The voice of freedom. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1839-1848, 1847-04-08
BRANDON, Thursday, April 8, 1047.

man, extended on one SIDE OF the nreplace.-
: On the other an old man was lying on som
straw, so far gone as to be unable to articulat
distinctly. He might have been ninety, o
fifty years of age 1t was difficult to deter
mine; for this wasting consumption of wan
brings out the EXTREMIST induces of old age il
the features of even the young. But Their
was another apparition which sickened al
the flesh and blood of my nature. 1t ha
haunted me during the past night like Ban
quos ghost. l have lain awake for hours
struggling for some graphic and truthful sim
lies or new elements Of description, by which
L might convey to the distant reader some
tangible image of this object A dropsical af
lection among the young and old isvery com
mon to all the sufferers by famine. | had
seen men at work on the public roads with
their limbs swollen almost to twice their lis.
ual size. But when the woman of this cabin
lifted from behind the dying man, a boy about
twelve years of age, and held him up before
us upon his the most horrifying spectacle
met our eyes. The cold, watery-taced child
was entirely naked in front from his neck
down to his feet. His body was swollen to
nearly three times its usual size, and had
burst the ragged garment that covered him,
and which now dangled in shreds behind him.
The woman of the other family, who was sit
ting at her end of the howell, brought forward
her little infant, thin-faced baby of two
years, with clear sharp eyes, that did not
wink, but stared stock still at vacancy, as if a
glimpse Of another existence had eclpsed its
vision. Its cold, naked arms were not much
larger than pipe stems, while its body was
swollen to the size of full grown person.
Let the reader group these apparations Of
death and disease into the spectacle Of ten
feet square, and then multiply it into three
fourths of the novels in this region of Ireland J;
and he will arrive at fair estimate of the ex-
tent and degree Of its misery. Were it not
for giving them pain, should have been glad
if the well-dressed children in America could
have entered these novels with us, and look
ed upon the young creatures wasting away
unmurmuringly, by slow, consuming destitu-
ton. | am sure they would have been touch
ed to the liveliest compassion at the spectacle
and have been ready to divide their wardrobe
with the sufferers.
SEib5ereen Feb. %. II DR. Hadden
called to take me to Castlehavcn parish, which
comes within his circuit This district Dor
ders upon the sea, whose rocky indented shores
are covered with cabins of worse descrip-
ton than those at Skibbereen. On our way
we passed several companies of men, women
and children at work, all enfeebled and ema-
ciated by restitution. Women, with their
red, swollen feet, partially swathed in old rags,
some in mems coats, with the arms or skirts
torn off, were sitting by the roadside breaking
stones. 1t was painful to see human labor and
life struggling among the lowest interests Of
Io1,o
trying to exc out a few miserable days to their
existence by toiling upon these works Poor
creatures Many of them are already FAM
they have reached a point from
which they cannot be recovered. DIR Dono-
van informs me that he can tell at glance
whether person has reached this point or
not. And | am assured by several expert
enced observers that there are thousands of
men who rise in the morning and 90 forth to
abor with their picks and shovels in their
hands, who are irrecoverably doomed to
Heath. No human aid can save them. The
plague spot of famine is on their foreheads
The worm of want has eaten in two their heart
strings. Still they 90 forth accomplishing to
heir labor and toll, cold, lamished, and half
naked, upon the roads; and divide their eight
1r ten pence worth of food at night among a
sick family of five or eight persons. Some are
Kept at home, and prevented from earning
his misery pittance, by the fear, that some Of
heir family may die before they return.
The first habitatlon we entered in the Cas-
5lehaven district was literally hole in the
wall, occupied by what might be termed in
America, a squatter, or a man who had bur-
rowcd a place for himself and family in the
acute angle of two dilapidated walls by the
roadside, where he lived rent free. We ell
cred this stinted den by an aperture about
,hree feet high,a and found one or two children
ying asleep,with their eyes open,in the straw
Such, at least, was their appearance, for they
scarcely winked while we were before them.
The father came in, and told us pitiful sto-
y Of want, saying that not morsel Of food
lad they tasted for twenty-four hours. He
lighted wisp of straw, and showed us one or
wo more children lying in another nook of
he cave. Their mother had died, and he
vas obliged to leave them alone during most
If the day in order to get something for their
subsistence. We were soon among the most
yretched habitations that l had yet seen; far
worse than those in Skibbereen. Many of
hem were hat-roofed novels, half buried in
he earth, or built up against the rocks, and
covered with rotten straw, sea weed or turf.
n one which was scarcely seven feet square,
We found five persons PROSTATE with the fe-
,or, and apparently near their end. A girl
bout sixteen, the very picture Of despair, was
he only one left who could administer any re-
ief; and all she could do was to bring water
n a broken pitcher to quench their thirst
As we proceeded up the rocky hill overlook
NC the scene, we encountered new sights of
Seeing a cabin standing some
What by itself in hollow, and surrounded by
moat of green filth, we entered itwith some
difficulty, and found single child about three
ears old lying upon kind of shelf, with its
title face resting upon the edge of the board,
md looking out at the door as if for its moth
r. 1t never moved its eyes as we entered,
,ut kept them fixed toward the door. 1t is
doubtful whether the poor thing had moth
n or father left to her. but it is more doubt
i L IL. Al,