THE AGRARIAN REFORM OF 1903. 133 



sentatives of the tenants had had any official 

 mandate.^ The Irish Parliamentary Party and 

 the official association of the Irish landlords felt 

 themselves, in a certain sense, set in the back- 

 ground ; and in both organizations there were 

 extreme elements who, on the one side, were not 

 favourable to a continuance of the land-purchase 

 policy, and on the other, hated all idea of a 

 peaceful settlement, on the ground that it would 

 make it more difficult to carry on the national 

 agitation. Wyndham succeeded, with rare tact, 

 in overcoming these difficulties. Even in Parlia- 

 ment he was able to commit Redmond and 

 O'Brien so deeply to his Bill that the Irish Party 

 can never rid themselves of their responsibility 

 for the Act of 1903." 



^ [It is true that the recognized Landlords' Convention 

 refused to approve the project of the Conference, but a 

 plebiscite taken among the Irish landlords in general accorded 

 this approval by a sweeping majority. On the other side, an 

 extraordinary proof of the completeness of the ascendency of 

 the political over all other interests in Nationalist Ireland was 

 given in the fact that in this Conference, where the fate of the 

 Irish tenant farmers was to be decided, not a single tenant 

 farmer had a voice. — Transl.^ 



^ O'Brien has had to pay for his championship of the 

 Conference programme by suffering a sort of political excom- 

 munication, pronounced against him by the Free77iaii' s Journal, 

 the chief organ of the Nationalist party. The indignation of the 

 Freeman is quite intelligible. O'Brien was imprudent enough 

 to declare his satisfaction with a measure of reform. For 

 proposals relating to Ireland, it is regarded as axiomatic that 

 beneficia obtruduntur. 



