THE 



COUNTRY GENTLEMAN'S MAGAZINE 



SEPTEMBER 1868 



A PRACTICAL VIEW OF THE IRISH LAND QUESTION. 



^By a Resident Landowner and Farmer.) 



T/ic CoNcy^sc of 1845. 



A\"ING for the last fifteen years de- 

 voted myself to the improvement 

 and cultivation of my own estate, 

 I have had numerous and varied 

 opportunities of investigating the system of 

 agriculture pursued in the south of Ireland, and 

 of forming an opinion as to the causes that 

 operate to connect the land question with that 

 discontent and agitation which are now dis- 

 turbing the public mind, and seriously imped- 

 ing the development of our natural resources. 



To know Ireland one must hve in it. A 

 casual ramble through the country may give 

 the eye a supei-ficial view, and a few notes 

 jotted down from policemen, national 

 schoolmasters, or mine host of the hotel, may 

 lead a hasty traveller to beUeve he has learned 

 something of her people. But one must go 

 deeper to understand those national peculi- 

 arities which lie at the bottom of such a 

 question as that of the land. The English- 

 man or Scotchman is naturally struck with 

 everything he sees which differs from his own 

 notions, of what is right and proper, and 

 instead of making allowances for differ- 

 ences of soil, climate, custom, and tradition, 

 varying with each district, he jumps to the 

 conclusion that the peculiarities of Ireland 



arises from ignorance, bad laws, or some 

 other cause, which up to the present time 

 has not been clearly ascertained. 



The national peculiarities of Ireland arc 

 neither so unmeaning or stupid, as some of 

 our detractors would wish the world to be- 

 lieve. The mud wall and the thatched roof 

 present to the mind of a man who has seldom 

 seen anything but substantial walls of masonry 

 and brick, covered with good slate, nothing 

 but a state of discomfort and wretchedness ; 

 but the Irish peasant, often with scant fire, 

 will tell you, that there is a degree of warmth 

 and coziness in his cabin not always to be 

 found in a house of more pretensions. If 

 we consider for a moment the cost, not to 

 say the difficulty, until very recently, of pro- 

 curing the materials for a superior structure, 

 we must see that the existence of our cabins 

 is due more to the absence of good slate and 

 other appliances, than to either the bad taste 

 or ignorance of any class. Again, our fences, 

 earth-banks with furze on the top, look poor 

 and slovenly to an eye familiar with the well- 

 trimmed quickset hedges of England, but I 

 should say that the breeze from the Atlantic 

 has more effect in determining the fashion of 

 hedges in Ireland than anything else. These 

 and other peculiarities are, upon our first 

 acquaintance \\ith Ireland, apt to produce 

 impressions in themselves unfounded ; the 



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