CORK . . . for the last four days this city and neighbourhood have been visited by one of the most protracted and terrific gales of wind which has occurred for many years, accompanied by heavy showers of rain, and the weather has altogether been of so severe a character as almost to put a stop to all outdoor transactions. The wind was principally from the west, consequently many wrecks may not have occurred in our immediate neighbourhood. Much serious damage has been done in the city . . . several stacks of chimneys having been blown down, and houses stripped of slates, and one of five old trees on Grenville-place was snapped across in the centre. As yet the only casualty is the death of a poor woman named Mary Brien, who resided at the cross of Evergreen, caused by a stack of chimneys having fallen upon her last night in Kiftis-lane.

She was a servant, and was returning home from her place when the accident occurred, and her remains were not discovered until this morning when her legs were observed sticking out from under the rubbish.

Hibernian Journal 11-13 December 1780 IT WAS predicted with some truth in the House of Commons, that the advantages we should receive from a free trade, would be very slow. Common people are as poor as ever, the lands uncultivated, and the landlords as rapacious as usual. In England, children from the age of three and upwards are employed in some form of industry, while the naked offspring of our ragged peasants, run about as wild and unprofitable as the morasses we enjoy since the Flood. Man requires to be changed in this country as well as the soil. Habitual indolence, and the licentious use of fermented liquors influence the conduct of our manufacturers, and both produce combination; in consequence of which the exports of Ireland can be of little importance, while we scarcely work up half enough for our own consumption. England has in vain opened our ports, and parliament may speculate new laws, for the improvement of such a benefit. Associations for industry can alone make Ireland a gainer, particularly when we reflect that the yoke was taken from her neck, and the chain from her foot, when she was so impoverished, that the continuance of her manacles threatened her dissolution.

Irish Press 10 December 1966 SURROUNDED by Dublin's rush-hour traffic, a 76-yearold man would certainly have died last night but for the quick action of two schoolgirls. Up to his neck in the Grand Canal at Baggot Street Bridge, Patrick Philips stood for twenty minutes awaiting a rescue.

Paralysed by the icy waters, he could not shout for help.

Two 18-year old schoolgirls, Maureen Shudell, Pleasant St, South Circular Road, and Linda McEvoy, Pearse Brothers Park, Rathfarnham, walking home from St Mary's Convent, Haddington Road, saw a white object bobbing about in the canal. At first they thought it was a swan, but their curiosity was aroused and they went closer. They saw Mr Philips . . . his head barely showing above the water. Maureen, a bronze medal holder for life saving, rushed for assistance. Aided by a passer-by, the three dragged him to safety. The man, who lives in Roebuck Castle, Dundrum, under the care of the Little Sisters of the Poor, was walking along by the canal when he tripped and fell in.