chising legislation of Stein and Hardenberg, had positive rights in the soil which they could not be deprived of. It is only in parts of Belgium that it is a frequent practice for small farmers to hold from large proprietors, with no other legal protection than the stipulations of a short lease: but their truly admirable industry owes its vigour to the fact that small landed properties are always to be had for money, at prices which they can hope to save. They, moreover, live in the midst of a large and thriving manufacturing industry, which takes off the hands that might otherwise compete unduly for the soil. In Ireland alone the whole agricultural population can be evicted by the mere will of the landlord, either at the expiration of a lease, or, in the far commoner case of their having no lease, at six months' notice. In Ireland alone the bulk of a population dependent wholly on the land, cannot look forward with confidence to a single year's occupation of it: while the sole outlet for the dispossessed cultivators, or for those whose competition raises the rents against the cultivators, is expatriation. So long as they remain in the country of their birth, their support must be drawn from a source for the permanence of which they have no guarantee, and the failure of which leaves them nothing to depend on but the poorhouse.
In one circumstance alone England and Ireland are alike: the cultivated area of both countries is owned in large estates by a small class of great landlords. In the opinion of great landlords, and of the admirers of the state of society which produces them, this is enough: the interest and the wisdom of the landlords may be implicitly relied on for making everybody
