They protested against any message being sent, unless it contained a statement that during the sixty years of Victoria’s reign Ireland had been subject to much suffering and deprived of her rights, and that therefore the Irish members of Parliament were dissatisfied and unable to join in the celebrations.

The House of Commons would not entertain this, and a motion was passed that the address should be sent to the Queen.

The Irish members continued their protests after the vote had been taken, declaring it false and absurd to present the address when it did not express the sentiment of the House, but only of a portion of it.

* * * * *

Captain Boycott has just died.  You are probably familiar with the name, and with the meaning of the word “boycott,” but it may interest you to know what a very young word it is, only seventeen years old, having been coined in 1880, and that it derives its origin from this very Captain Boycott who has just passed away.

He was a captain in the English army.  After a while he sold out his commission, and settled down as a farmer in Connemara, Ireland.  He became the agent of an Irish landlord named Lord Erne, and it was his duty to manage the estate, see to the sowing and gathering of crops, keep the houses on the property in repair, and collect the rents from the tenants.

The Irish had long been complaining that their rents were too heavy, and that their landlords did nothing for them in return for the money collected.  There was a good deal of truth in these complaints; the landlords hardly ever went near their estates, and seemed to care only for the money they got from the tenants.  The whole conduct of affairs was left in the hands of the agents, who were obliged to grind the money out of the tenants to supply the wants of their masters.

It does not appear that Captain Boycott was more severe than other agents, but he does seem to have been less in sympathy with the peasants.

There had been a long period of bad harvests followed by a famine, and the tenants could not pay their rents.  They begged that their back rent might be forgiven them, and their future rents lowered.

All over Ireland similar demands were being made.  Irish agitators, as they were called, were holding meetings all over the country, advising the peasants to make these demands.  Among the men who addressed the people were Charles Stewart Parnell, John Dillon, and Michael Davitt, all members of Parliament.

Excitement had run so high that the peasants had murdered several agents who refused their demands.

Mr. Parnell and his friends urged the people not to commit crimes, but to refuse to pay the rents demanded.

These leaders bade the people stop buying from, selling to, or working for any landlord who refused to listen to their demands, and to prevent others from having any dealings with them.