The Express.
London, England, 1851-09-20 00:00:00

IRELAND.

DUBLIN, SEPT. 19.

-.-
The Marquis of Ormonde's letter about flax cul-
ture has caused quite a panic among the farmers
who have speculated in that branch of industry in
the south of Ireland. According to his lordship's
showing the farmer cannot under present circum-
stances cultivate flax except at an enormous loss, and
from the calculations he sets forth it would appear
that ho himself will find a balance of some two
pounds per acre against him in his trials of the pre-
sent year. The Cork Reporter, however, shows that
his lordship labours under some mistakes. Among
others he assumes the price per ton for flax to be only
21. 10s., whereas good flax is worth 41. per ton, and
actually brings that price in some of the southern
markets at present. .

Again, says the Reporter, it is a mistake to suppose that
the seed is iucluded in the fits ; und the seed produced on
an Irish acre is worth from 3!. to 61. per tun, while the light
seed sad chaff of the hills may he made very valuable by
being used for feeding purposes. If we add, therefore,
11. Ins. per ton for the Ilas itself to his lordship's calcula-
tions, and 4!. for the seed, which he has not taken into ac-
(Aunt at all, we shall.iinit that his acre of itix should bring
11/., leasing a profit of nearly 61. per acre, uu u produce of
4" tons to the acre.
- -

Mr. Lehuide Crosthwaite, a respectable merchant
of Dublin, has addressed a letter to the Evening
Post, to combat the statements of Lord Ormonde on
this subject. lie shows hull the calculations of Mr.
Clarke, of Baileborough, an extensive flax grower,
that a profit of 71. 10s. Pee acre, not including rent,
may be reasonably expected on a good flax crop.
The following paragraph, however, in the Northern
shows that there is some foundation toe the
anxiety which prevails with respect to the flax crop
in the south of Ireland:—
'We have learned one great evil result of the mismanage-
ment, incompetency, and indifference of the parties who,
some time ago, attempted to get up a flax society in the
south of Ireland. Amongst tho•o whom their apparent
zeal induced to grow flax widely was Mr. Dorgan. Tho
issue of his undertaking we learn from a correspondent,
who says: "Mr. llargan has given up his large limn of
Kildinan, near Cork, and the flax concern. Mr. Roche,
M.P., his landlord, has gut all, and Mr. Bargau has lust
' heavily by the transaction. This affair has thrown a
damper on flax growing in this part of the country." If
the men who started the flax association bud exhibited an
ordinary degree of energy and unity of purpose, Mr. Delon
might have had a dillerent issue to his patriotic under-
taking. But it is thus things are too often done in Ireland.
Retuning to the increased itirretus which the
; potato blight, returning, as it has done, in all its
intensity through a great part of the country, must
give to emigration, the Northern Whig says :

We hear rumours already of many industrious farmers In
Down intending to give up th it land and go to America.
They complain that they are hard pressed at home—that
the old securities they trusted in are slipping away from
them—thus whilst the value of agricultural productions has
diminished, their landlords exhibit no willingness to come
forward mud bear their legitimate share of the Colo,lllllnleCS.
The proprietors still continue to enforce the payment of the
highest rent that can be squeezed truss the land, :Led the
..
tenant finds :to is A,,,,ming 1,1610.. my vir..A.ll,
he snjst
~hwopecolitm'seu,tleaialterrefimidunieorraltiir,caoir,its,,eleks,uind
that remains to him is to toll from ... &Hop., at
ot
lawtusuaer'el'iftuh•otuurkt
stectuorfetio,euwr
enrdtemel
cunly ofilt"wniireld'iutieftu•dl.toiathi:el" vidithto
and southern co • Let the landlords look to it. Lund
refused to Irish tenants, at thirty shillings an acre, some of
them have been since glad to let to Stutelimen for half the
sum. If the Down landlords force their holiest tenants to
Tait them now, they will rue it. They will never sec on
their land a better race of coon.

CONFESSION OF MURDER BY A SOLDIER IN CORK.
—On Tuesday a young man of about 30 years of age, named
Frederick Price, a private soldier of the 10th Regiment,
now stationed in this garrison, was brought iu military cus-
tody to the polite Whet:, and was there charged with having
stated that he had murdered a female ten years ago. lie
was examined in the magistrate's private room, bet-tire Mr.
Charles Sugruc, J.P. The magistrate cautioned him
against saying anything which might ithct his own aali•ty,
telling him that it ho did so his statement would be taken
down in writing b' the clerk, and would be used against
him on his trial. laic prisoner replied that he bad duly
considered the consequeeees, and he was prepared for the
worst. The magistrate said that under these ciremn-
stances he might proceed with his statement. Tho
prisoner then said that he was born and reared
in a place called Ash, in the county of Kent, in Eng-
land, where his father and mother lived. in July, tall,
he worked us a labourer. lie then knew by eyesight only
a young woman named Betsy Court, who lived as ssrvunt
with a gentleman not fir from Ash. On an evening in
July, 1841, he was thinking in a public-houso on a road
outside Ash, leading to the house ill which Betsy Court re-
sided. lie left the house nearly drunk, and accidentally
met her on the road. lie suspected she had money about
her, :.el he demanded it, but she refused to give itmp. On
her refusal he became, exasperated, and seizing her by the
throat dragged her along the footway, up a bank at the
side of a hedge, and into a field. There she struggled
with him for sumo moments, when he took a furs!. tin=
WA pocket, opened it, cut her throat across, and killed her.
lie then rifled her pockets and took what money she had
in gold and silver, to the amount of 5/. Having done
this he dragged the body along the ground to a cornfield,
where he lett it, and it was concealed by the standing corn.
In five or six weeks alter the corn was sickled, and the body
was found by a farm labourer. It was examined by doctors
but was so decomposed that they were unable to trace
the cause of death. It was, however, believed that she
was murdered, and suspicion of the crime attached to a
farmer named Hammond, as it was believed she was in
the family way by him. This was corroborated by a let-
ter written by the girl to Hammond, and which was in-
tercepted by his wife, in which she charnel him with
having seduced her, and that she would prove parentage
against him. Under these circumstances, Iltuntitond was
arrested, and was taken before Mr. Godfrey, a justice of
the peace, in whose presence he swore his innocence of
her murder over the corpse. This wan an old practice in
that part of the country. The prisoner remained in Ash
fur six months after the murder, and then with his father,
mot ier, and brothers removed to a place called Heal, nine
miles from Ash, where lie shortly after enlisted as a soldier
in the 40th Regiment. One of his brothers was at present
horsekeeper to a Mr. Bates, at beul, another of them was
clerk in the railway office there. Ever since prissier en-
listed his mind had been in the most shocking state, border-
ing on madness, so much so that he could sometimes scarcely
tell what he was doing. A short time ago, when stationed
at Carlisle, he loaded his gun, and was about to shoot him-
self, but he dreaded the commission of a second crime.—
The Magistrate: have you any more to say I—The Pri-
soner. l have not, further than that I am sincerely sorry
fur what I did. The confession wits then rend over to him,
and he said it was all true, and shined his name to it. The
magistrate then committed him to the City Gaol, prepara-
tory to his being transmitted to the county of Kent.