not mentioned in this thread yet, but in the DT and in the DT study thread for the song: " Children by Steam has always reminded me of Jonathan Swift's "Modest Proposal" to relieve hunger and poverty by eating Irish children. http://art-bin.com/art/omodest.html "

in this song reference is made to the Irish as cannon fodder, "is there sign of a war ... or what is the reason she wants them so fast?*

another possible implication of the song is that for some time after the Irish famine, people were marrying very late for financial reasons and because they didn't want so many children