curious fact that sentiments very similar were published by
one of Cromwell's officers about a century before. The plea which
he put forth for the Irish tenant in the dedication of his work on
Ireland to the Protector, has been repeated ever since by the tenants,
but repeated in vain: Captain Bligh, the officer alluded to, said:
'The first prejudice is, that if a tenant be at ever so great pains or
cost for the improvement of his land, he doth thereby but occasion a
greater rack-rent upon himself, or else invests his landlord with his
cost and labour _gratis_, or at least lies at his landlord's mercy for
requital; which occasions a neglect of all good husbandry, to his own,
the land, the landlord, and the commonwealth's suffering.' Now, this,
I humbly conceive, might be removed, if there were a law enacted, by
which every landlord should be obliged either to give him reasonable
allowance for his clear improvement, or else suffer him _or his_
to enjoy it so much longer or till he hath had a proportionable
requital.'

But although Primate Boulter protested against the conduct of the
landlords--all Episcopalians--who were ruining the church as well as
the country, the established clergy, as a body, were always on the
side of the oppressors.

The Test Act placed the Presbyterians, like the Papists, in the
position of an inferior race. 'In the city of Londonderry alone, which
Presbyterian valour had defended, ten out of twelve aldermen,
and twenty out of twenty-four burgesses, were thrust out of the
corporation by that act, which placed an odious mark of infamy upon
at least one-half the inhabitants of the kingdom.' Presbyterians could
not legally keep a common school. The _Edinburgh Review_ says: 'All
the settlements, from first to last, had the effect of making the
cause of the church and the cause of the landlords really one. During
the worst days of landlord oppression it never identified itself with
the interests of the people, but uniformly sustained the power and
privileges of the landlords.'

It was vain to expect justice from the Irish parliament. The people
of Ireland never were governed exclusively, or at all, by her own
Sovereign, her own Lords, and her own Commons. Ireland was 'in the
custody of England,' just as much before the Union as during the last
sixty-seven years. Even during the few brief years of her spasmodic
'independence,' the mass of the nation formed no part of the 'Commons
of Ireland.' It was