ain when it was done, you were killed long ago_. Now they have sat on
it, there are some of them that would wish to have it done at where you
live at present.... They have made a collection, and the man that kills
you will go to America... They have heard that you are one of the
skilfullest men in Ireland for planting and making drains; and they are
saying _that if they had you killed, he (Mr Quin) would never come to
the country_. If you don't take my advice, your daughter will cry salt
tears. And be God you will be killed."

Mr Armstrong, the history of whose persecutions is well worth the
trouble of reading, says--"In the same summer I was fallowing and
preparing at considerable expense a field for wheat. Every one exclaimed
at the folly of sowing wheat in that country; but finding that this
would not dissuade me from my plan, one of the most respectable men in
the neighbourhood told me, that 'the country' thought it a bad example
to bring in new plans, and that he had himself 'declined to sow wheat,
rather than get the ill-will of the people.' I said I really could not
see 'what offence this could give to any man.' 'Oh,' said he, 'you know
if the landlords saw the ground producing wheat and good crops, they
would raise the rent.' Determined, however, that nothing less than a
failure after trial should convince me of 'the folly of sowing wheat,' I
ventured to do so, and it turned out very fine, producing thirteen
barrels to the acre; but I was obliged to keep a guard watching for two
months, as a man who lived close to the spot told me, that it would 'be
mowed down in the shot-blade; bekase the country did not like whate
there at all at all.'"

Many similar instances could we adduce from the same source, did our
limits permit; but we have only to refer to what is daily occurring in
Ireland, to show the utter impossibility of the gentry making any
efforts to improve their own estates, or the condition of the tenantry,
under existing circumstances. Men here talk flippantly of the evils of
absenteeism, while they are the very first to object to measures which
would render it possible for landlords to reside at home. A coercion act
is opposed, while Sir Francis Hopkins, a resident and admirable
landlord, is fired at at his own hall door, and for what? because, six
years ago, he dispossessed an insolvent tenant, "_forgiving his arrears,
and paying him his own valuation for his interest_;" while the life of
Sir David Roch