XXII.
THE EARL OF ENNISKILLEN AND HIS TENANTS - CAUSES OF DISSATISFACTION -
SPREAD OF THE LAND LEAGUE AMONGST ENNISKILLEN ORANGEMEN - A SAMPLE
GRIEVANCE - THE AGENTS' COMMISSION - A LINK THAT NEEDS STRENGTHENING - THE
LANDLORD'S SIDE.
It seems a great pity that the attachment between the Earl of
Enniskillen and his tenants should suffer interruption or be in danger
of passing away.
The Earl, now an old man, was much loved by his people,
until, in a day evil alike for him and for his tenants, he got a new
agent from the County Sligo. Of course, I am telling the tale as it was
told to me. Since this agent came on the property, re-valuation, rent
raising, vexatious office rules, have been the order of things on the
estate. The result of this new state of things, has been that the Land
League has spread among the tenants like wildfire. I did not feel
inclined to take these statements without a grain of salt. To hear of
the Land League spreading among Enniskillen Orangemen, among the Earl's
tenants, of dissatisfaction creeping in between these people
historically loyal and attached to a family who had been their chiefs
and landlords for centuries, was surprising to me.
To convince me that such was the case, I was requested to listen to one
of the Earl's tenants reciting the story of his grievances at the hands
of the Earl's agent. It was a sample case, I was told, and would explain
why the people joined the Land League. It was pleasant enough to have an
opportunity of going into the country and to have an opportunity of
seeing the farms and the style of living of the Fermanagh farmers, as
compared with the Donegal highlands.
The country out of Enniskillen is very pretty. May has now opened, the
hedges have leafed out and the trees are beginning lazily to unfold
their leaves. The roads are not near so good as the roads in Donegal,
which are a legacy from the dreary famine time, being made then. The
hedges are not by any means so trim and well kept as the hedges by the
wayside in Down or Antrim. The roads up to the farm houses are lanes,
such as I remember when I was a child. The nuisances of dunghills near
the doors of the farmhouses have been utterly abolished for sanitary
reasons, also whitewashing is an obligation imposed by the Government.
For these improvements I have heard the authorities both praised and
thanked. In these times of discontent, it is well to see the Government
thanked for anything. The country is hilly and the hills have a uniform
round topped appearance, marked off into fields that run up to the hill
tops and over them and down the other side. There are, of course,
mountains in the distance, wrapped in a thick veil of blue haze.
The house to which I was bound was, like most of the farm houses, long,
narrow, whitewashed, a room at each end and the kitchen in the middle.
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