reet is long, wide, clean, well-paved,
well-built. The shopkeepers who live in the surrounding district make
money, and when they "go before," cut up for surprising sums. Said Mr.
Gordon, "Everybody here has money. The people are downright well off.
Living in constant communication with Dublin, fifty miles away on the
main line of the Midland and Western Railway, they have adopted the
prevailing politics of the metropolis. They do not understand what
Home Rule means, and they blindly believe that they will do better
still under a Dublin Parliament. I am quite certain of the contrary.
Suppose we want L500 for some improvement, who will lend us the money?
I am satisfied that the prosperity of the place would immediately
decline. The priests influence the people to an extent Englishmen can
never understand. The Protestant clergy do not intervene in mundane
matters, but the Catholic clergy consider it their duty to guide the
people in politics as well as in religion. Given Home Rule,
Protestantism and Protestants would be nowhere. There is no doubt in
my mind on this point."

Mr. Mason said:--"The whole agitation would be knocked on the head by
the introduction of a severe land measure, which would have the effect
of further reducing the rents. No doubt all previous land legislation
has been very severe, and I do not say that a further measure would be
just and equitable. I merely say that the people do not want Home
Rule, but they want the advantages which they are told will accrue
from Home Rule. If the measure is not to benefit them in a pecuniary
sense, then they do not care two straws about it. Do the English
people grasp the present position of landowner and tenant
respectively? Let me state it in a very few words.--

"Formerly the landowner was regarded as the owner of the land. At the
present moment, and without a line of further legislation, the tenant
is the real owner, and not the nominal landlord at all. For owing to
reduction of rent, fixity of tenure, free sale, and the tenant-right,
the tenant is actually more than two-thirds owner. This is a matter of
cash and not of theory, for the tenants' rights are at this moment
worth more than double the fee-simple of the land itself. What will
the Gladstonian party who prate about Rack-rents say to this?"

This seems a suitable opportunity for calling attention to the term
Rack-rents, which in England is almost universally misunderstood.
Separatist speakers invaria