Page:Letters to Lord John Russell on the Further Measures for the Social Amelioration of Ireland.djvu/13

10 Relief Committee of the Monaminey Electoral Division, in the Union of Mallow, made to the Relief Commissioners. In it I find the following passage:—

"The non-resident proprietors possess the most valuable interest in nearly nine-tenths of the soil of our district. Their estates are capable of great improvement; and for the most part, indeed four-fifths of them, are, waste and unproductive; but which, if reclaimed and improved, as they might he by drainage, &c., would give ample employment and subsistence to the whole surplus population, and change this district from a region of distress and calamity into one of comparative wealth and prosperity."

And this is a district in which "the majority of the labouring population" have been during the last twelve months, or more, either fed in complete idleness at the expense of the community, or but nominally employed on useless roadworks, and must continue to be so uselessly fed or wastefully employed, during the next and ensuing years (unless they are to be allowed to starve), as the Report of the Relief Committee asserts, "without legislative interference"!

Yes! "without legislative interference—because the resident farmers are utterly unable to give employment on a large scale, and the proprietors, or nine-tenths of them, are absentees."

It is indeed hopeless to expect from the voluntary