The necessity of applying labour to the cultivation of the soil was also most strongly insisted upon by a high Government official, Sir Randolph Routh, the head of the Commissariat Relief Office, Dublin Castle, whose experience was of the most extensive and valuable kind, he having superintended the relief works through Ireland in 1846.  He says:  “Under the circumstances which you describe, I recommend you to call a meeting of the proprietors, to explain to them the state of the country; to state the liberal intentions of the Government to give a grant equal to the amount subscribed, when the Workhouse is full; to explain to them that this grant is tantamount to selling them the supply at half-price, as their funds, being doubled, go twice in the purchases they require.  Point out to them also the dreadful responsibility the whole country will incur, if they neglect the cultivation of the soil.  The transition from potatoes to grain,” he says, “requires a tillage in the comparison of three to one between grain and potatoes.  All this requires a corresponding increase of labour; and wages so paid are a mere investment of money, bringing a certain and large profit.”  He adds these remarkable words:  “It is useless to talk of emigration, when so much extra labour is becoming indispensable to supply the extra food.  Let the labour first he applied, and then, it will be seen whether there is any surplus population, and to what extent.  If industrious habits can be established, and the waste lands taken into cultivation, it is very doubtful whether there would be any surplus population, or even whether it would be equal to the demand."[132] These were sound views, except in so far as they threw upon landlords and people the duty of cultivating the soil; the people could do nothing, and many of the landlords had not capital:  moreover, as a class, they were wholly disinclined to make any adequate effort.  From the terms of the memorandum just quoted, it is evident that, in their intercourse with Commissary Hewetson, they were clamouring for emigration.  If the Government were sincerely anxious to produce food, and save the country, they ought not to have leaned on such rotten reeds.  They should have put their own hand more thoroughly to the work, and framed an Act which would, at least indirectly, have compelled proprietors to second their efforts, and discharge those duties, which, as men and as Christians, they refused to attend to or acknowledge.

Besides the numerous letters called forth by the publication of the Treasury Minute, that important document came prominently under discussion at baronial sessions, and the meetings of Relief Committees.  At a meeting of the Relief Committee for the districts of Kells and Fore, in the County of Meath, held in the Court House of Kells on the 5th of September, and presided over by the Marquis of Headfort, the principal question debated was, “the nature of the employment which ought to be provided for the poor during the ensuing