parties undertook to solve, would exceed by far the speculative estimate
put forward in 1903; (2) that the credit of the British Exchequer, which
they have depressed, would prove unequal to the burden foreshadowed by
the new dimensions, which they have assigned. (1) _Size of the problem_.
The first assertion, that much nearer L200,000,000 than L100,000,000
must be borrowed in order to complete purchase, is based on two
assumptions explicitly stated in the Return presented to Parliament (Cd.
4412 of 1908) as follows: "It will be observed that the purchase money
of the agricultural land not yet brought before the Commissioners for
sale under the Land Purchase Acts has been estimated _on the assumption
that it will be all sold_ and that _it will be sold on an average at the
price for which lands had been sold up to 30th April last, under the
Irish Land Act_ (1903)." The assumptions on which the Government
proceeded are not, therefore, in doubt, but the validity of those
assumptions, on which the whole case of the Government depends, is
refuted by the ascertained facts of Irish agriculture. The census shows
that the number of agricultural holdings in Ireland is about 490,000,
including nearly 19 million acres. The whole area of Ireland includes
some 21 million acres, apportioned to 3-1/2 million acres under crops, 6
million acres of waste, and 11-1/2 million acres under grass. The Return
to which I have referred (Cd. 4412 of 1908) cavils at the figures given
in the census on the ground that the 490,000 "holdings" are more
accurately 490,000 "land-holders," since a tenant holding "half a dozen
farms in the same county is returned as having a single holding." But it
is right to take "holders" when, as under the Act of 1903, the limit on
advances applies to the person who receives them. Again, the Return
throws over the census for figures supplied by the Department of
Agriculture. But it is wrong to use these figures, for they include
holdings not exceeding one acre, of which there are 80,000 in Ireland,
and many more that cannot be described as "in the main agricultural or
pastoral." No special pleading on the part of the Government can alter
the fact that the 490,000 holdings given by the census include all the
lands under crops and grass and two-thirds of the waste. They embrace 19
million acres, and more than cover the ground. For the purpose of an
estimate it is an outside figure, the more so since, in respect of grass
la