The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1846-12-29 00:00:00

STATE OF IRELAND.

The state of this unhappy country is becoming quite
appalling. Every newspaper is filled with accounts of
murders perpetrated or attempted, robberies of food or of
arms, riotous outrages, and even destruction of the very
provisions, for the want of which numbers are perishing.
The Mayo Constitution of the 22d inst. contains an ac-
count of seven inquests held, in which the verdicts have
been " died from'starvation and want of food." And
from an official document, noticed in the same paper, the
number of committals of criminals awaiting trial up to the
20th December was 241, whilst it was only 137 in the cor-
responding period last year, being an increase this year of
104. The Dublin News Letter narrates an attempt to
murder a deputy lieutenant of Athlone and his brother, by
firing at them whilst driving up the avenue of their own
demesne ; and adds wish respect to the occurrence " No
one can assign the slightest reason for this diabolical at-
tack. There are not better landlords, or more exi-ellent
resident gentlemen, in any county in Ireland. They keep
packs of hounds, and contribute in every way to the
amusement of the gentry, as well as to the employment

and relief of the peas.infry in their neighbourhooil.".
The Banner of Ulster informs us of the robbery, on
the highway, and attempt to murder a respectable farmer
and horse-dealer, who was " left for dead," and whose
chance of recovery is still very precarious. The TVater-
ford Chronicle narrates the circumstance of the forcible
plunder of a boa, loaded with flour in the river Barrow,
by a party of seven or eight men, who boarded her, beet
the skipper very severely, fastened him in the locker, and
carried away twenty sacks of superfine flour. The Kil-
kenny Moderator contains an account of a desperate
attempt, by a mob, moon the life of an engineer employed
under the Board of Works, his crime being that he re-
fused to order his superintendents to give indiscriminate
employment to all applicants immediately. The gentle-
man in question succeeded in escaping, by the aid of the
pay-clerk of the district, to a neighbouring house, which
the mob surrounded, remaining all night, but not ventur-
ing an attack. The same paper notices the plunder of the
cart of a bread contractor, by a mob of men and women,
who carried off 120 loaves, and even smashed the bread
cart. It is added—" This outrage is altogether inexcu-
sable, the perpetrators or it having just risen from a most
abundant meal of excellent stirabour."

A similar occurrence had taken place in Callan Union,
the perpetrators being women alone ! The Contractor
has had furnished him twice a day a military escort for
his supply.

The 'Tipperary Vindicator gives a long list of similar
offences of which the following are s few specimens :—"A
man named Thomas Hickey was committed to our gaol
yesterday, charged with appearing in arms and firing at
Thomas Lahy and Mary Lahy. at Pallasdonohal, in this
county, on the 14th instant. When arrested Hickey had
in his pocket a bank receipt for £6O. On Tlorsday night
last, as a man named John Sheppard was returning from
Fethard to his house near Cashel, he was waylaid and
beaten in such a savage manner that he is still insensible.
When discovered his pockets were turned inside out. On
the night of the 14th instant, a party of armed men enter-

ed the house of John Maher, of Frehans, near Uaber, and
robbed him of a powder flask. They took a half guinea
from his wife, and beat all the inmates, Maher himself so
dreadfully, that his life is in danger.
On Friday last, three cars laden with flour, the property
of Patrick Hayes, of Limerick, were waylaid and attacked
at Barnlough, on their way from Caber to Bansha, by
about 30 men, one of whom was armed with a sword, and
the remainder with spades and shovels, who forcibly car-
ried away eight sacks, containing one ton of flc;ur. On
.Friday last, as two carmen were on their way from Chan-
mel to Dundrum with two loads of Indian meal, the pro-
perty of the relief committee of Dundrum, they were
waylaid and attacked at Dangan by a party of ten fel-
lows, four of whom were armed with guns and pis'ols,
they forcibly carried off six bags of the meal. Two of the
party were subsequently arrested and identified by the
carmen. On Saturday night last a farmer named Doyle,
who had just returned from America, was robbed of Xl7O
in this town." _ _

In this desperate state of things, the mania for the
possession of fire-arms continues. With respect to the
class of persons amongst whom it prevails, the Limerick
Chronicle contains the following correction of a very
general delusion :—" It has been asserted, with some
show of truth, that this ` popular armament' is confined
exclusively to the gentry and the more substantial
farmers ; such, however, is far from being the fact. It
will be admitted that none but the poorest class of the
labourers leave this country in order to procure work at
the other side of the channel ; and it has been observed
in Dublin, which is the leading port of debarcation, that
some of the money earned in England has been spei.t
there in the purchase of tie-arms. Among a gang of
men lending at the quays, a gun slung over the shoulder
of a half-clothed peasant is not altogether a novelty even
here."

A reference to any of the cheap gunsmiths upon some
of our northern deck quays, would at once tell us what
is the class of passengers to Ireland who are gun buyers.
What, however, is to be the upshot of all this? We
are doing what we can to feed those in Ireland aho can
work. We shall shortly have to adopt some steps for the
relief of those who cannot work, and who are dying of
famine in their cabins or on the highways. What are we
to do with those who will not work, but prefer to lice by
robbery and murder? There are, apparently, no trifling
number of the peasantry who are thus disposed ; and,
doubtless, the government must endeavour to protect the
well affected, for whom they are devising most expensive
measures of relief, from the exactions and barbarism of
the disaffected.