confronted, and whose solution has now
become a matter of very serious concern to the British taxpayer. The
condition of our agrarian life clearly indicates the necessity for
supplementing voluntary effort with a sound system of State aid to
agriculture and industry--a necessity fully recognised by the
governments of every progressive continental country and of our own
colonies. An altogether hopeful beginning of combined self-help and
State assistance has been already made. Those who have been studying
these problems, and practically preparing the way for the proper care of
a peasant proprietary, have overcome the chief obstacles which lay in
their path. They have gained popular acceptance for the principle that
State aid should not be resorted to until organised voluntary effort has
first been set in motion, and that any departure from this principle
would be an unwarrantable interference with the business of the people,
a fatal blow to private enterprise.[7]

The task before the people, and before the State, of placing the new
agrarian order upon a permanent basis of decency and comfort is no light
one. Indeed, I doubt whether Parliament realises one-tenth of the
problems which the latest land legislation--by far the best we have yet
had--leaves unsolved. This becomes only too clear the moment we consider
seriously the fundamental question of the relation of population to area
in rural Ireland, or, in other words, when we inquire how many people
the agricultural land will support under existing circumstances, or
under any attainable improvement of the conditions in our rural life.
Roughly speaking, the surface area of the island is 20,000,000 acres, of
which 5,000,000 are described in the official returns as 'barren
mountain, bog and waste.' This leaves us with some 15,000,000 acres
available for agriculture and grazing, which area is now divided into
some 500,000 holdings. Thus we have an average of thirty acres in extent
for the Irish agricultural holding. But, unhappily, the returns show
that some 200,000 of these holdings are from one to fifteen acres in
extent. Nor do the mere figures show the case at its worst. For it
happens that the small holdings in Ireland, unlike those on the
Continent, are generally on the poorest land, and the majority of them
cannot come within any of the definitions of an 'economic holding.'

These 200,000 holdings, the homes of nearly a million persons, threaten
to prove the greates