I am leaving Scotland without having seen half enough of it. My chief reasons are a determination to run over a good part of Ireland and an engagement to leave Europe in my favorite ship Baltic next week; but, besides these, this continual prevalence of fog, mist, cloud, drizzle and rain diminish my regret that I am unable to visit the Highlands. My friends who, having a day's start of me, went up the Forth from Edinburgh to Stirling, thence visiting Lochs Lomond and Katrine, thence proceeding by boat to Glasgow, were unable to see aught of the mountains but their bases, their heads being shrouded in vapor; and, being landed from a steamboat at the head of Lake navigation on Loch Lomond, found five miles of land-carriage between them and a comfortable shelter, and only vehicles enough to take the women and part of the men; the rest being obliged to make the distance on foot in a drenching rain, with night just at hand. Such adventures as this,—and they are common in this region,—console me for my disappointment in not having been able to see the Heather in its mountain home. The Gorse, the Broom, the Whins, not to speak of the Scottish Thistle, have been often visible by the roadside, and the prevalence of evergreens attests the influence of a colder clime than that of England; indeed, the backwardness of all the crops argues a difference of at least a fortnight in climate between Edinburgh and London. Wheat has hardly filled yet in the Scottish Lowlands; Oats are barely headed; and the Grass is little more than half cut and not half dried into Hay; on the contrary, it now looks as if it must winter on the ground or be taken in thoroughly water-soaked. Being so much later, the crops are far less blown down here than they are in England; but neither Grass nor Grain is generally heavy, while Potatoes and Turnips, though backward, looked remarkably vigorous and promising. Beautifully farmed is all this Lowland country, well fenced, clear of weeds, and evidently in the hands of intelligent, industrious, scientific cultivators. Wood is quite plentiful, Oak especially, though shade-trees are not so frequent in cultivated fields as in England; but rough, rocky, precipitous spots are quite common here, though in the Lowlands, and these are wisely devoted to growing timber. Belgium is more genial and more fertile, but I have rarely seen a tract of country better farmed than that stretching westward from Edinburgh to Glasgow (48 miles) and thence down the Clyde to Greenock, some 22 miles further. The farmers in our Mohawk Valley ought to pass through this gloomy, chilly, misty country, and be shamed into a better improvement of their rare but misused advantages.

Traveling is useful in that it gives us a more vivid idea of the immense amount of knowledge we yet lack. I supposed till to-day that, by virtue of a Scotch-Irish ancestry (in part) and a fair acquaintance with the works of Walter Scott, Burns, Hogg, &c., I knew the Lowland Scotch dialect pretty thoroughly; and yet a notice plainly posted up, "This Lot To Feu," completely bothered me. On inquiry, I learned that to feu a lot means to let or lease it for building purposes—in other words, to be built upon on a ground-rent. I suppose I learned this years ago, but had entirely forgotten it.

The Clyde, though a fair stream at Glasgow, is quite narrow for twelve to fifteen miles below that city, seeming hardly equal to the Connecticut at Hartford, or the Hudson at Waterford; but then it has a good tide, which helps the matter materially, and has at great expense been dredged out so as to be navigable for vessels of several hundred tuns. We passed a fine American packet-ship with a very wholesome looking body of Scotch emigrants, hard aground some ten miles below Glasgow, and I was informed that a large vessel, even though towed by a steamboat, is seldom able to get down into deep water upon a single tide, but is stopped half way to wait for another. This river fairly swarms with small steamboats, of which there are regular lines connecting Glasgow with Londonderry, Belfast, Dublin, Fleetwood (north-west of England), Liverpool, London, &c. We met four or five boats returning from Excursion parties crowded with the better paid artisans and laborers of Glasgow, their wives and children.

The banks of the Clyde for some miles below Glasgow are low and marshy, much of the intervale being devoted to pasturage, while a rude embankment has been interposed on either side, consisting of stones of five to fifty pounds each, intended to prevent the washing away of the banks by the ripple raised by the often-passing steamboats. The end is fairly though not cheaply subserved. As we descend, the shores become bolder; the rugged hills, at first barely visible on the right, come near and nearer the water: low rocks begin to lift their heads above the surface of the stream, while others have their innate modesty overpowered by wooden fixtures lifting their heads above the highest tides to warn the mariner of his danger. At length a gigantic cone of rock rises out of the water on the right of the channel to a height of fifty or sixty feet, resembling some vast old cathedral: this is Dumbarton Castle, with the anciently famous but now decaying town of Dumbarton lying at the head of a small bay behind it. A little lower on the left is Port Glasgow, the head of navigation for very large vessels; and three miles lower still is Greenock, quite a stirring seaport, somewhat addicted to ship-building. Here our boat, which had left Glasgow (22 miles above) at 4 P. M. held on till 8 for the train which left the same port at 7 with the mail and additional passengers; and then laid her course directly across the channel to Belfast, 138 miles from Glasgow, where she is due at 5 to-morrow morning.

GLASGOW.

Looks more American than any other city I have seen in Europe. Half of Pittsburgh spliced on to half of Philadelphia would make a city very like Glasgow. Iron is said to be made cheaper here than elsewhere in the world, the ore being alloyed with a carbonaceous substance which facilitates the process and reduces the cost of melting. Tall chimneys and black columns of smoke are abundant in the vicinity. The city is about twice the size of Edinburgh, with more than double the trade of that capital, and has risen rapidly from relative insignificance. New rows of stately houses have recently been built, and the "court end" of the city is extending rapidly toward the West. A brown or dark gray stone, as in Edinburgh, is the principal material used, and gives the city a very substantial appearance. Most of the town, being new, has wide and straight streets; in the older part, they are perverse and irrational, as old concerns are apt obstinately to be. They have an old Cathedral here (now Presbyterian) of which the citizens seem quite proud, I can't perceive why. Architecturally, it seems to me a sad waste of stone and labor. The other churches are also mainly Presbyterian, and, while making less pretensions, are far more creditable to the taste of their designers. The town is built on both sides of the Clyde, which is crossed by fine stone bridges, but seven-eighths of it lie on the north. Ancient Glasgow, embracing the narrow and crooked streets, lies nearly in the center, and is crowded with a squalid and miserable population, at least half the women and children, including mothers with children in their arms, and grandmothers, or those who might well be such, being without shoes or stockings in the cold and muddy streets. Intemperance has many votaries here, as indeed, throughout Scotland; "Dealers in Spirits," or words to that effect, being a fearfully common sign. I am afraid the good cause of Total Abstinence is making no headway here—Glasgow has a daily paper (the first in Scotland) and many weeklies, one of the best of them being a new one, "The Sentinel," which has a way of going straight to the core of public questions, and standing always on the side of thorough Reform. Success to it, and a warm good-bye to the rugged land of Song and Story—the loved home of Scott and Burns.



XL.

IRELAND—ULSTER.

DUBLIN, Thursday, July 31, 1851.

Though the night was thick, the wind was light, and we had a very good passage across the North Channel, though our boat was very middling, and I was nearly poisoned by some of my fellow-sleepers in the gentlemen's cabin insisting that every window should be closed. O to be Pope for one little week, just long enough to set half a million pulpits throughout the world to ringing the changes on the importance, the vital necessity, of pure, fresh air! The darkness, or rather the general misapprehension, which prevails on this subject, is a frightful source of disease and misery. Nine-tenths of mankind have such a dread of "a draught" or current of air that they will shut themselves up, forty together, in a close room, car or cabin, and there poison each other with the exhalations of their mutual lungs, until disease and often death are the consequences. Why won't they study and learn that a "draught" of pure air will injure only those who by draughts of Alcoholic poison or some other evil habit or glaring violation of the laws of life, have rendered themselves morbidly susceptible, and that even a cold is better than the noxiousness of air, already exhausted of its oxygen by inhalation? Nothing physical is so sorely needed by the great majority as a realizing sense of the blessedness, the indispensable necessity of pure, fresh air.

We landed at Belfast at 5 this morning under a pouring rain, which slacked off two hours later, but the skies are still clouded, as they have been since Tuesday of last week, and there has been some sprinkling through the day.

Of course the Crops are suffering badly. Flax is a great staple of the North of Ireland, and three fourths of it is beaten flat to the earth. Wheat is injured and poor, though not so generally prostrate; Oats look feeble, and as if half drowned; some of these are, and considerable Barley is thrown down; Grass is light, much of it uncut, and much that is cut has lain under the stormy or cloudy skies through the last week and looks badly; only the Potatoes look strong and thrifty, and promise an ample yield. I shall be agreeably disappointed if Ireland realizes a fair average harvest this year.

Belfast is a busy, growing town, the emporium of the Linen Manufacture, and the capital of the Province of Ulster, the Northern quarter of Ireland. It seems prosperous, though no wise remarkably so; and I have been painfully disappointed in the apparent condition of the rural peasantry on the line of travel from Belfast to Dublin, which I had understood formed an exception to the general misery of Ireland. Out of the towns not one habitation in ten is fit for human beings to live in, but mere low, cramped hovels of rock, mud and straw; not one-half the families on the way seem to have so much as an acre of land to each household; not half the men to be seen have coats to their backs; and not one in four of the women and children have each a pair of shoes or stockings. And those feet!—if the owners would only wash them once a week, the general aspect of affairs in this section would be materially brightened. Wretchedness, rags and despair salute me on every side; and if this be the best part of Ireland, what must the state of the worst be?

From Belfast we had railroad to Armagh, 35 miles; then 13 miles by omnibus to Castle Blayney. We came over this latter route with ten or twelve passengers, and a tun or so of luggage on the outside of the Railroad Company's omnibus, with thirteen of us stowed inside, beside a youngster in arms, who illustrated the doctrine of Innate Depravity by a perpetual fight with his mother. Yet, thus overloaded we were driven the thirteen miles of muddy road in about two hours, taking at Castle Blayney another railroad train, which brought us almost to Drogheda, some 25 miles, where we had to take another omnibus for a mile or two, for want of a railroad bridge over the Boyne, thus reaching another train which brought us into Dublin, 32 miles. The North of Ireland is yet destitute of any other railroads than such patches and fragments as these, whereby I am precluded from seeing Londonderry, and its vicinity, which I much desired. At length we were brought into Dublin at half-past three o'clock, or in eight hours from Belfast, about one hundred and thirty miles.

The face of the country through this part of Ireland is moderately rolling, though some fair hills appear in the distance. The land is generally good, though there are considerable tracts of hard, thin soil. Small bogs are frequently seen, but no one exceeding a dozen acres; the large ones lying farther inland. Taking so little room and supplying the poor with a handy and cheap fuel, I doubt that these little bogs are any detriment to the country. Some of them have been made to take on a soil (by draining, cutting, drying and burning the upper strata of peat, and spreading the ashes over the entire surface), and are now quite productive.—Drainage and ridging are almost universally resorted to, showing the extraordinary humidity of the atmosphere. The Potato is now generally in blossom, and, having a large breadth of the land, and being in fine condition, gives an appearance of thrift and beauty to the landscape. But, in spite of this, the general yield of Ireland in 1851 is destined to be meager. There is more misery in store for this unhappy people.

We cross two small lakes some ten to fifteen miles north of this city, and run for some distance close to the shore of the Channel. At length, a vision of dwellings, edifices and spires bounds the horizon of the level plain to the south-west, and in a few minutes we are in Dublin.



XLI.

WEST OF IRELAND—ATLANTIC MAILS.

GALWAY, Ireland, Aug. 2, 1851.

I came down here yesterday from Dublin (126 1/2 miles) by the first Railroad train ever run through for the traveling public, hoping not only to acquire some personal knowledge of the West of Ireland, but also to gain some idea of the advantages and difficulties attending the proposed establishment of a direct communication by Mail Steamers between this port and our own country. And although my trip is necessarily a hurried one, yet, having been rowed down and nearly across the Bay, so as to gain some knowledge of its conformation and its entrance, and having traversed the town in every direction, and made the acquaintance of some of its most intelligent citizens, I shall at all events return with a clearer idea of the whole subject than ever so much distant study of maps, charts and books could have given me.

The Midland Railroad from Dublin passes by Maynooth, Mullingar, Athlone (where it crosses the Shannon by a noble iron bridge), and Ballinasloe to this place, at the head of Galway Bay, some twenty-five miles inland from the broad Atlantic. The country is remarkably level throughout, and very little rock-cutting and but a moderate amount of excavation have been required in making the Railroad, of which a part (from Dublin to Mullingar) has been for some time in operation, while the residue has just been opened. (The old stage-road from Dublin to Galway measures 133 miles, or nearly seven more than the Railroad.) I presume there is nowhere an elevation of forty feet to the mile, and with a good double track (now nearly completed), there can be no difficulty in running express trains through in three hours. From Dublin to Holyhead will require four hours, and from Holyhead to London six more, making fifteen hours in all (including two for coming into Galway) for the transportation of the Mails from the broad Atlantic off this port to London. Allow three more for leeway, and still the entire Mails may be distributed in London about the time that the steamship can now be telegraphed as off Holyhead, and at least twelve (I hope fifteen) hours earlier than the Mails can now be received in London, to say nothing of the saving of thirty or forty hours on the Mails to and from Ireland, and twenty or so for those of Scotland. Is there any good reason why those hours should not be saved? I can perceive none, even though the steamships should still proceed to Liverpool as heretofore.

Galway Bay is abundantly large enough and safe enough for steamships, even as it is, though its security is susceptible of easy improvement. It has abundant depth inside, but hardly twenty feet at low water on a bar in the harbor, so that large steamships coming in would be obliged to anchor a mile or so from the dock for high water if they did not arrive so as to hit it, as they must now wait off the bar at Liverpool, only much further from the dock. But what I contemplate as a beginning is not the bringing in of the Steamships but of their Mails. Let a small steamboat be waiting outside when a Mail Steamer is expected (as now off the bar at Liverpool), and let the Mails and such passengers as would like to feel the firm earth under their feet once more, be swiftly transferred to the little boat, run up to Galway, put on an express train, started for Dublin, and thence sent over to Holyhead, and dispatched to London and Liverpool forthwith. Let Irish Mails for Galway, Dublin, &c., and Scotch Mails for Glasgow be made up on our side, and let us see, by three or four fair trials, what saving of time could be effected by landing the Mails at Galway, and then we shall be in a position to determine the extent and character of the permanent changes which are required. That a saving of fully twelve hours for England and thirty for Ireland may be secured by making Galway the European terminus of the Atlantic Mail Route, I am very confident, while in the calculations of those who feel a local and personal interest in the change the saving is far greater. But this is quite enough to justify the inconsiderable expense which the experiment I urge would involve.

Galway was formerly a place of far greater commerce and consequence than it now is. It long enjoyed an extensive and profitable direct trade with Spain, which, since the Union of Ireland with England, is entirely transferred to London, so that not a shadow of it remains. At a later day, it exported considerable Grain, Bacon, &c., to England, but the general decline of Irish Industry, and the low prices of food since Free Trade, have nearly destroyed this trade also, and there are now, except fishing-boats, scarcely half a dozen vessels in the harbor, and of these the two principal are a Russian from the Black Sea selling Corn, to a district whose resources are Agricultural or nothing, and a smart-looking Yankee clipper taking in a load of emigrants and luggage for New-York—the export of her population being about the only branch of Ireland's commerce which yet survives the general ruin. Galway had once 60,000 inhabitants; she may now have at most 30,000; but there is no American seaport with 5,000 which does not far surpass her annual aggregate of trade and industry. What should we think in America of a seaport of at least 35,000 inhabitants, the capital of a large, populous county, located at the head of a noble, spacious bay, looking off on the broad Atlantic some twenty miles distant, with cities of twenty, fifty, and a hundred thousand inhabitants within a few hours' reach on either side of her, yet not owning a single steamboat of any shape or nature, and not even visited by one daily, weekly, monthly, or at any stated period? Truly, the desolation of Ireland must be witnessed or it cannot be realized.

I judge that of nearly thirty thousand people who live here not ten thousand have any regular employment or means of livelihood. The majority pick up a job when they can, but are inevitably idle and suffering two-thirds of the time. Of course, the Million learn nothing, have nothing, and come to nothing. They are scarcely in fault, but those who ought to teach them, counsel them, employ them, until they shall be qualified to employ themselves, are deplorably culpable. Here are gentlemen and ladies of education and wealth (dozens where there were formerly hundreds) who year after year and generation after generation have lived in luxury on the income wrung from these poor creatures in the shape of Rent, without ever giving them a helping hand or a kind word in return—without even suspecting that they were under moral obligation to do so. Here is a Priesthood, the conscience-keepers and religious instructors of this fortunate class, who also have fared sumptuously and amassed wealth out of the tithes wrenched by law-sanctioned robbery from the products of this same wretched peasantry, yet never proffered them anything in return but conversion to the faith of their plunderers—certainly not a tempting proffer under the circumstances. And here also is a Priesthood beloved, reverenced, confided in by this peasantry, and loving them in return, who I think have done far less than they might and should have done to raise them out of the slough in which generation after generation are sinking deeper and deeper. I speak plainly on this point, for I feel strongly. The Catholic Priesthood of Ireland resist the education of the Peasantry under Protestant auspices and influences, for which we will presume they have good reason; but, in thus cutting them off from one chance of improving their social and intellectual condition, they double their own moral responsibility to secure the Education of the Poor in some manner not inconsistent with the preservation of their faith. And, seeing what I have seen and do see of the unequaled power of this Priesthood—a power immensely greater in Ireland than in Italy, for there the Priests are generally regarded as the allies of the tyrant and plundering class, while here they are doubly beloved as its enemies and its victims—I feel an undoubting conviction that simply an earnest determination of the Catholic Hierarchy of Ireland that every Catholic child in the country shall receive a good education would secure its own fulfilment within five years, and thenceforth for ever. Let but one generation be well educated, and there can be no rational apprehension that their children or grandchildren will be allowed to grow up in ignorance and helplessness. Knowledge is self-perpetuating, self-extending. And, dreadfully destitute as this country is, the Priesthood of the People can command the means of educating that People, which nobody without their cooeperation can accomplish. Let the Catholic Bishops unite in an earnest and potential call for teachers, and they can summon thousands and tens of thousands of capable and qualified persons from convents, from seminaries, from cloisters, from drawing-rooms, even from foreign lands if need be, to devote their time and efforts to the work without earthly recompense or any stipulation save for a bare subsistence, which the less needy Catholics, or even the more liberal Protestants, in every parish would gladly proffer them. There is really no serious obstacle in the way of this first great step toward Ireland's regeneration if the Priesthood will zealously attempt it.

But closely allied to this subject, and not inferior to it in importance, stands that of Industrial Training. The Irish Peasantry are idle, the English say truly enough; but who inquires whether there is any work within their reach? Suppose there was always something to do, what avails that to millions who know not how to do that precise something? Walking with a friend through one of the back streets of Galway beside the outlet of the Lakes, I came where a girl of ten years old was breaking up hard brook pebbles into suitable fragments to mend roads with. We halted, and M. asked her how much she received for that labor. She answered, "Six-pence a car-load." "How long will it take you to break a car-load?" "About a fortnight." Further questions respecting her family, &c., were answered with equal directness and propriety, and with manifest truth. Here was a mere child, who should have been sent to school, delving from morning till night at an employment utterly unsuited to her sex and her strength, and which I should consider dangerous to her eyesight, to earn for her poor parents a half-penny per day. Think of this, ye who talk, not always without reason, of "factory slaves" and the meagre rewards of labor in America. In any community where labor is even decently rewarded, that child should have been enabled to earn every day at least as much as her fortnight's work on the stone-heap would command. And even in Galway, a concerted and systematic Industrial Education for the Poor would enable her to earn at some light and suitable employment six times what she now does.

In every street of the town you constantly meet girls of fourteen to twenty, as well as old women and children, utterly barefoot and in ragged clothing. I should judge from the streets that not more than one-fourth of the females of Galway belong to the shoe-wearing aristocracy. Now no one acquainted with Human Nature will pretend that girls of fourteen to twenty will walk the streets barefoot if the means of buying shoes and stockings by honest labor are fairly within their reach. But here there are none such for thousands. Born in wretched huts of rough stone and rotten straw, compared with which the poorest log-cabin is a palace, with a turf fire, no window, and a mass of filth heaped up before the door, untaught even to read, and growing up in a region where no manufactures nor arts are prosecuted, the Irish peasant-girl arrives at womanhood less qualified by experience, observation or training for industrial efficiency and usefulness than the daughter of any Choctaw or Sioux Indian. Of course, not all the Irish, even of the wretchedly poor, are thus unskilled and helpless, but a deplorably large class is; and it is this class whose awkwardness and utter ignorance are too often made the theme of unthinking levity and ridicule when the poor exile from home and kindled lands in New York and undertakes housework or anything else for a living. The "awkwardness," which means only inability to do what one has never even seen done, is not confined to any class or nation, and should be regarded with every allowance.

An Industrial School, especially for girls, in every town, village and parish of Ireland, is one of the crying needs of the time. I am confident there are in Galway alone five thousand women and girls who would hail with gratitude and thoroughly improve an opportunity to earn six-pence per day. If they could be taught needle-work, plain dressmaking, straw-braiding, and a few of the simplest branches of manufactures, such as are carried on in households, they might and would at once emerge from the destitution and social degradation which now enshroud them into independence, comfort and consideration. Knowing how to work and to earn a decent subsistence, they would very soon seek and acquire a knowledge of letters if previously ignorant of them. In short, the Industrial Education of the Irish Peasantry is the noblest and the most hopeful idea yet broached for their intellectual and social elevation, and I have great hope of its speedy triumph. It is now being agitated in Dublin and many other localities, a central and many auxiliary schools having already been established. But I will speak further on this point in another letter.

Galway has an immense and steady water-power within half a mile of its harbor, on the outlet of Lakes Corrib and Mash, by means of which it enjoys an admirable internal navigation extending some sixty miles northward. Here Manufactures might be established with a certainty of commanding the cheapest power, cheapest labor and cheapest fuel to be had in the world. I never saw a spot where so much water power yet unused could be obtained at so trifling a cost as here directly on the west line of the town and within half a mile of its center. A beautiful Marble is found on the line of the Railroad only a few miles from the town, and all along the line to Dublin the abundance and excellence of the building-stone are remarkable. Timber and Brick come down the Lake outlet as fast as they are wanted, while Provisions are here cheap as in any part of the British Isles. Nature has plainly designed Galway for a great and prosperous city, the site of extensive manufactures, the emporium of an important trade, and the gateway of Europe toward America; but whether all this is or is not to be dashed by the fatality which has hitherto attended Irish prospects, remains to be seen. I trust that it is not, but that a new Liverpool is destined soon to arise here; and that, should I ever again visit Europe, I shall first land on the quay of Galway.



XLII.

IRELAND—SOUTH.

DUBLIN, Tuesday, Aug. 5, 1851.

I had hoped to see all of Ireland that is accessible by Railroad from this city, but Time will not permit. Having remained here over Sunday, I had only Monday left for a trip Southward, and that would just suffice for reaching Limerick and returning without attempting Cork. So at 7 yesterday morning I took the "Great Southern and Western Railroad," and was set down in Limerick (130 miles) at a quarter before 1, passing Kildare, with its "Curragh" or spacious race-ground, Maryborough and Thurles on the way. Portarlington, Mount Melick, Mountrath and Templemore—all considerable towns—lie a few miles from the Railroad, on the right or west, as Naas, Cashel and Tipperary are not far from it on the left; while another Railroad, the "Irish South-Eastern," diverges at Kildare to Carlow, Bagnalstown and Kilkenny (146 miles from Dublin) on the South; while from Kilkenny the "Kilkenny and Waterford" has already been constructed to Thomastown (some 20 miles), and is to reach Waterford, at the head of ship navigation on the common estuary at the mouth of the Suir and Barrow, when completed.

I left the Great Southern and Western at Limerick Junction, 107 miles S. S. W. of Dublin, and took the crossroad from Tipperary to Limerick (30 miles), but the main road proceeds south-westerly to Charleville, 22 1/2 miles further, and thence leads due south to Mallow, on the Blackwater, and then south by east to Cork, 164 1/2 miles from Dublin, while another railroad has just been opened from Cork to Bandon, 18 3/4 miles still further south-west, making a completed line from Dublin to Bandon, 183 1/2 miles, with branches to Limerick, Tipperary and Kilkenny, the latter to be continued to Waterford. In a country so easily traversed by Railroads, and so swarming with population as Ireland, these roads should be not only most useful but most productive to their stockholders, but they are very far from it. Few of the peasantry can afford to travel by them, except when leaving the country for ever, and their scanty patches of ground produce little surplus food for exportation, while they can afford to buy little that the Railroads bring in. Were the population of Ireland as well fed and as enterprising as that of New-England, with an industry as well diversified, her Railroads would pay ten per cent, on their cost; as things now are, they do not pay two per cent. Thus the rapacity of Capital defeats itself, and actually impoverishes its owners when it deprives Labor of a fair reward. If all the property-holders of Ireland would to-day combine in a firm resolve to pay at least half a dollar per day for men's labor, and to employ all that should present themselves, introducing new arts and manufactures and improving their estates in order to furnish such employment, they would not only speedily banish destitution and ignorance from the land but they would double the value of their own possessions. This is one of the truths which sloth, rapacity and extravagance are slow to learn, yet which they cannot safely ignore. The decay and ruin of nearly all the "old families" in Ireland are among the penalties of disregarding it.

To talk of an excess of labor, or an inability to employ it, in such a country as Ireland, is to insult the general understanding. In the first place, there is an immediate and urgent demand for at least Half a Million comfortable rain-proof dwellings. The inconceivable wretched hovels in which nine-tenths of the peasantry endure existence inevitably engender indolence, filthiness and disease. Generation after generation grows up ignorant and squalid from never having had a fireside by which they could sit down to read or study, nor an example of home comfort and cleanliness in their own class to profit by. In those narrow, unlighted, earth-floored, straw-thatched cabins, there is no room for the father and his sons to sit down and enjoy an evening, so they straggle off to the nearest groggery or other den in search of the comfort their home denies them. Of course, men who have grown up in this way have no idea of anything better and are slow to mend; but the personal influence of their superiors in wealth and station is very great, and might be ten times greater if the more fortunate class would make themselves familiar with the wants and woes, the feelings and aspirations of the poor, and act toward them as friends and wiser brethren, instead of seeming to regard them only as strange dogs to be repelled or as sheep to be sheared. But the first practical point to be struggled for is that of steady employment and just reward for labor. So long as men's wages (without board) range from fourpence to one and six-pence per day, and women's from a penny to six-pence (which, so far as I can learn, are the current rates at present, and nothing to do for half the year at any price), no radical improvement can be hoped for. A family with nothing to do, very little to eat and only a hog-pen to live in, will neither acquire mental expansion, moral integrity, nor habits of neatness and industry. On the contrary, however deficient they may originally be in these respects, they are morally certain to grow worse so long as their circumstances remain unchanged. But draw them out of their wretched hovel into a neat, dry, glass-lighted, comfortable dwelling, offer them work at all seasons, and a fair recompense for doing it, and you will have at least rendered improvement possible. The feasibility of cleanliness will instill the love of it, at least in the younger members; the opportunity of earning will awaken the instinct of saving as well as the desire to maintain a comely appearance in the eyes of friends and neighbors. The laborer, well paid, will naturally be adequately fed, and both able and willing to perform thrice the work per day he now does or can; seeing the more efficient often step above them to posts better paid and more respected, the dullest workers will aspire to greater knowledge and skill in order that they too may attain more eligible positions. "It is the first step that costs"—the others follow almost of course. If the Aristocracy of Ireland would unitedly resolve that every individual in the land should henceforth have constant work and just recompense, the outlay involved need not be great and the return would be abundant and certain. They have ample water-power for a thousand factories, machine-shops, foundries, &c., which has run to waste since creation, and can never bring them a dollar while Irish Industry remains as rude, ill-paid and inefficient as it now is. Every dollar wisely spent in improving this power will add two to the value of their estates. So they have stone-quarries of immense value all over the island which never produced anything and never will while the millions live in hovels and confine their attention to growing oats and potatoes for a subsistence. Agriculture alone and especially such Agriculture, can never adequately employ the people; when the Oats and Potatoes have been harvested, the peasant has very little to do but eat them until the season for planting them returns. But introduce a hundred new arts and processes—let each village have its mechanics, each county its manufacturers of the various wares and fabrics really needed in the country, and the excess of work done over the present aggregate would speedily transform general poverty into general competence. The Six Millions of People in Ireland are doing far less work this year than the Three Millions of New-England, although the Irish in New-England are at least as industrious and efficient as the natives. They work well everywhere but at home, because they everywhere else find the more powerful class ready to employ them, instruct them, pay them. In Ireland alone are they required to work for six pence to eighteen pence per day, and even at these rates stand idle half the year for want of anything to do; so that the rent which they would readily double (for better tenements) if they were fully employed and fairly paid, now benumbs and crushes them, and their little patches of land, which ought to be in the highest degree productive, are often the worst cultivated of any this side of the Alps. Ignorance, want, and hopelessness have paralysed their energies, and the consequent decay of the Peasantry has involved most of the Aristocracy in the general ruin. The Encumbered Estates Commission is now rapidly passing the soil of Ireland out of the hands of its bankrupt landlords into those of a new generation. May these be wise enough to profit by the warning before them, and by uniting to elevate the condition of the Laboring Millions place their own prosperity on a solid and lasting foundation!

GENERAL ASPECTS.

The South of Ireland is decidedly more fertile and inviting than the North or West. There is a deeper, richer soil, with far less stone on the level low lands. The railroad from Dublin to Limerick runs throughout over a level plain, and though it passes from the valley of the Liffey across those of the Barrow, the Durrow and the Suir to that of the Shannon, no perceptible ridge is crossed, no tunnel traversed, and very little rock-cutting or embankment required. Although the highways are often carried over the track at an absurd expense, while the principal depots are made to cost thrice what they should, I still cannot account for the great outlay on Irish railroads. They would have been built at one-half the cost in the States, where the wages of labor are thrice as much as here: who pockets the difference? Of course, there is stealing in the assessment of land damages; but so there is everywhere. When I was in Galway, a case was tried in which a proprietor, whose bog was crossed by the Midland Railroad, sued the company for more than the Appraisers had awarded him, and it was proved on the trial that his bog, utterly worthless before, had been partially drained and considerably increased in value by the railroad. There seems to be no conscience in exacting damages of those who invest their money, often most reluctantly, in railroads, of which the main benefits are universal. In Ireland they have palpably and greatly benefited every class but the stockholders, and these they have well nigh ruined.

There are fewer remains of dwellings recently "cleared" and thrown down in the South than in the West of Ireland; though they are not unknown here; but I saw no new ones going up, save in immediate connection with the Railroads, in either section. If Government, Society and Ideas are to remain as they have been, the country may be considered absolutely finished, with nothing more to do but decay. I trust, however, that a new leaf is about to be turned over; still, it is mournful to pass through so fine a country and see how the hand of death has transfixed it. Even Limerick, at the head of ship navigation on the glorious estuary of the Shannon, with steamboat navigation through the heart of this populous kingdom for sixty or eighty miles above it, shows scarcely a recent building except the Railroad Depot and the Union Poor-House, while its general aspect is that of stagnation, decline and decay. The smaller towns between it and Dublin have a like gloomy appearance—Kildare, with with its deserted "Curragh" and its towering ruins, looking most dreary of all. Happy is the Irishman who, in a new land and amid the activities and hopes which it inspires, is spared the daily contemplation of his country's ruin.

And yet there are brighter shades to the picture. Nature, ever buoyant and imperative, does her best to remedy the ills created by "Man's inhumanity to Man." The South of Ireland seems far better wooded than either the North or West, and thrifty young forests and tree plantations soften the gloom which unroofed and ruinous cabins would naturally suggest. Though the Railroad runs wholly through a tame, dull level sweeping ranges of hills appear at intervals on either side, exhibiting a lovely alternation of cultivation, grass and forest, to the delighted traveler. The Hay crop is badly saved so far, and some that has been cut several days is still under the weather, while a good deal, though long ripe, remains uncut; the Wheat looks to me thin and uneven; Oats (the principal grain here) are short and generally poor; but I never saw the Potato more luxuriant or promising, and the area covered with this noble root is most extensive. The poor have a fashion of planting in beds three to six feet wide, with narrow alleys between; which, though involving extra labor, must insure a large yield, and presents a most luxuriant appearance. Little Rye was sown, but that little is very good; Barley is suffering from the stormy weather, but is quite thrifty. Yet there is much arable land either wholly neglected or only yielding a little grass, while I perceive even less bog undergoing reclamation than in the West. I did not anticipate a tour of pleasure through Ireland, but the reality is more painful than I anticipated. Of all I have seen at work in the fields to-day, cutting and carrying turf, hoeing potatoes, shaking out Hay, &c., at least one-third were women. If I could believe that their fathers and husbands were in America, clearing lands and erecting cabins for their future homes, I should not regret this. But the probability is that only a few of them are there or hopefully employed anywhere, while hundreds of neglected, weedy, unpromising patches of cultivation show that, narrow as the holdings mainly are, they are yet often unskillfully cultivated. The end of this is of course ejectment, whence the next stage is the Union Work-House. Alas! unhappy Ireland!



XLIII.

PROSPECTS OF IRELAND.

DUBLIN, Tuesday, August 5, 1851.

Of Irish stagnation, Irish unthrift, Irish destitution, Irish misery, the world has heard enough. I could not wholly avoid them without giving an essentially false and deceptive account of what must be painfully obvious to every traveler in Ireland; yet I have chosen to pass them over lightly and hurriedly, and shall not recur to them. They are in the main sufficiently well known to the civilized world, and, apart from suggestions of amendment, their contemplation can neither be pleasant nor profitable. I will only add here that though, in spite of Poor Laws and Union Poor-Houses, there are still much actual want, suffering and beggary in Ireland, yet the beggars here are by no means so numerous nor so importunate as in Italy, though the excuses for mendicity are far greater. What I propose now to bring under hasty review are the principal plans for the removal of Ireland's woes and the conversion of her myriads of paupers into independent and comfortable laborers. I shall speak of these in succession, beginning with the oldest and closing with the newest that has come under my observation. And first, then, of

REPEAL.

The hope of obtaining from the British Crown and Parliament the concession of a separate Legislature of their own seems nearly to have died out of the hearts of the Irish millions. The death of O'Connell deprived the measure of its mightiest advocate; Famine and other disasters followed; and fresher projects of amelioration have since to a great extent supplanted it in the popular mind. Yet it is to-day most palpable that such a Legislature is of the highest moment to the National well-being, and that its concession would work the greatest good to Ireland without injury to England. Nay; I see fresh reasons for my hope that such concession is far nearer than is generally imagined.

On all hands it is perceived and conceded that the amount of legislation required by the vast, widely scattered and diversely constituted portions of the British Empire is too great to be properly affected by any deliberative body. Parliament is just closing a long session, yet leaving very much of its proper business untouched for want of time, and that pertaining to Ireland is especially neglected. Then it has just passed a most unwise and irritating act with regard to the titles of the Catholic Prelates, which, because every act of Parliament must extend to Ireland unless that country is expressly excluded, is allowed to operate there, though the bad reasons given for its enactment at all have no application to that country, while the mischiefs it will do there are ten times greater than all it can effect in Great Britain. Had Ireland a separate Parliament, no British Minister would have been mad enough to propose the extension of this act over that country, where it is certain to excite disaffection and disloyalty, arouse slumbering hatreds, and impede the march of National and Social improvement. An Irish Parliament, with specified powers and duties akin to those of an American State Legislature, would be a great relief to a British Parliament and Ministry, a great support to Irish loyalty and Irish improvement, and no harm to anybody. These truths seem to me so palpable that I think they cannot long be disregarded, but that some one of the Political changes frequently occurring in Great Britain will secure to Ireland a restoration of her domestic Legislature. Neither Canada, Jamaica nor any other British colony can show half so good reasons for a domestic Legislature.

TENANT-RIGHT.

The agitation for Tenant-Right in Ireland is destined to fail—in fact, has virtually failed already. The Imperial Parliament will never concede that right, nor will any Legislature similarly constituted. And yet the demand has the clearest and strongest basis of natural and eternal justice, as any fair mind must confess. What is that demand? Simply that the creator of a new value shall be legally entitled to that value, or, in case he is required to surrender it to another, shall be paid a fair and just equivalent therefor. Here is a farm, for instance, whereof one man is recognised by law as the owner, and he lets it for three lives or a specific term of years to a tenant-cultivator for ten, fifteen or twenty shillings per acre. The tenant occupies it, cultivates it, pays the rent and improves it. At the close of his term, he is found to have built a good house on it instead of the old rookery he found there, while by fencing, draining, manuring and subsoiling he has doubled its productive capacity, and consequently its annual value. He wishes to cultivate it still, and offers to renew the lease for any number of years, and pay the rent punctually. "But no," says the landlord, "you must pay twice as much rent as hitherto." "Why so?" "Because the land is more valuable than it was when you took it." "Certainly it is; but that value is wholly the fruit of my labor—it has cost you nothing." "Can't help that, Sir; you improved for your own benefit, and with a full knowledge that the additional value would revert to me on the expiration of your lease; so pay my price or clear out!"—Is this right? The law says Yes; but Justice says No; Public Good says even more imperatively No. The laws of the land should encourage every occupier to improve the land he holds, to expend capital and employ labor upon it, so as to increase its value and productive capacity from year to year; but the law of the British Empire discourages improvement and impedes the employment of labor by taking the product from the producer and giving it arbitrarily to the landlord. Yet the landlord influence in Parliament is so predominant, so overwhelming, that no repeal, no mitigation even, of this great wrong is probable; and every demand for it is overborne by a senseless outcry against Agrarianism. Still, the agitation for Tenant-Right does good by imbuing the popular mind with some idea of the monster evil and wrong of the Monopoly of Land—an idea which will not always remain unfruitful.

EMIGRATION.

Emigration is now proceeding with gigantic strides, and is destined for some time to continue. I think a full third of the present population of Ireland are anxious to leave their native land, and will do so if they shall ever have the means before better prospects are opened to them. Packet-ships are constantly loading with emigrants at all the principal ports, while thousands are flocking monthly to Liverpool to find ready and cheap conveyance to America. But this emigration, however advisable for the departing, does little for those left behind, and is in the main detrimental to the country. The energetic, the daring, the high-spirited go, leaving the residue more abject and nerveless than ever. If Two Millions more were to leave the country next year, the condition of the remainder would not be essentially improved. Over population is not a leading cause of Ireland's present miseries.

EDUCATION.

Rudimental knowledge is being slowly diffused in Ireland, in spite of the serious impediments interposed by Religious jealousy and bigotry. But this remedy, as now applied, does not reach the seat of the disease. They are mainly the better class of poor children who are educated in the National and other elementary schools; the most depraved, benighted, degraded, are still below their reach. The destitute, hungry, unemployed, unclad, despairing, cannot or do not send their children to school; the wife and mother who must work daily in the turf-bog or potato-field for a few pence per day must keep her older child at home to mind the younger ones in her absence. Education, in its larger, truer meaning, is the great remedy for Ireland's woes; but until the parents have steadier employment and a juster recompense the general education of the children is impracticable.

ENCUMBERED ESTATES.

The act authorizing and requiring the sale of irredeemably Encumbered Estates in Ireland is one of the best which a British Parliament has passed in many years. Under its operation, a large portion of the soil is rapidly passing from the nominal ownership of bankrupts wholly unable and unqualified to improve it into those of new proprietors who, it may fairly be hoped, will generally be able to improve it, giving employment to more labor and increasing the annual product. The benefits of this change, however, can be but slowly realized, and are for the present hardly perceptible.

IRISH MANUFACTURES.

Within the past few months, a very decided interest has been awakened in the minds of enlightened and patriotic Irishmen in Dublin and other places, with regard to the importance and possibility of establishing various branches of Household Manufactures throughout the country. It is manifest that the general cheapness of Labor and Food, the facilities now enjoyed for communication, not only with Great Britain, but with all Europe and America also, and the extraordinary amount of unemployed and undeveloped capacity in Ireland, render the introduction of Manufactures at once eminently desirable and palpably feasible. Even though nothing could be immediately earned thereby, the simple diffusion of industrial skill and efficiency which must ensue from such introduction would be an inestimable gain to the peasantry of Ireland. But allow that all the idle poor of this island could in six months be taught how to earn six pence each per day, the aggregate benefit to the Irish and to mankind would be greater than that of all the gold mines yet discovered. The Poorhouse Unions could be nearly emptied in a year, and this whole population comfortably fed, clad and housed within the next three years. A beginning must be made with the simplest or household manufactures, for want of means to establish the more complex, costly and efficient branches, which require extensive Machinery and aggregation of Laborers; but if the first step be successfully taken, others are certain to follow. With abundant water-power and inexhaustible beds of fuel yet untouched, it is demonstrable that Manufactures of Cotton and Woolen, as well as Linen, might be prosecuted in Ireland even cheaper than in England, though the average recompense of Labor should thereby be doubled.

The first impulse to the Manufacture movement appears to have been given by Mr. Thomas Mooney, a gentleman well known to his countrymen throughout the United States, whence he returned some eighteen months ago. Primarily at his suggestion, a "Parent Board of Irish Manufacture" was organized in Dublin several months since, funds collected by voluntary subscription, an office opened, and a central school established, with a view to the qualification of teachers for the superintendence of auxiliary schools throughout the country. The enterprise was proceeding vigorously and with daily increasing momentum when Dissension, the evil genius of Ireland, broke out among its leading supporters, which has resulted in the division of the original Society into two, one of them sustaining Mr. Mooney and the other claiming to have taken the movement entirely out of his hands. Thus the case stands at present, but thus I trust it will not long remain. The enterprise is one of the most feasible and hopeful of the many that have been undertaken for the benefit of Ireland, and affords ample scope and occupation for all who may see fit to labor for its success. I trust that all differences will speedily be harmonized, and that the friends of the movement, once more united, may urge it forward to a most complete and beneficent triumph.

PEAT MANUFACTURE.

The Peat Bogs of Ireland cover some Three Millions of Acres of its surface, mainly in the heart of the country, though extending into every part of it. Perhaps One Hundred Thousand Acres, chiefly in the north-east, have been brought into cultivation; of the residue, some yields a little sour pasturage, but the greater portion is of no use whatever, save as it supplies a very poor but cheap fuel to the peasantry. These bogs are of all depths from a few inches to thirty or forty feet, though the very shallow have generally been reclaimed. This is effected in some cases by removing the Peat or Turf altogether; but sometimes, where it is quite deep, by ditching and draining it, and then cutting and heaping up some six to twelve inches at the top, so that it can be thoroughly burned, and the ashes spread over the entire surface for a soil. This is not so deep as could be desired, but the climate is so uniformly moist and the skies so rarely unclouded that it suffices to insure very tolerable crops thereafter.

I do not know how the origin of these Bogs is accounted for by the learned, but I presume the land they cover was originally a dense forest, and that the Peat commenced growing as a sort of moss or fungus, carpeting the ground and preventing the germination of any more trees. In the course of ten or fifteen centuries, the forest trees (mainly of Oak or Fir) decayed and fell into the Peat, which, dying at the top, continued to grow at the bottom, while the perpetual moisture of the climate prevented its destruction by fire. Thus the forest gradually disappeared, and the Peat alone remained, gaining a foot in depth in the course of two or three centuries until it slowly reached its present condition.

Many efforts have been made to render this Peat available as a basis of Manufacture and Commerce, but hitherto with little success. The magnificent chemical discoveries heralded some two years ago, whereby each bog was to be transformed into a mimic California, have not endured the rough test of practical experience. There is no doubt that Peat contains all the valuable elements therein set forth—Carbon, Ammonia, Stearine, Tar, &c., but unfortunately it has hitherto cost more to extract them than they will sell for in market; so the high-raised expectations of 1849 have been temporarily blasted, like a great many predecessors.

But further chemical investigations have resulted in new discoveries, which, it is confidently asserted, render the future success of the Peat Charcoal manufacture a matter of demonstrable certainty. A company has just been organized in London, under commanding auspices, which proposes to embark L500,000 directly and L1,000,000 ultimately in Peat-Works, having secured the exclusive right of using the newly patented processes of Messrs. J. S. Gwynne and J. J. Hays, which are pronounced exceedingly important and valuable. By a combination of these patented processes, it is calculated that the company will be able to manufacture from the inexhaustible Bogs of Ireland, 1. Peat Coal, or solidified Peat, of intense calorific power, exceedingly cheap, almost as dense as Bituminous Coal, while absolutely free from Gases injurious to metals as well as from "clinker," and therefore especially valuable for Locomotives and for innumerable applications in the arts; 2. Peat Charcoal, thoroughly carbonized, of compact and heavy substance, free from sulphur, and for which there is an unlimited demand not only for fuel but for fertilization; 3. Peat Tar, of extraordinary value simply as Tar, an admirable preservative of Timber, and readily convertible into Illuminating Gas of exceeding brilliancy and power; 4. Acetate of Lime; and 5. a crude Sulphate of Ammonia, well known as a fertilizer of abundant energy. The company is already at work, and expect soon to have six working stations in different parts of the country, professing its ability to manufacture for 14s. per tun, Peat Charcoal readily selling in London for 45s., while they expect to realize 5s. worth of Tar, Ammonia, &c., with every tun of Charcoal, while on Solidified Peat they anticipate still larger profits. These may be very greatly reduced by practical experience without affecting the vital point, that sagacious and scrutinizing capitalists have been found willing to invest their money in an enterprise which, if it succeeds at all, must secure illimitable employment to Labor in Ireland and strongly tend to increase its average reward.

BEET SUGAR.

A similar Company, with a like capital, has also been formed to prosecute extensively in Ireland the manufacture of Beet Sugar, and this can hardly be deemed an experiment. That the Sugar Beet grows luxuriously here I can personally bear witness; indeed, I doubt whether there is a soil or climate better adapted to it in the world. That the Beet grown in Ireland yields a very large proportion of Sugar is attested by able chemists; that the manufacture of Beet Sugar is profitable, its firm establishment and rapid extension in France, Belgium, &c., abundantly prove. The Irish Company have secured the exclusive use of two recently patented inventions, whereby they claim to be able to produce a third more sugar than has hitherto been obtained, and of a quality absolutely undistinguishable from the best Cane Sugar. They say they can make it at a profit of fully twenty-five per cent. after paying an excise of L10 per tun to the Government, working their mills all the year (drying their roots for use in months when they cannot otherwise be fit for manufacture). Mr. Wm. K. Sullivan, Chemist to the Museum of Irish Industry, states that the Beet Sugar manufactured in France has increased from 51,000 tuns in 1840 to more than 100,000 tuns in 1850, in defiance of a large increase in the excise levied thereon—that the average production of Sugar Beet is in Ireland 15 tuns per acre, against less than 11 tuns in France and Germany—that each acre of Beets will yield 4 1/2 tuns (green) of tops or leaves, worth 7s. 6d. per tun for feeding cattle, making the clear profit on the cultivation of the Beet, at 15s. per tun, over L5 per acre—that there is no shadow of difference between the Sugar of the Beet and that of the Cane, all the difference popularly supposed to exist being caused by the existence of foreign substances in one or both—that Irish roots generally, and Beet roots especially, contain considerably more Sugar than those grown on the Continent—and that Beet Sugar may be made in Ireland (without reference to the newly patented processes from which the Company expect such great advantages) at a very handsome profit. As the soil and climate of Ireland are at least equal to, and the Labor decidedly cheaper than, that employed in the same pursuit on the Continent, while Ireland herself, wretched as she is, consumes over two thousand tuns of Sugar per annum, and Great Britain, some twenty-five thousand tuns—every pound of it imported—I can perceive no reasonable basis for a doubt that the Beet Culture and Sugar Manufacture will speedily be naturalized in Ireland, and that they will give employment and better wages at all seasons to many thousands of her sons.

Such are some of the grounds of my hope that the deepest wretchedness of this unhappy country has been endured—that her depopulation will speedily be arrested, and that better days are in store for her long-suffering people. Yet Conquest, Subjugation, Oppression and Misgovernment have worn deep furrows in the National character, and ages of patient, enlightened and unselfish effort will be necessary to eradicate them. Ignorance, Indolence, Inefficiency, Superstition and Hatred are still fearfully prevalent; I only hope that causes are beginning to operate which will ultimately efface them. If I have said less than would seem just of the Political causes, of Ireland's calamities, it is because I would rather draw attention to practical though slow remedies than invoke fruitless indignation against the wrongs which have rendered them necessary. Peace and Concord are the great primary needs of Ireland—Peace between her warring Churches—Concord between her rulers and landlords on one side and her destitute and desperate Millions on the other. I wish the latter had sufficient courage and self-trust to demand and enforce emancipation from the Political and Social vassalage in which they are held; to demand not merely Tenant-Right but a restitution of the broad lands wrested from their ancestors by fire and sword—not merely equal rights with Englishmen in Church and State, but equal right also to judge whether the existing Union of the two islands is advantageous to themselves, and if not, to insist that it be made so or cease altogether. But Ireland has suffered too long and too deeply for this; her emancipation is now possible only through the education and social elevation of her People. This is a slow process, but earnest hearts and united minds will render it a sure one. If the Irish but will and work for it, the close of this century will find them a Nation of Ten Millions, with their Industry as diversified, their Labor, as efficient, its Recompense as liberal, and their general condition as thrifty and comfortable as those of any other Nation. Thus circumstanced, they could no longer be treated as the appendage of an Empire, the heritage of a Crown, the conquest of a selfish and domineering Race, but must be accounted equals with the inhabitants of the Sister Isle in Civil and Religious Rights or break the connection without internal discord and almost without a struggle. There shall yet be an Ireland to which her sons in distant lands may turn their eyes with a pride unmingled with sadness; but alas! who can say how soon!



XLIV.

THE ENGLISH.

LIVERPOOL, Wednesday, August 6, 1851.

I do not wholly like these cold and stately English, yet I think I am not blind to their many sterling qualities. The greatness of England, it is quite confidently asserted, is based upon her conquests and plunderings—on her immense Commerce and unlimited Foreign Possessions. I think otherwise. The English have qualities which would have rendered them wealthy and powerful though they had been located in the center of Asia instead of on the western coast of Europe. I do not say that these qualities could have been developed in Central Asia, but if they had been, they would have insured to their possessors a commanding position. Personally, the English do not attract nor shine; but collectively they are a race to make their mark on the destinies of mankind.

In the first place, they are eminently industrious. I have seen no country in which the proportion of idlers is smaller. I think American labor is more efficient, day to day or hour to hour, than British; but we have the larger proportion of non-producers—petty clerks in the small towns, men who live by their wits, loungers about barrooms, &c. There is here a small class of wealthy idlers (not embracing nearly all the wealthy, nor of the Aristocracy, by any means), and a more numerous class of idle paupers or criminals; but Work is the general rule, and the idlers constitute but a small proportion of the whole population. Great Britain is full of wealth, not entirely but mainly because her people are constantly producing. All that she has plundered in a century does not equal the new wealth produced by her people every year.

The English are eminently devotees of Method and Economy. I never saw the rule, "A place for everything, and everything in its place," so well observed as here. The reckless and the prodigal are found here as every where else, but they are marked exceptions. Nine-tenths of those who have a competence know what income they have, and are careful not to spend more. A Duchess will say to a mere acquaintance, "I cannot afford" a proposed outlay—an avowal rarely and reluctantly made by an American, even in moderate circumstances. She means simply that other demands upon her income are such as to forbid the contemplated expenditure, though she could of course afford this if she did not deem those of prior consequence. No Englishman is ashamed to be economical, nor to have it known that he is so. Whether his annual expenditure be fifty pounds or fifty thousand, he tries to get his money's worth. I have been admonished and instructed by the systematic economy which is practiced even in great houses. You never see a lighted candle set down carelessly and left to burn an hour or two to no purpose, as is so common with us; if you leave one burning, some one speedily comes and quietly extinguishes the flame. Said a friend: "You never see any paper in the streets here as you do in New-York [swept out of the stores, &c.] the English throw nothing away." We speak of the vast parks and lawns of the Aristocracy as so much land taken out of use and devoted to mere ostentation; but all that land is growing timber or furnishing pasturage—often both. The owner gratifies his taste or his pride by reserving it from cultivation, but he does not forget the main chance. So of his Fisheries and even Game-Preserves. Of course, there are noblemen who would scorn to sell their Venison or Partridges; but Game is abundant in the hotels and refectories—too much so for half of it to have been obtained by poaching. Few whose estates might yield them ten thousand a year are content with nine thousand.

The English are eminently a practical people. They have a living faith in the potency of the Horse-Guards, and in the maxim that "Safe bind is sure find." They have a sincere affection for roast beef. They are quite sure "the mob" will do no harm if it is vigilantly watched and thoroughly overawed. Their obstreperous loyalty might seem inconsistent with this unideal character, but it is only seeming. When the portly and well-to-do Briton vociferates "God save the Queen!" with intense enthusiasm, he means "God save my estates, my rents, my shares, my consols, my expectations." The fervor of an Englishman's loyalty is usually in a direct ratio with the extent of his material possessions. The poor like the Queen personally, and like to gaze at royal pageantry; but they are not fanatically loyal. One who has seen Gen. Jackson or Harry Clay publicly enter New-York or any other city finds it hard to realize that the acclamations accorded on like occasions to Queen Victoria can really be deemed enthusiastic.

Gravity is a prominent feature of the English character. A hundred Englishmen of any class, forgathered for any purpose of conference or recreation, will have less merriment in the course of their sitting than a score of Frenchmen or Americans would have in a similar time. Hence it is generally remarked that the English of almost any class show to least advantage when attempting to enjoy themselves. They are as awkward at a frolic as a bear at a dance. Their manner of expressing themselves is literal and prosaic; the American tendency to hyperbole and exaggeration grates harshly on their ears. They can only account for it by a presumption of ill breeding on the part of the utterer. Forward lads and "fast" people are scarce and uncurrent here. A Western "screamer," eager to fight or drink, to run horses or shoot for a wager, and boasting that he had "the prettiest sister, the likeliest wife and the ugliest dog in all Kentuck," would be no where else so out of place and incomprehensible as in this country, no matter in what circle of society.

The Women of England, of whatever rank, studiously avoid peculiarities of dress or manner and repress idiosyncrasies of character. No where else that I have ever been could so keen an observer as Pope have written:

"Nothing so true as what you once let fall; Most women have no character at all."

Each essays to think, appear and speak as nearly according to the orthodox standard of Womanhood as possible. Hardly one who has any reputation to save could tolerate the idea of attending a Woman's Rights Convention or appearing in a Bloomer any more than that of standing on her head in the Haymarket or walking a tight-rope across the pit of Drury Lane. So far as I can judge, the ideas which underlie the Woman's Rights movement are not merely repugnant but utterly inconceivable to the great mass of English women, the last Westminster Review to the contrary notwithstanding.

I do not judge whether they are better or worse for this. Their conversation is certainly tamer and less piquant than that of the American or the French ladies. I think it evinces a less profound and varied culture than that of their German sisters; but none will deny them the possession of sterling and amiable qualities. Their physical development is unsurpassed, and for good reasons—their climate is mild and they take more exercise than our women do. Their fullness of bust is a topic of general admiration among the foreigners now so plentiful in England, and their complexions are marvelously fair and delicate. Except by a very few in Ireland, I have not seen them equaled. And, on the whole, I do not know that there are better mothers than the English, especially of the middle classes.

I did not find the Aristocracy so remarkable for physical perfection and beauty as I had been taught to expect. Some of them are large, well formed and vigorous; but I think the caste is not noticeably so. Among the ladies of "gentle blood," however, there is more of the asserted aristocratic symmetry and beauty than among the men.

The general stiffness of English manners has often been noted. Not that a gentleman is aught but a gentleman anywhere, but courtesy is certainly not the Englishman's best point. No where else will a perplexed stranger inquiring his way receive more surly answers or oftener be refused any answer at all than in London. Even the policeman who is paid to direct you, replies to your inquiry with the shortest and gruffest monosyllable that will do.

Awkwardness of manner pervades all classes; the most thoroughly natural, modest and easy mannered man I met was a Duke, whose ancestors had been dukes for many generations; but some of the most elaborately ill bred men I met also inherited titles of nobility. And, while I have been thrown into the company of Englishmen of all ranks who were cordial, kind, and every way models of good breeding, I have also met here more constitutionally arrogant and, unbearable persons than had crossed my path in all my previous experience. These, too, are found in all ranks; I think the Military service exhibits some of the worst specimens. But Bull in authority anywhere is apt to exhibit his horns to those whom he suspects of being nobodies. Elevation is unpropitious to the display of his more amiable qualities.

I have elsewhere spoken of the indifferent figure made by most Englishmen at public speaking. Many of them say good things; hardly one delivers them aptly or gracefully. Any Frenchman having Lord Granville's brains would make a great deal more out of them in a speech. I attribute this National defect to two causes; first, the habitually prosaic level of British thought and conversation; next, the intense pride which is also a National characteristic. John is called out at a festive gathering, and springs to his feet really intending to be clever. But the next moment the thought strikes him—"This is beneath my dignity, after all. Why should I subject myself to miscellaneous criticism? Why put myself on the verdict of this crowd? Does it become a gentleman of my standing to fish for their plaudits? What will success amount to, if attained?" Or else he criticises his own thoughts and meditated forms of expression, pronounces them tame, trite or feeble, and recoils from their enunciation as unworthy of his abilities, position and reputation. The result is the same in either case—he hesitates, blunders, chokes, and finally stammers out a few sentences and subsides into his seat, sweating at every pore, red-faced with chagrin, vexed with himself and every body else on account of his failure, which might not have occurred, and certainly would not have been so palpable, had his self-consciousness been less diseased and extravagant.

I have said that the British are not in manner a winning people. Their self-conceit is the principal reason. They have solid and excellent qualities, but their self-complacency is exorbitant and unparalleled. The majority are not content with esteeming Marlborough and Wellington the greatest Generals and Nelson the first Admiral the world ever saw, but claim alike supremacy for their countrymen in every field of human effort. They deem Machinery and Manufactures, Railroads and Steamboats, essentially British products. They regard Morality and Philanthropy as in effect peculiar to "the fast anchored isle," and Liberty as an idea uncomprehended, certainly unrealized, any where else. They are horror-stricken at the toleration of Slavery in the United States, in seeming ignorance that our Congress has no power to abolish it and that their Parliament, which had ample power, refused to exercise it through generations down to the last quarter of a century. They cannot even consent to go to Heaven on a road common to other nations, but must seek admission through a private gate of their own, stoutly maintaining that their local Church is the very one founded by the Apostles, and that all others are more or less apostate and schismatic. Other Nations have their weak points—the French, Glory; the Spaniards, Orthodoxy; the Yankees, Rapacity; but Bull plunders India and murders Ireland, yet deems himself the mirror of Beneficence and feeds his self-righteousness by resolving not to fellowship slaveholders of a different fashion from himself; he is perpetually fighting and extending his possessions all over the globe, yet wondering that French and Russian ambition will keep the world always in hot water. Our Yankee self-conceit and self-laudation are immoderate; but nobody else is so perfect on all points—himself being the judge—as Bull.

There is one other aspect of the British character which impressed me unfavorably. Everything is conducted here with a sharp eye to business. For example, the manufacturing and trafficking classes are just now enamored of Free Trade—that is, freedom to buy raw staples and sell their fabrics all over the world—from which they expect all manner of National and individual benefits. In consequence, these classes seize every opportunity, however unsuitable, to commend that policy to the strangers now among them as dictated by wisdom, philanthropy and beneficence, and to stigmatize its opposite as impelled by narrow-minded selfishness and only upheld by prejudice and ignorance. The French widow who appended to the high-wrought eulogium engraved on her husband's tombstone that "His disconsolate widow still keeps the shop No 16 Rue St. Denis," had not a keener eye to business than these apostles of the Economic faith. No consideration of time or place is regarded; in festive meetings, peace conventions, or gatherings of any kind, where men of various lands and views are notoriously congregated, and where no reply could be made without disturbing the harmony and distracting the attention of the assemblage, the disciples of Cobden are sure to interlard their harangues with advice to foreigners substantially thus—"N. B. Protection is a great humbug and great waste. Better abolish your tariffs, stop your factories and buy at our shops. We're the boys to give you thirteen pence for every shilling." I cannot say how this affected others, but to me it seemed hardly more ill-mannered than impolitic.

Yet the better qualities in the English character decidedly preponderate. Naturally, this people love justice, manly dealing, fair play; and though I think the shop-keeping attitude is unfavorable to this tendency, it has not effaced it. The English have too much pride to be tricky or shabby, even in the essentially corrupting relation of buyer and seller. And the Englishman who may be repulsive in his out-of-door intercourse or spirally inclined in his dealings, is generally tender and truthful in his home. There only is he seen to the best advantage. When the day's work is over and the welcome shelter of his domestic roof is attained, he husks off his formality with his great-coat and appears to his family and his friends in a character unknown to the outer world. The quiet comfort and heartfelt warmth of an English fireside must be felt to be appreciated. These Britons, like our own people, are by nature not demonstrative; they do not greet their wives before strangers with a kiss, on returning from the day's business, as a Frenchman may do; and if very glad to see you on meeting, they are not likely to say so in words; but they cherish warm emotions under a hard crust of reserve and shyness, and lavish all their wealth of affection on the little band collected within the magic circle of Home. Said an American who had spent two years as a public lecturer throughout Great Britain: "Circumstances have introduced me favorably to the intimacy and regard of many English families, and I can scarcely recollect one which was not in its own sphere, a model household." My own opportunities have been very limited, yet so far as they go they tend to maintain the justice of this remark. There are of course exceptions, but they would be more abundant elsewhere. And I regard the almost insuperable obstacles here interposed to the granting of Divorces, no matter on what grounds, as one cause of the general harmony and happiness of English homes.

But I must not linger. The order to embark is given; our good ship Baltic is ready; another hour and I shall have left England and this Continent, probably for ever. With a fervent good-bye to the friends I leave on this side of the Atlantic, I turn my steps gladly and proudly toward my own loved Western home—toward the land wherein Man enjoys larger opportunities than elsewhere to develop the better and the worse aspects of his nature, and where Evil and Good have a freer course, a wider arena for their inevitable struggles, than is allowed them among the heavy fetters and cast-iron forms of this rigid and wrinkled Old World. Doubtless, those struggles will long be arduous and trying: doubtless, the dictates of Duty will there often bear sternly away from the halcyon bowers of Popularity; doubtless, he who would be singly and wholly right must there encounter ordeals as severe as those which here try the souls of the would-be champions of Progress and Liberty. But Political Freedom, such as white men enjoy in the United States, and the mass do not enjoy in Europe, not even in Britain, is a basis for confident and well-grounded hope; the running stream, though turbid, tends ever to self-purification; the obstructed, stagnant pool grows daily more dank and loathsome. Believing most firmly in the ultimate and perfect triumph of Good over Evil, I rejoice in the existence and diffusion of that Liberty which, while it intensifies the contest, accelerates the consummation. Neither blind to her errors nor a pander to her vices, I rejoice to feel that every hour henceforth till I see her shores must lessen the distance which divides me from my country, whose advantages and blessings this four months' absence has taught me to appreciate more clearly and to prize more deeply than before. With a glow of unwonted rapture I see our stately vessel's prow turned toward the setting sun, and strive to realize that only some ten days separate me from those I know and love best on earth. Hark! the last gun announces that the mail-boat has left us, and that we are fairly afloat on our ocean journey: the shores of Europe recede from our vision; the watery waste is all around us; and now, with God above and Death below, our gallant bark and her clustered company together brave the dangers of the mighty deep. May Infinite Mercy watch over our onward path and bring us safely to our several homes; for to die away from home and kindred seems one of the saddest calamities that could befall me. This mortal tenement would rest uneasily in an ocean shroud; this spirit reluctantly resign that tenement to the chill and pitiless brine; these eyes close regretfully on the stranger skies and bleak inhospitality of the sullen and stormy main. No! let me see once more the scenes so well remembered and beloved; let me grasp, if but once again, the hand of Friendship and hear the thrilling accents of proved Affection, and when sooner or later the hour of mortal agony shall come, let my last gaze be fixed on eyes that will not forget me when I am gone, and let my ashes repose in that congenial soil which, however I may there be esteemed or hated, is still

"My own green land forever!"

THE END.



- Transcriber's Note: Inconsistent hyphenation, punctuation and spelling in the original document have been preserved. Periods have been added to dollar amounts. Typographical errors corrected in the text: Page 16 merchandize changed to merchandise Page 26 Sythes changed to Scythes Page 31 Ignots changed to ingots Page 57 skilful changed to skillful Page 60 Coeoperative changed to Cooeperative Page 63 then changed to than Page 151 Germains changed to Germain Page 161 armfull changed to armful Page 166 extraneous double quote removed Page 181 warming changed to warning Page 195 Belvidere changed to Belvedere Page 207 Belvidere changed to Belvedere Page 212 Reactionist changed to Reaectionist Page 213 Hew-Haven changed to New-Haven Page 277 bofogged changed to befogged Page 310 detrimen changed to detriment Page 349 Believng changed to Believing -

THE END