The social war has broken out again in Ireland, Mr.
William Scully, a well known landlord, being this time the assailant. He ordered his tenants on a new estate called Ballycoohey in Tipperary to sign leases binding them to depart at 21 days' notice, and to pay poor-rates, any Act of Parliament notwithstanding, a stipulation which we fancy would have invalidated the leases. The tenants refused, Mr. Scully proceeded to evict them en masse, two of his innocent assistants, policemen, were shot down, and he himself was wounded. Of course this is murder, and must be punished as such, the policemen being in the discharge of their duty, and Mr. Scully himself within his strict legal right, but the event shows the hopelessness of expecting order in Ireland under the present tenure. All these men had paid rent for years with the greatest readiness, and only two days before had sent their full rent to Mr. Scully. Exactly the same events would have happened in Bengal, or Naples, or Belgium, or any other place where the landlord claimed the soil while the people held him only entitled to his rent. They are not due to the Irish character, but to the permanent conflict which exists in Ireland between the land laws and the social system.
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