Note 55 — PREFACE.

If a desire for luxuries and refinements is in all classes the natural check to excessive population, and to the degradation of the species, that check is wholly wanting in Ireland. Not only the peasant, but the tradesman sees no attainable object of enjoyment in the possession of a class just above himself in ease and comfort, which might stimulate his ambition. The connecting link between the rich and the poor is wanting; for middlemen are no refiners of manners. As a familiar illustration, let the reader imagine that, except in towns of the first class, few vegetables beyond a cabbage or a potatoe are to be found in the market. There is absolutely no demand for such luxuries to repay the culture.