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No. XVI.

MY NEIGHBOURHOOD.

"It's no in books, it's no in lere,

To make us truly blest :

If happiness has not her seat

And centre in the breast,

We may be well, or rich, or great,

But never can be blest."

BURNS.

"THE tract of country around me is mountainous; yet every spot which human labour can reclaim is in tillage. The peasants are generally Roman Catholics; their cabins are built of stone, cemented with clay and thatched with straw, rushes, or potatoe-stalks. The poorest sort consist of a single apartment, and the next class of two rooms, in one of which is the loom that has produced an improvement in comfort: the best are built of stone and lime, well thatched

or slated, and neatly whitewashed: these comprize a kitchen, parlour, and bed-rooms, with a range of office-houses proportioned to the stock. Many of the last description are comfortable dwellings, occupied by the farmers, who are nearly all engaged in the linen trade, and have a green for half-bleaching the cloth, near their houses.

"This branch of the linen trade rewards industry. Those employed in it are called barrack-men: they travel much through England, where they find a good market for their manufactures; by degrees they acquire a taste for comfort and cleanliness, and an evident improvement soon appears in and about their houses. It is, therefore, clear that, even in this mountainous region, the linen trade is diffusing comfort.

"It is incredible how numerous the young people are. Many of the families consist of eleven children; and I have reason to believe that, in a square mile of this rock, which a century ago was considered uninhabitable, there is not now an acre for each person. The potatoe is their chief food: it is used three times a-day by the poor, with

scarcely any thing but salt, to render it palateable. A basket of potatoes is placed on a stool, or little table, in the middle of the cabin, and the whole family draw round it, and eat with their fingers. Even this mode of life has charms; and I am persuaded that a man who has enough in this way, and who has never known better, may be contented and happy.

"Very few of the poor weavers or spinners, in the course of their lives, better their conditions. much; for they all marry early, and soon find their exertions equal only to meet the absolute necessities of a house-full of children. At present the most industrious weaver of common linen cloth can, with difficulty, earn a shilling per diem ; and the remuneration for spinning is so trifling, that sixteen hours spent at the wheel yield little more than a penny. It has been attempted to introduce two-hand wheels, by which it was supposed that females could spin twice the quantity of yarn produced in the old way; but the new plan answers only for coarse yarn, which is not nearly so profitable as fine. However, when there are four or five wheels in a family, the amount of

their industry is considerable; and when we consider that, but for this mode of occupying time, the females would be idle, we may safely attribute the superiority of Ulster over other parts of Ireland, both morally and politically, to the influence which the linen manufacture has upon the habits and comforts of the peasantry.

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Many of the young girls pride themselves exceedingly upon being excellent spinsters; and I suppose there does not more joy flutter round the heart of a fashionable beauty on being complimented as the belle of an assembly, than is felt by the young hope of a cabin who carries away the palm from a camp or spinning match. Such is the truth of Dr. Paley's observation, with respect to the equal distribution of happiness. through all classes of mankind.

"I have remarked that very fine spinning is not considered profitable, and it is very little practised in this part of Ulster; but many of the industrious females in other parts of our province have done wonders, in producing cambric thread with the finger.* From a pound-and-a-half of * Vide Stuart's Memoirs of Armagh.

flax, which costs about two shillings, yarn has been spun of so fine a description as to sell for £5. 28. 44d. Sixty-four hanks have been produced out of one pound avoirdupoise of flax, by splitting the fibre with a needle; but it was a fortnight's work to spin one hank. A young girl, however, named Catherine Woods, has produced yarn so fine, that there would be seven hundred hanks to the pound of flax, which would make a thread 2,521,440 yards in length.

"A strong and earnest desire is manifested by these mountaineers to benefit by the spread of education they send their children regularly to school; and it is inconceivable what a thirst for knowledge the lending library of the Grinan School, which, as I have before intimated, is a donation from the Kildare-street Society, in Dublin, is exciting in this neglected quarter. Indeed, they appear to be quite sensible of the benevolent intentions of those societies, now labouring, with success, to promote the instruction of the poor."

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