The official returns of the collection and expenditure of the poor-rates are made up to the 31st March 1848, and comprise six months only of the parochial year which will end on the 29th September following. They show that in those six months 961,356l. had been collected, and 781,198l. expended, thus exhibiting an excess of collection over expenditure of 180,158l. The state of the balances appears therefore to have greatly improved,^[166] and rates to the amount of 661,855l. still remained on the books for collection. “Up to this point therefore (the commissioners observe) the financial progress has been favourable”—But they add, “if we should have to sustain operations for five months longer, at the rate of expenditure exhibited for March, it is clear that great exertions have yet to be made in the collection of rates, in order to escape a large accumulation of debt at the close of the year.” The above statements apply to the unions in the aggregate. There are however the commissioners say, certain unions which “cannot for some years be cleared from present debt under the most favourable circumstances, and in unions which on the whole are well provided with funds, many electoral divisions are in a state of almost hopeless bankruptcy.”

The proceedings of the “British Relief Association” have already been noticed.^[167] The committee of the association had still a considerable sum at their disposal in the latter end of 1847, and this it was determined to appropriate in aid of such of the distressed unions above adverted to as the Poor Law Commissioners should recommend for that purpose, and also in “affording food and clothing to children through the medium of schools.” Accordingly grants to the amount of 143,519l. were successively made to the distressed unions^[168] in aid of their general expenditure; and with regard to the school-children, it is said—“by the 1st of January 1848 the system was in full operation in thirteen of the more distressed unions, 58,000 children were on the relief-roll of the association, and this number gradually increased, until in the month of March upwards of 200,000 children, attending schools of all denominations in twenty-seven western unions, were participating in this relief. The total expenditure for feeding the children amounted to 80,885l., in addition to which the sum of 12,083l. was spent in clothing, making a total expenditure during the second period of the relief operations of the association of 236,487l.”^[169] Treasury grants to the extent of 114,968l. had also been made in aid of the distressed unions, during the present year.

It may not be irrelevant here to state, that the entire of the rates made in all the unions from the first introduction of the Poor Law down to the date of the present Report, have (exclusive of the last rate) amounted to 2,496,412l., of which not more than 48,804l., or 2 per cent., has been lost—143,046l., or 6 per cent., of arrears having been carried into the rates last made. The last-made rates amounted to 1,462,878l., which added to the above makes a total of 3,959,290l. assessed upon the property of Ireland for the relief of the poor, in course of the ten years since the introduction of the Poor Law, the last three being years of such intense distress as it was perhaps never before the lot of an entire people to be subjected to.

The Report for 1848-9 is dated, not on the 1st of May, as before, but on the 14th July. At the end of their last Report, the commissioners adverted to the great efforts which were made to restore the potato to its former position of the staple crop of Ireland, as being a circumstance at once hopeful and alarming. The policy of a people’s relying for subsistence on a crop so uncertain in its produce, and which so soon decays, is no doubt a question of momentous importance. But this was lost sight of in the promise of an abundant harvest; and as the disease had done little mischief last year, it was hoped the country would be equally free from its ravages in the present.|Recurrence of the potato disease.| At the beginning of August however, the appearance of blight was reported from many parts of the country, and although not so general nor so destructive as in 1846, the disease proved much worse than in 1847, and there can be no doubt that a considerable proportion of the crop was destroyed by it. In October sound potatoes were sold at 8d. per stone, a price at which the ordinary rate of wages would not allow a labourer to purchase them for the support of his family. Another season of distress was therefore evidently impending. The out-relief lists had been reduced from 830,000 in July, to 200,000 on the 1st of October, when the numbers again began to increase, and on the last day of December they amounted to nearly 400,000. The numbers in the workhouses increased in the same period from 114,000 to 185,000, with a weekly rate of mortality of 6½ per 1,000. Statements of the numbers relieved, and the cost of the relief afforded, were periodically submitted to parliament throughout the whole of this trying period.

In the earlier months of 1849 there was greater privation and suffering among the population of the western and south-western districts, than at any time since the fatal season of 1846-7. “Exhaustion of resources by the long continuance of adverse circumstances, caused a large accession to the ranks of the destitute. Clothing had been worn out or parted with to provide food, or seed in seed-time; and the loss of cabins and small holdings of land, either by eviction or voluntary abandonment, rendered many thousands of families shelterless and destitute of fuel as well as food.” The distress hence arising, aggravated by the inclement weather which then prevailed, was not we are told effectually met by the system of out-door relief. Where the workhouses were full, poor persons receiving out-relief were often compelled to part with a portion of their food to obtain a lodging. The cabins became crowded with ill-fed, ill-clothed, sickly people, and epidemic disease found victims prepared for its attacks. A great proportion of those who died in the workhouses at this period, had previously suffered from fever and dysentery, and entered the workhouse weakened by extreme privation, or in an advanced state of disease.

In the month of March a new enemy appeared, cholera having broken out in the western and south-western unions, whence it afterwards extended to other parts of the country. The disease however assumed its most virulent form in the above unions, and proved extensively fatal to the inmates of the workhouses, as well as to the population generally. Great exertions were made to check its ravages; but the commissioners express their regret that a want of means had crippled their efforts, and in some urgent cases they had been obliged to apply for permission to appropriate a limited portion of the funds placed at their disposal by government, to provide the means of treatment for cholera patients, at a time when they were anxious to apply every sum remitted to them to the purchase of food for the in-door and out-door poor in the distressed unions. After a time the cholera disappeared from most of the unions in the west and south, but at the date of the Report it still prevailed with much virulence in other parts of Ireland.

The inmates of the several workhouses in the first week of March 1849 amounted to 196,523, and the weekly mortality to 9½ per 1,000. In the first week of May the number of inmates was 220,401, with a mortality of 12½ per 1,000. At the end of June the inmates were 214,867, and the mortality was reduced to 6¼ per 1,000. The numbers receiving out-relief at the three periods respectively were 592,705—646,964—and 768,902. These numbers show the extent of distress to which the people had been reduced by famine and disease in the last four disastrous years. This is also evidenced by the inquests held in cases of alleged death through actual want, the number of which in the first five months of 1849 amounted to 431. The suffering must necessarily indeed have been greater in each successive year than in the one preceding, since the general means were being continually reduced by the failure of the crops, the weakest and poorest of the people suffering first, then those a degree above them, and so on, until the comparatively well-to-do occupier of a few acres of land who had contributed to the relief of others, is himself dragged down to the condition of the lowest.

A conviction appears to have become very general, that the abuses and shortcomings incidental to out-door relief, especially when administered on a large scale, cannot be altogether prevented; and that in-door relief is preferable, not only under ordinary circumstances, but in seasons of severe distress like the present. Hence the guardians had hired building after building in aid of the workhouses at first provided; and the entire accommodation, which was originally calculated for 100,000 inmates, and which during the previous year had been increased to 150,000, had now been so far extended as to be equal to the accommodation of 250,000. On this circumstance and the convictions out of which it arose, the commissioners chiefly founded their hope of securing an effective and economical administration of the law. It will be their duty, they say, to give a right direction to these views, by endeavouring to make the auxiliary establishments effective in point of classification and discipline, and to reduce where practicable the expenses of management; and if their efforts should be assisted by the gradual return of agricultural prosperity in the western and south-western parts of Ireland, they confidently expect at no very distant period to be enabled to withhold the exercise of the exceptional power confided to them in the 2nd section of the Relief Extension Act,^[170] or at least to confine its operation within very narrow limits.

The fact that in 25 of the unions no relief was given except in the workhouse is mentioned in the Report of the preceding year.^[171] Several unions which then gave out-relief have since ceased to do so, and the number in which relief is restricted to the workhouse was now 35. In the great majority of these unions the result of such restrictions had been in all respects satisfactory. The applications of proper objects were not refused, and yet there had been sufficient means for relieving all the really destitute, whilst except in cases where epidemic disease had prevailed in the neighbourhood, and been thence imparted to the inmates, the workhouses of these unions had generally been healthy. In some instances however where the destitution was severe and wide-spreading, and where the auxiliary houses had been insufficient or defective, the adherence to in-door relief exclusively was less satisfactory. The insufficiency of workhouse accommodation led to overcrowding, and thence arose disease, fed and aggravated by the continual influx of destitute persons in a state of utter exhaustion, or bearing about them the seeds of the prevalent malady. In all such cases, and they were not many, the guardians were urged to resort to those provisions of the Act which empower them to afford out-door relief, until they had provided the necessary accommodation for enabling them to restrict it to the workhouse without endangering life, or violating the principle of the Poor Law.

In connection with workhouse relief, the mortality which took place among the officers and other poor-law officials ought to be noticed, as illustrating the duties which the exigencies of the service required from them. The subject has already been adverted to as creating difficulty in obtaining suitable persons to fill these offices.^[172] Although not so great in the present year as in 1846-7, the deaths of workhouse officers by fever or cholera amounted to no less than seventy, including nine chaplains and eight medical officers. Seven of the vice-guardians likewise fell victims to disease in the discharge of their arduous duties, as well as eight of the temporary inspectors, together with Mr. Hancock, who had acted under the commission from the commencement, first as assistant-commissioner and then as inspector.^[173]

An increased disposition had latterly been evinced by the boards of guardians for promoting emigration, under the provisions of the Extension Act.^[174] The steady progress of the measure for sending orphan girls from the Irish workhouses out to the Australian colonies, the commissioners considered highly satisfactory. The number of these girls embarked for Adelaide and Sydney since the spring of 1848 was 2,219, at a cost to the unions of about 5l. each for outfit and conveyance to Plymouth, the remainder of the charge being defrayed from the colonial funds. Many other unions were desirous that the orphan girls from their workhouses should participate in this arrangement, but the number at first was limited to 2,500. A hope is however expressed that means will be found for continuing to remove from this country a class of emigrants so eligible in every respect, and so much required in the colonies. The entire amount expended on emigration during the year ending on the 29th September 1848, was 2,776l.—a sum, it is observed, “less important in its direct effects, than as showing a growth of opinion in favour of this method of relief.” Spontaneous emigration, chiefly to the United States, and irrespective of aid from the poor-rates, was exceedingly active from all parts of Ireland at this time, the natural love of country having been deadened by the pressure of want and disease.

In the session of 1848 two short Acts were passed which it is necessary to notice. The 11th and 12th Victoria, cap. 25, extends the powers for hiring or purchasing land for the use of workhouses to 25 acres, in addition to the 15 acres previously authorized. It likewise empowers the commissioners to combine unions for the maintenance and education of poor children, and also enables boards of guardians to provide for the burial of deceased poor persons. The 11th and 12th Vict., cap. 47, provides “for the protection and relief of the destitute poor evicted from their dwellings,” and directs relieving-officers forthwith to take order for the relief of such persons, either in or out of the workhouse, and to report the circumstances to the guardians at their next meeting. The power of purchasing an additional 25 acres of land given by the first of these Acts, was chiefly with a view to the establishment of industrial schools, and was not intended to be used as a means of employing the workhouse inmates. Few things would be more objectionable on principle, or more conducive to lax management, than adding such a quantity of land to a workhouse for the purpose of being cultivated by the inmates.

In the session of 1849 likewise two Acts were passed requiring our attention. The first of these,—The 12th and 13th Vict., cap. 4, relates to the appointment of vice-guardians. It provides that when a board of guardians shall have been dissolved, and paid officers appointed, before the 25th of March 1848, the commissioners may direct the continuance of such paid officers until the 1st of November 1849, and no election of guardians is to take place in the interim. But it also provides that the commissioners may if they think fit discontinue the paid officers, and direct the election of a board of guardians at any time. The second of these Acts is known as ‘The Rate-in-Aid Act,’ and its provisions require to be more fully explained.

The ‘Rate-in-Aid Act,’ 12th and 13th Vict. cap. 24, makes provision for levying “a general rate in aid of certain unions and electoral divisions in Ireland,” and it enacts as follows:—

Section 1.—The Poor Law Commissioners, with the approval of the lord lieutenant, may during each of the years ending the 31st of December 1849 and 1850, from time to time declare the amount they deem necessary for the above purposes, and may assess the same upon the several unions in proportion to the annual value of the property in each rateable to the relief of the poor; but the sum levied in any union in either of the two years is not to exceed 6d. in the pound on such annual value. The commissioners are to transmit to the guardians of each union an order under seal, stating the amount so assessed, and the portion leviable in each electoral division, according to the value of its rateable property.

Section 2.—In the rate next made on each electoral division, the guardians are to provide for the sum so leviable; and the treasurer of the union, out of all lodgments made with him of such rate, or any subsequent rate, on account of any division, is to place one moiety thereof to the credit of such division in an account to be entitled “The Union Rate-in-Aid Account,” until the whole sum leviable on such division shall have been so placed. And the treasurer is to pay over all sums so from time to time received by him to a separate account at the bank of Ireland, entitled “The General Rate-in-Aid Account.”

Sections 3, 4, 5.—The commissioners of the Treasury may order the whole or any part of the money standing in such separate accounts at the bank of Ireland, to be paid to such persons, at such times, and under such conditions as they may think fit, for affording relief to destitute poor persons in any union or electoral division, or for assisting emigration, or for repaying advances made for any of these purposes. And for the more speedy affording of such relief, the commissioners of the Treasury are empowered to advance out of the consolidated fund, any sums not in the whole exceeding 100,000l., the same to be repayable out of any rates levied in pursuance of the Act. Accounts of all receipts and payments under the Act are to be made up to the 31st December, in the present and the following year respectively.

This Act was passed on the 24th May 1849, and its duration is limited to the 31st December 1850. It must therefore be regarded as a temporary measure directed to a temporary object, and it was accompanied by a vote authorizing an advance by the Treasury of 50,000l. for relief of the distressed unions in the west of Ireland. The calls which had been made upon England during the three preceding years, amounting altogether to probably little short of 10,000,000l. in the shape of loans advances or donations by the government, and contributions and subscriptions of one kind and another by individuals, for the relief of Irish distress, had evidently excited alarm, and appear to have given rise to a determination on the part of the legislature to revert to the precedent of the Elizabethan law, and to make the property of Ireland answerable for the relief of Irish poverty. This was certainly open to no objection in point of principle, although it may be questioned whether the most suitable time was selected for its application. We have seen the calamities to which Ireland had been exposed by the successive failure of the potato crop. Such failures were unprecedented and exceptional. The calamity had been emphatically designated as imperial; and if it were so, there would be no violation of principle, but rather the fulfilment of a duty, in one part of the empire coming to the assistance of the other. It was in fact a common cause, and was so regarded throughout England, until the repeated failures caused apprehensions as to the perpetuity of the burden, and seemed to point to the necessity of compelling the Irish people to abandon the treacherous potato, which it was thought they would hardly do, so long as they could turn to England for help whenever it failed them. The rate-in-aid was calculated to effect this object, by casting the consequences of the failure entirely upon Ireland itself, which in such case would be unable to persist in its reliance upon a crop so treacherous and uncertain as the potato.

Such it is believed were the impressions under which the Rate-in-Aid Act was passed. Its duration was limited to a little over a year and a half, and yet within that period, indeed within less than a month after it had passed, a subscription was set on foot by the government, each of its members subscribing 100l. and her Majesty 500l., in the belief, it is declared, “that there are ways in which this money may be expended most usefully, without interfering with the relief administration through the Poor Law, such as the supply of clothing, which has now become a matter of paramount importance, especially to the children.” The prospects of the next harvest were said to be favourable, but the promoters of the subscription declare “that the short intervening period must be one of such overwhelming misery, as to afford a strong claim for the exercise of private charity.”^[175] The distribution of the money subscribed on this occasion, which did not quite amount to 10,000l., was intrusted to the same benevolent gentleman who had superintended the application of the funds of the “British Relief Association,” and who deservedly possessed the confidence of all parties, as well in Ireland as in England. That the urgency was great, as is above stated, there can he no doubt; and if it were susceptible of effectual relief by such means, it may be lamented that the remedy was not earlier resorted to, as it probably would have been but for the alarms which gave rise to the Rate-in-Aid Act, and prevented the intervention either of the government or individuals in furnishing eleemosynary aid.

It must not however be supposed that the whole of Ireland was in a state of “overwhelming misery.” Distress more or less severe was doubtless very prevalent, and everywhere arising from the same cause; but distress so intense and overwhelming as to require immediate assistance from some extraneous source, only prevailed in certain of the western unions, where the people had depended entirely on the potato, and when that crop failed became poverty-stricken and helpless in the highest degree. The potato constituted the chief, or it may almost be said the only source of wealth in these unions, and its failure left them without other resource. Rates could not be levied, for the land yielded no available produce; and the population, accustomed to subsist in a semi-civilized state upon the potatoes raised by themselves, would nearly all have perished, as numbers of them did perish, but for the assistance which was afforded to them from England.

It was chiefly with reference to these western unions that the Rate-in-Aid Act was passed. There were 22 of them,^[176] comprising a population of 1,468,248, thus giving an average of nearly 67,000 to each union; and they stood in much the same relation to the other unions in Ireland, as a pauper stands in towards the independent labourer. The other unions were generally equal to the occasion, trying as the period undoubtedly was, and supported themselves through it, although not without undergoing severe privations. But these western unions were utterly destitute and without resource, and aid of some kind was necessary to prevent a fearful sacrifice of life. The aid had hitherto been furnished by England, and chiefly from the imperial treasury. The legislature now determined that it should be derived from Ireland itself, a determination that seems only open to objection, on the ground of the distress being so general and severe as to constitute an exceptional case, warranting a recurrence to extraneous sources.

The power which had been given of levying a rate in aid was forthwith acted upon, a general order being issued on the 13th of June, declaring the sum to be levied in each union and electoral division throughout Ireland, according to the value of the rateable property for the year 1849. The whole amount so assessed was 322,552l. 11s., being at the rate of 6d. in the pound. The commissioners say that the resources thus placed at their disposal, and the advances by the Treasury on security of the rate in aid, “have been most seasonable, and have enabled the guardians of the unions assisted, to provide the necessaries of life during the last two months for a large mass of recipients of in-door and out-door relief, who must otherwise have been without food, the money and credit of the unions having been previously quite exhausted,” and the continuance of such assistance until the period of harvest, is declared to be necessary for the relief of pressing destitution in these impoverished and overburdened districts.

In the year preceding 32 boards of guardians had been dissolved, and paid officers appointed to execute the law.^[177] It became necessary likewise to dissolve some others in the present year;^[178] but two of the preceding boards (Trim and Cavan) were revived under the provisions of the original Relief Act, and another (Mullingar) was revived under the 12th and 13th Vict., cap. 4. By the operation of the latter Act, the boards of guardians will, on the 1st November next, be reinstated in all the unions now under the management of paid officers, except the five last dissolved, which will continue under paid officers until the 25th March 1850, unless previously re-established by order of the commissioners.

The orders issued authorizing out-relief under the 2nd section of the Extension Act had, the commissioners say, been more numerous during the present year than was intended at its commencement. “But the rapid filling of the workhouses in certain unions, and the pressure of the representations of distress, left them no alternative but to intrust once more this extraordinary and exceptional power of affording relief to the able-bodied out of the workhouse, to those charged with the administration of relief in the western and south-western unions.” |Distressed unions.|The financial state of many of these unions was a source of continual anxiety. In the last year 23 of them had been furnished with assistance in aid of their rates, by grants from government and from the funds of the British Association, and they required like assistance in the present. The sums remitted for this purpose from time to time by the Treasury, were guarded by the condition that they should not be used in payment of debts already incurred, but be applied in purchasing the means of preserving the lives of the people, when in danger of perishing through want of the necessaries of life. There were other unions also whose finances were much embarrassed, although they had not yet received assistance; but all, whether assisted or not, are said to require perpetual watchfulness on the part of the commissioners and their inspectors.

The difficulties and distresses to which the country had latterly been exposed through the failure of the potato, together with the sanction given to out-door relief by the Extension Act,^[179] had led many persons to consider that the unions and electoral divisions, as originally formed, were too large for the convenient and effectual administration of relief under existing circumstances. Representations to this effect were made to the government, and in March 1848 commissioners^[180] were appointed for the purpose of inquiring and reporting—“whether the size and other geographical circumstances of the unions, are such as to prevent the guardians and relieving officers from attending the boards without serious interruption to their other duties”—“whether the same circumstances prevent the applicants for relief, who desire or who may be required to attend the board, from doing so without serious inconvenience”—“whether the amount of population and pauperism in each union is greater than would render it possible for the guardians in ordinary times to transact the business of the union conveniently in one day of the week”—and lastly, “what alterations it would be advisable to make in the boundaries of existing unions, and what new unions it would be desirable to form, in order to meet the wants of the country on the points adverted to, or any others which may present themselves in the course of the inquiry: due regard being had to the position of the existing workhouses, and the charge to be incurred in the erection of new workhouses.” Similar inquiries were likewise to be made with respect to the electoral divisions. |Fifty new unions recommended.| Early in 1849 the commissioners reported the result of their inquiries, and recommended the formation of 50 new unions, the details of which, together with maps explanatory of the system on which the recommendation was made, were appended to the Report.

Early in the session of 1849, a select committee on the Irish Poor Laws was appointed in the commons, and empowered “to report their opinion and the minutes of evidence taken before them from time to time, to the house.” Many intelligent witnesses were examined, and much information was elicited with regard to the immediate object of the inquiry, and as to its bearing upon the state of the country generally. The recommendations of the boundary commissioners were also much canvassed, and there appeared to be considerable diversity of opinion on the subject, some preferring large areas both for unions and electoral divisions, and others being favourable to small ones. This is of course in some measure a question of degree, and must likewise depend very much upon local circumstances. |Size of the unions.| The size of a union or an electoral division might be perfectly suitable at one time, or under one class of circumstances, and yet may be unsuitable at another. When the unions were formed, we were aware that some of them were too large, and we reckoned upon these being afterwards divided, and the district readjusted. For instance, in the case of Ballina, the materials for constituting two efficient boards of guardians could not be found, and so an extent of territory sufficient for two unions, was formed into one, until adequate executives could be found for two, when a division might readily be effected. It was so likewise in other cases, that of Dingle, now taken from Tralee union and constituted a separate union, being one; and for my own part I always reckoned upon five or six additional unions being created after the law had come into orderly working. I certainly never thought it likely that 50 new unions, or anything like that number, would be required; but neither did I foresee the fearful visitations to which Ireland has latterly been subjected, or the sanctioning of out-door relief under the Extension Act.

The expenditure from the rates on relief of the poor in the 131 unions, (Dingle being now added to the former number) during the twelve months ending 29th September 1848, was 1,835,634l. The number of inmates on that day was 124,003, and the total number relieved in the workhouses within the year was 610,463. The number receiving out-door relief on that day was 207,683, and the total number relieved out of the workhouse during the year was 1,433,042. There is here a large increase both of expenditure and numbers relieved, over the amounts in the preceding year; but the excess is perhaps in neither case greater than might be expected under the circumstances, the cause of the distress continuing, and its pressure consequently becoming year by year more severe. In proof of the great efforts which had been made to meet this distress, it is only necessary to state the amount of the poor-rates collected during the three last years, each ending on the 29th September, viz.:—

Mr. Twisleton who had ably discharged the duties of chief Poor Law Commissioner since the separate establishment of the Irish board, resigned office in the month of May in the present year, and was succeeded by Mr. Power, the assistant-commissioner, whose vacated office was filled by the appointment of Mr. Ball, one of the inspectors.