Captain Shaw Taylor has scored a big point. He was the first to advocate a joint convention of Irish landlords and tenants to dense a scheme for a scttloment of that land question which has vexed not only Ireland but her partners for so many generations. In spite of the hostility of the majority of the landlords, he has managed to induce a fairly ropresentative body of them to act with o throughly representative body of Nationists, and they have agreed with absolute unanimity on a scheme. Lord Dunraven, Lord Mayo, Mr. Hutchinson Poo, and Mr. Nugent Everard on the one side, and Messrs. John Redmond, William O'Brien, T. W. Russell, and T.'G. Harrington on the other, hare signed the report. Even the Irish landlords who held aloof would for the most part welcome the scheme. But there is some reason to fear that the epithet applied to it yesterday by Judge O'Connor Morris will prove true. He said it was a gigantic fraud. The scheme is too loosely framed to enable one to judge easily of its effects; but the probability is that when it has been analysed it will be found that the burden which it will impose on the taxpayer is one no Parliament would dare to impose upon him. The scheme lays down the terms upon which landlords would allow their rights to be gradually bought up by the tenants, and the terms which the tenants would Petireen them, and this would have tobe Unfortunately there is a wide gap
made good from the Imperial Exchequer. OF course such an arrangement would defy the laws of political economy. Obviously the landlord would get more than the value of his land or else the tenant would Boy lasa, But we are used to dofancos of political economy in dealing with Trish land, and the country would be glad to pay a good, round sum to have the Irish land question settled ones for all. There must, however, be a limit to the sum it would pas, and it is to be feared that under the Convention scheme this limit vastly exceeded. Wo are promised a Government Bill to deal with the subject in the coming Session, and it will be interesting to see how it compares with the Convention scheme. In any. case the Convention has had one good effect. It has shown that landlords and tenants in Jreland are not absolutely irreconcilable, 211? that responsible Nationalists ro.ise thay it would be a bad day for their country if the wealthy or comparatively wer Ith landlords—tho "English garrison "—wy driven out of the country.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.