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AN IRISH NEWGATE "iN THE FIELDS." 255
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
O I Had Lieard A Great Deal Of An Irish....
jb . ay , others ploughing : in a few weeks we shall be reaping the oats . This is one of the fields : that hedge we eanie through was
the boundary of the prison farni . " A prison farm bounded by a little hedge I had just pushed
through ! and I was -walking in a prison field ! I was about to ask how the prisoners were guarded while
working in the fields , when nay companion said _, " Here they are . " As we came to the crest of a headland , there were some twenty naen
raking hay , distant some fifty yards from us . " Prisoners ! " I criedin a hoarse whisper .
, " Yes . " Some of them had pitchforks !
My companion was one in authority—one of their masters : I fervently hoped they owed him no grudge , for here was a chance of
paying it off . A short run , and twenty armed men would have been round hini—burglars and all—and in a few seconds the convicts
could be well avenged . Habit and use made me think pathetically of the way in which the newspapers would put the news , " Feabftjx
Outrage by _Convicts , " & c , with the secondary paragraph , " A gentleman from London , who wore a light coat and white hat , was
also set upon by the infuriated men , stabbed in several places , and brutally murdered . He was a man of great literary promise , and
. had he lived , " & c . I hoped less would not be said , but even with that flattering prospect , I still hoped to rob the penny-a-liner of
his fee . On walked my friend , and we neared tlie group . To my eye they
were ordinary Irish peasants working in a farmer's field—the farmer himself looking over them—for a steward-like man in a linen coat
i and straw hat was superintending them . iC " Yes A good indeed crop sir of ; hay " and in this then field ensued ? " much said my farm friend talk . rather unin .-
, , , - telligible to me , about grass , and meadow lands , and top dressing . I still kept my eye on the men at work—especially looking out for
burglars . There was no uniform dress ; the men had their coats off , and as to their other garments , wore vests and trousers of various
colors . Some of the men were young men of twenty , with honest , open faces : some had the bullet head , low forehead , and strong
chin of the criminal classes . We went close to the men ( I did not at all like itbut I thought it better to stick close to my friend : I
, anight offend these dangerous fellows by superciliously standing aloof ) and my companion talked to them . I found he knew some
, of them by name , and all by sight . Some had been at Bermuda ; some in convict hulks : all had come through the " intermediate
prisons . " I noticed how free from servility was the manner of the men : much less servile in fact than ordinary Irish laborers . They
had no rudeness or stiffness , however ; they answered his questions cheerfully and readily , and then returned to their work , laughing
and chatting amongst themselves , in our hearing , and quite freel y *
An Irish Newgate "In The Fields." 255
AN IRISH NEWGATE _"iN THE FIELDS . " 255
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Citation
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English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), June 1, 1862, page 255, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01061862/page/39/
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