A Historical Account of Useful Inventions and Scientific Discoveries: Being a manual of instruction and entertainment.Grant, George
History
A Historical Account of Useful Inventions and Scientific Discoveries: Being a manual of instruction and entertainment.
Grant, George
Inventions -- History
The communication between England and Ireland has greatly increased
since the above remarks were written, in 1832. There are now upwards
of four hundred steam-boats sailing between Ireland and Great Britain,
and of late years the largest export from that unfortunate country
consists of her starving population, who, true enough, find their way
into the interior of England, but not with the intention of purchasing
manufactured goods, but of being employed in the manufacturing of them.
We believe that our mechanical readers, at least, will agree with
us, when we say that the benefit has not been reciprocal. England,
for her share, has been burthened with a pauper population, and her
sons deprived of their employment, by the immense immigration that
has of late years taken place. Poor rates are multiplied to an extent
hitherto unheard of, and our streets swarming with beggars--and those
of the most importunate class. So much was this the case, that in
1847 and 1848, Liverpool was inundated with paupers from the sister
country to such a degree, that her authorities were compelled to
petition government to put an end to the nuisance, and to grant
them assistance to prevent the death of so many thousands of their
fellow-men from dying for want; the poor-rates were so increased that
the ratepayers with justice complained. And we question much if ever
the English manufactures have been so much benefited by the commerce
as the foregoing quotation would lead us to believe. That we have been
supplied with enormous quantities of provisions we cannot deny; but
that the payment of these was taken back in our cloths and our hardware
is very questionable. That the money was taken back there can be little
doubt, not for the purpose, however, of buying clothes for the wives
and children of those families whose industry had supplied us with eggs
and poultry, but for supplying the insatiate wants of their profligate
landlords, who were squandering the subsistence of the needy peasantry
in another land. If any class of men have obtained benefit by means of
this increased and speedy communication between the two countries, it
assuredly is the absentee Irish landlord.
MILLS.
Corn Mills are of very ancient origin, and it may not be uninteresting
to our readers to learn something of the customs of our forefathers
with regard to them; to which we will subjoin such modern improvements
as the more advanced state of the arts have enabled the moderns to
achieve, and to excel the imperfect information of the ancients in
mechanical sciences.
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