’How do you account for the difference?—­I do not know; perhaps by the bog rent.  We had the bog free before, and we were doing well; and then we were cut down from the bog, and we were raised from 3 l. 19 s. 11 d. to 6 l.  We are beaten down now quite.

’What does the county-cess come to?—­Sometimes we pay 1 s. 6-1/2 d. an acre, and oftener 1 s. 7-1/2 d., the half-year.

’Have you paid your rent pretty punctually?—­Yes, I have done my best so far to pay the rent.

’How much do you owe now?—­I believe I shall pay the rent directly after May; I am clear till May.  I cannot pay it till harvest comes round.

’How do you get the money to pay the rent?—­When I had my land cheap, and myself a youth, I was a good workman, and did work by the loom, and I would be mowing in the summer season, and earn a good deal, and make a little store for me, which has stood by me.  I buy some oats and make meal of it, and I make money in that way.  It was not by my land I was paying my rent, but from other sources.

’How much wheat have you now?—­Half an acre, rather above.

’How much oats have you?—­Half a rood.

’How much potato land shall you have?—­Three and a half roods besides the garden.

’Have you any clover?—­Very near a rood of clover.

’What is the smallest quantity of land that you think a man who has no other means of support can subsist and pay rent upon?—­I was paying rent well myself when I had three acres, when I was paying 3 l. 19 s. 11 d.

’You weave a little?—­Yes, but very little; but there was a good price for the barrel of wheat, and for pigs, and so I made a little store.  But as for any man to support himself out of a small farm, at the high price of land, and the price of labour that is going, it is impossible.

’What is the smallest farm upon which a man can support himself at the present rate of rent, taking a man with five or six children?—­That is a hard question.

’Supposing a man to pay 35 s. an acre, and to have two acres, and to be obliged to live out of the farm, do you think he could do it and pay rent?—­He could not; his land must be very good.  Unless he lived near a town, and had cheap land, it would be impossible.  But a man with five acres, at a moderate rent, he could support his family upon it.

’What should you earn at weaving?—­I only weave for my own family.  I weave my own shirt.

’Do your family ever spin any wool and weave it?—­Yes.

’Do you live upon the Shirley estate?—­Yes.

’How much bog do you require to keep your house in fuel?—­Half a rood, if it was good; but it is bad bog ground, red mossy turf, white and light; it requires more than the black turf.

’What do you pay for half a rood of turf?—­It is 13 s. 4 d. for a rood—­that is, 6 s. 8 d. for half a rood.  There is 4 s. 6 d. paid for bad bog.

’Do you pay anything for the ticket of leave to cut?—­Yes, I do; I have not a ticket unless I pay 6 d. for it.