x. Imagine that
in consequence of rebellions the land of England had been confiscated
three or four times, after desolating wars and famines, so that all
the native proprietors were expelled, and the land was parcelled
out to French soldiers and adventurers on condition that the foreign
'planters' should assist in keeping down 'the mere English' by force
of arms. Imagine that the English, being crushed by a cruel penal
code for a century, were allowed to reoccupy the soil as mere
tenants-at-will, under the absolute power of their French landlords.
If all this be imagined by English legislators and English writers,
they will be better able to understand the Irish land question, and to
comprehend the nature of 'Irish difficulties,' as well as the justice
of feeble, insincere, and baffled statesmen in casting the blame
of Irish misery and disorder on the unruly and barbarous nature of
Irishmen. They will recollect that the aristocracy of Ireland are the
high-spirited descendants of conquerors, with the instinct of conquest
still in their blood. The parliament which enacted the Irish land laws
was a parliament composed almost exclusively of men of this dominant
race. They made all political power dependent on the ownership of
land, thus creating for themselves a monopoly which it is not in human
nature to surrender without a struggle.

The possession of this monopoly, however, fully accounts for two
things--the difficulty which the landlords feel in admitting the
justice of the tenant's claims for the legal recognition of the value
which his labour has added to the soil, and the extreme repugnance
with which they regard any legislation on the subject. Besides,
the want of sympathy with the people, of earnestness and courage in
meeting the realities of the case, is conspicuous in all attempts
of the kind during the last half-century. Those attempts have been
evasive, feeble, abortive--concessions to the demand that _something_
must be done, but so managed that nothing should be done to weaken the
power of the eight thousand proprietors over the mass of the nation
dependent on the land for their existence. Hence has arisen a great
amount of jealousy, distrust, and irritability in the landlord class
towards the tenantry and their advocates.

The Irish race, to adopt Thierry's language, are full of 'malignant
envy' towards the lords of the soil; not because they are rich, but
because they have the people so completely in thei