140 I' N L A N D B O U N T Y. 



3. Spring corn ; and then fallow again. In this cotirfe thvi 

 fpring corn goes to horfes, &c. the fallow is a dead lofs, and 

 the whole national gain the crop of wheat ; one year in three 

 yields nothing, and one a trifle, whereas the grafs yields a full 

 crop every year. Let it not be imagined, that wafte and de- 

 fart tracts, that wanted cultivation, are only turned to this 

 tillage. Nine tenths of the change is in the rich {heep walks 

 of Rofcommon, Tipperary, Carlow, and Kilkenny. I have 

 already proved this fad ; the queftion therefore is reduced to 

 this : Ought you to turn fome of the fineft paftures in the 

 vvorJd, and which in Ireland yielded twenty {hillings an acre, 

 into the mod execrable tillage that is to be found on the face 

 of the globe ? The comparifon is not between good grafs and 



food tillage ; it is gsod grafs againft bad tillage. The tables 

 inferted prove, that Ireland has loft fifty-three thoufand 

 j>eunds a year for feven years in the produce of cows and 

 bullocks, and one hundred and fix thoufand pounds in that 

 of (heep ; this is a prodigious lofs, but it rs not the whole ; 

 there is the lofs of labour on above fifty thoufand ftones of 

 woollen yarn annually, which ts a great drawback from the 

 fuperior population fuppofed, perhaps falfely, to flow from 

 tillage. When thefe circumftaijces are therefore well confi- 

 dered, the nation will not, I apprehend, be thought to have 

 gained by having converted her rich {heep walks, which 

 yielded fofemply in wool, and in the labour which is annexed 

 to wool, into fo execrable a tillage as is univerfally intro- 

 duced. 



Another circumftance of this menfure is, that of facrificing- 

 aft the ports of the kingdom to Dublin ; the natural trade, 

 which ought to take a variety of different little channels, pro- 

 portioned to vicinity, was by this fyftem violently drawn away 

 to the capital ; a very ill fituatcd capital, the increafe of 

 which, at the expence of the out ports, was by no means a 

 national advantage. 



A queftion naturally arifes from the premifes before us ; 

 fitould the bounty be repealed ? Abfurd as it is, I am free to 

 declare, I think not at once. Upon the credit of the meafure 

 great fums have been laid out in raifing mills, moft in fitua- 

 tions which render them dependant on this forced trade for 

 \vork. Great lofs would accrue in this to individuals, and 

 the public faith rather injured. The following tables wiU 

 fhcTir that this is not a flight conllderation. 



The 



