The Great Famine : a Retrospect of Fifty Years. By
W. P. O'Brien. (Downey and Co.) — It is not for the reviewer to criticise Mr. O'Brien's book. It is the outcome of careful study and exceptional opportunities of observation aided, it cannot be doubted, by a sober judgment. The Irish famine began, we may say, with the partial failure of the potato crop in 1845, followed in the next year by "an almost total destruction." This meant a loss of nine millions of tons of food, valued at £11,300,000 (.£1 5s. per ton is a very moderate estimate of value). The effect was to reduce the cottiers and labourers to absolute destitution ; the small farmers suffered severely, the large farmers, especially those who grew wheat, bad some compensation in high prices for their losses. The first measure of actual relief was to import one hundred thousand pounds' worth of Indian corn from America. In August 97,000 men were employed on public works. The expenditure up to that time, August 15th, was £733,372, and ..£98,000 was given away by relief committees. In March, 1817, 734,000 persons were so employed, representing with their families three millions of persons. The total expenditure was .L4,850,000. In the first half of 1847, 2,849,500 quarters of corn were imported into Ireland. The total expenditure in eighteen months was £7,673,701. And this does not include the large amount of private subscriptions. That there was a deplorable amount of waste cannot be doubted ; but Mr. O'Brien is conspicuously just in his estimate of the policy pursued.
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