Page:Confiscation in Irish history.djvu/265

 To turn to the other side of the picture, it was Protestant Ulster that overthrew the Stuarts. It was the Presbyterians of Ulster, driven from their homes by the mistaken religious and economic legislation of the 18th century who formed the backbone of the armies that put an end to the rule of England in what is now the United States. The independence of the Irish Parliament in the closing years of the 18th century was won by the colonists. The main strength of the United Irish movement was amongst the Protestants of the north.

Not all of these movements can be considered as being to the advantage of England. And during the nineteenth century it was the colonist element which produced Emmett, Davis, Butt, Biggar and Parnell.

Largely owing to the efforts of leaders sprung from this element the work of confiscation has been to a great extent undone in recent years. The land is passing back to the older race. Peasant proprietorship, so abhorrent to the theorists of the age of Elizabeth and James, utterly destroyed under the Commonwealth, is once more being set up. But at what a cost, and not of money only. What a waste of time, what a crop of ill-feeling, what a breach in the unity of the nation, what an expenditure of political energy which might so easily have been diverted into more profitable channels have marked the latest agrarian revolution in Ireland. It would perhaps have been better for England in the long run if this price had never had to be paid.