Edward was annoyed by beggars and linked their poverty to alcohol and tobacco, and compared it unfavorably to slavery.
July 17, Giant’s Causeway
A great annoyance here are the beggars that follow you everywhere with something to sell & if you will not buy from them, they beg for money to obtain alcohol or rum.
I was repeatedly told that the Presbyterians in the north of Ireland did not take the temperance pledge of Father Matthew and the number of houses licensed to sell spirits & ale is very great. One landlady who had taken the pledge asked if we would have whiskey, brandy, or wine. The quantities of tobacco also used by the poor people is very great & one of the causes of their degradation.
. . . Irish gentlemen are very compassionate towards American slaves & denounce all west of the Atlantic on its account. Yet they are not conscious that vast multitudes of themselves are more degraded & more inflexibly fettered in slavery than the blacks.