Irish Affriculture. 
55 
The remedies for this state of matters are, first, the em- 
ployment of machinery as much as possible ; and, next, task- 
work, wherever it can be brought to bear upon farm labour. 
On this point — that of taskwork — I can speak without hesi- 
tation, from my own experience ; and I have invariably found 
that where it was honestly and fairly carried out, it was 
decidedly advantageous both to the employer and employed. 
I must sav I have known some instances where employers who 
found that men working on taskwork had made higher wages 
than thev would have done at davwork, have cut the payment 
down; but any such proceeding is very foolish, for it destroys 
all confidence between the parties. Employers should keep in 
view that men working on taskwork labour far more diligently, 
and usually for longer hours, than thev would do if paid by the 
dav ; and if a miscalculation has been made in fixing the terms 
for any particular job, so that the men really do make more at 
it than thev were perhaps entitled to, it is much better not to 
say anything about it, but to watch the estimate of the next 
piece of taskwork more closely. 
There is another point to which I must direct attention. In 
1870 certain "Reports from Poor- Law Inspectors on the Wages 
of Agricultural Labourers in Ireland " were presented to both 
Houses of Parliament. In these Reports the Inspectors all agree 
that one great cause of discontent among the labouring classes 
in Ireland is the generally wretched condition of their house 
accommodation. An " Irish cabin " has Ion? been considered 
synonymous with all that is squalid and miserable, and although 
much has midoubtedly been done of late years to improve 
cottage accommodation in Ireland, the evil is still far from 
being remedied, much less removed. Many landlords are un- 
willing to build cottages on their estates, dreadin? a return of 
the old cottier svstem ; and this frequently falls hea^"il^ on 
tenant-farmers where cultivation is carried on. A svstem of 
tillage-farming cannot be prosecuted without a steady supply 
of labourers, and therefore each farm of the kind should have a 
suiEcient number of cottages to meet its requirements. It has 
been suggested that the most simple way of meeting the diffi- 
culty would be, where proprietors object to build cottages, that 
tenant-farmers, bein? leaseholders, should be allowed to borrow 
from the Board of Works ; the cottages to be erected under the 
superintendence of the Board, and the number of cottages on any 
larm to be restricted to, say, one cottage for every 50 acres. 
Good cottages would induce a good class of labourers to remain, 
who would not be satisfied with the existing class of '* cabins." 
\\ hen a farmer has to look for labourers among the small holders 
around him, he never can depend upon having them when, per- 
