The Emigrants Of Ahadarra / The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two

by William Carleton

And yet, although the people have great errors, without which no people so long neglected can ever be found, and, although they have been for centuries familiarized with suffering, yet it is absolute dread of poverty that drives them from their native soil; They understand, in fact, the progress of pauperism too well, and are willing to seek fortune in any clime, rather than abide its approach to themselves—an approach which they know is in their case inevitable and certain. For instance, the very class of our countrymen that constitutes the great bulk of our emigrants is to be found among those independent small farmers who appear to understand something like comfort. One of these men holding, say sixteen or eighteen acres, has a family we will suppose of four sons and three daughters. This family grows up, the eldest son marries, and the father, having no other way to provide for him, sets apart three or four acres of his farm, on which he and his wife settle. The second comes also to marry, and hopes his father won't treat him worse than he treated his brother. He accordingly gets four acres more, and settles down as his brother did. In this manner the holding is frittered away and subdivided among them. For the first few years—that is, before their children rise—they may struggle tolerably well; but, at the expiration of twenty or twenty-five years, each brother finds himself with such a family as his little strip of land cannot adequately support, setting aside the claims of the landlord altogether; for rent in these cases is almost out of the question.

What, then, is the consequence? Why, that here is to be found a population of paupers squatted upon patches of land quite incapable of their support; and in seasons of famine and sickness, especially in a country where labor is below its value, and employment inadequate to the demand that is for it, this same population becomes a helpless burthen upon it—a miserable addition to the mass of poverty and destitution under which it groans.

Such is the history of one class of emigrants in this unhappy land, of ours; and what small farmer, with such a destiny as that we have detailed staring him and his in the face, would not strain every nerve that he might fly to any country—rather than remain to encounter the frightful state of suffering which awaits him in this.

Such, then, is an illustration of the motives which prompt one class of emigrants to seek their fortune in other climes, while it is yet in their power to do so. There is still a higher class, however, consisting of strong farmers possessed of some property and wealth, who, on looking around them, find that the mass of destitution which is so rapidly increasing in every direction must necessarily press upon them in time, and ultimately drag them down to its own level. But even if the naked evils which pervade society among us were not capable of driving these independent yeomen to other lands, we can assure our legislators that what these circumstances, appalling as they are, may fail in accomplishing, the recent act for the extra relief of able-bodied paupers will complete—an act which, instead of being termed a Relief Act, ought to be called an act for the ruin of the country, and the confiscation of its property, both of which, if not repealed, it will ultimately accomplish. We need not mention here cases of individual neglect or injustice upon the part of landlords and agents, inasmuch as we have partially founded our narrative upon a fact of this description.

It has been said, we know, and in many instances with truth, that the Irish are a negligent and careless people—without that perseverance and enterprise for which their neighbors on the other side of the channel are so remarkable. We are not, in point of fact, about to dispute the justice of this charge; but, if it be true of the people, it is only so indirectly. It is true of their condition and social circumstances in this country, rather than of any constitutional deficiency in either energy or industry that is inherent in their character. In their own country they have not adequate motive for action—no guarantee that industry shall secure them independence, or that the fruits of their labor may not pass, at the will of; their landlords, into other hands. Many, therefore, of the general imputations that are brought against them in these respects, ought to be transferred rather to the depressing circumstances in which they are placed than to the people themselves. As a proof of; this, we have only to reflect upon their industry, enterprise, and success, when relieved from the pressure of these circumstances in other countries—especially in America, where exertion and industry never, or at least seldom, fail to arrive at comfort and independence. Make, then, the position of the Irishman reasonable—such, for instance, as it is in any other country but his own—and he can stand the test of comparison with any man.

Not only, however, are the Irish flying from the evils that are to come, but they feel a most affectionate anxiety to enable all those who are bound to them by the ties of kindred and domestic affection to imitate their example. There is not probably to be found in records of human attachment such a beautiful history of unforgotten affection, as that presented by the heroic devotion of Irish emigrants to those of their kindred who remain here from inability to accompany them.*

*The following extract, from a very sensible pamphlet by
Mr. Murray, is so appropriate to this subject, that we cannot
deny ourselves the pleasure of quoting it here:—
“You have been accustomed to grapple with and master
figures, whether as representing the produce of former
tariffs, or in constructing new ones, or in showing the
income and expenditure of the greatest nation on the earth.
Those now about to be presented to you, as an appendix to
this communication, are small, very small, in their separate
amounts, and not by any means in the aggregate of the
magnitude of the sums you have been accustomed to deal with;
but they are large separately, and heaving large in the
aggregate, in all that is connected with the higher and
nobler parts of our nature—in all that relates to and
evinces the feelings of the heart towards those who are of
our kindred, no matter by what waters placed asunder or by
what distance separated. They are large, powerfully large,
in reading lessons of instruction to the statesman and
philanthropist, in dealing with a warm-hearted people for
their good, and placing them in a position of comparative
comfort to that in which they now are. The figures represent
the particulars of 7,917 separate Bills of Exchange, varying
in amount from £1 to £10 each—a few exceeding the latter
sum; so many separate offerings from the natives of Ireland
who have heretofore emigrated from its shores, sent to their
relations and friends in Ireland, drawn and paid between the
1st of January and the 15th of December, 1846—not quite one
year; and amount in all to £41,261 9s. 11d. But this list,
long though it be, does not measure the number and amount of
such interesting offerings. It contains only about one-third
part of the whole number and value of such remittances that
have crossed the Atlantic to Ireland during the 349 days of
1846. The data from which this list is complied enable the
writer to estimate with confidence the number and amount
drawn otherwise; and he calculates that the entire number,
for not quite one year, of such Bills, is £24,000, and the
amount £125,000, or, on an average, £5 4s. 3d. each. They
are sent from husband to wife, from father to child, from
child to father, mother, and grand-parents, from sister to
brother, and the reverse; and from and to those united by
all the ties of blood and friendship that bind us together
on earth.
In the list, you will observe that these offerings of
affection are classed according to the parts of Ireland they
are drawn upon, and you will find that they are not confined
to one spot of it, but are general as regards the whole
country.”—Ireland. its Present Condition and Future
Prospects, In n letter addressed to the Right Honorable Sir
Robert Peel, Baronet, by Robert Murray. Esq. Dublin, James
M'Olashan, 21 D'Olier Street, 1847.

Let it not be said, then, that the Irishman is deficient in any of the moral elements or natural qualities which go to the formation of such a character as might be made honorable to himself and beneficial to the country. By the success of his exertions in a foreign land, it is clear that he is not without industry, enterprise, and perseverance; and we have no hesitation in saying that, if he were supplied at home with due encouragement and adequate motive, his good qualities could be developed with as much zeal, energy, and success as ever characterized them in a foreign country.

We trust the reader may understand what the condition of the country, at the period of our narrative to which we refer, must have been, when such multitudes as we have described rushed to our great seaports in order to emigrate; the worst feature in this annual movement being that, whilst the decent, the industrious, and the moral, all influenced by creditable motives, went to seek independence in a distant land, the idle, the ignorant, and the destitute necessarily remain at home—all as a burthen, and too many of them as a disgrace to the country.

Our friends the M'Mahons, urged by motives at once so strong and painful, were not capable of resisting the contagion of emigration which, under the circumstances we have detailed, was so rife among the people. It was, however, on their part a distressing and mournful resolve. From the, moment it was made, a gloom settled upon the whole family. Nothing a few months before had been farther from their thoughts; but now there existed such a combination of arguments for their departure, as influenced Bryan and his father, in spite of their hereditary attachment to Ahadarra and Carriglass. Between them and the Cavanaghs, ever since Gerald had delivered Kathleen's message to Bryan, there was scarcely any intercourse. Hanna, 'tis true, and Dora had an opportunity of exchanging a few words occasionally, but although the former felt much anxiety for a somewhat lengthened and if possible confidential conversation with her sparkling little friend, yet the latter kept proudly if not haughtily silent on one particular subject, feeling as she did, that anything like a concession on her part was humiliating, and might be misconstrued into a disposition to compromise the independence of her brother and family. But even poor Dora, notwithstanding her affectionate heart and high spirit, had her own sorrows to contend with, sorrows known only to her brother Bryan, who felt disposed to befriend her in them as far as he could. So indeed would every one of the family, had they known them, for we need scarcely say that the warm and generous girl was the centre in which all their affections met. And this indeed was only justice to her, inasmuch as she was willing on any occasion to sacrifice her interests, her wishes, or anything connected with her own welfare, to their individual or general happiness. We have said, however, that she had her own sorrows, and this was true. From the moment she felt assured that their emigration to America was certain, she manifested a depression so profound and melancholy, that the heart of her brother Bryan, who alone knew its cause, bled for her. This by the rest of the family was imputed to the natural regret she felt, in common with themselves, at leaving the old places for ever, with this difference to be sure—they imagined that she felt the separation more acutely than they did. Still, as the period for their departure approached, there was not one of the family, notwithstanding what she felt herself, who labored so incessantly to soothe and sustain the spirits of her father, who was fast sinking under the prospect of being “forever removed,” as he said, “from the places his heart had grown into.” She was in fact the general consoler of the family, and yet her eye scarcely ever met that of her brother that a tear did not tremble in it, and she felt disposed to burst out into an agony of unrestrained grief.