The Irish standard., 1905-01-21


stalks abroad in county Mayo and
county Galway, and other counties in
the west of Ireland, where recently
made a tour of Investigation Of condi-
tions among the poor people Of the
tenant class, says ellison Willets in
Leslie's Weekly. The potato crop this
year proved failure; the potatoes
rotted in the ground and were not even
worth digging up. Add starvation to
the pitiable conditions of the wretched
cotters-c conditions described in this
article-and the total of distress is ap-
palling to contemplate. Even consery-
ative Irish leaders like John Dillon,
Michael Davitt and John O'Donnel
have made public statements declaring
that the famine in Ireland is real, not
simulated, and that without adequate
and speedy relief there is nothing for
my people but DEATH"
In short, the past season was the
worst the people of the counties men-
plague year of 1879.
My recent journey was one Of a
week through darkest Ireland-the
poorest, unhappiest country in the
whole world. AS my trip throughout
was far from the beaten, Travelled
paths, mostly in carts, saw and
heard those things which tourists miss.
The names of most of the places I
visited are carefully kept out Of
guidebooks by the railroads, which de-
pend for their right of way upon par
liament in London whose members
simply will not visit Ireland and see
for themselves the conditions there.
No investigator could be anything but
Mortified by the awful scenes have
witnessed-scenes of utmost poverty
and suffering, of oppression and desc
lation. Neither the people of Finland
nor of Poland, oppressed as they are
by the Russian government, are as
sorely distressed as the Irish people
in places 1 have been-only nights
Journey from the seat of government
of these poor peoples enlightened"
but blindfolded "conquerors.
ireland is the only country on earth
that shows steady decrease of popu-
lation all during the last half century.
Ireland has two million less inhabi-
-tants than it had SO years ago. Ire
land has half million less inhabitants
than it had ten years ago. Ireland,
as big as Maine or Indiana, had a
population at one time equal to that
of New York state; today this beautiful
island has only as many people as Mis-
souri,. At the present rate Of diminu
tion of families in Ireland the island
will be depopulated inside Of ten years.
The people who thus made these facts
abandoned the isle of their birth, emf
grated to other countries, because
they could not get food or work, Or
even a roof, save that of the poor
house. And the vast majority Of these
people and their offspring are in the
United States of America. The result
IS that the biggest Irish city in the
world is New York. That city has
an Irish population exceeding that Of
the two biggest cities in Ireland
Dublin and Belfast-taken together,
namely, 725,OOO. And the total num-
ber of Irish people in the United
States 100000 exceeds by 100000
the total number of Irish people in all
Ireland. And the reason for this 1 can
only suggest by telling exactly what
happened while I was looking and lis
tending in the land from which came
the Irish in America.
The deplorable condition of the Irish
poor was long a phenomenon which
neither statesman nor philosopher
could explain. The average American
today supposes that that deplorable
condition no longer exists. Mistake!
Rags and filth still exist, and human
beings live together in stencil and
smoke-in the out-of-the-way places in
Ireland which l visited. do not assert
that all Ireland lives thus; simply
state that dreadful conditions prevail