[Merry]

All that makes perfect sense, but not what I want to hear.

Do you also think registration in ordinary working class families in Ireland was more hit and miss than in the rest of the UK? I seem to have several families in Irish cities who registered more than half of their children, but certainly not all or even most of them. The missing ones don't look like the children of older daughters, so I wondered if they could be illegitimate children of cousins etc? Seems unlikely as all the neighbours would notice if Mrs X managed three children in under three years and didn't show for the middle one!