The San Francisco call., 1897-12-12


poor; the poor law guardian of the labor
ers whom he can put on the relief fund,
and so save his own labor bill.
All this is not new; it is far older than
the Duchess famine. Read any sober
account of the terrible famine of 1916,
and you will see that the vast sums spent
upon relief wages and for Improbable
public works utterly demoraliZed the
whole country. All the ordinary labor
on the small farms was suspended; all
notion of helping themselves and their
land by greater efforts was abandoned.
All the poor settled down in the full ex-
pectation that Government wages were
to replace private earnings.
But in addition to these people who
gain either direct profit or the pleasure of
idleness out of a famine there are the
classes who make public capital out of
it; the politicians and the priests, who
not only are, but desire to pose as the
true exponents of every Irish griev-
ance. Such were most of the Irish
Members of Parliament who signed
a petition to Mr.. Balfour to have
Parliament convened for an autumn seS-
sion to devise means for combating the
famine which could not possibly have
existed at that moment, but was in pros
pect if the weather continued wet | sim
cerely hope that none of them felt disap-
pointed when the weather turned dry
and they found that their agitation was
collapsing for want of facts to support it.
At this time all demands for such ses-
sion are not only silenced, but no one
thinks of reproaching the Government
for refusing the autumn session.
The public speeches of one priest show
the same hurry to publish and to exag-
gerate the distress. He spoke not
only of this years total failure of the
crop, but of the partial failure of last
year-a pure invention! for the crop of
last year was exceptionally fine. An
other said the crop of potatoes was so
bad that the farmers would not take the
trouble to dig it; they would ploW it up!
The good man seems not TO have re-
feoted that the real poor of Ireland do
not possess horses and ploWs, that those
who have do not live on potatoes, and
that in any case all large fields of pota-
toes are gathered by blowing them up
and not by digging. Was there ever
wilder or a more absurd statement?
And yet this was a man living in the
County Clare, who ought to have had
some elementary knowledge of Irish
farming.
The fact is that all the various classes
named being on the lookout for a famine
you may expect every August if there
are some Wet days to hear the alarm of
famine raised in the expectation that it
may take hold Of the English people and
SO " bring money into the country" And
if you charge these famine-mongerS with
eXaggeration many of them will defend
themselves by telling you that the people
are always very poor; that England
owes them vast sums of money and
reparaton for past Wrongs-in fact that
it is right to obtain relief by any means
whatever. This is the dishonest side of
the matter and one which am bound to put
before your readers, who are naturally
led by the statements of the Irish National
ist papers. 1t is all the more important
to do so because famine -mongering can
not but be detected in the long run and
will so ALLEVIATE the minds of the English
from all such appeals that real distress
will pass unheeded and those who have
cried wolf for many successive
seasons may in the end find no one to
help them when he sreally at their doors.
But is there no reality in the outcry of
this season2 Is there really no failure at
all? you ask. grieve to say there is.
The price of potatoes in the Dublin mar
ket is exceptionally high and it is hardly
possible that this dearness is the result of
a ring among the middlemen. have
trustwor thy letters from friends in the
West who tell me that the yield is about
half that of last year. There must be a
good many small districts where the
failure has been much more severe,
for a comparison of the great plenty of
last year does not alarm US if we really
can secure half that amount. But on the
other hand know districts where the
crop has been unusually prolific and
sound. And what about all the other
produce-hay, oats, green crops, etc?
These re details which shall handle in
succeeding letters.