t Peter W. Colli: JLiorary 193 3 9 8 l^v£^A 102 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. a Ions: time, and God was good ! At the end of the time Mr. O'Dowd demanded all the arrears. The tenants said they were ruined ; but in two instal- ments the entire amount was paid, as well as the running gales of rent. Mr. O'Dowd has not retired from trade, as so many would have done on the acquisition of so much property as he has bought. He is as keen a man of business as ever, and looks upon his property as a means for the increase of his business. When Paddy Miles was met wearing a new hat, which he had evidently bought in a rival establishment, Mr. O'Dowd ordered him to attend at the office at once and pay up his account for rent and goods. It was only by submitting to a fine of half a crown that Paddy escaped the threatened ruin, for to pay up his account was impossible ; and he has under- taken not again to break the rule of the property by buying anything in any other house than that of his landlord. It is unnecessary to say that the rents on Mr. O'Dowd's properties are much higher than on properties belonging to the old landlords, yet no tenants in the country make a braver show at mass or market. Mr. O'Dowd holds that tenants will cultivate up to their necessities, and only so far. These necessities are rent, food, and clothing ; and the land, food, and clothes being supplied by him, he has a fair idea of the amount that can be borne by them. Tom Lahy complains of being charged 16s. a hundredweight for guano, instead of 12s. 6d. } A SUCCESSFUL SHOPKEEPER. 103 which is the price in the open market ; but as he will not have to pay for it for a year the neighbours do not think he has any cause for complaint. When he is asked to pay up an instalment of his account, he will have forgotten all about that item. Nor will he suspect that his twenty pounds' weight of turnip seed really consisted of half that quantity, ten pounds being a cheap seed of another descrip- tion, duly scalded and killed by the thoughtful seed merchant, that its germination might not expose the fraud. Mr. O'Dowd is strong on the innocence of the transaction ; for is it not a well-known fact that the people sow all seeds too thickly ? and the little plan only secures that seed be sown in the propor- tion advised by good farmers. Mr. O'Dowd's best customers are the women, whose adornments form the greater portion of their husbands' bills, to the great injury of these patient spouses. When Paddy M alley sold his cow, and honestly determined to pay the four or five pounds that he thought his bill amounted to, he was sorely vexed to find he owed ten pounds ten, which was accounted for by the price of his wife's new hat and shawl, and the finely trimmed dress with which his daughter dazzled the neighbours on Sundays. Mrs. Malley did not hesitate a moment in ordering on credit the green silk hat with blue flowers and feathers and pink strings for which twenty-five shillings was charged in the bill. Who knows what might not turn up before payment was asked ? io4 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. And had Bill Grogan's daughter been dependent upon the money in her purse she would have choked with envy before she allowed that passion to lead her into the extravagance of ordering a bonnet at thirty shillings that must have twice as many colours and much wider strings than Biddy Malley's hat. Mr. O'Dowd is not a poor-law guardian. That position would deprive him of the advantage of contracting for the food and clothing required in the workhouse. He has many customers on the board, and can command the acceptance of his tenders. The representation of a division he re- gards as an empty honour, the command of the representative a solid advantage. After the partial failure cf the potato crop of 1879 he soon read the signs of the times, and determined that if money was to be distributed his neighbourhood must have its share. He has adopted the stories of famine to the fullest extent. If money is to be obtained, there must be a high bid made for it in the competition of destitution. He is an active member of the .local relief committee, and he de- clares the poverty of his tenants to be so great that special applications have been made by him in their behalf. Yet his offer of a reduction of rent had a curious ring to starving people. All the tenants on Owcnmackenna who paid up the rent to the 1st of November were offered a reduction of 25 per cent. As Mr. O'Dowd says that the tenants owe him from A SUCCESSFUL SHOPKEEPER. 105 two to five years' rent, the offer was a safe business transaction to him, and those who paid have not been neglected in the lavish supply of meal and seed from the different charitable funds. Michael Heffernan is one of the tenants Mr. O'Dowd declares to be five years in arrear. Michael stoutly denies it, but he has no receipt to show. Mr. O'Dowd's business system is not calculated to encourage in his tenant the independence of the village black- smith, who "owes not any man." When Heffernan went at fairly regular intervals to pay his rent, he was directed to the office, where he was assured that the amount was credited in the book and no receipt was necessary. When he went to claim the abatement offered for punctual payment he found that his payments were all credited for the general account of shop goods and the deficit debited to his rent account. Heffernan is growing dangerous, and it has become a question whether Mr. O'Dowd will not give him the abatement. Mr. O'Dowd has strong views about public works, and has spoken sternly on the impropriety of offer- ing charity to people who are able and willing to work. A large drainage scheme would be worth many hundreds to him. The building of a fishing pier would materially benefit him. Of course the meal account is a paying business. But half the amount in ready money circulating in the district would yield him double the profit, as the contract price of meal is low. He has borrowed some thou- io6 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. sands from the Board of Works to expend upon the Owenmackenna property ; and as he has let the drainage to the tenants, who are to be paid by wiping off their arrears due to him, the grant of money at I per cent, is a windfall making the years 1879 and 1880 not the least prosperous of the last decade. Mr. O'Dowd is a strong opponent of the cry for fixity of tenure at fair rents ; but though a landlord he has thrown himself into the agitation for a peasant proprietary. While he was speaking at the nearest land meeting, an awkward statement was made that he had fifteen processes for non- payment of rent in the hands of the process-server. He explained that they owed him five years' rent, but forgot to say how the rent and shop accounts had been manipulated. Mr. O'Dowd is prepared to stand up for the sacred rights of the people. A national Parlia- ment and peasant proprietary are the two planks of his platform. Nothing less will satisfy him. " I am prepared to sell every farm on my property to my tenants to-morrow," he exclaimed, knowing how empty were the pockets of the tenantry. " The tiller of the soil, rooted in the holding that he has made fertile by the sweat of his brow, is the end for which we struggle, and which we must attain." The cheering crowd does not give Mr. O'Dowd credit for as much sincerity as he deserves. A peasant proprietary would mean for him a ready A SUCCESSFUL SHOPKEEPER. 107 purchase of property. He has too large an ex- perience of the certainty of mortgages on small estates not to know that the acquisition of property by him will be materially assisted by the segre- gation of the larger properties around him. Be- sides, he owes a grudge to the landlords. Being, as he is, in a position to know who can pay, he refused to accept the plea of ruin put in by tenants on Sir George Baker's property. In due course they were served with processes and decrees were obtained ; but when the bailiffs went to execute the decrees they were confronted by notices from the landlord, who had not called for his rent, that the rent was due, and must first be paid before Mr. O'Dowd's debt could be considered. This Mr. O'Dowd stigmatizes as a shabby trick. A peasant proprietary would prevent such a plan for cheating the shopkeeper of his due, and Mr. O'Dowd would have no objection to even the compulsory sale to the tenants of the portion of his property not farmed by himself, if it were part of a scheme that would relieve him from the landlord's priority and give him a fair start for repurchase. The redistribution of property would mean increased security for his credit, and the certainty of an ultimate accumula- tion of real estate that would one day place the O'Dowds of Owenmackenna anions: the leading families of the county. io8 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. CHAPTER XI. A WESTERN TENANT. MAT EGAN is considered by the neighbours to be a very snug man. His farm of twenty- five acres of arable land, with about fifty acres of bog attached, is known in the Ordnance Valuation Office as Lot 9 in the tenement valuation of the townland of Knockeenashinnagh, a name signifying the little hill of the fox. The valuation of the lot is £18 ; the rent paid by Egan £28, being calcu- lated at £1 an acre for the arable land and £5 for the fifty acres of bog. About ten acres of the arable land is generally under crops. The remainder is in grass, the limestone rock cropping up in places, so that, stooping low, these parts seem only a mass of bare rock with tufts of herbage and fern peeping up here and there. This portion was valued by the Government valuers in 185 1 at a very low rate, and the bog at a merely nominal figure, as all light lands and bog were valued at that time. But Mat Egan knows how surely his sheep will find their way to the rock fields where the sweet grasses spring A WESTERN TENANT. 109 from every cleft and crevice, and where they grow as quickly as if planted in forcing beds ; and how in winter the cattle will abandon the withered herbage of the coarse bottoms for the bog, where, gingerly drawing up the black rushes whose buried portions are white and succulent and from six to ten inches long, they feed upon the tender morsels and thrive better than upon the grass. From the bog, too, he obtains heather for bedding the two young colts and an ample store of fuel for his house. He has therefore not complained of the discrepancy between his rent and the Ordnance valuation. The house and outhouses form three sides of a square, along the fourth side of which runs the rough bohereen, or lane, by which the house is ap- proached from the high-road. The centre is half filled by a manure heap ; and in the green, stagnant water that occupies the remainder the ducks and geese find constant occupation. The manure heap so boldly planted in front of the door gives off no pungent smell, thanks to the deodorizing properties of the bog mould of which it is more than half composed. This has been collected through the winter months from the portion of the bog where the refuse of the turf-cutting has formed a disin- tegrated mass of peat. The patient asses, who sink half-way to the knees, carry it in panniers straight on to the manure heap, where the withdrawal of a stick allows the hinged bottoms of the panniers to open, depositing the load without further trouble. no PICTURES FROM IRELAND. Opposite to the house is the barn, whose door is never locked — for the crime of robbery is of rare occurrence, and a robber or thief would have but a poor chance of escape from detection. Beside the house is a stable for the cows and the horse, and at the end of it a shed has been made for the cart, the roof formed of a pile of turf which can be used as fuel if necessary. The dwelling-house is a building of one story, in the eave of whose thatched roof the sparrows pick out holes in spring and build their nests. The thatch is much more comfortable than slates, being warmer in winter and cooler in summer ; and though it has assumed a green shade from the moss that has begun to form on the old straw, it will keep out the rain well for the remainder of the ten years since the last coat was added to it. Of course the gable is graced by a plant of house-leek, which is the only insurance against fire that Mat Egan allows himself; but everybody knows how excellent a preventive against fire is that precious plant, and how valuable a safeguard against the designs of bad fairies. The door in the middle of the house opens into the kitchen and living-room. At one end is the room occupied by the two sons and the servant-boy, and at the other the apartment in which Mat Egan, his wife, and his three unmarried daughters sleep in two beds, the tops of whose arched roofs are the receptacles for the unused lumber of the female A WESTERN TENANT. in portion of the house. On the wall is hung a small delft altar surrounded by artificial flowers, and before this the inmates of the room devoutly pray. It must be confessed that on the window-shelf is kept the milk, and the butter that has been made for market. There is plenty of room in the barn, but the trouble of going there with the milk would be greater. In the middle of the kitchen is a long table at which all the family take their meals, consisting of stir- about and milk in the morning, with bread and tea for the heads of the house, and potatoes and milk for dinner, with eggs added in the summer and autumn. In one corner are the roosts for the fowls — for fowls must have warmth, and the kitchen is the most convenient place — and on the walls are hung two pyramidal nests made of plaited straw, that the hens may lay in comfort. Egan's landlord made him a present of a range with an oven, which was anything but satisfactory, as the turf did not burn so well as it does on the ground ; but the oven has been useful for the hens to hatch in, and E^an has too great a regard for his landlord's good opinion to discard the un- welcome evidence of improvement. In every part of the house dirt reigns supreme, and a few pan- niers full of the absorbent turf mould thrown upon the mortar floor of the kitchen would materially sweeten the atmosphere of that apartment. Mrs. Egan would not consider it lucky to see the house unduly clean. She holds firmly by the old adage, ii2 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. "There's luck in muck," which is interpreted so literally by all the household that no member of the family would court ill fortune by washing face or hands before going in to market. When Mat Egan succeeded to the farm he found it saddled with a charge of ^200, being the for- tunes payable to his two sisters on their marriage. When, the following Shrovetide, he found that the matchmaker of that neighbourhood had arranged a marriage for each, he was obliged to borrow the money from the bank in the neighbouring town. This compelled a Spartan simplicity in family arrangements, and precluded the possibility of in- dulging in animal food, except a little fat bacon with cabbage on Sunday. In time the debt was paid off, and the gradually diminishing bill was replaced in the bank by a deposit receipt, to which money has been constantly added, until now a con- siderable sum is placed to his credit. His style of living 'has never changed, except that within ten years he has added tea to his expenses, for which he pays 4$". a pound, that being the lowest price at which tea is procurable at the nearest grocer's. In the entire farm there is not one straight fence. The arable land is curiously divided by tortuous banks, which, with the " grip " at each side, measure at least twelve feet across, the cart gaps being built up with loose stones when the crops are down. In one field are the remains of a similar bank now partially levelled ; but Egan has never thought of A WESTERN TENANT, 113 digging it entirely away and utilizing- the ground for tillage. If all the banks were removed and walls built in their places more than an acre of valuable land would be added to the tillage, but Egan thinks the operation would be too much trouble. Nor does he consider it necessary to plough his potato soil or stubble after the crop has been gathered in autumn. His father never did it before him, and he does not see why he should be always trying new plans like those Scotch Protestants who have settled on so many large farms in the neighbourhood. Every grip is filled with nettles and briars ; the growing oat crop struggles with the perennial thistle, dock, and prassia ; and the potatoes have a fight for existence with couch-grass, wild ranunculus, and other weeds of greater or lesser injury ; but Egan is of opinion that the expense of keeping these crops thoroughly free from weeds would be thrown away. In spring and harvest he hires five labourers to sow, reap, and dig ; but in the slack seasons he confines his attention to the tillage farm, to the collection of bog mould, which is done by one servant-boy ; while such of the labourers as are not small farmers hard by, return to the villages and towns, where they try to pull through the idle time w r ith the aid of the union. Of course what remains of the circular rath, forty yards in diameter, in the middle of the potato-field, has never been disturbed by placing a crop in it. Egan knows too well how certainly such an indignity to the dwelling-place of ii4 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. the fairies — of whom he always speaks cautiously as "the good people " — would be resented. As surely as the killing of the magpie that builds its domed nest in the small tree close to the house would be avenged by the destruction of his chickens, or the death of a cricket followed by the ruin of woollen articles left near the fire, being eaten into holes by the infuriated survivors, so surely would the first interference with the rath be followed by some misfortune to his family. Egan's eldest daughter Kate was married last Shrovetide, an event that was for a time the cause of serious anxiety. Mary, the second girl, is more comely, and William Flaherty, meeting her at Mrs. Cullman's wake, fell in love with her, not more from her good looks than from her general sprightliness and gaiety at the post-mortem festivities. William Flaherty was an eligible husband in every way ; so the matchmaker flattered herself that in making the proposal she was certain of a favourable reply. But there was a difficulty in the matter. Egan deter- mined that but one daughter must marry that Shrovetide ; and of course the marriage of the younger daughter would be an injustice to the elder. Everybody knows that if the eldest daughter is not married first, she receives a " blast " that may injure her future prospects. Kate feels that she would rather die than suffer the indignity of being chalked on " chalk Sunday " — the first Sunday in Lent — when the boys stand in rows at the chapel A WESTERN TENANT. 115 door, their hands well rubbed with chalk, and mercilessly clap the backs of the girls who have been passed over in the Shrovetide matchmaking, thereby branding them as rejected. So Kate must be married first. The situation was explained to Flaherty, and it was suggested that he should marry Kate instead of Mary. This he declined, and after much pressure by the matchmaker, assisted by the girl's mother, Egan at length consented to the marriage, undertaking to give his daughter openly a fortune of fifty pounds and a second fifty secretly, of which the priest was to know nothing ; thereby cheating that worthy pastor of £2 10s., his ordinary percentage. Flaherty was also to have five head of cattle from a herd of thirty that Egan had on a farm taken by him as winterage. When the bargain was concluded, Egan said, " Now, William, of course I'll stick to my bargain, though in all fairness Kate ought to be married first ; and a finer warrant to milk a cow or feed a pig you will not find in Connaught. But if you will change your mind and marry Kate, I will give you the pick cf the cattle, and if you insist on taking Mary you must be content with the culls." Flaherty gave no immediate answer, but consulted his friend Michael Scanlon, who, on considering the case, advised him to marry Kate. " For," he said, " believe me, William, when you come to marriage there is not the differ of a cow between one woman and another." So Mary now awaits her turn, which will come next Shrovetide. n6 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. Egan's life is by no means devoid of amusement. On fair days and at market he meets the neighbours and talks over local affairs. Holidays are rather a nuisance, as he is really industrious and does not like enforced idleness on a fine spring or harvest day. But a race meeting affords him the keenest enjoyment, and he looks forward anxiously to the annual steeplechases about ten miles distant. As for flat-racing, he considers it a poor amusement, only fit for Englishmen ; but he will stand all day at a big fence on the chance of seeing a fall, and shout with delight as the horses sweep over it. Were his fences twenty times as good as they are, he would gladly see them broken by jumping horses, and does not grudge the trouble of remaking them when he has had the pleasure of seeing the foxhounds hunting and the excitement of watching the fencing of the pursuing field. But perhaps no day in the year has for him a greater attraction than the day when at the baronial sessions he fights his battle for a road contract ; for, like his neighbours who possess horses, he is a road contractor, and thus secures work for his horse during the idle time. He wants to secure the contract for the repair of five hundred perches of the public road running past his farm, and he has left no stone unturned to effect that purpose. Not alone his landlord, but every magis- trate who is entitled to sit at " road sessions " is canvassed, and the assistance of the parish priest is A WESTERN TENANT. 117 sought to influence the ratepayers who have been chosen by ballot to sit with the magistrates. He is prepared to accept the contract at 8d. a perch, so he puts in tenders at 13^., the 3 being so formed that if no lower tender has been made he can declare the figure a 5. Then tenders at lid., iod., gd., and 8d. are put in. If any other tenders are made for that portion of the road he claims the contract on the proposal immediately below them, withdrawing any tender for a smaller sum. The competition is keen and exciting, and he delights in the exercise of his cunning. Indeed, the entire business is pleasant, affording, as it does, opportunity for staking his ingenuity against the observation of the county surveyor, who might possibly pass as properly done some superficial repairs. In years gone by Egan has listened night after night to the recital of fairy legends, having for their burden the rescue of some beautiful maiden ; or the adventures of some poor boy who leaves home to seek his fortune ; his mother's leave-taking being always the casting of a handful of feathers after him, while she cries — " My blessing go high, my blessing go low, My blessing go with you wherever you go." And how, after thrilling- adventures, in which he succeeded as often by cunning as by valour, he returns in a year and a day, having wedded a lovely princess, the invariable ending of the recital being " and if they don't live happy, that you and I may." n3 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. Now these charming and highly coloured stories have been swept away by the flood of education, and Egan satisfies his desire for news and forms his politics from the columns of the Weekly News, which is read by the National schoolmaster at the fireside to an attentive audience every Friday even- ing. He was not certain that the English Govern- ment was such a curse to Ireland and the landlords such robbers until he heard the Irish World read, which interesting American paper informed him of atrocities committed in his own parish of which he had never heard before. So far as his own landlord is concerned Mat Egan declares he has nothing of which he can complain. His rent remains what it was when his father first took the farm, and in many ways he has been assisted by the landlord. He has used these facts in his arguments with the National schoolmaster, whose political views are decidedly inimical to landlords. But he cannot deny that on the property at the other side of the road the rents have been twice raised, until they stand now 50 per cent, over what they were fifteen years ago. His two sons are enamoured of the doctrine of Socialism. They are quite content to share the farm equally if their father dies ; and one points out that, although their present landlord has not raised the rent, perhaps when his son, who is now in the army, succeeds him the rent may be increased. A WESTERN TENANT. 119 Egan's two sons have been for some time a cause of anxiety to him. They are frequently out until two and three o'clock. He knows that the meet- ings of the society he dreads are generally held under the cloak of a dance, and he fears that sooner or later his sons will find themselves within the grasp of the law. He disapproves of the secret society, and was so angry when Ned Massy, who shot Mr. Brophy in the back when that gentleman was driving past the houses in the outskirts of the nearest town, spoke openly to his sons and daugh- ters of his part in the murder as they sat by the fire one night, that he ordered Massy to leave his house. Of course he gave no information to the police. He does not consider the murder any of his business. Neither do the various people who were standing at their doors when Mr. Brophy was shot and saw the murder. And though ^1500 has been offered as a reward for information Massy is perfectly safe. Egan is not dissatisfied with the law, and regards with uneasiness any projected change. Fenianism he cordially distrusted, but his natural timidity made him cautious about expressing his opinions. The Fenians threatened to pike him if he would not join when the time came. The police intimated that any outrage would be visited by a police-tax, and Egan declares that it was like living with a pike at your back and a bayonet at your breast. Until the clergy joined the land agita- 120 riCTURES FROM IRELAND. tion Egan distrusted that also. He is now, to a certain extent, carried away by his family, who have all, especially the women, entered into the combination heart and soul. So far he has paid his rent, though not until he was processed, as he knew the danger of appearing to pay it without pressure. The winter of 1879 has been a good one for him, as Father Mooney has kindly put his name on the list for relief, and thus saved him a consider- able sum that he would otherwise have paid for meal. Father Mooney has not been forgotten in the Easter offering, and his kindness has borne fruit in increased dues. But for the landlord Egan will not produce more than half the rent at May, and he is beginning to yield to the influence of his wife and sons, who declare that even half the rent is too much to give to a tyrant, who in asking any rent at all is robbing honest labour of the land that God has made for the people. ( 121 ) CHAPTER XII. THE COUNTRY'S DIFFICULTY. SEVENTY years ago there was not in the townland of Bohernasoggarth a better farm than the sixty acres then granted on a lease for three lives to Patrick Higgins. No clause prohibiting subdivision was included in the lease ; and long before the original lessee was gathered to his fathers two sons had been settled on farms of fifteen acres each, and a third division was made for the husband of his eldest daughter, who came to reside in the house. Year by year, as families grew and marriages were contracted, the various divisions were further sub- divided, until at the expiration of the lease Mr. Roberts, the landlord, found himself confronted by ten families, who claimed the right to be received as separate tenants. After some difficulty this proposal was accepted, but the original rent of £6$ became £90 under the new arrangement. The Higginses are a wonderfully prolific family : and the Christian names are so often repeated that if you want to find a Peter Higgins of Bohernasoggarth 122 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. you must know if the man you require is Old Peter ; or Peter Jack ; or Peter mor, " big Peter ; " or Petereen, " little Peter ; or black Peter ; red Peter ; Peter the lord, so named from a hump on his back ; or Peter-na-puss, " Peter with the mouth " — a feature so enormous that it might with reason be called the mouth with Peter. Malachi Higgins is the tenant in possession of five acres of the divided farm. The house in which he lives was built by his father when on his marriage that portion of land was allotted to him. It is a cabin consisting of a single room. The walls are made of tempered mud mixed with straw, and the water that oozes from the rotten thatch makes slimy patterns upon their whitewashed faces. In this one room is a bedstead, raised about eighteen inches from the mud floor, on which a feather-bed is placed over a thick layer of straw, and in this bed sleeps every member of the family : Malachi Higgins, his wife, and the girls' heads one way ; the boys' heads at the other end of the bed. Before his father suc- ceeded in procuring a bed the family adhered to the primitive custom of sleeping "stradogue." At night, rushes and ferns being spread upon the floor, the husband and wife lay down in the middle, the youngest girl next the mother, the youngest boy next the father, and so on in gradation of age until at the extreme ends were the young men of the family and the young women, strangers sleeping on the outside of their respective sexes. The bedstead THE COUNTRY'S DIFFICULTY. 123 being raised so high off the ground affords a com- fortable place where the pigs can sleep, and in winter the additional warmth supplied by the animals is welcome. The other end of the apart- ment is large enough to accommodate the cow and the ass, so Malachi Higgins sees no necessity for erecting a shed for these useful beasts. Malachi Higgins has had ten children, of whom seven are now alive. Each year as soon as the ground has been dug for the spring work his three sons go to England, where they remain until the English harvest has been gathered, and return for the winter, during which they do no work, and are ready to join any mischief offering excitement or profit. They bring home with them the worst vices of the lowest classes in England, and, having lived a gipsy life during the summer, sleeping in barns and out- houses, and far from their chapels, they no longer feel for Father Tom Ryland the reverent awe with which they knelt to him in childhood. They have never been to school, as Higgins could not afford the fee of one penny per week for each child. One daughter, Judy, emigrated to America years ago, and is now in service in New York. Nelly has married Richmond Monaghan, who has come to share the single room, and, by agreement arranged by Father Tom Ryland, Monaghan has one acre set apart for his own use. As long as Higgins can remember, two acres have been under grass and the other land has borne i2 4 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. alternate crops of oats and potatoes. With the one exception that the land has been turned up by the spade instead of the plough, cultural neglect could go no further in preventing the proper return of either crop. As the land is turned up the sod is white with the roots of bindweed or wild convol- vulus, which propagates with amazing rapidity, and almost strangles the growing crop in its embrace. But weeding, except of the most superficial cha- racter, does not in Malachi Higgins's mind come within the meaning of agricultural operations. His fences, too, are covered with thistles the downy seeds of which are carried far upon the autumn breezes, and help to swell the army of weeds that consumes one third of the small farmer's crop. There is another cause that may account for the extraordinary differences between the yield of his crops and those of the great farmers of the district. He adopts the principle of selection and survival of the unfittest. Eating or selling the best potatoes, he gives the black ones to the pigs, and keeps for seed the tubers too small for sale. His seed oats are never changed ; and he wonders that his returns steadily diminish. It is not then surprising that Malachi owes three years' rent, and already visions of possible eviction present themselves. Mr. Roberts has intimated to him that he must have the rent or the land ; and Malachi has suspicions that his son-in-law, Monaghan, is trying to supplant him, as he heard that young man declare when THE COUNTRY'S DIFFICULTY. 125 comincr home drunk from market that he could borrow the rent if he liked. Judy has written, enclosing a post-office order for ,£3, as that faith- ful girl has often done before ; and, though she cannot exactly say what her father is to do when he arrives in New York, she begs that he will emigrate, and offers to send a free passage for her sister. Malachi sat one summer evening on the broken fence over asrainst the battered cabin and its stagnant dung-pit, and he thought over Judy's proposition. If he could get Mr. Roberts' consent to sell the interest in his farm, he would probably get sixty or seventy pounds, which would be suffi- cient to take himself and his wife to America. But Mr. Roberts is a hard man, and would not allow any tenant to sell his interest ; and as Malachi sat on the fence his thoughts went back over the years he had spent in Bohernasoggarth. Again he saw little Willy and Mary running out from the rickety doorway and amusing themselves by scooping up the green water from the dung-pit in a broken bowl, and pouring it over their bare feet. Nora rose before him, ragged and unkempt, her single garment a tattered frock, scarce hiding her attenu- ated limbs — dirty little Nora, with her grimy face and bright blue eyes, who long years ago crept on to his knee in that very spot one day when his work was done, and told him for the first time that she was "tired of playing." He went over the after-scene, when her lips were burning, and her 126 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. eyes more bright, and he remembered with what agony he heard from the poor-law guardian that he could not have a visiting ticket for the dispensary doctor because he was rated over £4. How he had begged among his cousins until he obtained a pound with which to tempt the doctor to come out at once and save his child. How, unfortunately, Father Tom was dining with the doctor that night, and he could not come, and how next day the doctor arrived — too late. The three little ones sleep in the old churchyard of Kilmurry ; and every time he follows a funeral to that lonely spot, he picks his way among the nettles, that almost cover the broken tombstones and hide the exhumed skulls and bones, to the little grave, where, kneeling reve- rently, he offers up a prayer for the souls of those whose memory is still fresh and green. No : he cannot leave the place around whose squalid pre- cincts so many memories cluster; and if Mr. Roberts carries out his threat of eviction, rent or no rent, there will be bad work in Bohernasoggarth. Malachi Higgins cannot be called a good man. Out of his poverty he paid two shillings towards the honorarium granted to Peter Quirk for the murder of Darmody, the bailiff, who had served notices to quit for his employer. The service of the notices must have been proved by Darmody before decrees could be obtained ; and in the war between landlord and tenant Malachi Higgins regards the murder of a bailiff with as much complacency as does Mr. THE COUNTRY'S DIFFICULTY. 127 Roberts' son, the captain, a successful skirmish in which the enemy suffered some loss. At the same time he performed a work of piety, as did Quirk, in attending Darmody's funeral, and no two men were louder in their denunciation of the cruel deed. One obligation Malachi has always faithfully performed. He has been regular in the payment of his dues to Father Tom Ryland, who now receives twenty times the sum from the subdivided holdings that his pre- decessor received out of the original farm. Father Tom will not see Malachi evicted without a struggle. The obliteration of even one small homestead is the thin end of a wedge that might ultimately rend off a considerable portion of his congregation ; and Father Tom Ryland is not the man to lose even one member of his flock without a struggle. To him Malachi has appealed, and he is leaving no stone unturned to excite public opinion against any eviction for any cause. The Higginses of Bohernasoggarth are a strong faction, and Mr. Roberts has been advised to leave the country for a time, when he carries out the eviction ; but he cannot afford to go, and so the matter stands at present. Not that Malachi Higgins's relations with his surrounding kinsmen are always amicable. Peter- na-puss, whose land joins his, asserts a right of way over a corner of Malachi's grass-field that the latter is prepared to resist to the last. Peter asserts that he has been going that way to his potato-field for 123 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. twenty years ; but Malachi declares that he only went by his permission, which was withdrawn when Peter basely took sides against his own flesh and blood, which he did by swearing the truth at petty sessions, where Malachi was summoned by Bill Maher for an assault and most justly fined — a decision that he attributes entirely to Maher's superior interest. The cause of the quarrel was carefully excluded from the evidence of both sides at petty sessions. When Paddy Nash was evicted for non-payment of rent, he appealed to the brotherhood to which he belonged to see him righted, as the landlord would not give him compensation. Why he should get compensation, having made no improvements, the landlord could not see, but Nash, who is penniless, thinks he might have been allowed to sell the farm. The society, true to its principles, took up the matter, and a notice was posted on the door of the vacant house that no person must take the land on pain of death. Undeterred by the notice, John Breheny, whose soul hungered for that farm, pro- posed for it and was accepted as tenant. Having put a new coat of thatch on the house, he began the removal of his modest furniture, and at length everything was prepared for occupation next day. But the society was not idle. It was determined that the house must be burned, and Malachi Higgins was appointed to carry the decision into effect. The night before Breheny was to enter into its THE COUNTRY'S DIFFICULTY. 129 occupation Malachi approached the house cau- tiously, carrying in a basket a lighted sod of turf, which — first carefully preparing a place for it — he thrust into the thatch. Next morning the house was a heap of cinders, and no clue existed that could throw any light on the matter. A special police-station was established on the spot, and the police-tax pressed so heavily upon the people that some openly complained that the action of the society was precipitate. Breheny could have been met by a party at a fair and beaten to death if necessary ; then the neighbourhood would not have been saddled with a police-tax. But with such a ready means of punishment in the hands of the Government, the more cautious of the neighbours deprecated these outrages, the cause of which are so readily traceable and easily localized. However, most of the people paid up their subscriptions to Malachi Higgins ; but Maher refused to pay, for which treachery Malachi punished him by waiting behind a wall, until, as Maher passed on his way from market, accompanied by Peter-na-puss, he received a crushing blow on the head from a stone flung by Malachi, who jumped over the wall and would have battered his head as he lay, only that Peter took Maher's side, as his name was on a bill for ten pounds which the latter had borrowed from the bank. Fortunately for Malachi Higgins, he is not entirely dependent on the produce of his farm. Each year K I3Q PICTURES FROM IRELAND. he takes a small quantity of turf bank on the verge of the bog, and during the winter the ass does good service in bringing daily a load of turf to the nearest town, for which a sum is received varying from is. to is. 8d. This is the main support of the family from December to March, except the contributions of the sons from the money earned in England. To Malachi Higgins and his family the doctrines of socialism are received as a new gospel, and already visions rise before them of the division of the highly improved land now held by the Scotch farmers and the removal of these heretics from the sainted isle. Higgins has been promised a reduction of 25 per cent, on the entire arrear if he will pay ; but he has attended too many of the anti-rent meetings not to see that if withholding 25 per cent, may have the effect of forcing the landlords to sell their properties to Government for resale to the tenants on credit, the refusal of all rent must hasten the triumph of the agitation. He is prepared to join in whatever course the society may recommend, and is strong in his determination to keep a firm grip on his holding. His confidence in his power to do so, however, has received a rude shock by the sight of such a force of constabulary at the service of ejectment processes in the neighbourhood as precluded the possibility of resistance, and his sons begin to talk of the advi- sability of emigration. Malachi still feels that to leave Bohernasoggarth would break his heart ; but if the means for emigration were forthcoming he THE COUNTRY'S DIFFICULTY. 13 r would not resist his sons' desire and the repeated invitations of Judy. Besides, the sight of one who had left in rags and returned one winter for a few months from that far distant country, clothed in broadcloth, removed the impression that from America there was no return ; and deep down in his heart there is a hope that if he is torn from the place so dear to him, he may one day come back to leave his bones in the churchyard of Kilmurry, among the friends of his life, whose crimes are counted as virtues by the warped morality of Bohernasoggarth. i 3 2 PICTURES .FROM IRELAND. CHAPTER XIII. A DISTRESSED LANDLORD. If Mr. O'Hara, of Garrauns Castle, owed no money- he would be in receipt of £700 a year or there- abouts. He still makes an effort to frame the arrangements of the establishment as if the pro- perty were unencumbered, which accounts in a great measure for the generally neglected and out- at-elbows appearance of the untidy little place. For Garrauns Castle is not so imposing a residence as might be expected from its somewhat ambitious name. A small two-storied house, there was nothing in its architecture to justify the magnificent addition to the name of the townland on which the house is built, except a modest attempt by raising the walls of the semi-circular porch to the top of the house to give that adornment the appear- ance of a castellated battlement. Once its name went near helping its present owner to a marriage with the daughter of a rich English manufacturer. It happened in this wise : — Mr. O'Hara, when a young man, spent some time in the neighbourhood A DISTRESSED LANDLORD. 133 of Manchester, where he met the daughter of the rich Mr. Plumrigg. He came, he saw, and he con- quered ; and nothing was wanted but the consent of Mr. Plumrigg to raise the fortunes of Garrauns Castle to a higher level than they had ever yet attained. Mr. O'Hara honestly felt that in marrying Miss Plumrigg, and consenting to accept her ^"30,000, he was conferring an honour on that rich but mushroom family not too dearly purchased at the money ; for the O' Haras of Garrauns Castle came of a family tracing its descent for many centuries. In the interview with Mr. Plumrigg he answered that gentlemen's questions as to his pro- perty with such candour — showing that unfortu- nately not more than about £6000 a year remained to him of the once vast possessions of his family — that a ready consent was given ; and he had the happiness of assisting that evening at the Plumrigg family dinner. Mr. Plumrigg was, however, a man of business ; and while Mr. O'Hara was engaged with his wife and daughter in looking over the most expensive things procurable with which the Castle was to be refurnished, his inquiries of the shopman indicating an order large enough to re- furnish a wing of Windsor Castle, that gentleman quietly took a ticket for Ireland, and found himself at the modest railway station close to the gate of his daughter's future residence. An Irish jaunting-car of the usual country type was at the station, the keen-witted but ragged driver looking 134 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. out for a possible fare. No sooner had Mr. Plum- rigg stepped from the train than Jack Rogers seized upon his portmanteau, and was busily en- gaged in tying it on the well of the broken car when Mr. Plumrigg appeared at the gate. " Why," he said, " I cannot drive on a vehicle of that description," as he looked at the car, which was seemingly held together by ropes. One step showed signs of having once been painted ; the other had been knocked off by a passing cart a few days before, and the wood of the new step was still unsullied by a paint-brush. The harness was a mixture of leather, wire, and twine ; and, once off, no human being but Jack Rogers could again place it properly on the wiry hack that waited patiently at the gate. " Arrah, don't be the laste onaisy, yer honour," answered Jack. " Sure, when yer on the car you will feel as aisy as if you wor sittin' on a feather- bed." - " You know Garrauns Castle ? " asked Mr. Plum- rigg- " Do I know the mother that bore me ? " an- swered Jack, in true Irish fashion, thus indirectly conveying assent to the question. "Well, how long will it take to drive there?" asked Mr. Plumrigg. " I'll rowl you up in half a minute," replied Jack. " Sure that's the gate there fornenst you. But, faith, there's no use at all for your honour to go up, A DISTRESSED LANDLORD. 135 for the masther is not at home, an* there's no one in the house but owld Betty Murray ; an', faith, you must go in wid the hens through the kitchen doore if you want to get in ; for owld Betty is blind an' deaf, and sorra one of her would hear the Day of Judgment if it kem rappin' to the doore." " Surely, my man, you make a mistake," said Mr. Plumrigg. "I mean Mr. O'Hara's Garrauns Castle." " The divil a mistake I make, your honour. Sure, isn't Mr. O'Hara in England, goin' to marry a lady wid a million of goolden sovereigns ; an', be me sowl, I'm thinking he's the boy that'll spend them for her. Faith, when he comes home every man in the village will be drunk for a week." Mr. Plumrigg returned by the next train, and no more family dinners were shared by Mr. O'Hara. The English matrimonial campaign having failed, Garrauns Castle was once more inhabited ; and in the fulness of time a marriage was duly solemnized between Mr. O'Hara and the seventh daughter of Gregory Coleman, Esquire, of Mount Coleman. Miss Coleman's dower was modest, and her ^"400 hardly sufficed to pay the expenses of the unsuc- cessful English tour and the wedding charges. But, the Colemans being people of position in the county and cousins four times removed of Lord Bally heigue, it was necessary that a fitting settle- ment should be made upon Mrs. O'Hara, who became entitled to a jointure of ^"200 a year if 136 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. she survived her mother-in-law, to whom that amount was then being paid. As years rolled on the O'Hara family increased, until it overflowed the nursery and took possession of the best bed- room. The expenses, too, increased in equal ratio, until even the falling-in of the dowager Mrs. O'Hara's jointure was only just sufficient to prevent a humiliating contraction of the establishment. With increasing years the expenses have steadily continued, until Mr. O'Hara is compelled to make the two horses do the work of the home farm in spring, as they carry him and his eldest son to hounds two days a fortnight in winter, and when not so employed still enable Mrs. O'Hara and her daughters to keep up appearances by driving in her waggonette. The coachman's coat and hat have braved the storms of many winters. The harness has long since been shorn of its enamel, and the silver has disappeared from its emblazoned ornaments. The waggonette has not been painted since the loan ten years ago, effected on an in- surance. But still it is a waggonette with two horses, driven by a coachman in livery, and Mrs. O'Hara feels that her dignity is sustained. Mr. O'Hara's interest, insurance premiums, and instalments absorb ^250 per annum, leaving the property worth on paper ^"450. But the tenants never pay up the full amount. James Neary owed three years' rent, and was ultimately evicted, Mr. O'Hara losing ^45 by the transaction. Biddy A DISTRESSED LANDLORD. 137 Russel begged so hard to be allowed for the timber and slates of a new cowshed that she could not be resisted, and £6 was deducted from her rent. Martin Scully's cow broke a leg in passing over an ill-made wooden bridge into the bog field, and three of his sheep died of rot, so it was impossible that he could pay the full rent ; £$ was therefore lost on that account. And every year similar deductions were to be made. Then the agent's fees of £$ per cent, on the full rental come to £35, for Mr. O'Hara, like other Irish gentlemen of his position, indulges in the luxury of an agent. He says that he could not deal directly with the tenants, who require the sternness of a person constrained to refuse their never-ending requests for abatement on the plea of justice to his employer. When half the poor rates and the county cess and the income tax are added to the average shortcomings, Mr. O'Hara finds that his actual income is barely ^"300 a year in good years, and often falls so much below it that the produce of his son George's game-bag is a most welcome addition to the larder. Mr. O'Hara keeps about forty acres in his own hands, and his smaller tenants are bound as part of the agreement under which they hold their land to work for him, whenever he requires their labour, at 8d. a day. This provision is readily accepted when a tenant is looking for a farm ; but once in possession they object to it strongly, and Mike Treacy, who took the corner of the deer-park for 138 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. which several tenants had proposed, and who went specially to thank Mr. Coleman for his interest in obtaining the farm for him, now declares the custom rank tyranny, and when he does attend his labour is not worth one half the stipulated sum. Mr. O'Hara is animated by the warmest feelings of friendship for his tenantry, whose families, with few exceptions, have lived on the Garrauns pro- perty for generations. He is always ready to assist them in any way where money is not required, and leaves no stone unturned to obtain appointments for their sons. He had serious intention of re- signing the commission of the peace when, despite his strong recommendation, Bartly Nally's son was rejected as a recruit for the Royal Irish Con- stabulary, because he had spent twelve months in Canada ; and nothing but his thorough Conser- vatism saved him from a radical transference of his political allegiance when Mary Flannery was re- moved from the position of local postmistress in consequence of ill-natured complaints of the illegi- timate gratification of her feminine curiosity. If he could afford it he would like to improve the stretch of rushy fields gently sloping down to the river. He spoke to the tenants on the advisability of obtaining a loan for the purpose of draining that portion of the property ; but, although the entire amount would be paid to the tenants for their labour on their own farms, they objected to A DISTRESSED LANDLORD. 139 the payment of five shillings per acre for thirty-one years, which increase would pay off the principal and interest, the improvement in the land being well worth the money. The tenants rather con- gratulated themselves when the plan was abandoned, and George O'Hara heard with equanimity a de- cision that leaves unspoiled by drainage his best bit of snipe ground. Except in the manner pro- posed, Mr. O'Hara could not afford to effect any improvements, and he shrinks from the trouble and danger of any increase of rent except with the consent of the tenants. He is very anxious that his daughters should be fairly educated, but beyond a governess at ^15 a year his means will not allow him to go. The accomplishments of the six young ladies are there- fore elementary. As George is the heir, he remains at home to assist his father in mismanaging the farm, while his second brother is studying medicine at the Queen's College in Galway, with a view of becoming a military surgeon. Many are the straits in which Mr. O'Hara finds himself from time to time to meet the current expenses of his education ; and when James Neary asked permission to sell his farm to Pat Toomey, who was ready to give him £85 out of which the arrears of rent were to be paid, he very nearly sacrificed his principle to expediency. There were so many things for which the ,£45 would have been useful. But Mr. O'Hara felt that to allow 140 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. the sale of a tenant's interest would be a sur- render of proprietorial rights that might one day diminish the value of the property ; and he had an idea that if Pat Toomey was prepared to give £8$ to the outgoing tenant, he would be pre- pared to give something near that sum to the landlord as a fine if he agreed to let the farm at the old rent. When Neary was evicted, however, not alone did Toomey decline to give any fine, but he refused to pay any higher rent than that at which it was let before, at which rent he got it after the farm had remained vacant for six months during which time no other person had proposed for it. Mr. O'Hara did not know that in offering £85 for the "good will" of the outgoing tenant Toomey was simply effecting an insurance against " acci- dents " that may possibly occur to the person taking land from which a tenant has been dispos- sessed. He was surprised that no other tenant had made an offer for the farm ; but he would have understood their disinclination to bid for it if he had seen £^0 counted down in a crowded room and handed over by Toomey to the man who had been evicted eight months before. George O'Hara has promised his father that when he comes of age he will, in consideration of receiving an allowance of ,£100 a year, consent to breaking the entail, when money can be borrowed at a much cheaper rate to pay the present debts, and make some small provision for his sisters. He A DISTRESSED LANDLORD 141 looks anxiously for the time when he can keep a horse of his own in the third stall, whose wooden rack and paved floor remain as they were arranged by his grandfather. He has visions of making money by buying raw colts and making them — for George can ride as well as shoot ; and has no thought for the beginning of the end, that will come with the substantial mortgage to be effected on his coming of age. In the mean time the anti-rent agitation has nearly driven Mr. O'Hara to despair. Never having raised his rents, he is nevertheless declared by Mr. Parnell and his followers to be a land-robber, and the tenants have demanded a reduction of 25 per cent, on all rent due, and proposed that in future the rent shall be the amount of the Government valua- tion and no more. In vain has Mr. O'Hara declared to a few influential tenants that a reduction of 25 per cent, on the gross rental, added to the large deductions that he has already to pay, would not leave him ,£100 a year. They declare that they dare not pay the full rent, and as leader of a deputation to Mr. O'Hara, Bartly Nally told him boldly that if he did not give the reduction they could not pay any rent at all. However, when the others left the room, Nally took the opportunity to say, " Serve me with a writ, your honour, and I'll pay the rent ; but it would not answer me to pay without it." Nally has been duly served with a writ — the services of a hundred constabulary 142 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. being necessary to protect the process server on that occasion, and under that compulsion Nally has paid ; so Mr. O'Hara hopes that ultimately the other tenants may follow his example. But while they hold aloof, from all sides come pouring in pressing demands for money. The interest and premiums on insurances were paid with the rent received ; but the butcher is getting clamorous, the patience of the baker is nearly exhausted, and in the near future Mr. O'Hara sees no outcome from the strained relations between him and the tenants but payment, or eviction, with a protection post of constabulary quartered in Garrauns Castle. ( 143 ) CHAPTER XIV. A DISPENSARY DOCTOR. THE dispensary district of Belgorman was stirred to its very depths by the contest for the appoint- ment vacant by the death of the dispensary doctor. The necessary advertisement for a successor was answered by forty-five applicants ; and if the printed testimonials forwarded by each as to his industry, cleverness, promise as an ornament to the profession, and peculiar fitness for the vacant situation were to be depended upon, the medical profession was that year enriched by the addition of forty-five men whose early promise bespoke a genius and devotion to science that must one day shed a lustre upon the profession whose teachers so generously crowned them in anticipation. Of the forty-five candidates but fifteen went so far as to canvass the members of the dispensary committee ; and a fortnight before the election the field had dwindled down to two competitors, between whom the committee was so evenly divided that excitement was at fever point. Dr. McNamara 144 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. was supported by all the influence of his father and the parish priest. His father, who was the proprietor of the principal shop in Belgorman, had many friends among the rural guardians ; and Father Gavin left no stone unturned to show the impropriety and indecency of electing any but a Catholic doctor to attend to the health of a Catholic population. Guardians were warned that their voting for a Protestant would be an insult to the people ; and to the people it was broadly insinuated that the new-fangled anxiety to appoint a Protestant doctor was in pursuance of a scheme certainly to mark the slavery of the people, and possibly to facilitate their extermination. With so effectual a spur to excitement it was not surprising that the people of the Belgorman dis- pensary district were moved. For Mr. Townsend, a magistrate and owner of property in the neigh- bourhood, had adopted a Protestant candidate and connection, Dr. King, whose testimonials seemed equally satisfactory as the credentials of the other forty-four seekers. The committee in whose hands the election rested was composed of all the elected guardians for the divisions of which the dispensary district was formed, and all the magistrates qualified by property within the district to act as cx-ojjicio guardians. As the day approached the excitement waxed more intense, and it was considered prudent to secure the services of one hundred additional con- A DISPENSARY DOCTOR. 145 stables for that day. At the last election, twelve years before, Mr. Townsend took but little interest in the matter, and voted for the person who had secured the interest of Father Gavin. But at that time the Irish Church had not been disestablished, and except for the gratification of the parson's vanity it mattered little the number of Protestants in the parish. Now that a moiety of the parson's stipend must be made up by the parochial sub- scriptions, Mr. Townsend felt a keen interest in securing the presence of an additional paying Protestant — an interest shared by every member of the congregation. The day of the election arrived, and from all the country round hundreds of people poured into Belgorman. Mr. Furlong, a Catholic gentleman who deserted his faith for his order, and promised his vote to his young friend Dr. King, was so furiously stoned as he drove into the little town that the constabulary were obliged to fix swords and charge the people to enable him to get to the committee room. As each Catholic guardian came in he was cheered to the echo, while the Pro- testants and supporters of Dr. King had a bad time of it. At length the decision was announced, the numbers being — for Dr. King, 9 ; for Dr. McNamara, 1 1. And the cheering was as loud as if the announcement had been the grant of Home Rule. That was some years ago, and the youthful L U6 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. enthusiasm with which Dr. McNamara began the practice of medicine has long since dis- appeared. He would no longer object to the services of old Betty Jennings as vicarious patient for the village of Pollnagreena. Betty was one of his first patients at the district dispensary. She described to him accurately her symptoms, which he treated by a prescription for lumbago. The next day she was there, suffering from what must be acute bronchitis, though he could not detect any evidence of the miseries she described with so much feeling. However, a bottle of cough mixture satisfied her. The following week she again ap- peared, and was warned to go home at once and go to bed, taking a mixture that Dr. McNamara hoped would bring out fully a rash that she assured him had appeared on her breast and back (which she declined to expose), and which from her description seemed like measles. An application next week for a prescription for the ague brought about an explanation. The village of Pollnagreena was almost entirely Irish-speaking ; and, as a simple escape from the difficulty attending the diagnosis of their complaints by a doctor who did not understand Irish, the inhabitants delegated the old woman to describe the ailment from which they suffered, and thus procure medicine which they took without a question. The district of Belgorman is a large one, and as every guardian and the clergy of each de*nomina- A DISPENSARY DOCTOR. 147 tion, who are usually appointed as wardens, can give a " red ticket " or order to the doctor to attend forthwith at the house of any person entitled to medical attendance, the doctor has from time to time had hard work. The poor are fanciful in their ailments ; and Dr. McNamara has more than once found a person, to whose house he has driven twelve or fourteen miles over rough by-roads on an urgent order, sitting comfortably at dinner, the ailment having subsided. He ought not to have given tartar-emetic to Paddy Ellison for a tooth- ache ; but his annoyance was so great at having to drive six miles, and walk across a wet bog on a stormy evening for three miles farther, in answer to a message that Ellison's life was in danger, that on finding the worthy only suffering from tooth- ache he relieved his mind by a prescription that effectually punished Ellison for his laziness in not having gone to the doctor for relief. Now ex- perience has hardened his heart, and many a poor wretch tosses impatiently on his miserable bed for many long hours after the time when the doctor ought to have arrived. More than once or twice complaints were made to the board of guardians, but the explanation given to the dispensary committee was always considered satisfactory. Outside his connection with many members of the committee, the Catholic portion of that body would think twice before they opened the situation to another con- 1 43 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. test. So the doctor is practically safe from everything short of a sealed order of dismissal despatched from the Local Government Board. One person he takes care never to offend. Father Gavin, who was so deeply interested in his suc- cess at the election', insists on his unquestioning obedience ; and Father Gavin is too bitter an opponent not to be obeyed. Dr. McNamara was dissatisfied when the priest gave a red ticket to John Ratigan, who could well have afforded to pay him the usual fee. But he did not dare to refuse to visit Ratigan, who, in common with numbers of his well-to-do neighbours, thus obtains from time to time gratuitous attendance and medicine. When a visiting ticket cannot be secured, they prefer paying a fee to the bone-setter and general quack of the neighbourhood to calling in the doctor. After a fair the bone-setter has considerable practice in patching up broken heads ; and the doctor is anxiously watching for a death under this practitioner's hands, that a verdict may possibly be obtained against him at the coroner's inquest. The bone-setter's treatment is simple. The scalp wounds are generally severe when his aid is re- quired, so he makes a preliminary examination by probing, during which he inserts a small piece of bone into the jagged wound, and, removing it before the admiring family, declares the skull is chipped but he will yet save the patient. Unsalted butter is then melted and poured into the wound, A DISPENSARY DOCTOR. 149 and a light plug of tow inserted. In the fulness of time the wound heals, and the bone-setter's fee is all the more gladly paid that his practice is illegitimate. Dr. McNamara is married to the daughter of a wealthy farmer living in the district, whose influence on the committee would be of great assistance to his son-in-law should any evil befall him. When the investigation was held in consequence of the serious mischief done to Mrs. Scott by a mistake made while the doctor was drunk, his father-in-law stood by him, declaring that the doctor had left his house to attend to Mrs. Scott, and was perfectly sober ; which was, to say the least, not true : but it carried him through. Dr. McNamara is in comfortable circumstances. His dispensary salary is .£120. For each vacci- nation he receives 2s., which brings in about £40 more ; a like amount per month for each police- man in the district adds another ^"40. As sanitary officer he has ^"io, and the registration of births brings in ^"20, giving him a settled income of ,£230 besides his private practice. Belgorman being a fighting neighbourhood, Dr. McNamara's " chances " may be set down at £80 more. When Peter Hunt, who had been beaten, called in the doctor, and, burning with desire for revenge, swore an informa- tion on which John Keating and Michael Carrol were arrested, Dr. McNamara handed in a certificate that Hunt's life was in danger. The magistrate there- upon refused to accept bail ; but next day, the pri- 150 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. soncr's friends having paid the doctor four guineas, a certificate was given that Hunt was now out of dan- ger, upon which bail was accepted. Dr. McNamara explains that, Hunt having received some scalp wounds, erysipelas might have set in. Therefore his life was in danger. Next day, on consideration, he thought the patient's symptoms so favourable that danger was no longer to be apprehended. The case was of course prosecuted by Government, and the doctor's fees for attendance at petty sessions and quarter sessions amounted to eight guineas. He thus made twelve guineas out of that case, besides his fee for attendance upon Hunt ; and many similar cases may be annually counted upon. Dr. McNamara's private practice is mainly con- fined to the farmers, as the gentry prefer the services of the doctor in the next town, who has no dispen- sary. The practice of medicine among the farmers and working people is so different to that among the better classes, that a dispensary doctor must forget his ordinary experience when treating people whose nervous systems are so much more highly strung and their digestive organs so much more delicate. The poor people who sit round the door of the dis- pensary every week to take their turn for treatment have not now much faith in Dr. McNamara : which is not to be wondered at, as he boasts that he can "polish off" thirty cases in as many minutes. When Ellen Nulty was suffering from acute rheu- matism, Father Gavin advised her to allow him to A DISPENSARY DOCTOR. 151 send Dr. McNamara to see her ; but she said she would rather die a natural death, and induced her husband to call in the quack. This longing for irregular attendance shows itself in many ways. Gratuitous vaccination is offered to the people ; and though it is often practically useless — the vaccination being carelessly performed, and the lymph so deteriorated by transmission through large numbers of children of all kinds of constitu- tions — so far as the people know, it is quite effica- cious. Yet nothing but compulsion brings the mothers to the dispensary, and more than one outbreak of small-pox has been traced by Dr. McNamara to the illegal inoculation of children. Judy Kirwan was prosecuted, but acquitted. She had her child inoculated in the usual manner. When the old woman who acted as operator came round, the child was left on the roadside with half a crown beside it. The mother retired for ten minutes, and on her return the child was inoculated and the half-crown had disappeared. Judy Kir- wan's mother took small-pox from the child, and died ; but even that catastrophe will not prevent Judy from leaving her next child under similar precautions against legal evidence of the criminal operation. Dr. McNamara reads but little : he is a farmer, and all his spare time is given to the business ot the farm. His medical knowledge remains pretty much what it was when he left the schools, his 152 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. anatomical studies being continued at intervals by post-mortem examinations, made by direction of the coroners' juries on victims of violence. But of the advance of the science of his profession he is profoundly ignorant. New instruments are un- known — new prescriptions undreamt of. A rough knowledge of the treatment in ordinary cases is sufficient for his practice, and he has no ambition to do more than get comfortably through the year. One form of disease Dr. McNamara never attempts to cure — epilepsy. He gravely and seriously holds this to be a subject for exorcism rather than medicine, and recommends an appeal to Father Gavin, only directing that no pork or bacon be eaten ; for, since the misfortune to the herd of swine, the flesh of pigs is sure, if used, to bring on an attack from the evil spirit whose presence takes the form of epilepsy. Dr. McNamara has seen so many real cures performed by amulets, blessed threads -of linen dipped in King Charles's blood, and other vehicles for the curative excitement of nerve- centres by the action of the will, that he is a firm believer in the supernatural. The sanitation of the filthy little town of Belgor- man could not be worse ; and when fever seizes on the place it is always difficult to get rid of it ; but nothing is farther from Dr. McNamara's mind than to earn his yearly £10 by really looking for nui- sances with a view to their abatement, and thus brinsfiiiGT a hornets' nest about his cars. The dir- A DISPENSARY DOCTOR. 153 tiest and most dangerous yard in the town belongs to a member of the dispensary committee, and others nearly as bad are owned by men who could bring influence to bear against him. He dare not excite the displeasure of his constituents by the performance of his duty ; nor is it expected that a man not appointed by Government should perform a duty that might make him unpopular Dr. Mc- Namara will continue to pay his dues to Father Gavin and abstain from giving offence to his com- mittee ; and if he lives long enough to see his son duly enrolled in the medical profession, he will pro- bably one day retire upon a pension, first securing the election of the rising genius as his successor in the dispensary district of Belgorman. 154 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. CHAPTER XV. THE VOTER OF THE FUTURE. If the town of Drumgoole were more compact in its formation it would look like the dirt-heap of the plain in which it is situated. Its five hundred and fifty thatched cabins, that have attached themselves to the one hundred slated houses forming the town proper, straggle along the five converging roads that meet at the market-cross, where stands a pre- tentious town hall, whose unrepaired windows, broken by missiles flung by playful urchins, afford a genial example of disregard for appearances by the town council that is followed by the inhabitants with the frank bonhomie of the Irish nature. For Drumgoole is governed by a town council, whose election, being strictly non-political, is a matter of so little interest that no change was ever known to take place in the representation save by the death of one of its members. The tolls and customs of the extensive market supply a fund sufficient to make the municipal arrangements perfect. But, except that from time to time a feeble effort is THE VOTER OF THE FUTURE. 155 made to reset a loose flag on the footpath, the town council is careful to make no boastful appearance of spending the funds at its disposal. A contract is gravely entered into that the streets are to be kept clean, and occasionally the aged contractor is seen sounding with a scraper the depth of mud, until when two or three inches deep it seems worth while to collect it in heaps at the sides of the street. Farther than that he never moves it ; yet it dis- appears like magic, and the mystery is only solved in spring, when from the hall doors emerge women bending under loads of manure, carried in baskets from the heaps in the back yards which have been accumulating for the past year. The evil-smelling mass, in which is a share of the valuable road- scrapings, is deposited in the street, and left for removal to the farms. At this time it is not well to visit Drum£Oole, which presents the appearance as if every house had turned right-about-face, at the same time stirring up its manure-heap for the benefit of the public. In Drumgoole the business of life is done in the face of the people. The bootmaker sits at his last, inside the door, and has not yet turned his shop into a " boot and shoe emporium." The tailor can answer inquiries from the front door, without leaving the board where he sits cross-legged, surrounded by his journeymen. The bare arms of the kneading baker can be seen at work as you drive past his house. The butcher 156 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. points with pride to the carcass of a cow killed, skinned, and hung in the room where he and his family eat and sometimes sleep ; or asks you to order a leg of the sheep tied and bound at the door of the " shop," into whose throat he plunges the knife, while a crowd of urchins stand around, taking early lessons in cruelty from the unpitying victualler. These are the incidents of the town proper — the body of the starfish that it resembles in shape. Along the diverging limbs cabin has been added to cabin, until they stretch for half a mile in every direction. The detail of these houses is simple, four walls and a roof being the limit of architectural pretensions. As no land is attached except a small " garden " behind, the dimensions of the familiar dungpit are attenuated, and the live stock is repre- sented by a few hens, which fly in and out over the half-door. The floors of the smoke-grimed cabins are dry, and, on the whole, though filthy to the last degree, they are almost as comfortable as an Indian wigwam. In one of these cabins Denis Hogan has lived since his marriage, which was solemnized when he was twenty-three, as after that age a single man becomes talked about ; and even among labourers old bachelordom is a reproach that must be avoided at all hazards, the contempt of the neighbours being added to the displeasure of the clergy. His provision for the union was a house, THE VOTER OF THE FUTURE. 157 a table, two chairs, and a bedstead ; to which his bride added a feather-bed, the materials of which she had collected with much care for some years. Their worldly wealth besides was £2, half of which was paid to the priest as a fee ; and the morning following the wedding Hogan took his place as usual at the market-cross at half-past five, spade in hand, waiting, with a crowd of the neighbours, for his chance of employment that day. Hogan's father and his grandfather were labourers, living in the same range of cabins, and the neighbours are also hereditary sons of daily toil. Their ranks are rarely recruited from the sons of farmers, who, if they cannot obtain a share of the father's holding, generally emigrate to America rather than subside into a class that even the poorest farmer considers so much beneath him. Hogan's family is no exception to the law of productiveness in proportion to approximation to the primitive state. Each year has brought its increase ; the advent of twins on two occasions im- posing an undue strain upon the family resources. Fortunately, these oft-recurring events, which in other classes occasion so much anxiety, do not appear to interfere with Mrs. Hogan's comfort farther than the necessity for increased supervision for a time over the young brood. Sometimes, even her day's work is not stopped for more than an hour or two, and before a fortnight the care of the latest arrival is handed over to Mary, the eldest 158 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. daughter at home, who numbers eleven summers Here, a celibate clergy prevents the assistance that at such times poor women receive in English parishes, where the parson's wife does full share of parochial work in providing the loan of necessaries on co-operative principles. Did the wife of the parson of Drumgoole dare to interfere with the Catholic population, she would kindle a flame that would soon make the town too hot to hold her. Mrs. Hogan has been educated at the National school, and can read and write. She even began to learn a treatise upon Greek roots. But of sewing or knitting or the most elementary principles of cooking she is profoundly ignorant, as she is oblivious of any idea of cleanliness. If she knew anything of cooking, she might, even with the oat- meal, potatoes, cabbage, herrings, grease, and milk which form the staple substances on which the family, live, make such a variety in their daily food as would render it palatable. But the oatmeal is always made into stirabout, the potatoes are boiled in their skins, the cabbage coarsely dressed, and the herrings fried. Her children are clothed from the remnants of her tattered garments. An old red flannel petti- coat makes two frocks with long skirts, that arc worn indiscriminately by boys and girls, until at nine or ten the boys are put into trousers. Her Sunday dress, of a cheap but brilliant purple material, was made by a neighbouring dress- THE VOTER OF THE FUTURE. 159 maker ; and even the home-made flannel petticoat, the materials of which she dyed herself with cutbear, was shaped by the dressmaker before she sewed it roughly together. Of knitting she does not feel the want, as except a pair of cotton stockings for Sunday, worn when the purple dress is donned, no member of the family wears boots or socks, save her husband, who could not otherwise do his spade-work properly. When Hogan is out of work Mrs. Hogan sees no shame in a little begging, but rather glories in a poverty that she believes, in common with most of her faith, must ensure to her the kingdom of heaven in the future in compensation for her position on earth as one of " the Lord's poor." Besides, if the practice of charity be necessary to salvation, there must be recipients as well as donors ; and in asking for alms Mrs. Hogan feels that she is only perform- ing her part in a partnership of faith, in which the benefits from the transaction are equally divided. There can be, therefore, no degradation in supply- ing a necessary outlet for a necessary stream. Nor does she ignore the danger to the soul of refusal ; and the beggar who asks at her door for a potato never leaves without one being added to his sack if there are any in the house. In the spring and autumn Mrs. Hogan shares with her husband the regular labour. She can cut the potatoes for seed, or lay the seed that is to be covered by the men. She too, with other women, 160 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. spreads the manure, carrying it from the heap deposited by the carts, in a basket which, having filled on the heap, she carries on her back to the ridge and spreads in her hands. She receives but half a man's wages, whether weeding, spreading, binding corn, or turning hay, but performs fully a man's share of the labour. All the money earned by the family is in her possession, and her husband rarely trenches upon the provision for the idle seasons except when he indulges in a visit to the public-house. Every Monday the clothes not required for use on week-days are placed in the pawn office, not more for the money thus set free, than because there they are safely stowed until Saturday, when they are duly released for Sunday's wear. Mrs. Hogan's eldest daughter has at last procured a place as housemaid in a gentleman's house. She began as maid-of-all-work in a public-house in Drumgoole, and changed to better places, until, hearing of the situation at Mrs. Jameson's, she was fortunate enough to obtain it. Mrs. Jameson was anxious to get a farmer's daughter to come to her ; but no farmer's daughter would demean herself by going to service — marriage, a teachership of a National school, or employment as shop-girls, being the objects of their ambition. Domestic servants must therefore be drawn from the labourers, and Ellen Hogan is a very honest girl. Mrs. Jameson com- plains of her want of cleanliness ; but if she could THE VOTER OF THE FUTURE. 161 see the cabin in which Ellen was brought up she might understand how difficult it must be to forget the lessons of the most impressionable part of a life, and learn in a few years to eradicate the familiarity with squalor which cannot see that dirt on floor or table is matter in the wrong place. Denis Hogan's life is not eventful. At half-past five o'clock in summer and half-past six in winter he is found at the market-cross, armed with a spade, a scythe, or a pitchfork, as the case may be, and looking for employment for the day. Sometimes he is fortunate enough to obtain regular work for a week or fortnight from a farmer, and two or three times he was employed during the hurried season at Mr. Gardiner's farm. This is the blue riband of the labour of Drum- goole. Here the labourer fortunate enough to be enrolled on the regular list has constant work at ten shillings a week. Mr. Gardiner always provides labour for the staff of workmen. On wet days they find something to be done indoors, and thus no half-days are made for broken weather. The farmers make much harder bargains. No farmer will give more than one shilling a day for con- stant labour; and though those who are not thus employed get as much as two shillings a day in the busy seasons, they cannot get more than ten- pence when the hurried time has passed. A day's labour, too, under the eye of a steward and in the company of a farmer are two very different things, M 1 62 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. the latter extracting ten per cent more work, and carefully deducting the broken time. Denis Hogan then does not love the farmers, while in the gentlemen he sees men who in their relations have treated him fairly. His politics are of a negative type, and though he does not dare to say that the parish priest is wrong in declaring that the tyranny of landlordism is unbearable, he knows to his cost the difference in the treatment of labourers by the landlords and the farmers. His house, for which he pays a shilling a week, belongs to a farmer who served him with notice to quit in the summer of 1879 because three weeks' rent was due, when at the time the same farmer refused to pay the landlord his rent, one year in arrear, except at an abatement of 25 per cent. Hogan heard at the next anti-rent meeting the vengeance of Heaven called down upon the land- lord's head for his treatment of the farmer in refusing the abatement, but was too shy to say before so many how sternly the down-trodden farmer insisted upon the punctual satisfaction of his own claims to the bitter end. He attended the meeting, as did all the neighbours, for the excitement of seeing the crowd with the green banners and sashes, tin pikes, mock guns, and array of horsemen robbing the patient plough-horses of their fairly earned Sunday's rest. With the political aspect of the Sunday's gathering he has no concern, and merely goes to see the sights and hear the THE VOTER OF THE FUTURE. 163 speaking, being by nature as fond of oratory as an Athenian. When his day's work is over he is too glad of the rest from physical weariness to trouble himself about political conspiracies. Nor are the ranks of discontent generally swelled by men whose days are passed in active toil. The blacksmith and carpenter are men of weight in the town. The shoemakers and tailors join the wilder spirits among the shopmen in working out impossible schemes of political salvation, and supply the mental activity that makes the recurring little conspiracies trouble- some. Denis Hogan has no hope of ever being in possession of one acre of land, and the land agita- tion has therefore for him but little practical interest. To a certain extent, indeed, he does farm every year. In spring he takes a quarter of an acre in conacre from some farmer near the town who is letting land for potatoes preparatory to taking an oat crop off it next year. The land is taken for the crop by various labouring men, who are only charged the rent paid by the farmer on condition that they manure it. The farmer has thus his land manured for the next year's oat crop for nothing. Hogan tills a quarter of an acre every year, and the potatoes usually last to the next spring. He tried sowing a crop of oats in conacre one year, but the rent of soil for an oat crop being £8 an acre he made nothing by it. Hogan is singularly insensible to beauty of form 1 64 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. or colour. The golden tints of the setting sun upon the purple mountains that form the sky-line from Drumgoole have for him no beauty. The little river stealing by its grassy banks flecked with daisies and buttercups never tempts him to sit and watch its course. The dog-violets and primroses that challenge admiration as they brighten the roadside fences with patches of brilliant colour he passes unheeding by. "A primrose by the river's brim A yellow primrose was to him, And it was nothing more." Even woman's beauty has for him but little charm, and in arranging the marriage with his wife he was influenced by her size and strength of body and constitution rather than by any personal attractions she might have possessed. Hogan's brother served in the army, and his tales of foreign parts have inspired Jemmy Hogan with a longing to enlist. This resolve is a great grief to Mrs. Hogan, who has a very poor opinion of the army, and would much prefer her son's seeking work in England when he is old enough to accompany the harvestmen who go over every year. Still the pensioner points to his pension for life, and shows that when sickness or old age overtakes him he can live in the free air of heaven, instead of feeling that his days may possibly be ended in the poorhouse, which the presence of eternal whitewash and the absence of tobacco render miserable in the extreme. THE VOTER OF THE FUTURE. 165 Hogan cannot be called a drunkard. From time to time he indulges in two or three glasses of whisky or porter, on which occasions he generally falls into the hands of the police and is duly fined. But as a rule he is abstemious, and only drinks now and again to procure excitement — almost the only kind that he experiences in the dull monotony of his existence. He is mightily fond of a game of cards, and often stakes his penny with six or seven others in a game of " five and twenty," when if the five, knave, or ace of hearts stand his friend he may win the price of half a day's labour. This is his only relaxation. Dances have practically ceased, so he cannot have the pleasure of even looking on. Hurling matches are no more. Wakes come but seldom. Coffee-houses are unknown. Now and again a bout of drinking with a friend makes his blood course freely through his veins. The stream of Lethe flows through the public-house tap, and excitement is followed by oblivion, where he forgets for a time that hardship and squalor and uncer- tainty for the future are his, and toil and labour go on for ever. 1 66 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. CHAPTER XVI. A NATIONAL SCHOOLMASTER. When Mr. Dixon was induced to build a National schoolhouse on his property he did so in the most economical manner. Close by an unoccupied house, which was allotted to the schoolmaster, a plain slated building was erected, of which the single room afforded accommodation for one hundred scholars. No ornamentation of any kind was per- mitted to swell the modest estimate of the architect ; for Mr. Dixon is a utilitarian, and has a rooted objection to what he calls architectural fal-lals. However, having built the school and undertaken to pay half the teacher's salary, he determined to obtain for his people the best schoolmaster he could get, and for that purpose he applied to the model training college in Dublin, where, under the direc- tion of the Commissioners of Education, men and women are specially trained, and receive certificates of qualification for the situation of National school- masters and schoolmistresses. In due course a schoolmaster was appointed who held a first-class A NATIONAL SCHOOLMASTER. 167 certificate ; school requisites were provided, and around the walls hung maps of different countries, pictures of birds and beasts, and diagrams of various mechanical combinations — wheel, lever, rack, and pinion, inclined plane, and the rest. But in taking upon himself the appointment of a schoolmaster Mr. Dixon counted without his host So far as building the schoolhouse, and guarantee- ing half the teacher's salary, his action was entirely commendable ; but in appointing a schoolmaster he had overlooked the necessity of consulting the parish priest, who lost no time in showing him the result of such an attempt to throw over the spiritual pastor. Father Johnston called upon Mr. Dixon and explained to him that the secular principles of the Government training establishment were denounced by the hierarchy, and however such a system might be approved of by the Education Commissioners he would not allow the children of his flock to be tainted by secularism in education. Mr. Dixon refused to reconsider the appointment made by him as patron and manager ; and the consequence was that for twelve months the master of Kinveagh National School had an easy time of it, not one of the children attending the school, while all of them marched past the door to another school five miles away. Ultimately Mr. Dixon bowed to the inevitable, and dispensed with the services of the trained teacher, who was in the mean time deprived of the rights of the Church by 1 68 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. Father Johnston, and obliged at intervals to go by rail to a distant city for the spiritual consolations of which he felt in need. Having given way, Mr. Dixon surrendered at dis- cretion, and the next appointment was made on Father Johnston's recommendation. James Farrel had never had any special training as a teacher, except that when he was a boy he had assisted as a monitor in teaching a class in the National school at which he was educated. Still he was a clever young man, and in a little while passed successfully the test examination to which he was subjected by the inspector of National schools before his appoint- ment could be confirmed. He has in time suc- ceeded in passing through three grades, and is now a second-class teacher receiving a salary of ^S a year, besides his allowances such as result-fees and school charges. To attain this position he has been obliged to pass in spelling, grammar, geo- graphy, - school organization, lesson-books and money matters, methods of teaching, arithmetic, geometry and mensuration, algebra, natural philo- sophy, mechanics, book-keeping, and agriculture. Farrel is, then, a fairly educated man, and pos- sesses no small influence in the neighbourhood. His neighbours consult him as to the correctness of their market accounts, when, puzzled by fractions, they fear that they may have been cheated by the buyers. Agreements as to division of farms, or arrangements before marriage, are generally pre- A NATIONAL SCHOOLMASTER, 169 pared by him ; and the fact that a trifling in- accuracy in Mrs. Nelligan's will carried the bulk of that worthy woman's property to the wrong person has not deposed him from his position as the prin- cipal drawer of wills in the Kinveagh school district. At ten every morning the school wakes up to its daily duties. As the children drop in by groups they give their names to the master, and each urchin deposits in winter his contribution of one or two sods of turf on the heap formed to supply a fire in the schoolroom for the general comfort. Kinveagh is not a populous district, and the average attendance at the school represents a large pro- portion of the children within its bounds. Even labourers readily pay when they can the penny a week demanded from them, while the better-to-do people pay double that amount. Around the walls are the various maps before mentioned, and behind the master's chair are hung the four sheets contain- ing the rules and regulations of the Commissioners of National Education. Of course no pupil has ever had the audacity to read these rules, nor does Farrel think it quite consistent with the dignity of his position that the parents of the pupils should consider him bound by any regulations in his mode of instruction. The Scripture lesson on toleration — the love of our enemies and consideration for those whose opinions differ from our own — displayed on the second sheet, the principles of which the Commissioners require to be strictly inculcated, 170 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. Farrel thinks poor stuff, the teaching of which rather tends to hamper the power of faith and take the backbone out of true religious fervour, If, he argues, we are weakly to tolerate a false religion, what is to be said of those who in times gone by have struck a blow for the true faith ? So he exercises his discretion by ignoring as far as possible the Scripture lesson. Nor does it seem necessary for the comfort of the school that lessons in toleration should be daily inculcated ; for it does not contain a single Protestant. Three times a year Kinveagh is visited by the district inspector, who examines the children and notes their proficiency in various subjects. On their answering depends Farrel's result-fees, and the preparation for the approaching visit is an anxious time for him. Nor is the examination a mere repetition of the lessons which the children have already gone through, questions being put to them to" test the amount of knowledge which they have really acquired. " What is success ? " asked the inspector, interrupting Tommy Murphy in his reading ; and Tommy's answer, " Good luck, sir," was nearer to the truth than the more elaborate explanation in Sullivan's Spelling-book. Outside the inspector's visits Farrel is practically free from supervision. Mr. Dixon has not come near the school since his appointment, and Father Johnston's visits can hardly be called a check upon his proceedings. His salary is a fixed amount, and A NATIONAL SCHOOLMASTER. 171 his result-fees and capitation grant are but slightly varying sums. Once, indeed, he was in trepidation for a time. An anxious lady whose property sup- plied nearly half the Kinveagh pupils was induced by the priest of the adjoining parish to offer it a schoolhouse and a guarantee for the master's salary, and the matter seemed all but arranged. Farrel was in very low spirits about it, but fortunately for him the project fell through. About a week after Mrs. Sinclair had consented to build the school- house the parish priest called upon her to say that the bishop disapproved of schools of which the patronage was not vested in the clergy. Mrs. Sinclair answered that practically he would be the patron, as she did not intend to take any active part in the management of the school ; but, as she was to build it and pay half the teacher's salary, she could not consent to resign the patronage into other hands. She was then informed that in that case she might establish the school if she liked, but no Catholic child should attend it. Master of his own actions and beyond the moulding influences of departmental discipline, Parrel's principles are profoundly affected by the prevailing mode of thought of the neighbourhood, which is decidedly antagonistic to existing social arrangements. Yet, as the life of a teacher is the experience of a little despot, he expects that his social and political convictions shall be received with unquestioning acquiescence. Therefore when 172 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. he joined the brotherhood who have taken into their hands the control of the relations between landlord and tenant, he did so as an adviser, who is to be consulted in all cases of difficulty. Although half Farrel's fixed salary is paid by the public he in no sense considers himself a servant of the State, and his mental attitude towards the Government is precisely the same as that of the surrounding far- mers. The person by whom he is appointed, paid, and may be dismissed is the patron ; and until the time draws near when he may look forward to the receipt of a pension he has no communication with any public department. The regulations order that not only is he to in- culcate loyalty, but he is to refrain from taking part in any political demonstrations. But such instruc- tions are liberally interpreted, and unfortunately Farrel's loyalty is not in the direction contemplated by the framers of the regulation. In 1867 he was regarded by the police with grave suspicion, and he declares that his brother, who is a constable, is no better than a traitor to his country. Again, when Mr. Enright, who had purchased a small property in the Landed Estates Court, began to improve his investment by the addition of 45 per cent, to the rental, and immediately received two or three threatening letters requesting him to prepare his coffin, Farrel's handwriting was made the subject of careful investigation. On both occasions surmise was insufficiently confirmed, and he escaped a A NATIONAL SCHOOLMASTER. i; 3 prosecution. Farrel is a doctrinaire, drawing his inspiration from the colums of the Shamrock, the Flag of Ireland, and the Irish World. An inde- fatigable reader, he daily consults the Freeman's Journal. But such constitutional pabulum is only accepted pending the weekly issue of the more advanced exponents of Irish opinion. The journal on which Farrel pins his political faith is the Irish World, the circulation of which he endeavours to increase by recommendations to his friends. Seated by Murty Gleeson's fire, he reads to an attentive audience the contents of that organ of American Socialism, and sighs for the day when landlords and capitalists shall be no more. Fenianism is dormant, and Farrel's friends no longer look for autonomy in which the present social fabric is to remain intact. Farrel is prepared to accept the most extreme propositions concerning land, labour, capital, and interest in the Commu- nistic creed. Still, great as may be the dignity of labour, he does not intend that his son shall be a tradesman, or even a National school teacher. When he has attained the proper age he will enter into competition for the Civil Service, and with every prospect of success, too ; while his father looks forward to the cultivation of a little farm, which, with his pension of £30 a year, will be suffi- cient to support him. He has not yet begun to think over the probability of finding a little farm vacant, and does not see that the principles of 174 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. which he approves will, if successful, render it all the more difficult for an outsider to obtain a farm at all, be it little or big. Farrel is animated by a real love for his country, and is so far a true patriot. Unfortunately his honest attachment to Ireland is fed by theories unsubstantial as soap-bubbles, and these theories are but too likely to be for the present imbibed by the youth committed to his charge. Blinded by the demand for an equality which has no existence in nature, and unballasted by the possession of even one acre of land, he presents a political pro- blem the solution of which can only be hoped for by the exercise of patience, generosity, and good temper. ( 175 ) CHAPTER XVII. A "gombeen" man. Much abused as is James Foley, many of his neighbours know that but for his timely assistance when the landlord's rent or the shopkeeper's demand had to be met they would have been obliged to pay costs, and perhaps have suffered the horrors of eviction. James Foley has been a money-lender for many years. He began his career on returning from a successful migration to England, when a neighbour who required ten pounds offered to give him two pounds for the loan of that amount for six months. From that moment the die was cast, and, the sweets of dis- count once tasted, he turned his money month by month, spending nothing except what sufficed for his bare necessities, and working hard to add to his store, until at length he found himself in possession of a goodly sum and settled in a small farm — most of his labour being done as complimentary work by his numerous debtors and those who wished to 176 PICTURES FROM IRELAND, stand well with the gombeen man in view of possible contingencies. The derivation of the word "gombeen" is obscure. The termination "een " is the diminutive in Irish — " potteen " signifying a little pot, "bohereen" a little road, "cruiskeen" a little jar. "Gombeen" means a money-lender; but " gom " means a fool, and the annals of usury will hardly justify the use of the diminutive in addition as the proper equivalent for a bill-dis- counter. The discount charged by Foley is generally about 30 per cent, or is. 6d. in the pound for three months. Of course this is for well-assured sums, where the promissory note is given by two or three joint securities ; but when more risky business is done the discount increases, until for small amounts, as much as cent, per cent, has been paid in kind. Not even the parish priest knows more family secrets than does James Foley. Among his best clients are the women, who barter in advance their eggs and butter for small loans to cover expendi- ture to which the husbands would strongly object. Half the produce of Biddy Brady's thirteen hens was duly handed over for an entire season in pay- ment of the interest on a loan of £5, and Foley knew so well the average number of eggs that she could not cheat him of even six in a week. Biddy Brady does not like to tell her husband of that debt, for he is a respectable man and would dis- approve of it highly. Indeed, his thrift was the A "GOMBEEN" MAN 177 cause of the drain going on in the income of the establishment ; for he refused to permit his wife to buy a new cloak on the ground that her present one was not quite worn out, and such stinginess could not be tolerated by any woman of spirit. She has almost exhausted her ingenuity in account- ing for the way by which she purchased the cloak ; but the truth must come out one day, and then the cloak will be for a time a garment of sorrow. Foley had established a large business before the National Bank opened a branch in the neighbour ing town. Its advent at once deprived him of all the really solvent customers, who now borrowed at 10 per cent, the money for which they had hitherto paid thirty. But a large class still remains whose security is so doubtful that their credit is worthless. To men like these he still gives loans, watching his opportunity to obtain repayment. He rarely appeals to the law for the recovery of his money. So long as the people are allowed to pay by small instalments they honestly strive to pay their debts, and, the money yielding good interest, Foley is content to receive the smallest amount, the dis- count and premium being paid on the renewal. Though the establishment of a branch bank has deprived Foley of the most secure portion of his business, it has enabled him to increase his small loans tenfold. He is known in the bank as a solvent man, and the bills given to him are duly entered to his account ; and as the bank will renew N 178 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. for him readily, he suffers no inconvenience from protracted payment. Many stones are current in the neighbourhood as to the origin of Foley's wealth. As his father was but a labourer, and he began life in the same humble position, his friends cannot believe that he could have amassed his money by thrift, however self-denying, or industry, however unflagging. The rapid increase of capital by multiplication of small discounts is a mystery beyond their comprehension, and the attainment of wealth is by acclamation attributed to a fortunate meeting with a Lepre- hawn. To the Celtic mind this supernatural good luck presents no feature of difficulty ; for even Mr. Duffy, the schoolmaster, acknowledges the all-per- vading presence of the various classes of fairies. Indeed, the matter admitted of no doubt, for ocular demonstration of their wicked interference was given when Mrs. Jackson's child gradually faded away without any apparent cause. Various charms were tried, but without avail ; and it was remarked that when the neighbours said "God bless him," and spat in his face for luck, he screamed, and dis- played such symptoms of infantile ferocity as left no doubt that the fairies had succeeded in spiriting the real child away and leaving in its place one of themselves, who, in the dead of night, when no one was looking, changed from a pining infant into a withered crone, until the approach of some one A "GOMBEEN" MAN. 179 compelled it to resume the appearance of the stolen child. No one could quite account for the way in which the ever-watchful fairies succeeded in obtain- ing possession of the child. Maybe it had sneezed and no one said " God bless it," or yawned three times while the mother was asleep, and thus prevented from repeating the protective blessing. The house-leek was growing on the house ; a cross was on the door, a bottle of holy water hung at the head of the bed, and every possible precaution against fairies had been taken, no person in the house ever venturing to speak of them except re- spectfully as the "good people." Anyhow, the mischief was done, and in due course the substituted child went through the form of dying, and was buried with a feeling of relief. There could be no doubt, then, in Killballyegan of the existence of fairies ; and the secret of Foley's good fortune was freely accepted. Killballyegan contains many circular raths, and tumuli, which re- mains are the circular fences round the residences of the ancient Celts, and the burial mounds beneath which rest the bones of many a hardy warrior. But the people know better. They know that out of the old raths at twelve o'clock at night issue troops of ladies and gentlemen in gorgeous costumes, with horses and dogs. They have been seen to ride races, and whole troops have disappeared into rath or mound at full gallop as the early dawn was i So PICTURES FROM IRELAND. ushered in by cock-crow. Of course no person would dare to be the first to desecrate a rath by turning a sod, for misfortune to him or his would surely follow. One morning Foley walked out very early, and as he passed close to a rath he saw seated on a stone a little man about twelve inches high. He was dressed in a red coat covered with gold lace, and a cocked hat, and was so busily engaged in mending a shoe that he did not perceive Foley. Such an opportunity only presented itself to one in millions ; but Foley was not for a moment at fault. He knew that if he could catch the Leprehawn, and keep him, without taking his eyes off him for an instant, he would in the end be shown a crock of gold ; so, stealing lightly behind the sprite, he grasped him tightly, nor loosened his hold, though the shrill screams of the Leprehawn were heartrending. After many ineffectual devices on the p'art of the captive fairy to induce Foley to remove his gaze for an instant, at length he con- sented to show him the spot where the long-buried crock of gold was to be found, and from that day Foley was a rich man. The details of this story have been amplified, and Foley has often been appealed to for corroboration. However the story originated, Foley is better pleased that his success should be so explained, than that the people of Killballyegan should think he had become rich on the proceeds of their money. A "GOMBEEN" MAN. 181 Foley is a very regular attendant at fairs and markets. He may not have anything for sale, but he takes careful notes of the sales and purchases of his neighbours. He can tell to a lamb the stock in possession of every person around, and confounded Paddy Ellis, who refused his demand for the payment of an instalment on the ground that he handed over his oats to the landlord for rent, by telling him that he had the day before received five pounds fourteen for the oats in hard cash from a corn-dealer. He sold all his litter of pigs on credit. The bar- gain was that ten shillings over the market price was to be paid by the purchaser ; the money not to be paid until the pig had been re-sold. Tom Barry thought he did a good stroke of business when he fattened the pig and killed it for his own use, re- fusing to pay Foley. He defended the process for the amount, on the plea that as he had not re-scld the pig the time for payment had not come ; but in this case ingenuity was not rewarded, for a decree was granted for the amount claimed. A hard man is Foley, when his money is in danger, and fearless as a hero in the recovery of a doubtful debt. Yet at times he has been lavish in his expenditure. In his success, as in his poverty^ family affection has remained green and vigorous, and when his father was dying he determined that he should have a respectable wake. The old man watched the preparations with the keenest interest, 1 82 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. and as his peaceful end approached he noted with a quiet pleasure the completion of the brown pall, ornamented with white satin cross and bows, that was to cover him while the funeral festivities were in progress. Everything was made tidy, and the candles already lit before he breathed his last, and for three nights the neighbours flocked to the house to pay the last mark of respect to the deceased. Helping themselves to tobacco and snuff from plates laid upon the legs and breast of the dead parent, and to whisky, of which a plentiful supply was on the table, they sat round the room, chatting and singing songs, or playing some romping game to keep up the spirits of the family ; and James Foley noted with pride the numbers that assembled next day to accompany the funeral. Many attempts have been made by the farmers of Killballyegan to secure for a son-in-law so " warm " a man ; but Foley feels that a wife would be a disturbing element in his business, and the cares of a money-lender are not conducive to the tender passion. He has therefore resisted all offers of alliance with his neighbours. Not even Betty Houlahan's ^"200 could tempt him ; though at one time her parents fondly hoped that it would have been a match. Indeed, the affair was in a fair way to a satisfactory arrangement, for a mutual friend had visited Foley and told him that on the day of the marriage the ,£200 would be placed in his hands in hard cash. Foley was so far tempted A "GOMBEEN" MAN. 183 that he promised to go over the following day and pay a visit to the Houlahans. Great preparations were made to receive him, and Betty Houlahan appeared in a silk dress, determined to display her charms to the greatest advantage. But here she made what a huntsman would call a wrong cast. Foley was to be tempted by money, not charms, and the silk dress settled the matter. He made a rapid survey of Betty's attire : that silk dress must have cost £6, and the kerchief fastened by a gorgeous brooch at least 10s. more. The boots were unfitted for field work, and the general get-up more suited to the shop than the farm. Foley calculated that it would take at least the interest of her money to satisfy her wants, and in such a marriage he could not see his way to any profit ; so the marriage fell through. He is now looked upon as a determined old bachelor ; and as he has no near relatives, a cousin " six o' kin," at present working as a farmer's boy, is looking forward to the time when he may step in for a valuable inheritance. But Foley has no intention of leaving his money for the enrichment of his connections. He loves money for money's sake ; and if he could take it with him he would require no other heaven. But as he cannot, he at least may secure to himself hereafter some benefit from the hard work of ac- cumulation in this world. He has determined to leave the greater portion of his money to be ex- 1 84 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. pended in masses for his soul, that his term of purgatory may thus be shortened ; and the direc- tion in which the remainder may be left will greatly depend upon the views of the person who writes his tardy will, when, at the last, his wearied brain will escape from the trouble of decision by assent- ing to the proposals of the neighbour who has hurriedly been called upon to inscribe his last will and testament. ( 185 ) CHAPTER XVIII. THE TRUE STORY OF THE IRISH FAMINE. As the time approaches for the winding up of the various funds formed for the relief of the Irish " Famine," it may not be without interest to con- sider the causes that led to these appeals and the manner in which the funds have been distributed. Bad as were the harvests in i8yy-yS, little was heard in Ireland of depression until the commercial failures in England compelled the Irish banks to contract their credits. Hitherto the banks had extended their business but too well. The shop- keepers followed suit, and the people, bitten by a system of reckless credit, entered upon a course of extravagance that could not last. The inauguration of the anti-rent agitation found the people just beginning to feel the withdrawal of the ready accommodation to which they had become accustomed. The banks were then making consider- able efforts to obtain payment of the outstanding 1 86 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. bills, and renewals were positively refused. Still things were not desperate. The shopkeepers had not yet refused to sell their goods on account ; and while the baker and grocer continued the supplies, the fact that the bank remained unpaid could be borne with equanimity, for banks are slow to institute legal proceedings. So matters remained, until, in view of the ap- proaching May rents, the wildest declarations of povery and ruin were made from the platforms oi the anti-rent promoters and in the columns of the press, until so effectually was the tenants' credit cried down that the shopkeepers took them at their word, and insisted upon a ready-money busi- ness for the present. At the same time some shop- keepers did a crafty stroke of business by joining the anti-rent agitation, and proclaiming the im- morality of paying the rent to the landlord until after the shopkeepers' demands had been fully and honestly met. Matters thus went on during spring and summer. Sunday after Sunday meetings were held at almost every village in the west of Ireland, the language being progressively intensified ; and, as the deluge of August and September continued week after week, the green oat crop looking as if it would never ripen, the potatoes checked in their growth, and the turf still lying on the bog as wet as when it was cut in the spring, the cry of famine was repeated at every meeting, and even wise men shook their THE TRUE STORY OF THE IRISH FAMINE. 187 heads and wondered if the poor rates would bear what promised to be a tremendous pressure. So late as the 5th of June the Roman Catholic Arch- bishop of Tuam had written to the Freeman's Journal publicly denouncing the action of the knot of agitators that afterwards formed the nucleus of the Land League. But before the end of August the Roman Catholic priests had, with few excep- tions, been irresistibly drawn into the movement, and were to be found on every platform, loud in denunciation of the present social system. It was in September, while the summer rains still continued, that the inspectors of the Local Government Board visited their various districts. No wonder they reported that the potato crop would not give half its usual yield ; that the general harvest was deficient in quantity and quality, and that the turf crop was practically lost. But with September the rain ceased, and before the official report was issued by the Local Government Board on the 28th of October the corn had already ripened, and yielded an average crop. The sodden turf would not have been saved by twenty-eight days of October fine weather ; but, fortunately, from the 1st of October to the 1st of January we had but three days' rain, so that the wells showed symptoms of running dry. With such weather, it may well be accepted that the turf, though inferior, was by no means lost, and then the remainder of the winter was exceptionally fine. 1 88 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. So fine was it that the hay stored for the winter feeding of cattle was not required, and large quantities are even now (in June, 1880) being offered for sale at a low price. The potato crop was the one whose loss seemed most assured. While the potatoes were being dug, Commissioners went through the country making close inquiries as to the state of affairs. The reports were all the same : the crop was lost. A couple of anecdotes may throw some light upon these reports. A gentleman, anxious to see for himself, walked into a field where the potatoes were being dug. He saw an excellent crop. " I am glad," he said to the owner, " that you seem to have a good crop." " Good crop, your honour ! Not a basket of white potatoes you could get on a whole ridge," he answered, in apparent distress. The gentleman, who was a practical farmer, said, "Well", I should like to get a basket of black potatoes, and I will give half a crown for a basket off this ridge." " Begor, then, the money '11 soon be earned," said the owner, as he took a basket and walked along the ridge. He could not fill it, and returned say- ing, "Ah, sure, I wouldn't take your honour's money for bad potatoes." Then, seeing from some remark made by the gentleman that he lived in the country, he said, " Well, thanks be to God ! they are not bad ; but sure I thought your honour was one of them English gentlemen that's going round." THE TRUE STORY OF THE IRISH FAMINE. 189 I went into over one hundred potato fields in the west of Ireland, and saw the potatoes dug. In some the yield was excellent ; in the majority a little more than the usual proportion of diseased tubers was apparent. In three fields the crop was practically lost. I always asked what the crop was like before I examined the potatoes. Invariably the answer was, " They are bad." One day I asked the usual question as I drove past a small field where a girl was busily engaged in carrying the potatoes to the potato pit. " They are all bad, sir," was the answer. I went in, and saw one of the finest crops I have ever seen. " Where are the black ones ? " I asked. " Och, sure, there aren't many," she replied, quite unabashed. " But I see none," I continued. " Troth, they're fair enough," she said, laughing. She had evidently taken me for a Commissioner. One thing is certain. All through the winter potatoes sold in the western towns at from 4^. to $d. per stone, and were to be bought in April at 6d. ; and while shiploads of potatoes were being imported into Ireland, at least an equal quantity was being exported to Wales and England. With such an allegation as convulsed the west of Ireland in the autumn, and with repeated state- ments that famine stared the people in the face, the collection of rent was no easy matter, however a landlord might see for himself that the farmers 190 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. were not so badly off as they maintained. Mr. Parnell declared in his speech at Castlebar, in December, that his plan of refusing to pay a larger rent than the tenants considered fair would save them four millions of money. If the amount of rent still due be added to the abatements freely made by the Irish landlords, Mr. Parnell's estimate of the money granted by the landlord or appro- priated by the tenant is not far wrong. All this time the shops were doing a good ready-money business, though the debts remained outstanding. The 150,000 people dependent upon the money earned by harvestmen, in England, were in great distress, and many were obliged to apply to the workhouse, as were some of the labourers. A few of the small farmers also felt the want of money. Grazing farmers had lost very heavily from the ruinous fall of prices, but the tillage farmers were in by no means a bad way ; while many landlords were obliged to shut up their houses and reduce their expenditure to suit their straitened circumstances. On the 1 6th of December the Duchess of Marl- borough made her appeal through the columns of the Times. Her Grace assumed that there would be extreme misery and suffering among the poor of the western counties and in the county of Cork, owing to loss of turf, loss of cattle, failure of pota- toes, and want of employment. Her Grace prefaced this statement by the acknowledgment that the Government had already initiated certain measures THE TRUE STORY OF THE IRISH FAMINE. 191 for affording employment, and that in numerous cases the landlords were nobly standing by their people. Hitherto there were many people in Ire- land who, while acknowledging severe pressure, could not find in any part of the country a state of affairs necessitating an appeal to the charity of the world. It was whispered that on Mr. Gray's acces- sion to office he would inaugurate his mayoralty by an appeal to the public on behalf of the starving poor. Though Mr. Gray was in no sense a follower of Mr. Parnell, it is known that no Home Rule Irish member, whatever his private opinions, could refuse his sanction to a declaration of famine that went to accentuate the assertion of landlord tyranny in Ireland. But with the wife of the Lord-Lieutenant it was very different. It was assumed that her Grace had official sanction for an appeal of so tremendous an import, and a ready response was given from almost every country in Europe. In due course an appeal was published from the Lord Mayor of Dublin, and the greater portion of money given for Irish distress has been subscribed through the Mansion House Fund. The Irish Land League followed suit, to a certain extent, and the New York Herald relief fund supplies the fourth stream by which the charitable donations of the world have been poured into Ireland. How these funds have been distributed in the west of Ireland will be seen in the next chapter. 197 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. II. The last chapter showed the state of affairs in Ireland up to the 16th of December, when the appeal was made by the Duchess of Marlborough. Besides the people dependent upon the harvest money earned in England there were a few circum- scribed areas in the counties of Roscommon, Galway, and Donegal where great distress was to be appre- hended ; for in these small districts the loss of the potato crop was much beyond the average. Her Grace's appeal was warmly responded to by the people of England, and subscriptions began to pour in. With the advent of the new Lord Mayor of Dublin a second appeal was made from the Mansion House, and a central committee formed of influential people representing every phase of opinion, religious and political. It may be stated at once that, so far as the central committees were concerned, the allo- cation of the funds placed at their disposal was as fair, and the plan of distribution as theoretically perfect, as ingenuity could devise for the disburse- ment of large charitable funds. But a great scheme of charity is always a dan- gerous experiment, and in no country in Europe are its dangers more patent than in Ireland, not yet quite recovered from the demoralization re- sulting from the distribution of money after the famine of 1848. No sooner had it become apparent that the charitable world responded to the appeals THE TRUE STORY OF THE IRISH FAMINE. 193 set before it than preparations were made in every part of Ireland to secure a rivulet from the Pac- tolian stream, and a competition in mendicancy began, increasing in urgency of demand and ex- travagance of assertion to the present moment. Committees were formed in every county, one might almost say in every parish, and letters appeared daily in the papers, generally from the parish priest, saying that gaunt famine stared them in the face, and starvation, widespread and terrible, could only be prevented by immediate and generous assist- ance. The markets were thronged with well-dressed people ; the shops were filled with customers ; the pawn-offices showed empty shelves, and sensible people read with astonishment that while Indian corn sold at j\d. per stone, and potatoes, oats, eggs, and fowl filled the markets, the comfortable- looking people were starving. No appeals had been made to private houses, and the workhouses were so empty that ample accommodation was available for troops if necessary. At first the sub-committees met, but one by one members withdrew until the business was left pretty much in the hands of the parish priest. The Protestant clergy soon found that their attendance was useless. The people to be relieved were almost exclusively Roman Catholic, and neither would it be expedient that Protestant clergy should visit their houses, nor could they well object to lists of O i 9 4 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. parishioners vouched for by the priests. Loud complaints were made by the unsuccessful, and the popularity of many a parish priest fell to zero. Instances were openly given of the number of people with money, meal, and cattle whose names were returned on the lists ; but, like the shooting of the obnoxious landlord who had two estates, what was everybody's business was nobody's business, and no representations were made on the subject. In some parishes the lists were returned by the person who collected the priest's dues. The priest said he knew best the people in want ; but disappointed parishioners complained that those only whose dues were paid appeared upon the list. On the days for distribution crowds assembled round every com- mittee-room. Farmers' wives with plenty at home were not ashamed to beg for meal. " Ah ! sure," one said apologetically, as she gossiped in the waiting crowd,. " It will do for the cows, the cratures ! " Tradesmen followed suit. The smith left his forge and the shoemaker his last. Men with hundreds in the bank got meal ; gombeen men got it ; shop- keepers got it ; and the misdirection of charity reached its culminating point when a grant of meal was made to a man who kept a bacon and flour store. All this time the knot of agitators assured the well-dressed people, who could afford to deck them- selves in gorgeous regalia, that they were starving ; at the same time recommending them to join the THE TRUE STORY OF THE IRISH FAMINE. 195 Land League and pay up their subscriptions ; that rent was a robbery and any action calculated to deter its exaction a virtue ; that while crying for food they asked for no charity, but demanded as a right the return of some of the money robbed from the people by the tyranny of landlords and the rapacity of an alien Government. That these principles were adopted may explain the extraordinary want of self-respect with which people clamoured for relief. That they were adopted in their entirety is too unhappily shown in the return of agrarian offences committed between the 1st of May and 31st of January, in which period 977 agrarian offences were committed in Ireland, more than half that number being committed in Con- naught. When it is remembered that these offences include such as killing of cattle or maiming them by cutting out their tongues and cutting off their tails, tearing out the tongues of horses, or smashing the legs of sheep, because rent has been paid or a farm taken, it will be seen with what ferocity the new agrarian gospel was propagated. The funds were now in full work, and from every part of the world subscriptions came in. The Eng- lish public began to suspect that there was more in the cry of famine than met the eye, and the English subscriptions were in consequence not one-third of the amount to which under other circumstances they would ''have amounted. Australia came nobly to the front, and America and Canada poured their 196 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. thousands of dollars into the Irish fund. Yet the commissioners from American papers of repute could find no famine. The New York Herald and the Chicago Tribune sent men who saw with their own eyes, and reported that while there was distress in some parts of the west there was nothing ap- proaching to a famine. The English papers were reticent, for a denial would look like a defence, and unfortunately they were almost committed to a famine by the Duchess of Marlborough's appeal. Among the Irish people the feeling grew that as money was being sent into the country it was no disgrace to get as much as one could. " Yes, sir," said a blacksmith one day, " I am badly treated ; every one in the street except my- self is getting the meal, and I have as good a right to it as they have." " Perhaps they are poorer than you, and you don't require it." " Not at all, sir. Don't I see them going and selling it every morning down at Brady's shop ? " " Have you applied to the relieving-officer for relief?" " Oh, Lord, no, sir ! sure I don't want it that way ; but when it's going, haven't I as good a right to get it as another ? " " Well," I said, " take my advice, and if you want to make a few shillings go and finish the gate I saw you working at this morning. You will be more happy afterwards than if you took this charity, THE TRUE STORY OF THE IRISH FAMINE. 197 and perhaps kept the meal from some one who required it." He thought for a moment ; then, saying, " Be- gorra, then, that's what I'll do, I'll work for it," he went away, content as a last resource to work for his daily bread. In the far west the consignments of meal were not even secure until legally distributed. The people of Slyne Head came to the conclusion that in the distribution of the meal at Clifden undue favour was shown to other neighbourhoods, and, like the blacksmith, they were determined to "have their share of what was going." One fine day they boarded a hooker, becalmed off the head, with a consignment of meal on board for the Clifden Relief Committee. There was other meal on board, of which they took none, but they settled the matter of distribution to Slyne Head for a time by helping themselves to as much of the relief meal as they considered their due. Thus the distribution has gone on for five months, and now, when the time approaches when real pressure may be felt in many districts, the funds so lavishly expended have nearly reached their limit of supply. Why, it may be asked, was no person found with sufficient public spirit to expose the exaggerated statements and misdirected charity in some locali- ties ? There are two reasons. As a rule the gentry have held aloof from the distribution of these relief funds, and left it almost entirely in the hands of 198 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. the clergy. Had there been a real famine they would probably have been drawn to the aid of the people ; but the anti-rent agitation has for the present placed a terrible gap between landlord and tenant that only time will close. But even if one were found with moral and physical courage to expose the way in which the cry of famine was being used to accentuate the proposition of the Land League that landlordism in Ireland is the cause of recurring famines, in answer to his state- ments her Grace's appeal would be quoted, as if it referred to all Ireland. The mere suspicion, mentioned from a Western pulpit, that a member of the congregation had made statements calculated to prevent money being granted to the parish, sent the congregation en masse rushing to his pew. Had he not brought his revolver with him he would never have left the chapel alive. Among the evils of the famine cry I do not class Major Nolan's Seeds Bill. Naturally every farmer tried to obtain new seed, even at the high price at which they were sold by the union. No doubt the feeling is universal that payment will never be demanded. Probably the disappearance of so much of the four millions of Irish Church Surplus would be regarded with equanimity by either party, and even if the money be not paid, the bestowal of new potato seed, in place of the old worn-out greentops, cannot be called an unproductive gift. Here the benefit of the Seeds THE TRUE STORY OF THE IRISH FAMINE. 199 Bill ends. The boards of guardians contracted locally for oats. The contractors bought oats from the farmers, and, mixing the different kinds, sold the mixture to the guardians, who distributed it as new seed. As the different kinds of oats will come in at different times, the mixed crop will be a serious loss to those unfortunate enough to take the seed on the conditions laid down in the Act. I do not mean to convey that there has been no distress in Ireland, or that great pressure may not be felt for the next two months. In certain districts there would have been distress necessitating an appeal to the poor rates but for the relief granted through the various funds. But one fact remains to show how hollow is the cry of famine. The average poor rate in the west of Ireland does not exceed is. 8d. in the pound, and in some unions in which large sums have been expended in charity the rates are one penny in the pound less than last year. That the farmers of Ireland could not have borne any increased rate is absurd. Thirty millions of Irish farmers' money lie on deposit in savings and other Irish banks, and bankers know well how much of this money is made up by the deposits of the small farmers. In round numbers £ 500,000 has been subscribed, besides the money borrowed by landlords and by sanitary authorities. Had the distress been met with the poor rate, one-sixth of this sum would have been sufficient. Loans could, if necessary, have been obtained by the unions for ex- 200 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. traordinary expenditure (though in very few unions would the amount of increased expenditure have reached is. 6d. in the pound) ; and the spectacle would have been spared of a population, demoralized by free gifts, day after day neglecting their business with eleemosynary languor, and proclaiming by their presence at the lottery of the committee-rooms, " We will not dig ; to beg we are not ashamed." III. Looking back to the Duchess of Marlborough's letter of the 16th of December, the first appeal made on behalf of the Irish people, it might have been expected that out of the ready response given by England would have grown to a certain extent a feeling of gratitude in Irish breasts. Committees were quickly formed, and from that fund came the first assurance that no Irish cry of distress would pass unheeded. But it is a singular fact that among the people the name of the Duchess of Marlborough was seldom heard, the funds being generally alluded to as "American money." Those who recognized the fact that England had sub- scribed only did so to contrast the comparative smallness of her subscription with that of Australia, and statements were made that England would be only too glad to see her poorer sister perish. Besides, however disaffected a large section of the Irish people may be, they look upon it as England's THE TRUE STORY OF THE IRISH FAMINE. 201 duty to come to their assistance whenever they may call, and accept the aid demanded as a small instalment of their plundered property. Even the members of the committees for the distribution of the Duchess of Marlborough's fund were not always unanimous in the acknowledg- ment of her Grace's benevolent intentions. At one of the committees where the parson and the priest worked amicably together, the former proposed a resolution conveying the thanks of the committee to the Duchess of Marlborough. The priest was asked to second it, but declined on the plea that " he was not in the habit of paying compliments to ladies." The fact is that from the first the Irish people either believed, or affected to believe, that the institution of the Duchess of Marlborough's fund was a bid for popularity, and the repeated suggestions from her Grace that money should be remitted for distribution to that fund rather than that of the Mansion House was quoted as a proof that her appeal had not been made exclusively from charitable motives. That this belief, or affected belief, was erroneous, there can be no doubt ; but the fact remains that, so far as the English sub- scriptions are concerned, charity must be its own reward. The distribution of private charity has always been a difficult problem ; but when a nation descends to crave for alms, the evils of free dis- tribution cannot be exaggerated. The moral weak- .OST9N COLLEGE LIBRART 202 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. ness and loss of self-dependence that injures the recipient is intensified a thousandfold when a large section of a community has learned that improvi- dence has no Nemesis, and money or money's worth is to be had for the asking. Not that it may not be necessary in extreme circumstances to ap- peal for help to the world. But who ever heard of such an appeal except when home resources had broken down, or were manifestly insufficient to meet the crisis ? The Irish demand has been as if a family, with thirty millions put by and an income of thirty millions a year, appealed for external help while the reserve fund was practically un- touched, and without waiting for a strain upon the resources set apart for the support of the weaker members. No doubt the income was sensibly diminished and the number to be supported sensibly increased, but the distress would have been amply provided for by an expenditure of ^"300,000, if levied off the rates ; and that Ireland should have posed before the world as a mendicant for an amount that would not have represented sixpence in the pound on its income is destructive to its self-respect as it is humiliating to every honest Irishman. I quote ^"300,000, about one-half of the sum dis- tributed, for few in Ireland deny that more than half the funds have been wasted. The probable effect of meeting the distress through the rates was shown in a Western union, where a Local Govern- THE TRUE STORY OF THE IRISH FAMINE. 203 ment inspector, struck with the apparent poverty of a number of the inhabitants of a certain district, ordered that they should be supplied with outdoor relief. The consequence was that the ratepayers of the district waited upon the board of guardians and protested against an expenditure which they knew to be unnecessary. How many hundreds of pounds from the relief funds might not have been spent in the district without protest ! It must not be imagined that those who objected were hard- hearted, or prepared to leave their poor neighbours to die rather than permit any increase to their poor rate. The bad qualities of Irishmen of that class (for which England has in the past been largely responsible) are exposed often enough ; but among them cannot be counted the callousness that would see a neighbour in want without coming to his succour. To their honour be it said that in such a case their private charity would not be appealed to in vain. The action, then, of the ratepayers in that dis- trict was full of significance. With the assurance of famine, it was declared that what the people wanted was work, not alms ; but when work was provided it was not always found that such an independent spirit asserted itself. The effect of the distribution of meal was that in some instances the men for whose benefit loans had been applied for by the landlords refused to execute the work, except on payment of double the rate of wages 204 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. then ruling in the neighbourhood. The works were of course abandoned, and the money granted by the Board of Works remains in their hands. It is asserted that the people most affected by the distress are the small ratepaying farmers, and under the poor law they could not obtain relief without first relinquishing their little farms. It is true that many small farmers have felt the distress severely, and under the poor law could not have been afforded relief; but the Government has since determined that relief is to be given, if necessary, to ratepayers of over £4. valuation. As to those rated under that amount, such an order could have been issued six months ago if necessary. In the event of the poor rate pressing unduly, loans could have been granted then as now to the unions, and the persons relieved might have received without shame a portion of the fund to which they had themselves contributed, and to whose aid they were legally entitled. But such a course would not have suited the views of the unscrupulous section that has made political capital out of an Irish famine. To bring the land laws before the world it was necessary that something startling must take place. What more startling than a famine ? And what so great a proof that the land laws must be at fault ? So we have had the famine, fortunately without its horrors. And, the ground being thus prepared, the first seedling of the new crop of proposed THE TRUE STORY OF THE IRISH FAMINE. 205 legislation has been planted by Mr. O'Connor Power, in the shape of his short bill enabling a man evicted for non-payment of rent to claim an amount equal to seven years' rent for dis- turbance. By this measure I can take a farm at ^20 a year, and, having paid no rent for three years, on being evicted I can claim ^"140 for dis- turbance, and take my chance of what the county- court judge may allow for unexhausted manures. Since the inauguration of the anti-rent agitation the Irish landlords have been execrated from a hundred platforms on both sides of the Atlantic. To their rapacity was attributed the primary cause of the famine, and it was declared that in their greed they squeezed the last penny from their hunger-stricken tenants. It may be well, then, to inquire what the landlords have done to assist the people ; and it must not be forgotten that the anti- rent movement was avowedly for the purpose of depreciating property and forcing estates into the market, that Government might purchase at a low figure and resell to the tenants. Mr. Parnell calculated that the remission of rents made by the landlords would reach the enormous figure of four millions ; but, allowing 50 per cent, for his enthusiasm, it is certain that very nearly half that amount has been remitted to the tenants, and that while the landlords were being reviled as the destroyers of the people, they were themselves feeling the pinch of poverty more bitterly than the 2o6 PICTURES FROM IRELAND. people by whom the abatement was demanded. Add to the two millions ;£ 1,250,000 granted as loans, by which employment could be given on their properties, and we find that the much-abused landlords have given towards the Irish "famine" more than six times the entire amount of the subscriptions from all parts of the world. Knowing what we now know of this battle with- out slain, the expediency of the inauguration of a great subscription, in accordance with the extrava- gant statements made from the anti-rent platforms, would appear to be questionable. If, without a death from starvation or a strain upon the poor rates, over three millions can be secured in hard cash by an inexpensive agitation, there are few ventures in political warfare that offer results so substantial as the producing of a famine to order. THE END. PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES. Date Due SEP - 7 ' H 1 *->UI / .' J BOSTON COLLEGE 3 9031 01646264 BOSTON COLLEGE LIBRARY UNIVERSITY HEIGHTS CHESTNUT HILL, MASS. 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