The Press.
London, England, 1858-11-06 00:00:00

1076

of labour in a country depopulated by famine,
pestilence, and emigration, and from the conse-
quent rise of wages. Irish mortgagees had
assuredly as much reason, and as much
right, to feel alarmed for their property, and
to call in their mortgages, as [rish proprie-
tors had to desire to extricate themselves
from a position of increasing embarrassment.
Sartre qui pent became, as it always does in such
cases, the order of the day. No sooner were the
doors of the Encumbered Estates Court thrown
open, than, not mortgagors only, but proprietors
likewise, rushed into it to save, in the most ex-
peditious and least expensive way, a wreck at
least of their property out of the general ruin.
The inevitable effect was a glutting of the
market, a further depreciation of Irish pro-
perty, and losses to an immense amount. Our
correspondent is mistaken, however, if he imagines
that the proprietors alone suffered these losses;
no small share of them fell upon the mortgagees.
lie is in error, likewise, if he supposes that none
but mortgagors were gainers by the operation.
There were instances in which the proprietors
took advantage of the new law, with more adroit-
ness, perhaps, than honesty, to clear their estates
at the expense of their mortgagees.
Bnt all this does not touch the principle of
the Encumbered Estates Act, as a change in the
law, which, whatever might be its results, " was
" carried into effect with a due regard for existing
rights." That the deepest commiseration is
due to Irish proprietors who, with their families,
were reduced from a state of at least seeming
affluence to a state of poverty and want through the
operation of the Act, we are the last to deny.
Nor do we feel ourselves called upon to become
the apologists of the animus with which the new
law was advocated, perhaps suggested, on the part
of some of its promoters, and by which the oppo-
sition offered to its enactment was mainly pro-
voked. We may observe, however, that the
severity of the Act, as originally proposed, was
greatly mitigated by the amendment introduced
into it in the course of its progress through Par-
liament, which limited its operation to estates
the revenue from which was reduced by
incumbrances to less than one-half its ori-
ginal amount. Nor, in dwelling upon the
reverse of fortune which befell many of the Irish
landowners, should the fact be lost sight of that
proprietors who derive their estates from a line
of predecessors unmindful of " the duties correla-
" ttve with the rights of property," cannot be
regarded, even with reference to their " exist-
ing rights," as standing in the same posi-
tion in which they would have stood had
their estates descended to them loaded, not
with the ruinous consequences of reckless neglect,
but with the happy fruits of a conscientious dis-
charge, of those duties. The remedy of the En-
cumbered Estates Court was a rough one; but it
was a remedy for a great evil, and was urgently
required. The lesson which it taught was a hard
one, but the lesson, too, was mach needed. Long
may it be before, either in Ireland or elsewhere,
a necessity shall arise for such another remedy to
be applied, and such another lesson to be learned !

THE CANNING AND PERCEVAL
ADMINISTRATIONS.
THE article in the Edinburgh Review, which
appears under the above heading, is in some
respects remarkable. It is remarkable because,
appearing in a party Review, it is really an
impartial summary of the events with which it
deals—a merit which such publications rarely
attain to; it is remarkable for the diligence with
which it has been compiled ; it is remarkable be-
cause, from the guileless character of the narrative,
it seems the work rather of a précis-writer than a
reviewer. You may apply to it in order to obtain
historical facts and authorities, but it is, for the
most part, innocent of all opinions on the facts
narrated or on the authorities referred to.
There are, however, some admissions in it,
which, coming from a Whig—and, mayhap
coming from a Whig statesman—are not by
any means of trifling value, as bearing upon
the conduct of a certain Whig Leader who is
'alb alive; and, also, as bearing upon the characters
of certain Tory statesmen who are now no more.