Page:Letters to Lord John Russell on the Further Measures for the Social Amelioration of Ireland.djvu/21

18 Of coarse, this is the best possible reason for their being set to work to maintain themselves (as I have shewn they may so easily do) by improved cultivation of the soil of the country,—a process which, instead of diminishing its net rental, would, as Mr. Kennedy proves by facts, vastly increase it.

So, again, of the county of Monaghan. Mr. W. Steuart Trench, who has for years been extensively engaged in reclaiming waste land there, is asked,

12. "You have alluded to emigration to America. Do you think the locating the superabundant population upon waste mountain tracts in Ireland would have an equally beneficial effect?" His reply is, "Certainly; at least for a vast period of years to come."

I might quote similar facts and opinions in regard to other counties, especially Galway, Cork, Kerry, Waterford, Donegal, &c. Indeed it is a singular and striking fact, that it is precisely those districts of the west and south of Ireland where the population is most wretched and destitute of employment, which most abound in improveable waste land. The useless land, requiring only labour to produce abundance, generally lies almost at the doors of the idle thousands, who are starving for want of work. In the words of the address of the Council of the Royal Agricultural Improvement Society, for 1845, "In every district may be seen tracts on which labour might be employed with the utmost advantage, and in all those districts are to