be limited by the insertion of the words "in respect of unexhausted improvements made by him, or any predecessor in title, and of interruption in the completion of any course of husbandry suited to the holding." As the Government were known to be about to remodel the clause, so as to separate compensation for improvements from compensation for eviction, this amendment struck at one of the main ideas of the Bill, and began the battle in earnest. By this intended separation Mr. Disraeli justified his attack upon the Government, as it would make the Bill entirely different from the measure for which he and his party had voted in debate; and introduced into it the principle that the "termination of an occupancy was a grievance for which the tenant ought to be compensated,' and that occupation therefore "involved a right of property," indeed a distinct right to a third of the freehold. The effect of this would be felt throughout the United Kingdom-would affect the security of all landlords, and indeed of all property whatever, while bringing no advantage to Ireland. "Then the landlord would say 'We must both stand upon our rights. This new-fangled law, which has given you a contingent remainder to the third of my freehold, has at least given me this security, that if you do not pay me your rent I may get rid of you.' We have heard a great deal of evictions under different forms and circumstances; but this Bill provides what I should describe as a species of natural eviction. When a tenant does not pay his rent the landlord may get rid of him without his claiming a third of his freehold as compensation. Every one must feel, that, if only in self-defence, the landlord will avail himself of that position, the only position of strength left him. He will wait till the tenant does not pay his rent-and, as far as I have heard, the class of tenants for whom we are legislating in this exceptional way have the habit of falling into arrear with their rent the landlord will avail himself of the power which is placed in his hands, and then what will occur? You will have farms consolidated, and the very farmers for whom you are taking this perilous step will be swept from the surface of the soil. Either the landlord will entirely assert his authority, or the tenant, finding himself in this position, will revert to those rural ethics with the consequences of which we are all familar. There will be a new grievance the payment of rent; and the non-payment of rent will become a principle, asserted by the same rural logic, the startling consequences of which have filled the mind of the country with apprehension and horror almost every day. The argument of the Irish tenant-belonging to the very class that you think you are now setting up by this violation of the fundamental law of the country-will be to this effect-I have lost my holding because I did not pay my rent; can anything be more flagrantly unjust than that a man should be deprived of his contingent right to a third of the freehold because he does not pay his rent?' That is a natural

view, which may lead to a much more successful agitation than any we have yet heard of. The question is unanswerable; we may think

it is abstractedly unreasonable, but it is the necessary result of our legislation. And what will be the consequence? Why, that payment of rent will become a grievance, and you will find yourselves in exactly the same position in which you are now placed. There will be great complaints of the consolidation of farms, great complaints of vexatious and tyrannical evictions, and on the other side, the most violent means by which the supposed rights of the occupiers to property in the soil may be vindicated will be resorted to. And so far from the improvement of the country terminating all these misunderstandings and heartburnings, which we seem now so anxious upon both sides of the House to bring to a close, you will have the same controversies still raging only with increased acerbity, and under circumstances and conditions which inevitably must lead to increased bitterness and increased perils to society." He appealed to the Government to return to their original scheme, and was followed on the same side by

as now

Mr. Gathorne Hardy, who argued that the measure as altered would "create a property which did not exist before-give a man something which he never had before," and "take it from somebody else."

The Government fully accepted the offered issue, the Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr. Lowe) pronouncing Mr. Disraeli's speech to be a declaration of war. He would answer his amendment and not his speech, which had "nothing to do with each other," and acknowledged plainly that the Ministry proposed to restrain (by legislation) the right of eviction in Ireland as liable to the grossest abuse. "We have not, however," he said, "treated eviction as a wrong, nor have we given damages for eviction. We have given compensation-which is of course the same thing as damages, one being the Latin and the other the English form of the word-to any person for any loss he shall sustain for quitting his holding. But we have not imposed an arbitrary fine. In this country we have a tenure of leases renewable on payment of a fine by the tenant. That tenure has not worked sufficiently well to encourage the Government to propose any such system in Ireland. All we have done has been to say to the tenant-Prove the loss you have sustained, and within a certain limit you shall receive compensation.' We have not altered the tenure of land; we have studiously avoided doing so; but we have said where a wrong can be proved we will give within moderate and fair limits a summary remedy."

Sir Roundell Palmer, while voting for the Bill, objected to what he described as "prospective interference with freedom of contract," rather than "taking away property," beyond the limits of absolute necessity, and expressed his belief that that necessity "could not possibly apply to holdings above a certain value (which he fixed at 507.), nor to bond fide leases of definite duration."

Mr. Gladstone, pointing out that Sir R. Palmer's speech had chiefly turned upon "matters wholly extraneous to the points at issue," and that the discussion in hand related only to the "basis

of computation of compensation to be made to the tenant in the event of causeless or arbitrary eviction by the landlord," declared that the provision in debate had been inserted from "the hard, invincible conviction which has been forced upon us, that the simple admission of free contract would be the destruction of this portion. of the Bill." The Bill was a measure 66 wholly and absolutely exceptional." "We look upon it," he said, "as an exceptional Irish measure. Nay, more, we hope the time may come when the provisions of this Bill may no longer be necessary in Ireland. Then, perhaps, you will say-Why not make the Bill a temporary one?" Well, we have endeavoured to give to that subject an impartial consideration. There is a very great difficulty in making the Bill a temporary Bill, upon a ground which every member conversant with its provisions will at once appreciate-namely, the longevity (if I may use the word) of many of the interests which will be created under it. What we believe is, that if the time ever comes-and I trust it may come when it will be possible and desirable for Ireland to work its way out of many of the peculiarities which we are compelled to ask Parliament to enact in its present circumstances, the best way of doing that will be by the reintroduction of the principle of free contract; because, whatever complications may arise from a system which we look upon as artificial, freedom of contract between the parties will be the simplest, the best, and even the quickest way of disposing of them, when once you have restored those parties to a position in which they can meet on equal terms. What we should propose is thisundoubtedly not that this provision as to free contract shall last for a certain number of years and then terminate, because that would be a very hasty and precipitate mode of proceeding; we cannot venture to say that twenty, or thirty, or any given number of years, will be sufficient: but there is a method which has been adopted by Parliament, I believe, in several instances, and certainly in one great instance, that of the Bank Charter Act. There the mode adopted by Parliament to mark that the engagement is terminable and rests upon conventional grounds is this-It is appointed to endure for a certain number of years, and thereafter until Parliament shall otherwise determine. By words of that kind Parliament marks its opinion that the principle of the provision made is not of an immutable and permanent character, and yet, at the same time, it does not prematurely venture to anticipate a given moment which experience does not warrant our endeavouring at this time to fix, and at which we can now say it will be possible for Parliament to dispense with such legislation. The words we propose to adopt are these This provision-namely, a provision which restrains freedom of contract-shall remain in force for twenty years, from the first day of January, one thousand eight hundred and seventy-one, and thereafter until Parliament shall otherwise determine."" As to the motion of Mr. Disraeli, it was aimed at "one of the main pillars of the Bill." And the speaker

"One of the

proceeded to specify its three "grand provisions." grand provisions of the Bill was the confirmation of Irish customs. Another grand provision was the assertion of the principle that improvements made by the tenant were the property of the tenant. And a third principle of the Bill, which was by far the most prominent in the lengthened statement it was my duty to inflict upon the House, was that damages for evictions were to be paid to the tenant." He admitted that "interference with property" in a sense existed in the measure, which was the "redressing of an inequality, partial, but the best the circumstances permit of," but distinguished between "the kind of interference which weakens the foundations of property, and that which strengthens them," and commenting, as Mr. Lowe had done, on the minuteness of the change of proceeding which Mr. Disraeli had charged against Government, maintained that his amendment was "an undisguised attempt to overthrow one of the main principles of the Bill as originally introduced."

In the division which followed the two great political parties fairly tried their respective strength, and the result of the vote on Mr. Disraeli's amendment was, Ayes, 220, Noes, 296.

This vote in effect rescinded the policy of two hundred years, and acknowledged generally that on the great question in dispute between England and Ireland, the tenure of Irish land, Ireland had been right and England wrong, and that history has in the former country given to the occupier a beneficial right in the soil.

On the following day the principle of tenant right was affirmed by a vote of 293 to 182 on the remodelled clause as moved by Mr. Chichester Fortescue, which declared that a tenant disturbed in his holding by his landlord should be entitled to compensation for the disturbance up to a certain scale. The question of free contract was a fertile source of discussion, and even of danger to the principle contended for by the Government, Mr. Gladstone consenting, with avowed reluctance, but in deference to Conservative feeling, to limit to twenty years the interference with freedom of contract, and to include all tenants of holdings of 50%. rent and upwards in the class with whose free contracts the Bill would prohibit interference. The member for Cambridge (Mr. Fowler) chiefly supported at first in his arguments by Sir Roundell Palmer, pressed to a division an amendment to the effect that no farmer paying a rent over 507. should be entitled to any damages for eviction to any thing, that is, beyond their claim for real improvements, and was defeated by a majority of only 32. Mr. Gladstone declared that he must withdraw the Bill in the event of this amendment being carried. The third clause being at length agreed to, the Bill proceeded rapidly. There was a sharp discussion on a clause which enacted that all improvements should be assumed to have been made by the tenant till proof given to the contrary. Mr. Plunket moved an amendment to limit its operation to tenncies created after the Act, and reproached Sir Roundell Palmer,

who, he said, had been "mesmerized into catalepsy," with not pushing his own amendment to the same effect. Sir R. Palmer replied that he had all along acted upon the principle of getting what he could, and not clamouring for what he found it hopeless to demand, and Mr. Plunket's amendment was defeated by 191 to 32. On clause 8, which defined the condition as to disturbances in holdings, Dr. Ball wished to deny damages for eviction in all cases where the Court held that the covenants of a lease had not been strictly discharged, but was defeated by 194 to 113. The clause enacting that the offer of a lease of a particular length should bar compensation for eviction, was left out at the instance of the Government by 250 to 148. On the question of advances to tenants to enable them to purchase their holdings, it was determined that the advances to be made were not to be more than two-thirds of the value, and that the repayment was to be by an annuity of 57. for every hundred pounds advanced, to last for 35 years, instead of 6l. 10s. for every such hundred pounds, to last only 22 years. A motion in favour of permissive fixity of tenure brought forward by Sir John Gray, by which it was proposed to permit any landlord to exempt himself from the operation of the Bill by granting his tenants perpetual leases, with periodical re-valuations, was characterized by Mr. Fortescue as a substitute for rather than an amendment to the Bill, and was rejected by a vote of 317 to 29. On the 30th of May the Bill was read for the third time, and thus passed the Commons without substantial alterations. In a brief debate Mr. Hardy made a final speech against the Bill, in which he hinted that the Lords must make certain alterations in principle in it, and especially abrogate the penalty on eviction. Mr. Gladstone intimated that no alteration in principle could be entertained, and recapitulated some of his previous arguments. "Now, sir," he said, "what are the sentiments which seem to predominate in the mind of the right hon. gentleman, so far as he is an objecting party to the provisions of this Bill? It is that they import some injustice to the Irish landlord. But I put to the right hon. gentleman this question, and I found myself on the conduct of the Irish landlords in this House for the opinion 1 entertain-Suppose we could gather the Irish landlords in a mass, and obtain from them, honestly, their judgment whether they would prefer the Bill, on the one hand, as it stands, or, on the other, the state and prospects of Ireland were the Bill to be rejected or to be mutilated in a manner to ensure its rejection, and we were to put to these Irish landlords, categorically, the question-Will you take it as it is, or will you have it lost?' I may be wrong; but my firm conviction is, that the cry of these landlords would be-Let the Bill pass into law!' There is no doubt that the settlement of questions of this kind should be governed by a studious moderation; that is essential in order to make it tolerable to a country which is distinguished for its attachment to the stability of property as much as its attachment to the principles of law and order. It is therefore, I think,