as affecting Agriculture in Ireland. 
389 
(which I do not think it is, of such crops of turnips as we grow), 
there is no reason that sucli a course should not answer and keep 
up the condition of the grass. In two or three years I expect 
the extent ploughed may be reduced to thirty acres each year, and 
with still more cake the same winter stock be kept and fattened. 
Just now I have a- tract of cut-out bog that has been drained &c. 
coming in. This for its own sake needs cultivation and turnip 
cropping, and so delays the decrease of tillage. Oats with 
grass seeds follow the turnips, unless the land is poor, when it is 
laid down with rape and grass seeds, no corn crop being taken. 
Experience can alone show how far we can decrease cultivation, 
and keep up the condition of the grass land. It can clearly be 
done to the extent of one-half, i.e. twenty-five acres instead of fifty, 
being ploughed each year. The net profit on the farm is more 
than double the rent the tenants paid for it when they failed, 
after charging to each year all the cake and manure bought, 
bailiff's salary, and every expense. The changed appearance of 
the land is a pleasure to one's eyes. The stock aie more than 
double the number, and individually double the weight of those 
the tenants kept. 
It may seem strange to say it, but religion and politics have 
been brought in Ireland even into the question of farming, and 
whether grass or tillage are best for the country is sought to be 
decided by what is most to the advantage of the Roman Catholic 
or Protestant interests. The power of the Roman Catholic 
clergy and their party depends on the number of Roman 
Catholics ; and tillage, as giving more employment than grass, 
has been favoured accordingly. Even the growth of flax has 
been urged on the same grounds, I have already shown the 
weakness of such reasoning, because there is plenty of work for 
every one for long years in draining and other improvements, 
far more profitable to all concerned than it can be to try to force 
one kind of farming instead of another that for any reason is 
more profitable. But there is no doubt it has been thought the 
increased employment from tillage would check the emigration. 
My own opinion is clear that the decrease of labourers is 
going on so fast that by the end of the next seven or ten years 
there will be no choice in the matter, and it is very fortunate 
for us that the increased price of grass products gives us so pro- 
fitable a means of escape from what would be otherwise a most 
serious difficulty. Those who have treated their land best will 
have least trouble. 
On one point alone Mr. Pringle, I think, is quite wrong — when 
he argues against grass farming because small farmers, holding 
7 millions of acres, keep on them stock to the value of 17^ 
millions of money ; whilst large farmers, holdina: 8f millions 
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