MEASURES 
 
 •••• 
 
 ADOPTED IN B0S¥fri 
 
 MASSACHUSETTS, 
 
 FOR THE 
 
 RELIEF 
 
 , OF THE 
 
 SUFFERING SCOTCH 
 
 AND 
 
 IRISH. 
 
 BOSTON, N. E. 
 1 847 . 
 
 eastburn’s press. 
 
REPORT. 
 
 The intelligence of tlie prevailing famine in Ireland, 
 has been received with universal sympathy, throughout 
 the United States of America. The sensibility of the 
 whole country was awakened, by the thought of thou- 
 sands of fellow beings perishing for w T ant of food. It was 
 the spontaneous impulse of the country, to hasten to 
 transmit to the sufferers, a share, of that abundant supply 
 of the fruits of the earth, which a kind Providence, with 
 more than ordinary bounty, had vouchsafed the last sea- 
 son to the People of the United States. 
 
 As soon as the accounts from Ireland, placing it be- 
 yond doubt tiiat the distress was general and urgent, had 
 circulated widely throughout the country, measures of 
 relief were proposed simultaneously in the principal 
 cities of the Union. A meeting of members of Congress, 
 and other individuals of influence was called at Washing- 
 ton, at which the subject was presented in the most 
 striking light by several leading Senators and Repre- 
 sentatives. An Appeal to the People of the United 
 States w^as issued by direction of this meeting, and a 
 circular letter was addressed to the Committees in the 
 principal cities. 
 
 On the receipt of this communication by the Mayor of 
 Boston, steps were immediately taken for holding a pub- 
 lic meeting of the citizens. The invitation for that pur- 
 pose was numerously subscribed, and an overflowing 
 assembly was held in Faneuil Hall, on the evening of 
 the 18th of February. 
 
 The Mayor on taking the chair, addressed the meeting, 
 
’• ‘ and* appropriate to the occasion were introduc- 
 
 ‘\\fecfc by J. T. Stevenson, Esq., and supported by himself, 
 , Dr.rTJewh. land Mr. Everett, in addresses which gave ut- 
 , \}\t.erkiVce* to the emotions of Christian benevolence and 
 sympathy that pervaded the assembly. 
 
 The Committees appointed to collect subscriptions im- 
 mediately entered upon the discharge of their duties. 
 The reports of the Sub-committees have not all been re- 
 turned ; but it is certain that about Fifty thousand dol- 
 lars have been subscribed in the city of Boston, and an 
 equal amount in the New England States. 
 
 While these steps have been in progress in Boston, 
 similar movements have taken place generally through- 
 out the country. Contributions have been made in the 
 churches, subscription papers circulated, and funds to a 
 large amount have been collected. On no former occa- 
 sion of this kind, it is believed, has so deep and general 
 a feeling been manifested. 
 
 A wish was entertained by many members of Con- 
 gress, that an Appropriation should be made from the 
 Treasury of the United States, in aid of an object which 
 the whole People of the Union had so deeply at heart. 
 Resolutions for that purpose were brought forward in 
 both houses of Congress. Doubts however were en- 
 tertained by some members of the competency of Con- 
 gress to make such an Appropriation of the public funds ; 
 — Considerations of delicacy influenced others ; — And 
 the proposed Appropriations accordingly failed ; but a 
 joint Resolution passed the two houses requesting the 
 Secretary of the Navy to place two of the Public Vessels 
 at the service of the Committees, which might wish in 
 this way to transport to Ireland a portion of the sup- 
 plies furnished by private benevolence, for the Relief of 
 the sufferers. 
 
 One of these vessels the Jamestown, under the com- 
 mand of R. B. Forbes, Esq., of Boston, who has liberallv 
 
5 
 
 offered his services for that purpose, and whose active 
 and disinterested exertions are entitled to the highest 
 commendation, is now in the harbor of Boston, loaded 
 with provisions for Ireland. 
 
 It would he unjust on this occasion not to allude to the 
 generous contributions made by the Irish residents and 
 emigrants in the United States for the relief of their dis- 
 tressed countrymen at home. Although the emigrants are 
 for the most part men in humble circumstances, support- 
 ing themselves by the labor of their hands, the sums sav- 
 ed from their hard earnings and remitted to Ireland since 
 the prevalence of the famine there, have been very great, 
 but form no part of the sums collected by this Commit- 
 tee. 
 
 The great and immediate object aimed at, has of course 
 been the relief of actual want. After this, the hope has 
 been entertained, that the kindly feelings called out and 
 expressed on this occasion would exert a happy influence 
 on the relations of the two great kindred countries. The 
 vessel which conveys the first offering of the sympathy of 
 the people of Boston and its vicinity, bears the name of 
 the spot where the first settlers from England established 
 themselves on the American soil. She carries we trust a 
 not unwelcome practical assurance that in laying the 
 foundation of the American States, the Parent Country 
 did but commence the establishment of another branch of 
 the great Brotherhood of Christian Love. To strengthen 
 this assurance, the foregoing brief note has been drawn 
 up to be conveyed by the Jamestown to our friends in Ire- 
 land, and with the same end in view, the proceedings at 
 the meeting in Faneuil Hall as reported in the Boston 
 Journal are herewith subjoined. 
 
 For the Committee of Belief, 
 
 JO SI AIL QUINCY, Jr., Chairman. 
 Boston, March 27 , 1847 . 
 
MEETING IN FANEUIL HALL. 
 
 A meeting to devise measures for the relief of the peo- 
 ple of Ireland and Scotland, now suffering all the horrors 
 of famine, was held in Faneuil Hall on Thursday Evening, 
 February 18, 1847, — which betokened the deep and 
 heartfelt sympathy of thousands of citizens of Boston for 
 their suffering brethren in foreign lands. 
 
 At the appointed hour, the meeting was called to order 
 by Moses Grant, Esq., and proceeded to organise by the 
 choice of His Honor the Mayor, Josiah Quincy, Jr., as 
 Chairman of the meeting. Mr. Quincy on taking the 
 Chair thus addressed the audience : 
 
 u This meeting has been called to take into considera- 
 tion the present state and the future prospects of the 
 people of Scotland and Ireland, and to decide what should 
 be done by the citizens of Boston for their relief. As to 
 their present state, it is unnecessary to harrow up the 
 feelings of the audience by the repetition of the scenes of 
 horror that have been described in the pages of the daily 
 press. But as to the future, we must remember that it is 
 yet six months to the harvest, and that the distress great 
 as it is at present, may be but the precursor to that which 
 
7 
 
 will be much greater. In such a state of things it is natural 
 to desire to do something, and it is the duty in an especial 
 manner for a community whose prosperity is increased by 
 the calamities of others, to do much for their assistance. 
 The question is, what can be done ? The vastness of the 
 demand almost paralyzes the power of action. But great 
 as the amount of suffering is, much may actually be 
 effected ; and more can be done by exciting hope and 
 energy in the sufferers. We are told that despair 
 broods over every countenance — that even the seed corn 
 on which the next harvest depends, has been consumed in 
 reckless desperation. The inhabitant of Ireland is like 
 the sailor swimming for his life, who as he surmounts bil- 
 low after billow, catches at intervals the glimpse of the 
 distant beacon that tells him there is land in sight, though 
 his sinking heart and failing arm warn him that he shall 
 never reach it. Your aid will inspire him with the re- 
 newed confidence that such a mariner would feel if he saw 
 the life-boat dashing through the surf to his assistance. 
 
 But the call for this charity is not confined to its reci- 
 pients. It is emphatically 66 twice blessed, it blesses him 
 that gives and him that takes.” There is hardly a more 
 beautiful sight recorded on the pages of history, than to 
 see that country, which once imported corn from the old 
 world, returning it again for its support. It again re- 
 alizes the description of Burke, u That the child of their 
 old age, with more than a filial piety, or Homan charity, 
 put the full breast of her youthful exuberance to the 
 mouth of her exhausted parent.” 
 
 But the scene is more than beautiful, it is sublime. A 
 nation hastening to the rescue of a nation. There have 
 been times when conquerors took advantage of the 
 exhaustion of famine, to subjugate their neighbors by 
 adding the horrors of war to those of want. But how 
 much nobler the sight, to see in the capital of our 
 
8 
 
 nation, the second officer in the government aided by 
 a Senator or Representative from every State in the 
 Union — calculating, not as they did a short time ago, the 
 power possessed by this country to war against and injure 
 England — hut how we might assist her in feeding her 
 starving children. An act like this must excite a cor- 
 responding feeling. If as enemies they hungered and 
 we fed them, we should heap coals of fire upon their 
 heads. How much more will those feelings he excited 
 when there is no enmity or animosity to overcome. If 
 the wild Arab is forever the friend of him of whose bread 
 he has eaten — how much more shall Christian England 
 appreciate our aid. 
 
 But there is another view which, as sons of the 
 Puritans, it is well to consider. Drawing their knowl- 
 edge from the pages of history, and the early records of 
 our religion, they believed that national sins, unless fol- 
 lowed by repentance and atonement, must be followed by 
 national misery. The dispensation founded on sacrifice 
 has passed. But may we not hope that this free-will 
 offering of a great people, rising as it will from the moun- 
 tains of the North, from the prairies of the West, from 
 the savannas of the South, from the sands of the ocean, 
 from the borders of the lake, from the margin of the 
 rivers, from every valley and from every hill-side through- 
 out our vast republic, will be an accepted sacrifice, and 
 this act of a nation’s charity be the harbinger of a day 
 foretold in prophecy — “ When nation shall no longer lift 
 up the sword against nation,” when connected by the 
 modem facilities of intercourse, and bound together by 
 mutual kindness and Christian charity, the kingdoms 
 of the world shall be united in the ties of universal peace 
 and brotherhood, and love.” 
 
 The meeting was then further organized by the choice 
 of the following officers : 
 
9 
 
 PRESIDENT, 
 
 Hon. JOSIAH QUINCY, Jr. 
 
 VICE PRESIDENTS, 
 
 Abbott Lawrence, Thomas H. Perkins, 
 
 Nathaniel Greene, Simon G. Shipley. 
 
 W. J. Hubbard, 
 
 SECRETARIES, 
 
 Lewis W. Tappan, Marcus Morton, Jr. 
 
 J. T. Stevenson of this city then came forward and 
 prefaced a series of Resolutions, as follows : 
 
 Fellow Citizens : — I am permitted to offer the busi- 
 ness resolutions for the consideration of this meeting, 
 which has been called together here, where all love to 
 meet, by no organized committee, but by the cries of a 
 starving people. We all know the very general sympa- 
 thy which is swelling in the hearts of our fellow citizens. 
 That is plain to all of us in our daily walks. 
 
 But the present is a case which individual efforts can- 
 not reach. It is a case in which each man, however rea- 
 dy he may be, cannot be his own almoner. It requires 
 concerted action, or that sympathy must waste itself in 
 expressions of good will. The kindest words will not 
 feed the hungry. 
 
 The voice of distress has come to us from a foreign 
 shore, but not in a foreign tongue, and the assembly here 
 to-night gives assurance, if any such were needed, that 
 the response to it from the City of Three Hills, will be no 
 empty echo — that the tumult of the ocean, which is roll- 
 ing between the sufferers and us, is not loud enough to 
 drown that voice — that the mountain waves are not high 
 enough to impede the current of international good-will. 
 
 The Resolutions, which will be offered, have for their 
 
10 
 
 whole object, the furnishing the method for embodying 
 the feeling which prevails, into action. It is concerted 
 action that is wanted — and that action must be prompt. 
 Delay in such a case is cruelty. 
 
 We want money — and Boston’s offering should be 
 large — so large as to be a worthy acknowledgment of the 
 blessings we enjoy. 
 
 We want the contribution to the present purpose to be 
 general throughout our city — and unless this meeting af- 
 ford the opportunity for that, it will fail to come up to 
 the kindly feeling which pervades the community. This 
 meeting should furnish the opportunity to all to do just 
 what their hearts are prompting them to. It should fur- 
 nish to the merchants the point, where they may cast 
 some of their bread upon the waters of that deep, every 
 track of which is whitened by the sails of their richly- 
 laden ships. It should give the manufacturer, who is 
 even now picturing to himself the frenzy with which the 
 mother’s prayer is offered up that her own children may 
 die rather than that they should no longer bear the pangs 
 of starvation, a channel through which he may follow his 
 own heart’s impulses. It should open to the mechanics, 
 who in the pride of their independence here are pained 
 by the despair which they know is painted — no, not 
 painted, but engraved — on the face of many a father, as 
 he realizes that his once strong arm has no longer the 
 power to carry food to his famishing family, the path by 
 which he may obey this call of Christian charity and uni- 
 versal love. 
 
 This meeting should open for these, and for all, a 
 channel of communication between those who are suffer- 
 ing there, and those who sympathize with them here. 
 Once opened, such a channel would be filled, as by a 
 flood, from the various contributions which will pour into 
 it from the lowly places, as well as from the high places 
 of the land. 
 
11 
 
 None can object to the objects of this .* meeting., , If. 
 any think that in distress of such appalling magnitude, 
 all which Boston can do, will be but as a drop ' id the 
 bucket, they are mistaken in the fact. Boston can do 
 good for thousands. 
 
 If any one whispers that charity should begin at home 
 — acknowledge the truth of the proverb, but remind him 
 that there is no such Boston proverb as that it should end 
 at home. 
 
 If any fear that contributions for this purpose will de- 
 tract from the aid that should be proffered to the suffer- 
 ing poor, within our own borders — tell them no — not one 
 iota ; the charitable offerings of very few reach the limit 
 of their ability, and it is the opened hand that continues 
 to give. 
 
 If any one doubt his Christian duty in this matter, to- 
 wards those whom he has never known and never will, let 
 him reflect that the blessings which will tremble from the 
 lips which he supplies, will be invoked from the same 
 God to whom he is offering up thanks for the supply of 
 all his wants. 
 
 In this belief that the feeling of our fellow citizens is 
 all right, and that all that is wanting is the machinery 
 for its exercise, I will move these Resolutions, which will 
 supply that deficiency. 
 
 RESOLUTIONS. 
 
 Resolved , That the present distress of the people of Ire- 
 land and Scotland makes an urgent appeal to the sympa- 
 thy of the humane of all nations, that it is the Christian 
 duty as it will be the acknowledged pleasure of those 
 whom God has blessed with the means of doing good, to 
 adopt prompt measures for contributing to their relief; 
 that an opportunity should be offered to allow fellow 
 citizens to do what they may for this object, and there- 
 fore 
 
12 
 
 . R&sobe'd, /That six persons be appointed to be an Ex- 
 ecutive. Committee, to collect subscriptions and to take 
 all necessary steps to carry out the objects of this meet- 
 ing- ’ ’ * 
 
 Resolved , That a Committee of four from each Ward be 
 appointed to aid the Executive Committee in raising 
 money by a general collection throughout the city. 
 
 Mr. Stevenson was followed by Dr. Samuel G. Howe, 
 who riveted the attention of his audience, while he ad- 
 dressed them as follows : 
 
 Mr. Chairman : — You have happily reminded us of the 
 pleasing contrast between the present feelings of this 
 country towards England, and those which existed a short 
 time ago, during the negotiations about Oregon. But 
 no where, sir, can the contrast be seen more strikingly 
 than within these hallowed walls this very night, — for, in 
 the olden time, our fathers gathered together here to de- 
 vise measures for breaking the political union with Great 
 Britain, while we come here to find means to strengthen 
 the bonds of Christian union with her, and to show the 
 sympathy, and the love we bear to those of our brethren 
 who still dwell in our mother land. 
 
 I hail this event as a sign of the dawning of that hap- 
 py day whose meridian fulness shall show peace on earth 
 and good will to men. 
 
 The beautiful words of Him who said "it is more blessed 
 to give than to receive” have been verified by thousands 
 of individuals in every age, until their truth has became 
 an axiom in morals ; but, like other words of the same 
 great Teacher, they have not yet been developed in half 
 their extent and their truth ; nations have yet to learn, 
 what so many individuals have already learned, that it is 
 better to act from generous than from selfish motives,- — 
 that it is better to love than to hate,— that it is better 
 to help than to fight. 
 
13 
 
 God is ever bringing real and permanent good out of 
 apparent and transient evil, and if the grievous dispensa- 
 tion with which He is now visiting Ireland, and Scotland? 
 and Belgium, shall teach the nations that there is more 
 true glory, — more real pleasure, — more lasting advantage 
 in striving to excel each other in deeds of charity than in 
 feats of arms, then will this dispensation have been for 
 good, and not for evil. 
 
 But we have not come together to speculate upon the 
 moral effect of passing events; we have come here to act; — 
 the cry of distress has reached our ears from across the 
 Atlantic, and we have hurried up to this place to answer 
 the cry, and to succor the distress. 
 
 The great danger is that our people may be daunted 
 by the magnitude of the evil. It is not a fire, it is not a 
 flood, it is not an earthquake, whose ravages we are called 
 upon to repair — it is a famine — a grievous famine, — 
 affecting not merely hundreds, or thousands, but mil- 
 lions. The heart sickens at the thought of the dread- 
 ful sufferings of the starving poor, and the mind is ap- 
 palled by the apparent impossibility of alleviating them. 
 But, there is all the more need of courage, and, when we 
 look at our resources, we can feel it. Boston has at least 
 
 20.000 families, and there is not one of those families that 
 would not engage to support a fellow being a whole year 
 rather than have him perish by hunger upon their door 
 step. Fellow citizens, let us imagine that the starving 
 Scotch and Irish are lying pale, and haggard, and perishing 
 upon our very door steps, and let us resolve that each of 
 us will take charge of one of the poor creatures, and will 
 keep him alive at least one year. Boston and her imme- 
 diate neighborhood can send 15,000 barrels of flour, or 
 the representative of them in cash, and these will keep 
 
 15.000 people alive until the next harvest. Let the rest 
 of the country, and the rest of the Anglo Saxon race do 
 as much in proportion to their means, and, with God's 
 
14 
 
 blessing, we will keep the monster famine at bay in 
 Scotland and Ireland, for a while at least. 
 
 My friends, there is a great virtue in a barrel of flour ; 
 it is the most effectual form into which you can put a 
 prayer for a starving fellow creature. You assent, I 
 see, — and yet, do not know that virtue — because you do 
 not know what hunger really is. None who have not 
 been out of this country, and very few who have been 
 abroad, have had any real experience of what hunger is. 
 
 I can tell you something about it, because I have been 
 among a people who were perishing with hunger, as the 
 Irish and Scotch now are, and it was my good fortune to 
 witness the effects of the distribution of the supplies of 
 corn meal, which were sent out from this country, and to 
 know how like an enchanter’s wand, hunger changed 
 that poor meal into a gorgeous feast. I refer to Greece. 
 
 War of the most ferocious and ruthless kind had rav- 
 aged the land for years; the villages had been burned, 
 the towns destroyed, the olive trees cut down, the vines 
 pulled up, and the inhabitants had fled to the mountains 
 for safety. 
 
 I was in the mountains when some of the provisions 
 were landed upon the shores of the Peloponessus, and 
 went to superintend their distribution. The poor, half 
 naked, half famished wretches came trooping down from 
 their hiding places — ten, twenty, thirty miles distance — 
 and tremblingly held out their hands, their caps or their 
 bags. Happy was the family that got a barrel of corn 
 meal! and grateful to my ears were the blessings they 
 showered upon my countrymen. I have known them, 
 where fire and cooking materials were not at hand, to 
 moisten the kiln-dried meal with water, and eat it raw. 
 I can answer for it, that when dried in the sun, it made a 
 palatable cake, as you would have found it, if you had 
 been living as we sometimes did upon sorrel and snails, 
 dished up without salt or pepper. 
 
15 
 
 Well ; these provisions were of immense use — for they 
 not only put food into the stomach, but courage into the 
 hearts of the Greeks ; and so would your supplies to the 
 Scotch and Irish do. 
 
 Let me assure you, that when famine invades a land, 
 all its horrors are increased by the demoralizing effects of 
 fear ; it is fear which makes the body yield quickly to 
 the pestilence which follows famine ; fear freezes up all 
 the small streams of neighborly love and charity ; fear 
 makes him who has a little bread refuse it to a dying 
 neighbor, lest perchance his own wife or child should be 
 dying for want of it to-morrow. 
 
 Those who know much of practical charity know that 
 its best sources are not in the purses of the rich; the 
 charities of the rich flow in a few large streams, and are 
 seen of men, while the charities of the middling classes, 
 and of the poor themselves, are ever silently descending 
 like the dews of heaven, and spreading their refreshing in- 
 fluence around them. The mite of the poor, given as it is 
 with his hearty sympathy to his fellow poor, is magnified 
 into greater proportions than the treasures which the 
 rich throw down from their high places. 
 
 Now, in the time of famine among the Greeks, all 
 these sources ofi charity were dried up by fear; and the 
 effect of the American contributions was to open them 
 again ; nor can we doubt that the effect would be the 
 same in Scotland and Ireland. 
 
 Men will take courage and hope ; they will see that 
 help is at hand ; and those who have a little will give to 
 those who have none. 
 
 But let us not look to the remote effects, let us try to 
 relieve the present evil. Let us not be daunted by its 
 magnitude, — let us not speculate about its origin — let us 
 not stop to ask whether, if we relieve the suffering now, 
 it will not be just as bad next year; the sufferers are 
 like men drowning before our eyes, — let us save them 
 
16 
 
 now, and if they fall in again, why, we will pull them out 
 again, if we can. Let us not ask what others are going 
 to do ; let not the credit of our city he our motive, hut let 
 us just do all that we possibly can. Finally, let it not be 
 done for show; and let it not be done as charity. There is 
 no charity about it; — it is a sacred debt of humanity; let 
 us pay it, — principal and interest ; and, of whatever else 
 the world may accuse us, let them have no chance to ac- 
 cuse us of repudiating that. 
 
 The Hon. Edward Everett next addressed the meeting. 
 The announcement of his name was greeting with enthu- 
 siastic cheers. 
 
 I rise, Mr. Chairman, at your invitation, to unite with 
 the gentlemen who have addressed the meeting with 
 such ability, in recommending the passage of the resolu- 
 tions. I scarce know in what manner to express myself 
 on the occasion. The general topics of remark which 
 suggest themselves have been exhausted by yourself, sir, 
 and the gentlemen who have already spoken. I am un- 
 willing, I may say I should be ashamed to think, that any 
 labored argument or any studied words of persuasion 
 ■were necessary, to convince an assembly of the citizens 
 of Boston of the duty, or to awaken in them the desire, 
 of speeding relief to the sufferers by famine in Ireland. 
 If it be our only object to lay the most important facts of 
 the case before those who have not particularly turned 
 their attention to the subject, the task is not without dif- 
 ficulty. Since I received the invitation of the committee, 
 the evening before the last, to attend this meeting, I have 
 looked over the newspapers received by the last steamer 
 from Liverpool, and I find it hard to make a selection 
 from the painful accounts with which their columns are 
 filled. Mere general statistics do not answer the purpose. 
 We read of the large proportion of the population depriv- 
 ed of their accustomed food ; of the numbers who offer 
 
17 
 
 themselves for labor on the public works, beyond the ut- 
 most power of the official agents to employ them ; of the 
 numbers, still more wretched, who knock at the doors of 
 the alms-houses, and find them closed; of the reputed num- 
 bers even of those who perish by starvation, or the dis- 
 eases produced by scanty and unwholesome food. All 
 these matters, stated in general terms, fail to bring the 
 dreadful reality of things with sufficient vividness to our 
 minds. If we seek to go further, and attempt to repeat 
 the horrid details of striking cases of destitution and suf- 
 fering, we are in danger of plunging into scenes too 
 dreadful to be recited in public. a Of all the maladies,’’ 
 says the great master of English eloquence, to whom you, 
 sir, have referred, “ which beset and waylay the life of 
 man, this plague of hunger comes the nearest to the hu- 
 man heart ; and is that wherein the proudest of us all 
 feels himself to be nothing more than he is. But I find 
 myself unable,” he adds, “ to manage it with decorum. 
 These details are of a species of horror so nauseous and 
 disgusting ; they are so degrading to the sufferer and the 
 hearer ; they are so humiliating to human nature itself, 
 that, on better thoughts, I find it more advisable to throw 
 a pall over this hideous object, and leave it to your gen- 
 eral conceptions.” 
 
 Mr. Chairman, it is universally known that there are 
 above two millions of people in Ireland who subsist almost 
 exclusively on potatoes. It is scarcely necessary to say 
 that, in the very best of times and under prosperous cir- 
 cumstances, they live on the borders of starvation. What 
 is looked upon as plenty by this part of the Irish popula- 
 tion, would be regarded by us as little better than fam- 
 ine. There is nothing to fall back upon, in case of hard 
 times ; no retrenchment in the quantity, no reduction in 
 the quality, no substitution of cheaper articles. They 
 already live upon the smallest quantity of the cheapest 
 food; and I have been told that it is a practice to eat the 
 
 3 
 
18 
 
 potatoes under boiled, because in that condition, they will 
 lie longer in the stomach, and thus delude its craving 
 emptiness. Two disastrous seasons have, in some parts 
 of the country almost wholly, in others altogether, cut off 
 the accustomed scant supply of this, the cheapest article 
 of food ; and the alarming question is how is the want to 
 be supplied ; how are the horrors of general starvation to 
 be staved off? To which question I can only answer, 
 Heaven knows. It must be, I fear, a more sagacious per- 
 son than any in this assembly, who can return a satisfac- 
 tory answer. The wisest heads in England and Ireland 
 seem confounded at the extent of the evil. The govern- 
 ment has contrived a very extensive scheme of employ- 
 ment on public works, which seems to have had but par- 
 tial success ; — in fact, such is the infirmity of human 
 counsel, to have been productive of some positive evils of 
 a serious nature. At any rate, it is plain, that to employ 
 two millions of people, or indeed any considerable portion 
 of them, of a sudden, in an unaccustomed way, by public 
 authority, must be a very dangerous experiment upon 
 the regular march of industry ; and if it were otherwise, 
 what are the unemployed to do? Nay, what are the em- 
 ployed to do with their pittance of wages, in districts 
 where there is little or no food ; where what little there 
 is, can be bought only, at what is called with dreadful 
 significance, a famine price ? 
 
 The natural and necessary consequence of this state of 
 things is that death — death by starvation, — is now a 
 common event — is daily happening. The plague having 
 done its work on the lower animals, has fallen on man. 
 The cow of the small farmer, all important as she is to his 
 family, has perished or been killed ; the pig, the poultry 
 of the cottier have in like manner died for want of food, 
 or been killed to eke out a few days’ miserable susten- 
 ance to their famished owner, — the watch dog has been 
 drowned (and the poor peasant v 7 ho has perhaps no other 
 
19 
 
 living being lie can call friend, had almost as lief drown 
 a child,) — every wretched substitute for wholesome food, 
 bark, roots, apple parings, turnip skins have been ex- 
 hausted, and now famine in all its horrors stalks through 
 the land. To what actual extent the work of death had 
 gone at the last accounts, it is not easy to say. There is 
 unavoidable over-estimate in the first reports of such gen- 
 eral calamities. I hold in my hand an extract from the 
 proceedings of a large meeting of the nobility and gentry 
 of Ireland, held at Dublin on the 14th of January, which 
 is the latest authentic statement I have seen ; and I find 
 one of the gentlemen who spoke, using this language, 
 “ that five thousand had already perished by want and 
 by disease ; fever had made its appearance in many 
 parts, and was daily cutting off the people by hundreds. 
 The sole cause was want of food.” Mr. O’Connell at the 
 same meeting, or on some other recent similar occasion, is 
 reported to have said, that three hundred were dying daily; 
 and as far as I have been able to form an opinion, by 
 running my eye over the provincial accounts transferred 
 to the London papers, I should think that one death daily 
 from every neighborhood in the South and West of Ire- 
 land, was not an extravagant estimate. If this be so, Mr. 
 O’Connell’s statement is quite within the bounds of the 
 dreadful reality. 
 
 Then, Mr. Chairman, as you have well remarked, these 
 accounts come down to the end of the year, at farthest to 
 the middle of January. Six or seven long months are 
 yet to pass, before any harvest of grain can ripen and be 
 reaped. What is to carry the people of Ireland through 
 these dismal months, in which famine, despair and death 
 will be doing their work on a population already driven 
 to the verge of madness. It cannot but be that the de- 
 moralization already commenced will go on. In the na 
 ture of things, due care to make ready the land for the 
 coming season will be neglected. Seed corn and seed 
 
20 
 
 potatoes, as yon have observed, where they exist will be 
 consumed for food. Outrages on property, under the spur 
 of this sharp necessity, will take place. Those who have 
 a little will hoard ; those who have nothing will plunder. 
 In the midst of frightful want there will be still more 
 frightful waste ; till, in the action and re-action of these 
 physical and moral causes, there is great reason to fear 
 that the frame-work of society, none too well compacted 
 in this unhappy country, will wholly break down, and 
 that horrors will be acted out in Ireland, in the course of 
 the ensuing Spring and Summer, for which language has 
 no adequate terms of description. God grant it may be 
 otherwise, and nothing can do so much to prevent these 
 forebodings from being realized, as to show to the people 
 of Ireland, in the most effectual manner, that the eyes of 
 a sympathising world are upon them ; but I do fear, Sir, 
 if not checked by some such genial influence, that the 
 fertile plains and lovely vallies of this unhappy country 
 will be the theatre before long of woes and horrors which 
 it sickens one but to think of it. 
 
 And now, Mr. Chairman, we have come to consult to- 
 gether what we can do to contribute toward the mitiga- 
 tion of this great calamity ; or rather to encourage each 
 other to do the utmost, in his power. What little I 
 thought to say on this topic, has been anticipated by the 
 gentlemen (Mr. Stevenson and Dr. ITowe) who have al- 
 ready addressed you with such feeling and pertinence. 
 It is true that no individual, no community even, can do 
 much to relieve the sum total of this mighty calamity ; 
 but every community, every individual, can do something, 
 and the aggregate of these somethings is to form, sir, for 
 months, the only stay of famishing millions. Don’t tell 
 me w r e can do but little, when the little that we and oth- 
 ers can do is the all of a starving country. And this I 
 will say, sir, that there is no community on earth that can 
 do more than this ; I mean that there is not another of its 
 
21 
 
 size, embracing a wider extent of prosperity. The glori- 
 ous sun in the heavens, that looks down on the misery of 
 famishing Ireland, does not, in his wide circuit, shine upon 
 a spot more abounding, in proportion to its size, with the 
 physical comforts of life, and therefore better able to min- 
 ister of its surplus to the relief of that misery. I shall 
 therefore be surprised — I shall be deeply grieved — if on 
 the list of contributions for the mitigation of this truly 
 appalling calamity, the name of any place shall, in propor- 
 tion to its numbers, stand higher than that of Boston. 
 Indeed, I have no fears that it will be so. If I unhappily 
 am disappointed, I shall at least hope, Mr. Chairman, that 
 not much will be hereafter said of what we have been 
 willing to regard as the proverbial liberality of Boston. 
 
 Liberality , sir ! I am almost ashamed to use the word at 
 all on this occasion. The liberality of giving from your 
 abundance, to save the lives of men, women, and children, 
 who to all intents, as was so well said by the eloquent 
 gentleman (Dr. ITowe) who preceded me, are starving 
 upon your door-step ! If we call this liberality, I should 
 like to know what we should consider a duty. I rejoice 
 to believe that I speak in the hearing of those, who re- 
 gard the work in which we now engage, as one of duty, 
 and that of the most imperative kind ; — a duty so high 
 and sacred, that could we neglect it, I should almost ex- 
 pect that the walls of these massy warehouses, filled al- 
 most to bursting with every article of food which enters 
 largely into commerce, would fall and crush us as we 
 passed. 
 
 You carried our minds, Mr. Mayor, by an interesting 
 allusion to the distant East. There is a dark tale in the 
 traditions of a less distant foreign land, which has haunt- 
 ed my recollection, in reference to some of the sad details 
 of the suffering which prevails in Ireland, as I have seen 
 them in the English papers. It is hardly appropriate to 
 business character of this meeting, but I have not 
 
22 
 
 been able to get away from it. An Italian nobleman in 
 the middle ages, fell into the power of his enemy, he and 
 several children, — who threw them into a prison, and after 
 long confinement, determined to starve them to death. 
 The door of the dungeon was locked and the key thrown 
 into the Arno. Thus much I believe is matter of history. 
 The secrets of that prison house are known only as they 
 were revealed to the imagination of Dante. After the 
 first day passed without food, the father too well forebod- 
 ing the doom that awaited them, a dear child, his little 
 Anselm, plaintively asks the cause of his gloomy silence. 
 Another and another day passes and still no food. The 
 parent, not so much from hunger as in frenzy, gnaws his 
 own hands. His children, duteous even in that dire ex- 
 tremity, supposing that the pangs of starvation were 
 more keenly felt by their father than by themselves, im- 
 plore him, instead of devouring his own limbs, to feed on 
 them, and thus take back the wretched flesh with which 
 he had clothed them. On the fourth day, Gaddo crawls 
 to his wretched parent’s feet, and feebly crying, “ My - 
 father, why do you not help me ?” dies. 
 
 This piteous tale, embalmed in the tears' of five centu- 
 ries, is no longer a remote poetic vision. It is, in all the 
 substantial features, a horrid reality, passing within a 
 fortnight’s sail of us. There is not an inch of terra firma, 
 sir, between the city over which you preside and the 
 scene of these woes. They are taking place not in a 
 solitary instance, but in hundreds ; not within the walls 
 of a dungeon, amidst the fury of civil wars, in a benighted 
 age, but within open doors, by the way side, beneath the 
 blue sky, in the face of heaven and of men, — in the nine- 
 teenth century • in this all-daring, all-achieving, all-boast- 
 ing nineteenth century ; and astonished Europe and as- 
 tonished America stand looking on, paralysed as it were 
 by the extent of the calamity. But paralysed, I trust, si!*, 
 but for a moment. A spirit of Christian charity has been 
 

 23 
 
 'awakened on both sides of the water, worthy of the occa- 
 sion ; and well I know that Faneuil Hall is not the spot 
 , where it will burn with the least fervor. Let me only be- 
 seech you, what you do, to do quickly. It is a fearful 
 thought that, do what you will, not a barrel of flour, pur- 
 chased with the funds provided this evening, can be laid 
 down within the Cove of Cork under six weeks, at the 
 very soonest, taking the average chances of sailing vessels 
 at this season. Before it gets there, the man — the family, 
 which it might have saved, has perished. Yes, sir, while 
 I fill your your ears with these empty words, some of our 
 poor fellow Christians in Ireland have starved to death ! 
 
 A vote was then taken, the resolutions were unani- 
 mously adopted ; and, the following gentlemen selected 
 as the Executive Committee : 
 
 Messrs. JOSIAII QUINCY, Jr., 
 
 JAMES K. MILLS, 
 
 DAVID IIENSHAW, 
 
 PATRICK T. JACKSON, 
 
 G. W. CROCKETT, 
 
 J. INGERSOLL BOWDITCIT, 
 
 THOMAS LEE. 
 
 And the Meeting then adjourned.