It is of no use assigning to a man forty acres of land to get a living out of, if he immediately sublets some of it to a less fortunate friend, or takes all his remotest relations into partnership. It requires no prophet's eye to discern that the instant the tenant's son got married he would bring his wife home to his father's roof, and that if the energies of the united family did not suffice to cultivate the whole of the forty acres, part would be let at "conacre," that is, for the period of one harvest, to a man with or without a holding of his own. The tendency to bring several families together in one cabin is almost irresistible, and has, as mentioned above, not been wisely and firmly met by proprietors, but taken a mean advantage of to wring money out of tenants.
Subdivision of holdings has in many cases been, not sternly forbidden on pain of eviction, but made the occasion of inflicting a fine. This shabby and extortionate kind of protest against subdivision has long obtained on certain estates. If one may believe evidence given on oath in a court of justice, as reported in a local newspaper, there was within the last twenty years on at least one estate a custom of exacting a fine from tenants who married without leave. Probably this originated in some clumsy attempt to prevent the subdivision of holdings and the accumulation of population in certain places—in itself a laudable and necessary precaution. Whatever shape any attempt to settle the unfortunate peasants on fresh holdings may take, the tendency to subdivide and sublet must be sternly resisted—and prevented. A thousand excuses will be made for taking partners, for subletting on the "conacre" and other systems. "Sure I was sick, your honour, and the farrum was gettin' desthroyed;" or, "I was too poor to buy seed for the whole of it, and let some at conacre to Thady O'Flaherty, that's a good man, your honour, as any in Galway!" or "Wad ye have me tur-r-r-n my own childther out like geese on the mountain?" are a few of the replies which would, I am assured by a native, be made to any inquiry or reproof concerning the subletting of land or the accumulation of people. But if any attempt be made to help the West, nothing of the kind must be listened to. The young bees must depart from the parent hive and begin life on their own account. This may appear the harsh judgment of a half-informed traveller. It is, on the contrary, the mere reflection of native opinion.
VI.[ToC]
THE RELIEF OF MR. BOYCOTT.
Ballinrobe, Co. Mayo,
Wednesday, Nov. 10th.
Finding that despite all the influence brought to bear upon it the Boycott Brigade was actually going to invade Lough Mask, I came from Galway to-day by the route preferred by Mr. Boycott himself, just before I met him and Mrs. Boycott herding sheep more than a fortnight ago. The steam packet Lady Eglinton conveyed an oddly assorted freight. Among the passengers were Mrs. Burke, the wife of Lord Ardilaun's agent, two commercial travellers, the representative of the Daily News, and thirty-two of the Royal Irish Constabulary, who had been summoned from Galway to the scene of action. From every side soldiers and constabulary—soldiers in everything but name—converge upon Ballinrobe and Claremorris, townlets, which, if one could quite believe their artless inhabitants, are Arcadian in their simplicity, prosperous to every degree short of the payment of rent, and absolutely safe as to life and property.
When the good ship Lady Eglinton had puffed and scraped her way through the tortuous shallows of Lough Corrib to Cong, she was received by a large meeting of the country folk assembled on the pier. Fortunately I had secured a car from Ballinrobe to await my arrival, and the driver, a perfect "gem of the sea," received me with high good humour. "To Ballinrobe, your honour?" he said, and drove off like a true son of Nimshi. As soon as he was fairly on the way, I said that I should like to drive to Ballinrobe by Lough Mask House. "It's not on our way, your honour," was the first and civil objection. I then observed that I wished to go that way in order to call on Mr. Boycott. "Sure it's a different way altogether, your honour," was the answer. "A long way round, your honour." Then I said, after the brutal Saxon fashion, "Go that way, nevertheless." No answer, but the speed of the car relaxed until two other cars came up. Then a particularly wild Irish conversation was kept up among the drivers, and I observed a pleasant commercial gentleman who was bound for the village, as distinguished from the landing-place of Cong, laughing consumedly as his car branched off and left me to pursue my way in the twilight. Then my car-driver, evidently backed by a brother car-driver, put his case plainly. He had been engaged to drive a gentleman from Cong to Ballinrobe, and would do what he had engaged to do cheerfully, but he had not engaged himself to go to Lough Mask House. It was not, as a notorious claimant said, "in the contract." I hinted that a mile or two out of the way, even Irish miles, could not matter; that at complete sundown there would be a moon; that increased pay would be given. Not the slightest effect was produced.