The Sun.
London, England, 1847-11-11 00:00:00

presents no feature which renders it so formidable as
several other diseases to which the community are
more accustomed. The numbers destroyed in the
United Kingdom by influenza, immediately after the
abatement of the Asiatic Cholera, in 1831-32, were
superior to those carried away by the pestilence.
The victims of pulmonary decline, of bilious or gas-
tric fevers, and of scrofulous affections, are numeri-
cally greater than the victims of Cholera, even
when that plague proves the most destructive,
and yet with influenza, with consumption, with
fever, and with scrofula continually around us, no
efforts whatever are made towards their diminution.
The mere enumeration of the most notorious of
physiological facts should be enough to arouse the
municipalities from their torpor and the Government
from its indecision. When it is remembered that
every human being requires for the maintenance of
life no less than ten cubic feet of air (namely, double
the bulk of the human body) per minute, and
when this truth is coupled with the recollec-
tion that the same atmosphere cannot be twice
inhaled without prejudice to the animal economy,
it becomes manifest that proper ventilation, proper
sewerage and drainage, and a proper supervision of
manufactories and graveyards, is absolutely essential
for the bodily (not to say the moral) preservation of
the community. And how much more forcible does
not this consideration become, when we reflect that in
London there are 2,000,000 of persons, each of whom
requires, every successive minute, ten cubic feet of
atmospheric air ! To exercise a beneficial influence
upon the body, that air should be composed of 21
parts oxygen to 79 parts azote, or nitrogen, mixed
with an inconsiderable quantity of carbonic acid gas.
How far these proportions are discoverable in the
atmosphere of the metropolis and the larger towns
may be imagined by those who bear in mind
the numberless causes of its vitiation—the am-
monias, the sulphuretted hydrogen, and the
volumes of carbonic acid reeking from a thou-
sand different sources of contamination, and
from the tons of coal and diluted animal matter
impregnating the air in the form of smoke and va-
pour. Such are the grievances which must be re-
moved before there can be any reasonable prospect of
the abatement of diseases more fell than the Asiatic
Cholera, because more frequent and prevalent in their
recurrence.

The adjourned meeting of the Assembly convened
by the Irish Council was occupied the whole of
Tuesday in the discussion of the resolution respect-
ing the alterations to be effected in the law of land-
lord and tenant, for the purpose of securing to the
tenant the property in all improvements made during
his tenancy by the expenditure of his labour and
capital, and the amendment thereon in favour of the
Ulster tenant right, together with a statement defin-
ing what that tenant right really consisted of. Not-
withstanding the important nature of the question
under discussion, the attendance was wretchedly thin,
and the great interest that was at first excited had
manifestly abated. It is strange, indeed, that any con-
troversy should exist as to the real character and extent
of the tenant right, which has existed and been fully
recognised for so many years in the northern dis-
tricts ; yet so it is, and to this moment considerable
doubts are entertained by very many of the Irish
landlords as to what it really is ; a considerable
number supposing that its general adoption would
completely deprive the present proprietors of all con-
trol over their estates, and make the occupiers the
real masters of the land. They regard it therefore
as something to be resisted to the last extremity,
which would, if sanctioned by law, effect their abso-
lute ruin. A moment's reflection might satisfy these
timid men that there is nothing really so injurious to
the proprietors in the system. They should
regard the position of those of their brethren
whose estates have been placed under
its operation, and if it shall appear
that in consequence thereof the land yields a smaller
return to its owner in proportion to its extent and
fertility, that the rents are paid in a less satisfactory
manner, or that if the estate be sent into the market
for sale it must be disposed of at a lower price, there
would be fair and reasonable grounds for these ap-
prehensions.
But, in point of fact, it is altogether the reverse.
The Ulster landlord will obtain fully as high a
rent for any portion of his land that he may desire
to let as will be offered by a solvent tenant in any
part of the country. Of course we do not compare
it with the reckless biddings that may be made by
starving wretches, and which it is morally
impossible can ever be satisfactorily paid, the
only object of the tenant being to get into possession,
and trust to chance and the agrarian disturbances by
which the country may be disturbed for maintaining
that possession ; but a person really desirous of per-
forming his part of the contract, and punctually dis-
charging the liabilities he thereby assumes, will
undertake to pay a better rent, because he is well
aware that under the custom he may improve the
lands to the greatest extent, and that himself or his
family will receive the benefits of such improvements.
It is scarcely necessary to show the difference in the
manner of satisfying the rent, or how greatly that is
in favour of the northern landlord.

It is, unhappily, too notorious that in three
of the Irish provinces there are large ar-
rears of rent constantly hanging over the tenantry,
which are wholly lost to the landlords, but
which act as a total prohibition to every species
of improvement; indeed, it would greatly conduce
to the real interests of the proprietors if these arrears
were wholly blotted out, and the tenant suffered to
commence de novo. A man who is out of debt will
struggle with great energy to continue so ; but if
once he is unable to continue in a solvent position, if
he gets heavily involved beyond the possibility of
payment, he cares little how deeply he may get into
debt ; he relaxes his exertions, because he himself
cannot reap the fruits thereof ; the produce of all his
extra labour will go into the landlord's pocket. If
he cannot pay the rent when unincumbered by
debt, it will be utterly hopeless for him to think
of doing so, together with heavy arrears,
when clogged and impeded by a heavy burden. At
length the forbearance of the owner is exhausted—.
distresses and ejectments are resorted to, the tenant is
driven from his holding, and the arrears are totally lost.
The lands when obtained are found to be quite ex-
hausted and worn out, and a considerable loss is
thereby sustained by the owner, in addition to that of
his rent left unpaid, and the heavy law costs for ob-
taining the possession of his land, while the peace
and tranquillity of the entire district is disturbed, and
riots and outrages are of frequent occurrence. In
the north matters are quite different ; the landlord is
certain of obtaining his rent, if not from the imme-
diate occupier, at least from his successor, as it is
an invariable rule that all arrears are liquidated,
in the first instance, out of the purchase-money for
the goodwill. Hence the landlord is not compelled
for his own security to resort to seizures or distresses,
and the tenant, even if through unavoidable misfor-
tunes he should get into arrear, does not therefore
relax his exertions, because he is aware that if he
does so he will obtain a smaller sum for his goodwill
when he desires to dispose thereof. In the north,
therefore, the landlords, with scarcely an exception,
receive the full amount of their rent-rolls, while
every person at all acquainted with other parts of the
country must know to what heavy deductions the
proprietors must submit for bad debts, losses by
tenants, deterioration of the land, and law costs. It
would follow as a natural consequence, that properties
in Ulster, when offered for sale, will bring higher

prices in proportion than those in the other provinces.
This is so to the extent of at least three or four
years' purchase.

Were the landlords, therefore, the only parties
whose interests were to be consulted in the legislative
enactments that should take place, it would be in the
highest degree advantageous to them that the Ulster
tenant right should be extended throughout the entire
island, but there are other classes whose interests are
also to be regarded, and to whom the question is of still
more vital importance the peace, tranquillity, and
the
promoted. prosperity n otf hethen oe
rntthi r
ofe
ruenl tarnyd 7.. t leastuldbe in thosetheroeubty
parts where the custom is recognised, agrarian
rages are wholly unknown, and every writer on
Ireland has borne his testimony to the re-
markable comparative prosperity that exists in
the districts in i
offorLcoer'd DE_
vON and his
have repeatedly quotedopinions
whichtheitis
brother Commissioners on this point,