Page:Notes on the Anti-Corn Law Struggle.djvu/244

 of the dark fate of his race and his own. His little brother had been burnt to death only a short time before, while engaged as he now was.

These children had recently lost their mother—one consequence of which was the death by burning of the little boy. They were now under the care of their eldest sister, a girl about seventeen. Rather less than three weeks after this time on visiting this village again, I was informed that this girl was dead and buried. She had gone to a gentleman's house at a little distance to beg, and, standing about two hours in the cold and the wet, she caught a cold, which, from the state of the cottage, insufficient covering (there were, as I have said, no blankets), and the want of necessaries, turned into a fever and carried her off in about ten days. She died raving mad. Her life had been short and miserable. Better to be in the grave than to go on living thus.

In cases of starvation, this is the usual termination of the melancholy process. "Towards the end," says Liebig ("Animal Chemistry," p. 26), "the particles of the brain begin to undergo the process of oxidation, and delirium, mania, and death close the scene."

I will not weary the reader with more of the