f Ireland was
one-eleventh of the total for the United Kingdom, throws much light upon
the social conditions of the smaller island. The rate of taxation per
head per annum went up in the second half of the nineteenth century more
than 250 per cent.--rising from about L1 in 1850 to more than L2 10s. in
1900. This occurred simultaneously with a diminution of population in
the same period from seven millions to four and a half millions, a
change which is in glaring contrast with the concurrent increase in
Great Britain from twenty millions in 1850 to more than thirty-eight
millions at the present day. Whatever may be the other causes which have
led to the stream of emigration from Ireland it may certainly be claimed
that not least among them is the ever-increasing incidence of taxation
which is year by year laying a greater burden upon the privilege of
living in that country.

A recent Report, issued by the Labour Department of the Board of Trade,
gives statistics with reference to the earnings of agricultural
labourers throughout the three kingdoms. It concludes that on an average
a labourer in England obtains 18s. 3d. a week, in Wales 17s. 3d., in
Scotland 19s. 3d., and in Ireland 10s. 11d. It may be noted that in no
English county is the average lower than 14s. 6d., while in Ireland in
seven counties it is less than 10s., Mayo being the lowest with an
average wage of 8s. 9d. The present writer has had occasion in the
course of the last few months to hear old men on political platforms in
a typical English agricultural constituency pointing a moral from their
own or their fathers' recollections of the days before the Corn Laws
when wages ran from 8s. to 9s. a week. What is recalled with horror in
England as the state of affairs in the "hungry forties" is the present
condition in several of the Irish counties. It would be idle to multiply
proofs to show the desperate condition of the country. Even in the ten
years which have elapsed since the issue of the Report of the Royal
Commission the taxation of the country has increased by more than two
and a half million pounds, while the population, it is estimated, has in
the same period diminished by no less than 200,000. On the assumption
arrived at by the Commissioners, that the proper share which Ireland
should pay was one-twentieth of the contribution of Great Britain, the
country was overtaxed ten years ago to the extent of two and
three-quarter millions; yet in spite of t