The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-12-27
THE POVERTY OF IRELAND
DISTRESS AND DESTITUTION IN THE
WESTERN PART OF THE ISLAND.
An UncOIOred Picture from the Graph
ic Pen of a staff Correspondent
of an English journal.
London Daily Mail.

/
frage, and, consequently as the arbiter OF
the political fate of Ireland.
He knows nothing of the fact that in
Mayo, Glare, Galway and Donegal there are
thousands upon thousands of little cottars
whose life is a perpetual struggle for food;
| whose daily meals, when more than one is
| possible, is the potato; and who, in years
| like the present, when the crop fails, are
| compelled to exist upon the diseased tuber
| alone, and on a reduced allowance of that.
If the terrible condition of our fellow
men in the west of Ireland were understood
| in this country that generous sympathy
which is always extended to the poor and
| the suffering would speedily find its way
| into the little cabins of Connemara and
| Kilcommon, and the Irish themselves would
| speedily be led to recognize the true ma
| ture of the English character.
We subscribe our tens of thousands to
| every noble cause under the sun, never
| staying our hands until we have inquired as
| to the race, the religion or the character OF
| those whom we would assist, and so 1t
| should be, / think, with the poor stricken
/ cottar He is member of the great British
community although his eyes are cast
| across the sea from whence he receives the
contributions which enable him to pay his
| rent or to provide his family with clothes
for the emigrant shares his savings with
| those he has left behind-and such some
| thing should be done to provide for him a
| respectable existence and position which
should make future seasons of famine and
| distress impossible.
| have recently passed some weeks in Ire
| land, and, as regards one of the most seri-
ously afflicted counties, l am in q position
1 to xxyI,u he IL To
| who picture the west of Ireland as they
know England. with its warm hedgerows
| and shady lanes, it's well-wooded valleys
and crested hills dts noble halls and pic
| turesque parks, its cosy farm houses and
well-built cottages. with their little front
| gardens, the real thing is a revelation-as
| bleak as the Alps without their grandeur,
as exposed as Manitoba without its luxuri-
| ant soil.
| Western Mayo covers more than a thou
| sand square miles of bog-cruSted moors;
| treeless, weird, and inhospitable, without
| farmhouse, as we understand the word,
| a possible home, if we except the hum
| BILE abodes of the priests and parsons. 1t
is a lone land. without hosiery or village,
| unless the wretched little collections of huts
| can be designated by so dignfied a word /;
| but It is here that the cottar has settled,
| twenty, thirty, forty mlies-for found MN MN
/ at all these distances-from a railway, and
| nearly half as far from a shop
WHY THEY ARE THERE.
| Let us first inquire how he came to settle
upon this dreary wilderness. The moors
| are practically valueless, and in early days,
| utilizing the loose stone which is here and
| there so abundant, these people, without
mortar or even mud, built a four-walleG
hut. sometimes of two apartments, at others
| or only one. They ignored chimneys ana
| windows, as many do to-day. Their little
| howell. for it is nothing better-supplied
| them with shelter, while the dried turf of
| the boys provided fuel and it is possible
| that the few necessaries of life were OBJ
tanned through the medium of some form
| IF labor. AS they cleared a piece of bog.
/ they planted the potato, practically the only
! crop to which it first responds.
The necessity for draining then APP
| parent, and the lazy bed system, with deep
/ bitches between. was initiated. The potato
| was followed by the oat, which is still the
| alternate plant, and more bog was cleared
| and drained for the potato; and so it went
| on until the cottars little farm reached
| from three to four acres, in some cases
| more.
| I visited one union in which there are
| 1853 holdings of land. and a population of
| only 50000-while of this number 5000 We're
| under &2 valuation, and 5592 under "a. 1t
| will be asked Do these people obtain a
| livelihood upon a plot of land valued at only
| G2 to ga per annum? No, but they make
| the attempt, with the result that they only
| exist, the mans earnings during harvest
| paying the rent in good year and the shop
| Ike per or the money lender what is owing.
| But TO continue. AS the young men grew
| to mans estate they married. cottage
| was Immediately built and lands occupied
and so immature villages, almost every
house alike, with its rotten thatch made
| of soft oat straw, and it's wretched sur
~oundingS-were constructed. So. too, the
| land question has been intensified, for the
owners OF the moOrS, ValueleSS as they
were, and for the most part are still, fixed
rents which in many cases, small as they
| are, can never be paid
1t will be asked, why do the people re-
main on the land under such conditions?"
| The answer is not an easy one to define
| but although many of the young people
which l witnessed at a final departure in
one case was as good as a wakemit Is
| labor. and to leave it is to leave all that
| the people hold most dear their home and
friends Yes, this desert land. this wretched
| village, this almost famine-sricken spot is
| their bome-they have known no other-and
| the people within it their friends. and they
hold fast to their hut and their little bit
of land with the tenacity of a drowning
man.
/ visited a parish on the extreme west
coast in which are $50 holdings, occupied
by 300 persons, and valued at &2,099-the
mere rent of a big English farm. In the
100 acres the poor-rate valuation is only
f12 290. or q little more than / shilling an
acre, houses included.
VILLAGES AND COTTAGES.
Let us now approach a village" The
parish priest, who knows every soul, and to
W1Om everything IS open SSSdIHS, Is WITH
us and we see and hear all we desire. We
leave the relief high road and pick our
way upon stones across a dirty stream, and
along the only approach, a dirty, puddly
path common to the whole people, who
barefooted use it, and are satisfied. Cabins
are dotted here and there without regular
| ity, unless it be that they are all squalid
| alike, with the manure heaps dumped near
| the only doorway There is no garden nor
semblance of a garden plant, but on two
| or three of the patches of reclaimed bog
are cabbageS or turnipS. Upon inquiry
found That carrots were unknown, and, in
deed this ignorance applies to almost all
| common garden vegetables.
We enter a cottage. There is door, but
| the doorway is the only source of light if
place is filled with smoke repulsive that
We retreat as soon as possible. but we first
look around and respond to the welcome of
the people with few sympathetic questions
The floor is of hard trodden earth; in the
center pig is feeding at the trough. with a
| dog for company at one end there is a
little half-bred shaggy donkey, which carries
the manure to the SOIL the potatoes from it.
and the corn TO market so far away. a bag
at time. By his side is a half-sized, half
starved hefer and here and there a fowl
or duck-both species, like the cattle, dwarfs
in stature
The man is at work digging potatoes.
which, as we subsequently find. are all under
sized, diseased and unfit for human food.
But there is nothing else-the cupboard is
absolutely bare. The wife is near the fire
her two of whom cling to her scanty skirts
of the strange visitor I