AVERAGE Quantities of Seed used, and of the Produce per Acre In this district I comprehend Limerick,* which like Roscommon has very little land in tillage, the greater part of it being a flat grazing country; also Kerry and the south-west and northern part of Cork, taking in the eastern side of the Blackwater and the remainder of the county of Waterford. The whole district produces little corn? but notwithstanding its neglected state, I do not hesitate to say that it is as capable of improvement as any part of Ireland. Had illicit stills been introduced into this country in the same manner as they have been in the northern mountains, the market created by them would have given a stimulus to the industry of the people, and have proved the primary means of rendering the land more productive. The revenue might have suffered in the mean time, but this evil would have outweighed, except in a moral point of view, all its attendant inconveniences. But in making this remark I allude to a market in general, and not to any particular species of demand. The whole of the southern part of Cork produces a great deal of grain, but the individual quantities are small, in consequence of the land being much divided, as in Ulster; for a particular account of it I must refer to the recent work of the Reverend Mr. Townsend. I did not spend much time in that part of the country, and even had I remained there as long as the gentleman to whose work I allude, I could not have given more information on the subject. OCT. 13th, 1808. CLARE, BALLYVALLEY.-Labour here is thirteen-pence per day for harvest work; turf digging and mowing two shillings and two-pence; mowing per acre six shillings and sixpence; grazing a cow two guineas. Meadow-land lets for six guineas an acre. Lea for potatoes at from seven to ten guineas. The * I am aware that, by including Limerick in this district, I class some of the richest land in the island with some of the poorest ; but little of it is tilled; and had I not done so I could not have arranged the whole country into districts. tythes of Killaloe belong to the bishop. A cotter pays to the person who farms them 35. 4 d. per rood for oats. OCT. 13th. LIMERICK. ADARE.-The average value of land here is £3. an acre, owing chiefly, no doubt, to its vicinity to the city of Limerick. Mr. Quin let a field of nine acres, adjoining to his residence, at ten guineas per acre for three lives. The Limerick merchants give the Palatines one penny per stone more than the market price for their corn, which is much better dressed, though their implements are the same as those used in the country. I observed no visible difference in their mode of farming, but they do not, like the Irish, hire lands at any price; and they always attend to a fair division of the produce. OCT. 14th.-Tillage in this neighbourhood appears to be increasing. OCT. 16th. KERRY. LISTOWEL.-The land from this place to Tarbert lets at a guinea per acre, I have frequently heard of land being let here by the quarter; that is, a quarter of an acre. The people pay their rents chiefly by the sale of pigs and butter, and by digging turf for the Limerick market. Tythe farmers abound in this part of the country, and the complaints against them are loud and universal. OCT. 17th. KERRY HEAD.-Came hither from Listowel over much bog, and before I reached a place called the Causeway, passed through a valley some miles in extent, between the Sturk's Mountains, and those which form Kerry Head. The whole is in a bad state of cultivation, but susceptible of improvement; the rents are paid by butter and pigs. The high-ways are impassable for carriages of any kind, and are even bad for horses. Kerry Head itself consists of a pathless mountain, and even near the houses and villages there is scarcely any trace or appearance of a road. The villagers hire large tracts of mountain in common, all being equally bound for the rent, and they take in cattle by adgistment from the 1st of May to the 1st of November. A dry heifer is called a collop; ten sheep are also a collop; the price of grazing a collop is 16s. 3d. The price of salt is 2s. 2d. per quart, or 13s. per stone; ten quarts are employed to salt one cwt. of butter; a firkin costs 4s. 4d. and holds half a cwt. The expence of carriage to Cork is 3s. 9 d. per cwt. It is common here for people to borrow money of the merchants to pay their rent on the gale day; for when effects are sold by cant, there is a difference of 15s. or 16s. per cent. between cant price and currency. The Cork merchants require the firkins to be of oak, and the hoops of ash. A dry heifer is called a shanever. Shanevers which have had the bull, are taken in about November, and in May are sold as springers. A shanever is bought at 5 guineas, and sold for 8 or 9. The people never kill sheep for their own consumption: a cow on the best ground will produce 14 cwt. of butter, to which are to be added, "horn money," that is, skimmed milk and a calf, worth together a guinea. OCT. 18th. TRALEE.-Land in this neighbourhood lets for an enormous rent, some times as high as 10 guineas per acre, but a large quantity, at a distance from the town, brings only from 3 to 4 guineas. Towards Dingle a great deal of wheat is cultivated and sent to Limerick. More flax is raised there than in any other part of the country; corn to be productive must be sown early; all the barley which grows here is sent to the breweries. CORK. BANTRY.-Came here from Killarney, over mountains covered with heath and bog, but capable of improvement, which is rapidly advancing; cultivation is every year seen rising higher and higher up the sides of these eminences, which consist of a brown-stone rock. The red deer are confined to the Kerry mountains near Killarney. OCT. 27th. SEAFIELD.-Widdy Island belongs to Lord Bantry; it consists of 1077 acres of remarkably rich land, which lets for three guineas per acre; a part of the opposite peninsula, towards Berehaven, is the property of his lordship, also being one of the Cromwelian grants. The mountain lands on the eastern side of Bantry Bay let as high as two guineas an acre, even very near the top. The people manure with sea-weeds, and their only mode of carriage is by panniers. In some parts of the bay there are beds of coral; this substance is remarkably heavy, and is dredged for, as it forms a calcareous manure which lasts many years, whereas sea-weed is exhausted in two crops. Lord Bantry has brought over the Devonshire cattle, which answer exceedingly well both in milk and in flesh; the country, on account of the wetness of the climate, being better adapted to grazing than to tillage. The usual price of labour is Is. per day. Near Glangariff wild bees are numerous among the vines which creep up the rocks, and some honey is obtained from them. OCT. 28th.-The Dingle Mountains are dry, and pastured to the tops. Nov. 23d. DONNERAILE, COUNTY OF CORK.-This is a tillage country in which a great deal of wheat is raised, and tythes are taken according to the English acre at from 8s. to 10s. for wheat and potatoes. The present price of the latter is a guinea per ton, by selling at which the person who raises them is a loser. Potatoe land lets for six guineas the English acre. Saw goats browzing in Nov. 25th.-Rode over good land, where I observed that lime had been employed, and ploughs going with two horses led by a man. The seed was mostly ploughed in; which in the north is called seed fallowing. every direction. When a family is not able to procure a cow, they purchase a goat. The hogs are kept to a great age, and attain to a monstrous size; they are fattened only with potatoes, and are suffered to run about the whole time; they have, however, less inside fat than any hogs I ever saw killed. The people here employ the highroad as a sort of floor on which they pound their straw into muck, and for this purpose it is continually spread out in front of the farm-house.* As the roads are con * The same plan is pursued in Cornwall. Annals of Agriculture, vol, xii. p. 34. 1 |