180 AWAKENING OF ENGLAND. 



drive, and whilst " the merriest people " painted 

 in the night a certain large grazier's cattle blue, 

 and drove them many miles across the bogs, 

 " the saddest " wailed over lost days spent in 

 unproductive labour. There is that inherent 

 love of sport in the Irishman which will make 

 him deny himself bread in order to paint a great 

 grazier's cows blue, and I am convinced that 

 it is the exercise of this sporting instinct in 

 practical matters which makes the Irishman 

 at times a bad business man. 



A great deal of farming in years gone by 

 consisted in the sterile game of passing cattle 

 and pigs from one hand to another, each farmer 

 hoping to make something out of the " deal " ; 

 and it is plain even to those who are ignorant 

 of political economy that this kind of unpro- 

 ductive labour must keep the farmers, as a 

 class, poor. When the creameries were first 

 instituted, and contracts had to be made with 

 English butter merchants, the same sporting 

 instinct drove the creamery secretaries to try 

 to drive bargains with stolid, phlegmatic British 

 butter merchants. The Irish farmer thought 

 that bystartingto ask an exorbitant price, asthey 

 had traditionally done with their cattle, they 

 could always come down ; but unfortunately 



