1891--the utter poverty of that unhappy land,
where human life, sustained only by the charity of American exiles,
still pays its doleful toll to far-off, indifferent landlords. Who can
tell whether some touch of remorse did not enter into the heart of the
man who up to that time had been the greatest of Irish coercionists
since Castlereagh, when he saw with his own eyes the sorry plight of
the poorest people in Europe--the people who, in the opinion of General
Gordon, were, as a result of a century of British civilisation, more
destitute and miserable than the savages of Central Africa?

Mr. Balfour, at any rate, relented from his policy of more oppression.
He even entered upon the first small beginnings of a policy of
restoration.

It was a very small beginning--that first Congested Board--and a
Commission that reported on its work nearly twenty years after[28]
decided that the Board had neither powers nor cash sufficient for its
work. The Liberal Government of 1906-10 frankly accepted the opinion of
the Commission, and gave the Board both new powers and new funds in the
Irish Land Act of 1909. Under that Act the Congested Board is endowed
with L250,000 a year, and has authority over half the area and a third
of the population of Ireland.[29] Over these great regions[30] this
authority now possesses extensive powers of purchase, rehousing,
replanting, creation of fisheries, provision of seed and
stocks--powers, in short, extending to the complete restoration, by
compulsion if necessary, of a whole community. The Board is appointed
by the Chief Secretary,[31] and already in two short years it has
accomplished great work. Estates are being bought and replanted;
holders are being migrated from bad land to good; villages are being
rebuilt; industries encouraged; health safeguarded; fisheries revived.
Those who examine its work as we did last summer will experience the
feeling of men looking on at a splendid and gallant effort to salvage a
race submerged.

This work, indeed, is still in its infancy. There are many absentee
landlords who are still holding out for heavy and extravagant prices as
a reward for the poverty and misery which they have often in large part
caused by their own neglect. The Board appears to be reaching the
limits of voluntary action. Much of the hope for the future of Ireland
rests on their courage and skill.

THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE

The passing of landlordism has produced a great revival of