The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1889-04-27

few seasons Of this invariably kills She
gatherer. The stores of weed are
dragged ashore, the weight and labor in
securing any important quantity being
almost inconceivable, and thatched
with potato stalks. They are then
dried in the sun for several weeks. In
the autumn the dried weed is burned to
ashes in rude ovens built on the shore,
the ashes fusing into solid substance.
This. the kelp proper, is broken into
fragments before being sent to market.
Now reflect a moment on the amount OF
labor and time rec uired to secure few
shillings to keep the novels above these
peoples heads. A months labor by
one able bodied person is sufficient to
secure one ton OF dried seaWeed.
Twenty-fouc tons are necessary to pro-
duce one tor Of kelp III former times
fifty dollars per ton was paid for this.
Today they do not receive the average
price of ten dollars. There is bu5 one
buyer here. He pays what ne pleases,
often securing their store, III their bit
ter extremities, at ten shillings per ton.
There is no recourse The starving
slaves are helpless.
So, too, it is revolving satire to call
the proddings at the island rocks. agri-
culture. There is not enough original
soil on the entire three islands TO make
an average American farIn. 10 be sure
on the bleak crags within the little pad
docks are what they call Fields" and
FARMS" a quarter, haf ana even
three-fourths OF an acre. where the rocks
are covered. For ten centuries the
islanders nave dug up tho mud in
pockety holloWs of the shore, and have
gathered all manner OF slime, ooze,
putin guano and seaWeeds and carried
them on their backs and hands in 0sler
crenIs. sometimes miles to their tiny
holdings, thickening and 1nuIching this
emade" soil until ten inches Of it may
be found between the ledges and the
sky. In this potatoes are planted. 1t
the season is wet, few scraWny pOreens
are ripsned. If dry, not so much as
seed is gathered, for the sun burns the
soil to fiery clay to the limestone be-
meath. Then not individual, but uni
versal, famine follows,
There are altogether thirteen strag-
Cling villages On the islands. Perhaps
200 people exist in the largest, the port
hamlet of Killarney. on the north shore
of Arranmore. This lis a long. strag-
Cling, hovel-bordered street, with low
stone cabins with rotten thatches, and
not a half dozen babitable for civilized
people. ODe is the inn, a dreary cot
tage, cleaner, but not larger, than a
wellnlade pig -sty; a miserable general
store OF two, a traders house, and one
or two priests dwellings,, the latter bare
and stricken with tbeuntellable poverty
OF the islands. for this is the one place
on earth where no comfort can be found
possessed by individual. or class. Every
other hamlet is immeasuraDly WoTse.
Some cluster like skeleton houses upon
the crags. Others cling to rock ledges
like dry and rotting fungi. Others
shrink at the bases Of duns and raths.
Still others are built Of, within and
around ruins Of the SURPRISING ecclesi-
astical antiquities Ct these once Islands
of the Blest," revolving burrows OF
human beings crouching within the
shadows OF ancient glories; not a home
among them all she!tering as the rude
beehive cells, still traceable here, in
which hudd|ed the skin-clad hermits OF
2, 900 years ago.
When the full consciousness Of the
circumstances in which these people
exist dawns on one, there is natural
desire to study the results on lines OF
home and ethical life. Neither exists.
Centuries of breeding and in breeding
through a poverty sO extreme and say.
age that the limit of human endurance
is AR endless, not an exceptional, ex
perience. leave chronological conditions
as astounding as pitiable and sickenlng
for contemplation Perhaps in winter
there is more of this awful struggle be-
tween life and utter want than in sum"
me1. But it is forever here. I have
visited more than 800 novels on the
islands. A picture of one is picture OF
them ALA low stone shed of one little
room, with a rotting thatched roof
above; a damp, cold, earthe,, of stone
floor; black. tumbledown, tireless
chimney; a pot or kettle or two, two or
three wooden dishes, a stove, bench Or
stone seat, bunks Of stone Or sticks, Or
upon the earth itself, with sacks OF
potato stalks for bedding; and miser-
able, miserable men, women and chill
dren crowding and budding together
in these black earth-hells for the little
comfort of each others bloodless bodily
warmth. They cannot all be this way,
you insist. No, not quite all. Bat the
difference between the hundred or so
who are able this season to just live,
who, next season may be on the other
side Of the dark line of hunger and tor
iure, and those who are now fighting
the grim battle, is vague and little IN.
deed. Here is an old man, with a tot
tering old crone, in q fireless, foodless
cabin He is not dying from old age.
but from cold and hunger. tits too late
to feed and warm him now. Here a
young man is dying. Three years III
the cold waters gathering seaweed from
the rocks have put his llfe-ires out.
Here are children dying, fading, wasting
away. They have never, even at their
mothers breasts, known enough food.
Here is mother dying, with four
skinny children wailing in the rags be.
side her. Where are the older, stronger
ones, the husband and youths2 Some
have gone to America, some to God.
You put fire and food within the place.
but the skeleton among the rags is too
far within the shadows to know 1t. You
can only hear with each feeble breath:
"Crosb orrin!-My pastchee boght! my
pastchee boeht!" NAV the cross encom-
pass me!--My poor childreD!--mv poor
chlldrenD There Is superstiti n here
that the bodies of all those buried in the
Arran Islands never decay. No wonder.
There is no substance left. Is there
help for this misery and wretchedness?