Lord Salisbury, in his speech of Wednesday, traced every disorder
in Ireland to a legislative interference with property in Ireland, which induced the people to hope that if they were violent enough, they might obtain more. He described the land- lords as discouraged by this policy in contending against "an implacable enemy,"—that is, apparently, the body of tenantry. The policy was not generous, because it gave away the property of other people. It was eminently un-Conservative, "because it was unstable," and "by thinly-veiled concessions made up the elements of an insurrection which is encouraged by every sign of yielding on the part of Government." If the Government had designed the disorganisation of society, they could not have succeeded better. Theirs was a policy of vacil- lation and oscillation. The Irish Land Act established a double ownership, "never tried in any land before" —Lord Salisbury forgets the mitayer system, not to mention India—and would have to be altered. "He was not one of those who believed that, after a revolutionary step, you could go back." You must go forward, and bring back single ownership, by enabling Irish tenants tiLpurchase their land. "I am well aware that this is a great undertaking," and "could wish that a mistaken policy bad not condemned us to the neces- sity" f hurrying on peasant-proprietorship." Order must also be restored, for you must go to Tr key to find a parallel for the condition of Ireland, which Frenchmen or Americans would speedily put straight. "Repressive measures must be adopted." No hint of the character of these measures was, however, offered.
