Irish Emigration and The Tenure of Land in Ireland/Chapter 3 Appendix
APPENDIX.
The Difficulties of an Irish Landlord's Situation.
The following extract from the Summary prefixed to the Digest of Evidence taken before the Devon Commission; describes very clearly the difficulties with which an Irish landlord has to contend when dealing with a property which has been subdivided and over-populated during the continuance of a long lease.
"It is quite evident that if the gross produce derived from a limited holding amount to £8, and that it be occupied by a family of five persons, in a district where there is little or no assistance for them in the way of profitable or casual labour, we find a most difficult and embarrassing situation to be presented, both as regards the land proprietor and the tenant; and yet this is by no means an exaggerated or uncommon case. The most moderate calculation of a year's maintenance for such a family would amount to £24, to pay which, together with the rent, the taxes, and the seeding of his farm, there is only the value of the gross produce, £8.
"Thus the gross produce would amount to only one-third of the sum requisite to support the family, without allowing for either rent, seed, or taxes. The seed and taxes must, however, come as a charge prior to maintenance—they are inevitable. The landlord then looks for his rent. His just claim is not the point which the debtor or the public considers when he seeks for its liquidation. The broad fact of a rich man pressing a wretchedly poor man for a payment of money is the point that arrests attention; it matters little whether the rate of rent be in fact low; any claim, however moderate, made by the landlord, appears exorbitant, not from its disproportionate amount as a rent, but from the utter destitution and inability of the tenant to meet it, however small it may be! Goods are distrained, or legal proceedings instituted, and the landlord at once acquires the character of an oppressive rack-renter. Inattentive management permits the subdivision of farms to increase: the £8 worth of gross produce must now provide for two or three families. This needy class of tenants increases in number and destitution, and the landlord's character for oppression increases in a like proportion, although his land may be let much below the rate that well-circumstanced tenants could pay with ease; and although his list of arrears may prove that a considerable portion of that rate has not been levied!
"The evil grows to an extent that threatens the annihilation of the landlord's income a clearance of the tenants, or consolidation of farms, is resorted to, and forms the climax of tyrannical landlordism, from which a sacrifice equal to the fee value of his estate could not cleanse him. Nor would his granting their holdings to such tenants free of rent, materially mend their case, as although it might raise the annual means of support for a family from £3 to £4, or from £6 to £8, it must be recollected that from £15 to £24 would be required to supply them even with the necessaries of life.
"Numerous witnesses have proved the extreme tendency that there is amongst the tenants to subdivide their lands below the quantity that will maintain the occupiers in comfort. They concur in describing the unremitting vigilance required to prevent a rapid recurrence of this evil, even after the estate has gone through the distressing ordeal of correction."
Digest Devon Commission, Summary, p. 8.
"The Pastures of Ireland." (pp. 94 and 130.)
"From the earliest times then, until late in the last century, Ireland was almost entirely a grazing country." p. 193.
****
"Its level surface, overspread with the most luxuriant herbage, presented a wide field over which the cattle of the first settlers might freely range and multiply at an exceedingly rapid rate. Their owners became proportionally wealthy."—pp. 196 and 197.
****
"The pastoral occupation of the primitive Irish was not laid aside as soon as they had divided their new country amongst them, and had stationed themselves on particular spots; but continued to be practised by their descendants for many generations. The principal obstacle to change was probably at first the nature of the climate which, Mela says, was as unsuitable for grain as it was favourable to the growth of grass (Pomp. Mela, de Situ Orbis, lib. iii. cap. 6); and this was, perhaps, the sole reason why, as late as the twelfth century, the people could still be represented as despising husbandry, and as not having laid aside their ancient pastoral mode of life. Even in the beginning of the l6th century the Book of Ballymote is said to have been purchased for 140 milch cows. More than a hundred years later, we find the poet Spenser lamenting that "all men fell to pasturage, and none to husbandry and recommending that an ordinance should be made to compel every one who kept 20 kine, to keep one plough going likewise." pp. 180 and 190.
****
"In the long period of anarchy which succeeded to the conquest by Henry the Second, the incessant warfare between the English Colonists and the natives, acted as an effectual bar to agriculture, for both parties thought it wiser to keep their property in the shape of flocks and herds, which could easily be removed to a place of refuge, than in corn stacks, or standing crops, which must have been left to tho mercy of a successful invader."—p. 191.
****
"In the year 1762, the Irish Parliament granted high bounties on the inland carriage of grain; and in 1783 and 1784, granted further bounties on its exportation, and prohibited its importation from abroad; and the rise of price which took place in consequence, was further promoted by the demand for foreign corn in Great Britain, after the commencement of the war with France, and by the abolition in 1806 of all restrictions on the corn trade between this country and Ireland. Inducements were thus given to landholders to substitute tillage for pasturage, and as the tracts held by single graziers were in general much too extensive to be cultivated by the actual tenants, they were divided into farms of more convenient size, and let to such persons as were willing to undertake them. There was not, however, capital enough in the island to meet the requirements of this revolution in husbandry, and most of the new race of farmers were so poor, that they could not pay their labourers in any other way than by assigning to them pieces of ground to build cabins upon, and to cultivate for their own subsistence. Together with the farmers, therefore, a considerable body of cottars sprang up, and in this manner the bulk of the peasantry were converted into occupiers of land."—Thornton's Plea for Peasant Proprietors, pp. 190 and 191.
PROGRESS OF BELFAST.
The following statement will give an idea of the progress of Belfast during the last half century.
| Population of | Belfast in | 1811 . . . | 27,000 |
| " | " | 1865 . . . | 150,000 |
| In 1856 | . . 176 | In | 1862 . . | 840 |
| " 1857 | . . 251 | " | 1863 . . | 1455 |
| " 1858 | . . 409 | " | 1864 . . | 1505 |
| " 1859 | . . 378 | " | 1865 . . | 1057 |
| " 1860 | . . 225 | " | 1866 (6 mos.) | 953 |
| " 1861 | . . 730 |
| Griffiths' | Valuation— | In 1861 . . . | £253,900 |
| " | " | " 1862 . . . | 278,892 |
| " | " | " 1863 . . . | 297,551 |
| " | " | " 1864 . . . | 311,041 |
| " | " | " 1865 . . . | 333,894 |
| Tons under. | |||
| In 1848 | . . . 506,953 | Revenue, | £23,911 |
| " 1865 | . . . 1,111,581 | " | 52,282 |
Expenditure on quays and dock accommodation, £716,000, giving an extent of tidal and floating dock room of 92 acres, besides 34 acres of water storage for timber.
One of our floating docks is 450 feet long, 60 feet width of entrance, and 15 feet depth of water on sill at high water neap tides.
Water Supply.
£150,000 are being expended by the Water Commissioners, giving an estimated daily supply of 6,000,000 gallons of water.
Iron Ship Building.
Three screw steamers are being constructed, each 3000 tons burthen; and wages paid in one establishment (whose owners, Messrs. Harland and Wolff, have been appointed constructors for the Admiralty up to 5000 tons), range from £1000 to £1200 weekly.
Machine Making and Engineering Establishments.
Turning out work yearly value for £550,000; of this £320,000 is for Ireland; £70,000 for England and Scotland; and £110,000 is for Europe, Asia, Africa, and America.
Spinning and Weaving by Power in Ireland.
Total cost, £3,514,416; and of this there is, within a radius of ten miles from Belfast, £2,476,920.
Deposits.
Our three local Banks have at their command, in deposits and other resources, upwards of £8,000,000 sterling; and the value of the exports from this harbour last year amounted to £11,755,170.