With regard to the third head, that is the reasons for not yet being able to report “whether any and what further remedial measures appear to be requisite to ameliorate the condition of the Irish poor, or any portion of them”—The commissioners observe that the reasons are sufficiently apparent in the fact that they have not yet completed their inquiry into the causes of destitution. They would, they say, be little worthy of the high trust reposed in them, were they content with deciding upon the extent and nature of distress, or upon the means of only present alleviation. “We consider it our duty (they remark) to endeavour if possible, to investigate the causes of the destitution which we discover, and to ascertain why classes of his Majesty’s subjects are from time to time falling into a state of wretchedness; why the labouring population do not provide against those events which seem inevitable; why the able-bodied labourer does not provide against the sickness of himself, or that of the various members of his family; against the temporary absence of employment; against the certain infirmity of age; against the destitution of his widow and his children in the contingent event of his own premature decease; whether these omissions arise from any peculiar improvidence in his habits, or from the insufficiency of employment, or from the low rate of his wages.” It would not even be sufficient to answer that the limited amount of employment and the rate of his wages will not permit him. “It is our duty (they say) to carry the investigation further, and at least to endeavour to trace whether there be any circumstances which restrict the amount of employment, or the rate of wages; or in any other way offer impediments to the improvement of the people, which are such as can be remedied by legislation.”