FAMINES IN IKELAND. 



295 



26. Minnesota: New jury law adopted; a five-sixth 

 vote renders a verdict valid in a civil action. 



28. Big Foot's band of hostile Indians surrenders 

 at Pine Kidge Agency. 



29. Big Foot's band resists disarmament and a fight 

 ensues. Capt. George D. Wallace, Seventh Cavalry, 

 and several soldiers killed. Lieut. Ernest A. Gar- 

 lington, Seventh Cavalry, and many soldiers wound- 

 ed. Many Indians killed and wounded. The Union 

 Pacific Eailway blocks traffic on the bridge at Omaha, 



to force agreement to terms on the part of rival roads. 

 Washington : Meeting of the Geological Society 

 meeting of the American Historical and Economical 

 Associations. 



30. Indians attack a provision train of the Ninth 

 Cavalry, near Pine Ridge Agency, but are repulsed 

 with considerable loss. 



31. Irish Nationalists hold a conference at Boulogne, 

 France, O'Brien and Parnell present. Parnell refuses 

 to surrender the party leadership. 



F 



FAMINES IN IRELAND. During August, 

 1890, there was among the Irish people great 

 anxiety in regard to the potato crop, and unfor- 

 tunately the worst fears were realized. The po- 

 tato rot or blight, spread through the western 

 half of Ireland. In west Cork the yield was 

 below the average. In the poorer districts of the 

 west in the counties of Donegal, Clare, Mayo, 

 Galway, and Kerry, and in the western islands 

 the crop was a total failure. The existence of an 

 Irish famine attracted great attention in the 

 United States, and the causes of the frequent 

 occurrence of famines in Ireland were investi- 

 gated. The potato has been cultivated in Ire- 

 land since its introduction by Sir Waltei Ral- 

 eigh in 1586. Producing more weight and bulk 

 to the acre than any other food crop, and being 

 easy of cultivation, it is peculiarly well adapted 

 to the needs of a people who live on the product 

 of small plots of ground ; and it had become the 

 principal food of the Irish as early as the end of 

 the seventeenth century. When Chief Baron 

 Rice went to London from Ireland in 1688 to 

 urge the claims of the Irish people upon James 

 II, the hostile populace escorted him in mock 

 state with potatoes stuck on poles. It seems to 

 have been about this time that the people mul- 

 tiplied their potato plots, to the detriment of all 

 other kinds of food products; and since then 

 the potato has been almost the sole food of the 

 Irish peasantry. In 1739 it was the custom 

 to leave the potatoes in the ground until near 

 Christmas, digging from day to day only what 

 was immediately needed for food; and in that 

 year an early and severe frost destroyed the un- 

 dug potatoes, and a terrible famine resulted, in 

 which one fifth of the population starved to 

 death. From that time to the present day Ire- 

 land has been visited with famines. In 1822 

 there was a serious famine in Munster and Con- 

 naught ; owing to excessive humidity, the pota- 

 toes rotted after they had been stowed in pits 

 and cellars. In 1831, 1835, 1836, 1837, 1839, and 

 1842 there were partial failures of the potato 

 crop which caused much distress. In the au- 

 tumn of 1845 there were rumors that a blight 

 had fallen upon the potato in various districts, 

 and before the close of the season there was 

 scarcely a county in Ireland in which the dis- 

 ease had not made some progress. " A famine," 

 says Charles Gavan Duffy, speaking of the horror 

 of this time, " was an ordinary occurrence in Ire- 

 land, and familiarity had diminished its terrors ; 

 but a famine on the scale of the one at hand was 

 scarcely known in the annals of the human race." 

 Before the autumn of 1845 had drawn to an end, 

 poor-law guardians and clergymen (including 



some of every denomination) affirmed that in 

 many districts when winter arrived no sound 

 potatoes would be left. The calamity of that 

 year was not confined to Ireland. The blight 

 fell at the same time upon the potato in widely 

 separated districts of the world ; in Belgium, in 

 Canada, in Hungary, in Holland, in Germany, 

 and in the United States. But the danger was 

 greater and the results more calamitous in Ire- 

 land than elsewhere, because in Ireland alone the 

 food product attacked was the sole food of the 

 rural population. A people whose ordinary food 

 is meat, maize, and wheat, and whose ordinary 

 drink is tea, coffee, and beer, can retrench in pe- 

 riods of scarcity and resort to cheaper kinds of 

 food, such as barley, oats, rice, and potatoes, with 

 water as a beverage ; but a people who feed en- 

 tirely on potatoes live upon the extreme verge 

 of human subsistence, and when they are de- 

 prived of their accustomed food there is nothing 

 cheaper to which they can resort. Poverty so 

 complete that the incidental potato of America 

 becomes bread and meat to a whole nation over 

 the sea is an impoverishment which it is hard 

 for the poorest American to understand ; but 

 this is the case with the peasantry in the west of 

 Ireland, and this is the reason why the failure of 

 the potato crop causes such widespread and aw- 

 ful suffering in that country. The fact that the 

 failure of the potato crop in 1890 was less dis- 

 astrous than similar failures in previous years, 

 was due to two causes : First, the relief move- 

 ment in America had directed attention to the 

 peril ; and, second, the population of the fam- 

 ished districts was less than it had ever been be- 

 fore. At the time of the great famine of 1846 

 Ireland had a population of between 8,000,000 

 and 9,000,000 ; but, in 1890, her resident popula- 

 tion was little more than 4,000,000. The de- 

 population was almost entirely due to emigra- 

 tion. 



During every famine year the suffering has 

 been relieved principally by private contribu- 

 tions and largely by the generosity of the Amer- 

 ican people. In the great famine of 1846 the 

 efforts of individuals were aided by a mark of 

 official sympathy from the United States Gov- 

 ernment, which, early in the winter of 1847, 

 commissioned two war-ships, the " Jamestown " 

 and the " Macedonian," to receive cargoes of pro- 

 visions and clothing and transport them to Ire- 

 land. The "Jamestown's" cargo included 

 wheat, barley, oats, rye, pease, beans, Indian corn, 

 flour (wheat), barley and oatmeal, Indian meal, 

 rice, biscuit, potatoes, dried apples, pork, hams, 

 fish, and clothing. The " Macedonian's " cargo 

 included Indian meal, rice, beans, pease, Indian 



