principle of fixity of tenure, and defending tooth
and nail the tenant-right of a few hundred planters, when little more
than thirty years ago this same body offered the most relentless
opposition to any recognition of the right of compensation for
disturbance on the part of four millions of Irish tenants. In this
matter the Lords gained their point, and compulsory powers are not to be
applied under the Act to the holdings on which the landlords have placed
planters, who are held to be _bona fide_ farmers. An amendment to this
effect was thrown out by the House of Commons, by a majority of more
than four to one, on a division in which only 66 voted for the
amendment, but although the Bill in its original form offered sitting
tenants the fullest compensation ever offered to such persons, and
although most of the planters would be only too glad to accept such
terms, the Upper House insisted on over-riding the will of the great
majority in the Commons.

Lord Lansdowne, on the second reading, gave three reasons why the Bill
should not be incontinently rejected by the Peers. In the first place,
it came to them, he said, supported by an enormous majority in the other
House, "and their Lordships always desired to treat attentively and
respectfully Bills which came to them with such a recommendation."
Secondly, the late Government, as well as the present, had pledged
themselves to a measure of reinstatement of some kind, and if they threw
out the Bill on a second reading "it would be said that they had receded
from a kind of understanding arrived at in 1903," and lastly, "the
summary rejection of the Bill might greatly increase the difficulties of
the Executive Government in Ireland." One would have thought that the
fact that the Bill was given a second reading did little to exonerate
the Upper House from similar consequences as a result of their
mutilation of the Bill in Committee.

In its final form the Act allows an appeal on questions of value from
the inspector, to two Estates Commissioners, and from them to Mr.
Justice Wylie, sitting as Judicial Commissioner with a valuer. On
questions of price there is no appeal from him. Other appeals, on
questions of law and fact, are, by Section 6, to be heard by a Judge of
the King's Bench, with whom rests the final decision whether a
particular planter is or is not to be evicted. Demesne lands and other
lands, purchase of which would interfere with the value of adjoining
property,