"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. What fine,
patient, intelligent faces were among the sufferers in the infirmary.
The children in the school-room looked rosy and well-fed, and the babies
were nursed by the old women. So many of them - it was a sad sight
indeed.
V.
ONE RESULT OF THE COERCION ACT - THE AGRICULTURAL LABORERS IN DOWN AND
ANTRIM - WHISKEY - RAIN IN IRELAND - A DISCUSSION ON ORANGEISM.
It is the eighth of March. The weather remains frightfully inclement;
the snow and sleet is succeeded by incessant rain storms. The Coercion
bill has become law and even in the north there seems a difference in
the people. There is a carefulness of expressing an opinion on any
subject as if a reign of governmental terror had begun. The loyalty
always so fervent is now intense and loud. The people here think that
there is an epidemic of unreasonableness and causeless murmuring raging
at the south and west.
In all that I have seen in Down and Antrim, the agricultural laborers
seem to be never at any time much above starvation; any exceptionally
hard times bring it home to them.
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