He requires an escort
of police. His son has been shot at and missed by a narrow enough shave,
one ball going through his hat, another grazing his forehead. This is
coming quite nigh enough. Some buildings on his property in which hay
was stored were burned - by the tenants, thinks Mr. Corscadden; by the
Lord, say the people. I hope to see Mr. Corscadden personally, so I have
made particular enquiries as to what he has done to deserve the ill-
feeling that rages against him.
The chief charges against Mr. Corscadden are wasting away the people off
the land to make room for cattle and black-faced sheep; taking from the
people the mountain attached to their farms which they used for pasture,
and then doubling the rent on what remained after they had lost part.
The land out by Glenade (the long glen) is very poor in parts. The
amount of cultivated fields does not seem enough to supply the
inhabitants with food. The country has in a large degree gone to grass.
There is also a suspicion of grass on the mountain sides which are bare
of heather and whins. They say the grass is sweet and good, and that
cattle flourish on it, but the improved quality of stock and milch cows
require additional tub feed to keep them in a thriving condition. There
are some rich-looking fields, but the most of the land has a poverty-
stricken look and the large majority of the houses are simply
abominable.
It is spring weather and spring work is going on. Men are putting out
manure, carrying it in creels on their backs. Asses are the prevailing
beasts of burden, carrying about turf in creels or drawing hay - a big
load to a small ass. Men and women and children are out planting
potatoes in patches of reclaimed bog. Very few cattle are to be seen
compared to the extent of the grazing lands.
The formation of rock here in the mountain tops has a resemblance to the
fortification-looking rocks at McGilligan, but they are neither so lofty
nor so abrupt. In one place there was a mighty cleft in the rock, as if
some giant had attempted to cut a slice off the front of the rock and
had not quite succeeded. I was told by my driver that an old man lived
in the cleft behind the rock; it was said also that a ghost haunted it.
I wonder if the ghost makes poteen.
Apart from the condition of the country and the poverty of the people a
drive through the long glen of Glenade on a pleasant day is delightful.
The hills swell into every shape, the houses - if they were only good
houses - nestle in such romantic nooks, and the eternal mountains rising
up to the clouds bound the glen on each side. I saw one house made of
sods, thatched with rushes, that was not much bigger or roomier than a
charcoal heap. I would have thought it was something of that kind only
for the hole that served for a chimney.
The people are very civil, and if they only knew what would please you,
would say it whether they thought it or not. If they do not know what
side you belong to, no people could be more reticent.
The Land League is very popular. Since the Land League spread and the
agitation forced public attention to the extreme need of the people many
landlords have reduced their rents. Lord Massey is a popular landlord;
anything unpopular done on his estate, Mr. LaTouche, his agent, has laid
to his door.
XXVI.
TENANTS VOLUNTARILY RAISING THE RENT TO ASSIST THEIR LANDLORDS -
BEAUTIFUL IRISH LANDSCAPES - CANADIAN EYES - RENTS IN LEITRIM - THE
POTATO.
Determined, if possible, to hear something of the landlord's view of
the land question, I wrote to Mr. Corscadden, the so unpopular landlord,
asking for an interview. This gentleman, some time ago, moved the
authorities to erect an iron hut for the police at Cleighragh, among the
mountains that garrison Glenade. There had been an encounter there, a
kind of local shindy, between him and his tenants, when they prevented
him from removing hay in August last. The police came in large numbers
to erect the hut, but it could not be got to the place, for no one would
draw it out to Glenade.
Mr. Corscadden bought this small parcel of land at Glenade from a Mr.
Tottenham; not the unpopular Tottenham, but another, much beloved by his
people. He lived above his income, and was embarrassed in consequence.
His tenants voluntarily raised the rents on themselves for fear he would
be obliged to sell the land, and they might pass into the hands of a bad
landlord. They raised the rent twice on themselves, and after all he was
obliged to sell, and the fate they dreaded came upon them; they passed
into Mr. Corscadden's hands.
During the famine this part of Leitrim got relief from the Mansion House
Fund. Mr. Corscadden never gave a penny; never answered a letter
addressed to him on the subject.
Having posted my letter I went out among the people who were, or were to
be, evicted in the country around Kiltyclogher, (church of the stone
house, or among the stones). We left the bright green fields that belt
around Manor Hamilton and the grand trees that overshade the same green
fields, and drove up among the hills, in a contrary direction from
Glenade. A beautiful day, warm and pleasant, shone upon us; the round-
headed sycamores are leafed out, and the larch has shaken out her
tassels, the ditch backs are blazing with primroses and the black thorns
are white with bloom, and there are millions of daisies in the grass. We
passed over some good land at the roadside, some green fields in the
valleys, but there is a very great deal of waste and also of barren
land.
