and we are none of its advocates,) it is unjust to charge its
practice on the landlords. They have nothing whatever to do with it; it
is a mode of dealing between one class of tenantry and another. The
assertion in the "Cry from Ireland," that the peasant _gives his manure,
and pays 18s. an acre besides_, is too ridiculous to require
confutation.

But suppose the rents in Ireland were exorbitant, who would be to
blame?--the landlords who accepted them, or the people who _swore_ to
their extraordinary moderation? Let us look to the registry
courts:--[36]

"There the landlords were found opposing the admission of their
tenantry to the register, and stating on oath that they considered
the rents received by them as the full value of the land--_while
the tenants, and their neighbours, and the liberal 'valuators,'
were proving 'that it was let by those rack-renting and heartless
men' grossly under its value_. And indeed, when the small extent of
the farms whose occupiers claimed the right to vote is taken into
consideration, this must appear true; for it sometimes required _to
prove the land worth thirty shillings the acre more than the rent
paid, to bring the annual profit up to the requisite ten pounds_.

"That the rents were not considered as too high, we have not only
the testimony of the freeholders themselves, but of other
_'competent persons,' employed by the registry association, who,
before the claimant was placed on the register, were obliged
solemnly to swear, in public court, 'that the land was in most
instances worth, and that a solvent tenant could afford to pay for
it_, DOUBLE THE RENT _imposed on the occupier by the landlord.'_ We
say, in almost every instance, _double the rent_; for when it is
considered that many have registered from seven to eight acres, it
would be necessary to do so in order to bring the value up to the
required L10; and yet those men who have so sworn, and those
leaders who have encouraged and induced them so to swear, and who
have procured and paid others to corroborate their testimony on
oath, are the persons who so lustily proclaim the extortion of the
landlords! _If what they have sworn, and what their priests have
encouraged them to swear, be true, their landlords must be
indulgent and merciful indeed._ If the contrary, not only have they
be