“From a multiplicity of concurrent statements respecting the pestilence, I shall merely subjoin one, which appears in the last _Tralee_ paper: ‘A man would hardly dig in a day, as much sound potatoes as himself would consume. But that is not the worst of it. Common cholera has set in among the people of the town, owing to the use of potatoes, which contain a large quantity of poisonous matter. A professional gentleman in this town, of considerable experience and unquestioned integrity, assures me, that he has attended, within the last fortnight, in this town and neighbourhood, more than 12 cases of common cholera, and that he would think a person as safe in consuming a certain quantity of arsenic, as in using the potatoes now exposed for sale.’” This is how the Famine of 1846–7 began, and what followed is a matter of history, which everyone ought to know, and ponder well over, but it can hardly come under the name of Gossip. There were, naturally, a few food riots in different parts of the country, but everyone tried to do their best, even in a blundering way, to alleviate the distress. The Archbishop of Canterbury composed a Special Form of Prayer, to be used on Sunday, 11 Oct. On 29 Sep. the gigantic equestrian statue of the Duke of Wellington, which used to crown the arch opposite Apsley House, and which was taken down 24 Jan., 1883, and then set up at Aldershot, was moved from the artist’s (Wyatt) studio, in Harrow Road, to Hyde Park. It was 27 feet high, and weighed about 40 tons, being made of brass guns taken by the Duke in various victories. Being of so great a weight, the appliances to remove it were on an equally massive scale, the carriage and framework in which it was placed weighing about 20 tons. It took 100 soldiers to haul the statue out of the studio; and, when mounted on its carriage, it took 29 huge dray horses, lent by Mr. Goding, of the Lion Brewery, Waterloo, to drag it to its destination. It was escorted by soldiers and military bands, and did the distance in about an hour a half. The next day was spent in preparing to hoist it; the day after, it was lifted some 50 feet, and there remained all night—and the next day was safely landed and put in position. From that time, until it was taken down, it was the butt of scoffs and jeers, and no one regretted its departure.