Handel arrives in Ireland on 18 November and is welcomed with open arms. Where life seemed light, cheerful, elegant and fashionable when the aristocracy were enjoying themselves in the new music hall in Fishamble Street, then life was looking considerably different to the majority of the inhabitants in Dublin. There was a particular reason that hospitals for poor people and musical charities for imprisoned debtors were in such dire need of raising as much money as possible. Because in 1741 there was a famine in Ireland, and throngs of famished people from the countryside would go to Dublin in the search of food.