116 PROSPECTS OF TIPPERARY. 



and repairing roads for the half-year. The contracts 

 had all been taken by small farmers, (a mile or two by 

 each,) of whom a great number were present. 



In the afternoon Mr Stewart, Lord Hawarden's agent, 

 accompanied me in a drive through the adjoining 

 country. There will be many fine estates in this quarter 

 for sale ; and, as the people are now surrendering their 

 farms, it is thought that a stranger would incur no 

 danger by purchasing or leasing land here. Yet there 

 are disagreeable legends associated with bushes here and 

 there on the road-sides, whence issued the deadly shot, 

 too recent to make one feel altogether comfortable. Iron 

 shutters, pistols on the mantel-piece ready capped and 

 loaded, hall doors heavily barred and bolted, indicate a 

 present of insecurity. A well-appointed railway, with 

 handsome road-side stations, setting down and taking 

 up punctual busy people six times a-day, running through 

 the centre of the county, with roads diverging from every 

 station, and coaches and cars constantly traversing them, 

 point to an early future of prosperity and peace for 

 Tipperary. It is not the lowest class, or the most des- 

 titute, who commit the murders which have shocked 

 society and made the name of this county infamous : 

 the small farmers, who themselves traffic in subletting 

 to those below them at exorbitant rents, grinding the 

 faces of the very poorest, are said to be the perpetrators 

 or chief instigators to crime. 



On the morning of 9 th November, I breakfasted with 

 Mr Bianconi, at his mansion on the Suir, within a mile of 

 Goold's Cross station on the Dublin and Cork railway. 

 This well-known and remarkable man is an Italian by 



