[227] Letter of Mr. Joseph M. M’Kenna to Lord John Russell.  Mr. M’Kenna gives the names of all the parties.  Yet still more dreadful is the case we read of as having occurred in Galway.  A man having been sentenced for sheep-stealing in that city, it was stated to the bench by the resident magistrate “that the prisoner and his family were starving; one of his children died, and he was, he said, credibly informed that the mother ate part of its legs and feet.  After its death he had the body exhumed, and found that nothing but the bones remained of the legs and feet.”—­Freeman’s Journal, April, 1848.

[228] Letter dated from Killybegs, 18th of 12th month, 1846.  Report, p. 151.

[229] Count Strezelecki’s Report to the British Association, p. 97.  “In addition to the Government aid, large sums were distributed by the British Association, through the agency of the generous and never-to-be-forgotten Count Strezelecki.”—­MS. letter from a Mayo gentleman, in author’s possession.

[230] Report, p. 97.

[231] MS. notes taken down from Mr. Egan.

[232] Joseph Crosfield’s Report to the Society of Friends, p. 145.

[233] James H. Tuke’s report to the same Committee, p. 147.

[234] In Irish corrac, pr. corrach or currach.  This primitive boat was made of a slight frame work of timber and covered with skins, whence its name.  In early times corrachs were used in all the British islands.  They are mentioned by many Latin authors, especially by Caesar, who had several of them made after the British model.

[235] Mr. Tuke’s report, p. 148.

[236] Letter dated from Killybegs, 18th of 12th month, 1846.  Report, p. 151.

[237] The Sack of Baltimore, by Thomas Davis.  A ballad, one of whose many beauties is the striking correctness of its topography.

[238] Letter of Commander J. Cruford Caffin, R.N., of Her Majesty’s steam sloop “Scourge,” dated 15th February, 1847, written to Captain Hamilton.

[239] Assistant-Commissary Bishop’s letter of 14th Feb., 1847.

[240] So he always signed himself, although Captain Caffin calls him Dr. Traill.

[241] Letter to Mr. Trevelyan of 14th Feb., 1847.

[242] Correspondent of Dublin Freeman’s Journal.

[243] “Report:  Colonization from Ireland.”  Brought from House of Lords 23rd July, 1847; ordered by the House of Commons to be printed 23rd July, 1847; pp. 243 and 244.

[244] This physician had three large crosses made from the timber of a sliding or hinged coffin.  One of these he kindly presented to the author, which is now in his possession.  It is two feet three inches long, by one foot one inch across the arms.  It bears the following inscription:—­

“During the frightful famine-plague, which devastated a large proportion of Ireland in the years 1846-47, that monstrous and unchristian machine, a “sliding coffin,” was, from necessity, used in Bantry Union for the conveyance of the victims to one common grave.  The material of this cross, the symbol of our Redemption, is a portion of one of the machines, which enclosed the remains of several hundreds of our countrymen, during their passage from the wretched huts or waysides, where they died, to the pit into which their remains were thrown.—­T.W.”