eir bread and tea. In a recent pamphlet[8] the
St. Vincent de Paul Society said: "A widow ... who after paying the rent of
her room, has a shilling a day to feed herself and two, three, four or even
more children, is considered a doubtful case by the society. Yet a shilling
a day will only give the family bread and tea for every meal, with an
occasional dish of potatoes. By strict economy a little margarine may be
purchased, but by no process of reasoning may it be said that the family
has enough to eat, or suitable food." The Irish wage would have to be a
high wage to buy the old diet. For that is not supplied by Ireland for
Ireland any more. When Ireland became a cow lot, cereal and vegetable crops
became few. But milk should be plentiful? The recent vice-regal milk
commission noted the lack of milk for the poor in Ireland. Why? The town of
Naas tells one reason. Naas is in the midst of a grazing country, but Naas
babies have died for want of milk, because Naas cattle are raised for beef
exportation. The town of Ennis tells another reason. Ennis is also in the
center of a grazing country. Until the Woman's National Health Association
established a depot, Ennis poor could not get retailed pitchersful of milk,
for Ennis cows are raised to supply wholesale cansful to creameries which
make the supply into dairy products for exportation.[9]

Bread-and-tea, and bread-and-tealess families get on the calling list of
tuberculosis nurses. "The nurses often found," writes the Woman's National
Health Association, "that a large number of cases committed to their care
were in an advanced stage of the disease ... in a number of cases families
have been found entirely without food. This chronic state of lack of
nourishment ... accounts in part for the fact that there are two and
sometimes three persons affected in the same family."[10]

Has mental as well as physical health been affected? Lunacy is
extraordinarily prevalent in Ireland. In the lunacy inspectors' office in
Dublin castle, I was given the last comparison they had published of the
insanity rates in England and Wales, Scotland and Ireland. English and
Welsh insanity per 10,000 people was 40.8; Scottish, 45.4; Irish, 56.2. The
Irish rate for 1916 showed an increase to 57.1.[11]

Emigration, remark lunacy experts, fostered lunacy. Whole families withdrew
from certain districts. Consanguineous marriages became more frequent.
Weak-minded cousins wedded to bring forth weaker-mi