promised this reinstatement were made a dead letter--the Executive once
again, in a historic phrase, driving a coach and four through the
statute.

With the advent to power of the Liberal Government these instructions
were withdrawn, but a further serious obstacle was to be found in the
refusal of some landlords--and those, too, the worst--to allow their
estates to be inspected with a view to find holdings for evicted
tenants. This was the condition of affairs to which Mr. Bryce--at that
time Chief Secretary--referred, when he said--"If the remedy for this
state of things is compulsion, then to compulsion for that remedy we
must go."

It is to be observed that the three Estates Commissioners were unanimous
in thinking compulsion necessary, and that which was demanded was that
the occupants, or planters, who in some cases have been _bona fide_
farmers, but whom the Land Commission inspectors reported had in many
cases allowed the land to get into a bad and dirty state, should, on
dispossession, be generously compensated or given their choice of other
lands. It was originally thought that one thousand would be the limit of
the number of applications which would be made for reinstatement, but,
in the event, out of ten thousand tenants evicted in the last quarter of
a century, such applications were made in 6,700 cases, and some notion
of the poverty of these peasants who were turned out upon the roadside
may be inferred from the fact that nearly one-half paid a rental of less
than £10 a year.

At the beginning of the session of 1907, out of the total number of
applicants 1,300 had been rejected as not coming within the scope of the
provisions relating to them, and 650, or less than 10 per cent. of the