Nevertheless, the debate on this amendment waxed very hot, and
even Mr. Chamberlain professed himself discontented with the instruction proposed by the Government, and wanted to substi- tute for it an instruction to the Commissioners to grant such abatements under the new clause as would place the tenants in any district in the same position as those who had had their rents fixed since 1885. But clearly that would never do. It would come to this, that a tenant with a very low rent who would not have needed any reduction of rent but for the fall of prices, would have his rent for the time as much reduced as a neighbouring tenant who had had a very high rent, and whose sent had been greatly reduced bemuse it was a rack-rent. Mr. Dillon thundered, and Mr. Parnell insisted, and Mr. Chamberlain mediated, and at last Lord Hartington proposed that this amendment and the town-parks amendment, which were both bitterly opposed, should be postponed till Thursday last,—to which the Government in the end reluctantly agreed.
