IRISH AGRARIAN TENURE. 99 



Up to the date mentioned therefore over 

 two milhon acres have been allotted to become 

 in the nearer or more distant future the pro- 

 perty of about 70,000 tenants for a sum 

 of over ;^20,ooo,ooo. The total number of 

 peasant ownerships thus created in Ireland is 

 as follows : — 



Under the Acts of 1869-1881 ... ... 7,663 



Under the Ashbourne Acts ... ... 25,367 



Under other Acts ... ... ... 42,436 



75>466 



In all these cases the State holds a kind of mort- 

 gage on the farm of the tenant, who becomes 

 owner when this is paid off. This constitutes a 

 material change in the economic position of the 

 tenant. 



Let us take a case in which a tenant has been 

 paying a rent of £100 a year. He redeems it, 

 let us say, at eighteen years' purchase. The 

 purchase-money is therefore ;^i8oo. On this 

 sum the tenant pays 4 per cent, for forty-nine 

 years, i.e. £72. In other words, by the use of 

 English credit he gets a reduction on his existing 

 fair rent of 28 per cent. An Irish peasant there- 

 fore becom.es an owner by the process of paying 

 for forty-nine years a rent 28 per cent, less than 

 that of his neighbour who is under a judicially 

 fixed rent. The only advantage of the neighbour 

 is that he can have his rent revised every fifteen 

 years and is thus in a position to profit by a fall 

 in prices. Such a fall would have to be a very 



