Irish Flocks crossed with the Leicester. 245 



opportunity of inspecting the flocks. The cross 

 with the Leicester is very observable, and has 

 evidently improved the form of the Irish sheep : 

 their average weight is now about thirty pounds 

 a quarter. Many of the flocks must have tra- 

 velled a great distance in the last few days ; 

 and though the road was wet, they had not suf- 

 fered so much as I should have expected from 

 such rapid driving, which may be owing to their 

 native activity and spirit 



Whilst we were stopping to refresh our horses, 

 Mr. Garnett arrived. He said he remembered 

 almost the whole of this country without hedges, 

 very thinly inhabited, and that the state of the 

 working classes was now more comfortable than 

 in ancient times he had known them. The 

 changes in eighty years have undoubtedly been 

 great, and have infinitely augmented the luxuries 

 among the higher ranks ; but unless it be that the 

 introduction of the potatoe has prevented the 

 lower orders from starving, I cannot, from 

 what I have observed, see how it is possible 

 their condition should be improved, when it is 

 not easy to conceive rational beings to exist 

 under greater privations than they at present 

 endure. 



"\Ve had fifteen miles from Ballamona to Ba- 



7 



