Under a recent law a peasant who accepted public relief
forfeited his holding, and thousands were ejected under this cruel
provision. But landowners were not content with one process alone; they
closed on the people with ejectments, turned them out on the roads, and
plucked down their rooftrees. In more than one county rents falling due
in November for land that no longer yielded food to the cultivator, were
enforced in January. In the southwest the peasantry had made some
frantic efforts to clutch their harvest and to retaliate for their
sufferings in blind vengeance, but the law carried a sharp sword. Eight
counties, or parts of counties, were proclaimed, and a special
commission, after a brief sitting in Clare and Limerick, left eleven
peasants for the gallows. Chief Justice Blackburn took occasion to note
that "The state of things in 1847 was exactly that described by an act
passed in 1776." The disease was permanent, so were the symptoms. One
well-head of Irish discontent was English prejudice, which refuses to
listen to any complaint till it threatens to become dangerous.
Pages:
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214