CHAPTER XVIII. 

 PAGANISM IN AGRICULTURE 



WHEN their hens die of a contagious disease, they 

 carry them at night into the neighbour's flock, 

 and leave them there, in order to get rid of the 

 disease by passing it on to the neighbour. Before 

 taking them they pluck them for the feathers, 

 making sure to keep the disease at home while dis- 

 tributing it. Not long ago I saw five dead hens 

 newly plucked and put down among a fine, young 

 flock, of which three out of four were dead in the 

 next six weeks. It may take several years to stamp 

 out the plague thus propagated in that flock, and 

 the same thing has often happened before on the 

 same farm. The idea is that the disease is 

 supernaturally derived, and that, to secure its 

 departure from one place, a suitable reception 

 must be secured for it at another. Meantime 

 we pay our poultry experts out of public money, 

 and the Department controlling them dares not 

 say a word against the industrial character which 

 makes it a virtue to spread the disease. The 

 Department can only spend the money on the 

 experts, hold its official tongue as to industrial 

 character, " recognise " the microbe, and ignore its 

 supernatural derivation, since any infringement on 

 the supernatural would be contrary to "Irish ideas" 



