On this same question of the reclamation of Irish waste lands and redundant population, Commissary-General Hewetson, one of the principal assistants of Sir Randal Routh, writes, in the height of the Famine:  “The transition from potatoes to grain requires tillage in the proportion of three to one.  It is useless, then, to talk of emigration, when so much extra labour is indispensable to supply the extra food.  Let that labour be first applied, and it will be seen whether there is any surplus population. If the waste lands are taken into cultivation, and industrious habits established, it is very doubtful whether there will be any surplus population, or even whether it would be equal to the demand.”  “Providence,” he adds, “has given everything needful, and nothing is wanting but industry to apply it.”  “Yes!” to use the words of Mr. Scrope, “there are two things more wanted—­namely, that Irish industry should have leave to apply itself to the improvement of the Irish soil, and be assured of reaping the undivided fruits of such application."[257]

From causes which can be only guessed at, there seems to have been always a passive but most influential opposition to the reclamation of the waste lands of Ireland.  Its opponents never met the question in the field of logical argument, yet, somehow, they had power enough to prevent its being carried into effect.  When Lord John Russell proposed the million grant to begin the work, Sir Robert Peel said he thought some more useful employment could be found for that sum, but he did not even hint at what it was.  A writer, who published in 1847 a work on Ireland “Historical and Statistical,” thus deals with the reclamation question:  “The Irish waste lands being of considerable extent have long attracted the notice of speculators and improvers.  They are about to receive the attention of her Majesty’s Government, and a sum of one million is promised to the Irish landlords as an aid towards their reclamation.  But there is much room to doubt the policy of such a proceeding at any time, and especially at the present time."[258] Here is a pretty decided opinion against reclamation, but there is no reason whatever vouchsafed for it.

On the other hand those who were favourable to the reclamation of our waste lands were rich in facts and arguments.  In the Parliamentary Session of 1835, a Committee of the House of Commons on public works reported that “no experiment was necessary to persuade any scientific man of the possibility of carrying into effect the reclamation of bogs.”  Nor is this strongly expressed opinion to be wondered at, founded, as it was, upon such evidence as the following:—­

Mr. Griffith deposed that—­

“The mountain bog of the south of Ireland—­the moory bog—­varies in depth from nine inches to three feet, below which there is a clayey or sandy subsoil.  On the average, about L4 per statute acre is required to bring it from a state of nature to one of cultivation, and then it will fetch a rent of from 5s. to 10s. per English acre.”