The republic. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1849-1853, 1851-05-28

Irish feat, which Hogarth has immortalized IN
one of his election caricatures, of man saw
ing off the limb of tree which he is sit
ting, and so precipitating himself to the ground
Ireland has long supplied England with har-
vest laborers; but now it is said that the Irish
farmers are beginning to be alarmed lest they
should have to send across thechannel for help
to get in their own harvests. We have lately
seen a statement in an English journal that a
benevolent Irish landlord, wishing to inform
himself of the actual hardships and inconve-
niences that the emgrants had to endure in their
passage across the Atlantic, disguised himself
as common laborer, and took passage in the
New York packet-ship Washington, on her last
voyage from Liverpool. This ship is the largest
merchant vessel in the world, and her live
cargo on this voyage exceeded a thousand per-
sons. Among such great number Of persons,
and at stormy season of the year, the chances
accustomed to roughing his way through the
world, were not very promising; and 1t ap-
pears that the benevolent experimenter received
such rough treatment that he has published an
account of his sufferings, with the hope of de-
terring his countrymen from embarking in our
ships. 1t would have been better, we think,
for him to have commenced his emigrating ex-
pertinent at the commencement of an emf
grants career, when he might have found the
steerage of packet-ship more endurabe. We
suspect that to the majority Of emigrants the
worst accommodations on shipboard are an i'm
provement upon what they have been accus-
toned to. A letter from Cork, giving an &C
count of the emigrants that embark from that
port, says:
| 81 can you that it is not exaggerating the
abject misery Of these mscalled lodging houses
for emigrants.' 1t ia unusual thing to thrust
from twenty to forty persons, of all ages and both
sexes, into rooms not moro than four yards by
| five six yards square, with no other accommo-
dation than mass OF filthy straw, placed around
the room, upon which the weary traveller ia cx-
pectod to find repose. In the event of his being
provided by the proprietor with some sort of COW
ering, he is charged three pence night; should
they bring their own bed clothes they pay two
pence; and those who content to sleep on the
straw, without divesting themselves Of their rags,
| pay one penny. For standng-room, where they
| may breakfast or dine-for it cannot be called
| accommodation-the charges are pretty much on
the scale. On tho whole, it il fortunate that
the great business Of emigration is generally
before the sstting-in of the warm weather, other
wise these lodging houses, from their overcrowded
state as well as from the accumulated amount of
filth in them, would become perfect nuisances,
and dangerous to the health of the community"
| Once on board Of an American ship the pro-
gress of the emigrant is constantly marked by
| Improvement; if he escapes shipwreck and ship
| fever, his career, in nine cases out of ten, is
| one of cheerful prosperity. Among the phe-
nomena of Irish emigration there is nothing
more surprising than the total change which
| the emigrant appears to undergo after landing
| upon our shores. The reckless, rolicking, i'm
| provident "broth ola boy" at once becomes an
industrious, pains-taking, law-abiding, and
thrifty citizen. The idler who had been bred
to no trade, educated for no good, and deemed
an incumbrance upon the soil where he was
born, suddenly becomes possessed Of talent
for adapting himself to any occupation which
may be awaiting him on landing in a new
world. He carries hod, digs canals, or waits
on table, just as it happens. Being qualified
for nothing in particular, he has no prejudices
nor old habits to overcome, but engages him
self to the first person who offers him employ
ment, with an audacity that carries conviction
of his fitness. To this country Ireland has
been source Of wealth of ten times the value
of California; without the raw material of labor
which she has furnished us our resources
could never have been developed to the extent
they have been, and some of the most valuable
and ilustrious of our citizens owe their exist
ence to humble emigrants, who sought in this
country the homes which were denied them in
| the land of their birth.
| One Of the strange phases of the Irish Ameri-
can character is the sensitive pride which every
son of Erin has in the land Of his birth. One
would suppose that the hardships Of one kind
| and another which drive an Irishman from his
| home would blunt the love of country that is a
common instinct with all men. But the reverse
is the fact and no people are so ready to fight
for their native land, or SO quickly take fire at
any shadow of insult upon their national char
acter, as these children of soil that denies
them support and shelter.
| The future of Ireland is dark mystery, its
past history is an enigma, and its present con-
dition puzzle. There is one thing, however,
certain, and that is, that the present rate
Of emigration cannot continue much longer.
Although the people are the most prolific in the
world, while the ratio Of depopulation is two
| millions year, the time must very soon arrive
when emigration must exhaust itself, and new
people will take possession Of the "first flower
of the earth and first gem of the sea-
Other parts of Europe are yearly sending US
vast and valuable additions to our population;
but in Ireland alone has the progress of emf
grafton been so great as to show a tendency to
depopulaton. The population of England,
Scotland, and Wales, even in those districts
which have sent out the greatest number Of
entrants has not decreased during the past