ears with 8,992 in two years demonstrates that the abolition of dual
ownership has been thrown back to the conditions which called for the
Treaty of 1903. Furthermore, it is proper to discount, in turn, even the
meagre total of 8,992. For it includes the remainders of estates, other
parts of which had been sold under the Act of 1903 and the spurt of
applications expedited, in this case, by the revolution of last August.
To the over-sanguine and the over-timid this seemed to foreshadow the
rapid passage of Home Rule, and, bad as are the terms of the Act of
1909, they are estimated to be better than any obtainable after the
Union has been thrown on the scrap-heap of the Constitution. One other
comparison may be noted. It was part of the Treaty of 1903 that
landlords should be encouraged to remain in their native land by
assistance in the repurchase of their demesnes--that is, homes--after
selling their properties. Under the Act of 1903 the advances on resale
to owners sanctioned by the Land Commission numbered 205. Under the Act
of 1909 they number two.

It will readily be inferred, even by those unacquainted with Ireland;
that a process for healing ancient wounds has been turned into a process
for exasperating future conflicts. A blister has been substituted for a
poultice on the sores of centuries. Existing agreements are blocked.
Future agreements--for this is their appropriate, if cynical--designation,
are relegated to a future which few can foresee. Landlords who have
contracted to sell are threatened with bankruptcy by the foreclosure of
mortgages. Tenants who have contracted to buy see their hopes deferred
with sick hearts. Whilst to owners and occupiers who have not completed
their bargains "no hope comes at all." The newly won prosperity of
Ireland is doomed because the Nationalist party and British Government
have not kept faith; and with prosperity peace is departing. The
environment that breeds agrarian disorder and crime has been restored,
and agitators, in expectation of Home Rule, are already at "their dirty
work again." A new plan of campaign menaces the peace of Ireland in
those districts whose past records are most darkly stained.

_Examination of the reasons alleged for tearing up the Treaty of
1903_.--The Government defended their reversal of the policy of 1903,
and departure from their pledges to carry out that policy, by making two
assertions. They asserted (1) that the size of the problem, which all