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the maritime villages of England from procuring from it, for themselves 

 and their families, if not the comforts enjoyed by the agricultural 

 peasantry, at least a certain elevation in social existence, adequate to 

 maintain them several degrees above that state of squalid destitution 

 which the Irish peasant deems alone deserving of being branded with 

 the name of poverty. The poverty of the Irish fisherman, therefore, 

 does not proceed merely from his being of that vocation. It may 

 tend to prevent his rising into some more profitable line of living; but 

 it exerts no necessary influence to depress him into beggary. His 

 ignorance, the second cause, is the natural the necessary result of his 

 poverty; and as to his prejudices, they are but an additional link in 

 this chain of causes and effects. 



In confirmation of the position, that the destitution, ignorance, and 

 prejudices of this class in Ireland arise from circumstances extraneous 

 to their mode of life, we shall, instead of entering into abstract theore- 

 tical disquisitions, adduce the actual state of the fishermen of Claddagh, 

 as given in " Hardiman's History of the Town of Galway," and shall 

 make no apology for deviating somewhat from the direct course of our 

 inquiry, because, while the episode is not without its connexion with 

 the main subject, it serves to introduce to notice a genus, or, more 

 correctly speaking, a variety of the Homo Hibernicus, little known, yet 

 worthy of being studied from the singularity of its distinctive charac- 

 teristics. Let the reader compare the following graphic description of 

 the insulated village of Claddagh, insulated not physically but morally, 

 for strictly speaking it is a suburb of the populous town of Galway, 

 with his recollections of the inland Irish peasant, as painted by the 

 still more graphic and equally accurate pens of Edgeworth, Caiieton, 

 or Inglis; and he must acknowledge that the former exists in a better, 

 a purer moral atmosphere than his brother agriculturists and mechanics 

 of the inland districts: 



" The Claddagh is a village in the western suburb of Galway, inha- 

 bited by about 3,000 individuals, who support themselves solely by 

 fishing; they have no land attached to their cottages; a milch cow 

 and a potato garden are equally rare among them. The colony, from 

 time immemorial, has been governed by one of their own body, perio- 

 dically elected, who is called the mayor, and regulates the community 

 according to laws understood among themselves : his decisions are 

 always final. When on shore, the villagers are occupied in fitting up 

 their boats and tackle for the next expedition; and spend their leisure 

 in regaling themselves with their favourite beverage, whiskey, or assem- 

 bling in groups to consult about their maritime affairs. When preparing 

 for sea, they take out potatoes, oaten bread, fire, and water, but no 

 spirituous liquor. On returning from the fishing, where they are often 

 absent for several days, they are met by their wives and female rela- 

 tions on the shore, to whom they hand over the whole of their capture, 

 which forthwith becomes the sole property of the women, who dispose 

 of it at pleasure, the men troubling themselves no further about it, and 

 contenting themselves with what money is necessary for the repair of 

 their boats, and whatever whiskey, brandy, and tobacco their wives 

 choose to allow them. They are ignorant; they speak no language 

 but Irish; they have no schools, contenting themselves and their 

 families with the religious instruction they receive from the convent 



