106 APPENDIX 



meet the situation. A more comprehensive and revolutionary 

 form of legislation was demanded." 



State assistance in the purchase of: land by the tenants 

 was recognized as early as an Act of 1869, and reaffirmed 

 in the Acts of 1870 and 1881 ; but the tenants usually 

 could not provide the one-fourth of the purchase price and 

 the heavy legal costs of transfer. The Act of 1885 

 provided a large fund for advance of loans to tenants at 3 

 per cent interest and 1 per cent sinking fund. The Act 

 of 1891 provided for the purchase of whole estates from 

 the landlords by the issue of Irish Land Stock. However, 

 the Land Stock rapidly fell below par and the terms of 

 purchase became unattractive to landlords. This resulted 

 in the Acts of 1896 and 1903. Finally in 1909 an 

 enormous sum of money was paid as a bonus by the British 

 Government to the Irish landlords to induce them to sell 

 their land on terms which enabled the tenants to buy the 

 land by means of an annuity for 68^ years including interest 

 and sinking fund, which was no greater than the reduced 

 rentals the tenants were already paying. 



" The actual result of the Land Purchase Acts in Ireland 

 has been to create a country of peasant proprietors. By 

 March 31, 1915, nearly 300,000 holdings had passed into 

 the hands of their occupiers. These represented nearly ten 

 million acres of land. At the same time, an additional 

 100,000 holdings of over three million acres were in 

 process of negotiation. Together these comprised more than 

 three-quarters of the soil of the country. A sum of nearly 

 100,000,000 had been advanced by the Government in 

 order to achieve this remarkable result. Ireland has, it is 

 true, not yet seen the end of agrarian legislation. There 

 have already been several efforts to amend further the Act 

 of 1903. Of the proposals made, the most important seems 

 to be the extension of compulsory sale throughout the 



