ty oppressive man,
who has other interests to serve besides those of his employer; and who
makes his employer's interests subservient to his own. Whether he thinks
it a duty he owes his master, or that he believes it gives himself
importance, an Irish land agent is frequently in the habit of acting in
a proud, browbeating manner towards the tenants under him. I have seen a
most respectable body of tenants, with their rent in their hands, stand
with cowed and timid looks in the agent's office; they kept at as great
a distance from him as space would allow; they were afraid to tender the
rent, and yet they feared to hang back too long, as either course might
bring down the ire of the great man upon them. His looks, his gestures,
the few words he condescended to utter--even his manner of counting bank
notes, which he thumped and turned over with a sort of insolent
contempt,--all went to prove that those fears were not ill-founded. The
scene forcibly reminded me of a group of children in the Zoological
gardens, before the cage of one of the fiercer animals; they view him
with awe, and, on account of his size and spots, with a certain
admiration, but they are afraid of their lives to approach him. It is
usual for a resident landlord to have an agent too, but he is subject to
the personal observation, and under the immediate control of the
landlord, who can be easily appealed to, if a misunderstanding should
arise between him and any tenant. It is always a great satisfaction to
the weaker party to have an opportunity of going, as they say, to the
"fountain-head." It is bringing one's case before a higher tribunal when
one feels he has not got justice in the court below. 3. Whether it is or
is not the fact, that the landlord by living at home and spending his
fortune amongst his people adds to the aggregate wealth of the nation,
it is certain that his doing so is a partial and immediate good to the
locality in which he resides. Often does the Irish peasant point to the
decayed village, and the crumbling mansion, as evidences that the owner
of the soil is an Absentee. 4. There is a special reason given by at
least one English writer, why Irish landlords ought to be resident, and
thus endeavour to gain the confidence of their tenants; and that is,
because nine-tenths of the Irish estates have been confiscated from the
native owners, and are held by men who differ from their tenants in
country and religion; and their non-residence,