Page:Letters to Lord John Russell on the Further Measures for the Social Amelioration of Ireland.djvu/55

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LETTER V.

Encumbered Estates Bill—Prospects of the Winter—In some districts, starvation or relief from the Treasury the only alternatives—Conditions of the latter—Repayment in full, and productiveemployment of able-bodied—Authorities in favour of Waste Land Bill—Devon Commission—Commissary-General Hewitson—The Irish must have leave to cultivate Ireland for themselves—Defects of Poor Law—Conclusion.

My Lord,

I have spoken of a measure for facilitating the sale of entailed and encumbered estates in Ireland as of scarcely less pressing importance than that for the reclamation of the wastes, or an improved law of land tenure. It would he superfluous, however, to suggest arguments in support of this opinion to your Lordship, by whom the task was last year entrusted to the Lord Chancellor of framing a bill for this purpose, and whom necessity alone, I believe, compelled reluctantly to abandon it for the time, to be re-introduced, no doubt, on the earliest opportunity.

It is, indeed, self-evident that the improvement of the productive capacities of her soil, which alone can enable Ireland to emerge from her present difficulties, cannot be generally, or even largely, carried into effect, so long as the bulk of her estates are bound in a condition of hopeless paralysis by the