into the STATE OF THE POORER CLASSES IN IRELAND.
253 Appendix (A.)
who are considered to have a claim for support, are a parent, brother, or brother's child, and their support thus becoming a burthen rarely leads to any ill feeling.
Those a°-ed persons who have no relatives to support them are mostly supported by their neighbours, who will often stint themselves in order to relieve them.
They feel a strong sense of duty to do so ; they think that the potatoes they have are God's, and that when one of his creatures is in distress, he has as good a right to a share of them as themselves.
There are a few instances of their receiving pecuniary assistance from relatives who have emigrated to America, but these are very rare.
Witness gives one instance of an old woman who receives 3/.
every Christmas from her
Impotent through Age.
Mumter, County Cork.
son In most instances, they who go about collecting alms are more comfortably off than those who are ashamed to beg, and go to live with their poor relatives.
There are no instances of the aged or infirm being regularly supported by the gentry, or by money collected at the chapel.
There is one almshouse for protestants, containing at present 16, where 1 s.
a week is given, in addition to lodging.
Masons, carpenters and fishermen (which last denomination earn about 8 s.
a week) might provide against the wants of age, but labourers could not do so, nor could fishermen in most cases lay by enough.
The general opinion is in favour of poor-laws, to the extent of providing for the aged and infirm; but most people are afraid that a commencement made in that way would end as the English poor-law.
Examinations taken by Thomas Martin, Esq.
John Lulor, Esq.
Parish St.
Multozc.
Town of Ki7isale.
Bar.
Kinsale.
Perso7is who attended the Exa7ni7iatio7i.
•William Coneney, shoemaker and publican.—Mr.
William Connell, farmer—Rev.
John Roger-
p .
, T .
, .
son Cotter, rector.—Daniel
Crowley, labourer.—Edward
Farmer, grocer, and clerk to „ „
• t ^ t »r,r.
, , x ,, „
Bar-Covrceys.
petty sessions.—James
Cibbons, esq.—John
M'Kennedy, labourer—Jonas Maurice Sealy, esq.,
j.
p.—Dr.
Samuel Wood, dispensary surgeon.
There are not many aged persons in the parish, considering the population; generally speaking, it happens that from a want of accommodation, as of firing and bed-clothes, from damp cabins and insufficient food, labouring people do not live to be old.
Most of those who.live
to be aged are supported by begging, or by charity given without begging; many of course are supported by their relatives, but none by the gentry; their chief support is among their neighbours.
The age at which they become unable to work is about 70, but some work even after that age.
Michael Coveney says,
" I am over 80, and 1 would work a little still if I got it to do."
It becomes a matter of duty with the children to support the old people, and as far as their means permit, they perform the duty.
Children often stint themselves to give a little to the father and mother.
Coveney says,
" My son is a labouring man; he has six children of his own to support, and his wife and myself; and he supports two orphans of one of his brothers besides : he has 11 in family, and very hard it is for him to put a bit in their mouth."
Mr.
Cotter bore testimony to the truth of Coveney's statement.
It often happens, he further observed, that the relatives are not able to support themselves, and then every mem¬ ber of the family is obliged to do with an insufficient quantity of food.
The scanty wages of the labourer are often not enough to support his family, and of course the support of his aged relatives must press heavily on him; yet, though they sometimes speak of the pressure of this burthen, they bear it willingly enough.
There is in this neighbourhood a woman who had been turned out of doors by her son, and the whole parish is crying out against •him as an unnatural villain.
Those who live by charity without begging are assisted now and then with food by their poor neighbours.
Several have friends in the colonies or in England, from whom they have received remittances.
Mr.
Gibbon states, "Many remittances have passed through my hands.
One case occurs to me.
A.
poor man has two daughters in England, who send him through my hands 2/01-3 /.
in the year.
Sometimes the husbands send money to the wives from England.
A poor woman lives just near me, to whom her husband sent 1 Z.
within the last three weeks."
Some few go about among the neighbours with wallets, collecting food, but most of them go off where they are not known, as there is a strong disinclination to begging.
The support given to the poor by the gentry does not amount to "
a fraction," except for the dispensary, and one-half of the landed proprietors do not even subscribe to this.
There are indeed extremely few resident gentry.
It would be impossible for a labourer to lay up * in youth for the wants of age.
And on the subject of a legal provision, Mr.
Cotter states, " The landlords would be quite against anything in the shape of a poor-law; but the farmers would be glad enough of it, if the funds were not to come entirely out of their pockets.
In that case it would be a great relief to them.
The relief of beggars is at present a very heavy tax.
I have heard the farmers, as well as people of the labouring classes, often contrasting this country with England, and saying, what a noble thing it was that no person there was in want, of a meal."
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