The Letters Of
The Letters Of "Norah" On Her Tour Through Ireland By Margaret Dixon Mcdougall - Page 11 of 208 - First - Home

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But Alas!

While the webs grew longer the price grew less and they are in a sad case.

I called, with a friend, on some of these weavers: one, an intelligent man, with the prevailing Scotch type of face. We found him, accompanied by a sickly wife, sitting by a scanty fire, ragged enough. This man for his last web was paid at the rate of twopence a yard for weaving linen with twenty hundred threads to the inch, but out of this money he had to buy dressing and light, and have some one, the sickly wife I suppose, to wind the bobbins for him. He must then pay rent for the poor cabin he lived in, none too good for a stable, and supply all his wants on the remainder.

Another weaver told me that all this dreary winter they had no bed- clothes. They think by combining together they will be able to obtain better prices; but they are so poor, the depression in the trade is such a fearful reality that I am afraid they cannot combine or co-operate to any purpose. However, people in such desperate circumstances grasp at any hope.

It is wonderful with what disfavor some of these people receive a hint of emigration. It seems like transportation to them. Truly these Irish do cling to the soil.

The weavers seem to blame the manufacturers for the reduction of wages. They complain that the trade is concentrated into a few hands; that therefore they cannot sell where they can sell dearest, but are obliged to take yarn from a manufacturer and return it to him in cloth. They complain that he still further reduces the poor wage by fines. As many of these have only a hut but no garden ground, they have nothing to fall back on. There are many suffering great want, and with inherited Scotch reticence suffering in silence. There may be some injustice and some oppression, for that is human nature, but the hand-loom weaving is doomed to disappear, I am afraid.

There are some complaints of the high price of land here, and of the hard times for farmers, but there is no appearance of hard times. Laborers are cheap enough. One shilling a day and food, or ten shillings a week without food, seems to be the common wage. The people of Down and Antrim, as far as I have gone, are rampantly loyal to Queen and Government and to all in authority. If a few blame the manufacturers, or think the land is too dear, the large majority blame the improvidence of the poor. "They eat bacon and drink tea where potatoes and milk or porridge and milk used to be good enough for them." It is difficult to imagine the extravagance.

I went through part of the poor-house in Ballymena. It is beautifully clean and sweet, and in such perfect order out and in that one is glad to think of the sick or suffering poor having such a refuge.

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