Penny Dreadfuls, 1781 · page 87 of 120
A Month's Tour, &c. — page 87: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Page Analysis This is a page of running prose (page 87) from a travel narrative titled "A Month's Tour." The text describes the author's visit to Rath-Farnham, an estate near Dublin owned by Lord Ely. The passage criticizes Irish transport methods, contrasting small carts with two-foot wheels (used in Ireland) against English wheel-barrows. The author suggests the Irish persist in using these antiquated vehicles out of patriotic stubbornness ("amor patrie") rather than practical sense, claiming they date to primitive mechanical times. The text continues mid-thought at page's bottom, suggesting the critique extends further.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
A MONTH's "TOUR. 87 /On the fixth:we fet. out for Rath«Farns “ham,‘a feat-of Lord’ Ely’s, fituate two -miles S. E. of Dublin. ‘This nobleman is a great admirer of the: Englith tafte. Here we fawa waggon, for the firlt time fince our arrival in Ireland. Inftead of ‘thefe, they ufe fmall cars, the diameter of whofe wheel is fcarcely two feet ;_ their load about twice as large as that of an Englifh wheel-barrow. Nothing fhews more ftrongly the ridiculous lengths to which the amor patrie is:carried by the Trith, than their perfevering, contrary to every principle of. intereft and common fenfe,. to ufe thefe abfurd.vehicles,. which were invented by their fore--fathers, in the ‘ :infancy of the mechanical arts. Their noddies are equally ridiculous and in- comicbooks.com