Orra's attitude toward begging changed over a short time. She was surprisingly unaware that, only a few years after the worst of the potato famine, many men could not find work.
July 11, Thursday, Dublin
. . . But O the wretchedness of a very large number of those about the streets. Such rags & filth & perfect wretchedness & despair I could never have conceived of . . . it is deeply impressed upon my heart . . .
July 13, Saturday, Belfast
One expedient however I adopted . . . was to take something to eat in my pocket & when they ask for a ha’penny to buy something for themselves or their children to eat, give them a piece of bread. They pass along & look quite satisfied.
July 17, Giant’s Causeway
. . . At the Causeway it was worse than any where else. It was not ragged children & old women & men but strong & hardy men . . . refusing would not silence them until I was so out of patience that I turned upon them and shamed them, hardy looking men, as they were able to work & following us along begging. This finally stopped their begging but not their murmuring. Those who do not beg will take advantage in some way or another to filch money out of your pockets. It really subtracts largely from the pleasure of such a time.