Page:Confiscation in Irish history.djvu/62

 At the present day if we take religion as the distinctive test we should estimate the Irish element in the six counties at 60 per cent.

In reality, however, it is more. For, while few or none of the dominant race in the plantation counties are likely to have become Catholics, it is quite certain, as surnames show, that very many of the old Irish have in the course of centuries become Protestants.

There is much confusion as to the extent of land actually affected. The official estimate was that in round numbers half a million acres were confiscated, and that 58,000 of these were distributed among about 280 Irish. Now, since the true area of the six counties is 3,680,000 acres, writers such as Froude and O'Connor Morris have stated that only the best lands were taken, and that the remainder—largely wood and waste—was left to the Irish.

This theory seems, however, to have no foundation in fact. In the first place particular pains were taken to remove the Irish from the hills and woods, and to settle them in the open country where they would be less dangerous to the State,