But the British land-owner, having enslaved the people of his own island, has shackled the people of Ireland, Scotland and Wales, doomed them and their posterity to be perpetual aliens in their native lands; he has, upon the plea of conquest, the argument of the base assassin and robber, reduced the people of India to a state worse than death; and his iron grip has been placed upon the uncounted millions of African soil; the Islands of the sea squirm in his grasp; the West India Islands are his prostrate prey; while a portion of the vast continent of America owns his sway and groans under his exactions.
But this is not all. In our own country the British land shark has made his appearance. His vile clutch, which our forefathers unwrenched in the strength of their Colonial greatness, has again been fastened upon our throat. The following table will show the extent to which the parasite has insinuated himself into our vital parts. Let the good people of this country—who should know that monopoly in land is the death note of free institutions; that large estates are the parasites of republics and the death of small freeholders—let the people read the following table with the closeness which its gravity should inspire. The San Francisco Daily Examiner, a leading paper on the Pacific coast says:
Besides the millions of acres belonging to railroad and other corporations, the amount of land that is being acquired by foreign capitalists and landlords is fairly amazing. Ireland is to-day groaning beneath the yoke of oppression, and not many years will roll around before the American tenant, upon his knees, will also look up into the scowling face of his master and acknowledge his obedience. Following are a few of America's foreign landlords, and the amount of their holdings expressed in acres:—
An English Syndicate, No. 3, in Texas 3,000,000 The Holland Land Company, New Mexico 4,500,000 Sir Edward Reid, and a syndicate in Florida 2,000,000 English Syndicate, in Mississippi 1,800,000 Marquis of Tweedale 1,750,000 Philips, Marshal & Co., London 1,300,000 German Syndicate 1,100,000 Anglo-American Syndicate, Mr. Rogers President, London 750,000 Byron H. Evans, of London, in Mississippi 700,000 Duke of Sutherland 425,000 British Land Company, in Kansas 320,000 William Whallay, M.P., Peterboro, England 310,000 Missouri Land Company, Edinburgh, Scotland 300,000 Robert Tennant, of London 230,000 Dundee Land Company, Scotland 247,000 Lord Dunmore 120,000 Benjamin Newgas, Liverpool 100,000 Lord Houghton, in Florida 60,000 Lord Dunraven, in Colorado 60,000 English Land Company, in Florida 50,000 English Land Company, in Arkansas 50,000 Albert Peel, M.P., Leicestershire, England 10,000 Sir J.L. Kay, Yorkshire, England 5,000 Alexander Grant, of London, in Kansas 35,000 English Syndicate (represented by Closs Bros.) Wisconsin 110,000 M. Ellerhauser, of Halifax, Nova Scotia, in West Virginia 600,000 A Scotch Syndicate, in Florida 500,000 A. Boysen, Danish Consul, in Milwaukee 50,000 Missouri Land Company, of Edinburgh, Scotland 165,000 Total 20,747,000
| An English Syndicate, No. 3, in Texas | 3,000,000 |
| The Holland Land Company, New Mexico | 4,500,000 |
| Sir Edward Reid, and a syndicate in Florida | 2,000,000 |
| English Syndicate, in Mississippi | 1,800,000 |
| Marquis of Tweedale | 1,750,000 |
| Philips, Marshal & Co., London | 1,300,000 |
| German Syndicate | 1,100,000 |
| Anglo-American Syndicate, Mr. Rogers President, London | 750,000 |
| Byron H. Evans, of London, in Mississippi | 700,000 |
| Duke of Sutherland | 425,000 |
| British Land Company, in Kansas | 320,000 |
| William Whallay, M.P., Peterboro, England | 310,000 |
| Missouri Land Company, Edinburgh, Scotland | 300,000 |
| Robert Tennant, of London | 230,000 |
| Dundee Land Company, Scotland | 247,000 |
| Lord Dunmore | 120,000 |
| Benjamin Newgas, Liverpool | 100,000 |
| Lord Houghton, in Florida | 60,000 |
| Lord Dunraven, in Colorado | 60,000 |
| English Land Company, in Florida | 50,000 |
| English Land Company, in Arkansas | 50,000 |
| Albert Peel, M.P., Leicestershire, England | 10,000 |
| Sir J.L. Kay, Yorkshire, England | 5,000 |
| Alexander Grant, of London, in Kansas | 35,000 |
| English Syndicate (represented by Closs Bros.) Wisconsin | 110,000 |
| M. Ellerhauser, of Halifax, Nova Scotia, in West Virginia | 600,000 |
| A Scotch Syndicate, in Florida | 500,000 |
| A. Boysen, Danish Consul, in Milwaukee | 50,000 |
| Missouri Land Company, of Edinburgh, Scotland | 165,000 |
| Total | 20,747,000 |
Commenting upon these startling figures, the New York (Daily) World, one of the best informed papers of the time says:
The land grabber is not a fungus of nineteenth century growth. He first came among English-speaking peoples over eight centuries ago. Wherever his foot has found a standing-place pauperism and its sequence, crime, have followed. In the British Isles he is known as an Acreocrat. Since he has extended his operations from his native country to our own free soil the land-grabber should be examined under the microscope of history analytically, impartially, and truthfully.
The unnaturalized foreigner threatens us with other dangers than those which would be created by our indigenous American land-grabber. The British acreocrat who owns real estate in this country believes in the cancer of English monarchy with its hideous annals of nearly a thousand years. He accepts the tradition of an hereditary House of Lords, a body composed of the effete and played out descendants of the most tyrannical and profligate rascals which Europe ever produced, and he will remain an English blueblood in every thought and action, which cannot fail to bring about in free America and on his own acres here the same poverty-stricken class of peasants as now curse Great Britain and Ireland.
English "upper-tendom" is represented in recent purchases of American soil by one duke, one marquis, two earls, a baron, two baronets and two members of Parliament. The British duke owns 425,000 acres; the marquis, 1,750,000 acres; the two earls, 160,000 acres; the baron, 60,000 acres; the brace of baronets, 2,000,500 acres; and the pair of Parliamentary politicians, 860,000 acres. In the rest of the land purchased by our brand-new imported lords of the soil, England's governing acreocrats, are largely represented in their 20,941,666 acres.
Much ignorance is affected in American society respecting the manner in which the British landocrats came by their property. It is enough that "my lud" has a handle to his name, and Murray Hill shoddyocracy will wine and dine and toady him, and perhaps for his title marry him to some sweet, pure and good American girl, whose life hereafter will be a purgatory to herself and a mutual misery to both.
But the land held by the foreigner in the United States is a mere bagatelle. He is odious not because he is a foreigner, but only because he is the representative, on the one hand, of the odious land system of the Old World, and on the other of those monarchical ideas which have made the great body of the European people unwilling slaves, reducing them to the very verge of desperation and starvation. Archimedes explained, as illustrating the vast power of the fulcrum, that if he had a place to stand he could move the world. The British land-shark, having got his hold upon the soil, possesses the place to stand for which the Greek sighed in vain, and no man will say he does not move the world; and he will continue to move it until such time as the world shall move him.
The foreign land-shark is still in his infancy. We have an indigenous land-shark whose maw is so capacious that the rapacity of his appetite in no wise keeps pace with its lightning-like digestion. Congressman William Steel Holman, of Indiana, one of the purest statesmen of these corrupt times, and one of the most thoroughly informed men of the country upon the question of eminent domain, and the bestowal of that domain upon corporations and syndicates, recently said, on the floor of the House of Representatives, in the course of a discussion on the Post-office Appropriation bill: