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 Yet the picture is not one of unrelieved gloom. The large resident landlord population could not fail to develop a certain amount of sympathy for the lower orders with whom they were in daily contact. The lower orders often transferred to the new landowners some part of the attachment they had felt for their former chiefs. In particular a close bond often united those few of the old houses who had retained their lands with their tenants. And bad as the eighteenth century in Ireland was it does not perhaps after all compare so unfavourably with the same period in Continental countries. There was horrible cruelty and constant oppression, with on the other hand continual wild outbreaks on the part of the peasantry. Probably no other country could produce such a degraded type as the squireen or buckeen, the drunken, gambling, profligate descendant of the Cromwellian or Williamite settler. But if we look into the political status of the peasantry in the various German States, in France, and even in Swiss Cantons such as Protestant Bern and Catholic Luzern, we may come to the conclusion that in certain respects their lot was even harder than that of their contemporaries in Ireland.

Having traced the course of confiscation in Ireland, and seen some of its effects, one might be inclined to speculate a little on whether the twofold process of confiscation and colonisation has really been to the advantage of England. The examples of Scotland and Wales are perhaps a sufficient answer to the query. In one there were frequent rebellions; the other is a conquered