Page:Irish Emigration and The Tenure of Land in Ireland.djvu/170

Rh was spared. How has it repaid the clemency of the British Parliament? By dowering the crown of England with as fair a cluster of flourishing towns and loyal centres of industry as are to be found in any portion of the Empire. Would you see what Ireland might have been—go to Derry, to Belfast, to Lisburn, and by the exceptional prosperity which has been developed, not only within a hundred towns and villages, but for miles and miles around them, you may measure the extent of the injury we have sustained. Would you ascertain how the numerical strength of a nation may be multiplied, while the status of each individual that comprises it is improved,—go to Belfast, where (within a single generation) the population has quadrupled, and the wages of labour have more than doubled.