Narragansett Herald

THE HOMES OF PRIVATION
HARD STRUGGLE OF THE IMPOVERISHED ARRAN ISLANDERS.

Girls Who Carry Sanded Seaweed to Make a Poor Soil, in Which to Grow a Scanty Crop of Potatoes.

Perhaps in no quarter of the globe is agriculture carried on under more disheartening conditions than in the Arran Islands. These islands, three in number, lie about ten miles off the west coast of Ireland, in the mouth of the Bay of Galway. They are simply three limestone rocks thrown up by some convulsion of nature long before the memory of man. During the ages a light deposit of soil has accumulated on the bare rocks in spots, particularly in the valleys, and peculiarly nutritious grass has sprung up. The blades of this grass are not flat, such as is the grass of this country, but perfectly round. The finest beef in the British Isles is raised upon the scanty product of these sea-girt islands. But very little of this beef is eaten by the men who cultivate the juicy tenderloins and sirloins. It all goes to pay the rent, that gaunt spectre, ever feeding, yet ever hungry and greedy, which has stalked over the beautiful island of Erin for 800 years, drinking the milk of the cows, devouring the sheep and lambs, and leaving only the potatoes as a feeble barrier between existence and starvation.

But raising potatoes on the islands of Arran is quite a different thing from raising them in the State of New York. A large proportion of the arable land is reserved from necessity for grazing purposes. The soil in which the potatoes are cultivated is all artificial. It is made of a queer compost of sand and seaweed. The sand is carried from the seashore on the backs of donkeys and Irish girls to the spots selected for a garden. It is a common occurrence for a young woman of sixteen or eighteen years to carry basket loads of sand weighing 100 pounds from one to three miles all day long and then come home and do the household work before going to bed. It will readily be seen that the soil thus made must be very light. Whatever fructifying properties it possesses comes from the seaweed. In this manner every foot of tillable soil on the Arran Islands has been made for centuries. As only a very small portion of the surface of the islands is sufficiently smooth to permit of the deposit, the area under cultivation is necessarily very small. When the seed potatoes have been planted the Arraner begins to pray for rain. He prays that water may come down in bucketfuls, so that his little plot will be soaked all the time. For the limestone rock beneath his artificial garden contains at all times a frightful amount of latent heat stored in it from the sun's fiery rays, and, unless there is a wet season, such as prevails in the tropics, the seed potatoes will be fried into Saratoga chips in the earth.

If the season has been a good one from an Arran Island standpoint, the product would excite smiles on the part of a New Yorker, were it not so pitiful. The yield is a veritable example of the old saying, "small potatoes, and a few in a hill." A potato as big as a hen's egg would be the exception. The majority would be no bigger than an old fashioned "dodo," such as the boys used to play marbles with. One crop exhausts the strength of the soil, and the same process must be resorted to each year as far as the seaweed is concerned, in order that another crop may be raised. And so, during the centuries, the people have learned by bitter experience the value of seaweed as a fertilizer, and they consequently look upon it with the same jealousy as a New York farmer views his expensive guano.

In this way rude customs which have grown into laws have sprung up with regard to the division of the precious fertilizer. No landowner can go down to the beach and gather seaweed whenever the notion strikes him to do so. He must go down to the sea in the spring of the year, when a certain weed which grows at the bottom of the sea begins to lose its hold, and join in the harvest of the seaweed. He must get into his little cockle-shell boat, called a curragh, made of ash ribs covered with canvas, and go at low tide to gather the weed. This is torn from the bottom by the aid of a rake sixteen feet long and carried ashore in the frail boat. It is then piled upon the beach in a heap. When the harvest is over two of the most important men on the island are selected to divide the weed. All the inhabitants, men, women and children are present on this occasion, to the number of between 3000 and 4000. The heap of seaweed is usually about 300 feet long, fifteen feet wide and ten feet high. The two men look the heap carefully over and agree on the place where it is to be divided. A narrow lane is then cut crosswise through the heap, dividing it into two piles. These heaps are in turn subdivided, until a hundred little heaps scattered over the beach indicate that each landowner has been allotted his share. The weed is then taken away at the leisure of the owner.

The Arraner, like the peasantry in other portions of Ireland, is as primitive to-day in his cooking of the potato as he was 400 years ago. He knows of only one way to cook his favorite vegetable, and will listen to the explanation of no other mode. He simply washes the potato and boils it just as it comes from the earth, with its jacket on. After cooking the potatoes are turned out into an oval-shaped wicker contrivance, closely resembling the lid of a champagne basket. After all the water has been strained off the potatoes are dumped from the "skib," as it is called, upon the middle of the table. The family then gather around the table and eat potatoes, with a little salt, until hunger is satisfied. The Arran Island child who cannot eat from fifteen to twenty-five potatoes at a single sitting is considered to be ailing. Sometimes if the cow has recently "come in," the children are allowed the indulgence of the "dip." Fresh milk or buttermilk is placed in the bottom of a bowl. The child seizes the potato around the middle with the thumb and forefinger of the left hand. Then, with the flat of his right hand he knocks the skin off the top of the potato, and, squeezing it with his left hand, he forces the mealy contents of the vegetable out upon the table. This he picks up and squeezes together like new-fallen snow, dips it into the milk and transfers it to his mouth.

Whatever may be said by scientists about the potato being ninety per cent. water, there is certainly some unknown quality about them which conserves in a most remarkable manner the health and strength of these rugged islanders. They will go out in their frail boats fishing all day, get wet to the skin, and sleep all night in the wet garments without any apparent ill effects. Even the little children frequently walk ten miles to procure a quart of milk for the visiting stranger, and return with as little concern as if they had just been around the corner to the grocery. Given plenty of potatoes, the Arraner has good health and is happy. Give him a chunk of boiled ling or codfish and he is delirious with delight. But he will cling to his old-fashioned style of cooking his potatoes.

One of the chief difficulties of the dwellers on these sea-girt isles is the procuring of turf with which to cook the potatoes. There is not a sod of turf in Arran. But across the narrow strait of ten miles of water on the Irish mainland there are thousands of acres of it. The turf is brought to the islands in little sloop-rigged vessels called "hookers." These vessels carry about the equivalent of a cord of wood. A load costs $25. Very few Arraners have that much money at one time, and so they club together sometimes as many as twenty-five of them being interested in a boat load. Some of them are so miserably poor that twelve cents will represent their interest in the fuel. It is all thrown out upon the wharf and carefully divided pro rata into heaps according to the amount invested. Then the young girls, wearing shoes made of raw green hide of a cow, with the hair on the outside, come down like pack horses, with their wicker baskets strapped on their backs, and carry the turf away. In this manner, when nature has been so kindly in those sea-girt isles as to permit the potatoes to grow as large as eggs, the pot is kept boiling.—New York Sun.