j6 LABOURING POOR. 



in the cabbins of Ireland has a near refemblance to that of a 

 fmoaked ham. The number of the blind poor I think greater 

 there than in England, which is probably owing to this caufe. 



The roofs of the cabbins are rafters, raifeci from the tops of 

 the mud walls, and the covering varies ; fome are thatched with 

 ftraw, potatoeftalks, or with heath, others only covered with 

 fods of turf cut from a grafs field ; and I have feen feveral 

 that were partly cornpoled of all three } the bad repair thefe 

 roofs are kept in, a hole in the thatch being often mended with 

 turf, and weeds fprooting from every part, gives them the ap- 

 pearance of a weedy dunghill, efpecially when the cabbin is 

 rot built with regular walls, but fupported on one, or 

 perhaps on both fides by the banks of a broad dry ditch, the 

 roof then feems a hillock, upon which perhaps the pig grazes. 

 Some of thefe cabbins are much lefs nnd more miferablc 

 habitations than I had ever feen in England. I was told they 

 were the worft in Connaught, but I found it an error ; I faw 

 many in Leinfter to the full as bad, and in Wicklow, fome 

 worfe than any in Connaught. When they are well roofed, 

 and built not of ftones, ill put together, but of mud, they 

 are much warmer, independently of fmoke, than the clay, 

 or lath and mortar cottages of England, the walls of which 

 are fo thin, that a rat hole lets in the wind to the annoyance of 

 the whole family. The furniture of the cabbins is as bad 

 as the architecture ; in very many, confifting only of a pot for 

 boih'ng their potatoes, a bit of a table, and one or two broken 

 ftools ; beds are not found univerfally, the family lying on 

 ftraw, equally partook of by cows, calves and pigs, though 

 the luxury of flies is coming in in Ireland, which excludes the 

 poor pigs from the warmth of the bodies of their mafter 

 and miftrefs : I remarked little hovels of earth thrown up near 

 the cabbins, and in fome places they build their turf (lacks 

 hollow, in order to afford fhelter to the hogs. This is a 

 general defcription, but the exceptions are very numerous. I 

 have been in a multitude of cabbins that had much ufeful 

 furniture, and fome even fuperfluous; chairs, tables, boxes, 

 cheft of drawers, earthen ware, and in fhort moft of the ar- 

 ticles found in a middling Englifli cottage ; but upon enquiry, 

 I very generally found that thefe acquifitions were all made 

 within the laft ten years, a fure fign of a rifing national prof- 

 perity. 1 think the bad cabbins and furniture the greateft in- 

 ftances of Irifh poverty, and this muft flow from the mode 

 of payment for labour, which makes cattle fo valuable to the 

 peafant, that every farthing they can fpare is faved for their 

 purchafe : from hence alfo refults another obfervation, which 

 is, that the apparent poverty of it is greater than the real ; 

 for the houfe of a man that is mailer of four or five cows, will 

 have Scarce anything but deficiencies ; nay, I was in thecab- 

 brns of dairymen and farmers, not fmall ones, whofe cabbins 



were 



