"As there is not a gentleman, or landlord, or any person in the parish to bring before the public the distress that prevails in this parish, nor even a poor law guardian to speak on their behalf in the board-room, I am forced to appeal to your charitable Committee on behalf of my parishioners, a great many of whom are in great distress, for there is not a poorer parish in the entire West, owing to the poor and barren nature of the soil, although the parish is very large (being 12 miles in circumference, and containing thousands of acres), there is not more than 200 acres of it that is good and arable land, capable of producing meadow, the remainder consists of bog and mountain. There are about 500 families, all except three or four are small landholders, their holdings varying from three to eight acres. The greater part of the population live along the page 48 side of a cold and wet mountain; and in consequence of the wet and barren nature of the soil for the last three years, I may say the crops entirely failed, and only for the shopkeepers in Castlebar, who gave the parishioners credit last year, I am sure the greater part of them would have to leave the country. In the year 1845 there were about 1,000 families in the parish, and in 1847 the population was reduced to 500. In last May, the Archbishop, Dr. McHale, drove through a part of the parish from Castlebar, and after returning, he said that he never passed through a more wretched or poorer country, and consequently sent me £20 for the relief of the distressed. Unless the Government and the charitable public come quickly to the aid of the poor people, I fear many of them will feel the pangs of hunger, and that before long. Trusting that your charitable Committee will be so kind as to send me relief for my poor people,