Breviary, he left the house by a private way, and bent his steps to a neighbouring wood.  On reaching it, he knelt down and began to recite his office aloud, to implore Almighty God to have mercy on his people and himself.  He did not expect to leave that wood alive.  After a time he heard a voice not far off; he became alarmed, fearing his retreat had been discovered.  Strange as the coincidence seems, it is perfectly true; the voice he heard was that of a neighbouring priest, a friend of his, who had taken the very same course, and for the same reason.  Gaining strength and consolation from having met, and giving each other courage, they returned to their homes, resolving to face the worst.

A physician, an excellent, kind-hearted man, who had been sent on duty to Bantry in the later stages of the Famine, said one day to a priest there—­“Well, Father——­, how are you getting on these times?” “Badly,” was the reply, “for I often remain late in bed in the morning, not knowing where to look for my breakfast when I get up."[244]

At this same time, there was a charitable lady in or near Bantry, who had discovered that another of the priests was not unfrequently dinnerless; so she insisted on being permitted to send him that important meal, ready-cooked, at a certain hour every day, begging of him to be at home, if possible, at the hour fixed.  This arrangement went on for a while to her great satisfaction, but news reached her one day that Father ——­ seldom partook of her dinner.  Such dreadful cases of starvation came to his door, that he frequently gave the good lady’s dinner away.  She determined that he must not sink and die; and to carry out her view she hit upon an ingenious plan.  She gave the servant, who took the dinner to Father——­, strict orders not to leave the house until he had dined; the reason to be given to him for this was, that her mistress wished her to bring back the things in which the dinner had been carried to him.  That priest, I am glad to say, is still among us, and should these lines meet his eye, he will remember the circumstance, and the honest and true authority on which it is related.

A short time after the five inquests above referred to were held, the Cork Examiner published the following extract from a private letter:  “Each day brings with it its own horrors.  The mind recoils from the contemplation of the scenes we are compelled to witness every hour.  Ten inquests in Bantry—­there should have been at least two hundred inquests.  Every day, every hour produces its own victims—­holocausts offered at the shrine of political economy.  Famine and pestilence are sweeping away hundreds, but they have now no terrors for the people.  Their only regret seems to be, that they are not relieved from their sufferings by some process more speedy and less painful. Since the inquests were held here on Monday, there have been twenty-four deaths from starvation; and, if we can judge from appearances,