The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1883-04-26
The Irish PeasantrY.

There are about 500 families, on
rough calculation, depending on the
daily earnings of agricultural labor in
one small county. Six shillings week
for half the year, and shillings week
for the other half, is generally the rate
OF wage. When men are not kept in
regular and constant work the average
pay would be about shillings week
for about nine months out of the
twelve, and it commonly happens that
they are unable to get work during the
other three months. Out of this sum
the laborer has, of course, to keep him.
self and his family He often has to pay
from so shillings to e2 year for his
little cabin, aud perhaps a miserable
patch of ground around il, on which he
painfully toils-when he is lucky enough
to have ito grow potatoes. In many
cases a man pays as much as "a a year
for his cabin. In considerable num-
Der of instances the laborer who is not
III constant employment engages to give
q days work in each week as the rent
of his house. The farmer who has lei
him his hut does not, perhaps, want his
labor during q considerable part of the
time and at harvest, when wages are at
their highest The laborer has to turn
out then and give his work without
reference TO the increased rate of wages,
and thus has virtually to pay genuine
raci1-rent for his miserable homestead.
\ very miserable place it truly is. Any
body who has been in Ireland at all
must have some knowledge of the out
side of laborer's cabin. 1t is small
lop-sized wigwam, built of stones and
mud, with a thatched roof, and with
three holes left in the front wall to act
the part of door and windows. The
traveller who stops to look into one of
these hutS seems at first to see nothing
but darkness visible. When his eyes get
used to the lack of light he sees hovef
almost absolutely devoid of furniture,
and very often consisting of only one
room for the family, however numerous,
to live in. The mud villages in which
the fellaheen of Egypt live contain few
novels so hopelessly grim I'd comfort
less as those that may be seen in many
parts of Ireland. and the Egyptian peas
ant has q climate around him which al
lows him, if he chooses, to pass his
NAoAC LiAI III tilC CpcEi Wulit III lIt-
lana the rain comes down often for davs
and days together without stint. On
wet nights the drenching showers soak
through the ill-thatched roof and come
dripping down on the beds of the
sleepers. | used the word bed in or
der to convey the idea of a place where
the inmates sleep rather than that of any
article of furniture constructed for the
purpose of being slept on. In many
eases the bed and bedding consist only
Of straw and some old sacks that once
held Indian meal or guano. A cabin
with Il second room in it is a somewhat
exceptional possession with the Irish la
borer of the poorest class. The food of
the laborer consists principally of pota-
toes, or else Indian meal mixed with
flour and soda. Tea of the thinnest and
poorest kind, Oftener without milk than
with it, is the enjoyment of the laborer
am his family. 1t is the drink they
would have at I'll times if they could
only get It, | suppose there still are
persons in this country who think of the
Irish agricultural laborer as a man going
about perpetually with bottle of whis-
Ky in his hand, and ready at every oppor-
tuiiitf W lilt INC illyutu III lie DOIUI6 10
his lips. 1 wonder whether such persons
have ever considered what the price of
a bottle OF whisky-would be, and how
many such bottles the Irish peasant
could treat himself to in the course of a
year out of the surplus of his wages.
The truth is that the laborer of this class
very seldom driuks spirits or porter un-
less when somebody better off than him.
self Is generous enough TO stand him
treat Nor can he easily keep himself
warm by less dangerous means than the
swallowing OF strong drinks. For more
than half the year in some places he finds
1t very hard 10 get fuel for his poor little
household fire. ana is often dependent on
the brushwood or the rotten sticks which
his wife and his daughter may gather
from theroadsileor or the bitches. Justin
Mccarthy, in LongmGq's Magazine.