APPENDIX X.

DEAN SWIFT,

JONATHAN SWIFT, D.D., was born in Dublin on November 20, 1667. His family came from Yorkshire. At the age of fifteen, he was matriculated at Trinity College, Dublin. In 1688 he left the university, and went to England, where he became amanuensis of Sir William Temple. Having embraced the ecclesiastical state, he was appointed Dean of St. Patrick's, Dublin. He died in 1745. Swift was a powerful writer and keen satirist. All his works on Ireland had great effect, especially his 'Drapier's Letters.' His 'Gulliver's Travels,' like Defoe's 'Robinson Crusoe' and Goldsmith's 'Vicar of Wakefield,' would alone immortalize any author.

APPENDIX XI.

DEPTH OF MINES.

SOME of the Cornish mines have attained a wonderful depth. The Consolidated mines are 1,800 feet deep. Tresavean mine is 1,920 feet below the adit level, 2,112 feet below the surface, and 1,700 feet below the level of the sea. Monkwearmouth coal mine, near Sunderland, is 1,590 feet perpendicular depth. The greatest depth attained is that of the Eselschacht mine at Kuttenburg in Bohemia, now closed, viz. 3,778 feet below the surface. A mile is 5,280 feet.

APPENDIX XII.

DELTAS.

Its

THE Delta of the Nile, so called by the ancients from its resemblance to the Greek letter A, lies between the branches of the Nile and the Mediterranean, and extends 130 miles along the coast, and seventy on the sides from the point where the Nile branches off to the sea. extraordinary fertility is owing to the periodical inundations of the Nile. It is a deposit of the mud of the river, resting on the desert sand. This deposit close to the branches of the Nile is fully thirty feet in thickness, and diminishes to six inches at the extreme edges of the inundation. The cities of the Delta are Alexandria, Damietta, and Rosetta; besides which there are several populous villages. The name of Delta is now generally given to similar alluvial formations at the mouths of great rivers.

Of this rock are constructed the piers of the artificial harbour of Kingstown, which was commenced in 1816, from the plans of Mr. Rennie, and cost over 800,000l. The eastern pier is 3,500 feet in length, and the western 4,950 feet. The depth of the harbour varies from 15 to 27 feet; its area is 250 acres, and the width of its mouth is 850 feet. The granite used in its construction was taken from Killiney Hill. Although, in the opinion of some competent judges, the position of its entrance might have been better selected, it has been pronounced by the Tidal-harbour Commissioners to be one of the most splendid artificial ports in the United Kingdom.' Another remarkable work in granite is the great river wall of the Thames embankment, which is nearly 7,000 feet long by 8 feet in thickness, and averages more than 40 feet high, with foundations, which go from 16 to 30 feet below the bed of the river. London and Waterloo bridges, and several other of the principal bridges of the metropolis and the kingdom, are constructed of this material. Immense quantities of granite are shipped from Aberdeen to London, where it is used for pavement.

EDMUND SPENSER, one of the greatest of English poets, was born in London in 1553. He came over to Ireland as secretary to the Lord Deputy, Arthur Lord Grey of Wilton, in 1580. In 1586 he obtained a grant of 3,028 acres, part of the forfeited estates of the Earl of Desmond. Residence being a condition of the royal patent conferring the lands, he took up his abode at Kilcolman Castle, near Doneraile, in the county of Cork. Here, in 1589, he was visited by Sir Walter Raleigh, and read to him the manuscript of the 'Faerie Queen.' In 1598 he was nominated by Queen Elizabeth sheriff of the county of Cork. The Queen's letter to the Irish Government making the appointment, dated September 30, 1598, is extant. The same year, owing to the rebellion of Tyrone, the poet was obliged to fly with his family, and his castle, in which was his infant child, was burned. He died of a broken heart in London in 1599. His 'View of the State of Ireland' is a work of much interest and authority on the history of the country in his time.

APPENDIX XV.

INDUSTRY OF IRISH IMMIGRANTS IN VARIOUS COUNTRIES..

From the Louisville Democrat,' July 1869.

THE IRISH ELEMENT IN AMERICA.-The Irish in America have this

curious and undeniable characteristic, that they never cease to be Irish, and, at the same time, are as good Americans as the best. They are, indeed, among the most remarkable of modern people. Genius, wit, and eloquence seem to be the common heritage, in a greater or less degree, of the whole Irish race. Among their most prominent characteristics are the courage of the men, the purity of the women, warm hearts and open hands of all, strong religious faith, and an imperishable love of old Ireland. The magnitude of the Irish element in our population may be judged of by the fact that in the forty-six years, 18151860, the total number of immigrants arriving from the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland on our shores was 2,750,874. In the same period, 1,196,521 persons emigrated from the United Kingdom to the British colonies in North America, a large portion of whom are known to have eventually settled in the United States. By the census of 1860 the population in the United States of Irish birth was 1,611,304, and that of German 1,301,136. Since that period the German element has increased, relatively speaking. The greatest number of Irish reside in the States of New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio, Wisconsin, and Michigan. It is computed that the four millions of emigrants enumerated in the United States in 1860, together with the number deceased, must have brought into the country an amount of property not less than 400 millions of dollars, besides the much greater capital which the immigrants in themselves represent, physically and intellectually. One fact, to which we would call special attention, is the large sums of money which have been sent by settlers in North America to friends in Great Britain, amounting, from 1840 to 1863, according to the returns of banks and mercantile houses through which they have been forwarded, and not including sums remitted through other agencies, to 56,191,733 dols. Taking as a standard the increase of population of Irish nativity from 1850 to 1860, which was about 751,000, the census of next year will probably give 2,362,304 persons of Irish nativity in this country, not counting the large number of Irish descent. No accession to our population from abroad has been more valuable than that of the Irish. They may be said to have been the pioneers in the emigration to this country, and as such their labour

APPENDIX.

441 was indispensable in all the industrial enterprises which have been necessary to the development of our national wealth. The public works of our country, the canals, the railroads, the clearing up of the Western wilderness, have been accomplished in great measure through their bone and muscle. They have formed the front ranks in the armies of peace as well as of war. Their creative energies are as great as their destructive; and when we say that, we need add nothing further. In all our battles, whether by sea or land, their courage has been conspicuous. It is not, however, by their stamina alone, either in peace or war, that the Irish have been of value to our country. They have contributed to our moral, intellectual, and political forces as largely as any class of immigrants, and they and their descendants are among the leading men of all our departments in public and private life. Henry Clay once pointed out a striking resemblance between the Irish and Kentuckians in their impulsive, hospitable, frank, intrepid character. In truth, they assimilate with our people with wonderful facility, and may be said to be full-fledged Americans before they step upon our shores. To those who are accustomed to speak of the poverty of the Irish peasantry as proof of a want of industry and economy, we need only to exhibit the prosperous condition of the same people here as evidence that the state of things in their own island is due to other causes than defects of the national character, whilst the vast sums they have sent to their friends at home exhibit qualities of heart which would do credit to any people. In fact, the amazing recuperative energies of the Irish people, which centuries of oppression have not been able to overcome, are a proof of a vitality that seems capable of outliving the tyranny which has sought in vain to repress it, and of showing that the shamrock, like some other plants, has a power of forcing itself from the ground upwards through the heaviest superincumbent pressure.

Irish Immigrants on the River Plate.

The Irish, although exercising little or no weight in public matters, may contend with any other nationality in point of usefulness. They have not, it is true, the position or advantages of their mercantile brethren, nor the versatility of the Basques in accommodating themselves to any calling or occupation; but to them is due the grand development of sheepfarming, which makes this country rival Australia in the growth of wool. The Irish farmers are estimated to possess nearly 30,000,000 sheep-they are also, as farmers, the chief landed proprietors in Buenos Ayres, and very hospitable to strangers. The districts of Lujan, Mercedes, Pilar, Areco, Lobos, &c., are thickly

settled with Irishmen, and each district has its own Irish clergyman. With one or two exceptions, the Irish settlers began life (within the last thirty years) having no other capital than a spade or shovel. There is nothing in the country more admirable than the steady industry of these men, some of whom count their sheep by the hundred thousand and have landed property of thousands of acres in extent. In the city there is a large number of Irish housemaids, who are remarkable for their uniform morality, honesty, and good conduct.'

APPENDIX XVI.

COSHERERS, COIGNY, SPEND ME AND DEFEND ME.'

COSHERERS are described as follows:

'Many young gentlemen of this kingdom that have little or nothing to live on of their own, and will not apply themselves to labour or other honest industrious courses to support themselves, but do live idly and inordinately, coshering upon the country and sessing themselves, their followers, their horses, and their gray-hounds upon the poor inhabitants, sometimes exacting money from them to spare them and their tenants, and to go elsewhere to their eaught and edraugh, viz. supper and breakfast, and sometimes craving help from them, . . apt, upon the least occasion of disturbance or insurrection, to rifle and make booty of his Majesty's loyal subjects.' See 10th and 11th Charles I., c. 16. An Act for the suppressing of Cosherers and idle wanderers. 'Irish Statutes,' vol. ii., p. 169.

Coigny is a com

Coigny is man's meat, as livery is horse-meat. mon use amongst landlords of the Irish, to have a common spending upon their tenants; for all their tenants, being commonly but tenants at will, they use to take of them what victuals they list; for of victuals they were wont to make small reckoning; neither in this was the tenant wronged, for it was an ordinary and known custom, and his lord commonly used to covenant with him, which if at any time the tenant disliked he might freely depart at his pleasure. But now by this statute the said Irish lord is wronged for that he is cut off from his customary services, of the which this is one, besides many other of the

1 Hand Book of the River Plate; comprising Buenos Ayres, The Upper Provinces, Banda Oriental, and Paraguay.' By M. G. and E. T. Mulhall, Editors of the Standard.' In two volumes. 1869, vol. i.