The morning after our return to Manor Hamilton, Mr. Corscadden called
on me in response to my note asking for an interview. I had formed a
mental picture of what this gentleman would be like from the description
I had heard of his actions. I found him very different. An elderly man,
tall, gray-haired, soft-spoken, with a certain hesitation of manner,
dressed like a better class-farmer, eyes that looked you square in the
face without flinching, and yet had a kindly expression. This was Mr.
Corscadden. I need not say he was not the man I expected him to be.
He, very kindly indeed, entered into an explanation of his management of
this property since it fell into his hands. He mentioned, by the way,
that he was a man of the people; had risen to his present position by
industry and stern thrift; what he had he owed, under the blessing of
God, to his own exertions and economy. He declared that he ruled his
conduct to his tenants by what he should wish to be done to himself if
in their place.
He then took up the case of one tenant, James Gilray, who waited on him
to enquire, "What are you going to do with me?" This man, according to
Mr. Corscadden's statement, owed three years' rent, amounting to L30;
owed L15 additional money paid into the bank for him; owed L6 for a
field, "for which I used to get L11 to L12." "Now," said Mr. Corscadden
to him, "what do you want?" "I want," said the man, "to have my place at
the former rent." "Do you," said Mr. Corscadden, "want your land at what
it was 118 years ago? Land has raised in value five times since then."
There is here a wide discrepancy between this statement of Mr.
Corscadden's and the statement of another gentleman--not a tenant--who
professed himself well acquainted with the subject. He said that before
Mr. Corscadden bought the land the tenants had voluntarily increased the
rent on themselves twice, for fear of passing out of the hands of the
man they knew into the hands of a stranger; so that it was under a rack
rent when Mr. Corscadden bought it.
Another case referred to by Mr. Corscadden was that of a man to whom he
had rented a farm of 20 acres at L16. He got one year's rent; two and a
half years were due, when he served a writ of ejectment. Mr. Corscadden
said to this man; "You are a bad farmer and you know it. You have about
L150 worth of stock; I will give you L40; leave my place and go to
America. He took the money," said the old gentleman pathetically, "and
did not go to America, but rented another farm. The woman at Glenade
whom you went to see I have kept--supported--for years. Her husband did
not pay his rent, and I gave him L10 to pay his passage to America. He
is a bad man. It is rumored that he has married another woman; his wife
never hears from him."
"It is wonderful, Mr. Corscadden," I remarked, "when you are so kind
that you have such a bad name as a landlord. Mr. Tottenham and you are
the most unpopular landlords in Leitrim."
"I do not know why; I act as I would wish others to do to me. I do not
forget that I have to give an account to the Holy One."
"You are accused of wasting away the tenants, because cattle and sheep
are more profitable than people."
"I transferred two to places down near the sea and gave them better land
than I took from them. I have been speaking about the others whom I paid
to remove."
"People complain that you took the mountain pasture from the tenants and
then raised the rent of the remainder to double of what they had paid
for all."
"Not double, nearly double. As to the mountain, I called them together
and proposed taking the mountain, as they had nothing to put on it; they
had not a beast. They consented, at least they made no objections. I
wanted the mountains for Scotch sheep. I put on about a hundred; there
are few to be seen now; they have disappeared."
He then mentioned the shooting at his son, the burning of the office
houses with hay and potatoes stored there, the trouble he had had about
the police hut which the constabulary had drawn to Glenade that morning.
"That will cost the country as much as L500," said Mr. Corscadden. "They
are unthrifty in this country, they eat all the large potatoes, plant
all the little runts, till they have run out the seed." (Alas, what will
not hunger do!) "They come into market with their butter in small
quantities, wasting a day and sacrificing the butter." (Need again: time
is wasted here, for labor is so plentiful and men are so cheap that time
has no value in their eyes.)
I asked Mr. Corscadden what he thought would be a remedy for this
dreadful state of things. He did not see a remedy except emigration. Mr.
Corscadden took his leave politely, wishing me a pleasant tour through
my own country. I have as faithfully as possible recorded Mr.
Corscadden's side of the story. The tenant's side I have softened
considerably, and omitted some things altogether to be inside of the
mark. One thing I forgot to mention: Mr. Corscadden said that the
tenants might raise a couple of pigs or a heifer and pay the rent and
have all the rest to themselves.
I said, "When these bad years ending in one of positive famine have
stripped the poorer tenants bare, and pigs are so dear, where could a
poor man get thirty shillings to buy a sucking pig or buy provender to
feed it?" This is true, the first step is the difficulty. They might do
this, or this, or this, and it would be profitable, but where are the
means to take the first step? It is easy to stand afar off and say, be
economical, be industrious, and you will prosper. In the meantime pay up
the back rent or get out of this and give place to better men. They tell
me that Mr. LaTouche charges the poor creatures interest on all the back
rent. Some who have paid their rent here did not--could not--raise it on
their farms, but got it from friends in America.
Mr. Corscadden asked me in the course of our conversation what I would
consider a fair rent. I said I would consider the rent fair that was
raised on the land for which rent was paid, leaving behind enough to
live on, and something to spare, so that one bad season or two would not
reduce the tenant to beggary.
The fact of the matter is, and I would be false to my own conscience if
I hesitated to say it, these people have been kept drained bare; the
hard years reduced them to helpless poverty, and now the only remedy is
to get rid of them altogether. The price of these military and police,
the price of these special services rendered to unpopular landlords to
aid them in grinding down these wretched people, spent to help them
would go far to make prosperity possible to them once more. If they had
a rent they could pay and live, the millstone of arrears taken from
about their necks, I believe they would become both loyal and contented.
Empty stomachs, bare clothing, lying hard and cold at night through
poverty is trying to loyalty.
The turbary nuisance is the great oppression of all. Want of food is
bad, but want of fuel added to it! Forty years ago renting land meant
getting a bit of bog in with the land. When there is a special charge
for the privilege of cutting turf and the times so hard there is much
additional suffering.
In the famine time people getting relief had to travel for the ticket,
travel to get the meal, and then go to gather whins or heather on the
hills to cook it, and the hungry children waiting all the time. A
respectable person said to me the famine was worst on respectable
people, for looking for the red ticket and carrying it to get meal by it
was like the pains of death.
Wherever I went through Leitrim I saw people, scattered here and there,
gathering twigs for fuel or coming toward home with their burden of
twigs on their backs. I declare I thought often of the Israelites
scattered through the fields of Egypt gathering stubble instead of
straw. A tenant who objects to anything, who is not properly obedient
and respectful, can have the screw turned upon him about the turf as
well as about the rent.