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.
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