212 My Little Farm 



advance in food production. They will not find 

 it out, and if they did, they would not dare to 

 mention it. These commissions discover nothing 

 to us but the old fact of Irish industrial incapacity, 

 and this must continue as long as primary educa- 

 tion is permitted to pervert the collective mind 

 into mediae valism. The Irish are people pretending 

 to go forward with their faces turned backward, 

 and I have already shown that their Department 

 could not touch this problem without an upheaval 

 like that which dismissed Sir Horace Plunkett. 

 In proportion as Englishmen run short of food, 

 it is possible that they may take an interest in 

 Ireland as one of their essential providers. Were 

 it not for Ireland we should have additional 

 millions of Englishmen at this moment deprived 

 of first class meat at any price ; but this Irish 

 provision arises from the kindness of Nature 

 rather than from the competence of man. There 

 can hardly be another country in the world where 

 a little advance in industrial character could give 

 us such results in increased food production. As 

 it is, Irish cattle have to be taken from some 

 of .the richest soil in the world to finish their 

 fattening on the comparatively barren hill sides 

 of Scotland. Meantime, the Scotchman looks 

 forward to the London meat market, while the 

 Irishman looks back to Brian Boru. 



