And again:—­

’We are not ready to accede to a principle of legislation by which the State shall take into its own hands the valuation of rent throughout Ireland.  I say, “take into its own hands” because it is perfectly immaterial whether the thing shall be done by a State officer forming part of the Civil Service, or by an arbitration acting under State authority, or by any other person invested by the law with power to determine on what terms as to rent every holding in Ireland shall be held.’

This categorical denunciation of the principle which he was then asked, and which he peremptorily refused to sanction, was not enough for Mr. Gladstone, for the records of debate show he went farther, but enough has been cited to show that never was prophecy more fully fulfilled.  Outrage followed outrage with a rapidity unequalled in Europe, and that in a country which previous to his remedial measures had practically been unstained by an agrarian outrage for fifty years.

It would certainly be both remiss of me, and altogether below the character which I trust I have acquired for honest plain speaking, if I omitted to give my views upon Mr. Wyndham’s Act, for those readers who regard my book as something more than a storehouse of anecdotes—­and since it is written at all, I maintain it claims to be more than that—­having noticed the freedom with which I have spoken of previous English legislation for Ireland, may very naturally think I should be begging the question of the hour, if I did not offer a few observations on the latest development of the Irish question.

I must emphatically repeat what I have already asserted:—­that the Acts of Mr. Gladstone rendered a Purchase Bill inevitable, and it fell to Mr. Wyndham’s lot to formulate the scheme which has now become law.

Mr. Wyndham’s Act is a great one for Ireland, because where a tenant previously paid L100 a year rent, all he will have to pay—­even at twenty-four years’ purchase—­is L80 a year, and at that rate with the bonus the landlord obtains twenty-seven years’ purchase.  But this scale is a little halcyon in most instances.

It should prove a boon to the country, and it is the necessary outcome of the Land Act of 1881, by which rents were cut down by commissioners, whose means of living depended on the reductions they made.

And to make this state of things yet more remarkable, there were two courts established for fixing rates.  The one consisted of sub-commissioners, who were paid by the year, and the other was that of the County Court judge, who was wholly dependent on a valuer paid by the day.

So, whoever cut down the most earned the most.

A valuer in Limerick was remonstrated with for cutting down local rents so low, and he replied:—­

’It is all for the good of trade, for it will bring every tenant into the Court.’

And so it actually did, for that Court very shortly afterwards was chock full of cases.