Chamberss Edinburgh Journal, No. 433 | Page 8

as an act
of sovereign favour; and the laws were relaxed--often to the injury of
well-disposed citizens. The people were again and again termed the
dear children of the emperor, and every member of the cabinet found
his best interest in advocating popular measures.
The rest of Taou-Kwang's reign was spent chiefly in endeavours to
improve his naval and military forces, and in fruitless struggles to

replenish the exhausted treasury of the state. His own, meanwhile, was
full to overflowing, having received immense accessions from the
confiscated property of his unsuccessful generals and degraded
ministers. He died on the 25th of February 1850, aged sixty-nine. In his
will, there appears the following notice of the English war: 'The little
fools beyond the Western Ocean were chastised and quelled by our
troops, and peace was soon made; but we presumed not to vaunt our
martial powers.'
FOOTNOTES:
[1] London: Smith, Elder, & Co.: 1852.

A GLIMPSE OF BALLYVOURNEY.
Among the various plans that have been suggested for ameliorating the
condition of Ireland, and improving the moral and social status of her
people, I know of few better calculated to produce these beneficial
results than that of opening good lines of road through wild and
uncultivated districts, and by this means facilitating the intercourse
between the inhabitants of almost unknown regions and those of more
advanced and enlightened districts. Where this has been done, in
conjunction with other local improvements, a moral regeneration has
taken place that could scarcely be credited by those who have not
witnessed the effect. In proof of what I say, I will endeavour to give a
short account of a journey I made last summer from Cork to the
far-famed Lakes of Killarney. I had performed the same journey several
years before; but I now travelled, after passing Macroom, by a road that
had been made since my last visit, through Ballyvourney, a wild and
mountainous district, formerly impassable. The territorial
improvements there are now matter of history, it having been proved
before the Commissioners of Land Inquiry, that land, valued at 3s. 9d.
per acre, had been made permanently worth L.4 per acre by a small
outlay, which, with all expenses, rent, and interest of money, was
repaid in three years.

The land had been deep turf (peat), and all but useless for agricultural
purposes. By drainage, cultivation, and irrigation, however, it was
made to produce the finest meadow grass, sold annually by public
auction for from L.4 to L.6 per acre; and sometimes it yielded a second,
and even a third crop. The great secret of this improvement was, that
the then proprietor gave his steward, who was likewise his relation, a
permanent interest in his outlay, by letting him the land on lease for
ever. In consequence of his doing so, the very worst land, judging by
the surface, has been made equal in value to town fields; and in the
progress of this work, the wildest race perhaps in the world, have now
become a civilised and industrious people. Mr C---- has sold his
interest in the improvements for L.10,000, calculated, on the average
profit of past years, at twenty years' purchase.
When he first undertook the work, he had every difficulty to contend
with: the people were unused to labour, and so wild and savage, that no
stranger dared to settle among them. I was told that when the first
land-steward was seen at the chapel in a dress which denoted him to be
a stranger, he heard a man behind him telling another in Irish--which he
supposed to be unknown to the stranger--the part of his neck in which
he would plant a deadly wound before he got home. The steward
fortunately understood the native tongue, and quitting the chapel before
the service was over, he fled from the dangerous place.
The present civilisation and industrious habits of the people, compared
with their barbarism thirty years ago, shews that the Irish character,
when properly directed, is as capable of advancement as any other in
the world. There was at that time no road into or out of Ballyvourney: it
was in this respect like the Happy Valley. The passes are yet in
existence, and are fearful to look at, where a gentleman from Kenmare,
on his journeys to Cork, used to bring his chariot, accompanied by a
number of footmen, and unharnessing the horses, let it down by ropes
from the top of the precipice. There is another spot of the kind on the
road from Killarney to Cahersiveen and Valentia, where on the side of
the Hill of Droum, nearly precipitous from the sea, is the track-mark of
the carriage-road, if such it can be called, where the vehicle used to be
supported and dragged by men. A new road has