196 Irish Jigriculture. [April, 



ships and canal boats has been fully demonstrated; dwellings too, 

 are being constructed of the same material, and few now will 

 venture to fix a limit to its use. Indeed, if the past and the 

 present be any indication of the future, this key of the arts will 

 meet a constantly increasing demand, until man shall cease to 

 move onward in his grand march of improvement. 



MARKET HILL AGRICULTURAL DINNER— IMPROVE- 

 MENTS IN IRISH AGRICULTURE. 



BY HENRY S. RANDALL. 



A great improvement is taking place in the agriculture of 

 some districts in the north of Ireland, by a system of means 

 novel, and not without interest, to American farmers. The in- 

 centive or impulse to these changes is given by the proprietors to 

 the tillers of the soil, partially by a judicious distribution of boun- 

 ties, calculated (and this is most wisely done) as much to appeal 

 to the pride — the esprit du corps — as to the pocket of the reci- 

 pient: and the spirit thus awakened is furthered and sustained, 

 as well as guided in proper channels, by the employment of agri- 

 culturists of science and experience to counsel and encourage the 

 tenants, to see that each is properly noticed and rewarded for his 

 improvements, — in short, to exercise all the supervision which 

 the tenants will voluntarily submit to. This is far preferable to 

 coertion through leasehold stipulations. 



Foremost amongst the landlords who thus wisely study their 

 own and their tenants' interests, is the Earl of Gosford, whose 

 large estates lie in the county of Armagh. And how favorably 

 does this nobleman's conduct, in this particular, contrast with 

 that of the scores of titled ahsentees, who treat the land that bore 

 them as a conquered province, to be drained of its entire income 

 to support the dissipations of the English and continental capitals 

 and watering places! 



Among the scientific agriculturists, who, as the employees of 

 the landholders, have done most to improve the husbandry of the 



