This roused the fury of the landlords to the highest pitch. "You would suppose," said Sir Edward Carson, "the Government were revolutionists verging on socialism.... I ask myself whether they are mad or I am mad? I am quite sure one of us must be mad." In spite of denunciations of this order the clause respecting compulsory sale of the estates mentioned was passed, occupying tenants having in those cases the right of pre-emption. Under its provisions the period for the repayment of the money advanced was extended to sixty-eight years. The annuity payable by the tenant during the first decade was to be calculated and made payable upon the total purchase-money advanced, but at the end of each of the first three decennial periods, as the debt was reduced by the accumulation of sinking fund, the annuity was to be re-calculated and made payable on the portions of the advance remaining unpaid. Under the Act every purchaser was to start with a reduction of not less than 25 per cent. on the rent which he had hitherto paid, and this amount was to be still further reduced by not less than 10 per cent. at the end of each of the first three periods of ten years. This Act effected the sale of 37,000 holdings. The applications for sale under it numbered 8,000 in 1898, and in the succeeding years the number steadily diminished, so that they amounted in 1899 to 6,000, in 1900 to 5,000, and in 1901 to only 3,000. The reasons for this are not difficult to find. The payment in Consols was profitable so long as securities stood at a high figure, but the expenses arising from the South African war resulted in a fall of Stocks from 112 to 85, and as a result new terms for land purchase became imperatively needed. In consequence Mr. Wyndham brought in a Bill in 1902, which was, however, stillborn, but its withdrawal was accompanied with a promise of legislation in the following session. The situation in the winter of 1902 was critical. An Irish Land Trust had been formed by the landlords to oppose the United Irish League, and on the 1st of September there was issued a Viceregal proclamation, putting the Coercion Act in force in Dublin and Limerick. By a curious coincidence, the papers published the same day a letter from Captain Shaw Taylor, an Irish landlord, inviting representatives of tenants and landlords to meet in conference in Dublin and discuss a way out of the agrarian _impasse_. The proposal was scouted by the _Times_, the _Daily Express_, and the Dublin _Daily Express_, but was favourably received by the Press in other quarters. A motion by Lord Mayo at the Landowners' Convention, in favour of the conference, was rejected by 77 votes to 14. A poll on the question being demanded, 4,000 landlords, each with an estate of more than 500 acres, received voting papers, and of these 1,706 replied, 1,128 in favour and 578 against a conference, while the small landlords were almost unanimously in its favour. A second appeal