SECT. V.] RESULTS OF THE INQUIRY. 235 



SECTION V. 



As the business of agriculture is, at present, the only 

 pursuit for which the body of the people of Ireland are 

 qualified by habit, it is chiefly through it that a general 

 improvement in their condition can be primarily wrought ; 

 but in proportion as the earnings of the agricultural la- 

 bourer extend, so will his consumption of commodities 

 produced by persons in other occupations. Trades of dif- 

 ferent sorts will thus be encouraged, and in the natural 

 and therefore certain course of things, we may expect that 

 division of labour in Ireland which exists in England, and 

 which is at once an acting and re-acting cause and con- 

 sequence of the wealth of nations. 



Having then improvements in the lands of Ireland im- 

 mediately in contemplation, it appears to us that the laws 

 which form the constitution of the Bedford Level Cor- 

 poration in England afford principles of legislation directly 

 suited to our purpose. They enforce improvements in pro- 

 perty at the expense of the property improved. We pro- 

 pose to do the same thing, and with this view we recom- 

 mend, in the first place, that a Board shall be appointed 

 for Ireland, with the necessary powers for carrying into 

 effect a comprehensive system of national improvement, 

 and that it shall consist of a president and vice-president, 

 having suitable salaries, and of such other members as 

 shall be named with them. 



To the end also that all legal questions which may be 



