124 A LIFE'S WORK IN IRELAND. 



landlord. No doubt I do ; and if I had not known 

 the real value of sentimental talk, I should have had 

 no business to live in Ireland, and could not have 

 succeeded there. But I write as one who knew from 

 the first that his own prosperity was involved in the 

 prosperity of his tenants, and who, after forty years' 

 experience, has found his course to succeed. Above 

 all, I write in the certainty that the owning and 

 improving of land is a business, as much as cotton- 

 spinning, and nothing else ; that it can only prosper 

 when managed on business principles, whether it 

 be in England, Ireland, or Scotland, and that the 

 tall talk of politicians in Ireland is only an empty 

 wind-bag, full only of scheming, and sure to coUapse 

 when met by a resolute will. 



