Question. "During that time have you known of many instances of illegitimate children being born in the Claddagh?"
Answer. "Not a single case—not one; and not only have I never known of such a case, but I never heard any person attribute immorality to the fishwomen. I was on duty in the three islands of Aran, inhabited almost exclusively by fishermen, who also farm potatoes, and I never heard of any one of their women (who are remarkable for their beauty) having had an illegitimate child, nor did I ever hear it attributed to them. Indeed I have been informed by a magistrate who lived in Galway for eight years, and has been on temporary duty in the isles of Aran, that he has never heard there of a case of that nature. These people, however, when required to pay poor-rates, having no native poor of their own in the workhouse, resisted the payment of what they considered a very unjust tax. In fact they closed their doors when the rate was only partially collected."
Three and twenty years after Sir Francis Head wrote the above we read in the writings of Frank Thorpe Porter, Esq., a member of the Irish Bar, long a divisional magistrate for the city of Dublin, and some time acting chief justice for Gibraltar, a further testimony of the worth of the islanders. On his return from Spain, he visited his son, Mr. Frank Porter, M.D., medical officer of the islands,[17] and whilst he was there several cases of typhus fever of a malignant type occurred.
THEIR KINDNESS.
The cottages are, with three or four exceptions, thatched and without any upper storey. The invariable course adopted during the prevalence of the epidemic was to nail up the door of the patient's apartment, to take out the sashes of the window, and render it the sole means of external communication. The medical attendant, priests, and nurse tenders had no other means of ingress and egress, and no objection appears to have ever been made to the system. Doctor Porter was stricken down by the disease, and although ten days had elapsed before a medical gentleman arrived from Galway, the doctor surmounted the fearful malady. "I spent," writes Mr. Porter, "each night in my son's apartment, and during the day he was attended by a nurse. Almost every night I heard some gentle taps outside the vacant window, and on going over to it, I would be told 'My wife is afther making a pitcher of whey for the poor docthor, you'll find it on the windy-stool;' or 'I brought you two jugs of milk to make whey for your son.' When the crisis had passed, and nutriment and stimulants were required, I would be told, 'We biled down two chickens into broth for the docthor, I hope it will sarve him.' Rabbits, chickens, and joints of kid were tendered for his use, and a bottle of 'rale Connemara Puttyeen,' was deposited on the window-stool. The people were all kind and anxious, and when he became able to walk out he was constantly saluted and congratulated; but no person would approach him if they could avoid it. They were all dreadfully apprehensive that he might impart the dreadful contagion. I brought him home as soon as possible, but he and I will always remember most gratefully the unvarying kindness and sympathy we experienced in Aran where they refused to take a farthing either for gratuity or compensation."
THEIR HOSPITALITY.
On September 3, 1886, Mr. R.F. Mullery, clerk of the Galway Union, thus, in answer to my letter to him, writes:—
"The present poundage-rate, one shilling in the pound, is exceptionally low, owing to a grant of £440, under the 'relief of the distressed Unions Act,' having been made to the islands. The average rate for the last ten years was three shillings in the pound. We never have islanders. There is no hospital, though there ought to be one, on the islands, as the sick poor are deterred from coming thirty miles by boat to the workhouse. The general health is exceptionally good, and very many live to a very old age. I have an opportunity of knowing this, as I have to examine the registry of deaths at the end of each quarter. The islanders as a rule are very intelligent, and quick at picking up anything they can either hear or see; and, best of all, they are a moral people, a case of illegitimacy scarcely ever occurring in the islands, and then it is looked on as a crime of the blackest dye.
"I have the honour, etc.,
"Robert F. Mullery."
The following extract from a letter written by my learned friend, Philip Lyster, Esq., barrister-at-law, resident magistrate of the district in which Aran is situated, bears testimony to the peaceful and law-abiding character of the islanders:—