The 'Monster' Misery of Ireland; A Practical Treatise on the Relation of Landlord and Tenant (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1844. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER II. OF RENT, AND OTHER PAYMENTS. In tracing the present state of the relation of landlord and tenant in Ireland, we must admit, however reluctantly, that too high rent, or in other words, too large a share of the produce of the soil, is exacted (but too generally) of the occupiers of land in that country: and there can be no doubt of this being one of the most fruitful causes of discontent. Every writer on Ireland speaks of "exorbitant rents," viz., Spenser, Dean Swift, Archbishop Boulter, Rt. Hon. J. Fitzgibbon, Gordon, Newenham, Dr. Woodward, Curwen, Parliamentary Report of, and evidence before, Committees, 1825, 1830, 1832, &c. Wakefield, the latest, says, "It is an undoubted fact, that as landlords they exact more from their tenants, than the same class of men in any other country," (see Sadler's Ireland, p. 49) and the close inspection of any particulars of sale of land will show the fact. I say we must admit, because the fact is RENTS TOO HIGH. 27 notorious, that rents in Ireland are vastly beyond any proportion of produce exacted in England, and because we shall prove them so in the course of our discussion. This cannot be attributed altogether, nor even for the most part, to want of humanity, or to rapacity, in the lords of the soil. As a body, they, generally speaking, are like other educated men in every part of the world, endowed with feelings of moderation and propriety; but, besides the exceptions to this rule, there are many circumstances which take the practical case out of their hands; but though innocent of it in their own persons, they are indirectly the cause of much oppression by various persons, and in various ways. Many if not most lords of the soil have had the greater part of their possessions alienated from them by leases ...