96 ON THE STATE OF IRELAND. [BOOK I. 



CHAPTER VII. 



OF THE STATE OF AGRICULTURE. 



THE Commissioners inquired in every barony the number 

 of acres, what proportion of the land was mountainous, 

 plains and bog, to what extent it was cultivated or capable 

 of cultivation, and on the cultivated lands the number of 

 acres of each sort of culture. 



The information obtained, in reply to these inquiries, was 

 very incomplete. In general the large farmers do not 

 devote the twentieth part of their farms to tillage. In the 

 barony of Kilconnel the largest tillage-farmer keeps seventy 

 acres under tillage on a farm of 250, but he is yearly re- 

 ducing it, as it is not so profitable. Another farmer tills 

 only forty acres in a farm exceeding two hundred. Two 

 others, who occupy, the one five hundred acres, the other 

 a thousand, devote nearly the whole land to grazing. 



The small tenants are the most numerous, but the 

 greater portion of the district is held by large grazing 

 farmers. 



Notwithstanding the general tendency throughout Ire- 

 land to diminish the quantity of tillage in the large farms, 

 the increase of population, on the other hand, requiring a 

 larger quantity of con-acre for the supply of potatoes, 

 operates in some degree to counteract this. The total ex- 

 tent of the pasturage and the quantity of cattle have di- 

 minished. The landlords have thus been absolutely obliged 



