[109] Froude—“English in Ireland,” vol. ii., p. 228.
[110] See the State Papers of Henry VIII., and the official certificates almost ever since. See also Lord O’Hagan’s Address to the Social Science Congress in Dublin, 1881. If any of these pronouncements were right, it would be difficult to discover any room for future improvement. All of these glowing congratulations were, however, invariably exposed and exploded by sober contemporary historians and observers, and the O’Hagan passage illustrates the process. His lordship said: “I have indicated to you the results of honest effort by Irishmen of this generation in obtaining for their country amended laws, cheap and facile justice—education liberal, unconditioned, and available to all—... increased provision for the national health and comfort—and security in his possessions and encouragement to his industry for the tiller of the soil. In the midst of many troubles and much discouragement, these have been steps of real cheering progress—improvements, permanently conquered from the past, and auspicious, as they will be fruitful, of a happier future.” Compare with this charming view the following versions.
In his speech in the adjourned debate on the Address in the House of Commons, January, 1881, Mr. Shaw, M.P. for Cork County, showed the value of this “real cheering progress,” and of the “permanent improvements and increased provisions for the national health and comfort.” “Within three or four months,” said Mr. Shaw, “I have gone through various parts of the country, and I must say this—I did not think it possible for human beings to exist as I found tenant-farmers existing in the West of Ireland.... It is a disgrace to the landlords, it is a disgrace to the Government, it is a disgrace to every institution in the country to think of it that now for years, for generations, this cry year after year has been coming up from the people.”
In the debate on the 28th of January Mr. Gladstone said that “there are still hundreds of thousands in Ireland who live more or less on the brink of starvation, and that forty years ago that was the case not with hundreds of thousands but with millions.”
A writer in the current number of the Quarterly Review, after picturing the maddened and disturbed state of the country, adds:—
“And all this with between four and five hundred suspects in gaols with an army of 50,000 men in the country, with Land Bills, Coercion Bills, Proclamations, new magisterial boards, the island parcelled out into military districts, spies, informers, and all the endless appliances of a Liberal Government in full operation.”
See, too, what Mr. Justice O’Hagan said in his judgment on the Stacpoole leases. It is not very easy to reconcile these four unassailable statements of facts with the smooth optimism of the ex-Lord Chancellor, although without question the “Conquests” enumerated by him have been, as he says, won. The truth is that these specialist statistics are no more a real index of the condition of the country than a brick is an index of the quality of a house. There is no use in attempting to deny that England—both when meaning well and meaning ill—has kept Ireland in a deplorable condition.
[111] Concerning this debate “Pepys’ Diary,” vol. iv., p. 109, records—1666—October 8th:—“The House did this day order to be engrossed the Bill against importing Irish Cattle—a thing, it seems, carried on by the Western Parliament men wholly against the sense of most of the rest of the House; who think if you do this you give the Irish again cause to rebel. Thus plenty on both sides makes us mad.”
P. 135—1666. October 27th:—“Thence to talk about publique business; he [Lord Belassis] tells me how the two Houses begun to lie troublesome, the Lords to have quarrels one with another. My Lord Duke of Buckingham having said to the Lord Chancellor (who is against the passing of the Bill for prohibiting the bringing over of Irish cattle) that whoever was against the Bill was there led to it by an Irish interest or an Irish understanding, which is as much as to say he is a foole. This bred heat from my Lord Chancellor, and something he [Buckingham] said did offend my Lord of Ossory (my Lord Duke of Ormonde’s son), and they two had hard words, upon which the latter sends a challenge to the former; of which the former complains to the House, and so the business is to be heard on Monday.” Clarendon and Carte attribute cowardice to Buckingham in the matter. Both he and Ossory were sent to the Tower. The Bill, as noticed above, was subsequently passed.
[112] “Life of Ormond,” vol. iv., p. 234, &c.