whole number who applied, had been reinstated. In the case of more than
half the total number of applicants no report had been made, and in more
than 450 cases, including, of course, those on the Clanricarde and Lewis
estates, inspection of the property had been, as it is still, refused by
the landlords. At this juncture Mr. Birrell declared that further
legislation was imperatively needed, and to this announcement Mr. Walter
Long replied that he accepted the view of his predecessor, Mr. Wyndham,
as to the bargain which had been come to in regard to this question, and
he went on to say:--[9]

"There can be no doubt whatever that in the interest not merely of these
unfortunate people, whatever their past history may have been, but in
the interest of the successful working of the Land Purchase Act, their
reinstatement is looked upon as an essential element and a thing
promised by Parliament."

The voluntary system, to which a tentative agreement was given under the
Act of 1903, having broken down, the Evicted Tenants Bill was designed
as a tardy act of justice to remove the cause for disaffection on the
part of a tenantry to which Mr. T.W. Russell paid a notable tribute the
other day as being not naturally lawless, but in point of fact the most
God-fearing, purest-minded, and simplest peasantry on the face of the
earth. That his diagnosis, that unrest is merely the product of
suffering under cruel circumstances, is valid, is illustrated by the
complete restoration of peace on the Massereene estate, when, on the
death of the late peer, the planters were replaced by the tenants who
had been evicted.

The land which it was proposed to affect by the Bill was a mere matter
of some 80,000 acres, a bagatelle to the landed interest of Ireland, but