School: Dromlachan

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1. Some Customs and Methods of Living 100 Years Ago (continued)

   

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   oats and potato crops were big. They people kept very few hens except a few on sticks in the corner of the kitchen. The land was rich in them days and used to give great crops without much trouble or manuring. They hadn't much manure anyway. The kind of potatoes sown was known as White Rocks. They were great big potatoes but a bit soapy. The old men told me that there was a kind of rot came on the White Rocks some years before '47. It was a light not on the outside, and the old people said potatoes with a rot like that were the best for boxty. But they never saw potatoes rotten right through, like what we see now. The old people I think destroyed the land. They took out terrible crops and didn't care (?) the land. Then they burned the moors, and there are parts of the country hasn't recovered yet from the way they worked it. The oats was a very important crop and it as nothing to see 12 or 14 20 stone bags of oats in any corner. For breakfast and supper the woman ground some in the quern and then sifted it through a "cauldron" (eg. a thing like a riddle with a perforated tin bottom in it) This took the seeds off and then she made porridge. ( It was called porridge when made on milk, and stirrabout when made on water. She steeped the seeds or tail meal and that made "bulls' milk" or sowens.

   

   Transcribed by a member of our volunteer transcription project.

   History Edit

   Language

   English

   Collector

   P. Mac Giolla Choinnigh

   Gender

   Male

   Informant

   John Kilkenny

   Relation

   Parent

   Gender

   Male