134 A LIFE'S WORK IN IRELAND. 



opinion lie has given on the faults of Irish tenants 

 and their wortMessness as farmers. 



5. I suppose there was never a question the facts 

 and statistics of which were so little taken into 

 account. Everything has been taken for granted on 

 sentiment. The only important question to the great 

 majority of the people is, in what way the general 

 prosperity of the country will be best promoted ? in 

 what way the most capital will be laid out ? how the 

 best wages will be paid, and who will pay them ? so 

 that the comfort of the whole people may be most 

 advanced in better houses, clothes, and all else. 



There is no doubt Ireland is a poor country com- 

 pared with England, and all the capital of all classes, 

 including the landlords, is not enough to lay out in 

 developing its resources. The capital of the occupy- 

 ing tenants is not enough for farming their land 

 moderately well in their own backward style. For 

 anything like good farming, with better stock and 

 enough bought manures and cattle foods, it is wholly 

 insufficient. It is only a chance tenant who has any 

 money to spare that he could lay out on draining or 

 permanent buildings. The Land Act is said to have 

 failed ; the true reason is because tenants cannot get 

 compensation for improvements which they have 

 not made. The tenants' friends in Parliament are 

 now asking that the owners' power of ejecting for 

 non-payment of rent may be taken away for one year 

 and a half and treated as a capricious eviction. 



