Browne — EthnograpJii/ of Inishbofin and Lmhsharh. 351 



There are three or four small shops, but only one has a regular 

 counter, and it is also the only public-house on the islands. 



Tliere is no regular employment for labourers, but occasional work 

 is paid for at the rate of Is. Q>d. a-day. 



The women, besides attending to the ordinary domestic duties, 

 help the men at field work, at seed time and harvest, and at drawing 

 sea-weed for manure ; they card, dye, and spin the wool for clothing, 

 and in rough weather, when supplies from the mainland are short, 

 grind oats or barley in the quern, either for the cattle or for domestic 

 use. This is extremely hard work, and requires two women, one to 

 work at the grinding, and the other to feed the, grain from her apron. 

 They also employ part of their time at quilting or knitting. The 

 average annual money handling of a family is from £40 to £50. 



2. Family Life and Customs. — The children of a family, who are 

 usually numerous, are sent to school when about four years of age, and 

 at first attend regularly ; but as they grow older their attendance is 

 often very irregular, as they are liable to be kept at home by their 

 parents to assist at field work in times of pressure. They are said to 

 be very smart and intelligent, but their progress is interrupted and 

 checked by this cause. At the age of fourteen or fifteen years, when 

 they have readied the second stage of fifth class, they are taken from 

 school, and then enter into the regular routine of household and farm 

 work until they either marry or emigrate. They marry young, gene- 

 rally for purely family reasons, romance not entering into the case. 

 Courtship as a regular institution does not exist ; and if exceptional 

 cases occur they must be rare ; as for two young people of opposite 

 sexes to be seen walking together is looked upon as being decidedly 

 wrong. Matches are arranged by the parents from considerations of 

 suitability of families, not, as in many other places, by money bar- 

 gains. As soon us an arrangement is come to between the elders, 

 usually before Shrove, the young man goes and asks the girl per- 

 sonally ; if he be refused, which sometimes, though seldom, happens, 

 he considers liiinself disgraced, and is often inconsolable. The mar- 

 riages often take place without any rejoicings or social reunions, the 

 young couple going quietly home after the ceremony is over. In some 

 cases they set up house afresh on their own account, but if the bride- 

 groom be the eldest son who usually inherits the parent's house, &c., 

 the bride goes to live with his family. 



Mr. Michael Lavelle, to whom I am indebted for much valuable 

 information as to the customs and folk-lore of the people, informs me 

 that he has heard that sometimes, on the occasion of a wedding. 



