AN ULSTERMAN FOR IRELAND
ground,—under the delusion, as it seemed, that those thick-headed individuals, and not they themselves, were the real masters and lords—a system of dealing whereby the countless shiploads of corn and other food for man were sent away out of the island, and money received in exchange, which money was then immediately sent out also after the commodities, and for result of the whole transaction many rent receipts were netted,—the money being fairy-money, and having turned into leaves—a system of society, whereby the more wealth was produced the less was used by its producers, and the more skilfully, rapidly, and entirely it was carried out of the reach of those producers, the more commerce, enlightenment, and civilisation there was said to be. Manifestly this was all one huge and horrible cheat, and cried aloud to be exposed, punished, and extinguished amidst the wrath and scorn of mankind.
There was, of course, but one way to do this needful business, and it was obvious enough, too: but for a long time I could not see it. Knowing that British dominion was the power which maintained the imposture here, I long thought that if only all "ranks and classes," as the phrase runs, could be banded together for the Repeal of the Union, the wrong and injustice would disappear; "Irish noblemen and gentlemen"—the thick-headed individuals before mentioned—would straightway treat their tenants like Christian men, and not like wild beasts, and the tillers of the soil would suddenly acquire a perpetuity in their lands, and sitting, every man of them, under his own vine and
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