y acres planted.

By 1880 the landlord had expended L30,000 on improvements, there were
over one hundred slated houses, about sixty miles of roads, and over
four hundred acres planted.

Under the Land Act of 1881 the rent was reduced to L3600.

That was the encouragement officially given to the landlord for
assisting in the improvement of his property.

From the time of Moses downwards, the policy of all Governments has been
to give relief to the debtor. By the Encumbered Estate Act, which was
passed just after the famine, special relief was given to the creditor.

What the English view was may be taken from the _Times_--

'In a few years more, a Celtic Irishman will be as rare in Connemara as
is the Red Indian on the shores of Manhattan.'

That is to say, English capital was at last to flow into Ireland for the
purchase of encumbered estates, but the anticipation of course was
erroneous.

English capital was placed for preference in Turkish and in Egyptian
bonds, to the great loss of all concerned. As for Ireland, out of the
first twenty millions realised by the new Court, over seventeen was
Irish money; and at the outset there was an inevitable downward tendency
of prices which involved heavy depreciation.

Credit was destroyed in Ireland, and every man who owed a shilling was
utterly ruined. Had the Government given loans at a reasonable rate of
interest, which would have amply repaid them, all this could have been
saved. As it was, properties were sold like chairs and tables at a
paltry auction, and in thousands of cases the judge expressed himself
satisfied that the rent could have been considerably increased.

I knew one unfortunate shopkeeper who paid L6000 for a property under
these circumstances; and in place of an increase of rent, the
confiscators--that is to say the commissioners imposed by Mr.
Gladstone--took a third of the rental off him.

Those purchasers who were English conceived when they bought properties
that they would get as much from them as the solvent tenants were
willing to pay. The legislation of Mr. Gladstone in coalition with the
blunderbuss soon put an end to the pleasing delusion. It was one more of
the English mistakes about Ireland, where, when the tenant is content to
pay, the British Government and the Land League both combine to prevent
him from offering a reasonable rent to a landlord.

As a matter of fact, even the most seditionary organs confessed that the
tenants gai