y a
comparison of the average rate per ton of merchandise in the year 1900--

In England In Scotland In Ireland

4s. 10.26d. 4s. 11.64d. 6s. 7.90d.

In the decade from 1890-1900 the figure in England and Wales decreased
8.79d., in Scotland 1.7d., and in Ireland increased by 1.92d.

Again, the control of the great English railway corporations over the
small companies in Ireland has led to a state of things by which
freights for imported goods are relatively lower than are those for
purely internal carriage, and by this means the railways of Great
Britain maintain their grip of the carrying trade, and incidentally
destroy the industry of Ireland.

The trade of Ireland is not two per cent. of that of the three kingdoms,
and this policy of swamping the Irish market with English-made goods at
low rates to such an extent that over twelve million pounds' worth of
imported goods are sold annually in Ireland shows the manner in which
the principles of free trade are applied to that country; and so it has
come to pass that the opening up of the country by railways has often
tended to destroy local industries and to substitute for their products
articles manufactured in England and Continental Europe at a cheaper
cost, carried in either case by English railways, which, in consequence,
reap the benefit of the freight. The carriage per ton paid by eggs to
London, to take one example, is 16s. 8d. from Normandy, 24s. from
Denmark, and no less that 94s. from Galway.

The bearing of the transit question on the agricultural problem is seen
by a consideration of the rates for every form of farm produce, which in
Ireland are fifteen to twenty per cent. of their value. On the Continent
the average is five to six per cent., and in the United States and
Canada it is three per cent. The discouragement of such a tariff to
agricultural enterprise has had a great bearing on the transformation of
plough land into cattle ranches, and the extent to which this has
occurred may be seen from the fact that there are to-day twelve million
acres of pasture to three millions of arable land in the island, and
fertile land, like that of the plains of Meath, is to be seen growing,
not corn for men, but grass for cattle. The success of the country in
stock-raising may very easily be rendered nugatory if the exclusion of
Argentine and Canadian cattle from the English market be ended by the
passing of an Act giving the Board of Agriculture