The Letters of "Norah" on Her Tour Through Ireland Part 8

A very telling speech was made by a dark, thin, wiry man named O'Neil.

His speech dealt with the hards.h.i.+ps which they had pa.s.sed through owing to excessive rents and hard years of poor crops. He spoke what the people felt, for many a voice chorused, "True for you; we know that well." In the middle of the speeches the platform prepared to break down, but only collapsed in the middle and fell half way and stopped.

Two of the priests spoke also, and spoke well to judge by the people's applause. No one spoke in favor of the Bill.

I thought as I sat there of the remark made to me by a Catholic gentleman of Innishowen, who said: "The Irish people have hoped in vain so long, have been deceived so often, that it is hard now to win their confidence." The more I move through the country the more I believe this. Mr. Dillon was the idol of the a.s.sembly, that was easy to be seen.

A few words with him, a touch of his hand, was an honor. He apologized for Mr. Parnell's absence, who being elsewhere could not possibly be at Omagh that day. I left before the meeting was over.

As far as I hear from the Common people themselves, they think the law and the administrators of it sympathize with the landlords only, and let that sympathy influence their decisions. They are, therefore, very averse to go to law to obtain what they consider justice from a landlord.

Another great complaint that I hear again and again is the expense attendant on a transfer of property. As an instance, a little property of the value of a hundred pounds changed hands when I was in Ramelton.

The deed of transfer was a parchment as big as a table-cloth, and cost L10.

XVIII.

IRISH HUSBANDRY--A DESCRIPTION OF LORD LEITRIM--ABOVE AND BELOW THE SALT--LANDLORD AND TENANT

The valley through which the railway pa.s.ses from Derry to Omagh is one long stretch of beauty, fertility and careful tillage. Every field, whatever its shape, is cultivated up to the fence and into the corners with a mathematical nicety. The regular fields, the green separating ditches with their gra.s.sy covering, the hills cultivated to the very tops, and the trees growing here and there all over made a landscape that should delight the heart of a farmer. Whenever I come to careless husbandry, I will be sure to record it. I have seen nothing of the kind yet on mountain side or valley. I do not wish to fling a rose-colored veil over everything because it is Irish.

The country is simply beautiful--no works can do justice to it. Still there are some things one could find fault with freely. Between Omagh and Strabane I took a third-cla.s.s car. It was dirty, of course, horribly dirty, but, as Mrs. McClarty said, "the dirt was well dried on," and it was almost empty, so I entered. At a way station a great crowd, great compared to the size of the compartment, came surging in. Every man had a clay pipe, every man had a supply of the most villanous tobacco. I do not wonder the Government taxes such tobacco, that it has to be sold by license--some would not grieve if the duty were prohibitory.

Soon matches were struck, a tiny flash and a fusilade of reports like toy pistols--all matches here go off like that. Every man began to smoke for dear life, and smoked furiously with great smacks and puffs. And the floor! when the mud of many days that had hardened and dried there was moistened again by tobacco juice! Soon the compartment was filled with smoke, there was literally nothing else to breathe. The car began to heave about like a s.h.i.+p at sea. Fortunately we stopped at a station and some on board got out, so that there was an opportunity of getting close to the door and letting down the gla.s.s and a faint was prevented.

It was not pleasant to sit there craning one's neck round to breathe at the window, for the seats ran lengthways of the carriage, and keeping all crushed up to keep out of the way of a cross fire of tobacco juice from the opposite benches. Made a vow there and then against third-cla.s.s carriages.

When the train stopped at Strabane was quite dizzy and sick and took refuge in the first 'bus, which 'bus belonged to that superfine establishment, the "Abercorn Arms." Was informed that the late Lord Leitrim had stopped there a day or two before his death on his way to Manorvaughan. "Stopped in this very room," said my informant. "He left here on the Sabbath day in his own carriage for Manorvaughan; he had not much reverence for the day. He was a very old man, walked lame with one leg, had a fiery face and very white hair. I did think they might have respected his gray hair. He had not long to live anyway, they might have spared him." He rested one day at Manorvaughan, the next day he set out for Milford and was killed.

"Why did they murder him?"

"They said he was a cruel landlord. Yes, a very bad landlord they said he was. He was very impatient to get away from here that morning. He little thought he was hurrying to his death."

From Strabane took the Finn Valley Railway, and went off on a voyage of discovery to Rusky.

From Killiegordon took a first cla.s.s ticket, as the distance was short, to see what first-cla.s.s pa.s.sengers enjoyed. There is a great difference indeed between first and third. Third-cla.s.s is a penny a mile, first is two pence half-penny; third is simply horrible with filth, first is as luxurious as carpets, curtains, cus.h.i.+ons, spring seats and easy chairs can make it. There is not nearly so much difference in price, as difference in style. As a first-cla.s.s pa.s.senger I was a.s.sisted in and out, and the door held open for me; as third or second-cla.s.s one can get in or out as they please for all the officials care. There is a very wide difference in every respect between those above and those below the line which separates "gentry from commonality." Of course I am using local words. Gentry are expected to have a well-filled and an open hand.

If they have not both, what business have they to set up for gentry?

Popular opinion thinks of them as Carleton's hedge scholar expressed himself, "You a gentleman? No, nor one of your breed, seed or generation ever was, you proctoring thafe you!"

Now the line of demarcation between the people trained by ages to stand with open hand expecting a gift, and those to whom a gift is an insult is hard to find sometimes. A young lad, a sharp boy, had been my guide to two or three places and carried my bag for me. I offered him pay, for pay had been expected from me by every one with whom I came in contact from the moment I landed. Tears came into the poor lad's eyes with mortified anger. One feels bad to hurt anyone's feelings, and between those who have a desire for a gift and are hurt if they do not get one, and those to whom offering a gift is the worst form of insult, one is sometimes puzzled to know what to do.

I find a very strong feeling in some places where I have been in connection with the contempt which some owners of the soil feel for the cultivators of it. A landlord--lately an attorney in a country town-- who has succeeded, most unexpectedly, to a great estate, takes no pains to conceal the contempt in which he holds his tenants. He sauntered into a shop, also the post-office of the town, and in the course of conversation informed them that his tenantry were a lazy lot of blackguards. Two of his tenants were present standing in the shop. He did not know them, but they knew him. To the eyes of an outsider like myself the tenants seemed the more gentlemanly of the two parties. This gentleman, it was explained to me by his tenants, was not a specimen of the usual landlord, who, whatever the fault of the land law might be which they believed in and ruled their conduct by, they were gentlemen who would not degrade themselves by such an utterance.

The idea is brought forward to me again and again that the best landlord clings to the power to oppress, absolute unquestioned power to do as he likes with his tenantry though he might never exercise it. The Protestants of Derry, Donegal, Tyrone, farmers with whom I have had the opportunity to converse, all refer to this fact. The good landlord considers it an infringement of his rights as a landlord, to take away a power he is too kind to use, although he will admit that some have used it unmercifully.

A recent speech of Lord Lifford's complains that things are now claimed as a right that used to be regarded as a favor on the part of the landlords. There is a strong, deep feeling among the best of the tenants against such utterances as these and the spirit behind them.

XIX.

LANDLORD AND TENANT--THE LAND QUESTION FROM BOTH SIDES.

As far as I have travelled yet, in the mountains of Donegal, through Derry, Antrim, Tyrone and Down, I have seen no trace of what Dr.

Hepworth lays to the charge of the Irish--laziness, never cultivating a holding up to the line or into the corners. What excited my wonder again and again, is the fact that up to the boundary ditch or hedge, into the corners, up to the very edge of the rocks the tillage extended. I saw men dig up little fields entirely with the spade among the sudden rocks of Port-a-dorus. Some of the patches a horse with a plough attached could not turn in, yet they were tilled; there was not a spade's breadth left in any corner. And they paid high rent for this ground, rocks and all. They fell behind in famine time--not so very far--and humbly grateful were they for the help that came from outside in that time, and a mercy that forgave a little of the rent. I saw men digging on the mountain-side on the Leitrim estate, and wondered how they could keep their footing. As far as I have seen, it is a slander on the people to say they are averse to labor. On the contrary, they are very laborious, and singularly uncareful for their personal comfort. I heard a fellow- countryman at Moville talk of Paddy's laziness. I pointed out to him how carefully mountain-side and rough bog were cultivated. He admitted it, but spoke of want of rotation of crops and absence in many instances of fall-ploughing. This, I humbly consider, is want of skill, or maybe want of means--not laziness.

Every one says that the country depends almost solely on agriculture; agriculture rests on farm labor; farm labor pays rents high enough to produce periodical famine. The L90,000 rental of one estate, the L40,000 of another, is all produced by these lazy people. If there were any spot so rocky, so wild, that it was under no rent, one might think them lazy if they failed to make a living out of it, but they make a living and help to support a landlord, too, out of these rocks and mora.s.ses. I hope to see life farther south, and see if these lazy people exist there.

They do not exist in the north so far as I have seen.

It seems to me that the tenant-farmers have been out of sight altogether. Now they have waked up, and there is no power to put them to sleep again. I am more than astonished to find not one intelligent person to defend the Land laws. There is no possibility of understanding previous apathy from an American standpoint unless we think of the thoughtlessness with which the Indians have been treated. The thoughtless landlord has looked upon his own needs according to the requirements of his station, not thinking whether the tenant could pay so much or not, and, whether, if the rent was raised, it left the means of existence behind. I met with very estimable people, who were taking a very high rent; higher than any man could honestly pay, and at the same time laughing at the poverty-stricken devices of their tenants. They did not think.

It must be borne in mind that there was a famine in the land but a short time ago, that these thousands and thousands of people who are under eviction now have no money and no place to go to but the ditch-back, or the workhouse. The workhouse means the parting with wife and children.

These things must be taken into consideration, to understand the exasperation of mind which is seething through the whole country.

I do not think the people here, generally speaking, have any idea of the amount or intensity of hidden feeling. I confess it frightens me. I stayed in a country place for a week. I boarded with a family who were much better off than their neighbors. They were favorites at the office of the landlord, and paid him their rent punctually. I often sat at the kitchen hearth as neighbor after neighbor came in in the evening and told in Irish the tale of some hard occurrence that had taken place. I understood enough to guess the drift of the story. I understood well the language of eye and clinched hand with which my host listened. The people who suffered were his people; their woe was his; he felt for them a sympathy of which the landlord never dreamed; but he never said a word. I thought as I sat there--silent too--that I would not like to be that landlord and, in any time of upheaval, lie at the mercy of this favorite tenant of his.

They talk of agitators moving the people! Agitators could not move them were it not that they gave voice to what is in the universal heart of the tenantry.

A gentleman connected with the press said to me to-day: "The fact is that any outrage, no matter how heart-rending, committed by a landlord upon his tenantry is taken little notice of--none by Government--but when a tenant commits an outrage, no matter how great the provocation, then the whole power of the Government is up to punish."

One great trouble among the people is, they cannot read much, and they feel intensely; reading matter is too dear, and they are too poor to educate themselves by reading. What they read is pa.s.sed from hand to hand; it is all one-sided, and "who peppers the highest is surest to please."

The ignorance of one cla.s.s, consequent upon their poverty, the insensibility of another cla.s.s, are the two most dangerous elements that I notice. It is easy to see how public sympathy runs, in the most educated cla.s.ses. There is great sympathy, publicly expressed, for Captain Boycott and his potatoes; for Miss Bence-Jones, driven to the degrading necessity of milking the cows; but I have watched the papers in vain for one word of sympathy with that pale mother of a family, with her new-born infant in her arms, set upon the roadside the day I was at Carndonagh. Policemen have been known to shed tears executing the law; bailiffs have been known to refuse to do their duty, because the mother's milk was too strong in them; but the public prints express no word of sympathy.

In the papers where sympathy with the people is conspicuous by its absence, there will be paragraph after paragraph about prevention of cruelty to animals. I had the honor of a conversation with a lady of high birth and long descent, and, as I happen to know, of great kindness of heart, a landlady much beloved by a grateful and cared-for tenantry.

I remarked to her that justice seemed to me to be rather one-sided: "There is much difference unavoidably between one cla.s.s and another, but there are three places where all cla.s.ses should stand on an equality-- on a school room floor, in a court of justice, in the house of G.o.d." "I would agree with you so far," said the lady, "that they should be on a level when they come before G.o.d." I am sure there would be no agitation nor need of coercion if all the landladies and landlords were like this kind-hearted lady in practice.

Another instance of kindly thought on the part of another landlady. The famine left many a poor tenant without any stock at all; every creature was sacrificed to keep in life. This lady bought cows for her tenants who were in this sad plight. She left the cows with them until a calf grew up into a milking cow; then the cow was sold to pay the landlady the money invested. If the cow sold for more than was paid for it the balance was the tenant's, and he had the cow besides. "Thus," said the lady to me, "I benefitted them materially at no expense of money, only a little." This lady, who claims and receives the homage of her tenants for the ould blood and the ould name, has by these acts of inexpensive kindness, chained her tenants to her by their hearts. "It's easy to see," said one to me, "that the ould kindly blood is in her."

There have been many humble pet.i.tions for reduction of rent; many have been granted, more have been refused. The reasons given in one case were, a ground-rent, a heavy mortgage, an annuity, and legacies. The question whether one set of tenants was able to meet all these burdens, not laid on by themselves mind, and live, never was taken into consideration for a moment.

When I arrived in Ireland, I met with an English gentleman who took a lively interest in the purpose for which I crossed the sea, namely, to see what I could see for myself and to hear what I could hear for myself on the Land Question. He volunteered a piece of advice. "There are two different parties connected with the Land Question, the landlords and the tenants. They are widely separated, you cannot pa.s.s from one to the other and receive confidence from both. If you wait upon the landlords you will get their side of the story; but, then, the tenants will distrust you and shut their thoughts up from you. If you go among the tenants you will not find much favor with the landlords. You must choose which side you will investigate."

Considering this advice good, I determined to go among the people and from that standpoint to write my opinions of what I saw and heard. I made up my mind to tell all I could gather of the opinions and grievances of the poor, knowing that the great are able to defend themselves if wrongfully accused, and can lay the land question, as they see it, before the world's readers.

I hear many take the part of the landlords in this manner: "You are sorry for the tenants, who certainly have some cause of complaint; can you not spare some sympathy for the landlords who bought these lands at a high figure, often borrowing the money to buy them and are getting no return for the money invested?"

Land hunger is a disease that does not attack the tenants alone. The poor man hungers for land to have the means of living; the rich man hungers for land because it confers rank, power and position. As soon as men have realized fortunes in trade they hasten to invest in land. That is the door by which they hope to enter into the privileged cla.s.ses. Men accustomed to "cut things fine," in a mercantile way, are not likely to except a land purchase from the list of things which are to pay cent.

per cent. The tenant has created a certain amount of prosperity, the new landlord looks at the present letting value of the land and raises the rent. This proceeding extinguishes or rather appropriates the Tenant Right. The landlord thinks he is doing no wrong, for, is he not actually charging less than Lord So-and-so, or Sir Somebody or other? which is perhaps very true. All this time the tenant knows he has been robbed of the result of years, perhaps of generations of hard and continuous labor. It is impossible to make such a landlord and such a tenant see eye to eye.

A gentleman asked a lady of Donegal if she would shut out the landlord from all partic.i.p.ation in profits arising from improvements and consequent increase in the value of the land. I listened for the answer.

"I would give the landlord the profits of all improvements he actually made by his own outlay; I would not give him the profits arising from the tenant's labor and means." Now I thought this fair, but the gentleman did not. He thought that all profit arising from improvements made by the tenant, should revert to the landlord after a certain time.

I could not think that just.

As a case in point, a brother of Sir Augustus Stewart said to a Ramelton tenant: