on the honour and integrity of their old landlords. But in the
advertisements for the sale of property under the Landed Estates
Court, it was regularly mentioned as an inducement to purchasers of
the Scully type that the tenants had no leases. The result of this
combination of circumstances bearing against the cultivators of the
soil--the chief producers of national wealth--is a deep, resentful
sense of injustice pervading this class, and having for its immediate
objects the landlords and their agents. The tenants don't speak out
their feelings, because they dare not. They fear that to offend the
_office_ in word or deed is to expose themselves and their children
to the infliction of a fine in the shape of increased rent, perhaps at
the rate of five or ten shillings an acre in perpetuity.

One unfortunate effect of the distrust thus generated, is that when
enlightened landlords, full of the spirit of improvement, like Lord
Dufferin and Lord Lurgan, endeavour, from the most unselfish and
patriotic motives, to make changes in the tenures and customs on their
estates, they have to encounter an adverse current of popular opinion
and feeling, which is really too strong to be effectually resisted.
For example: In order to correct the evils resulting from the undue
competition for land among the tenants, they limit the amount per acre
which the outgoing tenant is permitted to receive; but the limitation
is futile, because the tenants understand one another, and do what
they believe to be right behind the landlord's back. The market price
is, say, 20 l. an acre. The landlord allows 10 l.; the balance finds
its way secretly into the pocket of the outgoing tenant before he
gives up possession. As a gentleman expressed it to me emphatically,
'The outgoing tenant _must_ be satisfied, and he _is_ satisfied.'
Public opinion in his own class demands it; and on no other terms
would it be considered lucky to take possession of the vacant farm.