Page:Irish Emigration and The Tenure of Land in Ireland.djvu/56

Rh payer of wages, I am, above all things, an Irishman, and as an Irishman I rejoice at any circumstance which tends to strengthen the independence of the tenant farmer, or to add to the comforts of the labourer's existence.

But it is said, that though as yet no inconvenient diminution of the agricultural population has occurred, as is proved by the still inadequate rate of wages in the rural districts, emigration is acquiring a momentum which will carry it for beyond all reasonable limits. This I admit to be a contingency deserving serious attention: but the first precaution to be taken is to fix those classes most exposed to the current, in a position of such comfort and stability as will enable them to resist