Such a failure would, in his
opinion, be the worst event of the kind that had ever happened in
Ireland. No antecedent calamity of a similar nature could be compared
with it. He was, he said, well acquainted with the calamity of 1823, but
that was as nothing compared with the one from which the people had just
escaped. Alluding to the sums of money given by Government, and by
private individuals, he praised the generosity of landlords, naming
three or four who had given considerable subscriptions, one of them
belonging to a class who had been frequently and unjustly attacked, the
class of Absentees.[115] Of the aid given by Government, he said, that
although the funds had been administered as wisely as the machinery of
the law allowed, he entirely denied that they had been economically or
quickly administered for the relief of distress. To a certain extent the
Board of Works must be pronounced a failure. How had it acted when the
duty was confided to it of finding employment? In the County of Clare,
an application was made by Lord Kenmare and himself, to put them in the
way of giving productive employment to the people about them, and their
lordships would, he said, scarcely credit him when he stated that, up to
the present time, they had not been able to obtain the preliminary
survey, so as to enable them to take a single step.
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