which is necessary for the encouragement of agriculture. In the
flourishing islands of Guernsey and Jersey, corn-rents of fixed amount
are charged upon the same farm one after another, like the coats of
an onion; but the lowest holder, who is the party really interested
in the improvement of the property, has every requisite security that
he will enjoy the whole profit of any outlay he may make, and the
most essential part of the benefit of ownership is thus obtained. In
Mayo and other western counties the old barbarous Irish tenure called
_Rundale_ (Scotch _runrigg_), still prevails, which stops short of the
institution of individual property, and by making the industrious and
thriving responsible for the short-comings of the idle and improvident,
effectually destroys the spring of all improvement. The cessation of
this antiquated system is an indispensable preliminary to any progress
being made in the localities where it exists; but this improvement may
be effected by the landlords without any change in the law.

The master evil of the agricultural system of Ireland, however, is the
law of Entail, and the Incumbrances which seldom fail to accumulate
upon entailed estates. “Proprietors of estates,” observes the author of
an excellent pamphlet which has recently appeared on this subject[11],
“are too often but mere nominal owners, without influence or power over
the persons holding under them. Their real condition is often pitiable,
nor is it possible, in the great majority of cases, to retrieve the
estates. The burthen of debt, or the evils of improvident leases, are
fastened upon the land in such a manner as to convert the owner into
a mere annuitant, often glad to obtain from a good estate a scanty
annuity (after payment of the incumbrances thereon and the public
burthens) for his own subsistence. Proprietor and tenant are equally
powerless for good; and the whole kingdom suffers from the disorders
which have resulted from this state of real property in Ireland.” And
the author of another valuable publication on the same subject[12]
observes as follows: “The evils resulting from settlements and entails
may be regarded as arising from insecurity or uncertainty of tenure;
because the possessor of the property is not in reality the owner; he
cannot deal with it as an owner; he is merely a trustee for others; he
has no interest in its future thorough permanent improvement, except
so far as he may wish to benefit his successors; he can never reap
the benefit himself; he cannot sell; he cannot dispose of a part,
even though the alienation of a part might greatly enhance the value
of the remainder; he holds it during his lifetime, as his predecessor
held it, unaltered, unimproved, to transmit it to his heir clogged
with the same restrictions alike injurious to him and to his country.
This is the case of an unembarrassed landlord[13]. But let us suppose,
as is unfortunately too often the case, that he has received the
estate incumbered under a settlement, with a jointure to the widow of
the late possessor, and a provision for daughters and younger sons.
In what difficulties is he at once involved! this owner for life of
a large tract of country with a long rent-roll, but in fact a small
property! He cannot maintain his position in society without spending
more than his income; debts accumulate; he mortgages his estate, and
insures his life for the security of the mortgagee. Of course he cannot
afford to lay out anything on improvements; on the contrary, though
perhaps naturally kind-hearted and just, his necessities force him to
resort to every means of increasing his present rental. He looks for
the utmost amount; he lets to the highest bidder, without regard to
character or means of payment. If his tenants are without leases, he
raises their rents. If leases fall in, he cannot afford to give the
preference to the last occupier. Perhaps, with all his exertions, he is
unable to pay the interest or put off his creditors. Proceedings are
commenced against him, and the estate passes during his lifetime under
the care of the worst possible landlord, a Receiver under the Court of
Chancery[14].”

The remedy for this state of things is simply the sale of the
encumbered estate, or of a sufficient portion of it to enable the owner
to discharge his encumbrances and to place him in a position to do his
duty towards the remainder. This is the master-key to unlock the field
of industry in Ireland. The seller, in all such cases, is incapable of
making a proper use of the land. The purchaser, on the other hand, may
safely be assumed to be an improver. It is a natural feeling in which
almost all men indulge, and purchases of land are seldom made without
a distinct view to further profitable investments in improvements. “To
give every prudent facility for the transfer by sale of real property
from man to man, by the adoption of a simple, cheap, and secure system
of transfer, in lieu of the present barbarous, unsafe, and expensive
system, so that real property could be bought and sold in Ireland with
as much freedom and security as other property[15],” is, therefore,
the object at which we ought to aim, and especially to encourage
the investment of small capitals in the land, it being through the
instrumentality of small capitalists chiefly that the country can
be civilized and improved. “The purchasers would give extensive and
permanent employment to numbers of people around them in carrying out
that natural desire of man, the improvement of newly-acquired landed
property; they would promote industry everywhere; they would greatly
increase the value of land generally. By their number, all property
in land would be rendered secure against revolutionary violence. The
habits and example of men who had made money by industry, and who might
invest their savings in land, would place the social system of Ireland
on a solid basis. The best of the Protestants and Roman Catholics,
those who had been careful and industrious, would be purchasers of
land, and all would have a common interest in peace and order. That
surplus population beyond the means of present employment, which now
oppresses and embarrasses the country, might gradually be absorbed, and
become a source of wealth and strength. Towns would everywhere improve,
and new ones might arise by the extension of the railway system,
spreading industry and civilization among men now sunk in indolence and
almost barbarism[16].”

All the parties concerned in these transfers would be benefited by
them. Lands are comparatively valueless to those who have no capital
to improve them, and they are often justly felt to be a burthen and a
disgrace, because they entail duties which the nominal owners have no
means of performing. The effect on the character and prospects of the
whole body of landed proprietors would be as described in the following
passage from the author to whom we are already so much indebted: “When
men, however young, act under responsibility, they usually proceed
with caution; if others will think and act for them, and provide
for their wants, and secure them from poverty and danger, their own
prudential faculties may become dormant; and a man or any class of men
so protected, are likely to exhibit deficiency in the qualities of
prudence and good management of their affairs. But owners of land would
not evince any such deficiency, if once they felt that they would be
ruined, and their families also, if they were not governed by the same
rules of prudence which other men must observe, and which necessarily
enter into the proper management of all other descriptions of property.
The present difficulties of sale of land, and the consequent protection
afforded to entailed properties, are the chief reasons why so many
persons of the class of proprietors are in difficulties. With more
liberty, there would be more prudence and more attention to estates
on the part of owners, from which they and the country would be great
gainers[17].”

The manner in which the interests of the public at large are affected,
is correctly described in the following passage from the other
pamphlet: “If these premises be correct; if employment with regular
wages must be found for the peasantry: if capital be necessary, and the
parties holding the land do not possess sufficient for this purpose;
it follows, either that Government must continue to supply the capital
required, not merely by a loan on an emergency, but as part of its
regular system of action; or else that the land must pass into the
hands of those who do possess the means of employing the people--of men
who will carry on agriculture as a business, and will bring to their
occupation the capital, the habits of business, and the energy and
intelligence which have raised the commerce and manufactures of this
nation to their present pre-eminence[18].”

Her Majesty’s Government being deeply impressed with the importance of
these views, introduced a bill into Parliament in the session of 1847,
the object of which was to enable the owners of encumbered estates in
Ireland to sell the whole or a portion of them, after the circumstances
of each estate had been investigated by a Master in Chancery with a
view to secure the due liquidation of every claim upon it. The sale
was not to take place without the consent of the first incumbrancer,
unless the Court of Chancery should consider the produce sufficient
to pay the principal and all arrears of interest, or unless the owner
or some subsequent incumbrancer should undertake to pay to the first
incumbrancer any deficiency which might exist, and give such security
for the performance of his undertaking as the court might direct. This
bill passed the House of Lords, but was withdrawn in the Commons, owing
to the opposition of some of the Irish proprietors, and to objections
entertained by the great Insurance Companies, who are the principal
lenders on Irish mortgages, to having their investments disturbed. The
failure of the bill was a national misfortune which cannot be too soon
remedied.

The Government, however, did what was in its power. A system has
existed in Ireland since the time of Queen Anne for the registration
of all deeds affecting landed property; and of late years a similar
registration has been established of all judgments relating to that
description of property. The attention of the Lord Lieutenant has been
called to the practicability of diminishing the delay and expense
attending transfers of landed property, by the adoption of two simple
practical measures, viz., that when searches have been made in the
office of the Registrar of Deeds, copies should be recorded in the
office, as well as given to the parties on whose behalf they are made;
and that when judgments, &c., recorded in the office of the Registrar
of Judgments have been satisfied, notice should be immediately sent to
the Registrar, in order that such satisfaction may be recorded in the
books of his office[19]. The consequence of the neglect of the first of
these obvious precautions was, that, after expensive searches had been
made in the Registry Office, the same searches often had to be made
again and again, at the same expense, at the instance of other parties,
however limited the transactions might be for the security of which
these inquiries into past transfers and incumbrances were made; and the
consequence of the neglect of the other precaution was, that if, after
a search had been made through the records deposited in the office of
the Registrar of Judgments, to ascertain whether any judgment had been
passed against the estate, it appeared that any such judgment had been
given, another search had to be made in the courts of law, involving
fresh loss of time and fresh expense, to ascertain whether it had been
satisfied[20].

But it is time that we should resume our narrative.

The potato disease, which had manifested itself in North America in
1844[21], first appeared in these islands late in the autumn of 1845.
The early crop of potatoes, which is generally about one-sixth of the
whole, and is dug in September and October, escaped; but the late,
or what is commonly called the “people’s crop,” and is taken up in
December and January, was tainted after it arrived at an advanced
stage of maturity. When the disease had once commenced, it made steady
progress, and it was often found, on opening the pits, that the
potatoes had become a mass of rottenness. Nevertheless, this year the
attack was partial; and although few parts of the country entirely
escaped, and the destruction of human food was, on the whole, very
great, a considerable portion of the crop, which had been a more than
usually large one, was saved. The wheat crop was a full average; oats
and barley were abundant; and of turnips, carrots, and green crops,
including a plentiful hay harvest, there was a more than sufficient
supply. On the Continent, the rye crops failed partially, and the
potato disease was very destructive in Holland, Belgium, France, and
the west of Germany.

In the following year (1846) the blight in the potatoes took place
earlier, and was of a much more sweeping and decisive kind. “On the
27th of last month (July), I passed,” Father Mathew writes in a letter
published in the Parliamentary Papers, “from Cork to Dublin, and this
doomed plant bloomed in all the luxuriance of an abundant harvest.
Returning on the 3rd instant (August), I beheld with sorrow one wide
waste of putrefying vegetation. In many places the wretched people were
seated on the fences of their decaying gardens, wringing their hands,
and wailing bitterly the destruction that had left them foodless.” The
first symptom of the disease was a little brown spot on the leaf, and
these spots gradually increased in number and size, until the foliage
withered and the stem became brittle, and snapped off immediately when
touched. In less than a week the whole process was accomplished[22].
The fields assumed a blackened appearance, as if they had been burnt
up, and the growth of the potatoes was arrested when they were not
larger than a marble or a pigeon’s egg. No potatoes were pitted this
year. In many districts where they had been most abundant, full-grown
wholesome potatoes were not to be procured; and even in London and
other large towns, they were sold at fancy prices, and were consumed as
a luxury by the wealthy, rice and other substitutes being had recourse
to by the body of the people. The crop of wheat this year was barely
an average one, while barley and oats, and particularly the former,
were decidedly deficient. On the Continent, the rye and potato crops
again failed, and prices rose early in the season above those ruling
in England, which caused the shipments from the Black Sea, Turkey and
Egypt, to be sent to France, Italy, and Belgium; and it was not till
late in the season, that our prices rose to a point which turned the
current of supplies towards England and Ireland. The Indian corn crop
in the United States this year was very abundant, and it became a
resource of the utmost value to this country.

In the third year (1847) the disease had nearly exhausted itself. It
appeared in different parts of the country, but the plants generally
exerted fresh vigour and outgrew it. The result, perhaps, could not
have been better. The wholesome distrust in the potato was maintained,
while time was allowed for making the alterations which the new state
of things required. Although the potatoes sown in Ireland in the year
1847 were estimated only at 1/5th or 1/6th of the usual quantity,
it would have been a serious aggravation of the difficulties and
discouragements under which that portion of the empire was suffering,
if the disease had reappeared in its unmitigated form. The crops of
wheat, barley, and oats, in almost every part of the United Kingdom,
and in most of the neighbouring countries on the Continent, were this
year, to use the epithet generally applied to them, magnificent; and
it became more and more apparent on the brink of what a precipice we
had been standing, as the unusually small remaining stock of old corn
came to light, and the exhausted and embarrassed state to which every
description of business had been reduced, notwithstanding the advantage
of a good harvest, gradually declared itself.

Among the numerous causes which enhanced the difficulty of obtaining
adequate foreign supplies at moderate rates during the most exigent
period of the winter of 1846-7, one of the most embarrassing, was
the sudden and extraordinary advance in freights, which occurred
simultaneously in the ports of the United States of America, the
Mediterranean, and the Black Sea. Vessels were not obtainable in the
Black Sea and the Danube at less than 18s. and 22s. per quarter for
corn, whereas the usual rates are 9s. and 11s.; while in the United
States, where large shipments of grain, flour, and Indian corn, were
going forward to Europe, the comparatively limited number of vessels
caused the rates to run up to 9s. per barrel for flour, and 16s. and
18s. per quarter for Indian corn to British ports, the rates usually
given being 2s. 6d. to 3s. 6d. per barrel of flour, and 8s. and 9s. per
quarter for Indian corn.

On the 27th January, 1846, Sir Robert Peel proposed his measure for
the relaxation of the duties on the importation of foreign corn, by
which the scale of duties payable on wheat was to range from 4s. to
10s. per quarter, and Indian corn, which had previously been charged
with the same duty as barley, was to pay only 1s. a-quarter. This was
to last till February 1849, when an uniform duty of 1s. a-quarter
was to be charged on every description of grain. The bill passed the
House of Lords on the 29th June, 1846; and Sir R. Peel announced his
resignation in the House of Commons on the same day.

Immediately on the meeting of Parliament in January, 1847, Lord J.
Russell introduced bills to suspend until the 1st September, 1847, the
duties on foreign corn, and the restrictions imposed by the Navigation
Laws on the importation of corn in foreign vessels; and he at the same
time moved a resolution permitting the use of sugar in breweries; all
which measures received the sanction of the Legislature. At the close
of the same session, the suspension of the Corn and Navigation Laws was
extended to the 1st March, 1848.

On the first appearance of the blight in the autumn of 1845, Professors
Kane, Lindley, and Playfair, were appointed by Sir Robert Peel to
inquire into the nature of it, and to suggest the best means of
preserving the stock of potatoes from its ravages. The result showed
that the mischief lay beyond the knowledge and power of man. Every
remedy which science or experience could dictate was had recourse to,
but the potato equally melted away under the most opposite modes of
treatment.

The next step was to order from the United States of America 100,000ℓ.
worth of Indian corn. It was considered that the void caused by the
failure of the potato crop might be filled, with the least disturbance
of private trade and market prices, by the introduction of a new
description of popular food. Owing to the prohibitory duty, Indian corn
was unknown as an article of consumption in the United Kingdom[23].
Private merchants, therefore, could not complain of interference with
a trade which did not exist, nor could prices be raised against the
home consumer on an article of which no stock was to be found in the
home market. Nevertheless, with a view to avoid as long as possible,
the doubts and apprehensions which must have arisen if the Government
had appeared as a purchaser in a new class of operations, pains were
taken to keep the transaction secret, and the first cargoes from
America had been more than a fortnight in Cork harbour before it became
generally known that such a measure was in progress.

In order to distribute the food so obtained, central depôts were
established in various parts of Ireland, under the direction of
officers of the Commissariat, with sub-depôts under the charge of the
Constabulary and Coast Guard; and, when the supplies in the local
markets were deficient, meal was sold from these depôts at reasonable
prices to Relief Committees, where any existed, and where they did not,
to the labourers themselves. In the time of the heaviest pressure (June
and July 1846), one sub-depôt retailed 20 tons of meal daily, and the
issues from a single main depôt to its dependencies amounted to 233
tons in one week.

The Relief Committees were formed, under the superintendence of a
Central Commission at Dublin, for the purpose of selling food in detail
to those who could buy it, and of giving it to those who could not; the
requisite funds being derived from private subscriptions, added to, in
certain proportions, by Government donations. The Relief Committees
also selected the persons to be employed on the Relief Works carried on
under the superintendence of the Board of Works.

If the Irish poor had been in the habit of buying their food, as is
the case in England, the object would have been attained when a cheap
substitute had been provided for the potato; but as the labouring class
in Ireland had hitherto subsisted on potatoes grown by themselves, and
money wages were almost unknown, it was necessary to adopt some means
of giving the people a command over the new description of food. This
was done by establishing a system of public works, in accordance with
the previous practice on similar occasions, both in Ireland and in
other countries.

These works, which consisted principally of roads, were undertaken on
the application of the magistrates and principal cess-payers, under
the Act 9 & 10 Vic., c. 1, which was passed for the purpose, and the
expense of executing them was defrayed by advances of public money,
half of which was a grant, and half a loan to be repaid by the barony.
The largest number of persons employed in this first season of relief
was 97,000, in August, 1846.

The first symptoms of neglected tillage appeared in the Spring of 1846,
and they were worst in those districts in which the Relief Works were
carried on to the greatest extent. The improvements in progress on the
Shannon and the arterial drainages were also impeded by the preference
which the labourers showed for the Relief Works.

The measures of which we have been speaking were brought to a close
on the 15th August, 1846, and they may be considered to have answered
their end. The scarcity being partial and local, the deficiency of one
part of the country was supplied from the superabundance of others,
and the pains taken to prevent the people from suffering want, led
to their being better off than in ordinary years. Above all, Ireland
was prepared by the course adopted during this probationary season of
distress, as it may be called, to bear better the heavy affliction of
the succeeding season. No misapplication of the funds deserving of
notice took place, except in the instance of the Relief Works, the
cause of which was as follows:--The landed proprietors of Ireland
had long been accustomed to rely upon Government loans and grants
for making improvements of various kinds, and the terms on which the
Relief Works were to be executed being more advantageous than any
which had been open to them for many years before, a rush took place
from all quarters upon this fund, and the special object of relieving
the people from the consequences of the failure of their accustomed
food, was to a great extent lost sight of in the general fear, which
in many cases was not attempted to be concealed, of being deprived of
what the persons interested called “their share of the grant.” This
description of relief, therefore, instead of acting as a test of real
distress, operated as a bounty on applications for public works from
a class of persons who were at once charged with the administration
of the relief and were interested in the execution of the works. The
result was that, while the applications amounted to 1,289,816ℓ., the
sum actually sanctioned and expended was only 476,000ℓ., and great part
even of this was merely yielded to the distressing appeals pressed on
the Lord Lieutenant on the plea of urgent local destitution, and of
the lamentable consequences to be expected from allowing it to remain
unrelieved. The other expenses connected with this season of relief
were as follows:--Loans on grand jury presentments, 130,000ℓ.; loss
on the purchase and sale of grain, 50,000ℓ.; given in aid of Relief
Committees, 69,845ℓ.; extra staff of the Board of Works, 7,527ℓ.; thus
making the whole sum expended in relief to Ireland, up to the 15th
August, 1846, 733,372ℓ., of which 368,000ℓ. was in loans, and 365,372ℓ.
in grants. The sum raised by voluntary subscription through the Relief
Committees was 98,000ℓ.

The new and more decisive failure of the potato crop called for great
exertions from Lord John Russell’s recently formed Government, and the
plan resolved upon was explained in the Treasury Minute dated the 31st
August, 1846, which was published for general information[24].

The system of public works was renewed by the Act 9 & 10 Vic., c.
107, which was passed without any opposition in either House of
Parliament. In order to check the exorbitant demands which had been
made during the preceding season, the whole of the expense was made a
local charge, and the advances were directed to be repaid by a rate
levied according to the Poor Law valuation, which makes the landlords
liable for the whole rate on tenements under 4ℓ. yearly value, and for
a proportion, generally amounting to one-half, on tenements above
that value, instead of according to the grand jury cess (the basis of
the repayments under the preceding Act), which lays the whole burden
upon the occupier. It was also determined that the wages given on the
Relief Works should be somewhat below the average rate of wages in the
district; that the persons employed, should, as far as possible, be
paid by task or in proportion to the work actually done by them; and
that the Relief Committees, instead of giving tickets entitling persons
to employment on the public works, should furnish lists of persons
requiring relief, which should be carefully revised by the officers of
the Board of Works; the experience of the preceding season having shown
that these precautions were necessary to confine the Relief Works to
the destitute, and to enforce a reasonable quantum of work.

The question which the Government had to decide, in regard to the
renewal of the Commissariat operations, was of the most momentous kind.
After all that had taken place during the last few months, it could not
be expected that private trade would return, as a matter of course,
to its accustomed channels. Neither the wholesale dealers in towns,
nor the retail dealers in the rural districts, would lay in even their
usual stocks of food; still less would they make the extraordinary
provision required to meet the coming emergency, while they had before
them the prospect of the Government throwing into the market supplies
of food of unknown extent, which might make their outlay so much loss
to them. The Government could not, therefore, calculate, as it did on
the former occasion, on finding the private trade, by means of which
the people are ordinarily supplied with food, proceeding as usual, and
on being able to add more or less, at its discretion, to the resources
which that trade afforded. Mercantile confidence in this branch of
business was, for the time, destroyed. The trade was paralysed; and
if this state of things had been suffered to continue, the general
expectation of the Government again interfering would inevitably have
created a necessity for that interference, on a scale which it would
have been quite beyond the power of the Government to support.

Under these circumstances it was announced,--1st. That no orders
for supplies of food would be sent by the Government to foreign
countries. 2ndly. That the interference of the Government would be
confined to those western districts of Ireland in which, owing to the
former prevalence of potato cultivation, no trade in corn for local
consumption existed. And 3rdly. That even in these districts, the
Government depôts would not be opened for the sale of food, while it
could be obtained from private dealers at reasonable prices, with
reference to those which prevailed at the nearest large marts. It was
also determined to adhere to the rule acted upon during the preceding
season, not to make any purchases in the local markets of Ireland,
where the appearance of the Government as a buyer must have had the
effect of keeping up prices and encouraging interested representations;
and a promise was given that every practicable effort would be made to
protect the supplies of food introduced by private traders, both while
they were in transit and when they were stored for future consumption.

The Relief Committees of the preceding season were re-organised;
the rules under which they had acted were carefully revised; and
inspecting officers were appointed to superintend their proceedings,
and keep the Government informed of the progress of events. A large
proportion of the people of Ireland had been accustomed to grow the
food they required, each for himself, on his own little plot of ground;
and the social machinery by which, in other countries, the necessary
supplies of food are collected, stored, and distributed, had no
existence there. Suddenly, without any preparation, the people passed
from a potato food, which they raised themselves, to a grain food,
which they had to purchase from others, and which, in great part, had
to be imported from abroad; and the country was so entirely destitute
of the resources applicable to this new state of things, that often,
even in large villages, neither bread nor flour was to be procured; and
in country districts, the people had sometimes to walk twenty miles
before they could obtain a single stone of meal. The main object for
which the Relief Committees were established, therefore, was to provide
a temporary substitute for the operations of the corn-factor, miller,
baker, and provision-dealer, and to allow time and furnish the example
for a sounder and more permanent state of things; but they were not
precluded from giving gratuitous relief in cases of more than ordinary
destitution. The agency of Relief Committees was this season almost
universally substituted for the coast guard and constabulary depôts
with the object of drawing out the resources of the country before
the Government depôts were had recourse to, of inducing the upper and
middle classes to exert themselves, and of preventing a direct pressure
of the mass of the people upon the Government depôts, which in a time
of real famine it would have been very difficult to resist.

Such was the plan resolved upon for the campaign of 1846-7 against the
approaching famine, and we shall now show the result of the struggle.

It was hoped that a breathing-time would have been allowed at the
season of harvest, to enable the Board of Works to reorganize their
establishments on a scale proportioned to the magnitude of the task
about to devolve on them, and to prepare, through their district
officers, plans and estimates of suitable works for the assistance of
the baronial sessions. This interval was not obtained. The general
failure of the potato crop spread despondency and alarm from one end
of Ireland to the other, and induced every class of persons to throw
themselves upon the Government for aid. On the 6th of September, the
Lord Lieutenant ordered all the discontinued works under the 9 & 10
Vic., c. 1, to be recommenced, and sessions were rapidly held in all
the southern and western counties of Ireland, at which roads were
presented in the mass, under the 9 & 10 Vic., c. 107, the cost of
which, in some cases, much exceeded the annual rental of the barony.
The resident gentry and rate-payers, whose duty it was to ascertain,
as far as possible, the probable amount of destitution in their
neighbourhood, the sum required to relieve it, and the works upon
which that sum could best be expended, and who had the necessary local
knowledge, in almost every case devolved these functions upon the
Board of Works, who could only act on such information as they could
obtain from naval and military officers and engineers, most of whom
were selected from among strangers to the district, in order to prevent
undue influence being used. After that, to advance the funds; to select
the labourers; to superintend the work; to pay the people weekly;
to enforce proper performance of the labour; if the farm works were
interrupted, to ascertain the quantity of labour required for them;
to select and draft off the proper persons to perform it; to settle
the wages to be paid to them by the farmers, and see that they were
paid; to furnish food, not only for all the destitute out of doors,
but in some measure for the paupers in the workhouses, were the duties
which the Government and its officers were called upon to perform. The
proprietors and associated rate-payers having presented _indefinitely_,
said it was the fault of the Government and its officers if the people
were not instantly employed, and these officers were blamed, even by
persons of character and understanding, if they were not at once equal
to execute the duties which in this country are performed in their
respective districts by thousands of country gentlemen, magistrates,
guardians, overseers, surveyors, &c., resident throughout the country,
and trained by the experience of years to the performance of their
various functions. The Board of Works became the centre of a colossal
organization; 5,000 separate works had to be reported upon; 12,000
subordinate officers had to be superintended. Their letters averaged
upwards of 800 a-day, and the number received on each of the following
days was--

  January 4th,    3,104
  February 15th,  4,900
  April 19th,     4,340
  May 17th,       6,033[25]

The strain on the springs of society from this monstrous system of
centralisation was fearful in the extreme. The Government, which ought
only to mediate between the different classes of society, had now to
bear the immediate pressure of the millions, on the sensitive points
of wages and food. The opposition to task-work was general, and the
enforcement of it became a trial of strength between the Government and
the multitude. The officers of the Board were in numerous instances
the objects of murderous attacks, and it became necessary for the
preservation of the whole community, to have recourse to the painful
expedient of stopping the works whenever cases of insubordination or
outrage occurred.

Meanwhile, the number of persons employed on the works was rapidly on
the increase. The utmost exertions of two sets of inspecting officers,
one under the Board of Works, and the other under Sir R. Routh, were
insufficient to revise the lists; and the Lord Lieutenant in vain
directed that no person rated above 6ℓ. for the Poor Law cess, should,
except under very special circumstances, be eligible for employment.
Thousands upon thousands were pressed upon the officers of the Board
of Works in every part of Ireland, and it was impossible for those
officers to test the accuracy of the urgent representations which were
made to them. The attraction of money wages regularly paid from the
public purse, or the “Queen’s pay,” as it was popularly called, led to
a general abandonment of other descriptions of industry, in order to
participate in the advantages of the Relief Works. Landlords competed
with each other in getting the names of their tenants placed on the
lists; farmers dismissed their labourers and sent them to the works;
the clergy insisted on the claims of the members of their respective
congregations; the fisheries were deserted; and it was often difficult
even to get a coat patched or a pair of shoes mended, to such an extent
had the population of the south and west of Ireland turned out upon
the roads. The average number employed in October was 114,000; in
November, 285,000; in December, 440,000; and in January, 1847, 570,000.
It was impossible to exact from such multitudes a degree of labour
which would act as a test of destitution. Huddled together in masses,
they contributed to each other’s idleness, and there were no means of
knowing who did a fair proportion of work and who did not. The general
enforcement of the system of task work had justly been considered
necessary to stimulate the industry of the labourers on the Relief
Works, but when this point had been carried, after a hard struggle, the
old abuse reappeared in the aggravated form of an habitual collusion
between the labourers and the overseers who were appointed to measure
their work; so that the labourers, if they could be so called, were not
only as idle as ever, but were enabled withal to enjoy a rate of wages
which ought only to have been the reward of superior industry.

The plan of the Labour Rate Act (9 & 10 Vic., c. 107) was based on the
supposition that the great majority of the landlords and farmers would
make those exertions and submit to those sacrifices which the magnitude
of the crisis demanded, leaving only a manageable proportion of the
population to be supported by the Board of Works; and the Act would
probably have answered its object, if a larger, instead of a smaller
number of persons than usual had been employed in the cultivation and
improvement of the land, and the Relief Committees had put only those
who were really destitute upon the lists. Including the families of the
persons employed, upwards of two millions of people were maintained by
the Relief Works, but there were other multitudes behind, including
often the most helpless portion of the community, for whom no work
could be found. The Relief Works did not always furnish a subsistence
even for those who were employed on them. The wages, paid regularly in
money, were higher than any which had ever been given for agricultural
labour in Ireland, but at the existing prices of food they were
insufficient for the support of a family, melancholy proof of which was
afforded by daily instances of starvation in connexion with the Relief
Works[26]. The fearful extent to which the rural population had been
thrown for support upon the Board of Works also threatened a disastrous
neglect of the ordinary tillage. If the people were retained on the
works, their lands must remain uncultivated; if they were put off the
works, they must starve. A change of system had become inevitable,
and when Parliament met in the end of January, it was announced that
the Government intended to put an end to the Public Works, and to
substitute for them another mode of relief, which will be hereafter
described.

Meanwhile, the pressure on the Relief Works was continually on the
increase, and the persons daily employed, who in January had been
570,000, became in February 708,000, and in March amounted to the
enormous number of 734,000[27], representing, at a moderate estimate
of the average extent of each family, upwards of three millions of
persons. At last, the Government, seeing that the time suited for
agricultural operations was rapidly passing away, and that the utmost
exertions made on the spot had failed in keeping the numbers in check,
took the matter into its own hands, and directed that on the 20th
March, 20 per cent. of the persons employed should be struck off the
lists; after which, successive reductions were ordered, proportioned
to the progress made in bringing the new system of relief into
operation in each district. These orders were obeyed, and the crisis
passed without any disturbance of the public peace or any perceptible
aggravation of the distress. The necessary labour was returned to
agriculture, and the foundation was laid of the late abundant harvest
in Ireland, by which the downward progress of that country has been
mercifully stayed, and new strength and spirits have been given for
working out her regeneration. In the first week in April, the persons
employed on the Relief Works were reduced to 525,000; in the first
week in May to 419,000; in the first week in June to 101,000; and in
the week ending the 26th June to 28,000. The remaining expenditure
was limited to a sum of 200,000ℓ. for the month of May, and to the
rate of 100,000ℓ. a-month for June, July, and the first fifteen days
of August, when the Act expired. These sums were afterwards permitted
to be exceeded to a certain extent, but the object was attained of
putting a curb on this monstrous system and of bringing it gradually
and quietly to a close. Great exertions were made, and a heavy expense
was incurred, to leave the roads and other works in progress in a safe
and passable state as far as they had gone; but their completion must
depend upon the parties locally interested in them. From the first
commencement of the Relief Works in February 1846, repeated warnings
were given that the object was not the works themselves, but the relief
of the prevailing destitution through the employment afforded by them;
that the works would be closed as soon as they were no longer required
for that purpose; and that if the proprietors desired to complete them,
they might do so under the ordinary system of Government loans made on
the security of county presentments[28].

This system threw off a shoot, the history of which it is necessary to
trace. In order to impose some limits on what threatened to become a
gigantic system of permanently supporting one portion of the community
at the expense of the remainder, and of making provision out of the
taxes for classes of undertakings which properly belong to the economy
of private life, the application of the public money under the Labour
Rate Acts was strictly limited to works of a public character, which
were not likely to be undertaken except for the purpose of giving
relief. This condition was generally objected to in Ireland; and
although no disposition was evinced to take advantage of the loans
which the Government was ready to make under the General Improvement
and Drainage Acts, a great desire was expressed that the funds advanced
under the Labour Rate Act should be employed on what were called
reproductive works. The Lord Lieutenant, having obtained the sanction
of the Government, yielded to this general feeling, and authorized
presentments to be made for the drainage and subsoiling of the estates
of individuals, provided they consented to their estates being charged
with the repayment of the sums advanced. This was the arrangement which
acquired so much notoriety under the name of “Labouchere’s Letter,”
owing to its having been announced by the publication of a letter from
Mr. Labouchere, who then held the office of Secretary for Ireland, to
the Board of Works, dated 5th October, 1846; but the result did not
answer the expectations which had been formed. The aggregate amount
presented “under the Letter,” was 380,607ℓ., of which presentments were
acted on to the gross amount of 239,476ℓ. The sum actually expended
was about 180,000ℓ.; and the largest number of persons at any one time
employed was 26,961 in the month of May, 1847. Some incidental good
was done by the example of the advantages of thorough draining, and of
the proper mode of executing it; but, as a remedy for the wide-spread
calamity, the plan totally failed.

Upon this, a two-fold agitation sprang up. Some landed proprietors
required that their liability should be confined to the relief of the
destitute on their own estates; while others demanded that, instead of
being employed on the roads, the people should be paid for working on
their own farms. Both these movements were steadily resisted by the
Government. The objection to the first was, that if the inhabitants
of the pauperised districts had been separated from the rest in the
administration of the measures of relief, they must either have starved
or have become entirely dependent on the Consolidated Fund; while,
if the other plan had been adopted, the entire cost of carrying on
the agriculture of the country would have been transferred to the
Government, without its being possible either to test the applications
for assistance, or to enforce a proper amount of exertion. This last
scheme was most clamorously urged in the county of Clare, and it may
be considered as the masterpiece of that system of social economy
according to which the machine of society should be worked backwards,
and the Government should be made to support the people, instead of
the people the Government. The Government was also to provide tools
and seed as well as wages, but the rent was to be received by the same
parties as before.

Baronial presentments were authorized for the construction of railway
earthworks, as relief works under the 9 & 10 Vic., c. 107, subject
to the conditions required for the fulfilment of the object of the
Act[29]; but advantage was taken of this permission only in two
baronies of the county of Cork, where the Waterford and Limerick
Railway was aided from this source.

The silver currency which had previously sufficed for a people who
lived upon potatoes grown by themselves, and paid their rent by so many
days’ labour, fell short of what was required to pay the labourers
employed on the numerous Relief Works carried on simultaneously in
different parts of the country, and a large supply was therefore
distributed, by means of a Government steamer, among the principal
towns on the coast of Ireland. On the cessation of the Relief Works,
the greater part of this coin accumulated in the banks, which were
relieved by the transmission of the surplus to the Cape of Good Hope to
aid in carrying on the Caffre war.

In the Commissariat branch of the operations, every pledge which
had been given was strictly adhered to, and confidence having been
re-established, prodigious efforts were made by the mercantile
community to provide against the approaching scarcity. The whole world
was ransacked for supplies; Indian corn, the taste for which had by
this time taken root in Ireland, rose to a higher price than wheat;
and the London and Liverpool markets were again and again swept by
the enterprising operations of the Irish dealers, who, from an early
period, appreciated the full extent of the calamity, and acted upon the
principle that the gulf which had opened in Ireland would swallow all
that could be thrown into it, and remain still unsatisfied. In February
1847, the beneficial effect of these measures began to be apparent. On
the 24th of that month, Mr. N. Cummins, a respectable merchant of Cork,
wrote as follows to Mr. Trevelyan:

    “From this gloomy picture I turn to the supply of food, and
    am happy to say that in this quarter the importations, both
    direct and from England, during the past month, have been very
    large; heavy cargoes of maize continue almost daily to arrive,
    and I feel persuaded that the stocks of bread stuffs generally
    are accumulating here to a much larger amount than some of
    our dealers would have it believed. Prices cannot, however, be
    quoted at more than a turn below the extreme point yet; they
    stand as follows,--say Indian corn, by retail, 17ℓ. 15s. and
    18ℓ. per ton; Indian meal to 19ℓ.; oatmeal, 25ℓ.; wheaten meal,
    19ℓ. to 20ℓ. per ton.”

On the 12th March, the same gentleman wrote,--

    “Our market for Indian corn seems at length quite glutted, the
    arrivals within the last few days having been so extremely
    numerous, that the trade is unable to take off the supply, or
    indeed to find sufficient stowage in the city. Several cargoes
    for discharge here are at this moment lying under demurrage,
    and I may quote the article 15s. to 20s. per ton cheaper than a
    fortnight since.”

And on the 19th,--

    “There are at present over 100 sail, containing an aggregate
    amount of bread stuffs not short of 20,000 tons, afloat in our
    harbour; and maize, which a month since brought freely 18ℓ. per
    ton, is this day offered in small parcels at 15ℓ.”

And on the same day Father Matthew wrote to Mr. Trevelyan as follows:--

    “For the first time since the Lord visited this unhappy land
    with famine, I address you with delight. The markets are
    rapidly falling; Indian corn from 16ℓ. to 15ℓ. per ton. The
    vast importations, and the still more vast exportations from
    America, have produced this blessed effect.”

On the 26th March, Mr. Cummins states--

    “I have now to report the continuance each day of numerous
    arrivals of food cargoes here; the additional number during
    the present week (mostly maize laden) considerably exceeds
    100 sail, several being American ships of large burthen; and
    although many have proceeded to other ports, the number afloat,
    waiting orders or sale, has been fully doubled. I cannot
    estimate the fleet this day in our harbours at less than 250
    sail, nor the contents at much under 50,000 tons. Indian corn
    may be purchased at 14ℓ. by the cargo, and retailed at 15ℓ. per
    ton.”

It now began to be perceived that more was to be expected from the
collective exertions of the merchants of the United Kingdom, than from
the Admiralty or the Commissariat. The whole quantity of corn imported
into Ireland in the first six months of 1847 was 2,849,508 qrs., which
was worth, at the then current prices, 8,764,943ℓ.; and the Irish
market was, to use the words of the present Lord Lieutenant, “freer,
cheaper, and better supplied, than that of any country in Europe where
distress prevailed, and where those measures of interference and
restriction had been unwisely adopted which were successfully resisted
here.” The price of Indian corn, which in the middle of February had
been 19ℓ. a-ton, was reduced at the end of March to 13ℓ., and at the
end of August to 7ℓ. 10s. a-ton; and such was the quantity of shipping
which flocked to the United States on the first intelligence of the
unusual demand for freight, that the rate for the conveyance of corn
to the United Kingdom, which had been as high as 9s. per barrel during
the winter months, was as low as 4s. 6d. in May, and has since fallen
to 1s. 9d. It may safely be asserted that these results would not have
been obtained, if the great body of our English and Irish merchants and
shipowners, instead of having free scope given to their exertions, had
been left under the discouraging impression that all their calculations
might be upset by the sudden appearance in the foreign market, of
Government vessels and Government orders for supplies. The noble
harbour of Cork was established as the house of call and entrepôt for
the grain ships bound to every part of Western Europe; and the merchant
being now free either to sell on the spot or to re-export, Ireland
began to enjoy the benefit of her admirable commercial position, by
getting the first, and largest, and cheapest supply.

Nevertheless, the public establishments were not idle. Upwards of
300,000 quarters of corn were purchased from time to time to supply
the Government depôts on the western coast of Ireland[30], and large
stores of biscuit and salt meat, which had been laid up at the
different military stations in the year 1843, in anticipation of
popular disturbances arising out of the repeal movement, were now
applied to the relief of the people. One of the consequences of the
sudden change from a potato to a corn diet, was, that the means of
grinding were seriously deficient. The powerful Admiralty mills at
Deptford, Portsmouth, Plymouth, and Malta, besides two large hired
mills, were therefore constantly employed in grinding the corn
bought by the Commissariat, leaving the mill-power of Ireland to the
private importers of grain into that country; and hand-mills, on the
principle of the old Irish Quern, were made for distribution in the
most distressed districts; while others, constructed on an improved
principle, were procured from France. Thirty-four large depôts were
established on the western side of Ireland, from Dunfanaghy, in the
most northern part of Donegal, to Skibbereen, in the south-west of
the county of Cork: and the sales were made, as far as possible, to
the Relief Committees, with the double object of drawing forth the
resources and activity of the upper classes, and of preventing an
indiscriminate pressure upon the depôts, which it would have been
difficult to resist. Several ships of war were moored in convenient
situations and used as store-ships. The largest and most powerful
war-steamers, reinforced, when the occasion required it, by sailing
vessels, were appropriated to the conveyance of the meal from the mills
in England to the depôts in Ireland, and every other available steamer,
not excepting the Admiralty yacht, was employed in making the necessary
transfers between the depôts, and in conveying the supplies which the
Relief Committees had purchased.

The highest praise to which these great operations are entitled, is
that they were carried through without any sensible disturbance of the
ordinary course of trade, and that in some important respects they even
gave new life and development to it. The purchases were all made in
the home market, and care was taken never to give the highest current
price. The sales were made at the wholesale price of the nearest
large mart, with a reasonable addition for the cost of carriage, &c.
When supplies of food could be obtained elsewhere, the depôts were
closed. Private merchants, therefore, imported largely in the face of
the Government depôts; while, in the remote western districts, the
Commissariat acted as pioneers to the ordinary trade, and led the way
to habits of commercial enterprise where before they had no existence.

There was the same general pressure for the premature opening of the
depôts as for the early commencement of Relief Works, but in this case
it was successfully resisted. It was explained that the Government
depôts were intended to be a last resource to supply the deficiencies
of the trade, and not to take the place of that trade; and that if the
depôts were opened while the country was still full of the produce of
the late harvest, that produce would be exported before the spring
supplies arrived from America and the Black Sea, and the population
would become entirely dependent upon the depôts, which must, in that
case, soon come to a discreditable and disastrous stop. Meanwhile,
great exertions were made to protect the provision trade, and the
troops and constabulary were harassed by continual escorts. The
plunder of bakers’ shops and bread-carts, and the shooting of horses
and breaking up of roads, to prevent the removal of provisions, were
matters of daily occurrence; and at Limerick, Galway, and elsewhere,
mobs prevented any articles of food from leaving the towns, while the
country people resisted their being carried in. Convoys under military
protection proceeded at stated intervals from place to place, without
which nothing in the shape of food could be sent with safety.

As many as 1097 Relief Committees were established under the
superintendence of the Commissariat; while 199,470ℓ.[31] was
subscribed by private individuals, and 189,914ℓ. was granted by the
Government (making together 389,384ℓ.) in support of their operations.

One of the functions of these committees was to provide supplies of
food for sale at the current market price; and when the rise of prices
began to be seriously felt, the Government was called upon from every
part of Ireland to permit the grants of public money made to the
committees to be employed in reducing the price of provisions to that
of ordinary years. To this demand it was impossible for the Government
to accede. In 1845-6 the scarcity was confined to a few districts of
Ireland, while there was abundance everywhere else. The question,
therefore, at that time, was a money one; and all that was required to
relieve the distress, was to purchase a sufficient quantity of food
elsewhere and to send it into the distressed districts. In 1846-7, on
the contrary, the scarcity was general, extending over all Western
Europe, and threatening a famine in other quarters besides Ireland. The
present question, therefore, was not a money, but a food question. The
entire stock of food for the whole United Kingdom was insufficient, and
it was only by carefully husbanding it, that it could be made to last
till harvest. If provisions had been cheapened out of the public purse,
consumption would have proceeded in a time of severe scarcity, at the
same rate as in a time of moderate plenty; the already insufficient
stock of food would have been expended with a frightful rapidity, and
in order to obtain a few weeks of ease, we should have had to endure a
desolating famine. Those Relief Committees which attempted to follow
this plan speedily exhausted their capital; and private dealers (who
necessarily lay in their stock at the current market price, whatever
that may be) retired from the competition with public bodies selling
food at prices artificially reduced by charitable subscriptions and
grants out of national funds.

The other function of the Relief Committees was to give gratuitous
aid in cases of extreme destitution, and this was well performed by
them to the extent of their means. As the distress increased, the
distribution of cooked food by the establishment of soup-kitchens was
found the most effectual means of alleviating it. The attention of
the committees was therefore generally directed to this object by the
Inspecting Officers. Boilers were manufactured and sent to Ireland in
great numbers, and Government donations were now in every case made
equal in amount to the private subscriptions (“pound for pound”), and
in cases of more than usual pressure, twice or three times that amount
was given. This mode of giving relief was not found to be attended with
any serious abuse. The committees expended in a great measure their
own money, which made them more careful in seeing that it was laid out
with the greatest possible advantage and economy; and as the ration
of cooked food distributed by them was not an object of desire to
persons in comfortable circumstances, as money wages were, it acted in
a great degree as a test of destitution. The defect of this system of
relief was, that being voluntary, it could not be relied on to meet the
necessities of a numerous population in a period of great emergency,
and the difficulty of obtaining private subscriptions was often
greatest in the most distressed districts.

The point at which we had arrived, therefore, at the commencement
of the year 1847, was, that the system of Public Works, although
recommended by the example of all former occasions on which relief had
been afforded to the people of Ireland in seasons of distress, had
completely broken down under the pressure of this wide-spread calamity;
while the other concurrent system, which, on the principle of the Poor
Law, aimed at giving relief, in the most direct form, out of funds
locally raised, had succeeded to the extent to which it had been tried.
The works were therefore brought to a close in the manner which has
been already described: and it was determined to complete the system
of relief by the distribution of food, to give it legal validity, and
to place it more decidedly on the basis of the Poor Law. This was done
by the passing of the Act 10 Vic., c. 7. A Relief Committee, composed
of the magistrates, one clergyman of each persuasion, the Poor Law
guardian, and the three highest rate-payers, was constituted in each
electoral division[32], the unit of Irish Poor Law statistics. A
Finance Committee, consisting of four gentlemen, carefully selected
for their weight of character and knowledge of business, was formed
to control the expenditure in each union. Inspecting Officers were
appointed, most of whom had been trained under the Board of Works
and Sir R. Routh; and a Commission sitting in Dublin, of which Sir J.
Burgoyne was the head, and the Poor Law Commissioner was one of the
members, superintended the whole system. The expense was to be defrayed
by payments made by the guardians out of the produce of the rates; and
when this fund was insufficient, as it always proved to be, it was
reinforced by Government loans, to be repaid by rates subsequently
levied. Free grants were also made in aid of the rates in those unions
in which the number of destitute poor was largest, compared with the
means of relieving them, and when private subscriptions were raised,
donations were made to an equal amount.

The check principally relied on, therefore, was, that the expenditure
should be conducted, either immediately or proximately, out of the
produce of the rates. No loan was to be made to any Board of Guardians
until the Inspecting Officer had certified that they had passed a
resolution to make the rate upon which it was to be secured, and that,
to the best of his belief, they were proceeding with all possible
dispatch to make and levy such rate. This principle, although still
imperfectly applied, and consequently irregular in its action,
exercised a pervading influence over the working of this system of
relief. In forming the lists of persons to be relieved, and making
their demands upon the Commissioners, few committees altogether
rejected the idea that it was their own money which they were spending;
and in some districts the farmer rate-payers assembled, and insisted
on large numbers of persons being struck off the lists, who they knew
were not entitled to relief. The tests applied to the actual recipients
of relief were, that the personal attendance of all parties requiring
relief was insisted on, exceptions being made in favour of the sick,
impotent, and children under nine years of age, and that the relief
was directed to be given only in the shape of cooked food, distributed
in portions declared by the best medical authorities to be sufficient
to maintain health and strength. The “cooked food test[33]” was found
particularly efficacious in preventing abuse; and the enforcement of
it in some parts of the country cost a severe struggle. Undressed meal
might be converted into cash by those who did not require it as food;
and even the most destitute often disposed of it for tea, tobacco, or
spirits; but stirabout, which becomes sour by keeping, has no value
in the market, and persons were therefore not likely to apply for it,
who did not want it for their own consumption. Attempts were made
to apply the labour test to this system of relief; but, besides the
practical difficulty of want of tools and proper superintendence, the
Commissioners considered that, owing to the absence of any adequate
motive, it would “lead to a want of exertion on the part of the men
which would perhaps be more demoralising than relief without any
work.” It was therefore left to the Relief Committees in large towns
and other situations favourable to such a mode of proceeding, to take
their own course upon it; and the result was, that some light kinds
of labour, such as cleaning the streets and whitewashing the cabins,
were exacted by a few of the more zealous and active committees.
Relief in aid of wages was strenuously insisted on by many of the
Relief Committees, and was steadily and successfully resisted by the
Commission; but it was not considered right, in the administration
of a temporary measure, to require the surrender of the land held by
applicants, provided they were proved to be at the time in a state of
destitution.

This system reached its highest point in the month of July, 1847, when
out of 2,049 electoral divisions, into which Ireland is divided, 1,826
had been brought under the operation of the Act, and 3,020,712 persons
received separate rations, of whom 2,265,534 were adults, and 755,178
were children. This multitude was again gradually and peaceably thrown
on its own resources at the season of harvest, when new and abundant
supplies of food became available, and the demand for labour was at its
highest amount. Relief was discontinued to fifty-five unions on the
15th August, and the issues to the remaining unions entirely ceased on
the 12th September. The latest date allowed by the Act for advances to
be made, was the 1st October.

This was the second occasion on which upwards of three millions of
people had been fed “out of the hands of the magistrate,” but this
time it was effectual. The Relief Works had been crowded with persons
who had other means of subsistence, to the exclusion of the really
destitute; but a ration of cooked food proved less attractive than
full money wages, and room was thus made for the helpless portion of
the community. The famine was stayed. The “affecting and heart-rending
crowds of destitutes[34]” disappeared from the streets; the cadaverous,
hunger-stricken countenances of the people gave place to looks of
health; deaths from starvation ceased; and cattle-stealing, plundering
provisions, and other crimes prompted by want of food, were diminished
by half in the course of a single month. The Commission closed amidst
general applause, and “Resolutions were received from many hundreds of
the committees, praising the conduct of the inspecting officers, and
frankly and honourably expressing their gratitude to Government and the
Legislature for the effective means afforded them for carrying out this
benevolent operation[35].” This enterprise was in truth the “grandest
attempt ever made to grapple with famine over a whole country[36].”
Organised armies, amounting altogether to some hundreds of thousands,
had been rationed before; but neither ancient nor modern history can
furnish a parallel to the fact that upwards of three millions of
persons were fed every day in the neighbourhood of their own homes,
by administrative arrangements emanating from and controlled by one
central office.

The expense was moderate compared with the magnitude of the object. The
amount at which it was originally estimated by the Commissioners was
3,000,000ℓ.; the sum for which Parliament was asked to provide was
2,200,000ℓ., and the sum actually expended was 1,557,212ℓ., of which
146,631ℓ. was paid to the Commissariat for meal supplied to the Relief
Committees from the Government Depôts. The price of meal fortunately
fell more than one-fifth during the progress of these operations,
or from 2½d. a ration, to less than 2d., including all expenses of
establishment.

The Finance Committees, which were selected bodies, consisting of from
two to four gentlemen in each union, “with rare exceptions acted with
zeal and intelligence[37].” The Relief Committees, a miscellaneous body
composed of the foremost persons in each petty district, whoever they
might be, showed, as was to be expected, every variety of good and bad
conduct. In some cases the three highest rate-payers could not read,
and even themselves established claims to be placed on the list of
destitute for daily rations. It is a fact very honourable to Ireland,
that among upwards of 2000 local bodies to whom advances were made
under this Act, there is not one to which, so far as the Government is
informed, any suspicion of embezzlement attaches.

In order to check the progress of the fever, which, as usual, followed
in the train of famine, the Act 10 Vic., c. 22 was passed, by which
the Relief Committees were empowered to attend to the proper burial of
the dead, to provide temporary hospitals, to clear away nuisances, and
to ventilate and cleanse cabins, the necessary funds being advanced
by the Government in the same manner as the advances for providing
food. These sanitary arrangements were extensively acted upon and at
moderate expense. On the 17th August 326 hospitals and dispensaries
had been authorized, with accommodation for more than 23,000 patients,
with medical officers, nurses, ward-maids, &c. The additional expense
incurred under this Act, was 119,055ℓ., the whole of which was made a
free grant to the unions, in aid of rates.

The state of the finances of some of the unions was a source of deep
anxiety through the winter and spring of 1846-7. Rates were not
collected sufficient to defray the current expenses of the workhouses
of these unions, and the guardians threatened to turn the inmates into
the street, if assistance were not given from the public purse. The
dilemma was a painful and perplexing one. There was no reason to doubt
the readiness of some of the persons who held this language to put
their threat into execution; while, to admit the claim, might bring
upon the Government the greater number of the workhouses, in addition
to the whole of the outdoor relief; in other words, would transfer to
national funds a burden intended by law to be local, and not likely
to be administered with economy on any other footing. Important aid
was, however, given. Large supplies of clothing were collected from
the stores of the army and navy, and sent to Ireland for the use of
the workhouses. Small sums of money, amounting in the aggregate to
23,503ℓ., were lent from time to time with a sparing hand to assist
the guardians in providing food and clothing in the most pressing and
necessitous cases; 4,479ℓ. was expended in providing proper medical
inspection and superintendence in localities in which great sickness
prevailed; and 60,000ℓ. was advanced for the enlargement of the
workhouses, principally by the erection of fever-wards.

The improvement of the Fisheries on the western coast of Ireland has
always been an object much pressed upon the Government. In order to
give the fishermen a motive for exertion, and to set them an example of
improved modes of preparing the fish for sale, experienced curers were
obtained from the Fishery Board in Scotland; six stations were formed,
at which fish are purchased at a fair market price, cured, and sold
again for consumption to the highest bidder; and supplies of salt and
tackle were provided for sale to the fishermen. This was done without
any expense to the public, by means of a sum of 5000ℓ. placed at the
disposal of the Government out of the balance of the subscription for
the relief of Irish distress in 1822.

The plan of making small loans to fishermen to enable them to equip
themselves for their trade, was not resorted to, because experience
had proved that the fishermen are induced by it to rely upon others,
instead of themselves, and that they acquire habits of chicanery and
bad faith in their prolonged struggle to evade the payment of the
loans. Sir J. Burgoyne had authority given him by the British Relief
Association, to apply 500ℓ. to this object, and he induced the Relief
Committee of the Society of Friends to take up the same cause. “I
have made,” he states, “many inquiries for the purpose, but I have
always made it a point that there should be a decided prospect of any
advances being repaid, and here the matter hangs. The officers all
report that they doubt being able to get the money back; and I think
it so necessary to be firm on this point, that I have not made use
of a penny of the 500ℓ., and have recommended the Friends to reserve
their funds also for a better mode of expending them.” Since then, the
Society of Friends, who are able to give a more particular attention to
such subjects than it is possible for the Government to do, have done
much good by assisting poor fishermen to redeem their nets and other
implements of their trade, which they had pawned during the season
of extreme distress; and these excellent people have also adopted an
admirable plan of providing good boats and all requisite gear, with a
competent person to instruct the native fishermen, who are formed into
companies or partnerships and work out the value of the boats, &c.,
of which they may then become the owners. A large supply of seamen’s
jackets and trousers, obtained from the Admiralty, was delivered to
the Society of Friends, for distribution among the poor fishermen on
the west of Ireland.

From the first failure of the potato crop in 1845, the subject
of providing seed was repeatedly considered, and the conclusion
invariably arrived at was, that the moment it came to be understood
that the Government had taken upon itself the responsibility of this
delicate and peculiar branch of rural economy, the painful exertions
made by private individuals in every part of Ireland to reserve a
stock of seed would be relaxed, and the quantity consumed as food in
consequence of the interference of the Government, would greatly exceed
the quantity supplied by means of that interference. The Government
therefore never undertook to supply any kind of seed already in
extensive use; but Holland was had recourse to for flax and rye seed,
Scotland for the hardy description of barley called bere, and England
and the neighbouring Continental countries furnished turnip, carrot,
beet-root, and other vegetable and green-crop seeds; all of which were
sent to Ireland for sale at low prices, and latterly for gratuitous
distribution. More than thirteen tons of turnip seed belonging to
the Government and the British Relief Association were distributed in
the county of Mayo alone[38], besides 125 hogsheads of flax seed; by
which means, in addition to the present supply of food obtained, a
foundation was laid for an improved system of agriculture by a rotation
of crops. One of the remedial measures proposed by the Government at
the commencement of the parliamentary session of 1847, was to make
loans to landed proprietors to the aggregate amount of 50,000ℓ. to
enable them to provide their tenants with seed, which loans were to
have been repaid out of the produce of the crops raised from the seed;
but nobody availed himself of this boon. The objections which exist
to the Government leaving its province to interfere in the ordinary
business of private life, were in nothing more clearly demonstrated
than in what took place in reference to this subject. The accidental
detention, by contrary winds, of a vessel laden with rye and bere seed,
called forth expressions of anger and disappointment from various parts
of the west and south of Ireland which had depended upon this supply;
and the unfounded belief that the Government had entered upon a general
undertaking to provide seed corn, largely contributed to that criminal
apathy which was one of the causes of large tracts of land being left
waste in 1846-47. On the other hand, it was found, when inquiries
were made for vegetable seeds in the spring of 1847, that every ounce
of parsnip seed in the London market had been already bought up and
sent to Ireland; which is only one instance among many that might be
adduced, of the reliance which may be placed on private interest and
enterprise on occasions of this sort[39].

There is still another measure which does not the less deserve to be
mentioned, because it ended in failure. The Act 9 & 10 Vic. c. 109,
passed at the close of the session of 1846, had appropriated a sum
of 50,000ℓ. to be granted in aid of public works of acknowledged
utility, one-half of the expense of which was to be provided for by a
loan, and another portion was to be contributed in cash by the persons
principally interested in the works. No application was made to
participate in the advantage of this arrangement, and the 50,000ℓ. was
therefore transferred in the next session of Parliament to the erection
of Fishery Piers and other useful objects.

The qualities displayed by the officers intrusted with the conduct of
these great operations, will always be regarded as a bright spot in the
cloud which hangs over this disastrous period. The nation had never
been better served. The administrative ability which enabled Sir R.
Routh to dispose, without hurry or confusion, of masses of business
which to most persons would have been overwhelming; the stoutness of
heart with which Colonel Jones commanded, and ultimately disbanded his
army of 740,000 able-bodied Irishmen; the admirable sagacity displayed
by Sir J. Burgoyne in coming to a safe practical decision upon
perplexed social questions, then perhaps for the first time presented
to him; the remarkable financial ability of Mr. Bromley, the accountant
to the Relief Commission; the cordial co-operation of Admiral Sir Hugh
Pigot and his able secretary, Mr. Nicholls, and the valuable assistance
rendered in many different ways by Colonel Mac Gregor, the head of the
Constabulary Force, proved that, however great the crisis might be, the
persons in chief trust were equal to it[40]. But the most gratifying
feature of all, was the zeal and unanimity with which the large body
of Officers employed devoted themselves to this labour of love[41],
although they had been suddenly brought together for this particular
occasion from many different branches of the public service, or from
the retirement of private life. It may truly be said of them, that they
“offered themselves willingly among the people;” and several painful
casualties from the prevailing fever, and the failing health of others,
showed that the risks and hardships attending this service were of no
ordinary kind. The officers and men belonging to the numerous ships
of war employed in the “Relief Service,” entered with characteristic
spirit upon duties which indicated in a more direct manner than ever
before, that the real object of their noble profession, is, not to
destroy men’s lives, but to save them; and it was creditable to their
seamanship, as well as their humanity, that the dangers and hardships
attending their incessant employment on the exposed western coasts of
Ireland and Scotland during the stormy months of winter, did not lead
to the loss of a single vessel[42].

A slight reference to the exertions which had to be made for the single
object of conducting and checking the expenditure, will give some idea
of the magnitude and difficulty of the task which was imposed on the
officers of the Crown.

In establishing a system of Relief Works, intended to bring employment
to every man’s door, it was impossible to avoid creating an extensive
staff for the superintendence and payment of the labouring poor. Very
voluminous accounts suddenly poured into the Office of Works from all
parts of Ireland; and as the lives of thousands depended upon the
supply of funds, it became a duty of the first importance to insure
their immediate distribution over the whole surface of the country.
Remittances were made to about 600 pay clerks weekly, and it was often
found necessary to transfer from one to the other sums of money upon
the authority of local officers, whereby an intermixture of accounts of
a very intricate description took place. The weekly accounts sent to
the office at Dublin exceeded 20,000, and the pay lists were more than
a quarter of a million in number, the expenditure being at one time at
the rate of a million a-month. To watch the distribution of such large
sums would have been a gigantic task, even for a long-established and
well-organized department, but for a temporary establishment, composed,
for the most part, of persons with little, if any, previous knowledge
of business, the duty was one of unprecedented difficulty, and it is a
matter of surprise that greater irregularity was not the consequence.

In the books of the temporary Relief Commission, it was found necessary
to open accounts with more than 2000 bodies intrusted with the
expenditure of public money; and such was the rapidity of the service,
that within a period of five months, more than 19,000 estimates were
received in the accountant’s office, and acted upon, with a like number
of accounts, which were registered for examination, and more than
17,000 letters were received and answered. The pecuniary transactions
of this Commission were not with public officers, but with ephemeral
bodies composed of persons generally unused to business, and almost
irresponsible; but the utmost good faith prevailed; and by requiring an
immediate account, with vouchers, every fortnight, of the disbursement
of the previous amount remitted, with the balance remaining on hand,
before a further supply was sent down, the best control upon the
expenditure was established, and the result has been the great saving
(more than half a million) effected, while scarcely an instance of
misappropriation has occurred. It has also been admitted in many
parts of Ireland, that these accounts, and the instructions for their
preparation, have induced habits of business that never before existed,
while at the same time they have urged the Stamp Laws into more active
operation.

The prompt examination and audit of the accounts of the Board of Works,
the Commissariat, and the Relief Commission, was provided for by the
deputation of experienced persons from the offices in London, under
whose superintendence the whole of the expenditure has been subjected
to a searching local revision, and wherever any symptom of malversation
has appeared, the matter has been probed to the bottom.

It has been a popular argument in Ireland, that as the calamity was
an imperial one, the whole amount expended in relieving it ought to
be defrayed out of the Public Revenue. There can be no doubt that the
deplorable consequences of this great calamity extended to the empire
at large, but the disease was strictly local, and the cure was to be
obtained only by the application of local remedies. If England and
Scotland, and great part of the north and east of Ireland had stood
alone, the pressure would have been severe, but there would have been
no call for assistance from national funds. The west and south of
Ireland was the peccant part. The owners and holders of land in those
districts had permitted or encouraged the growth of the excessive
population which depended upon the precarious potato, and they alone
had it in their power to restore society to a safe and healthy state.
If all were interested in saving the starving people, they were far
more so, because it included their own salvation from the desperate
struggles of surrounding multitudes phrenzied with hunger. The
economical administration of the relief could only be provided for
by making it, in part at least, a local charge. In the invariable
contemplation of the law, the classes represented by the rate-payers
have to bear the whole burden of their own poor; the majority of the
British community did so bear it throughout this year of distress; and,
besides fulfilling their own duties, they placed in the hands of the
minority the means of performing theirs, requiring them to repay only
one half.

A special objection has been raised to the repayment of the advances
for the Relief Works, on the ground that their cost exceeds that for
which they could now be constructed. The answer to this is, that these
works were undertaken solely for the purpose of giving employment in
a great and pressing emergency, when it was impossible for them to be
executed with the same care and economy as in ordinary times[43]; that
the counties are therefore chargeable with them, not as works, but as
relief; and that if they had cost either half as much, or twice as
much as they did, the liability would have been the same. But when
it is remembered that the expensive character of the works was in a
great degree owing to the Board of Works not having received from the
Presentment Sessions and the Relief Committees that assistance in
keeping down the expenditure, which it was the duty of those bodies
to have rendered, both by making a proper selection of the works to
be undertaken, and by confining their recommendations for employment
on them to those persons who were really destitute, it is a matter of
surprise that any answer has been rendered necessary.

We should probably have heard less of these repayments if it had been
generally known what their real amount is. The sum expended under the
first Relief Works Act (9 & 10 Vic. c. 1) was 476,000ℓ., one half of
which was grant, and the other half is to be repaid[44] by twenty
half-yearly instalments, amounting on an average, including interest,
to about 12,500ℓ. each. The expenditure under the second Act (9 & 10
Vic. c. 107) was about 4,850,000ℓ., half of which was remitted, and
the other half is repayable by twenty half-yearly instalments of
145,500ℓ. each, including interest. The annual addition made to the
Rates by the repayments under the two Acts relating to the Relief
Works is therefore about 316,000ℓ.[45]; while, by an Act passed on the
28th August, 1846, the Rates were relieved from an annual payment of
192,000ℓ., being the remaining half of the expense of the Constabulary,
the other half of which was already defrayed out of national funds. The
additional charge upon the Rates, therefore, amounts only to 124,000ℓ.
a-year for ten years, or 1,240,000ℓ. in all. The sum advanced under
the 9 & 10 Vic. c. 2, on the security of grand jury presentments, was
130,000ℓ., which will have to be repaid in various periods extending
from three to ten years; but the expenditure under this Act was merely
in anticipation of the usual repairs of the public roads, the cost of
which is in ordinary years raised within the year without any advance.
Lastly, the sum expended in the distribution of food under the 10 Vic.
c. 7, and in medical relief under the 10 Vic. c. 22, was 1,676,268ℓ.,
of which 961,739ℓ. is to be repaid, and the remaining 714,529ℓ. is a
free grant. The first-mentioned Act included a fund for making grants
as well as loans, and the demands for repayment have been adjusted as
nearly as possible according to the circumstances of each district. In
some of the western unions, where the amount of destitution bears the
largest proportion to the means of the rate-payers, and, owing to the
extent to which the potato was formerly cultivated, a painful period of
transition has yet to be endured, only a small part of the sum expended
is required to be repaid[46]; while in other unions where the return
of low prices has restored society to its ordinary state, grants have
been confined to those cases in which the expenditure has exceeded a
rating of three shillings in the pound on the valuation.

All the claims of the Exchequer, arising out of the Relief operations
of 1846 and 1847 have now been described, and it must be borne in mind
that the several localities received full value for what they have to
pay. They were saved from a prolonged and horrible state of famine,
pestilence, and anarchy, which was the main consideration; and they
had, besides, the incidental advantage of the labour bestowed upon the
Roads and other public works, especially in the poor and wild districts
of the West, where lines of road have been opened with the aid of
the relief grants and loans, which, although much wanted, could not
have been undertaken for years to come without such assistance. The
rest of the expenditure, including the large donations made to Relief
Committees previously to the passing of the Act 10 Vic. c. 7, the cost
of the staff of the Board of Works and of the Relief Commission, the
Commissariat staff, and the heavy naval expenditure, has been defrayed
out of the public purse; without any demand for repayment.

Hitherto our narrative has been confined to what was done by the
Government, but the voluntary exertions of private individuals
contributed their full share towards this unprecedented act of public
charity.

It is highly to the honour of our countrymen in India, that the first
combined movement in any part of the British empire was made by them.
On the arrival of the news of the first failure of the potato crop
in the Autumn of 1845, a meeting, presided over by Sir John Peter
Grant, was held at Calcutta, on the 2nd of January, 1846, for the
purpose of concerting measures to raise a fund for the relief of
the expected distress; and a committee, consisting of the Duke of
Leinster, the Protestant and Roman Catholic Archbishops of Dublin, and
six other persons, was solicited to act in Ireland as Trustees for
the distribution of such sums as might be subscribed. This example
was followed at Madras and Bombay, and the result was that a sum of
13,920ℓ., contributed as follows, was placed at the disposal of the
committee:

  Bengal                                8,200
  Bombay                                2,976
  Madras                                1,150
  Ceylon                                  718
  Hong Kong, 18th Royal Irish              82
  Mobile, U. S.                           192
  Toronto, C. W.                          300
  England, including 200ℓ. from Lord
    John Russell                          302
                                      -------
                                      £13,920

The whole of this sum was distributed between the 24th of April and
the 21st of December, 1846, and was entirely independent of the large
subscriptions from different parts of British India subsequently added
to the funds of other societies. More than 2000 letters were received
by the Trustees of the Indian Relief Fund; and by a strict attention to
economy, they were enabled to distribute 13,920ℓ. at an expense of 180ℓ.

In the United Kingdom, the Society of Friends were, as usual, first
in the field of benevolent action. When the renewed and more alarming
failure of the potato crop in the autumn of 1846 showed the necessity
for serious exertion, a subscription was opened by them in London in
the month of November in that year; members of the Society were sent
on a deputation to Ireland, and those who resided there aided by their
personal exertions and local knowledge. On the 6th January, 1847, a
committee, of which Mr. Jones Loyd was chairman, and Mr. Thomas Baring
and Baron Rothschild were members, invited contributions under the
designation of the “British Association for the Relief of extreme
Distress in Ireland and the Highlands and Islands of Scotland.” On
the 13th of January, 1847, a Queen’s Letter was issued with the same
object, and the 24th of March was appointed by proclamation, for
a General Fast and Humiliation before Almighty God, “in behalf of
ourselves and of our brethren, who in many parts of this United Kingdom
are suffering extreme famine and sickness.” A painful and tender
sympathy pervaded every class of society. From the Queen on her throne
to the convicts in the hulks, expenses were curtailed, and privations
were endured, in order to swell the Irish subscription. The fast was
observed with unusual solemnity, and the London season of this year was
remarkable for the absence of gaiety and expensive entertainments.
The vibration was felt through every nerve of the British Empire.
The remotest stations in India, the most recent settlements in the
backwoods of Canada, contributed their quota, and 652ℓ. was subscribed
by the British residing in the city of Mexico, at a time when their
trade was cut off, and their personal safety compromised by the war
with the United States. The sum collected under the Queen’s letter
was 171,533ℓ. The amount separately contributed through the British
Association was 263,251ℓ.[47]; and this aggregate amount of 434,784ℓ.,
was divided in the proportion of five-sixths to Ireland and one-sixth
to Scotland. But besides this great stream of charity, there were
a thousand other channels which it is impossible to trace, and of
the aggregate result of which no estimate can be formed. There were
separate committees which raised and sent over large sums of money.
There were ladies’ associations without end to collect small weekly
subscriptions and make up clothes to send to Ireland. The opera, the
fancy bazaar, the fashionable ball rendered tribute; and, above all,
there were the private efforts of numberless individuals, each acting
for himself and choosing his own almoners, of which no record exists
except on High. Upon application being made to the managers of the
Provincial Bank of Ireland to permit English charitable remittances to
pass without the usual charge, it turned out that they had been in the
habit of doing so for a considerable time, and that the amount sent
through that one channel, in the six months ending on the 4th March,
1847, exceeded 20,000ℓ. In the contemplation of this great calamity,
the people of the United States of America forgot their separate
nationality, and remembered only that they were sprung from the same
origin as ourselves. The sympathy there was earnest and universal,
and the manifestations of it most generous and munificent. The
contributions from this land of plenty consisted principally of Indian
corn and other kinds of provisions, and the cargoes were, for the
most part, consigned to the Society of Friends, whose quiet, patient,
practical exertions, commanded universal confidence. The freight
and charges on the supplies of food and clothing sent to Ireland by
charitable societies and individuals, as well from the United States
and Canada on the one side, as from England on the other, were paid
by the Government, to an amount exceeding 50,000ℓ.[48]; all customs
dues were remitted, and the meal and other articles were to a great
extent taken charge of by the officers of the Commissariat, and
held by them at the disposal of the parties to whom they had been
consigned for distribution; by which means the necessary harmony was
preserved between the operations of the Government and those of the
private associations, and the bounty of the subscribers reached the
destitute persons for whom it was intended, with as small a deduction
as possible for incidental expenses. Thus, when the British Association
was desirous of giving the cultivators on the Western Coast of Ireland
an opportunity of purchasing seed at a low market price at the close
of the sowing season of 1847, five large steamers were collected by
the Government, which were loaded in a remarkably short space of time,
with oats and other seed provided by the Association, and were sent
forth, each to its appointed section of the Western Coast; so that
every harbour accessible to a steamer, from Kinsale to Londonderry, was
looked into, and what remained unsold was left in the Government depôts
for subsequent sale or gratuitous distribution. On the other hand, the
Government received much assistance and support from the operations
of these benevolent societies, and they were especially useful in
bridging over the fearful interval between the system of relief by work
and relief by food. Several gentlemen, with a noble self-devotion,
volunteered their services to the British Association, among whom Lord
Robert Clinton, Lord James Butler, Count Strzelecki, and Mr. Higgins,
were distinguished by their zeal and ability, and by the fortitude with
which, for months together, they endured the pain and risk attending
the immediate contact with hunger and disease.

A large committee, with the Marquis of Kildare at its head, was formed
in Dublin under the name of the “General Central Relief Committee for
all Ireland,” the contributions received by which amounted to upwards
of 50,000ℓ., independently of 10,000ℓ. in cash and an equal value in
food, entrusted to this committee from the sum raised by the Queen’s
Letter. British North America contributed through this medium the
munificent sum of 12,463ℓ., including 5,873ℓ. from Montreal; 1571ℓ.
from Quebec; and 3,472ℓ. from Toronto. The United States gave 5,852ℓ.,
of which 3,199ℓ. was from New Orleans. British India 5,674ℓ.; the
Cape of Good Hope 2,900ℓ.; Australia 2,282ℓ.; South America 772ℓ.;
the Military 386ℓ.; Scotland, France, Germany, Italy, Belgium,
Gibraltar, the Channel Islands, West Indies, the Ionian Islands, &c.,
2,168ℓ.; Ireland, independently of local subscriptions, which were
very considerable, 9,888ℓ.; and England, over and above the 20,000ℓ.
remitted from the produce of the Queen’s Letter, 8,886ℓ.

Subscriptions were received to a smaller amount, but from an earlier
period of the distress, by another committee established in Dublin
under the name of the “Irish Relief Association for the Destitute
Peasantry,” which was announced to be a reorganization of the
Association formed during the period of famine in the West of Ireland
in 1831. The list of patrons commenced with the names of the Archbishop
of Dublin and the Duke of Manchester; and, independently of some
cargoes of corn, flour, &c., from Canada and the United States, the
funds placed at their disposal amounted to nearly 42,000ℓ., among the
contributions to which, the following were conspicuous:--England,
17,782ℓ.; Ireland, 6,151ℓ.; France, 1,390ℓ.; Italy, including 1,481ℓ.
from Rome, 2,708ℓ.; British North America, 2,821ℓ. (1,165ℓ. of this
being from Quebec); United States, 847ℓ.; India, 5,947ℓ., of which the
large proportion of 4,981ℓ. was from Madras; West Indies, 1,043ℓ.;
Australia, 2,314ℓ.; and from the officers and men of various regiments,
and the pensioners and constabulary, 508ℓ.

But the most considerable of the Dublin Charitable Committees was that
composed of members of the Society of Friends, of which Mr. Joseph
Bewley and Mr. Jonathan Pim were the Secretaries. The contributions
placed at their disposal since the 3rd of December, 1846, in money and
provisions, have been to the amount of upwards of 168,000ℓ., of which
no less than 108,651ℓ. is the estimated value of provisions (7,935
tons) consigned to them from the United States of America. Of the
subscriptions in money, 35,393ℓ. was remitted by the London Committee
of the Society of Friends; 8,494ℓ. by members of the Society and others
in Dublin; and the large sum of 15,567ℓ. by persons residing in the
United States. The provisions received from America were as follows:--

                               Estimated Value.
                          _Tons_          £     s.  d.
  From New York          4,496         58,299   15   0
    ”  Philadelphia      1,870¼        24,948   18   0
    ”  New Orleans         349          7,538    5   0
    ”  Newark, N. J.     316¾           5,141    0   0
    ”  Baltimore         262½           3,913   10   0
    ”  Richmond, V.      252½           3,486   15   0
    ”  Charleston        169            2,362    0   0
    ”  Alexandria, V.    102            1,422   10   0
  From Sundry other
    Ports, United
    States, America      117            1,518    7  10

And in addition to these large donations of money and food,
consignments of clothing were received from England and America, to the
estimated value of from 5,000ℓ. to 10,000ℓ.

The ladies of Ireland exerted themselves with characteristic zeal and
benevolence, to alleviate the sufferings of their country-people,
and to promote their moral advancement, by awakening and encouraging
a spirit of independent exertion, and fostering habits of industry
and self-reliance. The “Ladies’ Relief Association for Ireland,”
in the management of which the Honourable Mrs. Newcombe takes the
principal part, and the objects of which are “to encourage industry
among the female peasantry of Ireland, to contribute towards providing
nourishment for the sick, and to procure clothing for the destitute,”
raised 11,465ℓ. previously to the 1st of August, 1847, of which
3,043ℓ. was derived from the proceeds of a Fancy Bazaar in London,
and of this sum 2,500ℓ. was appropriated to the relief of families
whose husbands or fathers “have been removed while performing their
painfully laborious duties.” The “Ladies’ Industrial Society for the
Encouragement of Remunerative Labour among the Peasantry of Ireland,”
of which Mrs. Lloyd is the active promoter, more particularly aims
at encouraging the manufacture of those articles which are likely to
find a ready sale in the trade; for which purpose, instruction is
given in the best and most practicable descriptions of remunerative
labour; patterns, models, and implements are furnished, and a sale is
provided for the produce, through the intervention of a mercantile
agency in Dublin. Numerous benevolent persons adopted the same course
in various parts of Ireland, sometimes in connection with these
societies, and sometimes using their own means, with such aid as was
sent to them by their private friends. Mr. Gildea, the Rector of
Newport, and the ladies of his family, revived the manufacture of
coarse linen at that place, and they have employed between 500 and 600
females since the beginning of January, in the execution of orders
sent them by charitable persons[49]. The ladies of the Presentation
Convent at Galway gave every day a good meal of porridge to upwards
of 600 starving children who attended their schools. The ladies of
the Owenmore Relief Committee raised and expended in various works of
charity, 2,427ℓ., exclusive of grants of the British Association and
of the Government, to five parochial kitchens superintended by them.
Want of space alone prevents us from alluding to many other similar
instances.

In the autumn and winter of 1846 efforts were made to induce the
Government to take an active part in assisting emigration by an
apportionment of the expense of passage and outfit between the
public, the landlords, and the emigrants themselves; but, on a full
consideration of the subject, it appeared that the emigration about
to take place in the ensuing season to Canada and the United States,
without any assistance from the public, was likely to be quite as large
as those countries could properly absorb, and that the consequence of
the interference of the Government would be that the movement would be
carried beyond those limits which were consistent with safety, and that
a burthen would be transferred to the taxpayers of the United Kingdom,
which would otherwise be borne by those to whom it properly belonged,
owing to their interests being more immediately concerned. It is also
a point of primary importance, that those persons should emigrate,
who, from age, health, character, and circumstances, are best able to
contend with the hardships and difficulties of a settler’s life, and
it was considered that this object would be most fully attained if the
emigration were entirely voluntary. The true test of fitness in this
case is the possession, on the part of each individual concerned,
of the will and ability to emigrate; and the probability of helpless
multitudes being sent forth, who, both for their own sakes and for
that of the colony, ought to have remained at home, is increased in
proportion as other motives and other interests besides those of the
emigrant himself influence his act of expatriation. For these reasons
Her Majesty’s Ministers determined to confine themselves to taking
increased securities for the safety of the emigrants during their
voyage, and their early and satisfactory settlement after their arrival
abroad. Additional emigration agents were appointed to Liverpool and
to different Irish ports; the annual vote in aid of colonial funds for
the relief of sick and destitute emigrants from the United Kingdom,
was increased from 1000ℓ. to 10,000ℓ.; provision was made for giving
assistance in the case of emigrant ships being driven back by stress
of weather, and the Governor-General of Canada was informed that Her
Majesty’s Government would be prepared to defray its fair share of any
further expense that might have to be incurred in giving the Emigrants
necessary relief, or in forwarding them to places where they might
obtain employment[50].

Early in the year 1847 the roads to the Irish sea-ports were thronged
with families hastening to escape the evils which impended over their
native land. The complaint in Ireland, at the time, was, that those
who went belonged to the best and most substantial class of the
agricultural population. The complaint afterwards in Canada was that
those who came were the helpless and destitute. The fact was, that
the emigrants generally belonged to that class of small holders, who,
being somewhat above the level of the prevailing destitution, had
sufficient resources left to enable them to make the effort required
to effect their removal to a foreign land; and the steps taken by
them to convert their property into an available form, had for months
before been the subject of observation. Large remittances, estimated
to amount to 200,000ℓ. in the year ending on the 30th March, 1847,
were also made by the Irish emigrants settled in the United States and
the British North American provinces, to enable their relations in
Ireland to follow them[51]. The emigration of 1846 from the United
Kingdom, which was the largest ever known up to that time, amounted to
129,851 persons; the emigration of the first three quarters of 1847 was
240,461; and almost the whole of it was from Ireland to Canada and the
United States[52].

Even this does not represent the full extent of the outpouring of the
population of Ireland which took place in this eventful year. From the
13th January to the 1st November, 278,005[53] immigrants arrived at
Liverpool from Ireland, of whom only 122,981 sailed from that port to
foreign countries. The conflux of this mixed multitude was formidable
both to the health and resources of the inhabitants of Liverpool;
but they nobly faced the danger, and exerted themselves to meet the
emergency with the vigour it required. The portion of the town occupied
by the Irish was divided into thirteen districts, in each of which
a relief station was opened, and twenty-four additional relieving
officers were appointed, under the superintendence of two inspectors.
The number of persons relieved daily amounted for some time to upwards
of 10,000. The district medical officers were increased from six to
twenty-one, and extensive premises were hired or constructed for the
purpose of being used as temporary fever hospitals. All this was done
at the expense of the inhabitants, and the only assistance given by the
Government was, that when the fever increased to an alarming extent,
quarantine ships were stationed in the Mersey to receive the infected.
Nineteen relieving officers died at Liverpool alone of fever caught
in the execution of their duties. The influx of poor Irish by way of
Glasgow, Ardrossan, Port Patrick, Fleetwood, the Welsh ports, Bristol,
Plymouth, Southampton, and London itself, was also very large; and
quarantine arrangements had to be made in the Clyde similar to those at
Liverpool.

Some relief was obtained by the passing of the Act 10 & 11 Vic. c.
33, “to amend the Laws relating to the Removal of Poor Persons from
England and Scotland;” and 4,583 paupers who had become chargeable
to the Liverpool parochial funds, or who applied to be removed, were
sent back to their own districts in Ireland, at a cost of 1,322ℓ.,
between the 19th July, when the Act came into operation, and the 31st
October. Previously to this, there was very little crime among these
poor people, not even in petty thefts; but it soon appeared that
they preferred being sent to prison to being sent back to Ireland.
In the year ending 30th September, 1846, 398 natives of Ireland were
committed to the borough prison at Liverpool for begging, pilfering
about the docks, &c. In the year ending 30th September, 1847, 888 were
so committed. In the month of October 1846, 80 were committed; in the
same month of 1847, 142. This pauper immigration passed inland to all
the large towns of this island, as far as London and Edinburgh; and the
following statement of the number of Roman Catholic clergymen who died
of the Irish fever caught in attending the sick since March 1847, may
be taken as an index of the relative pressure[54]:--


    _Lancashire._

  Rev. Peter Nightingale, resident priest of St. Anthony’s, Great
        Homer Street, Liverpool.

      William Parker, senior resident priest of St. Patrick’s, Park
        Lane, Liverpool.

      Richard Grayston, resident priest of St. Patrick’s, Park Lane,
        Liverpool.

      James Haggar, resident priest of St. Patrick’s, Park Lane,
        Liverpool.

      Thomas Kelly, D.D., resident priest of St. Joseph’s, Grosvenor
        Street, Liverpool.

      John F. Whitaker, removed from Manchester to succeed Dr. Kelly at
        St. Joseph’s, where he died.

      J. F. Appleton, D.D., senior resident priest of St. Peter’s, Seel
        Street, Liverpool.

      John A. Gilbert, resident priest of St. Mary’s, Edmund Street,
        Liverpool.

      William V. Dale, resident priest of St. Mary’s, Edmund Street,
        Liverpool.

      Robert Gillow, resident priest of St. Nicholas’s, Copperas Hill,
        Liverpool.

      John Hearne, senior priest of St. John’s, Wigan.

      Robert Johnson, resident priest of St. John’s, Wigan.

      John Dowdall, resident priest in Bolton.


      _Cheshire._

      Michael Power, resident priest of St. Mary’s, Duckinfield.


      _Yorkshire._

      Thomas Billington, Vicar-General of Yorkshire district, and
        senior resident priest of St. Mary’s, York.

      Henry Walmsley, senior resident priest of St. Ann’s, Leeds.

      Richard Wilson, resident priest of St. Anne’s, Leeds.

      Edward Metcalfe, successor to Rev. R. Wilson at St. Anne’s, Leeds.

      Joseph Curr, Secretary to Bishop Briggs, with whom he resided at
        Fulford House near York. He volunteered his services after
        the death of Mr. Metcalfe, and in the course of a few weeks
        died at St. Anne’s, Leeds.

      J. Coppinger. Removed from Hull to supply the vacancies caused
        by the above deaths, and very shortly after his removal died
        at St. Anne’s, Leeds.


      _Durham._

      Joseph Dugdale, resident priest of St. Mary’s, Stockton.


      _Northumberland._

      James Standen, senior resident priest of St. Andrew’s,
        Newcastle-on-Tyne.

  Right Rev. Dr. Riddell, Vicar Apostolic of the Northern District
        and Bishop of Longo. After the death of Mr. Standen, Bishop
        Riddell undertook to attend to the visitation of the sick in
        person. He very soon caught the fever and died at Newcastle.


      _Staffordshire._

  Rev. James Kennedy, resident priest at Newcastle-under-Lyne.


      _Gloucestershire._

      P. Hartley, resident priest of St. Peter’s, Gloucester.


      _Wales._

      Edward Mulcahy, resident priest of St. Mary’s, Bangor, North
        Wales.

      M. Carroll, resident priest at Merthyr Tydvil, South Wales.


      _Scotland._

      Richard Sinnott, Stranraer, Greenock.

      J. Bremner, Abbey Parish, Paisley.

      W. Walsh, Old Monkland.

The pestilence, which all the precautions practicable on land could
not overcome, broke out, as was to be expected, with increased
virulence on board the emigrant ships. A new law was passed at Boston
in Massachusetts, empowering the local authorities to demand a bond
of 1000 dollars from the masters of emigrant ships for each passenger
apparently indigent, that he should not become chargeable to the State
or to the city for ten years, the effect of which was to divert the
stream of emigration to a greater extent than usual to Canada and New
Brunswick. The deaths on the voyage to Canada increased from 5 in every
1000 persons embarked, to about 60, or to twelve times their previous
rate; and so many more arrived sick, that the proportion of deaths in
quarantine to the numbers embarked, increased from 1⅓ to about 40 in
the 1000, besides still larger numbers who died at Quebec, Montreal,
and elsewhere in the interior[55]. A Medical Board was appointed;
large supplies of provisions were dispatched to the quarantine station;
tents sufficient for the reception of 10,000 persons were issued from
the Ordnance stores, and the labours of the Commissariat in this war
against famine and pestilence, were carried on at the same time on both
sides of the Atlantic; but the utmost exertions and the most liberal
expenditure could not prevent a fearful amount of suffering amongst the
emigrants, and a painful spread of disease to the resident population.

We are well aware that among men of talents and of benevolent
dispositions, there is a wide difference on the important question
of emigration; and in what follows on this subject, we wish to be
understood, not as committing ourselves to particular opinions, but
merely as making a statement, in pursuance of the historical character
of this review, of what we believe to have been the views which guided
the resolutions of the Government.

There is no subject of which a merely one-sided view is more commonly
taken than that of Emigration. The evils arising from the crowded state
of the population, and the facility with which large numbers of persons
may be transferred to other countries, are naturally uppermost in the
minds of landlords and rate-payers; but Her Majesty’s Government, to
which the well-being of the British population in every quarter of the
globe is confided, must have an equal regard to the interests of the
emigrant and of the colonial community of which he may become a member.
It is a great mistake to suppose that even Canada and the United States
have an unlimited capacity of absorbing a new population. The labour
market in the settled districts is always so nearly full, that a small
addition to the persons in search of employment makes a sensible
difference; while the clearing of new land requires the possession
of resources[56], and a power of sustained exertion not ordinarily
belonging to the newly-arrived Irish emigrant. In this, as well as in
the other operations by which society is formed or sustained, there
is a natural process which cannot with impunity be departed from. A
movement is continually going on towards the backwoods on the part of
the young and enterprising portion of the settled population, and of
such of the former emigrants as have acquired means and experience;
and the room thus made is occupied by persons recently arrived from
Europe, who have only their labour to depend upon. The conquest of
the wilderness requires more than the ordinary share of energy and
perseverance, and every attempt that has yet been made to turn Paupers
into Backwoodsmen by administrative measures, has ended in signal
failure. As long as they were rationed, they held together in a feeble,
helpless state; and when the issue of rations ceased, they generally
returned to the settled parts of the country. Our recent experience
of the effects of a similar state of dependence in Ireland, offers no
encouragement to renew the experiment in a distant country, where the
difficulties are so much greater, and a disastrous result would be so
much less capable of being retrieved.

It must also be observed, that from an early period of the present
distress, two modes of meeting the calamity presented themselves,
which have since acquired greater distinctness in people’s minds, and
have been acted upon in a more and more systematic manner. The first
of these was to stimulate the industry of the people, to augment the
productive powers of the soil, and to promote the establishment of new
industrial occupations, so as to cause the land once more to support
its population, and to substitute a higher standard of subsistence,
and a higher tone of popular character, for those which prevailed
before. This plan aimed at accomplishing the object without the pain or
risk of wholesale expatriation; and the result proposed by it was to
increase the strength and prosperity of the country and the happiness
of the people, by enabling the present population to maintain itself
comfortably at home by the exercise of its industry. The Government
adopted this plan from the first, and has since promoted its success
by every means in its power. The other plan was to relieve the
mother-country by transferring large masses of people to the Colonies;
and great efforts were made to obtain the command of public funds to
assist in paying the expense of this emigration.

The main pointy therefore, is, that by taking an active part in
assisting emigration, the Government would throw their weight into the
scale with the last of these two plans. They would assist it by their
means; and, what is of far more consequence, they would countenance
it by their authority: and in the same degree, they would discourage
and relax the efforts of those who are exerting themselves to carry out
the opposite plan. In order to appreciate the full ultimate effect of
such an interposition, it must be remembered that the solution of the
great difficulty by means of emigration carried out on the scale and
in the manner proposed, offers to the promoters of it the attraction
of accomplishing their object by a cheap and summary process; while
the other remedy, of enabling the population to live comfortably at
home, can be arrived at only by an expensive, laborious, and protracted
course of exertion: and it therefore behoves the Government, which
holds the balance between contending parties, to take care to which
side it lends its influence on a social question of this description.

Those who have purchased or inherited estates in which a redundant
population has been permitted or encouraged to grow up, may with
propriety assist some of their people to emigrate, provided they
take care to prevent their being left destitute on their arrival in
their new country. The expense of assisting emigration under such
circumstances properly falls on the proprietor. A surplus population,
whether it be owing to the fault or to the misfortune of the
proprietor or his predecessors, must, like barrenness, or the absence
of improvements, be regarded as one of the disadvantages contingent
on the possession of the estate; and he who enjoys the profits and
advantages of the estate, must also submit to the less desirable
conditions connected with it. So long as emigration is conducted only
at the expense of the proprietor, it is not likely to be carried to
an injurious or dangerous extent, and it will press so heavily on his
resources, as to leave the motives to exertion of a different kind
unimpaired. Emigration is open to objection only when the natural
checks and correctives have been neutralized by the interposition of
the Government, or other public bodies. It then becomes the interest
and policy of the landed proprietor to make no exertion to maintain his
people at home, to produce a general impression that no such exertion
could be successfully made, and to increase by every possible means
the pressure upon those parties who, having the command of public
funds, are expected to give their assistance; and the responsibility
of the consequences, whatever they may be, becomes transferred from
the individual proprietors, to the Government or public body which
countenances and promotes their proceedings.

Three things had become apparent before the close of the year 1846:
the first was, that if these gigantic efforts were much longer
continued, they must exhaust and disorganize society throughout the
United Kingdom, and reduce all classes of people in Ireland to a state
of helpless dependence; the second was, that provision ought to be
made for the relief of extreme destitution in some less objectionable
mode than that which had been adopted, for want of a better, under
the pressure of an alarming emergency; and the third was, that great
efforts and great sacrifices were required to provide another and a
better subsistence for the large population which had hitherto depended
upon the potato. Upon these principles the plan of the Government for
the season of 1847-8, and for all after time, was based.

Much the larger portion of the machinery of a good Poor Law had
been set up in Ireland by the Irish Poor Relief Act (1 & 2 Vic. c.
56), which was passed in the year 1838. The island had been divided
into unions, which were generally so arranged as to secure easy
communication with the central station; and these had been subdivided
into electoral districts, each of which appointed its own guardian,
and was chargeable only with its own poor, like our parishes. A
commodious workhouse had also been built in each union by advances from
the Exchequer[57], and rates had been established for its support.
No relief could, however, be given outside the workhouses, and when
these buildings once became filled with widows and children, aged and
sick, and others who might with equal safety and more humanity have
been supported at their own homes, they ceased to be either a medium
of relief or a test of destitution to the other destitute poor of
the union. To remedy this and other defects of the existing system,
three Acts of Parliament were passed in the Session of 1847[58], the
principal provisions of which were as follows: Destitute persons
who are either permanently or temporarily disabled from labour, and
destitute widows having two or more legitimate children dependent
upon them, may be relieved either in or out of the workhouse, at the
discretion of the guardians. If, owing to want of room, or to the
prevalence of fever or any infectious disorder, adequate relief cannot
be afforded in a workhouse to persons not belonging to either of the
above-mentioned classes, the Poor Law Commissioners may authorize the
guardians to give them outdoor relief in food only; the Commissioners’
order for which purpose can only be made for a period of two months,
but, if necessary, it can be renewed from time to time. Relieving
officers and medical officers for affording medical relief out of
the workhouse are to be appointed; and in cases of sudden and urgent
necessity, the relieving officers are to give “immediate and temporary
relief in food, lodging, medicine, or medical attendance,” until
the next meeting of the guardians. After the 1st November, 1847, no
person is to be relieved either in or out of a workhouse, who is in
the occupation of more than a quarter of an acre of land. No person
is to be deemed to have been resident in an electoral division so as
to make it chargeable with the expense of relieving him, who shall
not during the three years before his application for relief have
occupied some tenement within it, or have usually slept within it for
thirty calendar months. All magistrates residing in the union are to be
_ex-officio_ guardians, provided their number does not exceed that of
elected guardians. Greater facilities are given for dissolving Boards
of Guardians, in case they do not duly and effectually discharge their
duty according to the intention of the several Acts in force. Public
beggars and persons going from one district to another for the purpose
of obtaining relief are rendered liable to one month’s imprisonment
with hard labour; and an independent Poor Law establishment is
constituted for Ireland, consisting of three Commissioners (two of
whom are to be the Secretary and Under-Secretary for Ireland for the
time being), an Assistant Commissioner and Secretary, and as many
Inspectors as may be required.

The principle of a comprehensive Poor Law and of the abolition of
mendicancy, having thus been established, the efforts of the Government
were earnestly directed to the removal of the difficulties likely to
impede its satisfactory working. The repayment of the first instalment
due on account of the advances for the Relief Works of the winter and
spring of 1846-7 (9 & 10 Vic. c. 107), was postponed until after the
Spring Assizes of 1848, and it was announced that no demand would
be made until after the 1st January, 1848, for the repayment of
the advances under the temporary Relief Act, when the rates levied
previously to that date for the current expenses of the permanent
Poor Law equalled or exceeded 3s. in the pound, and that even when
rates had been struck for the purpose of repaying the advances, they
might, if necessary, be applied to defraying those current expenses.
By these arrangements the demands for repayment between the Summer
Assizes of 1847 and the Spring Assizes of 1848 were limited to the
second instalment for the Relief Works and repairs of Grand Jury
Roads of 1846 (9 Vic. c. 1 and 2), amounting only to 27,000ℓ. for the
whole of Ireland; and after providing for this and for the expense
of the gaols and other ordinary local demands, all the rates levied
from the produce of the abundant harvest of 1847 became applicable
to the relief of the people under the Poor Law, then for the first
time coming into full operation. The Guardians were at the same time
earnestly recommended by the Poor Law Commissioners to strike rates
sufficient to meet the exigencies of the coming winter, and to be
strict in the levy of them. They were advised to guard against the
necessity of giving out-door relief to the able-bodied, by providing
for disabled persons, widows, school-children, and fever patients out
of the workhouse; and five Boards of Guardians which had obstinately
persisted in not doing their duty, were dissolved, and paid Guardians
were appointed in their place. Ireland had now had a year and a half’s
experience of the administration of relief on a great scale and in
different ways, and the objects to be aimed at and the abuses to be
avoided had become generally known. “The very evil itself,” the
Relief Commissioners observe in their Sixth Monthly Report, “has been
attended with a salutary reaction, and the whole country seems, by
this experience, to have been made sensible that it is only by the
most rigid and thoroughly controlled principles of affording relief
by any public arrangement, that society can be protected from a state
of almost universal pauperisation, and that the charge of a more
benevolent alleviation of distress than what is absolutely necessary
for the bare support of the thoroughly destitute, must and ought to
be left to the exertions and voluntary distribution of the charitable
and humane, which it is hoped will always be largely afforded.” During
the week ended Saturday the 14th August, 1847, there were above 20,000
persons on the relief lists of the electoral division which comprises
the northern half of the city of Dublin; and as the operations under
the Temporary Relief Act terminated in that union on the 15th, the
guardians, on the 16th, had to deal with the apparent necessity of
having to provide relief for above 20,000 persons. On the morning of
that day, however, owing to previous arrangements, they had room in
the workhouse of their union for 400 individuals; and by offering
workhouse relief to applicants, aided by some assistance from the
Mendicity Institution, the guardians were enabled in the course of six
days to reduce the number on the relief lists to about 3000 persons.
This is only one instance among many that might be adduced, of the
practical value of the experience that has been acquired in Ireland of
the true principles of Poor Law management.

A principle of great power has thus been introduced into the social
system of Ireland, which must be productive of many important
consequences, besides those which directly flow from it. Mr. Drummond’s
apophthegm, that “property has its duties as well as its rights,”
having now received the sanction of law, it can never hereafter be
a matter of indifference to a landed proprietor, what the condition
of the people on his estate is. The day has gone by for letting
things take their course, and landlords and farmers have the plain
alternative placed before them of supporting the people in idleness
or in profitable labour. Hitherto the duties of Irish landlords had
been, as jurists would say, of imperfect obligation. In other words,
their performance depended upon conscience, benevolence, and a more
enlightened and far-seeing view of personal interest than belongs to
the generality of men; the consequence of which has been a remarkable
difference in the conduct of Irish landlords: and while some have
made all the sacrifices and exertions which their position required,
others have been guilty of that entire abandonment of duty which has
brought reproach upon their order. For the future this cannot be.
The necessity of self-preservation, and the knowledge that rents can
be saved from the encroachments of poor-rates, only in proportion as
the poor are cared for and profitably employed, will secure a fair
average good conduct on the part of landed proprietors, as in England,
and more favourable circumstances will induce improved habits. The
poor-rate is an absentee tax of the best description; because, besides
bringing non-resident proprietors under contribution, it gives them
powerful motives either to reside on their estates or to take care
that they are managed, in their absence, with a proper regard to the
welfare of the poor[59]. Lastly, the performance of duty supposes the
enjoyment of equivalent rights. When rich and poor are at one again,
the repudiating farmer will find the position of his landlord too
strong to allow of his taking his present license, and it will then be
fearlessly asserted that the converse of Mr. Drummond’s maxim is also
true, and that “Property has its rights as well as its duties.” For the
first time in the history of Ireland, the poor man has become sensibly
alive to the idea that the law is his friend, and the exhortation of
the parish priest of Dingle to his flock in September 1847, indicates
an epoch in the progress of society in Ireland:--“Heretofore landlords
have had agents who collected their rents, and they supported them. The
grand jury had agents to collect the county-cess, and they supported
them. Now, for the first time, the poor man has an agent to collect
_his_ rent. That agent is the poor-rate collector, and he should be
supported by the poor.” Time must, however, be allowed for the gradual
working of this feeling, before its full effects can be seen.

Those who object to the existing Poor Law are bound to point out a more
certain and less objectionable mode of relieving the destitute and
securing the regular employment of the poor. The principle of the Poor
Law is, that rate after rate should be levied _for the preservation of
life_, until the landowners and farmers either enable the people to
support themselves by honest industry, or dispose of their property to
those who can and will perform this indispensable duty.

The fearful problem to be solved in Ireland, stated in its simplest
form, is this. A large population subsisting on potatoes which they
raised for themselves, has been deprived of that resource, and how are
they now to be supported? The obvious answer is, by growing something
else. But that cannot be, because the small patches of land which
maintained a family when laid down to potatoes, are insufficient for
the purpose when laid down to corn or any other kind of produce; and
corn cultivation requires capital and skill, and combined labour, which
the cotter and conacre tenants do not possess. The position occupied by
these classes is no longer tenable, and it is necessary for them either
to become substantial farmers, or to live by the wages of their labour.
They must still depend for their subsistence upon agriculture, but upon
agriculture conducted according to new and very improved conditions.
Both the kind of food and the means of procuring it have changed. The
people will henceforth principally live upon grain, either imported
from abroad or grown in the country, which they will purchase out of
their wages; and corn and cattle will be exported, as the piece-goods
of Manchester are, to provide the fund out of which the community will
be maintained under the several heads of wages, profits, and rents.
It is in vain that the granary of the merchant and the homestead
of the farmer are filled to overflowing, if the mass of the people
have not the means of purchasing, and it has therefore become of the
highest consequence that the resources which are most available for
the payment of wages should be cultivated to the utmost. The Poor
Law cannot alone bear the whole weight of the existing pauperism of
Ireland; and its unproductive expenditure, however indispensable, must
be supported by adequate industrial efforts, in order to prevent all
classes of society from being involved in one common ruin. Before this
crisis occurred, Sir Robert Kane had proved in theory, and many good
farmers in practice, that a much larger produce might be raised, and
a much larger population might be supported from the soil of Ireland
than heretofore; and this view has since been confirmed by numerous
surveys conducted under the superintendence of the Board of Works,
which have disclosed an extensive and varied field for the investment
of capital, upon which the whole unemployed population of Ireland
might be employed with much advantage to all parties concerned. The
great resource of Ireland consists in the cultivation of her soil, the
improvement of her cattle, the extension of her fisheries; and while
there are large tracts of flooded land to be reclaimed, and still
larger tracts of half-cultivated land to be brought to a higher state
of productiveness, it would be a misdirection of capital to employ
it in the less profitable manufactures of cotton and wool. Ireland is
benefited to a greater extent than many parts of Scotland and England
are, by the markets and the means of employment which Manchester and
Glasgow afford; but her own staple manufacture is corn.

The Treasury was authorized by the 1 & 2 Wm. IV, c. 33, passed in
1831, to lend money to private individuals for the improvement of
their estates, provided the value of the estate was increased 10
per cent. and repayment was made in three years; and by the first
Act of the Session of 1846 the period of repayment was extended to
twenty years. This power was however very sparingly acted on. Grave
objections existed to the State becoming a general creditor throughout
the country, and the operations of private capitalists were likely to
be deranged and suspended by the interference of such a competitor. A
rate of interest (5 per cent.) higher than the market rate for money
lent on mortgage, was therefore charged, and the result was, that
only three persons took out loans under this arrangement, one of whom
was the late Lord Bessborough. At the close of the Session of 1846,
the Act 9 & 10 Vic. c. 101, was passed, by which 1,000,000ℓ. was
authorized to be lent for drainage in Ireland, and repayment was to be
made in equal half-yearly instalments, spread over twenty-two years,
including interest at 3½ per cent.; but this Act could not be worked,
so far as Ireland was concerned, partly owing to a legal opinion that
tenants for life were not eligible for loans under it, and partly
because the works must be executed to a certain extent before the
money could be advanced. Upon this the Treasury issued a Minute dated
the 1st, and a letter dated the 15th December, 1846[60], offering to
lend money for the general improvement of estates, including drainage,
on a footing which combined the advantages of the previous Acts with
the indulgent mode of repayment introduced by the last; and in the
following session the Act 10 & 11 Vic. c. 32 was passed, by which
all the existing legislation on the subject was consolidated, and
loans[61] were authorized to be made in Ireland to the extent of
1,500,000ℓ., on the principle that the improvements on each estate
are to be executed by the proprietor, and that the interference of
the officers of the Government is to be confined to ascertaining, in
the first instance, that the proposed improvements are likely to be
of such a permanent and productive character as would justify the
cost of them being made a charge upon the estate, with priority over
other incumbrances, and, afterwards, to inspecting the works from time
to time, so as to secure the proper application of the sums advanced
to the purposes for which they were intended. No advance can be made
under this Act unless the increased annual value to be given to the
land by the proposed improvement shall equal the amount to be charged
on it; and a difficulty having arisen from the circumstance that the
full benefit to be derived from draining is attained in different
soils at different periods after the completion of the drains, it
was declared by a Treasury Minute dated the 15th June, 1847, that it
is not necessary that each portion of land improved should yield, in
the first and in every subsequent year, an additional rent equal to
6½ per cent. per annum on the outlay beyond the present rent; but
that the general result of the improvement of the lands on which the
rent-charge is to be secured, will, one year with another, from the
period when the full benefit of the improvement may be supposed to
have accrued, be such as to produce an increased annual value to the
above extent; taking care, of course, that the rent-charge is fixed
upon lands amply sufficient to secure the repayment to the Government
of the sums so charged. These directions had particular reference to
the circumstances of the poverty-stricken districts in the West of
Ireland, where it is peculiarly desirable to increase the food grown on
the spot, and to provide the means of employment for the people in the
productive avocations of agriculture; and every practicable facility
and preference is therefore given to the landed proprietors in those
districts, which is not inconsistent with justice to other parties.
It was determined by the same Minute, in pursuance of the course
taken by Parliament with respect to the loans for drainage in England
and Scotland, that the loans to be made to any one landed proprietor
should not, under ordinary circumstances, exceed, in the aggregate,
the sum of 12,000ℓ.; but if, in any particular case, owing to the
extent of the property to be improved, or other causes, it should be
advisable to enlarge this limit, the Lords of the Treasury will be
prepared to authorize such additional sum as may appear to be proper,
not exceeding, however, an aggregate amount to the same proprietor, of
20,000ℓ.

In taking its line on this subject, the Government had to choose
between employing the agency of the landed proprietors and that of
public officers; and after much consideration and some experience,
the final decision was in favour of the former alternative, as above
described.

By following this course, all the existing relations of society were
preserved and strengthened; the landed proprietors were held to their
responsibility for the well-being of the people residing on their
estates, and they were assisted to the extent of the loan fund placed
by Parliament at the disposal of the Government. The proprietor or
his agent has the strongest interest in seeing that the work is well
done, and can exercise the most effectual superintendence over it; and
as the people are invited to exert themselves under the eye of their
natural employers, the healthy relation of master and labourer becomes
established throughout the country. It has not, as yet, been usual
in Ireland, for the landlord to undertake to make the more expensive
and permanent improvements, as is the case in England, but it may be
hoped that an impulse will be given to this wholesome practice by the
loans to proprietors under the Land Improvement Act. The landlord will
be encouraged to proceed in a course of improvement which he finds by
experience to be profitable to him; he will be likely to make further
investments on land which has been reclaimed or improved by him, and he
will be especially careful to prevent it from being subdivided into
small holdings[62].

The other plan of reclaiming waste lands by the direct agency of the
Government, did not survive the objections made to it on the score of
its interference with the rights of private property. The land must
be obtained before it could be improved, and was it to be left to the
discretion of Commissioners to take any bog-land they pleased at a
valuation; to single out, for instance, a tract of unreclaimed land in
the centre of an estate? Some firm land also must be annexed to each
allotment for the erection of the farm buildings, and to obtain soil
for the improvement of the bog, and this would have given a still wider
and more arbitrary discretion to the Commissioners. The compulsory
powers had therefore to be given up; and without them the plan could
not be worked.

But there are other objections to this plan which have a much deeper
root. The first result of the Government undertaking to reclaim the
waste lands of Ireland would be that the mass of the people would
throw themselves on these works, as they did upon the roads, taking
it for granted that the means of payment were inexhaustible, and that
less labour would be exacted than in employment offered with a view
to private profit. The landlords and farmers would consider that, as
the Government had undertaken to employ the people and improve the
soil, they were themselves absolved from responsibility, and they
would refer all the persons who applied to them for employment, to the
Government works, as has been so often done on former occasions. The
single agency of the Government would be substituted for the exertions
of the whole body of the landowners acting in concert with their
tenants and dependants; and instead of landed proprietors and farmers
laying out their own money for their own benefit, with all the care
and economy which this supposes, we should have hundreds of public
officers, of various grades and characters, expending public money,
for the supposed benefit of the public, in a business totally foreign
to the proper functions of Government, and without a possibility of
effectual superintendence; the inevitable consequence of which would
be, bad work, idle habits, and profuse and wasteful expenditure.
Lastly, when the land had been reclaimed, whatever care might be taken
to dispose of it in farms of reasonable size, however durable might be
the interest granted, or whatever legal restrictions might be attempted
to be imposed, the old process of the subdivision of the land, and the
multiplication of the persons subsisting upon it, would run its course.
Nothing can supply the place of the watchful supervision exercised by
a proprietor, for the protection of his own interests, in such a case.

A peasant proprietary may succeed to a certain extent[63], where there
is a foundation of steadiness of character, and a habit of prudence,
and a spring of pride, and a value for independence and comfort; but
we fear that all these words merely show the vain nature of schemes of
peasant proprietorship for Ireland. The small holders of Belgium[64],
with all their industry and frugality, have, during this calamitous
period, been the most distressed population in Europe next to Ireland.
Their own resources were too small to carry them through a season of
dearth, and they had no employers to assist them. In India, society
is based on a system of small holdings, and there is no country in
which destructive famines have been so common. In Ireland itself, the
greatest over-population, and consequently the greatest distress,
prevailed in those districts in which, owing to the existence of long
leases, the landlords had no power to prevent the subdivision of the
land. Mere security of tenure is of no avail, without the capital,
and skill, and habits of life, and, above all, the wholesome moral
qualities required to turn this advantage to good account. During the
late season of dearth, food was dearer in the long peninsula which
stretches to the south-west of England, than it was in Ireland, and
the poor had no resource analogous to the farming stock of the Irish
small holder; but the Devonshire and Somersetshire labourer lives by
wages paid by persons richer than himself; and though severely pinched,
he had enough for daily bread, with some assistance from charitable
aid, which was generally afforded throughout the west of England,
during the late season of distress, either by parochial subscriptions
or by allowances from the unions. The south-west of England is the
least favourable specimen which Great Britain affords of the system
of society based upon wages, because the flourishing manufactures
which formerly existed in that quarter have disappeared before the
superior natural advantages of the North, and wages are consequently
very low[65]. In every other part of this island the contrast is
more decidedly to the disadvantage of the small holdings; and in
Northumberland, which is a county of large farms, there may be said to
be no poor. Whether the good order, the physical well-being, or the
moral and intellectual progress of rural society, be considered, the
best model is that in which the educated and enlightened proprietor,
the substantial farmer, and the industrious labourer on regular wages,
each performs his appropriate part.

The works required for deepening and straightening the course of many
of the rivers are of peculiar importance to Ireland; because until
the outfalls have been cleared, the landowners cannot enter upon the
detailed or thorough drainage of their respective estates. In such
cases the necessity of working upon the lands of different proprietors
calls for the active interposition of the Board of Works, who make the
preliminary survey, execute the work, and afterwards apportion the
charge, according to the benefit derived by each person interested. The
funds for carrying on these improvements had been chiefly obtained by
the issue of debentures under the authority of the Acts of Parliament
relating to the subject; but, under existing circumstances, loans were
not to be expected from private individuals at a moderate rate of
interest; and the ordinary loan fund of the Board of Works amounting to
60,000ℓ. a-year, was therefore reinforced with 120,000ℓ., transferred
to it from the London Loan Commissioners, and 250,000ℓ. issued from
the Consolidated Fund; making altogether a sum of 430,000ℓ. placed
at the disposal of the Board of Works, between the 1st April, 1847,
and the 1st April, 1848, to be advanced by them for works of utility
in Ireland, but principally for drainage of the above-mentioned
description.

Next to agricultural improvements, well-selected public works perhaps
offer the greatest resource in the present unhappy circumstances of
Ireland. It is a mistake to suppose that opening a good road may not
be the most reproductive work in many districts; and the construction
of railroads on the great lines of communication, does for the whole
country what new roads do for particular districts, facilitating and
stimulating every description of production, and agriculture more than
all, binding society together by a closer intercourse and interchange
of good offices, and rapidly diffusing through the remote provinces the
advantages enjoyed by the more favoured parts of the country.

The objection to Lord George Bentinck’s plan for assisting Irish
railways was, that while it was inadequate as a measure of relief,
it was too large and indiscriminate when viewed as a measure for the
promotion of public works. Private enterprise would have been overlaid;
the bad lines would have been benefited at the expense of the good; the
public credit would have been lowered; the available stock of national
capital would have suffered an additional drain which it could ill
afford; and after all, the object of relieving the existing distress
would not have been attained. The famine was then at its height, and
it could not be stayed by any measure short of distributing food to
the multitude. After allowing for the largest number of persons who
could be employed on railways, millions must still have starved, if
other more effectual steps had not been taken; and the sums advanced
to the Railway Companies, large as they would have been, would not
have perceptibly diminished the expense of feeding a whole nation[66].
When this primary object had been attained, and all the funds had been
raised by loan which the state of Ireland required, the Government
was then in a position to consider what assistance could be given to
railroads in common with other works of public utility; and 620,000ℓ.
was voted by Parliament to be lent to Railways which were legally
able to borrow, owing to their having paid up half their capital, and
could undertake to expend within a certain fixed time, another sum of
their own equal to that advanced to them. By the aid thus given, the
great South-Western Railway of Ireland will be enabled to employ a
large number of men throughout the winter, and the important object of
opening the communication between Dublin, Cork, and Limerick, will be
accomplished at a much earlier period than would otherwise have been
the case.

The other works in progress in Ireland, with the aid of grants or loans
from Parliament, are as follows: the Shannon navigation, which has been
in operation for several years; the construction of new floating docks
and markets at Limerick; works at Hawlbowline, with a view to render
that place more useful as a naval station; four great works of combined
navigation and drainage; the construction of three new colleges, and of
several prisons and lunatic asylums; and the repair and construction
of fishery piers, for which 50,000ℓ. was voted in the session of 1846,
and a further sum of 40,000ℓ. in the session of 1847.

       *       *       *       *       *

Having thus furnished as clear a sketch as the variety and complexity
of the incidents would allow, of this remarkable crisis in our
national affairs, when the events of many years were crowded into two
short seasons, and a foundation was laid for social changes of the
highest importance, it may be asked, what fruits have yet appeared of
this portentous seed-time, and what the experience is which we have
purchased at so heavy a cost?

First, it has been proved to demonstration, that local distress cannot
be relieved out of national funds without great abuses and evils,
tending, by a direct and rapid process, to an entire disorganisation
of society. This is, in effect, to expose the common stock to a
general scramble. All are interested in getting as much as they can.
It is nobody’s concern to put a check on the expenditure. If the poor
man prefers idling on relief works or being rationed with his wife
and children, to hard labour; if the farmer discharges his labourers
and makes the state of things a plea for not paying rates or rent;
if the landed proprietor joins in the common cry, hoping to obtain
some present advantage, and trusting to the chance of escaping future
repayments, it is not the men, but the system, which is in fault.
Ireland is not the only country which would have been thrown off its
balance by the attraction of “public money” _à discrétion_. This
false principle eats like a canker into the moral health and physical
prosperity of the people. All classes “make a poor mouth,” as it
is expressively called in Ireland. They conceal their advantages,
exaggerate their difficulties, and relax their exertions. The cotter
does not sow his holding, the proprietor does not employ his poor
in improving his estate, because by doing so they would disentitle
themselves to their “share of the relief.” The common wealth suffers
both by the lavish consumption and the diminished production, and the
bees of the hive, however they may redouble their exertions, must
soon sink under the accumulated burden. The officers of Government,
overborne by numbers, and unable to test the interested representations
pressed upon them from all quarters, cannot exercise their usual
watchful care over the expenditure of the public money. Those persons
who have the will to do their duty, have not the power. Those who have
the power, have not the will. There is only one way in which the relief
of the destitute ever has been, or ever will be, conducted consistently
with the general welfare, and that is by _making it a local charge_.
Those who know how to discriminate between the different claims for
relief, then become actuated by a powerful motive to use that knowledge
aright. They are spending _their own money_. At the same time, those
who have the means of employing the people in reproductive works, have
the strongest inducement given them to do so. The struggle now is to
keep the poor off the rates, and if their labour only replaces the cost
of their food, it is cheaper than having to maintain them in perfect
idleness.

Another point which has been established by the result of these
extensive experiments in the science, if it may be so called, of
relieving the destitute, is that two things ought to be carefully
separated which are often confounded. Improvement is always a good
thing, and relief is occasionally a necessary thing, but the
mixture of the two is almost always bad; and when it is attempted
on a large scale without proper means of keeping it in check, it is
likely to affect in a very injurious manner the ordinary motives and
processes by which the business of society is carried on. Relief,
taken by itself, offers, if it is properly administered, no motive
to misrepresent the condition of the people; and being burdensome to
the higher, and distasteful to the lower classes, it is capable of
being carefully tested and subjected to effectual controul. But when
relief is connected with profitable improvements and full wages, the
most influential persons in each locality become at once interested in
establishing a case in favour of it, and the higher are always ready
to join with the lower classes in pressing forward _relief works_
on a plea of urgent general distress, which it may be impossible to
analyse and difficult to resist. Relief ought to be confined as much
as possible to the infirm and helpless. Wages, by means of which
improvements are carried on, should be given by preference to the
able-bodied and vigorous. Relief ought to be on the lowest scale
necessary for subsistence. Wages should be sufficiently liberal to
secure the best exertions of the labourer. Relief should be made so
unattractive as to furnish no motive to ask for it, except in the
absence of every other means of subsistence. Improvements should be
encouraged and urged forward by every practicable means, both as
regards the parties undertaking them, and those by whom they are
executed. If labour is connected with relief, it should only be as a
test of the destitution of the applicant, and of his being consequently
entitled to a bare subsistence, in the same way as confinement in a
workhouse is also a test; and the true way to make relief conducive
to improvement, is to give the rich no choice between maintaining the
able-bodied labourers as paupers, or employing them on full wages on
profitable works, and to take care that the poor have no reason to
prefer living on public alms, to the active exercise of their industry
in their own behalf.

Among all our discouragements, there are not wanting many and sure
grounds of hope for the future. The best sign of all is, that the case
of Ireland is at last understood. Irish affairs are no longer a craft
and mystery. The abyss has been fathomed. The famine has acted with
a force which nothing could resist, and has exposed to view the real
state of the country, so that he who runs may read. We have gained,
both by what has been unlearned and by what has been learned during the
last two years: and the result is, that the great majority of people,
both in Ireland and England, are now agreed upon the course which
ought to be pursued, in order to arrive at the wished-for end. The
attention of the two countries has also been so long directed to the
same subject, that a new reciprocity of interest and feeling has been
established, and the public opinion of each has begun to act upon the
other with a force which was never felt before.

The Irish have been disabused of one of the strangest delusions
which ever paralysed the energies of a naturally intelligent and
energetic people. Those who knew the country best, were aware of
the habitual dependence of the upper classes upon the Government;
and it was a common saying of former days, that an Irish gentleman
could not even marry his daughter without going to the Castle for
assistance. The vulgar idea was, that when difficulties occurred,
every personal obligation was discharged by “bringing the matter under
the consideration of the Government;” and if, in addition to this, “a
handsome support” was promised, it seldom meant more than helping to
spend any public money that might be forthcoming. But it was reserved
for that potent solvent, the Famine, to discover to the full extent,
this element of the national character. To pass with safety through
this great crisis, required that every man, from the highest nobleman
to the meanest peasant, should exert himself to the utmost of his
means and ability; instead of which, the entire unassisted burden of
employing all the unemployed labourers of Ireland, of improving all the
unimproved land of Ireland, and feeding all the destitute persons in
Ireland, was heaped upon a Board consisting of five gentlemen, sitting
in an office in Dublin. The example of the gentry was followed with
customary exaggeration by the lower orders, and throughout extensive
districts, the cultivation of the land was suspended in the spring of
1847 until it should be seen what “encouragement” the Government would
give, or, as it was sometimes ingenuously expressed, “We expect the
Government will till the ground.” It is also a fact that the people in
some parts of the West of Ireland neglected to a great extent to lay in
their usual winter stock of turf in 1847, owing to the prevalence of a
popular impression that the Queen would supply them with coals. Ireland
has awakened from this dream by the occurrence of the most frightful
calamities, and it has at last begun to be understood that the proper
business of a Government, is to enable private individuals of every
rank and profession in life, to carry on their several occupations
with freedom and safety, and not itself to undertake the business
of the landowner, merchant, money-lender, or any other function of
social life. Reason is now able to make herself heard, and there has
not been wanting many a warning and encouraging voice from Ireland
herself, declaring--“The prosperity of Ireland is only to be attained
by your own strong arms. We are able to help ourselves. We will no
longer be dependent on the precarious assistance received from other
lands. We will never rest until every sod in Ireland brings forth
abundantly--till every inch of ground is in its highest and fullest
state of bearing. In a short time we shall have among us more industry
and exertion, less politics and more ploughing, less argument and more
action, less debating and more doing[67].”

The uniting power of a common misfortune has also been felt throughout
the British Empire. Those who had never before exchanged words or
looks of kindness, met to co-operate in this great work of charity,
and good men recognised each other’s merits under the distinctions
by which they had been previously separated. The Protestant and
Roman Catholic clergy vied with each other in their exertions for
the famishing and fever-stricken people, and in numerous instances
their lives became a sacrifice to the discharge of their exhausting,
harassing and dangerous duties. To the priests all were indebted for
the readiness with which they made their influence over their flocks
subservient to the cause of order; and the minister of religion was
frequently summoned to the aid of the public officer when all other
means of restraining the excited multitude had failed[68]. The
political dissensions which had distracted Ireland for centuries
became suddenly allayed. The famine was too strong even for the mighty
demagogue, that great mixed character to whom Ireland owes so much good
and so much evil. People of every shade of political opinion acted
together, not always in an enlightened manner, but always cordially
and earnestly, in making the social maladies of Ireland, and the means
of healing them, the paramount object. In the hour of her utmost need,
Ireland became sensible of an union of feeling and interest with the
rest of the empire, which would have moved hearts less susceptible
of every generous and grateful emotion than those of her sons and
daughters[69]. Although the public efforts in her behalf were without
parallel in ancient and modern history, and the private subscriptions
were the largest ever raised for a charitable object, they were less
remarkable than the absorbing interest with which her misfortunes
were regarded for months together both in Parliament and in society,
to the exclusion of almost every other topic. It will also never be
forgotten that these efforts and these sacrifices were made at a time
when England was herself suffering under a severe scarcity of food,
aggravated by the failure of the cotton crop, and by the pecuniary
exhaustion consequent upon the vast expenditure for the construction
of railways. Even in such a state of things, though serious injury was
done to all her interests by the Irish Loan, and though the pressure
upon the labouring classes was greatly increased by the wholesale
purchase of their food, that it might be given without cost to the
starving Irish, yet every sacrifice was submitted to without a murmur
by the great body of the people.

Although the process by which long-established habits are changed, and
society is reconstructed on a new basis, must necessarily be slow,
there are not wanting signs that we are advancing by sure steps towards
the desired end. The cultivation of corn has to a great extent been
substituted for that of the potato; the people have become accustomed
to a better description of food than the potato[70]; conacre, and
the excessive competition for land, have ceased to exist; the small
holdings, which have become deserted, owing to death, or emigration,
or the mere inability of the holders to obtain a subsistence from
them in the absence of the potato, have, to a considerable extent,
been consolidated with the adjoining farms; and the middlemen, whose
occupation depends upon the existence of a numerous small tenantry,
have begun to disappear. The large quantity of land left uncultivated
in some of the western districts is a painful but decisive proof of
the extent to which this change is taking place. The class of offences
connected with the holding of land, which was the most difficult to
deal with, because agrarian crimes were supported by the sympathy and
approbation of the body of the people, and were generally the result
of secret illegal associations, fell off in a remarkable degree[71];
and although offences against other kinds of property increased, owing
to the general distress, the usual difficulty was not experienced in
obtaining convictions. The much-desired change in the ownership of
land appears also to have commenced; and when great estates are brought
to the hammer now, instead of being sold, as formerly, _en masse_, they
are broken up into lots[72], which opens the door to a middle class,
more likely to become resident and improving proprietors than their
predecessors, and better able to maintain the stability of property
and of our political institutions, because they are themselves sprung
from the people. The most wholesome symptom of all, however, is that
a general impression prevails, that the plan of depending on external
assistance has been tried to the utmost and has failed; that people
have grown worse under it instead of better; and that the experiment
ought now to be made of what independent exertion will do. This feeling
has been much strengthened by the necessity which has been imposed upon
the upper classes through the Poor Law, of caring for the condition
of the people; and the attention of the country gentlemen has in many
districts been seriously directed to the means of supporting them in a
manner which will be alike beneficial to the employer and the employed.

The poet Spenser commences his view of the state of Ireland by these
discouraging observations: “Marry, so there have been divers good
plots devised, and wise counsels cast already about reformation of
that realm, but they say it is the fatal destiny of that land, that
no purposes whatsoever which are meant for her good, will prosper or
take good effect; which, whether it proceed from the very genius of
the soil, or influence of the stars, or that Almighty God hath not yet
appointed the time of her reformation, or that he reserveth her in
this inquiet state still for some secret scourge, which shall by her
come into England, it is hard to be known, but yet much to be feared.”
Our humble but sincere conviction is, that the appointed time of
Ireland’s regeneration is at last come. For several centuries we were
in a state of open warfare with the native Irish, who were treated as
foreign enemies, and were not admitted to the privileges and civilising
influences of English law, even when they most desired it. To this
succeeded a long period of mixed religious and civil persecution[73],
when the Irish were treated as the professors of a hostile faith,
and had inflicted on them irritating and degrading penalties, of
which exclusion from Parliament and from civil and military office
was one of the least; the general characteristics of this epoch of
Irish management being that the Protestant minority were governed by
corruption, and the Roman Catholic majority by intimidation. During
all this time England reaped as she sowed: and as she kept the people
in a chronic state of exasperation against herself, none of her “good
plots and wise counsels” for their benefit succeeded; for there was no
want of good intention, and the fault was principally in the mistaken
opinions of the age, which led to persecution in other countries
besides Ireland. Now, thank God, we are in a different position;
and although many waves of disturbance must pass over us before that
troubled sea can entirely subside, and time must be allowed for morbid
habits to give place to a more healthy action, England and Ireland are,
with one great exception, subject to equal laws; and, so far as the
maladies of Ireland are traceable to political causes, nearly every
practicable remedy has been applied. The deep and inveterate root of
social evil remained, and this has been laid bare by a direct stroke
of an all-wise and all-merciful Providence, as if this part of the
case were beyond the unassisted power of man. Innumerable had been the
specifics which the wit of man had devised; but even the idea of the
sharp but effectual, remedy by which the cure is likely to be effected
had never occurred to any one. God grant that the generation to which
this great opportunity has been offered, may rightly perform its part,
and that we may not relax our efforts until Ireland fully participates
in the social health and physical prosperity of Great Britain, which
will be the true consummation of their union.




FOOTNOTES


[1] We have endeavoured to gather up all the threads of this strange
tissue, so that every circumstance of importance connected with the
measures of relief may be placed on record; but our narrative does
not, except in a few instances, extend beyond September 1847, and the
progress of events after that date will form the subject of a separate
article.


[2] The author of this paper was the late Mr. Joseph Sabine, the
Secretary to the Horticultural Society.


[3] Sir John Burgoyne’s letter to the “Times,” dated th October, 1847.


[4] The following description of the state of agriculture in West
Clare, previously to the failure in the potato crop in 1845, is taken
from a narrative by Captain Mann of the Royal Navy, who had for some
time previously been stationed in that district, in charge of the Coast
Guard, and when the distress commenced, he took an active and very
useful part in assisting in the measures of relief: “Agriculture at
that period was in a very neglected state; wheat, barley, and oats,
with potatoes as the food of the poor, being the produce. Of the
first very little was produced, and that not good in quality; barley,
a larger proportion and good; oats, much greater, but inferior for
milling purposes. Various reasons were given for this inferiority in
produce, the quality of the land and deteriorated seed being the cause
generally assigned; but I would say that the population being content
with, and relying on, the produce of the potato as food--which had
with very few exceptions hitherto proved abundant--there was a general
neglect and want of any attempt at improvement. Green crops were all
but unknown, except here and there a little turnip or mangel wurzel in
the garden or field of the better class,--the former scarcely to be
purchased. Even the potatoes were tilled in the easiest way, (in beds
called ‘lazy beds’), not in drills, so that the hoe might in a very
short time clear the weeds and lighten the soil.”


[5] We are indebted for these particulars to Mr. Mc Cullagh, who has
lately collected the contemporary accounts of this famine. It appears
that the farmers at this period did not dig their potatoes until about
Christmas, and that few stored them at all for use.


[6] An interesting account by Mr. Bertolacci, of the manner in which
this fund and that collected in 1831 were distributed, will be found in
the “Morning Chronicle” of the 25th November, 1847.


[7] For the details of these operations see the following Parliamentary
papers:--

“Copies of the Reports of Messrs. Griffith, Nimmo, and Killaly, the
civil engineers employed during the late scarcity, in superintending
the Public Works in Ireland; 16 April, 1823 (249).”

“Report from the Select Committee on the employment of the poor in
Ireland; 16 July, 1823 (561).”

It is a remarkable testimony to the improvement effected by such works
in the social habits of the people, that the district between the
Shannon and the Blackwater, which was opened in four directions by
the roads executed by Mr. Griffith, although formerly the seat of the
Desmond Rebellion, and subsequently, in the year 1821, the asylum for
Whiteboys and the focus of the Whiteboy warfare, during which time four
regiments were required to repress outrage, became perfectly tranquil,
and continued so up to the commencement of the late calamity.


[8] The following remarkable passage is extracted from the Report of
the Dublin Mansion House Committee, dated the 22nd October, 1831:--

“But while the Mansion House Committee thus congratulate themselves
and the subscribers upon the success of their efforts to avert famine
and disease for a season from so considerable a portion of the island,
they owe it also to themselves and the subscribers to avow their honest
conviction that similar calls will be periodically made on public
benevolence, unless a total change be effected in the condition of
the Irish peasant. What means should be adopted to remedy these evils
it is not the province of this Committee to suggest; but they deem it
their duty to call the attention of the subscribers particularly to
this state of things, in the hope of some remedy being discovered and
applied before public benevolence is quite exhausted by repeated drains
on its sympathy.”

On the 21st May, 1838, the Duke of Wellington made the following
observations in the debate on the introduction of the Irish Poor
Law:--“There never was a country in which poverty existed to so great a
degree as it exists in Ireland. I held a high situation in that country
thirty years ago, and I must say, that, from that time to this, there
has scarcely elapsed a single year, in which the Government has not
at certain periods of it entertained the most serious apprehension of
actual famine. I am firmly convinced that from the year 1806, down
to the present time, a year has not passed in which the Government
have not been called on to give assistance to relieve the poverty and
distress which prevailed in Ireland.”


[9] The particulars of what took place on this occasion will be found
in a letter from the Poor Law Commissioners to Sir J. Graham, dated the
9th June, 1842, and in a statement dated 18th August, 1842, prepared
under the directions of the Irish Government, showing “the sums issued
for the relief of distress in Ireland from the 17th June to the 17th
August, 1842,” &c.


[10] This Return is for sums “advanced on loan since the Union,” but
in some cases the advances have not been repaid, and in others large
grants were made in addition to loans.


[11] “Observations upon certain evils arising out of the present state
of the Laws of Real Property in Ireland, and Suggestions for remedying
the same.”--Dublin: Alex. Thom, 1847. The author of this pamphlet is
Mr. Booth, who has for many years past held the responsible office of
Clerk of the Survey in Ireland, under the Master-General and Board of
Ordnance. It will be seen by a perusal of the pamphlet, that this able
and deserving officer has fully availed himself of the opportunities
which his situation afforded, for making himself acquainted with the
social state of Ireland; and that he has successfully applied to the
consideration of the subject, that practical ability from which the
public service has derived so much benefit.


[12] “Observations on the evils resulting to Ireland from the
insecurity of Title and the existing Laws of Real Property, with some
Suggestions towards a remedy.”--Dublin: Hodges and Smith. London:
Ridgway; 1847. The author of this pamphlet is Mr. Jonathan Pim, who, in
the capacity of joint secretary, with Mr. Joseph Bewley, of the Dublin
Friends’ Relief Committee, took the lead in the admirably benevolent
and practical measures adopted by that excellent society for the relief
of the distress, and the re-establishment of the industry of Ireland on
a more secure and satisfactory footing than before. Mr. Pim is also the
author of a more extended work, entitled “The Condition and Prospects
of Ireland,” which has just been published, and which, if we mistake
not, will prove one of the most useful publications which have yet
appeared on this deeply interesting subject.


[13] It is perfectly true that the unembarrassed holder of an entailed
estate is often not sufficiently owner of it to be able to do justice
to it. He cannot sell a portion to improve the remainder, however
much both the part sold and the part retained would be benefited
by it. He can burden the estate to provide for younger children’s
portions, but not to carry on improvements which would increase its
annual produce. Improvements are generally made out of capital, and
not out of income. Owners of entailed estates, for the most part, live
up to their means; and when they do not, their savings are seldom
sufficient to carry on works of any importance. Over the capital sum
representing the aggregate value of the estate, they have no command,
except for purposes which make them poorer, and consequently still
less able to execute any useful design. At the present crisis of our
national affairs, it behoves us to consider what course will be the
best both for the landowners and for the community at large. There is
a fearful surplus population in Ireland and the north-western part of
Scotland which must be provided for; while in England itself thousands
of railway labourers and Irish paupers roam unemployed about the
country; and the question is, whether, by removing the obstacles which
at present oppose the profitable employment of the enormous capital
invested in land, we might not obtain new resources which would enrich
the owners of land, diffuse comfort and enjoyment in each locality, and
help to provide for the unemployed population which is sitting like an
incubus upon all the three kingdoms.


[14] The following Table gives the leading particulars relating to the
estates under the management of the Courts in Ireland during the years
1841-2 and 3:

_Court of Chancery._

  +-----------+------+--------------+-----------------+----------------+
  |           |      |              |         Arrears of Rent.         |
  |           |No. Of|   Rental of  +-----------------+----------------+
  |           |Causes|   Estates.   |  When Receiver  | When Receiver  |
  |           |      |              |  was appointed. | last accounted.|
  +-----------+------+--------------+-----------------+----------------+
  |           |      |   £     s. d.|    £   s.  d.   |   £    s.  d.  |
  |   1841.   | 698  |598,635 13 10¾| 39,358 16  4½   |347,226 14  10  |
  +-----------+------+--------------+-----------------+----------------+
  |   1842.   | 595  |548,783 12  9 |  3,105  0 10    |299,554 10   8  |
  +-----------+------+--------------+-----------------+----------------+
  |   1843.   | 764  |563,022  2  4 | 39,265 13  1    |290,292  4  10  |
  +-----------+------+--------------+-----------------+----------------+
  |Average of | 686  |570,147  2 11¾| 27,243  3  5    |312,357 16  10  |
  |three years|      |              |                 |                |
  +-----------+------+--------------+-----------------+----------------+
  |           |      |     _Court of Exchequer._      |                |
  |From 1836  |      |              |                 |                |
  |to 1843    | 316  |132,675  2  3 | 56,163  6  6    | 87,849  0  11¼ |
  |inclusive. |      |              |                 |                |
  +-----------+------+--------------+-----------------+----------------+

The arrears of rent have since greatly increased, although the object
of the Courts is confined to getting in the Rents, improvements being
seldom attempted. The condition of the people on these neglected, and
with reference to their present state of cultivation, over-populated
estates, is melancholy in the extreme.


[15] “Observations upon certain evils,” &c.


[16] “Observations upon certain evils,” &c.


[17] “Observations upon certain evils,” &c.


[18] “Observations on the evils resulting to Ireland,” &c.


[19] Treasury Minute, October 15, 1847.


[20] These useful reforms were suggested by Mr. Pierce Mahony, who
is entitled to the gratitude of the public, for the perseverance
and ability with which he has, for many years past, with little
encouragement either from the public or from those who have
administered the Government of the country, advocated these and other
measures directed to the extremely important object of simplifying,
facilitating, and rendering more secure the transfer and tenure of land.


[21] The year 1845 was the second and worst in America; and in 1846,
although it still extensively prevailed, the disease was of a milder
type and only partially affected the crop.


[22] The following extract from Captain Mann’s Narrative, descriptive
of what took place at this period in the county of Clare, will be read
with interest: “The early culture of 1846 was in no way improved; a
great proportion of the land was again tilled with potatoes, under
the expectation that, as in former years, the late scarcity would be
followed by a bountiful supply. The first alarm was in the latter part
of July, when the potatoes showed symptoms of the previous year’s
disease; but I shall never forget the change in one week in August. On
the first occasion, on an official visit of inspection, I had passed
over thirty-two miles thickly studded with potato fields in full
bloom. The next time the face of the whole country was changed; the
stalk remained bright green, but the leaves were all scorched black.
It was the work of a night. Distress and fear was pictured in every
countenance, and there was a general rush to dig and sell, or consume
the crop by feeding pigs and cattle, fearing in a short time they
would prove unfit for any use. Consequently there was a very wasteful
expenditure, and distress showed itself much earlier than in the
preceding season.”


[23] The following extract from Captain Mann’s Narrative will give some
idea of the difficulty of prevailing on the people to have recourse
to the new food:--“The first issue of Indian corn meal was in March,
1846. It is impossible to conceive the strong prejudice against it; and
I may here bear testimony to the benevolent and right feeling of the
Rev. J. Kenny, P P. Previously to the sale of the meal being commenced,
a small portion was sent to me by Commissary-General (now Sir Edward)
Coffin, which I placed in the hands of the reverend gentleman. He
tried and approved of it, and in order to overcome any feeling against
it, subsequently, with his two curates, all but entirely lived on
the meal made into bread and stirabout, for nearly a fortnight using
all his influence to convince the people that the pernicious effects
ascribed to it were untrue. Such conduct is above any praise of mine.
The success attending this measure, it is quite unnecessary for me to
allude to; and the merchants profiting by the example, commenced a
trade new to them by importing the article.” The use of Indian corn
meal was adopted in hundreds of households of the higher classes,
both Protestant and Roman Catholic, besides that of Father Kenny,
for the purpose of overcoming the popular prejudice by the force of
example. The Society of Arts awarded a gold medal to Mr. O’Brien,
baker, of Leinster Street, Dublin, for the attention paid by him to the
introduction of cheap popular modes of preparing Indian corn for use;
and tens of thousands of pamphlets and printed sheets were distributed
through the Commissariat containing instructions for cooking the Indian
corn, and showing the people what other cheap descriptions of food were
available to them. Those who know how difficult it is to induce a large
population to adopt new habits, will be surprised at the success which
attended these efforts. The “yellow meal,” as it is called, was first
known as “Peel’s brimstone,” and it was remembered that the attempt
to introduce it in a former season of distress occasioned a popular
commotion, arising from the absurd notion that it had the effect of
turning those who ate it black.


[24] This minute will be found from pages 67 to 71 of the first Board
of Works Series of Parliamentary Papers for 1847.


[25] A member of the Board of Works, writing to a friend, observed as
follows:--“I hope never to see such a winter and spring again. I can
truly say, in looking back upon it, even now, that it appears to me,
not a succession of weeks and days, but one long continuous day, with
occasional intervals of nightmare sleep. Rest one could never have,
night nor day, when one felt that in every minute lost a score of men
might die.”


[26] An officer of the Board of Works, observing the emaciated
condition of the labourers, reported that, as an engineer, he was
ashamed of allotting so little task-work for a day’s wages, while, as
a man, he was ashamed of requiring so much. In some districts proof
of attendance was obliged to be considered sufficient to entitle the
labourer to his wages. The exhausted state of the workmen was one
main cause of the small quantity of work done compared with the money
expended. The Irish peasant had been accustomed to remain at home,
cowering over his turf fire, during the inclement season of the year,
and exposure to the cold and rain on the roads, without sufficient food
or clothing, greatly contributed to the prevailing sickness. In order
to obviate this as far as possible, a Circular Letter was issued by the
Board of Works (1st series of 1847, page 499) directing that, in case
of snow or heavy rain, the labourers should merely attend roll call in
the morning, and be entered on the pay list for half a day’s pay; and
if it afterwards became fine, they were to come to work, which would
entitle them to a further allowance.


[27] In this month (March) the expenditure upon the Relief Works was
heaviest, viz.:--

  Labour and Plant          £1,024,518
  Extra Staff                   26,254
                            ----------
                 Per Month  £1,050,772

  In the Week ending 13 March, 1847,
    the expenditure for all the above
    services was                                £259,105
  which gives a Daily average for
    that week                                     43,184
  On the 5th March there was remitted
    into the interior for carrying on
    Relief Works                                  68,000
  On the 30th March, only                         16,000
  These two are the extremes during the month.
  The mean (for the month) of daily
    remittance                                    38,920


[28] The proceedings of the Government, in reference to this point, are
fully explained in a letter from Mr. Trevelyan to Colonel Jones, and in
the accompanying Treasury Minute, printed in the first Board of Works
Series for 1847, page 97 to 100.


[29] See page 44 of the first Board of Works Series of 1847.


[30] The following shows the extent of the Government interference in
the supply of food in the two seasons of 1845-46 and 1846-47:--

 +--------------------------------------------+--------------+---------+
 |                                            |   Reduced    |         |
 |                                            |  to general  |         |
 |                                            | denomination |  Cost.  |
 |                                            |      of      |         |
 |                                            |   quarters.  |         |
 |                                            +--------------+---------+
 |Total quantity of Indian Corn and Oatmeal   |              |    £    |
 | provided for the Relief Service during the |              |         |
 | first season of distress, up to August 1846|     98,810   | 163,240 |
 |                                            +--------------+---------+
 |Of this quantity there remained in store    |              |         |
 | at the close of the first season of the    |     14,575   |  24,073 |
 | operations                                 |              |         |
 |                                            |              |         |
 |Total quantity of provisions of all kinds   |              |         |
 | (Indian Corn, Wheat, Barley, the meal      |              |         |
 | of those grains, Ryemeal, Biscuit, Peas,   |              |         |
 | Beans, and Rice) provided for the Relief   |              |         |
 | Service, during the second season of       |              |         |
 | distress up to September 1847              |    289,335   | 672,767 |
 |                                            +--------------+---------+
 |                                            |    303,910   | 696,840 |
 |                                            +--------------+---------+
 |There remained in store at the close of     |              |         |
 | the second season of the operations, about |    108,960   | 249,836 |
 +--------------------------------------------+--------------+---------+


[31] This was the amount of the private subscriptions upon which
Government donations were made; but other large sums were raised by
local Irish subscriptions, through the medium of some of the Relief
Committees, of which no account was furnished to the Government,
because the Committees concerned would not submit to the rule of
selling at cost price except in cases of extreme destitution.
Large funds were also administered by private individuals, quite
independently of the Local Relief Committees; of which class of
operations the following account of the expenditure of a Protestant
clergyman in the south-west of Ireland, with a parish of 10,000
inhabitants, no resident gentry, not a single town in the whole of it,
nor a road through the greater part of it, may be taken as a specimen:--

                                        £   s.  d.
  Gratuitous aid of every sort         306   6  0
  Loss by sale of food under market
      price, when exorbitant           208   9  0
  Payment of labour--making road
      to the bog, and other public
      works                            150  10  0
  Seed--corn, wheat, oats, and barley  300   0  0
  Turnip seed                           15   0  0
  Fishing materials                    150  10  6
                                      ------------
                                    £1,130  15  6

Funds of this sort administered by benevolent and public-spirited
individuals in Ireland, were generally supplied by the exertions of
their relations and friends, or by grants from societies in England
and elsewhere. It was a common practice for ladies in England to
have parishes assigned to them in Ireland, and each lady raised all
she could, and made periodical remittances to the clergyman of her
adopted parish, receiving accounts from him in return, of the manner
in which the money was expended. The self-denial necessary to support
this charitable drain was carried to such an extent at Brighton and
elsewhere, that the confectioners and other trades-people suffered
severely in their business.


[32] Two electoral divisions were sometimes united under one Relief
Committee, but the accounts of each electoral division were kept
separate.


[33] The ration consisted of one pound of biscuit, meal, or flour;
or one quart of soup thickened with meal, with a quarter ration of
bread, biscuit or meal. When bread was issued, one pound and a-half was
allowed. It was found by experience that the best form in which cooked
food could be given, was “stirabout,” made of Indian meal and rice
steamed, which was sufficiently solid to be easily carried away by the
recipients. The pound ration thus prepared, swelled by the absorption
of water to three or four pounds.


[34] Report from Count Strzelecki to the British Relief Association.


[35] Seventh and last Monthly Report of the Relief Commissioners.


[36] Letter from Sir John Burgoyne, quoted by the Chancellor of the
Exchequer in the House of Commons.


[37] Third Report of the Relief Commission.


[38] The small holders in the Barony of Erris, in this county, declined
at first to accept the seed which was offered them, saying that if they
sowed it, the crops would be seized by their landlords. This was not
believed at the time in England, but it has nevertheless turned out
perfectly true. This barony, of which Belmullet is the principal place,
is the darkest corner of Ireland. In some instances broken Landowners
and their families were receiving rations, while their Tenants were
starving.


[39] The following interesting account of what took place in the county
of Clare on the subject of seed, is extracted from Captain Mann’s
Narrative:

“The first supply of seed sent for distribution by sale, was received
on the 13th March last, up to which period the prospect of the tillage
of the land being neglected was very alarming. The seed-grain had been
in most cases either partially or wholly consumed for food. Bad advice
had been given, that the Government or the landlords would be forced
into assisting--the former to pay wages for the time while the work
was going on, and the latter to provide seed, if the Government would
not. The supply alluded to was bere and rye. By dint of persuasion, and
having it published by the Roman Catholic clergy, the quantity sent was
taken and planted; and here let me add, that the most sanguine could
not have anticipated the great benefit of this importation. The value
of the bere as an early crop and produce exceeded every expectation. It
was reaped and in the market the latter part of July; and as compared
with other barley, it is stated to me, thrashed out five stone to the
barb, of twenty hand-sheafs, while the other only yielded three stone
from the same quantity. The rye grew on bog merely burnt, and that even
slightly; in some cases the heather being in bloom where the rye in the
same ground was ripe. Thus hundreds of acres were cultivated that might
have lain waste; and as the rye-meal brought by the ‘Sisters’ from St.
Petersburgh to this depôt, and issued as rations, became, after some
opposition, popular with the poor, it does not require any remark to
show the value and importance of this article, when considered as an
auxiliary substitute for the potato food, and the more so because it
can be grown on inferior land here, and not like the Indian corn meal,
which we are forced to look to other countries for.

“The supply of green crop and oat-seed by Her Majesty’s ship ‘Dragon’
was received here the 12th of April last. Some few landlords purchased
of the first, and supplied their tenantry, but of the latter but
little was purchased at that time. The feeling still existed that the
Government or the landlords would be forced into providing seed and
assisting the tillage; but when that vessel sailed, and they became
convinced to the contrary, the most pressing and even distressing
applications were made to me by the people to procure a supply of any
seed; the fact being clear that grain seed (oats and barley) was not to
be procured. Most fortunately, in a few days after, the hired steamer
‘Doris’ arrived with her cargo of oat-seed, the greater part of which
was freely purchased, and a vast quantity of land immediately tilled.
A sudden and favourable reaction took place, all appearing anxious
to raise something, and not let the land run to waste. Turnip-seed
was imported by dealers to a very large amount; and those who could,
bought and sowed it. Subsequently a small quantity was sent to me for
gratuitous distribution. Lists of the parties who received it, and the
quantities allotted, are herewith annexed; and to this were added some
small pamphlets given to me by Lord Robert Clinton, my object being
to assist the poor, and spread the benefit over the greatest possible
extent.

“I have now the pleasure to state, that instead of this part of the
country being as described in the first series, with respect to green
crops, the turnip particularly has become a general produce with even
the poorest. Quantities are daily exposed for sale in the markets, and
with a mixture of Indian corn meal, rice, or flour, it is used as a
substitute for bread. Emulation has been excited; and a few days since
I was invited to view an exhibition at Colonel Vandeleur’s, of the
following:

                   stone.  lbs.                      lbs.
  3 swedish turnips  4      0  weight. Heaviest of
                                         the three    20
  3 white ditto      3     11    ”     Ditto          20
  3 mangle wurzel    3      8    ”     Ditto          18

Beside white carrots, &c. Experiments have been tried with the potato
set in drills very successfully; and I do trust that improvement will
make further progress under the system of instruction which it is said
will be adopted.”


[40] The readiness with which the Bank of Ireland, and the Provincial,
National and other banks, undertook the office of Treasurer to the
Finance Committees, and entered into every proposed detail and
accommodation, in support of the operations of the Commissariat, the
Relief Commission, and the Board of Works, is very creditable to the
managers, and deserves the thanks of the public.


[41] All the letters and proceedings of these officers showed that
their predominant feeling was an anxious desire to fulfil the
benevolent mission on which they had been sent. One observed that he
could bear anything but the “careless misery of the children;” another
that his heart was broken by the sobs of the women returning to their
homes with a smaller quantity of food than was sufficient for the
support of their families.


[42] The Four Commissions employed on these operations were composed as
follows:--

The Board of Works.

  Lieut.-Col. H. D. Jones, R.E., Chairman.
  Richard Griffith, Esq., Deputy Chairman.
  Commissioners:
    John Radcliff, Esq.
    Wm. Thos. Mulvany, Esq.
    Captain Larcom, R.E.

The First Relief Commission, appointed by Sir Robert Peel’s Government

  Rt. Hon. E. Lucas, Chairman (afterwards retired).
  Com.-Gen. Sir R. I. Routh (afterwards Chairman).
  Colonel D. Mc Gregor.
  Lieut.-Col. H. D. Jones, R.E.
  Sir James Dombrain.
  Professor Sir Robert Kane.
  E. T. B. Twisleton, Esq.
  Theobald Mc Kenna, Esq.

The Second Relief Commission, appointed by Lord John Russell’s
Government.

  Major-Gen. Sir J. F. Burgoyne, K.C.B., Chairman.
  T. N. Redington, Esq.
  E. T. B. Twisleton, Esq.
  Com.-Gen. Sir R. I. Routh.
  Lieut.-Col. H. D. Jones, R.E.
  Colonel D. Mc Gregor.

The Poor Law Commissioners in Ireland.

  E. T. B. Twisleton, Esq.
  Rt. Hon. Sir W. M. Somerville, Bart.
  T. N. Redington, Esq.

  Sir Randolph Routh was in charge of the Commissariat from the
      commencement to the end of the measures of relief.

It is due to Mr. Redington to state that his intimate acquaintance
with Ireland, and excellent judgment, were a never-failing ground of
reliance in the most difficult emergencies.


[43] One of the principal causes of the expense incurred, was the
necessity of finding work for every person in the neighbourhood of his
own home, which added greatly to the number of the works, and to the
proportion of them left unfinished.


[44] The first instalments due under the 9 & 10 Vic. c. 1 and 2 have
been already paid.


[45]

  Viz.,   25,000ℓ., being the aggregate of the two half-yearly
                      instalments under the 9 & 10 Vic. c. 1; and
         291,000ℓ., the same under the 9 & 10 Vic. c. 107
         ---------
   Total 316,000ℓ.
         ---------


[46] The proportions in which the expenditure was made a local or
general charge in the following unions, were--

                                   Loan to    Grant in
                                     be        aid of
                                   repaid.     rates.

                    {  Ballina     £13,716     £43,610
                    {  Ballinrobe   12,183      27,997
  County of Mayo    {  Castlebar     7,282      19,813
                    {  Swineford     6,620      31,797
                    {  Westport      5,624      37,993

                    {  Clifden       3,228       8,868
    ”       Galway  {  Gort          7,663      18,475

    ”       Clare      Scariff       6,406      10,943

    ”       Cork    {  Bantry        6,079      12,294
                    {  Skibbereen   13,451      21,627

    ”       Kerry      Kenmare       3,359      10,956


[47] The following are some of the most remarkable contributions:--

                                                    £    s.  d.
  Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen          [A]2,000   0   0
  H. R. H. Prince Albert                            500   0   0
  Her Majesty the Queen Dowager                   1,000   0   0
  His Majesty the King of Hanover, as
      Duke of Cumberland and Chancellor
      of the University of Dublin                 1,000   0   0
  His Imperial Highness the Sultan                1,000   0   0
  The East India Company                          1,000   0   0
  The Corporation of the City of London           1,000   0   0
  The Bank of England                             1,000   0   0
  The Duke of Devonshire                          1,000   0   0
  The Worshipful Company of Grocers               1,000   0   0
  Messrs. Jones Loyd and Co.                      1,000   0   0
    ”     Rothschild and Co.                      1,000   0   0
    ”     Baring Brothers and Co.                 1,000   0   0
    ”     Truman, Hanbury, and Co. (including
              50ℓ. from their clerks,
              and 8ℓ. 10s. from their workmen)    1,163  10   0
    ”     Smith, Payne, and Smiths                1,000   0   0
    ”     Overend, Gurney, & Co.                  1,000   0   0
  An English Friend, two Donations                1,004   0   0
  An Irish Landlord, for Skibbereen               1,000   0   0
  Manchester and Salford Relief Committee         7,785   0   0
  Newcastle and Gateshead ditto                   3,902   0   0
  Hull ditto                                      3,800   0   0
  Leeds ditto                                     2,500   0   0
  Huddersfield ditto                              2,103   0   0
  Wolverhampton ditto                             1,838   0   0
  York ditto                                      1,700   0   0
  Cambridge University and Town, including
    617ℓ. 10s. from Trinity College,
    and 500ℓ. collected at the Baptist
    Chapel in St. Andrew Street                   2,706   0   0
  Oxford University and City                      1,770   0   0
  Proceeds of a Ball at Florence given by
    the Prince de Demidoff at San
    Donato, besides 500ℓ. from the Florence
    Relief Committee, and 9ℓ.
    13s. 9d. from the English
    servants at Florence                            891  17   2
  St. Petersburgh                                 2,644   0   0
  Constantinople                                    620   0   0
  Amsterdam; collections in the English
    Church                                          561   0   0
  Denmark; partly collected by Parish
    Priests in the provinces                        504   0   0
  Malta and Gozo                                    720   0   0
  Remittances from British Guiana, the
    result of public subscription                 3,000   0   0
  Nova Scotia, including a vote of 2,250ℓ.
    by the House of Assembly                      2,915   0   0
  Barbadoes Relief Committee                      2,575   0   0
  South Australia £1,000 in money, and
    an equal value in Wheat                       2,000   0   0
  Jamaica, including a vote of 525ℓ. by the
    House of Assembly                             1,537   0   0
  Trinidad                                        1,350   0   0
  Newfoundland                                      868   0   0
  St. Lucia                                         614   0   0
  Grenada                                           564   0   0
  St. Christopher; vote of the Legislature
    of the Island                                   505   0   0
  Bermuda; vote of the House of Assembly            500   0   0
  Hobart Town                                       500   0   0
  Bombay                                          9,000   0   0
  Madras                                          2,150   0   0
  Remittance from the Mauritius, including
    111ℓ. 16s. 11d. from the Seychelles
    Islands, and 16ℓ. 7s. from Rodrigues,
    and in addition to 2,211ℓ. 13s. collected
    by the Vicar Apostolic and
    sent direct to Ireland. (The amount
    subscribed at the Seychelles Islands,
    and at Rodrigues, is very remarkable,
    when the poverty of their inhabitants
    is considered.)                               3,020   0   0
  Collection at Basseterre, St. Kitts, from
    <DW64>s belonging to the Congregation
    under the charge of the Moravian
    Missionaries, per Rev. G. W.
    Westerley                                        15  17  10
  Officers and crew of Her Majesty’s ship
    “Hibernia”                                      167  17  11
  Contribution by the Governor, Commissioner,
    Lieutenant-Governor, and
    officers of Greenwich Hospital, being
    the sum allowed them for a festival
    dinner in commemoration of the
    battle off Cape St. Vincent                      40    0  0
  The 2nd Regiment of Life Guards                   156    4  6
  A diamond cross from a lady (realized)             42    0  0
    Workmen employed by Sir John Guest at
    the Dowlas Iron Works                           176   17 10
  Metropolitan Police                               161    0  0
  Proceeds of two amateur performances at
    the St. James’s Theatre                       1,413    0  0
  Collected on board the British and North
    American Royal Mail steamer “Hibernia”
    for Ireland                                      51   12  8
  Wesleyan Methodists; part of the first
    distribution of collections in various
    chapels                                       5,000    0  0
  Members of the London Daily Press,
    chiefly Reporters and Compositors,
    in addition to other Contributions               88   18  0
    Proprietors of the “Morning Herald”
    and “Daily News,” each                          100    0  0
  “Punch”                                            50    0  0

Many of the smaller subscriptions, such as 800ℓ. from the Town of
Bridgewater, and 747ℓ. from the Bahamas, are more remarkable in
proportion to the means of the contributors, than many of those which
have been mentioned.

The officers and men of the Coast Guard raised a fund amounting to
429ℓ. which was expended by the members of the force in Ireland in
giving relief in the neighbourhood of their respective stations.
From the commencement of the distress, the Coast Guard has been
distinguished for its active benevolence.

The National Club in London collected a sum of 17,930ℓ., 1000ℓ. of
which was from various congregations at Brighton, 500ℓ. from an
anonymous contributor, and 500ℓ. from the Wesleyan Irish and Scotch
Relief Committee. This fund was intrusted for distribution to the
clergy of the Established Church in Ireland, acting under a committee
appointed for each diocese, headed by the bishop.

The amount collected by the London Committee of the Society of Friends
was 43,026ℓ., nearly the whole of which was disbursed through the
Dublin Friends’ Committee.

    [A] Her Majesty also contributed £500 to the Ladies’ Clothing
        Fund, which was established in connection with the British
        Relief Association.


[48] Two United States ships of war, the “Jamestown” and “Macedonian,”
were manned by volunteers, and sent to Ireland and Scotland with the
following charitable supplies, for which no claim for freight was made.
These two cargoes will serve as a specimen of the rest:--

“JAMESTOWN.”

  Corn and Grain:--           cwt.  qrs.  bshl.
    Wheat                              4   0
    Barley                             3   4
    Oats                               2   4
    Rye                                9   2
    Peas                              30   0
    Beans                            279   3
    Indian Corn or Maize             339   2

  Meal and Flour:--
    Wheatmeal or Flour           96    1   0
    Barleymeal  }
    Oatmeal     }                19    2  16
    Indian Corn Meal          4,229    3   0

  Rice                          154    1   4
  Bread and Biscuit           1,048    3  21
  Potatoes                       61    1   1
  Apples, dried                            6
  Pork                          707    0  16
  Hams                          291    3   4
  Fish                            4    0   0
  Clothing             10 cases, 18 barrels.


“MACEDONIAN.”

Landed in Ireland.

  Indian Corn Meal, 5,324 barrels
    at 196 lbs. each                    1,043,504 pounds.
  Rice, equal to 217 tierces at 6
    cwt. each                             145,824   ”
  Beans, 6 tierces of 4 cwt., 66 bbls.
    of 196 lbs., 38 bags of 100 lbs.       19,424   ”
  Peas, 53 bbls. of 196 lbs., 100
    bags of 100 lbs. each.                 11,388   ”
  Indian Corn, 38 bags of 100 lbs.          3,800   ”
  Wheat, 1 bag                                100   ”
  Salt Pork, 1 barrel                         200   ”
                                           ------
                                 Pounds 1,224,240 = 546-1200/2240 tons.

  Besides 100 barrels Indian Corn Meal and 3 packages
    of Clothing, landed as a “private consignment to the
    Rev. Mr. Taylor.”

  Clothing, 13 boxes, 3 bales, 3 barrels    19 packages.


Landed in Scotland.

    1 package clothing,
    1 barrel beef,
  143 barrels meal,
  133 bags oats,
    2 barrels beans, and
    8 chests of tea.

Of which the Glasgow Section received--

    1 package clothing,
    1 barrel beef,
   37 barrels meal,
  133 bags oats, and
    8 chests tea.

The Edinburgh Section received--

  100 barrels meal; and 6 barrels meal and 2 barrels beans
    were delivered to Mr. Mathieson, of Stirling, as instructed
    by the manifest.


[49] Nearly 3000ℓ. was remitted to Mr. Gildea in advance, in sums of
from 10s. to 20ℓ., for linens to be afterwards furnished. He might have
received much larger sums, and he found great difficulty in stopping
the outpouring of sympathy and support that came upon him; and until it
became generally known that he had returned large sums of money, the
influx did not cease. It is an interesting fact that of 30,000 yards
of linen made up to the end of October, there is only one piece that
was not duly returned to him by the workwomen, and Mr. Gildea thinks he
shall still get the missing piece.


[50] Upwards of 100,000ℓ. has been expended by the Home and Provincial
Governments, in giving relief to the sick and destitute emigrants
landed in Canada in 1847, and in forwarding them to their destinations.


[51] The following extract from a letter from Mr. Jacob Harvey of
New York, to Mr. Jonathan Pim, one of the Secretaries of the Dublin
Relief Committee of the Society of Friends, contains many interesting
particulars relating to these remittances, which are highly honourable
to the Irish character:--

            “New York, January 5, 1847.

    “The destitution of our poor at this season will certainly
    curtail the amount for Ireland, and it is used as an excuse by
    those who feel called upon to assist them at their own doors
    first. But I am happy to say that the poor labouring Irish
    themselves are doing their duty fully. Without any public
    meetings or addresses, they have been silently remitting
    their little savings to their relations at home; and these
    remittances, be it remembered, go to every parish in Ireland,
    and by every packet. These drafts are from 1ℓ. and upwards;
    they probably average from 4ℓ. to 5ℓ. In my letter to J. H.
    Todhunter I told him I had ascertained from five houses here,
    that within the past sixty days, they have received and
    remitted from the poor Irish 80,000 dollars. I had not time
    to send round to the other houses that day; but since the
    steamer sailed, I have collected further returns, although not
    yet all; and to my no small delight, the sum total remitted
    since November the 1st amounts to 150,000 dollars or 30,000ℓ.
    sterling. I am now collecting an account of the sums remitted
    through the same houses by the poor Irish for the year 1846,
    and I have received returns from the five principal houses, and
    the sum total is 650,000 dollars, or 130,000ℓ. There are yet
    four houses to hear from, which will swell the amount. This,
    however, is enough to astonish everybody who has not been aware
    of the facts; and it is but right that credit should be given
    to the poor abused Irish for having done their duty. Recollect
    that the donors are working men and women, and depend upon
    their daily labour for their daily food; that they have no
    settled income to rely upon; but with that charming reliance
    upon Divine Providence which characterizes the Irish peasant,
    they freely send their first earnings home to father, mother,
    sister, or brother. I requested J. H. Todhunter to have the
    facts I gave him published, and I make a similar request to
    thee, as they are still more cheering. A publication of the
    kind may stimulate the rich to do their duty, where they have
    hitherto neglected it; and it will give evidence to those who
    have no faith in Irishmen, that whenever they are able to get
    good wages, they never forget their relatives and friends who
    are in want.”


[52] The emigration for each division of the United Kingdom
during the first three quarters of 1847 was as follows; but
it must be remembered that those who embarked at Liverpool
consisted almost wholly of Irish. There can also be no doubt
that the Irish helped to swell the tide from several other
ports of Great Britain, and especially in the west of Scotland.

  -----------+-----------------+------------
    From     |   From other    |  Total from
  Liverpool. | English ports.  |   England.
  -----------+-----------------+------------
   114,301   |    20,942       |  136,395
  -----------+-----------------+------------
    From     |    From         |
  Scotland.  |   Ireland.      |   Total.
  -----------+-----------------+------------
     8,155   |    95,911       |  240,461
  -----------+-----------------+------------


[53] These Irish labourers who annually come to England, by way
of Liverpool, to help to gather in the harvest, and return to
Ireland after it is over, are included in this number. They are
variously estimated at from 10,000 to 30,000.


[54] 5000 Irish paupers were relieved in Manchester in the last
week in February, and for several weeks following there were
more than 4000 on an average receiving outdoor, and from 600
to 700 in-door, relief. This was independent of the adjoining
districts of Salford and Chorlton, where great numbers of Irish
were also relieved. Nearly 90,000 destitute and disabled Irish,
including women and children, were reported to have received
parochial relief in Scotland at a total expense of about
34,000ℓ.; but as the same persons were frequently relieved in
more than one parish, and were therefore returned by more than
one Inspector, the number of persons of this description newly
arrived in Scotland is not so great as that above stated.


[55] The details of the frightful mortality connected with
the great emigration of 1847 from Ireland to Canada, are as
follows:--

Whole number of British emigrants embarked 89,738

  Died on the passage                   5,293
       at the quarantine station        3,452
       at the Quebec Emigrant Hospital  1,041
       at the Montreal   ditto          3,579
       at Kingston and Toronto          1,965
                                       ------
                                       15,330

showing a mortality of rather more than 17 per cent. on the
number embarked. One-third of those who arrived in Canada were
received into hospital.

The people of Canada deserve great praise for the spirited
and benevolent exertions made by them to meet the exigencies
of this disastrous emigration, which is described as having
“left traces of death and misery along its course, from
the Quarantine Establishment at Grosse Isle to the most
distant parts of Upper Canada, cutting down in its progress
numbers of estimable citizens.” Besides the larger hospital
establishments, twenty-four Boards of Health were formed
in Upper Canada. Numerous deaths also took place among the
emigrants to New Brunswick. The ships containing the German
emigrants, and two ships fitted out by the Duke of Sutherland
from Sutherlandshire, arrived in Canada in a perfectly healthy
state.


[56] Settlers in the backwoods must have the means of support
from twelve to fifteen months after their arrival, and this
cannot be accomplished for less than 60ℓ., at the lowest
estimate, for each family consisting of a man, his wife, and
three children, or equal to 3½ adults on an average.


[57] The repayment of these advances, which amount altogether
to £1,145,800, has not yet been pressed, out of consideration
for the circumstances of the country.


[58] An Act to make further provision for the Relief of the
Destitute Poor in Ireland, 10 Vic. cap. 31--[Passed 8th June,
1847.]

An Act to provide for the Execution of the Laws for the Relief
of the Poor in Ireland, 10 & 11 Vic. cap. 90--[Passed 22nd
July, 1847.]

An Act to make provision for the Punishment of Vagrants and
Persons offending against the Laws in force for the Relief of
the Destitute Poor in Ireland, 10 & 11 Vic. cap. 84--[Passed
22nd July, 1847.]


[59] “I would sincerely regret that anything I have said
should appear to be written as if I sought occasion to point
out errors and hold them up; far from it; I mention them
with sorrow and a kindly wish that they may be corrected.
The position of the respectable classes at this moment in
many instances is surely pitiable. There is but one course by
which this country can rise and take her proper position, and
that is by a hearty and sincere determination to work for the
public good, at the same time throwing aside all selfish and
party feeling. In that case, there is no reason why we should
despair; but otherwise, no mortal can either pass laws or
propose any other thing which would be attended with success.
In this I particularly allude to the Poor Law now about to
be administered. I look upon it as an indirect absentee tax,
drawing from those who did not contribute before, or in a very
slight degree. It assures the poor man that from the land he
must have support, and that what he labours on will one day
sustain him when he can no longer toil. It will also compel
others to consider that unless employment is provided, they
must support him without a remunerative return,--and if this
is rightly considered, then the heavy affliction which the
Almighty has been pleased to lay on them will prove a lesson
for good.

“On the subject of relief being given without having a
corresponding return for it in labour, I feel very apprehensive
that, owing to the habits of the lower orders, the present
repugnance to entering the union-house may give way, and that
for the sake of an idle life, they may accept the terms. To
prevent this and rescue both landlord and peasant from certain
ruin, there must be employment given fairly remunerative
to both, not by Government, but by the owners of the soil.
Until lately, what was the condition of the peasant? Work as
he would, till and rear what he might, he could never hope
to benefit. His portion was the potato only, shared, it may
be said, with his pig. He dare not use anything else. Let
misfortune come on him, or disease render him unable to work,
he had no claim on the land. One a little less poor than
himself might help him, but who else? The charity I have seen
has been from the poor to the poor. Is it any wonder that they
became spiritless, idle, and even worse?

“A townland near here, owned by a landlord who resides
constantly away, is let to a middleman at 10s. an acre. That
middleman resides away also, and he relets it to a person who
lives in the county of Cork, and only occasionally comes there.
It is sub-let again, until the price received for a quarter of
an acre is 1ℓ. 10s. per annum. Can that place be otherwise than
full of distress?

“Near it is another townland. The owner resides here, but he
has never attended to it. In the late calamity he applied to
me for seed and assistance, declaring his intention to provide
seed at his own expense; and to insure its being sown, he
said he should employ a person to superintend the sowing, as
the land was prepared. His tenants were without food; but to
encourage and assist in this case, an application was made
by me to the Society of Friends for a supply to sustain the
people while working, which was granted. The party supposed
he had about sixty to provide for, but was frightened at over
600 applications for food; and it then came out that his land
was underlet to an enormous degree. He had never paid proper
attention by inspecting his farms, &c. The result is, that
now he can neither get rent, nor the repayment of the value
of the seed. What has been grown will not suffice to feed
those who are located on the land. They cannot pay rent, and
they will not give up their holdings. The population has been
increased in such cases, and others, to an extent beyond what
the land can bear. Another cause is, that the Roman Catholic
clergy derive their income mainly from fees and contributions
at marriages and christenings; and though there are some who
see the disastrous result of encouraging the increase of the
population, and are scrupulous on that head, still, as their
subsistence depends on it, it cannot be expected that they will
exert themselves in a way likely to deprive themselves of daily
bread by discouraging thoughtless rushing into improvident
marriages.”--CAPTAIN MANN’S NARRATIVE.


[60] First Board of Works Series of 1846-7, page 338 to 341.


[61] The purposes to which these loans are applicable are as
follows:--

  1. The drainage of lands by any means which may be approved by the
       Commissioners.

  2. The subsoiling, trenching, or otherwise deepening and improving
       the soil of lands.

  3. The irrigation or warping of lands.

  4. The embankment of lands from the sea or tidal waters, or rivers.

  5. The inclosing or fencing, or improving the fences, drains,
       streams, or water-courses of land.

  6. The reclamation of waste or other land.

  7. The making of farm roads.

  8. The clearing land of rocks and stones.


[62] By neglecting their estates, and omitting to construct proper farm
buildings, and to make other necessary improvements, Irish landlords
relinquish their position in rural society, and give free scope to
the agrarian revolutionary plans which, under the disguise of “fixity
of tenure” and “tenant right,” would dispossess the landlord, without
conferring any permanent benefit on the tenant. In the smaller class of
holdings, the entire gross produce is insufficient to support a family,
without allowing for either rent, seed, or taxes; and even supposing
that, with the dangerous help of the potato, eked out by harvest-work
and begging, a rent is paid, the tendency to multiply and subdivide
is so strong, that if the whole rent were given up, the holders would
become in a generation or two much more numerous and equally poor. The
fact is, that the main hope of extrication from the slough of despond
in which the small holders in the centre and west of Ireland are at
present sunk, is from the enterprise and capital and improved husbandry
of the class of owners commonly known by the name of landlords.


[63] In what follows we must be understood as giving expression to
the practical conclusions of those who, having been charged with the
unenviable task of superintending the measures of relief, and assisting
to replace society on a permanent basis after it had been unsettled by
this great calamity, must be allowed to have had unusual advantages for
a close examination of the subject under a variety of aspects.


[64] The same results appeared in those parts of France, Switzerland,
Germany, and Sweden, in which the subdivision of the land has been
carried to the greatest extent. The following extract from a letter
received in January last from Brest, contains a correct description of
the manner in which that part of France was affected by the dearth:
“All the petty farmers are in the greatest distress, having been
obliged to sell their wheat and most of their other grain in October,
to pay their rents due on Michaelmas-day. The overplus in the crop of
buckwheat is not sufficient to compensate for the deficiency in their
stock of potatoes, and they are now living on cabbages, carrots, and a
very small proportion of buckwheat. Unless some stringent measures be
adopted to prevent the progressive subdivision of land in France, the
country must eventually be reduced to the present state of Ireland.”
It has been justly observed, that “in agriculture, as in every other
industrial process, prosperity must depend upon the application of
capital to production; and equal injury is done when such application
of capital is prevented, either by landlords refusing to give tenants
a beneficial interest in their improvements, or by a combination of
pauper occupants to prevent capitalists from obtaining possession of
land.” Those who take an interest in this important subject will do
well to read Mr. M‘Culloch’s excellent chapter on compulsory partition,
in his recently-published work “On the Succession to Property vacant by
Death.”


[65] The inferior condition of the peasantry in the West of England
is in a great degree owing to the increased use of the potato, the
cultivation of which by the poor was much encouraged by the gentry
and clergy as a cheap means of subsistence during the high prices of
corn in the last war. Somersetshire and Devonshire were, in fact, fast
becoming potato countries; and if the blight of that vegetable had
occurred twenty years later, their sufferings might have approached to
those of Ireland.


[66] Lord George Bentinck stated that 1500 miles of railroad would give
constant employment, either on the line or in the various occupations
connected with it, to 110,000 able-bodied labourers and artificers,
representing, with their families, 550,000 persons; but even supposing
that all these had been set to work at once, they would have been
selected from the classes of persons least likely to require charitable
assistance, while the weak and infirm would have been systematically
excluded. The number of persons for whom the Government had to provide
the means of subsistence at this crisis, was upwards of three millions;
and this had to be done in the neighbourhood of their own homes, which
could not be accomplished by means of railroads, employment on which is
confined to particular localities. The number of persons stated in the
House of Commons as likely to be employed on railroads in Ireland was
greatly overrated; the general surface of the country requires scarcely
any deep cuttings or embankments, and the eskars, through which the
cuttings are made, offer the finest possible material for ballasting.


[67] Speech of Mr. Richard Bourke, M.P. for Kildare, to his father’s
tenantry, September 1847.


[68] Although both did their best, it is fair to state that the
Protestant clergy had some advantages which the Roman Catholic clergy
did not possess. The Protestant clergy were assisted by liberal
subscriptions from England; and as their stipends are primary charges
on the rent, they were regularly paid even during the period of the
greatest distress. The Roman Catholic clergy, on the contrary, depend,
both for their own subsistence, and for the means of helping their poor
and ignorant people, upon the voluntary contributions of the people
themselves; and when these had nothing to give, owing to the failure
of their crops and the want of employment, the clergy were reduced to
great straits, which they bore with exemplary patience. The fees on
marriages and baptisms which are the principal source of the income of
the Roman Catholic clergy, almost entirely ceased in some parts of the
country. It is much to the credit of the poor Irish, that now that they
have been deprived of the potatoes on which they had been accustomed to
bring up their families, marriages have become much less frequent.


[69] “A great deal has been written, and many an account given, of
the dreadful sufferings endured by the poor, but the reality in most
cases far exceeded description. Indeed, none can conceive what it
was but those who were in it. For my part, I frequently look back on
it as a fearful and horrid dream, scarcely knowing how sufficiently
to express gratitude to the Almighty for having brought this country
through it, even as it is. If the first measures which prepared us
to meet the second and severest calamity had been neglected, it is
frightful to suppose what would have been the state of this afflicted
country. My opinion is, that there are but very few who will not
gratefully remember the generous and prompt relief afforded in this
time of trouble; such sufferings, and such help, cannot be easily
forgotten.”--CAPTAIN MANN’S NARRATIVE.


[70] The Irish peasant made up for the deficiency of nutritive
qualities in the potato, by the quantity he ate, amounting generally
to as much as fourteen pounds in a single day; and it was therefore
a general complaint at first, that the Indian corn left an uneasy
sensation, arising from the absence of the habitual distension of
the organs of digestion. The half raw state in which it was often
eaten, arising partly from ignorance of the proper mode of cooking it,
and partly from impatience to satisfy the cravings of hunger, also
concurred with the previous debilitated state of the people, to produce
sickness when it was first introduced. All this, however, has been
got over, and the people have now not only become accustomed to the
use of a grain food, but they prefer it, and declare that they feel
stronger and more equal to hard work under the influence of a meal
of stirabout, than of potatoes; and their improved appearance fully
bears out this conclusion. One main cause of the fact which has been
so often remarked, that the Irishman works better out of Ireland than
in it, is, that when he leaves his native country and obtains regular
employment elsewhere he commences at the same time a more strengthening
diet than the potato. It is commonly observed in Canada, that the
Irish emigrants, although a much larger race of men than the French
Canadians, are, for some time after their arrival, inferior to them
as farm labourers; and this difference is attributed to their food.
The Canadian labourer, who receives his food as part of his hire, has
an ample breakfast on bread and milk. He dines at midday on soupe aux
pois, with a full quantity of salt pork and bread à discrétion. At four
o’clock he is allowed a luncheon of bread and onions, and at night he
has a ragout of meat and vegetables for his supper. He however works
laboriously, and generally from sunrise to sunset, and is scarcely ever
absent a day from his work. An Irishman cannot endure this continuous
labour without better food than the potato; and in every way it is
desirable to teach him the use of a more substantial diet, both to
enable him to give a proper amount of labour for his hire, and in order
to raise him to a higher standard as a social being. We shall not
consider the object finally accomplished until the people of Ireland
live upon a bread and meat diet, like those of the best parts of
England and Scotland.


[71] The following is the proportion of agrarian crimes in each quarter
from January 1845, to November 1847:

In the Quarter ending

  Jan.  31, 1845, the proportion is one in 4¼
  April 30, 1845,        ”        ”        3-1/12
  July  31, 1845,        ”        ”        4⅖
  Oct.  31, 1845,        ”        ”        5⅓
  Jan.  31, 1846,        ”        ”        4
  April 30, 1846,        ”        ”        3⅓
  July  31, 1846,        ”        ”        8
  Oct.  31, 1846,        ”        ”       19
  Jan.  31, 1847,        ”        ”       54
  April 30, 1847,        ”        ”       64
  July  31, 1847,        ”        ”       42
  Oct.  31, 1847,        ”        ”       12

The increase of agrarian crimes which has lately taken place, is more
connected with resistance to the payment of rents, than with opposition
to ejectments from the possession of land; and it has been almost
entirely confined to the counties of Tipperary, Clare, Limerick, and
Roscommon. Out of 195 crimes committed in the whole of Ireland in
October 1847, 139 were committed in Clare, Limerick, and Tipperary;
being 71 per cent. of the whole number, although the population of
these three counties is only 13 per cent. of the population of Ireland.
The districts in the north-west and south-west of Ireland, which
suffered most from the failure of the potato crop in 1845-6, were at
the same time remarkable for the absence of atrocious crimes.


[72] The manner in which the Clanmorris and Blessington properties,
and a portion of that belonging to the Cunningham family, have been
disposed of, are instances in point.


[73] Although we do not intend to excuse the system of the Penal Laws,
it is fair to mention, that these measures of restraint were considered
at the time to be necessary for the protection of the liberty and
religion of the country, and that they were imposed at the conclusion
of a desperate struggle, the renewal of which was for a long time a
source of serious apprehension. The battles of the Boyne, Enniskillen,
and Aughrim, the sieges of Londonderry and Limerick, and the critical
operations at Athlone, ushered in the Penal Laws, the real object
of which was to keep in check the great political party which had
arrayed itself on the side of the Stuarts and of their principles of
Government; and as the danger diminished, these Laws were gradually
relaxed until they were finally abolished by the Catholic Emancipation
Act in 1829. It will also be remembered that the Penal Laws were passed
by the Irish Parliament and repealed by that of the United Kingdom.




Transcriber’s Notes


Punctuation and spelling were made consistent when a predominant
preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.

Simple typographical errors were corrected; occasional unbalanced
quotation marks retained.

Ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines were retained; occurrences of
inconsistent hyphenation have not been changed.

Currency symbols were italicized in the original book. To make the
Plain Text version of this eBook easier to read, those symbols are
not marked as italics, but are displayed here as “ℓ.”, “s.”, and “d.”
(without quotation marks).

Footnote 3, originally on page 5: The day of the month was missing.

Footnote 64, originally on page 178: “M‘Culloch’s” was printed that
way, with the right-curling apostrophe.

Page 186: “controul” was printed that way.





End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Irish Crisis, by C. E. Trevelyan

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