438 Past and Present State of Af/ricidliire in Ireland. 
bepnnino^ to be turned towards agricultural pursuits. To enter 
into any particular examination of the statements given by this 
writer would ine\itably cause me to transgress the limits to which 
I jnopose to confine myself; it appears sufficient to say that with 
few exceptions the general practice was to exhaust the ground by 
a ruinous succession of corn crops after potatoes, and then leave it 
nomiiialh/ in pasture, but in reality producing almost nothing, for 
such a number of years as were considered in some measure suffi- 
cient to restore it to fertility, when it again underwent tlie same 
treatment, and thus nearly three-fourths of the farm were left in 
an unprofitable state, whilst the remaining fourth was expected to 
pay the rent of the whole and provide for the wants of the family 
besides. All modern improvements, such as draining, house- 
feeding of stock, proper rotation of crops, turnips, mangel- 
wurzel, clover, and artificial grasses, early ploughing, and tho- 
roughly cleaning the land, were either unknown or unattended 
to ; in short, it may be truly said that a worse system of cultiva- 
tion, either in principle or practice, can scarcely be imagined. 
The consequences attending such a state of things could not be 
otherwise than most disastrous. Although the country was not 
one-third peopled, the miserable inhabitants year after year were 
exposed to all the horrors of famine, followed too generally by 
disease; and even in favourable seasons they were most commonly 
under the necessity of importing food. Contrasting the then state 
of Ireland, as described by Young, with its altered condition in 
the present day, when it maintains three times the number of in- 
habitants, besides exporting more food than the whole of the 
island produced in those times ; and comparing also the general 
state of its present population with what it was then, they being 
beyond all contradiction bettor fed, better clothed, and better 
lioused now than was then the case; it seems impossible to 
deny that, as population increases, the condition of society im- 
proves, notwithstanding all that may be said to the contrary : 
and the truth of this not only appears on a comparison of, the 
general stale of the country now with what it was many years 
back, but it also appears by a comparison between the stale of the 
east and west of the kingdom at this present moment. In the 
west and south-west the ])opulation is small, and exhibit,s every 
appearance of poverty and destitution ; whereas in the east and 
north-east, where the population is great, they are coinparativclij 
in the enjoyment of all the comforts /)f life. One cannot help 
being struck with the positive contradiction which these simple 
facts give to all the assertions of those who argue that the misery 
to be met with in Ireland is brought on by over population. 
The misery is to l)e met with, gener;dly s}ieaking, vv'hcre the 
population is thinnest ; and the least of it is to be seen wiiere 
