48 THE LANDED INTEREST. 



having either emigrated or died. The deaths 

 from fever and famine had ceased in 1850, 

 but the emigration continued, partly to Great 

 Britain and the colonies, but chiefly to the 

 United States. The population had fallen in 

 1871 to 5,412,000, and was then almost the same 

 as that of 1801, seventy years before. There is 

 no darker page than this in the history of our 

 country in the present or preceding century. 

 Millions of money were lavishly spent by the 

 Government in direct relief, and in relief and 

 improvement works to give employment, with a 

 view to palliate the collapse which befell a people 

 who had no resources when the potato failed 

 them. The landowners in the more distressed 

 districts were nearly as much broken down as 

 their tenants. They had either encouraged or 

 not discouraged the continued subdivision of 

 small farms, as well as the rapid increase of the 

 people, by which, so long as the potato could be 

 relied on, their rents were increased. The 

 famine-stricken land was everywhere abandoned 

 by the starving occupiers, and thrown tenantless 

 upon the owners' hands, making many of them 



