DISCOURAGEMENT OF ABSENTEEISM. 143 



very men who are most deeply interested in the right 

 application of the funds, and least liable to the influence 

 of private jobbing in the works to be performed. The 

 improvement of access to farms and markets, the dis- 

 couragement and punishment of crime, the support of 

 fever hospitals and dispensaries, the patronage of the 

 public offices of the county, are surely the true business 

 of the landlord. They are matters of such importance, 

 that they require a degree of intelligent supervision, 

 such as the landlords only have time for. This is 

 at present both their duty and their privilege, and it 

 needs only the stimulus of self-interest to make it be 

 heartily performed. 



To the want of such a stimulus may be owing much 

 of the absenteeism, which has so long contributed to 

 drain the resources of the country. An Irish landlord, 

 with no direct interest in the county business, no 

 improvements proceeding on his own estate, a competi- 

 tion for his land which made it far more profitable to 

 him to let it than farm any of it himself, had very little 

 inducement and no occupation whatever to keep him at 

 home. Let him feel the pressure of mismanaged rates, 

 and he will awake to the necessity of learning his own 

 business. Living among his tenantry he will acquire a 

 taste for country affairs, softening by his intercourse the 

 asperities unhappily too common in Irish social life, 

 promoting the views of improving farmers, and teaching 

 all classes, by his own example, the inestimable value of 

 humanity, integrity, and truth. 



With regard to the poor-rate, there are reasons for 

 dividing this burden which do not apply to the county 



