CANAL — TASK-WORK. 39 



seventy or eighty steps, you come to the bed of the 

 subterranean river which flows from Lough Mask to 

 Lough Corrib ; and when it is lighted up by the blazing 

 torch of the guide, who, as he jumps from rock to rock, 

 drops burning sparks, which are instantly extinguished 

 in the black silent stream, the effect is striking and 

 not unmingled with awe. 



In the afternoon, I walked up the new canal, at present 

 being formed to open a navigable passage from Lough 

 Corrib to Lough Mask. Upwards of 300 men are 

 employed on it. Besides opening up this communica- 

 tion, it is expected to reduce the waters of Lough Mask 

 permanently to their summer level, and thereby drain 

 an immense tract of low country on the river Robe and 

 its tributaries in Mayo. I was informed by Mr Collins, 

 the resident engineer, that the men employed were all 

 natives of the province; and he found their workmanship, 

 now that they were taught, as good in building dry 

 masonry as that of experienced English workmen. The 

 men, all along the line, were working with as much 

 diligence and assiduity as I have ever seen in England. 

 They are employed in gangs by task-work, and their 

 diligence affords a remarkable contrast to the indolent 

 style of work which I observed wherever the labourers 

 were paid by daily wages, unless they were, at the same 

 time, under the most vigilant superintendence. This 

 great operation is expected to be completed in two 

 years. The whole cutting is through solid limestone 

 rock : horizontal, lying on vertical beds. It is every- 

 where split into great crevices or " swallow-holes/' and 

 these require all to be puddled ; but nature, everywhere 



