The Sun.
London, England, 1864-03-12 00:00:00

perfectly idle to attempt to stop the tide that was now flow-
ing; and not only would the proposal be inoperative, but
it would tend to increase and encourage rather then to ar-
rest emigration.

Sir R. PEEL said that, with regard to the objection
which had been urged against the cost of registering
births, deaths, and marriages in Ireland being defrayed oat
of the poor rates, it should be borne in mind that in this
country a large amount of money raised by poor rates was
devoted to purposes unconnected with the relief of the poor.
He agreed with the hon. and learned member for the King's
County that the system of out-door relief in England and
Scotland was a vast improvement on the Irish system. The
arguments of the hon. gentleman, howeve-, would tend to
create an impression that in Ireland no out-door relief was
grmated at all ; but his opinion on this subject was alto-
gether incorrect. The endeavour to introduce into Ireland
a system of out-door relief, similar to that of Great Britain,
would not meet the wishes or the requirements of the Irish
people; and if it succeeded, the persons who received relief
would be placed in a higher position than the honest and
independent labourer. Every halfpenny expended in out.
door relief which was not absolutely required was a premium
for vice and misery, and if the system proposed by the how
gentleman were introduced into Ireland, it would be found
that the results would not be commensurate with what was
met with in England and Scotland. As regards out-door
relief in Ireland, although no doubt the Act of 1838 was
greatly improved in this particular by the Act of 1847, no
individual had a right to receive such relief. When he
introduced the bill of 1862, he proposed that persons hold-
ing a quarter of an acre of land should be entitled to
relief from the guardians of the poor; but an amend-
ment was introduced and arguments were brought
forward to show that under no circumstances whatever
were the occupiers of more than a quarter of an acre to
receive relief. In this country the guardians could afford
relief to an unlimited extent, but it was provided that,
in the case of able-bodied men, part of such relief should
be in food and part in money, and that the recipients
should be set to work. Now, in Ireland there was no
system at all like that ; but it was distinctly understood
in 1838, when the poor law was first introduced into that
country, that it should not create a right of relief in all
classes of persons. Let the house consider for a moment
what would be the expense of carrying out this scheme. It
was certain that the burdens of the country would be enor-
mously increased. At the present moment the expenditure
per head on the population of England and Wales was Cs
3d, whereas in Ireland it was only 2s 2d. If, however, Ire-
land were to pay the same sum per head as England and
Wales, the result would be that, instead of £652,000 a year
in poor law relief, she would have to pay £1,757,690. He
did not think his hon. and learned friend would be very
much pleased at bringing about such a result. As to the
alleged inadequacy of the Irish system to the requirements
of the people, he would remind the house that in 1849, when
the system was in full operation, with the exception, of
course, of the liberal improvements introduced in 1862, no
fewer than 2,143,766 persons were relieved, and £2,177,000
was expended in the country. There were therefore ample
means to meet any emergency that might occur. The hon.
gentleman had alluded to the emigration, which had no
doubt been of a very vast and extended kind, but it could in
no way be attributed to the operation of the poor law. It
might be interesting to state the amount of emigration that
had gone on and was going on. Last year 119,788 persons
left Ireland ; but of that number 62,988 were men, and
56,800 were females. It was, therefore, not true that
100,000 fighting men had left Ireland, as had been stated.
(Hear, hear.) Of these emigrants, 14,842 were under the
age of ten years. During the first two months of the
present year there had been a considerable increase in the
emigration as compared with the corresponding months of
last year. He believed that this emigration was not due
to the poor laws, bat to natural causes, which were
in operation and must continue 3 and he thought it
better that the people should remove to England or
America, where they could get good wages, than remain
in Ireland, where there was not sufficient remuneration for
their labour. It was only natural, looking to the wages
offered in America, that people should proceed there rather
than remain in Ireland. And when they considered the
prosperity of Irishmen who went abroad, they ought not to
blame the emigrants. These people were quite right to go
where they could find that reward for their labour which
they could not obtain in their native country. He did not
think we had seen the end of the emigration from Ireland ;
on the contrary, he thought that before the state of that
count, y became what they could wish, another million must
leave. The effect of this would be to relieve the labour
market, which was now glutted, and thus to improve the
condition of those who were left behind, Another cause of
enagiration was the general desire to get rid of the small
holdings, which had done so much injury to the country.
During the last few years the number of holdings under 30
acres had largely decreased, while those above that size had
increased. Now this was a desirable result, for it was im-
possible that any satisfactory result could be attained by
men holding five or ten acres. The condition of such men
would be very much improved if they became agricultural
labourers at good wages. Nor should it be forgotten that
the emigration from Ireland was not a solitary fact ; it was
part of a general movement which was in process from the
west of Europe to America. From Germany especially
there had been an immense increase of emigration, From
England there had emigrated 610,316 persons, and from
Scotland 102,9.54 persons, during the ten years from 1851 to
1861—and the present annual average was 74,000. He
maintained that, great as was the emigration from Ireland,
there was no general discontent there. They had no
doubt Fenians there, and strong meetings in the Rotunda;
but these demonstrations did not indicate the real feeling
of the people of Ireland. They had in Ireland a rebel
press, whose object was to vilify the authorities and to
retard the progress of the country. Was it to be wondered
at that poor men who read such articles should prefer to
emigrate rather than remain in a country of which these
things were written, and under the influence of agitators
like these, whom he regretted that the law could not
reach? He did not suppose that many gentlemen in that
house knew who the Fenians were. He would tell them.
(Laughter,) He found from a note to one of Moore's poems
that the ancient Fenians were the nationai militia of Ire-
land. (Laughter.) Pursuing his inquiries further, he dis-
covered that in the third century there was a king named
Cormack, who had ten daughters—(renewed laughter)--
one of these married Fin M'Komma, who, although a man
of independent means, took such a liking to hie father-in-
law, that he raised a regular militia called Finnii-Frlan, or
the national militia of Ireland. These militia fought the
battles of the king, and gained the greatest distinction. At
last they quarrelled amongst themselves, and the king of
the time said that he could not endure their dissensions any
longer, and at the head of the national army he annihilated
them all with the exception of one wan, who lived until the
time of St. Patrick. (Laughter.) During the winter they
were billetted upon the people, but in the summer they
fished for themselves in the country. They boiled
,their
food in big pots—(laughter)—but before eating they were
obliged to strip themselves naked. (Renewed laughter.)
They slept in trees, like the gorilla of the present day.
(Roars of laughter.) They were bound not to marry for
money, but for love, and to fight nine men of any other na-
tion. (Laughter.) The aspirant for admission into their
ranks was obliged to prove his speed by running through a
wood pursued by the rest of the Fenians, and ,he was not
enlisted unless he could get up to and ascend a particular
tree before he was caught. (Laughter.) He hoped that the
Fenians of the present day would confine themselves to this
harmless amusement, and not pursue the course which had
led to the annihilation of th, it predecessors. He would
now return to the consideration of the existing condition of
Ireland. It was a remarkable fact that the number of cri-
minal offences in Ireland in 1863 exhibited a decrease of
1,200 as compared with 1862 ; and a further improvement
was visible in the present year. During the month of Feb.,
1864, not a single homicide had been committed in any part
of Ireland—a fact unexampled in the history of the crime in
that country. It was not true that the trade of Ireland is
falling off On the contrary, there were many proofs that
there was a spirit of enterprise abroad amongst the people,
and many great improvements had recently been made.
The hon. gentleman then referred to the cultivation of the
flax crop, which he regarded most hopefully, and concluded
by expressing for himself, and his colleagues in the Irish
Government, their earnest intention to do all in their power
for the substantial improvement and permanent benefit of
that country. (Cheers.)
Mr. BRIGHT, while thinking one portion of the speech
of the hon. gentleman was much below the dignity of the
house, complimented him on the moderation he had shown,
but remarked that there was not a single argument he had
used that would not be quite right in a discussion in favour
of abolishing out door relief in England. In this country,
in the year 1862, there were 1,142,000 persons relieved, or
more than 5 per cent. of the population of England and
Wales ; in Ireland there were 66,000 persons relieved, or
not more than 1 per cent. of the population of that country.
In England, out of those who were relieved, 13 per cent.
were in the workhouse and 87 per cent. out ; in Ireland 91
per cent. were in, and only 9 per cent, out of the workhouse.
It might be that the tendency of poor laws in every country
was to promote pauperism ; but we had a poor law of a libe-
ral character in England, one less liberal in Scotland, and
one infinitely less liberal in Ireland. And he would venture
to ask the house on what ground it was that an Irishman
in his own country had no claim for relief from the land,
buildings, and property in his country unless he went into
the workhouse ; but if he came into the county in which he
(Mr. Bright) lived, and in which they had a large Irish po-
pulation, that same man, if overtaken by distress when he
had lived among them three years, had a right for relief
from the rates levied on the houses, lands, and factories of
that county. The state of things now was very different from
that which existed in Ireland in 1847, when the poor law,
as it had since existed, wits passed. Notwithstanding
the distress which now existed in Ireland, the population
was much less than it was then, and whatever might be
the system of poor law relief, it would be much more easily
administered, and the burden, whatever it might be, on the
land would be much less than it was at that time. It was
to be presumed that a state of things was approaching in
that country under which labour
ould be more scarce,
wages would be higher, and the proportion of the pauper
population there would diminish year by year. If that
were so,were they now coming to the time—if they had not
now arrived at it—when, without unduly burdening the
land of Ireland, which was its main property—without