she softly touched the
lips of each, to try and discover if there was any warmth in them, and
she eagerly watched to see if the breath of life still came from their
nostrils. Her apprehensions were but too well founded, she had lost some
of her dear ones during the night."

The mournful poetry of this simple narrative must touch every heart.

Ass and horse flesh were anxiously sought for, even when the animals
died of disease or starvation. In the middle of January it was recorded
that a horse belonging to a man near Claremorris, having died, was
flayed, and the carcass left for dogs and birds to feed upon; but, says
the narrative, before much of it was consumed, it was discovered by a
poor family (whose name and residence are given), and by them used as
food. Father, mother and six children prolonged life for a week upon
this disgusting carrion, and even regretted the loss of it, when the
supply failed; and the poor mother said to the person who made the fact
public, "the Lord only knows what I will now do for my starving
children, since it is gone!" A fortnight earlier a most circumstantial
account of the eating of ass flesh is given by a commercial gentleman in
a letter addressed to the Premier, Lord John Russell, and dated
"Ballina, Christmas-eve." (!) In this case the poor man killed his ass
for food, the skin being sold to a skin dealer for 8d. The writer of the
letter visited the skin dealer's house, in order to make sure of the
fact. It was quite true, and the skin dealer's wife told him this could
not be a solitary case, "as she never remembered so many asses' skins
coming for sale as within the month just past."[227]

Mr. Forster, in his report to the Society of Friends, says of the
condition of Westport in January, 1847, that it was a strange and
fearful sight, like what we read of beleaguered cities; its streets
crowded with gaunt wanderers, sauntering to and fro, with hopeless air
and hunger-struck look; a mob of starved, almost naked women were around
the poorhouse, clamouring for soup-tickets; our inn, the head-quarters
of the road engineer and pay clerks, was beset by a crowd of beggars for
work.[228] The agent of the British Association, Count Strezelecki,
writing from Westport at this time, says, no pen could describe the
distress by which he was surrounded; it had reached such an extreme
degree of intensity that it was above the power of exaggeration. You
may, he adds, believe anything which you hea