XI.The Miraculous Pitcher
If the Holland people brought the Christmas tree to America the Irish brought us something for every day in the year. It was like the milk in the mi-rac-u-lous pitcher. No matter how much was given away the pitcher was always full.
You wouldn't think people so poor would have anything at all to give away. Why, they were so poor the children were hungry. There were Kathleen and Nora and Pat, Larry and Tommie and baby Mary. They lived in a little gray plastered cottage in Ireland. The floor under their bare feet was black earth, the straw roof leaked in wet weather. The farm was just one acre for growing potatoes. A lot of potatoes can be grown on an acre of ground if the weather is just right. But some years there was too much rain and the potatoes rotted. Some years there wasn't enough and the potatoes grew no larger than marbles. One dreadful year many people in Ireland starved. In thousands of cottages there wasn't enough to eat in September. It was plain the potatoes would not last all winter.
The black pot was not half filled, but it bubbled bravely above the peat fire in the open grate. The potatoes made a small heap on the bare table. Father and mother just pretended to eat so the children could have enough. The mother said she didn't care for new potatoes until they got old. That was an Irish joke. It made everybody laugh. Then the father said he would have to step across the sea to England and do some real work to get an appetite. There were two jokes, for the Irish sea was eighty miles wide, and he worked at home all the time. Kathleen gathered up the peelings and two of her own potatoes to feed the pig. Poor pig, he couldn't see the joke. When he was hungry he squealed.
Why didn't they eat the pig? They couldn't. He was "the good little fellow who paid the rent." When father sold him the money was sent to the great nobleman who owned the potato patch and the wretched little cottage. He lived in London. All the land for miles around belonged to him. Hundreds of such poor families sold their pigs to pay rent to him. He was very rich. Ship loads of corn were sent from America to feed people, and England sent food and money too. Still, of Ireland's eight million people, three million were hungry. It was hard to get enough food to them and some really did starve.
