The Staffordshire and Potteries Examiner. — 1880-11-06 (Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England)

THE CONDITION OF LRELAND.  Ireland to.day is like a child that, having an injured limb, chooses rather to kick than to allow remedies to bo applied. The present Government is the doctor that wishes to apply all political skill to improve the condition of the sister country; but Mr. Parnell and his associates have preferred to let slip the dogs of anarchy, and agrarian outrages have been preferred to waiting a few months for logiclative remedies. The English Government will meet with fierce opposition under any circumstances from the territorial interest when they attempt sound and complete legislation in the interests of the Irish teuxritry and peasantry. And Mr. Parnell is playing into the hands of the landlords, and when he encourages lawlessness and extreme demand, that cannot possibly be granted. The Liberal Government is prepared to legislate in favour of the agricultural population of Ireland on the ground that the land. laws are harsh and unjust. The Parnellites are enabling the landlords to say that only severe laws can keep the Irish tenantry in order and make them pay rent at all. It is certain that the number of outrages have been exaggerated, and when we compare the present with the time when the powerfal Peel Ministry was wrecked by the refusal of the House of Commons to pass a Coercion Bill, we find that the outrages committed in October, 1846, were mach greater in number than in October, 1880. The following are the figures. '  Firing at Seizure Homicide. Intimidation. Total. person, of arms. 1846 19 1885 3 Sat since 1846,the legislation of 1850, and especially of 1870, has certainly improved the condition of the Irish people. The Land Ad of 1870 established the proprietory right of the tenant in the soil by securing to all tenants oompensation for improvments. It is true however the land owning class have prevented that beneficient Act from conferring the advantages its framers anticipated, for by increasing rents, and evicting for their non-payment, they have practically kept a ruthless grip upon the occupiers of the soil. Under the Land Act only eight hundred tenants have purchased their farms, and further legislation in the interests of justice is imperatively demanded. We believe that what Fox said of the Irish is in the main true." They may have their failings like others. They may have a quick foaling of injury, and not be very patient under it ; but I do affirm that of all their  characteristics there is not one feeling more predominant, in every class of the country, from the highest to the lowest, than "gratitude for benefactions and sensibility to kindness." It appears to us, however, that the Government had no alternative but to put the ordinary law in force against the leaders of the Lad League who have incited the tenantry not to pty rent. Instead of the drastic coarse of passing a stringent Coercion Act, the Government are trneting to the ordinary methods of law for suppressing in organised conspiracy against We. The landlord ittterests is Ireland and this country are not satisfied with the Government's choice between the two a3tenaatives ; and it is contended that the prosecutiou will fail to secure a conviction, but at least the pros erotica will show that Mr. Parnell is as much subject to the law of the land as the poorest peasant in Ireland.