THE AGRARIAN REFORM OF 1903. 131 



parties signed a joint report to serve as the basis 

 for the new Bill. The Report declared the 

 purchase policy to be the only one possible. 

 It was to be carried out in such a fashion that 

 the yearly payments of the purchasing tenants 

 should be 15 per cent, to 25 per cent, lower than 

 second term rents. Also, evicted tenants who, 

 as such, had no right to have judicial rents fixed, 

 were to be permitted to purchase. The petty 

 holdings were to be enlarged by dividing up the 

 grazing lands. The landlords were to receive 

 as their purchase money a sum which at 3 per 

 cent, to 3|- per cent, interest would yield them as 

 much as second-term rents, less not more than 

 10 per cent, representing the difference between 

 the gross rental and the net receipts. ' If the 

 payments of the tenants were to be reduced by 

 15 per cent, to 25 per cent., and the gross income 

 of the landlord to be reduced by only 10 per 

 cent, on the basis of 3 per cent, investments, it 

 is clear that there must be a gap to be filled up. 

 This gap was to be filled by the Treasury of the 

 United Kingdom, by means of a bonus to be 



ready to go into conference with their opponents on the 

 initiative of well-meaning outsiders. It is supposed in many 

 quarters that this institution of the extra-parliamentary, un- 

 official conference was brought by Sir Antony MacDonnell 

 from India, where no Parliament exists. 



[It may be commented on the above that the first of the 

 extra-parliamentary conferences, the Recess Committee, took 

 place before Sir Antony MacDonnell's Irish appointment. — 

 Trans I. '\ 



