§ MR. SEXTONasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether Mr. Peel, R.M., on visiting, last Friday, the scene of the recent evictions on the estate of Mr. Wybrants 671 Olphert, in the county of Donegal, found 165 members of the evicted families, including 60 women, 20 infants, and several aged and infirm men and women, lying in the ditches, and ascertained that they had lain there shelterless during the previous three days and nights; whether, although the guardians and the relieving officer had been notified of the condition of the evicted people, and were quite aware of it, and although the relieving officer was on the scene on Saturday last, no food or shelter was provided, and the people had to depend for the means of sustaining life on the care of the Rev. James M'Fadden, the parish priest; whether the relieving officer provided any conveyance to take the people to the Workhouse; whether, before the eviction of these families, the relieving officer had been supplying several of them with meal, at usurious prices, on the "gombeen" system; whether the Report of Mr. Macfarlane, Local Government Board Inspector, who visited the scene at midnight on Saturday, will be laid upon the Table; whether the parish priest on Monday provided means of transport, and conveyed 140 of the evicted people in a body to the workhouse; whether the landlord who had evicted those families, Mr. Wybrants Olphert, was in the Chair at last Saturday's meeting of the Board of Guardians, and refused to put a Motion instructing to temporarily provide food and shelter for the evicted; whether he also refused to vacate the Chair in order to allow the sense of the Board to be taken upon the Motion; and, what notice the Local Government Board will take of these proceedings?
§ MR. TREVELYANCaptain Peel, on his visit, found that 141 persons had slept in the open air. On the same day on which he so reported, the relieving officer visited the place and offered to the tenants individually and collectively relief in the workhouse and suitable conveyance there on that afternoon. The people, however, refused to accept this offer, stating that they were to go on the following Monday, when the Rev. Mr. M'Fadden would have them all taken together. The relieving officer, who had been rate collector for many years and had peculiar opportunity of knowing the resources of the people, did not consider that they required temporary relief. He offered meal to one 672 man, and it was declined. The Local Government Board Inspector, who has made inquiry on the spot, states that it is not the fact that the relieving officer had been supplying the people with meal at usurious prices on the "gombeen" system. The relieving officer bears a high character with the Catholic clergy of his district, and is stated to be upright and generous in his dealings with the poor. On the Monday the parish priest did provide transport to the workhouse for the people who had refused to accept it from the relieving officer on Saturday. The Chairman at the meeting of the Board of Guardians declined to vacate the chair on a suggestion made by one Guardian—no other Guardian approving or supporting that suggestion. No such Motion as is mentioned in the Question was duly put—the Local Government Board Inspector, who was present, having explained the powers already possessed by the relieving officer. The Local Government Board do not feel called upon to take any notice of the proceedings—the Guardians having relieved the evicted persons in a legal manner.