the whole city who had not some member
ill of it. Galway was cruelly scourged by the Famine, to meet which
little or nothing seems to have been done by those whose bounden duty it
was to come to the relief of their starving brethren. When fever
appeared on the terrible scene, the town became one great lazaretto.
Under date of July the 8th, the following intelligence comes from that
unhappy place: "The fever so rages here that the physicians say it is
more like a plague than a fever, and refuse to visit patients for any
fee whatever."[28] "The gentlemen of the county" met, in a way peculiar
to themselves, this twofold calamity which threatened utter
annihilation to their historic capital. To counteract the inevitable
results of famine, they announced that they would give the reward of L30
for the first, and L10 for every other robber that would be prosecuted
to conviction, and this in addition to whatever the Government would
allow. What excessive liberality! They must have had plenty of money.
The plague, which no physician would attend, they dealt with by a
proclamation also, of which they seemed proud, for they published it
repeatedly in the journals of the time. Here is an extract: "The town of
Galway being at this time very sickly, the gentlemen of the county
_think proper_ to remove the races that were to be _run for_ at Park,
near the said town of Galway, to Terlogh Gurranes, near the town of
Tuam, in the said county." What humane, _proper-thinking_ "gentlemen"
they were, to be sure; and such precise legal phraseology! But their
enticing bill of fare contained more than the "races that were to be run
for;" it announced balls and plays every night for the entertainment of
the ladies.

The learned and kind-hearted Dr. Berkeley, Protestant Bishop of Cloyne,
under date 21st May, 1741, writes to a a friend in Dublin:--"The
distresses of the sick and poor are endless. The havoc of mankind in the
counties of Cork, Limerick, and some adjacent places, hath been
incredible. The nation probably will not recover this loss in a century.
The other day I heard one from the county of Limerick say, that whole
villages were entirely dispeopled. About two months since I heard Sir
Richard Cox say, that five hundred were dead in the parish, though in a
county I believe not very populous. It were to be wished people of
condition were at their seats in the country during these calamitous
times, which might provide relief and employment