On the Cultivated Potato. 
267 
obtained between them twenty millions of money for the relief 
of Irish distress consequent upon the failure of this crop in 
question, and that sum is inconsiderable as compared with the 
widespread loss caused by panic, pestilence, and their far reach- 
ing consequences. The appearance, in 1845, of an extensive 
disease in the potato crops in various parts of the United King- 
dom, though regarded as a serious calamity to the poorer classes, 
especiallv in Ireland, Mas scarcely deemed a satisfactory solu- 
tion for the wreck of one of the most powerful Cabinets of 
modern times. Yet it transpired that it was in this apparently 
insiffnificant cause that Sir Robert Peel had found the necessitv 
of his retirement from office. In the face of the alarming 
prospect presented to his mind by the destruction of a large 
portion of the staple food of the labouring population, his reso- 
lution to maintain the existing Corn Laws gave way, and his 
secession from pQwer was the consequence.* The American 
Government has been charged with supineness, it has been told 
to rise above party to consider mankind. We have an Irish 
question, and the Irish question is, after all, subordinate to that 
of the potato and the question of its " constitution I " f Factious 
cries are usually as impracticable as they are abstract, but such 
a cry as pacification by means of the potato would have a con- 
crete significance. In the sequel I have a modest suggestion 
to offer to our Government ; meanwhile, I only stay to express 
a hope that the governments and public scientific bodies, who 
in the way of preserving the crop in question have done so little 
in the last hundred years, do not in their secret hearts share 
Mr. Goldwin Smith's opinion,! which, after all, may be that 
of Dame ^« ature, namely, that misery and barbarism have multi- 
plied on the British precarious and philoprogenitative potato ! 
Everything depends on the spirit, the scientific spirit, with 
which we are imbued on entering upon this inquirv. If, with 
candour, we ask ourselves what on the subject we really know, 
echoes from vacant caves in our minds will answer — very, very 
little. But, says the wisdom of the old common law — the 
origin of a thing ought to be inquired into. § Again, the law 
says, inquire into doubtful points, for, by reasoning, we come 
to the real reason of a thing. Every one, in regard to the 
present subject, starts afresh to run far on little ground ; there 
* •• Annual Register," p. 2. 1846. 
t In 1881 it was calculated that in Ireland tliere were six persons for everv 
acre of potatoes, in England fifty persons per acre of that crop. • Morton's Hand- 
book.' — " Crops." 
X Goldwin Smith in - Nineteenth Century," IGth of June. 1883. 
§ Coke upon Lit. 
