I stopped with him for a fortnight, and succeeded in procuring a tuition in the house of a wealthy farmer named Piers Murphy, near Corcreagh. This, however, was a tame life, and a hard one, so I resolved once more to give up a miserable salary and my board, for the fortunate chances which an ardent temperament, and a strong imagination, perpetually suggested to me as likely to be evolved out of the vicissitudes of life. Urged on, therefore, by a spirit of romance, I resolved to precipitate myself on the Irish Metropolis, which I accordingly entered with two shillings and ninepence in my pocket; an utter stranger, of course friendless; ignorant of the world, without aim or object, but not without a certain strong feeling of vague and shapeless ambition, for the truth was I had not yet begun to think, and, consequently, looked upon life less as a reality than a vision.

from William Carleton's Traits and Stories of the Irish Peasantry

My ancestors* were such miserly, boring employers that they drove 19th century writers to run away and seek their fortunes! What impressively indirect patrons of the arts.

*That Piers Murphy is my great-great-great-great-grandfather.