The Sun.
London, England, 1844-08-26 00:00:00

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.
FROM THE EVENING PAPERS OF THIS DAY.
GLOBE.—The tardiness with which the inquiry
into the Landlord and Tenant system in Ireland pro-
ceeds, and the improbability of any considerable prac-
t'c it advantage to the population from the labours of
the Commission, have been often made the subject of
complaint and prediction. We do not expect any
new disclosures by the publication of the report, ap-
pear when it may. It is not information as to the
state of Ireland, and the causes of the depressed and
disorganised condition of the people, that is required ;
nut an honest purpose to remove their grievances ; with
which all who are not wholly ignorant of the social
condition of Ireland, are acquainted and must deplore.
The appointment of the Commission to inquire into
the nature and practical operation of the relations
which exist between the landlords and tenants in Ire-
land, was a mere pretext, resorted to by Sir Robert
Peel for the purpose of evading the demand for a
practical remedy for well-known grievances. It was a
weak apology for doing nothing. The source of most of
the monster miseries of that wretched country, and the
provocatives of its peasantry to those terrible instances
of what has been described as " the wild justice of
revenge "—by which it is degraded and disgraced—
will continue to operate. The report of this Commis-
ion—fraught with facts which have been elicited by
former Commissions and Committees, and published in
their reports—will be laid upon the tables of Parlia-
ment, and ordered to be printed, with all the pomp
and circumstance of some new revelation. 'Thus
the farce of inquiry will close. While, however,
the Commissioners are carrying on the inquiry at
the several places they visit, with closed doors, and
all the other means of keeping the information they
receive sacred from the prying curiosity of the
public, some of the particulars they collect escape,
by some means or other, and thus prematurely obtain
publication. The following facts, published in the
Irish journals, as having been given in evidence before
the Commission, though not new, sufficiently illustrate
the condition of the peasantry, and account for the
recklessness they occasionally display :
" In consolidate on of farms agrarian outrages have
chiefly originated. This has diminished labour and
caused great distress and misery, driving many of the
evicted tenants to desperation.
" FARMING POPDLATION.—Large farmers with grass
lands are in some cases in a comfortable condition.
With tillage lands the contrary is generally the case.
Small farmers are commonly struggling for a liveli-
Ii od ; and labourers are in the most wretched state.
Wages, where employment can be had, seldom ex-
coed sixpence per day, without food. Witness knows
many families who can get no more than one meal of
potatoes and salt a day. The Government loan fund is
of great service to labourers. . . . . .
The rent on small farms is generally higher than on
the larger ones—the rent of small farms is generally
paid in cash, and witness believes more punctually than
that of large farms. The children of tenants. on the
death of their parents, are left to the care of friends,
who, in general, perform the duties of guardians, if the
farms are left to them. Labourers in the country
usually hold cabins with little or no land from far-
mers, but they usually reside near or in towns, where
their condition is miserable in the extreme. In the
country, the rent is paid by distress, or civil bill at
Quarter Sessions. The con-acre system, which prevails
in some parts, is of infinite service ; but for this they
would be unable to obtain provisions. Con-acre is
usually set at 101. per acre, and taken from farmers. In
many cases employment cannot be obtained at any rate
01 wages. The wages usually given are Bd. per day in
seunmer, and 6d. in winter. Witness has known la-
beurers to go seven or eight miles at four o'clock in the
morning, and offer to work the day for 6d. Agrarian
outrage in almost every case has arisen from the evic-
Con of tenantry."
" Lord DEVON—Do the Catholic clergy assist, by ad-
ice, to put down agrarian outrage?
Answer—Yes, always; and but for the advice of the
Catholic clergy, the dread of future punishment, and the
Lope of future reward, I am confident assassinations
would be more frequent.
" Lord DEVON —How did these outrages originate?
" Answer— Before the passing of the Emancipation
A ct, gentlemen gave leases to a numerous tenantry for
,i,e purpose of making them 40s. freeholders, and had
1, equent intercourse with these tenants for different
perposes; but since the passing of that Bill the landlords
;tre consolidated their farms, and driven the smaller
formers to seek employment as labourers when no ern-
Voyment could be obtained. If the landed proprietors
ha I more intercourse with their tenants, and corrected
sock grievances as lay in their power, I feel confident
t hat the tenants would do all they could to cultivate
their friendship. But the rents are chiefly paid through
::gents, who, having no interest in the welfare of the
tenantry, do not care, with some honourable exceptions,
what becomes of the tenant, so that the rent is paid.
Now, as the rents are frequently demanded at a time
when the tenant is not able to pay it, from not having
s 41 his crops, an eviction takes place, and the tenant
is driven out on the world. From the number of
those evictions, the tenants look on the landlord
ith suspicion ; the landlord, on the contrary, equally
Istrs and suspects the tenant • and thus originate the
a trarian outrages. Some landlords and agents ask their
rents in a harsh and intemperate manner ; this appears
t the tenant as if the landlord or agent owed him some
i 1-will, and he is, thereforei'afraid that they will evict
I,im. Tenants will make great sacrifices to serve a
i-nellord or agent who deals with them in a kind and
Itrteous manner. I know of some landlords and
a ;ents who are more kind and generous to tenants of a
d ;:perate character than to their more industrious and
peaceable tenants."
V:That security cal exist for the preservation of
e -cud order, or for the respect in which life and pro-
perty should be held by the community, to render
hoth secure, in a country where masses of the popu-
I tion are thus made to feel that " that the world is
net their friend, nor the world's law ?" One advan-
tage will result from the iiiquiry, though not pre-
cisely that which Sir Robert Net contemplated
when he issued the Commission. The wretched
eondition of the small farmers and labourers will be
n !airs exhibited—a condition more deplorable than is
t ' he met with in any other portion of civilised
Eerope. The cause of that deeply-seated and
evid,ely spread moral and social wretchedness will
el-o be partially, if not fully, developed. Though
nut within the range of legislative interference, nor
to be cured by the interposition of Government, the
xposure will not be altogether futile. Publicity
be secured ; and public opinion will he brought
to bear upon the landed proprietors; to whom, as a
class, the calamitous circumstances of the tenantry
noel labourers insist be attributed. Neglect of the
duties of property, with a rigorous exaction of their
i4lits—and in many cases extortion of more than
their legal claims—constitute the source of Ireland's
monster grievance.
STAN DA II D.—The paper pellets which have
I een fired from the masked battery of a Contempo-
rery at Lord Brougham's Act for abolishing impri-
sonment for debt for all sums not exceeding twenty
pounds, afford ample evidence, if further evidence were
wanting, of the absolute necessity that existed for
such a measure ; the virulence and unchristian vindic-
tiveness displayed by these writers clearly evincing
hat degree of forbearance might be expected by
the most honourably disposed debtors at their hands.
For the obstruction it has met with in other quarters
it would be more difficult to account, if one of its ob-
jects had not been to protect the unfortunate insolvent
from the rapacity of a class of persons who are often
the chief cause of his inability to meet his engage-
ments; and whose rapacity is frequently the only ob-
stacle to his release from prison, when the obduracy of
his creditor has been finally overcome. In the teeth
of the opinion of Lord Brougham, that the attestation
ef the affidavit of the insolvent need not cost him more
than half-a-crown, the Commissioners of the Bank-
ruptcy Court, although not entirely agreed as to
the extent in which the unhappy debtor shall be
mulcted, are sufficiently of accord as to the im-
possibility of his dispensing with the services of an
" attorney-at-law ;" and whilst some of these func-
tionaries are content that the amount of which he is to
he thus denuded shall be 21., others have decided that
it ought to be 31. It was naturally enough to be
expected that a measure calculated to discourage
the rapacity of the lower class of attorneys, and
cl:minisle the necessity for the interference, as
often as heretofore, of even the more respectable
part of the profession, would meet with every possi-
ble opposition from those whose profits it is cal-
culated to abridge. Hitherto, in a large majority
of the instances in which a debtor has been incarce-
rated for less than 20/., the law costs have fornied
the larger portion of their respective debts.
Lord Brougham's Bill diminishes the temptation
of either the creditor or his lawyer to heap cruel
au 1 fruitless expense upon the debtor, since he
can no longer hold over him in terrorem the
)spect of imprisonment on his account, whilst it
relords the creditor ampler and more accessible
moons of punishing any fraudulent or dishonest
conduct on the part of the debtor. Lord Brougham
1-,ttres us that no " attorney-at-law"
ist an insolvent in his application to the Bank-
rui-tcy Court, and that the Commissioners have no
power whatever to require such a person to witness
caii sheet of the petition and schedule, in the face
of
the schedule to the Act, which requires the signature
I.:ut once, and the attestation, not of an attorney-at-
law, but merely of an attorney or agent." The Com-
missioners refer, it seems, to the statutes of the 5 and
6 Victoria, c. 116, and the 7 and 8 Victoria, as
their authority for altogether resisting his Lord-
ship's suggestion, and quote the clause that each
sheet of such petition and schedule shall be signed by
the petitioner, in the presence of and attested by his
attorney." We do not understand in what manner this
revision can be said to controvert his Lordship's opinion.
lie seems, indeed, to have been perfectly aware of its
eeistence, and the language in which it is couched is
precisely that on which his suggestion appears to
have been founded. Perhaps his Lordship's re-
marks on the irregular attendance of Commis-
sioners, coupled with a fellow feeling for the pro-
fceion of the law, and an impatience of the cur-
tailment of its profits, may have had some influ-
ena.e.,in the matter. For the present, however, we
,--1iV15V:'61;1;51.4,14t we prefer Lord Brougham's iefuntiese
A - :034—"Relative mewling of the words "at-
:\-

"if

torney" and " attorney-at-law," to that of the
Commissioners', and we cannot but continue to
regard it as one of the most importan` features
of his Bill that the debtor may obtain his li-
berty without being subjected to the extortions
of the lower classes of attorneys-ataw. Such
a proposal could not fail to excite a stro-'g opposition
on the part of a large and singularly active body of
persons. Their objections are, however, entitled to
even less credit thin those of the traders and shop-
keepers who have lately expectorated, through the
columns of the Times, so much bile upon the subject.