The Sun.
London, England, 1847-03-01 00:00:00

--r-..................„.„-•.,..
SMALL MEASURES FOR IRELAND
70 THE EDITOR OF THE SUN.
SIII,—At a moment of' almost unparalleled difficulty,
a hen the live, and properties of millions of the people of
this great empire hang, with a painful importance upon
the men-ores of the Government, and upon the. fiat of
the Legislature—when the heart must be permitted
to bring her dictates to the wisdom of the head—may so
humble an individual as I am be permitted, through
your kind courtesy, to offer a few remarks upon the all-
importart subject of legislating for Ireland, to bring my
feeble taper to the blaze of light which is now, through
the columns of an unrivalled press, thrown over her
watts and her misfortunes; and to crave your indulgence
while I take a short notice of the ungenerous tone which
has, on this subject, been adopted by what I may call
the great history of " the 7 imes." Feeling, Sir, with
ce her Irish n oil, very grateful for much that this influen-
tiel journal and its talented commission have done, from
time r o time, to rouse our I ish landlords to a sense of
the duties and responsibilities of their position, and
as oiree that it is often impelled to do or say what may
wound hv a stern Si nse of public duty, still I can find in
th. se ' er, t i won rs little to paliatc, nothing to ju,tily, the
re- nt ne so iiee,iro viol( it. at d sweep rig attacks, in that
paper, upon Irish landoirds, but am eery reluctantly
°big, d to join in the almost universal feeling of painful
indignati, n with which the-se statements have been re-
ce iv, d. No ore is more aware of the high, and often
onerous, r:cues which the press has to perform in wield-
inv.; fir the public good the enormous power
which its owe talent, Heft
public coefideeco, may
ph.ce in its hands—no one more anxious to bear
humble terimony to the wisdom, moderation,
and.justice, in e hieh it has generally upheld this sacred
trust, no one mere ready to admit that where strung feel-
ings are aroused, it is difficult to stay the pen of an
honest and enthusiastic writer. Still I would ask in all
courtesy, if, while the dark clouds of a mysterious and
de, n affliction, still hang over this ill-fated country,
while 'he hand of the Almighty has let loose upon it,
the withering scourge of famine and of pestilence, while
we know not where his mercy may place a limit to our
sufferings, if, it is only, Sir, at such a season the Times
can strike with such cruel and unrelenting blows, the
already overtaxed, overtoiled, and overabused Irish
gt ntry ? Why is it that in this instance as in that of
the Court Martial, in the seventh Hussars, last Septem-
ber, we find the bulky influence of this journal
thrown so readily and so recklessly into the scale of
public prejudice and misconception—defeating only the
Door ambition of the writer? Colonel Whyte and Lord
St. Laurence, the Adjutant of that distinguished regi•
ment, in the strict and eloper performance of a most
pait fa duty, carried with them in a gnat degree the
sympathy of a right-minded and intelligent public, when
the Times assailed them and made that feeling universal.
My present object, however, in addressing you, Sir, is
not so much to offer a feeble vindication of my gallant
brother officers of the British army, or to Irish landlords,
as to express my grateful admiration of the manner in
which my ta'ented countrymen have met their ungenerous
assailants; they have replied to empty words by energetic
action, they have met irritation and anger with
forbearance and manly temper, they have borne down
prejudice and opposition, by an e.oquent and earnest
vindication of their character and of their rights ; they
have appealed in enlightened argument, in a high spirit
of confidence and courtesy, to a noble public, and they
have been met with universal sympathy and respect.
Their time, their money, and their health, are freely
-ecrifieed to relieve their starving fellow-countrymen,
and God will bless them for it. Most truly have they
proved themselves worthy to cope with the great and
afflicting exigencies of their unhappy country—they
have fairly won the admiration of a world, and can well
affrd to pass by such statements as some of those in the
Times and House of Commons, in the consoling convic-
riot( that such must ever carry with them their own best
refutation, their own most complete condemnation.
Having thus performed a pleasing duty towards the great
Irish party—a noble confederacy in a noble cause—you
will. Sir. I am sure, permit me once more to assure you
of the regret I feel in being obliged thus strongly to ex-
press my disapproval of the unmeasured length to which
this paper has carried its condemnation of Irish land-
lords, a vast number of whom are not to be surpassed in
the civilised world for every feeling which can adorn
their position or benefit mankind ; enlightened, gene-
rous, arid humane, the condition of their properties best
attest their worth. While I must now join in deep dis-
approbation of another class of Irish proprietors, from whose " penny wise," short-sighted views, reckless or
rapacious conduct, spring up, in my opinion, the chief
sources of Irish disconteet, poverty, and outrage. A.
man Conies to one of these gentlemen with
400 L in his pocket, to take a farm of a hundred
acres. The really needy, or habitully im-
provident. landlord, asks him what fiane hes
i
prepared to pay him, as there are many who wish for the
farm, and he cannot afford to let it without one. The man
offers one, or even two hundred, but the previous infor-
mation of an agent or bailiff gets from him finally the
third hundred pounds, and he goes into the farm a san..
guilie but a ruined man. Glad to get a respectable wife
and family settled, the poor hard-working fellowstruggles
on for years, perhaps in want, privation, and in waning
hope, to inevitable beggary, when the exasperated land-
lord enters the house with an execution in his hand, and
drives out upon a cold world an intelligent, respectable.
and industrious, but heart-broken man, involuntarily to
swell the number oF those homeless and forlorn beings
who goad and sting our unhappy country into madness,
misery, and crime, while the wretched landlord loses in
the noo-paytnent of his rent, and deterioration
iif his land, four times the sum for which
he blindly sacrificed perhaps an entire family ;
all the high rewards of his position, and all the best
feelings of his heart. In this, Sir, and in small holdings,
below the yearly value of 101, lies the master evil which
afflicts this country, and until this class of Irish pro-
prietors recognise their duty and their interest to be
identical with the great principle of " Live and let live,"
we can hope for little to amend, little to ameloriate.
How great is the contrast, how different the results on
the properties of such landlords as Lord Farnham, Lord
Erne, Lord ash-rough, Mr. Sharman Crawford, Lord
Devon, Lord George Hill, Lord Abercorn, Mr. Fortes-
cue, Sir A. Brook, Col. Bruen, and thank God, an
hundred others. Here you will see the reciprocal
duties of landlord and tenant wisely and warmly
recognised. Here you e ill s©e men protected, contented,
and happy, whose sole ambition is in all things to evince
their gratitude to their laud) rd, and to hand down to
their children a fair farm and a fair fame. When such
feelings spring from the heart, you may feel assured that
the moral and social condition of that people is sound.
Which is best ? I would ask of Irish landlords, the
shot of the midnight assassin, the howl of the
starving incendiary around them, or the long loud
shouts of joy which welcome back to his home the
friend, the benefactor, and the guide? Surely, it must
be such sounds as these which make the happy man
happier, the good man better ; it must be such sounds
as these which open wide the fountains of the heart,
and sends the glad current of life bounding in joy and
triumph over the cares avid crosses of a fickle world. I
agree very much with Mr. Hamilton, that it is a series
more of " little measures " which we require than of
great and sweeping changes ; but as few have pointed
any such out, or seem willing to do so, I am sure I will
be allowed to offer one or two suggestions which may at
all events lead to a better and more practical considera-
tion of this important subject. In the first place, I cer-
tainly think an "absentee tai" would be only a fair
instalment of the compensation due to this country for
the rn,,ney yearly drawn and spent out of it ; and, al-
though I also concur with Sir G. Wood, that some of
the absentee landlords are among the very best, and
might naturally enough strongly ohjcct to be thus taxed
to swell the public Exchequer, cause the funds so raised
to be spent on their own several estates, in giving pre-
miums for green crops, cattle, and cottages, draining,
tartu servant,, and fencing, arid I will answer for it you
will anihilate their opposition ; for this reason—that
although these enlightened landlords do at
this moment spend, and have for years done so,
large sums in the advancement of agriculture and
improvement of their estates, they will have simply to
withhold such portion of that sum as may be equivalent
to the new tax. They are thus no sufferers in their in.. come, and all their best objects are equally attended to,
while the like benefits are cenapulsorily conferred on the
pout- tenants of the thoughtless, the reckless, and the
improvident, and to give them still a direct and pleasing
interest in the benefit accruing to their estates, they
could point out six names of their most respectable
farmers to the nearest deputy-lieutenant of the county,
who should nominate three of these as judges for the
year, for the distribution of such prizes as the tax on the
property may yield In the next place, Sir, I propose
that manybe at once, and for many years to come,_
perhaps, advanced in loan frcm the Consolidated Fund,
for the purpose of giving a stimulus to manufactures in
Ireland—" the steam-engine,
the mill, the manufactory—these elements of wealth,
the loom,ben jngeethactedetmperinnttowfotthre,
this issue for an over agricultural population," as. the
talented Member for Dublin, Mr. Gregory, justly term_
them ; these are, indeed, what we really require, 4
although warmly
ly eym sympathy
yg r
of
ft e f
Lordu I lyr e eGoegenrgi semßg
etnh
tei generalsnek, and
thatwit with atrhdeernet best
we r e
eet for oei
pointsr i
ocf throeoi
btrwbnee.
Crown,
lifeshsisl did
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it
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by the
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country,pinretsheehtl:whoimheifeenhkit wainoniudaltdemrcaoa
John Russell is, and I still think
aidedeueneleosfsencourage.
illustrated by the important.
kind be proposed roust
be
imperfect,
a uil ery
went to manufactures,
. which must always afford the
most certain security for the discharge of interest and
repayment of capital if something like the following
y
plan could be adopted :—When an indivi-
dtheureamosriaplecom
pa n
y,
lay out, in raising mills or mans-
factories, say 8,0001., and when this outlay is duly certi-
fied, by accounts furnished to, and attested by, a board
composed of the three nearest magistrates. The execu-
tive, on receiving the same from them, accompanied by a policy of insurance on the property so far completed,
may
advancings urel y
an th ienqku
at
lh es
umms e ltvoe s
thatsa yweelxlpseencduerde.d in
fealraenadd
d c loalinots sfoo r ahimgesnelefroeuvseralnadstiennglihgohnteonuerdinllithinaiastrhyecojmusit4
tl-,e, happy medium, through the high influence of which
is infused into an impoverished country some small share of
surplus English capital, in return for the hundreds of thou-
sands annually drawn from poor Ireland, and squandered
in rich and happy England ; and for the repayment
of which I can imagine no better security than what is
here proposed. I would earnestly recommend, also, that
money be advanced on the same principle, as nearly as
can be, to encourage the construction of a capable and
strong description of vessel, and thus make deep sea-
fishing what it is not, and ought to be, a great semen
of national profit and employment. The next point I
consider most essential is, to infuse a more healthy
tone into the rural population of the country, by mime.
lating industry and self-reliance, by the gradual aboli,
,
lion of stna,l holdings, and by a better and more comt
pact allotment of tillage land to farmers, all nearly ot.".
I which may be accomplished through a wisesystemar_
encouragement to emigration, and whicb sahibs 81111.