In Nottinghamshire the “Noble” proprietors are having their farms left upon their hands for the same reasons, and they are attempting to farm them by their agents, practically evicting the skilled labor which was born upon the soil and is best fitted to cultivate it.
These owners are those whose debts compel them to get something out of their land. They either attempt to farm them themselves, or they make leases at a rent just low enough to induce their tenants to continue.
MEATH LADS AT CROSSAKEEL.
But there is another class that is not so merciful—or rather who are not compelled to be just, and the English nobleman is never just except upon compulsion. These are the drones who are actually rich, and have an income from some plunder outside of their lands. They will not make leases at all, for fear of losing the game! They want this beautiful land to grow up into shelter for hares and birds and all that sort of thing, for the sake of the pleasure of shooting in the season. The distress of the evicted tenant—eviction by reason of exorbitant rent is as certain as eviction for non-payment—is nothing to them. They must have their preserves of game; they must have their sport.
The process is the same in England as it is in Ireland. The landlord puts his estates in the hands of an agent, selecting for the purpose a man with a heart of flint and a face of brass, one who knows no mercy, and who would not do a kind act were he paid for it.