TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE SITUATION IN IRELAND.
IRELAND is nothing if not anomalous. Find out what would be likely to happen under normal cir- cumstances and to a normal people, and then predict the opposite. That is a safe rule for the Irish political prophet. An excellent example of this unwillingness to be shut in within the cold bare walls of the natural and the expected, has just been given by Ireland. By all the rules, Ireland ought to be in a ferment of rage and discontent. During the last two years the island has been kept in a state of suspended disorder by the promises made to the evicted tenants. The turbulent and landless men who lost their farms and their living to follow the behests of Mr. O'Brien and Mr. Dillon, and to carryon the " Plan of Campaign," joined with other so-called victims of the land-war, form, as it were, the Praetorian band of Irish politics. Ever since the present Government came into office, every nerve has been strained to keep the evicted tenants in line. Again and again they have been told that if they would only keep quiet an Act of Parliament would be passed to restore them to their holdings,—only let them have patience, and remember that they would never be deserted by the Irish Parliamentary party. The word of that party was pledged, and unless a Bill providing reinstatement were passed by the present Ministry, the Nationalist Members would hurl them from office. Under these circumstances, and after so many promises of legislation, ample, speedy, and secure, one would have supposed that the news that after all the evicted tenants were to have nothing, and that the effort to reinstate them by Act of Parliament had failed, would have produced the most violent outbreak of hatred and rage. Men who have been led year after year to believe that they are to get their desires, who have had their prey pointed out to them again and again, and who have been told that in the end they are sure to get back to the homes from which they have been parted, are not usually rendered very amiable by the announcement that all the promises made them were but wind, and that the vision of rein- statement was a bubble that has been pricked. In a word, the evicted tenants might have been expected to be half- mad with rage and disappointment, and ready not only to tear in pieces the men on whose word they had been relying, but to fill all Ireland with noise and confusion.
As a matter of fact, Ireland was never more quiet than it is at this moment. The evicted tenants have taken the overthrow of all their hopes and of the promises that have been piled up so liberally for the last three years, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Hardly a growl of anger is to be heard in any part of Ireland. Instead of the land agitation bursting out into fierce flame owing to the action of the Lords, it has sud- denly begun to die out. It is as if the evicted tenants had said to themselves, " Well, the bottom is out of that for good and all. Let us turn to something new." Close observers of the situation all agree as to the calm which is settling down on Ireland. Even the Independent, the extremist organ of the Parnellites, admits that there is not a kick left in the evicted tenants' agitation. " We are told " (it says) "by the Whig leaders, that the action of the Lords will be the signal for a new agitation in Ireland, the result of which will be that the landlords will come cap in hand' to the evicted tenants next spring, craving for a settlement almost on any terms. We have heard of this cap-in-hand prophecy before, and we all know that it was nothing more than the vain boast of men strong in rhetoric but weak in wisdom and in action." The Independent goes on to complain of the lack of spirit shown by the evicted tenants. "Having regard to the state of the Evicted Tenants Bill, it might be expected that those most immediately concerned would show some little spirit. But they are doing nothing of the kind. A few meetings of the tenants were held in this county yesterday, and resolutions of the most colourless and spiritless character were passed. They were even more mild-mannered than Mr. Dillon's speech of surrender in the House of Commons." It is useless, says the Independent, to think of getting up a new land-agitation. The task is impos- sible. "The apathy amongst the general body of the farmers is even more hopeless than that which exists amongst the despairing [evicted] tenants. It is the merest nonsense to say that the farmers can be roused now as they were in 1880 and 1886. Very much has happened since then." The Independent then goes on to point to the advantages enjoyed by the Irish tenant farmers. " They have fixity of tenure, and rents essentially moderate compared with pre-Land League days. Many of them have purchased their farms under the Purchase Acts, and the most of them hope to purchase same day or another.Under these circumstances the average Irish farmer will not engage in any further agitation, especially when he is convinced that those who invite him to agitate are powerless to secure any beneficial legislation for him." That is pretty plain speaking. It contains, moreover, an admission which we trust will be largely made use of by Unionist speakers. No better answer could be given to those who declare that the Irish tenant is still a poor rack- rented, down-trodden wretch, entirely at the mercy of his landlord. The Independent is perfectly frank as to the cause of the collapse of the agitation, and as to the impossibility of putting anything in its place. The cause is the success of land-grabbing. As long as land-grabbing was put down, and the land-grabber was made impossible, men felt it was worth while to join the agitation. The success of Irish agitation is to be measured by the success of the putting down of land-grabbing. But during the past few years, the efforts to crush land-grabbing have gradually failed. The law has been used to protect the land-grabber, and all the best evicted land has been taken. The result has been that the farmers doubt the strength of the agitation. " There will never again be the same unity amongst the peasantry. The legalising of grabbing has put a full stop to sacrifice by the strong on behalf of the weak. In other words, combination, in the old sense of the word, is out of the question ; and that is why the Landlord party are so confident that their hostile policy is certain to go un. punished. The landlords know perfectly well that even if the farmers are asked to fight they will decline. They may, indeed, form a few Federation branches here and there to please the clergy, but they will refuse to go within the limits of Morley's Mile,' or to pass a resolution about the grabbers, the effect of which might be to embar rasa the Government, or lose a vote for the English Refoi party." " The present Administration when out of office," continues the Independent, "used the sufferings of the tenants, and the existence of the grabbers for the purpose of gaining over voters from the Tory party. The Liberals. got the votes sure enough; but the poor tenants got nothing except the declaration from Mr. John Morley that the grabbers would be- protected from disturbance at all cost." The article from which we have quoted is a pretty clear admission that it will not be possible to rouse Ireland over the throwing out of the Evicted Tenants Bill. Testi- mony with a similar import is to be found in an interesting article contributed by Mr. T. W. Russell to the Pall Mall Gazette of Monday last. Mr. Russell, in diagnosing the political situation, confirms the statement of the Inde- pendent. " Home-rule is fading out of sight. The Nationalist organisation is utterly broken up. The Evicted Tenants question is rapidly settling itself. To- day I saw figures which show that even on the estate of Lord Clanricarde, with a rental of £28,000, the rent of the vacant farms stands at £420. The land-grabber goes about like any ordinary citizen. Nay, he multiplies, increases, and flourishes everywhere. Mr. Dillon and Mr. O'Brien may rave and storm as they like, but Ireland is profoundly quiet." Ireland, says Mr. Russell, gets on fairly well. There has. been a little too much rain of late, but to that Ireland is accustomed. " The potatoes are good. The price of cattle tends upward. The harvest is fairly promising. And, notwithstanding evil prognostications, Mr. Morley is likely to have a quiet winter at the Castle, and with all these advantageswe can surely afford to have our differences in politics."
The situation must then be admitted to be a very satis- factory one. It would, perhaps, be over-curious to inquire too closely why it is that the evicted tenants should apparently feel their disappointment so little, and take so easily the destruction of all their hopes. A word in suggestion of an explanation may, however, be given. Irishmen know too much about fine promises and honeyed words to believe in them altogether. An Irishman is never more than half deceived by rhetoric. Hence, when he is wholly undeceived, he suffers no very rude awakening. He always knew with half his mind that he was contemplating the Fairy Palaces of Morgan La Faye. It is the hard, dull, unimaginative, incredulous man who is so dangerous when deceived, not the impres- sionable Celt. It is very difficult to get a Yorkshire- man to believe in your promises, but if you once succeed, and then throw him over, he will not only never forgive you but will be mad with black rage and ready for any mischief. The Irishman is always deceiving and being deceived, and cannot find it in his heart to be very angry with those who promise a thousand times more than they perform. That is so natural a course as hardly to be condemned. The evicted tenants never quite believed they were to get what they were promised, and hence their disappointment is only skin-deep.
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