while we were promised calm from
infectious influences, a tempest arose wilder than the winds, a tempest
bred by the passions of man, nourished by his most violent impulses,
unexampled and dire.

A number of people from North America, the relics of that populous
continent, had set sail for the East with mad desire of change, leaving
their native plains for lands not less afflicted than their own. Several
hundreds landed in Ireland, about the first of November, and took
possession of such vacant habitations as they could find; seizing upon the
superabundant food, and the stray cattle. As they exhausted the produce of
one spot, they went on to another. At length they began to interfere with
the inhabitants, and strong in their concentrated numbers, ejected the
natives from their dwellings, and robbed them of their winter store. A few
events of this kind roused the fiery nature of the Irish; and they attacked
the invaders. Some were destroyed; the major part escaped by quick and well
ordered movements; and danger made them careful. Their numbers ably
arranged; the very deaths among them concealed; moving on in good order,
and apparently given up to enjoyment, they excited the envy of the Irish.
The Americans permitted a few to join their band, and presently the
recruits outnumbered the strangers--nor did they join with them, nor
imitate the admirable order which, preserved by the Trans-Atlantic chiefs,
rendered them at once secure and formidable. The Irish followed their track
in disorganized multitudes; each day encreasing; each day becoming more
lawless. The Americans were eager to escape from the spirit they had
roused, and, reaching the eastern shores of the island, embarked for
England. Their incursion would hardly have been felt had they come alone;
but the Irish, collected in unnatural numbers, began to feel the inroads of
famine, and they followed in the wake of the Americans for England also.
The crossing of the sea could not arrest their progress. The harbours of
the desolate sea-ports of the west of Ireland were filled with vessels of
all sizes, from the man of war to the small fishers' boat, which lay
sailorless, and rotting on the lazy deep. The emigrants embarked by
hundreds, and unfurling their sails with rude hands, made strange havoc of
buoy and cordage. Those who modestly betook themselves to the smaller
craft, for the most part achieved their watery journey in safety. Some, in
the true spirit of reckless