What the Commissioners say on the boycotting initiated by Mr.
Parnell in his Ennis speech in 1880, is very impressive and pithy:—" We are of opinion that the combination of which boycotting was the instrument was illegal both in its objects and the means which were adopted. The object of this elaborate and all-pervading tyranny was not only to injure the individual landlords against whom it was directed, by making their land useless to them unless they obeyed the edicts of the Land League, but to injure the land- lords as a class, and drive them out of the country." The means by which the depreciation of land from twenty- one to fifteen years' purchase, had already in 1879 "been, and continued to be effected was," say the Commissioners, "by inciting tenants not to pay the rents they had contracted to pay, and by intimidating those who were willing to fulfil their engagements from doing so. This intimida- tion was extended to caretakers and herds, and all by whose assistance the land could be rendered of any value to its owner." "It is further to be observed that though boycotting led in many cases to actual outrage, yet it was persisted in for years against the same individuals, and was generally recommended notwithstanding the evils which plainly resulted from it. In our judgment, the leaders of the Land League who combined together to carry out the system of boycotting, were guilty of a criminal conspiracy." And amongst those who are enumerated as taking part in this criminal conspiracy are Mr. Parnell, Mr. Dillon, Mr. Biggar, Mr. Sexton, Mr. T. P. O'Connor, Mr. Matthew Harris, Mr. W. O'Brien, Mr. T. D. Sullivan, Mr. Healy, both the Messrs. Harrington, both the Messrs. Redmond, and a great many more of the popular leaders in Ireland and in the Parnellite Parliamentary Party.
