The Letters of "Norah" on Her Tour Through IrelandNorah
History
The Letters of "Norah" on Her Tour Through Ireland
Norah
Ireland -- Description and travel
As an instance of hardships of which the poor had to complain, my
informant mentioned the case of one very old man, whose children had
scattered away over the world, which meant that they had emigrated. He
held a small place on a property close beside another property managed
by my informant's brother. This old man had paid his rent for sixty-nine
years; he and his people before him had lived, toiled and paid rent on
this little place. He was behind in his rent, for the first time, and
had not within a certain amount the sum required. He besought the
intercession of my friend's brother, who, having Scotch caution in his
veins, did not, though pitying, feel called upon to interfere. The old
man tendered what money he had at the office and humbly asked that he
might have time given him to make up the rest. It was refused with
contempt.
"Sir," faltered the old man, "I have paid my rent every year for sixty-
nine years. I have lived here under three landlords without reproach. I
am a very old man. I might get a little indulgence of time."
"All that is nothing to me," said the agent.
"Sir," said the old man, "if my landlord himself were here, or the
General his father, or my Lord Belmore who sold the land to him, I would
not be treated in this way after all."
"Get out of this instantly," said the agent, stamping his foot, "How
dare you give such insolence to me."
"You see," explained my friend, "he was very old, it was not likely that
any more could be got out of him even if he got time, for he was past
his labor. Besides there was a man beside him who held a large farm, and
he wanted this old man's little holding to square off his farm, so the
old man had to go to the wall, but I was sorry for him."
There is a good deal of this unproductive sorrow scattered over Ireland
among the comfortable classes. There are a good many also who feel like
that motherly Christian lady in Clones who said to me, "When they have
to go into the poor-house at the last, and they know it will come to
that, why not go in at once?"
I am convinced more and more every day of the widespread need there is
that some evangelistic effort should be made to bring a practical Gospel
to bear on the dominant classes in Ireland.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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