Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-01-02
QUEER THINGS IN KERRY
Lord Kenmare and the Land Ones.
tion-Two Strange Islands.

~-N' DAo0ho' AL harper weekly.
Even in Killarney you cannot get wholly
AWAY from the land question. The great
landed proprietor Of the neighborhood ia
LOU hehn1are' VINO owns an estate of some
$1,000 acres
NEGOTIATIONS have been going on between
himself and his tenants-the tenants neeoA
tlating through four priests-with a view
10 the sale and purchase of the estate m
ger the Wyndham act Both sides are any
,ous 10 make the deal, and the difference
between them, in point of money, is yery
small. WY
But money is not the only thing that
counts In these matters There are four
estate. and their position has to be set
tied before sale can take place. The case
OF one of them is worth looking into.
ne rented town farm at an annual
rental Of something less than 81 900 a wear.
fell behind in his rent and was finally evict-
ed. In Kerry and probably throughout all
Ireland a farm from which a tenant has
been evfcted must be worked by the land
lord or not at all. No one else will look
at 1t, and a man who had the hardihood to
take 1t would be shot or boycotted within
a week.
Lord Kenmare has offered to reinstate
this and the other evicted tenants on his es-
tate on receipt OF one years rent in dis
charge of all arrears. The estates commits
sioners have found themselves legally I'M
able to raify the arrangement, and the
transaction therefore still hangs fire.
Lord Kenmare Is the head Of one Of the
Oldest Catholic families In Ireland. He Is
also lord lieutenant of the county and as
such has the privilege Of advising the lord
chancellor In regard to appointments to the
| magisterial bench.
heard it said more than once in the
district that If he would only nominate so
and 80 to the bench the sale would quickly
go through. / also found 1t a matter of
common gossip that the evicted tenant /
have alluded to, a master of the first
water, intends when reinstated to sell. his
farm at once. There is no doubt he will
net a handsome profit
In the Kenmare river there are two
islands that must be unique In these lati-
tudes One Of them is owned by Lord
Dunraven and the other by a local justice
of the peace. / have gone over both of
them In crescendo of wonderment ask
ing myself repeatedly whether l was in
Kerry or Algeria.
For, thanks to the gulf stream, these
two islands. on which thirty or forty years
ago not single tree was to be found, and
which were mainly bog and moor, have
been turned into semi tropicaI paradises.
Tree ferns grow there in the open air,
palms, bamboo and eucalyptus flourish
there as though on their native soil, and
many plants and shrubs from Australia and
New Zealand do better. am told. in these
islands than In their own homes
To pass from the bleak mainland into
this growth of dollhouse vegetation u to
travel 1000 miles due south in ten or fif-
teen minutes. Lord Lansdowne, who owns
an estate nearby has, / am told made even
more of it than Lord Dunraven and his
neighbor have made of their islands, but
lieve. In any case, / have seen enough to
rob the talk of growing tobacco and plant
ing tea In Kerry of all its seeming Wild
ness