third of this area (or 5,700,000 acres) is cropped, the remaining nine millions and a-half being under cattle, and consequently, requiring only one-eighth of the amount of labour necessary on a corresponding expanse of tillage. [1]
If, therefore, I had desired to push the argument to an extreme length, I might have brought out a more startling result. But being perfectly aware of the fallacy involved in too close a comparison between countries so differently circumstanced as the sister kingdoms, I contented myself with an approximation, as unfavourable to my case as possible, but which, nevertheless, was sufficient to prove that the disproportion of agricultural labour in Ireland to the area under cultivation, and to the amount of capital invested in the pursuits of husbandry,—originally deplored by Archbishop Murray, Mr. More O'Farrell, and Archbishop Whately,—still existed. As, however, it may be useful to elucidate this point to the fullest extent, I now subjoin a comparative table of the proportion of cultivators to the extent of land under tillage and pasture, in Belgium, Flanders, England, Ireland, as well as in the four provinces, and in some of the counties of the latter kingdom, together with the amount of produce obtained from corresponding areas in each locality.
- ↑ Evidence of John Quinn, Esq. "Upon the plains of Roscommon one man has 4000 sheep, and only two herds attending the flock."—Dig. Dev. Com. p. 73.
