Up the Lough we sailed into beautiful Ramelton, an exceptionally pretty, clean little place, boasting of a very nicely kept hotel. The scenery all around is delightful. Across the Lannon River, on the banks of which is one of the principal streets, is a lofty ridge crowned with grand trees. The Lannon runs into Lough Swilly, and is affected by the ebb and flow of the tide. The trees on the ridge are tenanted by a thriving colony of rooks, very busy just now with their spring work. Two delightful roads, one above another, run along the brow of the hill under the shade of the trees.
I discovered that rooks know a great deal; that there is infinite variety of meaning in their caw. The young couples who are starting housekeeping have not only to provide materials and build their homes, but to defend their property at every stage from the rapacity of their neighbors. They have also to build in such a manner as to satisfy the artistic taste of the community. I saw an instance of this during a morning walk. Five rooks were sitting in judgment on the work of a young and thoughtless pair of rooks, I suppose. The work was condemned, the young couple were evicted without mercy and the nest pulled to pieces by the five censors with grave caws of disapprobation, while the evicted ones flew round and showed fight and used bad language. The Coercion Act was not in favor among the black coated gentry of the air.
It has fallen like a spell over Ireland though, and evictions are hurried through as if they thought their time was short. People are afraid to speak to a stranger.
I have succeeded in obtaining introductions, which I hope will give me an entrance into society in Donegal.
Was driven by my new friends over a part of Lord Leitrim's estate, and through his town of Milford. The murdered Earl has left a woeful memory of himself all over the country side. He must have had as many curses breathed against him as there are leaves on the trees, if what respectable people who dare speak of his doings say of him be true, which it undoubtedly is. Godly people of Scottish descent, Covenanters and Presbyterians, who would not have harmed a hair of his head for worlds, have again and again lifted their hands to heaven and cried. "How long, Lord, are we to endure the cruelty of this man?"
One case (which is a sample case) I will notice. In the plantation of Scottish settlers in the North it seems that either for company or mutual protection against the dispossessed children of the soil, the farmhouses are built together in clachans or little groups. After a lapse of years these clachans in some cases expanded into small towns. The people built houses and made improvements on their holdings, paying their rent punctually, but holding the right to their own money's worth, the result of years of toil and stern economy under the Ulster custom. In this way the greater part of the town of Milford sprung into existence.
One John Buchanan, a Presbyterian of Scottish descent, son of respectable people who had lived on this estate for generations, was employed in the land office of the Earl of Leitrim over twenty years. This man trusting to the Ulster custom, and the honest goodness of the old Earl, grandfather of the present Earl, a good landlord and a just man, by all accounts, invested his savings in building on the site of the old farmhouse in Milford a block of buildings—quarrying the stone for them—consisting of two large houses on Main street, and the rest tenement houses on Buchanan street. He improved his farm by reclaiming land, making nice fields out of bog.
When the good Earl died and the late Earl came into possession, he immediately raised the rent to nearly double what was paid before, making John Buchanan pay dearly for his improvements. John Buchanan died rather suddenly, leaving a widow and five children. The widow in her overwhelming grief was visited by Lord Leitrim personally. He told her with great abuse and outrageous language, that she had no claim whatever to a particle of the property, "she did not own a stone of it." The widow, worn and nervous with the great trouble she had passed through, was unable to bear this new trouble; his Lordship's violence gave her a shock from which she never recovered. He then sent his bailiffs and put her and her children out; put out the fires, as taking possession, and re-let the place to her, again doubling the rent. Her eldest son, a young lad, boiling with wrath over the wrong done and the language used to his mother, went to his aunt, living at some distance, and besought her to send him out of the country, lest he should be tempted to take vengeance in his own hand. His aunt seeing this danger, fitted him out from her own pocket, and the poor lad, his mother consenting, was expatriated out of harm's way to far Australia.
The widow never recovered the shock which Lord Leitrim had given her. It was aggravated by despair at seeing all the savings of her husband's lifetime appropriated by the strong hand, and her children left destitute. She was also in debt to the value of L600 for building material for an addition built to the house and some office houses, built later on, some time after the rest of the property. This debt of L600 wore on her. She had no means of payment; all her means were swallowed up in this property. The creditors could not collect it off the property, it was not held liable for the debt, neither was Lord Leitrim, who had seized the property. Her sense of honesty and the honor of her husband's name made her fret over this debt. The doctor had declared her illness heart disease brought on by a shock, and her death imminent. To soothe her mind her sister again came forward and out of her own pocket paid the money. The widow died and was buried. Their only relative tried what the law would do to redress the grievances of the orphans. The presiding judge, the chairman of the quarter sessions, lifted up his hands saying, "Must I issue a decree that will rob these helpless orphans." The decree was issued, and the children ejected without a farthing of compensation. To leave no stone unturned, the children went in a body to Lord Leitrim to ask, as justice had been powerless, for mercy from him. He ordered his servant to put them out. At the time these orphans were turned out of the house their father built, there was not a farthing of rent due, all had been paid up at the unjust Earl's own estimate.
This case had been heard by the Royal Commissioners sent to enquire into these things, but it appears that there is no law to redress a tenant's wrong. This occurred under the tenant custom of Ulster.