=Source.=--_Freeman's Journal_, September 9 (Report of a speech by
Parnell at Ennis).
Depend upon it that the measure of the Land Bill of next session
will be the measure of your activity and energy this winter; it
will be the measure of your determination not to pay unjust rents;
it will be the measure of your determination to keep a firm grip of
your homesteads; it will be the measure of your determination not
to bid for farms from which others have been evicted, and to use
the strong force of public opinion to deter any unjust men among
yourselves--and there are many such--from bidding for such farms.
If you refuse to pay unjust rents, if you refuse to take farms from
which others have been evicted, the Land Question must be settled,
and settled in a way that will be satisfactory to you. It depends,
therefore, upon yourselves, and not upon any Commission or any
Government. When you have made this question ripe for settlement,
then, and not till then, will it be settled.... Now what are you
to do to a tenant who bids for a farm from which another tenant
has been evicted? [Several voices, "Shoot him!"] I think I heard
somebody say, "Shoot him!" I wish to point out to you a very much
better way--a more Christian and charitable way--which will give
the lost man an opportunity of repenting. When a man takes a farm
from which another has been unjustly evicted, you must show him on
the roadside when you meet him, you must show him in the streets
of the town, you must show him in the shop, you must show him in
the fair-green and in the market-place, and even in the place
of worship, by leaving him alone, by putting him into a moral
Coventry, by isolating him from the rest of his country as if he
were the leper of old--you must show him your detestation of the
crime he has committed.