the famine-stricken were, meantime, hastening to their shroudless and coffinless graves by the thousand.  During its progress the terrible scourge was checked more or less by the various means made use of, but it was never stayed.  The Government were not only astonished—­they were profoundly alarmed at the magnitude to which the public works had grown.  Almost the sole object of those works was to apply a labour test to destitution; but the authorities now felt that they must dismiss that pet theory of theirs and try to feed the people in the most direct way possible.

At the opening of Parliament the Prime Minister brought forward, as we have seen, a new Irish Relief Act, the 10th Vic., c. 7.  It was called an Act for the temporary relief of destitute persons in Ireland.  It was framed according to the views expressed by the Prime Minister in his speech of January the 25th, and became law on the 26th of February.

The first clause acknowledged that the Labour-rate Act failed to meet the exigency, for it recites that “by reason of the great increase of destitution in Ireland, sufficient relief could not be given according to the provisions of the Labour-rate Act;” the Lord Lieutenant was, therefore, empowered to appoint Commissioners for the relief of destitution in that country, with full authority to carry out all arrangements under the Act.  Its chief provisions were:  That Relief Committees should be formed by order of the Lord Lieutenant, and their powers were to extend to the 1st of November, 1847, on which day they were to cease.  Those Committees were to consist of the Justices of the district, the Poorlaw Guardians, and one of the Inspectors appointed by the Relief Commissioners.  A Finance Committee was to be selected from the General Committee, but the Lord Lieutenant was empowered to add others to it.  A chief duty of Relief Committees was to make out lists of persons requiring relief, but the Finance Committees had authority to examine such lists, and correct them if necessary.  The money required for this new system of relief was to be levied and collected as a poor-rate; and the guardians of any Union who refused to do this could be dissolved by the Poorlaw Commissioners, who were also empowered to appoint paid Guardians in their place.  The Treasury, on being applied to by the Relief Commissioners, was authorized to make advances to enable them to grant loans in aid of rates, but no such grant or loan was to be made after the 1st of October, 1847.

There is a clause in this Act which is not without its interest at the present time.  It is the thirteenth.  It recites that “the Relief Commissioners, with the sanction of the Lord Lieutenant, are empowered to direct, whether the whole or any part of the sum mentioned ... shall be borne by and charged exclusively against the Electoral Division, or whether the whole or any part thereof shall be borne by and charged against the whole Union; and the Guardians shall charge the whole Union, and the several Electoral Divisions accordingly.”