A  boatman  on  Killarney  told  me  he  supported  a  family  of  eight
children  on  $75  a  year.  A  bright,  intelligent  man,  who  did  some  work
for  me,  said  he  could  earn  only  twenty-five  cents  a  day,  and  that,  in  the
same  cabin  with  his  domestic  animals,  himself  and  ten  children  lived
upon  the  food  which  fattened  the  chickens  and  the  pigs.
An  Irishman  in  the  employ  of  the  Central  Bailroad  got  to  the  bottom
of  the  Irish  question.  He  stepped  into  a  meat  market  and  asked  an  old
lady  the  price  of  fowls.
*'  A  dollar  apiece,"  was  the  reply.
'^  And  a  dollar  is  it,  my  darlint?  Why,  in  Ireland  you  might  buy
them  for  a  sixpence  apiece."

''Then  why  didn't  you  stay  in  that  blessed  cheap  country?"

''Och,  faith  and  there  were  no  sixpences   there,  to  be  sure."*
[Laughter.]


298  KINGS  OF  THE  PLATFORM  AND  PULPIT.
