Ireland yesterday and today (1909) (14771377184)

Identifier: irelandyesterday00suth_0 (find matches)
Title: Ireland yesterday and today
Year: 1909 (1900s)
Authors: Sutherland, Hugh
Subjects: Land tenure Home rule
Publisher: Philadelphia, The North American
Contributing Library: Boston College Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Boston Library Consortium Member Libraries



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SHADED PORTIONS SHOW CONGESTED DISTRICTS from a few shillings to several pounds a year. The plots wereusually planted with potatoes and oats, and the methods of culti-vation were extremely primitive. There was no rotation of crops,no adequate supply of manure and no proper system of drainage,whilst the breeds of live stock were worn out and of little value.The result was that the inhabitants were forced to depend very
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CONGESTION AND MIGRATION 75 largely upon certain secondary sources of income of an uncertainand varying nature. Many of them received occasional gifts fromrelatives in America, whilst weaving, knitting and sewing formedother small subsidiary sources of income. The results of sea fish-ing helped the families dwelling along the coast to eke out a scantyliving, whilst those living inland depended largely upon the wagesearned during some months of the year as migratory agriculturallaborers in England or Scotland. Thus in most cases the people did not really live on the produceof their holdings, but rather on some secondary source of income,such as field labor in England or Scotland. They paid a rent fortheir holding, generally not because of its agricultural value, butrather because it was necessary to have some home for their family.In a good year many of the inhabitants were little more than freefrom the dread of hunger, whilst a bad year, arising from thecomplete or partial failure of