 A comedy about apparent patricide, it attracted a hostile reaction from sections of the Irish public.The "Freeman's Journal" described it as "an unmitigated, protracted libel upon Irish peasant men, and worse still upon Irish girlhood".Arthur Griffith, who believed that the Abbey Theatre was insufficiently politically committed, described the play as "a vile and inhuman story told in the foulest language we have ever listened to from a public platform", and perceived a slight on the virtue of Irish womanhood in the line "... a drift of chosen females, standing in their shifts ..."

At the time, a shift was known as a symbol representing Kitty O'Shea and adultery.